Wikipedia talk:Verifiability/Archive 28

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Contents

Shortcuts

I am about to add twelve shortcuts that were created to point here, but never seem to have been mentioned here. I searched the archives to verify there is no suggestion anywhere that shortcuts should be suppressed, so I will add them in good faith. Some of them are a bit long for shortcuts, so I would request that dissenters speedy or prod any which seem not to qualify as shortcuts before deleting their links here. Alternatively, some can be moved to the lowercase versions and the capitalized version speedied.

On related note, I think the section titles to which two shortcuts point should be shortened losslessly to "2.3 Self-published sources" and "2.4 Articles about self-published and questionable sources", and the "SELF" anchor deleted as orphaned. I will wait to see if there is any objection. JJB 16:24, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Please don't. Many policy pages have a lot of shortcuts; only the "most important" ones are advertised. If someone wants to use one of the other shortcuts that's fine, but we don't need to list them all. — Carl (CBM · talk) 16:41, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, but why create an improbable redundant shortcut without advertising it? Why retain an improbable redundant shortcut unless advertising it? JJB 18:47, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
We keep them because some people use them; so some people type in WP:V, some WP:VER, etc. But tradition is to only advertise one or two of the most common ones, rather than a list of 5 or 6. — Carl (CBM · talk) 18:56, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
If people use them they should be listed. It is a disimprovement for someone to create and/or use a secret shortcut to a major policy and then not inform readers of the policy of that action: the unadvertised link will stay orphaned or with only a couple of links. The examples below show this to happen regularly. Of course WP has never been one for petty consistency, so I can see the other POV, but overall it's silly for the core policies to have this kind of messiness. I am speedying the following orphaned shortcuts: rumors, rumour, rumour, verifyallinfo. Additionally, the following shortcuts have only 2-3 links and could be refactored in their referring talk and then speedied: accuracy, provit, rumor, unverified. That should quell the concerns here because then there will be only 4 new shortcuts here, plus my new qs which has already picked up one link. JJB 13:41, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

News sources: When the links go dead

What is the policy when there's a notable news source found linking to the news company's website and then a year or so passes and the news company removes the article from their website? Often times an alternative sources cannot be found after this happens. William Ortiz (talk) 05:38, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

WP:DEADREF probably has what you're looking for. --Onorem♠Dil 13:24, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

NYS Route 21A...

...has a souce on it's page. Please use this link to transport to page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_State_Route_21A

--Check77 (talk) 19:55, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

That's your website though. That's not nearly good enough for us here at Wikipedia. Nick (talk) 19:57, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

What is "mainstream?"

There is a claim going on at WP:fringe which people might want to look in on. Essentially, as I explain in my last post there, people are using the REDFLAG section, and also the FAQ on Pseudoscience to say that when you are dealing with articles which are about exceptional claims, the mainstream scientific view is the viewpoint of Wikipedia, and always carries the greatest WEIGHT in articles. Where the scientific POV cannot be determined through non-partisan sources, it may be derived from logical inference from standard textbooks on the general subject of the article (this is usually thought to be Original Research).

I think this is a good enough view, and if taken literally it is what the FAQ at NPOV says [1]- and the FAQ holds the status of policy. However, if this is what is intended, then the rest of WP policy needs to make it clearer. There are a lot of people who think that the scientific POV is usually notable, but not necessarily dominant in terms of WEIGHT and the POV the article is written from. The FAQ seems to contradict this view, by equating "mainstream" with "mainstream science," saying Pseudoscience is a social phenomenon and therefore significant, but it should not obfuscate the description of the main views, and any mention should be proportionate and represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view. This means that non-scientific views are always held in WP to be the minority per WEIGHT. If it were clear that articles on fringe subjects are written from the POV of mainstream science, then things would be much easier. But the FAQ is probably the only place we say that. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 21:26, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

What change to WP:V are you suggesting? MastCell Talk 21:39, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
I think that we should indeed rewrite the core wiki policies in such a way that it is very clear that wikipedia gives precedence to the scientific perspective on any subject matter (if indeed such an perspective exists) Count Iblis (talk) 21:42, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
Basically I'm not sure what the exact wording would be. But I want one of two things: either do what Count Iblis says, or change anything which could be interpreted otherwise. I think I suggested wording during the SPOV discussion- and this a similar discussion, because the FAQ basically says that the mainstream sci POV has WEIGHT no matter what. There are also issues of OR, see the fringe talk page. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 21:46, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
Please see Wikipedia:Scientific point of view. The community explicitly rejected a proposed WP:SPOV guideline which would have preferred scientific points of view over others, and WP:NPOV has been interpreted to prohibit such a preference. If you would like to propose such a change feel free to post it at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy); but know in advance that it’s a hard sell. The German version of WP “gives precedence to the scientific perspective on any subject matter”; but not the English language version. Brimba (talk) 02:48, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Can't see why we need to rewrite anything. We already have balance, and the SPOV already gets the very full representation it deserves as the mainstream, on topics where that is relevant. There are a few articles where pressure groups for fringe views still hold the article in ownership, and the solution is for fair-minded editors to work on them/. Artificial support is not needed, just cooperative work. DGG (talk) 03:17, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
You don't seem to understand. First, not only are there articles held hostage by fringe POV pushers, there are people pushing for SPOV on many of the same articles. Second, policy supports SPOV. Right now. It's written that way in the FAQ. Either that FAQ needs to be changed to not support SPOV where it says Pseudoscience is a social phenomenon and therefore significant, but it should not obfuscate the description of the main views, and any mention should be proportionate and represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view or else those equations of "mainstream/majority" with "scientific mainstream/majority" and "pseudoscientific" with "minority" need to be changed. We can do either one as far as I am concerned. Policy makes a statement of SPOV, right now, and either we reject SPOV or we integrate SPOV, but if we aren't SPOV then we shouldn't go on pretending that, as Fill recently put it
"NPOV means that the mainstream view should be most prominent in the articles on Wikipedia. That includes articles on WP:FRINGE topics." --Filll
What he means by "mainstream" is what the FAQ says: he means "mainstream science," not what most people would think of if you said the word "mainstream." And he has the support of policy.
I'm asking that policy be made clear: either we make it clear in policy that we're SPOV, or we make it crystal clear somewhere in policy that what Filll says is not right. How about a FAQ section on the subject? I'd be happy for WP to go either way, but we need to make it clear.
Wikipedia's policy is SPOV right now. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 04:15, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
SPOV is given extra weight in determining what is science, yes. But it's not given weight in the articles on the virgin birth of Jesus. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 05:07, 12 May 2008 (UTC)


To DGG, you write: Can't see why we need to rewrite anything. We already have balance, and the SPOV already gets the very full representation it deserves as the mainstream, on topics where that is relevant. There are a few articles where pressure groups for fringe views still hold the article in ownership, and the solution is for fair-minded editors to work on them/. Artificial support is not needed, just cooperative work. - Unfortunately, almost all the pages on Alternative medicine are entirely and completely in the hands of the practitioners of same, and heap glowing, POV praise on them. Chiropracty, Naturopathy, Radionics, etc, etc, etc. This is NOT a situation of a few articles, this is Augean stables territory. Please, please, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, throw us a little policy help? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 05:11, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

It's hard work, no doubt, but it can be done and I think DGG's suggestion is the only viable one. Radionics doesn't look too bad - it notes the mystical nature of the concept repeatedly, and anyone who believes that sprinkling pesticide on a photo of an afflicted area will eradicate its resident pests is not going to be dissuaded by stronger language in the Wikipedia article. Changing the wording of policy won't stop POV-pushing; only shining a light (in the form of experienced outside involvement) on the darker corners of Wikipedia where it's dominant will fix the problem. The fringe theories noticeboard has been noticeably effective at this, I've found. Back to the topic we began with - I again agree with DGG that policy is amply clear here. It sounds like Martin disagrees with NPOV as it's explicated in the FAQ, but I don't see the problem, nor do I see inconsistency between the FAQ at the parent page. MastCell Talk 16:48, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Agreed with MastCell & DGG here. There are still problem pages; we need to fully apply current policies to those pages, rather than invent new policies for them. This won't be easy, but it is possible. Antelantalk 18:50, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, Reiki then. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 19:23, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Shoemaker's is hugely exaggerating. Those articles are well-cited and mainly factual, Reiki included. Naturopathy doesn't even talk about any of the naturopath techniques or their efficacy, unfortunately. Policies are fine as it is. I'm all for science as well, but we're an encyclopedia -- we record facts. If people think their mumbo-jumbo is effective, we'll say that they think this and how they go about doing this stuff (with the reservation that these facts are considered unscientific). I don't see why this is so hard to understand. Impin | {talk - contribs} 07:29, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
It's not my fault if people are trying to fix the articles I'm pointing out. Look at the version from the time I mentioned it. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 12:56, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

No, you misunderstand: If SPOV is indeed policy, as the FAQ says, then we need to make it clearer. If it is not, then the FAQ needs to be changed. But we can't just keep going as is. Here's why: one side or the other here is POV pushing. They both have policy on their side, so far as we know now. What would be wrong with making it clear?

Shoemaker said in an edit summary the FAQ was the clearest statement of policy on this matter. So, we need to make it even clearer, so that, for example, I can't interpret it to mean only fringe ideas in mainstream articles. We need to make it so that any fringe POV pusher can see what it says and how it applies. We need to put it in FRINGE. But first, we need more input, to see what it really says. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 20:27, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

“If SPOV is indeed policy” it is not, please see here WP: SPOV; “as the FAQ says” you and I have read the same material, and I fail to see the points expressed in the manner in which you are describing them here, it appears to me that you are reading things into the FAQ that simply are not there. I too agree with MastCell & DGG, the current policy is fine as it is currently written.
As this subject has been discussed more then once in the past, I will draw upon a prior argument made by Shirahadashain, which I have copied intact from: Use of word "academic" in WP:V#Exceptional claims require exceptional sources (see archive 24)
I qualified the phrase "academic" community in this section, and because this has gone back and forth a couple of times, discussion appears to be in order. The reason for qualifying is not to allow every quack-medicine or flat-earth claim; it's simply to try to ensure that "non-academic" is not casually equated with "extraordinary". The community expressly rejected WP:SPOV, and accordingly there is a consensus against the idea that Wikipedia expressly favors academic points of view vis-a-vis non-academic points of view. It seems to me that WP:V needs to be consistent with consensus on this matter. The key issue, it seems to me, is to prevent misrepresentation: the problem here is claims which represent themselves as scientific/academic theories or facts which verifiably aren't. We should make clear that this subsection doesn't threaten Star Trek, Ablution, Pizza, Libertarianism, and any of the hundreds of thousands of articles on subjects which are simply not scientific, medical, historical, BLP or similar in nature. (I'd be happy if some of the popular culture articles had any 3rd party sources, requiring academic sources seems excessive and without consensus); similarly, in mixed articles like Bible, the key issue is that religious and academic viewpoints need to be identified as such, the rejection of WP:SPOV means there is no favoritism for one viewpoint over another. Labeling non-academic subjects and viewpoints as "extraordinary" in a general, across-the-board fashion strikes me as risking an end run around the community's rejection of WP:SPOV and hence against consensus. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 01:50, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
It should be noted that in the United States, there are many issues in which current social policies are different from what most academics believe. For example, the composition of the current United States Supreme Court is much more conservative than most law school faculties, and the Supreme Court on several occassions rejected viewpoints that virtually the whole academic community supported. It also strikes me that in many matters of social policy, politics, morality, etc. where scientific viewpoints are relevant, other viewpoints are also relevant and significant and can easily be reliably sourced. Arguing the merits isn't the point; the fact is, rightly or wrongly, WP:SPOV isn't policy. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 01:55, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I know that SPOV isn't policy..... and yet, that is the interpretation that is being given to the FAQ. Additionally, the interpretations I've been talking about have been actually applied to many articles. I don't like it. But what I mainly don't like, is that WP is saying it is NPOV, while acting SPOV many times. I want that FAQ changed, that's my point here. Because it can be interpreted as SPOV.
When I "read things into the FAQ which aren't there," it isn't that I read it in, it's that other do. I'm telling you what they've been saying around the paranormal/fringe articles.
In short I know and what I'm trying to do here is to get the policy made so that the false SPOV interpretation is impossible.
So please, help me with this (especiall the NPOV FAQ), so that we won't have to deal with this over and over again, explaning that SPOV is not policy to those who wish to make it so. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 00:52, 20 May 2008 (UTC)


Brimba (talk) 05:36, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree with most of what most people have stated here, although it is a bit disconcerting to see myself listed as some sort of expert. Please do not quote me as an expert!! I am far from an expert in these policy matters; I only parrot what more senior editors have told me and taught me. I do believe Martinphi is quite correct in one important aspect. That is, our writing and policy is confusing and contradictory and spread over many pages and vague.

For example, if I am working on an article in a WP:FRINGE area, and I want to write about the views "in proportion to their prominence", I often cannot do justice to the topic with only a small amount of space devoted to the view that is a proponent of the topic. Say a FRINGE view has 1 percent prominence, however we determine that (through the proportion of WP:RS or however). Well I probably cannot write a fair and understandable article under the requirement that only 1 percent of the article be from the perspective of the proponents of the FRINGE view. In practice, we are supposed to address this vagueness of policy by negotiating and forging a consensus. But this just seems to open the way up to huge fights and more discord than necessary.

But this is only one problem with our policies in this area. I believe that NPOV is named poorly and that contributes to misunderstandings. I believe we have to be more explicit about what "mainstream" means as Martinphi points out, since we do not really have WP:SPOV although it might appear so in some cases. There are also some cases where those who want a Scientific Point of View go too far to the detriment of clear writing. Some valuable topics and articles are removed by those who are pressing some sort of pro-science campaign here. They believe they are engaged in some sort of war against FRINGE ideas and one way to win is by engaging in deletionism, but I think this impoverishes the project. I have complained about this before several times to DGG and I have lost a lot of material I have written this way. And there are many other problems as well.--Filll (talk) 12:41, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, but I'm not clear what you think I did wrong? DGG (talk) 06:02, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
Um, right, well said. I don't really know what to do about it. I've made my WP career out of trying to keep articles in FRINGE areas from becoming forums for debunking, but I also completely recognize that there is a lot of fringe POV pushing as well- sometimes to the danger of the public, as in alt med. I think as I've said here, that one could, for example, read that NPOV FAQ and see SPOV. What could we do to make the policy in general easy to understand? I mean, I've made efforts in this direction, without caring what the change was. I just said, OK, SPOV or NPOV, but not some sort of foul mix. Not SPOV under the name of NPOV. And I got nowhere. So what would you suggest? ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 00:58, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't think we shouldn't discuss the views and opinions of fringe proponents on articles about their fringe theories
I have also never seen anyone ever argue that we shouldn't. However, I have seen eleventy billion fringe proponents arguing that all criticism should be removed from the article, or that the claims of the fringe proponents should be presented as fact, or that we're just being mean to them by insisting that the mainstream view have any presence whatsoever. So, frankly, Martinphi, unless you can show me one person seriously claiming that WP:NPOV/FAQ#Pseudoscience, say, means that the views of the fringe proponents shouldn't be discussed at all, then I'm afraid that I'm going to press forr clear statements that the scientific view mst be treated as if it has a little more chance of being factual than the raving statements of a mad prophet of alt med in 1the sixteenth century,.Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 01:12, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
Yes, great, because if you keep pushing that POV, it will get people's attention, which is exactly what I want.
I've been working on fringe articles for years now, and I've never seen what you say,
"fringe proponents arguing that all criticism should be removed from the article, or that the claims of the fringe proponents should be presented as fact, or that we're just being mean to them by insisting that the mainstream view have any presence whatsoever."
except one time from one editor who said there should be no criticism. I hardly think it's a big problem, but if you could provide diffs, that might help.
To the others here: the attitude represented by "raving statements of a mad prophet of alt med in 1the sixteenth century" is exactly the attitude which thinks that it's so urgent to have SPOV dominant, else the world will degenerate into the Dark Ages. But really, we can quite easily present science without having it overwhelm articles. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 01:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Title of REDFLAG

Having discovered Truzzi's popular phrasing, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof", I recommended it instead of the obvious paraphrase (which has gained its own currency now as a WP core), "Exceptional claims require exceptional sources". Martinphi reverted and I'd like to ask him why under WP:BRD. I think that (1) the more popular phrase is more appropriate, (2) nothing is lost because the longtime WP phrasing is still represented by the inline text, (3) I did mention changing the REDFLAG redirect also, which Martinphi did not change back and which now defaults to the head of the article, and (4) "exceptional sources" is not really what we want (what does that mean, are Reuters and the AP and the NYX exceptional or something?), "extraordinary proof" is what we want. Clearly the original author was thinking on Truzzi lines and there is no reason (since the footnote has been helpfully supplied) to avoid the more often used version. I am sympathetic to Martinphi's concerns as expressed above but I'm sorry I don't always understand them. Thoughts? JJB 13:24, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

This section was transferred to WP:V from WP:RS. In the original draft of Wikipedia:Reliable sources, dated 28 Feb 2005 the section was titled “Exceptional claims require exceptional evidence” (Certain "red flags" should prompt editors to closely and skeptically examine the sources for a given claim.) It has held up well over time, and in its current state is well recognized by most established WP editors. WP:NOR deals with the need for sources, while WP:V deals with the need for reliable sources (there is a fair amount of overlap between the two). The need for “proof” has not been established on this page to the best of my knowledge, the need for verifiable sources has. It is likely; in fact almost certain, that Truzzi’s work influenced the original formulation of this section, either directly or indirectly, but I don’t see why that would be grounds for such a change, nor do I see an upside in such a change. Brimba (talk) 14:59, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Incidentally, I've removed the Truzzi quotation. He is not a source of policy here, so footnoting a policy statement with a citation of his gives the wrong impression. If we want to have essays and expositions about the history of skepticism we can do that, but I don't think such a core policy page is the right place for that. Incidentally, Carl Sagan is also credited with originating the phrase. Wikidemo (talk) 08:10, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
OK, I'll accept that, not on the grounds of whether footnoting to Truzzi gives a wrong impression, but on the grounds that you suggest Truzzi is not clearly the sole originator. JJB 17:12, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Is a nonspecific reference to a non-publicly-accessible website "verifiable"

The reference in question (on Malinda Cramer) is "Gale Publishing (2008) "Malinda Cramer" in Contemporary Authors Online. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2008. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/BioRC. Accessed May 2008." The URL requires that you are a member of a participating library to get any further. It seems to indicate that if you had access to the website and if you typed "Malinda Cramer", you would eventually get to information on her. My questions are twofold:

  1. Is non-publicly-accessible information acceptable under WP:V? The Website in question doesn't even allow access with registration and/or paying a fee via credit card.
  2. Is a web-based citation that is not to a specific, fixed-address URL (but simply to a portal address) acceptable under WP:V?

HrafnTalkStalk 03:26, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Any reasonably accessible publication is a potential source; there is no requirement that it be immediately or freely accessible to everyone. Further, the citation is fine as far as V is concerned so long as it is unambiguous. URLs change sometimes, but so long as "Gale Publishing (2008) "Malinda Cramer" in Contemporary Authors Online. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2008 refers to a particular publication, it's OK (although I can't be sure that's the case here; it seems a bit ambiguous to me...). Now, reasonably accessible includes the ability to ask someone else to email you a copy; you may find some help at Wikipedia:WikiProject Resource Exchange, or your local library may have access to it. Someguy1221 (talk) 03:40, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Just a little more, if the citation is not to a specific publication (I often see citations to the publisher itself, on AFC at least), then it's not a citation. If a quick search of the given citation and subject doesn't turn up the source, I act the same as if there is no citation. Someguy1221 (talk) 03:49, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
What you can do if the referenced item is contentious and the source not readily available (i.e. online with no subscription required), is to ask the editor adding the material to provide more specific details. For example, you can ask for exact quotes, page numbers, specific URL and/or other locating information. The quoted material provided (which need not necessarily go into the article) should be sufficient to understand the context and validate the reference. You can also ask for evidence that the publisher is reliable, e.g. name of publisher, number of people involved in the fact checking process, examples of previous publications, citations in other independent publications, etc. If the provided context material is insufficient, and the inserted material is contentious, it should be removed pending proof of verifiability and reliability. Crum375 (talk) 03:52, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
That makes sense. Is there a policy / guideline / essay one can point to when doing so, or is that just a statement of good practice? I'm concerned that a number of contentious propositions are backed up by citations to entire books, narratives, speeches, other stuff that one could theoretically look up in a library or pore through. On the one hand I'm sometimes dubious about the sourcing; on the other hand one wants to assume good faith regarding the editor's veracity and competence, and also not blind ourselves to the vast amount of material that isn't free or online. Wikidemo (talk) 06:11, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Demonstrably findable

I have a question of clarification about "demonstably findable". When it states:

The source should be cited clearly and precisely to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question. It is not necessary that the source be findable instantly by any reader, merely that it be demonstrably findable (for instance, by library or archive request).

an editor has stated that a common interpretation of this is that book citations must provide an isbn number for them. I contend that this is too general an interpretation to be accurate, because some books do not have isbn numbers, and yet they would still be considered reliable sources for certain specific purposes. More importantly, they would be verifiable and demonstrably findable if the citations contained the author, date, title, place of publication, and location of publication: it might not be instantly findable if a library prefers one to have an isbn number, but it would still be demonstrably findable. Now, in the particular case, the book did have an isbn number which I provided at the same time as the editor's objection was being written, but I think it is worthwhile enough to ask for some clarification here as the interpretation that was made seemed to me to be too generalized to be accurate. If the editor had said that the common interpretation is that books should give isbn numbers where they are available, then I would agree, but he did not.  DDStretch  (talk) 11:51, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Providing the isbn number is good citation practice, but it is not required by this Policy. One can easily find a book without having the isbn number. Blueboar (talk) 12:58, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
While I agree with Blueboar, I would caution that a book that does not have an ISBN number is very unlikely to be reliable source. Vassyana (talk) 13:26, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the replies. I agree that a book without an isbn number may be quite unlikely to be a reliable source, but that can only be decided on a case-by-case basis by considering the book in the context of how it is being used in the particular instance. Furthemore, failing to include an isbn number when citing a book which has one is mainly incorrect implementation of citation, which can be corrected by simple copy-editing, rather than the use of an unreliable source, which cannot be corrected in the same way by copy-editing without ultimately removing the information. Needless to say, the need to be alert to using as reliable a set of sources as possible means we should strive to reduce errors like this if possible.  DDStretch  (talk) 13:30, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
It has never occurred to me that not adding the ISBN number might be a problem and cause an edit of mine to be reverted. Having said that, I am more frequently adding ISBN numbers. Of course, it is purely a coincidence that this particular problem involved whether or not the phrase 'British Isles' was acceptable.--Doug Weller (talk) 14:17, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
Just a further clarification. What is meant by "demonstrably findable (for instance, by library or archive request)" in the case where the book in question is a local book - for example a book written by a local historian on the local town. If the book is available in the local bookshop in the local town, does that qualify? What I mean is, at what point does the source become "demonstrably findable"? What is meant by "library" and does this not imply an ISBN number *should* be available? --Bardcom (talk) 14:24, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

(outdent)For example: The book here and it's not available in Ireland. Or the USA. Or anywhere in the UK except in one library in Bristol. Is this a reliable source for the purpose of quoting? --Bardcom (talk) 15:00, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

You are obviously trying very hard to find a reason to remove the phrase "British Isles" from an article (see User talk:Bardcom#Use of British Isles) and are now trying to remove the book's claim to be a reliable source or of being available to be verified. Firstly, I have the book, and I can confirm what is written. Please accept that as an experienced editor and as a professional academic of longstanding (though not of local history) I would not invent such claims. Frank Latham is a local historian who has been the editor in charge of a number of books which trace the local history of various Cheshire villages. Each of his books (I have a number which I use to source statements) make use of documents held in the Cheshire Record Office, which is a department of Cheshire County Council, and he has worked with them on similar projects in the past. I have cross-checked some of the statements in various publications of his against the originals and always found he has been accurate. This lends weight to the idea that the claim mentioned in Frodsham is accurate, and, in any case, I have provided a quotation that may resolve this. On your talk page you cite a link which shows that the book can be found in Bristol, though I see that it is available at British Library, Boston Spa (not Bristol) from which books can be got by inter-library loan from any other UK library. Since there is pressure on libraries to save money and reduce space taken up by books which are not loaned out often, it is not unreasonable to assume that libraries would note that such a book as this could be got by means of an inter-library loan request operating within the UK and usually at cost to the person making the request. I do not think this makes it not readily available.  DDStretch  (talk) 15:21, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to point out that books published in the Soviet Union didn't generally have ISBN numbers, as the Soviets had their own classification system. And of course if you go back far enough, the same is true of books published in the West. Joeldl (talk) 15:55, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

The question I posed here is still a valid question. What constitutes a book being "demonstrably findable (for instance, by library or archive request)"? DDstretch's explanation above is a great explanation, and shows exactly how the book is demonstrably findable in the UK. For the purposes of a Verifiable reference, the question I pose is the same - does this suffice for a reference? Is availability in one country enough? --Bardcom (talk) 16:09, 11 May 2008 (UTC) Question answered in earlier thread. Thanks. --Bardcom (talk) 16:23, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for noting that. I opined that "demonstrably findable" means provided with "just about any [reasonable] ordinary online link". I haven't looked at the debate, but if there's only one book involved, an OCLC has been cited even if an ISBN hasn't, so that's fine by me. If there was no OCLC either, it would still be fine to list author, date, title, publisher, location, iff the author or publisher has a Wikipedia article, because providing that link indicates the book is real and that researching the extant author or publisher would provide verification means. (Of course if author or publisher notability is disputed, so is verifiability until resolved by WP:DP, and the system should not be gamed otherwise; commonsense overrules.) The whole point is that "demonstrably findable" is an easier test to understand and implement than "readily available". Now take any other questions to WP:RSN as directed here. :D JJB 16:33, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
If the issue is the use of the term "British Isles" in an article ... a quick Google Books search comes up with a ton of reliable sources ... or is the issue that the term is used in a specific book? Blueboar (talk) 16:16, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
The question posed here had nothing directly to do with the term "British Isles", and has already been answered. If you wish to open a discussion on the term "British Isles", I suggest you go Talk:British Isles. --Bardcom (talk) 16:26, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
If I can summarize the course of discussion that led to me asking this question, it may make matters more clear? Bardcom, in good faith, replaced the term "British Isles" in the following short paragraph in Frodsham because he considered its use was unverified: "The name derives from the Old English personal name of Frod, and ham which means a village or homestead; hence Frod's village. Frodsham is unique as the name of a settlement in the British Isles. Earlier spellings of the name have included Fradsham, Frandsham, Frodisham, Ffradsam, Ffrodesham and Ffradsham.[2]" It was reverted without any comment or explanation by another editor, which I thought was unhelpful, and so I then added a justification for inclusion of "British Isles". The problem was that the sentence containing "British Isles" was not unreferenced, as the reference at the end of the short paragraph (labelled 2) justified its use. The change introduced by Bardcom thus unwittingly introduced an unverified and incorrect statement, which I resolved by giving a more explicit reference to the specific sentence which contained "British Isles". This then led to a debate about whether the reference I gave was really from a Reliable Source, which prompted my question here. (Later still, when the reliability of this source had been established, the claim in the quoted and referred to sentence that the name "Frodsham" was unique in the British Isles was then challenged because of the apparent presence of another settlement nearby apparently called "Newton by Frodsham". This was also dealt with.) The debate has happened on User talk:Bardcom#Use of Britsih Isles, and, latterly, on Talk:Frodsham concerning the unique nature of the name. This article is still in need of a lot of editing to introduce more reliable sources, I might add, and Bardcom has certainly been meticulous in helping us all work towards a better solution for this one point. I hope that helps put this issue here in a better context.  DDStretch  (talk) 18:34, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for that interesting answer, sorry to join in so late but just thought I'd mention that several of the books cited by me don't have ISBN numbers because they were published in th3 1960s or earlier. Sometimes it's possible to look them up on Amazon and find a number for a more recent edition, but then there's the question of whether any revisions had been made to the book, invalidating the ISBN number as a reference. . . dave souza, talk 20:30, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

stability of policy

Having wikimigrated away from participating on the more heated policy and guideline pages I sometimes wonder what crazy things might have crept into Wikipedia while I was gone. You know, unstable policies make it hard to edit articles constructively. I'm pleased to say that despite the discussions, argument, edits, and reverts here a diff of the last five months' changes shows that the page has been remarkably stable. Thanks and keep up the good work.Wikidemo (talk) 08:14, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. Mind, I have thought for a while that WP:V#Exceptional claims require exceptional sources ended a bit abruptly, and that diff shows why: A paragraph was cut from the end. While I can see why that paragraph was cut, I've added a brief summary of other policies (Mainly WP:UNDUE and WP:NPOV/FAQ#Pseudoscience) to clarify what to do about things that fail such tests. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 13:09, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
Which is disputed. Should leave the policy alone till the FAQ is sorted out. As I said before, and as you've pointed out, as it now stands the FAQ can be erroneously interpreted to say that in fringe articles we always give conventional science the greatest weight and write from that POV. It does this by, again erroneously, defining the fringe view as the minority view. But, I can hear Wikidemo say, How can it not be minority when it is fringe? Because WP:FRINGE covers things which are not fringe at all, but very mainstream, such as Creationism. We cover those by NPOV. To make out that the scientific view is always "mainstream" is to institutionalize that POV as the POV of Wikipedia. This is not the same as NPOV, nor is it reflected in other areas of policy. This is therefore a debate which needs to be settled before extensive changes to policy are made. You can't work backward from the NPOV FAQ to NPOV to V. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 18:54, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
It is disputed by you, Martinphi. It has otherwise been policy since 2001 with pretty much that exact wording; it was originally part of the NPOV policy page, which was spun off for length reasons, and to treat it as if it's some questionable new thing that can't be trusted, when it's been policy for seven years... Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 20:45, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
At such time as consensus arises to change policy, it can be changed here as well. Wikipedia is not a crystal ball, and neither should the summaries of policy be such. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 21:09, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
Which is why you should definitely not be edit warrring your changes in. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 22:43, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
I didn't catch all that, but I would strongly disagree that academia takes precedence over all other fields - so I removed it two of the three places where it appeared. The first mention, which seems to have been here a while and is stable, is that academic and peer reviewed publications are usually the most reliable "in areas where they are available, such as history, medicine and science." With the possible exception of some types of history, I think that's uncontroversial. However, where it says that claims that contradict "...the relevant academic community" or that a red flag is a claim that has little or no standing in the relevant academic community, I don't think that is policy. Truth (and verifiability) comes from many sources. Official records, the law, and journalism, among other things, are robust mainstream sources that are sometimes at odds with claims from academic. Some academic fields - sociology, politics, critical race/gender studies, ethnic studies, semiotics, architecture, art, film studies, to name a few - are highly subjective. Wikidemo (talk) 23:03, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, my main worry is people might think that, say, the article Creationism should be judged in light of the creationist community, then try and exclude mainstream science as a fringe topic within the creationism community. That may be overly paranoid.Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 23:40, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

"Hmm. Mind, I have thought for a while that WP:V#Exceptional claims require exceptional sources ended a bit abruptly, and that diff shows why: A paragraph was cut from the end. While I can see why that paragraph was cut." I have restored the paragraph to its former position. “I've added a brief summary of other policies” this is neither necessary, no desirable; its at best it is simply policy creep and at worst it is a misstatement of policy. Brimba (talk) 01:38, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

That's a misrepresentation of what I did - the old paragraph from five months ago read "Including exceptional claims in Wikipedia requires locating the best available sources supporting such claims, but that alone is not enough: if and only if these sources are reliable should you include the material. Be sure to also adhere to other policies, such as the policy for biographies of living persons and not giving undue weight to minority opinions. The requirement to provide carefully selected qualitative sources for exceptional claims especially applies in the context of scientific or medical topics, historical events, politically charged issues, and biographies of living people." I did NOT restore that, for reasons that should be obvious. Instead, I briefly summarised other existing policy.


Yes, Shoemaker, it's completely overly paranoid. WP:NOTABILITY takes care of that. There just isn't any way that science can be excluded, because it's extremely notable. Same in, say, Astrology. Same in even scientifically fringier topics, where the views of skeptics are notable. There isn't any problem, and the FAQ merely makes it out as if mainstream science is the POV of Wikipedia. That's because it doesn't make a distinction between mainstream scientific articles which might need to include fringe views, and articles about the scientifically fringe veiws. So, it is basically a statement of WP:SPOV right in policy, which people have overlooked till now. We need to make policy clear and consistent. And you're trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist in policy, unless policy is SPOV. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 05:12, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

“ The important question that Filll is raising is how we reconcile the notion of neutrality with the notion of "in proportion to their prominence" but for me that seems pretty obvious. If you have an article about the moon which treats equally the idea that the moon is made of rocks, and the idea that the moon is made of cheese, you don't have neutrality, you have extreme POV pushing for a radical minority view! How, in practice, to sort out a proper sense of proportion and balance is always going to be tricky and involve thoughtful consultation and dialog, of course. There is no magic formula. But a recognition that some views are widely held and grounded in a reasonable analysis of evidence, and that some views are extreme fringe views and not based in evidence, is pretty important to achieving neutrality.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 04:11, 18 May 2008 (UTC)" ”
Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 10:52, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

“That's a misrepresentation of what I did”, I never said YOU did that. I said I did that. Brimba (talk) 14:21, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure I follow you, then. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 14:43, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
The paragraph you are speaking of still exists, it never went away. On May 11 Fyslee repositioned the paragraph to the top of the section, and yesterday I returned it to its former position at the bottom of the section. It was “gone” for a week. The version that you are quoting from 5 months ago is the same paragraph; that version has been rewritten into its current form. Brimba (talk) 14:48, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Ah, right, I see. It's been edited a bit since then, though, and the old version is different.
That said, what's wrong with mentioning the relevant policies in summary? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 14:50, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Putting the horse before the cart comes to mind. First you establish the principle, and then you establish the particularities. Not the other way around. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:03, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
“That said, what's wrong with mentioning the relevant policies in summary?” I have to head out the door. When I get back tonight I will try to give a better or fuller answer; in short, policy pages should follow the KISS principle for several reasons. Brimba (talk) 15:14, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

(od) Small note on the initial thread post: V has been incredibly stable. We had that flare-up last summer (which was really just quibbling over a few words) and some things were moved from RS at the end of the year, but otherwise it's hardly changed at all. Marskell (talk) 15:26, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

To everyone, this is basically a discussion continued from other pages and disputes relative to the paranormal, which have gone on for years. The argument is this:

In an article on a fringe subject mainstream science has the greatest WEIGHT and Wikipedia takes the scientific POV.

That's what the FAQ here seems to say right now.

Ah, shoemaker, first, I should have said [Undue weight means that you would never have an article, say on Creationism or even truly "fringe" claims which would eliminate scientific views to the extent that the reader didn't know why the basic concept was wrong.

Second, what Jimbo says is exactly right: but notice the basic thing: he's talking about an article on the moon. That is where the NPOV FAQ does things just right, saying that the scientific view is equated with the majority view. What Jimbo doesn't talk about is the article on the belief that the moon is made of cheese. In such an article, mostly you have sociology, then you have the scientific claims of cheesers, then you have the scientific claims of astronomers. You don't have to lard the article with huge renunciations by astronomers to get your point across. What you're trying to do is get a reason into policy which would have us make most of the article, or at least the scientific section, be mainstream science. That just isn't necessary, in fact it just makes WP and science look silly, as if we're actually afraid people will take the concept seriously. If they in fact do take it seriously, debunking the notion isn't going to help. In other words, you have nothing to fear- so you don't need to try and make policy WP:SPOV.

Sorry I don't have more time to pursue this. Because I've been involved in these debates, I am in a position to see changes in a different light, because I know how they will effect a certain fringe part of Wikipedia. I know that some changes would look just fine to the general editor, but actually have a large non-NPOV effect. This is one of those times. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 17:58, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

To Shoemaker, I'd agree with Brimba and Martinphi that your additions were not the best reflection of consensus. They did not seem to me sufficiently accurate as summaries of existing policy. To Martinphi, however, I don't think the SPOV is the official POV taken by WP in "fringe" articles, nor does the FAQ imply that. Phrasing could be improved, but as it stands the FAQ (Jimbo's statement too) refers to weight across WP, not in the specialty article itself. To all, the majority of an article on any minority viewpoint would be expected to discuss the minority viewpoint! I cite Flat Earth Society as an excellent example. Those who overcrowd articles on minority topics with the majority POV should be directed to articles on the majority POV instead. (Note also that no formal relationship between "SPOV" and "majority POV" should be inferred anywhere without evidence.) JJB 18:53, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I know, dude, I KNOW, god do I know. It's just that for the past few years there have been a bunch of editors saying otherwise, and Shoemaker is one of them. Reforming the FAQ to definitely say what it obviously means (obvioulsy to us) would help. SPOV is the policy in some cases because editors make it so. That said, I want to say, again, that the majority or skeptical POV needs to be well represented also. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 19:37, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Shoemaker's addition wasn't so bad except here:

"and in articles about the fringe theory themselves, care should be taken to clearly portray them as a minority viewpoint, and to explain the mainstream view of them."

Because this keeps the false notion that the "majority view" on an article covered by FRINGE, such as Creationism is actually the scientific view. Also, it turns out to mean that the WEIGHT is mainly mainstream, since that is the "majority." If he said

"and in articles about the fringe theory themselves, care should be taken to clearly portray the viewpoint of mainstream science."

That would be OK by me. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 19:45, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

How about

"and in articles about the fringe theory themselves, care should be taken to clearly portray the viewpoint of mainstream science, and not to portray disputed, fringe claims as fact."

Very good. We should say this. We need to make clear that 1) skeptical opinions are to be included 2) scientific opinions are to be included where they exist 3) these opinions must be clearly portrayed so the reader knows what the objections are. But they need not take up more room than that requires. And the ammount of room they take up shouldn't limit the ammount of room that explanation of the fringe idea takes up. In other words, make this a bit clearer:
Minority views can receive attention on pages specifically devoted to them—Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. But on such pages, though a view may be spelled out in great detail, the article should make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint wherever relevant, and must not reflect an attempt to rewrite majority-view content strictly from the perspective of the minority view.

We should phrase it something like:

On pages specifically devoted to views which are pseudoscientific or scientifically disputed, though the views may be spelled out in great detail, the article should make appropriate reference to the mainstream scientific viewpoint. If such a view has not been published, skeptical opinions will probably represent a notable viewpoint. If no skeptical sources can be found, then this information should be included in the article. Such articles must not state as fact views which contradict the scientific consensus or generally recognized scientific principles. Rather, care should be taken to attrubute opinions expressed in the article so that the reader will have the necessary information avaliable to judge the reliability of the information presented. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 02:48, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
"and in articles about the fringe theory themselves, care should be taken to clearly portray the viewpoint of mainstream science, and not to portray disputed, fringe claims as fact." No, that material clearly is describing POV issues and this page is specifically about sourcing. This too is about POV:
On pages specifically devoted to views which are pseudoscientific or scientifically disputed, though the views may be spelled out in great detail, the article should make appropriate reference to the mainstream scientific viewpoint. If such a view has not been published, skeptical opinions will probably represent a notable viewpoint. If no skeptical sources can be found, then this information should be included in the article. Such articles must not state as fact views which contradict the scientific consensus or generally recognized scientific principles. Rather, care should be taken to attrubute opinions expressed in the article so that the reader will have the necessary information avaliable to judge the reliability of the information presented.
Again, WP:V is the policy page dealing with sourcing, as is the Redflag section. The appropriate page for POV policy is WP:NPOV.
For the record, the Redflag section is about extreme claims in general, be they that XYZ was behind the assignation of JFK, or that so and so was once on the payroll of the CIA or KGB, or that little green men live on Mars. The Redflag section is about pseudoscience, but it is also about many other things that are neither directly nor indirectly tied to pseudoscience.
Redflag functions as it is named. “Certain red flags should prompt editors to examine the sources for a given claim.” If you see these things, double check the sources given; that is its primary function. It is backed-up with the policy statement “Exceptional claims in Wikipedia require high-quality reliable sources; if such sources are not available, the material should not be included.”, and beyond that by WP:SOURCES and WP:PROVEIT when the sources do not check out. Trying to give it a heavy POV slant diminishes that function. Let’s leave the POV policy to NPOV, and the sourcing policy to V. Brimba (talk) 05:12, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
yes, I think pseudoscience is the least of it here. I think what we need is not quibbling about policy wording, but sensible application of policy. We don't have to give more space to the SPOV when its not appropriate to the article. When I came here, there were attempts to add to each individual article of every Biblical topic a statement at considerable length about how the Bible wasnt reliable in general. Now this is usually besides the point--when something is clearly talking about the Bible, it's clear what the context is. It would be like adding to every article of Star Trek as discussion of to what extent the physics is likely. That seems to have stopped, and the physics of Star Trek is discussed in a few articles where particularly appropriate, and the historical and scientific reliability of the Bible likewise. One article can discuss the medical aspects of the Resurrection--every article relating to the NT does not need to do this. Every article devoted to a homeopathic remedy does not have to explain why homeopathy is a scientifically unlikely therapeutic system, though it might be advisable to have a sentence in there to avoid quotation out of context by people saying, see, the WP supports homeopathy. But I do not knowhow to state this as a concise rule, except that NPOV requires both proportioal weight, but enough weight for adequate explanation. DGG (talk) 06:14, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, you know, it really wasn't as if I thought that would actually get into WP:V. I was just saying what I would personally be content with. Shoemaker is the one who wants major change here.
Brimba, what I actually want is to clarify that yes, you can use fringe source in fringe articles. REDFLAG seems to contradict this “Exceptional claims in Wikipedia require high-quality reliable sources; if such sources are not available, the material should not be included.” In other words, if the article is about an exceptional claim, you can use less than very RS sources to fill out the viewpoint of that claim.
Yes, yes, I know that's common sense. It's just that I've had to have that argument. A tiny explanation would be enough.
And see guys, it would be a lot easier to edit on FRINGE articles if only a few NPOV editors were willing to edit there. So if you want common sense, you'll have to round up some editors who have it. As it is, we only have SPOV and FRINGEPOV zealots. The situation DGG describes is still going on and on and on and on in paranormal articles. Come help!
DGG, when you say
But I do not knowhow to state this as a concise rule, except that NPOV requires both proportional weight, but enough weight for adequate explanation.
It looks like "the least WEIGHT sufficient to get a mention in an article is sufficient WEIGHT that the subject's basic arguments or data can be explained. Otherwise, just link it or leave it out."
What do you guys think about (yeah, I know this is the wrong talk page, but while I have your attention) the concept that WEIGHT is relative to the subject of the article? Science would be a minority view in Creationism, Creationism would be a minority view in the Evolution article. I think this might be a way to say what DGG is talking about.
BTW, Filll's pointed out a problem, which is that policy is scattered over different pages and doesn't always harmonize. ——Martinphi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 01:30, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


Verification vs. Facts - No Unique Information Allowed on Wikipedia

Just a comment. I find it interesting that facts are irrelevant as long as the source is verifiable. I have run into many articles on Wikipedia where something is marked "citation needed" that I know for a fact is true. Examples include features of a freeway that I have personally driven on. Maybe no one has written an independent third-party article about it, but a fact is still a fact, and sometimes that fact is a valuable addition to the article. I understand you need to verify information, but at the same time, not everything has been written about by a respected third party. Maybe you should consider alternate evidence, such as photos proving that the freeway is configured as stated, instead of dismissing the claim that it has 4 toll lanes and 4 free service road lanes because there is no citation (which I have seen before, by the way!). Any person who has actually driven the road would see that the statement is factually correct, no fancy article by a respected independent source required. I can understand your efforts to make sure Wikipedia is factually correct, but at the same time, let's not get overzealous. After all, if 240,000 vehicles travel a particular freeway every day, you would think someone would notice that Wikipedia incorrectly states the number of lanes and would correct it. Besides, how many people actually write articles stating the number of lanes on a freeway? A perfect example of something that is important, but probably has very few citations for it in existence. --WisTex (talk) 22:46, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Like almost every other instance I've encountered where people complain about a lack of sources, there are more than enough sources to address the specific problem you've raised. For freeways, there are plenty of news stories (usually during construction, heavy repairs or significant modifications) and government documents available about the configuration, size, etc of the roadways. Add in travel guides, regional periodicals, travel magazines and related sources, and it's quite clear that are more than enough sources to provide a citation. There may not be sources that are easily and immediately available online to source the information, but all it requires it a trip to the library and a little effort. Vassyana (talk) 04:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
not to mention Google maps. Use the highest magnification in Satellite view. DGG (talk) 02:49, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Google's terms of service here include provision that "... You may not modify, rent, lease, loan, sell, distribute or create derivative works based on this Content (either in whole or in part) unless you have been specifically told that you may do so by Google or by the owners of that Content, in a separate agreement." -- Boracay Bill (talk) 04:27, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Jim's sentiment

Reference Wikipedia talk:Verifiability/Archive 27#Jim's sentiment. Four editors and an IP suggest that Jimbo's "pseudo information" quote, which appears here and at WP:BLP, may be safely demoted to WP:BLP only. If so, I think it would be well replaced with a one-sentence summary and a stronger For more details link. E.g., the nuances are retained by "Generally, speculative text that cannot be sourced may [or should] be removed aggressively." The archived discussion also suggests to me that the community is now prepared to use a better summation of this point for WP:V than Jimbo's quote, while the quote would retain its full policy power at WP:BLP. Thoughts? JJB 15:13, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I went ahead with this one to see who'd revert, and it was High on a tree, as "that is not an accurate summary, but significantly weakens the original statement". Keep in mind that the original statement is not weakened because it retains its full policy force at WP:BLP, of which this is redundant. Logically, the summary statement appears to contain everything necessary from the quote. Presumably the reverter's objection is that this point needs the really really strong emphasis expressed by the quote instead of just strong emphasis; but I do believe this is against the leanings of the editors I linked above. The loose consensus there seems to be toward "two policy cites of this hefty quote are perhaps undue". More thoughts and/or WP:BRD? JJB 21:11, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
The one concern I have is that Jimbo's quote did not simply deal with BLPs. Yes, he says it is especially true in BLPs... but it also applies to other types of articles. So perhaps it does need to be stated in full in both policies. Blueboar (talk) 22:41, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, but I don't think that that plus the revert is strong enough rationale to indicate that any prior consensus trumps the later consensus of more folks, as suggested by Archive 27. The point is that repeating Jimbo here gives undue weight to him and is redundant; his sidelong applicability to nonbiographies is not sufficient to resist the apparently better approach of paraphrase and link. I will "bold again" if I don't hear "discussion" otherwise. JJB 17:17, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
First, let's be clear that your claim the original statement is not weakened was not correct. As Blueboar had already pointed this out, I am quite surprised that you are repeating it here and in your edit summary ("redundant"). By deleting the "This is true of all information" part and putting the quote under the new "Living persons" heading, you are in essence restricting the remarks as they appear here to not apply to non-BLP articles.
I am also a bit puzzled by the "undue" argument. We are not writing an encyclopedia article which has to summarize a disagreement between Jimmy Wales and John J. Bulten in a NPOV way. Instead, we should think about what is the best way to collaboratively write a high-quality encyclopedia. Now of course even Jimmy Wales could sometimes be wrong about this, but instead of all these meta-talk about "consensus leanings of 4 editors", BRD, "hefty"-ness etc., could you please give some convincing factual argument about how, in your opinion, your new version helps better to create a high-quality encyclopedia than the old one which has been in place since ca. 2006? Or give some examples of the damage that the full quote has done during this time, in your view?
Regards, High on a tree (talk) 17:27, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, to clarify and repeat, (1) it appears Jimbo's statement is not weakened because it's still policy at WP:BLP. (2) And it would be redundant for the same reason. (3) My edit referred to "speculative text that cannot be sourced", just as Jimbo did, so it did not narrow the definition to BLP only. (4) There is no disagreement between Jimbo and me. (5) I have no strong emotions about this edit, I merely find the arguments of the other editors convincing and feel confident enough to press for their recognition.
Your objections are that I "in essence" restrict the remarks, and that I have no "convincing factual argument" for improvement. To the first, since I didn't imply a restriction (you inferred it), my edit has the potential liability of ambiguity (I think it does not restrict, you think it does by inference). That can be solved by refactoring. E.g., we could move the clause up into the prior paragraph, as "Any material lacking a reliable source may be removed, and speculative text that cannot be sourced should be removed aggressively, but editors may object if you remove material without giving them sufficient time to provide references." That would improve on both my edit and your revert.
As for why paraphrasing the quote here is an improvement, here are the reasons mostly already stated. (1) Linking is almost always better than boilerplating. (2) Taken in good faith, the IP editor claims that quoting Jimbo at V has encouraged thoughtless or blind deletion. (3) The IP editor believes Jimbo's quote tends against WP:AGF. (4) DGG believes it is overstated. (5) Blueboar believes it is overquoted and misunderstood. (6) Dank55 opens the question of deleting the quote and relying on WP:BLP, implying he favors the move. (7) An essay by the esteemed Raul654 also indicates the quote should be moderated. (8) The edit was made based on that consensus, and yours is the first real objection to it, and your objection suffers from needing the clarifications I made above. (9) The quote itself suffers from the same liability as the paraphrase, in that it may be hastily misread by some (like me earlier) as applying to BLP only; so it is no improvement on the paraphrase on that ground. (10) A cursory review of V shows that it already refers to BLP more times than one would expect, suggesting BLP may already be unduly overemphasized here. (11) However, the primary argument is that we must properly (not unduly) balance the tension between encouraging commonsense deletion and discouraging thoughtless deletion: putting the quote in two policies tends to favor thoughtless deletion because it can be seized upon as a fallacious appeal to authority, rather than be balanced by emphasizing responsibility, as the prior paragraph does. Does that help? JJB 18:06, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
John, you are misinterpreting my views... yes, I do think that the Jimbo qoute is overquoted and frequently misunderstood... but the solution to that is to include a better explanation of what that statement means and how to apply it. I think the quote should be included in this policy. While it especially applies to BLPs, it does not only apply to BLPs... thus, it should be included in both policy pages, with appropriate (and slightly different) explanation in each policy as to how the quote applies within the context of that particular policy.
I definitely would not remove or change it based upon the statements of only four editors... you need a much stronger consensus to change long standing policy language. If there is a broader consensus to change the language, then a lot more input is needed to reach consensus on what that language should be. I would suggest that you post your suggested language here, so that others can comment and have input. Blueboar (talk) 19:29, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
No misinterpretation intended; we agree on "better explanation" of meaning and application. Well then, I might be better off in the future separating this into two questions: overemphasis toward deletionism (language change needed), and overemphasis toward BLP-policing (organizational rearrangement needed). JJB 20:49, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
OK... to really understand what Jimbo is saying, we need to break down his qoute and look at it phrase by phrase... because there is a LOT in there. ...
"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." This is a key sentence... and omiting it or not understanding what he is talking about is where most of the misapplication of the quote comes from. He tells us that the issue is 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information... in other words he is not talking about other forms of unsourced information (like things we know or suspect are accurate, but are simply unsourced).
"Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced." Jimbo is clearly telling us to delete here (And remember, he says he "can not emphasize this enough" so he really means us to delete and not tag)... but... he goes on to say" unless it can be sourced. This is a key phrase, so let me repeat it. We should remove such information, UNLESS it can be sourced. Note that Jimbo did not say "unless it IS sourced"... I take this to mean that if we think that it can be sourced, we should leave the information in and either cite it or tag it.
"This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons," we should apply it broadly to all articles.... however, we should be especially strict with BLPs.
So... taking the statement as a whole, Jimbo is telling us to watch out for pseudo information that is not able to be sourced, and to remove it if we find it. He tells us that this applies to all articles... and, in the case of BLPs we should draw the line much lower. Blueboar (talk) 22:36, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
OK, and pseudo information means contentious or contended information? What do you think of Wikidemo's suggestion below that the Jimboquote is already fully fleshed out in policy? JJB 16:41, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Football: Straw Poll

See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football#Straw Poll - Unreferenced tagging for famous player sections

Wikiproject football is discussing whether to veto the use of maintenance tags for unreferenced section in articles under it's remit. It may be of interest to people in this area Fasach Nua (talk) 15:22, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

All three affect reliability

The page says:

The word "source", as used in Wikipedia, has three related meanings: the piece of work itself, the creator of the work, and the publisher of the work. All three affect reliability.

My question is about the precise relationship. Is it an "AND" relationship, where the piece of work AND the author, AND the publisher must all be reliable.

Or is it an "OR" relationship, where either the piece of work, OR the author, OR the publisher have to be reliable in order to consider the source to be reliable.

By example, is a book published by a non-notable press, but written by a professor who is a recognized expert, a reliable source? What about a book published by a respected publishing house, but written by a non-scholar?Bless sins (talk) 04:09, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

The rules where never meant to be so precise as to remove the responsibility to exercises sound judgment. So without knowing the specifics of what prompted the question, I would have to say that in both cases the likely answer is that they are both reliable sources. “is a recognized expert, a reliable source?” yes, regardless of who he/she chooses to publish under. “a book published by a respected publishing house” yes, as there is no requirement that an author be a scholar. There could be extenuating circumstances that would negate both of those answers, but as a general rule they would both be reliable per WP:V. Brimba (talk) 05:09, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Any material?

My question above went unanswered:

While we're at it, isn't "Any material lacking a reliable source may be removed" contrary unless changed to "Any contentious material or direct quotations lacking ..."? JJB 13:51, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

However, my hairline change to "any such material", as one resolution to this apparent contradiction, was reverted. Isn't this policy sentence patently false as stated, and needing some kind of moderation? It is the (contentious) material discussed in context that may be removed, not "any material". JJB 14:30, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it is contradictory, and in any case we don't remove such material, at east not without trying to source it. The phrase has been defended best by emphasing the may', and interpreting it as "is liable to be removed by someone" which of course rather destroys the effect and the meaning of it as policy. Yes, there are people who will remove particular parts of unsourced material for whatever reasons, and then it generally gets discussed, sometimes rather vociferously--it doesn't usually stay out unless there is some reason to think it contentious. If anyone started in systematically doing this, I wonder how long it would take till the first hundred people showed up at AN/I to ask for an emergency block. if policy has any relation to reality, this is not policy. DGG (talk) 22:54, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
The point is... any material that lacks a source may indeed be removed. Are there additional steps that in many situations (even in most situations) should probably be taken before actually doing so? Sure... but that does not change the fact that unsourced material may be, and often is, removed. Blueboar (talk) 03:38, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, now I understand how the discussion went which I only skimmed over! But given that, (1) wouldn't Blueboar and other supporters be agreeable to an unambiguous text (perhaps "may potentially be removed")? And (2) wouldn't that removal of ambiguity also indicate that (against Wikidemo, alas) the Jimboquote, stating that some text should be removed, has not fully been summarized in policy, is not unambiguous, and should be paraphrased to reflect what a consensus of editors believes policy to be? Simply, "may potentially" does not have the liability of implying "should". (My leaning would also be that if the "may" sentence merely intends to restate the obvious facts of vandalism and open-source risks, it is not really part of the WP:V concept.) Again, while ambiguity of text is useful for compromise elsewhere on WP, it should not be used in core policies; the disagreement hidden by the ambiguity should be aired and resolved unambiguously. (More towards my ultimate point, the additional steps that should probably be taken in most situations, as Blueboar identifies, have not yet been fleshed-out here as well as possible, but I will remake my proposal on that issue later.) JJB 14:22, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

FWIW, I'm fine with "may potentially be removed" which I think is clearer overall, without disturbing the basic meaning or prejudging the points at issue in either direction. DGG (talk) 20:49, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! If Blueboar remains silent I'll do that too. JJB 15:26, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

I think the intent here goes beyond "may potentially be removed." The point of Jimbo's quote is that unsourced material should be removed... under certain circumstances. So much depends on the situation... different approaches are needed for different articles and how you deal with unsourced statements often depends on nature of the statement being made. Sometimes the right thing to do is try to source the statement yourself, sometimes it is to flag the statement and discuss the issue on the talk page... but at other times the right thing to do is to bluntly remove the statement. The Jimbo quote allows us to do the latter when needed. Blueboar (talk) 17:56, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the intent of this section goes beyond "potentially". That harmonizes with this clause saying "may potentially be removed", and Jimbo's quote (or a paraphrase thereof) providing some form of "should be removed". Could you please comment at "Speculative text" above? I appreciate it. JJB 18:55, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia talk:Verifiability/Archive 27#May object?.
I reverted the last change by JJB from "may potentially" back to "may" because the burden of proof lies with the editor who adds or re-adds the material because of lack of a citation, putting in the word potentially may lead some to think that the person doing the deletion has to some get sort of other permission to make the delete. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 15:27, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure about burden or permission, but the person doing the deletion ought to have some good faith concern that the information is not reliable, rather than wikigaming content the person disapproves of or pointy deletion over the simple fact it is uncited. "May" sounds a little permissive, if not attached to a standard or couched as advice to the person inserting the content rather than the one potentially deleting it. Wikidemo (talk) 17:42, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, Philip. Wikidemo says it well. I discover that WP's structure already provides that almost any editor can, may, and might remove almost any material in good faith, not just "material lacking a reliable source". This clause has no way to broaden the extant permission to edit boldly (WP:IAR, WP:BOLD); it also really doesn't address the separate Jimboquote duty to remove "pseudo information". This clause largely describes an obvious "is" and fails to provide a real "should", as Jimbo does. Maybe the whole thing can be scrapped and the paragraph begin "Editors may object"; or it can be changed to a "should" as in "Be bold when updating, and demonstrate good faith, but"; and/or "Unsourceable low-quality text, questionably inserted, should be removed unhesitatingly, but". JJB 18:28, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

One person's "pseudo information" is another person's obvious fact, if it is obvious then they can either restore the information with a citation or they may complain about the deletion on the talk page and be directed to WP:PROVEIT. I would not object too strongly to the first "may" in the sentence being changed to "can", but last time I looked at the OED it seemed to me that "may" is as good or a more suitable word in this context. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 11:20, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps I'm being too subtle again Philip. The reason people are objecting to you is that both "can" and "may" are ambiguous and that some of the meanings permitted by the ambiguity are misleading or not policy. By that argument neither is more suitable and some other wording should be favored. And I wasn't talking about whether another person finds material to be an obvious fact, I was saying that the clause itself is obvious, because WP's structure is such that "any material may, can, might be removed" already. That means our emphasis on "lacking a reliable source" is superfluous. Policy has two ways of guiding, known as "is" and "should". My point is that this clause has no "is" value because the fact that anyone can delete you is reminded to you every time you edit; and the clause attempts to have "should" value as well, but fails because it is a milquetoast version of Jimbo's stronger statement. Therefore the clause can be deleted.

From another angle, we should look at the related clause in graf 1 (second sentence of policy), which I've failed to do. There a different, clear "should" appears so you can see both aspects better. All material IS always at risk of removal, so you SHOULD cite it if controversial. The "should" is then developed well in the first three grafs of "Burden". Then the "is" takes over, but less thoughtfully, and relying on the overworked word "may". How about "material lacking a reliable source is at high risk for removal"? I don't mind that it takes lots of drafts to succeed in communicating, but I do get impatient also. JJB 13:03, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

JJB you use "should" a lot and like "may" it has more than one meaning, do you mean "should" as in "ought to"? --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 10:57, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Umm, yes, why do you ask? JJB 14:55, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Reasonable TIme

What is considered a reasonable time from when a FACT or CITE tag is added to the time the material can be removed from the article? Paulrach (talk) 09:26, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

This is left to editorial judgment... we do not set a time frame because so much depends on the nature of the uncited meterial and the article it is in. Some statements should be removed immediately (for example, see: WP:BLP) and not even tagged. Others can be left with a tag indefinitely. But if you feel that the material in question is objectionable, and should be removed, then I would suggest waiting at least a month. I assume you have explained what the problem is on the talk page? Blueboar (talk) 12:35, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Example of the use of questionable sources

If this example is erroneous, then the policy really needs to be rewritten to show that such a use of questionable sources is legitimate. 77.235.40.107 (talk) 18:46, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

See #More on SPS. JJB 18:49, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Better section names

At Wikipedia talk:Verifiability/Archive 28#Shortcuts I said:

I think the section titles to which two shortcuts point should be shortened losslessly to "2.3 Self-published sources" and "2.4 Articles about self-published and questionable sources", and the "SELF" anchor deleted as orphaned. I will wait to see if there is any objection. JJB 16:24, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

This seemed not to raise any eyebrows in itself, though one or two other shortcomings with my related shortcut proposal were raised and resolved. My later research shows that "SELF" is not orphaned as I thought, but has some 100-200 links, so I have restored it. I also discovered several former section names which have sometimes hundreds of links but which had reverted to the top of the article due to section name change. This indicates it should become a point of honor, when changing a section name in a policy, either to ensure the old section name is orphaned in all namespaces, or to add a "span" identifier which preserves the old name as an anchor. I added four of these; there are more. Anyway, all this indicates that we are now ready to proceed with improving these section names, primarily because undue length both clutters the contents box (also creating overlap in some browsers) and looks less professional. I am now favoring "2.3 Self-published sources" and "2.4 Articles about otherwise unacceptable sources", because that is how they are described in the article. The in-line text (and thus the policy) will not be changed, indicating that "otherwise unacceptable" is shorthand for "either questionable or self-published" (also dodging the and/or issue). When these are changed the old names will be again added as spans. JJB 15:26, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Crum, since you favored just "Self-published and questionable sources", can I get you to comment here on how that compares to the above, or to just "Use of otherwise unacceptable sources", or perhaps "Exception for ..."? I'd like to have better consensus on a single shorter name first, due to not wanting to encourage excess links that would need handling. JJB 20:46, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
I found the titles "Self-published sources" and "Self-published and questionable sources in articles about themselves" better. When I read the idea of "Articles about otherwise unacceptable sources" I had to read it three times and I still don't think it's very clear. After the text change which happened, there sounded to be a contradiction because the section "Self-published sources" says there are some circumstancies where self-published sources may be used (other than on pages about themselves), and then the section "Self-published and questionable sources in articles about themselves" said that they can be used only in articles about themselves. Best regards Rhanyeia♥♫ 07:56, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, that was actually a good catch: SPS may be used in articles about themselves and sometimes if a RS regards them as expert. Maybe we need a different tack on the title, like "Self-coverage exception" (that's really what it is!), or else something like "Use of less reliable [or acceptable] sources". A section name need not be too specific and should not be too contentious; honestly, "Self-coverage exception" might fill the bill. JJB 13:12, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

More on SPS

As already pointed out, I initially liked Crum375's change but then realized Rhanyeia's countervailing logic was correct. With Crum's latest edits there are (at least) three questions outstanding:

  1. What should the title of this section be? No title has supplanted the prior consensus on the overlong title. My suggestions are above, Crum's are in edit history.
  2. In addition to the limited use in WP:SELFPUB for articles about the source, are SPS also usable when a recognized expert in the field as described in WP:SPS? I think obviously so, but Crum hasn't yet abandoned the position that the first use is the only use. Example: Suppose Stephen Hawking says something contentious but sincere about time travel on a blog, but it appears in no scientific journal or news report. Hawking is an established expert, he has reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, but he's not third-party. Doesn't that make him excluded under WP:SELFPUB because contentious, yet includable under WP:SPS due to expertise?
  3. In addition to the limited use in WP:SELFPUB for articles about the source, are SPS also usable when speaking about themselves in any other article, assuming proper weight? I that that would be too loose a rule for Crum to advocate, and two IPs were just reverted trying out another version of it. But I would also hold for a hairsbreadth of expansion, because Crum's concern goes a little ways. Currently the SPS is usable for articles about the author, the book, or the organization (three defs of source), but I think it ought also be usable for articles about the POV or movement or spouse or invention, etc., namely, very closely allied topics. An article about any minority philosophy would be poor if it excluded all SPS's simply because the philosophy is not the source. The SPS ought to be permitted to speak a bit more than about self. That would suggest the wording be "in articles about themselves or very closely allied topics", presuming that the community can tell the difference between closely allied topics (often minority POV articles) and loosely related topics (often overviews of all POVs). JJB 18:04, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Discussion continues at points 5, 8, and 9 of #Recent changes. JJB 20:37, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Which material, factual claims

I undid two of Wikidemo's suggestions on the same grounds: in both cases text that has long standing as policy was replaced with text which has not been vetted for consensus. The edits may well lead to improvements after discussion, but let's discuss them. Though Wikidemo did edit text I had just worked on, I am considering Wikidemo as the "bold" and myself as the "revert" because Wikidemo's text was wholly new, while mine was previously reviewed at other pages, and Wikidemo did not use "undo" while I did.

  • Wikidemo did not like either the canonical "the type and quality of material" acceptable (WP:NPOV, WP:NOR), or my recent version (based on SlimVirgin) which includes information quality (enjoying a successful airing at WP:A and WP:NPOV, V and OR), and Wikidemo favors instead "which material" is acceptable. I don't believe that concern will be sustained. The first is well-respected, clearer, and tighter, and the second is being supported because it reinforces the concept that reliability and acceptability are spectra and not booleans. We don't use "unreliable" and "unacceptable", but we use "largely", "in some circumstances", "high-quality", "more reliable", "most reliable".
  • Wikidemo also changed the statement from WP:NOR, "All material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source", to "All factual claims in Wikipedia articles must be attributable to reliable, published sources". I don't mind the narrowing of Wikipedia to Wikipedia articles, or the pluralizing of source, as they are logically defensible; but I don't believe narrowing "material" to factual claims is useful. The topic is, simply, all material in Wikipedia articles. Subheads, images, bibliographies, all characters must be attributable (and not necessarily attributed).

If Wikidemo or others agree, I have nothing against a reedit on those lines. JJB 06:05, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

  • I did ask Wikidemo here in edit summary, but Wikidemo has instead now also deleted the full statement from WP:NOR and WP:A mentioned in the second point above, and Shoemaker's Holiday has jumped in too with a different edit. As I already mentioned, the first clause has clear consensus at WP:NOR, and the second clause is an obvious statement, regularly discussed on this talk, that not all material is attributed in practice. I don't understand Wikidemo's concern with why that statement should be deleted, so will await instruction. JJB 06:12, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
  • (EC) I reverted back before seeing any question, following normal BRD procedure. The version I reverted back to appears to be the stable version, before of the recent changes were made for which I'm asking for consensus. Its language, though not perfect, is identical to WP:NOR so it is at least consistent, whereas the version proposed, "type of material and information quality level of material" is not the exact same as other policy pages. Shoemaker's Holiday simply re-added what looks like a minor improvement[2] that got deleted when I made the reversion - no problem there.
  • Regarding the "the type and quality of material that is acceptable in articles" language from NOR, it is fine and I think we all agree on the substance of what this means. However, as a matter of wording we have to be careful, especially when making changes, to make clear that we are referring to the type and quality of source material, not the type and quality of material that we actually put in the article. There is indeed a spectrum of reliability among sources, and of quality of information within any given source. However, we don't distinguish between quality levels once the material is in a Wikipedia article. That has one standard, verifiability, and it is the decision of whether or not something is verifiable that rests on a sliding scale of quality of source materia. Saying "...and quality level of material" tends to confuse things, by making it more likely people will mistakenly think WP:V references varying levels of material within articles.
  • The wikilink and phrasing, information quality, isn't direclty related to encyclopedias. The link is to an article that in the lede says it is about Information systems. We ought to be careful when we link words used in policies to articles, because that seems to endorse it as a specially defined term. That is a short, start-class article, and whatever we mean by quality of information it is not exactly what is in that article. The analogy between knowledge and computers / signal theory is useful sometimes but we shouldn't take it too far or stretch the metaphor. If it has recently been added elsewhere it should be changed back there too. However, one of those pages is fully protected and the other is a mere proposal.
  • The phrase "all material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source" is not strictly true, as I explained. It doesn't apply to things that are not facts, and it does not apply outside of article space. It's not part of NOR either - it's part of the nutshell, which is a simplification. That's fine for nutshells, but if we're going to add it here we should state the full version. This is a real issue because people frequently make the mistake of claiming that arguments made in AfDs or talk pages are invalid unless verifiable, that images have to be verifiable, that image captions need published sources, etc.
- Wikidemo (talk) 06:30, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for your consideration. Recall that IS is not IT; IS includes the cognitive sciences. My thinking was "consensus" = "type and quality of material" = "type of material and quality of information" = "... and information quality level". How about "type of material and quality of information"? Then it doesn't look like an endorsed term, but it still lets people know that we are in fact an information system that has, dare I say, reputable standards? Let me also look in the archives. I take it you're OK with my restoring your other edit (which, really, is just as new and presumably commonsense as my reintroduction of IQ). JJB 06:51, 2 June 2008 (UTC) Second, this clause applies to all 3 policies jointly, and neutrality is certainly a spectrum, and nonoriginality has some gray areas too. And per the other discussion here, "demonstrably findable" is also a spectrum. So the argument from verify/attribute being a boolean process does not seem to require that we "make clear that we are [not] referring to ... the type and quality of material that we actually put in the article" or that we are "making it more likely people will mistakenly think WP:V references varying levels of material within articles". JJB 07:02, 2 June 2008 (UTC) Third, in actual practice, using a photo of a dress to illustrate an article on dresses does indeed intend to claim factually that the picture accurately depicts something in the class of dresses, and if that should be disputed (perhaps someone thinks it's a gown and not a dress), you'd ultimately need to source the challenged statement that objects such as that depicted are reliably defined as dresses. This would not necessarily happen in this case, but "dress" is not a boolean either, and in more complicated cases such disputes certainly happen. JJB 07:06, 2 June 2008 (UTC) Anyway, I'm ready to restore this version, so long as we understand it's an agreed temporary compromise and not a revert of anyone, and that the question of IQ is open. JJB 07:13, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
I'm fine with your proposal so the following is discussion, not consensus-building. Looking at the information quality article and those linked to it, one definitely gets a lot more about data quality than knowledge quality. So I'm not sure what linking to a start-quality article does as far as clarifying policy. We should make sure we're clear that the goal is high quality content and that we're not importing a different concept. Could we do a footnote "see also" kind of link? The second point is an explanatory issue and I'm not sure of the effect. Maybe someone can just go ahead and improve that article. OR, verifiability, and NPOV together don't combine to produce an emergent trait called information quality do they? It's just OR, verifiability, and NPOV. I do disagree on #3, images. Images verify themselves. If there's an image with a caption that it is Sigmund Freud, and people disagree as to whether the image truly is one of Sigmund Freud, they have a discussion in the talk space somewhere based on a wholly different set of considerations than verifiability. I think you've teased out of the dress example a possible factual claim embedded in calling a thing a dress, but the question of exactly what it is (as opposed to whether that thing qualifies as a dress) is sourced from the image itself, not a reliable third party published sources. Wikidemo (talk) 07:24, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
OK thanks for a BRD success! Archives reveal links which soundly place IQ as a WP discipline, e.g. Wikipedia:Wikipedia in academic studies, Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2005-08-01/Featured content; here is where SlimVirgin makes the direct application. The three policies do severally and jointly contribute to some emergent trait which many have supported being described as "quality of material" (information), which (to me) is equivalent enough to information quality to use the latter because of its linkability and because of the other links in support for it. Yes improvement of the IQ article is desired.
The image issue is one from a deep philosophy, though it takes a bit to wrap your mind around. A picture of a red dress makes no claims in itself about it being red or a dress, and a picture of Freud makes no claims about it being Freud. When placed in the context of an article they do make those claims. And the discussion does then turn on the factual claim. A photo and a sentence are both data; the data's uploader must demonstrate that it accurately matches a reliable source. Some reliable source had better verify that that is a "dress" and this is Freud (hmmm), just like a reliable source is (theoretically) needed for attributing sentences like "dresses are clothing" and "Freud was bearded". And if it turns out that the uploader heard some rumor that this free image was really a dress and that free image was Freud, why, it's failed verifiability, whether or not the rumor is true. Anyway, "factual claims" subsumes it all.
Let's put the question up for wider discussion as "Is it appropriate for this page to link to the topic of information quality, from the lead?" Anyone? JJB 07:53, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
It's not a very good link here, it's not about the same thing. I think "type and quality of material" was ok, but "type of material and quality of information" could be ok too. Best regards Rhanyeia♥♫ 17:13, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Discussion continues at point 3 of #Recent changes. JJB 20:41, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Carrying this to the point of absurdity

Recently, I've been running into people who seem to be carrying the requirement for third-party sources to what seems to me to be the point of absurdity. For example, it seems to me that it should be entirely legitimate to cite a newspaper's masthead for the names of its editors, or the existence of an article with a certain byline for the fact that a particular person has written for that paper. It is cumbersome to have to find an independent source for this sort of thing, and extremely rare that the third-party source would be more reliable. Yes, there are exceptions (like Private Eye or another satirical publication running an obviously false byline, or the need to cite a third party for "Boz" having been the same person as Charles Dickens), but the normal case is that these things can be taken at face value. For example, I should not need to go anywhere other than the masthead (or the online masthead) of the Village Voice to assert that Tony Ortega is its current editor. - Jmabel | Talk 17:25, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree. I have run across an editor who is insisting that every sentence of many spirtuality organization articles be referenced by a completely neutral 3rd party academic source, and fights against citing those organizations' own webpages regarding the history of the organization, what they believe in, etc. What can be done in these situations? Madman (talk) 16:12, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
No, Madman. You restored a wholly uncited article from redirection, threw in four citations, three of them bad (one to the wrong URL, one that would only verify it with some heavy WP:SYNTH thrown in -- leaving me to correct the former and rewrite the latter, and one was sufficiently vague that it let you also throw in a piece of false information without realising it). Thereafter, you've added one source, I've added two and the article is still half unsourced. So what do you do? Edit war to keep the unsourced half in there and bitch at me for not adding more sources (which per WP:V is your "burden" for restoring the material). I did not "fight[] against citing those organizations' own webpages regarding the history of the organization" -- I fought against your slap-happiness in not citing the correct URL in one instance & not rewriting to match the cited source in the other. "What can be done in these situations?" HrafnTalkStalk 17:26, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Guys, I'd appreciate it if you'd skim pages about how this is not the page for edit war discussion, how there are no personal attacks, and how disputes are resolved. This policy is very clear about when self-published sources are permitted. Thank you for your forbearance. JJB 17:44, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Ignoring Madman & Hrafn's remarks, but replying to JJB: I don't think it is "very clear". The section starts "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published" and then goes on to talk about "experts", but it really says little or nothing about citing institutions when they write about themselves. It seems to me that, for example, barring unusual circumstances, a corporation should be the preferred source for information about its own current officers. Anyone else probably got their information from that same source; it is quite possible that they garbled it or aren't up to date. If there is a source that says explicitly that the information from the organization is misleading, outdated, etc., then we may have good reason to look elsewhere, but (for example) it seems to me the height of foolishness not to go to a newspaper's masthead to find out the names of its editors, or an NGO's web site to find out the names of its officers and board members, or a list of people that NGO may have honored with awards in the past. - Jmabel | Talk 19:54, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Actually it's "very clear" for their purposes (an organization may be cited about its history or beliefs subject to clear WP:SELFPUB limits) though some details irrelevant to their concerns are not yet very clear because we're still hammering them out. Please comment at 5, 8, and 9 below in #Recent changes. JJB 20:08, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Guideline stuff

I have moved this text from this edit to here for further discussion:

ISBN or OCLC indexing, or notability of source). If a reliable source is not readily available (e.g., freely accessible online), the editor inserting or restoring the challenged material should be able to provide page numbers and/or direct quotes from the original text supporting the material, upon request. Direct quotes may be posted on the article's talk page for evaluation—they need not be added to the article.

I think this type of detail ought to be in a guideline. Not in the policy. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 18:04, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

  • An ISBN number is not a substitute for notability -- this is a major change.
  • If someone enters an edit and references the information, there is no reason why, a year or so down the line that, the editor who added the citation, will still have access to the original text. To date we have only insisted that the person provides enough information in a citation that a reader reader can check the citation. This is another major change.
  • As for "Direct quotes may be posted on the article's talk page for evaluation" what about copyright issues? --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 18:17, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
This came from consensus in archive 27 or 28 that "demonstrably findable" was good but needed expansion. I added the parenthetical and I think Crum did the rest, which I and Martinphi (at my talk) immediately applauded. Your first point seems to mistake topic notability for source notability: if source is notable, it's verifiable; if source has an ISBN, it's also verifiable (whether source is notable is then irrelevant). Secondly, regardless of who first cited the material, either no one argues against the deletion, or someone argues against it and thereby takes up the burden of dealing with its inaccessability (the "restoring" editor): if it's inaccessible to all current editors, that's a new consensus of unverifiability. Thirdly, why would copyright issues apply to three sentences quoted in talk if they don't apply to one sentence quoted in the article, as routinely? People transcribe long stuff into talk all the time. This whole piece is a natural description of how to meet the burden of evidence and, while it may easily be tweaked, the archive suggests it is a needed outgrowth. JJB 18:36, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
Not all notable sources have an ISBN, not all publications with an ISBN are notable. It is notable not ISBN that make it a reliable source. As I said if this point needs expanding then do it in a guideline.
"If it's inaccessible to all current editors, that's a new consensus of unverifiability" -- is clearly not true. If the current editors do not have access to the library where the information comes from it does not mean that the information is unverifiable. For example suppose that a there is a fully cited reference for an edition of a book published in the UK but the current editors are American and they do not have access to that UK edition. I have worked on a page were it was expanded using a Romanian edition of I book I have, I believe (as I must) that the person who added the citation did so in good faith. I have no right to delete his additions just because his page numbers and the ones in my book do not correspond. I have started to alter the pages to an English language edition, but it is not a high priority of mine. But the by the implications of what you are suggesting this sentence could be used to removed all good faith editions simply because an editor does not have access to a specific edition of a book.
"Thirdly, why would copyright issues apply to three sentences quoted in talk" Because the addition is not talking about quotes in the article, but adding possibly very large sections of a book to the talk page to provide proof of a point.
"This whole piece is a natural description of how to meet the burden of evidence" Then it should be in a guide line not cluttering up a policy which should be a succinct as possible. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 08:55, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Excuse me, PBS, I think you will be open to the concept that "source notability" is not what makes something a reliable source. Reliability requires at least third-party, published, well-reputed, and findable; this sentence is not discussing "reliable" but "demonstrably findable". "Demonstrably findable" is established by criteria like weblink, library or OCLC existence, ISBN, or proof that source is independently notable. (That is, source notability is one way of demonstrating findability, which is a sufficient but not necessary criterion for reliability.) If the statement could be misleading enough to make it appear that I'm saying ISBN equals notable or ISBN equals reliabile, then rephrasing and/or moving it elsewhere might well be indicated, perhaps even to WP:CITE.
For "inaccessible" I probably should have said "unfindable", meaning that proof of existence is inaccessible. If no current editors can find either an ISBN, OCLC, or WP article about book, publisher, or author, or any archived talk about why the source is so inaccessible, or any other indication that the source is real, then yes it can be deleted in good faith. If it's a matter of pagination in a book everyone has, that is not this. I don't believe that my haphazard talk explanations imply potential bad faith, as I would trust your talk wouldn't either.
If you fear others adding whole book sections, just add "brief" to the edit.
A couple editors found this a necessary clarification of how accessible sources should be. It may well be a guideline-style clarification but it certainly met the initial consensus test. How about you propose what it should say and where it should go? Both my clause and Crum's sentences. Thank you. JJB 14:13, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Not in this policy document, because there are too many exceptions that need to be added. For example I added information to the Burma Campaign using Bill Slim's book Defeat into victory. I used a 1956 second edition (No ISBN), which is available under OCLC. 1 in Sweden, 1 in England, 1 in Scotland, and Lots in Australia including the library in Wagga Wagga (What a great name). Now if someone deletes a passage that relies on this edition and that edit is reversed. Are we really saying that the person who reverses that edit must have access to this edition of 1956 edition of the book? If so the person doing the reversal better live in Australia! What if I had used a first edition, the OCLC has no record of it. I'll give you another example. What about journals like Journal of Railway and Canal Historical Society which is used to provide for information on commercial navigation River Teme. Tricky to get hold of in most parts of the world, but essential for that debate as it is the only source. As it happens the editor who added the information is still around. But if he were not then should the the information be deleted if current editors do not have access to the Journal of Railway and Canal Historical Society? These sort of details need to be discussed in a guideline and qualified with exceptions, it is not the sort of details that should be in a content policy page. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 19:10, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
We have discussed it at Wikipedia talk:Verifiability/Archive 27#Verifiability when you have hard-to-access sources, I'm sorry my hint towards the archive was unclear. The person who reinserts need only state that OCLC proves the existence of the book and thus that the original inserter (you) can be taken to have summarized it in good faith. This is not about deletion of material not quotable on demand. Quotability on demand should only be used in this application when nobody can demonstrate that the source exists. (It should also be used in the application where another editor has evidence for the suspicion that the source may be incorrectly summarized, but that's the NOR policy again.) Perhaps there is an improper ambiguity and it should say instead "If a demonstration of the source's findability is not readily available". JJB 19:24, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Discussion continues at point 4 of #Recent changes.

factual claims in Wikipedia

I have moved the following recent addition to here:

All factual claims in Wikipedia articles must be attributable to reliable, published sources; in practice not all material is attributed.

This is a massive change to this policy, and there needs to be far more editors involved in the decision making process before such an innovative sentence is added to this policy document. I personally am not against it, but after the WP:ATT fiasco, such a change needs wide consultation and consensus before it is added, as it is a deletest's charter. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:54, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for watching PBS! I like your fix to the lead quite a bit. However, you may not have noticed that the first clause of the sentence above (except as minorly changed by Wikidemo and vetted above), has been policy at WP:NOR for half a year. And the second half is rather indisputable and I don't think it implies anything erroneous either. See the wide consultation and consensus. This does not seem a massive change to policy, let alone to this policy. Would someone else mind reinserting please? JJB 18:24, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Not quite the same thing, because it does not carry the implication that everything must be cited and "new analysis or synthesis of published facts", is not the same thing as facts. Besides if you think it is covered there then it does not need to be repeated here.--Philip Baird Shearer (talk)

Well then, I'm always a reliable "support" !vote on a redundancy argument. I'll take that as acceptance for this version, including Wikidemo's tweak and my clause from WP:A (regarded as policy already by Brimba), being brought back into WP:NOR as the suitable location. JJB 14:19, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Lets get a firm consensus prior to trying to reinstate any version, as that is something we sorely lack atm. Brimba (talk) 14:58, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Discussion continues at point 1 of #Recent changes. JJB 20:40, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

"Verifiability INSTEAD OF truth" or "verifiability IN ADDITION TO truth"?

I have run into an editor who appears to believe that the WP philosophy of "verifiability, not truth" means that anything that can be attributed to somebody else is sufficient for including it on a page. That is, she seems to believe that "verifiability" is a lower bar than is "truth."

By contrast, I interpret "verifiability, not truth" to mean that for a claim to be included, it must be both true and verifiable. That is, WP has a higher bar than mere truth.

Any input would be appreciated.

—MarionTheLibrarian (talk) 01:38, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd say that it depends on the subject of the page, the subject of the quote, and the notable expertise of the attributee in relation to both. As a top-of-the-head example, this page on Shirley MacLaine's official website says, that astrology "... can provide a road map that will permit us to avoid obstacles, enhance our natural abilities, help us chart the course of our life and reach a deeper, more thorough understanding of ourselves, our past and our future." That page can be cited as a supporting source for an assertion that Shirley MacLaine has expressed such beliefs, perhaps in the WP Shirley MacLaine article. That page might possibly be used as a supporting source regarding e.g., notable astrology-believers in the WP Astrology article. That page probably cannot be used as a supporting source regarding assertions regarding how planetary positions influence our daily lives in the WP Solar System article.
We need to be very careful with diddling core policies, but perhaps this policy ought to say "One threshold for inclusion ..." rather than "The threshold ...". It could be argued that the implies the sole—that once the inclusion threshold of verifiability is reached (e.g., it is verifiable that Shirley has expressed ...) that a statement about Shirley having expressed those beliefs can be included in any WP article. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 04:18, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Permit my pontification? Actually, it says "the threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia", not in any given article. If it's reliably attributed, and text attribution is given for controversies, then it's suitable for inclusion where WP:DUE, but maybe not in the article the person is pressing for.
  • Marion's wording change was discussed last month and the present compromise text has been successful instead. IMHO, the real "higher bar" is "not just verifiability, but also what we believe to be true", and consensus favors only a hint of the second part of that: it actually appears as WP:DGF, "demonstrate good faith". Each part is necessary, not sufficient, which is already covered by the presence of the different policies and guidelines.
  • If "MacLaine says Controversial X", that may be included appropriately. "Controversial X<ref>MacLaine, p. 1.</ref>" may not be included except subject to WP:SELFPUB.
  • "One threshold" can wrongly imply "this threshold OR that" instead of what we mean, "this threshold AND that". True, the presence of other simultaneous thresholds is described by other policies like WP:BLP. That may permit a different modifier like "The quality threshold", e.g. But I don't think the potential implication of "the threshold for inclusion" is so problematic as to fight over.
  • As to objective truth, WP:OR also applies. Say a reliable source says something is 500, but a little OR suggests to me, and most folks I discuss my OR with, that it really is 50. A reliable-source correction may not be published for years. In this case someone unknowingly inserting 500 into WP does properly meet the bar here: it was verifiable and believed to be true, though it may not have been objectively true. The proper solution for me, the doubter, is not for WP to state what I believe to be true here (OR), but simply to delete the potentially erratic statement from mainspace and retain the discussion at talk. This (truly) happened to me. It turned out that 3 or 4 reliable sources stated that the appropriate measurement should be 50 and thus indicated the first source's statement as error, but if they hadn't, deletion would be the proper outcome, assuming that consensus validated the doubts arising from OR. This protects the editors' good faith when they follow sources accurately but mistakenly. Making "objective truth" the actual bar for entry would technically be too high, because no one on earth can know "objective truth", only what they believe to be true. (Other philosophies of truth differ.) JJB 14:35, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the points thus far.
Perhaps the specifics might also be helpful: The editor I have in mind included on a list of external links a link to a lawyer who presented that lawyer's argument to a judge. (The judge's decision on the lawyer's argument was not included in the link.) When I said that those were not sufficient, the editor said, "Wikipedia's policy is verifiability, not truth. As such, a legal memorandum presented in court regarding the scientific unreliability of PPG is both verifiable and a reliable source." This struck me as an improper interpretation of the WP policy. That is, if 'I found somebody who said so' were sufficient, then WP would be just a big rumor mill.
Am I off base?
—MarionTheLibrarian (talk) 15:23, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

It's verifiable all right! But notice how there is nothing to prove the minor premise of reliability? A lawyer's memo in court is easily not WP:RELIABLE unless the lawyer has a good reputation for fact-checking and accuracy (insert lawyer joke here). If in doubt it could be ruled on at WP:RSN. If it's found suitable as an accurate WP:PSTS for scientific claims, you must still reach WP:CONSENSUS as to WP:UNDUE weight. If there is consensus to include, assuming we don't know the judge's decision, you would still need a disclaimer at least as long as "In a legal argument in X Court, attorney Y stated:". And if you know the decision, state it as overruling. Plenty to discuss without WP:V being the policy misinterpreted. FWIW, I am declining to find out what PPG is. JJB 16:11, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
Marion, short answer for you: the editors simply forgot to establish Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, didn't they? --Kubanczyk (talk) 22:56, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
I suspect the editor bothering MarionTheLibrarian will want the answer to be longer than Kubanczyk's sensible, direct response.
Is there any way to make sure JJB's legal pyrotechnics remain visible when this page is archived?
Re PPG, after much Googling I concluded it was more likely to mean "Pollution Prevention Guidelines" rather than Babylon 5's "Phased Plasma Gun". Any other guesses, anyone? Philcha (talk) 23:09, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks Philcha! The policy changes might be: (1) change "the threshold for inclusion" to "the first threshold for inclusion", which resolves the other concerns about the reality being plural thresholds; (2) Add to WP:RS something like, "When a consensus of editors believes a reliable source to have made a simple error, but the error cannot be demonstrated from another reliable source, the solution of completely omitting the claim may be considered." (probably needs strengthening); (3) Add to WP:DGF something like, "For instance, do not add material you do not believe to be true;" and other examples of good faith. I believe the rest is obvious from current policy. Comments? JJB 13:47, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Discussion continues at #Recent changes point 11, as well as at WT:RS#Suspected source errors. JJB 14:30, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it is the place of a neutral editor to decide what is and what is not truth. Truth is a subjective concept and cannot be demonstrated objectively and thus is incompatible with our goal of neutrality. That is why we use verifiability instead, not in addition to truth.
Just because something can be attributed to somebody else does not make it sufficient for including on a page. We have WP:RS, and WP:UNDUE to address these very concerns. 1 != 2 14:34, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Attribution again

Brimba reverted my adding two words as "readers are able via attribution to check"; the edit summary was Rm, Policy is every source must be attributable; not that every source be directly attributed. “Although everything in Wikipedia must be attributable, in practice not all material is attributed.". I agree with the summary except for two problems: it quotes WP:A which is not policy (yet), and I don't think it supports "rm". But since my goal is to build resolution of the WP:A dilemma, let's do it.

  • Since you agree that sentence represents best practice, let's add it right here right now. I'd love to.
  • "Everything must be attributable" leads to "readers must be able to attribute anything" which leads to "policy is that readers are able to check anything via attribution". "Able via attribution" is precisely consonant with "everything must be attributable, not everything is attributed".
  • If you think my phrasing permits the impression that readers must be able to check via someone else's attribution, i.e., that everything must be attributed, then what properly describes the role of attribution? I have no problem with the bolder "whether readers are able to attribute material added to Wikipedia as already published by a reliable source"; how's that? There "attribute [it] as" is a synonym of "check that [it] has been". Thank you. JJB 03:32, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
Crum? JJB 04:18, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
I modified slightly to make clear this only applies to factual claims, and only article space. Obviously, attribution does not apply to images, talk pages, templates (except to the extent that, by transclusion, they introduce a factual claim), opinions (which don't belong, verifiable or not), word choice (as opposed to factual claims) in headings, phraseology, punctuation, etc., except to the extent they make factual claims. Wikidemo (talk) 05:45, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
Based on this reversion[3] I've reverted farther back to a stable version.[4] We obviously don't have a consensus for the latest additions, so we should talk about this further before making changes to a fundamental policy page. The other change I had made, that was rolled back, was adding a statement about "quality" which was wikilinked to an inapt article about data quality that has more to do with signal theory than encyclopedias. We don't have low, medium, and high signal strength in Wikipedia, with an arbitrary cutoff - we have a bright line rule that verifiable information is included and non-verifiable informaqtion is not. Wikidemo (talk) 05:58, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
We're editing in different sections. Give me a moment while you read the below section. JJB 06:18, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
First, remember the attribution clause is long-standing text from WP:NOR. I agree it need apply here only to article space (WP:BLP is an exception, but handled separately). I'm really not too opposed to "factual claims" for "material"-- but anything which an image intends to communicate must be attributable; word choice and such must be supportable by reference to attributable sources; and any opinion (of which there are many) must be attributed (making it a verifiable and true "Y says Z" statement even if "Z" is false). You could well argue I don't need to attribute templates like "citation needed" by telling who opines that citation is needed; but I don't think template would be understood to be material in this sentence. Given that all that may be characterized as factual claims, I don't think "factual claims" is too much of a problem, except that you need to verify more consensus for it than me.
I'm not going to speculate about "stable version" or "don't have a consensus" other than to remind you that I have always cited the consensus (or occasionally the common sense) of my edits, unless I am specifically putting them out speculatively for comment and potential reversion.
Whether info is verifiable or attributable is a bright line. The quality of the info isn't. Quality is determined by whether info is reliable or acceptable, which as I demonstrated below admit of many degrees of difference between, say, "most reliable" and "largely not acceptable". Again, SlimVirgin and others have emphasized the information quality link, and I don't know what article you were reading about signal theory, because that link seems right-on for detailing a key definition in this policy.
So how about we compromise by my restoring one of your two edits in full (though there may be potential disagreement from others), and we continue to discuss the other one? JJB 06:35, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
Many factual claims about images are not supposed to be attributed. In an article about dress, if you have an image of a girl in a red dress, you can say "photo of a girl wearing a red dress" and none of it needs to be verifiable - or could possibly be verifiable, given the non-free policy. We only use free (generally meaning unpublished) images. Could we continue the discussion in one place, below?
Actually, such a caption is verfiable... by the photo itself. On the other hand, if the caption were to say "photo of a girl wearing a red Versachi dress" we might need a citation to the fact that the dress is indeed by Versachi. Blueboar (talk) 14:54, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
I agree, verifiable...but not in the policy sense because the photo itself is not a third party independent published reliable source. It's verifiable by direct inspection, i.e. original research. Hence my comment that we allow original research in photo captions. You could describe this in a few ways. I don't think there's any way you can get a citation that a particular dress in a photo is a red versace because if it's a free photo there is no published version of it, hence no reliable source. You would just hash it out in the talk page if anyone disagrees, reach a consensus, and move on. Or accept the uploader / image inserter's claim on good faith that they took a picture of something known to them to be a versace. This exact question comes up every once in a while in various places. Wikidemo (talk) 19:07, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
Red dress - This also depends on the actual article in which the photo is used. In an article on 'Tourism' a photo of a tourist would be captioned, "Woman in a red dress at Niagra Falls" — that the dress is by versace, even if true, is pretty much irrelevant. In an article on the 'Academy Awards', where apparently who designed whom's dress is considered important, the caption would read "Jane Doe wearing a fabulous red versace gown' which would easily be supported by a reliable reference to newspaper reports etc. --
If some reader wishes to dispute the evidence of their own eyes, that the dress is 'red', or dispute that 'dress' and 'gown' are equivalent in this context then that is discussed in the normal manner; one or two editors venture their opinions on the talk page and a 'consensus version' is implemented. (I don't think it would take long to sort out, lol.) --NewbyG (talk) 23:50, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
Restricting it to article removes "portals" which is not a good idea. I think it is better not to name the space(s). --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 07:41, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Partial rewrite of Questionable Sources

In the discussion WP:AN/I#Editor deleting reliable sources, the issue of what happens when an unreliable source copies or claims to copy a reliable source verbatim. For example, if a Pastafarian web site reprinted a New York Times article from 1987 on the nutritional value of pasta. The Pastafarian web site is not a reliable source and should not be used in articles about food, but the New York Times article is not otherwise widely available: You either have to pay to see it or visit your local library.

The consensus in that discussion is still evolving but it seems to be: The citation should be the original, reliable source, but it is OK to supplement it with a link to the web page hosted at the unreliable source. However, there was concern that some unreliable sources may deliberately or carelessly mis-copy 3rd-party materials.

There is also the issue of fringe source != unreliable source: You can be unreliable and not fringe, and you can be fringe and, with respect to reprinted material from reliable sources, reliable.

With that in mind, I would like to change

WP:V#Questionable sources from

Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking. Such sources include websites and publications that express views that are widely acknowledged as extremist, are promotional in nature, or rely heavily on rumors and personal opinions. Questionable sources should only be used as sources about themselves as described below. Articles about such sources should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources.

To:

Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking. Such sources typically include websites and publications that express views that are widely acknowledged as extremist, are promotional in nature, or rely heavily on rumors and personal opinions, but may also include blogs and other sources which do not do a good job of fact-checking. While such sites may contain some reliable content, particularly if that content pulled from reliable sources, anyone quoting from such sites should be prepared to defend the accuracy and reliability of the material. Except for content shown to be reliable, questionable sources should only be used as sources about themselves as described below. Articles about such sources should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources.
When an otherwise-unreliable source quotes material from a reliable source, and that material is not otherwise readily accessible, it is better to cite the original source and provide a web-link to the questionable source. For example, after verifying that the book and author are not themselves fringe elements:
is preferred over
  • Wheelan, Charles, Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science, 2003, W. W. Norton & Co., ISBN 0393324869, p. 29
because other editors can fact-check it without going to their local library or bookstore.

What do you guys think? davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:49, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Speaking of pasta! I think you want to start with WP:CITE with that draft. It's OK as a start but the language needs some tightening (e.g. delete "typically"). Aside from self-coverage, QS content is only usable if it actually quotes and cites RS content, and becomes unusable upon simple proof that the RS content was misrepresented; and I don't think the draft reflects that fully yet. Otherwise it's already covered here, including the blog footnote we already have (which I think should be promoted into the main text as was done in another policy). The general idea that RS may be provided with a link to QS is, I believe, well-supported for inclusion at WP:CITE, and might merit a clause here. JJB 21:02, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
The draft could be a little shorter. I support the intention, though, and would like to see it clarified in policy. forestPIG 21:04, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
I forget where (probably here or in RS), but there used to be a clause somewhere about convenience links. The essay to which I link is worth reading. Jakew (talk) 21:10, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
We should not, however, be knowingly linking to copyright violations (for example, a copyvio of a documentary uploaded to Youtube, or a copyvio of a New York Times article on a personal website). BuddingJournalist 01:29, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

er, the proposed draft says Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking. Such sources ..... may also include blogs and other sources which do not do a good job of fact-checking. So sources which do a bad job of fact checking may include sources which do a bad job of fact checking? Umm. Sandpiper (talk) 08:33, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Second draft

Try this:

Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking. Such sources include most websites and publications that express views that are widely acknowledged as extremist, are promotional in nature, or rely heavily on rumors and personal opinions, and may also include blogs and other sources which do not do an adequate job of fact-checking. In general, questionable sources should only be used as sources about themselves as described below. Articles about such sources should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources. An broad exception is the convenience link (essay), where an questionable source holds an authentic or at least an apparently-authentic copy of a reliable source. In such a case the reference should include information pointing back to the original source as well as to the convenience link. Use caution when using convenience links: Sites with reputations for hosting inauthentic but apparently-authentic copies of reliable material should not be used, nor should links to obvious cases where copyrighted material is used without permission.

davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 21:15, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

If we are going to discuss convinence linking in this policy (and I am not sure we should) we need to point the reader to WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT. The key is that we can not act as if we have read Wheelan's book, if all we have seen is a quote at kookyeconomictheoriesrus.com. Unless we have seen both the book and the website, we have to cite the web page. The important thing is that the material is cited to a reliable source. If that means people have to go to the library or book store to check it, fine. Adding the convenience link is an optional courtesy.Blueboar (talk) 21:42, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Oppose. Unclear, both in terms of wording and necessity. Marskell (talk) 21:47, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Do you oppose Blueboar's comments or my draft? If mine, please re-indent.[resolved and correctly indented] I'm open to rewording. I'm also open to reasons why this might not be as necessary as it looks. For example, if the point I'm trying to get across: using an unreliable source to quote a reliable source is sometimes okay - is already covered elsewhere in WP:V and I just missed it - then open my eyes and I'll withdraw the proposal. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 21:50, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
I don't know; I think I'm opposed to this on the grounds that the convenience of a convenience link can be far outweighed by how objectionable an objectionable fringe site is. Nasty fringe sites can boost their Google traffic by hosting RS material. Pastafarian is kooky; a pedophile or neo-nazi website is something else. Also, someone brought up copyvio, which is a good point. If the only thing the site has going for it is a purported full text convenience link of something not available elsewhere, shouldn't the lack of availability elsewhere on the web indicate a copyvio issue? (Perhaps the wording could be adjusted to 1) the site does not promote an extremely anti-social fringe view/Wikipedia should not be abused to boost traffic to these sites 2) the site gives copyright info.) -PetraSchelm (talk) 22:20, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
@davidwr. I was opposing your wording and (lack of) necessity. Your initial example is a split hair. No, obviously, we cannot cite an unreliable secondary source to quote some primary source that we assume is reliable. Marskell (talk) 22:22, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
It's not at all obvious. In fact, I would say that absent evidence that the unreliable source is misrepresenting the quoted source or has a history of misrepresenting similar material, it is obvious that we can use it. By the way, by "reliable" I mean the quoted source is known to be reliable, such as a pre-1923 article from The New York Times, and the copy hosted by the blog or other unreliable source is presumed to be authentic based on lack of a reason - such as someone checking and saying "they mis-copied it" or a history of such mis-copies from the unreliable source - to think it's not. If either fails, then buh-bye. By the way, sources cited by blogs and fringe sites are not necessarily primary sources, they may be secondary or tertiary sources, but that's not the point. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 22:48, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
PetraSchelm, that's Google's problem. Google's algorthims or the games 3rd party sites may or may not use to manipulate them should not affect Wikipedia editorial policy. If Google is an issue, that should be addressed at a technical level, perhaps by either Google or Wikipedia taking steps so including those links does not affect the rankings. To put it another way: We should edit as if Google did not count outbound links from Wikipedia articles. To put it a 3rd way: We should not be held hostage to Google's algorithms. WP:CITE strongly recommends that if material is courtesy-linked from fringe sites, and the same material is available from a less-fringe site, the reference should be changed to the less-fringe site. However, if the material is only readily available from fringe sites, or less-readily available by a trip to a courthouse or library, then I think we should allow it, and WP:CITE seems to agree. The issue of copyvio is already addressed above and by WP:CITE. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 22:48, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Ah yes, I see here: "When offering convenience links, it is important to be reasonably certain that the convenience copy is a true copy of the original, without any changes or inappropriate commentary, and that it does not infringe the original publisher's copyright. Accuracy can be assumed when the hosting website appears reliable, but editors should always exercise caution, and ideally find and verify multiple copies of the material for contentious items." This means we already address this, and that the burden of proof is squarely on the editor wishing to include such a convenience link, not the other way around. That does still leave the issue of extremely objectionable/anti-social fringe sites. (Re reliability and the site, International Pedophile and Child Emancipation which sparked this discusssion, if there's no factchecking staff/the site is operated by one anonymous person, it can be presumed to be unreliable on those grounds, I think--it certainly can't be presumed to be reliable). Also, I don't think it is "Google's problem"--bringing the project into disrepute is an issue that Arbcom and Jimbo take seriously, and there is no reason to gratuitously linke to pedophile websites for dubious convenience links; there's not a net benefit when harm to the project comes into the equation. -PetraSchelm (talk) 23:02, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
If a source is not reliable, it's not reliable to use as a convenience link either. A source with no positive reputation for accuracy or fact-checking, especially if it's a fringe source, does not instantly gain reliability because it posts a document that it claims is an accurate copy of a document published elsewhere. On the other hand, for websites that are known to be reliable based on reputation of the site and the specific individuals who run it or oversee its editorial content, documents posted on that reliable source website can dependably be used as convenience links.
Another consideration is that when reliable source websites post documents, they do so with permission from the copyright owner. If a website posts what it describes as a copy of a published document, but does not have permission to post it, that introduces significant doubt about the reliability of the website as a source and the accuracy of the copy they present. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 23:49, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
A scenario to think about:
I run a blog that espouses a fringe theory of world creation. I include verbatim a copy of a 1910 newspaper article from the New York Times. On my blog I comment "see, in 1910 a New York State Senator believes that schools should teach all theories of creation no matter how unpopular" Now, a Wikipedia editor who happens to work at a library edits the article on education and cites the New York Times article and includes the link to my blog as a convenience link. She makes a comment on the article talk page saying "Sorry about the bizzarro link but it's the only online copy I could find. I read the article on microfilm and the copy online is the same." What then? Should the link be allowed?
If so, should the link be allowed if she didn't bother to make the comment on the talk page, leaving editors to wonder why she linked to a blog full of garbage theory for a New York Times article?
davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 02:58, 4 June 2008 (UTC)


I think we need this in some form, to avoid both the use of links to apparently unreliable sources that do not say that the material is actually from a good source originally, and the omission of the source from which the material can actually be found by most users. This middle road is the logical extension of what we mostly do already--I see it as a restatement of current practice. I prefer the first version as being much clearer than the second; the example given there illustrates it perfectly. Among the reason for giving the convenience source is that we can upgrade it--in the example just above, the 1920 NYT is now available free on the NYT site, so we could now remove the previous link. As for google, I agree we shouldn't give undue prominence, but sources are where you find them. Its enough to give a non-partisan source when such is available in preference. But some advocacy websites host really remarkably extensive collection of documents, often from both sides of the question, & unless we know they are faked or copyvio, they are in fact valuable resources for the issue. Sure, it's their purpose in putting them there--the hope that you'll also see the advocacy, but if they do provide the material without messing with it, they are making in at least that respect a positive contribution to the discussion. (I think CITE is the better place by the way, not here--this is a guideline, not policy). DGG (talk) 13:06, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

You mean this is policy, not a guideline, I assume. My own position is, no, the link shouldn't be allowed. To paraphrase a Wiki maxim, if some document or other is notable enough for description here a reliable source ought to have it in an archive. Marskell (talk) 13:19, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

er, the proposed draft says Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking. Such sources ..... may also include blogs and other sources which do not do a good job of fact-checking. So sources which do a bad job of fact checking may include sources which do a bad job of fact checking? Umm. It can be argued that a wiki terms 'unreliable source', which in real terms is a source of unknown quality (it might in reality be entirely reliable) ought to be allowed for convenience when referring to a document (or a quote from one) which people can read there online. This is a benefit to readers. There should be a formally acknowledged distinction between 'unreliability' with regard to signposting material from an accepted wiki-reliable source elsewhere and their own original material. Sandpiper (talk) 08:33, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

WP:ATT

There are discussions and edits being made at WP:ATT that people here need to be awair of (example: changing the line about "The threshold for inclusion..." to "The first threshold for inclusion...".) I personally feel that some of the proposed changes are good, and others are not so good ... but my main concern is that they are being discused and changed there instead of here. WP:ATT is supposed to be (in part) a summary of this page... so I think key sentences should essentially follow what is stated on this page. If a major change is needed or wanted, it should be discussed and made here first, and then imported over to the summary. Blueboar (talk) 12:12, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I think, when WP:ATT has its backed turned, someone should drop a little cyanide in the kool-aid and pass it over. Marskell (talk) 13:21, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Discussion continues at point 11 of #Recent changes. Marskell, something like that was reverted 14 times over there this past week. JJB 14:33, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Please slow down

Too many chages are happening too fast, and I have lost track of what is being added, changed, reverted, etc. ... I don't mind people being bold and making an initial edit without in-depth discussion... but once a potential change has been reverted please stop, discuss, and reach a firm consensus before continuing. Blueboar (talk) 15:05, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree entirely! I hope I'm not going overboard to direct virtually every conversation back to #Recent changes where consensus can be built point by point, but Blueboar, doesn't it seem to you that there are a few people running around a bit too liberally here? Is it just me, or is this a case of everyone talks about consensus but nobody does anything about it? Okay, frustration over, don't answer that. JJB 17:40, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Protected

Given the spate of medium level revert wars over the last week, I have f-protected this for three days. I have been involved in wording disputes previously here but am not involved in this one and take no side in the various competing versions for the moment. (I have made no direct edits myself, recently.)

My main concern is that this generally very stable policy not be hastily changed. There is on-going discussion and I don't think a protection break will hurt. Marskell (talk) 19:04, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Marskell... now, can we please sit down and go through the proposed changes one by one... and reach a consensus on one change (or agree to postpone) before we move on to the next? Blueboar (talk) 19:11, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks from me too, Marskell.
I have a couple of objections to the recent changes:
1. This was added: "It is not necessary that the source be findable instantly by any reader, merely that it be demonstrably findable (for instance, by library or archive request)."
First, the writing is a little odd, and secondly it's stating the obvious, given that we allow offline material, which is never going to be "findable instantly" unless it's on your bookshelves. —This is part of a comment by SlimVirgin , which was interrupted by the following:
This came as a result of Wikipedia talk:Verifiability/Archive 27#Verifiability when you have hard-to-access sources. This and its expanded version attempt to convey a criterion several editors desired for how accessible or findable sources need to be. There is a more recent distilled draft at #Recent changes point 4 that addresses those concerns and I'd appreciate your consultation there. JJB 19:32, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
2. This was removed: "It is important to strike a balance between being quick to removed unsourced material that is clearly wrong or in some way damaging, while at the same time making sure that challenges are reasonable, and that editors are given enough time to find supporting sources. Before you challenge unsourced material, ask yourself whether you really do doubt that the material is accurate. Unsourced material should not be removed simply because of a difference of opinion, or in an effort to make life difficult for other editors. As with all policies, this one must be applied with common sense."
This was added to the policy after long discussions on talk started by Phil Sandifer, who wanted something to be added to prevent editors from removing stuff willy nilly and citing this policy as justification. I think it needs to be restored. SlimVirgin talk|edits 19:14, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
I'm not familiar with this one, although it appears a bit unrehearsed yet. It would probably pass muster with tightening. I too want something added for that reason, and I have a proposal in the archive. We might be able to harmonize. JJB 19:32, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Regarding SV's 1, my first impression is that it's non-colloquial. I understand what "demonstrably findable" means but it just...sounds weird. However, even if the point is a little obvious and the wording weird, I don't mind the intent. A lot of people show up on this talk wondering about the "reader can check" idea. I'd just suggest better wording.
Regarding 2, I agree that this is potentially useful but we need to discuss its positioning and relation to other wording (such as the Jimbo quote, which creates an opposing mood). (Could you link back previous discussions, Slim?) What constitutes a "reasonable challenge" is an extremely sore point—perhaps more important than the other things being reverted over. We should give it good discussion. —This is part of a comment by Marskell , which was interrupted by the following:
See Edit 18:34, 6 April 2008 by Phil Sandifer and Arhive 26: Do not leave unsourced information in articles for too long? Archive 26: Changes to "burden of evidence" section, Archive 26: This is not wrapped up and Archive 26: Changes to "burden of evidence" section 2 --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 11:20, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
My position has not changed, I do not think it should be restored. I have already given details of why in the archived sections listed above, but the major problem is the third sentence could be used to reverse the burden of proof and that I think is a retrograde step. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 11:33, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Lastly, I'm sort of opposed to JJB's numberings and Done! checkmarks. (Sorry—but it might just confuse other people.) Marskell (talk) 19:42, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Agree on #2, that's an important discussion to hammer out. Believe that your concerns on #1 are addressed by the draft above I already mentioned. And what do you propose in lieu of Wikidemo's and my numberings, in order to achieve consensus on several different point-by-point discussions? I apologize if I forgot to say that all can demote the "done" tags or add "not done" tags if they disagree. Thanks. JJB 19:56, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Move the WP:PSTS section from the WP:OR page here ?

It is odd that the primary, secondary and tertiary sources are defined in WP:OR instead of in this page. Any issue with moving it here ? Pcarbonn (talk) 11:31, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

You might want to look at the history of PSTS for clues as to why it is where it is, and how it is. There was considerable activity, debate, and a little heat, over PSTS several months ago. I'm not being coy here, I don't really remember. I just recall that it was the subject of some considerable debate. Wikidemo (talk) 19:16, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Link to historical page

The link to Wikipedia:NPOV, V and OR under See Also links to a historical page. Should this be changed to link directly to Wikipedia:NPOV and Wikipedia:OR or another current page? WeisheitSuchen (talk) 14:49, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that page was ever intended to be an active policy or guideline page... It was created during the formation of WP:ATT... and was designed to give historical background as to how the various core policies developed and grew out of each other. It is useful for understanding the original intent of these polices, so I think a link to is is appropriate. Perhaps it should be renamed to something like "History of WP:NPOV, WP:V and WP:NOR" and marked as an essay (as opposed to "historical", which is really for failed policy proposals). What do people think?

True meaning of the word "The Blister" : The Blis-ster \'blist-r\ 1. A paranoid misguided individual who calls herself a mother, which chooses to harass the Father of her children. 2. Any person resembling this, as a unreasonable erroneous human being. 3. A person who hurts others and says that she is only doing it for the well-being of her children. Her swelling lack of self-confidence is transparent to everyone concerned. -v.; blis-tered; blis-ter-ing \-r(-)ing\ 1. To cause blisters. New wives may cause the blister to fester. 2. To get a rise from the blister. The blister is usually under stress and striking out against the people who love her children but do not care for her. -blis-tery\-r(-)e\ adj. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.183.55.46 (talk) 22:23, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Reorganization of the discussion

Could we please have a reorganization of the various proposals... What is settled and what is still outstanding? It is getting very difficult to follow the conversations... and there is some overlap (for example: we now have overlaping numbering in different threads: Wikidemo has a proposals #1 and #2... and Slim Virgin has points #1 and #2). When someone posts a reply to something, I am finding it hard to figure out which proposal or point is being referred to.

I would suggest seperate headers for each outstanding proposal, so that if someone wishes to comment on a proposed change, we all know which change they are commenting on. Thanks. Blueboar (talk) 15:22, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Rather than having twelve bullets at once we could have a section per point. Start with the instantly findable business? Marskell (talk) 17:13, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

"Wikify" flag v. "Articles and posts on Wikipedia may not be used as sources"

Wondering about an apparent contradiction.

WP:V states, and many talk page discussions endorse, "Articles and posts on Wikipedia may not be used as sources".

In contrast, the "Wikify" flag renders as, "This article or section needs to be wikified to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please help improve this article with relevant internal links."

In practice, that text has led at least one editor to remove an external link and replace it with a link to a Wikipedia article. Looks like a good-faith edit by an editor who's simply taking the flag's text at face value -- Wikipedia's quality standard is internal links (I'm not agreeing; I'm just trying to point out that the editor's actions reflect a reasonable interpretation of the flag's text). So, a couple questions for more experienced editors:

1. The flag's text, in its most straightforward reading, leads the reader to think that Wikifying = adding internal links; internal links are the only component of Wikification, and are Wikipedia's quality standard. Am I correct in thinking that's not the intended message?

2. If not, where should I go to discuss getting the language of the flag more in line with the intent?

I think it's likely that readers of this page are almost all experienced editors who read the Wikify flag text and instantly understand its underlying intent. However, as a relative newcomer, the value I'm trying to add is to point out the difference between the intent, and the words that actually appear. I think Wikipedia's goals would be achieved better and faster with a little word-smithing to get the intent and the text into alignment. Thanks, Thirdbeach (talk) 19:17, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Template talk:Wikify would be the place to discuss any proposed changes in wording. This is an interesting suggestion, though I'm not certain that replacing external links with internal ones constitutes the "most straightforward reading" of the text. =) Powers T 19:22, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
It's a common-sense judgment call. If I say "Earl Campbell is an NFL football player" I need an external reference to say that. If in the NFL article I say "Notable players include Earl Campbell" I don't, since there will be obvious references in the E. C. article that say so. In general, the more obvious the references in the target article are, the less likely you need a reference in the source article. The two things you must avoid: Circular references with no external link, and no highly obvious reference, either in the source or target article. If I have to spend more than a few seconds at the target article looking for the relevant reference, then I should put a reference at the source article in addition to the wikilink. You are allowed to have both. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 23:41, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
A similar difficulty applies where there exist sub-articles. The main article is supposed to contain a summary of the sub article. Any summary of one article has to be original research done by wiki editors, that is what a summary is. Obviously, it cannot have external references because it is original. The only effective way to reference it is to refer someone to the longer version which presumably will reference points as they occur. The only logical answer to the question, therefore, is to presume that because something is wikilinked, it is satisfactorily referenced. If this is doubted, then the matter should be argued out on the linked page. Sandpiper (talk) 06:44, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Thinking about it more, my impression is that the purpose of WP:V and external links is to make an individual article robust; the purpose of the "wikify" flag and internal links is to make Wikipedia as an integrated system robust. Does that sound right? If so, it seems like the next step is to make the purposes and usage of internal vs. external links clearer, especially in the "wikify" flag where it currently (IMO) could be clearer. Please comment on my proposed rewrite of the flag, which is on Template talk:Wikify. My thanks to LtPowers for the link. Thirdbeach (talk) 19:49, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Extended protection

I just protected ATT for three days given edit-warring, and decided to extend protection for the same period to here. Some means of centralized discussion needs to be agreed upon. We have more than enough fora--it needs to be reduced to one forum, in addressing current arguments. One place to discuss the current rash of edit warring. Marskell (talk) 22:11, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

It's interesting that you protected that page and left the transcluded subpage (intended to prevent such protection by separating the header dispute from the main content) unprotected. —David Levy 00:06, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Whatever policy discussions are going on should take place here, not at ATT, which is just a summary. Can someone summarize what the issues are with V that people want to change? SlimVirgin talk|edits 01:22, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Agree, and this is the eleventh thread on this page which I am repointing to #Recent changes. Someone objected to my organizing and centralizing and clerking the discussion in one location, so I held off, but nobody else wanted to flag it so I'll go ahead. There are a couple other open questions in some other sections but they don't appear to be edit-war level. I would appreciate all users commenting to demonstrate where consensus lies on each point. JJB 02:24, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Sorry JJB, for the wheel-spinning. Let's try to solve one thing at a time thing to at least make some use of this protection. How about findability? At present:
"The source should be cited clearly and precisely to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question. It is not necessary that the source be findable instantly by any reader, merely that it be demonstrably findable (for instance, by library or archive request). If a reliable source is not readily available (e.g., freely accessible online), the editor inserting or restoring the challenged material should be able to provide page numbers and/or direct quotes from the original text supporting the material, upon request. Direct quotes may be posted on the article's talk page for evaluation—they need not be added to the article."
Some have objected to a bit of odd wording and it's also longer than it needs to be. How about:
"Readers should be able to check source material either immediately through a weblink or through a library, a journal or newspaper archive, or other standard, professional collections. Editors should cite sources precisely, providing as much publication information as possible, including page numbers for book sources."
This drops the direct quote business, which I think obscures the main point and should be handled separately. Marskell (talk) 16:55, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, I actually agree that the draft you quote was odd and long (it wasn't mine). Assuming you don't want to comment at #Demonstrably findable? or at WP:CITE#Findability, the question is: what standard do I, the inserter, need to meet in good faith in my own judgment to ensure this checkability reasonably for others? That is, if it's not online, how can I evidence that the material can be found at a library, archive, collection, etc.? My answer (per my draft at those links) has been that the cite should provide something that evidences that, either by way of an ISBN, OCLC, wikilink, or direct good-faith quote of really rare material; if it doesn't, and nobody else can find it, then it's not verifiable. (Also, which page does this info go on, V or CITE?) Your draft is fine but it doesn't answer the question, which was raised in Archive 27 as "hard-to-verify sources". JJB 17:51, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
First, JJB, I think part of your frustration stems from trying to solve everything at once in the recent changes thread.
On your specific Q, I am strongly opposed to foisting specific demands on people adding material beyond the general demand that they provide proper publisher and author information for an RS source. I don't have to mail you a copy of the book I cited this morning. Asking someone to quote a book or journal on article talk is problematic—it amounts to saying "we assume you are lying until we get a direct quote." (And, of course, if I was some sneaky vandal I might just invent a quote for article talk.)
So, we ask people to provide primary publication info without throwing up weird hoops to jump through. I would avoid getting into the specifics of ISBN etc. on a generalized policy. Marskell (talk) 18:17, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
OK, that's an interesting take. Testing the limits of that theory, does that mean that, if I merely post plausible-sounding author and publisher names (and perhaps page number), I have done all I need do to enable readers to find the supporting source text (my WP:V duty)? The reader may take my insertion in good faith but still claim that it is insufficient for meeting the bar of findability because (assuming good faith) the inserter might be mistaken. A full quote, unlike a name and number or two, forces a conclusion of either unmistaken good faith or (if proven false) bad faith.
Or are you perhaps saying that any well-formed citation always passes the bar of findability due to good faith, and that the question is moved to the court of reliability instead? (I.e., if inserter claims author A says X, and I find no evidence of existence of author A, may I delete, or must I go to RSN with the claim "author A is unreliable because not provably existent beyond inserter's good-faith assertion"?) That doesn't sound right either. I think the minimum standard we developed is a good definition of the point at which the inserter should no longer be questioned about being mistaken, and at which good or bad faith can be judged. I'm not too much against putting it at WP:CITE if it will stay there. JJB 18:48, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I am all for a more complete specification of how to source and cite things, but that should be guideline material. This policy and NOR say that it should be verifiable. How it is verified is a more subtle matter, potentially with lots of special cases, exceptions, IAR possibilities... in other words, guideline stuff. Too much of that will actually weaken this policy page by getting lost in the details, not strengthen it. As to the substance of the argument I don't have any real preference but as in other areas I urge you to think of all the far corners of the encyclopedia where this might apply...in music articles you have covers of out-of-print rare albums; in other places things may be cited to speeches or conference papers, what have you. A preference, even a requirement, that something be readily and speedily findable makes some intuitive sense, but how much will that really help the encyclopedia if in practice nobody is going to actually go through the exercise? I like JJB's point that the citation should be specific and believable enough that accuracy and good faith would not reasonably be questioned. It's not so critical that someone does actually check the source, but that they could. Wikidemo (talk) 19:13, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
(ec. @JJB) "If I merely post plausible-sounding author and publisher names (and perhaps page number), I have done all I need do to enable readers to find the supporting source text." Yes, in a sense. Title, publisher, author, date—these are basics. Of course, you could lie—nothing in this policy can change that. "A full quote, unlike a name and number or two, forces a conclusion of either unmistaken good faith or (if proven false) bad faith." Wrong. Totally. Assuming the questioner doesn't have access to the inserted source, they could be lied to about the content of a quote as easily as about an author or publisher name. If they do have access to the source, the point is moot: they can simply check for themselves. Demanding a quote makes no concrete difference in determining reliability. Marskell (talk) 19:19, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
In theory, I am a great fan of the idea that citations should contain as much information as possible... ideally, they should contain Title, Author, Publisher, date of Publication, page refs, ISBN or other Index Number...etc, etc, etc. However, I think all that should be discussed at WP:CITE and not spelled out here. Here we should just say something brief like: "when citing to a print publication, provide as much publication info as possible (see WP:CITE)". As for quotes... I actually dislike quotes in citations. It is far two easy for a POV editor to take a sentence or two from a source out of context, and end up with a quote that seems to say something very different than it would if read in context. I would prefer that if someone doubted a print citation, they actually go to the library, obtain the book, and see the text being cited in context. Blueboar (talk) 19:32, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
I don't disagree. As above, I think the policy should demand as much publication info as possible, while leaving specifics to guidelines. Marskell (talk) 19:37, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
OK that sounds like consensus for returning to a short sentence and letting the rest thrash out in discussion like WT:CITE#Findability. For instance, The citation should state, as clearly, fully, and precisely as possible, how a reader can find the source text. We already have the link to WP:CITE atop this section anyway, so if anyone wants to go down the rabbit trail of "how easy must it be to find" we direct them there.
Before Marskell concludes so quickly that I'm totally wrong, it would be good to consider my point: that if an inserter only provides an unfindable author/publisher, it is still possible to overrule the insertion in good faith as unfindable, if the inserter might be mistaken; but if an inserter provides an otherwise unfindable 50-word quote, the insertion can no longer be overruled in good faith as unfindable, and we move to discuss other topics like its reliability. Marskell's valid observations about lying might relate to reliability, but not to findability, which can be audited straightforwardly. JJB 19:59, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

instruction creep, quote from Wales

Someone elsewhere started using this quote from wales, and I see it has now popped onto this page. Although accurate referencing, never mind truth, is not required of policy pages, this quote is misrepresented. Wales might really believe that wikipedians should adopt an aggresive policy of deleting on sight any information which does not have a direct attribution, but I hope to goodness he does not. The actual context of the quote seems to imply he is talking about biography, where special rules may reasonably apply because of the sensitivity of information about living people.

This encyclopedia was created by people merrily typing away about stuff they know but almost certainly could not reference without further work, or maybe not at all because they don't have the resources. Policies like this are being interpreted that nothing may remain on wiki without a cite right next to it. This is a fundamental abuse of the system by editors, and is being encouraged by statements like this. This quote is exactly the sort of source material which screams for further research and explanation before allowing it anywhere near a page. Placed like this it is begging to be interpreted as: history professor comes and write a learned treatise on his lifelong pet subject. Joe bloggs comes along and sees no attribution and wipes the lot. Joe may read it, think how interesting it is, probably dead on the mark, but he doesn't approve of unreferenced text so he wipes the lot because it is just random speculation and Wales supports his deleting anything without a ref.

This diametrically opposes how this encyclopedia grew to this size, and indeed came to be widely respected. By having unsourced but nonetheless authoritative texts created by anonymous editors who happen to know something about a subject. It only remains authoritative because such people continue to contribute. Attempts at stiffening policies like this, which are going on all the time, are driving this encyclopedia away from the mechanism which has created it. Please remove this quote, it is not appropriate here. Sandpiper (talk) 06:33, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I generally agree but we have not gotten consensus for it. First it is observed that he does speak of "all information" so it is suggested it might be better if removed from BLP and left here. Second it is observed that he excepts when "it can be sourced" so it is suggested he does not argue for overdeletion, but for deletion when the material can be expected not to be sourceable. Thus status quo has reigned. Actually, the quote is both overstated and ambiguous. I have attempted to replace it with a better paraphrase of what people here think the true policy to be, but no version has jumped out as a clear leader. My current proposal at #Speculative text is, at the "may be removed" clause of WP:BURDEN, to add or replace the policy text as "Unsourceable low-quality text, questionably inserted, should be removed unhesitatingly". While this gets closer, it is still a bit ambiguous and people object to it on that ground without realizing that the familiar quote is even more so. What would you say the practice of "aggressive" deletion ought to apply to, if anything? It certainly applies to vandalism and attack BLPs. JJB 14:57, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
I would not limit it to any particular category of article or type of statement ... If there is an unsourced statement that strikes someone who has a solid understanding of the subject matter as being "speculative, I heard it somewhere" information it can and should be deleted. Admittedly, this is always going to involve a judgement call... and yes, every editor is going to draw the line a bit differently. Sometimes this will result in a statement being deleted that others think should not be deleted... but that is what discussion pages are for. If it turns out that the statement is not "speculative, I heard it somewhere" information it can always be reinserted (hopefully with a citation, so it will not be deleted again by someone else). To be honest, I like the fact that the Jimbo quote is a bit ambiguous... it gives us wiggle room in all directions. Deletionists can delete... inclusionists can include. Eventually a consensus is reached. Blueboar (talk) 17:22, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Um, if Jimbo's quote is a wax nose, we don't need it. Both sides already have license (WP:GFDL in fact) to insert and delete as they judge fit. What we're looking for is a clearer, more professional standard for making that judgment call than calling it "some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information". If I judge that it's unsourceable (or unsourced), low-quality (speculative), and questionably inserted (heard-somewhere), then (as you seem to admit) that's the category and I should delete unhesitatingly (aggressively), unrelated to what other editors judge. JJB 18:56, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Partly correct... When faced with unsourced information, you have to ask several questions. One of which is: "Do I think it likely that this is accurate information that simply needs to be sourced, or do I think it is random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information?" If, in your best judgement, your answer is the former, then you should leave it (with a citation request). If your answer is the latter... then indeed you should delete. That said, if that deletion meets with opposition, if another editor comes along and says, "wait... this isn't random speculative pseudo-information", then you should go and discuss it further on the talk page. What is wrong with that? Blueboar (talk) 19:49, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Its nonprofessionalism. What does it mean in grammatical English? JJB 20:02, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
As I said above, my reaction to it is immediately to seek further information, because it is not clear what it means. It really isn't acceptable if half the editors here think it means one thing, and the other half think something else. This is not supposed to be a page for fudge but a definitive statement. It says 'unless it can be sourced'. Did Wales mean 'unless it could be sourced', or did he mean 'unless it is sourced within a week'. The inclusion of the word 'aggressively ' implies something should be done at once. Blueboar seems to feel that a random unattributed sentence should either be given a {fact} tag, or be deleted. I think it most likely should be left absolutely alone, like all the other unattributed sentences in wiki which are maybe 90% of the total. No action should be taken unless there is doubt about it.
If something is 'particularly' true of biography, how much less true is it in other circumstances, and how much should we therefore disregard it in other contexts? What did Wales mean by 'Random speculative I heard it somewhere pseudo information'? Did he mean the history professor in his lunch hour, or the guy who saw a telly program yesterday while having a few beers? How do you distinguish the cases? Under what circumstances did Wales write this? did he think what he was writing carefully, or was he somewhat annoyed, as seems to be suggested by the first line of the original document, so perhaps he did not think before writing. The 'particularly' really doesnt make any sense if action is to be taken in all cases, which again smacks of hyperbole and a not thought out statement, which should not be taken too seriously. If he is not inclined to explain rather better, why is everyone quoting him as a delphic oracle, with just as much comprehensability? If he wants to play god and ruler of wiki, then he needs to explain what he means. If he doesn't, then why is anyone paying attention to this. Wiki is moving away from the encyclopedia anyone can edit because of statements like this. Seems a case of killing the goose which laid the golden eggs because it has fleas. Sandpiper (talk) 21:06, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
All I have to say is welcome to Jimbo's world. The answers to those rhetorical questions are a bit obscure but boil down to this: Jimbo Wales and his words of wisdom do have a unique, and special role in the formulation of Wikipedia policy. Why? That's not hard to figure out given that he created this endeavor. Should it be? That's a matter of opinion but enough people find the quote useful that it is unlikely to be removed anytime soon. I struggle with all of the questions you raise, and have concluded that you simply can't take this quote literally. On the other hand, it is useful as a forceful and cogent reminder of what Wikipedia is all about. Fortunately, we have few fundamentalists around here who actually think that every word in the quote is a specific requirement. Most follow it in spirit, not in the letter. Wikidemo (talk) 21:25, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
That may be true of the sort of people who wrangle here, but I assure you any unclarity in policy will be noted down and used in evidence in a dispute. This similarly applies to points arrising in more than one policy document, where minutiae of difference will be seized upon to prove a point and justify another 1000 lines of argument. Do people find the quote usefull because it confuses? Depending on the meaning attributed to the quote I would pat the guy on the back, or argue fundamentally about how he could go so wrong. Sandpiper (talk) 23:20, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

What do we do when there are no non-English sources in an article & an English source contradicts it??

See Siege of Trsat. No sources I can verify, an creator who likes to call battles sieges when they weren't and who has been blockec for copyvios in the past and who tells me on his talk page he has read a lot but can't remember what he read where. His last 'siege' turned out to be a legend. All I can find is [5] "It was last mentioned as a small coastal settlement in 799 when its inhabitants killed the Friulian army leader, margrave Eric, in an ambush on the road near the church of St. Lawrence. The following year Tarsatika was burned down in a raid of revenge, and the surviving inhabitants moved to a more protected hill where they established a new settlement called Trsat." which is contrary to the Wikipedia article. Doug Weller (talk) 10:26, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I would tag the statement as {{dubious}} and put a note on the talk page saying what you said here. I would also try to find people who might be able to read the original source material and have them assess the use of the source for accuracy and the source itself for accuracy and reliability, and post the results on the article talk page. If the citation is bogus or does not support the use in the article, I would strip the questionable content. You can probably find speakers of those languages on wikiprojects about related countries. Good luck. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 13:36, 7 June 2008 (UTC)