Wikipedia:External links/Noticeboard

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This page is for reporting possible breaches of the external links guideline. Post questions here regarding whether particular external links are appropriate or compliant with Wikipedia's guidelines for external links. Provide links to the relevant article(s), talk page(s), and external links(s) that are being discussed. Questions about prominent websites like YouTube, IMDb, Twitter, or Find a Grave might be addressed with information from this guide. Sections older than 10 days archived by MiszaBot. (For help, see Wikipedia:Purge) If you mention specific editors, you must notify them. You may use {{subst:ELN-notice}} to do so.
Search this noticeboard & archives Additional notes: Concerns with links used as references should be handled at the reliable sources noticeboard. For cases involving blatant spamming, please file a report at the spam project. Obvious cases of corporate vanity can be tagged with {{db-g11}}. This board is not intended for generalized discussion about the external links guidelines themselves, which should be handled at the guideline talk page. To mark a report resolved, place {{Resolved|Your reason here ~~~~}} at the top of the section.
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Punkcast

Hello, I was told here [1] that this is a good place for this. I will copy from original RFC: Concern over whether links like [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] (these examples are only a small amount of total links like this), where the user who added the links is the owner of Punkcast (site that is linked to, also wikipedia article created by him, history of COI) but was not clear about it always, are a violation of WP:LINKFARM WP:NOTCATALOG WP:ADV WP:LINKSPAM WP:SELFPROMOTION. I don't know but it is suggested maybe it is a copyright violation too for some videos. Thank you, MarioNovi (talk) 20:30, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Is something with wrong with how I did this? Thank you, MarioNovi (talk) 16:02, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

No one has a comment? or I did something wrong? Thank you, MarioNovi (talk) 20:44, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Some one tell me what I did wrong? MarioNovi (talk) 17:34, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

First, it looks like there isn't much activity on this board. Secondly, you provided an awful lot of links for people to look at...it's a little overwhelming. Maybe start small with one question. 69.125.134.86 (talk) 20:46, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

HTML5 Diagramming Tool Appropriate EL?

There is a tool that is becoming pretty popular for making diagrams. It is fully free for students and teachers and has a free version. Many pages that are searching about diagrams seem like they would have a better experience with a link to a tool that helps them build the diagrams that they are looking at. For example the page about floor plans you could link them to https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/examples/floor-plans. Same thing for more technical diagrams like P&ID diagrams, circuit diagrams. In my opinion, most people looking for those are also working on making a diagram which I had historically had to draw with paper and pencil. Also I would add probably most are students so completely free. While all diagramming tools that I have found have free versions, this is the best because this also gives full version for free to students. Would like to know others thoughts on this.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Bhanks (talk • contribs)

No, linking to commercial sites such as yours is not appropriate. Please stop spamming this site. - MrOllie (talk) 18:27, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

No. At most we would link neutral lists of tools. Specially if they have comparisons, lists of features, etc. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:38, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Template:Official websites

I just noticed that {{Official websites}} is used on 37 articles. I rather thought that one official website was standard. Perhaps there is a reason for car articles to have multiple links? Johnuniq (talk) 09:37, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

No, not really. it's true that a product may have multiple official websites in different regions, but on the English Wikipedia we rarely require to link to anything but the English site. In practical terms, this usually means only one case where multiple links might be appropriate: where there are multiple official English sites (typically US and UK). I don't really think we need a template specifically for that. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 17:03, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

One official website is standard, but there are always exceptions to the rules. Looking over the Toyota articles, it doesn't seem that the additional language ELs help any, or provide any extra "official" data, so they are probably not needed. But some other articles might benefit from the template. ThemFromSpace 03:50, 12 July 2013 (UTC)\

I indeed would consider one enough, we hardly ever need to list multiple ones. I could here see that a company has an official-official site in a non-English language, but also an English variety, we could there consider to link those two (but I think it is already a bit excessive). Linking to the Spanish, Greek and Russian official site (omitting the English) is certainly not necessary. And I certainly don't think that we need a separate template for that, two times '{{official website}} with an extra not is good enough. This invites linkfarming. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:33, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

"Google Earth Hacks"

• gearthhacks.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com

A number of editors have been adding links to specific gearthhacks.com pages as external links, e.g. [17] [18]. The site seems to fall between open wiki / map source and blog. Do not think these are appropriate. Babakathy (talk) 13:28, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Absolutely not appropriate. The first paragraph of the article linked appears to be copied (without attribution) from our Zambezi article. AndyTheGrump (talk) 13:47, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

• There are 30 articles found if you search gearthhacks.com the few I checked are used as sources.--Canoe1967 (talk) 16:56, 12 July 2013 (UTC)
• Use Special:LinkSearch/*.gearthhacks.com to list all external links to that site. BTW, this discussion should be moved to WP:ELN (the noticeboard for discussing dubious links). Johnuniq (talk) 00:11, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Moved the above from Wikipedia talk:External links

To me this is one of many user-input projects out there, and it does not make sense to have a link to all of them. Babakathy (talk) 05:59, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Get rid of this, we have a toolserver linky-thingy for this that does the necessary part of it, the rest of the hack is just extra information that is not necessary (just as an amazon.com link on a book with an ISBN is not necessary at all). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:35, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Done. Babakathy (talk) 11:16, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

IMDB

Are IMDB links okay to be used inside an article proper? WP:EL seems to clearly say "no". Joefromrandb (talk) 22:55, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

You mean as a source? No, because it is user generated like Wikipedia. See WP:RS/IMDB. Betty Logan (talk) 00:29, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Not so much as a source, but rather in place of wiki-links for non-notable actors. The article in question is The Haunted Hathaways. Another user seems to think they're perfectly fine, as they're "interwiki links". IMDB is not a sister-project of the WMF. Joefromrandb (talk) 00:32, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

I don't know if there is a specific policy or guideline against it but I don't think it's a good idea. A reader not familiar with Wikipedia may then be under the misguided notion that IMDB is affiliated to Wikipedia in some way if we treat it like a wikilink. An external link should always clearly identify the site to the reader, otherwise you could end up with a scenario where a reader is taken to a profile of a Playboy centerfold on the Playboy site on a work computer etc. Betty Logan (talk) 00:56, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

IMDb is defined as a link that is often fine as an external link in an external link section, however, WP:EL does strongly discourage to use external links inline in the text. I often remove them without prejudice. Those should all be wikilinks to their own article, or no link (or remain a redlink) if the subject is really not notable enough for Wikipedia - still they might need a proper reference to a reliable source to make the statement in itself verifiable. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 08:53, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. The other editor has self-reverted so this issue has hopefully been settled. Thank you both. Joefromrandb (talk) 22:59, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Ballotpedia

The site Ballotpedia is included in the {{CongLinks}} template for members of the U.S. Congress, which means it appears as an external link in hundreds of existing articles. Given that the site is an amateur wiki, does it belong here? —Designate (talk) 13:16, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

You might question their political bias, which seems to be getting much stronger recently, but in point of fact that wiki is almost totally written and reviewed by paid staff. Flatterworld (talk) 23:41, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

as a source of information the ballotpedia is much more up to date than wikipeida, I have been working on making sure the links work just as a source of info. We need to be pragmatic, for locate state legislators in kansas the ballotpedia is much more accurate, the wikipedia is way out of date. James Michael DuPont (talk) 02:31, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Punkcast

This again?

[19], where the user who added the links is the owner of Punkcast (site that is linked to, also wikipedia article created by him, history of COI) but was not clear about it always, are a violation of WP:LINKFARM WP:NOTCATALOG WP:ADV WP:LINKSPAM WP:SELFPROMOTION. I don't know but it is suggested maybe it is a copyright violation too for some videos. Thank you, MarioNovi (talk) 19:32, 20 July 2013 (UTC) First. MarioNovi did not notify me as per "If you mention specific editors, you must notify them." instruction above. However since this editor has harassed me for months, I keep a fair eye on his/her contribs, so it's not a big deal. Second: MarioNovi has been warned about WP:OUTING before. Third. Punkcast was a collaborative effort to video document the NYC music scene in the early 2000s. In the case of the Moldy Peaches this band broke up in 2004. In 2008 I did some clean up on the article and delved into the Punkcast archive for a still image for commons and put EL's to video clips from 2001-2002, since Punkcast's agreement with the band did not include posting the clips under an open licence. These links have since been removed by other editors. So now, since the original clips are in realvideo format, it is more likely that people will go to YouTube where they are indeed to be found easily via google. These are uploaded by other people who have previously downloaded from Punkcast and thus, unlike the originals, are indeed copyvio, not that anyone's too concerned. If there is a question of permission on the original videos on Punkcast I can have the band contact OTRS. I am not sure what MarioNovi is trying to achieve here. Wwwhatsup (talk) 03:38, 21 July 2013 (UTC) Wwwwhatsup, this is not appropriate place for this response. I was warned for OUTING and someone filed and it was decided I did nothing inappropriate. If you have a problem please take it to the appropriate place or stop the false accusations and stalking of my edits you just admit to. You have posted many links to your own website, which is a violation, and others have said you may not have copyright clearance for all the clips, so they suggested I come here, it was not my idea. Thank you, MarioNovi (talk) 05:18, 21 July 2013 (UTC) 1) If "the user who added the links is the owner of Punkcast" is not outing, I don't know what is. For the past, I suggest a review of the incident archive, it was inappropriate and it was deleted. The incident wasn't further pursued partly at my suggestion that it was due to ignorance rather than malice.[20]. 2) "others have said you may not have copyright clearance" - please, who, what, where? 3) "violation" - not necessarily. For instance, in your eyes uploading an image to Wikipedia Commons and mentioning its source is prohibited, when pretty much the reverse is true, 4) "they suggested I come here, it was not my idea" - this is a disingenuous excuse for the ongoing forum shopping that started with your very first edit over 7 months ago[21]. Wwwhatsup (talk) 06:03, 21 July 2013 (UTC) 1) User had no right to warn me, and other user admitted I did not do outing here. Other user tried to report my OUTING but it was decided you are up front about your identity so it is not OUTING.[22] You are wiki lawyering. . Was also discussed on ANI[23]. Do not discuss it further, follow correct procedures thank you. 2) [24] user tells me to go to this board. 3) Don't understand. I listed policies you violate. 4) [25] again. You are not assuming good faith. Please take your complains about me to the appropriate place and stop cluttering this board in attempt to make people not look at the links. Thank you, MarioNovi (talk) 06:35, 21 July 2013 (UTC) Ok, on the topic of ELs. What exactly is wrong with Moldy Peaches? Wwwhatsup (talk) 07:59, 21 July 2013 (UTC) Link is out of date so we look at The Box Tops, ok? MarioNovi (talk) 08:18, 21 July 2013 (UTC) OK. That's one down! The Boxtops is a pretty good EL in my opinion. Playing their most notable song under the Twin Towers just 40 days before 9/11, and one of Alex Chilton's last shows with the band. The sole video EL. It was added on Christmas Eve 2007 and has stood the test of time. The history of this clip is that the band asked Punkcast for it to be taken down for a period immediately after 9/11, but then eventually agreed for it to be re-instated a while later. In 2009 it was posted to YouTube [26] in better quality - the EL could perhaps be updated. Wwwhatsup (talk) 08:37, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

• What a waste of time. MarioNovi, I dare say this was ignored the first time (despite your regular bumping to keep it at the top) because one quick look at your contribution history and talk page would reveal to any regular/experienced WP editor that both of these posts are simply the last desparate attempt at continuing your 6-month campaign of forum-shopping harassment against Wwwhatsup. For what must be about the 384th time... drop the damn stick. Your fair share of good faith expired months ago. Stalwart111 11:22, 21 July 2013 (UTC)