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Are Bus Routes Encyclopaedic?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

This is a perennial discussion on Wikipedia, and we have Wikipedia:OUTCOMES#Transportation which indicates that in general in AfD discussions some bus/train routes are kept and some are not. The views given within this discussion tend to reflect what happens at AfD, that if there are appropriate sources a bus/train route article is kept, that if a route is seen as significant it is kept, and if an article does not have reliable sources and it appears unlikely they will have such sources then it is deleted. There have been some attempts to draw up advice on this matter - Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies), Wikipedia:Places of local interest, Wikipedia:Notability (Railway lines and stations), Wikipedia:WikiProject Buses/Bus route list guide, Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains/Manual of style - though it might be useful for some people to pull together a notability essay on transport in general, which refers to the existing essays, guidelines and AfD outcomes, and gives advice on how to deal with articles on various transport aspects, such as bus and train routes. The consensus is that if a subject has been written about significantly in reliable sources (ie. at least two independent sources - rather than one or more Wikipedia editors - has seen that the subject is notable) then we should have an article on that subject, and this principle is enshrined in our guidelines and polices and doesn't significantly differ according to the topic. While some editors may passionately feel that a particular topic (such as bus routes or porn stars) should be included on principle and others feel that the same topic should not be covered on principle, this doesn't reflect the general consensus which is as it always has been - judge each subject within a topic on its merits, and only have a stand alone article on those subjects for which independent reliable sources have shown are notable. It is a shame that some AfDs get closed as No consensus, and it would be prefered that if a closer can't read the consensus or doesn't know the appropriate guidelines, that the closer should not attempt to close that AfD or should relist until consensus is clear, however it just happens that sometimes consensus on a particular subject cannot be found and No consensus is the most appropriate close. The consensus here and on Wikipedia, however, is clear, that bus routes (same as any other topic - other than significant geographic locations) are not inherently notable, but if there are appropriate sources on the route, and the material is more than can be contained in a parent article, then a stand alone article is appropriate. In short, bus routes are to be treated the same as any other topic, and judgement is made on a case by case basis with relevance to appropriate policies, guidelines and essays. SilkTork *^{Tea time} 11:47, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

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Recently a number of Lists of UK Bus Routes have come up for AfD, two closed on Delete and more closed on No Consensus.

Postdlf's closing statement on the last of these would seem sum up the problems associated with these debates:

The result was NO CONSENSUS. ...to delete outright, at least. The principle Thyduulf supports is unresolved (see also Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of bus routes in Peterborough) as to whether such bus route lists should be viewed as in furtherance of Wikipedia's coverage of real places, or should be viewed as a WP:NOTDIR violation. The assertion that "Wikipedia is not a bus directory" doesn't help answer the question, even if "true" (i.e., consensus-supported interpretation), as what makes an article a "directory" or not can be a matter purely of detail and presentation (e.g., including ephemeral info such as timetables, street intersections for bus stops) rather than subject matter. Particularly given the vast number of bus route articles that exist (take a look atCategory:Bus routes in England, for example) it would probably be best to have an RFC or other centralized discussion to resolve the issue, rather than try to delete individual lists here or there when the reasons for deletion target the whole subject rather than being specific to that list. This particular list is unsourced at present, but I do not see an argument that it is unverifiable, nor is there a clear way to apply WP:GNG here.

Some of these articles are sourced to Primary sources - Timetables, etc - others remain unsourced.

The arguments against are that the articles fail WP:N, WP:NOTESAL, WP:NOTDIR, WP:NOTTRAVEL, WP:SAL amongst others The arguments for are that such lists do not form a directory or travel guide (removing WP:NOT arguments), that the lists are WP:V, and that if the list meets WP:5P (section #1 - Wikipedia incorporates elements of general and specialized almanacs, and gazetteers.) then notability can be established by the number of sources even if those sources do not meet WP:GNG.

Whilst I've !voted Delete for these AfD's I think there are some ways the lists can be integrated into Notable Articles - For instance some lists are contained not in a SAL but within the articles on the operating companies within each region (articles on first Bus are good examples like First Aberdeen) , Also in some cities a SAL may actually meet GNG and could be justified in remaining.

Finally WikiProject Buses previously considered a set of notability guidelines for Lists of Bus Routes, their now inactive guideline read:

Generally, if the bus routes in an area descended from streetcars, a list is appropriate, and if the system did not exist at all until the 1990s, it is probably not. In between those extremes, use your own judgment.

currently I see no evidence that the age of the routes is being taken into account by the editors creating some of these lists.

So the questions needing discussed.

1. Are lists of Bus routes automatically notable, even if GNG cannot be met?
2. Do Bus route lists establish a directory or Travel guide failing WP:NOT?
3. if not automatically notable, Should a Guideline be established to differentiate lists of routes that are automatically notable due to their longevity, and those that are notable for more recent reasons?

Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 14:56, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

I believe they should be treated the same as databases. The information contained is not notable, in fact shouldn't be referred to unless as a primary source relating to information given by a secondary source. Dmcq (talk) 15:10, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Notability is NOT EVER automatic for anything. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 15:12, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

No special case of notability for any type of schedule that is subject to change - that includes busses, trains, subways, airlines, etc. If the route is notable via the GNG (which I'm sure there are some examples from major cities), an article about it would make sense but even then, the detailed route schedule wouldn't make sense (it's one thing to say "the route is renown for regular hourly punctuality" as a general comment, and a full list of every stop and timetable). --MASEM (t) 15:17, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

I think our coverage of transportation infrastructure in the U.S. and U.K. is an area where we are producing huge volumes of content that are unlikely to be the sort of thing that benefits our users. There is this idea that individual subway stations and now even bus stops and routes are notable and should be included here. What's next? Taxi stands? Cross walks? A major metropolitan transit authority is notable. The individual routes driven by it's buses are not. The individual stops on a railroad or subway are generally not, although there are some exceptions such as Victoria Station which has a fully fleshed out article with 40+ sources. A bus route is extremely unlikely to ever have that depth of coverage. Beeblebrox (talk) 15:23, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Per WP:STATION If it does not meet GNG, include the station or line in a parent article. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 15:34, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

At least one bus route has GA status - The Witch Way, which I wrote based on a whole string of sources I found by accident. Others such as London Buses route 73 are notable but aren't as well written. Lists of bus routes are different in that the general topic doesn't usually receive coverage as a whole, but individual members or smaller groups often do. Perhaps prose articles about the buses in a town or county with written information about individual routes would be a better way forward. Buses in Bristol is a good example, but even that benefits from not having to cover the information in List of bus routes in Bristol. Alzarian16 (talk) 15:40, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

A few thoughts:

• These articles are not schedules. Schedules contain times of arrival and departure, these articles don't (or shouldn't). Anybody who cannot even realise this basic fact before spouting off about how they violate this or that, doesn't deserve an opinion at Afd or in this Rfc.
• These articles are not directories. An actual directory of bus routes would contain information on all stops and all streets served. These don't (or shouldn't). Again, people who don't realise this should have their views weighted accordingly.
• These articles are not even decent travel guides. They are most certianly not intended to be travel guides, whatever anyone thinks. No date of last update is given, no tourist information or telephone helpline information is given, nothing you would find on an actual, useful, usable, travel guide is included in the articles, except the route number, operator, and major way points. This would appear in a travel guide, and it would also appear in an encyclopoedic record, if it wished to document bus routes in an area. These are as much travel guides as road maps are tbh. And Wikipedia has no problem with documenting what road goes where as being a 'travel guide'.
• Merging to company articles is not a satisfactory alternative. Right across the country many routes are operated by multiple operators, often with the same number, or if not, the exact same route. And a good many individual routes have two different operators - a daytime commercial operator and an evening/weeked subsidised one, again with the same route and number. Merging all of this to company articles would simply be a waste of reader's time, and be a pointless potential sources of confusion/obfuscation, if it is accepted that lists of routes is valid content. Infact, several companies don't even have articles, where would their routes get documented, if not in a 'bus routes in place' type article?
• Primary sources exist in abundance, verifiability of any of this content is never an issue frankly, and while it can get out of date if not updated by editors, that's never been a reason for deletion anywhere on Wikipedia
• Changes to bus routes, either individually if the change is siginificant enough, and especially if changing whole networks, will always get at a minimum, independent secondary coverage in the local news. Some will even be protested. Improvements or initiatives, especially governemnt funded ones, also always get their fair share of free publicity. There is no way that national coverage would ever happen, but then again, what national coverage ever exists for schools? Or any other local type of infrastructure that Wikipedia documents?

Having said all that, while I would never in a million years waste the time trying to looking for GNG type coverage of a route directory, I cannot see how anybody can predict what might be found by someone motivated to keep such an article. So, I see no way that the status quo can be improved by a guideline, or by declaring a straight yes/no as to automatic notability. Sending to Afd will have to remain the status quo imho. At best, I would recommend such articles should be kept to county level and above, as these are the level at which bus services are provided/regulated, and that such lists should be incorporated into wider 'bus transport in X' type articles (but per PRESERVE, not deleted until that happens). MickMacNee (talk) 16:07, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

There's also the issue of whether specialist sources like Buses Magazine or Buses Yearbook etc etc are GNG type coverage, as they do contain coverage of whenever major routes/networks are changed. I used to think not, but having seen what sort of aviation-porn type source is routinely held up as the reason for all the 'omfg meets GNG eeeasily' type votes at Afd whenever you dare to suggest to Aviation editors that a small plane crashing in the woods kiliing 10 people but never written about again except in the likes of Flight Magazine or primary sources (which is what NTSB reports are, whatever some people say), just might not be historically notable. MickMacNee (talk) 16:20, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

1) If the article only cites primary sources, it's a good bet it won't pass notability. 2) The difficulty of AfD-ing something shouldn't deter us from setting a guideline on them. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 18:16, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Yet, at the same time, if articles from a certain realm consistently survive AfDs, then the guideline needs to be revised to account for the consensus that these types of articles are considered typically notable. It's a classic case where guidelines don't accurately reflect a wider consensus. A potential pitfall, that is. oknazevad (talk) 20:44, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

We currently have 168 articles with intitle:"Bus Routes" - That suggests 168 lists (there may be a few that aren't lists) Of those 11 have been to AfD (with one 2nd nomination - London) 6 AfDs were No consensus on virtually the same grounds as above - 6 AfDs were keep - yet reviewing them I find them much closer to no consensus - for instance Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Colombo Bus Routes which only had one vote more towards keep. What's worse is that even when these articles are kept they can remain unsourced and unimproved for years after the AfD - even when the closing Admin specifically mentions this needs done. A further 18 not included in the current 168 have actually been deleted.

Above this we have 305 Articles on individual bus Routes - I think 69 have been to AfD with 12 Keep, 8 NC, and a further 22 Deleted. So for both there is currently a balance of keeps and deletes. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 21:55, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

305 sounds too low. Category:Bus routes in England and its four subcategories have 362 between them (it used to be over 600, but many have been redirected to lists or deleted). There are plenty more for other countries too (80 for Canada, about 60 for the USA and 40 in Bucharest to name but a few). So anything that comes out of this discussion will have wide-ranging consequences

Speaking only for the UK, there have been two previous attempts to clean up bus route articles: one in May 2009 as a result of Wikipedia:WikiProject Buses/UK bus route quality drive, which redirected a lot of poor articles but did little to improve the 400 or so that survived, and one in April 2010 which took in this discussion, thirty AfDs and two ANI threads, and basically led to a few articles being improved, a few being deleted, and a proposed task force that never got off the ground. Let's hope this one achieves more, or we'll be at arbitration by next year... Alzarian16 (talk) 22:06, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes, a quick look and I can see you're right I was using an intitle search which is fine if the title contains "Bus Route" or "Bus Routes" but would completely miss article titles like "Southern Vectis route 10" Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 22:29, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

• I'm agreeing with what Beeblebrox wrote above. While I admit to being a staunch inclusionist, I have a hard time imagining why anyone would want to consult Wikipedia for this kind of information. How does having having a separate list of bus routes, without detailed schedule or route information, meet a need that having articles like Public transportation in X or Public transit in X fails to address? Even interurban bus routes can be handled with a sentence in the respective articles, e.g. "Weekly bus service from here to there is provided by Acme Coach". I'm open to persuasion that I'm wrong, but I just don't see a need for these kinds of articles. -- llywrch (talk) 22:51, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
• This comment by MickMacNee, caught my attention '"Infact, several companies don't even have articles, where would their routes get documented, if not in a 'bus routes in place' type article?", If the company is not notable enough for an article, how could it's product (a bus route) be notable? The answer to MickMacNee's question is that bus routes get documented in a bus schedule, which Wikipedia is not. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 10:58, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
  • I had the same question and you beat me to it; There was a comment in one recent AfD that suggested that "scheduled public transport are generally considered notable"; if this is a widespread presumption of notability it doesn't seem to be vindicated by available sources. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 11:14, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Bus routes aren't 'products', they are part of physical geography. A 'bus routes in X' article is in no way comparable to a 'list of company X's products' article. Not least because they include routes from different operators. To suggest we would only include routes by companies with an article is absurd. And that comment was a rebuttal of the merge argument, it was not an argument that the articles themselves are automatically notable, so you were rebutting a point I never actually made. And as I said above, people who cannot appreciate the difference between a route and a schedule should have their opinions weighted accordingly, they aren't the same. MickMacNee (talk) 11:56, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
    • I'm sorry but Bus Routes are not physical geography in the way that a road or train line are. They are constructs that may have similarities to physical geography but they arbitrarily change at the whims of Drivers, Schedulers, Road Works, Weather conditions; even the time if day. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 12:31, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
      • No, not at all. While the actual route taken on any one day may change due to transient effects, the design of the route is very much a fixed item, which does not infact change, in the UK at least, half as much as some here might want to make out. And how many times has this got to be said? The issue is documenting routes, NOT schedules (timings, frequencies etc). And as someone else said I think, it's surprising how many routes have varied little from the (very fixed) geography of trolleybus systems, which were mostly dismantled in the 1950s. Just because they can change, doesn't mean they have, or even do. In London, the routes are infact fixed for 7 year periods, and most have not actually been altered for decades. In the rest of the UK, the design of the route is fixed for the term of the registration - penalties are imposed for not sticking to it in full, or simply withdrawing it. Active competition aside, which is also very regulated as to what you can and can't change, and why, the design of routes is only really substantially changed due to changes in physical geography, such as new roads/estates. Any large scale changes for simply operational reasons are likely to be covered by secondary sources for their basic impact on the town/city's basic transport system - just search for Firstbus and their large scale 'Overground' network changes made in many cities, and you'll find coverage all over the place in local news, for no other reason than it involves changes to the design of many long standing fixed bus routes. If all of this isn't convincing as to the physical nature of bus routes, one thing's for certain, bus routes in the UK certainly cannot simply be changed at a 'whim' of anybody, and certainly not in any unverifiable and unpredictable way, not at all. And on a side note, while trains tracks don't change, train services do - and Wikipedia devotes massive amounts of coverage to documenting such services in addition to the tracks they run over. In terms of encyclopoedic worth and verifiabiltiy/notabilty, there's really not much difference between train services and bus routes tbh, not in the UK at least. MickMacNee (talk) 13:53, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
        • "there's really not much difference between train services and bus routes"; Per WP:STATION If it does not meet GNG, include the station or line in a parent article. It is pretty simple either there are independent source the meet GNG or not, if there are add them to the article and it passes WP:N. Else delete or merge and redirect. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 15:24, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
          • I really don't see the revelance of guidance on what to do for individual station articles has to articles about whole bus route networks. Particularly when there would be no merge or redirect target for several of the routes, as already said. If your'e trying to claim that the millions of train services (not lines) are backed up by GNG type coverage, I think your'e just wrong. If you're trying to simply say list of bus routes must have GNG coverage, I haven't actually disagreed with you there have I? MickMacNee (talk)
            • We agree that each article needs to meet GNG, I don't see what the relivance of what "no merge or redirect target" is. If it fails WP:N it either gets deleted or it merges, if there is no place to merge to then you either create the article (assuming it meets WPN), or you delete the content without merge. A completely off topic example would be an article on the "left foot of thumper", if his foot does not meet WP:N, then we can merge and redirect to the artilce on Thumper (Bambi), or up the next stage to Bambi, failing that up the next stage to Walt Disney. If the only place to merge to is content on "left foot of Thumper" is to Walt Disney, then merge and redirect there, where it may stay (or more likely) be deleted. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 16:00, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
        • There's an important issue being avoided here: bus routes, unless shown otherwise, are transient. In other words, ignoring the asserted case of the UK, bus routes can be changed, dropped or renamed at any time. While in many cases the transit organization must negotiate some amount of government red tape, a bus route is far more transient than either a road or railway. In those cases, there is the cost & labor required in acquiring right-of-way, & creating the infrastructure. (Admittedly, there are temporary railroads -- they were common in the early 20th century & used in the NW United States to move harvested timber by loggers -- but these individual railroads would not be notable by Wikipedia standards.) This whole issue is, IMHO, just another example of Wikipedia editors confusing the trees for the forest: we have countless articles on specific subjects, some highly developed, yet generalized articles on more generalized subjects lack proper attention. -- llywrch (talk) 19:47, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

• I'm surprised that there hasn't been any discussion yet of municipal/public bus service coverage versus commercial bus service coverage. From List of bus routes in Bristol, it looks like even the "city, suburban, and county services" are run by private companies (in addition to the "coach services") rather than government transit authorities? I can see an argument to some extent for treating municipal transit authority bus routes (the kind you will find in American cities) as infrastructure, even tolerating some primary sourcing for the sake of completeness (and such primary sources would ultimately be produced by municipal transit authorities, and so reliable). Given the vicissitudes of public funding, service coverage to needed areas, etc., you would even expect a good degree of (local) secondary source commentary on individual routes whenever changes are proposed, at least. But is there any reason to treat commercial bus lines the same way rather than impose the standard notability requirements, and the usual summary treatment of stating that "Company X services Towns A, B, and C"? postdlf (talk) 12:06, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

  I see no reason to do so. Municipal ownership and operation is only a tiny part of UK bus provision - only in Northern Ireland and a few remaining outposts. There's no difference in reliability between sources from local authorities and private companies, and local authorities tend to provide information on both anyway - even wholly commercial services have to be registered as regards timing/route details for set periods of validitiy. London aside, where buses are still run by (many) private companies even though the network is municipally designed, on the whole the only role local authorities play elsewhere in GB is to subsidise socially necessary routes not provided commercially - and these in no way can be logically seperated from the commercial networks, not least as they mostly parallel them, just in the evenings/weekends. As such, I don't think comparisons to US authorities/practices is relevant really, and to consider one system notable and the other not, would probably be a case of WP:BIAS. MickMacNee (talk) 13:53, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

  Prior to 1986, we had three kinds of bus operator in Great Britain - those owned by one or more of the local authorities (which were generally confined within the boundaries of the local authorities concerned, except where one LA operated services on behalf of another); the state-owned operators, which agreed their areas of operation amongst themselves; and the independent privately-owned operators. Bus operators falling into either the second or third group had to get a license from the local authority, and if a bus route crossed a local authority boundary, it needed licensing by both authorities.

  Bristol was a city with no purely municipal bus operator - all the bus services there were provided by the Bristol Omnibus Company, which was jointly owned by the state and by Bristol City Council, and whose area extended many miles from the city boundary - they had depots as far north as Cheltenham, as far east as Swindon, and as far south as Warminster, and operated even further - such as to Oxford, some 70 miles from Bristol.

  In 1986 we had Bus deregulation in Great Britain, which had several effects: the larger operators were broken down into smaller units; all the state-owned operators were sold into private hands, as were the majority of the municipal operators (a minority, such as Reading Transport, remain owned by the local authority); all the boundaries and area agreements were dissolved; licensing was relaxed but not entirely eliminated - operators could, technically, run buses wherever and whenever they liked provided that they gave the local authority eight weeks notice.

  This is why there are now so many private bus operators in Bristol: the state aren't allowed to, and the city council is discouraged from doing so. Bristol is by no means the worst case; Manchester is utterly crazy. London is now the only part of Great Britain where the local authority has any proper control over the bus routes, and even there, they're all privately-operated. --Redrose64 (talk) 13:11, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

• I don't think that modern bus routes are encyclopedic. I wouldn't necessarily object to a List of bus routes in Hometown that says things like "Route 2: serves northeast end of town, running from downtown to the Foo Hospital and Public School #3", but except for WP:SIZE issues, I think such a description should would be better off in the article about the agency that operates the routes. I would not include a complete list of stops anywhere: That job should be delegated to the bus agency's own website. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:31, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Break

This RFC never closed, as it was archived instead, however it has subsequently received a further comment whilst in the archive which may inspire further comment; and as it is relevant to a current AFD it seems prudent to get it closed formally. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 12:18, 21 April 2011 (UTC) Another comment from those supporting these articles which might inspire further debate on the subject:

1. If these routes have been mapped interdependently of the operator (By Local authority, or Federal mapping agency) then this map is a reliable secondary source asserting the notability of the route system.

A few archived threads on both WP:OR and WP:RS suggest that this should not be the case. but it's certainly a claim being made here. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 14:48, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

• YMMV Buses are much the same as trains, planes and other forms of mass transit. The extent to which they are notable varies and our coverage will vary accordingly. Each case therefore has to be judged on its merits. London buses certainly merit detailed coverage as there are copious sources which detail their history. Colonel Warden (talk) 09:55, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
• When in question, notability is pretty easy to show. Add independent reliable secondary references to the articles. If there are severel it is notable if, not... JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 10:24, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

• I agree with both points but several AfDs are closing where the subject does meet what would be considered notability for any other subject and are bending policy and guideline in a manner that takes extreme liberties with the intent/spirit of these guidelines. However closing admin's have little guidance on whether the liberal interpretation is a valid interpretation and have been closing on no consensus rather than a keep or delete. In general the history of an extremely large city's bus routes are liable to be the subject of reliable secondary analysis so List of bus routes in London is sourced to the Guardian Newspaper and works specifically about the history of those routes, similarly List of bus routes in Manhattan is sourced to the New York Times, as well as Histories of the routes. By contrast a small city, large conurbation, county may have sources that discuss bus transport within the area but only give a general overview of any actual routes or network - in this case a prose article similar to Buses in London, or Buses in Bristol or a history of a specific operator such as History of Lothian Buses is more appropriate than these list articles and a condensed list of important routes should be discussed in that article. The only exception would be if the size of the Prose article is already large where spinning the list out into another article may be appropriate (and I don't see this as the current case with List of bus routes in Bristol which I feel should be condensed and merged into Buses in Bristol.

The problem appears to be that lists of Bus routes are Fancruft to some people. On one users talk page, I saw him declare that he didn't care about types of bus or the general bus history of regions but he was a big fan of learning "where buses go" - to me recording "where buses go" is an indiscriminate list of information and essentially a database both of which are things that Wikipedia is not. Repeatedly I've heard the argument that these lists fulfil our remit to be a gazetteer - hence claiming notability from the existence of a map rather than a source giving an actual discussion of the route system, but even gazetteers have a level of discrimination which varies from gazetteer to gazetteer. Some gazetteers draw the line at towns of a specific size; others document every post box; we have no policy or guideline to set that level of discrimination for our articles other than the GNG, whilst some editors claim that the GNG doesn't apply to our remit to be a gazetteer - only to our remit to be an encyclopaedia. Ideally we need some sort of guideline to establish when articles for individual routes are appropriate, when articles for lists of routes are appropriate, and when articles on the general state of bus transport within a city are appropriate and this would help to guide both those editors churning out these articles particularly in the UK where a lot of the editors creating these articles (at least 3) are extremely young and perhaps need the extra guidance, but also Admins who could use a clear guideline/policy on which to judge the keep/delete arguments. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 12:25, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

WP:Secondary does not mean independent. If someone unrelated to the transit operator creates an entirely new map from scratch, that new map is a primary source from an WP:Independent source.

What makes something be a "secondary" source is the fact that the author based his work on stuff written by other people. "Secondary" is about how the source was created. "Independence" is about who created it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:32, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Is representing someone else's data in a different format without adding some sort of analysis of the data even enough to move a source from primary to secondary? I would say no, though if the bus company routelist is assumed to be primary then that is what is being claimed about the map by those defending it as a reliable secondary source. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 20:14, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

I think bus routes could be encyclopedic, especially if someone can figure out how they get that way. I mean, some of the lunatic bus layouts in the U.S. seem like a five year old child could think of a smarter way to arrange them to get people around, and you wonder how such bad decisions are made.

Actually, I think that Wikipedia should abandon WP:NOTDIR. We have the servers, we have the people, we have the inclination --- just make directory articles like this, give them a special tag, or put them in a special namespace. They'll serve the public and do no harm. Those limitations in WP:NOT aren't some kind of moral crusade, but just a statement of incapacity from the earliest days of Wikipedia. Get rid of them. Wnt (talk) 08:31, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

and another AfD closes as no consensus List of bus routes in Colchester there is a need for a clear guideline on the subject . Unlike Wnt, I believe notability serves the key purpose of maintaining the signal-to-noise ratio of the encyclopaedia. Allowing directory style lists just because something is verifiable fills the encyclopaedia with articles that are of very specialist interest and may be misleading to general readers. What would people think about working together and thrashing out a potential guideline at Wikipedia:Notability_(buses)? Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 14:16, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Let's try to avoid making a new notability guideline just because something wasn't deleted (or was deleted) to one's disliking. The problem here is understanding what WP:NOTDIR is meant to apply to. Clearly details of bus routes should be falling under that, but there's some that feel that we should have that info somewhere. (Note: I see nothing wrong with putting details of bus routes to something like WikiSource or another sister project). Maybe the better solution is a larger RFC that is to identify the role of NOTDIR with public transportation schedules, instead of trying to focus on a single AFD. --MASEM (t) 14:25, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

There already is a projects specifically tailored to (at least the UK part) on Wikia but at least one of the editors responding in this latest AfD claimed that the wiki there wasn't popular enough (seen by enough people) and I could see similar arguments appearing for any sister project. My issue isn't that something wasn't deleted (or was deleted) but that now for the 5th AfD on the subject in a row no decision whatsoever has been made. It's also the second time this RFC has been delisted and a neutral summary of the points raised by an uninvolved editor or admin may assist in showing the direction required. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 14:51, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Since this discussion seems to have died again, is there any benefit in moving it to a centralised discussion page e.g; Wikipedia talk:Centralized discussion/Bus Routes and is there anywhere that this discussion has not been advertised that might ignite further debate? My concern is that this discussion has generally erred on the "These lists don't belong" consensus but whenever an AfD is started a whole host of editors who are not involving themselves in this debate (despite the debate being raised at the relevant wikiproject) appear and lead to no consenus being formed. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 15:55, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

One of the Articles that sparked this RfC has now been nominated for a second time since none of the issues raised in the first AfD have been addressed. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 23:09, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Some minor adjustment of WP:NOTGUIDE is needed to make it clear that it covers non notable bus routes under directory. At present the gazetteer argument is being pushed way beyond any sensible limits by an editor who at the same time admits that the lists are unencyclopedic. Bus routes are not fixed infrastructure in the way that rail and tram tracks are and are liable to change with varying degrees of frequency. Even if we wanted to provide this sort of information, and there is no reason why we should, it would be uncertain whether it would be kept up to date, depending on the continued interest of particular editors. It could become a source of misinformation.--Charles (talk) 08:50, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Having reread WP:NOT I think a lot of NOTDIR should already cover this and perhaps explicit mention should be made of bus routes - particularly in mentions of "an article on a radio station should not list ... current schedules", and in specifically ruling out the creation of lists of Patent Filings by Company - Lists of Bus Routes by County would seem to be very comparable to the patent example. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 23:23, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I've restored the thread in hopes that a neutral Admin can close and give a summary of the next step forward. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 07:51, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

• I was asked if I could close this, but upon reading it I find that I have a strong opinion on the subject, so I'm going to comment instead: the idea of individual bus routes, or lists thereof, being "inherently" notable is ludicrous. Something is notable if independent secondary sources discuss it. For many of these "articles" (quotes necessary because many of these pages are far from being anything like an encyclopedia article), there is nothing but primary sources in them, and no reason to believe secondary sources exist. The presumption (note: presumptions are defeasible) of notability for some types of subjects (such as towns) is based on the reasonable belief that such subjects are likely to be covered in secondary sources, even if the specific sources aren't already cited in the article. Does anyone really think bus routes almost invariably covered in independent secondary sources? I don't believe that for a minute. In cases where there is coverage, then by all means create an article and cite that coverage. Otherwise, bus route articles based on primary and non-independent sources should be deleted just as readily as articles on any other non-notable subject. --RL0919 (talk) 20:01, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
• As seems to be usual with all these debates there is much yammer about how individual bus routes can never be notable and therefore lists of them can never be either. However articles about individual bus routes and articles about the bus routes in a certain area are different things and we should be clear on that. Individual bus routes can be notable, but rarely are. Lists of bus routes in a suitably sized geographical area (in the UK that generally means large urban areas and their hinterland, and counties) have a lot of potential to be encyclopaedic. Compare this to air travel, where the only infrastructure needed for a route is a start point and an end point, so they truly are ephemeral constructs, often operating only for one or two seasons. We still have details about which destinations are served from which airports without any shout that it is unencyclopaedic. Bus routes are not ephemeral, and where they change over time it's always either gradual change over decades or a big-bang reorganisation - both of which are important for encyclopaedic coverage of the subject of "public transport in X". Many of the "list of bus routes in X" articles are currently poor, but think of them as the "history of public transport in X" articles that they can easily be and it becomes clear that they are not just "fancruft" or whatever.
  

I also take exception to the comments that WP:NOTDIR needs changing to make it cover bus routes because "it was obviously meant to". If it was obviously meant to cover bus routes then they would be listed there either explicitly or under a type of directory that they came under. They are not, so unless there is evidence to the contrary we must assume that bus routes are not included because they were not meant to be included. If you want to include them now, you'll need to get consensus to do so. However as these extensive discussions show that wont be easy to get, because there are many of us who believe they are encyclopaedic in several ways.br> tl;dr version: Individual bus routes can be notable, but only rarely. Lists of bus routes can easily be encyclopaedic when the history is added to the article. WP:NOTDIR doesn't exclude bus routes and there is no evidence that it was intended to, consensus is needed to change this. Thryduulf (talk) 01:36, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

• I don't see NOTDIR preventing articles on bus routes if WP:N is met. I also don't see any automatic inclusion criteria for busroutes making sense and haven't seen a good argument for a SNG for busroutes. I basically I agree with CW and Thryduulf. Hobit (talk) 10:29, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

RfC on dashes

Dear editors, an RfC entitled simple resolution to disagreements over dashes is live at the Manual of Style talk page. Your participation, opinions, views would be appreciated. Tony (talk) 16:22, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Let us know when this crucial issue, which is obviously vitally important and not a nitpicky waste of time on a subject few users care about, is decided. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:19, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

That type of attitude is part of the reason Wikipedia has trouble retaining editors. Just because an issue isn't important to you doesn't mean it's not important to anybody. While I am not well versed in the issue of hyphens vs en dashes vs em dashes, I respect people who try to develop a consistent and reasonable policy on the issue. Buddy431 (talk) 02:51, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

One might say the fact we have an RfC over dashes is part of the reason Wikipedia has trouble retaining editors. Killiondude (talk) 05:18, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Point to Killiondude. Carrite (talk) 01:40, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Can we open an RfC on whether we give a monkey's? AndyTheGrump (talk) 01:50, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

At long last! I have awaited the day that this controversial issue be put to rest. ☻☻☻Sithman VIII !!☻☻☻ 04:39, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Lol@Killion's thing, and it makes sense for people to just use -. A, no one really cares about the differences between that and the long one; B, no one can actually type out the long one; C, no one knows the proper usage afaik except a few people. So why is it an issue? xD Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie Say Shalom! 04:44, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

No, a mere RFC isn't enough...such a crucial issue needs 3 AN/I threads and an ARBCOM decision...oh wait.... DeCausa (talk) 21:00, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

You mean like Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Date delinking? --Tothwolf (talk) 23:09, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Typing the long one is easy. Alt 0151. As is the short one. Alt 0150. My mnemonic for remembering which is which is that the larger one takes the larger value. I use both almost every day.--SPhilbrickT 19:29, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

There is quite literally not one good reason why readers--you know, the people who use this site and outnumber editors by several million to one--should be forced to use arcane keyboard combinations in order to come up with something that looks like what we use every day. The MOS wankers are, as usual, not only failing to see the forest for the trees, they are in fact arguing over whether trees even exist in the first place and what colour they should be. I cannot wait for the Wikipedia equivalent of Ark B to take off. → ROUX ₪ 20:25, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Ark B is thataway. – iridescent 20:31, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

(ec) No, they're planning a feasibility study to explore product placement strategies for "wood." Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 20:35, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Not long after I first started editing Wikipedia several years ago I came across an argument over dashes on some article talk page. I could scarcely believe that anyone thought it important enough to argue about. I haven't bothered to keep count of how many times I have seen similar arguments since then, but unfortunately I have long since reached the point where it doesn't surprise me in the least that this stupid discussion is being conducted. A very large proportion of the disputes that take up time at ANI, RFC, and so on stem from the fact that editors get really worked up about matters that they could easily walk away from and forget, but this must really be one of the silliest of all. If and when this pointless discussion comes to a conclusion, what will have been achieved? The vast majority of editors will not know about the decision, and so will carry on as before. Some of us who do know about it will think it's pointless and will ignore it. And, most important of all, the overwhelming majority of people who use Wikipedia as a source of information will never notice the difference, and of those few who do most will have better things to do with their brains and will have the sense not to care. JamesBWatson (talk) 07:52, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Order please

Okay folks, one way to kill disputes is to get a consensus - the final voting is taking place at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/dash drafting, but we are just finalising the questions (to see if any were left out). For all those who think this is not worth voting over, if you do vote for whichever you feel slightly in favour of for whatever reason, we strengthen the case for consensus so we don't keep having these arguments. This is one of those "strike while the iron is hot" moments where we can nail this and move on to more productive pursuits. So please, everyone keep calm and focussed - really focus on looking forwards and not backwards. Under the arbitration motion, admins can be proactive in monitoring reversions and civility. So this is general advice for everyone to keep their cool. Please. Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:41, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Wow, you really don't get it do you? Beeblebrox (talk) 08:33, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

I don't get "it", whatever "it" refers to here. Care to explain?
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 08:40, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

The above section is chock of full of comments about how utterly unimportant this is to 99.999% of the world, and yet here we have a user trying to get everyone riled up to come and "vote for whichever you feel slightly in favour of for whatever reason" which rather misses the point that most people don't know or care what the difference is and will not abide by or even want to know what the result of this process is. I hope that clarifies matters for you. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:35, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

I think you might be trying to say this is like Parkinson's Law of Triviality about a committee's deciding the colour of a bicycle shed compared to the siting of a nuclear plant. I would reject that utterly. This is a very important point, consistency in doing this will stop people always wondering which of the three different symbols to use and stop an enormous amount of time wasting and indirection in Wikipedia. You only have to look at the amount of trouble and dissention this point has caused to see it is not a trtivial matter. Dmcq (talk) 16:49, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

TBH I think the wider view of the community is that it doesn't matter one jot what symbol individual editors use, and that the fact this is still an issue amongst a small faction of editors is becoming tedious. You know, perhaps the easiest way to solve this is propose the same ideas as with references; do not disturb the existing practice on an article. That would probaly pass nice and easy. Let's propose it here, get consensus and put an end to the bickering. --Errant ^(chat!) 16:58, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Here's the thing: this isn't a user conduct issue. People involved in the debate here (rightly) aren't particularly concerned about "what symbol individual editors use". The issue is what symbols our articles should use generally, under various circumstances. It also includes a component of deciding exactly how much or how little role Wikipedia guidelines and policy plays. yourself and others may be either anarchists, or would prefer to stick your heads in the sand, but there are others who are not (obviously), including the Arbitration Committee at the moment.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 23:10, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

That's the same sort of overblown hyperbole about the importance of this non-issue that caused all this pointless ruckus in the first place. Not caring one way or the other about something so incredibly trivial is not an indication of being an anarchist or an isolationist. ArbCom hasn't said much beyond telling everyone involved to come down off their collective ledge and make a decision, they don't seem to care what that decision is any more than the rest of us. Reminder: we aren't here to show off how well we can craft a consistent policy on the use of small horizontal lines, we are here to build the best encyclopedia this earth has ever seen. Our readers, the people we are doing this for, are never going to know or care what the result of this flaming ruin of a debate is. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:56, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Like Killiondude (talk) 19:00, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Right, because caring about how we write (collectively) is so obviously a waste of time.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 19:06, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

How did you do that Killiondude? Oh yeah, Like. SpinningSpark 19:19, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Redlinks in lists and dab pages

I would like to start a debate on redlinks in lists. The disapproval of redlinks in lists and dab pages was inserted with this edit into WP:REDLINK apparently without discussion and a rather misleading edit summary. The requirements for featured lists include both completeness and minimal redlinks. That is, some redlinks in a featured list are acceptable; kind of implying that a lesser list might have more redlinks. The redlink issue has been debated numerous times regarding FA and FL and still it remains in the requirements. The most extensive debate concerning FL I could find was Wikipedia talk:Featured list criteria/Archive 2#RfC: Removal of minimal red link criteria in 5a. My reading here is that although controversial, redlinks in lists have consensus.

A list to my mind should be comprehensive, even if that means including redlinks. WP:N and WP:V apply to lists just as much as articles and they are sufficient reasons to remove entries which do not belong. Removing entries solely because they are redlinks is entirely wrong. Dab pages are different, but I think the guidelines at MOS:DAB have got it about right and WP:REDLINK should merely refer to the MoS rather than promulgating contradictory rules. So in short, my proposal for WP:REDLINK is to remove the special exception for lists and refer to MOS:DAB for dab pages. SpinningSpark 18:49, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

As with any case, only links you assume would actually be good articles to write should be linked. If it is obviously not notable, then there is no point linking to it. If you think the article should be written, then link it. So if you are adding redlinks to a featured article/list/dab, then I suppose you should give some hint of notability. There are also two different types of lists. Some lists have all content available, which may have some redlinks, or non-articles. Some lists have limited content because a full list would be gigantic, and they only list the most notable examples. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 18:59, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm not disagreeing with any of that, and my proposal does not change the notability requirement for inclusion as documented at WP:SAL. To be clear, what I am trying to remove is the link to the essay WP:Write the article first which wants list items left out until an article is written, which I do not believe has consensus. SpinningSpark 20:28, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

I think this edit is fine. It is suggested to write the article first. It is not policy that you MUST write the article first. It is just encouraged. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 03:16, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree. I certainly -- although sparingly -- add redlinks when I think that there would be 1) a reasonable case that the article should exist and 2) a reasonable expectation that an article might exist in the future. I've created a couple-few articles based on seeing redlinks, and they do offer a bit of nudge to editors, although they should be used sparingly. I don't know why this wouldn't apply to lists and dab pages as much as any other article. I would say that the editor would be justified in going ahead and WP:BOLDly remove the material if she wants, and it would be a good idea for her post a note on the talk page to the effect of what she has done and why, and see what develops. Herostratus (talk) 03:24, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

"Encouraged" not to add redlinks is pretty much telling editors not to do it, even if pedantically there is no hard rule. Redlinks to notable subjects should be encouraged in lists, not discouraged. SpinningSpark 09:29, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

It is not discouraging redlinks. That is not at all what it is saying. It is just saying that before adding them, you should think about writing it. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 10:53, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Umm...if you write the article first then it won't be a redlink, it will be blue. The corollary of encouraging writing the article first is to discourage redlinks - that is merely logic. The linked essay most definitely comes down on the side of having no entry rather than a redlink. You seem to be saying you are not for discouraging redlinks, if so I take it you would not object to a rewrite making that clear. Editors should be encouraged to write articles from list redlinks in the same sense that editors are encouraged to write articles, that should not be turned round to discouraging redlinks. SpinningSpark 20:46, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

There is a distinction to be made between disambiguation pages and list articles. Dab pages are supposed to be navigational aids, and aren't really "articles" per se, so they have their own rules, and most places STRONGLY discourage (as strong as can be done without violating WP:IAR) redlinks in dab pages. Lists are another topic entirely. List articles each need to be adjudged of their own accord. Some lists, in the interest of completeness, may have a mix of blue links (for existing articles), red links (for yet-to-be-created but obviously needed articles) and unlinked terms (for items which belong on the list, but do not deserve seperate articles of their own. Take a look at List of cheeses, which I think needs a lot of work, but has the right general idea. Somes cheese are notable enough for their own articles, given the copious sources on their history and production and usages. Some cheeses may be so notable, but just haven't had anyone interested enough to write an article yet. And some cheeses may lack any significant reliable sources to support stand-alone articles, but do clearly exist and should perhaps be listed in the interest of keeping the list relatively complete. --Jayron32 03:44, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

• IMO there should normally be zero red links on a disambiguation page.
• IMO whether red links in a non-dab stand-alone list are okay is something determined by the editors of the list, when they define the list selection criteria. You could easily imagine cases where red links are appropriate (e.g., "List of United States Senators": we really ought to have an article about each of them), and cases where red links are not (e.g., "List of television shows", where not just notability but the existence of an article might be used to focus the list).
• IMO red links in (regular, prose-oriented) articles are desirable and should always be accepted whenever Wikipedia ought to have an article on that subject. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:26, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

• Disambiguation pages provide differentiation between wikipedia-notable TOPICS not necessarily all being articles yet. If you know a topic is notable and will get an article eventually, we want it to show in the dab page, where it serves readers and editors who might be looking for it, and provides important structure. There is a standard for keeping redlinks on DAB pages, at MOS:DABRL, which basically requires a supporting bluelink to document that the topic is wikipedia-notable, e.g. by linking to a list-article that shows the same redlink in context. --doncram 15:55, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

• Comment Full disclosure: I made the edit User:Spinningspark identifies as problematic, but additional full disclosure, the edit has been in place for over three years apparently without any problems. In my experience, redlinks in lists (such as those in List of cheeses almost always violate the verifiability policy. And how are we supposed to tell whether redlinked list entries are notable or not? Do we really want List of social networking websites or List of companies of the United States to be "comprehensive" (whatever that means), as User:Spinningspark suggests? In my experience the guideline's current wording (and the link to the essay) has led to a much higher quality of encyclopedia articles since it has been in place. UnitedStatesian (talk) 13:02, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
• MOS:DABRL covers the inclusion of red links on disambiguation pages, with the appropriate limitations. If the difference in language at WP:REDLINK is causing confusion or contention over the use of those kinds of red links on disambiguation pages, we should update the language at WP:REDLINK to be clearer/in agreement with MOS:DABRL. -- JHunterJ (talk) 14:04, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

On the contrary, I believe the current language of WP:REDLINK reflects current WP practice better than the current language of MOS:DABRL; can you point to any examples of DAB pages containing redlinks? UnitedStatesian (talk) 14:54, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Bell River. Many of the NRHP dab pages. -- JHunterJ (talk) 15:09, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Garland House is one example NRHP dab page, i.e. a disambiguation page that includes one or more places listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. General consensus from many past AFDs and other discussions is that NRHP-listed places are Wikipedia-notable, because there exist reliable sources on the places and the NRHP-listing reflects approvals by multiple local and state authorities applying a set of objective standards of notability. The Garland House dab, which I created, includes 2 redlink entries for places named exactly "Garland House" and several of format "Firstname Garland House" that a reader could be looking for. Having the dab page with its redlink entries immediately serves readers who learn elsewhere of an NRHP-listed place and want to find their way to an article or to find out that there is not yet an article for it. It also serves the general development of wikipedia by assisting in the removal of article name conflicts from NRHP list-articles like National Register of Historic Places listings in Dubuque County, Iowa and National Register of Historic Places listings in Union Parish, Louisiana, which previously each had a redlink entry for "Garland House" and are now pipelinked to "Garland House (Dubuque, Iowa)" and "Garland House (Bernice, Louisiana)" instead. Having different list-articles link to "Garland House" when meaning a different place is an article name conflict. Consider when an editor would start the Louisiana article at the "Garland House" name, say, rendering the Iowa list-article inaccurate, leading to need for Requested Move debates and dispute over which one is possibly primaryusage, because the first creators tend to think their one is primary. Putting the redlink entries into the dab page clarifies upfront that there are several places of the same name and allows for orderly fixing of all the list-articles that link to the dab page. There is a dabsolver tool which works well in fixing such article name conflicts, if and only if the redlinks on dab pages are there.

Another consideration is that there are NRHP editors are very adamantly against starting stub articles for the NRHP-listed places, and prefer for their entries to stay as redlinks until an article of a certain quality can be created (with varying views of what the minimum quality suffices).

My evolving view is that the NRHP articles could/should be created as stubs sooner rather than later, but there are many thousands of these. The redlinks on dab pages and in list-articles are essential and cannot simply be removed. --doncram 15:45, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I mostly agree with WP:MOSDABRL, in that we have to have some criteria for why we deem a subject notable enough for a redlink. Mention and links in the English Wikipedia are a logical place to look for such justification. The one extension of this I've long wanted to see is to allow redlinks when foreign-language Wikipedias have encyclopedic treatment of subjects we still lack here. This comes up a lot in foreign literature, geography, etc. For one thing, templates like {{ill}} and {{ill2}} would allow us to point multi-lingual readers to articles on the subjects they want. (It's not that our average reader reads language X; it's that so many readers perusing "List of rivers in Brazil" or "Some Russian Name (disambiguation)" do!) Wareh (talk) 15:58, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I also agree that we have to have some criteria for redlinks inclusion, and find MOSDABRL too limited. I'm not sure whether a foreign-language encyclopedia link would be a useful addition, though—after all, the notability criteria in those Wikipedias aren't always compatible with ours (but it's also likely that I'm over-thinking this part). What I think would be useful, however, is an ability to add an external link, which would simultaneously show the notability of the redlink, verify it, and serve as a starting point for article creation.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 24, 2011; 16:52 (UTC)

Wikipedia disambiguation pages disambiguate topics that are ambiguous on Wikipedia. If the topic isn't on Wikipedia, it doesn't need to be disambiguated on Wikipedia. A red link in the article space (with citation, as needed) would show the notability of the red link, verify it, and serve as a starting point for article creation, no problem. -- JHunterJ (talk) 16:56, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

That's providing there is an article to add such redlink to. All too often (especially with geographic entities) there is a high-level article where the red link in question would be out of place but there is not yet a lower-level article, where the red link would be right at home. MOSDABRL in its present form is totally in the way of doing anything about such cases—it's bureaucracy for the sake of bureaucracy.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 24, 2011; 17:07 (UTC)

If the not even the homey lower-level article has been created, perhaps the even-lower-level entity is not actually notable enough for an English-language encyclopedia? And please assume good faith: MOS:DABRL in its present form is a guard against explosions of non-notable red links. -- JHunterJ (talk) 17:14, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I don't doubt that for some cases the answer would be "yes", but for the hundreds and hundreds of such cases I myself have encountered over the years it would be a sound "no". As your own comment confirms, MOSDABRL dictates a very specific workflow ("always work from top to bottom") which in my line work is the most time-consuming, maintenance-creating, and generally inefficient (which, when multiplied by the sheer scale of the project, results in literally months of time wasted on nothing more than satisfying rigid bureaucratic requirements of MOSDABRL). Surely I'm not alone to feel that way—there must be other process where "bottom-to-top" approach works better but can't be efficiently employed because something like MOSDABRL stands in the way. When a guideline actually impedes useful work, that's a good sign there is a problem with the guideline, not with the work being done. As for your good faith remark, I don't quite understand what it is in reference to—could you clarify what it is you mean? I'm not at all saying that MOSDABRL is completely useless and should be scrapped—it is in fact a good starting point—but it sure enough could use more flexibility. What does "good faith" have to do with me pointing it out?—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 24, 2011; 17:59 (UTC)

The problem here is that you're assuming the fix for that inefficiency must lie in a change in the guidelines. The guidelines do not work on a top-to-bottom assumption -- the red link in the article space can be in a "lower" article, or a "sibling" article, or an article that's not in the hierarchy at all. But if Wikipedia doesn't cover the topic somewhere, that topic isn't ambiguous with the title on Wikipedia. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:08, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I more or less agree, but for my purposes, and those of many other readers, "on Wikipedia" is usefully defined as "on all Wikipedias." Yes we have different administrations enforcing rules, but that is not a reason why I should have to search a dozen Wikipedias to know if there's a Wikipedia article that could be useful to me. Maybe down the line more sophisticated technology will allow readers to welcome more information of this kind. The idea that such a measure would lead to lots of links to foreign articles that don't meet our notability criteria seems very far-fetched to me. In sum, I don't see this as an issue put to rest by the "link explosion" or "on Wikipedia" tests. Wareh (talk) 18:32, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

• My opinion In my opinion red links should be in lists but not in Disambiguous pages. A dab page is supposed to disambiguate between existing pages not pages that might someday exist if we get around to creating them. For lists, it is very helpful and needed for red links to be in lists because it helps to identify the articles for that list that still need to be created. Additionally, if we just start removing the items from the list (names for example) then the list is automatically incomplete. --Kumioko (talk) 18:16, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

  A dab page disambiguate between existing topics that are covered on Wikipedia, whether in their own articles or as mentions on other articles. In the second case, mentions, the mention might red link to the topic. In those instances, the dab page can (and should) use the same red link that exists in the article space. That's the summary of MOS:DABRL and MOS:DABMENTION. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:28, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

• I think I need to clarify a couple of points of my proposal. Firstly, we seem to have got sidetracked on dab pages. The proposal was never about dab pages, I think MOS:DAB is fine as it is on redlinks, perhaps we need a separate thread on that. Secondly, my comment on "comprehensiveness" was not meant to mean that all non-notable additions to, say, list of operating systems should be allowed and redlinked. Spam can be kept out by challenging it under WP:V and requiring references before reinsertion - exactly the same rules that apply to any article. SpinningSpark 19:12, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I would agree with what you suggest: a change to instead discourage unreferenced redlinks from list articles and templates. UnitedStatesian (talk) 12:55, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

• Opinion - Redlinks should not exist in dab pages as the dab exists solely to direct to articles. As for lists, we have a few different cases.

• Closed lists: "Mayors of Anywhere, USA" should include all current/former mayors of that town, with a cite showing it is true. Redlinks for articles that probably should be written, no link for unlikely articles. Lists that imply they are complete should be.
• Open lists: "Notable left-handed people", "List of Irish Americans" and such should obviously include all notable items. (We certainly wouldn't want a list of every left-handed person.) The question revolves around "notable".

Template:Uw-badlistentry says there must be a bluelink. WP:LISTPEOPLE doesn't quite agree, saying the person must be notable, pointing to BIO notability criteria. My reading of this is that bluelinks are certainly in and redlinks require cites sufficient to start at least a stub (demonstrating that there should be an article). This avoids the inclusion of someone's left-handed (or Irish American) gym teacher who was once interviewed in your hometown newspaper. - SummerPhD (talk) 14:33, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

I've added links here from Template talk:Uw-badlistentry and Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(stand-alone_lists)#Inclusion_criteria_-_Requiring_blue_links. - SummerPhD (talk) 14:35, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

• Most of the time redlinks do not belong in DAB pages, exception would be an article that should be written, but is significant mention in a other article, then the redlink appears along with a blue link to the pertinent article. Redlinks in lists should be left up to the editors on the specific list. Some lists are long already with just the entries that have articles, it is better to not add redlinks and require the articles to be written first. Other lists are missing so many articles that they wouldn't be much without the redlinks and they should be included. GB fan (talk) 14:49, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Comment - I agree on dabs being separate from lists. On lists, there is a problem of leaving the list completely up to the individual article. A list of right-handed people vs. left-handed (or Irish Americans vs. Hmong Americans) would, as a result of availability, have more stringent requirements. By quickly glancing at the two, it would seem there are relatively equal numbers of both. However, the first might only allow bluelinks (the two Irish American mayors of New York City (I'm making this up)) while the other includes just about anyone (the first Hmong American Eagle Scout). Additionally, this leaves less watched articles as free-for-alls. After struggling to hash out a workable policy for "List of people named James", you end up with a one-on-one argument at "Podunk, Kentucky#Notable residents" with no guideline to fall back on. - SummerPhD (talk) 16:16, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Multiple accounts?

Is it possible for wikipedia editors to have multiple accounts? Not neccesarily a sockpuppet but another account for a contributial editor? Shakinglord (talk) 16:27, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

It is certainly possible, and there are legitimate reasons for one person to have multiple accounts; see Wikipedia:Multiple Accounts. If the account is for another person, then it isn't "multiple accounts" anyway, although if the two people edit from the same place (same computer, or two computers in the same home sharing an external IP address), then it might be a good idea to note the relationship on your user pages to avoid confusion in the event of a sockpuppet investigation. --RL0919 (talk) 16:34, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Ah, thank you, I was thinking about experimenting using a new account. I wanted to try using anti-vandalism software on a new account similar to my account name. Shakinglord (talk) 17:00, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

It doesn't have to be similar to your main account name, although most editors do that. I have one completely different from my main account name just for fun; Hall of Jade. Especially if you create an account close to your name, just make sure you clearly mark it as yours so someone doesn't think it's an impersonator. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 18:24, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

You may want to use {{User Alternate Acc}} & {{User Alternate Acct Name}}. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 15:32, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

I'd recommend it, even though I don't do it myself. Hall of Jade (お話しになります) 04:02, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

a newbee with questions about advertising?

industrial and commercial products / manufacturers are often named directly, referenced or added to picture labels in generic articles. the references often have external links to the commercial web site. I have been corrected that links to external technical references (ASME gas turbine papers) listed and free to obtain at a commercial web site is wrong. this does not look fair. i respect wiki enough not to care what the official policy is, so long as I understand. can someone point me at the relevant wiki material to learn more about this? has anyone found a simple test that works most of the time? p.s. i come from an academic area where if it is not relevant it is edited out.Mkoronowski (talk) 03:41, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

See our rules on external links and more generally our rules against commercial misuse of Wikipedia as a whole. --Orange Mike | Talk 21:02, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

The first given by Orangemike is for the external links section only. I would say that it is ok if other sources are not available. It is always best to link to non-commercial sources and to a stable URL (to avoid any future dead links). -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 22:13, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Do you have any examples of how you are using these links? -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 22:13, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics/Straw poll regarding lists of mathematics articles

User:JHunterJ has suggested that the broad issues raised at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics/Straw poll regarding lists of mathematics articles should be discussed at the Village Pump, and not confined to the relatively obscure straw poll where these matters are now being discussed.

To provide a brief summary, there is an alphabetical set of 27 pages in a List of mathematics articles series. These pages are assembled by a maintenance bot, which regularly adds new content to them by adding whatever links fall within any mathematics-related categories. The lists have therefore come to include hundreds of links to disambiguation pages. The Manual of Style for disambiguation pages (WP:MOSDAB) has a policy addressing such links (WP:INTDABLINK) which states that intentional links to disambiguation pages must be piped through a redirect containing "(disambiguation)" in order to make it clear that such links are not errors requiring repair. Efforts to make such repairs to the lists of mathematics articles are overwritten by a maintenance bot, which adds back the direct disambiguation links as part of its routine. This has been brough to the attention of the mathematics project, some members of which have asserted that it is necessary for direct links to disambiguation pages to be present in these lists because the lists themselves are used by various bots to alert editors of changes occurring in project-related pages. Based on this perceived need, those project members have declared the lists to be an exception to MOSDAB. No prior discussion has occurred where these pages were in fact determined to constitute such an exception.

A number of solutions have been proposed to accommodate the needs of all parties, including the exclusion of disambig links from the lists, moving or copying the lists, or certain elements of them, to project space, or moving the disambiguation pages themselves to titles including "(disambiguation)", although the last option would also violate MOSDAB, albeit in a way that does not hinder the work of disambiguators. These proposals have been rejected by at least some members of the effected project as requiring too much work, or being unnecessary in light of the pages having been deemed an exception by those members.

What is really at issue in this discussion are the questions:

1. Can a project make an internal determination that articles constitute an exception to Manual of Style provisions such as those in MOSDAB, which were instituted to enable errors to be repaired (as opposed to those instituted merely to conform to aesthetic norms);
2. Is it permissible to keep lists in article space when the primary function of those lists is to facilitate project maintenance; and
3. Can a bot permissibly be used to revert edits that bring links in line with the Manual of Style, and add links to pages that do not comply with policies or guidelines?

I have tried to present the situation neutrally here, although I am fairly deeply involved in the discussion occuring on the project space, on behalf of disambiguation efforts. On a more personal aesthetic note, I find lists like these (occurring in many projects) generally to be ugly walls of links, of little value to a visitor actually trying to find something. In this particular case, it is impossible to make any substantial reform to the content or layout of any of these pages, as the bot will merely come by and undo any repairs or improvements in its next pass. The bot owner is awaiting the consensus generated by the straw poll to act on this matter. This being the situation, I agree with JHunterJ that wider community input into the situation would be helpful. Cheers! bd2412 T 19:52, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

My opinion is that projects should be able to vary MOS requirements if there is a valid reason. After all it is a guideline only. Lists in article space should only be there if they also have use as an article or navigation tool for readers. If there is no such use, primary or secondary it should go in the WP: space. Instead of proposal 3, isn't there a nobots directive that you can add to a page to keep bots from tampering with it? If not then there should be, and used. We do not need a battle of the bots reversing each others actions. However an alternative proposal could be a nobots template that obfuscates the link enough that bots cannot edit it. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:19, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Graeme, as always, I appreciate your views. The bot being used in this case ignores (in fact, deletes) {{nobots}} tags on these lists; the bot's owner has indicated that he will make whatever changes are necessary to accord with whatever consensus is reached, but we must first develop a consensus in the straw poll for that to happen. As for the namespace issue, it has been proposed that the pages are useful in mainspace for browsing, but I don't see readers getting much use from overstuffed walls of links. Actually, one of the proposals in the straw poll is to maintain two sets of lists, one in article space that conforms to all MOS guidelines and is ordered in a neater and more user-friendly fashion, and one in project space that contains all the links needed for maintenance tasks. bd2412 T 13:16, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

I would prefer the debate be phrased in terms of what is best for producing an encyclopaedia rather than whether some guideline is being followed in a particular case. Dmcq (talk) 21:16, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I've been unable to find a good solution for a related DAB problem: the disambiguation-with-possibilities page. A clean example is acute leukemia.

It's a legitimate search term, and there's no good guess what the readers are looking for. They might be looking for one of the major types of acute leukemia (acute lymphocytic leukemia or acute myeloid leukemia). They might also be looking for information about one of the rarer types. They might be looking for information about acute leukemias as a class; you could write a reasonable overview article on that page.

It's not really a disambiguation page, because they're all closely related. But I'm not sure that it's exactly what we mean by a set index, either. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:49, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

We have a policy for that called WP:DABCONCEPT. If it is possible to write a substantive article collectively addressing the links, then they are not really ambiguous, but are merely expressions of a broader concept. In the case of acute leukemia, the term is used to describe a family of serious medical conditions relating to an original diagnosis of leukemia, which is itself a legitimate target article for a nonspecific reference to someone suffering from the condition. By the way, while you are here, your input would be most welcome in the straw poll referenced above. Cheers! bd2412 T 19:27, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Mathematics/List of mathematics articles (A-C) and the related article are stuck in Category:Indexes of articles. They should not be there. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 05:33, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles being sold by book companies

Is there a page/discussion on Wikipedia that deals with the issue of companies selling books based on Wikipedia articles e.g. [1] Thanks. Eldumpo (talk) 20:34, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

See User:PrimeHunter/Alphascript Publishing sells free articles as expensive books. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:37, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

The licence of wikipedia clearly allows it, as long as the licence is respected. Cambalachero (talk) 20:42, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for responses. I read through a number of the articles from PrimeHunter's link. Regarding Wikipedia:Buying Wikipedia articles in print or another form, why does the Wikipedia license allow people to redistribute Wikipedia commercially. Why does it not state that it can be republished in free sources, and then only allow paid use via accredited Wikipedia partners e.g. Pedia Press? Also, going beyond that, if 3rd party publishers do charge for Wikipedia articles in a book, why are they not obliged to make it clear the articles come from Wikipedia? Is there a better place I should be asking this/perhaps similar questions have been asked before? Regards. Eldumpo (talk) 08:39, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

As to the second point, the license under which wikipedia text can be used does place a requirement on the user to specify its origin. As to the first, and if I remember correctly, the original license used when submitting text to wikipedi was the GFDL, which does not bar commercial use of the text. Let me turn your question around: why should wikipedia seek to limit the use of its text? Sure, we could have started out down the line you suggest, much like we could have set off down the advertising line for funding. We chose not to. Advantages and disadvantages attach to any of the options that could have been selected. What makes your suggestion better than the current situation? --Tagishsimon (talk) 09:01, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

These "book" sites appear to be internet only, so if people can access them they can access Wikipedia. It can hardly be an encouragement to editors to improve Wikipedia when they see some rip-off company making profits from text they've worked on. I don't see any benefit to Wikipedia in these "books" being offered for sale. Anyone know many of these books are produced/sold? Eldumpo (talk) 11:06, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

It shouldn't be a discouragement to editors: it's what they signed up for, the spread of knowledge. The benefit is not to Wikipedia, the benefit is to the world, and, as such, entirely inkeeping with the Wikimedia project. Okay, so we can think of better ways to spread knowledge, but as Voltaire said, it's a case of the better being the enemy of the good. - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 13:04, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Except that these books can hardly be called "good", they are a dump of Wikipedia articles without any redaction, ordering, ... You get book titles like "Dylan Dog: Insert SHorror Fiction, Comics, Eponym, Tiziano Sclavi, Publishing, Sergio Bonelli Editore, Dark Horse Comics, English Language, Cemetery Man"[2] or "Folklore of the Low Countries: Epic Poetry, Legend, Fairy Tale, Luxembourg, Dutch Language, Medieval Dutch Literature, Belgium". Most of theirt book titles omit the second part, but they are still created in the same way: you take an article, and add all articles linked from the first one. You don't get a book on one topic, but a book containing one article and a long series of loosely related other articles about terms used in the first one. Fram (talk) 14:40, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Agree with the above. Why does Wikipedia want to enable profits for these shoddy companies. Couldn't it all be avoided by stating that you can freely use/distribute it, but not for commerical purposes. Eldumpo (talk) 16:10, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

This would violate one of the core principles of the Wikimedia Foundation ("Free licensing of content; in practice defined by each project as public domain, GFDL, CC-BY-SA or CC-BY"). It is not going to change; that "If you do not want your writing to be edited, used, and redistributed at will, then do not submit it here" box you're always saying "accept" to means what it says. – iridescent 16:25, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Reusing Wikipedia content, which begins "There are many reusers of Wikipedia's content, and more are welcome. If you want to use Wikipedia's text materials in your own books/articles/web sites or other publications, you can do so..." WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:27, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Because you can't say "no shoddy companies" in a license. We either forbid all commercial companies or none of them. There are plenty of legitimate commercial purposes. Mr.Z-man 21:40, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Also should be kept in mind that the decision is (in my amateur, non-lawyer opinion) irrevocable at this point. All the existing (text) contributions (outside of fair-use quotes or unremoved copyvio) have been licensed under terms that permit commercial use, and require the makers of derivative works (that's us) to license them under the same terms. So we simply are not allowed to go to a more restrictive license, unless we dump all current content and start over, or get all contributors to agree to the change. --Trovatore (talk) 21:47, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

While it is permitted, one thing that bothers me is that these books are listed at online book retailers without any indication of the nature of the book. For example, check out this "book" selling on Amazon for $116.98 (and up) that I wrote probably about 80% of: [3]. There's nothing on the page to indicate that it's all Wikipedia content. Just about no one would buy this if they understood what it was. By the same token, I'm sure just about everyone who buys it feels very ripped off once they crack the cover, and some may blame Wikipedia despite the unfairness of that. Maybe we can somehow influence the big sellers into instituting a policy of disclosure on their sites when acting as the intermediary for such manuscripts?--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:34, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

That would be about all we could do. And I don't see where we would have much leverage. It would take an effort by the Foundation to have any chance (slim) of having any effect, I would think. And I don't see the Foundation as having any strong desire to bother with this, probably. I agree that it's a regrettable situation (not the commercial distribution, but the scammy high price/low quality nature of it), but some things you just have to let go, I guess. Herostratus (talk) 04:43, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, if it's true (and i have no intention, at this point, of paying $117 to verify), then no beef with them offering it for sale, but without mentioned the content and license it seems to be violate the spirit, if not the letter of the GFDL. That's part Caveat Emptor, but i see no indication any sucker has actually paid >$100 for the book, part Amazon for allowing/tolerating product listings promoting a misleading product, and then a potential license violation - "you must make clear to others the license terms of this work" - sure implies to me that you make it clear before accepting anyone's cash.Cander0000 (talk) 05:37, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

One thing we could do is swamp the internet with shit reviews of Alphascript publishing books. Both Google and Amazon have a facility for users to add reviews. If people want to pay to have Wikipedia articles nicely bound into a book I don't see the problem with that; the problem is not declaring that's what you are getting. Trading standards authorities might also be interested in hearing about this - misleading advertisments are not allowed in most countries. SpinningSpark 06:08, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

I can't imagine that if the project knew that this was being done in the manner it is being done, there wouldn't be a move to amend the license. I would suggest that we stipulate that any commercial work comprised in part or in whole of Wikipedia article(s) as content (as opposed to, they're presenting a selection of articles in totem and they then analyze or review the benefits and drawbacks of the phenomenon of user-generated content, or they're quoting Wikipedia coverage of a subject among other sources), must indicate this fact in the subtitle of the work and at point of sale. How can a buyer beware if sales happen sight-unseen over the internet and we are abetting such highway robbery by allowing our content to be repackaged wholesale (as in its entirety, not as in discount from retail) for profit?

Upon the death of Farrah Fawcett, I was casting about for material commemorating her life and career. I did a good deal of work at Farrah Fawcett before and after her death, and when I discovered that a new book with the working title The Accomplishments of Farrah Fawcett was available for pre-order at Amazon.com, I thought, "what an odd title," but I put it in my watchlist. When the cover art was finally published, my suspicions were confirmed. Two-bit graphics and the only attribution on the cover was "The Editors". Sample pages showed cut-and-pasted refs (replete with blue type where the links were) from the Wikipedia bio I'd been working on. http://www.amazon.com/Accomplishments-Farrah-Fawcett-Editors/dp/1448630169/ref=sr_1_13?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1306394782&sr=1-13 That title is now out of print, replaced by "Farrah Fawcett and Charlie's Angels" http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1448644313/ref=si_aps_sup?p=random&ie=UTF8&qid=1306393505, which is the same bio appended with the Wiki bios of some of the notables she portrayed in TV films and, I suppose, the series article and bios on the other Angels. As bad as it was that such an incomplete and skewed bio was up there representing her life and career for free on Wikipedia, I was repulsed to learn that someone would sell such a half-baked product and without any indication of the source of the material. No place on the depicted covers, on their Amazon pages, or in the sample pages available for view, does it attribute the authorship or origin of this material. This is a scam, it reflects poorly on Wikipedia, and it's apparently not isolated to one publisher—the "Emporium Books" the OP notes is nowhere to be found on these pages, the covers or the sample pages. These are attributed in the Amazon Product Details section to "CreateSpace". Yet CreateSpace isn't searchable, only the author is searchable. The author for the "Accomplishments" was "The Editors", which is ambiguous enough to bring up hundreds of thousands of hits including credible sources, which is misleading. The author for the second version is listed as "Old School Cinema", but this is the only title linked to that author name. (Adding insult to injury, someone is selling this thing used for $19.99.)

Again, this isn't like, "hey, I want my cut of the $19.99." It's, "hey, I feel partly responsible for everyone who paid $19.99." Or worse, over $110! I'm not saying they should be prevented from offering this work for sale, and I'm not saying that free mirror sites should be forced to attribute the work, I'm saying that someone republishing this for commercial sale should be required to indicate on the cover and at point of sale (the description they provide to Amazon, for example) that the material was previously published, and by Wikipedia. Abrazame (talk) 07:57, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

We cannot amend the licence. Historical content could always be used without the stipulation, and adding in the stipulation would make our licence not an already established one. Why is that bad? Because existing licences are big names, well understood, well maintained, and, in most cases have legal precedent. They are easy to enforce and their terms are well-defined: unfortunately unlike your proposed terms.

However, I would agree that $118 is extortionate and misleading. That line is a much better line of attack IMHO. Does Amazon.co.uk host any of these? They may be liable under the new UK advertising standards rules. - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 08:43, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Besides not being able to amend the license, that's also a ridiculous restriction. So if a book wants to include a paragraph of content from Wikipedia, they have to mention that on the cover? Restrictions that made it difficult for people to reuse Wikipedia content offline were one of the main reasons (if not the main reason) why we made the effort to dual license with CC-BY-SA instead of only the GFDL. Note that even if we did amend the license, or these publishers are in violation of the current one, it's still up to individual users to enforce it. Mr.Z-man.sock (talk) 16:16, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

I suspect including a paragraph (as a clear quote, not inline) would probably fall under fair use, at least in the US, and therefore would not require accepting the license at all. The license can't put restrictions on reusers who don't accept it. --Trovatore (talk) 23:24, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Assuming they only want to sell the book in the US and countries with similar copyright laws, they probably could. But making the license more difficult to adhere to and more often bypassed is still a step backward in terms of Wikipedia being free content. Mr.Z-man 01:17, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Wait, I thought attribution was required (not on the cover, but somewhere). No? --JaGa^talk 07:20, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Not only can we not amend the license of existing content, we can't amend the license of new content either, because the combination of old and new content would form a derivative work that must be licensed under the same license, per the Share Alike clause. Everybody hates Alphascript, because they're a shoddy print-on-demand press with zero editorial investment. But let me make an analogy.

Penguin Books sells a variety of books of public domain works, such as this version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. The same book is available for free online at Project Gutenberg, and indeed at Wikisource. Penguin does not tell us this on their cover, and you could not guess from the title and author alone whether one of their books is a public domain work or a licensed work. Yet Penguin is considered a reputable publisher, although they do almost the same thing as Alphascript, except for tacking on a short, original preface, presumably to make the volume copyrightable.

So what makes Penguin and Alphascript different? Well for one thing Penguin's books are pretty damn cheap ($10 is typical). For another they provide added value. If Alphascript did these two things, would they become reputable as well? Dcoetzee 10:25, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

• These books are making it more and more difficult to do research on Google. They show up even when you use "-wikipedia". I believe it is one thing to use wikipedia text on a commercial product, but another thing entirely to be making a profit entirely off the written work of others. These books do not meet the attribution requirements, as they often hardly even mention "From wikipedia" on them, let alone the article URLs and a list of contributors. Wikimedia musy have some sway with Google and Amazon to get these piles of trash from multiplying like horny rabbits. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ ^τ _¢ 10:46, 27 May 2011 (UTC)
• The Attribution problem is one that is of Creative Common's making and is an issue they haven't (and refuse to) solve. Essentially they leave terms such as "Commercial Use" (for NC licences) undefined and allow the content creator to define the method of Attribution. Whilst this may seem minor, the legal repercussions could be huge - The foundation's legal department has been shrewd in the interpretation by clarifying this for Wikimedia content with the legal disclaimer 'By clicking the "Save Page" button... ...You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license.' So if this is considered legally binding, these books simply need to provide a URL back to the original article to comply with the attribution requirement of the CC license. However I wonder about the implications of an editor signing their contribution in Article Text and legally challenging either the foundation or one of these publishers if that signature attribution is removed but their content is retained - Similarly although perhaps more pertinently is the removal of watermark attribution from images that may have been imported from another site such as flickr. It may even be the case that some other site may be legally challenged and precedent set that content creators cannot be made to agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution for CC license only in terms of service; meaning that the user's content and individual attribution may need to be removed from article text in order to comply with the CC. Unfortunately I've already debated heavily with CC, that they need to clarify the meaning of "Commercial Use" in their license without response, so I don't think they will do anything about attribution. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 13:27, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

  Creative commons can say whatever it wants to, but they aren't lawyers. Attribution has a legal meaning, and it is not "a hyperlink back to the original content", it is (in US law, the law which applies to WikiMedia) "...the act of regarding a quality or feature as a characteristic or inherent part of someone or something. The act of attributing, especially the act of establishing a particular person as the creator of a work of art." Linking back to the original copy does not attribute the original work to its authors, it attributes plagarism to the original. This is plagarism, pure and simple! - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ ^τ _¢ 20:32, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

  Providing a URL is exactly how Wikimedia says to attribute our content. From the Terms of Use, "To re-distribute a text page in any form, provide credit to the authors either by including a) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to the page or pages you are re-using". Mr.Z-man 01:17, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

I had a look around on amazon.com after first reading this. While examples given do not indicate any attribution I did find some that did state the orgin of the material in this one of 1965-66 English footbal

More amusing is the number of resellers with their wide range of pricing and that some claim to have it "in stock". I'm almost tempted to pick one of the UK sellers and ask them. Do you really have a copy on your shelf? GraemeLeggett (talk) 17:10, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

I find this practice disturbing. The publishers often invent one or more names as the authors, and that seems to me to violate the spirit, if not the letter, of the licence. In addition, the books are absurdly expensive, and in some subjects overwhelm Amazon with rubbish. So it seems unintelligent and misleading. SlimVirgin ^{TALK|CONTRIBS} 20:54, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Agree. I'm surprised Amazon UK sells them as I would think they would not be fit for purpose under the Sale of Goods Act, this just looks like rubbish. Can we ask for mediawiki legal advice as to whether use of fake authors violates the attribution clause of the licence? Rjwilmsi 23:01, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Books, LLC also reprints Wikipedia content. They at least seem to respect the attribution requirements. --Tothwolf (talk) 23:16, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Responding to republishers

Collectively, Wikipedians buy a lot of books. My guess is that making it clear to e-retaillers (Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, Alibris, and such) that we find it offensive would be helpful. Most of these retaillers have websites that accept reviews, we could simply (even automagically) submit reviews that disclose the publisher's practice when one of these is found. Of course, they'd get zero star ratings too. Note too that we should have {{Backwardscopy}} on the article talkpages.LeadSongDog come howl! 16:38, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Amazon, at least, has a system of tags such as "stolen wikipedia content", "plagiarized", and "commercial copyright infringement" as seen on this version of our Opposite-colored bishop's endgame. I also note that here listed are 332 of these "books" that libraries (sometimes several) have forked out scarce money for. It would seem appropriate to let these libraries know what's been happening so they can respond too, though judging by the "notes" section here the OCLC is already on to their game in some cases. LeadSongDog come howl! 17:12, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

For starters, I'd like to see a bot go through all of the books found by querying gbooks or worldcat for ("VDM Publishing" or "Alphascript Publishing" or "Betascript Publishing" or "Frederic P Miller" or "Frederick P Miller" or "Agnes F Vandome" or "John McBrewster" or "Lambert M Surhone" or "Miriam T Timpledon" or "Susan F Marseken") and ("WIKIPEDIA" or "Wikipedia") and add the appropriate backwardscopy template to the same-title WP article's talkpage header.LeadSongDog come howl! 18:17, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

You get the list, and I'll handle the rest. :) - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 19:25, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

I offer to help. Rjwilmsi 23:05, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

This search of OCLC is also interesting. LadyofShalott 23:27, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Registered users at WorldCat can create lists from search results, and these can be exported as CSV files. Unfortunately it's a bit handraulic: you can only add ten query hits at a time to the lists. It's possible there's another way that uses their APIs.LeadSongDog come howl! 14:40, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Examples of these books and original copyright

Thanks for all the posts on this topic. It seems it is a concern for others as well. Has anyone got a copy of one of these books so they could scan a page so we can get a fuller understanding of what is included from the Wikipedia article. In particular I'm wondering how they deal with referencing. Presumably they just cut out the references and external links sections, and the in-line citations? Does that mean that if any of the Wiki articles they use were themselves effectively direct copies from another source, then they are liable for copyright breach from the original source? Eldumpo (talk) 10:40, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Maybe, maybe not. You're asking whether they could be liable if they inadvertently included a Wikipedia article that was itself a copyvio (and which we hopefully have since removed)? They could always argue that they relied upon Wikipedia's representation that all of our text was freely licensed. Whether a court would expect them to have made their own investigation, I don't know. I'd expect that these "publishers" are all kind of fly-by-night working-out-of-the-back-of-a-Singapore-sweatshop kind of "companies", so there probably isn't much to sue anyway. But if someone does want to take the time to look through some of these, see if they included any copyvio articles, then notify the infringed publisher that this was a copyvio, we fixed it, they didn't, good luck to you. postdlf (talk) 15:00, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Undo

Is the message If you are undoing an edit that is not vandalism, explain the reason in the edit summary. Do not use the default message only a suggestion or policy ? Gnevin (talk) 12:41, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Consider it policy. It is an extension of Wikipedia:Editing policy, which says you need to explain your edits. Yoenit (talk) 13:00, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Gnevin (talk) 14:12, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Which would be what the undo message is doing when you click undo. That being said if it is, it should be put on a policy page somewhere because it is an extremely common use to use undo without an edit summary. And policy is supposed to reflect action not prescribe action after all. -DJSasso (talk) 14:14, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I Am really not planning to use edit summaries for edits like [4]. If people don't realise why I made this undo, they can always ask for an explanation, and if the editor would persist and make the same change again, I would also provide an explanation, but in general for such obvious errors / tests, no edit summary on undo is needed. Fram (talk) 14:28, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

On the contrary, Fram: in the example you use, an edit summary like "fixing formatting" explains what you've done and why. In many cases, something you're undoing may have been done in total good faith by somebody who needs to be told why you're reverting them if they are to learn better. It's part of making this whole project transparent rather than opaque. --Orange Mike | Talk 16:16, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Of course, because IPs stay around for an hour to check edit summaries... If they can't be bothered to check the result of their edit (and use the non-informative edit summary "alex kille" themselves-, what is the chance of them staying around for an hour or more to check the edit summary of the next edit to that article? And what is the chance that they would not understand what happened now, but would suddenly understand with "fixing formatting"? I am assuming good faith, or I would have used rollback instead of undo. But I don't believe in fairy tales, and am not wasting my time on them. Fram (talk) 19:39, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

The editors at those IPs often return to the same article, even via different IPs or subsequently registered accounts. An edit comment can prevent revertwarring. It's that simple. LeadSongDog come howl! 16:44, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Assuming that the unregistered editor checks the history, which is not something I'd necessarily want to rely on.

Fram, if you think it too much trouble to provide edit informative summaries in general, you might at least consider doing so on subsequent reversions, especially if the other person 'undid' your reversion rather than making new mistakes. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:56, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Announcing our new community liaison

I’m delighted to announce that the Wikimedia Foundation has engaged Maggie Dennis (User:Moonriddengirl on the English Wikipedia and elsewhere) to serve as our first Community Liaison. The Community Liaison role is envisioned to be a rotating assignment, filled by a new Wikimedian each year, half year or quarter. One of Maggie’s responsibilities is to begin to lay out a process for how this rotating posting would work.

Maggie has been a contributor to the projects since 2007 and is an administrator on the English Wikipedia and an OTRS volunteer. She has over 100,000 edits, including edits to 40 of the language versions of our projects. Her broad experience and knowledge made her a natural fit for this role.

This role is a response to requests from community members who have sometimes felt they didn’t know who to ask about something or weren’t sure the right person to go through to bring up a suggestion or issue. Her initial thrust will be to create systems so that every contributor to the projects has a way to reach the Foundation if they wish and to make sure that the Foundation effectively connects the right resources with people who contact us. If you aren’t sure who to call, Maggie will help you. Obviously, most community members will never need this communications channel - they’re happy editing, doing the things that make the projects great - but we want to make it as easy as possible for people to communicate with the Foundation.

The job of the liaison will have two major parts. First are standard duties that every liaison will perform which may include maintaining a FAQ about what each department does, making sure that inquiries from email or mailing lists are brought to the attention of appropriate staff members, etc. However, we also want liaisons to be free to pursue unique projects suited to their particular skill sets. Maggie will develop such projects in the coming weeks.

Maggie will be on the projects as User:Mdennis (WMF) and can be reached at mdenniswikimedia.org. Her initial appointment runs for six months. I look forward to working with Maggie in this new role!

Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 21:51, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

You couldn't have picked a better user!--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:01, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Seconded. Excellent choice, and best of luck with you new job, Maggie :) . - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 16:26, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

1 user likes this. – ukexpat (talk) 17:56, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Leaks

Asking for community input on the use of news leaks in Wikipedia talk:Identifying reliable sources#Leaks patsw (talk) 23:59, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Call to Action: We need more participation, more questions, and many more voter guides for the current Board Election

I'm in the process of compiling my own Voter Guide and could use more input.

• The candidates have not been asked that many questions this time around. Ask them! They're going to control millions of dollars and help run the show for at least two years!
• Like nearly all users, I need more feedback on the people I don't already know well-- who should we absolutely be supporting and why??
• Or even better, make a voter guide of your own and share it. The Arbcom elections had 24 voter guides, right now there aren't any for the Board Election, and it's way more important than the Arbcom election.
• We need to designate a central place for English speakers of all projects to discuss the election-- right now discussions are happening all over, or worse, not happening at all. We need to advertise that place extensively (in the central notices of the english-speaking projects )
• In general, we need to spark a more robust discussion. Otherwise the elections will come down to name recognition + throwing darts at a wall.

--Alecmconroy (talk) 10:58, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

"Live" football score updates

There is a discussion in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football#Live scores issue again regarding whether it is appropriate to add football scores during a match. It would be helpful if others could contribute to the discussion. Thanks,  Chzz  ►  22:49, 29 May 2011 (UTC)