Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

Welcome — ask about reliability of sources in context!

Before posting, check the archives and list of perennial sources for prior discussions. Context is important: supply the source, the article it is used in, and the claim it supports. Additional notes: RFCs for deprecation, blacklisting, or other classification should not be opened unless the source is widely used and has been repeatedly discussed. Consensus is assessed based on the weight of policy-based arguments. While the consensus of several editors can generally be relied upon, answers are not policy. This page is not a forum for general discussions unrelated to the reliability of sources. Start a new discussion

Can we please adapt the Daily Mail consensus to reflect a position on Mail on Sunday?

The applicability of the Daily Mail ban to the Mail on Sunday has bee raised multiple times, and yet many editors are labouring under the impression that it does. These are the facts (briefly):

1. The Daily Mail (including its website) was proscribed in 2017 in an RFC: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_220#Daily_Mail_RfC. There was no mention of Mail on Sunday being subject to this ban.
2. This ban was reaffirmed the following year: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_255#2nd_RfC:_The_Daily_Mail. Again, there is no mention of the Mail on Sunday.
3. The examples brought forward that led to the ban came from The Daily Mail or Mailonline, not the Mail on Sunday from what I can see.
4. Mail on Sunday is not just a sunday edition of The Daily Mail, it is editorially independent i.e. different editors, different writers. Occasionally they even adopt opposing positions (such as on Brexit). They are different newspapers but with a common ownership.
5. Mailonline publishes content from The Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and its own stuff.

The question of the Mail on Sunday has been raised on several occasions:

1. At Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_278#Does_WP:Dailymail_apply_to_the_Mail_on_Sunday the prevailing opinion (summarised by Andy Dingley) is that the ban does not cover the Mail on Sunday namely because it is not stated to apply.
2. At Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_280#Daily_Mail_(sigh,_yes,_again) Newslinger also notes that Mail on Sunday is unaffected by the ban.
3. At Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_311#Clarification:_Does_Daily_Mail_RfC_apply_to_the_Mail_on_Sunday? we have a discussion that explicitly tackles this question, but does not explicitly answer it. Mazca observes that the two publications are editorially independent. He also comments that there is an argument that MoS shares many of the same reliability issues as its sister publication, and that the ban that applies to the online platform acts as a "de facto barrier" to MoS.
4. We now have a situation with David Gerard purging Mail on Sunday references from Wikipedia: see [1], [2], [3] just for a few examples. There are dozens more.

I certainly don't dispute that an argument exists that the Mail on Sunday shares the same reliability issues as its sister publication, as noted by Mazca, but the key word here is argument. The case has not been successfully prosecuted, which must surely mean that the ban does not apply to the MoS if we accept the prevailing opinion they are editorially independent publications. I also don't dispute Mazca's statement that the proscription of the online platform (that houses some MoS content) acts as a de facto barrier. It is statement of fact. If we can't cite Mailonline then the print version of the newspaper must be consulted directly. But Mazca does not state whether the Daily Mail ban explicitly applies to the Mail on Sunday or not. It is certainly being interpreted as such by David Gerard.

I am pinging in all the editors who closed the two Daily Mail RFCs: @Yunshui, Primefac, Sunrise, Jo-Jo Eumerus, Tazerdadog, Vanamonde93, and Ymblanter:.

I appreciate everybody is tired of debating these damn newspapers but can we PLEASE reach a point where the Daily Mail ban either explicitly states it applies to the Mail on Sunday or explicitly states that it does NOT apply to the Mail on Sunday?? If the ban is to encompass the Mail on Sunday then we should proceed with replacing the sources in an orderly fashion. Ripping out content (which is probably 99% good) is not constructive and detrimental to building an encyclopedia. Betty Logan (talk) 09:56, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

As the asker of the clarification request, I understood the result of the discussion as: “MOS is not included in the DM RfCs, but may suffer from the same issues. A new RfC will be required to come to a determination on its status.” Obvious question is: what until then? If it’s got the same reliability issues, we wouldn’t want it being used on wiki, and I doubt there’s much community energy for an RfC on this niche case. I think it’s thus appropriate to treat it with questionable reliability, but not as explicitly deprecated. But I don’t care enough either way. Someone like Newslinger may be better placed to answer the procedural issue. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 10:27, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

I agree with your concerns. I have seen David Gerard's newest approach to the Daily Mail topic. He has now proceeded to strip anything published by the DMG Media company in the past two week. He his now removing the Mail on Sunday, Irish Daily Mail, and Irish Mail on Sunday. The reliable source noticeboard needs to deal with this topic, since numerous long term editors, who have spent years on this project, are being insulted left and right by this automated process. Since, the reliable source noticeboard is what is providing the cover for these actions, the board needs to be very precise about the decisions it is taking. And as far as the Mail on Sunday, no it is not included under the Daily Mail deprecation. Many of us editors who create the content obviously have access to outside newspaper databases and do not need to use the website www.dailymail.co.uk --Guest2625 (talk) 11:02, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

This seems like an overly procedural argument. If they have the same reliability, why the need for endless debates on it? According to WP:RS, part of the core content policy, unreliable sources should not be used (with narrow exceptions, but that's not what we're dealing with here). (t · c) buidhe 11:36, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Also note that there is no assumption that a source is reliable, the WP:ONUS is on those seeking to restore disputed content is to show that the source is reliable. So I ask, what is the evidence that Mail on Sunday, Irish Daily Mail, etc. are reliable sources? (t · c) buidhe 11:38, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Have we not just had this very discussion?Slatersteven (talk) 12:30, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

The prohibition on citing dailymail.co.uk in practice provides a significant de facto barrier to using the Mail on Sunday as a source is what the last discussion said, and your laughable content (which is probably 99% good) flies in the face of reality.

numerous long term editors, who have spent years on this project, are being insulted left and right by this automated process I'd say that the Wikipedia readers are being insulted by the numerous long-term editors using shitty sources, and I know whose side I'm on. --Calton | Talk 12:49, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Citing dailymail.co.uk is indeed a barrier to citing the Mail on Sunday. But it is a technical barrier. In the same way if Wikipedia were only to insist on hardcopy citations. It is misguided to suggest that the MoS is not reliable purely because some of its content is reproduced at MailOnline. On the other hand, it may be reasonable to suggest that it is not reliable because it is plagued by the same problems as Daily Mail. In fairness I am putting a simple question to the administrators who closed the two Daily Mail RFCs: does the consensus also apply to the Mail on Sunday? Some of you may consider this overly procedural. Maybe it is, but I wouldn't be asking if an editor were not deleting vast amounts of content on entirely procedural grounds. Betty Logan (talk) 13:32, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

If anybody in that discussion had made that "barrier" argument, it would have been countered, just as Betty Logan has done, by saying there is a print edition. But nobody did make that argument, or anything remotely similar to it, so "barrier" is not a reflection of consensus, it is merely the closer's opinion. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 14:18, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Is there any evidence that the MoS is a reliable source for anything? Reassuringly, the Sunday Mail doesn't seem to be subject to the restrictions, but as it's a tabloid I wouldn't tend to think of it as a RS. . . dave souza, talk 14:43, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Betty Logan has neglected to link the cause of the present discussion: she used this unreliable tabloid source to reinsert controversial claims about living people, sourced only to this unreliable tabloid, at List of snooker players investigated for match-fixing - apparently in the belief that using this trash source is acceptable as long as it isn't specifically deprecated.

I mentioned this in talk, Betty Logan blindly put the content back after without responding to the material having been challenged (thus not meeting WP:BURDEN, and then claimed the question I raised in talk was about WP:DAILYMAIL rather than her deliberately edit-warring in a reference to an unreliable source when making claims about living people.

I would suggest that even if the MoS is not covered by WP:DAILYMAIL - and not a word of either RFC's conclusion supports it being excluded, and nor does the result of the discussion, which concluded a carve-out would likely need a fresh RFC - that this is WP:POINTy behaviour, and material concerning living persons is absolutely not the place to be doing that - David Gerard (talk) 15:42, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

My primary concern is your interpretation of the RFC consensus. I have raised this same issue with you prior to this latest incident: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_299#dailymail.co.uk_reversion:_eyes_wanted. Your contribution history shows you were engaged in a purge of the Mail on Sunday and justifying it using the Daily Mail RFC. I don't see any attempts to locate an alternative source or raise the issue on the talk page. Removing content in this manner is destructive. Betty Logan (talk) 17:18, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

If you ever think unreliable tabloids are a suitable source for material about living people, you have greatly misunderstood Wikipedia sourcing, and what constitutes "destructive". You appear both unable and unwilling to back up the content you want to edit-war back in, under WP:BURDEN - David Gerard (talk) 17:39, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

You keep calling it "unreliable" but I have not seen any evidence for that position. During the Daily Mail RFC examples were presented of The Daily Mail or its website fabricating stories. Are you able to provide such examples of the MoS doing so? THis IPSI report (page 18) shows that in terms of upheld complaints it is comparable to other other publications in its category. The Sunday Times had more complaints upheld than MoS but I don't see you objecting to that title. It is fairly obvious to me that your actions are motiviated by an agenda against The Daily Mail rather than any objective assessment of MoS's reliability. Betty Logan (talk) 08:26, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

• Speaking as a closer rather than someone who had an a priori opinion on the source; no, the DM RfCs do not extend to the Mail on Sunday, and citing the DM proscription as a reason to remove the Mail on Sunday source isn't appropriate. Conversely, just because it isn't proscribed by the DM RfC does not make the Mail on Sunday a reliable source by default, and the spirit of WP:BURDEN still applies to any content that it is used for, in that the person seeking to include that content needs to demonstrate verifiability. To be honest, for contentious material sourced to the news media, I would want multiple corroborating sources always, unless the first source is of unimpeachable quality. Vanamonde (Talk) 16:02, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

  I've already spoken (and answered) this exact question, but to (again) reiterate, I'm with Vanamonde on this: the RFC related to the Daily Mail and the Daily Mail only. The fact that they share a website is problematic, but if a reference is for the Mail on Sunday then it is inherently not a reference for the Daily Mail. Primefac (talk) 17:59, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

  Agree with Vanamonde and Primefac above - The Mail on Sunday was not covered in the RFCs, and it can be argued seriously (and probably correctly) that it is a fundamentally different source. Therefore the DM RFC does not cover the Mail on Sunday. If you think that the Mail on Sunday is a bad source that should be deprecated or otherwise restricted, you are free to open a fresh RFC to find consensus on that. Tazerdadog (talk) 00:45, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

  I still stand by my comment at User talk:Primefac/Archive 29#The Daily Mail RfC, Again, i.e no unless MoS is part of DM the RfC on the latter does not apply. That's a separate question than whether it's a good idea to use MoS as a reference for something. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:00, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

RfC: Mail on Sunday

What is the reliability of The Mail on Sunday?

• Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
• Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
• Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated

Hemiauchenia (talk) 08:41, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Responses (Mail on Sunday)

• Option 4 The content on mailonline (at https://www.dailymail.co.uk/mailonsunday/index.html) seems to be no different and inseparable from the rest of the outlet, Peter Hitchens has reported favourably on the Douma chemical attack leaks, which are discredited by most mainstream sources. Hemiauchenia (talk) 08:41, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Even for news stories, there's no separate subdomain for MoS stories and the bylines say "for Mailonline", the only way you'd be able to definitively know whether it was a MoS story would be by checking the actual physical newspaper, which wikipedians aren't going to be citing anyway. The TV&Showbiz section which editors find to be the most problematic is displayed right with the news on the MoS section. Hemiauchenia (talk) 08:53, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

The MoS has its own separate domain, https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/, but it's only been cited 11 times per mailonsunday.co.uk  , and provides no separation from the TV&Showbiz section https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/tvshowbiz/index.html, which appears to be the same as the rest of the mailonline, and the website functions as more of a mirror than anything else. Hemiauchenia (talk) 08:58, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

As I write this on a weekday, The content of mailonsunday.co.uk is identical to that of dailymail.co.uk, making it for all intents and purposes a mirror of MailOnline, and so therefore mailonsunday.co.uk should be added to the deprecated domains list regardless of the outcome of the RfC. If the Mail on Sunday is not deprecated, it should be allowed to be cited as a print reference only. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:18, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 I regard Mail on Sunday reliable for the following reasons:

1. It has editorial oversight. independent from The Daily Mail and the website.
2. It has been established that the DM ban does not apply to MoS.
3. During the Daily Mail RFC, examples of the DM fabricating stories were presented. I do not recall any from the MoS.
4. Other reliable sources reference it.
5. The number of complaints upheld by IPSI report (page 18) is comparable to other publications in its category that are generally regarded as reliable sources. The Sunday Times, for example, had more complaints upheld than MoS.
6. MailOnline (which is already proscribed) is a separate entity. It houses content from The Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday but also publishes its own content. This does not confer unreliability on the MoS. This is nothing more than a technical barrier and the print edition can be cited directly.

It may get things wrong occasionally but no more than other comparable titles. No evidence of it fabricating stories has been presented and an objective measure shows that its level of accurate reporting is comparable to other titles deemed reliable. The arguments presented in the above discussion invariably boil down to WP:IDONTLIKEIT and a misunderstanding of the relationship between the Sunday and daily editions and the website. Betty Logan (talk) 09:31, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

There's a couple of lists now of egregious fabrication - please address these (with more case by case specifics than "I feel like it's no worse than others"), even a little bit of this sort of thing seems a massive red flag that would rule it out as being treated as an ordinary WP:NEWSORG - David Gerard (talk) 12:34, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

There are no lists of fabricated stories, just lists of stories that were proven to be factually inaccurate. For example, the story about a "Muslim" gang attacking a van was not fabricated. The incident happened! The MOS was forced to adjust the article because the religion of the perpetrators was based on conjecture. The story about climate change that was prcolaimed "fake news" wasn't fabricated if you look at the article, it was simply inaccurate. Again, the level of complaints upheld against it is not significantly different to other titles, such as The Sunday Times. Betty Logan (talk) 13:33, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

They've been provided right here in this discussion - fabrication of claims, extensive fabrication of quotes, etc - but if you want to pretend they don't exist and think "lalala I can't hear you" and "but whatabout that other paper we're not discussing" is a refutation, you can certainly stay with that. If you want to discuss the Sunday Times, you should start an RFC on that. (And if you didn't actually want to discuss the Sunday Times, then your discussion of it so far is indistinguishable from throwing up chaff.) - David Gerard (talk) 13:41, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

To be fair, the meat of Betty's argument isn't so much that there isn't any incorrect information, just that there isn't any more incorrect information than papers we tend to consider reliable. They aren't saying they 'feel like it's no worse than others' but that there's empirical evidence that it isn't. Bringing up other papers we consider reliable isn't irrelevant. The problem is that the empirical evidence presented is extremely flimsy: the IPSO report is on the number of articles which received complaints, not how accurate they are. The report itself says "newspapers with the highest circulation [...] received the most complaints." It doesn't tell us anything. I was unable to find any empirical reports on the reliability of the Mail on Sunday specifically (if there were any I imagine there'd be no discussion), and all fact-checking websites treat it alongside the Daily Mail. Wikipedia seems to be alone in considering it separately. I think the false information already presented is egregious enough to warrant Option 4 and if other sources we consider reliable have done the same we should stop considering them reliable too. Iesbian (talk) 18:36, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

You're making this seem a lot more reasonable than it is. An outlet that bases significant information on conjecture is not reliable. Other outlets we consider reliable don't do that. Iesbian (talk) 18:42, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4 - it's the same trash from the same sewer, and it always has been - David Gerard (talk) 10:08, 12 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4. Obviously. Examples of false stories published specifically in the Mail on Sunday: In all cases, they only ever published corrections months later when forced to by the Independent Press Standards Organisation. ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 10:56, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

These are not fabricated stories. They are stories containing inaccuracies. Statistically speaking, the MOS on average contains no more inaccuracies than something like The Sunday Times. It had two complaints upheld in 2018: https://www.ipso.co.uk/media/1823/ipso-annual-report-2018.pdf#page=10. Should we proscribe The Sunday Times as well because five complaints were upheld over the same period? Betty Logan (talk) 13:38, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

The false claims are central to the story in every example I've given. IPSO only deals with cases that get referred to them by members of the public and the inaccuracies they investigate can vary in severity which is why we're looking at specific examples. If you can find similarly many examples of egregious journalism in The Times, we can have a discussion about them as well. ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 17:49, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

False or misrepresentative claims usually are central to inaccurate stories. I am not defending these articles. I am pleased the beautician won her case! But are any of your examples more egregious than this sequence of Times stories: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-43887481. It is worth noting that of the 69 stories that received complaints only two were ultimately upheld. The remainder were either not taken up, resolved through other means, or IPSO found in favor of the MoS. I take on board your point that the IPSO cases are just a sample and not a comprehensive vetting of MoS's output, but that is true of the other publications they have ranked too. I think these examples would carry more weight if this were a discussion about a class of sources i.e. a discussion about raising the bar on what constitutes a reliable source. But this is not about raising the bar; it is about purging one particular source that sampled evidence shows is not disproportionately worse than rival titles in the market. Betty Logan (talk) 23:53, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4 The above is enough for me to say 4, rather then 2 or 3.Slatersteven (talk) 11:10, 12 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 Complete trash, per ReconditeRodent and others. This is lipstick on the Daily Mail. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:22, 12 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 – these are not just "stories containing inaccuracies", on the global warming "pause" it made allegations of malpractice while ignoring evidence, and as noted above was eventually forced to publish online the IPSO finding that instead it had based the article on misrepresenting a blog post. Similar misreporting appeared in the MoS in 2012. . . dave souza, talk 17:38, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

References

• Option 4: There are dozens of examples of Mail on Sunday fabrications, but I will list just one, featured in Vogue: Meghan Markle Responds to a Set of Tabloid Rumors --Guy Macon (talk) 20:22, 12 September 2020 (UTC)
• Bad RfC. The list from dave souza above looks like 11 transgressions until you notice that 7 are about the same David Rose article in 2017. The list from David Gerard below is over-the-top with its accusations, e.g. being in fifth place for complaints just ahead of The Guardian doesn't show anything as others have already indicated, and there were no "fabricated claims of anti-Semitism" (the Mail on Sunday did not say Mr Livingstone was anti-Semitic), etc. But the lists do show that Mail on Sunday publishes corrections, and (see WP:RS) "publication of corrections" is a good signal. They are sometimes forced by IPSO but that is a good thing too, the British newspapers that refuse to join IPSO are the contemptible ones if that's what matters. Mail on Sunday is a "well-established news outlet" so WP:NEWSORG tells us it "is generally considered to be reliable for statements of fact", so voting to censor it is a demand to violate WP:RS. Option 4 should not have been proposed. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 01:22, 13 September 2020 (UTC)
  • Here is the article Peter Gulutzan is referring to: Ken Livingstone stokes new Labour anti-Semitism row after dismissing problem as 'lies and smears peddled by ghastly Blairites'. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:43, 13 September 2020 (UTC)
  • Bad counting. Peter Gulutzan at 01:22, 13 September 2020 wrote "The list from dave souza above looks like 11 transgressions until you notice that 7 are about the same David Rose article in 2017" The list was started with 7 items by ReconditeRodent at 10:56, 12 September 2020, and I added four items, two of which were articles covering the same incorrect article by David Rose already covered in item 3 on the list, and mentioned along with other incorrect articles of his in item 4 on the list. I'd already researched it independently, so added my items and tried to indicate two were on the same topic, but evidently not clear enough. In total, the list of 11 items covers 12 transgressions, that is 12 separate articles published by the MoS, some of them repeating false claims by David Rose. Appreciate it's a bit complicated, so miscounting is understandable if rather careless. Hope the following list helps to clarify things. . . dave souza, talk 18:27, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

list for clarification:

1. 31 August 2014, ‘The Mail on Sunday’ featured an article by David Rose which claimed that the rate of decline in Arctic sea ice extent had slowed.

2. MoS accusation "Muslim" gangs 25 July 2015, corrected to just a "gang of youths" 18 September 2015

3. 4–5 February 2017 MoS alleged "World leaders duped by manipulated global warming data", 18 September 2017 MoS forced to publish IPSO correction

4. as 3., plus two subsequent articles on February 12 and February 19 repeated the claims, 22 April 2018 page 2 of MoS print edition concede incorrect, "Corrections to these articles have been published online."
Article also noted IPSO complaints upheld against two other articles.

5. MoS 29 September 2018 "Number 10 probes Remain MPs’ ‘foreign collusion'"

6. MoS June 2019 false claim about "Labour's tax plans", IPSO ruled inaccurate in November, publication of the correction delayed until after the election.

7. MoS December 2017 "rogue beauticians" story, IPSO upheld complaint but correction on wrong page, June 2019, Associated Newspapers agreed to pay damages.

8 article and correction as 3

9 article and correction as 3

10 MoS 29 January 2012 "no warming in last 15 years", refuted by Met Office

11 MoS 14 October 2012 second article claiming "no warming in last 15 years", refuted by Met Office

dave souza, talk 18:27, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

References

• Option 2 - depends on context and whether the discussion is conflating items. The article says this the largest WEIGHT such publication so seems a bit much to exclude it, and seems in the category of popular press so I’m thinking it reasonable to cite for that context and folks are trying to consider it outside the context it would/should be used. Seems obviously “Generally” reliable in the sense of usually having the criteria of editorial control and publication norms and accessibility, and the bulk of stories factual correctness is not in particular question. I don’t think anyone here has put it as the category of 3 generally self-published or blog or sponsored pieces. Category 4 seems excessive - false or fabricated doesn’t seem a correct characterization if people are having to go back to 2012 and 2014 for cases to discuss. Also, much of the discussion above seems to be confusing https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/ and https://www.dailymail.co.uk/mailonsunday/ with https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ or that none of these are actually The Mail on Sunday. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 23:09, 13 September 2020 (UTC)
• Categorise the same as the Daily Mail: there's no substantial difference between the two paper's journalistic values and fact-checking processes, and hence this RfC should not be able to override the stronger, more global consensus to deprecate the Daily Mail. As a second resort, if we are to categorise the Mail on Sunday differently then we must categorise it as option 4 per the compelling evidence presented by ReconditeRodent and David Gerard that it is established practice at the paper to lie and suppress corrections wherever legally possible. — Bilorv (talk) 21:43, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 – 2 - Requires scrutiny but a respected paper that has done much serious reporting unavailable elsewhere. The majority of advocates for "deprecating" the MoS are the same "it's the Daily Mail" line even though it in fact has its own website i.e. Mail on Sunday and a totally separate editorial staff. Ownership by the same company has little if any relevance. Basing your vote on carefully ignoring the facts seems unreasonable to me. Cambial Yellowing❧ 07:02, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4, same or substantially the same editorial policy and authors. Stifle (talk) 12:18, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

This is an incorrect statement. It has been stated multiple times that the Mail on Sunday is its own independent newspaper. This means it has its own staff, journalists, and editorial board. Please read the Mail on Sunday wikipedia article to inform yourself about the newspaper. These are the "authors" as you call them of the Mail on Sunday:

Peter Hitchens

Rachel Johnson

Olly Smith

James Forsyth

Robert Waugh

Piers Morgan

Craig Brown

Tom Parker Bowles

Chris Evans

Ruth Sunderland

Sebastian O Kelly

Liz Jones

Sally Brompton

Sarah Stacey

Mimi Spencer

Jeff Prestridge

John Rees

Ellie Cannon

Jane Clarke

Katie Nicholl

Oliver Holt

Stuart Broad

Patrick Collins

Glenn Hoddle

Michael Owen

Nick Harris

Andrew Pierce

You have also chosen option 4, which means that you are stating that these journalists as a group are involved in writing "false or fabricated information". You have provided no proof of your statement. --Guest2625 (talk) 12:33, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 The Mail on Sunday has a completely separate editorial oversight, staff, office and so on. They are completely different newspapers that compete with each other, but simply have a similar name. I do, however, see the risk of their content being hosted on the MailOnline/DailyMail.com, as they do not have their own website. In which situation I would endorse Option 2 with the condition that the Mail on Sunday remains a reliable source but that the print edition must be the one cited, with online links unacceptable. Ortolan57 (talk) 18:38, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
  • It's hard to see how it's an option 1 given its cited record of fabrication - surely this should be addressed in an opinion worth taking into consideration - David Gerard (talk) 21:11, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4, just as completely divorced from the truth as the regular Daily Mail, despite being nominally seperate. They clearly have the exact same record of lying constantly. Devonian Wombat (talk) 22:05, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 No evidence that this source is any more reliable than the regular DM, and considerable evidence to the contrary. Remember, the onus is on those who are arguing the source can be used to demonstrate that it actually has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy per WP:RS. (t · c) buidhe 08:11, 16 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 or 4 Although the MoS may not be in Breitbart/National Enquirer territory it is clearly generally unreliable as per above comments. A note on comparisons of complaints: if we look at the nature and scale of the inaccuracies in the MoS presented in the lists above and below, and not just how many there were in a given year, it is clear that most of them are serious and relate to central news stories not just marginal human interest stories (major inaccuracies about electoral candidates not corrected until after election, major mischaracterisations of data about climate change) and also that they fit into a pattern of repeating false allegations as part of an ideological campaign (e.g. around climate change, where false statements were repeated despite earlier corrections) or systematically misrepresenting religion/ethnicity (e.g. to generate clickbait buzz by plugging into anti-Muslim panic), and not simple mistakes such as mistyping the number of arrests at the Appleby fair. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:45, 16 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 since not proof has been offered to show the Sunday edition of the mail any more reliable than the daily --Guerillero | Parlez Moi 14:19, 16 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 I wouldn't want anything on Wikipedia based solely on a MoS article, it is too unreliable. If it is valid information it will also appear in more reliable papers like the the Guardian or the Telegraph. Boynamedsue (talk) 14:09, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Putting aside the paper's politics, all wikipedians should recognise that newspapers should never be our first choice for sourcing content and we should prefer neutral academic sources. Use of newspaper sources should usually be a last resort and guided by exercising good judgement. Large parts of what the Mail on Sunday (and the Daily Mail) content are reliable and well-written and were the same content published elsewhere we wouldn't even question it - such as this for example [4]. This pogrom of Daily Mail content has already seen sources being blindly removed even when for our purposes they would be reliably sourced and well-written and it's often to the detriment of articles - and anyone who questions this is shouted down. Editors should be allowed to exercise judgment on a case by case basis, I am firmly opposed to blanket pronouncements such as this related to mainstream media. WCM_email 16:32, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
  • So you're fine with the list of blatant fabrications? - David Gerard (talk) 17:24, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

Apparently you're fine with the "fabrications" of the newspapers you judge to be reliable? Please quit this obviously disingenuous and facetious line of argument - the output of a media outlet should be judged as a whole and not based on cherry-picked examples. FOARP (talk) 14:05, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

The argument "but whatabout these other newspapers that aren't the topic here" isn't regarded as a useful argument on RSN. If you want to discuss those, you should start an RFC about them, listing their fabrications. This discussion is about the Mail on Sunday - David Gerard (talk) 17:50, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Responding to "but the MoS is not less reliable than the Sunday Times according to the metric that you've chosen to ban it" with "then you should start an RFC on banning the Sunday Times" is clearly not an argument made in good faith. We all know that the outcome of such an RFC would be a snow-close for "Option 1" and a possible trip to ANI for whoever chose to waste everyone's time by proposing it. FOARP (talk) 12:11, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

David you clearly chose not to read my comment, so I will reply to your strawman with emphasis added. "all wikipedians should recognise that newspapers should never be our first choice for sourcing content and we should prefer neutral academic sources. Use of newspaper sources should usually be a last resort and guided by exercising good judgement. .... Editors should be allowed to exercise judgment on a case by case basis. You appear obsessed by the Daily Mail and removing any reference to it, often to the detriment of article quality and blind to the reliability of the article. You would remove this for example and are you suggesting that an opinion sourced to David Attenborough becomes unreliable simply because it is published in the DM? WCM_email 16:12, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 As per Curry above and the fact that MOS has a separate editor. The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 06:22, 18 September 2020 (UTC)

  @The C of E: Seeing as you were opposed to the deprecation of the Daily Mail itself (arguing that there was "no need to blacklist a whole publication because of a few opinion pieces that may not be to some tastes") and then argued just two years later that the ban should be lifted because they had "changed", what possible relevance could The Mail on Sunday's editorial independence have? 207.161.86.162 (talk) 04:49, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

This argument essentially boils down to trying to exclude anyone who was in the (substantial) minority in the DM Ban RFC from ever having a say in any future issue related to banning media. FOARP (talk) 12:19, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

I question who this IP is @FOARP: given he seems to have only started editing this year so how can he know about whom said what back when? The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 13:30, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

I don't recall having participated in a previous RfC on the use of the Daily Mail as a source. 207.161.86.162 (talk) 19:03, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

I'm merely questioning the particular argument being used here. Given what The C of E has said in the past, supporting option 1 is consistent, but given their premises, I can't see what relevance the publication's editorial independence could have. Perhaps The C of E can clarify.

But I don't see how what I'm saying would exclude anyone who participated in the past RfCs from having a say here. 207.161.86.162 (talk) 19:03, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

It is a clear attempt to daisy-chain RFCs. "But you didn't agree with the concept of these RFCs so you can't vote Option 1 in this RFC" the argument goes, resulting in a more extreme and less balanced result. FOARP (talk) 12:46, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4 (preferred) because it shares DM staff, history of fabrications, and has the same website as the Daily Mail, complete with "sidebar of shame" and its obsession with objectifying (see also "all grown up"). Failing that, then go with print edition only as no worse than the average tabloid, but still best not to use because tabloid. Guy (help! - typo?) 09:45, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
  • FWIW, not really seeing why the print edition should be presumed less deprecable than the online version - is there a convincing reason? - David Gerard (talk) 11:49, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

David Gerard, convincing? Not sure: depends who you're trying to convince (and obviously here I exclude Brian K Horton and his hosiery drawer). The bar to inclusion means that most of the churnalism on the website doesn't make it into print. The print edition is exactly as biased, and has undoubtedly printed some egregious bollocks, but the level of oversight is at least marginally higher. But you'll note that is my second choice, because my strong preference is to exclude altogether. You cannot trust anything you read on the Mail websites, and that fatally undermines any claim to journalistic integrity for any of its output IMO. Guy (help! - typo?) 11:58, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

fair - I'll certainly agree that if there was an Option 4½, Mail Online would warrant it - David Gerard (talk) 12:26, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

• Bad RFC (or Option 1 if the RFC still goes ahead) - These "let's ban media outlets we don't like" have no link to any actual issue in an article on Wikipedia. They always turn into a forum-style discussion on the perceived good-ness or not of the source itself rather than its reliability in relation to any subject matter. Editors should be free to decide what sources they use through consensus on a case-by-case basis, rather than these pointless blanket bans. Comparisons to reliable sources with exactly the same failings that the news outlet to be deprecated displays are always batted away with "why don't you start an RFC on banning the New York Times then?" (or similar facetiousness). The outcome is pre-determined as soon as the typically right-wing nature of the publication to be banned is highlighted. Rampant double-standards abound especially between UK and US publications. FOARP (talk) 14:05, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

  Seeing as your issue is with the writ-large deprecation of sources generally, isn't that an argument better suited to WT:RS to have Wikipedia:Reliable sources § Deprecated sources amended? I don't see how it's relevant here when we're trying to apply the existing guidelines. 207.161.86.162 (talk) 05:06, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

Since I oppose these blanket bans of regulated media with well-established editorial teams based in countries with robust freedom of speech, then I also oppose banning the MoS and hence am voting on those grounds. FOARP (talk) 12:19, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

hence am voting on those grounds These discussions are not votes; so you appear to be declaring that your statement here is explicitly not about the MoS as a source, and hence meaningless in the discussion. The process of deprecation was itself ratified in an RFC; if you want to remove it, then you would need to run an RFC to do so - David Gerard (talk) 14:45, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

You're trying to make any opposition to this steady banning of sources invalid ab initio. Sorry, doesn't work that way. I note you haven't answered my point below about your deletion campaign deleting even WP:ABOUTSELF statements by the MoS (explicitly allowed even under the DM 2017 RFC close) which is a prime example of how this isn't about content, or what has been specifically decided in RFCs, but about getting something you can use to justify a mass-deletion campaign against a publication you dislike. FOARP (talk) 15:26, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

Your other question is you whatabouting the issue - this is a discussion of the Mail On Sunday, not of me. If you have a point to make about the Mail On Sunday, it needs to be a point about the Mail On Sunday. If you can't make a point about the quality of the Mail On Sunday as a source - and you've just said above that you're not making a point about the Mail On Sunday, you're trying to reverse the idea of deprecation of sources, which is an action that's been ratified at RFC. You can keep on trying to flail about to distract from the point, but if you're not addressing the question then you're just making noise. You don't even understand that this isn't a vote, so I can't say that you are even proceeding in bad faith, but you don't appear to be proceeding competently - David Gerard (talk) 18:03, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

1. It's not 'whatabouting' the issue. You're trying to referee the discussion, which given the magnitude of your involvement is totally inappropriate. If you fail to understand this, then that would render you patently unqualified to have any weight be given to your statements regarding reliability (since that would mean that you lack a fundamental understanding of what reliability even is).

2. Comparisons with other sources are NOT irrelevant to this discussion, and telling editors to 'go start an RFC about The Times' or whatever is flat out disruptive. GENERAL RELIABILITY is RELATIVE. We should not be applying different sets of standards to sources we don't like than the sources we like. Furthermore, your 'suggestion' is a non sequitur, and is clearly in bad faith, because every one of us knows that will NEVER happen. Firejuggler86 (talk) 23:28, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

Agree with FOARP. It's unfortunate because blanket bans will come back to haunt us in the future for a number of reasons. This is not to say there are not problems with sources, but every source article should be evaluated and never site banned. -- GreenC 16:12, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4 As per ReconditeRodent. Autarch (talk) 15:59, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 per others, they make corrections and the volume of problems is not severe. -- GreenC 16:12, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 - generally reliable newspaper. The Mail on Sunday had a relatively low number of complaints based on the ipso statistics. The number of complaints was similar to its competitor the Sunday Times. It’s a respected newspaper that has a number of notable contributors. Other newspapers quote it. The paper is conservative leaning so care is required on political topics. --Guest2625 (talk) 05:48, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3, prefer 4 I kept being surprised that this was still being employed as a source following the Daily Mail deprecation. Tabloids are bad sources, and this is on the bottom layer of tabloids, sharing staff and large amounts of content (and apparently its philosophy and veracity) with the Daily Mail. The above examples of fabrication and evasion require some pretty dedicated scampering to ignore. We are an encyclopedia and must be able to exclude material that has a high chance of being misrepresented or made up. If an item is of wider impact, we can use one of many other sources; if it is MoS exclusive, we run the risk of it having been blown up into some chimaera in order to add another five points to the headline size. Do not need. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 14:29, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4. The list of issues above is persuasive. The reason why full depreciation rather than unreliability is called is twofold. First, the "errors" highlighted above are all in one direction and all reflect the biases of the Mail's owners (its "errors" are inevitably stuff that eg. downplays global warming, paints Muslims or Labour in a bad light, bolsters the Tories, and so on); this, combined with the tendency to slow-walk corrections or neglect them entirely, suggests that, regardless of the (still uncited?) claims of editorial independence, it is subject to the same forces, in the same way, that make the Daily Mail itself unreliable. Bias is acceptable in a source, and occasional errors are not an issue; but repeated errors, in the same direction, which consistently reflect the biases of the owner suggest a systematic problem that makes it hard to justify using them as a source - there is simply every reason to think that their overriding goal is to advance their owners' political agenda at the expense of fact-checking or accuracy. Second, they fit the same criteria that made depreciation of the original Daily Mail necessary in that they are clearly not reliable due to the above, yet a vocal minority of editors insists that it can be used - and not merely that it can be used, but that it is somehow an exemplary source (note how the opinions here split between overwhelming numbers of people favoring depreciation and people saying it is generally reliable, with so little in-between.) That is the sort of situation that requires a decisive conclusion, since it is plain some people will continue to try and use it as a source everywhere unless there is an unambiguous decision saying they can't. Finally, in case it comes up - given that this discussion focuses on the parallels between the Mail and the Mail on Sunday and how those seem to stem from its ownership, I would suggest that whatever decision we reach here ought to apply to any outlets owned by Daily Mail and General Trust, at least by default (Metro, the other major paper they own, is already listed as generally unreliable.) It is clear from these discussions and the examples above that the root problem is the owners and not the individual editorial boards. --Aquillion (talk) 21:53, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

To deprecate a whole media publishing group is very problematic. It's merely indicative of the slippery slope that Wikipedia is heading down with its whole deprecation process. The next thing to appear on this board will be an attempt to ban the Rupert Murdoch publishing group. The problem with this board and its perennial sources list is that it has a legitimacy problem. Were all the editors individually notified on their talk page who will be directly affected by this upcoming Mail on Sunday decision? If not, this local group decision has a legitimacy problem. And a vague RFC advert in the wiki-jungle doesn't cut it. Those editors who used the source have a right to defend their decision. And, the only way to defend your decision is to be notified. I know for a fact that a group of editors who are in the middle of a content dispute over the Mail on Sunday have not been notified. This is very problematic.

It's not complicated for me. The complaint statistics of the the Sunday Times and Mail on Sunday are the same. The Sunday Times has also made a number of significant corrections. All this information was provided below. What the Sunday Times does better is that it has a more sophisticated writing style, since it targets the professional upper class. The Mail on Sunday is targeted towards the middle class. Option 2 I certainly can understand, since this is similar to how many American editors view Fox (which has some parallels to the politics and biases of the Mail on Sunday). Even option 3 would be understandable for people who cannot bear any publication which makes an error. But option 4 would mean the newspaper is worse than a self-published source. It would mean the highest selling Sunday newspaper, which won newspaper of the year in 2019 and has a number of notable writers, cannot be even used for its review of a theatre play which is gross and absurd. Fortunately, what is happening with the British media market on this board cannot be done to the American media market which has a much larger and more diverse pool of Wikipedia editors who use it. --Guest2625 (talk) 07:08, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

Whole heartedly agree with this view. That the editors who have actually used the MoS as a source have not been notified is a legitimacy issue with this RFC. That they are excluded is an inevitable product of this RFC being completely divorced from actual content issues with articles. Engaging with the actual use of the MoS on Wiki would mean acknowledging that a lot of the present use (which is not high) is simply WP:ABOUTSELF (e.g., the edit by David Gerard linked above where he deleted even the mere mention that a book had been MoS book of the week, claiming that this was justified by the DM ban which explicitly allows "about-self" use), or completely uncontroversial. The double standard between UK and US media outlets, let alone between UK outlets and those of China or Iran, is as palpable as it is absurd. Responding to clear evidence that the MoS has had no more complaints upheld against it than the Sunday Times with "well then you should start an RFC to ban the Sunday Times" is not arguing in good faith. FOARP (talk) 12:41, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4 - I would think that because The Mail on Sunday is just the weekend branding of Daily Mail that it'd fall under the existing restrictions there, but nonetheless, they still seem to have a desperate use of trigger words, sensationalism, low-quality fact checking and having been the source most sanctioned by UK regulators (source which says "The Daily Mail is used here to include the Daily Mail, the Mail on Sunday...") three years in a row (source). ItsPugle (please ping on reply) 01:59, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

It has been explained multiple times that the Mail on Sunday, Metro, i (originally a sister newspaper of The Independent), and also Daily Mail are all separate newspapers. This means that the newspapers have separate staff, journalists, and editorial boards. These different newspapers are published by DMG Media which itself is owned by the media company DMGT. It is normal for media companies to own multiple titles. See for instance Rupert Murdoch's News Corp which owns Dow Jones & Company (publisher of 'of the Wall Street Journal, MarketWatch and Barron's), News UK (publisher of The Sun and The Times), and book publisher HarperCollins.

Also it is not clear why you provided links to two blogs about the IPSO statistics, when below is the complete IPSO table for 2018. The table clearly shows that the Mail on Sunday did not rank poorly. Please uncollapse the green bar below that says table and trust your own eyes. The only thing I do want to quote from one of your blogs is the following:"Sunday Times Forced to Admit to Fake Antisemitism Smears". That sounds like a major faux pas that the Mail on Sunday's competitor made, just like that little faux pas that the New Statesman made in regards to the Roger Scruton interview that we just discussed on this reliable source board. It is unfortunate that generally reliable sources sometimes make faux pas. --Guest2625 (talk) 10:27, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

@Guest2625: Would you be able to link to the discussion that ended in a consensus that the staff etc are different and that there's absolutely no commonality between the two? I think you'll also notice that the source I provided is from 2019, not 2018. Associated Newspapers Limited, which owns Metro, Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, Mail Online, even says in their annual report that Mail Online shares editorial content, lawyers, and replies to complaints to IPSO on behalf of Mail on Sunday. ItsPugle (please ping on reply) 06:17, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

The Wikipedia article on the Mail on Sunday explains that it is its own newspaper. It is stated there that the newspaper has its own staff and editor. The blog you provided is from 2019; however, it's referencing the IPSO complaint statistics from 2018. This is a quote from the blog:[5] "In terms of total number of sanctions, the top seven reached 90 between them across 2018. This is slightly better than 2017’s total of 115, but up on the 62 offences committed in 2016." As you'll note the blog's most recent numbers are the 2018 IPSO statistics, which are provided in clear detail in the table below from the 2018 IPSO report on page 18. So for clarification again, the chief editor of the Mail on Sunday, as stated in the Wikipedia article, is Ted Verity and these are the current writers for the newspaper:

Peter Hitchens

Rachel Johnson

Olly Smith

James Forsyth

Robert Waugh

Piers Morgan

Craig Brown

Tom Parker Bowles

Chris Evans

Ruth Sunderland

Sebastian O Kelly

Liz Jones

Sally Brompton

Sarah Stacey

Mimi Spencer

Jeff Prestridge

John Rees

Ellie Cannon

Jane Clarke

Katie Nicholl

Oliver Holt

Stuart Broad

Patrick Collins

Glenn Hoddle

Michael Owen

Nick Harris

Andrew Pierce

Since the owners of the Mail on Sunday have multiple papers, it would not be surprising, if they used the same legal staff for the different papers. I read the Associated Newspapers Limited 2019 annual report hereand here, but I wasn't able to find your statement about sharing editorial content and complaint reply in the report. Could you provide me with a link to the annual report that you read and the relevant page number. --Guest2625 (talk) 08:33, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 How much confidence can really be taken from a debate where even basic pertinent details, such as whether or not the Sunday edition has a separate editorial staf , cannot seemingly be settled a priori? I note too, the complete lack of impeccable sources like the Columbia Journalism Review. These have been used when debating the reliability of Fox and the New York Post in this foraaa , so their absence here, given the claims that basically cast the MoS as a step change worse, rings alarm bells as far as the potential for bias goes. Jack B Williamson (talk) 18:32, 3 October 2020 (UTC) — Jack B Williamson (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

  The Columbia Journalism Review is a US based outlet and generally doesn't cover the UK press so the lack of coverage by that outlet is irrelevant. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:43, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

  I have struck the contribution from the boring sockpuppet. --JBL (talk) 21:22, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 I think generally news media shouldn’t be considered reliable by it self. Citing facts from news is not how it works in the real world. You need to also consider other sources. A body of news sources together give weight, but it is still in the news. I read newspapers and enjoy, but that is mostly because I think. The narrative that we need to fact check the media is a construction. This RfC I think is created to ease some admin work, and that is perfectly OK. They already banned publications that can easily be mistaken, because of the architecture of the web address. I understand it’s a mess. I don’t like the options. I think option 1 and 4 are divisive provocations for the trenches. And option 2 and 3 are vague. What does even option 3 mean? Mysteriumen•♪Ⓜ ^•♪talk _{♪• look} 22:41, 7 October 2020 (UTC)
  • If, as you say, you don't in fact understand the question, it's not clear this helps form an informed consensus - David Gerard (talk) 06:39, 8 October 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 It is clear that the Mail on Sunday, while technically independent editorially, shares ownership and agenda with the Daily Mail. While this alone is not enough to deprecate the paper, it is relevant because the Mail on Sunday also appears to share the bad habits of fabricating claims about living people and publishing lies, bad information and untrustworthy speculation. I am sure that they often publish good and true information, but I am also sure that they publish outright false information which, I believe, they often know to be untrue. For the use of the MoS as a source on Wikipedia, they surely therefore have to be considered unreliable and deprecated. It would be inconsistent to come to any other conclusion. I think it is also important to acknowledge that the Daily Mail as well as the MoS make their 'mistakes' in a very particular direction, which is aimed propping up the Conservative party (and perhaps occasionally offshoots of it) and putting down Labour as well as any right-wing movement which may become a threat to the Conservative party. Downfall Vision (talk) 13:30, 9 October 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 per Aquillion and others. Glee^anon 06:46, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 – Notwithstanding ReconditeRodent's links, which would be reason enough by themselves, the Mail on Sunday should still be excluded due to its association with the Daily Mail. Even if it were more reliable than its parent newsletter, the fact that it's owned by the same company will inherently detract from its credibility as a source. Kurtis ^(talk) 08:49, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

This argument about deprecating a source because of company ownership makes no sense. Rupert Murdoch's News UK owns The Sun and The Times. Do you feel that The Times should be deprecated because Wikipedia has deprecated The Sun? This is the argument that you are making. --Guest2625 (talk) 08:48, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

This argument actually makes complete sense in my opinion. Perhaps an unconventional view, but I would argue that indeed The Times should be viewed with suspicion given its shared ownership with a deprecated source and perhaps should be seen as unreliable based on that fact alone. It is not that The Times should be deprecated because The Sun has been deprecated, but that The Times should be viewed with suspicion based entirely on its strong association with a deprecated source. I think we should set the precedent that when media outlets share ownership, they should be viewed to share reputation. Rupert Murdoch and his media empire obviously do not take issue with their papers printing falsehoods, so why should we trust them? In the same vein, the MoS shouldn't be deprecated only because of its association with the Daily Mail, but it should be viewed as unreliable based on that fact alone. Separately, the MoS should be deprecated because it has be shown to have published multiple falsehoods and lies. I think Wikipedia could benefit from a more suspicious outlook on news media in general. Downfall Vision (talk) 11:42, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Honestly, this is the argument under which the MoS is basically getting taken down: guilt by association. Stating that THE newspaper of record - The Times - should be banned, basically just because it's British and leans to the right politically. FOARP (talk) 11:41, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

I probably should have made this clear from the start, but I was referring more to the fact that there is significant overlap between the editorial control over the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday. Murdoch does own the Times, but he makes it clear that he has no control over the stories they print. Kurtis ^(talk) 22:53, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4 There is nothing in there that you can't find through a more reliable source in the UK. There is no loss to wikipedia to not having this as "source". Albertaont (talk) 04:53, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 or 4, it is the same publisher as the Daily Mail. There are better sources in the UK. Vici Vidi (talk) 05:35, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3; pushing 4 Daily Mail and MoS may share the same publisher but IIRC editorial staff are different Nightfury 10:21, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3 the Mail on Sunday may technically have different editorial staff but clearly has very similar outlooks on how a paper should behave. The editorial oversight does not appear to be 'meaningful' and the opinions often seem to be on the fringes of British politics. On the other hand, where it is worth citing viewpoints from columnists especially where they are part of a significant minority it should be considered reliable for their opinions. For example, Hitchens is a experienced foreign commentator who has won the Orwell Prize and as such his views on Syria may be worth mentioning. El komodos drago (talk to me) 13:14, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3 I agree with most of the other voters. It's owned by the same company that owns Daily Mail. Although their editorial stuff is different, it looks like it has the same quality and the tendentious writing Daily Mail has.Lordpermaximum (talk) 18:09, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4: This needs to be the end of it. No more Daily Mail discussions. It's not an acceptable source, ever, and anything in its domain is unreliable as well. Toa Nidhiki05 20:55, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

That people keep raising this topic is not, at all, a logical reason to block a source that is not the Daily Mail nor managed by the same people. It will also not end the discussion because the people who keep raising this topic can not stop raising it - they simply move the goal-posts. Hence the recent discussion on the DM in the past being an RS because banning the DM of recent decades wasn't enough for them. Additionally, saying "we should ban this source to stop discussions about banning it" is essentially a WP:BLACKMAIL position.

The only thing that will end these discussion is requiring an actual link to an actual issue with the actual content of an actual article that is actually on Wiki, since none of these discussion are related to article-content and none would go forward if it were a requirement. FOARP (talk) 10:47, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

It's not even remotely a blackmail position, for starters, it isn't threat and it isn't tied to the outcome of the RFC. It is perfectly fair for editors to be left with a bad taste in their mouth from past Daily Mail discussions, not least because it published an article slamming the editors that !voted for its removal the first time. El komodos drago (talk to me) 20:28, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

I agree with FOARP. No argument has been provided in this opinion for deprecation. In this request for comment, two flawed arguments have been presented for deprecation: the mutual ownership argument and the cherry-picked complaint argument.

The mutual ownership argument states that because the Mail on Sunday is owned by DMGT, which also publishes a deprecated newspaper, that the Mail on Sunday should be similarly deprecated. This argument is flawed when it is realized that the Mail on Sunday's competitor the Sunday Times faces this same issue. The Sunday Times is owned by News UK, which also publishes the deprecated newspaper The Sun. No one is proposing to use the mutual ownership argument to deprecate the Sunday Times.

The cherry-picked complaint argument presents a few complained about articles from the newspaper (in the past ten years the Mail on Sunday has published over 400,000 articles) and then concludes that the newspaper should be deprecated. This argument is flawed given that the full IPSO complaint statistics have been presented below. The full set of complaint statistics indicate that the Mail on Sunday had few complaints and ranked similar to its competitor the Sunday Times. No one is proposing to use the cherry-picked complaint argument to deprecate the Sunday Times even though a number of cherry-picked complaints against it were presented below.

Just to re-emphasize the flawed nature of the second argument, let's use the argument to cherry-pick the IPSO complaint database on another competitor the Daily Telegraph. Here's is a set of serious article complaints against the Daily Telegraph: multiple cases of falsification to inflame hatred towards Muslims, falsification to inflame racial hatred, multiple cases of falsification to label others as antisemitic, falsification to smear environmentalists, distortion to harm the Labour Party, multiple cases of falsification to support Brexit, blatant antisemitism (article stated: “Only three countries on the planet don’t have a central bank owned or controlled by the Rothschild family”, and listed: Cuba, North Korea, and Iran.), numerous cases of bad science. Does this board really plan on deprecating the Telegraph. We should avoid bad science (i.e. the cherry-picking argument) and use the full IPSO complaint statistics that have been presented below. --Guest2625 (talk) 07:32, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

Sources
References

• Option 2 This is a bad/malformed RfC. Judge each reference on its own merits seems to be the best option of those presented. Mike Peel (talk) 18:47, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
• Same as the Daily Mail. Currently, this means option 4. Substantially similar content. The "sidebar of shame" on the Mail on Sunday (named "Don't Miss") includes the same articles as the "sidebar of shame" in the Daily Mail (titled "Femail Today"), except in a different order. The articles listed in https://www.dailymail.co.uk/mailonsunday link to other subdirectories on dailymail.co.uk; none of the ones I checked had any identifier that would distinguish them from Daily Mail articles. The community has already deprecated the Daily Mail in the high-participation 2017 RfC, and the decision was reaffirmed in the high-participation 2019 RfC. As the Mail on Sunday publishes substantially the same content, and even reuses articles (e.g. the sidebar articles) from the Daily Mail, it should be treated the same way. — Newslinger talk 09:34, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

The reliable source noticeboard is supposed to be frequented by individuals who are specialists in investigating sources. Surfing briefly around the Mail Online website is not called investigating a source. Go to the corner newsstand if you live in the UK and pick up the Mail on Sunday and see for yourself that it is its own newspaper. A list of the writers and editor of the Mail on Sunday has been presented now twice, what other proof do you need. If you do not live in the UK, go to your library and get access to microfiche of the Mail on Sunday or one of the numerous online databases that has it. The Gale database for instance has access to the Mail on Sunday. The online website provides access to only some of the articles. If you want to know if an article is by the Mail on Sunday, read the byline, that's why they are there. An example of an article that is by the Mail on Sunday is this one "My defence of Julian Assange - a man I abhor. It ended badly the time they met yet Peter Hitchens argues extraditing the WikiLeaks boss to the US violates British sovereignty, threatens press freedom and is nothing less than a politically motivated kidnap". Note the byline where it says "by Peter Hitchens for the Mail on Sunday". --Guest2625 (talk) 04:42, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Insulting the many editors who have carefully weighed the evidence and who disagree with you isn't exactly productive. There is a strong consensus that The Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday are substantively the same and should be treated the same way. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:07, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

BTW, do you have an explanation for this?[6] Or this?[7] Or this?[8] --Guy Macon (talk) 05:15, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

(...Sound of Crickets...) --Guy Macon (talk) 09:32, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm not criticising the "editors who have carefully weighed the evidence and who disagree" on the reliability of the source. Carefully weighing the different arguments is important so we can get to a consensus. If this was not a consensus building process that involved evidence and reason, we could save time and just have a straight vote. As far as your belief that the Mail on Sunday is not its own newspaper, you are wrong. The Mail on Sunday has its own writing staff and editor, newspaper databases archive it as its own newspaper, ipso regulates it as its own newspaper, and its wiki article indicates that it is its own newspaper.

As concerns your btw, I was wondering when this board was going to have a request for comment on the Daily Telegraph. The cherry pickings from the ipso complaint database are concerning. In fact, the cherry picking argument can be done with all the newspapers that are regulated and have their complaints stored in the ipso database. That is why any scientifically literate person knows to look at the full set of statistics.

The Guardian was wise not to have itself regulated by ipso, so it could more easily hide article complaints. However, it's well known that the Guardian is a falsifier. Once again we come to Julian Assange the darling of the 2000s, of the open information movement, and the left that is until he betrayed them. And this is how the left got back at him: The Guardian’s summary of Julian Assange’s interview went viral and was completely false Those who want to combat Fake News should stop aggressively spreading it when it suits their agenda. I think I would like to be able to quote Peter Hitchen's and the Mail on Sunday and not have to depend on the Guardian as being the sole gatekeeper to the supermax prison cell. --Guest2625 (talk) 09:29, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

The vast majority of citations of the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday are not referencing physical issues. In almost all cases, editors are not going to the library and using microfiche before citing the source. Instead, nearly all citations to the Mail on Sunday include a link to an article that was originally linked from the official websites of the Mail on Sunday: https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk and https://www.dailymail.co.uk/mailonsunday. Those websites mostly host and/or link to other Daily Mail content. The 2017 and 2019 RfCs took place over multiple months, and were closed by panels – the RfCs show that the community consensus is to deprecate the Daily Mail, which differs from your opinion. As the Daily Mail has already been identified as a generally unreliable source, there is no reason to trust a website that mostly uses Daily Mail content. Any website that republishes such a large quantity of Daily Mail content inherits the general unreliability of the Daily Mail. Edit filters work through URL matching, and when the articles on https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk or https://www.dailymail.co.uk/mailonsunday mostly duplicate content from the Daily Mail, that means the edit filter that applies to the Daily Mail should also apply to these websites. If, in some rare situation, an editor is citing an old physical/microfiche edition of Mail on Sunday that is not available online, that citation is not affected by edit filters, and is partially covered by "The Daily Mail may have been more reliable historically" from the 2017 RfC.

Finally, the volume of your 16+ comments in this discussion has the effect of bludgeoning the process. Not everyone is going to agree with you, and repeating your arguments so many times does not improve the strength of your position. — Newslinger talk 22:53, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Newslinger - WP:BLUD is seemingly being used as a bludgeon here. Guest2625 is not even nearly the most prolific commenter on this board - that's more likely to be David Gerard (20+ comments in total on the MoS discussion). WP:BLUD is, anyway, just an essay (Guy Macon tried to upgrade it to supplementary guideline but that was - very correctly in my view - reversed). It has also recently been updated to highlight that repetition, and not mere volume of comments, is typically the heart of WP:BLUD. FOARP (talk) 10:28, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Newslinger - It seems like the main concern with the source is its url and technical issues regarding an edit filter. Verifiability does not require an online link. They are provided as a convenience to the reader. In fact most citations on wikipedia do not have them. When editors create content, they generally use books, magazines, journals, and newspapers, which they either access through the library or paywalled online databases. It is only for current affairs material that editors use online search engines like google news that provides urls for online newspapers to do their research. Current affairs being news happening in the past month or so. --Guest2625 (talk) 07:32, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 - Mail on Sunday should generally be considered reliable for all articles ~9 months or older. Such articles have had time for complaints to make their way through the system and be fixed. Articles younger than 9 months should receive extra caution in BLP situations where controversy could be involved. With respect to Hunter Biden stuff just coming out it would be best to wait and see if the material they publish proves reliable or is disproved in the coming months.--Epiphyllumlover (talk) 04:49, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 It's just another newspaper. The details have to be considered on a case-by-case basis, not with a draconian, one-size-fits-all blanket rule. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:40, 3 November 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 I don't think it's fair to judge Mail on Sunday's reliability based on the owner of Daily Mail. Their editorials and articles have been overseen by experienced people. It's a reputable newspaper, not to be confused with Daily Mail.Magnus Dominus (talk) 20:25, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Discussion (Mail on Sunday)

• I am tired of discussing the Daily Mail as much as anyone else, so hopefully after this there will be no more need for any RfC's on the topic. Hemiauchenia (talk) 08:41, 12 September 2020 (UTC)
  • Please specify that this covers all editions at all URLs for all purposes - otherwise someone will be along making excuses as they already do with the DM: "oh, the Shetlands edition has some different staff", "but you didn't specifically mention articles on trainspotting", "but I like this guy", "but exceptions exist so I'm claiming this as an exception", etc., etc., etc - David Gerard (talk) 12:40, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

If the Mos and Daily Mail are both deprecated, it automatically covers all DM domains. Hemiauchenia (talk) 13:34, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Including This is Money? Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:37, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

This Is Money is in its own words the "financial website and money section of the MailOnline", so is covered by WP:DAILYMAIL - David Gerard (talk) 22:11, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

In fact, I see that you already asked this precise question before, and that was the answer then too, so it's entirely unclear why you're asking again - David Gerard (talk) 22:12, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

That was one response from you that was not mentioned in the closing statement. I am open to hearing from other editors. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 22:21, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

• Here's about half an hour's quickest casual search. I'm sure if I put actual effort in, the list would be far longer. If anyone has their own lists of the MoS's mission to spread nonsense that we absolutely cannot trust as a source for encyclopedic content, please post them.

• A pile of distorted and fabricated claims about the EU: [9]
• Fabricated front-page claims of "foreign collusion" by Remain MPs [10]
• Fifth in the list for PCC complaints, 2013 [11]
• Fabrication about claimed BMA guidelines for doctors [12]
• Capital gains tax fabrication, IPSO rules as "serious breach" [13]
• Fabricated claims of anti-Semitism [14]
• Defamatory attack on individual [15]
• IPSO: "significantly misleading" [16]
• Fabrication of quotes in interview (the MoS cannot be trusted for quotes any more than the DM) [17]

The MoS is lying rubbish just as much as the DM is, it just pretends not to be. A trash-tier tabloid that tells gullible readers it's a newspaper of record - David Gerard (talk) 10:38, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Some of those are not the best sources but I find (5) and (8) to be particularly alarming at a glance. Would you/someone mind digging up if the paper version, ie not MailOnline, has the same issues? And can we clarify if we’ve got this issue just in politics-related reporting or in other topics as well? ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 10:56, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

No idea if it's in the paper version, but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't distinguish on that - some of the above are paper version specifically. Nor on politics, e.g. the irresponsible lies about the beautician - David Gerard (talk) 12:33, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

David observe how I presented the errors made by the Sunday Times. Now look at the way you presented the errors made by the Mail on Sunday. I have used completely neutral language. I merely stated these are some errors made by the Sunday Times. And then quoted the completely neutral ruling of the IPSO committe. You on the other hand have used completely loaded language. Do you think that me or anyone else could not also use such loaded and over-the-top language that you are using? Your language is reaching for the reader's senses, my language is intended to reach for the reader's mind. I believe it is better when we are trying to find the truth through debate that we use the language of reason. --Guest2625 (talk) 02:12, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

I haven't studied yet the different sources that David Gerard has provided for his case, but I did look at Betty Logan's table which is quite rigorous and not prone to cherry picked examples. I provided a copy of the IPSO table below.

Table

IPSO Annual Report 2018 No. of articles complained about No. of Rejected complaints in remit Rejected Not pursued by complainant Resolved by IPSO mediation Resolved directly with publication Upheld Not upheld 1 MailOnline 503 213 135 5 16 34 9 14 2 Daily Mail 313 129 112 2 4 6 1 4 3 thesun.co.uk 178 88 53 1 6 22 2 4 4 The Sun 155 96 59 3 3 17 6 8 5 The Times 124 92 68 3 5 6 2 8 6 mirror.co.uk 102 48 25 1 2 13 4 3 7 The Daily Telegraph 78 58 37 7 2 4 1 7 8 Metro.co.uk 75 37 27 1 2 7 0 0 9 express.co.uk 71 50 28 1 4 12 5 0 10 The Mail on Sunday 69 37 27 2 2 2 2 2 11 The Sunday Times 58 52 33 2 5 2 5 5 12 Daily Express 48 30 21 2 0 1 3 3 13 Daily Mirror 40 20 13 0 1 2 2 2 14 dailyrecord.co.uk 36 22 16 0 1 1 0 4 15 Daily Record 34 22 15 1 1 2 2 1 16 The Argus (Brighton) 29 7 5 0 0 1 0 1 17 Metro 28 16 13 1 0 1 1 0 18 The Spectator 25 18 15 0 0 0 2 1 19 walesonline.co.uk 25 10 7 0 0 2 0 1 20 Telegraph.co.uk 24 9 9 0 0 0 0 0

The results are quite informative. --Guest2625 (talk) 14:10, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Yes, but MailOnline includes the MoS's online content, and we aren't citing the physical newspapers. Using single digit "Upheld" is a weak metric for reliability. Hemiauchenia (talk) 14:21, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

We have in fact cited the physical newspapers quite a lot - most content before 2000 isn't on dailymail.co.uk, for example - and I'd have expected the RFCs covered those - David Gerard (talk) 14:33, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

That's getting into "was the Mail more reliable historically" territory, which was discussed in the last RfC. Hemiauchenia (talk) 14:36, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for table, but I don’t get it. There’s plenty of reliably sourced examples above of unreliable reporting by MOS, so why are numbers relative in table (which should be quite complete) so low? Are reports in MailOnline including problems with MOS (“paper edition”)? To clarify (as I don’t get their structure personally), is MailOnline actually the digital version (ie, word for word) of the paper newspapers? Or is it separate reporting? Further, are all stories in the MOS available word for word on MailOnline, and all MOS stories on MailOnline word for word the ones in the paper edition? And there’s no stories on MailOnline credited to MOS which don’t appear in the paper edition? ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 22:02, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Because IPSO complaints are not the be-all and end-all of whether a source should be deprecated in Wikipedia, and IPSO is widely regarded as a captured regulator. I don't know how many stories from MoS make it into one of print and paper but not the other, but either would count as MoS - David Gerard (talk) 22:15, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Sure but I just expected the number to be higher, or at least the number of filed complaints to be higher (in table, it's comparable to The Sunday Times, which doesn't seem right). I think any reliability of the paper copy is relevant though. If it's just MailOnline (which is covered under existing RfCs anyway) it shouldn't be a big issue and this RfC is moot. If the paper copy has reliability issues too, then the RfC is important. So if there's a distinction of content, really this RfC should be focused on if the paper version is equally as crappy. I've never read a copy of the MOS (tabloids with gossip covers aren't quite my thing) so I'm not saying if it's reliable or not, just that the focus should be on the paper component (if it differs). At a skim, looks like a couple of the links by dave souza above are content also included in the paper copy, though. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 23:30, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

• I'm confused David. In your above critique, two of your points use IPSO to criticize the Mail on Sunday. Now after the IPSO table for 2018 is presented, you state that "IPSO complaints are not the be-all and end-all of whether a source should be deprecated". This is truly some ironman logic. --Guest2625 (talk) 06:47, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Since, some people are advocating for deprecating/banning the Mail on Sunday, I thought it would be useful to provide a sampling of some notable journalists and writers who write or have written for the Mail on Sunday.
Some notable Mail on Sunday writers:

• Peter Hitchens
• Liz Jones
• Piers Morgan
• Tom Parker Bowles
• Chris Evans
• David Mellor
• Dan Hodges
• Anna Mikhailova
• Derek Draper
• John Junor
• Julie Burchill
• Austin Mitchell
• Norman Tebbit
• Suzanne Moore
• Rachel Johnson
• Frank Barrett

It would be a loss to the neutrality of Wikipedia if editors were not able to mention the opinion of some of these notable writers from the right-leaning Mail on Sunday, which is the highest selling Sunday newspaper in Britain. It's hard for me to believe that the Quillete or Iranian Press TV, which both received option 3 from this board, are of better quality than the Mail on Sunday. I cannot see how the Mail on Sunday is equivalent to Breitbart News or the National Enquirer, which received option 4 from this board. Wikipedia which is neutral does its readers a disservice by not allowing the opinions of conservative British commentators to be voiced. --Guest2625 (talk) 06:23, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

These are opinion pieces, not quality journalism about facts, and as such are subject to the care needed when using any opinion pieces. Wikipedia:Deprecated sources#Acceptable uses of deprecated sources states that "Deprecated sources can normally be cited as a primary source when the source itself is the subject of discussion, such as to describe its own viewpoint." If the viewpoint of these commentators is valuable, they can be "voiced" subject to the conditions in WP:ABOUTSELF. It's not a blanket ban. . . dave souza, talk 03:49, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

As a side note: it is not ok to cherry pick corrections to build one's case, when there is a very clean and precise comparative table available with complaint and accuracy data. I believe many of the above editors are not aware at how problematic their method of analysis is. I believe the best way for me to show the problem with cherry picking reported errors is to provide cherry picked counter examples of how its competitor the Sunday Times has made similar reporting errors. This is a counter list of reporting errors by the Sunday Times. The table above is the proper way to compare the complaints and accuracy of the different newspapers supervised by the IPSO committee. I'll note that the Guardian is not monitored by anyone, or for that matter, any other newspaper in the English-speaking world. --Guest2625 (talk) 11:32, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Your note that the Guardian is not monitored by anyone, or for that matter, any other newspaper in the English-speaking world is incorrect. See Independent Press Standards Organisation#Membership: "Several of the broadsheet newspapers, including the Financial Times, The Independent and The Guardian, have declined to take part in IPSO. The Financial Times and The Guardian have established their own independent complaints systems instead." The latter has long had a "readers’ editor – who is appointed, and can only be dismissed, by the Scott Trust – [and] can comment on issues and concerns raised by the public. There has also been an external ombudsman to whom the readers’ editor can refer substantial grievances, or matters concerning the Guardian’s journalistic integrity." That includes a feature of corrections and clarifications, not waiting for months or a year for IPSO judgment on public complaints.[18][19] . . dave souza, talk 04:07, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

Yes. You are correct. I made a slight mistake. I meant to say that no other set of English-speaking newspapers is monitored by an outside regulatory agency. Most newspapers have procedures in place to deal with corrections, and many bigger newspapers have a newspaper ombudsman who deals with questions of journalism ethics and standards. The position is independent of the control of the newspapers's chief-editor and perhaps owner. Frankly, I think wikipedia should think about getting a centralized corrections "ombudsmen" who the reader could easily deal with in order to ask for corrections. For many wikipedia readers the talk page and how to ask for corrections is a mystery. --Guest2625 (talk) 07:17, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

The Fox RFC was also full of people going "but whatabout this other paper that isn't the subject of discussion". If you and Betty Logan want to start an RFC on the Sunday Times, that should be its own discussion. If you don't, then you need to discuss the MoS - whataboutery about other papers really isn't an argument. And nor is going "this is numbers, therefore they are the end of the discussion" - David Gerard (talk) 15:58, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Good point David. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 16:33, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Bad point. Clearly the number of corrections/complaints are relevant if you're using them in this RFC as a ban-rationale. Clearly it's relevant if the MoS receives no more complaints/corrections than sources that are recognised as reliable sources. It is simply facile logic to say "but those reliable newspapers aren't under discussion - you should open an RFC on blocking those reliable sources" because everyone knows that an RFC on the reliability of the Sunday Times would be snow-closed and the nominator would be at risk of a ban for wasting everyone's time. FOARP (talk) 13:52, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Sources
References

Most of the information appears to be anecdotal. The New York Times and other mainstream media pushed the false narrative that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, deliberately helping to start a war that foreseeably would kill hundreds of thousands of people, displace millions and cost trillions of dollars. That is more serious than the MOS publishing defamatory information about a beautician that they retracted after an IPSO complaint. The fact that IPSO upheld 9 complaints against them in one year is not statistically significant considering that they publish 52-53 issues each year. That works out to 1 error every six weeks, which is subsequently retracted. We don't expect that news media is 100% correct in reporting. We expect a small error rate and that the most significant errors will be corrected on a timely basis. The New York Times for example publishes error corrections every day. The MOS of course is not in the same league, but its accuracy rate is close to 100%. TFD (talk) 03:20, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

Regrettably, this RfC conflates the Mail's website and the printed Mail on Sunday newspaper.

While I have no time for the company's owners, nor their outlets' politics, I recognise that, like most newspapers, the reliability of its coverage varies. Large parts of the content of the Mail on Sunday - especially outside the spin of its political columnists - are both reliable (in the Wikipedia sense) and well-written; some of it by guest contributors whose relatability we would not doubt if published in another newspaper (most recently, for example, David Attenborough). Sadly, I've seen too many cases of the DM being blindly removed as a source even where its coverage is both reliable and unique, leaving statements unsupported or, worse, substituting source which do not support the valid statements made. This RfC, if it passes, will see the same happen to the Mail on Sunday. Wikipedia editors should - and should be allowed to - exercise judgment on a case by case basis, just like other adults. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:51, 16 September 2020 (UTC)

• I'd like to respond to the point that the proposers "are tired" of arguing about the Daily Mail and newspapers related to it in some way: there was absolutely no reason at all given here to propose this ban now. The reason why people keep arguing about the Mail is because you keep opening these RFCs - there is no other reason, especially no actual content-related reason, why it is still being discussed. In this entire crusade against the DM, not a single issue with an actual article has been discussed. The impression is of a group of people for whom the DM ban was their greatest moment and as such they wish to revisit it again and again. FOARP (talk) 08:15, 23 September 2020 (UTC)
  • In this entire crusade against the DM, not a single issue with an actual article has been discussed. If you read the discussion above -probably a useful step if you're going to weigh in on a discussion - you will see that your statement here is trivially incorrect - David Gerard (talk) 09:25, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

David, where is an actual issue with an actual article actually referenced in this entire farago? You deleting MoS references from articles is not an "issue with an article". You need to show that people are relying on MoS as a source and that this is causing actual problems (eg., it is being used to push fringe or incorrect views above and beyond what may happen with reliable sources), not "people are occasionally relying on MoS as a source and the problem is I keep deleting it because this is what I choose to prioritise". FOARP (talk) 15:48, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

PS - David, whilst we're at it, please explain this edit. Even if you think the DM ban applies to MoS why are you deleting statements from the MoS about what the MoS book of the week is - i.e., a situation where the MoS is talking about itself, a scenario which is explicitly allowed for by the DM 2017 RFC close ("the Daily Mail may be used in rare cases in an about-self fashion")? To me it doesn't look like the problem is with people citing the MoS here. FOARP (talk) 16:06, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

Closure?

Is there any particular reason that this specific debate is lingering on this board, stale to the point of mouldy, and long overdue a summation? HangTenBangTen (talk) 13:24, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

I believe the traditional thing to do is go to the admin's notice board and make a request. If someone does this can they please make it just a request for closure without all the palaver about how this is a contentious subject and how the closing Admin will need a "thick skin" or to be "flame proof" that some people like to put in? Admins don't need to be told how to do their job. FOARP (talk) 13:36, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Requests for closure is the place to list this. Woody (talk) 13:54, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

• Put in a closure request. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 20:04, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

HYPR sources, are they good enough to start an article?

Hello, I have a couple sources and I don't know if they are considered reliable independent and sig coverage, I tried to create the article through AfC but it got deleted. I am not happy with the explanation. These are the sources I would like to know if they meet WP:NCORP, thanks to everyone :). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kriptocurrency (talk • contribs)

Sources

Ivan (Jovan) Radonjic letter to Queen Catherine 2

Hello, there is an ongoing long discussion without concensus on Vasojevic talk page [20] about the letter send by Radonjic (2 letters in 1788. and 1789.) to Queen Catherine 2 , is it reliable source and does it goes under WP:AGE MATTERS since there is also reference of the letter from an autor from 1900. Thank you. User:Cobalton (talk) 15:24, 20.September 2020 (UTC)

Sherdog.com

http://sherdog.com

Is it reliable?

I found it completely unreliable and unverifiable. It has no about page. The website in question's person (mixed martial artist) profiles are all over the place, seems outdated and and have huge discrepancies between other reputable sources such as the sport organizations themselves, UFC, Bellator, One or their media partners like ESPN, CBS, Fox, BT Sport, Independent or even the Athletic Comissions that organize competitions. But nearly all of the Mixed Martial Arts-related content have sherdog.com as the main source instead of the reputable sources that were mentioned above. A few editors seem to enforce it as the sole reliable source for thousands of biographies of living persons and their infoboxes. Even more various reputable sources that contain high-quality recorded footages or images or statistics or commission reports are disregarded in favour of sherdog.com. Conor McGregor's Height section of the Talk:Conor_McGregor page have a rather more detailed discussion about its reliability.

The site is reliable. I guess Sherdog is "self-published" but it has a very good reputation among mma fans. Likely, like many data-heavy sites, it introduces minor errors in its data to discourage scraping and republishing. Ofc, not all stats are equally reliable; for a top fighter like McGregor, you can expect most data to be accurate, but not for a no-name fighter that fights in a regional league somewhere. Regarding the height, why can't you use a range? E.g 5 ft 8 in to 5 ft 11 in ImTheIP (talk) 01:35, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

Like you said, it's self-published. It has no about page. The data provided by the site tend to conflict other reputable sources' content although other reputable sources tend to share similiarity between them. Some of those reputable sources that I mentioned are ESPN, Fox, UFC, BoxRec, Independent, NSAC, BT sport, CBS, Independent. As an example, in McGregor and Alvarez's cases, those reputable sources' listings are also defintely closer to what other video footages and images provide. Sherdog.com on the other hand doesn't seem consistent or reliable. Especially considering they don't update fighter profile pages for decades, even after public becomes certain that data in most of those pages are clearly wrong. After an MMA competition where everyone can compare physical attributes for example. The most obvious example is the McGregor vs Alvarez match. As for using a range for height, weight etc., what should we do for a person that has 7 different listings for each attribute? Implementing height, weight, reach etc. ranges like 5'6 to 6'0 or 70 kg to 80 kg or 160lbs to 190lbs for every single person that has Wikipedia page would not be ideal and appropiate.Lordpermaximum (talk) 02:11, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

If it's self published it has no business being on BLPs per WP:BLPSPS. Nil Einne (talk) 08:48, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

We've reached a consensus to disregard Sherdog as a reliable source and use the reliable, independent and secondary sources, such as The Independent and CBS in the case of Conor McGregor's height, in the Talk:Conor_McGregor page. The consensus was only for the height of Conor McGregor but I think it was a very lengthy and detailed discussion with a lot of sources which had the participation of 7 editors, one being an administrator, so that sherdog.com should be considered unreliable site-wide. Nil Einne also agreed to consider sherdog.com unreliable here and I also want to inform another administrator Woody who also found self-published sherdog.com which has no about page unreliable in the Talk:Dan_Henderson page after another lengthy discussion.

Does anyone including ImTheIp who found sherdog.com reliable here previously before the achievement of consensus for Conor McGregor's height, has any objections to sherdog.com being considered an unreliable source?Lordpermaximum (talk) 10:36, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: No consensus has been made on Talk:Conor_McGregor as the thread of the discussion is still open as of October 31, 2020 - see here where by the false claim by Lordopermaximum/Perm claim on October 13, 2020. Cassiopeia^(talk) 07:35, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

I just learned thanks to Nil Einne that there's a strict policy to avoid any self-published source on BLPs per WP:BLPSPS. Not only sherdog.com is an unreliable source, it cannot be used at all on BLPs because of the policy in question. This seals it.Lordpermaximum (talk) 11:07, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I've an objection to finding it unreliable just yet - the previous discussion (11 years ago, IIRC) that found it to be reliable was flawed because it was literally three or four editors deciding it, after one asked the question, over a very short space of time, and that led MMA editors being able to declare "It's a reliable source, as agreed by WP:RS/N!". I understand your desire to move quickly on this, but there's no rush. And yes, I know that can be frustrating... I've learnt patience after having people stall decisions by creating 30-day Requests for Comment over issues that are obviously only going to go one way, but hey, patience is a virtue!

As to the substantive issue: lack of bona fides for sherdog, such as an 'about' page, and it's demonstrable lack of accuracy (whether deliberate or not) would preclude it from being a reliable source where other, more reliable, sources exist. Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 15:05, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Of course Sherdog is a reliable source. I don't know where 'it's (sic) demonstrable lack of accuracy' has been shown or proven. Occasionally, sources differ slightly on things like height. It's hardly a crisis. In fact, Sherdog's just as likely right and the others wrong as vice versa. After all, it's the largest dedicated MMA database in the world. Before editors jump aboard here could we please consider that the vast majority of less high-profile fighters won't have a listing elsewhere. I would ask Lordpermaximum please to chill out a bit and stop saying things like 'We've reached a consensus' after two comments and 'that seals it' after three. Sherdog has not been shown to be unreliable at all. It's also a source that contains accurate method of finishes, provides a reliable and verifiable source of nicknames (more of an issue than you might think). Its strengths are massive and the fact that some other sources disagree on stuff that none of us knows anyway (not that it'd make any difference if we did) is no reason to conclude that it's wrong. In the McGregor example, if you Google 'Conor McGregor height' is says 5'8. Since Sherdog is also the source used for all infoboxes on MMA fighter pages, it might have been nice to inform editors that this discussion is taking place. I have neither the time nor inclination to comment further as I'd rather edit. There are lots of editors who edit MMA page regularly and their contribution should be sought. I have made my thoughts clear simply won't read and reply to another series of WP:BLUDGEON posts.NEDOCHAN (talk) 16:16, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

My dear NEDOCHAN, Google lists Conor McGregor's height as 5'9" now thanks to our consensus, like I told you before that it would. Have a good day.Perm 20:50, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

More of than not, Google takes its profile information from English wikipedia so that's where Google took it from. The change in Conor McGregor's Wikipedia profile will soon reflect on Google also. We'll try to reach at least a rough consensus here as I don't see any reason why we shouldn't expand the consensus we've reached for Conor McGregor. Also NEDOCHAN, I remind you and others to stop using sherdog.com as a source on any BLP as it looks there's a mass violation of biographies of living persons (BLP) policy per WP:BLPSPS. It literally involves thousands of pages. I'll report it in WP:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard, pretty soon. I'll RfC for deprecation of sherdog.com next as it requires immediate action because there's mass violation of BLP policy which is taken very seriously.Lordpermaximum (talk) 17:16, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Please don't ping me. You have absolutely no right to start telling another editor what source they can and cannot use.NEDOCHAN (talk) 17:34, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Sherdog is not self-published. Their "contact us" page is their "about us" page.[21] Morbidthoughts (talk) 17:48, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

As per WP:Identifying_and_using_self-published_works, "if the author works for a company, and the publisher is the employer, and the author's job is to produce the work (e.g., sales materials or a corporate website), then the author and publisher are the same.". Sherdog.com is a clear example of that, it has no about page, you can't volunteer to be an editor and it's not clear who's producing the content since there's no author sign in their articles, pages etc.Lordpermaximum (talk) 19:25, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

No, it is clear from that link I gave that they have an editorial staff, radio staff, and writers (contributors). Their publisher is Evolve Media. There is no requirement that their editors be volunteers. Their news articles do have authors.[22] It may be an ugly site, but you didn't do your due diligence in looking up this stuff. Morbidthoughts (talk) 20:08, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Having authors doesn't mean it's not self-published. Please read the quote from the policy again. Sherdog.com is a clear-cut example of a self-published site. Although the violation of BLPs is important, our main topic here is the reliability of Sherdog.com. We don't even know where they get their info from and according to archive.org, they very rarely update the profiles of fighters if at all which makes it outdated also.Lordpermaximum (talk) 21:09, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

You don't seem to understand that the concept that the authors cannot publish an article without the approval of the editorial staff. The editorial staff is also not the publisher which is the company itself. Your reliance on WP:USINGSPS is misplaced since it is neither policy or guideline, and your arguments for strict adherence to that quote would render newspaper reporters to be SPS if their employer is the newspaper.[23] Morbidthoughts (talk) 23:59, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

One instance of a fighter's height not matching what CBS and The Independent lists does not make sherdog unreliable. More often than not, sherdog lists the correct information. There isn't one individual authority that measures all fighters; they're measured by different people (networks or promotions) using different methods (a wavy measuring tape or stadiometer) at different times in different places. Common sense says there will always be discrepancies in such cases. Sherdog is as reliable as a sporting database can be when there is no single source to pool all its stats from. As for the site being self published, says who? I think the fact that their news section is filled with articles by multiple journalists says otherwise. – ².O.^Boxing 19:24, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm a total outsider to this topic, but Sherdog is obviously not self-published, and it seems likely to be reliable:

• it's published by Evolve Media, which has over a hundred employees per their LinkedIn page
• they have a seven person editorial team and a twenty-two person team of contributors

Gbear605 (talk) 21:13, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

You and a couple others only cofirm the quote in WP:Identifying_and_using_self-published_works: "if the author works for a company, and the publisher is the employer, and the author's job is to produce the work (e.g., sales materials or a corporate website), then the author and publisher are the same." What are we even debating here?Lordpermaximum (talk) 21:38, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Lordpermaximum, you're misapplying your quote - by your definition, all news agencies are self-publishing. Gbear605 (talk) 23:48, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

It's not my quote. It's a direct quote from WP:Identifying_and_using_self-published_works. Best, Lordpermaximum (talk) 23:56, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

"This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community." That's the quote you need to focus on. Morbidthoughts (talk) 00:07, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

No doubt Lordpermaximum will still claim they are self-published because their website doesn't have an "About" page, even though it does. FDW777 (talk) 21:15, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

You should focus on the content and comment on the reliability of sherdog.com instead of reading my mind. About page is just an anecdote.

Sherdog.com is "completely unreliable" because it's self-published, they don't share how they get their information, their information usually contradicts other well-known reliable sites such as UFC, ESPN, Fox, Independent, CBS and those sources agree eachother and sherdog.com's "contact page" is the definition of ameteurish.Lordpermaximum (talk) 21:47, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

You should focus on what you're being told, instead of saying what you think. Repeating the same mistake over and over again doesn't stop it being a mistake. There is zero to little support for your position, see WP:BLUDGEON. FDW777 (talk) 22:11, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Please be civil and relax. In the mean time, check Proof_by_assertion, WP:RS and WP:V. Best, Lordpermaximum (talk) 22:26, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

You should in turn checkout, WP:FORCEDINTERPRET and WP:STONEWALL Morbidthoughts (talk) 00:10, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable. I suggest Lordpermaximum reads WP:SPS, since none of them apply to Sherdog. FDW777 (talk) 21:15, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

RfC: Sherdog.com

What is the reliability of Sherdog.com?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Reliable, in the absense of generally reliable sources
• Option 3: Unclear or additional considerations apply
• Option 4: Generally unreliable
• Option 5: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated

Lordpermaximum (talk) 23:20, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

User Notifications about the RfC:

• Cassiopeia who voted for option 1, mentioned and pinged 21 other editors at WT:MMA#Reliability of Sherdog, and wanted those editors to ping other editors about this RfC. So far from that list only Gsfelipe94 joined the RfC and they voted for option 1.
• FDW77 who voted for option 1, opened a section at WT:MMA and informed other editors of the RfC.
• I voted for option 4, informed 4 of those who hadn't already participated in the RfC that were involved with the height discussions at Talk:Conor_McGregor which eventually reached consensus that I agreed with and had lead to this RfC as an expansion of the consensus. Out of those I invited, Cassiopeia voted for option 1, Bastun and Hunterb212 voted for option 2 or 3, GirthSummit hasn't voted yet. I also informed an administrator, Woody, who was involved with similar discussions at Talk:Dan_Henderson and voted for option 2 or 3. I also opened sections about the RfC at WT:BOXING, WT:SPORTS, and WT:WPBIO.

Please report invites, pings, mentions of any kind and newly opened sections that inform other editors about this RfC, so we can list them here in the spirit of transparency.Lordpermaximum (talk) 14:31, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• User:Lordpermaximum or "Perm" has been blocked by 3 admins for many reasons - see here. Cassiopeia^(talk) 10:19, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

False Reports:

Anything below that is meaningful has already been covered above. Everything else is only disruptions and false reports that aren't related to the RfC.Perm 04:03, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

I think you forgot to add this fabulously neutral invite. But I really need your vote no matter what it is at WP:RSN#Responses_(Sherdog.com) if we are to stop them from using sherdog.com as the sole source....lol. – ².O.^Boxing 00:30, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

All of this because of our first encounter at Talk:Conor_McGregor where I had shared my suspicions about you and your friends? I didn't notify that user there, first. I actually invited him before and mentioned him here as one of the 2 editors that took part in the consensus we reached atTalk:Conor_McGregor but had not participated here yet. What you took out of context was from a discussion about Tony Ferguson which wasn't even started by me. You didn't even post the entire discussion deliberately in order to remove the context and blame me again for something I did not do again. Please don't turn this into another war and let people get sidetracked, again. You're extremely disruptive under this RfC. But I know you don't care as long as Sherdog.com becomes a reliable source because of your personal vendetta.Lordpermaximum (talk) 01:35, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

I'll strike it and put it this way then: I think there's an option for your thoughts such as "reliable in the absense of generally reliable sources" which seems to suit your opinions or another option if you like, and, But I really need your vote no matter what it is at WP:RSN#Responses_(Sherdog.com) if we are to stop them from using sherdog.com as the sole source, are highly inappropriate comments to somebody you've previously invited to an RfC. And just to note, I have no vested interest in Sherdog whatsoever. I have never, in my 15,000 and something edits, used Sherdog in a citation. – ².O.^Boxing 02:06, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

You took them even more out of context to make me look even worse. They're cherry-picked from answers to a user that was bothered by the use of sherdog as the sole source. The discussion which I didn't start is here at User_talk:Hunterb212#Tony_Ferguson.Perm 04:03, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Background (Sherdog.com)

Sherdog.com has generally been used as "the sole reliable source" on thousands of articles which are related to MMA and mostly WP:BLP. In favour of Sherdog.com, all reliable sources such as The Independent, CBS, ESPN, UFC, Fox, BT Sport, BoxRec, Bellator, One and Athletic Commisions such as NSAC have been disregarded. Lordpermaximum (talk) 15:53, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

And the point of this is? None of that has anything to do with deciding whether or not Sherdog is a reliable source. But anyway, no. Just no. Sherdog has not generally been used as "the sole reliable source" on thousands of articles which are related to MMA and mostly WP:BLP. I task anybody to find me at least a start class MMA BLP that uses Sherdog as its sole reliable source. – ².O.^Boxing 16:30, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

If it's not clear enough, what that means is those editors who generally edit MMA articles favour Sherdog.com over other generally reliable sources. Those reliable sources have only been used when there's no info about that particular topic on Sherdog.com. For example if one editor references ESPN as a source in an MMA page, it will be reverted by some hardcore MMA editors in favour of Sherdog.com as the only source if sherdog has info about that. This is against the WP:RS policy and it's the main reason this discussion has been started in the first place. But I wanted to hear the community's opinion about the reliability of sherdog.com first so I opened an RfC about that first. That's why this section is titled "Background".Lordpermaximum (talk) 16:42, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

So, basically, your addition of this subsection has nothing whatsoever to do with evaluating whether or not Sherdog is reliable? Thanks for confirming that. – ².O.^Boxing 16:56, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

As I said, it gives some background to the discussions that were happened before the RfC since it's still under the main section. The starting point of these dicussions was pointed out at the top of the main section and this section only refers to that background. It's up to other editors to bear this in mind or not while evaluating sherdog.com's reliability but I thought it was important since it's going to affect thousands of pages because of the fact that Sherdog.com is relied upon very heavily in those articles.Perm 13:53, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Responses (Sherdog.com)

• Option 4 - There doesn't seem to be any evidence for reputation for fact-checking and accuracy (WP:RS). It doesn't look like there's a detailed about page of any sorts and it seems to fit the criteria of self-publishing. Its fighter infocards looked outdated when I checked the history of those from archive.org. Its runners don't seem to share how they get their information; therefore I think it violates WP:V and makes Sherdog a questionable source. After checking other reliable sources that create MMA-related content such as CBS, ESPN, Fox, BT Sport, The Independent, BoxRec, UFC, Bellator, One and Athletic Commisions such as NSAC more in detail and making thorough comparisons, I found out that those reputable sources generally agree with each other, unlike Sherdog which has a clear tendency to contradict them. Besides that, none of sherdog.com's fighter profiles has any author mention. We know it's generally used on BLPs although it probably violates the BLP policy per WP:BLPSPS by likely being an SPS according to the definition in WP:Identifying_and_using_self-published_works. Considering some editors' tendency to use Sherdog as the sole source on many BLPs without evaluating other possibly more reliable sources, it's dangerous for Wikipedia and makes the Encylopedia open to many lawsuits, in theory at least. Espcially if the runners of sherdog.com decides to manipulate Wikipedia by adjusting some of the information on their website since it's relied upon very heavily. We've previously reached consensus to disregard sherdog.com and use other reputable, likely more reliable sources instead at Talk:Conor_McGregor which eventualy had lead to this RfC. That page has detailed discussions about the reliability of sherdog.com if anyone's interested.Lordpermaximum (talk) 23:20, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

"if the author works for a company, and the publisher is the employer, and the author's job is to produce the work (e.g., sales materials or a corporate website), then the author and publisher are the same."

• That's a direct quote from WP:Identifying_and_using_self-published_works. That's the reason I think sherdog.com is an SPS if we go by that.Lordpermaximum (talk) 09:21, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 Addressing each repeatedly made incorrect point one at a time.
  • It's self-published No, it's not. It's published by Mandatory, part of Evolve Media, LLC. Self-published means "man with blog" or "man with website", not a publishing company with 150 editors and writers across more than 40 websites.
  • it has no true about page The about page is right there, and it lists the editorial team.
  • runners of the site don't share how they get their information and this clearly violates WP:V I can look at any newspaper right now and they won't say where they got their information from either, it doesn't make them unreliable. WP:V does not require a reference to have a footnote for every single piece of information.
• Since there is no evidence to back up any of the other spurious claims made without evidence, I will simply dismiss them without evidence. FDW777 (talk) 07:33, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1: Not self published as per above. All the articles in the 'News' section are attributed to their authors. As for the fighter profiles not having citations for the information given or an "author sign" on the pages, that's just silly. BoxRec, ESPN, and Fox have been given as comparisons (besides UFC, which is a primary source, they are the only three out of the nine sources mentioned that have fighter profiles); just like Sherdog, none of them have citations for the information given in fighter profiles nor do they have an "author sign". Finding two or three fighter's profiles, out of thousands, whose heights are disputed and reported at different measurements by multiple sources is by no means a reason to deem a source unreliable. – ².O.^Boxing 09:38, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Having an author on some pages doesn't mean it's not self published. According to to the rule in WP:Identifying_and_using_self-published_works:

"if the author works for a company, and the publisher is the employer, and the author's job is to produce the work (e.g., sales materials or a corporate website), then the author and publisher are the same."

From this alone it's clear that it's self-published, thus it openly violates WP:BLPSPS and on top of that it violates WP:RS along with WP:V too, when we consider the other reasons in the first response.Lordpermaximum (talk) 09:58, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

You've already been informed that what you're quoting is not policy or even a guideline. So the quote, which you've used three times already in this RfC, five times in the whole thread, and many more at the BLPN discussion (where far more experienced editors have disagreed with your interpretation of SPS as well as flat-out dismissing any BLP violation), doesn't hold much weight at all. You can copy and paste the same quote all you like, it won't make it any more relevant. Calm down with the relentless WP:BLUDGEONing. – ².O.^Boxing 12:07, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Please calm down and see Proof_by_assertion. The discussion you're referring to on the BLPN is still ongoing although you claim it's ended in one way. Best, Lordpermaximum (talk) 15:02, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2: I've struck my previous vote following more research. After trying my hardest to find some evidence for a reputation for fact checking, I couldn't find enough to personally satisfy my initial vote. There's multiple instances of reliable sources using Sherdog's fighter stats and match results, but there's also a few articles that discuss discrepancies in that area. And to my surprise I couldn't find a reliable source that discussed the site in detail. As for the news they report, I'd consider that generally reliable. There's a bob load of instances where reliable sources have accredited Sherdog with breaking an MMA news story that the reliable sources in question would cover a week or so later and Sherdog articles are repeatedly quoted in multiple reliable sources. – ².O.^Boxing 11:35, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

• Not an SPS I have no opinion on the reliability of Sherdog since I haven't looked into that, and don't plan to. But I said above "if" since 2 editors had suggested it was an SPS. However now that I've seen more commentators and also read our article and looked into some other details, it seems clear to me Sherdog isn't an SPS. Some parts of it may be, e.g. obviously its forums but most of it doesn't seem to be. Nil Einne (talk) 12:53, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Nil Einne, could you check Sherdog.com a bit and/or read some of the discussion that's going on here? I would really like everyone that participated in the discussions to choose an option no matter what it will be. I also added a very short background for why these discussions started in the first place. If you could read a bit more about it, do you think there's enough evidence in favour of sherdog.com to give it a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy? I and a few others claim there aren't. If there are not, thousands of pages are affected by it for the worse because of MMA editors' tendency to use it as the sole source. Thanks for participation anyways even if you don't want to choose an option. Best, Lordpermaximum (talk) 18:58, 14 October 2020 (UTC).

• Not an SPS per Nil Einne. No opinion as to it's general reliability, but even The Irish Times and other papers of record get their facts wrong sometimes. That said, Sherdog is not the sole definitive source for MMA stats, and other sites, equally reliable, can absolutely be used as sources, too. Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 13:51, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Bastun, I added a section about the background of these discussions and the RfC that highlights your concern. But it can be adressed indirecly here by this RfC so that we won't need another consensus for your and my concern about that, in the future. I think option 2 or 3 is close to your thinking so you can always choose option 2 or 3. I would really like you to choose an option, no matter what it will be if we are to reach consensus here. Thank you for your participation even if you don't choose an option anyways. Best wishes, Lordpermaximum (talk) 18:45, 14 October 2020 (UTC).

• Option 2 or 3. I would have questions over its sourcing and accuracty and all of those "staffers" listed on the 'Contact us' page certainly aren't full time, as linkein searches show. That said, nothing to stop it being used as a source. Just not exclusively. Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 19:08, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 or 3: Not self-published, but I couldn't find significant evidence of reputation for fact-checking and accuracy (WP:RS). It may well be popular among MMA fans and have a small editorial team, but there needs to be significant independent evidence to make it generally reliable. It's probably usable but established high-quality sources (e.g. existing green WP:RSP sources) would be preferred. — MarkH₂₁^talk 15:08, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1: It's the leading source for such data globally and there's no evidence whatsoever that it's not reliable. This RFC was started by an editor who thought it was self-published. It isn't.NEDOCHAN (talk) 15:34, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Yes, it's self-published. I want to remind you of WP:OWN, WP:But I'm an administrator!, User:Jimbo Wales/Statement of principles #2, WP:Equality, WP:Newbies aren't always clueless.Lordpermaximum (talk) 10:02, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1: It must be incredibly frustrating for those who edit mma fighters' pages and knows what Sherdog is to have to deal with this. ImTheIP (talk) 15:40, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 or 3: It has been made clear to me after stumbling into MMA pages during an edit war on Dan Henderson (see Talk:Dan Henderson for extended discussion about a similar height issue to McGregor above) that the MMA community places Sherdog above other sources but without any consensus or discussion as to it's reliability. This RFC is the perfect place to develop a consensus which can be used to justify it's inclusion going forward. I agree with MarkH21's thinking here above. It isn't self-published under our own guidelines but at the same time there isn't any evidence whatsoever that it has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy (WP:RS) which is what we need to deem it a generally reliable source. The page itself doesn't make this clear. Sherdog is not the sole definitive source for MMA stats, and other sites, equally reliable or green WP:RSP, should be used where available. (Note: I was invited/canvassed to participate in this discussion by User:Lordpermaximum with this edit but I was intending on bringing this site up here at some point) Woody (talk) 16:47, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the disclosure. I have issued a canvassing warning on Lordpermaximum's talk page.[24] Morbidthoughts (talk) 19:03, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• It wasn't canvassing because Woody has participated in sherdog.com's reliability dicussions before. I suggest you to read this quote: "Editors who have participated in previous discussions on the same topic (or closely related topics)" It's from WP:CAN and that's placed under "Appropiate notification" section. If it was canvassing it wouldn't be your problem because Woody as an administrator would handle it before you or anyone else. I reverted your edit and I will report you for vandalism if you do that again in my talk page.Lordpermaximum (talk) 19:10, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

In the warning, I also included the links of who you selectively recruited to participate, not just Woody.[25][26][27] You should review WP:VOTESTACKING and WP:BATTLEGROUND again. Morbidthoughts (talk) 19:18, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

This discussion is the place to discuss the reliability of sources when weighed against our policies and guidelines. Please take discussions of editors away from here. Let's try not to get side-tracked here. Woody (talk) 19:26, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• (edit conflict)The wording was entirely neutral but the selection of individuals could be seen as trying to back up your point of view. Canvassing can be a pretty grey subject. I noted I was invited to this discussion to avoid any accusation of impropriety. @Lordpermaximum: next time I would give a neutral notification to key wikiprojects/editors that are closely related to the discussion eg WP:MMA (This has been done at WT:MMA#Reliability of Sherdog though the pinging of individual editors to this discussion is a bit borderline). If any doubt leave a notification at the beginning of this RFC to say who has been notified (similar to the many found at AFD). Woody (talk) 19:26, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Morbidthoughts, it's not true because I only tried to reach out to those who hadn't participated in this discussion at RSN. Others who were against my proposal in the beginning did participate here except just one editor who admittedly said she needed a week to reply to the ongoing discussions that started this RfC in the first place and she was very busy, just yesterday. Next time do your research properly.
• Woody, please see above. He's just making an empty accusation and hiding the other side of the truth. Only 2 editors that participated in the previous discussion were'nt notified because one of them wanted us to give her some time, around a week. The other editor that I didn't notify was an administrator that involved in the discussions as neutral in the beginning and we were in the same side of consensus in the end. So if anything, I hurt my case by not inviting him/her.

Thanks to you I learned that they pinged every one of those editors that have been using sherdog.com as the sole source on anything MMA-related. He was blaming me for canvassing and then I learned this. It's funny though the one that pinged all those users is that one editor who said she needed time to respond to previous discussion in the talk page of Conor McGregor. It looks she simply tried to stall and deny consensus but she failed.Lordpermaximum (talk) 19:35, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1: Per fellow editors comments. I believe Sherdog serves as a common ground for most of the information. Obviously they are not the ultimate guide to it. If we have other reliable sources, we should take that in account and use it as the most reliable option for that case. We use it as means to add fight results, but they're not always right. To me they are still a reliable source, but I never took them for the only option available. I believe such cases require discussion and people should be open to consider other sources as more accurate than Sherdog itself. That being said, Sherdog is definitely one of the most reliable sources in MMA media regarding database and news as well. Gsfelipe94 (talk) 19:58, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• You chose option 1 but it sounds like option 2 suits your opinions more. Can I ask why did you choose option 1 with those thoughts then? Is it because they who use sherdog.com as the sole source pinged you and tens of others to come and vote here at WT:MMA#Reliability of Sherdog?Lordpermaximum (talk) 20:32, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

You probably didn't see my comment Gsfelipe94. Don't you agree me with me that your opinion sounds more like option 2? Choosing option 1 with those opinions sounds like a mistake.Lordpermaximum (talk) 00:28, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 or 2: It is not a self published source, and it is written by sufficiently specialized people (I navigated here [28]) . The tone of the information is perfectly fine. Also, I don't think they need to disclose how they get information, as I have never seen this being required on any sort of newspaper. Overall, I think all three points of WP:SOURCEDEF are quite fine, with maybe the publisher being a little subpar. I'd say the website still qualifies under WP:RSEDITORIAL. Best, Walwal20 ^{talk ▾ contribs} 05:12, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1: Besides certain point have maked by other editors, I here add (1) Sherdog is largest independent MMA media site in the world and (2) Sherdog is the official content partner

of ESPN reported by Sprot Illustor. As ESPN is considered reliable - reputation for fact-checking and accuracy (WP:RS), and they partner with Sherdog (use Sherdog's coentent) that would make Sherdog a reliable source. (3) Sherdog is not a self publishing firm for it is own by Evolve Media LCC, thus Sherdog is not a self publishing company. (4) There was also discussion in the past in Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard with the outcome that Sherdog is a reliable source - see here and this RFC would be the updated version. (5) overall, Sherdog do meet in term of content/tone/NPOV, WP:RSEDITORIAL and WP:SOURCEDEF. (6) Site note: Sherdog is voted by MMA fighters the leading source of breaking news, fight reviews and in-depth features sites - see [https://www.worldmmaawards.com/mma-awards-category/mma-media-source-of-the-year/ HERE. Cassiopeia^(talk) 12:19, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• There's no outcome that found Sherdog reliable before. The link to that RSN discussion shows it was almost a decade ago it was attended by a couple editors who were like "it looks kinda ok" and that was all about it. As for the ESPN deal, the link states it was made 13.5 years ago. It also says "As part of the agreement, ESPN will highlight exclusive, in-depth Sherdog content contextually within ESPN.com, including news, interviews, videos, event listings, and more. ESPN.com's new Mixed Martial Arts section index will also feature Sherdog's Fight Finder module, which allows users to search the largest fighter database online for stats and personal information. Sherdog's weekly online Radio show will be offered at ESPNRadio.com and for download via the ESPN PodCenter." None of those things that were mentioned in the quote are found on ESPN right now and they haven't been found on ESPN for years. ESPN (along with other reliable sources) and Sherdog have been contradicting each other for a long time and any time you can check for those discrepancies between them, now or then thanks to archive.org. So bearing all of this in mind, it's pretty clear that deal wasn't for a lifetime and it ended a long time ago. Probably years ago.Lordpermaximum (talk) 12:37, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

It's pretty clear that deal wasn't for a lifetime and it ended a long time ago. Probably years ago. WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH is not permitted. Do you have a source to say that it probably ended years ago? To add to what CASSIOPEIA said on fact checking; the UFC's The Ultimate Fighter series used Sherdog as a source for checking contestants records, as seen here. "You MUST have a minimum of 3 Professional MMA fights to be considered. All records will be verified on sherdog.com & mixedmartialarts.com. If we cannot verify your record on either of these sites you will NOT be eligible to tryout." The world's most prominent MMA promotion seems to think that Sherdog has a good reputation for fact checking. – ².O.^Boxing 13:04, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• An insignificant news article from 2.5 years ago which was about TUF entrance which is not considered an official UFC fight. As for other acussations, it doesn't even worth answering. As an administrator already pointed out "This discussion is the place to discuss the reliability of sources when weighed against our policies and guidelines. Please take discussions of editors away from here. Let's try not to get side-tracked here."Lordpermaximum (talk) 13:16, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

Cassiopeia, for 1) above, do you have a source rather than an assertion? For 2), that article you've cited is from literally ten years ago, and that same article also states that UFC had pulled Sherdog's press credentials; and also that they hadn't had access to the UFC for most of the preceding five years! Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 10:18, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Bastun First of all, I come and comment here in good will. UFC is a private company and not a sport organization like FIFA, as such they do what the want - we all remember well Ariel Helwani and his associates were pulled form UFC press credentials for being just doing their job as good journalists would and should do. The source is from Sport Illustrator and being pulled the credential has nothing to do with the source reliability and independent. I have placed my vote and for those who disagree, they can give evidence/comment/guidelines of why they think Sherdog is not reliable or independent. I am rather sad to see one inch height different of Conor McGregor in source would lead to so much uncomfortable and unpleasant discussions in so many articles and editors' talk pages. Do note content of the MMA articles come from many different sources and the infobox which is an optional is sourced by Sherdog. Those parameters in the infobox (such as style, stand, trainer, rank, university and etc) which could notvbe obtained from Sherdog fighter profile would need to sourced elsewhere if info is added. This is just a normal practice in other sport as well to use a sport specific database in the infobox / game /sportsperson record / results. Changing a fighter height for one more inche higher is not big deal, but it would effect thousands of thousands of MMA articles in Wikipedia would not only the height but the fight records, team, fight out of, nick name and etc. If it does not effect in such a big scale, I would not comments for I have invited to settle a numbers of edit warrings/content dispute and it was not pleasant just to read those comments from editors for some of them were not there to discuss/understand/collobrate/support each other/learn from each other but just fight, troll just because they wanted to win the arguments due to the fighters are from their countries/same ethnicity/just riding the hype train and lack of Wikipedia guidelines and communicated as if they are in twitter /utube. Stay safe Bastun and best. Cassiopeia^(talk) 11:47, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

I just asked for a citation for 1) above; I didn't and don't doubt your good faith. Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 15:52, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

2.0 boxing's comment clearly refers to the reliability of the source and none of it relates to you or any other editor. They're right, only WP:OR is behind your argument re ESPN.NEDOCHAN (talk) 13:22, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

Exactly what NEDOCHAN said. I'm addressing your argument, which is original research, which is policy. But anyway, all fights within The Ultimate Fighter series are officially sanctioned bouts, promoted by the UFC. So the requirement that a fighter's record is confirmed by Sherdog relates to an official UFC bout. Which gives credibility to Sherdog's reputation for fact checking. – ².O.^Boxing 13:47, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 or 3: I believe Sherdog is somewhat reliable in the sense that it is up to date with match statistics and fighter's records. However I believe the info such as height and weight of fighters is not always the most accurate. Comparing Sherdog to ESPN's website you will find that ESPN lists the height and weight measurements of most current fighters in the major promotions such as UFC and Bellator just like Sherdog does. And it updates these measurements after every weigh in. Sherdog on the other hand does not update these measurements therefore you have outdated information such as some fighters being listed at different weight classes than which they currently fight in. So in my opinion a compromise would be to use ESPN stats for height and weight of any fighters whose information is available there, and match records and stats for fighters unavailable on ESPN's website still be cited from Sherdog. Hunterb212 (talk) 7:10, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 I'd say. They're not ESPN-type reliable, but for general uncontested information like who won a fight or the card for an event, then they're useable. I also agree with what Hunterb212 says above. Red Fiona (talk) 21:56, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 or 2 I lean towards option 1 because I generally use sherdog for fight information and results because they get that basic information correct. It appears there may be less reliability in their height and weight statistics. It certainly isn't self-published and the fact that McGregor's height varies depending on the source is not that unusual. Many athletes in the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL have official heights and weights that are generally believed to be incorrect. My doctor's office measured my height differently in successive visits in the past year, but it doesn't make them unreliable (though it might say something about my posture sometimes). Note that option 1 says "generally reliable" not "always correct". Even the best media sources make errors. Papaursa (talk) 00:35, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 I hadn't planned to comment here, but I'm rather alarmed at the idea that we would accept Sherdog's figures regardless of what other sources say. I don't have a problem with using it as a handy go-to source for information that would be hard to get elsewhere, and even with a general agreement that it is more reliable than (insert name of alternative MMA database here), but when multiple RS like the Guardian and CBS all say one thing, and Sherdog is the only source saying something else, we surely have to go with the other sources - we can't have a situation where the content at a bunch of BLPs can only come from one source, regardless of what others say - no source is that reliable. GirthSummit _(blether) 11:14, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 I've come across this issue once or twice before - this modestly-staffed entity (it looks like a small core staff and a range of enthusiastic part-timers, nothing wrong with that) does keep a massive database, mostly, as I understand, robust but it seems updating is not always done - and then the odd stat (like the height of Conor McGregor) is just perhaps off (weights change per fight, styles and finishes shift, but not height). I see no problem in using it, but it cannot be some "unique source" for MMA BLPs - however, especially for less-known fighters, it may be their only solid listing. NO clear evidence of major problems has been given, ertainly not against the 10s of thousands of data points it supplies - and it seems the MMA area is a bit "hot" in terms of debate, a pity, and something which I see has made a straightforward discussion hard. So I believe it can be considered Generally Reliable, but capable of being over-ruled by other RS - and as a side benefit, I believe this process also reminds that while a WikiProject may make recommendations, no project can declare that some source is "the only source" for something, nor does a Project "own" the content in its area of interest (which may cross multiple other projects anyway); none of this takes away from recognition of the hard and often rather thankless - but critical - work done by WP MMA or any other project or contributor. SeoR (talk) 11:36, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

I have to say I think this is a superb response from SeoR.NEDOCHAN (talk) 23:59, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 or 3: It looks somewhat reliable, especially for its area of expertise. I think it can be used when there aren't credible sources but it should be handled per article basis.Magnus Dominus (talk) 20:32, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Comments

Really? You've started discussions at two different noticeboards (which are still active), both of which are currently showing consensus against your opinion that the source is unreliable and somehow a serious BLP violation, and now you open an RfC? This is getting a bit daft now. This all stems from you saying sherdog is basically shit because you found a video source that says Conor McGregor is 5'11, contradicting sherdog. Shall we also start an RfC to attempt to get CBS Sports and The Independent deprecated as well? They also disagreed with your video source after all. – ².O.^Boxing 23:45, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Those are two different topics on two noticeboards. One is about the reliability of sherdog.com, the other you mentioned is about the BLP policy violation on one particular article. They have loose connection. One of them stems from sherdog.com being the sole source on thousands of BLPs with its very questionable, unreliable data which violates WP:RS, WP:V and the other stems from one particular website's self-publishing identity which violates WP:BLPSPS on a BLP article... If you want to response on the reliability of Sherdog.com, please do. Best, Lordpermaximum (talk) 00:09, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Sorry this is madness. Lordpermaximum is now going through and editing their old comments retrospectively and therefore riding roughshod over the discussion and replies. This cannot be permitted. Admin attention is required and I think ANI might be necessary.NEDOCHAN (talk) 11:43, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

I edited my vote comment without changing my vote to make it more precise after getting new information from everyone involved, and made multiple consequent edits to fix grammar mistakes and typos because admittedly I'm not a native English speaker. Because of that I often try to fix my comments later because I generally realize those mistakes later. I don't even get what are you acussing me with here? But I'm not surprised since you're doing that all the time because I don't agree with your opinion.Lordpermaximum (talk) 13:08, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

What's your first language out of interest? I am an EFL teacher so am curious.NEDOCHAN (talk) 13:17, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

This is not the place to ask another editor about their first language, and they are, of course, under no obligation to answer. In any case, there are several editors participating here who do not appear to have English as a first language - and that's fine! Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 10:22, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

I edited my vote comment without changing my vote to make it more precise after getting new information from everyone involved...which is something that definitely should not be done. Other editors will read the comments and votes in the RfC. There's no need to refactor your comment to include other people's points, especially when you haven't looked into those points yourself. There's also the bludgeoning issue which is rather tedious. You don't need to reply to every comment you disagree with to repeat your points over and over and over again. – ².O.^Boxing 13:53, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

I suggest Lordpermaximum reads WP:STICK and does something more productive instead of the constant arguing here, since there is absolutely zero support for their claim is self-published. FDW777 (talk) 15:10, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

You should tell that to your friend Squared.Circle.Boxing who had extremely disruptive behavior under this RfC and tried to damage it as best as he could.Perm 04:22, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: The above used "Perm" is User:Lordpermaximum (see in source edit mode) not sure why they choose to use Perm name suddenly in the disussion. Cassiopeia^(talk) 08:10, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

It was too long.Perm 10:03, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

References

New York Times article on paid reporting

Not sure if this belongs here or on the talk page. This New York Times article article mentions many items that are of interest to us. For example:

Maine Business Daily is part of a fast-growing network of nearly 1,300 websites that aim to fill a void left by vanishing local newspapers across the country. Yet the network, now in all 50 states, is built not on traditional journalism but on propaganda ordered up by dozens of conservative think tanks, political operatives, corporate executives and public-relations professionals, a Times investigation found.

ThatMontrealIP (talk) 22:47, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

Look at what happened to Newsweek on WP:RSP after International Business Times bought it in 2013. It's certainly possible for the newspaper to have different reliability depending on era. Graywalls (talk) 23:09, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

And that article is published by the NYTimes? The same NYTimes that endorsed Joe Biden for US president? No way! ^[stretch] Atsme 💬 📧 00:19, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

You know better than that on this page. O3000 (talk) 00:22, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Better than what? Trying to point out that a competitor is concerned about opposition to their POV? What's your point? Atsme 💬 📧 00:25, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Don’t even start... We don’t need to hear it all again. We know that your personal opinions on what constitutes a reliable source differs greatly from the current consensus, you don’t have to keep reminding us when its only vaguely on topic. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 03:05, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

CJR reported on this back in 2019: https://www.cjr.org/tow_center_reports/hundreds-of-pink-slime-local-news-outlets-are-distributing-algorithmic-stories-conservative-talking-points.php (t · c) buidhe 06:28, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

I suggest that we view all Metric Media sites as, at best, questionable sources. This reporting indicates that the sites have minimal editorial controls, are directed by people buying articles, and are generally content farms. This clearly fails WP:RS and WP:V standards. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 02:45, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Right, just as we wouldn't want to consider Courier Newsroom sites to be reliable sources of news, it doesn't sound like these Metric Media sites would qualify either. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 03:00, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

• Good work by the Times there, I'd say. This looks like an open and shut case: these sources should not be used. In fact if anyone has a full list of domains there should probably be an edit filter. Guy (help! - typo?) 11:35, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Here is a start. Metric Media.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 17:39, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

• Here is a list with over 1,000 domains belonging to Metric Media: https://github.com/MassMove/AttackVectors/blob/master/LocalJournals/sites.csv (t · c) buidhe 06:25, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
• New York Times has now published the complete list of the fraudulent "news" sites on Google Docs. I believe this these should be added as deprecated sources on WP:RSNP (do we need an RFC for that?), and a bot may be needed to create a list of wikipedia articles where they are currently used. Abecedare (talk) 18:43, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

• Does that mean they will be added to a filter of sorts? I can imagine that it will be hard for editors to keep up with all the different sources. Might be better to just block the URLs like a spam filter to pretty users from accidentally adding these pseudo-news sites. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 21:32, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

• As noted above, we need to be careful about blanket removal because these papers existed before being subsumed by 'pink slime'. -- GreenC 18:55, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
• Though it's certainly far too common among established media, it's also fair to note that they violate the copyright of Wikipedia contributors (see this talk page message I left one user whose CC-BY 3.0 image of a local school wasn't attributed) Vahurzpu (talk) 05:43, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

The Dispatch on Guo Wengui

While doing research on Guo Wengui and GTV Media Group, I came across a relatively new source called The Dispatch (thedispatch.com) that published an informative article about Guo that appears to be reliable:

• Lawson, Charlotte (October 26, 2020). "The Strange Case of Guo Wengui". The Dispatch.

The Dispatch describes itself as a website that provides "Fact-based reporting and commentary on politics, policy and culture – informed by conservative principles". One of its co-founders is Stephen F. Hayes, former editor-in-chief of The Weekly Standard (RSP entry). The Dispatch's editor-in-chief is Jonah Goldberg, former senior editor of the National Review (RSP entry). There are 15 individuals listed on the website's "People" page.

Goldberg states that The Dispatch aims to produce "conservative, fact-based news and commentary that doesn’t come either through the filter of the mainstream media or the increasingly boosterish media on the right". Nieman Lab described The Dispatch as "center-right", and offered some context on the US media landscape. The Atlantic (RSP entry) covered the beginnings of The Dispatch with cautious optimism.

Is The Dispatch a generally reliable source, and is its report on Guo reliable for the Guo Wengui and GTV Media Group articles? — Newslinger talk 07:50, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

I think The Dispatch and similar Substack-style outlets are probably in a similar place now as some 'new media' outlets were 5-7 years ago. There is some indication that good journalism might come out of them, and there are some specific outlets about which I am optimistic. However, there is absolutely zero track record on them. The NiemanLab article you quote from mentions "eight full-time staff members", and this TechCrunch article notes that they have an at least one editor (though that editor is Stephen Hayes, also the CEO). The article describes The Dispatch as "in many ways the flagship among full-fledged news organizations built on Substack, but the list of publications now includes Asia Sentinel, Let’s Go Warriors and Write for California", so evaluating this outlet 1) could be done by looking at those other three, and 2) could be used as the high water for Substack (assuming we trust TechCrunch). The NYT described The Dispatch as "a conservative newsletter with more than a dozen employees" as of September 2020.

To summarize my thoughts: this site is probably fine for non-controversial claims, though it should be replaced when possible with outlets with more history. The biggest issue is just that it has no history. Most of the people involved have reasonable decent track records as conservative journalists, but it seems very premature to treat this as a reliable source. This might change in a year or two. A second limiting factor is lack of evidence of editorial standards. It looks like The Dispatch has many, many sub-newsletters, and it is unclear whether 1) editorial standards exist, and 2) whether they are the same for all sub-newsletters. So: okay for non-controversial claims, but untested and lacking editorial transparency (as far as I can tell). Jlevi (talk) 16:04, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Generally we like to see some daylight between the ownership and the editorial staff, not really seeing that here. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:15, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Oh, sure. To be clear, I think that for the moment we should probably treat this outlet as experts/journalists self-publishing on a marginally controlled platform. That may change as the outlet gains more experience/discussion/transparency. Jlevi (talk) 15:16, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

It would appear that more time is needed to evaluate whether The Dispatch should be considered a reliable source. Their articles look to me to be well-research, full of details and hyperlinks and I have yet to see the magazine publish an article filled with false claims, but the outlet is only a year old and the layout of their website has very much an amateur feel to it (or "bloggy feel" as some would say). If they are serial purveyors of fake news, then this will bubble to the surface in time. Fortliberty (talk) 23:42, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

New Era

New Era is a Namibian newspaper that is owned by the government of Namibia. As a news outlet it is clearly bias toward being favorable to the government. According to it's Wikipedia article "The Minister of Information and Communication Technology has the ability to appoint and discharge members of the board of directors. Several researchers report that government ministers have acted as direct owners of the newspaper, telephoning the editorial department about articles that have criticised them." Although a Sweedish study didn't have the same findings, but it's still a government owned news outlet either way. So, given the newspaper's lack of independence as a news source, it's clear to me that it should not be used as a reference for anything that is related to the government. Which I would appreciate confirmation of. The main reason I'm asking is due to it's use as a reference for information on government ran schools. Which are already being covered pretty well by other outlets. For instance The Namibian has pretty good coverage of them and isn't forced to write favorably about the government. There's other also. There's no reason to use a clearly bias source when better alternatives exist. I guess I could do an RfC, but I don't see a problem with using the newspaper for things that don't have to do with the government. --Adamant1 (talk) 02:16, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

• I agree with you that it's not editorially independent of the government (similar to some state media, such as Xinhua, Telewizja Polska, unlike others—BBC, Deutsche Welle). But there's not enough information to say if it's generally reliable. We would be willing to cite a school website for certain info and this is one step removed from that so I would not completely ban it from use on articles of government-run schools, just be cautious and supplement with other sources. (t · c) buidhe 03:59, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Sounds like a fair compromise. --Adamant1 (talk) 04:03, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

@Buidhe: Am I correct to assume that supplementing it with other sources would also apply when using it as a reference for items in a list? --Adamant1 (talk) 16:54, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Well, it depends: if it's the only source for the entire list, then maybe think about whether it's WP:DUE, otherwise, I see no problem for instance using a non-independent source to fill in the gaps and provide a complete list of something. (t · c) buidhe 20:13, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

• If better alternatives exist, by all means use the alternatives. But where this discussion is coming from (Talk:List of schools in Namibia) the contested action was to remove entries from that list, together with their New Era reference and an edit summary of "unreliable source". As explained over there, New Era is not a good source for the evaluation of Namibian government. To simply state that school X is in village Y and was established in the year Z, the source is good enough. --Pgallert (talk) 06:05, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Yep. I didn't say I had problem with that did I? Anyway, you wouldn't even let me change a dead link without making a massive deal out of it. So, no, the problem wasn't "removing entries from the list." That was a separate issue, that still hasn't been resolved yet, and didn't have anything to do with this. Plus, last time I checked, you had zero problem with New Era. Even when it came to being used directly as a reference for the government. At least this is dealt with though. Ultimately, I could really care what reference is used. As long as follows the guidelines. Which is why I asked about it. --Adamant1 (talk) 06:11, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

You didn't. You simply removed it, and only after we repeatedly reverted you did you even find the talk page. But as with many other guidelines, you're oversimplifying: Reliability of a source depends on the context, on what we want it to be a reference for. You will not find an example of me giving a New Era reference for something like "Massive support for the president". But for factual information about a flood in the North, the electrification of a village, or name and location of a school, New Era is a source as good as any other. --Pgallert (talk) 07:12, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

I removed ones that were dead links. Outside of that, I could really care less how you use references and your personal preferences have nothing to do with why I asked about it. The important thing is that the question was answered. There's zero reason to WP:BLUDGEON things beyond the answer just because you feel like making this personal. --Adamant1 (talk) 09:08, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Deprecation of jacobite.ca

• jacobite.ca  

Should http://www.jacobite.ca be removed from the deprecation list? Noel S McFerran (talk) 02:11, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

On 1 June 2020 Guy created an RfC on More nobility fansites asking that five sites be deprecated. Among the sites listed was one edited by me: http://www.jacobite.ca. Three other editors responded "Deprecate all". On 14 August 2020 the discussion was closed by MrX with a consensus to deprecate the five sites.

Deprecation is meant to be "reserved for sources that have a substantial history of fabrication or other serious factual accuracy issues". This is not the case for jacobite.ca. Usually deprecation is used for inaccurate news sites.

In the orignal request Guy said that jacobite.ca is "another one-man project, Jacobite fansite run by an enthusiastic amateur but no editorial board and no relevant academic status". No other editor made any other comments about jacobite.ca. It does not seem to me that the RfC was listed on any relevant talk pages to encourage comments from users who have cited the website on wikipages.

jacobite.ca is a "one-man project" and it has "no editorial board", but it is not a fansite. It is well-known on the web (within its scholarly area), as the largest academic site about Jacobitism. I have two graduate degrees and have been employed as an academic librarian at a Canadian university for over twenty years. As such I am a member of the University of Toronto Faculty Association. Like many of my academic colleagues I was trained largely in one area, but my research has moved over the years in a particular direction. The claim that I have "no relevant academic status" is false; every year my university provides me with ten research days in which I am permitted (among other things) to visit Jacobite sites in Europe and publish my research online. I choose to publish online for free in order to make my research available to as large an audience as possible.

The two largest parts of the site are Documents Illustrating Jacobite History http://www.jacobite.ca/documents/index.htm and A Jacobite Gazeteer http://www.jacobite.ca/gazetteer/index.htm The vast majority of these pages have multiple footnotes citing my sources. On most other pages of my website I include a bibliography of sources.

The site is written from a Jacobite perspective and I use Jacobite titles for certain individuals. On multiple webpages I make clear that these titles are the ones "recognised by the Jacobites" or "used for them by the Jacobites".

jacobite.ca has existed for almost 25 years. In May 1998 it received a StudyWeb Academic Excellence Award as “one of the best educational resources on the Web”. In January 2000 it received a Britannica Internet Guide Award as “one of the best [sites] on the Internet when reviewed for quality, accuracy of content, presentation and usability”.

No editor has shown any evidence that jacobite.ca is "highly questionable" or "generally unreliable".

Remove deprecation for jacobite.ca Noel S McFerran (talk) 02:11, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

@Mcferran: Thanks, for bringing this up, it's probably worth discussing further. Above, you said: "It is well-known on the web (within its scholarly area), as the largest academic site about Jacobitism." Perhaps you can help us with some evidence that shows your site is used by other authorities? GPinkerton (talk) 02:51, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

That's a "straw man". The point is whether or not this site has "a substantial history of fabrication or other serious factual accuracy issues". If it doesn't, it shouldn't be deprecated. No evidence has ever been provided of any such fabrication. Noel S McFerran (talk) 04:50, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

@Mcferran: There are other reasons to deprecate something. In any case, this noticeboard is about assessing ratings of reliability. If you want a rating to change, you should provide evidence supporting the change. Otherwise why bother. Reliable sources are supposed to have a reputation for fact-checking. Does this self-published website? You have claimed "it is well-known on the web (within its scholarly area), as the largest academic site about Jacobitism." There should be lots of citations to to it beyond Wikipedia; it shouldn't be hard to find them for us. GPinkerton (talk) 06:11, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

• In support of Jacobite.ca's reputation, I have found citations to it in John M. Owen IV, Confronting Political Islam (Princeton University Press); Caroline Castiglione, Accounting for Affection (Springer); and some articles on Google Scholar [29]. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 06:50, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

There are less than 54 references to the website on google scholar, the vast majority of which have almost nothing to do with jacobitism. Hemiauchenia (talk) 06:54, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

• Retain deprecation (first choice) or Change to Generally Unreliable (second choice). Wikipedia's standards for source reliability are well understood. As the request acknowledges, this is a one-man site and there is no editorial board. It is also written "from a Jacobite perspective" - that's WP:FRINGE in context. What are the author's relevant qualifications and credentials? The comments above make it sound as if his credentials are in a different, albeit perhaps adjacent, field. It looks very much as if this request is prompted by a drop-off in referral traffic, which isn't really our problem to fix. As to why these references exist on Wikipedia perhaps the user who made this edit can help? Oh, wait: user:Mcferran. Fancy that. Guy (help! - typo?) 08:42, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

It's unfortunate that people can make false accusations on Wikipedia talk pages without any evidence. I don't follow traffic statistics for my website. I learnt about this change because of a newspaper report about Wikipedia deprecation. If Guy looks closely at that edit, he will see that I re-ordered the links which were already there (which included a link to an essay on my website) and added one other. Noel S McFerran (talk) 00:23, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

@Mcferran: What newspaper article? Did you see the other questions I asked? GPinkerton (talk) 00:25, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Mcferran, {{citation needed}}. Guy (help! - typo?) 00:48, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

• Retain deprecation – clearly fails the (limited) exceptions sanctioned by the WP:SPS policy. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:51, 2 November 2020 (UTC)
• Retain deprecation - unconvinced it isnt a fansite, I hate to say this to the guys face but while their site is “well known on the web” it is not respected within the relevant academic communities nor do I see any indication that they themselves are a respected or notable scholar in their field. I don't see the sort of publications and lasting impact I would expect to see from the level of expert we would accept this sort of one man show source from. This appears to be a clear case of WP:FRINGE and I support retaining deprecated status for this site as well as the rest of the royalty hobby sites deprecated in that RfC. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:08, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Fansite? Do you see the almost 150 historical documents which are available on the site, http://www.jacobite.ca/documents/index.htm

@Mcferran: Is there some reason these documents would not be available elsewhere? Indeed, is there any reason, they can't just be uploaded to Wikisource? GPinkerton (talk) 00:28, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Fansites can cite sources, and include replicas of reliable sources. They often do. Guy (help! - typo?) 00:50, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

• Retain deprecation - Sources should not be undeprecated just because they were deprecated in a bundle with other sources. If the reason for deprecation is no longer valid then it can be revisited, but only then. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 20:06, 2 November 2020 (UTC)
• Not one single example of falsity or fabrication has been cited by an editor, and yet the site has been deprecated. Deprecation is not the penalty for Self-published sources. I don't see any other group of sites listed on Wikipedia:Deprecated sources. It seems to me that the site has been deprecated because of its topic (history related to royalty) not because of any lack of reliability (since none has been cited). Noel S McFerran (talk) 00:23, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

  There is precedent for the deprecation of self-published sources. See Baidu Baike (RSP entry), Crunchbase (RSP entry), and Rate Your Music (RSP entry) for examples. Deprecation is intended to caution editors against the addition of unreliable sources. If a self-published source is being inappropriately added to many articles, and there are few to no valid uses for the source in Wikipedia articles, then deprecation would be a valid solution. The jacobite.ca website may be one of these cases. — Newslinger talk 08:48, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

• Remove deprecation: This is what the policy says A small number of sources are deprecated on Wikipedia. ... It is reserved for sources that have a substantial history of fabrication or other serious factual accuracy issues This is clear cut. What is the point of having policies if voters just ignore them? To boot, McFerran is right and I've found his website cited in a number of books and journal articles. ImTheIP (talk) 08:39, 3 November 2020 (UTC)
• Remove deprecation The site qualifies as a reliable self-published source per WP:SPS, "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications." Assuming good faith that the OP's credentials are valid, I see no reason to deprecate this SPS. --Jayron32 14:47, 4 November 2020 (UTC)
• Remove deprecation Per ImTheIP and Jayron32. Also, just because a site has a point of view doesn't make it unreliable. From WP:BIASED: reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. IdRatherBeAtTheBeach (talk) 15:22, 5 November 2020 (UTC)
• Retain deprecation - I agree with Francis Schonken. It should retain its deprecation per WP:SPS and WP:RS. Also, what has happened in the mean time to change its deprecated status? I don't see any significant changes.Magnus Dominus (talk) 14:24, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
• I'll ask again. Where is the evidence for a substantial history of fabrication or other serious factual accuracy issues Just being self-published is not enough to make a site deprecated. There has to be inaccuracy. I am relieved that some editors see this; I was beginning to lose confidence in the Wikipedia community. Noel S McFerran (talk) 05:57, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
  • @Mcferran: Meanwhile you're ignoring my and others' questions to you ... why should anyone satisfy you with an answer to (another)one of yours? As for errors and inaccuracies, why does the claim appear that From his birth Francis was recognised by the Jacobites as a "Prince of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, Prince of Cornwall and Rothesay"? Who are these Jacobites, how did they "recognize" him, and how did they do so on the instant of his birth? Why should an encyclopaedia rely on this kind of fantasy? Again, why should anyone cite this site, when the documents can be cited to their actual origins and when the original material is pure fantasy. What is a "prince of England" anyway? GPinkerton (talk) 06:08, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
    • A charitable explanation of Mcferran's absence is that he doesn't have as much time for this as you and I have. The Jacobites are pretenders who believe that the English revolution in the 17th century was illegitimate and that they are the heirs to the throne. An article in the Guardian explains Franz' claim: This could mean that the next rightful monarch of Britain would be neither Prince Charles nor any of his close relations, but a 74-year-old Bavarian duke called Franz Bonaventura Adalbert Maria von Bayern. For this amiable man, who lives alone in the enormous Nymphenburg Palace near Munich, is the closest blood descendant of King Charles I and considered by Jacobites to be the rightful Stuart heir to the British throne. In my opinion, it is troubling that Wikipedia editors that don't know what Jacobitism is, are participating in this discussion. They can't possibly tell if jacobite.ca is a reliable source or not. ImTheIP (talk) 10:05, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

As far as I can tell taking Jacobite claims at face value is a problem vis-a-vis WP:FRINGE... This whole website seems to be some sort of Jacobite role playing exercise which treats Jacobite claims as historical facts. At best this is a highly partisan source that can be used to provide the Jacobite viewpoint on a given issue, its useless as far as actual history is concerned. Now I will give you that at best it would not be worthy of deprecation it would just be generally unreliable. The problem is that the Jacobite viewpoint is inherently fringe so there is just no way we can use this site for anything. Any removal of deprecation would be purely symbolic, it wouldn’t allow this source to be used on more than a half dozen pages. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:46, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Can you provide some examples of WP:FRINGE claims on the site? Is the Guardian article I cited also WP:FRINGE? ImTheIP (talk) 22:43, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Take for example "The documents made available here illustrate the intentions of the Jacobite kings: liberty of conscience for all; liberty for all to worship in their own fashion or even in no fashion; the national integrity of each individual kingdom - England, Scotland, and Ireland. This may be compared with the intentions of their opponents: religious intolerance (not only towards Catholics but also to all those who did not believe in the Trinity); required attendance at Protestant religious services; forced unions between England, Scotland, and Ireland.” [30] which is way beyond what we would expect an academic source to say. This guy is clearly arguing a corner and presenting a rather fancifully curated version of history. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:02, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

The quoted text is not WP:FRINGE (nb. FRINGE is defined as "an idea that departs significantly from the prevailing views or mainstream views in its particular field") ImTheIP (talk) 23:21, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

In my opinion it is fringe, I respect that you disagree. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:29, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

ImTheIP, the Guardian article is an opinion piece the mentions Jacobitism tangentially. The author goes on to note that Franz, the notional heir, "ridicules the claim and has never considered giving up his Catholic faith." Mackensen (talk) 23:26, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

• Comment. I agree that there's some drift between how sources are handled here, and how Wikipedia:Reliable sources describes deprecation. I think the guideline is out of date, given the sorts of discussions I see here, though I leave that to regulars to address. I also note that the original, rather perfunctory discussion said nothing about jacobite.ca. Typically a self-published source is evaluated based on whether the author is a recognized expert in his field; that is, is the author's reliability certified by others even though in this instance there are none of the usual editorial controls. The question of whether Jacobitism is even a thing in the 21st century is somewhat beside the point; that's a question of undue weight and wholly separate from reliability.

On the question of deprecation, then, we need to turn to McFerran's credentials. He holds multiple academic degrees and is employed as an academic librarian at a university. He receives several weeks research leave per year; I'm curious to know more about this, but I would note that this is not enough time for there to be any expectation of producing a book or an article. He doesn't appear to publish in academic journals because he wants to make his research freely available. That's a fine and laudable goal but it also deprives us--and him--of the scholarly commentary that establishes a reputation. Most of the Google Scholar citations are to documents that he has hosted. That's a good and useful function but it doesn't help establish reliability. The website awards from 1998 and 2000 do, but the Internet was a fundamentally different place twenty years ago. Is there anything more recent? Mackensen (talk) 23:23, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

• Retain deprecation. Per Mackensen, I do not see evidence of the rather extraordinary credentials needed for SPS exemption here. I also agree that the guidelines ought to be updated to reflect the current treatment of unreliable sources, which, as mentioned by others, is trending towards exclusion of sites that provide limited citability (i.e. information on them can easily be obtained elsewhere) regardless of documented falsification. And Wikipedia editors absolutely don't need expertise in a subject to weigh in on whether a source meets the mostly objective RS criteria discussed here. JoelleJay (talk) 01:58, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Muslims and Pastafarians Vs. Atheists

Can following news about Muslims and Pastafarians Vs. Atheists in Melbourne counter-demonstration, be used as reliable source ? Melbourne counter-demonstration: Muslims and Pastafarians Vs. Atheists

Thanks

Bookku (talk) 04:46, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

While I would count myself as one sympathetic to the noodly deity, for me, this is a flat no. The interest here is not in presenting "news," there is no reputation for fact checking nor accuracy, and the heavy does of satire, while appreciated, does not lend itself to RS status. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 04:51, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Given that your potential source currently shows the message "Error 404 - Not Found", no. HiLo48 (talk) 05:04, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

@ HiLo48, Updated the link, thanks Bookku (talk) 05:22, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. Well, I too appreciate the satire, but still no. HiLo48 (talk) 05:36, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Quoting:

"Islam and Flying Spaghetti Monsterism have the same core beliefs in common; we believe ..."

"We just have different opinions about the name of that god ..."

Thus, this is an opinion piece, and self-promotional at that. Limp noodle and all that. Shenme (talk) 05:51, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Ramen to that, brother. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:49, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

For what?Slatersteven (talk) 13:13, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Do this notice board needs more Pastafarians to assist naysayers. Matter of fact is I am not too dependent on this source for any thing. My primary case is to revisit nuances of Wikipedian culture, Whether more nuanced views are really not possible for this or any other cases. I do find insistence in Wikipedian concept of necessarily throwing child with bath water that too on the basis of antecedents of the child quite strange.

For, example in this particular case a live satire was played out is informed. Now the information too might have been given in satirical way, even if that satirical way is stripped out information of satire took place remains to have minimum information irrespective of Wikipedians accept it as a reliable source or not. So for example can this link be used in external links on articles Religious satire or Humour in Islam.

I am not expecting any one even to agree on for even in external link section. I purpose is to make people rethink to have more nuanced encyclopedic culture. Thanks

Bookku (talk) 04:43, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Comment The website in question is a parody of religion, and therefore is not a reliable source. Maqdisi117 (talk) 01:43, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

The Spinoff / thespinoff.co.nz

Does The Spinoff [ https://thespinoff.co.nz ] meet the requirements of WP:BLPRS?

Claimed to be a reliable source for BLP information at Talk:Cavetown (musician)‎#RfC on aromantic and transgender identity.

Previously discussed at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 221#The Spinoff.

Article at The Spinoff --Guy Macon (talk) 02:06, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Context matters. What do you think is being reported that’s not acceptable in some way? Glee^anon 04:42, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Asked and answered. I clearly stated the context above. I realize that you have strong feelings about the RfC, but while you are here please limit your comments to whether or not The Spinoff [ https://thespinoff.co.nz ] meets the requirements of WP:BLPRS. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:11, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Again, Does The Spinoff [ https://thespinoff.co.nz ] meet the requirements of WP:BLPRS? --Guy Macon (talk) 20:20, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

The source is used as follows:

According to The Spinoff Skinner “maintains an extremely open and genuine social presence online” via his social media. (Adams, Josie (2019-12-09). "Who is Cavetown, and how did he sell out in Auckland?". The Spinoff. Retrieved 2020-11-02. He likes intimate gigs and intimate songs, and he's made it very clear that even though he identifies as aromantic, he still has a lot of love.) He identifies on the “aro”—or aromantic spectrum, and discusses this with fans online.[other refs also on this]

The BLP subject has publicly discussed, and identified as being aromantic so this article is reporting that identity. Glee^anon 21:00, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

The Spinoff is reliable: it's a mixture of sensible analysis and light entertainment and it's fairly obvious which is which. The question is whether the focus on sexuality is WP:UNDUE, and I would guess it probably is, so leave it out. Daveosaurus (talk) 06:57, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

New Musical Express / NME / www.nme.com

Does New Musical Express (NME) [ https://www.nme.com/ ] meet the requirements of WP:BLPRS?

Claimed to be a reliable source for BLP information at Talk:Cavetown (musician)‎#RfC on aromantic and transgender identity.

Previously discussed at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 26#Rolling Stone, NME, Popmatters and Metal-Observer

Article at NME. -Guy Macon (talk) 02:28, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable This a decent source for music related news. GPinkerton (talk) 04:13, 3 November 2020 (UTC)
• Context matters, this is the “contentious” content in dispute:

  When NME asked about his talking “openly about things like sexuality or mental health” he replied, “You’re allowed to just have a mental illness or be a certain identity, there doesn’t have to be anything further than that. You can just be.”

  • "Cavetown: Bedroom-pop hero building worldwide community". New Musical Express. 2020-07-10. Retrieved 2020-11-03.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
• I’d say it’s quite reliable for these direct quotes, what was asked/answered. Glee^anon 04:47, 3 November 2020 (UTC)
• NME is pretty solid, but this looks more like an UNDUE issue than a RS one. Guy (help! - typo?) 08:38, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

  (Also for @Newslinger:.) That’s a fair assumption, however after reading every reliable source available from the last twelve months Cavetown has a very active conduit with his fans via YouTube, he has a solid reputation for being transparent and very emotional. He writes songs about his anxieties and issues, and his younger fans flock to his concerts. A good article, and this one is already a good size at least, would certainly have this or something very similar. Glee^anon 09:08, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

  Just to be clear, I'm not commenting on the due weight of the excerpt above, other than that it needs to be evaluated separately from its reliability. My comment is only to confirm that NME, including its interviews, qualifies under WP:BLPRS. — Newslinger talk 09:14, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

  Thank you. That was indeed the question I wanted answered. The WP:WEIGHT argument is being discussed in the RfC and does not concern this noticeboard. All I wanted to know was whether New Musical Express (NME) [ https://www.nme.com/ ] meets the requirements of WP:BLPRS in the context I mentioned. That question has been answered. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:17, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

• NME is a well-respected British music publication, and is generally reliable, including for biographies of living persons. I don't see any reason to distrust the accuracy of this NME interview. Due weight is another question. — Newslinger talk 09:00, 3 November 2020 (UTC)
• NME is not perfect, but it's an RS in its area, and doesn't have a history of undue gossip content about BLPs - David Gerard (talk) 09:07, 3 November 2020 (UTC)
• Reliable within its area of expertise, keep in mind that as always if a claim about a BLP can only be found in a single source then its best to err on the side of not including it regardless of the quality of the source. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:20, 3 November 2020 (UTC)
• What Guy said. Reliability is not in dispute, due weight is. feminist (talk) | Americans, unite 03:07, 9 November 2020 (UTC)
• I found it Generally Reliable in its area but just like David Gerard said, it's not perfect.Magnus Dominus (talk) 20:36, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Is ArtistDirect a reliable source.

ArtistDirect is a digital media website that mostly posts news about and interviews with famous music artists. I used an ArtistDirect interview with Avicii while working on the article, "Levels (Avicii song)", due to it having information about how "Levels" was made. I want to know whether or not ArtistDirect could be considered a reliable source.

Choose one of the options below and the reason why.

• Option 1 - ArtistDirect is a generally reliable source.
• Option 2 - ArtistDirect is a questionable source, or should be used with considerations.
• Option 3 - ArtistDirect is a generally unreliable source.
• Option 4 - ArtistDirect needs to be deprecated due to providing false or fabricated information.
• I think that for biographical information directly, in the website's own voice, it may be borderline, but for the words of the artists themselves per WP:ABOUTSELF, I think it can be acceptable for use. If you're using an interview, and paraphrasing or quoting the artist's own words, I see no reason to suspect they have fabricated the interview. I think that for other aspects of music journalism (such as original news stories) the information may lack some of the pedigree of more established music journalism sources; that isn't a "don't use it" warning, but a "use with a bit of caution" warning; there may be a time when it develops a well-respected reputation in the industry, but I'm not sure it is there yet for those purposes. If we have to vote, I would say "option 1 for interviews" and "option 2 for news". --Jayron32 15:38, 4 November 2020 (UTC)
• For me, it’s generally a source I use as a last resort, but try to find other sources if possible. Sergecross73 msg me 02:03, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Vanity Fair partisanship

I question if Vanity Fair is unbiased when it comes to politics. The article https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2004/10/florida-election-2000 is a heavily used source on Bush v. Gore.

Vanity Fair is listed as "generally reliable for popular culture" at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources. Is this legal case popular culture? Previous Noticeboard discussions were about Lindsey Lohan and model Manushi Chhillar. For politics I believe the site should be labeled as WP:PARTISAN as is Mother Jones and Vox. If relevant, here are the most popular articles on Vanity Fair's sidebar: "Joe Biden Is Closing In On the Electoral College and All Donald Trump Can Do Is Angrily Tweet About It", "Fox News Is at War With Itself Over 2020 Election Results", and "Bill Barr, Trump Henchman, Is Sending Armed Agents to Ballot-Counting Locations". In particular the Florida election Vanity Fair article makes frequent claims from unattributed law clerks which end up in the Bush v Gore article. The article is written more like an essay to push a particular political viewpoint instead of as news.

I'd love to hear the community's thoughts on this. Wqwt (talk) 05:02, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

We don't care if it's biased, but we do care about accuracy and factuality. Extreme bias tends to affect that, but a source can be somewhat biased and still accurate, hence the difference between how we tend to rate right- and left-leaning sources. At this time in history, in the USA, left-wing sources tend not to lose their accuracy as much as right-wing sources. So accuracy, not bias, is how we judge sources. -- Valjean (talk) 05:10, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

"At this time in history, in the USA, left-wing sources tend not to lose their accuracy as much as right-wing sources." I have no idea where you got this from and whether it is blatantly false or not (you didn't cite anything), and I don't know who you're speaking for when you say "we" for "rating sources". Anyway my point is to ask whether the site should be considered generally reliable or biased. Rfc if necessary. Wqwt (talk) 05:30, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Stating that Vanity Fair is “generally reliable for popular culture” doesn't imply that they aren't reliable on other subjects, Wqwt: as you yourself point out, the previous discussions were about celebrity BLPs, which is probably why conclusions weren't reached outside of popular culture coverage.

Which stories Vanity Fair chooses to advertise on their web site sidebar, and their titles, has nothing whatsoever to do with the publication's reliability as a source. As our headline article notes even of major front-page titles, It is generally written by a copy editor, but may also be written by the writer, the page layout designer, or other editors.

The 2004 article you refer to, cited in our Bush v. Gore SCOTUS case article, is in no way written like an essay. Its author is David Margolick, a law school graduate and legal affairs reporter at The New York Times before joining Vanity Fair in the late twentieth century, where he is now a contributing editor, not just a reporter. He is also the author of multiple published books about Supreme Court cases.

So, thanks to this discussion, IMO we can now probably remove the “for popular culture” qualification and just call it “generally reliable”. By all means, RfC away, though I think the fact that after Valjean's explanation you still seem to regard “generally reliable” and “biased” as antonyms, or something, may indicate you're not prepared to present such a question in the context of Wikipedia sourcing policies and guidelines. --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 05:43, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

"Stating that Vanity Fair is “generally reliable for popular culture” doesn't imply that they aren't reliable on other subjects" - nor does it imply it is reliable for other subjects. Thus the point of me posting here to gather consensus. "we can now probably remove the “for popular culture” qualification and just call it “generally reliable”." Again, who is 'we"? Is your view automatically editor consensus? Wqwt (talk) 05:54, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Even as far as the bulleted opinions at the bottom of this discussion, note at the top of the page it says, While we attempt to offer a second opinion, and the consensus of several editors can generally be relied upon, answers are not official policy.

If you go to delete cited material at this article, you can make any argument you want; but of course, since you opened up this discussion and linked to it from the article talk page, by that point an absolutely mountainous pile of evidence supporting the reliability of VF will probably have accumulated, which anyone disagreeing with you can simply cut and paste (though linking here again is probably better) if you still take the position that VF is not a reliable source. --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 11:45, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

If the claims in the Vanity Fair article about Bush v. Gore are accurate, there probably should be other, more scholarly sources to support them. If you can find better sources, please use them; as this was one of the most famous Supreme Court cases of recent years, plenty of sources should be available. As for what interviewees may have said about the internal disputes among Supreme Court justices, please consider that if the VF article is the only source for those comments, including those comments may be undue emphasis. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 05:45, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

I'd certainly concur that more, better sources is always better; but if other sources have not also pursued the question of internal disputes among Supreme Court justices, that doesn't make the information reported by VF a WP:UNDUE minority viewpoint like the flat Earth concept: a majority of sources would need to be arguing the opposite, that there was great harmony among SCOTUS justices with no internal disputes, (edit: and specifically in this case, which was 5–4 in the final opinion against the remedy) for VF to be an insignificant minority viewpoint in that case.

Similarly, under the WP:PROPORTION subsection, you'd need to have an effective argument that the overall significance to the article topic, the significance of disputes among SCOTUS justices about a particular case to the article about that particular case, was so insignificant as to support exclusion, to justify a deletion of the cited facts under WP:UNDUE. “Undue emphasis” is often used in quite the underpants gnomes fashion but it has a very specific meaning in the WP:NPOV policy. --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 11:18, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

• Generally reliable for news. Vanity Fair has won multiple National Magazine Awards for topics outside of popular culture, including politics. See "Rules of Engagement", its report on the Haditha massacre that won the 2007 National Magazine Award for public interest reporting. — Newslinger talk 05:55, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
• Generally reliable. Their fact-checking is thorough IME - David Gerard (talk) 11:24, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

It's reliability depends on other factors that usually change over time such as authors, timing, source quality, independence. Although it seems reliable more often than not, I think its reliablity cannot be generalized, especially nowadays.Magnus Dominus (talk) 14:31, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

• Generally reliable for news.Vanity Fair is the only paper magazine I subscribe to, and only for the political articles, they are that good. My wife enjoys the fashion stuff. They are like Playboy, which has always had very high quality articles on political and social justice subjects. Both magazines do not leave such topics to amateurs but use only very good authors.

How is this an argument for its reliability? Wqwt (talk) 04:50, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

I fully agree with Struthious Bandersnatch that "we can now probably remove the “for popular culture” qualification and just call it 'generally reliable'." -- Valjean (talk) 15:48, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

• Generally reliable, bias is not disqualifying and never has been. Nor am I sure that Vanity Fair’s bias rises to the point of us labelling it partisan. What matters is editorial independence and a reputation for accuracy/fact checking which Vanity Fair has. On the specific issue of the Bush/Gore Florida article I agree with Struthious Bandersnatch that its not an essay in the slightest... Thats a piece of top tier journalism. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:43, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
• Additional considerations apply, Vanity Fair is more focussed on opinions and backgrounds than news reporting and unlike at e.g. The New York Times, there is no clear distinction between the two. As such, WP:RSOPINION should apply to all content. According to Glenn Greenwald writing for The Guardian, Vanity Fair has engaged in 'journalistically corrupt practices'. In any case, attribution should be required. ExcitedEngineer (talk) 12:07, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Nothing about that Greenwald opinion says that the Vanity Fair article was not accurate (rather the opposite, the actual quotes used were double checked although the approval process was problematic), and it would make no sense to make our decision on a single Greenwald opinion column. But contrary what your argument seems to imply, sources are not limited to journalism and don't have to be journalism to be incidentally accurate. Greenwald's other opinion in which he was even more critical was about Rolling Stone and he objected to a historian doing an interview Greenwald deemed soft, well what an historian does in asking questions are not necessarily going to be the same purpose as journalism. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:21, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

The Greenwald article is an illustration of their partisanship and that their standards of journalistic integrity and level of independence from the topic are not as high as those of other news sources. The reason I crossed out two statements above is that, in my impression, Vanity Fair does contain quality investigative journalism that can be used for obtaining statements of fact (the article used in Bush v. Gore seems to fall into that category). But a large proportion of their content is opinion pieces that should not be used for that purpose and do fall under WP:RSOPINION. In my opinion, for a source to be labeled generally reliable, there should be a clear distinction between the two and that is not the case with Vanity Fair. Editors should evaluate this on a case-by-case basis and exercise more caution when citing Vanity Fair than when citing sources such as New York Times news articles. ExcitedEngineer (talk) 11:57, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

You’re citing an opinion piece from one source (notice the “commentisfree” in this URL?) to argue that we shouldn't use opinion pieces from another source? You’re confusing me ExcitedEngineer, RSOPINION applies to all reliable sources already... Its not an additional consideration. They do clearly label which pieces are opinion and which aren’t, what exactly are you arguing here? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:31, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

'You’re citing an opinion piece from one source (notice the “commentisfree” in this URL?) to argue that we shouldn't use opinion pieces from another source?' That is not my intention. Opinion pieces are very valuable to Wikipedia, but we have to be aware of their limitations. The essence of RSOPINION is that they should not be used for statements of fact. 'RSOPINION applies to all reliable sources already.' It doesn't apply to scholarly sources and most news articles and reports. These can be used for statements of fact. 'They do clearly label which pieces are opinion and which aren’t, what exactly are you arguing here?' That they don't, at least not online. Notice how most newspaper websites have columns and tabs that say 'opinion'? Vanity Fair doesn't, which is why it is not immediately obvious whether what you are reading is investigative journalism, which can be used for statements of fact and where attribution may not be needed, a news report, or an opinion piece. Assessment on a case-by-case basis is needed to determine this. I hope this answers your questions. ExcitedEngineer (talk) 19:20, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

It answers most of it, I’m still not sure why you used opinion piece to make your point but thats immaterial. Can you post an example of a Vanity Fair opinion piece that is indistinguishable from quality in-depth reporting? That would be rather troubling. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:47, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

For example, I would consider this article an example of journalism that describes the current state of affairs, while this one is mostly the authors' opinion. These are not two extreme examples but simply the first two articles on the politics page right now. There is no clear difference in respect to lay-out, presentation, or labeling as there would be in most respectable news sources. Before using VF for statements of fact, be sure to determine what you're working with. ExcitedEngineer (talk) 17:18, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

The opinion piece says “Levin Report” across the top, thats a clear difference in labelling. In fact Lavin produces the exact same sort of content (regular opinion column) for Vanity Fair as Greenwald does for The Guardian, they are substantially equivalent. Off the top of my head I cant think of a news source that uses a different layout and presentation for its opinion pieces, what exactly are you expecting here? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:30, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Didn't even notice the small print. There are also plenty of opinion pieces that don't have such a tag, like this one. As for lay-out, the Guardian opinion pages have a different background color, are presented on a specific section of their web site with a different URL, have a highlighted bar on the opinion tab and present the author's name in large print right below the title to emphasise that it is their personal work and opinion. VF does none of that. ExcitedEngineer (talk) 18:26, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

• Highly respected magazine. We mainly use it for cultural commentary, features and interviews. It isn't a daily newspaper. Itsmejudith (talk) 20:52, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Who is "we"? Wqwt (talk) 04:50, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

We at Wikipedia. At least that's how it should normally be used. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:33, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

• Generally reliable, with considerations - I would add the tag Some editors believe that Vanity Fair is biased or opinionated for politics to give guidance that attribution would be nessicary.[31][32] Similar to The Daily Telegraph, Reason, or The Register. PackMecEng (talk) 21:02, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
  • I'd like to see such a claim being evidenced first, which it hasn't been really. Particularly not using MediaBiasFactCheck to back your claim - David Gerard (talk) 21:35, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
    • The claim is they are a biased and opinionated source. The two sources I gave are both respected sites that rate sources for just that. Though your claim of fact checking is unsupported and odd given they have been sued and lost the case for fabricating information.[33] Then their is their editorial staff protecting Jeffrey Epstein.[34] Oh and their copyright infringment.[35] PackMecEng (talk) 23:55, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
      • MediaBiasFactCheck is not a "respected site", per WP:MBFC - in fact, it is specifically listed on WP:RSP as generally unreliable - David Gerard (talk) 11:17, 8 November 2020 (UTC)
        • WP:NOR applies to articlespace only, consensus of bias or being opinionated among editors does not require a WP:RS. For some more illustration of VF being opinionated, compare coverage of the 'Doctors make money out of COVID diagnoses' claim by CNN, the Washington Post and Vanity Fair ExcitedEngineer (talk) 12:17, 8 November 2020 (UTC)
• TTo me the source looks to be generally reliable. From what I have seen of their reporting, their articles appear to be well researched, full of details and have yet to contain a single case of fake news. Fortliberty (talk) 23:33, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

• Vanity Fair fabricating a headline with no retraction. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-my-crimes-investigated/ Wqwt (talk) 04:54, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

• You should perhaps read an article before attempting to use it to prove a point. Suffice to say it doesn't say what you want it to say. I would explain in detail but if you don't understand from reading it, you won't understand any explanation either. Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:32, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

• Basically it is an example of why WP:RSHEADLINES is a thing. A misleading headline that was not supported by the article. Incidentally the VF article explains and clarifies who said what and how but yeah bad headline. PackMecEng (talk) 00:52, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Here is the proper media bias fact checking site (Ad Fontes Media):

• https://www.adfontesmedia.com/vanity-fair-bias-and-reliability/

Valjean (talk) 16:54, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Valjean. Please take a look at the Ad Fontes entry at WP:RSP. You'll see that consensus does not view it as typically useful for these discussions. Jlevi (talk) 17:12, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Anarchist FAQ used in various -ism articles.

Such as Socialism, Federalism, Anarcho-capitalism, Libertarian socialism, Anti-capitalism.

Source: These are all the same thing as far as I know. Is An Anarchist FAQ explains what this book is.
https://web.archive.org/web/20171006003544/http://www.infoshop.org/AnarchistFAQIntro
https://www.worldcat.org/title/anarchist-faq/oclc/182529204 by AK Press

Is this a reliable source that should be used? Graywalls (talk) 05:14, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

It's a statement of opinion about a philosophy, so it's not more or less reliable than other opinons. In the articles I looked it it was appropriately attributed. Spudlace (talk) 04:55, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

There is a dearth of good sources on anarchism, and the Anarchist FAQ is pretty highly regarded. It has a wikipedia page: An Anarchist FAQ, which has a section showing how it is seen as reliable by anarchists. The frequently cited version here is now offline, but it is available here: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/the-anarchist-faq-editorial-collective-an-anarchist-faq-08-17 BobFromBrockley (talk) 13:00, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Is Metalreviews.com a reliable source

MetalReviews.com was used in part to defend the notability of Torn (Evergrey album). I would like to know if others consider it a reliable source.

Please choose one of the below:

• Option 1 - MetalReviews is a generally reliable source.
• Option 2 - MetalReviews is a questionable source, or should be used with considerations.
• Option 3 - MetalReviews is a generally unreliable source.
• Option 4 - MetalReviews needs to be deprecated due to providing false or fabricated information.

--TheSandDoctor ^Talk 06:41, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

• 2. It looks like a fan website filled with amateur reviews of music. It does not impart notability. They don't explain what they're about either. Graywalls (talk) 18:18, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Option 1 at least at the time of the review the website seems to have had a fair number of regular contributors. However, I will also note that this is irrelevant given that the album meets at least two notability standards per WP:NALBUM including coverage in the RSes Blabbermouth and AllMusic and having reached 4th place in the Swedish charts. El komodos drago (talk to me) 20:44, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Alha Udal Ki Veergatha

Hi, I'm Sumit banaphar. Recently I have been trying to make changes in Udal of Mahoba by participate on the talk page , so i want to ask did this book consider reliable source for making changes.

Book:- Alha Udal Ki Veergatha [36]

Author:- Acharya Mayaram Patang

Publisher:- Prabhat Prakashan

Page number:- not given but I'm giving the link of the exact page that i want to show here[37]

The article Udal of Mahoba currently includes the text

They were of mixed Ahir and Rajput descent and belonged to the Banaphar clan.

And I want to change it to

"They were of Rajput descent and belonged to the Banaphar clan of Rajputs"

so i want ask that, is this source is reliable for making the changes.Sumit banaphar (talk) 13:25, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Quoting the google-page: "Prabhat Prakashan, 1 Jan 2018 - Fiction - 176 pages" (my emphasis). So no. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 15:48, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

• If it is a work of fiction, then it can't be used as a source. Also, not a comment on sourcing, but, apparently, the original statement is well sourced and is a superset of what you're proposing. I don't get why you want to change it? --RegentsPark (comment) 17:38, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

@ User:Sumit banaphar P. avoid getting confused. As I stated earlier @ Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Aalha Khand page 19 to 22 of Aalha Khand analysis in chapter 'Lokgatha' by Dr. Asha Gupt (It is not 'Gupta" but just 'Gupt') very much amounts to be secondary reliable source as expected by English language Wikipedia. Dr. Asha Gupt is Doctor of literature in Hindi language in Bhagalpur Hindi University and hence he is an acceptable authority. You just need to translate his commentary part in your own words put it on talk page of the article and then use gist of it in the article.

Please do understand original epic poem amounts to be primary source. It's analysis by an expert is secondary source. So use analytical part by Dr. Asha Gupt and don't use original epic poem as reference in the same book.

If you still need help in understanding issues discuss at Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics or at Hindi Wikipedia itself. They might explain issues and rules better.

Bookku (talk) 18:14, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

@Bookku I already proved my point in hindi wikipedia[38].So can we use the translation of the hindi Wikipedia's page? If not, then I will participate on Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics for help. And thanks for guidance.Sumit banaphar (talk) 05:14, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

There is no direct bearing of one language Wikipedia on other language Wikipedia as such. You will need to prove your point interdependently on each of language Wikipedia as such. I told you to contact experienced users there not as a proof of your point but there are certain nuances you are finding difficult to understand and they can help you better probably. Contact @ Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics not for campaigning purpose because that won't work. First understand how Wikipedia operates about references from them then probably you will understand Dr.Gupt can be your best possible positioning that what I can foresee.

Secondly this is not the forum to discuss caste and clan mindsets but since those are driving force behind this contesting; but Adding new scholar opinions is easy, most probably removing other scholar opinions won't be an easy task on English Wikipedia unless you get a informal doctorate in rules here by gaining editing other articles. So add Dr. Gupts references as of now and forget issue till you get enough experience of Wikipedia rules through un related articles. That is my honest opinion. For more help seek guidance from Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics and Wikipedia Tea house etc. Bookku (talk) 05:38, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

@RegentsPark I want to change it because the article is not totally correct, that's it.Sumit banaphar (talk) 05:14, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Is Kathimerini reliable on this page?

I couldn't find any directly mentions on archives, so I'm asking this question. I came to here after this discussion. My thoughts about it was that it could be conflict of interest on that topic and -that following part is specifically about my edit- I couldn't find any third party source to confirm it (other ones were repeating itself as far as I see).--Ahmetlii (talk) 19:46, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

• It's a generally-reliable mainstream WP:NEWSORG, isn't it? - David Gerard (talk) 22:44, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
• The only way for there to be a COI is if the paper is run by and not editorially independent of the Greek (or Turkish) government. Just being published in Greece does not make a COI. (t · c) buidhe 23:51, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Buidhe I know, and that's why I opened a discussion on RSN because I don't know whether it's reliable by verified by other reliable sources or it's editorially dependent (and I couldn't see a discussion about it in here).--Ahmetlii (talk) 10:09, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

• Daily Sabah or Kathimerini are not the best sources for the Greek-Turkish relations page. Kathimerini diverges significantly from the mainstream press on some issues, which is not unusual for local foreign language papers. Take the illegal immigration section for example. There is no lack of mainstream sourcing for this. Reuters has run countless stories on the subject, and so has every other mainstream international news outlet. While that doesn't rule out the sources for Wikipedia purposes, it does imply good sense in their use. In this article it has been cited for the following content:

"According to Greek sources the Turkish authorities are tolerant of smugglers trafficking illegal immigrants into Greece; a notable such incident is the one of a trafficking boat, filmed on September 14, 2009 by the Latvian helicopter crew of Frontex patrolling near Farmakonisi island, during which "it is clear that the Turkish coastguard, at best, does not prevent the "slavetrade" vessels to sail from its shores. At worst, it accompanies them into Greek territorial waters".

Context matters, and saying the Turkish government is accompanying slave trading vessels into Europe is tabloid-quality stuff. If it were true I think it would have attracted attention in the mainstream press. I'm not inclined to read the article in more detail but I wouldn't be surprised to find many more examples like this in there. Spudlace (talk) 04:43, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

• A politically biased source. As the main article notes, Kathimerini is "one of the main conservative voices of Greek media". The Greek Wikipedia version of the article helpfully points that it has the same owner with Skai TV. The channel "has been ferociously criticized by Greek socialists for allegedly promoting right-wing politics, liberal and pro-EU politics". Dimadick (talk) 14:42, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Is Ardit Bido a reliable source?

The work in question is Bido, Ardit (2020). The Albanian Orthodox Church: A Political History, 1878–1945. Routledge. ISBN 0429755465. Edion Petriti (talk) 11:28, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

A reliable source for what? A claim about The Albanian Orthodox Church? Probably. If something else then would need to look more closely at the matter. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 12:06, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

I mean, is it a reliable source in general, being published by Routledge. We're having issues with some editors, regarding the author, Ardit Bido. Edion Petriti (talk) 12:14, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

What are the issues though? It can be a reliable source for claims, but does that not automatically mean the author is notable enough to have article. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 13:15, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Please see the talk page Talk:Korçë [39] for the latest discussions. There are editors who want to dismiss him entirely for being a member of a political party. Edion Petriti (talk) 13:18, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Have responded there. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 16:11, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Ardit Bido and anyone else is neither reliable, nor unreliable as a source. Their work is either reliable or unreliable. If someone's work gets picked up by Springer, it's reliable. If the same author publishes a brand new theory on twitter right after his Springer deal, it's not reliable. The work in question is Bido, Ardit (2020). The Albanian Orthodox Church: A Political History, 1878–1945. Routledge. ISBN 0429755465.) It's part of a Routledge series: Routledge Religion, Society and Government in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet States This Series seeks to publish high quality monographs and edited volumes on religion, society and government in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet states by focusing primarily on three main themes: the history of churches and religions (including but not exclusively Christianity, Islam, Judaism and Buddhism) in relation to governing structures, social groupings and political power; the impact of intellectual ideas on religious structures and values; and the role of religions and faith-based communities in fostering national identities from the nineteenth century until today. Thus, it's a monograph published by a highly valued academic publishing house. Per WP:SCHOLARSHIP: Material such as an article, book, monograph, or research paper that has been vetted by the scholarly community is regarded as reliable, where the material has been published in reputable peer-reviewed sources or by well-regarded academic presses. it's WP:RS.--Maleschreiber (talk) 04:07, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

ABC News and FiveThirtyEight

When looking around the perennial sources list, I noticed two of my personal go-to sources for American news are missing, those being ABC News and FiveThirtyEight. I can't find a lot about them in the noticeboard archives either. Is that simply because nobody has disputed their reliability and that they can be considered generally reliable, or is there more to it? ExcitedEngineer (talk) 12:19, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

No one has disputed them, and you probably know this but for future readers, generally reliable does not mean always reliable, nor reliable for every conceivable purpose (see eg,, context matters, and general newsorg) -- and some content on 538 is written fast reaction blog style and so probably should be a bit wary on that in the way it is handled. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:55, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Well put. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 13:13, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Agree with this as well. Spudlace (talk) 04:16, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Both are generally reliable. 538 does a lot of analyses. Those should generally be attributed as "According to a 538 analysis..." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 02:12, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

• Both are generally reliable. Agree with Alanscottwalker's qualification about FiveThirtyEight. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 09:48, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
• ABC News should be treated as reliable like the other major network news desks. 538 should be treated as something like an expert opinion site. That is, a 538 report by itself doesn't establish weight for inclusion in an article but if a RS discusses the findings of a 538 article/report then we should generally consider it worthy of attributed inclusion. Springee (talk) 17:39, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

ABC News is somewhat generally reliable. FiveThirthEight needs additional considerations because there are many articles that contain POV analyses.Magnus Dominus (talk) 20:16, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

@Magnus Dominus: Are you asserting that FiveThirtyEight articles contain a point of view or that Wikipedia articles that cite FiveThirtyEight articles include a point of view? ElKevbo (talk) 20:31, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

The former. Even some statistical analyses have a little bit of skewed view on any given subject depending on editor.Magnus Dominus (talk) 20:40, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

The point of view of a publication typically has little if any relationship to its reliability. WP:NPOV applies to Wikipedia articles, not to cited sources. ElKevbo (talk) 20:44, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Is a book by the PhD candidate Mustafa Hamza a reliable source for a denial of a Syrian Kurdistan?

There is currently going on a dispute at the Syrian Kurdistan article. The parties are me, who believes that the existence of Syrian Kurdistan is common sense as all major researchers on the Kurds mention a Kurdish population in Syria. The Kurds have defeated ISIS in 2017 and Turkey wages a war explicitly against the Kurds in Syria, so it is more or less common sense that Kurds live in Syria, that there exists a Syrian Kurdistan and most of the people active on Wikipedia probably accept that there exists a Syrian Kurdistan. The editor Ibn Amr disputes that there exists a Syrian part of Kurdistan and brings the PhD candidate Mustafa Hamza as a reliable source in the dispute. Do you agree with Ibn Amr that this is a reliable source for such a claim or not? Usually I don't bother to come here for such nonsense, but Ibn Amr explicitly states it is not me who decides what is a reliable source, and in his view it is one, whether he is a professor or not. So his PhD candidate should equate all the lecturers and professors who write about a Syrian part of Kurdistan and therefore it shall only be mentioned that "some regional experts" see call it either a Syrian Kurdistan, Western Kurdistan or Rojava. Here you can find the discussion we had on the topic. Thank you.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 21:23, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

A person is not a source. Tell us about this document. Who published it? Was it reviewed prior to publication? Does the publisher have a reputation for fact-checking and corrections of mistakes? ElKevbo (talk) 21:31, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

About Mustafa Hamza, little is known. I have googled him, but to no avail. The paper was published by the Arab Center for Research & Policy Studies in Doha. According to Ibn Amr, it is a peer-reviewed paper, but I guess it wouldn't pass a good article review on Wikipedia.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 21:38, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

If this is a peer reviewed publication with a legitimate publisher and editorial processes then it's highly unlikely that we'd consider it unreliable. Of course, that doesn't mean that it meets any criteria for due weight; just because a source is reliable doesn't mean that it merits inclusion in an article. That, however, is a separate discussion from its reliability. ElKevbo (talk) 22:12, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

@ElKvbo, I have adapted the title of the discussion to the book of the PhD candidate Mustafa Hamza. I hope it is enough if I only like to it here in the discussion and don't spell it out in the title of the discussion.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 21:51, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

This is a peer-reviewed journal article. PC is getting the spelling of author name wrong (same as with my user name). So, their claims need to be taken with a grain of salt. Furthermore, this article is not unique in saying "Syrian Kurdistan" is a nationalist Kurdish invention. below are some books talking about Kurdistan without any mention of a "Syrian Kurdistan":

• David McDowall, 1997. A Modern History of the Kurds
• Denise Natali, 2005. The Kurds and the State: Evolving National Identity in Iraq, Turkey, and Iran.
• Edgar O'Ballance, 2004. The Kurdish Struggle.

Cheers, Amr ibn Kulthoumعمرو بن كلثوم (talk) 22:04, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

In my experience, book reviews are not subject to the same peer review processes that research articles undergo in peer-reviewed journals; they're typically only read by the editor who runs the book review section of the journal prior to publication. So they're often not of the same scholarly weight as research articles published even in the same issue of the same journal. The specific details of how or if they're solicited, written, and reviewed vary so we'd need to know how it's specifically done in this journal. Nevertheless, book reviews in legitimate journals are typically held to editorial standards and processes that are sufficient to meet our definition of "reliable." Due weight is likely the more pressing issue. ElKevbo (talk) 22:18, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough, thank you. Amr ibn Kulthoumعمرو بن كلثوم (talk) 22:39, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Ok, very diplomatic and tolerant you are. Another discussion at the NPOVN will follow ASAP then.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 23:14, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Matthew Sheffield

Twitter thread – worth a read. Matthew Sheffield provides important context regarding American conservative journalism. What he says is worth considering when we write about conservative coverage of US politics. feminist (talk) | Americans, unite 02:17, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

• Thanks, Feminist. Editors that worked on the Great Barrington Declaration will be interested in the link at the end to Sheffield's piece on Creationism and Covid-19, which discusses the milieu of the American Institute for Economic Research, the Discovery Institute, the Hoover Institution, Jay Bhattacharya (one of the Great Barrington authors), David Berlinski, and Peter Thiel. [40] GPinkerton (talk) 03:13, 9 November 2020 (UTC)
• Like. It should be beyond obvious at this point, but a disturbingly large number of people still think of conservative media as some analogue to mainstream or liberal journalism with just a different bias, rather than an entirely distinct profession that has no interest in the truth-seeking mission of actual journalists. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 17:02, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

  It depends on what you mean by "conservative journalism", where both of those terms mean different things in different contexts. Are you talking Buckley or Bannon here? There is legitimate media with a conservative editorial stance. It's not the batshit crazy stuff, but it exists. Sadly, it doesn't do much to advance the agenda of the far-right in America, so it doesn't get put forth as a source to do so, but it exists. I've never seen any significant criticism of source like the Wall Street Journal or the Christian Science Monitor or The Hill, though those sources are rarely used to try to push the contentious Q-Anon stuff that everyone wants to try to support with the less savory right-wing sources. --Jayron32 17:41, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

  Yeah, that's fair. I'm not talking about The Wall Street Journal here. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 22:38, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

• Hoover Institution has (or at least used to have) real scholars in addition to partisan hacks. (t · c) buidhe 11:43, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

College historical accounts

I'd like to have input here on two books, The Story of Pomona College by Charles B. Sumner (1914, Pilgrim Press) and The History of Pomona College, 1887–1969 by historian E. Wilson Lyon (1977, Castle Press), which are used at Pomona College and related pages. They are the two main historical scholarly accounts of the college, so I've been using them for sourcing and establishing notability as I've worked on those pages. However, both Sumner and Lyon had ties to the college—Sumner as an influential early trustee and Lyon as a retired president—so their independence has been questioned in the context of a notability discussion.

I haven't been able to find reviews of The Story of Pomona College, but reviews of The History of Pomona College, 1887–1969 praised its scholarly detachment: The American Historical Review called it a "clear and objective account", and Pacific Historical Review noted Lyon's "established reputation as a professional historian" and stated that "Lyon's detachment in writing this history has been exemplary."

I note that similar situations exist for many other colleges/universities, such as with A History of Georgetown University by Robert Emmett Curran (2010, Georgetown University Press), the most definitive history of that institution, which is cited frequently at FA Georgetown University despite its author having worked there as a history professor for three decades.

Personally, my view is that these books do qualify as reliable sources, mainly because they were published through independent publishers who had final say over their content and held them to objective scholarly standards. What do you all think? {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 22:35, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Well they are reliable in my opinion as they have met with critical approval in reliable sources and held to a high standard by respected publishers. However if there is an extraordinary claim of some sort then that would need more than one source, imv Atlantic306 (talk) 01:58, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

We should be suspicious of histories of organizations that were written by employees or commissioned by the organization, especially if they were self-published or published by a publisher that does not have a strong reputation for being reliable. There are many colleges and universities in the U.S. that have commissioned "house histories," especially when they're celebrating an important anniversary, and there is tremendous variation in the quality and reliability of these publications. So we can't make a blanket judgment about this genre of publications but must judge each one independently.

In this case, The History of Pomona College, 1887–1969 sounds like it's got some acceptance among historians so I'm relatively comfortable relying on it. You haven't presented any information that tells us that The Story of Pomona College meets our criteria for reliability so I'm much less confident; until we know more about it, it's probably okay for information that isn't controversial but not much more than that. ElKevbo (talk) 02:30, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

https://evgrieve.com/

I would think that it is simply a blog, but it claims to be a hyper-local news. My question is, would it rise to the level of news blog? Graywalls (talk) 00:32, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Google Maps

Google Maps, Google www.google.com/maps

List of road routes in the Northern Territory

Hi

DIPL hasn't released a single map with alphanumerics on it. So the only way to know is through OzRoads or Expressway. OzRoads is no longer updated and Expressway is only updated when someone has a photo of it that's non copyrighted.

So this leaves us with Google Maps as the only choice to update things.

Thanks, Thent1234

Thenorthernterritory1234 (✉) 10:47, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Counter-Currents.com for music

Kyle Peake (talk · contribs) has repeatedly restored this source to Follow God and Water (Kanye West song)

• Weisswald, Scott (October 28, 2019). "Kanye West's Jesus is King: A Review". Counter-Currents Publishing. Archived from the original on October 28, 2019. Retrieved November 19, 2019.

For Water, the source supports that "The outro of the song features ad-libbing." For Follow God it is one of several redundant sources which mention that the song uses a trap beat.

Counter-Currents Publishing redirects to Greg Johnson (white nationalist). This website is a blog published by Johnson which mainly pushes pseudo-intellectual theories about race, white genocide, an ahistorical view of "Western Civilization", and that sort of thing. There is no indication I have found that this blog is more reliable for music specifically than it is for anything else. Grayfell (talk) 20:08, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Hello, I would like to offer my point of view. This is that the source in question is not one to be considered unreliable for music claims because any bias it has due to Johnson's views on certain subjects is entirely unrelated to music, plus it is not a violation of WP:SELFPUB. It will be interesting to hear what other people have to say though. --K. Peake 20:28, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

WP:SELFPUB falls under the "Sources that are usually not reliable" subheading. As that page says, if the information in question is suitable for inclusion, someone else will probably have published it in independent reliable sources. So is this white nationalist's blog post really the best source for this across multiple articles? Neither use of this particular source was attributed or contextualized. Who is Scott Weisswald? How would readers know why his opinion would be significant? Grayfell (talk) 20:41, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Not every single writer for a website needs to have detailed information about them to have their articles classified as suitable to be cited; there are multiple authors for reliable sources like NME, The Guardian and Rolling Stone that have no articles and lack detailed info but are viewed as fine for citing. --K. Peake 21:15, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Newsmax

With Newsmax gaining a much broader audience, I think it needs to be reconsidered as a reliable source, their coverage of this election differs from other MSM such as CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, Etc. I believe that they offer a different perspective of current events that is widely ignored by other reliable sources. I believe that this perspective is important and should be considered reliable for election related news at a minimum.they no longer represent only fringe viewpoints as their viewership has increased post election. Here is a source that gives numbers https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/11/newsmax-tv-surpasses-fox-business-cnbc-key-ratings-newsreal-blog/ BlackBird1008 (talk) 01:33, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate: "High viewership" does not equate to reliability.

1. "their coverage of this election differs from other MSM such as CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, Etc." - That would be because Newsmax is a propaganda outlet unconcerned with factual accuracy.
2. "I believe that they offer a different perspective of current events that is widely ignored by other reliable sources." - Your belief is your belief, but Newsmax as an outlet produces and promotes falsehoods with shocking regularity and disdain for human life and the consequences of spreading false information, such as their promotion of anti-vaccination propaganda. [41]
3. "and should be considered reliable for election related news at a minimum" - Ahh, now we're getting to it. It's the spreading of disinformation about the 2020 United States presidential election that you're wanting?
4. "they no longer represent only fringe viewpoints." - They may repeat what other parts of the extreme right-wing WP:FRINGE of American politics repeat, but that does not make their false claims, propaganda, or disinformation WP:RELIABLE.

Given the sheer unreliability of Newsmax, it should probably be in the same Deprecated category as Breitbart News, The Daily Caller, Daily Mail, and The Epoch Times. IHateAccounts (talk) 01:45, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

NewsGuard's analysis is not positive. [42] Schazjmd (talk) 02:00, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

"Proceed with caution: This website severely violates basic journalistic standards." Yikes indeed. IHateAccounts (talk) 02:52, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Do you have some better sources than media matters? PackMecEng (talk) 03:26, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Following up on Schazjmd's comment, Ad Fontes Media (https://www.adfontesmedia.com/interactive-media-bias-chart-2/) rates the reliability of Newsmax at 31.76. For comparison, similarly positioned sources on Wikipedia that are already deprecated include the following:

1. RT / Russia Today: 30.65
2. OANN: 29.91
3. Epoch Times: 37.35
4. Zero Hedge: 32.53
5. Breitbart: 27.74
6. Daily Caller: 27.73

I know that Ad Fontes is listed as "should not be used in article space" because it is self-published, but it may be valuable information for analysis here. IHateAccounts (talk) 03:49, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Right but do we have other RS calling Newsmax those things. I personally like adontes for bias reports, not so much for reliability personally. PackMecEng (talk) 03:51, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

@PackMecEng: the poster of this (who moved it over from Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources) does not appear to understand wikipedia policy on sourcing, but there is a larger problem in that Newsmax - despite sharing similarities in both lack of credibility and a pattern of propagating falsehoods - is sitting at "no consensus" level and looking at the last discussion [43], @JzG: made the excellent observation that this status is because "what that means is that it's a crappy source but conservatives like it, basically." Even in 2013, it was looked at as unreliable [44] and I think at this point it would serve Wikipedia well to settle this status with the other sources it is so highly similar to that are already deprecated. IHateAccounts (talk) 04:01, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

My point is editor opinion alone is not enough to deprecate a source. We need secondary sources giving examples and backing it up or it boils down to a WP:IDONTLIKEIT argument. PackMecEng (talk) 04:04, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

all I want is this to be discussed because they are the only new source that is truly covering the “other” side of this election and they are gaining in popularity. What IHateAccounts points out is that they don’t like there coverage of current events so it must be disinformation and propaganda. The only exception that I would buy into at this time is that they are not a reliable source for anything related to vaccine because they have peddled stories with questionable claims. To blanket state that they are wrong does in fact boil down to a WP:IDONTLIKEIT. I think the other MSM gets it wrong on a lot of things but that doesn’t make them an unreliable source. BlackBird1008 (talk) 04:17, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

@PackMecEng: you may want to read The Guardian's coverage of Newsmax as part of "The misinformation media machine amplifying Trump's election lies" [45]

Also, Daily Beast: "An even more overt suggestion of a deep-state plot to infect the president, however, came from Greg Kelly, a former Fox News personality who now hosts a show on Newsmax TV, the little-watched right-wing cable network run by longtime Trump pal Chris Ruddy." [46] The issue is that Newsmax is an unreliable source, that promotes conspiracy theories and other falsehoods. The fact that it's flown under the radar with few discussions until now is probably, as JzG suggested, because it was already listed as a crappy source and most reasonable editors stayed away from it, but simply leaving it there isn't wise given what it does and its lack of journalistic integrity. IHateAccounts (talk) 04:20, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

See that is kind of what I mean here. Do we have a source that does not require an asterisk when we use them. Both the Guardian and Daily Beast have the biased or opinionated source tag. PackMecEng (talk) 04:31, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I’d urge someone to pull something off their home page that is truly not factual.BlackBird1008 (talk) 04:39, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

@BlackBird1008: There are several issues with your claims, starting with your lack of understanding of wikipedia policy, and your continued attempts to portray reliable secondary sources as "sides". To make something perfectly clear, though: my objection to Newsmax is not because I "don't like" them, my objection is that - again, just as with Breitbart News, The Daily Caller, Daily Mail, The Epoch Times - they are factually unreliable. IHateAccounts (talk) 04:25, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

FrontPageMag is itself a discredited source; the fact that something has a particular level of viewership or readership has nothing to do with reliability. Lots of people can all be wrong. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 02:51, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

@NorthBySouthBaranof: I’m not making the argument that they should be considered reliable because of their viewership, merely I’m arguing that they should be reconsidered because they are becoming a bigger player in the news market. I only used frontpage as a reference because Newsmax had the same article on their site and I thought it would be wrong to post their own article, Neilsons ratings put it above those other outlets BlackBird1008 (talk) 04:51, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

You might find it helpful to review WP:RS if you haven't read it in a while. "Number of people who read/view a source" is not an indicator of reliability. Instead, we focus on things such as the publisher's reputation for fact-checking, policies and practices related to correcting errors, and similar mechanisms and policies. ElKevbo (talk) 04:54, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I’m not arguing that it’s is a factor in its reliability, merely pointing out that this discussion should be had because they are becoming a bigger player. WP:RSP has them listed as "No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply". BlackBird1008 (talk) 05:08, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate per IHateAccounts. They are a disinformation machine. -- Valjean (talk) 02:55, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
• Depreciate. This paper lists them as a source that has repeatedly repeated false claims from another outlet (The Washington Free Beacon, which should probably also be depreciated) without fact-checking or verification, apparently for ideological reasons, and without a retraction or follow-up when it was found to be false; it was also one of several similar sources publishing false claims about ISIS trying to cross the US-Mexico border, again with no fact-checking, verification, or followup when it was debunked. This source describes it as spreading fringe ideas in an effort to make them mainstream. This paper lists them as a misinformation source. This paper lists them in its "junk news" classification, which is defined as These sources deliberately publish misleading, deceptive or incorrect information purporting to be real news about politics, economics or culture. This content includes various forms of propaganda and ideologically extreme, hyper-partisan, or conspiratorial news and information. (Also, that paper seems like it would be extremely useful in future discussions.) This source similarly lists them as one of ten sources known for pro-mulgating political disinformation in Facebook. More recently, they have hawked a dietary supplement as a means of fighting COVID-19 while advising readers to avoid any vaccine because it would "change their DNA." I'm not seeing any evidence they have changed at all. (And, as others have said, Frontpagemag is itself a depreciated source, so its endorsement is not helpful.) --Aquillion (talk) 04:23, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
  • Those are not terribly strong though. Your first source lists then in a column with other sources saying they repeated a claim that turned out to be false. The second source does give that one line then goes on to say things like stronger commitment to the bottom line than to presenting himself as an ideologue. Three not a fan of thesis in other languages but is just listing them in a table with a bunch of other sources lacking context or why. Which is again similar to the last source, they are just in a list. PackMecEng (talk) 04:44, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
    • Corrections: The first source says they repeated false claims multiple times, without fact-checking or verification and then failed to follow up with a retraction or correction, all of which are core principles of how we assess WP:RSes. The second source straightforwardly describes their fringe nature; the third and fourth sources show that it has been classified as junk news and misinformation in peer-reviewed literature (with the final one using a definition that is almost word-for-word our definition of an unreliable sources.) These are strong, sterling sources to support depreciation, far beyond what we usually rely on; I'm unsure what else you would want beyond peer-reviewed papers that almost point-for-point go down our requirements for a WP:RS and say that they fail nearly every one. --Aquillion (talk) 05:08, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

      Mostly things that specifically deal with Newsmax instead of passing mention or lumped in a group with no specific description. Which those fail to do. I am not saying they are necessarily wrong and heck it is a source I try to avoid. That said your answer does not address my concerns. PackMecEng (talk) 05:14, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

• I am glad that we agree that Newsweek is a source that should be avoided, at least; that is, after all, the most important part of a depreciation discussion - beyond that it is mostly minor quibbling over how to word the discussion's summary. I don't feel you've raised any significant or policy-based concerns beyond that; I was merely correcting a few important omissions from your summary (to wit, the aspects of those sources that make them so brutal to anyone's attempts to argue Newsmax could be used as a source, given the way they focus almost laser-tight on the ways Newsmax fails our WP:RS policy and meets the standards for depreciation.) To me, the fact that numerous high-quality academic sources list it as what we would consider depreciation-worthy without further comment is actually a stronger argument, because it says that among top-quality sources Newmax's status as a source that deliberately publish[es] misleading, deceptive or incorrect information purporting to be real news about politics, economics or culture is so well-established and clear-cut that numerous academic papers could use it as a benchmark for political disinformation without worrying that someone will object to that categorization in a way that would call their results into question. An extended essay in a news source would be someone making the argument that Newsmax is what we would call depreciation-worthy; whereas its unequivocal hard categorization as a purvayor of political misinformation in numerous academic sources using such lists establishes it as a commonly-accepted fact, at least within those academic domains. The fact that all these papers passed peer-review while using it in that fashion underlines this reality. By my reading, you don't even seem to be seriously disputing that basic fact (you haven't presented any sources of your own that I can see, and concede that it's a source you would try to avoid), you just wish we had some additional sources digging into Newsmax in more depth. By all means go an search for them; but it's not necessary to have such an in-depth analysis for depreciation when sources like the ones I listed make the general assessment of Newsmax in academia crystal-clear. We're trying to assess its general reputation for fact-checking and accuracy here; we're not trying to write an extended case-study on it. --Aquillion (talk) 05:39, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Newsmax is "Fox's new challenger. President Trump's fans who don't think Fox News is right-wing enough have another option on cable and satellite: Newsmax TV."

That's from Brian Stelter at CNN, who is an extremely RS. This tells us a lot. Newsmax is even more extreme right-wing than Fox News has become under Trump.

Because Fox has dared to tell the truth about this election, Trump's supporters are moving to Newsmax and other fringe platforms, such as Parler, that will keep lying to them. These supporters are moving even further away from reliable sources that can correct their delusional thinking and debunk their favorite conspiracy theories.

This placement on the media fringes, far from the facts, tells us all we need to know. Bias is irrelevant to determining reliability, but extreme bias does affect it,, and here we have an example of the deleterious effects of extreme bias.

Full deprecation is fully deserved. -- Valjean (talk) 05:35, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

So you are sourcing to a newsletter opinion article for all that? You used to be really good at trying to use the best RS. Now it's partisan things like this and sourcing things to Twitter.[47] PackMecEng (talk) 05:41, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I think you are starting to approach the point of WP:BLUDGEONing this discussion. It is not necessary to reply personally to every single point you disagree with; if the arguments are flawed in the way you say, someone else will see it and say something. (And if you are the only one who does, it is likely that your points are not as strong as you believe them to be.) --Aquillion (talk) 05:46, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I don't think that is true actually on the bludgeoning claim. Also yes someone else could call out bad arguments, or I could take a second and do it myself. There is nothing wrong with that. PackMecEng (talk) 05:51, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

It is not your responsibility to point out every flaw in everyone's comments. If their opinion is so obviously flawed, give other readers the benefit of the doubt in figuring that out on their own. That is from WP:BLUDGEON. As far as I can tell, you have personally replied to every single source that anyone has presented arguing that Newsmax requires depreciation, which is textbook bludgeoning and isn't really a helpful way to contribute to discussions. --Aquillion (talk) 06:00, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

OMG! You know perfectly well that the tweet itself is not the RS. It contained the RS quote. Sheesh. -- Valjean (talk) 05:49, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

No it did not. You cannot use as unreliable source as a source for quoting a BLP. PackMecEng (talk) 05:51, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

BS. That was a talk page comment not intended to be used as is in an article. -- Valjean (talk) 05:55, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

BLP applies everywhere. Using unreliable source as a source for quoting a BLP, even on a talk page is not acceptable. PackMecEng (talk) 05:57, 12 November 2020 (UTC)