Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

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The Economic Times

Hi I'd like to get opinions on whether The Economic Times is a reliable source when used at Phoolan Devi. It is taken as India's leading financial newspaper by other newspapers such as Washington Post, Guardian, NYT, Times. It's not in the list of perennial sources and searching the RSN archives doesn't give a conclusive view. At Phoolan Devi, two citations are used three times:

• "Main witness of Behmai massacre dies, court yet to pronounce verdict in 1981 case is used to back The court case concerning the Behmai massacre began in 2012; of the twenty-three people facing charges, sixteen (including Phoolan Devi) were dead by 2020. Of the seven remaining suspects, three were on the run (including Man Singh). A verdict was expected in January 2020 and then delayed because important case documents had been lost.
• "Eye on Nishad votes, Akhilesh meets Phoolan Devi's mother" is used to partly back Mallah people were happy to have someone of their caste representing them in parliament for the first time and she was generally popular among Other Backward Classes. She visited her constituents in their villages and listened to their concerns.[32][33] and Also in 2021, tributes marking the anniversary of her death were made by Akhilesh Yadav of the Samajwadi Party, Chirag Paswan of the Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) and Tejashwi Yadav of Rashtriya Janata Dal.[33][70]

Thanks for any help. The previous discussion about this is at Talk:Phoolan_Devi#The_Economic_Times Mujinga (talk) 08:54, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

The Economic Times is owned by Times Group, which also owns the Times of India. The Times of India has a mixed reputation based on our list of perennial sources. However, that doesn't mean that all news outlets of Times Group are automatically unreliable. Reuters states that Indian news in general has tough times due to government suppression, and that freedom of the press is low in India. That said, freedom of the press doesn't determine the quality of journalism - you can have a free press that consists of nothing but tabloid rags. However, the low freedom of press combined with borderline promotional pieces like this about Modi, which The Economic Times is unreliable with regards to the Indian government. Nevertheless, they may be reliable for reporting that doesn't step on the government's toes. Cortador (talk) 10:08, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

The Economic Times is considered a reliable source. Perhaps it is worth adding a note of caution on The Times of India in regards to India related articles. Homerethegreat (talk) 11:31, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

It's not, there has been no significant discussion on it previously and the related ones that have occured don't lead to such a conclusion (2013, 2021). There is also nothing unique about The Times of India (TOI) for a note like that, there are many others of its kind with some variations here and there.

Regarding the question, it is true one musn't paint all publications under a particular owner with the same brush and instead assess them individually. That said, in this case it is very valid. Times Group (BCCL) is known for having pioneered the strategy of paid news, as in selling advertisement space in the place of articles and having hidden advertorials which masquerade as news pieces, through its flagship The Times of India, which was then quickly adopted into The Economic Times. The same goes for the pro-government orientation, these two things are actually quite related because a lot of the times the advertorials are coming from the government. The practice itself is also a big liability if the government is dissatisfied with them so you can generally expect these kinds of newspapers to loyally toe the government line regardless of whether the articles are paid for or not (forget concern for factual accuracy), to the point that their normal articles are even discernable since there are no disclosures, this is also in the context of democratic backsliding and the present government's crackdown on independent press generally.

Also, for Indian newspapers generally one can also assume that the assessment of a company's flagship newspaper (The Times of India (RSP entry), The Indian Express (RSP entry) The Hindu (RSP entry), etc) is applicable to their business newspaper (The Economic Times, The Financial Express, The Hindu Businessline, etc) as well. They are usually packaged together or even come as a supplements to the flagship newspaper, and tend to be organisationally conjoined, sometimes even sharing staff. Now, this wouldn't apply to say some publication like Bangalore Mirror which is also owned by Times Group.

As for the specific article, the information is probably accurate but for the lack of doubt, it would be preferable to replace them with better sources. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 22:41, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

References

Thanks. Any other opinions on whether these specific sentences are appropriately sourced? Mujinga (talk) 17:07, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Purely in my own selfish interest of not having to think about Phoolan Devi any longer, I'll chop out the citations to ET, which were only queried because it has the same owner as ToI. The whole time I've been working on this article it's been a challenge to get editors to comment on anything, which I guess more than anything else indicates systemic bias. I still find it hard to believe that a leading business newspaper should be judged on the policies of its sister publication, rather than specific context, but here we are. I wouldn't want this discussion to point to any real consensus on how to use Economic Times more generally, because that discussion simply hasn't been had. Mujinga (talk) 18:00, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

I've went to the article and have restored some of the material with other sources, turns out there were in fact mistakes in the first ET article. For instances, the case did not begin in 2012, it began long ago, the charges were introduced against a few more suspects in 2012. And the number of people accused seems to have been wrong as well. The term "leading" doesn't mean anything for our purposes, other than it being well known and having a wide circulation, TOI itself is "leading" and so is say the Daily Mail. Regardless of whatever reason people may have questioned it at FAC, if judged on its own merits one does see that BCCL has introduced the same practices in ET as it has with TOI which causes the same issues. That said, generally good work on the article, and congrats on getting it to FA status.Tayi Arajakate _Talk 23:53, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, per WP:FAOWN I'm going to revert your edits to Phoolan Devi and we can discuss, what you deleted / changed has been discussed quite a lot already. My point here is that using ET and even ToI at Phoolan Devi should be context specific, since nobody has convinced me that reporting on her was subject to paid editing or political bias. There weren't mistakes in the ET article by the way, the court case was reinstituted in 2012 and there number of people accused included the three who are on the run. Mujinga (talk) 13:52, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

If one is going by the standard of FA article to have the highest quality sources they really should not be used. One can not always distinguish between what article is paid for or not, moreover an article doesn't even need to be paid for specifically, under condition of private treaties, a company can simply promise positive coverage for an individual or entity generally beyond publishing specific articles. The second example in this discussion could easily have influence of these practices but we couldn't say definitively. It's a systemic problem.

The first article does have mistakes. The case was neither started nor reinstituted in 2012, rather 4 more accused were added. The initial accused were 35 in number. The ET article has inconsistent number and mistakes the charges against the new accused as being the first time charges are being framed against all its accused. It's not like this care so much about rigour that they can't make such mistakes that too on topics that is not even in their mainstray. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 19:19, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

References

I'm not sure why, but the reporting on the trial is really messy in terms of numbers across all the sources. I think we are talking about different discrepancies as well. In any case, I've taken the ET refs out, so the discussion here now is done, although I will look at the talkpaghe now. Cheers! Mujinga (talk) 15:59, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

RFC: Electronic Intifada

What is the reliability of Electronic Intifada?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

The last discussion was in 2018 and can be found here. Iskandar323 (talk) 10:25, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

• Option 2: The previous discussion on the Electronic Intifada (EI) was not a particularly sophisticated discussion and needs revisiting: it was not a formal RFC, and the opening statement was somewhat rambling, but one key takeaway is that EI does not appear to have generated serious concerns about its adherence to factual accuracy. Media bias fact check is not a reliable source, but is a usefully indicative resource, and it "could not find any instance where EI directly failed a fact check from major fact checking sources". The site goes on to note that only rates "Mostly Factual" as opposed to "High" in terms of its reporting "due to a lack of transparency regarding funding, as well as strongly loaded emotional wording that may be misleading – so again, pertaining to bias, not factual error. EI is distinctly biased (as all media sources are) – this is certain – and this was the principle charge laid against it in the previous discussion, but bias ≠ unreliable, per WP:BIASEDSOURCES, but merely demands attribution. In the case of EI, the direction of its bias, and its specificity to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is so obvious that it hardly bears mentioning, but option 2 allows for the formal caveating of the source and noting the attribution requirement. I would note that the first naysayer in the last discussion was the now notorious sock puppeteer User:Icewhiz wielding a Huffington Post opinion piece as the only evidence of factual issues, and, per WP:HUFFPOCON, Huffington Post contributions have themselves been deemed unreliable (in a subsequent 2020 RFC). Many of the following votes merely cite the source's bias, which again, should be addressed through attribution, but does not relate directly to reliability. There are a couple of editorial issues that are drummed up, including a piece from 2008 with a misleading quote that has since been caveated at the bottom of the piece, and another quibbled-over piece regarding a statement and its attribution dating to 2002. However, that in 2018 the best evidence of EI's unreliability that could be drummed up are some relatively isolated poorly attributed statements from 2002 and 2008 suggests to me that the evidence of factual inaccuracy is very threadbare indeed. WP:GUNREL means "generally" unreliable, not demonstrably unreliable once every decade or so. I'm not sure I've seen a bar as high as this applied to any source. To maintain the GUNREL rating for EI, a more serious discussion is required, and some significantly more substantial and damning evidence needs to be provided sustaining the charges of factual inaccuracy or manipulation, as opposed to merely lambasting it for its bias, which is utterly transparent – if only in its name alone, with which it really wears its heart on its sleeve about its leaning. Iskandar323 (talk) 10:25, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

MBFC is not a useful way of gauging source reliability. It is the opinion of one random guy, no different to the opinion of the average Wikipedia contributor. That said, I have no opinion on the reliability of this publication. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:12, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

• Option 4: Existing consensus is that the source is generally unreliable for facts, as discussed, for example, in Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_250#Electronic_Intifada_(Again). This source is not only extremely biased but also has a very poor reputation for fact-checking. There were plenty of examples brought up in previous discussions. The fact that the website is cited in existing articles, usually for opinions with attribution, has no relevance to its tendency, or lack thereof, to provide accurate and trustworthy facts. Citing these kinds of sources for matters of fact would compromise Wikipedia's reputation as a trustworthy reference. There is also strong consensus that The Electronic Intifada is a partisan source, although this is independent of its reliability. If something is worthy of publishing in Wikipedia, then there will surely be better RS options. Marokwitz (talk) 21:57, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  @Marokwitz: If you are saying it is generally unreliable, why have you said option 4, which is deprecation - something else. To deprecate a source, you need to provide some justification, not just your impression based on old, very outdated evidence, part of which was countered in the prior discussion, and which was further discussed in my statement. You have not progressed the discussion on the detail in and way, but merely opined in it. Iskandar323 (talk) 22:28, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  Al Mayadeen and Press TV are very similar to Electronic Intifada. In comparison, the tabloid Daily Star (UK), though not a top-tier source, is considered more reliable. These three have been deprecated due to their one-sided reporting and loose approach for fact checking. Examples I saw recently in EI include coverage of Israa Jarbis where Electronic Intifada fails to mention she has seriously injured a police officer; relying on a debunked community-noted tweet by Twitter user SyrianGirl as a source in a recent article; and reporting on helicopters shooting at Nova partygoers based on a Haaretz article, while failing to disclose the police's rebuttal of this claim that was published on the same day.

  Overall, evidence shows that the site has a non-existent approach to fact-checking and publishing formal error corrections. Publishing the truth doesn't seem to be a priority compared to advocacy of a specific narrative, thus I believe it should be deprecated to save our editors' time. Marokwitz (talk) 23:24, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  Evidence stands taller with some actual links for verification. Iskandar323 (talk) 11:50, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

• No consensus. No statements made by the source have been given by the opener of the RfC. What are we supposed to evaluate here? jp×g🗯️ 23:07, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3 - it publishes mostly opinion, and where that opinion is by an expert in the field it should be able to be used. But for its news reporting, it is reporting on other outlets reports. I would say, as I did in the last discussion, that when they report something it will usually be found in other sources, otherwise I place it basically on the opposite end of Arutz Sheva and would not use it as a source for facts. nableezy - 23:44, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Option 4 - A) Electronic Intifada is a partisan news site that has a recent and long history of biased partisan reporting and appears to be pursuing political goals through its newspapers.

It also appears that it seems to support armed struggle and removal of organizations deemed terrorist by Western countries from terror lists.

In August 2020, Electronic Intifada published an article by Samidoun coordinator Khaled Barakat, there they wrote “Association with the Palestinian armed resistance and its political parties is not a cause for shame or a justification for repression…boycott campaigns and popular organizing are not alternatives to armed resistance but interdependent tactics of struggle. Any meaningful defense of the Palestinian people must clearly uphold the right to resist colonialism by all means, including armed struggle – and support efforts to remove Palestinian resistance groups from lists of ‘terrorist organizations.’”

Ali Abunimah, the site’s co-founder and current executive director, stated the following regarding Zionism : “one of the worst forms of anti-Semitism [sic] in existence today” and claims that it is the “continuation in spirit” of the Holocaust. Abunimah has compared Israel to Nazi Germany [1] , he also commented the following on a Holocaust survivor (called Elie Wiesel a “moral fraud and huckster”).

Furthermore, from an article in 18 January 2023 it appears the EI supports the incorporation of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, considered terrorist organizations by US, EU... into the PLO.

"But for that storm to sweep away the old, it needs direction. So far, Palestinian discontent with their leaders has not thrown up any clear alternative strategy behind which parties and new political forces can agree to unite.

Any such strategy needs to answer several crucial questions, notably what outcome to seek and how best to get there, how to unite the main factions behind a new vision for Palestinian liberation and how to ensure that Palestinians in occupied territory can endure under different political conditions.

It will also need to find a way to incorporate Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other factions considered “terror groups” in the west into the PLO while managing the diplomatic and financial fallout."

In November 2022, EI hosted a podcast called “How Zionists collaborated with the Nazis.” in the podcast, “Zionists during that time not only were not bothered about the Holocaust, they actively tried to stop anyone who wanted to provide a refuge from doing so.”

In August 2022, Abunimah has said the following in an interview : “Israel always has to kill Palestinians because it is an illegitimate settler-colonial regime that faces constant resistance from the people whose land it is occupying, colonizing and stealing…the regular shedding of Palestinian blood is a necessary component of maintaining the existence of Israel.”

In June 2021, EI Associate Editor Nora Barrows participated in a conference, “Challenging Apartheid in Palestine: Reclaiming the Narrative, Formulating A Vision,” hosted by the Istanbul Sabahattin Zaim University. It was reported that sponsors, participating and conference , were linked to various terror groups, including, Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).

In conclusion, Option 4 is the most relevant, considering EI's published content both historically as concluded in previous Reliable Sources discussions as well as recently as shown above; therefore one assumes that this source meets the criteria of Deprecation. Homerethegreat (talk) 10:30, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

@Homerethegreat: I'm sorry. What is the point behind the quotations above? You just quote passages without making any points about how they relate to reliability. "one assumes that this source meets the criteria of Deprecation." - don't assume: assumption was the problem with the prior discussion, and now you're copy-pasting the problem. Iskandar323 (talk) 11:22, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

• Option 2 Features section only, anything else only if it is a subject matter expert, and always with attribution. I don't believe that this source is guilty of falsification but some material is fairly heavily biased, so use with due care and attention.Selfstudier (talk) 11:40, 26 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3. They don't seem to do much original reporting. I give them 3 rather than 4 for the odd story that might serve as a useful justification for a statement, but I cannot see that happening very often. Most of their articles seem to be either one-sided reinterpretation of the news reported elsewhere or personal opinions. Epa101 (talk) 16:36, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

• Bad RFC Where is the prior discussion? Why is this going to a RfC without a recent discussion or a discussion of how this source is being used? We need examples of misuse before starting a RfC.

Springee (talk) 19:24, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

• Option 3 (possibly 2): There are a number of major issues with EI, which it is better to see as a group blog rather than a news site. First, it does not adequately distinguish between opinion and news (it has a category "features" which has /news in its URL and a category "opinion and analysis" with /opinion in the url; both of these are mainly opinion).The simple additional consideration would be to treat all articles as opinion pieces and therefore attribute. Second, it rarely presents new factual information. The "features" pieces by guest contributors in Palestine count as reportage, which are the most useful and fact-based articles, but the "features" pieces by their own (mostly US-based) team are second-hand analysis of material reported elsewhere. I would say that this secondary material should not be used citing them but rather that the original source should be used if and only if it's reliable (many of its sources are very unreliable, e.g. deprecated Grayzone), and that EI is not sufficiently reliable for it to count towards assessing noteworthiness. (Unsurprisingly, disinformation and conspiracy sites also republish EI articles. E.g. David Icke's website carried an EI article "How the Israel lobby fakes anti-Semitism" by Asa Winstanley.[2]) Third, I think that this is one of those cases where bias and reliability bleed into each other: EI frequently goes into conspiracy theory territory (this is especially true of its associate editor Asa Winstanley).[3] For instance, its support of antisemitic conspiracy theorist David Miller has led to its reportage being described as antisemitic by the Community Security Trust (CST),[4] and CST and anti-fascist researchers Hope Not Hate have described its reporting of Antisemitism in the UK Labour Party as conspiracy theory.[5] Winstanley frequently appears on Iran's PressTV, on a show produced by David Miller dedicated to antisemitic conspiracy theories.[6] Fourth, I think there might be instances where it can be seen to have been actively dishonest. In 2011, along with the Guardian, it falsely claimed that the CST had made up some quotes; the Guardian corrected their story but EI didn't.[7] Several right-wing monitors (CAMERA, HonestReporting, etc) have presented further examples, but I'm reviewing those as I don't see them as reliable sources either. I'll come back here when I have, and if these claims are compelling I'd say option 3 for definite, otherwise option 2 might be fine. BobFromBrockley (talk) 13:53, 27 November 2023 (UTC) Couple more data points. 1. Here are three biased (right-wing), probably unreliable and slightly outdated sources itemising several issues with EI: NGO Monitor,[8] HonestReporting,[9] CAMERA.[10] It's hard to disentangle political criticisms from exposing inaccuracies there, so I'll leave these for other editors to review themselves. 2. I hadn't realised the extent to which EI is integrated with sources that we deprecate. For instance, it heavily uses Al-Mayadeen as a source,[11][12] it is in turn hosted by Al-Mayadeen,[13] it gives a frequent platform to Max Blumenthal of Grayzone,[14] its staff also contribute to Sputnik, ZeroHedge, Russia Insider, MintPress, etc,[15] and are used as talking heads by Sputnik.[16] In this PolitiFact fact check of a fake news story circulated in the current Gaza conflict, by a far right anti-vaxxer, EI was one of the sources he shared, but the fact check does not actually describe the EI article as false. 3. On the other hand, I've found a couple of instances of its use as a source by reliable sources: Columbia Journalism Review from 2010,[17] Associated Press from 2013,[18] and India Today recently.[19] BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:53, 29 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3 per Nableezy and Bob above, and Alaexis below. While not outright lying (as far as I'm aware), and while yes, all sources are biased, EI's partisan to the point that its usefulness can be heavily questioned (see exaggeration, loaded language, reliance on questionable sources, omission of certain details, and so on) and most if not all of its factual reporting can be found in far more reliable, less-outright-partisan sources. I'm also not sold by the proposer's usage of MBFC, which they themselves bluntly state isn't entirely reliable. The Kip 08:14, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3, see my comments below re the lack of separation between opinion and news and various outrageous claims made by the source. No evidence has been presented that changed my opinion in either direction. Alaexis_¿question? 08:58, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Discussion

This noticeboard is for discussing the reliability of sources in context. What kind of content do you want to use and for which article? Alaexis_¿question? 20:50, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

The regular discussions are about the sources in context, but the RFCs are general and a simple neutral question with the four options. See the other RFCs further up the page. Iskandar323 (talk) 22:04, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

The point stands. EI is cited as a source in several hundred articles, so its status at RSP has not presented an obstacle to its use. Is there an actual, live issue about its use or misuse as a source? Otherwise a new RFC is not in order. Banks Irk (talk) 01:42, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

The previous discussion was not a formal RFC with the four normal choices; Option 2, i.e. a halfway house was not presented; and the discussion was swamped by accounts now blocked as sock puppets/puppeteers. It was a not a level of discussion that should stand as the bar for this source. Obviously being labelled as GUNREL has a long-term impact on whether the source is deemed usable, with or without caveats. Iskandar323 (talk) 06:25, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

One more thing, is there a way to distinguish opinions from news published by the EI? E.g., is this article an opinion piece or news [20]? Here are some of the quotes from it (a) But we are to believe the Israelis had no idea [of the October 7 attack that] was planned right under their noses? They probably knew. And they waited for it., (b) The vast network of Zionist organizations acts as appendages of the Israeli state that extend into all our lives around the world. Alaexis_¿question? 20:55, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

Not in the url from what I can tell, but other than by style, each piece has a short author bio at the end. The example you've shared has a conversational tone that betrays it as clear opinion, but beyond that it is attributed to an external party - the director of a literature festival. This analysis, on the other hand, is attributed to various contributors and "Asa Winstanley is an investigative journalist and associate editor with The Electronic Intifada", so we know it's in-house. This colour piece appears to be not in-house, but from a journalist and presumably commissioned, but it's a colour piece, so not news. Iskandar323 (talk) 22:01, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

So I assume that the analysis is the kind of content you'd like to use on Wikipedia. It's long and uses all kind of sources which range from very reliable to complete garbage, but these are some of the highlights

• Non-sequitur bordering on fake news. How is an opinion of a retired officer who did not take part in the fighting becomes a confirmation that Israel killed most Israeli civilians?

“ A retired Israeli army major has admitted [sic] Israel probably killed some of the 1,200 Israelis the government claims Hamas murdered on 7 October. The confession, discovered by The Electronic Intifada, is one of the highest level confirmations to date that Israel killed many, if not most, of the civilians that died during the Palestinian offensive. ”

• Opinion-piece-style statements in the supposed analysis piece: [Josep Borrell] had no regard for the dead women, children and elderly of Palestine, not to mention the men.
• Extreme bias: the hostages are described as detainees in the custody of Palestinian fighters
• Usage of dodgy sources: they mention an anonymous letter published by Mondoweiss

I wouldn't support deprecating the EI, unless there are proven examples of publishing deliberate falsehoods, but it falls far short of reliable source standards. Alaexis_¿question? 11:34, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

I believe I set out by noting that its bias is clear. The question remains not one of its opinion, but one of factual inaccuracy. And, e.g., the "one of the highest level confirmations" statement, while clearly leaning into a viewpoint, is still couched. Any exceptional claims also remain covered by WP:ECREE. Iskandar323 (talk) 11:45, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

The Daily Telegraph (UK)

I want to re-open the debate on the reliability score given to the Daily Telegraph as a perennial source. It's currently on "Generally reliable". Epa101 (talk) 09:59, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Responses (The Daily Telegraph (UK))

• I know that there was a debate on the Telegraph in December 2022. This will focus on rulings by the Independent Press Standards Organisation since then. I have found seven cases when either the Daily Telegraph or telegraph.co.uk was given a sanction on a point of accuracy. I feel that its "Generally reliable" status is outdated. It has drifted outwith the mainstream with its vaccine scepticism. I know that their opinion on vaccines is outwith the considerations on this board, but I mention it to illustrate that this is not the "newspaper of record" of the past. I presume that there is only a realistic chance of its going down one rank, so I'll just put two options.

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations

Exhibit 1 They said that a court had overruled the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill. This was not true.

Exhibit 2 They said that Sweden's spending on COVID-related interventions was less than a tenth as much as the UK's. This was not true.

Exhibit 3 They said that there is evidence that home-schooled children do not receive a good education, but then failed to produce the evidence when challenged.

Exhibit 4 They published inaccurate numbers on the number of people allowed to stay in the country under the UK's schemes in combatting modern slavery.

Exhibit 5 They said that a gas-turbine generator that was small enough to go on the back of a lorry would produce the same electricity, faster and more reliably, than 10 offshore wind turbines the size of the Eiffel Tower. This is not true.

Exhibit 6 They said that doctors and nurses were receiving 9% pay increases. This was not true.

Exhibit 7 They said that the decrease in deportation of criminals was linked to an increase in legal challenges on the grounds of human rights, but they could not back this up. You'll not be surprised to know that I vote for Option 2:. I know that all newspapers make mistakes, but I have two simple reasons: first, many of the British newspapers with lower reliability scores have made fewer mistakes in the same time period; second, the mistakes show a systematic bias towards the political right and I do not believe that this pattern could be a coincidence of simple errors. Epa101 (talk) 18:54, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

• Option 2 with regard to any of its 'oppion' pieces. The issue goes beyond just making mistakes, and in Exhibits 3–7 they argued for there incorrect figures/details until IPSO rules against them. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:36, 23 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1: Generally reliableLukewarmbeer (talk) 10:10, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1 The source is clearly biased in terms of its right-wing perspective, but no news organisation is free of bias. However, the examples listed above do not detract from its reliability for our purposes. Rulings of this nature occur frequently for UK news orgs. I will deal with them one by one:

Ruling 1 (Sturgeon GRB): This was an opinion piece in which the columnist made a factual error. It would not be used in Wikipedia. The paper published a correction.

Ruling 2 (Covid) Opinion piece, would not be used other than for the writer's opinion. IPSO-mandated correction published.

Ruling 3 (Homeschooling) Opinion piece, would not be used other than for the writer's opinion. IPSO-mandated correction published.

Ruling 4 (modern slavery) Article quoted a minister who made inaccurate statements, and complaint was only partly upheld. IPSO-mandated correction published.

Ruling 5 (gas turbines)Opinion piece, would not be used other than for the writer's opinion. IPSO-mandated correction published.

Ruling 6 (doctors pay claim) This piece has poor use of statistics, however, the body text was accurate and the only factually false section was the headline which could not be used per WP:HEADLINE,

Ruling 7Was inaccurate, but only in part, and was corrected by IPSO.

Only two articles could have led to misleading information making it into Wikipedia, and these were later corrected. Boynamedsue (talk) 16:42, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Does it not matter that those two were only corrected after an IPSO ruling? If we say that corrections after an IPSO ruling erase the original error, then any newspaper that's a member of IPSO (i.e. the vast majority) would become a reliable source, since they all correct their errors when IPSO tell them to. Epa101 (talk) 22:06, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Well, not all papers are regulated by IPSO, but the two that aren't are probably more reliable in any case. I fully agree that membership of IPSO does not make a paper reliable, but I don't see significant unreliable content here. These are mostly really borderline cases, and the amount of good sourcing we would lose by downgrading the telegraph is insane. We can't compare with the Mail which is unusable given the propagandist nature of its entire output, or even something like the Jewish Chronicle which published a large number of factually inaccurate stories on a single topic over a very short period . Boynamedsue (talk) 23:44, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Just to be clear, my suggested Option 2 does not put it on the same level as the Daily Mail. It would still be two levels above the Mail. There would be no need to delete every Telegraph reference: it just loses its golden image. On propaganda, it should be noted that its close links to Boris Johnson made it very partisan during his premiership, and it has gone outside the mainstream since Borus was ejected. It's not the Torygraph any more. Epa101 (talk) 13:15, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

• No consensus. I really think it's destructive to the project to constantly be having RfCs about "do you like this newspaper? YES, everything it says is automatically true or NO, everything it says is automatically false". In the real world of normal humans, there are always "considerations" when you write something and find sources to cite. Opinion pieces reflect opinions. Why do we have to have an official stance on them? jp×g🗯️ 23:06, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

• Comment: My impression is that The Daily Telegraph is generally reliable for news reporting. As with other news sources, opinion pieces are not relevant to our evaluation of the source's reliability for factual reporting. Many news outlets do not fact-check their opinion pieces to the same standard as reporting; this is why WP:RSEDITORIAL says that "Editorial commentary, analysis and opinion pieces...are rarely reliable for statements of fact." —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 02:36, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

I think Boynamedsue analysis is correct here. It's totally normal for a major newspaper with a lot of content to have IPSO complaints upheld and to issue corrections. Although IPSO is very imperfect, the fact the paper succumbs to regulation and acts on findings against it counts in its favour in terms of reliability. If there were a significant number of news. Given these corrections mostly relate to opinion and a headline and/or were only partially upheld shows that there is no cause to move from the current option 1 status. BobFromBrockley (talk) 13:58, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1: no change - there seems no substantive change here to make for any change to the "Generally" reliable. IPSO issues had happened prior to the 2022 rating, and having another 7 problems among some hundreds or thousands of pieces since still seems "Generally" reliable. That they occurred in opinion pieces and were responded to by editorial staff seems further mitigation. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 22:55, 29 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1 effectively per Mx. Granger. It seems most of the issues are with opinion pieces, which, besides having been IPSO-corrected, aren't typically relevant to our considerations of reliability. While biased, I don't see a reason to no longer consider it "generally" reliable. The Kip 08:26, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1. The issues were mostly with opinion pieces, and many cases are borderline (see Boynamedsue's analysis). Also, the initiator of the RfC failed to provide any evidence that these issues caused problems on Wikipedia. Alaexis_¿question? 09:19, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

* Option 2 All media outlets are biased, but this is one that wears it on their sleeve more than the best ones do. Reliable for mundane reporting, but any summary of complex events should be considered editorial. Sennalen (talk) 15:15, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Discussion (The Daily Telegraph (UK))

• You haven't set this up as an RFC, WP:RFCOPEN explains how to do it properly. That will ensure that notifications are sent out, and the discussion is listed correctly. As an aside "Exhibit 1" doesn't say that "Nicola Sturgeon resigned as a result of the Bill" was untrue but rather that it was a unprovable statement of opinion, and "Exhibit 2" has the same link as "Exhibit 1". -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:30, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

  Epa101, ping so you're aware. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:37, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

  My apologies for not setting this up correctly. After more than 15 years on Wikipedia, I'm still making errors. Thanks also for your pointers on my mistake. Epa101 (talk) 22:26, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

  Epa101, please remove all of your argumentation to the discussion section and leave a neutral rfc statement at the top before this draws responses. As it is now it's a violation of WP:RFCNEUTRAL. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 00:08, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  OK, I'm moving it. I don't understand why some of the other notices on this Noticeboard don't have this structure that's being required here, but I'll move it anyway. Epa101 (talk) 09:57, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  • Bad RFC Not only is this malformed, as noted above, but it is improper. The last RFC was only a year ago. All of the "evidence" consists of complaints about statements in editorial of opinion pieces, not the accuracy or inaccuracy of news reports. And none of them involved use of those opinion pieces as sources in a specific article here. A new RFC is not in order. Banks Irk (talk) 01:53, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

    First, putting evidence in inverted commas is just childish. That is robust evidence. All of it is since the last decision, so it's all new. It all says that it's a matter of fact and not of opinion. Are you arguing that the IPCC is wrong to say that these are matters of fact? If so, you need a source for that, which is stronger than the IPCC's judgement. As regards how they're not used in a specific article, I don't think that is required for a judgement on a perennial source. There wouldn't be much point in having the ratings for each perennial source if we just judged each article on its individual merits. Why say that the Mirror, Morning Star, Mail, Sun, Express, etc. is less reliable in general by the Telegraph if we can just judge each article in each publication on its own merits? When we gave lower ratings to those publications, we didn't say that their inaccuracies had to occur in an article cited in a Wikipedia article. Epa101 (talk) 10:02, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

    Agree it's far too soon for another RFC Lukewarmbeer (talk) 10:08, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

    Is there any time period in which you're not allowed to make another suggestion? I didn't see this in the rules. I can understand that it would get annoying if the same person keeps making the same argument again and again, but I hope that my suggestion here is substantially different to the last one. The December 2022 debate was dominated by the Telegraph's coverage of trans issues. That comes into my first exhibit, but that is only one of seven. I would also note that this newspaper has changed in recent years. It has become more alt-right (e.g. on vaccines) and less conventionally Conservative Party; a rule that a source cannot be reconsidered for multiple risks missing changes such as this. Epa101 (talk) 12:13, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

• Several of these complaints appear to be with reference to opinion pieces in the Telegraph, which already would not usually be considered reliable for statements of fact per WP:RSOPINION. I think only three ([21], [22], [23]) are related to the Telegraph's news coverage, of which one ([24]) only rules that the headline was misleading: and per WP:RSHEADLINE headlines are already not a reliable source. So of the seven rulings initially cited, as far as I can make out only two are relevant to the question of the reliability of the Telegraph's news coverage. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 14:36, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  Also, 4 is about false statements by a former minister that were correctly reported. Although that violates IPSO journalistic standards, rs policy does not say that news media could report false statements by politicians without fact-checking them. TFD (talk) 17:10, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

• Agree per Banks Irk BADRFC, and no need for a new RFC per Caeciliusinhorto and others that the examples offered are opinion pieces, not news, whose use is already covered by other guideline. I also note criticism of the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) at that article, and wonder if there is any such body limiting freedom of published opinions in other countries (eg US). We have fact-checkers, for example, but no body that I'm aware of limiting the freedom to be wrong in your opinions. Short of defamatory publications, I wonder how many non-UK publications would by reduced to "restrictions apply" to their reliability if we included mistakes in their commentary and opinion sections; I suspect we'd be left with very few generally reliable sources if we scrutinized very opinion column in the US to the level that apparently the IPSO does. When fact-checking extends to opinion and commentary, rather than news, short of defamation, that would seem to limit freedom of expression, which includes the possibility of being wrong in your opinions. And if the UK has this IPSO body, why do they have such a horrific tabloid industry (confused)? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:47, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  You can search on their website for breaches, including whether a sanction was decided upon, against any newspaper that is a member (which is the vast majority). Note that the websites are listed separately from the paper, as some articles are only published online. If we compare to newspapers with a lower reliability rating in the same time period: the Daily Mirror/Sunday Mirror has 4, the Morning Star has 0, the Daily Mail/Mail on Sunday has 3, the Daily Express/Sunday Express has 3, the Sun [on Sunday] has 3 and the Daily Star [Sunday] has 0. I accept that some newspapers see the IPSO as insufficiently strict and have not joined, so we cannot compare with them. Still I think that there are enough member newspapers to make comparisons. I feel that the Daily Telegraph is living on old glory with its Wikipedia reputation. Epa101 (talk) 22:02, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

I agree that most of the complaints were about commentary pieces, which are not considered rs anyway. Also, the proposer does not provide any comparison with other broadsheets. If for example the Financial Times, Independent and Guardian had similar levels of complaints upheld against them, then we would be unfairly apply an impossible standard. In fact those papers are not even members of the IPSO, yet are considered rs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by The Four Deuces (talk • contribs) 17:16, November 24, 2023 (UTC)

The Independent is considered a bit of a fallen giant in Britain now and it is not considered alongside the other broadsheets any more, but nonetheless it has 0 rulings against it for accuracy in this time period. The Financial Times has 0 rulings in the same period. The Times has 3. Unlike other British newspapers with Sunday editions, the Sunday Times is still a very different newspaper from the Times, so I'll count that separately. The Sunday Times has 1. The Guardian is not a member of IPSO, so I cannot compare with that. These comparisons are limited, but the Telegraph has more than others considered. As you can see in my response to SandyGeorgia above, the perennial sources with lower reliability scores have had fewer sanctions for accuracy in this period. Epa101 (talk) 22:22, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

It still reflects an odd sense of press freedom, given there is no such thing in the US to my knowledge; people are entitled to errors in their opinions, as long as they aren't defamatory. And given we have no such beast in the US, it makes no sense to penalize one UK paper for a controversial guardian of the press. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:07, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

I suggest leaving ideas of press freedom to one side, as that is a big can of worms. There are some restrictions in the USA that don't apply in the UK, such as the rules on foreign ownership. A lot of our national papers are owned by people with little connection to the UK. On its reliability, I'm not saying to treat it worse than every other newspaper. I'm questioning why we put it on a pedestal at present. My suggested Option 2 only knocks it down one rung. Epa101 (talk) 13:15, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

• I'd say we should wait and see whether The Telegraph is acquired by the Emiratis (which is currently under discussion). Once that has happened and some time is passed, a RfC is probably appropriate considering the UAE's track record regarding freedom of the press. Cortador (talk) 14:05, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Request additonal eyes to review refs

These three refs have recently been attached to an entry on the list of Longest recorded sniper kills, (currently ranked first), as well as in some of the article's prose. While I know some of these sites are generally accepted as reliable, I'm not so sure about their reliability in supporting the content there after further evaluation of them. Would appreciate some extra eyes to take a look. Thanks - wolf 05:19, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

refs

• Thewolfchild already requested extra eyes at Longest recorded sniper kills... Specifically pinging me on the talk page and requesting I review the entry[25]... Apparently they didn't like what I had to say because they decided to edit war and jump venues. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 05:24, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
• The Independent is a good quality source, I can't see any reason to doubt it. Also as four of the references used for other entries in that article are undefined error messages the referencing for this entry is doing well.-- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:17, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
  • Agreed. If we accept the premise that "longest recorded sniper kills" is a meaningfully confirmable record, the sourcing for this entry appears to be just as good as the others in the table – and better than several. The Independent is normally a reliable source; unless other reliable sources have actively cast doubt on the validity of this claim it seems to have just as good a claim to inclusion as anything else in the list. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 12:25, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
• Just to clarify, I'm not asking if the source itself is unreliable, just the specific report, for this specific entry. (If an editor wishes to examine the sources for a different entry and ask asistance, they're free to. But to say "the other entries sourcing isn't very good, so give this a pass", is not very helpful.) The Independent relies on a post from Messenger, an SPS, and comments from a primary source. Newsweek states they: "could not independently verify this information nor the video, and has reached out to the SBU and Russia's defense ministry for additional comment.", and the Kyev Idenpendent relies on a "local source", which is also a post on the Telegram Messenger app, an SPS. So I'm asking if these specific reports are acceptable sourcing. Note, I had first posted about this to the article talk page (as we're supposed to), but after several days, only received a response from two editors, one that only addressed another entry on the list, and the second that only addressed one of the sources, so I came here. Thanks again for any assistance. - wolf 14:55, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  My point on the other references wasn't on their reliability it is that four of them don't exist they are just error messages. My other comments still stand the Independent is reliable, and I very much doubt any of the other claims have been independently verified (unless someone from the Guinness book of records was there adjudicating). -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:06, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

  By coincidence I got to this article today while clearing down Category:Harv and Sfn no-target errors and removed the references that were broken. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:25, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

  We don't generally question the sources a source uses. Nor would I expect independent verification of most military activities to be available, we don't have that for anything else on that page... So either you're challenging the entire page or you have no argument here. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:30, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

  So when Yahoo states that their report is supported by an sps post on a messenger app, you still believe that specific source should be retained as reliable? Or when Newsweek openly states that they haven't verified the info in their report (so not just a questionable source, but no source at all), you would also accept that report as reliable? WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. - wolf 05:37, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

  Again you're using our RS standards to evaluate the sources that the sources use rather than simply the sources themselves. That is a misapplication of this standards. You're mistaken and need to refresh your understanding of how reliability works on wikipedia. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:38, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

  Erm, I thought we were supposed to evaluate sources to determine if they specifically apply to, and sufficiently support, the content they're being attached to. I must've missed the part in the P&G that says we "must blindly accept any ref jammed into an article, as long as it comes from a source that is found to be 'generally' reliable". Again, in evaluating these sources here, one stated they were referring to a "local source" which turned out to be a comment on the telegram messenger app (one step above 4chan on the sps ladder), while another source plainly stated they "had not confirmed the info in their report". Are you really saying you believe we must accept those refs as reliable, with no study or discourse what-so-ever? You think that makes for a dependable encyclopaedia? - wolf 05:08, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

  Reliable sources all use SPS, primary, fringe, biased, unreliable, etc sources in their reporting... Thats not a problem for us. If you want to challenge the sources themselves you can do so... But right now you're challenging the sources the sources are using which is completely different thing. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:07, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

  "Not a problem"...? There's problems right here. RS doesn't say we accept sources blindly, it says we need to evaluate them. - wolf 02:28, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

  The Independent attributes these claims to Ukrainian sources (A Ukrainian sniper claims, In a press statement, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said: “The SBU sniper set a world record for a successful shot.). While they do mention it as a fact later (The world-record comes...) they don't say anything about verifying these claims and I would attribute them too on Wikipedia. Alaexis_¿question? 20:46, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

Is the WashPo using Wikipedia as a source when reporting on MM4A.

Is the Washington Post copying bits from Wikipedia? The opening paragraph of this WP article about the Musk MM4A lawsuit included this line, "For almost 20 years, the nonprofit Media Matters for America has been known for its aggressive criticism of conservative outlets and journalists, and it has worked to get advertisers to boycott Fox News.".[26] Here is the last sentence of the Wikipedia MM4A article, "It is known for its aggressive criticism of conservative journalists and media outlets, including its "War on Fox News"."[27] The two sentences are very similar. Note, the rest of the article is not a copy from the Wikipedia entry. Springee (talk) 16:09, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

They are similar but they are summaries. I dont think the words aggressive criticism mean enough or are rare Softlem (talk) 16:46, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

If the goal of this is to suggest that the WP is relying on Wpedia and is thus not a reliable source itself, no. The WP has certainly done enough coverage of MM4A over the years that it has established the information in that sentence, whether or not we had an impact on its presentation. (And if that is not the goal, then I'm not clear why the matter is at this noticeboard.) -- Nat Gertler (talk) 16:53, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

I wouldn't argue WashPo is unreliable based on that one sentence even if it was copied from Wikipedia. I thought it was worth noting and wasn't sure if where it would be best discussed. Springee (talk) 18:04, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Strictly speaking, if WaPo copied a Wikipedia article word-for-word, but independently vetted all of the copied statements, it would still be a WP:RS. If we catch a source copying bad info from Wikipedia with an apparent lack of vetting, that would be a problem for that source. BD2412 T 17:49, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

No. Banks Irk (talk) 19:30, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

No what? Are you staying the sentence isn't copied with mild changes? Springee (talk) 11:24, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Yes. Banks Irk (talk) 12:33, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Looking at the 4 sources cited in the wiki article, none have a sentence that would be a close phrasing of what we have. The WashPo sentence very much looks like a copy paste with a slight change. If you want to say it's not technically a copyright violation, sure. It's just one sentence. However, it certainly is evidence that WashPo is looking at Wikipedia for info and copied part of our lead with only mild changes. Springee (talk) 17:57, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Newsweek is more blatant but they buried the cut paste deeper in their article [28]. "Media Matters for America is a left-leaning 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and media watchdog group founded in 2004 by journalist and political activist David Brock. It was established as a counterweight to the conservative Media Research Center and is known for its aggressive criticism of conservative journalists and media outlets, including its "War on Fox News."" Springee (talk) 18:04, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

The sentence was added to Wikipedia here and here by User:Safehaven86 in September 10, 2015. Safehaven86 was likely a member of a politics-oriented sock farm, possibly with a political agenda. Who is behind this? Clearly some kind of attempt to shape narrative. The earliest echo of the phrase is Fox News itself December 2017, and a Google search finds many other instances. Way to go Safehave86, job done. IMO it should be deleted from the article, but the damage is done, the meme has spread widely. -- GreenC 18:49, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

I removed this phrase from the article, and started a talk page discussion. -- GreenC 21:10, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Sidebar note: There is no WP:RS requirement that requires WP:RS's to be based on wp:RS's. North8000 (talk) 18:16, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Indeed the hallmark of RS in some areas is that it is based on unreliable sources. For example in sci/med we want sedondary sources (reliable for Wikipeida) which analyse, synthesise and comment on primary sources (unreliable for Wikipedia). The supposition is that expert sources can sift and use unreliable source in ways which no Wikipedia editor is entitled to. Bon courage (talk) 18:30, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

If we start to see a pattern where a news outlet is frequently using WP in its reporting, then we definitely need to re-evaluate whether we can use it as a source for WP. We want to avoid circular referencing (WP citing a source which is based on WP). However, a single sentence in one news article being similar to a single sentence in WP is not a pattern. Blueboar (talk) 18:41, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

• Yeah. Reliable sources using non-WP:RSes is not, itself, a problem, as long as it's going through their proper system of fact-checking. For specific sentences and statements that seem taken from or inspired by Wikipedia we might be cautious about relying too heavily on the exact wording or focus in that one sentence for WP:CIRCULAR reasons (though it's important to remember that they might just be looking at the same sources we are and therefore paraphrasing them the same way - for example, in the quote above, the first part is a close paraphrasing of a NYT article.) If we feel they're doing it frequently, and especially if we suspect that Wikipedia is their sole source and they're not doing any further fact-checking, then we'd want to be a bit more cautious in general for that reason, and if they're using Wikipedia to the point where they're mirroring us then that makes them unusable. But RSes are allowed to use non-RSes (including us) - to a certain extent taking things from non-RSes and using their fact-checking (and reputation for accuracy) to vet them and turn them in to proper reporting is the entire purpose of a RS. If we didn't allow RSes to use non-RSes as sources then we'd have no sources at all, since ultimately all coverage traces back to someone examining something that we wouldn't consider a valid source. So simply using Wikipedia isn't itself a problem as long as they're doing so judiciously and not just automatically accepting everything here as truth (and by default we'd assume that they're using us properly if we consider them an RS, since that sort of care is part of the definition of an RS.) --Aquillion (talk) 07:26, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

SimpleFlying.com

I'm not very experienced so please correct me if I'm not going about this correctly. I've noticed that a vast number of aviation articles utilize information sourced exclusively to https://simpleflying.com which is a content farm that regularly plagiarizes other publications, doesn't have a reputation for fact checking, or otherwise being reliable. I began removing citations to simpleflying but realize that given how many articles utilize it, I should seek input.

I found a previous discussion that seems to agree with my perspective. It contains a lot of information but anything that's noteworthy in the aviation/airlines/airports space will have gotten coverage from more reliable publications or local news.

I believe that it should be "deprecated". Avgeekamfot (talk) 08:43, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Hi @Avgeekamfot,

I've read the previous discussion on this and would agree. The website seems more like a re-sharing platform and if you look at many of their articles, they state a lot of news but rarely share the sources, at which point, it would be much more reliable to just find and quote the actual original source than simpleflying.

For example, the following article (https://simpleflying.com/how-el-al-has-adapted-its-operations-to-the-conflict-in-gaza/) talks about El Al's strategy managing its flights during the Isreal-Hamas war, and although it contains a quote from El Al's CEO, non of the other information is sourced so there's no way to actually verify what they're publishing. Resharing information doesn't make it a secondary source, so in terms of wiki articles, I'd agree with you that it shouldn't be used.

Starlights99 (talk) 12:21, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Sports Illustrated

Sports Illustrated was caught publishing articles by AI-generated writers per Futurism. See Awful Announcing's coverage also [29]. The articles in question were apparently removed but this bears watching. Jessintime (talk) 20:04, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

I had come here just now to post the same thing. This is quite disturbing. It's not so much that they are using whatever technology to write these, but that they are apparently lying and deliberately misrepresenting the product of doing so. Like -- fake authors with GAN profile pictures? You've got to be kidding me. This is like, www.best-reaI-news-4u.co.biz tier shit. jp×g🗯️ 20:52, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

I came here for the same reason. Generally, reliable sources acknowledge their mistakes and publicize their corrections. So far Sports Illustrated has done neither. To me that isn't a good sign. --Pinchme123 (talk) 21:38, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Both Sports Illustrated and Men's Journal are now just content farms for Arena Group. Neither should be assumed to be reliable sources going forward. Nosferattus (talk) 15:35, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Saw this too. CNET did something similar back in January, and we downgraded its reliability to "generally unreliable". May need to consider something similar for Sports Illustrated. InfiniteNexus (talk) 17:41, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Second time this has happened and again the source outfarms responsibility to a third party, which is understandable as they were outfarming their content creation to content farms. The fact their reputation goes in the trash doesn't seem to be a factor, only accepting any old drivel in a bad attempt to increase page views. Someone should right an essay about sources no longer being reliable once they start shipping AI content. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:04, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Not sure whether I'm the right person for that, but we should adapt a policy that sources who use AI-written content are automatically considered to be unreliable unless a discussion/RfC says otherwise. Cortador (talk) 14:26, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

AP and the Washington Post have reported on this. Apparently SI hired a third party that did that, but per AP denies that the articles were AI-written. I don't buy their excuse that only the pen names were AI-written - who would use AI for that, exactly? - and I think SI should be downgraded to "generally unreliable" for the time being. Cortador (talk) 14:25, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Ouch. If their internal editorial standards and operations are that low, then we should definitely bring Sports Illustrated down to "generally unreliable". :bloodofox: (talk) 14:34, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Sports Illustrated does still have some good human reporters who do good work. But, their overall content has gone downhill. Some of their content is still usable, but we should be cautious on what we use and what we don't. – Muboshgu (talk) 16:05, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps the way forward is to mark it as "special considerations apply", as "marginally reliable" in circumstances where the authorship can be easily determined to be a human. I think Cortador's proposal is something worth discussing further, as well. AI is going to be a serious problem for verifiability and reliability, particularly when distinct AI sources start referring to each other. --Pinchme123 (talk) 19:58, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Seems it's heading this way already, but would it be time to open an RfC on SI? The Kip 08:28, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

The biggest red flag to me is that Arena Group has not been forthcoming about the issue. They have instead tried to minimize and deflect the criticism (both regarding SI and Men's Journal). This indicates to me that they don't take the issue seriously and don't have any real editorial standards (other than profit). I think an RfC on SI would be warranted as it is a very commonly used source on Wikipedia and we risk creating circular sourcing of misinformation. Nosferattus (talk) 18:02, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

The Cradle

Seeking input about TheCradle ([30]). It was previously discussed last year with limited input. I've never heard of it, and I can't find anywhere it's cited by mainstream RS.

It describes itself as "online news magazine covering West Asia" and is user-supported. On its website, there's no masthead or an evidence of editorial oversight, and the language it uses is very biased (e.g., referring to Hamas as "Islamic resistance movement") and it appears to peddle in conspiracies ("a 'Hamas massacre' that may never have happened.". In one of its news articles, it states as fact that "some Israelis were killed by Hamas during the attack, while others were killed as collateral damage by Israeli forces using tanks, drones, and Apache helicopters, and to prevent Hamas from taking them back to Gaza as captives," which is disputed in mainstream RS.

There doesn't seem to be much original reporting, instead mostly selectively aggregating and repackaging content from other sources. Longhornsg (talk) 21:12, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Where has it been cited? Selfstudier (talk) 01:18, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

It’s a really bad source but if it’s not being used in WP it’s not really worth discussing here. BobFromBrockley (talk) 05:24, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Oh we use it quite a lot: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?search=insource%3A%22thecradle.co%22&title=Special%3ASearch&profile=advanced&fulltext=1&ns0=1&ns1=1 First use listed (in Afghanistan article) is a piece by conspiracy theorist Pepe Escobar. This is a dreadful site that’s possibly worse than recently deprecated Al-Mayadeen and we should not be using it. BobFromBrockley (talk) 05:29, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Never heard of or read Pepe Escobar, but calling him a conspiracy theorist seems harsh after scanning his wikiarticle. Mujinga (talk) 17:02, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

In addition to the Cradle, he's found a comfortable home for his words at The Unz Review, RT, PressTV, and Sputnik News, among other watering holes of conspiracy theorists and antisemitism peddlers. Longhornsg (talk) 21:19, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

and yet our article describes him as a "Brazilian journalist and geopolitical analyst" - are you coming with some sort of bias here I wonder? Mujinga (talk) 18:09, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Please WP:AGF. Discuss the merits of the sources, and don’t attack editors. Longhornsg (talk) 18:12, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

• "no masthead" - there's clearly a masthead
• "no ... an evidence of editorial oversight" - it's weak for sure but their about exists
• "referring to Hamas as "Islamic resistance movement" - that's its name, as previously mentioned
• "mostly selectively aggregating and repackaging content from other source" - that's not my impression of the site at all, it seems mostly original journalism

Mujinga (talk) 18:12, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

@Mujinga: Would you be willing to provide a link to the masthead? I'm having trouble finding their listing of editorial staff, though I can find the names of individual contributors by crawling through the site. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 07:00, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

I'll hazard a guess and say that the difference in use of the term "masthead" in British and American English is the problem here. Ostalgia (talk) 11:34, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

• The Cradle is clearly pro-Palestinian, and therefore a biased source, if that's what you wanted me to say. I'd disagree with pretty much all of your assessment though. For example, we also call Hamas the Islamic Resistance Movement since that's its name. Mujinga (talk) 17:03, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
• The site has an icon "Become an Author", i.e. anyone can contribute after registering. It does not say anything about editorial policies and fact checking. Therefore, it looks to me almost like a blog, i.e. "generally unreliable". It probably should not be used for contentious political topics. My very best wishes (talk) 17:14, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

  The "become an author" link is an invitation to pitch a story -- not at all like anyone can contribute. (Also that's not how blogs work?) --100.36.106.199 (talk) 21:14, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

• It's quite interesting that they chose to write the following passage on their About Us page We chose the name The Cradle as a reminder that the cradle of civilization was borne of this region... West Asia is the start of history in so many ways, but today the region has lost its roots largely because non-sovereign states act as pawns in the geopolitical calculations of The Other (bold mine). They don't say who The Other is but they do lavish praise on those who want to eject The Other on the same page. Possibly I'm paranoid but this reminds me of the rhetoric of some other organisations in "West Asia" whose goals include the obliteration of a certain people. Happy to be proven wrong if they clarify their position elsewhere. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alaexis (talk • contribs) 1919:52, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

  I was thinking more along the lines of this "Other" being the US, but one way or the other this is beside the point. Neither the content nor the names inspire confidence in this outlet. The above mentioned Pepe Escobar is a crackpot and I don't think we should be relying on content from a "news organisation" that lists him as some sort of star columnist. Ostalgia (talk) 11:40, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

  That's certainly a valid interpretation, just weird they wouldn't write it explicitly. Alaexis_¿question? 20:42, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

• I've looking into this source more, and I'm just coming up with a bunch of question marks. There's no masthead from what I can tell, and I'm not able to find any sort of evidence of editorial review pre-publication (there are no obvious listings of staff editors, nor listings of editorial standards, nor am I able to find any upon a deeper search). What I'm noticing on many of the pieces, even in their "investigations" section (ex. [31] [32] [33] [34]) is that there's a general label The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.. This is a bit damning for the reliability of what would otherwise be passed off as investigative reporting, since it does not imply that the newsroom of the organization (or its editorial staff) sign off on the reporting.
  From what I can tell, more or less the only recent reports that don't include that label are those written by the "news desk" author ([35]). That all of their non-opinion writing would be handled by an anonymous author is odd, and the lack of apparent editorial oversight on the majority of the other content does not give me confidence. Per our guidelines, editors should consider whether the source meets the normal requirements for reliable sources, such as editorial control, a reputation for fact-checking, and the level of independence from the topic the source is covering. And frankly I'm not seeing editorial control, and I don't see evidence in this thread that the website has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. The lack of apparent editorial oversight, in particular, makes me think that this is a questionable source. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 17:51, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

  I never did get an answer to my question of what was the cite or citations that led to the query here so I have looked into it a bit myself and I agree that this source should not be used except for expert opinions that may show up there, per the usual exception for those. Selfstudier (talk) 18:29, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Is the Charles Fort institute website a reliable source for academic information?

I am currently searching for reliable sources that have info on the Mongol Banners (tugs). I found an article on the Charles Fort Institute website about this very topic (https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/the-spirit-banner-of-genghis-khan.69644/) and I want to know if I can use it. Sci Show With Moh (talk) 12:57, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Trying to view that link gives the message that my IP address is banned. That's interesting; so far as I know I've never been to that website, let alone interacted with it. A link to a forum for an institute presumably associated with Charles Fort doesn't inspire confidence. Mackensen (talk) 13:05, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

That is not an article, that is a discussion forum, so we cannot assume there is editorial control for factual correctness. This makes it a self-published source. Such sources can be used for statements not about living people so long as the self who is publishing it is an acknowledged expert in the relevant field. In this case, the post is from "MrRING: Android Futureman", so you might understand my dubiousness as to the level of established expertise. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 14:38, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, even if we ignore the forum/self-published aspects here, I can't imagine what that could possibly be useful for. It looks like there's plenty of random speculation ("Another place where the banner could have been hidden is right under the monastery. ... Anyway, it wouldn't surprise me if there are other, larger caves in the area and if someone took the opportunity to hide relics there.") and stories told second hand without sufficient information to possibly corroborate ("My guide, a Western expat, had once climbed its slopes and had had an unexpected "accident" there. She broke an arm or leg. Her Mongolian friends immediately took her away, and insisted she never go back, because the place was taboo.") This is completely unusable as a source. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 16:55, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

well yes, that's clearly not useful in any way as a reliable source Mujinga (talk) 18:14, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

PesticideInfo for non-BMI

References to pesticideinfo.org have been removed from articles (mainly) due to its characterization as a "Generally unreliable source" in the widely used user script User:Headbomb/unreliable.js. For non-BMI, this judgement is unfounded and actually contradicts the evidence:

• Assessment of toxicological databases: PAN Pesticides Database met the inclusion criteria and ranked in the midfield of the evaluated 21 databases
• Arizona Department of Agriculture: This environmental group maintains a pesticide database that presents current toxicity and regulatory information. Notable features: sources for information (including EPA) completely transparent; site is very easy to navigate.
• Statements by provider: Sources & Methodology, About

pesticideinfo.org has been listed in Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Toxicology task force#Tools / Resources for 13 years. Moreover, there is a Wikidata property (PesticideInfo chemical ID; no opposing votes to the proposal).
In my view, the tabs Ecotoxicity, Usage and Regulation may be generally usable. On the other hand, the content of the tab Health should not be used per WP:MEDRS. To get an impression of the database, you may want to have a look at some example entries (nonanoic acid, paraquat dichloride).
In conclusion, I would like to propose that pesticideinfo.org is no longer considered a "Generally unreliable source", but a generally reliable source for non-BMI content. Leyo 11:18, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

For anyone interested the last discussion appears to be Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 257#Compendium of Pesticide Common Names. The main concern in that thread is that pesticideinfo.org is a work from Pesticide Action Network a group that advocate for alternatives to pesticides. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:38, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Concur. If that's the only source then something's up. Bon courage (talk) 12:02, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

@ActivelyDisinterested: That's why the NGO has been putting resources into the development and the update of this database. There is no evidence that the content of the database is biased. I'd guess that for the NGO, it is important that this database is perceived as reliable to actually be used by other stakeholders. The same would of course apply to an industry database. --Leyo 12:12, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Just one point on it is important that this database is perceived as reliable to actually be used by other stakeholders, it's not Wikipedia job to help improve the perception of the database.
If it meets the standard of a reliable source it should be used, if it doesn't it shouldn't, but anything else isn't an important factor. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:47, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Of course, I didn't mean it in the way that Wikipedia should do anything. I gave the reason why they strive for an unbiased, reliable database. --Leyo 14:38, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Seems to be some misunderstanding of my comment, I was just highlighting the last discussion as the header and edit notice ask you to do when opening a new discussion. I'm not stating any opinion on the source itself. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:42, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Concerning If that's the only source then something's up.: As detailed in Sources & Methodology, the data is available in the original (many) sources, too. However, the data from multiple sources is compiled in the PesticideInfo database. For example, in the tab Regulation, there is information on the regulatory status internationally, in the U.S., in California as well as on allowable residue levels in various regions. --Leyo 15:42, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Then use the reliable source (if its content is DUE is another question). Bon courage (talk) 04:38, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

You mean the original sources? They might not be easily identifiable to all users. Especially, if a user intends to add all of the regulatory information mentioned above, it is much easier to cite one reference.

I noticed e.g. that among the first 10 substances in Rotterdam Convention#Substances covered under the Convention, only one article mentions the listing in the Convention with a reference. --Leyo 13:14, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

About "if that's the only source", the fact that it compiles information from other sources means that those other sources can and should be cited. PAN is an advocacy organization, and we should cite its advocacy positions only with attribution; where it presents matters of objective fact, we should confirm, by citing the original sources, that the information we report is untainted by advocacy. This is no different from what we would do with any other source maintained by an advocacy group. And we should regard "statements by provider" through the same lens.

In the opening post here, two independent sources are cited as vouching for the website's reliability. For [36], it's important to note what the authors say about what they were trying to measure. First of all, they say in the very first sentence of their abstract that they are evaluating sites for use by health professionals; Wikipedia, on the other hand, writes for the general public, and health professionals have skills in evaluating the quality of health information that the general public, and editors here, lack. The authors then say that "we evaluated toxicological databases for their ability to answer practical questions about exposure and prevention." That's not a general endorsement of non-BMI information, nor are "practical questions" the same as, for example, scientific questions. For [37], the PAN website is listed only under "Chemical Identification", that is, for determining the chemical structures of pesticide compounds, not for any other kinds of non-BMI info. And the chemical structures of these compounds are widely available from many other sources. So I'm just not seeing a problem with using other sources in preference to PAN. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:20, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Even though the evaluations were not done exactly for the same purpose as it would be in Wikipedia articles (as reference or potentially also in the External links section), none of them showed any issues with the reliability, transparency or similar. I have not seen any evidence of such issues either.

I just wanted to mention that industry associations (that have similar but opposing interests as the NGO) are cited in several articles, e.g. CropLife International (19 articles) and American Chemistry Council (58 articles). These sources seem to be considered reliable, too. BTW: Here, we are discussing the PesticideInfo database only, not the PAN website. --Leyo 13:14, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Is eurasian-defence.ru a reliable source?

I've been trying to find a reliable source for a Major General who was commander of the Uzbek Airforce and I came across this source. It is The Center for Military-Political Research (CVPR) at Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The article currently under deletion discussion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.193.181.182 (talk) 15:57, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

They are a part of MGIMO which is a well-known university. For this specific case there are no reasons to doubt its accuracy, I think. Alaexis_¿question? 19:57, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for your input. There is an AfD going on where this source is being discussed. I request you to share your thoughts on that AfD. 91.193.181.182 (talk) 11:32, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Machine-generated text at ScienceDirect used as source

An alarming number of articles (over 1000) currently contain some links to www.sciencedirect.com/topics/, which is a collection of machine-generated pages. Not only machine-generated text isn't a valid source, but referencing such an URL obscures the real source of a piece of information. It's like adding a claim to a medical article and referencing it to "somewhere between the third and the fifth corridor in the medicine section in the library", or "the computer told me", or "an AI thinks so". Nemo 23:38, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Recently discussed last month: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_417#Elsevier_topics_again. I agree that something needs to be done here. Like Guy said last month, its probably worth creating an edit filter. Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:52, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

I second that. The "sources" are basically just online searches. Cortador (talk) 06:44, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Thirded. This is just a selective dynamic search result. Should never be used as a source. Bon courage (talk) 06:47, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

+1. In deWP chemistry project, we have replaced/removed all occurrences. Over here, it will be quite a workload to get rid of all occurrences. --Leyo 14:23, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe blacklisting is the way to go. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 15:25, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Made an edit filter request, see Wikipedia:Edit_filter/Requested#ScienceDirect_topics. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:35, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Would https://mongoltoli.mn/history/ be a sufficient source for info on mongolian history?

I was recently trying to find sources for banners of the mongol empire, and I stumbled upon this. It has an article on mongol banners, but I can't tell if this is a legitimate academic source or just some self-published nonsense like the Charles Fort institute. Sci Show With Moh (talk) 04:21, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Yes. its operated from research institute that belongs to Mongolian government. it looks pretty legit to me. But debatable facts should be not sourced. It needs some fact check Gologmine (talk) 10:09, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm not trying to source about the events of mongol history that could be debatable/biased, I just want sources that the mongol war tugs were used in battle. Could I use it? Sci Show With Moh (talk) 11:22, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Overall yes, I guess. As i said that looks pretty legit reliable source. Gologmine (talk) 12:39, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Ontslog.com is reliable source or not?

https://opendatalab.mn/search/6865917 I have even fact checked their legitimacy. Its 100% trusted news agency that is recognized by Mongolian government. Ontlog.com has even their owen social accounts on various platform, which clearly shows their transparency. The problem is that it is not recognized news outlet outside of Mongolia, which clearly know very little know about. Only way to verify articles on Wikipeia is through such not recognized sources. Gologmine (talk) 10:07, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

@Gologmine Do you have a link to the masthead or "About Us" page for ontlog.com? That's usually more telling as far as who the editorial staff is and what their policy is on accuracy than a company registration page. —C.Fred (talk) 13:11, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

https://ontslog.com/about

https://ontslog.com/terms

they are all written in Mongolian. I guess you need to use translator. editoral staff is not introduced. But I asked them personally via their FB page. Anyone is free to contact them, if having doubts. Gologmine (talk) 13:17, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

In the terms page, they are clearly stating that they are fully responsible for what they are publishing and stating also that their materials are all according to the law. In the about page you can see their contact information and company's name that is registered to state. In opendatalab.mn(State opereated public data base) you can find this company by its name and will find its even reeisteration number. I dont think someone would establish a company just to lie about entertainment insdustry. Gologmine (talk) 13:21, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

@Gologmine It also states that they accept third-party material that they disclaim responsibility for, so it's probably important to look closely at the bylines and attribution of pages. So I don't think we can make a blanket statement without looking at some specific pages out of the site. —C.Fred (talk) 13:23, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

So its reliable or not? Gologmine (talk) 13:32, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Context is important. You need to supply the exact article in the source, the article you are going to use it in, and for what claim are you going to make with the source. Ca ^{talk to me!} 00:03, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

The context appears to be related to this edit. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:32, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

That it does, yes. CommissarDoggo^Talk? 14:04, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

This is the source that commenced the discussion on their talk page: https://ontslog-com.translate.goog/entertainment/entertainment-celebrities/5657?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en-GB CommissarDoggo^Talk? 13:46, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

That seems to clearly be the "third-party" material alluded to in their terms; an anonymous tabloid listicle. Most of the other articles from that account are pretty sketchy (please don't add this material from the same author to our article at arthritis noting the condition is now cured by pineapple smoothies). Some of your (Gologmine's) statements are curious; just registering an entity with the state does not make it reliable in any way. Sam Kuru (talk) 00:03, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Journal of Astrological Big Data Ecology

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Do you think this source could be used at Hypersonics? Sennalen (talk) 15:19, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

No a paper written by "Santa Claus Dr.", "Twinkles Holly-Jolly Tinselbottom", and

"Dr. Mittens Snowball III M.D3" should not be used for referencing. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 15:24, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

The author is an expert in the field. I'm more concerned about the publisher. Sennalen (talk) 15:52, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

JABDE describes itself as being for "made up science". This is a good indicator of reliability; as the great Dr. Leo Spaceman once said, "Science is whatever we want it to be." Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 16:21, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes I know that's not the real authors of the work, but the fact that they are the one's listed in the paper show exactly how seriously we should take it. It is slightly worrying that the question was asked. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 20:20, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

If they aren't real, then who eats the cookies? Sennalen (talk) 20:39, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

• Primary source. We need to wait to see whether it's picked up in decent WP:SECONDARY sourcing before it's useable on-Wiki. Bon courage (talk) 16:42, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
• I'm very confused. The paper is clearly a joke, with fake authors and references (yes, Santa Claus is not real). Why would we ever want to cite it for anything? Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:21, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Bell Bank: a tale of churnalism using InForum.com and bizjournals.com.

Hi all, this is as it relates to this COI edit request, but the talk page more broadly is generally indicative of the {{COI}} concerns that I have with the article.

The article cites to a lot of InForum.com and bizjournals.com peices, and a lot of them seem to be churnalism, a concern at Wikipedia:Independent sources § Press releases. The rest of the article reads pretty promotional to me—each of the individual statements backed by the questionable sources are all factual, I'm not disputing that. But put together as a whole, it's almost like 2/3rds the readable prose is name-dropping sponsorships, corporate awards that might better belong on Glassdoor, and company stats and timeline that might otherwise be lifted from an "about us" or "our history" section of a corporate website.

So I have two questions: (1) do you have any experience with InForum and bizjournal as RS? InForum returns no hits on the RS archive search but bizjournal seems to pop up pretty regularly as an unreliable source, notably Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 271 § BizJournals in the Bitcoin Cash article which echo my concerns. This relates to the COI edit request. Again, more inforum and bizjournal fluff pieces to puffery. And (2) what should be done with the article as a whole? My preference would be cut most of it for promotional material, seeing as it was added in dubious ways anyways, and let non-conflicted editors write it naturally. I'd cite WP:BRD as my policy justification, but I might be involved at this point following the interactions on my and the article's talk page. The article is probably not entirely promotional for the purpose of CSD WP:G11 but I have to say if I saw this at AfD it'd lean "significantly re-write, delete all the promotional material" but I hesitate to do that unilaterally without some discussion first, which brings me here.

Thanks for your assistance in advance. — microbiologyMarcus ^{(petri dish·growths)} 20:41, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

I've subscribed to my local bizjournal in the past; it can be a good way to keep track of new construction around the neighborhood. I don't see it as a good source for Wikipedia, I perceive it as mostly a place for real estate developers to name drop and amplify their press releases. I agree it's churnalism, not independent of the subject, and shouldn't be used for determining due weight or notability. Geogene (talk) 22:13, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

The first source you've listed (InForum.com) is the website of The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead, which is a newspaper based in Fargo, North Dakota that's owned by a broader Upper Midwest regional news group. Bell Bank is based in Fargo, and it's got ~1800 employees, so I can imagine that its business moves would attract attention in its hometown paper and interest among locals. Doesn't seem like a particularly nebulous thing. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 06:57, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

Encyclopedia of Arkansas

Is this RS? Looks like articles are written by volunteers and some level of their review process is also done by volunteers1, though they also have editorial staff. Thanks Cannolis (talk) 01:15, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

• It's not a wiki, and authors have to propose articles, that then get reviewed and edited. I think it's actually a valid but tertiary source. Banks Irk (talk) 03:09, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

The Bahmanis of the Deccan

I have doubts about the reliability of the book 'The Bahmanis of the Deccan.' Additionally, could you please assess its alignment with WP:RAJ? Does this book fall under the purview of WP:RAJ, and is it deemed suitable for use in articles? ImperialAficionado (talk) 13:01, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

The author Haroon Khan Sherwani is a well regarded historian and expert. This book certainly does not fall within WP:RAJ as it was written long after the applicable time period. But, the question is otherwise unanswerable absent context. What information in this lengthy book is being used at what article for what purpose that you question its reliability? Banks Irk (talk) 15:54, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Thank you. I want to use it for the military conflicts between the Bahmanis and the Gajapati empire. I asked for reliability because when I searched it in archive.org, it showed the publication date as 1946, which was a British era. Which one is the correct year of publication of this book? ImperialAficionado (talk) 16:31, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

1946 is the original publication date; he died in 1980 and it was republished after his death. WP:RAJ doesn't apply to everything published by anyone prior to Indian Independence. It applies to ethnographic/caste studies, typically by colonial amateur ethnographers, and most often from an earlier time period than this book. And WP:RAJ is simply an essay, not a hard rule. Banks Irk (talk) 16:50, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Ok. Thank you. ImperialAficionado (talk) 17:25, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

thedisinfolab.org

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

Come across this site previously? There seems to be a group of WP:SPAs spamming content linked to it. - Amigao (talk) 17:30, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

My first encounter with this was in November, I think around November 10. The modus operandi is that new accounts with few edits plug it into China-related articles, usually at the end of the lead. The edit summaries were often identical and vague, I think it was typically something like “add important information.”

Seems to be an effort to spam or promote the website. The propositions it was cited for were sometimes redundant to the material in the article or sometimes the kind of broad assertion were a plethora of real sources could have been used instead. JArthur1984 (talk) 17:48, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure if this is WP:SPI, WP:MEAT or some kind of SEO, but the first five I checked[38][39][40][41][42] are all by new accounts posting very similar content. Checked three more[43][44][45] and it's the same, this isn't organic editting. I'm not sure what to suggest, possibly WP:ANI or MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 20:52, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

It's an Indian government-sponsored disinformation operation; both the site, and the coordinated edits here. Many of the edits linked by ActivelyDisinterested have to do with criticizing the Khalistan movement (dozens of whose leaders have been targeted by the Indian government for assassinations in recent months), criticizing Pakistan, and, as JArthur mentions, criticizing China (like in this edit). Follows Indian propaganda to a T. See this article about the site for context. I've removed all use of the site in mainspace; same pattern as AD.[46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55] DFlhb (talk) 23:11, 2 December 2023 (UTC) edited 01:20, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the details DFlhb, and thanks to Amigao for posting it to the MW blocklist page. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 01:50, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Is Kyiv Post or MEMRI right?

Kyiv Post wrote that Hamas relies on the support of its allies, including major powers such as Russia and China, Mashal stated in an interview with an Egyptian TV channel. They provided a link to a video by MEMRI which contains the translation of the interview from Arabic to English. The problem is that Mashal does not say that Russia and China are Hamas's allies and also does not say that they got support from them. He starts talking about Russia and China at 0:50. Can someone check the original interview? Alaexis_¿question? 21:35, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

As with all things MEMRI, you simply cannot trust that they have not completely cut out of context the material they post or that they have not fabricated the translation. You would need the original interview, absent MEMRI's creative editing, to see that. And we shouldn't be basing our articles on interviews that secondary sources have not analyzed anyway. nableezy - 22:29, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that's precisely what I'm asking, to check whether he said anything about allies or support in the original interview. Alaexis_¿question? 08:24, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

My own reading is that the statement is ambiguous, you can also interpret it as the section in the commas being the Kyiv Post's addition (you would normally see it done like this, but you will also see commas) and only "Hamas relies on the support of its allies" is actually being attributed to Mashal. In that case it would be read as Mashal saying that Hamas relies on its allies and the Kyiv Post saying that its allies include Russia and China (something which I don't think anyone would challenge). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:40, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

It's possible, but half of the problem remains as the translation doesn't say anything about China and Russia supporting Hamas. Alaexis_¿question? 08:27, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

A MEMRI translation on an Israel related matter is not something to be relied on. Selfstudier (talk) 10:24, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Have you read my question? I'm asking about a specific interview given to the Egyptian Sada El-Balad channel. Did Mashal say anything about allies or support or not? Alaexis_¿question? 12:56, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

You mentioned the translation, that's what I am responding to. Selfstudier (talk) 13:03, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

If the question is "is MEMRI reliable?" the answer is unequivocally no... But I stand by my interpretation of this as a misreading of an ambiguous situation not one where we need to ask that question. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:39, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

The question was Can someone check the original interview? to see what Mashal actually said. Alaexis_¿question? 18:09, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

And the answer I would provide is that if you have to do OR to figure out what to say you should look for a different source. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:39, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Why is it OR? I cannot verify a source (Mashal's interview to Sada El-Balad channel) myself and ask other editors to do it. Alaexis_¿question? 07:19, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

It's not. --JBL (talk) 17:42, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

If that part is not attributed to the translation then why does the problem remain at all? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:37, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

This source was used on Wikipedia and since I don't know Arabic well enough to understand Mashal's words, I'd like to know what he actually said. Alaexis_¿question? 18:11, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree, the primary source (the interview) has been misrepresented by Kyiv Post. M.Bitton (talk) 10:56, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Just to confirm, are you saying this having listened to what Mashal was saying in Arabic or because you trust MEMRI as a source? Alaexis_¿question? 18:14, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

After watching the video repeatedly and carefully reading the Kyiv Post article, I concur that Kyiv Post misrepresented the MEMRI video. They misinterpreted the subtitle context, and I would be willing to upload the full video with Arabic and English subtitles if the copyright holder of the original video agrees to publish it on Wikimedia Commons. QalasQalas (talk) 12:32, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! I think that for now it's enough that we know what has been said. I've removed the Kyiv Post article from the article in which it was used. Alaexis_¿question? 13:26, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Apple Maps and WP:USERGEN

According to Apple Map Acknowledgements, Apple Maps includes data from OpenStreetMap. As far as I can tell, there is no way to determine which aspects of Apple Maps are sourced from OpenStreetMap and which are sourced from reliable sources.

If I am not mistaken about this I think we need to consider Apple Maps an unreliable source? BilledMammal (talk) 05:54, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Apple by "by far the most prolific" corporate contributor to OSM; it seems their editorial role is active, not passive (Bloomberg). (Bloomberg also favourably compares OSM to Google Maps for developing countries, but that doesn't address USERGEN). If this is about NZ: Apple started off using TomTom/OSM/etc for data, but since 2020 they've been rolling out "redesigned" maps which rely on fully in-house data ([56][57][58][59]). New Zealand has it since 2022 ([60]). DFlhb (talk) 16:07, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

RfC: Sports Illustrated

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

What is the reliability of Sports Illustrated?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

Apologies for any issues with this filing, as I've never actually opened an RfC before. Anyhow, as per the discussion going on here, SI was recently caught utilizing AI-generated writers, although they deny any published articles were AI-written. SI is used extensively on WP, albeit obviously many of these articles predate this AI experiment. As noted by @InfiniteNexus in the linked discussion, CNET did similar earlier this year and its post-2020 acquisition content promptly got deprecated as a result. Should we consider doing the same? The Kip 07:40, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

• Comment as nominator, I personally side with option 2. SI does generally put out solid-enough content, and is often utilized by other sports media; however, even the possibility of AI-generated content deprives it of assumed reliability. I don't see a huge issue with its content being used provided editors are vigilant; they might want to look into the author of the article(s) to confirm humanity, and/or verify the content of the article(s) before adding as a source. The Kip 07:40, 3 December 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2. Given the widespread ubiquity of Sports Illustrated's acceptance as reliable up to this point, and given the seriousness of problems that will arise from attributing past reliability to current (often hidden) AI production, I think this warrants quicker action that having to wait for multiple discussions (doesn't WP:COMMON indicate that dogmatically holding to the "rules" here is perhaps not the best idea?). I think it would be best to note the outlet as "special considerations apply", as "marginally reliable" in circumstances where the authorship can be easily determined to be a human. This is important to be noted for this source specifically (as it should be for each source found to be using AI) because the very decision to deceptively use AI for generation and authorship is indicative of broader reliability problems beyond the specific articles generated via AI. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pinchme123 (talk • contribs) 19:18, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Discussion

Is an RfC needed here? I'm not seeing the "repeated discussion" of this source required for an RfC to be held. I would also suggest a general discussion on how to use sources that incorporate AI-generated content would be more beneficial that discussing the individual sources one-by-one. BilledMammal (talk) 08:08, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

See WT:Reliable sources#Use of AI content generation by previously reliable sources. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:55, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Agree that a RFC is not in order. The linked discussion above is a better place to try to resolve the issue, which isn't confined to SI. Banks Irk (talk) 23:38, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

I’ll reiterate I’m not exactly experienced with the RfC process, so if closing is in order I’m perfectly okay with that. The Kip 21:46, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Help with a source

• Vittou, Christou D. (2000). Τα Γρεβενά στην κατοχή και στο αντάρτικο. Ιστορική μελέτη δεκαετίας 1940/1950 (in Greek). ART OF TEXT Publications – Graphic Arts S.A. ISBN 9789603120797.

Is this a reliable source? This is an over 600 pages-long book dealing with Greece during World War II. From what I see it is self-published, but it's apparently also in the libraries of the University of Tübingen [61]. Christou D. Vittou is not an academic and does not appear to have any formation as a historian, he figures as a "Υποστράτηγος Ε.Α." in the book, so he'd be apparently a Greek major general. This could be relevant since much of the war in Greece was unorganized guerrilla warfare against Axis occupation forces. The book also appears to have been cited by some scholars [62] [63]. In one of the citations a different publisher is featured, Tsiartsanis, which apparently is the edition at the University of Tübingen.

This book features a lot of information regarding an obscure part of the life of a figure I am writing an article about (separatist Zicu Araia/Ζήκος Αράιας and his role during WWII), so it'd be greatly useful, and I also think there's no other source with this information (which might be a bad hint). Other than the opinion of users here I'd also like, if possible, to hear the opinion of Alexikoua and Khirurg, competent and established editors in the Greek topic area.

The listed ISBN is ISBN 13, it also has an ISBN 10 which might result useful for finding information: ISBN 9603120790. Also, the only way to access the book's contents is through this website [64], which I can clearly not link in an article so the URL at the citation above is different. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 14:08, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

• No, it's a self-published source. To the extent that it is based on his personal experiences during WWII, it would also be a primary, not secondary source. Banks Irk (talk) 20:37, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

request for third-party suitability check

May I ask for a third-party evaluation of this site as a reliable source: https://kyband.com/information/about-us/ (FWIW, it strikes me as a fan site.) — Fourthords | =Λ= | 23:09, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Definitely user-generated content. It invites people to submit the content, posted without editorial oversight. Banks Irk (talk) 23:36, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! — Fourthords | =Λ= | 22:48, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Business Insider and Wikipedia mirroring

I'm looking at [65], which flagged here as a potential copyvio related to Quantitative easing. It's obviously a case of copying Wikipedia; the particular page appears to be a properly labeled Wikipedia mirror, which I had never noticed before on Business Insider.

Has anyone else encountered a page like this in the wild on BI? It's not the strangest thing, and presenting this sort of page transparently as a mirror is the sort of thing we'd want any mirror to do. But, if there are other sorts of pages like this on BI that are labeled Wikipedia mirrors, it might be worth noting that there are occasional Wikipedia mirrors on the website's RSP entry. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 05:05, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

9/11 Commission Report

Is the 9/11 Commission credible about the planning of the September 11 attacks? The following three sources contradict the report.

[66][67][68]

Also, they used torture to a great extent, which questioned the credibility of the commission. See also Criticism of the 9/11 Commission Parham wiki (talk) 11:16, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I doubt that this is a question for RSN. Is the Commission or its report used as a source in a specific article? If so, for what? Banks Irk (talk) 12:21, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@Banks Irk, Yes, the report is used in articles related to September 11 attacks, Iran and Al-Qaeda, and my question is, is the report of the commission about the planning of the September 11 attacks valid? Parham wiki (talk) 17:10, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

The report was 20 years ago. Historians will have covered every detail by now and affirmed or challenged anything you wish to cite. Then the proper citation would be primary-secondary: "Historian p. AA, citing 9/11 commission p. BB". SamuelRiv (talk) 12:29, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Contradicted on what? Generally speaking, the report has a reputation for accuracy and fact-checking. But as SamuelRiv points out, the source is 20 years old and historians have had enough time contradict the report if new information has become available. Is there something specific you think is not correct? Which article? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 12:43, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@A Quest For Knowledge, The 9/11 Commission identified Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as the mastermind of the attacks and said that the idea dates back to 1996 and that planning began in late 1998 or early 1999, but al-Qaeda and a document in Bin Laden's home released by the CIA show that Bin Laden (and not Khalid Sheikh Mohammed) is the mastermind behind the attacks and the start date is different from the 9/11 Commission Report.

In some paragraphs in the articles Planning of the September 11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Timeline of the September 11 attacks, the report is stated as fact. Parham wiki (talk) 17:02, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

If different reliable sources don't agree on details it's usually something best discussed in text, e.g. the 9/11 report say it was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed but other later sources say it was in fact Bin Laden (obviously not those exact words, but you get the idea). -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:42, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Thank you! Parham wiki (talk) 22:01, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

At this point the 9/11 Commission Report should be considered a primary source for WP purposes, and a CIA-released document from a raid will always be a primary source. Again, ideally such sources should by this point now only be referenced via internal citation of a history article or book. SamuelRiv (talk) 22:10, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree with this. At this point in time, the report should be treated as a primary source, and references should be to secondary sources reporting on its findings. Which is a separate issue from its reliability. Banks Irk (talk) 22:37, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@User:Parham wiki: Thank you, that helps. The question I would ask is what do other sources say about the matter? Especially modern sources. Do they now say that Osama Bin Laden instead of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is the "mastermind" or "architect" of 9/11? Is this is the commonly accepted account scholarly sources? If so, yes, I would say we should look into changing our articles to match our current understanding.

But we should be careful in reading and understanding what sources are actually saying. The Independent article you cited in your first post doesn't say that Bin Laden (not Mohammed) was the mastermind behind 9/11. Instead, it's reporting what Al Qaeda propaganda is claiming. There's a big difference between 'source says a" and 'source says a says b'.

Also, keep in mind that this is a bit nebulous in that "mastermind" and "principle architect" aren't exactly job titles. The Al Qaeda source (as reported by the Independent) seems to be more about who first had the idea to crash planes into buildings. I'm not sure if who had the idea first is the same thing as "mastermind" or "principle architect" A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 13:08, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Fearless: Wilma Soss and America's Forgotten Investor Movement

Trying to determine the reliability of Fearless: Wilma Soss and America's Forgotten Investor Movement for a biographical article, on Soss and others. The authors seem to be reputable, but I've never heard of the publisher. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 16:47, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

All Seasons is apparently a new publisher which claims "to take head-on the cancel culture that is destroying the publishing industry and the country" ([69]). The founders apparently have a publishing background, but it's small enough and new enough that I don't know it can have established a reputation for reliability yet. Given the authors, I would expect the book to be broadly reliable as a source about Soss, but you do have to wonder why they didn't choose a more mainstream, less polemically-based publisher. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 19:09, 4 December 2023 (UTC)