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Unite Against Fascism and The Times et al

[1] defends removal of a short declarative sentence sourced to RS sources. The excuse appears to be that if The Times does not make the same claim in every article, that somehow it is not RS, and the Daily Mail is not RS in the first place. This edit does not comport with my recollection of the discussion here, and I would like this edit examined for being properly supported by RS sources: [2].. Thanks. Collect (talk) 18:07, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Actually the point is that while the debate on RS and NPOV on this issue is still active here Editors should not be changing the article in the areas of contention. The RS and WEIGHT issues were previously discussed and transcluded to NPOV as per the diff above. Lets have the discussion in one place. --Snowded ^TALK 18:30, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

You assert, for example, that the Daily Mail is a "tabloid" and automagically not RS [3]. This is an RS issue, clearly, and the NPOV discussion is actually over. Perhaps you would like to stop over there for an opinion that the "The Mail is a tabloid not a broadsheet"? Thank you most kindly - the aim here is to get the opinions of others as to whether a "tabloid" is ipso fact not RS. Collect (talk) 18:34, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

OK then, opinion again on the Daily Mail. It's been discussed before. Worth looking at the archives, but from memory the consensus is that the Mail is mid-market, good for some things, not so good for others. Science reporting is the most notable area where it's problematic. For factual general news, should be OK; for an epithet that is essentially opinion, if that's what you're talking about, avoid. Itsmejudith (talk) 18:42, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I tend to judge a newspaper by its content, rather than its size. As for whether the Daily Mail is RS, I'd say on any issue concerning politics, it is far from neutral, and generally it has a reputation for making crap up, so I'd never trust it as the sole source for anything of significance. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:44, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

(ec)Actually Collect the RS resolution which was not altered by the subsequent NPOV discussion was implemented on the article, restoring the long standing stable version before you and others edit warred to impose a label which failed on WP:WEIGHT. That was immediately reverted by one of your side in this dispute. In consequence there is some more work to do there or on ANI to deal with the issue. This edit by you is a part of that resolution. --Snowded ^TALK 18:49, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I have no "side" other than meeting the obligation of WP to present material from reliable sources in as neutral a manner as possible. AN/I has nothing to do with this, as far as I can tell. Collect (talk) 18:59, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Inserting "left wing" without consensus and not respecting the RS view that the sources did not support the insertion per WP:WEIGHT. That sounds like something which is probably ANI sooner rather than later. --Snowded ^TALK 19:03, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

(ec)Andy: The word 'tabloid' has multiple definitions.[4] In the US, "tabloid" usually means the second definition, "featuring stories of violence, crime, or scandal presented in a sensational manner". A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:51, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough. On that basis, the Mail is definitely a tabloid, see here. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:53, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

IOW, you do not like the Daily Mail which, on WP, is not the way RS sources are determined. Collect (talk) 18:57, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

(ec)Yes, Quest, there is "tabloid" = small format, and "tabloid" = sensationalist. We all agree that the format of publication is irrelevant. The DM is sometimes sensationalist but not consistently. The editors have formulated their policies deliberately to frustrate WP editors who want clear-cut rules. Either that or to sell lots of copies. Itsmejudith (talk) 19:05, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Collect, if you really want evidence that the Daily Mail isn't a reliable source, I'm sure it isn't difficult to find. Is there any particular field in which you'd like to see its unreliability demonstrated? AndyTheGrump (talk) 19:09, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

WP has WP:RS which governs. And by the standards of that, the DM is RS. RS is not determined by "I found something they printed which was wrong"-type argumentation -- in that case the NYT would never be usable. The criteria as set forth on WP:RS are all we are to examine. Collect (talk) 19:13, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

In this case, where the text in dispute is along the lines of "UAF has been called a left-wing organization by X, Y and Z" and the Daily Mail is "Z", the Daily Mail is a reliable source for that purpose. It doesn't mean that UAF is a left-wing organization, it means that the Daily Mail and some other sources called it one. The argument that the Times used the term in one article but not others and thus the one article in which it did is not an RS or gives undue weight to that one article is frivolous. We just got done discussing that source here recently. This looks like a content dispute and an edit war rather than a legitimate RS issue. It doesn't even look like a legitimate NPOV or weight issue at this point. Fladrif (talk) 19:30, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I think you're missing the point of the dispute, Fladrif. The issue is about whether these sources are good enough for us to label the organisation, without attribution, as "left-wing" in the first sentence of the lead. I don't think anyone would suggest that attributed discussion of the political leanings of the organisation is not appropriate in the body of the article. --FormerIP (talk) 19:34, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

No, I'm not missing the point, because the specific question posed above had nothing to do with the first sentence of the Lede nor with unattributed statements. It had to do with removing a sentence which is clearly attributed and sourced to RS, based on claims that the sources were not RS for the purposes for which they were being used. Those claims lack merit. As for how to write the lede, that is a matter for another board, and from my vantage point the fact that the interested editors are unable to resolve that question is looking like an edit war rather than collaborative editing. Fladrif (talk) 20:07, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Collect, I see nothing whatever in WP:RS that can support a statement that 'X is RS' in the abstract. It is only of relevance in determining whether it is RS regarding a particular issue. Given the Daily Mail's long-standing right-wing political stance, I'd hardly take it as RS for unattributed assertions about the politics of UAF. What do other newspapers say? AndyTheGrump (talk) 19:37, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

For the billionth time, the political leanings of a source are completely irrelevant to the question of its reliability. Dlabtot (talk) 19:42, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Since the statement that 'X is left-wing' can only ever be opinion, reliability doesn't even come into it. AndyTheGrump (talk) 19:46, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

There are in fact probably millions of statements of opinion in Wikipedia; like all content, our verifiability policy requires they be cited to reliable sources. Statements of opinion should be cited with attribution. The WP:Identifying reliable sources guideline quite correctly does not include political leanings or alleged bias among its criteria. Dlabtot (talk) 19:55, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Regardless of whether the Mail is a tabloid, it isn't a RS; indeed, it has a reputation of making things up (ironic for the paper with the columnist who says that "you couldn't make it up"), especially for political purposes. This is an endemic problem among the "mid-market" papers that include, in essence, the Mail and the Express. Hell, both papers probably account for more PCC complaints than anything else. However, the Times is an RS for most intents and purposes; it has a reputation for being a good news source, and doesn't toe the Murdoch line as much as say, the Sun. It is right-leaning, though, so I'd personally not use it without due care (like I wouldn't use, say, the Guardian in an article about the EDL without due care). General rule of thumb: if it costs 50p or less, it's probably not reliable. The Evening Standard is a notable exception of this rule. Sceptre ^(talk) 19:58, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

it has a reputation of making things up -- Sceptre, could you point out some specific instances of DM 'making things up'? Dlabtot (talk) 20:09, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Notably, nearly everything about the EU it reports are complete falsehoods; an example is this article about Cadbury being forced to remove their "Glass and a Half Full" slogan from their Dairy Milk bars by the EU (they did remove it, but for completely different reasons). That said, the fact that the Mail makes things up is a generally accepted truth in most of Britain. Sceptre ^(talk) 20:35, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

What part of the text of the Cadbury article are you saying is inaccurate? Or are you just disputing the headline. I would argue against citing the headlines from any newspaper. Dlabtot (talk) 21:04, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

The general tenor of the article is an anti-EU screed that the Mail is famous for. Indeed, as a Sun article mentioned on the same day, they removed the slogan as "the phrase didn't make sense" with the different sizes of bars Cadbury's uses. In addition, the European Commission released a letter sent to the Mail describing the story as (another) falsehood about the EU. Sceptre ^(talk) 01:06, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Given that the BBC ran a story to the same effect the day before the Daily Mail ran the article cited above [5], as did a number of other reputable news organizations[6] before Cadburd "clarified" what is was doing or not doing, this would seem to be an ill-chosen example. The story isn't really "wrong", at all, it just has a bit of a Europhobic spin. Even the best news organizations get things wrong now and again. Not saying the Daily Mail is among the best news organizations. Just saying. Fladrif (talk) 01:22, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

The Daily Mail is a reliable source in that it generally reports accurate facts. If it reports Tommy Sheridan has been convicted of perjury we can believe that. If it reports Heathrow has been closed down due to snow we can believe that. It is a reliable source for reporting facts. If you were to check the Daily Mail, most its reported facts (as opposed to unqualified and ill-informed opinion pieces) would check out. Labelling something left-wing is an opinion, so it is really an issue of notability. I would say that comes down to the background of the person writing the piece. What is his education? What is his area of expertise? Is his judgment respected by other reliable sources? If the writer's credentials are established so that he is an authority on political ideology, then it is acceptable to source his views as a opinion through the Daily Mail. Betty Logan (talk) 20:27, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

The author is Jack Doyle, who is the main Home Affirs correspondent for the DM. Several hundred bylined articles. Apparently started as an "investigative journalist" but can't find his c.v. immediately. Clearly writes a lot on political topics though, as specialist on Home Affairs. Collect (talk) 20:59, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I'd recommend the PCC website for evidence of the Daily Mail's 'reliability': a search for 'Daily Mail'. Here's a classic: (not for those with a weak stomach) AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:29, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

The Daily Mail might get some stuff it gets from the agencies right, but its quality of journalism otherwise is really bad. Sceptre ^(talk) 20:35, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

From that PPC site you get 492 hits for the Daily Mail compared to 316 for The Independent, 1400 for The Times, 159 for the Daily Telegraph and 184 for The Guardian. When you consider that the circulation for the Daily Mail is 2 million compared to 200,000 for the Indy, 500,000 for The Times, 700,000 for the Daily Telegraph, and 300,000 for The Guardian it doesn't seem to attract a disproportionate higher rate of complaints than the broadsheets. In fact, from those stats it's The Times we should be worried about. Betty Logan (talk) 20:42, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Statistics should be treated with caution. If the Mail has a poor reputation, people may not feel they need to worry so much if it lies about them. As has been said above by someone else, the Mail has been discussed to death as a source. Community consensus appears to be that it is a reliable source for certain facts about news stories, but non for scientific reporting or for matters of opinions related to politics. That seems to me to obviously fair and there's no need to go round in circles over it. --FormerIP (talk) 21:03, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

The community consensus doesn't really seem to be founded on anything concrete though, just a casual disregard for the Daily Mail. In reality no newspaper should be used for something like scientific reporting, peer reviewed journals should really be used for that sort of thing. As for political opinion pieces, again this is entirely down to the notability of the author, not the newspaper. The Daily Mail is no less reliable for sourcing an opinion piece than say The Telegraph would be for the same piece by the same author. I don't see any evidence based arguments for regarding the Daily Mail differently to the broadsheets. I have no love for the Daily Mail but the reliable source criteria seems to be getting applied fairly arbitrarily here. Betty Logan (talk) 21:16, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Actually, 'statistics' like those Betty Logan gives are best ignored entirely. The 1400 hits for 'the Times' on the PCC website include such newspapers as 'The Herne Bay Times', and quite likely every article that includes the words 'the' and 'times' too. There are clearly some false positives in the 'Daily Mail' search, but I'd suspect a lot less, from looking at the articles found (and I didn't cite numbers anyway). I'd also point out that not every complaint to the PCC is upheld. And yes, the Daily Mail is widely held in contempt, for being demonstrably biased and unreliable. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:20, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

As opposed to the "Graudian"? Amazingly enough, folks seem to view "the other side" as intrinsically "unreliable" but WP policy is that is not a reason to call an RS source "unreliable." Really. Collect (talk) 21:22, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Are you seriously suggesting that a demonstration that a source isn't reliable is irrelevant to its status as WP:RS? AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:26, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

So far, I have never found an infallible news source. Only if such exists would RS ever be construed to mean "infallible." What it means, moreover, is described in detail on WP:RS. And "infallible" is not one of the words used for RS. Collect (talk) 21:33, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

True enough. Here's some words that are used though. "Whether a specific news story is reliable for a specific fact or statement in a Wikipedia article is something that must be assessed on a case by case basis". Now can we assess whether the Daily Mail is reliable when it says that UAF is a left-wing organisation? AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:39, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

WP:NEWSORG states Mainstream news sources are generally considered to be reliable. However, even the most reputable news outlets occasionally contain errors, which is a criteria the Daily Mail satisfies. I would say the Daily Mail is a reliable source for someone saying the UAF is a left-wing organization. Whether their opinion is notable enough for inclusion in teh article depends on their authority on political ideology. Betty Logan (talk) 21:43, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

The writer has written several hundred articles on the broad area of "Home Affairs" which is certainly enough to establish reasonable journalistic dredentials. And since the sentense used the term "called", and the fact is that the DM did call them that, that is sufficient. The edit did not assert that the UAF is anything at all, just that a number of reliable sources have called them "left wing." Which is a fairly incontrovertible fact, I should say. Collect (talk) 21:50, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I think the edit needs to be to be reworded slightly: it is the writers that call the UAF left-wing, not The Times or Daily Mail so it shouldn't be attributed to them directly, but I think those sources are fine for saying something along the lines "...the UAF have been described as a left-wing group in The Times, Daily Mail etc..." Betty Logan (talk) 22:23, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I agree with that in general, but also I think it gives undue weight to one or two sources to have that in the first sentence of the article. --FormerIP (talk) 22:29, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

No I wouldn't agree to that per WP:UNDUE passing mentions is not enough to label this whole article as being about a left wing group. Mo ainm~Talk 22:34, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I disagree with those sources being used to say it is a left-wing group. I'm not convinced the writers are qualified to make those judgments, so they should be kept out of the lede. The best place for them would be in discussing perceptions of the UAF, which do have a place in the article. They are commonly seen as left-wing, or at least having left-wing allegiances even if they have no actual political affiliation, and it is fair comment to document public perception of their political ideology. In that capacity it is ok to mention The Times, Daily Mail etc and other newspapers that describe them as left-wing, but it should be explicit that it is only a description, not a qualified assessment of their ideology. Betty Logan (talk) 22:39, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that's perfectly correct. --FormerIP (talk) 03:05, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

From where I'm standing, it's not a matter of political ideology. I find the Mirror to be just as unreliable as the Sun or the Star. As far as whether the Mail is a tabloid: the Mail, I believe, has always been a compact-size paper. From the driest sense, it is a tabloid. This is in contrast to the former broadsheets (Indy, Grauniad, Telegraph, Times, FT, all of which I'd be more inclined to use as sources for anything), which I find to have a better sense of writing. The Mail do have a tendency to be over-sensational too; other Britons will remember last Monday's front page, expressing outrage at the over-sexualisation of The X-Factor and then printing the pictures.

I should also point out that the Mail shouldn't be used as a source in this case, because if not through support then through tone, they do have a strange relationship to the far-right. Infamously, they ran the famous "Hurrah for the Blackshirts!" story back in the thirties. Even now, though, their readership does tend to be more reactionary than the broadsheet conservative papers, as evidenced by their "exposé" of the EDL last week which went down in flames. They also take a reactionary editorial line on the Muslim population, and are so well known that it's been mentioned in songs. In any case, they'd probably have a vested interest for this topic to negatively cover the UAF, if only to keep their readership. However, I have no reservations to using the Times with the standard due care given. Sceptre ^(talk) 01:06, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

The DM may have apolitical outlook but most (if not all) newspapers do. We would not say that you cannot use the Gaurdian as a RS for the EDl becasue its a bit lefty. Nor do we dismiss fox news as a sources becaseu its biased or somethimnes makes 'mistakes' we then see it retract in small print. NOw if we dismiss the DM here I hope we would dismiss it in all similar circumstances. The DM is used 5 or 6 times in the EDL article with no question of its RS status having been raised (as far as I know) until now. Slatersteven (talk) 17:37, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Sceptre, why do you keep raising the bias argument, even though it has been repeatedly pointed out that it is irrelevant? Dlabtot (talk) 18:32, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Because the right-wing bias of the Daily Mail is relevant? They are stating an opinion, not a fact, and as such, their own political stance is clearly going to affect their stance regarding UAF. This is common sense. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:38, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Bias is not a factor in our WP:Identifying reliable sources guideline. If you think the guideline should be changed, go to the take page of the guideline and propose a change. Dlabtot (talk) 22:18, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

The same applies to any newspaper (and most other medai). So I propose that any medai outlet (including magazines and webzines) that are politicaly opposed to a group as RS for the politics or polocies of that gruop.Slatersteven (talk) 18:47, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

The Daily Mail quite obviously meets the standards of WP:NEWSORG. Most UK papers have a political bias; indeed, most Western newspapers do. If we started dismissing them based on "political bias", we'd disqualify them all. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:57, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

The latest source being objected to is Searchlight. Which has been called non-RS for its views on its split from the UAF, and its accusation that the UAF is a SWP recrutiment drive [[7]]. Is searchlight RS for its views on this matter?Slatersteven (talk) 13:56, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

I would say that Searchlight is not an RS. It's a pressure group with an agenda that sometimes publishes stuff, but not a news organization. Betty Logan (talk) 15:27, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

Searchlight is used as a source on the English Defence League, however. If it is not RS in one place, it can not be RS in the other? Alternatively, as a SPS, would material relating to its own view of itself be ascribable as its view of itself? Collect (talk) 15:35, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

I think it would qualify as a primary source for information about itself, provided that information was not disputed by third-party sources. It would qualify as a primary source for its own views, but I seriously doubt its views about UAF and the EDL would qualify as notable. I can only imagine it is sourcing the EDL article because no-one has challenged the source. Betty Logan (talk) 15:50, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

Can people stop using this 'it's a reliable source, therefore everything it says is reliable' argument. This isn't what WP:RS says at all. Look what it says in relation to News Organisations for instance: "Mainstream news sources are generally considered to be reliable. However, even the most reputable news outlets occasionally contain errors. Whether a specific news story is reliable for a specific fact or statement in a Wikipedia article is something that must be assessed on a case by case basis. When using news sources, care should be taken to distinguish opinion columns from news reporting.". If this is true for mainstream sources, it must be even more so for less-reliable ones: "a specific fact or statement... must be assessed on a case by case basis". In any case, the comments about the relationship between the SWP and UAF were not written by a Seachlight journalist, as has already been indicated. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:57, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

"Can people stop using this 'it's a reliable source, therefore everything it says is reliable' argument." - I'm pretty sure no one has ever said that, therefore people will be unable to 'stop' doing so. Dlabtot (talk) 02:31, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

Political bias certainly does affect the reliability of a source, as it very often compromises journalistic integrity or scholarship (it's why I mentioned to another user a couple weeks ago why we should use less Searchlight, and more academic work). Given how the Mail uses "left-wing" as a slur, it shouldn't be used as a source for the term (and I should argue, with its record on political reporting, nothing regarding politics at all). We should also be careful with what we do cite, given its (somewhat unfortunate) association with the far-right may also compromise its reliability (even if it's only to keep its readership) and its status as a mid-market tabloid with a tendency to oversensationalism (e.g. last week and X-Factor, or Manuelgate a couple of years ago). However, given the Times has none of these disadvantages, this may be used to cite "left-wing" (again, with care to ascribing labels and due weight). Sceptre ^(talk) 19:55, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

If you start trying to disqualify sources that meet the requirements of WP:RS based on allegations of "political bias", then you're heading down a very dangerous road. If we disqualify all newspapers with a "political bias" from commenting on political matters, we'll pretty much have to disqualify almost all of them. Are we now going to disqualify The New York Times or Wall Street Journal as WP:RS on political issues because of their well-known political stances? Are we going to disqualify all Marxist academics? Not likely. Jayjg ^(talk) 02:18, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

Not only does 'bias' not disqualify sources from being 'reliable', as the term is used on Wikipedia, but our WP:NPOV policy requires that all significant viewpoints be included in articles. That would be impossible to do if a source could be disqualified for having a strong point of view. Dlabtot (talk) 02:36, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

"...our WP:NPOV policy requires that all significant viewpoints be included in articles". Yes, but here's the problem. The Daily Mail's viewpoint is that UAF is a left-wing organisation, so it says so. Other sources apparently don't consider it 'left wing, and therefore don't say it is. You can't cite what a source doesn't say, so if you cite only the sources that do say anything, you risk giving a spurious impression that this is consensus. This is actually a fundamental problem with the way Wikipedia rules on sourcing work. About the only way around this in this particular case would be to say that "certain right-wing newspapers have characterised UAF as a left-wing organisation", but that isn't exactly elegant. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:00, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

Your interpretation of multiple RS saying something without anything else disputing it is flawed.Cptnono (talk) 03:08, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

How? If the only notable sources that describe UAF as left-wing are right-wing, are we supposed to ignore this? It is ridiculous to suggest that a source can give an opinion on the political orientation of an organisation, and at the same time suggest that its own orientation is beyond comment. This isn't NPOV at all, instead it is 'RS' fetishism, which treats an opinion about something ('we think X is reliable for what it says on Y') as a statement ('X is RS, therefore anything it says about Y must be reliable'). There is no objective measure of political orientation, so everything written is opinion, and needs to be treated as such, with allowances made for the orientation of the source. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:25, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

Just account for the bias in the claim then. You can say something like "the UAF is often described as a left-wing group by the right-wing press such as The Times and Daily Mail". Although claims may be one-sided, the socialist and liberal media as well as the UAF itself don't seem to be contesting those observations, and if they did you could include them. Betty Logan (talk) 13:24, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

Might you give an RS for specifying The Times as "right wing"? I would think that specifying their position sans any sources would be far worse than simply specifying that these particular sources identified the UAF as "left wing" in articles. Collect (talk) 13:54, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

http://www.ipsospublicaffairs.co.uk/researchpublications/researcharchive/poll.aspx?oItemId=755 and http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/may/04/general-election-newspaper-support. The sources don't refer to them as "right-wing", but they do show them to be conservative newspapers if you want to qualify the political allegiances of these newspapers. Betty Logan (talk) 14:26, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

And a paper which supported Labour in 2001 and 2005 is "right wing"? I would think such a claim is weak. Very, very weak. Collect (talk) 15:04, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

As did the Sun, but alleging it's been left-wing at any point in the last thirty years would get you laughed at, as it takes, and has taken, a editorial line in support of most traditional Conservative policies (especially its Euroscepticism and stances on the economy and immigration); indeed, it had Richard Littlejohn on the payroll in those two election years.

On the topic of bias of sources: in most cases, especially for statements of fact, these sources would be fine to use. But when it comes to things such as political outlook and using these very general and very loosely defined terms, then we need to be careful. It's why I wouldn't use "left-wing" (questionable sources, bad specificity) in the article if we could use "anti-fascist" (good sources, good specificity). Which includes using high-quality sources over low-quality sources. For non-peer reviewed sources such as newspapers, there is a very real danger that an otherwise reliable source will skimp its duties to journalistic integrity when covering something it's opposed to (see: Fox News and its coverage on the healthcare debate).

For high-quality sources, such as the NYT, WaPo, WSJ, the Times, the Guardian—traditional broadsheets—this danger is minimised. Indeed, some newspaper editors for more sensational newspapers (Kelvin MacKenzie comes to mind) insist that their writers don't fully research stories because otherwise they wouldn't have a story at all. Which is why I'd lean against using the Mail (mid-tabloid, sensationalist, very right-wing), but I'd use the Times (former broadsheet, drier coverage, centre-right) or even the Telegraph (broadsheet, infamously pro-Tory). But given that the Times and the Mail are the only sources that use the appelation, we're really down to one source: which brings in WEIGHT issues.

Finally, Andy has a point on "RS fetishism". There is this obsession on Wikipedia that " if an RS says it, it must be true!". RSes are not always right and we don't expect them to be; it's why Fox News still remains a source despite infamously calling the then-chairman of the Republican Governor's Association a Democrat. We don't expect the sources to be neutral, either. But too many editors have blind allegiance to the fact something is an RS that they don't bother checking what the source says; I remember one source I used in an article mentioning Easter happened on a date in early March that happened to be a Thursday: instead of making the claim that Easter fell on a date it actually can't, I instead made the assumption they meant "April" (a Sunday that Easter did fall on that year). Editors really need to check the sources, especially ones that aren't peer-reviewed, before using them, because otherwise, we could re-introduce obvious inaccuracies that should've, but didn't, get caught out in the peer review process. Sceptre ^(talk) 00:33, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Please don't encourage editors to label sources as "left-wing" or "right-wing", particularly based on WP:NOR; these simplistic labels add nothing but POV to articles. Jayjg ^(talk) 19:51, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm encouraging editors to clarify the political viewpoints of sources that make political claims as opposed to just stating facts. The Daily Mail is an RS, but including their political opinions without clarifying their political leanings is to be selective in the information you include. If David Cameron wrote in the Daily Mail that "Labour is crap", do you not think it would be wise to mention the fact here leads the rival party? Please don't encourage editors to violate Wikipedia's policy of neutrality, you should read up on here: WP:NPOV. Betty Logan (talk) 13:05, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

You're encouraging poisoning the well based on simplistic labels. There's a reason we have links to articles on these newspapers, it's so people can get a full picture of the source, rather than two-word sound bites. Please take your own advice. Jayjg ^(talk) 18:57, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

WP:NPOV obliges editors to disclose any potential bias in presenting information, especially opinion based content. There however is no policy that prevents us or even suggests we do not disclose potential bias which is what you are advocating. If any editor wishes to characterize the political allegiances of a source then that is his prerogative, provided the claims about the source are sourced. If you are going to quote The Mail to say something is left-wing, then it is acceptable to point out The Mail is right-wing (or at least note its support of a right-wing political party) provided you source the claim. If you can't put the opinion into context, then you have to think twice about including it. Betty Logan (talk) 16:22, 28 December 2010 (UTC)

WP:NPOV nowhere obliges editors to pre-emptively POV names of reliable newspapers with simplistic labels intended to create POV and poison the well, under the guise of "disclos[ing] any potential bias in presenting information, especially opinion based content". That is why you will no-where in Wikipedia find The Guardian described as "the left-wing Guardian" or "the liberal Guardian", despite its well-known, longstanding, left-wing and liberal editorial policies. These terms are only used to discredit sources editors don't like, and for no other purpose. Please do not continue to pretend otherwise. Jayjg ^(talk) 02:18, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

This is extremely WP:LAME. Looking at the subject page, there's no way this group could be considered anything other than left-wing. Referrign to a political group aligned as this one is as "left wing" is not a contentious claim. As a matter of fact, it should be so unlikely to be challeged it wouldn't even need a source. Anyway, there's been a lot of churn, and it looks like both the Times and the Daily Mail were used as a source for it. And that doesn't require any further attribution; this org appears to be much further to the left than the Times is to the right . Squidfryerchef (talk) 14:37, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

I can't agree with you on this, Squid. How can a group that David Cameron supports be unequivocally left-wing? Betty has said a lot of good sense about the Daily Mail, which will be useful when it crops up here again. I sympathise with what Jay says about not labelling sources. It well poisoning when this is done in mainspace, but in the discussion here I see a good faith attempt to unpick reliability. If we want to bring the thread to a close and help the editors of the page towards a compromise, I think we can say the following. There are sources to support "the group has been called left-wing"; sources to support "the Socialist Workers Party had a role in setting it up", and also sources to support "senior politicians from across the political spectrum have expressed support for the group". While it isn't the role of this board to determine exactly how those sources are used in the article, as a board we could advise that there are sufficient reliable sources for editors to write up a nuanced description of how the group is regarded. Itsmejudith (talk) 14:08, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Another sources saying that Seachlight mleft becaseu of SWP influence over the UAF http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/09/fighting-racism-united-we-stand. IS this RS for the claim?Slatersteven (talk) 14:12, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

No. Because it doesn't say that. It says "When Unite Against Fascism was founded, Searchlight and its supporters were part of it. The fallout centred on the Socialist Workers party, and its perceived influence over UAF. As a result Searchlight and its supporters left UAF". Firstly, note perceived influence, and secondly, note that this is in the Guardian 'comment is free' section. The writer is Peter Lazenby "...chairman of the Leeds branch of the NUJ and Joint Father of the NUJ Chapel at Yorkshire Post Newspapers". [8] He is clearly not writing as a Guardian journalist (he isn't), but in a personal capacity. This is an opinion piece, nothing more. Though there appears to have been a falling-out between Searchlight and UAF, we cannot simply take Searchlight supporters as sole arbiters of the causes of this. AndyTheGrump (talk) 14:38, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

So we are saying that the Comment is free section of the Gaurdian is not RS? By the way is there any evidacen he is a Searchlight supporter? It seems to me he is not attributing blame. Asl owe can use one side, if only one side is ever given. This seems to be the case here. O)ne side has stated their reaspons for the split and the othe side has nopt reponeded.Slatersteven (talk) 14:45, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Andy is confusing WP:RS and WP:NPOV. WP:RS qualifies the Daily Mail as a reliable source for reporting facts and opinions (although some editors may disagree) until there is a consensus that it isn't a reliable source. I understand his concerns about the Daily Mail not being neutral, but there is no requirement for the sources to be neutral. There is however, a requirement that claims are presented neutrally: WP:NPOV. To take this specific case, the Daily Mail has published an opinion that the UAF is "left-wing"; it is a reliable source for that opinion, but some care has to be taken in presenting it so WP:NPOV is not violated. The Daily Mail clearly don't like the UAF, so it is entirely conceivable that they decided not to identify it as "anti-fascist" since it could generate support for the group among their readership (some of which are presumably against fascism), so they label it as "left-wing" to immediately generate contempt for the group among their majority Conservative readership. An editor has argued that WP:NPOV obliges the inclusion of the Mail's opinion because it it is a viewpoint held by a notable contingent of the press, and I agree with that, but WP:NPOV also compels that opinion is put into context, by either including counter-claims or by clearly identifying potential bias in the publisher. I think it's fine to include polticial opinion pieces by the Mail (and any other mainstream newspaper for that matter), but its political allegiances clearly have to be identified for such opinions to be presented neutrally in the article. Betty Logan (talk) 15:12, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

On contentious subjects, sources that are generally reliable, especially non peer-reviewed ones such as newspapers, have to be carefully examined to see if they are reliable in that case. Would we use the Mail as a source on anything to do with European law? Of course not. Besides, the consensus on the Daily Mail is that it's evaluated on a case-by-case basis, a far cry from "generally reliable". That said, I have no objection to using the Times, as it is a good source, but really, if only two newspapers out of ten use the term "left-wing", then it's probably a minority viewpoint that doesn't belong in the lead section without attribution. Also, re: Slater: I wouldn't use CIF as a source, given that it's normally op-eds of a more controversial nature (see: Toynbee's "final solution" comments about the Coalition). Sceptre ^(talk) 18:16, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

It has been asked a hundred times but it must be asked again, where is the evidance that any one of wikipedia has contested this lable?, We only neded to take into account controversy where one exsists. We only need to put both sides where there are two opposing views, not where there is one view and a no comment. I take it them that we have consensus that CIF is not RS, and that anything sourced to it should be removed?Slatersteven (talk) 18:46, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Other sources

As Andy notes above, it is difficult to find sources characterising UAF's political position (except as an attempted smear), or stating "UAF is not left-wing". However, there are clearly reliable sources making a more nuanced assessment, including the following:
BBC — "Unite Against Fascism, a new group supported by trade unions and MPs from all parties, including Tory leader David Cameron, and veteran left wing campaigner Tony Benn" [9]
The Times — "UAF, an umbrella organisation of a number of anti-racism groups and trade unions"[10]
The Guardian — "Unite Against Fascism is a group which was founded with the aim of uniting "the broadest possible spectrum of society" against far right politics. The list of UAF supporters illustrates its success in that goal."[11].
I'm sure there are others; but this seems sufficient for us not to simply state in the lead that it has "been described as" left wing. RolandR (talk) 19:22, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

I thought it had been agreed that CIF is not RS, or is it RS now? As for the others, they do not discus what the UAF views are, and at least one the antifascist organisations (how many others are there?) have in fact disassociated from the group (over its alleged the undue influence of SP). At least one trade union branch has also raised doubts about the amount of influence SWP has with UAF. We need an up-to-date source stating who does and does not still support UAF (by the way the list of supported appears to be broke at the moment). Also I would argue that "UAF, an umbrella organisation of a number of anti-racism groups and trade unions" does not dispute the left wing label, it just does not justify it. So in fact there is one RS here that could be seen as arguing against the label, against how many that use it?Slatersteven (talk) 19:46, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

To be honest, my personal position is that we shouldn't use "left-wing" because it's too vague. We should get out of this habit on Wikipedia on using vague labels just because a couple of RSes may use them. "Anti-fascist" is more specific and better sourced in this case, so should be used. Sceptre ^(talk) 20:37, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

It is used. But they have been accused (by a number of RS, an un-disputed accusation) that they are either left wing, or are a left winf front organisation (by the way its not a couple of sources). As I have said I am against all no self applied labels or for all non-self applied labels. Consistancy in approach is what I want to see. As an example either CIF is RS or its not. What I don't wnat to see is a situation where sources are disparaged or supported based upon what view they happen to be upholding (as a source) at that time.Slatersteven (talk) 20:45, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

We have consistent policy on CIF, but it's not a straight yes no RS/nonRS. It's the same with the Telegraph blog and all other blogs in the mainstream press. The initial pieces are op-eds and the standing of the author is important. The comments from members of the public aren't RS. Itsmejudith (talk) 22:25, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Then it can never be consistant. Who is David Tate, and why are his views more RS then Mr Lazenbys? It wilol always be a case of (for example) CIF is accetable here becaseu its wirten by X, but not here becaseu its writen by Y. In that case we need to see why X is a btter RS then Y. So what are the criterai for accepting a peice on CIF as RS, that it has to be writen by a Gaurdian Jouonalist, or some one writing in the capactiy of one? Mr Lazenby Appears to be a reporte on the Yorkshire evening post, He appears to write regularly for CIF. He also appears to have writen for the Newstatesman, the wibsite RedPepper, Searchlight. Is this not enought to make his views notable?Slatersteven (talk) 13:41, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

This is really more a POV than rs issue, and was taken to the wrong board. It is very easy to Google "[a bad word]" and "[someone/something]" one does not like and if there are thousands of articles about the subject, one may find a description that matches one's point of view. That is editing of the worst kind, and totally unacceptable. TFD (talk) 04:36, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Theoretical Question on Sources - Related to Gibraltar Sovereignty Dispute

[12] This source, written in German, is being presented as a neutral and objective source. It has been published by what would normally be classed as a reliable source. However, it contains several errors of fact, facts which are not even controversial or disputed and accepted by both sides of the sovereignty dispute. So it can be demonstrated that the source as a reference is flawed and I have always applied a policy of not using sources like this in my editing (a personal approach) i.e. I tend to discard sources that get uncontroversial facts so badly wrong. I see this as simply the application of common sense, another editor seems to disagree and that as a reliable source it must be used. Outside opinion would be welcome. Wee Curry Monster talk 19:54, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

As far as I can gather the book is an editted scientific book (Neues Europa - alte EU?: Fragen an den europäischen Integrationsprozess By Johannes Varwick, Wilhelm Knelangen) that consists out of chapters by a range of authors; all political scientists as far as I can see. The specific chapter is by Dieter Nohlen and Andreas Hildenbrand, both respected (political) scientists. So as I see no problem with classifying this source as reliable.... BUT

1. The book seems to be set up as a series of essays, or position papers, which allow the author a large amount of freedom to present their own point of view, going far beyond what is usually accepted in peer reviewed journals.
2. A scientist tends to be expert in their own domain, and may mix up examples and context information. This makes a scientific work reliable and useful in regard to its own main thesis, but not necessarily a relevant source on the examples / context information. In this case however, there are enough words making the statement very subtly worded that I find it hard to see that there are true factual errors. For example the contested 1984 issue is all about the UK making some actual concessions to Spain; which is different from never negotiating before, and from reaching an all out agreement. The problem is, of course, that when these carefully chosen nuances are disregarded by Wikipedia editors the factual mistakes kreep into Wikipedia. But that is basically the result of WP:NPOV and WP:SYNTH by Wikipedia editors.
3. Social sciences (of which political sciences are one) have a very small basis of generally shared objective Truths (capital T intended) many of its truths are socially constructed and therefore often not the only relevant point of view. However, the historical facts appear rather straightforwardly listed here.
4. To come back to my second argument, books are considered of lower importance compared to journal papers, this means that both authors, editors, reviewers and publishers have less strict quality control in place (I have published on social sciences in many scientific books, and have edited one recently; besides publishing and reviewing many papers in peer reviewed journals - so I have some experience there). Again there is no reason to assume this to be a problem here, although some additional sourcing in the original text would have helped a lot.
5. Finally, even a reliable source never "must" be used, as other policies (like WP:DUE WP:SYNTH WP:NPOV) tell you what information should NOT be part of the article, reliably sourced or not. Arnoutf (talk) 20:31, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

We do not have to use all reliable sources. Which ones to use is really not a question for this board.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 20:43, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

A theoretical answer: My own bias is that reliable sources are reliable sources, and the argument (which RSN sees all the time) RS "X" is indisputably wrong about "Y", so it can't be a RS for "Z" isn't persuasive with me. VS Verlag is a highly-regarded academic publisher. Its books are reliable sources. Even the best of sources can contain errors or mistakes - even stunningly obvious errors and mistakes. Where common sense comes in, you obviously don't want to cite it for the indisputably wrong "Y" (eg according to X, the Battle of Hastings was fought in Leeds in 1056), but it can certainly be cited as a reliable source for "Z" with attribution. Whether one chooses to use the source or not for that purpose is an editorial decision to be arrived at on the article Talk page, but is not a RS decision. Fladrif (talk) 20:49, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

In political science, a book chapter is close in status to a journal article. This looks like it does count as a reliable source. Per Fladrif, anything obviously mistaken must be avoided. I agree that not all sources have to be used, and that this should be discussed on the talk page, but you also want to be sure that you have included all relevant perspectives, and an essay by political scientists might well be a relevant perspective. It should probably be attributed. Itsmejudith (talk) 23:25, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Flafdrif that is a good point. I agree that sources should not be excluded ONLY because they are not good for all things. And you are right that this comes up a lot, and I'd add that often when it comes up it is because someone is trying to exclude a whole source or category of source on a "technicality".--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 10:13, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

BTW for clarity, it is a personal policy of mine that I don't use sources that have known errors of fact. For the record, I wasn't suggesting excluding sources on a "technicality". Wee Curry Monster talk 22:18, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Thank you gentlemen for a comprehensive response. In answer to your question its being used to claim there were no negotiations between Britain and Spain before 1984. Refer to the wikisource:Lisbon Agreement (1980) for ealier negotiations. It is the demonstrably inaccurate comment that is being used. Wee Curry Monster talk 18:58, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Wee Curry Monster, just on the side subject, the problem with excluding any source with any error in any way is that in practice this becomes a fuzzy and arbitrary red line, which can be and often is abused. Obviously setting your own personal policy should also not impact on what other editors may do. The simplest approach from a policy-for-everyone point of view is to say that this is a content dispute: If editors of an article agree that something does not need to be in Wikipedia then as long as this does not distort the neutrality, or remove something very notable, then that's enough. Trying to exclude material that other editors think important because, let's say, it appears in an article with spelling mistakes or a sentence which has become out-of-date, or whatever, does often verge on trying to use a "technicality".--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 12:56, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Again I'm not trying to exclude it, just to have it noted as an opinion piece and not a "neutral and objective" source as originally claimed. In addition, I don't believe it should be used as cite for "facts" that happen to be untrue. Wee Curry Monster talk 21:29, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Declaring my interest, I am involved in this dispute. My point is general, but it's probably worth making my interest clear from the outset.

So, there seems to be an argument that an error in one place never suggests that a source is unreliable in other places. I think this is too sweeping. If, as in Fladrif's example, an otherwise apparently reliable source put the Battle of Hastings ten years early and in entirely the wrong part of the country, I would be very uncomfortable in using it to back up more contentious or less well-established details of eleventh-century English history.

It would be the same if an otherwise apparently reliable source put the US Declaration of Independence ten years early and in Chicago. Such a basic error and apparent lack of fact-checking would make it difficult to accept that the source is credible in other matters.

Given this, I would be inclined to suggest that there are shades of grey. The fact that errors of fact are made is relevant to the determination of how reliable the source is - the bigger the error, the more question it calls on the source. A source with small or common errors might still be acceptable for other points. A source with major flaws might well not be. Pfainuk talk 23:04, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

UNINDENT

Hi, I am the editor who has proposed this source. Thank you very much for your comments, I have found them very interesting (one of the side benefits of editing in WP).

About discarding sources: I agree with Pfainuk (about the grey zones and terribly fundamental errors), Arnoutf, Andrew Lancaster, Fladrif and Itsmejudith in the theoretical approach.

About this specific source (which I didn't think would raise such hot debate in the article talk page) and its theoretically "being riddled with factual errors" that discard it as a RS: Pfainuk and Wee Curry Monster say (I don't know based on which reliable source) that there have been declarations of the UK's willingness to negotiate sovereignty with Spain pre-1984, so this source saying the contrary disqualifies it as a RS. Two things:

1. This is a very secondary issue in our discussion.
2. Even so, the source seems to be right and Wee and Pfain wrong. Take a look at the talk page for more info if you want. In any case, here you have just a few sources supporting this point (from Gibraltar, Spain and third countries):

• New York Times: "Under that accord [the Brussels Agreement], Britain for the first time said it would discuss the question of sovereignty with Spain."
• Panorama (a Gibraltar newspaper): "Former foreign secretary Sir Geoffrey Howe writes an opinion piece in The Times today. It was he who signed the controversial Brussels agreement with Spain in 1984, agreeing to discuss the sovereignty of Gibraltar for the first time"
• RTVE (Spain's public national television): "It [The Brussels Agreement] is the first time that the British part expressly admits that sovereignty issues will be dealt with in this process" "[La declaración de Bruselas] Es la primera vez que la parte británica admite expresamente que se abordarán en este proceso cuestiones de soberanía."
• Gibraltar Socialist Labor Party (a quite nationalist Gib party): "The 1984 Brussels deal was a climb-down by the British Government because for the first time ever the UK agreed to discuss sovereignty when it had been defending the opposite view until then."
• Finally, Timeline of the history of Gibraltar (an article Pfainuk and Wee have intensely edited): "Under the Brussels Agreement[68] (27 November 1984) signed between the governments of the United Kingdom and Spain, the former agreed to enter into discussions with Spain over Gibraltar, including by first time the 'issues' of sovereignty." (this sentence has been sitting there for the last couple of years and neither Pfainuk nor Wee has ever disputed it).

I would be terribly thankful if you could add some comments taking this into account. Thanks!!! -- Imalbornoz (talk) 23:50, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Imalbornoz,

1. We are not trying to discard this as a reliable source. 2. We are not trying to discard this as a reliable source.

Thought I might say it twice, to emphasis the point.

Now you presented this as a neutral objective source. It is not. It is an opinion piece. All we have asked is that it is noted as an opinion piece and acknowledged as the OPINION of the authors. That is all. Emphasis added to make the point.

You also presented this source as stating there were no negotiations before 1984. See wikisource:Lisbon Agreement from 1980. 1980 precedes 1984. You now much later qualify it as sovereignty negotiations. This is tedious in the extreme and starting to look like tendentious argument. Regarding your original claim, the source is clearly wrong. May I suggest you refer to responses above and in particular " The problem is, of course, that when these carefully chosen nuances are disregarded by Wikipedia editors the factual mistakes kreep into Wikipedia."

The people here have given a useful guidance, lets use it and move on in the correct place, which is the article talk page.

And finally, again we are not trying to discard this as a reliable source. Just asking it is acknowledged as an opinion piece, it is not presented as neutral and that it is not used to cite facts in areas where it is inaccurate. Wee Curry Monster talk 00:14, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Just for info, a (very) minor point in the source, as I posted it, says (in German): "A significant progress in December 1984 yielded the agreement reached in Brussels, in which the British government for the first time since the Peace of Utrecht declared willing to clarify through negotiations the existing differences between Britain and Spain over the sovereignty of Gibraltar."

MOST IMPORTANT: at the current stage we are only trying to see how reputed secondary sources summarize the sovereignty and territorial dispute in order to decide how to summarize it -e.g.: whether to include the POV of the UN (so I can hardly see how I am trying to use this source to support any claim at this stage, like Wee has commented). Would you consider this a good source for this use? -- Imalbornoz (talk) 01:07, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

In response to a post by Imalbornoz on my talk page. This does look like a normal academic source. It definitely isn't an opinion piece. The only thing limiting its use is that it is a rather rapid overview. Make sure it isn't used to support anything that it doesn't actually say. Don't repeat any errors it makes. If it is contradicted by other scholarship, also cite that other scholarship, and attribute. The discussion above is rather involved; if you want more comments here you should try and summarise a bit more so that it is clear to those who haven't followed the talk page discussion. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:24, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

If anything, we're looking for something quite a lot more rapid than this. What we're looking for are the points that are absolutely essential to a discussion of the dispute, the idea being that these will be used to create a 2-3 paragraph description of the dispute, including only the most basic of points and leaving all the detail to the two existing dedicated articles. Imalbornoz argues that his opinion of the UN's position has to be included as one of those basic points. Others disagree. Pfainuk talk 11:31, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you very much Itsmejudith. To summarise the discussion a bit more: like Pfain said, at the current stage we are trying to see how reputed secondary sources summarize the sovereignty and territorial dispute in order to decide how to summarize it in the Gibraltar overview article -e.g.: one of the hottest points would be whether to include the POV of the UN on the dispute (and decide which that POV would be through secondary sources); nobody mentioned that 1984 agreement until Wee brought it here to say it was wrong.

IMHO, the relevant questions for this noticeboard would be:

1. Would you consider this a good source for this use as a "summary guide"?
2. How would this source compare (for the use explained above) with:

• "Lonely Planet: Andalucia"
• encyclopedia.com[13] (which puts together info from World Press Encyclopedia 2003, World Education Encyclopedia 2001, World Encyclopedia 1980, The Columbia Encyclopedia...)
• GRIN Verlag (a self-publishing source) with a thesis to obtain the Master degree in Philosophy at the U of Wien called "Die NATO-politik der spanischen Parteien (The NATO policy of the Spanish political parties)"[14] by Christian Tillinger
• Editions Ophrys with an "Atlas géopolitique des espaces maritimes: frontières, énergie, pêche et environnement (Geopolitical atlas of Maritime spaces: borders, energy, fishing and the environment)"[15] by Didier Ortolland and Jean-Pierre Pirat

I think the comparison would be very relevant for our current discussion. Thank you very much for your time already, and even more if you can spare the time to answer my last questions. -- Imalbornoz (talk) 11:34, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Now having asked, and looked at the talk page, I don't think we actually do want to have a summary of the dispute here. The best help that this page can be for the Gibraltar article is to provide an external view of which sources are of the right calibre for the article. Then it will be up to you use them correctly, balance them, etc. Of the four you mention above: Lonely Planet, no use at all; World Education Encyclopedia, good to guide you in how to write an overview, tertiary source so not ideal; Master's thesis, not for this article, look for academically published texts by the same author; Ortolland and Pirat, could be OK. Surely you should be looking for an academic monograph on the topic of Gibraltar? If not available, then standard overviews of European politics. Itsmejudith (talk) 12:10, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

The sources that I have been trying to find are sources that summarise the dispute, but in an all-Gibraltar context, or else a general context. IOW, a context other than that of a long-winded document about the dispute. It seems to me that a source on the subject the dispute is less likely to be useful - as is a source on the subject specifically connected to the arguments on one side of the dispute (such as the UN General Assembly or Ceuta and Melilla). The point of this isn't to try and source the facts - we can already do that. It's to see what other sources think is appropriate.

Hence the Lonely Planet - it may not be reliable from a let's-get-all-our-facts-from-here perspective, but it does give an example of how the dispute is portrayed to a general audience by an outside publisher in a context other than that of the dispute. Hence also the Columbia Encyclopædia and a maritime atlas.

We do already have two articles on the subject of the dispute and I am very much against the notion being pushed by some that Gibraltar should be made into a third. Pfainuk talk 12:38, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't think it is helpful to lobby everyone who has responded [16],[17],[18],[19] trying to get them to change their minds.

Getting back to the actual subject, the source in question is a series of essays, or position papers, which allow the author a large amount of freedom to present their own point of view, going far beyond what is usually accepted in peer reviewed journals. It has been portrayed as neutral but it is not. It represents the author's opinion and if used that should be reflected in the cite.

We have a surfeit of sources presenting objective secondary opinion, see Talk:Gibraltar/primary sources and Talk:Gibraltar/secondary sources. But that is not the subtext here. Consensus fell apart at Imalbornoz's insistence the article must state the UN supports Spain's territorial claim, citing Spanish Government papers and interpreting primary sources with WP:OR, rather than as requested seeking secondary sources that reflect an overview of the matter he is looking for very specific sources to back up his original demands.

Again the correct place for this discussion on the article content as Itsmejudith points out is the article talk page. But seeing as we have brought it here, I would like to take the opportunity to ask a further question. Imalbornoz makes a great deal of use of Google snippets, searching for selected phrases. When he finds what he likes, that is what he quotes - the snippet and the snippet only. If you look at the source itself, a very different picture often emerges. Examples Talk:Gibraltar#New Source 1, Talk:Gibraltar#New Source 2, Talk:Gibraltar#New Source 3. I don't think Google snippets should be used as it does not allow the quote to be considered in context, as I pointed out on the article talk page it reminds me of a theatre critic's review that described Laurence Olivier's performance as "Not one of Olivier's best performances." The quote on the poster in the theatre stated "...one of Olivier's best performances." Wee Curry Monster talk 20:14, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Is this book an reliable source or would it be classed as self-published

Book Title: Arborsculpture: Solutions for a Small Planet Copyright 2002 to Author Richard Reames Richard Reames's publishing name Arborsmith Studios. ISBN 0964728087.

This is the author's 2nd book in the field of Tree shaping. His first book How to grow a chair copyright in 1995. Richard has self-admitted to being a non-expert at that time for his first book. An editor has suggested due to the length of time that Richard has been in the field of Tree shaping he must now be an expert and that his 2nd book should be considered as an reliable source. I disagreed and have asked for who and where he as been classed as an expert. The other editor hasn't produced any reliable source/s stating that Richard is an Expert. I first asked for sources in June 2010.

So would this book Arborsculpture be a reliable source or would it be classed as self-published. Blackash have a chat 09:06, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Qualifications can be an indication of expertize but are clearly not the only one. How do experts in the tree shaping field see it? Do any cite him or discuss him in other publications?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 10:09, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

There is no set standards yet. There are only approximately 17 practitioners in the world who do this art form and 3 of those are dead. Most have not published their shaping method. As far as I know no-one within the field has published that Richard Reames is an expert. Richard edits here and knows that I have repeatedly asked for the other editor to provide a cite-able source that Richard is an expert. Yet neither have done so. Blackash have a chat 18:16, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

It certainly appears to be self-published. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 18:21, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

I agree. Until he is referenced in several clearly reliable sources, I don't think it should be used. Dougweller (talk) 06:26, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

The author and his book are referenced in several reliable sources. FYI, Blackash is a professional rival of Reames.Slowart (talk) 02:32, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Enneagram reliable sources oversight

Can someone review the source issues discussed here?

• Talk:Enneagram_of_Personality#Reliable_source_issue
• Talk:Enneagram_of_Personality#Pseudo.28what.29.3F

Would appreciate disinterested party oversight.

Thanks Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 15:58, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

This [20] is indeed a reliable source, provided it is not used in a way that supposes that its claims are definitive statements of fact and a general spirit of NPOV is observed. The support given for the Ennegram of Personality in this paper appears to be very tentative, and that should be properly reflected if the source is to be used.

The dispute appears to relate to NPOV issues, however, so I'm not sure that my opinion about the source will be much help in moving things forward.

FWIW, it looks to me like the Enneagram of Personality doesn't appear to have any theoretical basis in psychology, and it would therefore be misleading for Wikipedia to give out the impression that it is a scientific practice. --FormerIP (talk) 18:17, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, the Enneagram of Personalty is a construct in-which, psychology theories have been mapped to. The field is relativly new and seems to be growing around the Newgent study, which focused on RHETI psychometric testing. This testing validity, actually places it ahead on validity, as compared to many old established and widely practiced psychology theories, which have little if any reproducible claims. The RHETI is significant scientific practice. The Ennegram of Personality is still basically a theoretical description. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 22:35, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Hedge fund returns for Empirica Capital.

The ref in question: "The "Black Swan" Hedge Fund Returns Aren't So Hot", by Joe Weisenthal [21]. On that page is a Scribd link to an image of a financial statement from Empirica Capital LLC, run by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, detailing returns from a hedge fund. In that image is a table of "monthly performance".

This is an issue at Talk:Empirica Capital. Please see the discussion there for background.

Actual numbers for that fund are hard to come by, and this is the most comprehensive set of numbers available. A few numbers are available from more prominent sources, but none of the other sources provide enough data to build a table of yields. This is a hedge fund, so there are no SEC findings or public financial statements to provide definitive numbers. Taleb has released some numbers, but primarily for the "good years" when the fund went up. Using those creates an illusory image of the actual returns.

This is an issue because much of the reputation of Taleb rests on his performance as a fund manager. --John Nagle (talk) 17:45, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

I have earlier thought this reference (Business Insider) was a "gossip blog", and hence not a reliable source for Wikipedia. However, I recently searched on www.nytimes.com, and they reference Business Insider 216 times under the last 12 months. If this reference is good enough for NY Times, I guess it is should be of acceptable standard for Wikipedia. I encourage everyone to give arguments for and against Business Insider as a reliable source; on e.g. talk page of Empirica Capital there are good arguments against using Business Insider as a reliable source which would be nice to repeat here. Ulner (talk) 17:17, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

I would avoid giving numbers... as they will quickly become out of date. Stick to generalities. Blueboar (talk) 17:46, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree. What is true and will never become out of date is the fact that NY Times have cited Business Insider hundreds of times, and this is a good indicator that Business Insider is a reliable source in my opinion. Ulner (talk) 20:15, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

"Out of date" is a non-issue for Empirica, because that fund has shut down. --John Nagle (talk) 23:57, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

It is the NYT that calls it "a gossipy Web site, Business Insider" and most certainly not what the NYT uses for financial returns (on October 5, 2010)[22]. The fact that they have cited them for anecdotes means nothing. IbnAmioun (talk) 12:42, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Well from the New York Times link provided by Mr Amioun it literally states that it is a gossip blog.

"Tellingly, his first guest was an old target, Henry Blodget, a Wall Street analyst whom Mr. Spitzer got banned for life from the securities industry. (To settle with regulators, Mr. Blodget also paid $4 million in penalties.) Now, like his nemesis, Mr. Blodget has recast himself as a journalist -- he is the editor in chief of a gossipy Web site, Business Insider. They congratulated each other on their comebacks." [23]

Also the site itself claims it is an gossip blog.

"Editor and CEO, Business Insider "Star tech-stock analyst-turned-media mogul; his fall from grace in 2002 was an obsession of the industry he has now joined. His gossipy Business Insider has been dubbed by some as 'the Hooters of the Internet, a title Mr. Blodget is known to appreciate." [24] LoveMonkey (talk) 14:28, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Despite much noise, no one has suggested that the numbers in the image of the Empirica Kurtosis LLC fund statement are wrong. If they were, Taleb and his team would probably have made a public statement by now. Taleb is very active in defending his reputation. So I think we can safely go with the numbers. --John Nagle (talk) 17:55, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

More from the above Editor...

Over at the above Article( Fingerpoke of Doom ) the same editor has now added new sources, whose Reliability is questionable. I would simply remove them, but the editor has accused me of "disruptive editing" and "vandalism", so I'm bringing them up here....

1. [25]

This is a fan website. While there is a book of the same name, this piece is NOT written by the author of the book, and appears to be nothing more than fan fiction. Certainly this is not a Reliable Source?

2. [26]

Not only is this piece irrelevant to the Article, but is the website wrestleview a Reliable Source?

3. [27]

No idea what this is supposed to be as it's a Dead Link, there though ARE commercials for "international dating". But it was supposedly from a site called "Wrestling Digest". Is this possibly a Reliable Source?

4. Overdoing stuff. For instance the editor gives BOTH

[28]

AND simply the text

WWE RAW USA Network Detroit Michigan 2009-08-31

as two separate "Reliable Sources". Of course, NEITHER(or is that just ONE?) makes any reference whatsoever to the January 4 1999 Nitro, let alone that it was a "pivotal moment" or anything at all!

Like I said I have removed these sources, but was then bombarded with warnings for "disruptive editing" and "vandalism", being "blinded by a vendetta", and threats of blocking by the person who inserted them. Seeker of the Torch (talk) 08:17, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

(1) is being used to source the fact that "fingerpoke of doom" is a nickname for an event. On the site in question,it is used as a nickname. The site has editorial control (by an author who is an established expert in the subject area with three published books about the topic) and is a long-running site that has been discussed in various, reliable, non-wrestling news sites. (2) is being used to reference the fact that a wrestler returned on this episode after two months absence. I believe that a few factors combine to make it a reliable source: it is well established, as it has been around for twelve years, per this, they do not publish unsolicited articles, and they have an established staff that has gone through an application process, and it has been discussed in the Toronto Sun and Ottawa Sun (see the January 12, 2003 update here) combined with the fact that a SLAM! Wrestling reporter appeared on a radio show with a WrestleView reporter (mentioned in the 2008 news section here) indicate that SLAM! Wrestling, an unquestionably reliable source, accepts WrestleView as a reliable source. While I understand that the radio show certainly does not establish reliability on its own, I note that the vast majority of reliable reporters would hardly be willing to do a broadcast with a complete hack. To an extent, it puts them on the same level. Based on these factors, I believe that the source is sufficiently reliable to source something that could easily be sourced with "cite episode". (3) Likewise, while the link doesn't work, Wrestling Digest is certainly not just a "dirtsheet", as it has editorial control. It is also important to note that the information it sources also has a second source (Canadian Online Explorer) to verify the statement, which again could be sourced with "cite episode", as it is a statement of what happened on a television show with no analysis provided. (4) States that the wrestlers were watching moments on old television shows, and is combined with an article from The Sun, which states the specific moments. As such, the reference is being used to source the names of the wrestlers who were watching the television. It is also sourced with (5), which is a "cite episode" reference to the program itself. The editor who is challenging this source has been on Wikipedia for fewer than three weeks, which has clearly not been enough to allow him to familiarize himself with policies and reference types, as "cite episode" is certainly sufficient to source a plot summary. GaryColemanFan (talk) 16:57, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

How to compile a list of programs

There is a discussion about which programs should be included in List_of_installation_software. Currently the list is based on whether given program (or its author) has an article in Wikipedia. However as noted on WP:RS "(...) Wikipedia articles (...) are not reliable sources for any purpose." (and there are other arguments against current sitiation mentioned in the talk page Talk:List_of_installation_software). So we (me and Ronz) came to conclusion that we need some reliable sources. Then there is a question what "reliable source" is in this case. Should the source merely confirm that given program exists? Or could it be a review? How are we to judge whether review is reliable (or should we judge it at all)? In particular we need to stablish reliablity of two links:

1. http://www.installsite.org/pages/en/msi/authoring.htm
2. http://www.appdeploy.com/reviews/sw_installaware_studio_2005.asp

Grobelny (talk) 20:25, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

• Installsite.org appears to be a self-published website. It would not be considered a reliable source for this article, although it might be an acceptable external link (at the bottom of the article).
• Appdeploy.com appears to be run by Dell computers. It's acceptable as a primary source about itself.

But to establish notability, you want third-party sources such as InfoWorld, ComputerWorld, PC Magazine, etc. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:17, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

What do you mean that it is acceptable as "source about itself"? We want to write about installation programs, not about appdeploy.

I hope we can all agree that Nullsoft_Scriptable_Install_System is notable. Yet none of those magazines mentions it. And article on WP does not mention any third party references either. Grobelny (talk) 22:37, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

It is completely acceptable and often done where lists are limited to entries that have articles on WP. To have an article on WP, topics should pass our notability guidelines, which nearly all of the time require reliable sources in the topic article. Thus, while you're correct that WP is not reliable itself, one can use the existence of a notable topic for that purpose. In other words, yes, what you're doing about reliable sources for installation software is one approach, there is nothing wrong with the present approach. --MASEM (t) 21:21, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

See my above comment. Plus I hope you have read my arguments in article's talk page. With many of those articles we have a problem that they are notable because they are on WP and they are on WP because they are notable. But probably for more than half of them we have no proof (ie. third party source) whatsoever. Grobelny (talk) 22:37, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

In order for a topic to be notable, it needs significant coverage in third-party reliable sources. This is explained in more detail at WP:Notability. Yes, the article on Nullsoft Scriptable Install System is poorly sourced (mostly primary sources and a forum posting). I did a search for sources, the the best I could come up with are these articles by Network World[29] and Windows IT Pro.[30] It's also briefly mentioned in this article by eWeek.[31] A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:05, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Of those 3 IMHO only the first states something more than the fact that NSIS exists. In the other 2 NSIS might just be a typo (in fact eweek gives incorrect name!). And even the network world article doesn't state much (certainly less than 5% of claims made in article about NSIS). It doesn't list an features, bright sides, dark sides, plugins, nothing. The author is by no means an expert in software deployment (or at least he doesn't show that in the article). IMO that kind of coverage is by no means significant. Grobelny (talk) 19:16, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Right. Which means NSIS might not technically be notable. Unfortunately, you're working on an article where there aren't a lot of good sources (according to Wikipedia's rules). Sorry, I'm not sure what else I can say. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:28, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Then we might just remove article about NSIS (as non-notable because of lack of significant coverage in reliable sources) and for than matter probably large portion of articles about other installation programs or even computer programs in general. Or we can accommodate Wikipedia's definition of reliable source and/or notability guidelines to this specific situation. So maybe in this situation sources such as installsite, mailing list messages or forum posts would be acceptable? I'm fine with either option (but would like the criteria to be common to all programs in given category). Grobelny (talk) 13:46, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't know what you want me to say. I didn't make the rules. I'm just trying to answer your question. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:13, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't want hear anything in particular from you (hint: if anybody else is reading this discussion your opinions are much appreciated). I'm just wondering whether general Wikipedia guidelines can be bent in such cases as this one (installation software). Grobelny (talk) 17:31, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, you can try asking the other editors on the article if they'd be willing to change the inclusion criteria. Right now, it's whether the program or its the author is notable. Perhaps they might be willing to change it to simply any program that has at least one reliable source about it? Or maybe 2? Or 3? Of course, they might not want to change the inclusion criteria, but you can always ask. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 13:26, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Two dubious sources. Am I correct in saying these are not reliable?

See also: Talk:Leonard Hofstadter § Robert & Douglas Hofstadter, and Talk:Sheldon Cooper § Nobel Prize

At Leonard Hofstadter and Sheldon Cooper, articles on the two main characters in The Big Bang Theory, an editor has added some claims using sources that appear dubious.

Leonard Hofstadter

The content was first added in February 2010 but was removed then because it was uncited and showed no direct link to the article, only a coincidental link between last names. It was again added on December 23 and removed for the same reason. After attempts at discussion failed the editor finally added the content to the lede with some citations.[32] The first of these was The Big Bang Theory Wiki, which states on the source page "NOTE: Edited from Wikipedia:" so I removed it as it's very clearly WP:SPS. The second citation is to Imparja, a TV network in central Australia.[33] At first this may appear to be a reliable source however a google check reveals that some of the page has been sourced from bigbangtheory.wikia.com, another wiki. The claim that "He is named after Nobel prize winner Robert Hofstadter" is not supported by any source other than Imparja and therefore seems dubious, given Imparja's apparent reliance on wikis for its content. As it stands now, this article does not claim that Leonard Hofstadter is named after Robert Hofstadter, only that they share a last name. However, this is only a coincidence and not sufficient justification for inclusion in this article and especially not in the lede, which is supposed to summarise the main topics of the article, not introduce content that is not covered in the article. This last point aside, as it's more a content issue that a sourcing issue, am I correct in believing that the Imaparja source doesn't qualify as reliable?

Sheldon Cooper

The disputed content at Sheldon Cooper was only added today,[34] but it has been added by the same editor, who has already reverted the removal of it once,[35] so I thought I'd address it here as well. The claim is sourced from myfivebest.com which has as it's tagline, "User Submitted Trivia and Opinion" which makes it a WP:SPS as well.

Am I correct in stating that because Imparja sources at least some of its content from wikis and myfivebest.com boasts of being "User Submitted Trivia and Opinion", neither of these sources qualify as reliable? --AussieLegend (talk) 00:17, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. Note also that both the Imparja page and the bigbangtheory.wikia.com page have "content from Wikipedia" acknowledgements, so they have the same circular-reference problem as with wiki.the-big-band-theory.com. For all I know, some other Imparja pages or broadcasts might meet the requirements for RSs, but this one definitely doesn't. --GenericBob (talk) 04:10, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, those aren't reliable sources. I couldn't find sources to verify those statements, however plausible they sound. Also see List of characters from The Big Bang Theory. Fences&Windows 18:35, 1 January 2011 (UTC) Ah, I think the mention of the names theory has gone. Fences&Windows 18:37, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

blog.zagat.com

• blog.zagat.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com
• 87.23.69.215 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

This ip has been spamming blog.zagat.com references across Wikipedia. I've removed maybe a dozen of this ip's edits because of the spamming (WP:REFSPAM) and promotional (WP:NPOV and WP:SOAP) nature of the material, but decided to hold off on anything more until I got others' opinions of it as a source. (I've not checked if all the current references have come from this one ip, or if this ip has done any other editing besides adding these references.)

For example, this documents a Zagat award, and [36] the opening of a new restaurant. It could be argued that this blog is under Zagat's full editorial control as mentioned in Wikipedia:Rs#Self-published_sources_.28online_and_paper.29. --Ronz (talk) 16:18, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

I think this falls under the part in WP:RS stating that "otherwise reliable news sources—for example, the website of a major news organization—that publish in a "blog" style format for some or all of its content may be as reliable as if published in a more "traditional" 20th-century format." So in general, Zagat blogs should be ok as sources. But in the Spicer example, it's a primary source, so secondary sources would be preferable. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:48, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

That's pretty much what I was thinking. In Susan Spicer, they're reporting on their own awards.

I messed up on the second example and gave the ref rather than the diff. It reports on Pei Wei Asian Diner restaurants opening a new location. --Ronz (talk) 02:27, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Are these academic papers reliable?

This is in regard to a recent AfD, but since this is not the place for discussing whether AfDs were properly closed I won't point to it here. In discussion subsequent to the closure, the closing admin explained that he did not feel that the following four sources were reliable:

• Java, Akshay; Kolari, Pranam; Finin, Tim; Oates, Tim (2006), "Modeling the spread of influence on the blogosphere", Proceedings of the 15th International World Wide Web Conference (PDF).
• Busker, Rebecca Lucy (2008), "On symposia: LiveJournal and the shape of fannish discourse", Transformative Works and Cultures, 1, doi:10.3983/twc.2008.0049.
• Fiesler, Casey (2008), "Everything I need to know I learned from fandom: how existing social norms can help shape the next generation of user-generated content", Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment Law & Practice, 10: 729–762.
• Hellekson, Karen (2010), "History, the trace, and Fandom Wank", in Urbanski, Heather (ed.), Writing and the Digital Generation: Essays on New Media Rhetoric, McFarland, pp. 58–69, ISBN 9780786437207.

I disagree: I believe that as peer-reviewed academic works (two journal articles, a chapter in an edited book, and a paper in a peer-reviewed conference) they clearly fall under WP:RS#Scholarship, bullet 2. The material they were being used to source is a web site that is the main subject of the book chapter, that has about a page of material in the two journal articles, and that is mentioned more trivially (but named as one of 50 most influential blogs) in the conference paper. What I would like to get here is a sense of the community on whether these are indeed reliable sources. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:03, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

The Proceedings of the 15th International World Wide Web Conference are certainly RS. It's a bona-fide conference, and in computer science, conference proceedings generally rank with journals. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:28, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

All look to be reliable for the purpose. The link in the first one has gone dead, but you don't need a link if you have full bibliographical details. Itsmejudith (talk) 10:28, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I am the person who created the AfD in question. Because I initially handed the situation very poorly, I opted to sit out of the AfD. I have followed this fallout since the Fandom Wank was deleted, and I have to speak my mind at this point.

WP:RS reads: Wikipedia covers notable topics—those that have been "noticed" to a significant degree by independent sources. GNG also states ...not every person, business, or street can be considered notable, so on such topics, the line has to be further drawn. (I would assume this applies to websites as well.) According to Wikipedia: Party and person (which looks to be an essay and not WP policy): Wikipedia should not have articles on any topic that third-party sources have never written about, or have published only trivial, routine, or passing mentions. David has stated that two out of the four sources he is asking about have "about a page of material". This simply isn't true; one could not make a page of material on the first three sources combined. Let's look them over.

• The first source - the Conference - lists the Fandom Wank url twice in a table. WP:NOT: "Notability and lists" section states: The fact that sources discuss a specific X (or even several individual Xs) does not in itself mean that all Xs are notable, or that Xs are a notable topic. To establish notability, the sources must discuss Xs as a group or set. There is no mention of Fandom Wank anywhere in the entire seven-page paper. I believe this would not be an RS because the mention is trivial; even David acknowledged this could be the case.

• The second ("Modeling the course...") is two paragraphs (not pages) in a 34-page paper. A legitimate place to start, but the mention is both passing and routine. Because of this, I believe this is not an RS.

• The third reference (the symposium) mentions Fandom Wank in four sentences, with no sources other than a link back to FW's home page. The piece is about LiveJournal, with FW mentioned only in passing, which is why I don't believe this is an RS.

• The fourth, IMO, doesn't meet any of those criteria, but has another problem. It is a book with a (mostly) full chapter largely concentrating on single incident that occurred in Fandom Wank, not Fandom Wank itself. We see lots of third party sources in the chapter, but virtually none of them relate to Fandom Wank, but to fandom. The sources in regards to Fandom Wank itself come directly from Fandom Wank. (This also looks to be a problem with #2.) WP:RSEX states under "uses of electronic and online sources": Material from bulletin boards and forum sites, Usenet, wikis, blogs and comments associated with blog entries should not normally be used as sources. These media do not have adequate levels of editorial oversight or author credibility and lack assured persistence. David's source is based on the book, but the book's sources where FW is mentioned are the FW entries and the FW wiki. I'm not what this would be considered. Original research? Conflict of interest? Lack of verifiability? Reliable and okay?

I believe three out of four fail the requirement of reliable sources as far as Fandom Wank as as an article is concerned. These sources could probably be used in an article about fandom, or fanfic, or snark communities, but not about Fandom Wank. The fourth source, I think, is the one that needs the most clarification. Andrewowen2000 (talk) 12:28, 2 January 2011 (UTC) ^{A source is a source, of course, of course...}

While such a long detailed analysis would have been very welcome in the AfD, I think it is out of place here, since it is about the significance and depth of coverage of these sources rather than their reliability. WP:GNG treats nontriviality of sources (what you seem to be discussing) as a separate issue from their reliability. What I want to discuss here is just a very specific question: can these sources be considered reliable for what they happen to say about the web site? —David Eppstein (talk) 18:04, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

David, I'm not all that interested in what you feel is "very welcome" as far as I'm concerned, particularly since you seem to be clinging to the verifiable part of the AfD while completely ignoring the notable part.

Now, other than the gushing love fest that is the fourth source what do they say about the website? The first one doesn't say at all, other than listing FW's URL. The second and third are trivial mentions, which is why I asked whether you could even consider them sources for Fandom Wank. The fourth is little a gushing lovefest, but I'd like to see that one clarified, for the record.

So, a summary:

- You: Can these sources be considered reliable for what they happen to say about the web site?

- Me: I wouldn't think so, because the three of the four sources are saying little to nothing at all.

Short enough for you? Andrewowen2000 (talk) 22:05, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I hardly think that ranking a web site as one of the 50 most influential in the world is "saying nothing". But my reason for attempting to restrict the topic here is not that I'm uninterested in the rest of the AfD; it's because it's off-topic for this board. This is not WP:DRV, I have not taken the AfD to DRV, I don't intend to take the AfD to DRV, and I don't want to take the blame for starting an off-topic discussion here. —David Eppstein (talk) 09:19, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I hardly think that ranking a web site as one of the 50 most influential in the world is "saying nothing". No, but listing nothing but the URL is. We won't even get started on how they are defining "influence", or who they are to define it in the first place. And you (or anybody else) has yet to explain the reliability of your other three sources - two of which have no sources at all, other than FW links. Three, if you include your beloved first source. Andrewowen2000 (talk) 11:52, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

A reliable source does not achieve its reliability by some sort of homunculus argument in which its reliability comes from its own sources. It achieves its reliability by going through a process of being vetted by multiple people before being published. That vetting, by referees and editors, is exactly what happens to peer-reviewed academic publications, which all four of these are. My claim is that by virtue of undergoing peer review and publication they become reliable sources for the factual claims that they make. (Of course, that doesn't guarantee that what they say is true, or that their factual claims are nontrivial, but we can't guarantee that for any of the sources we use.) —David Eppstein (talk) 17:32, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

And what, exactly, was claimed? Nobody is going to argue that peer reviews are not reliable in and of themselves, which makes this DRV masquerading as RS/N to be a waste of time. I've said my piece, and I've made my point. You don't want consensus - or even discussion - but approval. Good luck. Andrewowen2000 (talk) 22:29, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The closer of the AfD, in a discussion on his talk page after the closure, expressed the opinion that part of the reason for his deletion close was that the discussion had persuaded him that the sources were not reliable. I disagreed, pointing to the policy that (in my reading, and perhaps yours) clearly includes peer-reviewed academic papers as reliable sources, and he told me to take it here if I wanted to persuade him of their reliability. I was hesitant, because I was afraid of getting exactly the reaction I provoked from you: an attempt to re-litigate the AfD. I don't want to re-litigate the AfD; I don't see much chance of persuading DRV that it was improperly closed, but I think it would be helpful to persuade the closing admin that he misinterpreted our policies on reliability so that in future his closes don't make the same mistake. Instead, here we are, with you attempting to re-litigate the AfD anyway. Maybe now that you've signed off from here we can get some other participants to be more constructive. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:41, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Although I found Andrewowen's approach to this question rather unhelpful, I think he does bring up a valid question, which is, what statements were these sources used to source?

• The WWW conference paper was used to support the sentence "A 2006 study of approximately 1.3 million blogs ranked Fandom Wank among the 50 most influential blogs according to its pagerank and also according to an alternative greedy algorithm for selecting blogs in order by their influence."
• The Busker paper was used to support the sentence "The portion of fandom hosted by LiveJournal is a particularly frequent target of these discussions, and many Fandom Wank participants are also active on LiveJournal." Here, "these discussions" refers to the discussions posted on the web site in question.
• The Fiesler and Hellekson papers were used to describe and contrast two conflicting views of the role of the web site: a quote from Fiesler was used to support the view that the web site's role is to enforce social norms, while a quote from Hellekson was used to support the view that the web site's role is to document the history of its community.
• Separately, the Fiesler paper was used to support the notability of the web site: the article stated that Fiesler called it "perhaps most notable" among several sites devoted to introspection in the fandom community.
• The Hellekson paper was also used to document the etymology of the site's name from a British slang term.

Are they reliable sources for these statements? Note that I am not asking whether these statements together constitute the "significant coverage" that WP:GNG also requires of an article, only whether they are reliably sourced. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:04, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Adding content supported by what I have heard in a Radio report

Is it correct as regards policy and guidelines to add things I have heard in radio reports? Is it correct to listen to a radio report and use it to source and add content? Off2riorob (talk) 00:45, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Read WP:RS: "audio, video, and multimedia materials that have been recorded then broadcast, distributed, or archived by a reputable third-party may also meet the necessary criteria to be considered reliable source." Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:56, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, may also seems unclear - is this like encouraged, or normal practice or what do users think, is it good practice or perhaps an occasional possibility? IMO it is to be avoided as it is difficult to verify and also could well be classed as a primary report. It clearly isn't common practice. Radio interviews make much better external links than they do easily verifiable reliable sources, if users agree with this position I would like to add the disclaimer to the RS guideline. Off2riorob (talk) 00:59, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

• It depends. If i cited Rush Limbaugh, probably not. His program is not a reliable source, and he is not a journalist. However, the specific incident that precipitated this discussion involves coverage of Tammie Wilson from the Alaska Public Radio Network, a statewide organization that employs professional reporters. The exact content of the cites I used can be easily accessed through audio streams that I linked to the article that specifically verify the statements they were attached to. Therefore, there is no issue with verification as the source can be easily accessed and is a reliable professional journalistic entity. I would add that removing the content as unsourced and then later asking if the sources were reliable is somewhat backwards, and I ask once again that you please restore it. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:52, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Without comment on this specific incident - this debate about offline sources comes around every so often. WP:V explicitly states that sources don't need to be easy to verify, only possible to verify. A radio interview isn't hugely different in that regard from an out-of-print reference book, or an old newspaper that doesn't have an online archive, or a journal article that you can only see with a paid subscription. I think easily-accessible sources are preferable where they exist, but sometimes inconvenient sources can add a lot to an article.

Exception to this: some editors are quite willing to abuse our sourcing policy by making up cites that are hard to check (e.g. Peter Foster had an ongoing problem with this). When people are abusing them, I think it's reasonable to reject offline cites in that particular context. --GenericBob (talk) 02:00, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Ok, I'm not sure why this point is not getting through, but I will repeat it once again. There is nothing inaccessible about this. All you have to do is follow these links [37] [38] and click the little play button and you can hear the reports for yourself. It's not an interview, it is a news story just like you would see in a newspaper. Alaska is really, really, big. Less than a quarter of it is accessible by road. Radio is therefore a much utilized resource here as it allows instantaneous transmission of content throughout the state. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:07, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I think you missed my "without comment on this specific incident" there. In this particular case, as you say, the source is easy to check; I was responding to Off2riorob's general argument that sources that aren't easy to check should be avoided. The question of whether this particular source falls into that category is relevant in this specific case, but as I noted above I wasn't commenting on that aspect of the discussion - I felt you'd already settled that point and I had nothing to add. --GenericBob (talk) 23:41, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Another issue I think is related to radio talks is that they can easily be 30 mins or 45mins long and to use then to cite perhaps a single sentence of your choice seems open to cherry picking by use of a single comment from a lengthy interview, the difficulty of which to find making verification extremely difficult. Off2riorob (talk) 12:16, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't see why we shouldn't ask editors to add how many minutes in to a tv or radio report, just as we ask for page numbers. Dougweller (talk) 12:20, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

The key qualifier that seems to have been not mentioned so far is when using such sources "Additionally, an archived copy of the media must exist". While not made explicitly clear, obviously this must be taken to mean an archived copy which is accessible to anyone, not for example a closed archive held by a radio station. O Fenian (talk) 12:21, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Well I appreciate Beeblbrox's comment that the medium used in Alaska has a stronger radio aspect, the particular station has around fifty links, suggesting to me that even in Alaska the practice of using radio station content to support content n the body of an article is not commonplace at all. Another here added by him here - one in Dean Young added by Beeblbrox here - four in Ted Stephens who died in the Alaskan plane crash, added by Beeblbrox - here, here and here - perhaps he has added them all? Surely there is a better source to say Ted Stevens died in a plane crash - Like an international publication in preference to a local radio station difficult to verify mp3 file. .Anyways, I don't think such radio interviews are a good way to support content at all, they make good external links and imo should not be used for anything contentious in relation to living people at all and the practice should be discouraged. Off2riorob (talk) 12:43, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

• - note - I don't think there is much community support for radio reports/interview links to be used to support anything contentious, and it clearly isn't common practice, but in this situation and from comments in this thread and as regards this non controversial content I have replaced them. Thanks for commenting. Off2riorob (talk) 18:25, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

The point is, encyclopedic content must be verifiable. So if there is a way (it is not necessary for it to be easy or free, just possible) to verify a citation, it's usable, if not, it's not. Dlabtot (talk) 18:42, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, which means there is no problem using radio reports. Imagine someone arguing that something from a BBC Newshour segment was not a reliable source -- it's absurd. Likewise NPR. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 18:51, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

And in this particular case the individual reports, which were aired as part of a half-hour long daily newscast, can be linked to individually. There's only about two minutes to each report, so it's not any more of a burden on anyone trying to check it for verification than reading a brief newspaper article. I'll grant that users with hearing problems or really old computers won't be able to do this, but since the vast majority of users can easily verify that the content is in fact supported by the source in this instance I think we can consider APRN a reliable source. And once again, these are not interviews. Rob, I don't know what it is like wherever you are from but everywhere I have ever lived there has been a strong tradition of local broadcast journalism. I know a lot of radio shows are more or less just interviews that allow the subject to spin the story any way they wish, but these news reports are good old fashioned hard news and nothing more. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:56, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes we are done, just a note, a couple of comments here have apparently claimed that it is good practice and a fine way to cite any comment, as in the same can be claimed of video interviews, I have disputed these also in the past and also don't think the overall community supports the addition of videos and saying watch it, you can see he says he doesn't like jonny at 32 mins, or do users think there is large support for this type of citation for content in article bodies, say for contentious content about living people? Off2riorob (talk) 20:04, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I think policy is clear about this, Rob. Video and audio are as capable as text of being RS. --FormerIP (talk) 20:06, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

So you are claiming that any reliable-ish video interview can be used say to cite any comment users like about anyone? Off2riorob (talk) 20:07, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Not reliable-ish, but reliable, yes. And not "any comment users like" but any comment that is supported by the source and is significant enough to include in the article. --FormerIP (talk) 20:10, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Ok, so , multi - media, so all reliable videos and all reliable radio reports can be used to cite any article body content at all, about anything noteworthy. got it. Thanks to all commenters. (talk) 20:15, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Not sure why you bolded that text. Here is some bold text in reply, since you seem to think that typography lends weight:

Other than you, no one said that, no one implied that, and no one said anything that could be reasonably inferred to mean that, or anything like that. Dlabtot (talk) 20:33, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I thought that was supported here, what don't you support about it then, users here appear to have supported that position, I bolded it to draw attention do it. What do you dispute about it? Former IP said just above you - " I think policy is clear about this, Rob. Video and audio are as capable as text of being RS."Off2riorob (talk) 20:36, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes the policy is clear and neither it nor FormerIP's comments in any way resemble the absurd strawman you have presented. Please refrain from further disruption of this noticeboard. Dlabtot (talk) 20:50, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Your position is disruptive not mine, pointedly bolding a comment because I bolded one. My comment is an attempt to clarify where the communities position actually is as regards this issue, so please don't attack me and feel free to actually comment something, its not a strawman comment, what do you actually dispute about it, or in what way do you think the comment is strawman against policy and accepted practice? - all reliable videos and all reliable radio reports can be used to cite any article body content at all, about anything noteworthy. Off2riorob (talk) 20:57, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I'd say that is more or less correct, Rob. I think the important point, though, is that the standards are not lesser compared to print sources. I also think it may often be a good idea to go the extra mile in explaining your edit on the talkpage, including quote with the citation etc (in exactly the same way you might do if you are using a print source that others will find difficult to access). But, in the final analysis there is nothing in particular that makes an audio source less usable that anything else. --FormerIP (talk) 21:39, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I think this is like a growing thing as far as wiki goes, more and more users are fully media accessible - and I can see in the expanding multimedia environment that specific citation templates for such additions would be an asset, like with a time section to state where the content is and perhaps a quote and an additional space also for who said it and to whom. But that is for another time and another noticeboard. Off2riorob (talk) 21:46, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Guardian Lost in showbiz blog

Could this [39] be used to write a brief summary of the production of the documentary in question in the Lindsay Lohan article? Siawase (talk) 11:49, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

No problem. This is by a Guardian staff journalist. It does have a rather strong viewpoint on media coverage, which you can probably just ignore, and pick up simple factual info from it. Remember that the article is a BLP. Itsmejudith (talk) 16:57, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Two editors at Talk:Lindsay Lohan object and think the source should basically be treated as an opinion piece, and that per WP:BLP no factual statements that may reflect negatively on Lohan should be sourced to this piece. Ie, something like "Lohan was initally scheduled to be present at the raid, but due to rescheduling she arrived too late." would be out of bounds. Thoughts? Siawase (talk) 21:02, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Glad to see the careful tone of the discussion on the talk page. On my reading the source was not so much critical of Lohan herself but scathing about the way that the media use stars like her. I'm sure that this piece received all the fact-checking that one would expect in a broadsheet paper, considering Britain's libel laws. It doesn't seem to contain anything that could simply have been made up. My advice is still the same: you can use but take care. You might get other views. Itsmejudith (talk) 21:19, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm one of the two editors, and although Siawase did an admirably concise job of summarizing what I said, I'd like to elaborate (not so concisely).

First, one of the issues I have goes to the RS guidelines, which permit a blog to be cited if it's not self-published. That is the case here. However, frankly, not all unself-published blogs are the same, and the tone and content of this particular source gives me pause.

Second, I don't necessarily have the same confidence in the fact-checking of a blog, even when it comes from an otherwise reliable periodical, mainly because opinion and fact generally get intertwined, so a misstatement could be construed as an opinion (acceptable) rather than a misstatement of fact (unacceptable).

Third, if "facts" can be derived from this source and they are otherwise sufficiently notable to warrant inclusion in the Lohan article, then they should be findable from news pieces rather than opinion pieces.

Finally, because this is a BLP, we have to be especially cautious of statements that are critical of Lohan.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:26, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

WP:NEWSBLOG applies here. Newspaper blogs like this are under the same editorial control as the rest of the newspaper, and may be used, even in BLPs. Jayjg ^(talk) 23:39, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

That's right. As a source this is OK, but it's right to consider whether there is any substantive information that is worth including. We avoid trivial celebrity tittle-tattle - but this piece isn't exactly that. The language used about Lohan is quite scathing, but the criticism is actually aimed at the TV company that employed her. Itsmejudith (talk) 10:03, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

The Transformers: The Movie (1986) development script notes

In a recent charity auction one of the writers of the 1986 Transformers movie sold off early development art and scripts of the film. I wanted to add a few notes to the movie's article as "development", noting how the movie changed dramatically from it's original conception to final version. What would be the best wat to cite these notes? I realize all I have is a scanned copy posted by the guy who won the auction on a message board, but they are accepted as legitimate items as a group of fans got together and bid on them as a group just to make them available to the other fans. You can see one set of notes here: http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/transformers-news-rumors/352750-early-synopsis-1986-movie-plot-characters-ron-friedman-goodies.html Mathewignash (talk) 23:06, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

These might be allowable as primary sources, but unfortunately I am not a member of the Transformers World forum (I've been meaning to get around to it, honest!) so I can't see the jpegs in order to give an opinion. They would need to be permanently archived somewhere (if legal, archive.org would do) in order to qualify for Wikipedia. --FormerIP (talk) 02:37, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The_Advocate as a reliable source

The_Advocate is a well-established, even venerable magazine serving the gay community. A reference to an Advocate interview with musician Spencer Day in which he self-identified as gay was removed from the article and blanked and deleted from the discussion page as the information was apparently deemed "disparaging" or "threatening". At what point can a published interview with an article subject be considered a "reliable source"? And since when has even the DISCUSSION that a person is openly gay become an "attack" or "disparaging"? Some guidance here? 160.111.254.17 (talk) 16:45, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Oops, here is a link to the interview in question: http://www.advocate.com/Arts_and_Entertainment/Music/Brand-New_Day 160.111.254.17 (talk) 16:50, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The "self identification" seems absent - there is no simple statement on the order of "I am gay" in the article. Rather it beats about the bush a great deal. Even the apparent question about him being an "out articst" manages to leave the issue open. Is there a stronger source for this claim in a BLP? Collect (talk) 16:58, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd say that one can only take Day's comments as a confirmation that he considers himself gay:

Was there any hesitation for you being an out artist?

Oh yeah, I think its still a really big deal. It’s a challenge for a lot of my friends still to do it. The record industry is not doing well, so I think any variable or challenge for them to sell you and not just do the typical, matinee idol, Jonas Brothers thing makes it a detraction ... at the very least, not a good business move. I think that’s one of the really great things Rufus Wainwright and k.d. lang have done, is to blaze the trail and hopefully get it to the point where it’s like mentioning my eyes are brown. What I do, the causes I’m behind, that’s what’s important. Who I am, unless it is particularly relevant, has no place in my music.

The only question in my mind is whether Day's sexuality is relevant to an article about him. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:11, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I had also included another source, which I'm not going to push as "reliable" but it has similar commentary: http://greginhollywood.com/singer-spencer-day-tells-greg-in-hollywood-why-hes-publicly-out-i-want-to-be-part-of-building-a-bridge-29760

We are not talking about "outing" a closeted person here. It seems clear that, by agreeing to discuss the subject with a well-known gay magazine, he himself considers it relevant and wants the information to be out there (even as he cautions that it's not the sole thing defining him). Not to mention that he has been active in several gay-related causes. Aside from the "reliable source" issue, I guess what I found oddest was that this was considered inappropriate even on the discussion page. 160.111.254.17 (talk) 17:32, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

pakistanthinktank.org

Imran Farooq

Hi, this cite http://pakistanthinktank.org/component/k2/item/749-imran-farooq-was-a-ruthless-operator is being added to support a single ethnic claim that the subject is a Muhajir. The user wants to add that Farooq was a Muhajir(immigrant) and has struggled to find a RS calling him one, his father was one but Imran was born in Karachi (son of an immigrant but Pakistani born). The cite is imo very opinionated and an attack cite full of extreme claims, checking on the usage of it it is only used in one other place,http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:LinkSearch&target=http%3A%2F%2Fpakistanthinktank.org%2F is it wiki reliable and is it undue to use such an attacking opinionated cite to cite a single word in an article? The article is written by Maheen Bashir Adamjee who it says is an editorial assistant with Newsline - I can't see any evidence of editorial control or suchlike but I found this author FAQ . Off2riorob (talk) 18:05, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The article (as with any op-ed piece) maybe attacking and is this not used as gospel to cite the OPINION of the article at all. Nothign suggests figures are made up, furthemore part of what the other user added above is beyond the scope of RSN in dealing with the issue of a mohajjar (this article deals with the issue of RS). Both the wikipedia page and other editors had explained waht the term means in its SOUTH ASIA context as opposed to the ARABIC ROOTS, somethign he doesnt want to believe so expects everythign else to be changed.

Are we then questioning the facts from the article (As opposed to opinion on it) which says "medical degree from Karachi’s Sindh Medical College and began his political career as a founding member of the All Pakistan Mohajir Students Organisation in April 1979" something that also exists on this wikipedia page for it?

If, and when, consensus says the cite is unreliable then im obviously accepted to removing it, but now on the whim of 1 editor ofcourse.(Lihaas (talk) 14:58, 4 January 2011 (UTC)).

• - Well, user Epeefleche has also commented on the article talk page that the cite "lacks any indicia of being an RS, from what I can see both on the site and in a search for RS coverage of it." .. are there any users here that support this external as a reliable source? Off2riorob (talk) 15:15, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes ... I happened by this page due to a link to it on the article talk page, and Off2 has accurately reflected my view (after having searched both the site itself and google news, google books, and google generally). It appears to be a non-RS blog.--Epeefleche (talk) 15:41, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I also supported your supporting consensus that i was against the grain of opinion on that page. I have not problem with removing it, but then also tagged the part as such pending the discussion on here that he has then initiated. When consensus is forthcoming (particularly with the outside editors) then i agree that it would be fair to remove it.Lihaas (talk) 14:58, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Editor adding poor sources to NY 112

An editor insists on sourcing claims on New York State Route 112's history section with a myriad of unreliable sources, such as self-published sources, e-mails, or photos used to source opinion claims. He's been raked over the coals for this on Talk:New York State Route 112, but given the lack of edits to the article since the last post to the talk page and the fact that the editor has edited other items since that time, I doubt any of it sunk in. I'd post something to the talk page myself, but given my prior history with this editor, I don't anticipate a positive outcome. Perhaps if other, non-road editors examined the article and commented on the talk and/or removed poorly sourced statements from the article, it would sink in better. TIA. – TMF 18:46, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Trying to help out. Ravensfire (talk) 23:09, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Free Copts and 2011 Alexandria bombing

There is a dispute relating to the 2011 Alexandria bombing article that hinges on whether or not Freecopts.net is an RS. In the article's talk page and throughout the article's edit history, one side says the website "is in fact one of the most, if not the most respected source of news in the Coptic community", whilst the other claims it is an unreliable source, which is then challenged with "says who exactly?" Other people's opinions on this would be useful. Ericoides (talk) 22:18, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I am against the inclusion. I don't know enough about wikipedia policy, so maybe I confused WP:RS and WP:COI as another user pointed out on the talk page, but I feel such drastic words, specifically, "The scattered body parts were covered with newspapers until they were brought inside the church after some Muslims started stepping on them and chanting Jihadi chants." hold such a strong accusation against Muslims that they require a VERY reliable source. I'll quote another user who said "extrordinary claims require extrordinary sourcing." Furthermore, I do believe that we can express this information, aka WP:NOTCENSOR, while reducing the chance that these words will insight violence. I am worried that people would have violent thoughts against Egyptian Muslims after reading such a claim... Even if another source is provided, I would like different wording... Tim.thelion (talk) 22:30, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Per About Us page, a source that solely exists to lobby in the perceived interests of the Coptic minority. If editors do present evidence that Freecopts.net represents the majority viewpoint of the Coptic minority, then this source is usable as a primary sources (with secondary sources backup). But in light of the statement "We do not claim to represent the Coptic people as a whole politically or otherwise in any official capacity" in the About Us page, are there any other evidences that shows the Freecopts.net represents the majority viewpoint of Coptic minority? Jim101 (talk) 22:33, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

An article like this should be written up from the coverage of AP, the BBC and similar mainstream news sources. Itsmejudith (talk) 22:59, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Another, more main stream, source presents a different story: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2040491,00.html I'm not saying it's true either, from Prague, I really can't see anything that's gping on in Egypt, but.... Tim.thelion (talk) 23:45, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The article in question http://english.freecopts.net/english//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1180&Itemid=2 at freecopts.net is cited to the news agency http://www.aina.org/index.shtml and the author Mary Abdelmassih. I was able to verify that Mary Abdelmassih reports for aina with the aina search function... There is also a slight problem that the sentence in question appears to have been copy pasted from the article, but I don't think we need to worry about that now... Tim.thelion (talk) 01:34, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

This is a clear case of nothing more than a phobia of islamophobia. The article is not saying "Muslims are bad people". Nor is the article saying "every Muslim is stamping on Coptic corpses screaming jihadi chants". It does not even say "Muslims were justified by the Koran in stamping on corpses" as indicated here (http://www.adnkronos.com/IGN/Aki/English/Security/Egypt-Edict-posted-to-jihadist-websites-legitimises-church-attack_311489867679.html)

So at the very least, it is not even a critique of a particular religion.

It is describing the bare minimum - that a number of people, who were Muslims, and because it's quite obvious from Egypt's history of persecution of Copts, that they would be Muslims (since it is hardly imaginable that a Copt would chant jihadi chants on their former comrades) , committed an unspeakable act.

Otherwise every IRA attach should have any hint of "Catholic" removed - we all know how "Catholic" the [IRA] were.

But no, we can't state that some Muslims did this! Why? How is this inflammatory? We have yet to see a reason. I am worried that people would have violent thoughts against Egyptian Muslims after reading such a claim... is ridiculous. I think the current worry should be toward the 10% persecuted and blown up Copts. But that's a red herring - and more so of a red herring are the [lack of] "reasons" given for not including this

If including it worries you for the safety of Egyptian Muslims - because there are so many people out there stupid enough to think there friendly Egyptian living across the street has something to do with an event on the other side of the world - why not remove every eveil deed committed by anyone! What about every Catholic priest being viewed as a pedophile, because of a small percent, less than among US public school teachers - should we censor articles on those pedophilia cases? Think, please. 98.176.12.43 (talk) 01:33, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

The question here is whether the claim is A from a reliable source, and B true. As to the wording, if the claim is true the claim can go in. I just think that the wording should be euphamised as much as possible... Tim.thelion (talk) 01:42, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

The search is on for another source to contest or confirm then. 98.176.12.43 (talk) 02:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

"FreeCopts is a major source of reliable information for the majority of the Coptic minority worldwide." This is a simple truth, and I'm not sure how exactly you want me to support it!!! When any Copt wants to read about unbiased and non-governmentally-tainted news concerning the Copts (especially in English), they refer to either A) FreeCopts or B) CoptsUnited. You can ask any Copt in the world about that, but I don't know exactly how to prove it. It's like asking us to prove that it's the earth that rotates around the sun and not the opposite. --Coptic101 (talk) 02:54, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Even if 100% of Copts believe it, that still doesn't nessesarilly make it WP:RS. I'm not sure why. I personally don't like WP:RS belief that only "mainstream media" is capable of reporting the truth. Indeed, I'm inclined to blieve that the main stream media is not the best source of truth. However, just imagine if every bit of slander from a hypothetical sect of Islam was taken as truth on wikipedia, and that sect of Islam published things in their newspapers such as "The Copts kidnapped, beat, and raped two women who attempted to free themselves and convert to Islam..." and was quoted in this article. I'm sure I could find an article which said that. I could also find an article from a source believed by 100% of athiests which said that god does not exist. Or from sceptics which said that faith is nothing more than guess work. Or from radical sceptics who questioned whether the attack even happened, and whether Egypt exists or if reallity is nothing but illusion(I'm pretty sure there are more people who believe that then there are Copts, so...). Tim.thelion (talk) 03:38, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to have to argue against that Tim. See, it's unlikely a 10% minority would, in a country whereby Islamic law (mandating severe punishment for apostasy, proselytism or criticism of their religion) is at the least a great influence in the laws of Egypt, kidnap 2 women from a 90% majority. As for the other papers you've cited, I think it's a fallacy to assert their reliability with freecopts. That is not what you are doing, I see that -you are merely playing the devil's advocate. But I think we can escape any risks of going down a slippery slope, due to the fact that the "unreliability" of freecopts, if it has any, which it has not been shown to have (and therefore is innocent being not proven guilty) is far removed from the bias and unreliability a website might have concerning women being kidnapped by a Christian minority against a Muslim majority. In fact, these cases clearly testify to the opposite:

• http://www.asianews.it/index.php?l=en&art=17231&theme=5&size=A
• http://www.worthynews.com/8119-breaking-news-saudi-forces-free-kidnapped-christian-girls-in-yemen
• http://www.crossrhythms.co.uk/articles/life/Christian_Girls_Kidnapped_In_Egypt_And_Forced_To_Convert_To_Islam/22375/p1/
• http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Kidnapped-Christian-girls,-judge-ratifies-marriage-and-conversion-12771.html
• http://aknews.com/en/aknews/3/206413/

98.176.12.43 (talk) 04:06, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

A source is reliable because it has not proven to be unreliable? First of all, per the principle of WP:BURDEN, all sources are presumed to be unreliable until proven reliable, so don't dodge the question. Second of all, what does religion/ethnicity/truth has to do with the reliability of a source? Which part of the "third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy" criteria (per WP:RS) is based on the above three factors? We can ignore the "third-party" criteria for now if we are looking at a primary source usage, but the "reputation for fact-checking and accuracy" still need to be proven with tangible evidence instead of the philosophical notion of truth. Seriously, the laziest defense people could form here is a Google search and a freecopts-is-reliable-since-x-numbers-of-other-RS-are-using-it argument. By going with "a source is reliable because it is not proven unreliable" is beyond lazy.

From my previous experiences in dealing with topics like this, there are only two kinds of sources that can be reliably cited. 1) Third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy or 2) THE official mouthpieces of the parties involved in the conflict. Which category does freecopts belong and where is the evidence? Jim101 (talk) 07:31, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Agree with Jim. Free Copts website gives little information about the organisation, but it must count as either 1) an advocacy group or 2) an online current affairs magazine, or 3) both. If we treat as 1) it can eventually be cited for its own opinion, provided that it is a notable group, and with due regard to the problems of covering current events as they are emerging, i.e. it may not be appropriate to carry any commentary at all yet. If we treat as 2) we need to know that it is a notable magazine with a good reputation for fact-checking. Itsmejudith (talk) 09:56, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

a military as a reliable source on their own targets

Over at List of Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel, 2011 I find myself facing multiple editors who are reverting the article to include " Israeli Air Force responded by targeting a Hamas terrorist activity center in northern Gaza and a weapons manufacturing facility in the central Gaza Strip" and sourcing that to In Response to Rocket Fire, IAF Targets Two Hamas-Linked Sites in the Gaza Strip, IDF Spokesperson 01-01-2011. (IDF is Israeli Defense Forces - i.e., the Israeli military.) It seems to me that this is a primary source that one cannot assume is non-biased -- nothing against the Israeli military in particular, militaries on both sides of almost all conflicts have made dubious claims about the targets they've hit and the impact. I'm open to being convinced otherwise. (Unfortunately, such convincing is not coming from the editors I am dealing with, who are reverting without edit summaries and not engaging my statements on the talk page.) I'm trying to replace it with " Israeli Air Force responded by targeting what they claimed were a Hamas terrorist activity center in northern Gaza and a weapons manufacturing facility in the central Gaza Strip", as the cited source is reliable for the force having made such a claim. --Nat Gertler (talk) 23:21, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Your approach ("the cited source is reliable for the force having made such a claim") is WP:OR; theirs (the "multiple editors") seems to me to be POV-pushing and is entirely questionable. The IDF source is certainly not an RS, for the reasons you have given. Ericoides (talk) 23:37, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Agree that the IDF is not a reliable source for statements of fact here. Ideally, a third-party source should be found. Alternatively, the IDF source could be used and attributed in the way you suggest ("...what they claimed..."). I don't think this is OR - we attribute statements all the time - although it is still one-sided and a way of avoiding it should be sought. --FormerIP (talk) 00:29, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

The IDF is reliable for what they publicly claim to have targeted as SPS opinion. They are not reliable for what they targeted as that is a matter of fact. Find secondaries for what they actually targeted. If the what the IDF claims to have targeted is encyclopaedically notable, use them for their own claims. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:33, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

The Israel Defence Forces website is not a reliable source for facts. TFD (talk) 00:37, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

It's a contentious issue, and I don't think a primary source is satisfactory in such an instance. A secondary should be used, and if the primary source differs from the secondary source then the primary source should be included to present their version of events. In the absence of a secondary source the information should not be included. Betty Logan (talk) 00:39, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I see two issues here, the general case of targetting decisions and the specific case of sourcing IDF statements and targets.

First I think you need to be clear on what you mean by targetting, in a military context that would mean the legal and operational identification of legitimate targets and the creation of a corresponding target pack. That is different from what the munitions were launched against and where the munitions landed. The latter are not targetting.

In this instance until such time as the targetting material is placed in the public domain there is no way to demonstrate what the target actually was. I would suggest wordings along the lines of IDF have stated that.... Personally I would avoid the use of IDF have claimed... as one could easily infer that the author believes otherwise. Merely state the facts, and let the reader come to their own conclusion rather than leading them by the nose. If, on the other hand, there is some debate around targetting decisions and statements then represent the debate in text, at which point the use of a pejoraative term like claimed could be used as long as it's a reasonable reflection of the relative merits of the arguments.

ALR (talk) 12:00, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Agree with ALR's well-stated analysis. And yes, "claimed" is a "word to avoid" ... for the reasons ALR mentions, coincidentally.--Epeefleche (talk) 15:39, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

i dont think it should reverted because the article is not "reason for rocket attacks" and seems to be "list of rocket attacks" so the reason aside its still a rocket attack whether supported or opposed by anyone. words like "terrorist" are not npov here, ut it would be fie to add a Hamas target is sourced elsewhere too. (pov doesnt cancel out pov)

As for the source, i think we can use it here. they do after all acknowledge full well carryign it out, although the wording can be changed. try also adding an additional source and asking for admin intervention for waht is clearly vandalism and warring reverts without reason.(Lihaas (talk) 17:08, 4 January 2011 (UTC));

Fair 'nuff on the "claimed" concerned, and the article now uses "described". We've got another editor chiming in with a more appropriate source, and while that source only states that the IDF named what their target was, the article has (for a few hours at least) been stable with stating it as in IDF statement. So I think all is relatively good at the moment; I'll take a look in a bit to see if we still have "targeted" in there and replace it with "fired upon" or somesuch if so. --Nat Gertler (talk) 19:55, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Sources in Veganarchism

I'm wondering what people think of the sources here, especially the one (and it seems only one) published by Firestarter Press. The article looks like a bunch of OR and synthesis to me, but wiser heads might see otherwise. BE——Critical_{__Talk} 02:20, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't think it qualifies as a reliable source. The Brian Dominick source is listed at here at Amazon, and seems to be a propaganda piece. It seems to be published by a company called "Critical Mess Media" identified by only a PO Box and an email address (MessMedia@rootmedia.org). It looks like an SPS published by some vegan activism group. All the other bits are general animal rights/vegan stuff that seem to be dragged in to support the thesis put forward by Dominick. I'd nominate the article for deletion as a non-notable topic. All the sources make it look deceptively notable, but for the most part it is synthesis, and the only source that recognizes "veganarchism" as an ideaology/concept/subject is the Dominick source, which I don't think is RS. Betty Logan (talk) 03:43, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Hey, thanks, that's what I thought but it's so well done I wanted more eyes on it (: BE——Critical_{__Talk} 21:29, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Sourcing required in lists linking to other articles

Related to discussion at Talk:Comparison_of_heavy_lift_launch_systems#Citation_needed_flags_for_launch_numbers.2Fetc.

There is a group of 6 articles listing the different classes of rockets (according to the weight they can bring to orbit). Each rocket gets a line starting with a link to the article about it and the rest of the columns include different statistics about this rocket - such as weight uplift capability, number of successful launches, number of total launches (including failures), etc. - these stats are taken from the linked rocket article.

The problem is how such list/comparision articles should be sourced. So far, there are two opinions:

1. User:N2e - each individual data piece should have a [1] note after it with the source reference. Data pieces that don't have such note after them are tagged with [citation needed] and after 6 weeks can be deleted - even when at the individual rocket article (linked in the begin of each line of the list) there is an external source for this data. He cites WP:V/WP:BURDEN (OK) and WP:CIRCULAR (this is irrelevant as nobody claims that the data is backed up by "another wikipedia article", but by "external sources at directly linked wikipedia article")
2. User:Alinor (filing this question) - individual data pieces that are backed up by external sources at the directly linked individual rocket articles should not have [1] notes and all the sources from all rocket articles should not be copied over into the list/comparison article. Only data pieces that are not backed by external sources at the linked rocket article (if there are such data pieces) should be tagged with [citation needed] (and be deleted eventually).

At the discussion linked at the top you can see examples of N2e tagging with [citation needed] data piece sourced in the way described above and of N2e deleting such data piece. So far he doesn't dispute the sources in these examples as unreliable or anything like that - he just insists that somebody else should copy the sources to the list/comparision articles from the rocket articles after he has tagged/deleted the respective data pieces. Alinor (talk) 09:46, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Someone should absolutely copy the citations over. You shouldn't expect readers to have to go looking for references. Each article should be able to stand on its own, with its own list of references. Nightw 11:13, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Night w, unlike the other debate that you and I still haven't finished - where you question the data itself and where there are other things you considered as controversial - this case is different. There are no controversies or anything - it's just that the sources are at the linked pages. Alinor (talk) 11:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

It doesn't matter. Every claim that isn't considered common knowledge should be referenced to a reliable source wherever it appears. No matter how ordinary the claim, nor how lazy the editor who added the information is, there aren't any exemptions. Nightw 11:50, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Professor Mobo Gao

Moved from [40]

There is a dispute over the inclusion of Mobo Gao, a Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Adelaide [41], on the Mao: The Unknown Story and Great Leap Forward articles. One editor insisted on removal of Professor Gao as a source [42], suggesting that Gao is an employee of the Chinese Communist Party and follows party lines because he works for the Confucius Institute imbedded into the University of Adelaide[43][44]. He justifies this by using criticism of the Confucius Institute on its Wikipedia article as evidence [45], which I believe violates WP:SYN--PCPP (talk) 10:56, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Runs a research centre in a respectable Australian university. Reliable source. If he takes a particularly pro Mao line then balance him with other scholars. Your point about synthesis doesn't come into it, because that relates to main article space, not to arguments on talk pages. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:06, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out.--PCPP (talk) 11:22, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Disagreement if two sources are WP:CIRCULAR

Related to discussion at Talk:Foreign_relations_of_the_Palestinian_National_Authority#John_V._Whitbeck_source. There are two sources by authors who User:Night w consider to be 'reputable experts' over the issue, but I find a particular part of the content of these sources to be suspiciously similar to the Wikipedia page these sources were added to.

Background - as documented on the same page at the end of 2010 a few countries recognized the State of Palestine (SoP) - Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador (in that order). With each subsequent announcement the Wikipedia page was updated accordingly (using sources other than those in question here). As can be seen at the page the question of "total number of states recognizing SoP" is not so easy to answer, because A] some sources are conflicting/inconclusive and B] there are sources stating "about/over 130" without giving the names of these ~130 states and we have sources with the names of only 108-118 (presented in the list at the article).

Now, the two sources in question here:

• [46] - "Bolivia's recognition brought to 106 the number of UN member states recognizing the State of Palestine" - this corresponds to this version of the Wikipedia page (Bolivia listed as 106th)
• [47] - "With recognitions in recent weeks by Brazil and Argentina, some 105 states now formally recognize Palestine at the diplomatic level." - this corresponds to this version of the Wikipedia page (Argentina listed as 105th)

Even up to here the two sources appear to be WP:CIRCULAR, because they cite exactly the number of the first part of the Wikipedia table ("sure thing") - not counting any of the entries listed in Wikipedia as having "conflicting and inconclusive sources" (second part of the table). If we are to accept that the authors of the two sources in question here were using another information source different from Wikipedia - it's almost sure that they will come up with a different number than the "sure thing Wikipedia" figure (as do the sources that don't give a list of states - such as Boyle, Anat Kurz and others - they give 114, 117, 130, etc.). I wouldn't open this question if the two sources in question were giving a figure different by at least 1 from the "sure thing" Wikipedia figure.

But then, on 30 December 2010 Night w found multiple official sources showing that Dominican Republic has recognized SoP already in 2009. We added it to the article, but now it is obvious that the two sources in question are wrong (because Argentina is 106th and Bolivia is 107th - not as the two sources in question state). I think that they are wrong, just because they are WP:CIRCULAR and had used the versions of the Wikipedia article before we corrected the Dominican Republic mistake there.

So, the question is: Are these two sources WP:CIRCULAR? Alinor (talk) 14:45, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

It'd be helpful to identify the authors, don't you think?

• John V. Whitbeck, "an international lawyer who has advised the Palestinian negotiating team in negotiations with Israel, author of The World According to Whitbeck." (Al Jazeera), and
• John B. Quigley, "a distinguished professor of law at the Ohio State University's Moritz College Law and the author of more than a dozen critically acclaimed books on various aspects of the law" (McClatchy-Tribune) Nightw 15:50, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I'll admit that renowned credibility cannot preclude any accusations of circular sourcing, but I'd normally expect said accusations to be based on a little more than coincidence in numbers. Nightw 17:13, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

more than "coincidence in numbers" - the coincidence I described is too suspicious - they use exactly these wrong numbers that the Wikipedia article used before founding the DR source. Alinor (talk) 17:36, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Citizens for Truth about the Kennedy Assassination

An editor used a reference from this organization as a cite for a recent change in the John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories article. I posted a question on the talk page, but thought it might also help to post here. I've seen this website used as a reference elsewhere, and I don't think it's a viable source as it appears to be a pure advocacy site. Thoughts about the site in general and the specific edit would be appreciated. Ravensfire (talk) 16:56, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd say that "Citizens for Truth..." can only really be a reliable source for their own opinions. The attempt to use the site as a reference for quote from a 'Secret Service agent' is rather stretching things. Unless the quote can be found in WP:RS, I'd say it should go. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:10, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Unreliable, un-notable, and if Godfrey is still alive, a WP:BLP violation. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:29, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

asianews.it/

i just came across this link on wikipedia at an ITN page (assassination of the pakistani figure) and tagged it as dubious, but i also had further concerns about its status as reasonable/reliable. Its about page cites its goal as "dedication is a missionary gesture," where a cursory glance at article also shows its one-sided view to portray persecution and push a pov. It also says its mission to start the chinese language page was because "Nowadays, curiosity about Christianity, the Church and pope John Paul II is widespread among the Chinese populace" clarifying its worldview limits. "urgency becomes even more heightened because of two facts:" + further proofs of pov in its raison d'etre "We wish to place the beginning of our mission on the internet under the protection of St. Francis Xavier, whose feast day we celebrate today (Dec. 3) and who died desiring to go to China. He is the patron of foreign missions and is venerated in China and throughout Asia." + "This effectiveness -at a distance- adapts well to our brand of news service, while being far yet near to the heart of the Church in China and her people."

the source is also cited above for the other ongoing ITN event (alexandria bombing)

I would also like to suggest a WP:Blacklist listing.(Lihaas (talk) 17:01, 4 January 2011 (UTC));

Atheist being used as a source for church scholars' opinions

An encyclopedia entry written by G.A. Wells (an atheist) in the encyclopedia of unbelief is being used a source for the opinion of "mainstream church scholars". Using an atheist as a source for the opinion of church scholars seems highly problematic to me. Laker1988 (talk) 22:34, 4 January 2011 (UTC)