User talk:Jimbo Wales

(Manual archive list)

Homeopathy article and the parody of Neutral point of view

I always wanted to ask you how is it possible that controversial articles like homeopathy make neutral point of view looks like parody? What is wrong and how it can be corrected - I have no idea - I have no ....conflict of interest but I did and do have good intentions. For a curious editor, it would take 15 min to understand the problem. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Homeopathy#Heavily_Biased_article. Best regards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Motorola12 (talk • contribs) 00:14, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

This has been a problem for many years. The basic problem with the homeopathy article is that it attracts extremists from both sides: Practising homeopaths who want to present Hahnemann's Gospel as the truth, and enthusiastic members of the "skeptic" community who don't appear to understand science. It's the latter category that really shocked me when I first went to the article under the expectation that I would have to help taking the pseudoscientific garbage out. I had no idea that there is such a thing as hooligan followers of science, and as they bring 'my' side into disrepute I am more annoyed at them than at the homeopathy supporters.

In this environment it is actually rather hard to give sensible, neutral information about the history and practices of homeopathy. Nobody seems interested in that. Everything is considered under one aspect only: "Does it help 'us' or the 'enemy'?"

The Citizendium article, not unlike homeopathy articles in many established encyclopedias, is a disgrace because it is too openly pro-homeopathy. (At least it was last time I looked.) But our article goes too far in the other direction. Consider the current last two sentences of the first lead section:

"Scientific research has found homeopathic remedies ineffective and their postulated mechanisms of action implausible. Within the medical community homeopathy is considered to be quackery."

The first sentence says everything there is to know. The second sentence adds nothing but insult, and even with weak sourcing that does not seem to remotely meet the high standard of WP:RS/AC. It also flies in the face of surprisingly large numbers of regular doctors worldwide who administer homeopathy in one way or another. (The number differs a lot from country to country, but is quite high in Germany and probably still in the UK.) Most likely they use it as a placebo, but I doubt that they think of themselves as quacks. That is not to say that there is no quackery among homeopaths, quite possibly more than among regular doctors.

Our readers have come to expect from Wikipedia an excessively neutral and dispassionate tone. This article, however, shouts right into the reader's face: If you believe in homeopathy there is no need to read on, as we are going to try to teach you otherwise. A neutrally written article will teach such a reader otherwise, and it will not prevent them from reading by using poorly supported insults.

Disclaimer: I have been mostly inactive for almost a year and didn't look at the homeopathy article or its talk page even longer. But my quick research showed that nothing much seems to have changed. Hans Adler 11:05, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

The characterization of homeopathy as quackery has in the past been overwhelmingly supported by MEDRS secondary sources, so perhaps the talk page archives and/or article history needs to be examined to find them. It is not an insult any more than characterizing anti-vaccination activists as presenting a danger to public health is an insult. Stark terms are called for when failing to include them is likely to cause harm or even fail to prevent harm. 71.212.238.208 (talk) 01:13, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Not exactly. There are several other high quality sources which depart from this point of view. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Motorola12 (talk • contribs) 19:22, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

On the contrary, those are a WP:PRIMARY source (of which at 5% are expected to be significant at the p<0.05 or better level), and an opinion letter to the editor. Neither are the WP:SECONDARY sources to which I was referring and which continue to overwhelmingly characterize homeopathy as quackery to this day as they have for decades. Please read WP:PSTS and WP:RS. 71.212.238.208 (talk) 20:51, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

The sources I have produced are all secondary and meta analyses or reviews published in first rate sources. The letter to the Lancet is from the authors whose views have been cited and distorted in wikipedia that Homeopathy =placebo= quackery ; they sent this letter to the lancet saying that homeopathy is NOT proven but it is NOT only placebo and they cite their own research (the research the homeopathy article is misrepresenting) to support that.

It has been explained on the Homeopathy talk page why these reviews are not included. And the Lancet letter does not state a conclusion that homoeopathy has effects over placebo: the only direct statement about homoeopathy in it is that its authors "agree that homoeopathy is highly implausible and that the evidence from placebo-controlled trials is not robust." It makes specific criticisms of the methodology of a particular review that concluded that its findings were compatible with homoeopathy beng placebo, but to use this to support a statement that the authors of the letter have concluded that it has effects over placebo would be a clear violation of WP:SYN. We've been over this ad nauseam on the talk page as well. Brunton (talk) 09:05, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Thats a lie: LInde Jonas in their letter to the Lancet state that " If homoeopathy (or allopathy) works for some conditions and not for others (a statement for which there is some evidence4), and they cite their own meta analysis to support that. They state that homeopathy has NOT be proven but also state clearly The Lancet should be embarrassed by the Editorial5 that accompanied the study. The conclusion that physicians should tell their patients that “homoeopathy has no benefit” and that “the time has passed for … further investment in research” is not backed at all by the data. Now wikipedia falsely states that linde and jonas basically agree and the consensus among researchers is that homeopathy = placebo. If any good faith reader reads what the authors state above he will immediately see how absurd is to say that the major researchers agree that homeopathy = only placebo (as the article falsely states). This is the reason you have excluded this source. --Motorola12 (talk) 19:18, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

It does not state that homoeopathy works, even for some conditions; it says that there is some evidence that homoeopathy works for some conditions but not for others. That is not the same as a statement that homoeopathy works, and neither are the criticisms of the Lancet's editorial. The article states that some trials report positive results but that the evidence as a whole is that homoeopathy doesn't work; it does not attribute any specific opinion on efficacy to Linde and Jonas. As I said before, we have gone through all this already on the talk page of the appropriate article, and this user talk page is probably not an appropriate venue for rehashing it. Oh, and please at least try to assume good faith. Brunton (talk) 08:59, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

The article says that all authors who studied and published systematic reviews on high quality sources agree that Homeopathy = ONLY placebo while in fact only one review stated that. other authors disagree with the statement Homeopathy = Only placebo - and also they DO NOT say it is proven. The article says that everybody agrees homeopathy = placebo. Thats is a lie. False if you prefer this word. Whoever reads the sources can verify that. --Motorola12 (talk) 17:45, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

• Shows need for fringe content-forks: There have been many controversial subjects, with POV-edit-wars, in trying to force a single article page to represent each side's concept of "neutrality". The best solution, while balancing wp:SOAPBOX concerns of wp:GRANDSTANDing in a major, heavily-viewed article, is to create a valid, sourced but fringe-level subarticle (wp:Content fork) where questionable ideas can be explained without tainting the top-level article with too much fringe text as "top-billed" hokum. For example, in a murder article, suppose there were many experts who concluded the major suspects might be innocent, but some other person, acting alone, was the real culprit (as documented by reliable sources); in such a case, there could be a sub-article "Murder of X lone-wolf theory" which could explain the unusual (but heavily-sourced) viewpoint that one guy, acting alone, committed the murder and clean-up, as returning to the scene of the crime to see "did that person really die" and then performed extra clean-up when confirming the death was real. By having such fringe-level sub-articles, then sourced, "minority report" opinions can be explained without flooding the major article with all the details needed to clarify how such a fringe concept actually fits the many facts as a plausible explanation. Overall, it is a balancing act, to provide a voice for credible fringe concepts, but not wp:GRANDSTAND those ideas with "top billing" at the search-results level of a major article. In later years, as a fringe concept becomes more mainstream, then the fringe sub-article could be summarized with a greater presence in the main article, but until then, each subarticle is dedicated to a specific (sourced) concept which ensures full details without (as many) edit-warriors trying to slant the text to emphasize some other viewpoints. That tactic really seems to work, as edit-warriors seem more obsessed with slanting the main article, then the less-read subarticles. Albert Einstein (translated in Out of My Later Years) advised a similar tactic in world politics: to have a confederation of different cultures, each as a sub-page of world culture, but acting together as united nations where each could maintain a different culture supported by a minority group, yet all loosely joined in the overall confederation. His idea made me think of the Swiss university, the "Eidgenoessische Technische Hochschule" (the Swiss Federal Polytechnic) as a conferation of different university departments, each a minority to the others. After years of analysis, I really think the tactic of "confederated subarticles" is a good solution (whether Einstein liked it or not!). Anyway, Hans, welcome back, and I think other areas here have improved during the past year. -Wikid77 (talk) 22:41, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Hell no - the last thing Wikipedia needs to do is become a platform for fringe theories. Our articles should represent the balance of consensus of material from mainstream reliable sources. Permitting 'fringe-forking' is a guaranteed way of giving such material more credibility than it deserves. All articles must conform to Wikipedia standards regarding NPOV, weight etc - to act otherwise is totally contrary to the encyclopaedic objectives of the project. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:51, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

I've concluded that where science conflicts with a belief set, the compromise should be to present the science in a calm way without making a point of bashing the belief set. A more common place for this is religion. I've run into the same situation as Hans Adler. I'm a scientific atheist, but I often butt heads with folks at articles that have my same RW POV / are of scientific bent because they often want to turn articles on those topics into nasty attack pieces that make a point of bashing the belief set. North8000 (talk) 22:54, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Wiikipedia supposes to reflect the scientific consensus or any uncertainty or controversy as long as it appears in a reliable source.

According to the NPOV, the weight of every review is NOT judged by the wikipedia contributors evaluating if their content is "correct" or not, but by typically and better, solely by the significance and importance of the journal.

For instance, whatever review or information has been published in the Lancet or the Annals of internal medicine about the X subject ( Homeopathy for instance ) not matter how pro and anti homeopathy the conclusions or the information are , HAS to be reported. In the latest dispute, the group of the editors who control the article while finally accepted ( at least some of them ) that there are several high quality mainstream sources which don't say that Homeopathy = only placebo= quackery, they refused to report their findings because they are NOT consistent with what THEY believe is the scientific consensus.

This the perfect parody of Np of view. The current homeopathy article is a graphic example of what a wikipedia editor should NOT be doing and how should NOT be behaving. --Motorola12 (talk) 00:03, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

With only 1 page about the topic, then edit-warring can be intense. There were similar edit-war problems in 2006 with article "Search engine" which was often severely trimmed to omit Internet search concepts (as considered irrelevant), until the article was forked, and then subarticle "Web search engine" was expanded to contain numerous details about each type of Internet "search engine" database. The result of subarticles, after years of struggle, was almost like magic to reduce edit-warring and broaden details. It's just the rules of "[p]article physics" to reduce conflicts. In some cases, a disambiguation page can also promote similar branched articles, rather than continue conflicts. -Wikid77 (talk) 01:23, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Wikid77, you seem to be under a misapprehension as to what Wikipedia is for. Forking articles might possibly reduce edit-warring (though I see no particular reason that it should), but if it is done with this objective in mind, at the expense of violating WP:NPOV within particular articles, it is contrary to the objectives of the encyclopaedia. Wikipedia is here to provide neutral and balanced material to our readership, and violating this principle for the convenience of contributors is just plain wrong. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:33, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Well, content forks do not mean NPOV; there is no slanting to write "Web search engine" as a type of "search engine" where someday people might write more about "intranet search engine" or such. I wish I could find the words to better explain why subarticles work so well, and why edit-wars are reduced so sharply. Use of wp:content_forks is truly amazing. -Wikid77 (talk) 11:50, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Per WP:MEDRS, we don't allow contributors to cherry-pick a few random primary case studies to 'disprove' overwhelming scientific consensus - have you any evidence that this consensus has changed? AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:18, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Nope. (And this just in: Earth still not flat!) --Orange Mike | Talk 00:35, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

See: "Flat Earth" or "Cardiff Giant" as examples of how Wikipedia handles fringe topics. -Wikid77 (talk) 01:23, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

You could have read more carefully what I wrote - There are NOT primary case studies but reviews and meta analyses published in first rate journals - see above ( The Lancet, Annals of Interval Medicine and more) . There is not clear consensus among the researchers - Several reviews published in first rate journals contradict each other. Can you justify why you don 't want to apply the NPOV principle "Make readers aware of any uncertainty or controversy. A well-referenced article will point to specific journal articles or specific theories proposed by specific researchers". Why don't you w ant readers to know for instance about these ? --Motorola12 (talk) 19:15, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

It's great to see Hans commenting again. "Within the medical community homeopathy is considered to be quackery" is wrong because, as Hans points out, lots of doctors don't think it's quackery, sadly. Within the medical community homeopathy is considered by most to be quackery. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 16:59, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Modern medicine has made great advances since Hahnemann's time, when homeopathy was actually more successful than regular medicine simply by feeding patients well, keeping hygiene (medical doctors didn't believe in it) and not poisoning them. However, it still has its limitations, it has some problems with quackery both in practice and in science (in a famous 2012 Nature study, 47 of 53 cancer studies were not reproducible, and some authors new about this! [1]), and it totally neglects patients' spiritual needs in a way that many providers of alternative and complementary medicine such as homeopathy don't. Therefore they provide a useful service even if they are obviously worthless by medical efficacy standards. Some doctors know this, others are just naive, and the same applies to lots of nurses and midwives. All part of the medical community. But even the scientific medical community chooses its words carefully. Scientists, when making official statements, use understatement, not swearwords.

"Quackery" in the homeopathy lead was once sourced to a polemic article in a Nigerian journal that only discussed the situation in Nigeria, because there was nothing better. The present sourcing appears better than that but still quite poor.

The word "quackery" doesn't even appear in Christian Science. (Nor anything like it last time I had a closer look.)

A judge in Berlin decided that referring to the Catholic church as "the child fucker sect" is fair commentary. Do we find this in the lead of the Catholic Church article? No. There is only a one-paragraph section on sex-abuse cases right at the end of the article, mentioning in general that the church "was criticised". Following someone's argument a bit further above, we would need a lot more space for this topic because being Catholic can ruin one's children's lives in the same way that believing in homeopathy can ruin one's health. If you happen to deal with a priest who doesn't have his sex drive under control, or with a homeopath who doesn't understand the limitations of his faith.

It appears to me that for certain editors putting strongly worded statements about quackery in the homeopathy article functions like capturing and desecrating the opposing team's flag. (Some of the same editors jealously protect the Stephen Barrett article against any and all criticism and everything that might undermine the notion that he is an ultra-reliable medical science expert.) Hans Adler 18:31, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

I would agree with Hans and Hans but please allow me to underline the most important issue here. It is not only a matter of elegance , style and kindness. Wikipedia supposes to report the scientific literature about Homeopathy including controversies and uncertainties . Even if the NPOV didn;t require that, which it does, we had to add it in its definition. The criterion for reporting is solely the weight and the importance of the journal the info is reported ; NOT whether we personally believe that the information is worth reporting or not. If there is no clear consensus or there are several conflicting views in first rate journals, one should report exactly that and not to edit out whatever it does not comply with his her preconceptions. Otherwise the NPOV becomes a parody, the way it is in the homeopathy article. --Motorola12 (talk) 19:47, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Motorola12's comments here are a demonstration of the problem caused by an article whose tone is (in the first paragraph, which is the only thing many readers read) seriously non-neutral. One homeopathy fan after another will notice the problem, realise that it is so bad that Wikipedia will ultimately do something about it, and will believe that in the process the article will also be 'corrected' in the sense of, for want of better words, 'teaching the controversy'. Even though that last goal is totally unrealistic, reality-oriented editors will have to support them in part, and this will get their hopes up. Hans Adler 22:04, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

And of course I would not even think of suggesting to include controversies and uncertainties if they were not so strongly apparent in first rate journals. I just got inspired by reading the definition of NPOV in wikipedia. --Motorola12 (talk) 01:27, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

For various reasons which the medical community does not seem to be addressing, all kinds of extremely poor studies get published in medical journals -- even in the best medical journals. That's one reason Wikipedia has WP:MEDRS, which stresses that whenever possible one needs to use high quality reviews of studies rather than infividual studies. As I mentioned further up, one study reported that about 94% of the important cancer studies they tried to reproduce were highly misleading. I don't remember the details, but I do remember that such metastudies exist for homeopathy and that the result is that it simply doesn't work better than placebo.

I am not saying that homeopathy has no value. But any value of homeopathy apparently cannot be proved by double-blind studies. (Or theoretically it could be restricted to some very specific patients and/or conditions.) It becomes clear that this is an important distinction if you consider operation such as amputating a limb. Its efficacy after a snake bite can't be proved in a double-blind study any more than its efficacy as a measure against the common cold. Hans Adler 11:20, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

The interpretation of meta analyses varies and depends on the authors point of view. There are reviews they have found homeopathy = placebo and they have been criticized by other authors in high quality journals and reviews which arrive in different conclusions. Click to see yourself. But you are right - homeopaths say that the individual character of the method cannot be properly tested with the standard methods. The main question is why the contributors of this article refused to report this information not as the truth but as a part of the discussion in the scientific community. ?--Motorola12 (talk) 16:59, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

You already presented all these sources in Talk:Homeopathy#Heavily_Biased_article and they were all rejected for several reasons. --Enric Naval (talk) 13:00, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia should not put on airs - we're no better than medical journals. If something gets published there, we should cover it here, "MEDRS" be damned. Though we should, of course, be clear about the limited nature of such evidence. Contradictions are good, because they tell the reader where there is interesting reading to be done. We should not allow snap prejudice to get in our way when a little creativity quickly reveals we can't be so sure - for example, it is possible that Zicam is not the only manufacturer ever to slip an effective (and/or dangerous) remedy past the medical cartel by labeling it "homeopathic". Perhaps some of the studies that found an effect were positive for this reason, or for some other reason we haven't thought of. We are here to direct the reader to the sources he wants, not to herd him. Wnt (talk) 21:13, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

As a request : I think it is reasonable and fair as long there is a dispute on the neutrality of this article to be tagged - [pov-check] or something similar. Can an uninvolved admin add it if it is appropriate ? I tried to do it myself and it was reverted as vandalism (sic) --Motorola12 (talk) 18:36, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

In the last weeks, Motorola12 has been cherrypicking sources for positive statements on the scientific basis of homeopathy. He has failed to show anything. The balance of the article seems to reflect the balance in the sources and Motorola12 still has to show otherwise. --Enric Naval (talk) 13:00, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

This is the typical editing mode in the homeopathy article = instead of replying with reasonable and good faith arguments and reliable sources, one can try to spread inaccurate info about someone who happens to disagree with the current bias. In fact I advocated ONLY for the inclusion of all sources if they appear in a high quality sources and NOT to prove that Homeopathy works or not. What you are writing is really embarrassing - certainly not for me. --Motorola12 (talk) 23:37, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia has established standards for dealing with medical sources, see WP:MEDRS. There is no chance that, based on these standards and the current state of the research literature, Wikipedia will pretend there is a chance that homeopathy works anything like the way homeopaths think it should. The fact that most fans of homeopathy who see the skewed article try to push it way too far in the other direction is precisely why it's still in that sorry state. Hans Adler 11:30, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Additionally, we cannot possibly include "all sources if they appear in a high quality sources"; there simply isn't room in any article for this. We have to be to some extent selective. The inclusion/non-inclusion of particular sources should be discussed on the appropriate article's talk page. Brunton (talk) 12:52, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Isn't........ room? That;s funny Brunton. --Motorola12 (talk) 17:25, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Hans, I don 't care what homeopaths or fans of homeopathy want - I m NOT one of them and you should not reduce my views to this kind of stereotype. I never said that the article should report that homeopathy is proven - I did advocate for neutral reporting of the scientific literature. And please don;t tell me to see WP:MEDRS ; I have seen it and they don't say if there is no consensus in the literature just pretend that it exists one and report it. The article reports that all literature is in agreement that H= only placebo and this is a false. Some reviews found H= placebo , others depart from this view, others heavily criticize the point of view the article has adopted. These are published in high quality secondary sources and to say that there is no controversy or uncertainty among the researchers who have published on the evidence in Homeopathy is at least ludicrous. The real question is why the editors in an encyclopedia do NOT want the readers to know what generally the literature says about an X subject but they want to show only the part which they agree with But maybe this a rhetorical question. --Motorola12 (talk) 14:47, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

My point was that there is consensus among the highest-quality sources that homeopathy does not work as it claims to. Evaluating medical studies is extremely tricky because they involve only a small number of patients. Repeat the same study a few times, and you will get results that contradict each other. Then publish only those whose results you like. Pharmaceutical companies have writing services that anonymously write scientific articles which well known researchers only need to sign to get another publication on their CV. This, and even worse things (see Joachim Boldt for an example), are actually being done. That's why even meta-studies can be problematic. But in the case of homeopathy the basic question of whether it works as it claims to do is not open at all because (1) the idea is sheer lunacy once you look at the fine print so would need very strong evidence, (2) only few of the meta-studies indicate anything approaching efficacy, and (3) even Edzard Ernst, holder of the only chair specifically on alternative medicine and a former homeopath has come around to that position. [2] Hans Adler 21:30, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

PS: I just found this link in Ernst's article in the Guardian Science blog. That's a direction for which I actually advocated on the homeopathy talk page for some time (probably even before they started that study). The way they deal with their patients is a key point that homeopaths are typically doing better, and our article needs to reflect this fact and the possibility that this leads to real efficacy that cannot be measured in a double blind study because it's an improved placebo effect. That's one thing that has a plausible mechanism and has not been discredited yet. Hans Adler 21:42, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Hans your approach is very personal and I would be happy to reply but this is not the real question. The problem though is that wikipedia supposes to report the scientific consensus, if any, as it appears in high quality sources and NOT personal opinions about the sources and the subject. As you can see above the meta analyses conclusions differ significantly depending on the authors point of view and the current article reports only the part the editors agree with. This is the real issue and this is what WP:MEDRS. dictates and it is very clear. As a reader I would NOT trust an encyclopedia which reports only one sided information in order to make me believe that there is no real disagreement on the efficacy of homeopathy among the researchers who publish on the subject. Would you ? This is the value of the neutral point of view if the words and the principles we purport to defend have any real meaning.--Motorola12 (talk) 01:40, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Clearly we have a disagreement on whether there is a scientific consensus in the highest quality sources. That's the kind of dispute that must be settled by a consensus of editors, not an appeal to policies. And among editors there is a consensus on this, whether you agree with it or not. (For Wikipedia, consensus does not mean that everybody agrees, but that after appropriate discussion there is a robust majority that is unlikely to change without new data. Or something like that.) You are welcome to try swaying this consensus, but you are unlikely to be successful. There is also a consensus that the homeopathy article must insult homeopathy by cherry picking sources that contain strong words. This consensus is more likely to change because it is not in line with how things work elsewhere. (E.g. you won't find anything about 'negro presidents' [3] in the Barack Obama article, and quite correctly.) Hans Adler 10:10, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

The high quality sources I produced shows such as strong evidence of a scientific disagreement ( prominent authors object that H= only Placebo in the Lancet citing their work ) that it seems a breach in wikipedia policy to say it is not and decide to not report it - that's why I decided to ask Jimbo. I hope he is curious to investigate and comment. The evidence is here. --Motorola12 (talk) 17:54, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

MEDRS isn't actually written to be that terrible a policy, but it is vague, and in practice it is more often than not an overbearing policy used by overbearing people who act as if it is morally wrong to explain that there are two sides to an argument when they know that one is right and to give any credence to the other would put lives in danger; or to fight the horrors of "false hope", that terrible phenomenon that can result when laymen are aware of what cures scientists are trying to develop. No, editors should not take a good review article, say, "but wait, it's wrong, because I went out and found a primary source that appears to contradict it, so let's explain why I think it is wrong". But editors should explain the chief arguments of homeopathy supporters (and of course those of proponents of more plausible but unproven theories), even if they do not have the kind of scientific prominence as the opponents. This is because the purpose of the article is to let people understand the phenomenon and hear the arguments each side makes, not to decide for them whether it is good or bad. Wnt (talk) 20:13, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Development of Wikipedia and Projects

This is the first time I have hjad the pleasure of sending you a message. I hope you enjoy reading it. My first question is about the evolution of wikipedia and wikimedia. Why did all of the content not just stay centeralised on wikipedia rather than creating multiple other projects e.g. Wiktionary and Wikibooks. Why were more namespaces not created on the main wikipedia site to encompas the expanded infomation? I personally have neve looked back at when the first project was spawned after wikipedia was first created but would love you know your opinions regarding the above. All other comments are of course welcome. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 05:30, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

• Simple answer is scope of encyclopedia articles, full answer would take days: Before Wikipedia, there was Nupedia, and the scope was to provide text in the form of encyclopedia articles, rather than in the form of dictionary entries, booklets, or a map atlas, etc. Jimbo installed a wiki software package to collect text, in a collaborative manner, from multiple editors, and the article count grew faster by wiki-style editing than by submission to Nupedia's 7-level approval process. The word "Wikipedia" was a natural follow-on to "Nupedia". See article "Wikipedia" for more details, in particular the following paragraph:

Sister projects – Wikimedia
Wikipedia has also spawned several sister projects, which are also wikis run by the Wikimedia Foundation: "In Memoriam: September 11 Wiki," created in October 2002, detailed the September 11 attacks; Wiktionary, a dictionary project, was launched in December 2002; Wikiquote, a collection of quotations, created a week after Wikimedia launched, and Wikibooks, a collection of collaboratively written free textbooks and annotated texts. Wikimedia has since started a number of other projects, including: Wikimedia Commons, a site devoted to free-knowledge multimedia; Wikinews, for citizen journalism; and Wikiversity, a project for the creation of free learning materials and the provision of online learning activities. Of these, only Commons has had success comparable to that of Wikipedia. Another sister project of Wikipedia, Wikispecies, is a catalogue of species.

The separation of Wikimedia Commons allowed images to be shared among any of the other-language wikipedias. Now we have project Wikidata also. A fuller answer would take days to explain, so read each of the wikilinked topics (such as "Wikinews") for the history of each sister project. However, the simple answer is to note the scope of data format covered by each project, and how they were separated depending on limitations in the scope of each format. -Wikid77 (talk) 15:16, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Hi Addshore, good question. I suspect it was because creating extra wikis for Wiktionary and similar projects was easier to do in the short term than to create Wiktionary, Wikisource and so forth as extra namespaces in a wiki for each language. We are now paying the price for that in many ways including the lack of global watchlists and that it is much more effort to migrate a dictionary definition from Wikipedia to Wiktionary than it would be if they were separate namespaces in the same wiki. But chiefly we are hitting the problem that the wisdom of crowds is dissipated if you have an ever more subdivided crowd. There have been a couple of suggestions on meta and Strategy to migrate to a single wiki for each language, but they tend to run into the sand, partly because it would take a bit of consolidation as some editors have different userpages on different projects and some template names have been used for different templates, and partly because the existing system whereby each permutation of language and project gets its own wiki has acquired a certain inertia. ϢereSpielChequers 16:03, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

I am guessing you have read or know where to find these discussions and trying to have single wikis per language, Is there any chance you could throw me a link or two? ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 16:07, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

meta:Wikimedia.org was one of them, though that started as a specific suggestion to consolidate the multilingual wikis. ϢereSpielChequers 15:32, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

• Separated because plain wikilinks should connect same-format pages: The separation of dictionary entries into a separate wiki is due to the need for most plain wikilinks to link directly to some other dictionary entries, rather than booklets or articles. For example, in a dictionary, a simple wikilink to "vertigo" should not include a film by Alfred Hitchcock, or a link to "distribution" should not list articles about probability and film distribution, but instead both of those wikilinks should connect to the basic definitions of those words. Similarly, on Wikisource, a link to "Hamlet" should connect to source documents, not to a summary article about plot, reception and cultural influences, nor to an entry about pronouncing "ham·let". In general, the mainspace of a wiki should wikilink to pages of a similar data format, while the rare wikilinks can use namespace prefixes such as "Talk:" or "Help:" or "Template:" or "Module:" (Lua script) or "File:" etc. The separation of wikis allows the main namespace (of each) to contain pages of similar format and purpose, all interconnected by plain wikilinks of form "[[page]]". However, the use of a hypothetical "reset-default-namespace" attribute could cause all plain wikilinks to default to the current namespace, so once inside a "wikt:" namespace, then all wikilinked words would connect to wikt-namespace entries, and article wikilinks would then need prefixes, such as colon "[[:article]]" to link back to the mainspace, from a reset-default namespace. As I noted above, this discussion could take days to address all the issues as to why various wikis are separated from each other (why Wikivoyage?) and discuss the proposed or rejected features for default "pathnames" for wikilinks, and the ability to specify a default "path" sequence of lookup rules, where a wikilink might search into other namespaces until a match was found, but not confuse readers when uncreated articles show the dictionary definition instead, perhaps by a hypothetical change-namespace banner which could notify the reader, such as by, "No article found, showing dictionary entry [or talk-page] instead". Currently, millions of plain wikilinks connect only to the main namespace in each wiki, and a merge would require a massive change to wikilinks. There are many issues to consider. -Wikid77 (talk) 11:50/13:56, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

I think you have just hit the nail on the head in a number of ways. "all plain wikilinks to default to the current namespace, so once inside a "wikt:" namespace, then all wikilinked words would connect to wikt-namespace entries," is sort of what I had in my mind, but as you said going from where we are now to that system would be one massive change. I have spent a few days looking around and I do see good things developing such as the use of WikiDat, to start with for interwiki links but hopfully in the future allot more. Also developments on the Mediawiki side such as expanding on the current SUL and having a for of GlobaUser area hopfully including user pages talk pages watch list and preferences. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 23:44, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

The design would indeed be a little different, and there would be a substantial but bot based migration required. Similarly where there are templates which need renaming because the same name has been used for templates on two different wikis. But this is all straight forward stuff for bots to resolve. The difficult thing comes in merging userrights across wikis, especially when you have an admin on one who isn't an admin on others, or indeed whenyou have a valuable editor on one wiki who has been banned or blocked from another. ϢereSpielChequers 15:32, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

I have to admit I had not thought about the blocked user side of things, as for Userrights I am sure something could be changed so that sysops would only have 'jurisdiction' haha, I mean be able to perform their actions in the regular namespaces (File, template e.t.c) and one other language (en). I guess this could also work for blocks, you could be blocked from editing individual namespaces. Of course the more this is thought about the messier it gets! ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 16:22, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Yes, though the complications are mostly about the migration. Possibly the biggest problem is that some small communities would fear that wikipedia would swamp them in succh an integration. My belief is that it would be better to start this amongst smaller language communities, perhaps including ones that are otherwise struggling for viability and would welcome the larger community it would bring. EN Wikipedia and the other big projects should only be integrated once we've ironed out migration bugs and established that it works better than the current arrngements in practice as well as theory. ϢereSpielChequers 18:37, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

So you are saying the best idea would be to pick a small language which has a few instances of projects and then merge the projects together for that one language providing a central location for that one language. After this any problems would have been noticed and the process improved upon before moving to the next language up in the list? I guess this could also be performed as a test on a NON Live site to get a feel of the look and how it would work. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 23:48, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Your opinion on the inclusion of an image under Fair-Use on Execution of Rizana Nafeek

Dear Mr. Jimbo Wales,

I request your opinion whether we could include the image of the letter on the executed Rizana Nafeek's page since that has her finger thumb impression with the following excerpts on the letter;

“ In these circumstances, I under duress placed my signature on the written paper they gave to me. They took me to another place and asked a question, As I was virtually in a state with loss of memory and in fear and frightened mood, I had happened to tell them that I strangled the infant. In the name of Allah, I swear and aver that I never strangled the infant.

I hereby place my signature after having read this statement.

”

We had a lengthy discussion on the subject and on the images' talk page and other pages, but still I believe the image has some encyclopedic value.

This is my final attempt on this subject and request your opinion since you are the founder of this project and this project too could be instrumental for an another Arab Spring on unjustifiable executions.HudsonBreeze (talk) 12:23, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Er, "this project too could be instrumental for an another Arab Spring" ? If you're using this project as a platform from which to foment revolution then you're really not here for the right reasons, and should be blocked and forgotten swiftly, IMO. Tarc (talk) 13:27, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

The basic gist of this is that there's no way the letter is going to be PD. Anything from the letter that's important enough to be included in the article will be referenced in reliable sources. Ryan Vesey 13:42, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Of course it isn't going to be PD, but that wasn't the question asked. The question is whether or not it would quality as "fair use" - and clearly the answer is "yes". While I agree with Tarc that using Wikipedia to "foment revolution" isn't appropriate, I didn't take HudsonBreeze to be arguing against NPOV, but rather to be making the rather mundane but also rather true point that if Wikipedia presents the truth (and no one appears to be denying the factuality here) in a compelling way, then the truth can be a powerful force for good in the world. What I haven't seen yet (but I haven't been to the talk page discussion) is any valid arguments against inclusion. An illustration of the facts explained in the article and backed by reliable sources is a great way to improve the experience of the reader.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 18:00, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I read this one poorly. Prior to making this statement, HudsonBreeze had been arguing that it was PD at the deletion discussion and on the talk page of the file. Ryan Vesey 23:39, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I don't think the burden of evidence falls that way, though, does it? I had thought that if an image is not free, the onus is on the inclusionist-to-be to justify it. So the question to ask is "is an image of the piece of paper critical to the reader's understanding of the subject matter?" Obviously the event itself, that a confession was coerced/forced by authorities, is central to the narrative. But do we need to see the written word on the page to understand what happened? Tarc (talk) 18:13, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Similarly to Ryan, Tarc et al., I'm not sure how this image meets the non-free content criteria, particularly criterion #8. I understand that it'd be nice to have in the article, and if it was a free image (it was originally tagged public domain, and arguments were put forward at the FfD to that effect), I would support having the image. But I can't really say that "its omission would be detrimental to [the reader's] understanding" of the topic; its contents can be summarized effectively by text, since it in itself is just text. Points have been made that looking at the handwriting, one might be able to hazard guesses about her emotional state, education, etc., but those guesses would be better made in the text of the article, with reliable sources backing them (where they cease to become guesses). Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 18:45, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

It certainly meets [[WP:COMMONSENSE]], which trumps the rote application of NFCC via WP:IAR. I mean really, how does it serve the mission of Wikipedia or the interests of its readers or the public to exclude this image even if that were the letter of the policy / guideline? We're here to create a free encyclopedia, and by all rational standards that photo is free. It may be freely copied for any purpose without fear of litigation, or stepping on anybody's toes. The girl either owned the copyright or not as of the moment of the letter's creation, and it either got inherited by her parents or more likely escheated to the state, all depending on the copyright and inheritance laws of Saudi Arabia (!). Do you really thing the girl's parents or the government of Saudi Arabia are going to claim infringement here? - Wikidemon (talk) 20:23, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I disagree strongly with Writ on this. Most images of people places etc, can be excluded and not be detrimental to [the reader's] understanding of the subject with a desription in prose. A written document being used under Fair Use has more encyclopedic value than a simple picture of the person themselves and cannot be replaced with a description without losing huge amounts of information or doing it in a manner that will not do it justice. I have always hated the way criterion #8 was written. Sounds like an argument can be made against any image with that.--Amadscientist (talk) 20:32, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

1. 8 sucks, I've had plenty of images I'd like to include not be allowed due to #8, but that doesn't mean we can ignore it. Ryan Vesey 20:43, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I don't think WP:IAR applies to copyright questions. That's not something you can just "ignore all rules" on, since it's not really up to you.Volunteer Marek 20:34, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I have yet to see a rational explanation of how a picture of this hand-written document is of any importance to the article. I'd wager that 99.9% of the readers are unable to read it, so it isn't being used to convey actual information. Tarc (talk) 20:35, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Could you explain your reasoning to exclude it?--Amadscientist (talk) 20:37, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Have you considered that this is the english Wikipedia and we want to include a photograph of a letter written in Tamil? Wouldn't a much better solution be to include a link to an English translation of the letter in the external links? Ryan Vesey 20:43, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

This is the English wikipedia? Could have foold me. Wow. Maybe we should link to the English version of File:MagrittePipe.jpg as well? - Wikidemon (talk) 21:43, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Just being the English Wikipedia does not mean we exclude non english images. LOL! Even our policy states that we can use non English sources when no other source of equal validity exists. You cannot sub out a translation of the original document and that is what this is. An original document. It has encyclopedic value for that reason alone (if not more). This image cannot be replaced by a free image. This image has direct context to the article's subject. Regardless of the image being written in another language, does not mean it does not have encyclopedic use on the English Wikipedia. There are no copyright issues when Fair Use is used properly and the last part of criteria 8 is a Wikipedia policy and guideline, it is not a part of Fair Use case law. There really is no actual Fair Use law. Fair Use pertains to a number of decisions not an actual current US copyright law. Fair Use allows images as part of critical commentary. Why wouldn't we include the image and a link to a translation?--Amadscientist (talk) 21:54, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Well, first of all, my purely personal opinion is that I don't want to mess around with copyright, so I don't think there's really any circumstance where I'd ignore the copyright rules. (I'm completely boring about rules, it's true.) Second, you're right about nobody claiming infringement in practice of course; they have more important things to worry about than what we do here, and probably wouldn't be able to file a claim even if they wanted to. But I could see them objecting to the distribution of their daughter's letter in a book made for profit. I can't find the links right now, but there are people scraping Wikipedia and selling the articles as books on Amazon, which is permitted by our license. I wish I could find the links, so that I could see what they do with the fair-use material; they might take it out, I don't know. But I could see the copyright holders--whether it's her parents or the government, really--objecting to that. I always thought that was kind of the spirit of the NFCC, that we try to use non-free content as little as possible, and this is in accord with that spirit because, as much as we'd like to have the image, it's not necessary to the article. Useful, definitely, but not necessary. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 20:50, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

IAR does not mean circumventing rules or violating copyright, it means using your head to reach the right result instead of following rules where they don't apply. Jimbo was being playful and idiosyncratic, or perhaps pedagogical, by phrasing it that way. He could have been more legalistic about it and said something like "when interpreting what any rule means or whether it applies to a given situation, the results of various interpretations should be measured against those of other rules and principals, and where there is a contradiction the most sensible outcome should apply." I'm kinda sorry I brought this up, because people's understanding of IAR is quite a tangent. - Wikidemon (talk) 21:40, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Sure, I totally agree with you, but let me just point out this one thing: sometimes the right result isn't the result that we like best. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 21:50, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

As in this case. I don't like that image and I'm not sure I would want it in the encyclopedia. I haven't edited that subject area and have little interest in it. My comments are mostly about Wikipedia's copyright policy and how it's applied, and sometimes misapplied. - Wikidemon (talk) 21:59, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

You don't need reasons to exclude it, under the foundations mission statement you need reasons to include it that comply with the fair use statement. WP:IAR never applies to copyright issues , Wiki foundation position on copyright is a Wikipedia:Legal_policies position - see it here http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution:Licensing_policy - Wikipedia:Non-free_content - to quote - Non-free content can be used on Wikipedia in certain cases (for example, in some situations where acquiring a freely licensed image for a particular subject is not possible), but only within the United States legal doctrine of fair use, and in accordance with Wikipedia's own non-free content criteria as set out below. The use of non-free content on Wikipedia is therefore subject to purposely stricter standards than those laid down in U.S. copyright law. - if you want to use the pic you should make a case for it using a rationale that allows usage via the content guidelines outlined under Wikipedia:Non-free_content - Youreallycan 21:04, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Of course you need a reason for removing an image. If you just removed one and said "I don't have a reason for removing it", it would be quickly replaced. Your reason would be that it fails copyright policy, and the reason to keep it would be that it does not. The rule that IAR does not apply to copyright situations can also be safely ignored here, because this image is clearly not a copyright problem for the encyclopedia. I'm well aware of the Foundation's statement and the whole history of the policy, and it was not intended to cover this situation. You probably could make a fine case for the image under NFCC but it's a moot angels dancing on pinheads exercise. All the arguments I see for excluding the image are arguments for following the rules just for the sake of following the rules, I haven't heard a single argument that removing the image actually serves Wikipedia's mission. - Wikidemon (talk) 21:30, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

"Following the rules" is the reason, and it's not a bad one when it comes to copyright issues. We have NFCC for a reason; it's not "we can use a non-free image when it meets NFCC or alternately we can just ignore NFCC and use it if we really want to." If you think that the image is essential to the article, then that's fine, and the image meets NFCC, and there's no problem. You should start (or rather, continue, you've already started it) talking about why it's essential, and give up the "ignore NFCC" angle. If you don't think it's essential, then there's no good reason for ignoring NFCC and including it anway. Put another way, NFCC already is our IAR response to our policy of only using freely-licensed content, in a way; it's just that it has now been codified. So, yeah, that's my 2 cents. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 21:43, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm just after the correct result, and that's what I'm doing by pointing out that NFCC is somewhat beside the point. Not ignoring it at all, saying it doesn't reasonably apply here. It definitely doesn't apply on Jimbo's talk page, which has become a community forum of sorts for meta-talk about Wikipedia. If we want to have a deletion discussion there's a page for that. I won't say there's anything particularly wrong with following rules for their own sake, that's what keeps the trains on time in some parts. But there's also nothing wrong with looking beyond the rules to what they mean, that's what got the trains (and Wikipedia) built in the first place. Wikidemon (talk) 21:56, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I really don't understand Writkeeper's argument. The image, in this case does apear to be essential in an understanding of the subject. We do not use only free images so the point is moot. As long as it stands up to NFCC (which it does) then it can be included. This case is far clearer than most. Cartoon characters with a true registered copyright have more wiggle room with editors than a controversial political document. Hilarious. At least the Wonder Woman article has lots of pretty pictures. Too bad its a horrible missuse of our Fair Use policy...but then it seems NFCC IS being ignored there.--Amadscientist (talk) 22:01, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

My point is that it's just text. We can describe pretty accurately what is in the text without having to show it. It's much easier to provide a summary of a text without needing reproducing it than it is to generate a mental picture of an image (like Wonder Woman, I guess) with words. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, which is why we would have an image of Wonder Woman in that article. (Fair warning: I haven't actually read that article.) But in this case, the picture is still just words, so I don't really see how not having it would significantly detract from the reader's understanding of what's going on, especially since the letter is not directly the subject of the article. If it was, then that would probably be a different story. But it isn't an article about the letter she wrote, it's an article about the whole situation, and given that, I'm just not sure that including a picture of a written letter adds much to the understanding of the events in the article. The relative importance of the letter in this image in Wonder Woman is neither in doubt nor the point. I just don't see how not including a picture of words on a page, in an article that could easily summarize the contents of the letter without needing the picture, would detract from a reader's understanding of the execution and what happened. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 22:13, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I actually get where you are coming from on this. I just disagree strongly. Fair use, in this case, is clearly applicable. What you are arguing is the use of an image of text that you cannot read means that it has no value or less value. That seems to mean that we, as English speaking and reading users of Wikipedia, are limited in our understanding of the situations being summarized if they are not clearly all English. No. That is shortsighted. The document has direct context to the subject. It contains more information as an image then just text and is the document used by this government. Regardless of its language it has as much context and value as any document, regardless of the written language.--Amadscientist (talk) 22:22, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Well, no, I haven't argued anywhere about whether or not it's acceptable because it's not in English. I think Ryan brought that up, but it's a non-issue to me; I'd say the same were it in English. It's just that it's not illustrating anything, since it's just text. A freely-made summary would, in my mind, serve just as well, because I don't really see the value in looking at a picture of the original document here. I just don't see what it offers the article in terms of new information or understanding.

All that aside, though, this is something upon which reasonable people can differ, so the FfD will take its course, and if it's decided to be kept, well, that's totally fine. My only objection is that I don't think a fair-use claim on it is valid according to NFCC; if everyone thinks that it is valid under fair use, well, nothing wrong with that. :) Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 22:30, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I don't see what it being "just" text has to do with the fair use issue. Some have argued that the actual writing gives some understanding into the woman's state of mind or education. I don't necessarily agree with this, so I can understand others' disagreement. But, the text itself is relevant to understanding the issue. So in order to get equal understanding of the issue without the image, it would be necessary to copy the text, not just summarize it. But copying the text would be subject to the same fair use issues as the image. So whether the image is "just" text or not, we have thesame fair use issue. Rlendog (talk) 22:11, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

• Discussions like this only reinforce the reason why I am so disdainful and dismissive of image deletion discussions; the area is simply infested with "I like it" and other insipid rationales. One editor keeps saying that it "appears to be essential in an understanding of the subject" without any rational explanation of how. Another editor is "just after the correct result", meaning that he has already made him his mind that the image should be in the article and looks to back-fill the argument to support that conclusion. I'm not the learned man that some are around here, but I'm pretty sure that is a basic logical fallacy. Tarc (talk) 22:26, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I have to agree that little effort is being made on my part to give a rationale, but mainly becuase this is not my argument. I just happened to see the discussion. But I should explain why I feel it is essential. This is the document that she is signing to claim she was coerced into a confession. It has relevance to the subject which is the execution of the person the letter was written by. Kurt Cobain's supposed suicide letter is less legible and is in English and is on the BLP of the subject [4]. This is clearly a valid inclusion due to the controversy, even if we can't read it. The same applies to the Nafeek letter.--Amadscientist (talk) 22:48, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

And for my part, I disdain nonfree content issues because it's infested with misguided zealots with a persecution complex who know nothing of copyright law or the free content movement, and think they're on a thankless drone mission to spread the word of the Foundation, often flanked by administrators and unapproved bots, by eradicating all traces of human-created images and other profane media, which they scorn as unnecessary "decoration", from a text-only encyclopedia. Present company excluded of course, I enjoy working with Tarc in other ignoramus-invested quarters of the encyclopedia :) - Wikidemon (talk) 23:10, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

BTW, nice ad hominem. When you throw WP:ILIKEIT accusations around, the last refuge of the editor who can't come up with a substantive rebuttal, it could be useful to check whether your target does in fact like it and seek that result. Check my comments above. I have no dog in this race, as they say. My comment about the correct result is exactly that. I didn't choose an outcome before reasoning through things, I looked at the our copyright policy and why we have it, and reached an outcome that it is simply not meant to exclude historically important noncommercial documents like this from the purview of the encyclopedia. - Wikidemon (talk) 23:16, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

The foundations position is that free content is what it is all about - non free is to be avoided as much as possible - Is this writing cited in WP:RS ? if it is then use them to comment about it in a free way - avoid the worthless addition of non free content - because it looks pretty - Youreallycan 23:30, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Uhm, no. Absolutely not. If the foundation felt the way you just commented then we would not be able to use non free content. Did everyone already forget why we had a blackout last year? If the foundation really felt this way we would not have had such a demonstration. Wikipedia relies heavily on Fair Use. Images and text. When used within our policy this is more than acceptable, it is standard practice. Yes, we should be using free content as much as possible but we have never abandoned the use of nonfree content. I have no idea what you are stating in regards to WP:RS.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:48, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Why isn't it acceptable to provide a link to an English version of the note and describe any important aspects of the note that are referenced in reliable sources in text? Ryan Vesey 23:51, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

We can provide a translation without an off wiki link, but any discussion of the letter itself would require secondary sourcing to verify the claims.--Amadscientist (talk) 00:05, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

I was through all this with File:Innocence of Muslims.png, which was one frame from an Egyptian TV broadcast on YouTube that was hosted in-frame by the New York Times presumably without the then-unknown filmmaker's permission. After endless arguments, it was deleted as "not in use", simply by sufficiently insistent removals. But then again, for that matter, it remains absolutely impermissible (despite repeated attempts) for Innocence of Muslims to link in any way to Ya`fūr, period, or vice versa, despite the animal being named in the film and numerous reports - or indeed, for the article to contain any discussion of the film's content outside the narrow permitted dialogue of describing it as bad, puerile, racist, and detailing the full criminal history of the author. Such is NPOV on Wikipedia. It simply is not worth the time to try to argue an NFCC with a political opposition, because there are an unlimited number of invalid objections. If you care enough to write about such things, write your own article, all rights reserved. Wnt (talk) 05:34, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Ryan Vesey should not have commented here that - "She either killed a kid or allowed one to die in her care". Then all his arguments quoting various policies are based on ill-motivation on the subject.

It was revealed that the Dawdami police failed to take the dead infant for a postmortem to determine for certain the cause of its death. And we are not the God to prevent the death when someone in our care. Then many thousands of doctors are at this time either lost their jobs or executed.123.231.89.36 (talk) 13:46, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Jimbo, please close this thread. It is starting to become an Argumentum ad Jimbonem issue. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 02:01, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

I have no idea what you mean by Argumentum ad Jimbonem. Was someone misquoting Jimbo?--Amadscientist (talk) 07:52, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

User:Stefan2, User:Future Perfect at Sunrise and User:Writ Keeper voted Delete at Rizana's Image Deletion, now deleting important analysis under Copy-Vio. The content was not deleted for more than 4 Hours but after my response, it was deleted immediately by User:Writ Keeper within 2 Minutes. User:Stefan2 and User:Future Perfect at Sunrise are following him to revert once his Two reverts are over removing the content as Copy-vio and User:Future Perfect at Sunrise has warned me for Edit War, possibly to use his Admin tool to block me.61.245.165.22 (talk) 18:45, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Because it is, in fact, a copyright violation; unlike the image, which I'll be the first to admit has some subjectivity and room for interpretation in it, the material you copied was unambiguously a copyright violation, which is a problem no matter what namespace it's posted in. The link to the article is still there, so I'm not even sure what you're worried about; anyone can still read it. You just need to refrain from copying and pasting the article into Wikipedia.Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 19:13, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Copyright violation may be an issue, but the timing of your revert as I mentioned above raises doubts on your credibility and on others too.61.245.165.22 (talk) 19:37, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry about that, but it's entirely coincidental; I removed it when I saw it. I had no nefarious intent, and indeed, I'm not sure what the point would been if I had; the link to the article you were using is still there, so it's not like your point is made any less strongly. (An argument could be made that it's better for you not to copy and paste such a long article into your argument regardless of copyright, since making such a long post can cause people to not read it.) Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 20:21, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Hello Jimbo

I've signed your guestbook and trough that I know you. But I'm curious about something. And my question is Did you became administrator in normal way? I mean did you became admin like others in RFA? Please answer me. And I would like to work with you in future. --Pratyya ^(Hello!) 15:25, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Jimbo was an admin before our current "normal way" was invented - he was a founder of the site! Actually, there are still a few people with admin rights who became admins back in the days when the process to become an admin was "email Jimbo and ask". For example, one current admin, User:Lee Daniel Crocker, requested adminship via this email. Take a look at some early Wikipedia admin history at User:NoSeptember/Early admins (20 Sept 2002). – Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 17:24, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Jimbo should get to appoint Admins, sorta like how the British monarch gets to appoint people to the House of Lords. NickCT (talk) 16:33, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Except she doesn't really - she just rubber-stamps the list she's given by the government. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:27, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Right. Me getting involved in appointing admins would not speed up the process, but slow it down, unless we transferred actual decision-making power to me, which is not a good idea for a variety of reasons.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 20:29, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Mr. Wales is invariably modest. Ah well.... I guess I'm on a one man campaign to have Jimbo recognized as king of WP. NickCT (talk) 06:34, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

We could go all ancient Roman and raise him to the level of god.....but I don't think he'd approve of that. Being a deity is much harder work...miracles can take a lot out of you.--Amadscientist (talk) 08:46, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. Raising Jimbo to deity status might be a bit too much. NickCT (talk) 06:08, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

OK. No goat sacrifice then.--Amadscientist (talk) 07:53, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Really? I'd better strike that off my to-do list. I've also been elbows-deep in chicken entrails since moon-up trying to find the best way to resolve a current ANI dispute. Hmmph. (✉→BWilkins←✎) 10:40, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

No amount of animal sacrifice will bring peace to ANI. Not even the hand of Jimbo can act to quell the turmoil. NickCT (talk) 11:58, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Oh....for AN/I you don't sacrifice a chicken. How silly. Everyone knows that for AN/I you sacrifice two badgers and a squirrel.--Amadscientist (talk) 04:57, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Where is help for editors if the majority of editors is somewhat biased?

Sounds arrogant, but is mainly not for me, but other editors. Let me explain:

A strong point of Wikipedia is the diversity of opinions related to an article/statement. Normally this results in an overall acceptable message. IMHO you had this in mind when you created Wikipedia, and by the way thank you for that.

But in those many years i have been editing Wikipedia i found cases, where this is malfunctioning: When the majority of editors here has some not fully realistic opinion about a topic and there are much less editors stating the contrary: I currently given up correcting some opinions about article messages relating for example to religions or countries: A revert of hours of writing neutral text can be done in seconds, and at any time: Wasting mine.

Currently facing some issues [5] on technology (aircraft, mainly Boeing 787 Dreamliner) articles. Neutral help would be welcome.

Its difficult to improve the situation in general, for editors with other (for example religious) believes, other countries related statements and else, but imho it will be worthful. I am thinking about an idea of templates:

• An inline template: Template:Minority statement or so. Should direct to a page which lists min. 2 requirements: Editors must state on the article talk page, why they think they are a minority, and second: Give the facts. Somehow trying to motivate others to dig deeper for reasons and probably change, which is often not preferred.

Also there are Dispute resolution noticeboard or something, this does often not really help: A majority often reverts a minority into oblivion or to ANI, before something like that could be started. IMHO Wikipedia articles would loose some of the (already low, i like Wikipedia) remaining bias. But: I am not sure if it will work.

• An additional template for the ANI page, like: "This user asks that his case is analyzed deeply to understand his reasons." Probably a variant for the user-talk page, if he got blocked without having any chance to answer, as i got lately, and already 2 times for edit war: My reason: WP:Ignore all rules.

The templates are just my 2 cents, a draft, and i am not sure if it will work. Some comments? Thank you very much in advance. Tagremover (talk) 14:26, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

• Minority viewpoints tend to get trampled but check wp:VPIL: There would need to be a higher-level empowerment to protect minority viewpoints, as in courtroom proceedings, where an official "minority report" would get filed for future consideration, rather than laughed away as the hounded group of "losers" would be driven away to find support somewhere else. Meanwhile, Jimbo is expecting a busy week, but might offer some suggestions later. The general concept, to request deeper analysis of minority opinions, sounds like a good idea, to perhaps "champion" a little-noticed viewpoint to become a future breakthrough in overall understanding. Finding a wp:Mentor might be a possible avenue to seek support. In general, the topic of minority-viewpoint analysis could be discussed at the wp:VPIL lab [the WP:Village pump (idea lab)], where other editors might have already made some progress to support that approach. -Wikid77 (talk) 22:11, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

This certainly IS a problem, and a widespread one, and it goes beyond content determination. If the tyrannical majority in a walled-garden venue is nasty and wiki-savvy, the wiki-system/environment makes it too easy to conduct gang-warfare against the person to silence them and also use their majority in that venue to override policies and guidelines. More protection mechanisms are needed, but they shouldn't be to blindly protect a minority viewpoint just because it is minority....instead they should assure that a good process is used to resolve the dispute instead of the current situation where the majority in that little venue can use such to over-ride policies, guidelines and sound arguments. One element of the answer is to simply identify & recognize the problem which would ten t help the situation. North8000 (talk) 22:29, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

The essay WP:CRUSH has some bearing on the issues discussed above. Deicas (talk) 07:31, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Thanks to all for your comments. I didn´t noticed wp:VPIL, thanks, but: New ideas seem to disappear there after a few weeks, probably before they got appropriate notice. Probably the page should include for example 200 ideas, but be split in several pages like Categories, with the newest entries first. Of course this is an idea for the wp:VPIL (talk?) page. Haven´t read WP:CRUSH due to an edit conflict, will do so: Interesting.

Regarding my proposal of Template:Minority statement inline tags, i forgotten the most important thing: It should give some clearly, but clearly limited power for the minority. Summary:

• It should be seen as disruptive for normal users to remove especially the protected, related statement from the article, if NOT ALL requirements were fulfilled:

1.The editor using minority rights must previously have talked clearly (in the talk page) about his proposed statement or concerns, and minimum several times detailed/answered his reasons and others comments or tried to if ignored.

2.The editor must have tried minimum once to establish his statement in the article (or including Wikipedia pages?) and got reverted/removed: Active editors are meant.

3.The editor must previously posted on the related talk page:

1. his reasons, why he thinks he is a minority or the article is related to the protected statement biased. If these are OBVIOUSLY wrong or by an informal voting rejected: No protection. Probably there should be an appropriate minimum time to discuss: 3 days?
2. reasons about the protected statement, including facts or references, if needed. If these are OBVIOUSLY wrong or by an informal voting rejected, in a hopefully constructive, detailed discussion: No protection. Probably there should be an appropriate minimum time to discuss: 3 days?

4.It should be CLEARLY or mainly no personal attack, vandalism or else.

This tag and the related statement/change could be removed anytime by admins not involved in this conflict. And:

• This quite high protection should be protected for abuse: It should be regarded as disruptive, if the editor used the tag knowingly or clearly wrong, included repeated placement: Could be placed only once per user and all related article statements.
• The Template:Minority statement inline tag should place two links, somehow similar to the tag: First an information page listing also all requirements, and second a link to the related talk page, which could be directed to the related subsection in this probably heavily discussed article.

Additionally an ANI tag, because editors are probably taken to ANI very quickly, like: "This user asks that his case is analyzed deeply to understand his reasons." Abuse should be only punished in very clear cases. Users should be informed about the existence of this tag at the top of ANI.

A third tag for the user talk page, if the user got blocked without being heard or just thinks the decision needs to be removed requiring a much deeper analysis. Abuse shouldn´t be punished: its his own user talk page.

As usual, all tags should add a (hidden) category. Sockpuppets imho mostly have a WP:POINT or WP:AGENDA and identify themselves hereby quickly.

Some details, summarized. The word: "Minority statement" is just a proposal, important is its function. Template:Protected statement is probably better. Again, Thanks. Tagremover (talk) 09:50, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

WT:RFA#New RfC

Just a pointer. - Dank (push to talk) 21:34, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Why not make everyone admins. That would solve all our problems. :D Of it wold create many more. Mwhahaha >D—cyberpower ^Chat_Online 23:20, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

:). No one has responded I have only two comments so far (both supports) at WT:RFA (but everything that even smells like an RfC usually gets enough opposition to snow-close it, so the lack of response is promising). I'd like to write a news item on this for the Signpost, but I don't want to say "Jimmy said so-and-so a month ago" ... do you have any update for me before I write my story, Jimmy? - Dank (push to talk) 02:02, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

Kitty wants to help edit your page!

Sannybear (talk) 06:00, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Kerry & Kay Danes

As you asked about information on this topic, you might be interested in this Jimbo http://issuu.com/tn21/docs/briefing

Maybe a good look at some of the wiki issues mentioned in that might document be a good idea. 158.255.208.121 (talk) 21:40, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Rolling Ball

Hello,

I have created a new page called WP:Rolling Ball. It shall be a friendly place where experienced as well as new editors can freely discuss topics on Wiki. Everyone is invited and welcome to join the Group. You presence shall also be much appreciated.

You may join by adding your name to the list here. We are currently trying to hold all discussions on the Hang Out Zone. We would love to have some feedback from you at the talk page. Should you join, please also watchlist/keep an eye on the Hang Out Zone, so you can be aware of all the discussions that are going on.

Cheers, TheOriginalSoni (talk) 04:32, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

1,000,000 articles on it:wiki!

Good morning Jimbo! Italian Wikipedia reaches one million articles today, come party with us and leave here a message to support our community! Have a nice day! :-) --Patafisik (talk) 08:49, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

A Norwegian commando and purge from google search results

The topic about commando Bjørn Sagvolden has previously been deleted from Norwegian wikipedia, alongside the topic of Ben Griffin (British Army soldier). Maybe we should have another try at the first topic.

(The Norwegian article about Ben Griffin was repeatedly deleted until the last round of deletion discussions, which was the first time that a Norwegian administrator found Griffin notable. (Administrators Jebland and Keanu were a minority of (two) administrators against the vote of five administrators in the aggregate discussion.

Maybe it is enough to say that Norwegian wikipedia has their practices--and few if any policies regarding soldier biographies--and we have ours. (Everyone of Norway's dead soldiers in Afghanistan each have their article in Norwegian, in addition to their mention on this wiki memorial wall. Our wikipedia does things differently. Perhaps the Norwegian site's administrators are unsympathetic to soldiers who criticize NATO (i.e. Griffin) and soldiers who sue Norway (i.e. Sagvolden).

Dagbladets 2010 article about Sagvolden's medical record and doctor, has apparently been "filtered out" from google search results. So until someone at google does an un-snafu, one will need this URL [6] or a link from a source without "filtering" similar to Google's.

Our article about the U.S. soldier and his process to abtain a copy of his medical records from military service, was kept after its deletion discussion. Maybe that type of notability is part of the notability of Bjorn Sagvolden.

He was a pioneer of special operating force FSK (Forsvarets Spesialkommando). (He was headhunted[7] to the force in 1982, two years before the force became operational in 1984[8].)

As a plaintiff he lost a courtcase against the Ministry of Defence in 2009.

A 13 November 2009 article in Dagbladet said that a letter from the ministry (dated 25 August 2009) said that regarding his military medical records, the ministry could not locate those "because doctor [Svein] Eidsvik has died, therefore the ministry can not examine the matter any further". In the article the doctor's wife stated that the doctor was alive and well [9]. The article quoted Sagvolden, "I interpret the letter as visible evidence that the ministry did not want Eidsvik to witness in my lawsuit (against the ministry). And they are trying to keep me away from the truth by claiming that the key witness and diving mentor [https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svein_Eidsvik Svein Eidsvik] is dead".

This article on French wikipedia has mentioned Sagvolden, with references since 2011. Maybe that article needs to hide revisions at the same rate that we hide revisions in ouR article. I am quite certain that french wikipedia will be purged before this week has passed.

--Barnstar candidate school (talk) 09:32, 22 January 2013 (UTC)