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James, can you say what the $250,000 grant is for that Knowledge Diffusion Inc (operating as Osmosis) received in January 2017 in relation to WikiProject Medicine? The grant was from the Hewlett Foundation: "In collaboration with WikiProject Medicine and the UCSF-UCB Joint Masters Program, Osmosis will undertake a 12-month pilot project to help medical school faculty and students integrate OER [open educational resources] into their curriculum through a scalable approach combining technology and credit-bearing electives."
User:SlimVirgin part of it is to support this class at UCSF. Amin Azzam has received some funding for this work which includes out reach to other medical schools regarding the editing of Wikipedia. Wiki Project Med Foundation is supporting the teaching of these classes and have been since 2013. Wiki Project Med Foundation however is not receiving any money, nor am I. There was a write up about this class in the NYTs back in 2013 when it started.[1]
We are also hoping that this will support a "teaching assistant" and the development of a "userscript" to guide medical students who are editing Wikipedia. Will need to look at this once / if the dust settles.
Thanks for the information. I can't see what Osmosis has to do with the student editing mentioned by the NYT. [2]
Knowledge Diffusion Inc, operating as Osmosis, received $150,000 in 2014 from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation "to help Osmosis make its platform accessible to all clinical students", [3] and I believe this led to the creation of the videos for those students; $250,000 in January 2017 from the Hewlett Foundation (touting their relationship with WikiProject Medicine); [4] $100,000 from TEDCO in December 2017 (again the relationship with Wikipedia is mentioned); [5] investment from Coverys, the insurance provider, in January 2018 (the relationship mentioned again); [6] and now they're applying for $100,000 from the Wikimedia Foundation (again mentioning WikiProject Medicine). [7]
That's $600,000 plus an unknown amount from Coverys, much or all of it connected to or mentioning WikiProject Medicine or Wiki Project Med Foundation. Which Wikipedians are involved in this? SarahSV(talk)02:31, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The "credit-bearing electives" refers to the elective for medical students at UCSF. The prof who leads efforts at UCSF has the folks from Osmosis give a talk during his Wikipedia editing class. He was interested in promoting Wikipedia editing to other schools so joined Osmosis on a grant application to help support these efforts.
Wiki Project Med Foundation through myself and others were collaborating with both Amin at UCSF and folks at Osmosis on the class. You can see the nine discussions about these efforts over the last few years on the WTMED pages.
It is additionally described in the reports from WPMEDF in both 2016 and 2017. They have also build us a video to help teach people how to edit Wikipedia's medical content.[8]
These organizations are also funding the creation of the videos we were using of course.
Can you say more about it, please? How did they come to ask for a grant from an organization that has been giving them free advertising space? Look at their LinkedIn: "Osmosis aims to provide your future clinicians the best education so that they can provide you the best care. Our popular videos are featured on Wikipedia, YouTube, Medscape/WebMD, the Washington Post, and many other outlets ..." This is the kind of thing you normally can't stand. Something about it being medicine, video, and people you've come to know has blinded you to the PR aspect of it. SarahSV(talk)17:34, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The primary issue I have with COI is when the organization creating the content has a COI with respect to the subject matter in question. I do not generally have issues with the NIH using NIH sources, or Cochrane using Cochrane sources, or the WHO using WHO sources.
Osmosis as I have said is primarily supported by grants. My initial understanding was that they were working to become an NGO. That they have not at this point is a little frustrating.
As the videos per the ongoing RfC are in all likely going to be removed this collaboration will be ending and the chance of them being considered for funding will decrease to around zero.
I hope we can look into that as well, because by driving almost exclusively NIH sources into the leads of articles (including FAs, which had superior sourcing before you re-did them all to NIH), the quality of those articles has been driven down. Not only that, there is no reason to have Wikipedia article leads which essentially do nothing more than repeat what the NIH sources have-- that demotes the very strength that Wikipedia provides. Sorry this is off-topic, but I hope it is something we will discuss in the future. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:48, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Agree that is a separate issue. Are you saying you plan to push for not allowing the use of the NIH/CDC as a source? I have always taken them to be positions of national expert bodies. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:58, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
James, can you say what you meant by "Other than telling them that there is a grant process, no"? Are you saying you advised them to apply for a grant from the WMF, and if yes, can you elaborate, please? SarahSV(talk)17:53, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Sure. They asked "does the WMF provide funding" and I said yes they do here is a link to the funding process page on meta. I have had zero roll in the draft of their application and in fact the link you provided above was the first time I had seen it. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:58, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, thank you for explaining. It just seems utterly bizarre that (a) we give them free advertising by placing their videos in hundreds of articles topped and tailed by their company logo and URL, then (b) we're asked to give them $100,000, when it should be them giving us money, and considerably more than $100,000. SarahSV(talk)18:09, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I do not believe they are making any profit. None of the links within the videos here are clickable. I consider the videos a useful resource. That they were willing to use an open license is fairly amazing. Expecially given that the Khan Academy and most other NGOs are not willing to use open licenses. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:04, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Unless they've opened up their accounts to you, you can't know whether they're making a profit, but there's no reason to assume that they don't intend to, and given that the CEO has an MBA from Harvard Business School, I'm going to assume that he knows what he's doing. Wikipedia was a platform that might help them to grow; if they hadn't used an open licence, you wouldn't have been able to give them the space.
Would you please explain how it came about? The short replies mean I keep having to ask more questions. Jake was there in his WMF capacity (diff). SarahSV(talk)19:34, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
User:SlimVirgin I do not fully remember the step by step details of how this all came together. A few details:
I have liked the work of the Khan Academy for years. I randomly reached out to them to suggest collaborating back at least as far as 2013.
This is how I meet Rishi who was leading the efforts at Khan to create medical videos. Over a number of meetings I convinced him to convince the organization to do a trial of releasing three videos for use on Wikipedia which occurred in early 2015 and which you can see here.
After those three there was no further interest from Khan in releasing more videos under an open license. Khan also decided to narrow their work to K to 12 and thus dropped medical information.
Rishi was than picked up by a newly formed group, Osmosis to continue doing what he was previously working on at Khan. This new group was willing to use an open license which I thought was great. Thus we see the videos uploaded by this accountDoc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:49, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Looking back at old emails. Rishi reach out to both myself and WMF staff in 2015 which is what brought them into a meeting.
The only folks I have really collaborated with were on the content project side of things, this being Rishi and Kyle. Did not interact to any degree with others within the organization. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:59, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Can you tell us about that meeting, e.g. where it took place and who attended? (This is re: "Rishi reach out to both myself and WMF staff in 2015 which is what brought them into a meeting.") SarahSV(talk)15:51, 30 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
James, you've always presented yourself as strong on transparency. During the search-engine issue, you were highly critical of people who were releasing bits and pieces of information but who avoided telling the whole story at once. Please do now what you wanted them to do then, and tell us everything that happened. SarahSV(talk)20:05, 30 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
You are by now grave dancing and just kicking and your actions here are coming across very like a hostile deposition-taking or interrogation. This is not like the Knowledge Engine, which was a major direction the WMF were thinking of taking our entire movement in.
WPMED has lots of informal collaborations as Doc James already mentioned in this exchange with you.
Doc James used some poor judgement by not managing the relationship more closely as he already said. The community didn't pay enough mind to the postings that Doc James made about this, as it was happening.
You are trying to hold James accountable for things the company did, like how they leveraged the relationship.
Do you really think Doc James is corrupt?
The relationship as it stood is over. If you care about the use of our name you should keep an eye on that and let everybody know if they keep using it. Jytdog (talk) 22:04, 30 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
SV I have presented above what occurred. There is and was no behind the scenes machinations.
Here in 2013 I mentioned that folks at Khan were interested in collaborating (ie Rishi).[10]
Mentioned it again plus a number of other efforts with respect to video in Aug 2014.
Here in Nov 2014 you can see the "success" we had with an initial agreement of release of 5 videos that turned into 3 videos. Uploaded here. But this still took more time and when it occurred was announced here in 2015.
This is more or less how all my collaborations have worked. I email people asking if they are willing to release stuff under an open license. This is how I got the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines released under an open license. This is how I got all these ECHO cases released.[11] and these ECGs from ECGpedia[12]. I can list more cases beyond this but the pattern is fairly obvious.
James, I'm not alleging "machinations". I'm saying that there are several ways to view what happened, and that you're only seeing it one way. The concern is that you (inadvertently) helped to organize an advertising campaign on Wikipedia (arguably native advertising), which led to a startup receiving eight million views of videos containing its brand name, as well as the ability to call itself a Wikipedia partner in its advertising material, and the official source of medical videos for Wikipedia. That relationship may have helped it obtain hundreds of thousands of dollars of funding, considering that Wikipedia is mentioned in the press releases announcing the grants.
You're credited as an author of the congestive heart failure video, by the way: [13].
If you had put that out to tender, other parties—including mission-aligned organizations—might have been willing to supply much higher quality videos, in exchange for that amount of advertising. Instead, the partnership went to a couple of people that you knew and liked. Can you see the problem with that? (This ignores the other issues: that the videos didn't comply with WP:V and WP:MEDRS, and that the wider community wasn't consulted.) SarahSV(talk)19:35, 31 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Put out a tender? Wow. You appear to believe that working with Wikipedia for free is a massive honor that people are falling over themselves to accept. SV how many partnerships have you worked on? How many groups have you reached out to to make donations of content such as videos or images?
I have reached out to dozens of groups, most have flatly said no, including about 4 or 5 related to videos. NGOs generally are not interested in using a Wikipedia compatible license or even having us use their content at all.
Now I would love you to prove me wrong and there is nothing stopping you from putting our a tender for video creation.
With respect to them saying they worked with Wikipedia. Yes they were working with Wikipedia. Do you want all organizations that work with Wikipedia to stop saying they are doing so? Do you want the UCSF School of Medicine, the National Library of Medicine, International League Against Epilepsy, and Cochrane to stop making any claims that they work with us? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:37, 31 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
James, I want to AGF of you, but it doesn't help that you keep comparing this for-profit company to the World Health Organization, Cochrane, etc. What they did wasn't "for free". You allowed them to embed ads for their brand name and subscription service into hundreds of Wikipedia articles, in or near the lead. That was worth a lot. Can you please take that point? SarahSV(talk)20:50, 31 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
They have used an open license. What they have risked by agreeing to do this is substantial. They also know that they cannot rescind this risk. These videos are the primary thing they produce. Already other organizations are picking them up showing them beside their own ads and providing nothing in return. Here they are for example on the Merck Manual page.[14] Remember Youtube pays the creator of the content. Using an open license allows your material to occur in places that does not pay.
Giving away one primary product with the hope that people will than give you grants to produce more and update the current ones is a long shot. They took this long shot. The subscription model is also fairly dicey.
Khan Academy, the World Health Organizations, and Hesperian Health Guides among many others are not willing to take this risk. How do I know? Well, I have repeatedly asked them. Khan does not want unapproved commercial organizations to use their materials without paying or to compete with them. WHO licenses some of their material to third parties for specific use and makes a few million from that. Herperian sells some of their material too.
You seem to be saying that you think that letting them have their 'branding' on videos we display is a 'fair trade' for our having access to these videos. Am I reading that correctly? Jbh Talk04:15, 1 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Whats Inside of BloodIntroduction
I am saying that they were uploading here what they upload at Youtube. I did not see a couple of seconds of attribution as a huge deal and thus did not bother removing it. Appears I was mistaken.
The attribution at the beginning of these videos is not dissimilar to that done in the Khan videos. And less than the CDC / John Hopkin's videos.
Additionally we have Template:External media which creates stuff like this and this. It requires our readers to leave Wikipedia and give up private information to someone else. Additionally attribution is similar if not greater in these examples. Having the videos under an open license here does not require people to give up personal info plus these relationships expand the presence of open content.
Re: your point above about Merck, Osmosis entered into a partnership with Merck; the videos weren't simply "picked up" by them, as you said. Did you know (before this recent discussion) that the videos on Wikipedia were getting millions of views? SarahSV(talk)18:52, 1 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
• Thank you for that perspective. From my perspective though the problem arises in the aggregate — in other words, to me, there is a huge difference between use of a single branded video on a single page after discussion and the use of 300+ branded videos placed by fiat. The first instance I would advocate removing the branding but if no one wanted to it would not be a big deal. Its a single video and the issue was discussed so meh. The second instance though is total saturation of out medical articles by a single provider. That alone should ring alarm bells in your head. That they were placed without discussion, without descriptive edit summary, and were replaced when removed raise big red flags which turn into flashing, screaming alarms. Then when one considers that two outside organizations, one for-profit, worked to create content that would effectively put Osmosis' name on most of our major medical articles. Just having material from a single source prominently displayed on so many articles is a really big deal which was made exponentially bigger by directing watchers to their web site. I know you want to improve Wikipedia. I know you do not like companies using Wikipedia as a promotional platform, and I know you are not seeking to profit from Wikipedia. I simply can not square that with the effectively stealth inclusion of these videos which resulted from a collaboration which should have been shouted from the rooftops. I find that very frustrating because I think, had these been properly presented to the community (by that I mean the editors at each page), that these would have added a lot of value to many articles. You did a great thing by securing a huge amount of potentially great content and you can be rightly proud of that. On the other hand, you completely blew introducing it to the medical editing community at large. I do not know why you decided it was OK to add these by fiat and without explanation but I believe that is what killed it. The sheer scale and penetration of an entire class of articles by a single provider will always be an issue. There is a point at which one must consider whether the videos supported out articles or Wikipedia became a vehicle for showcasing a product. Colin's snarky 'Amazon colaboration' post was over the top but it does illustrate a point. Any organization that places content across an entire class of articles will change the character of our coverage of that topic area. If they have a little logo on each video they also get a PR boost and Wikipedia becomes associated with them in the readers mind — how could they not? The donor's logo is on every article the view. Scale and saturation matter. I really do not intend to dump on you here. I want you to see how these events look from the outside. There has been a lot of discussion about V and RS etc but there has been less about the failure to protectively seek out community engagement and nearly none about the effect of a single company providing significant content to an entire class of articles. Thank you for listening. Jbh Talk20:28, 1 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
You do not view the at least 9 discussions about these videos that occurred at WTMED over the last 5 years to be "discussion"?
Additionally I presented about the Osmosis collaboration at Wikimania in 2017 during the main conference.[16] And Osmosis themselves presented about their work during the preconference to which about 40 people attended.[17]
With respect to people following "clickable links", this is actually very minimal per discussions with the pubmed. The videos contained NO clickable links.
These videos cost about 2 million to produce by the way. Attribution was only present when people clicked on the video, which is less than we give Khan in the arts project. Thus a very small percentage of people who looked at a page saw any evidence of Osmosis. To further clarify Osmosis was never mentioned in any captions that I can remember adding.
I had also convinced other providers to release videos under an open license such as you can see here.[18] Have removed that one aswell.
We have had less on Wikipedia discussion about our collaborations with the World Health Organization, National Institutes of Health, Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Cochrane, British Medical Journal, Radiopedia, Ultrasound of the Week,[19] and International League Against Epilepsy than about Osmosis. Ultrasound of the Week may also be a for profit (I have not looked as I do not really care). They have their logo on their ultrasound images (I have not removed it as I also do not really care). They produce amazing ultrasound videos and I was able to convince them to release them under an open license.
This is not the COI issue I find concerning. What concerns me is the armies of undisclosed paid promotional editors. The ones that are paid by an organization to write promotional material about said organization. Osmosis does not have a COI with respect to pneumonia, gout, or HIV/AIDs. If they did I would have no interest in collaborating. I have declined to collaborate with a number of pharmaceutical companies as they do not share our goal of trying to provide high quality health care information to all for free. Osmosis on the other hand shares that goal and I believe the WHO, NIH, and CDC do aswell.
(outdent)
James, what I find particularly troublesome in these discussions are the untruths you come out with, which when pointed out to be patently false, you continue to repeat. This then becomes a deliberate lie: you are now knowingly telling untruths to further your case. We've seen this about the lies that the videos were summaries of the article text so met the definition of WP:LEAD, we've seen this about the lies that the videos could be edited (as Wikipedians understand that word), and we see this above about the "at least 9 discussions about these videos that occurred at WTMED over the last 5 years". I commented on your nine diffs here so won't reproduce all that. One of them is a UNICEF video in Hindi, for crying out loud James. The closest that discussion (with a few people) gets to "these videos" is a side-note that you are "Still working on a bigger release from the Khan Academy." The closest you get to a discussion on "these videos" is this. The "discussion" involves Chrisbospher trying to correct mistakes by James and then getting his ass kicked at AN. soupvector, who is already aware of Osmosis, reviews some and is fairly negative. Ozzie10aaaa is positive but I seem to recall he's an involved-party too. And CFCF too. So pretty much the meta med project team talking among themselves. WhatamIdoing requests that the top editors on articles be contacted for review. Something that doesn't then seem to happen (don't see many reviews) and certainly doesn't happen going forward -- James added al the videos unannounced and sometimes without even an edit summary. This post is on a "How to Edit Wikipedia" video, not a medical article video, and as I note here, just about sums up the dreadful way that James edits Wikipedia and appears to encourage others to do likewise. I describe in that diff how people should actually be editing Wikipedia medical articles: we are not an accumulation of factoids to insert and edit war over.
Wrt the other stuff, James, why are you the judge as to whether Osmosis is an acceptable neutral-paid-editor for Wikipedia? Let's just not have private companies providing any content for WP that states "facts" or "opinions". Videos of hearts beating, medical procedures, ultrasounds, etc, do not come loaded with any POV or concern about WP:WEIGHT or WP:V.
You have, so far, done the bare minimum wrt these videos -- removing them -- but have not recognised your problematic behaviour wrt edit warring with your peers over them. You broke WP:V when you added them back to Epilepsy. In a working Wikipedia, you'd have lost your Admin badge over that. And you bullied to ensure breastfeeding continued to show dangerous health information to our readers. In a working WP:MED, that should have cost you any authority and respect you have. You have shown contempt for your peers, clearly indicating that consensus means "getting James to agree", but doesn't apply to you.
This: "These videos cost about 2 million to produce by the way. Attribution was only present when people clicked on the video, which is less than we give Khan in the arts project." is very worrying. It demonstrates that you were proxy COI editing to protect a 2 million investment by your partners. And the "we give" shows you think you are Wikipedia's representative with authority to negotiate on our behalf.
Have you not considered that when your RFC was offered to the wide community for review, and they told you in no uncertain terms where to stick your videos, that you have in the past totally misjudged how you both present partnerships to Wikipedia but fundamentally how you've been going about making partnerships on behalf of the community. Rather than standing your ground and arguing, you should be saying "Yes, I screwed up". WP:MED should be doing a post-mortem on the whole thing and openly asking for advice on how to do better in future. -- Colin°Talk09:09, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Colin, you are talking at James as if he were a paid volunteer who has to do better, as if you employ him and have authority over him. Any reversions (which you believe were edit warring) would, from James' perspective, have been motivated by what was best for Wikipedia, specifically the viewers of Wikipedia's articles. You forget that he will learn from his mistakes and therefore does not need daily put downs and lecturing to remind him. James' motives were always pure and motivated by spreading, what he believes was, valuable healthcare information in video format to people. He wanted knowledge of medicine to grow in the public mind for the greater good. The community has rejected this in an RfC for several reasons. It is sad to see two good Wikipedians arguing like this, yourself and James (I am mindful you are the main author of MEDMOS and MEDRS, which deserves respect), surely you can recognise the good James has done in other ways on Wikipedia and get beyond this video thing? It looks fairly certain that you have 'won' the RfC, your argument carried the day about deleting the videos. Surely the fighting or negativity should come to an end too?--Literaturegeek | T@1k?10:15, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Literaturegeek, there's been a lot of comment about James' pure heart and motivation to help WP. I haven't ever suggested that he's deliberately trying to harm Wikipedia. But he is, nonetheless. Look, I've met James and taken him out to dinner. I've worked in the past with him on medical issues, such as when student editors were wrecking our articles, or to investigate the problems with copyright on x-rays. I don't doubt he hard work he puts in, for no financial gain. But there are real problems with his behaviour on his project, and frankly those problems are not helped by editors like you worshipping him. James has forgotten what Wikipedia is, a collaborative project of peers who, when editing in good faith, require respect and consensus-seeking. Instead he put the goals of "free educational media" above what Wikipedia is, and commissioned a private firm to create articles, presented as videos, and forced them onto hundreds of pages, where his fellow editors cannot (and are not allowed to) edit them or remove them. Look at what Graham wrote here. Graham is one of the finest medical writers on the project, who intimately knows how to write great prose for the lay reader, is (unlike James) a published expert in his field, yet has the humility to cite sources and take advice from lay editors. He's taken several articles to FAC, which represents a solid understanding of our policies and guidelines as well as how to structure and present information to readers. And yet James shows contempt for him by edit warring and then lying about a video meeting WP:LEAD (James is well aware of the content of the article -- he wrote it -- and the content of the video -- he inserted it into the article). James is so arrogant that he refuses to back down even when SlimVirgin tells him it fails WP:V. We still haven't seen any recognition from James that he accepts the fundamental problems with the videos -- only that he's prepared to accept a SNOWBALL level of opposition to his RFC option 1.
To be honest, like Sandy, I'm going to potter away at the article or two that I care for and then leave again. The big names I respect at WP:MED no longer seem to be supporting James or have left. He's already driven away a real subject expert in Epilepsy. There are too many people assuming that having MD after your name makes you a subject expert in all of medicine, which is as daft as thinking a biologist is an expert in quantum mechanics.
As Sandy has noticed elsewhere, these videos are just a symptom of a deep illness affecting WP:MED, and James is at the core of it. Just one example is this edit today where Narcissistic personality disorder loses the words "empathy", "exploit" and "manifests". The dumbing down of Wikipedia continues. The principle way that people learn new words is to see them used in context. A psychology article most certainly needs to be free to use those words and for readers to understand what they mean. This "making Wikipedia more shit" has been going on for years. James has good intentions for doing it, but has been frequently told off by better writers and wiser heads, yet he continues. And that's really the story here, and will continue to be the story when I go back to taking photos. -- Colin°Talk10:46, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I've met James too. I don't worship him, I have clashed with him about antibiotic articles and disagreed about other things. I have argued and debated things with James, and in my experience he is willing to change his mind when the facts or sources are against him and is capable and does work with lay editors. Many lay editors make mistakes in medical matters, because of their often limited knowledge, so I would expect him to disagree with a lot of lay editors. I favour using more professional wording too, so long as it is wiki linked for the lay reader to click on to learn what it means. But the guideline MEDMOS encourages 'dumbing down' language for the lay readers, so that would not be James' fault for following guidelines. The 'problem' is MEDMOS (which you wrote, although I know others have altered it somewhat since then). A large section of our readers will have a reduced vocabulary because our readers are young adults, even teenagers, and lower IQ individuals compared against the typical Wikipedia editor who tend to be higher IQ, so there is logic to 'dumbing down' language.--Literaturegeek | T@1k?11:22, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
This isn't the place to have the argument but our guidelines do not require "dumbing down" - the actual guidelines are more nuanced, but then "nuanced" isn't a word James one could use to describe James's editing. One big problem is James substitutes individual words, often without actually understanding the topic he is revising. Careful writing for a general audience requires first to understand the topic, immersing oneself in the literature, to be gifted in expressing those ideas in one's own words, and to develop the text in an engaging way that the reader can follow. It will introduce necessary "hard words" in a way that the reader can figure out their meaning from context: that's how an encylopaedia provides an encyclopaedic education. You went to read about a physchological disorder, and on the way learned how diseases "manifest" themselves as symptoms. By removing these words with unsuitable replacements "Occurs" isn't the same as "manifest", one loses an opportunity for education as well as making the text mean something else. The scattergun approach James has to this -- he just randomly picks on articles and changes words -- is disrepsectful to those who have worked on them. People who have carefully chosen words to express what they want to say, find them "copyedited" by someone who, to be frank, doesn't have a clue about copyediting, doesn't have a clue about the subject, and has himself a rather poor level of English writing. Why is an AE doctor with a poor grasp of witing prose rewriting the lead of Narcissistic personality disorder? Hubris; that's why. It is quite dispiriting for other others and just one example of the lack of respect. Ok, I'm bowing out here. These problems are well known, have been going on for many years, and aren't going to be solved today. I'm researching another article at the moment, which is more fun. Unwatching. -- Colin°Talk12:00, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
James, thank you for your response - somewhere way back up there. I appreciate having your perspective on this. I think there is way too much heat here for me to contribute much right now so I will leave off for now. I hope that when the furor dies down you will initiate a postmortem and lessons learned discussion. Jbh Talk13:58, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
James, you may have missed my question above: did you know (before this recent discussion) that the videos on Wikipedia were getting millions of views? SarahSV(talk)16:16, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I decided to look at the edits at Narcissistic personality disorder to see for myself. James did this: [20]. Part of that was the piping of "empathy", which looks to me like a matter of editorial opinion, and which was subsequently changed back by other editors: [21], [22]. I don't think that any of those three versions was "dumber" than any of the others: it's just a matter of looking for the most precise wording. But there was another part of James' edit that was not contested. He changed "exploit" to "take advantage of", which I think is a modest improvement, and "manifests in a variety of contexts" to "occurs across a variety of situations". That last part is a very significant improvement: the "manifests" version is very bad writing whereas the "occurs" revision converts it into clear and lucid English. To characterize that as "dumbing down" or lacking in nuance seems to me to be nonsense. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:35, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
User:Tryptofish, I agree that "take advantage of" is a subtle improvement, but disagree about other wording, having given it some more thought, and suggest you might not be entirely correct. Given the "context" of the subject matter, article body and the source cited, to simplify "manifests in a variety of contexts" you would change it to something like "appears in a variety of different ways." because those words are talking, I think, about the different subtypes of narcissistic PD (malignant, secure versus insecure narcissism, etc, etc) - James instead changed it to "occurs across a variety of situations." which indeed did change the meaning of the original wording. Manifest is not the same as 'occur', James' change; manifest is something that can be seen and recognised - either visually, auditory or tactile; e.g. "the wound manifested itself with sharp shooting pain and deep red swelling that was very distressing to the child and his mother". I am not even confident that my suggested alternative of changing "contexts manifests" to "appears" would be an improvement. So James does actually change the meaning of the sentence, I think, out of context with the source. User:Colin might have a very valid point (which is mostly lost by his confrontational style) that, not just James but all editors in general need to be very careful when rewording sentences, especially if the editor has not read or considered the whole article body and if necessary the source itself to understand the "context" of what is written and why. Maybe we need to consider making MEDMOS a lot more clear on this point?
I think most people would know what the word context and in fact manifest means, most lay people would understand this example: "she took me out of context," so was it worth changing the sentence with the risk of altering the meaning of the sentence? Personally, I probably would have just left "manifests in a variety of contexts" as is.--Literaturegeek | T@1k?22:20, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I can certainly leave room to say that some third approach, such as "appears", might be better than either the original or the change. Or "appears in a variety of forms". I might even alter the structure of the sentence, to frame it in terms of what the people do, as opposed to what the disorder does: people with the disorder do these things in a variety of contexts. And I can accept that readers are generally able to understand what "manifests in a variety of contexts" means. But I absolutely reject the contention that "manifests in a variety of contexts" is anything like good writing. It sounds like a parody of committee-speak. If I were to say, here, that you and I are "devoting ourselves to an examination of the paramount designation of the particulars of the attributes of the subtypes of narcissistic PD" (OK, I'm obviously having fun with this), you could figure out that it means that we are "discussing the best way to say it". But that obviously does not make it good writing. And it certainly does not make Doc James insensitive to the desirability of getting the wording right, or justify that "confrontational style". These are things to work out through the normal editing process, not through a battleground. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:01, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Fair points. I never scored an A in English at school, so I try to avoid nuanced changes to articles anyway. I guess the fact that - without having to think about it and consider the whole article body - I and perhaps you too were unsure exactly what the original writer meant by "manifests in a variety of contexts" that the whole sentence could have been better worded to begin with, so we are not left at first glance at the words 'best guessing.' Yeah, I have been quite upset with Colin's confrontational style, I dunno how James has kept his cool.--Literaturegeek | T@1k?23:34, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Just to note that I said above James "not recognised [his] problematic behaviour wrt edit warring with [his] peers over [the videos]. Subsequent to that, he has apologised to Gandydancer. It is a step, but a long way to go yet. Wrt James "keeping his cool", well he has his worshippers who speak on his behalf, just as James speaks on behalf of Osmosis. Jtdog, CFCF, et al, have written gigabytes in defence of the videos and misguided actions of WP:MED editors in fundamentally breaking Wikipedia. And as long as guys like Tryptofish spend their time devoted to defending James and nitpicking one example, rather than, perhaps, looking at his contribs and thinking rather than just knee-jerk responding. Consider: "If I'd taken an article to FA, and James came along and reordered by sections "per MEDMOS", or replaced words that I'd agonised over for the lead, in the space of mere seconds of time he devoted to a subject he knows nothing about, before skipping merrily onto the next subject he knows nothing about, would I feel any collaborative spirit?" I see below someone quotes Jimbo Wales nonsense about "sum of all human knowledge", which has never ever been Wikipedia's mission. Homeopathy and astrology are part of human knowledge. Dan Brown's conspiracy nonsense is part of human knowledge. No, what Wikipedia is about is, written in Wikipedia:About. The first two paragraphs of which, are in direct and very clear contradiction to what WP:MED have been up to. If people here aren't actually rather angry about that, then they should be, and should examine just what sort of project they thought this was. -- Colin°Talk09:26, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Colin, may-be, it's high enough time that you re-evaluate whether your (IMHO) continued battle-ground-mentality and participation, (despite un-watching this t/p), is making any proportional benefit? Whilst, the pulling-down of Osmosis videos, seems to have been the product of your efforts, honestly, it's time to drop the stick and move on.~ Winged BladesGodric09:39, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
"Guys like Tryptofish"?? Uh-huh. For the record, "guys"[citation needed] like me try to be good editors, edit based on content, try not to take "sides", and try not to personalize disagreements. But I will certainly remember this. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:02, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
External v internal
James, I appreciate the Yeoman's work SarahSv has done on the external factors here (it appears that Osmosis had their way with Wikipedia, to their benefit rather than ours), but I am more concerned about the internal (to normal Wikipedia processes, policies, and procedures) factors. Could you please indicate:
Did any editor other than yourself or @CFCF: ever add a video to an article? That is, are you the only editor who added these almost 300 videos to articles?
Did anyone ever make a post, for example, to the Village Pump and it's various subpages, or any other place for notifying the broader community about this plan?
@WhatamIdoing: asked several times for notification to significant contributors. Was there any case where an article talk page was noticed that a video was contemplated, in process, or that a script was provided to editors who were knowledgeable in the content area and might provide feedback?
Was there, at any time, a discussion about or contemplation of how to make sure the videos were accurate and met sourcing requirements, particularly with respect to requirements for FAs, as they were installed on almost every FA? If so, could you please provide a link to that discussion.
I have been through the (sparse) edits of all of the people involved in this UCSF project, and find them not to be knowledgeable in the most basic basics of Wikipedia editing. I do not find any indications of a solid grasp of the policies and guidelines that relate to medical editing. By whom and where were these people, who then asked for WMF money to train other people, trained? (In fact @AminMDMA: has edited his own article. And it appears they asked students, as their first edits, to support the latest grant, which shows a surprising arrogance and lack of respect.)
Was there at any time any attempt to centralize, formalize, or allow community education or feedback on the videos, similar to, for example, Wikipedia:Wikipedia CD Selection or Wikipedia:Spoken articles? Those pages give examples of the kind of internal process that do not seem to have happened here.
Was there any process in place for vetting/verification of accuracy in these videos? The inaccuracies in the articles I edit are an irritation, but the Breastfeeding example is dangerous. What process was in place for vetting these videos, preferably at the production stage? What process was in place for making sure they stayed updated (eg, the Lewy body video seems to have been in production just as the diagnostic criteria were changing)?
I would like to be able to highlight your good intent over what is appearing to be a significant amount of naivete about how a project of this nature should have/could have worked, and any feedback you can give that will show that this was not just a "closed garden" project, furthered by only you and CFCF, would go a long ways towards healing. Please convince me that the minimum of process, procedure, knowledge of how to approach a project like this was in place, and that it was not just CFCF and you making content decisions in a vacuum.As you know, it is due to the deteriorating quality of our medical content (and all the issues raised by Colin on this page) that I no longer participate, and you have many times awarded me as a top medical content contributor.I would also like to see this discussion move into healing. Since the various incorrect moves of the actual RFC, even if we subtract the 173KB moved, CFCF is dominating the RFC to an extreme extent,[23] but does not yet seem to understand basics of how the video project might have functioned, how the RFC might have been framed, that the videos were not summaries of leads (which, even if they were, would be another problem in and of itself), or how both of you can be viewed as having a COI in the matter. I do not see that healing is going to progress much if that doesn't change. I would also like to hear from you what you were thinking when you edit warred to keep these videos in articles, after errors had been pointed out. Everyone makes mistakes, and I am not above forgiveness, but would like to understand why you did that, as that to me represents one of the most egregious things that occurred here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:54, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
You do not feel the more than 9 posts at WPMED were sufficient. Okay yes I understand your position. None of the other collaborations I or WPMEDF have been involved in, including those that involved release of other videos were brought to a wider venue than WTMED.
We tried to get more involvement in drafting scripts here but you already know that. I agree that the on Wikipedia processes could have been better. With respect to processes used internally by Osmosis I recommend you reach out to them to get the details as I do not know them.
Breastfeeding is recommended for a year by the APA. I agree that other foods should be introduced at 6 months and agree that restoring that video before that was fixed was an error on my part. I would like to apologize to User:Gandydancer for doing so. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:47, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, James. You are very kind and I appreciate this detail on your part very much.
The same case has occurred with the video of celiac disease, as we all already know. I hope you have read this too [24].
Anyway, I think right now it's not enough to apologize (and I IMHO who has put you in this difficult situation is Osmosis and they are who have to apologize). The errors must be fixed. Better said, they can not be fixed, we can not fix the erroneous information that 42,018 people have received until this date about breasfeeding [25] and 205,051 about celiac disease [26]. That damage can no longer be solved. But they can avoid continuing to harm more people, removing the videos from YouTube and Commons.
It is not enough that they have removed the advertising (proof that they are perfectly aware of what we are talking about in Wikipedia), ( ? It seems that they have ads again...) they must be eliminated. They are misinforming hundreds of thousands of people, it is a very serious issue.
I'm trying to understand it, but I can not. I can not understand how knowing this, the videos continue posted on YouTube and Commons. This says very little in their favor.
Therefore, I make you a request here, since there is a total silence from Osmosis [27]. Please, can you ask them to remove these videos (at least Breastfeeding, Celiac Diseas and Irritable Bowel Syndrome)?. Thanks.
Ballena Commons has very different guidelines for inclusion. Once released under a CC BY SA license I do not think one can simple ask for the content to be removed.
With respect to removing from Youtube, you can add comments to the videos. And you can reach out to them to ask them to remove the videos you find concerning. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:37, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Doc, it is kind of you to apologize, though I did not take it personally. You wouldn't know this, but you were the one that introduced me to medical article editing around ten years ago. I think it had to do with the common cold and you agreed that cough syrup doesn't work and everyday comfort approaches were the best - I loved you instantly! And I still appreciate your common sense approach to the practice of medicine and and that through the years you have resisted corporate influence in our articles, something very important to me as well (as you can see on my user page). So all the more reason that I am just baffled by your difficulties in seeing the Osmosis marketing strategy when Sarah has clearly pointed it out to you. Gandydancer (talk) 18:34, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
1) The COI issues I have the greatest concern with is when those producing the content have a COI with respect to the content in question. Osmosis does not have a conflict with respect to the topics they produce videos about.
2) The 2 second logo at the beginning I viewed as simply attribution and did not view it as concerning enough to remove. Plus it was similar to what Khan does.[32] I obviously misjudged the communities opinion on this and offered to remove these bumpers during the proceeding discussions if there was a desire to keep the videos on EN WP.
3) Osmosis back in 2013 had said they were becoming an NGO. That they continue to put this off does concern me. I should not have let it slide.
4) With respect to having the videos near the top of the articles, I viewed them as summaries of the conditions in question and therefore saw that as not unreasonable.
5) With respect to claims that the videos are little more than advertisements, I disagree. There are organizations out there that are paying to display these videos. With respect to Osmosis mentioning collaboration with Wikipedia in grant applications, for them to improve and make more videos it does require funding. Many organizations mention collaborating with us. With respect to claims about them being "official videos" they state that that statement was made in error and I agree it is completely inappropriate. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:33, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I see that you remain firm in your position. I still do wonder, however, how it was that you were willing to overlook several errors, two of which could do real patient harm, that were clearly pointed out to you by Clayoquot. How did that happen? I take responsibility for the part I played in this since I should have followed up on my concerns rather than do what I've learned to do when it comes to a disagreement with you, which is to just give in. Gandydancer (talk) 13:48, 5 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Firm in what position? Yes I still support having video summaries. Yes I assumed and continue to assume good faith of Osmosis. I believe their goal like ours is to get health information out to the world.
I agree with removing the videos with significant errors (like the breastfeeding video) is the correct thing to do until they are fixed. I was expected them to be fixed more quickly. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:38, 5 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Doc, I just don't see how you can defend this video production company and assert that "their goal like ours is to get health information out to the world." To this date, months after you first informed them of the Breastfeeding errors, the video remains up on Youtube and their WP rep refuses to respond on their talk page. I can only believe that they used you to further their marketing goals. I've always seen you as a pretty decent person and I can imagine that they took advantage of your willingness to assume that others are as altruistic as you are. Following Ballena's lead, I also made a post at Osmoselt's page. Gandydancer (talk) 18:13, 6 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
"Are you saying you plan to push for not allowing the use of the NIH/CDC as a source?"
First, thanks for asking. No, I am not suggesting that at all.
An explanation of my concern starts with what I believe to one of the fundamental strengths of Wikipedia. Setting aside the medical realm for a moment, one of the joys of my days as FAC delegate was the privilege to read some articles that were exquisitely written and researched, and comprehensive beyond anything available anywhere online-- clearly pathsetting in their fields (along with some other truly awful articles I was obliged to promote because consensus was there and that was my job). I had the joy of promoting some FAs that put information on the internet that was previously unavailable to people unless they had access to a university library.
In the medical realm, this had great potential. At the time I came to Wikipedia, there was nothing comprehensive anywhere online about Tourette syndrome. The readers' options were textbooks (that were above the reading level of some), laybooks (typically dreadfully biased self-help type), brief NIH fact sheets (and for years the NIH would not correct their TS errors), advocacy group websites (that were not so good in the case of TS, because to make money, they needed to promote a somewhat pessimistic prognosis), and a few free full-text journal articles. The ability to pull from the highest quality information available and gel it down to what readers needed to know, in hopefully accessible language (I recognize that we don't always attain that, but we sure try) and give readers more than they could find on an NIH factsheet was motivating, powerful, and inspirational for me. It is a core strength of Wikipedia-- getting info to general readers they might not otherwise have access to.
By driving our leads to contain only that which is already available in NIH sources, we lose a core strength. We give our readers nothing they couldn't already get online. They are a reliable source that I often use and that has a place in our sourcing scheme. But by using them almost exclusively in leads, we sacrifice a core strength, and a motivating factor for people who want to produce top content.
I am hoping you will understand that some of us are highly motivated to create a unique resource for internet readers. This is what I hope to do at dementia with Lewy bodies (right now, it's a mess-- I tend to chunk in factoids, and go back and smooth prose later). I don't want to only duplicate what readers can already find at the Lewy Body Dementia Association or the NIH.
I suspect this matter is at the core of the instances when you and I disagree, which is why I hope you will try to understand, as I try to understand that you are motivated by different factors. This is why the drive to (what I believe) downgrade leads to basically what is already available at NIH sources is so difficult for those of us who hope to provide unique internet resources. We have the ability to offer more than what is already available online, and should use that. Regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:29, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
As an example, I'll give dementia with Lewy bodies. The sources from NIH highlight depression (neuropsychiatric) and urinary incontinence (autonomic), while the sources I'm reading highlight apathy and constipation. We shouldn't be constrained by what the NIH chooses to highlight; we can offer more. If the top researchers in the field are seeing more concern with apathy v depression or constipation v urinary incontinence, we can offer something of interest to our readers relative to what they can already find. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:41, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Glad to hear that you are not pushing to disallow the NIH and CDC. I have no problems with other high quality sources being used in the leads or anywhere else in the article, and apologies if I gave that impression. Additionally I use way more than the CDC and NIH as sources. They are however useful in many respects as they provide an easy to access overview. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:10, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I know you use other/more sources, but when aiming to have leads use only easily understood sources (as opposed to language), we may be missing out on valuable information. And by appearing to force leads to be citable to these easily accessible sources, we lose nuance, other information, and other value added by having the lead be a true summary of the article-- not just what is in a few sources that are highlighted in the lead. According to WP:V and WP:LEAD, I can say "urinary incontinence or consipation", "apathy or depression", without having to chunk up the lead with citations-- any citation at all. I can combine thoughts that are summarized in the article. That is much more useful to our readers, and more readable than being forced to stick on another citation of something that is summarized in the body, just because the NIH doesn't use it. Leads are also supposed to entice readers to read the article-- not just to click out to the NIH. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:20, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I am happy to hear that, thanks. I would hope to encourage editors to work on article content, and summarize last to the lead-- it's just better editing. Generally, citations in the lead are evaluated case by case, but that we ended up with this eyesore I suspect is because the fellow truly thought he had to do that, per you. Why FAC passed it is a whole 'nother problem. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:42, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
No, that "eyesore" is all based upon my own preferences Sandy. The notion that a lead shouldn't be cited is utter bullshit. It's article content. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 22:05, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
It is odd that someone who does not seem to have digested Wikipedia's policy and guideline pages would respond with "bullshit"; maybe you are spending too much time absorbing the WP:MED ethos.SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:33, 30 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Or maybe you are taking the recent incident too personally, now seemingly wanting to dismantle everything in WP:MED as a way to get back at us for disagreeing with you. This type of behaviour is despicable and ruinous to Wikipedia. Carl Fredrik talk23:27, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I sure hope that you each can recognize that there is a middle ground between "despicable" and reducing all the active editors at MED to having a single "ethos". --Tryptofish (talk) 23:48, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The characteristics, culture and beliefs of a community allow for exceptions-- never intended to imply everyone. There is a fundamental change at the medicine project which has taken it from an internal focus (on content in here, things like weekly collaborations, producing top content) to an external focus (partnerships with groups outside of Wikipedia, eg videos) that has not been focused on improving content. It's too bad that CFCF wants to overpersonalize something like that, at a time when WP:MED could be/should be seeking direction and how to avoid a repeat of the video situation. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:56, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I have taken your point, and struck the generalization, Trypto. I hope that the silent majority conforms to a different ethos than the generality I experience. (I still don't know what CFCF is referring to.) And I am relieved that Doc James is not pushing for citation overkill in leads. I thought we were off to such a good start in this section, aiming for understanding, and then we hit "bullshit" again :( SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:48, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Doc, following on the discussion above with Tryptofish and Seppi331, here is the page that is driving the LEAD issues that concern me (per discussion above):
Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Translation task force highlights (at the bottom of the page) you and CFCF (and another editor I am not familiar with). I have never seen a Wikipedia WikiProject page that highlights individual editors like that; are you aware of others?
WP:V and WP:LEAD are clear on when leads need inline citations, along with other practice about LEADs.
Yet, Wikipedia:Good lede#Translation Task Force appears to be calling for citations in the lead. But that is not all it is doing-- I find there the two other troubling factors, that IMO are driving down article quality:
"Content is ordered within the lead, the same as the recommended section ordering in the manual of style for medical articles." (Which in cases I am familiar with, disrupt the flow of the lead.)
"The lead needs to be written in English that is as simple as possible while the content remains medically correct."
None of that is based on Wikipedia guideline. This is why I continue to say the efforts of the Translation task force (which appears to be CFCF and you and one other editor Lucas) are not in all cases leading to improvements on en.Wikipedia, and in several cases that I am aware of, are driving content down. Can you see here the same problems/mentality as led to the video situation? A very small group of editors, imposing things on articles that are not based in Wikipedia policy, process, or guideline.) Could I ask that you stop inserting the preferences of a few editors into the leads of every article (particularly FAs), and instead gain consensus on talk before rewriting leads to meet the needs of one Project, since the guidelines that Project is using are not in alignment with Wikipedia-wide guidelines? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:43, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Sandy you would do well to go back and read the last 5 years of the talk page of WT:MED to see what you missed.
Putting references in the leads of medical articles and using easier to understand language has been discussed. In fact it is in WP:MEDMOS as "Adding sources to the lead is a reasonable practice but not required as long as the text in question is supported in the body of the article." and "The lead of an article, if not the entire article, should be written as simply as possible without introducing errors or ambiguity."
We have already discussed that Wikipedia is to be written for a general audience. In fact MEDMOS says "Write for the average reader and a general audience—not professionals or patients." We have already discussed the reading level of the general audience.
Yes I know we disagree on this aswell. And no I will not request permission from you before making any edit to any article.
<Deep breaths>. Doc, I think/hope/believe I understand what you are saying, but I don't think you understand what I am saying. Let's keep trying, ok? The problem that occurred with the videos was partly based in the Medicine Project operating in a vacuum, outside of normal policy, procedures and guidelines. The problem with you pointing out multiple discussions at the Medicine Project about leads is the same problem as the videos. One WikiProject does not get to trump Wikipedia-wide policy or guideline. That is what is happening, no matter how many discussions WP:MED has about it.And in the cases I mostly follow, this prescription of content for the translation project has damaged FAs. You do not need my permission to edit, but strangely, I need your permission to edit. Even though my editing is per policy, guideline, etc. while the translation project prescriptions are not. It would be wonderful to put the video thing behind us, but this is another example of the thinking that led to the video problem. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:08, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The following lists of suggested sections are intended to help structure new article or when an existing article requires a substantial rewrite. Changing an established article simply to fit these guidelines might not be welcomed by other editors. The given order of sections is also encouraged but may be varied, particularly if that helps your article progressively develop concepts and avoid repetition. Do not discourage potential readers by placing a highly technical section near the start of your article.
...
the spectrum of medical conditions is huge, including infectious and genetic diseases, chronic and acute illness, the life-threatening and the inconvenient. Some sections will necessarily be absent or may be better merged.
The first important fact is that these are "suggestions" and no more than "encouraged" for "new articles" or "existing article requires a substantial rewrite". The guidelines highlights many reasons why writers may want to deviate from the suggestions, such as for the flow developing an idea, because some topics are too small for a sub-section and need merged, because history may be better up at the top, because a concept needs introducing early on so that readers understand the later sections, etc, etc.
The second important fact is that the MEDMOS sections were listed by me, much to my regret now, after examining about half a dozen featured articles on medical topics. My findings allow me to use that great derogatory term beloved of writers of systematic reviews: "heterogeneous". There was no consistency whatsoever. The result is that the sections and their order are really rather arbitrary, a whim if you like, and seemed like a good idea at the time.
My regret is that some editors at WP:MED don't read the guideline carefully and go around reordering sections (and apparently lead sentences) based on this, which is explicitly forbidden by the guideline. Unless you are writing a new article, or are thoroughly overhauling the article and are currently knee deep in the literature on the topic, or have asked very nicely on the talk page and gained consensus for your change, do not apply MEDSECTIONS to an article. This guidelines expressly forbids you to be BOLD on this matter wrt existing articles. There are far more important things about article structure to worry about, and article structure is really something best left to editors who are seriously working on the topic and have made an investment in developing it. -- Colin°Talk 15:16, 3 April 2018 (UTC)
(Thought this discussion was on WP:MED for some reason. It should be.) -- Colin°Talk15:27, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
WT:MED is unmanageable right now (as is the RFC). The RFC was put on talk instead of its own page, so the talk page of the RFC could never be used, which is where everything shoulda been. Now we have a video proposal at WT:MED which would be better placed at the talk page of NOTYOUTUBE ... I wanted to come directly to Doc, because I am trying to achieve some long-needed understanding. I understand Doc's objectives, and they are well-intentioned. He doesn't understand that he has made editing, for me, miserable and impossible. I should not need his permission to write an article in such a way that it could become an FA, but that is what I hit when I turned to dementia with Lewy bodies. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:00, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
And now I have understood by what mechanism I am impeded from improving the lead at dementia with Lewy bodies. Category:RTT is where the Translation Task Force tracks articles that have leads that are "ready" (according to their standards, not Wikipedia's) for translation. To work on those hundreds and hundreds of articles, I have to get through the OWNership of a small WikiProject, whose standards are not in sync with Wikipedia-wide guidelines. A bigger concern is that, I can now see that a factor driving the problems (that surfaced in relation to the videos) at Epilepsy might be that it is in Category:RTT(full)-- full articles intended to be ready for translation by this one (exceedingly small) project's standards. This project has essentially frozen hundreds of articles, and makes improvement difficult. Here I thought it was just my imagination :( :( And even worse still, there are multiple FAs assigned to the RTT(full) category. It is, literally, the exact walled garden problem we saw in the videos. So, is there any medical article that I can work on according to community-wide standards? This is worse than OWNership of articles; this is OWNership of the most substantial portion of Wikipedia's medical content. I would like to be able to edit medical content, according to WIAFA standards, without interference from a three-person Project whose standards are not in sync with Wikipedia guidelines. I left the prostate suite to work on another article where I could make real improvement, and hit this wall. How can we solve this problem? Specifically, can we please solve this problem without being another example of the stonewalling that we saw with the videos? Leads do not need to be cited, leads do not need to be dumbed down to the NIH level, leads do not need to flow in an order assigned by one teensy tiny WikiProject, etc. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:39, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I see nothing wrong with having citations in leads. Cited leads are permitted; uncited leads are permitted. Generally, it's a good idea to cite anything that's non-obvious. But demanding that citations be removed strikes me as just as "walled garden"-ish as is demanding that pages be kept "ready" for translation. I think translation is a good thing to do, very much in the spirit of the Wikimedia project. But there can always be one version that is kept in the edit history for translation purposes. I see no good reason to keep pages "translation-ready" into perpetuity. There, the en-Wiki editing process, with community standards, should take precedence over translation. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:15, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Of course there is some text in leads that begs for a citation. And it's possible to cite a lead without citation overkill. But on the article I want to work on, we're already past that. When you start with a lead that already has citations on trivia that doesn't require citations, it's kind of hard to add/change text from there without adding citations, lest it appear that the citation left on one part is intended to cover the rest of a sentence. In other words, if I want to bring dementia with Lewy bodies to FA standard, I have to stick with the established citation overkill, or remove them altogether where they are not necessary (not challenged or likely to be challenged, which is most of what is in that lead now). Doing anything in between won't work. If I add or change text without adding a citation now, it is left misleading, as if the existing citations cover new text. So, an article I would like to bring FA, and I can't rewrite the lead as it exists now. And it would really pain me to bring an article to FA that cites the NIH all over the place, when they are outdated and we have so much better. So ... what to do? I really just need to leave, since I can't do what I do here, and what I do is what is in guideline and policy :( SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:23, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the explanation. I suggest treating these things as a regular content dispute. First, bring it up at the article talk page, explaining which inline cites you would like to remove. Listen to whatever replies come, and try not to focus on who said it. Then, assuming that doesn't work, start an RfC. And – always be on the lookout for a "third way". Perhaps if you add something to the lead that is not covered by existing cites, you can provide a cite of your own, and in the course of re-citing, you can remove some of the other cites that seem unnecessary. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:31, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Doc James: (Hey, this is your talk page, isn't it? ) Could you please say here that you agree that pages that are being translated can still be edited normally when they are not being translated (setting aside, for the moment, the question of citations in the lead), assuming that you do agree with that? If you are able to say that yourself, maybe it will put to sleep some of the disputes here. Thanks. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:55, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks (and I know you also said this briefly below). @Sandy: Would you be willing to discuss lead citations on the talk page of one of these pages, and if you are dissatisfied with the way that the discussion goes, would you be willing to call an RfC about it? --Tryptofish (talk) 22:20, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Trypto. Ok, enough whining; Trypto inspired me to a solution that may work for me, and may work to avoid having the TTF fall into the same issues as the videos (not enough community engagement, no talk page notification, things like that).
TTF designs a talk page template that announces when articles are in the RTT Category, and
has a bot install it on article talk pages in the category, but
the template also tells other editors where to go for feedback, etc regarding the translation project, and
allows editors to request, for example, a delay because major updates are in progress.
It makes no sense for any of us to be constrained by translation issues at dementia with Lewy bodies, when two weeks ago, it was a grossly outdated article-- we shouldn't have been translating it anyway when a major change was made with the new diagnostic consensus. It makes sense for all of us and our readers to have it removed from the translation category, finish updating the article in peace, and then deal with whatever needs there are for the lead when done. Then re-add it for translation. This just seems to make more sense for everyone. And involves more of the community. And provides talk page advertising for the TFF. and leaves TFF maybe even with a full article, not just a lead. And gives editors a motivation to "finish" (I know, Wikipedia articles are never finished) works in progress. Would that work? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:32, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The template should have an optional parameter for permalinking to the version of the article deemed to meet the requirements of the category. This would take any pressure (real or perceived) off of future editors to have their edits comply with TTF requirements. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs)00:42, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Two things I don't understand, Sandy
You seem to be saying that James is insisting on NIH refs, but up above he said others (e.g I reckon exactly the kind of recent reviews/clinical guidelines you found for DLB) are very fine and what he uses very often, and that he that he just finds NIH/CDC refs useful in many respects as they provide an easy to access overview. My sense is that if you replaced all the NIH/CDC refs in the lead with recent reviews or guidelines you would get little to no pushback. (perhaps the recent NIH ref also added, so there is one there).
here, you said that TTF has essentially frozen hundreds of articles, and makes improvement difficult. and also To work on those hundreds and hundreds of articles, I have to get through the OWNership of a small WikiProject..... So where you are you getting these notions of "Freezing" and "OWN" come from? I don't see anything like that at this talk page or at Talk:Dementia with Lewy bodies.
I walked through the history of the DLP page starting about 300 diffs back, dif by dif, and saw what happened there. I also read the talk page carefully. I saw the two of you having a fairly normal head bumping with respect to content but with some overheatedness. And I do not understand all this stuff about "freezing" and OWNing. But can you explain where 1 and 2 are exactly coming from?
Solutions are good but not if they don't address the actual problem, which I believe is a long-standing style difference between you and Doc James.
Also as has been mentioned above, since references in the lead are now discussed at MEDMOS, I would be surprised if folks at FA would really ding for that, if they were pointed to MEDMOS and the widespread practice in medical articles, and now we have beta-Hydroxy beta-methylbutyric acid as an FA to point to as well...
SandyGeorgia you have improved that article a lot and I hope you continue. I will be putting some time into it as well. Jytdog (talk) 02:12, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
On point 1, the citations are already there, so deleting them would look pointy. But they aren't needed. Makes it a difficult situation, if one wants to write an article that doesn't have its lead unnecessarily glooped up. On point 2, coming from the history at several other articles (Featured and others), over many years, when Doc James wanted to install personal preferences (ordering of sections, ordering of the text in the lead) that changed carefully crafted flow and text. From there, comes the reluctance/sense of futility to take on editing any article that has fallen under one of his projects. (You are aware we lost an epilepsy doc?) I can't really agree that it is a style difference between us, or long-standing, when a) we edited just fine together for gobs of years, until these external projects took over, and b) there is no policy or guideline that backs Doc James personal preferences. I could never understand what was behind the personal choices, but seeing TTF, his preferences make more sense now. His choices seem to be aimed at making articles easier to translate. To the extent that FAC is even still a thing any more (it isn't really), that messy article with citations in the lead will be a case of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS and pointing at it means nothing to the delegates-- one project doesn't get to decide to override project-wide guideline or policy. And you won't catch me ever citing a lead like that :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:30, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your reply. My sense (fwiw) is that it is all of a piece. His editing has always been aimed at making content maximally accessible to everyone, while not losing ~too much~ nuance. There is data somewhere that lots of people, especially on mobile (who are now most of our readers) don't venture much past the lead. If I recall rightly his emphasis on leads started with that fact. I think the translation project and it method of translating just leads, grew out of that, with the continued goal of getting as much of our content into the hands of as many people who really need it, as possible.
When I take on article, I deal with the lead as the very last thing I do; sometimes (rarely) I push new content that is important up there as I go (with the new ref there) but most often just waiting til the body is done. Writing leads is usually easy with the body done, especially if one is rigorously summarizing the body, section by section...
It is frustrating to try to deal with an article that needs to be completely rebuilt, as DLB does, and be discussing a lead, which seems set in stone because of a translation project. A distraction and time sink. That's why my proposal to solve this impasse is to remove any article that is undergoing a major rewrite from the translation category until work is has progressed enough to re-add it. Then perhaps Doc James won't be so tied to the lead, and it will be easier to work. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:36, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I hear the frustration! I hear it.
The underlying thorn does seem to be this stylistic difference over citations-or-not in the lead.
If it isn't clear, I have no aesthetic objection to refs in the lead, and if given an RfC with someone saying "it is ugly" or "they are not needed" on the one hand, and "it helps get well-sourced health information to many people who have few resources further the mission of the movement and of en-WP, as well as making well sourced health information more available to our many mobile readers" I know what I would pick, in a heartbeat, and I reckon (but cannot of course know) that most community members would choose the same. If there is some stronger argument for not including refs in the lead I am all ears....Jytdog (talk) 02:43, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
But forcing every clause/factoid in a lead to have an inline citation (which WP:LEAD and WP:V do not) prevents one from writing precisely what an FA is supposed to have-- a compelling lead, with "brilliant" prose, that summarizes the article and entices the reader in, leading them to want more (that's what the best FAs do). I have said many times that I understand Doc's motivations, but he isn't hearing mine, or acknowledging that different editors have different motivations. I do not believe we can ever achieve a level of accuracy in here that we should be even trying to spread our (mis)information to other languages. I am motivated to write a unique article on a topic such that it provides information to our readers that exists nowhere else on the internet. RE: Accuracy, because of this conversation, and finding the Category, I noticed that the ADHD article is listed as fully ready for translation. But Ballena and I just removed an error there that stood for five years. I suspect Doc thought I had seen it, since it is Tourette text that snuck in on the heels of my editing in Nov 2013, but I didn't return for several weeks, and missed the text that had snuck in, and never saw it again until today. It's been there for five years. We cannot pretend to achieve accuracy in here across hundreds of articles, or that we can maintain them to a state of accuracy to have them constantly ready for immediate translation. But in trying to do that, we have quite successfully de-motivated every previous medical FA writer from taking an entire article and bringing it to the best possible state. I have no interest in trying to make hundreds of articles accessible. I am interested in making one article shine. One person cannot maintain the entire Wikipedia. By de-motivating editors who coulda/woulda been helping all of these years at WP:MED, as I once did, more articles suffer. I wasn't here watching ADHD, and the error stood. Message-- don't de-motivate editors with inflexible requirements driven by a translation project; everyone has different interests. I do understand and respect what Doc wants to do. I don't think he understands how much his not "hearing" de-motivated Graham, or Colin, or me, after spending years bringing articles to a place where readers can get more info on that topic from Wikipedia than they can anywhere else on the internet. I still have the idea if I keep at this, Doc and I will understand each other. Or, I give up and go away again ... but on a volunteer project, people write what they enjoy writing, and I have no interest in repeating an NIH fact sheet on a disease or condition. I want to produce something unique. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:56, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Yes I am in strong support of references in the lead. This is not just because of translation work, this is also because it 1) makes justifying and discussing the lead easier 2) makes updating the lead easier 3) our readers will often tag statements in the lead if they are not referenced.
No, it is premature to say that. I don't want to be constrained by citations that pre-exist in the lead, if it comes time to write a more compelling lead than what our readers can find via the NIH. I can't say how a lead should be or needs to be cited until writing the lead. Some facts in the lead do need to be cited; I don't want writing to be forced to be choppy in the lead so that each clause or factoid matches one-to-one to a citation. I don't see the point in writing articles or leads to repeat info that readers can already find in an NIH factsheet-- I have no motivation to regurgitate what the NIH, or NIA, etc have already done. Something else just occurred to me ... I might have understood all of this earlier if the category were more descriptive. A category named RTT isn't something I noticed until just today, when I tried to find the translation project :) Might it not be renamed to something editors will recognize? Or perhaps not necessary if the Project develops a template. That there is no talkpage template doesn't help either. For years, when spoken wikipedia and wikipedia CD were honing in on Tourette syndrome, I got to participate and be heard (as in wait, not ready yet, I am doing a major upgrade). A talk template would help solve a lot of this ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:18, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
As in my points above, I am suggesting that the Translation Project should have a talk page template and it should be installed on every article in the category. Just as Wikipedia CD did, and as Spoken Wikipedia did. Did you see my 4-point proposal above? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:24, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
It is not helped that there is a WikiProject tag, that goes to a page that doesn't look like a WikiProject, and doesn't give information about what the tag means. I honestly took a long time to understand that page was a Wikipedia Project page, and thought I was at Meta or something, and what is really needed is a feedback link. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:28, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Did you see this request? Would you be amenable to taking articles out of the RTT category when editors are doing major updates, as that might relax the need to finalize the lead before the article is ready? That is, let a writer work-- when you are ready to revisit the lead, then talk about whether every clause and sentence requires a citation. For example, I always cite data and quotations ... but other than that and a few more things, there is nothing in the lead of dementia with Lewy bodies that is likely to be challenged. Ever. Why must every sentence, even when they are basic definitions that are covered in the article, be cited in such a way that the writing is forced to choppiness? DLB is one of two LBDs, eg, is a basic factoid that is covered in the article that doesn't need citation. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:35, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
You were challenging many of the sentences in the lead such that I went and added quotes from the source behind each reference. There is no need to remove the category. It does not make any difference with respect to updating and is tangential to the question of having references that you are raising here. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:11, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Time to call it
"You were challenging many of the sentences in the lead such that I went and added quotes from the source behind each reference."
Doc, it's time to call this what it is: DISHONESTY. If you can't start being honest with yourself, at least try not to be dishonest with everyone else reading this conversation. I have tried my hardest NOT to point out your dishonest statements, in the hope that you truly are good intentioned, but that's not working. So now, let's get real about what you really did there. I'm sorry that Jytdog chose not to highlight the facts in his "analysis" here. I was willing to let that go, but enough already. Here is the dishonesty you are not admitting to:
Our discussions on talk reveal that it is most likely that you were not aware, and it took me a lot of wasted editing time to get you to even recognize this, or understand the significance of RBD being 90 to 95% predictive of progression to a synucleinopathy. That is pretty powerful and exciting stuff, and understanding what RBD is (not sleepwalking, sleeptalking) is rather basic to editing that article.
If you don't have a grasp on the basics, why are you imposing anything at the article? Why are you even editing the article?
When I came to the article, mid-February, it was grossly outdated, and horrible. You care about leads, so the lead was cited. To grossly outdated sources. I started working.
When I removed the outdated sources from the infobox and from the lead, and attempted to rewrite to newer, updated sources, you not only restored outdated info,
... but, to justify your edits, you (quite dishonestly, compared to what you are claiming here) reinstated the old, archived versions of a source which has since been updated to reflect the new consensus. The updated NIH pages did not say what you wanted in the lead, so you used old, archived versions, even after I had corrected them once. That is, you showed ownership of outdated information of text in the lead, when there is an abundance of new MEDRS information available. A few samples only of the whole long mess I had to deal with there, just to get the new sources in the lead. [34][35] Yes, as you say, you added quotes. After you KNOWINGLY cited and re-added archived versions of NIH pages that have now been updated, while I was using a superior, newer source.
Either you are being dishonest here, or obtuse, or as I have long said, you simply edit too fast and lose track. In which case, it would be nice if you would let others edit in peace.In the same vein (honesty) while we are having a discussion here about the issue of citations in the lead, you argued at epilepsy (when you wanted to keep the videos)
"If you read WP:LEAD, the lead just needs to be supported by the body of the text, it does not need inline references itself." Doc James, March 28
Once again, it is clear that this is much more than a "difference in style". It gets better. With this kind of editing going on, while almost every top contributor to medical content is not agreeing with your views on the videos, and trying to get you to see the damage done to medical content, Jytdog opens an ANI on Colin and me, where this other person (who spends the bulk of his Wikipedia time at User talk, and has 50 edits to a Start class article after 11 years of editing) says this utterly ridiculous thing. Yes, James, we have some difference in style. When I see something that is wrong Wrong WRONG, I address it, no matter which "side of the aisle" it's coming from. That's a matter of character. That you are silent as people deify you, rather than speaking up to affirm when other editors are correct, with or without an MD, casts you in an interesting light. You have been unknowledgeable about the topic, and wrong on every medical article where we have met lately. And I believe that happens because, rather than exploring any topic in depth, you try to do too much, too fast. I can recognize your good intent until you start being dishonest about the basics that are happening here, which are:
Consider what it means to medical content on Wikipedia to lose these people over a focus on leads.
Do you really want to have fans like the fellow with 50 edits to his best start class article, or do you want to work with the people for example like I list above (I will soon likely have to apologize for leaving out someone)?
I/we have cancer. (We because prostate cancer changes married life, d'oh.) I have months ahead of three-hour days, every day all week, for radiation therapy. All I friggin' wanted to do was work on an article where there was a recent fun and exciting development (the understanding of prodomal RBD in DLB) as a distraction over the next months. You have made it impossible for me to edit here. You dishonestly, again, referenced above needing my permission, but it is clear I need your permission to edit. This conversation is bordering on the absurd. I have YEARS of overseeing the production of and producing top content, but I need your agreement to be able to update a grossly outdated article. That editors of the caliber I showed you in the link to my sandbox, like myself, can no longer edit or no longer want to edit medical content, or have spoken in opposition to your "tenure" at WP:MED should concern you, and all of us. (Recognizing that does not apply to all of those on that list, eg Johnbod who has stayed mostly out of this, but you certainly did not have the support of most of those editors on the video debacle, and we sure aren't seeing any more top content generated in medical articles. No, we have leads now, which obscure the serious problems in the rest of the article).
Just stop it, James. You have made Wikipedia impossible for a number of us. If you can't see that, then expect me to start calling you on it when you are dishonest. Whatever fun and distraction I could have had by bringing dementia with Lewy bodies to FA while I sit through radiation therapy has already been destroyed by you. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:21, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
+1000. The thorough ignorance of the subject; the dishonesty; the needing your permission to edit, but not vice versa; the "consensus" only applying to other folk, and meaning really "agreeing with James"; the terrible terrible quality of writing; dumbing down to remove carefully chosen words and make it meaningless and less educational; the reorganising paragraphs and sections against the express instructions of our medical style guide; writing articles that are just an accumulation of factoids; editing the lead out-of-sync with the body; edit warring with his peers who he should respect; edit warring with real actual subject experts; edit warring with lay editors who know damn well how to write high quality medical articles and source them; edit warring to protect a $2million investment by his off-wiki partners; not understanding the basics of Wikipedia:About; violating WP:V when edit warring to restore totally unsourced material; ....
Since you bullied me off of Wikipedia in 2014, I look now and find that in the years since, WP:MED does not appear to have nurtured anyone with the drive and talent and collaborative spirit to develop featured quality articles. Your ego is so huge that the world's biggest encyclopaedia is still too small for you to let one of our finest editors, Sandy, work in peace without constant reverts and warring and having to teach you some basics on the subject. Now they are giving up too, it appears. Well done James. Well done. Wikipedia is a collaborative editing project above all else. One cannot develop an article to featured standard (and keep it there) if one is faced with repeated reverts by editors who know and care nothing about the subject. Is it too much for you to take a few articles off your watchlist and let others drive for a change? -- Colin°Talk14:44, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
It's time to "call it", as in to flat-out stop it, with personalization of these disputes. Editors should focus on page content, and stop picking at the scab about personal dislikes of one another. If it keeps on like this, I will seek broader attention to this problem. --Tryptofish (talk) 16:35, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't really matter what you seek, does it, since the result is the same either way. I can't edit medical topics, and I'm not exactly going to hang around here to edit flowers. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:09, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
It's obviously up to you what you do or do not edit. But you can edit medical topics if you want. You just cannot require that other editors agree with you as a condition of your editing. If you choose to edit medical pages, you can, but you have to deal with it as it is. If you choose not to edit there, then you really shouldn't go around complaining about it either. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:13, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The problem is that Trypofish is still stuck thinking this is a content dispute, with the videos, or the problems at prostrate or dementia or epilepsy. I see he wrote on his talk page "I will oppose any efforts to treat the WT:MED editors as wrong or bad." These things that are being discussed are symptoms of an underlying illness with WP:MED which at its core lies Doc James, with a chorus of worshippers: his beliefs about what Wikipedia is, how to interact with others when editing, his level of competency and understanding. This has driven away all the good medical content editors from the project, so James has had the bright idea of outsourcing it from a private firm. Sometimes, editors are wrong and bad. To flat out oppose that, is just to deny reality, become an apologist for them, and then be part of the problem. To trivialise this as a "scab" or a "personal dislike" is insulting. Tryptofish, do you realise your comments "If you choose to edit medical pages, you can, but you have to deal with it as it is" sound exactly like an apologist for sexual abuse in the workplace: "The guys here are a bit crude at times, might feel your bum in the lift, peer down your top, but you know, they don't mean harm by it, and if you want the job, well you have to deal with it as it is". Wrong and bad. -- Colin°Talk17:29, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I don't understand the culture of people who work on FA, but if we are "calling it", what I call this whole thing is a dispute over style preferences. Style preferences notoriously generate conflagrations in WP. It is the same dynamic as the infobox wars, where people who work to bring an article to FA (or otherwise invest heavily in the writing quality and aesthetics per se) generally find "their work" to be marred by an infobox, and people who want infoboxes cannot understand resistance to the utilitarian value of the infobox. Hm. Artistes vs worker bees.
fwiw i generally find the overheated drama of the artiste folks to be unseemly at best.
You do love words, SandyGeorgia, and you have been pouring layer on layer of a form of rhetoric - namely speech intended to persuade without regard for truth - into your comments around this, even as you describe others as "dishonest". This is beyond unseemly. So if you are going to start playing "dishonesty" cards please be aware that you would be doing so with dirty hands.
You have a very utilitarian goal here - namely to be "free to create" and have leads free of citations and shaped in whatever way pleases you within the limits allowed by LEAD; Doc James has a utilitarian goal to make leads useful for multiple user bases, so wants them in plain English, standardly structured, and sourced, which is also within the limits allowed by LEAD.
As I said before, if you put that style issue to an RfC it is pretty clear to me what the community will choose.
Your words mean little here, since you were incapable of an impartial analysis of the edits and talk page at DLB. And my words were "poured" on only because of and after James' dishonest portrayal. Why don't you poke your nose out of this and let us settle it? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:13, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I have my own reading of what happened at the DLB that is all my own, independent of you or Doc James, and quite rigorous in its own right. You have added a lot of value to that article.
I think an RfC around this style difference would be the best way to resolve this; I do not see it being resolved through discussion, since both you and Doc James have very firm stances. Your proposal above about removing the translation tag doesn't resolve it, since the style difference predates the translation project.
fwiw I would propose Denk to frame it; in my view Denk is wise on these matters. I just linked and didn't ping since I don't want to bother them if that is unacceptable to you or Doc James... Jytdog (talk) 15:57, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Talk about deflect, detract and enable when I'm trying to deal with a problem WITH Doc James (not you). Just stop it (ignoring James' dishonesty, and attaching spurious claims to my diffable facts). And stop calling this a "style difference". WP:LEAD is thataway--> RFC all you want. If you can get the community to agree to your proposed changes at lead, great, then we all comply. In the meantime, you are most obviously derailing and interfering with me trying to resolve a dispute with James. (Comments from helpful observors welcome above, you are not.) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:06, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Both what you want to do, and what Doc James want to do, are allowable under LEAD. It is a style thing.
This is unfortunately a continuation of the same dispute that was actually driving the intensity around video thing (there were legit issues there as most everyone has agreed) - both you and Colin brought up these other matters consistently in the course of that, as I showed with diffs at the ANI, and here are both of you repeating those same points again.
I am taking the same line as User:Tryptofish above in this diff. Tryptofish and I differ in that the proposal about the translation project and its templates is not really the issue, as the conflict predates that project. I am not sure that Tryptofish knew that.
That's what i have to say for now. I have seconded the notion that this is going to take an RfC, and warned you to be careful with the rhetoric. You are indeed your own person to do as you will. Jytdog (talk) 16:34, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
By coincidence, I got that ping while I was writing the comment that I just made in the talk section above. Yes, I'm aware that the conflict goes back longer than that. About what may or may not be "style differences" everyone here should work that out at the article talk page, or a content RfC if local discussion does not get a consensus. Personalizing the issue is very bad. Forget who was responsible for what, and focus instead on the content issues. And again, this isn't that difficult: translation is good, but there is no reason to keep pages in a translation-ready state in perpetuity. I don't care whether there is a template, and I don't care whether there is a bot. Have one version in the page edit history that is translation-ready, and use that one for translation. Then leave the page open to normal editing, and resolve any content disputes as content disputes. --Tryptofish (talk) 16:42, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
fwiw Trypto as far as I can the translation thing is a red herring. I looked carefully and I didn't see any place where Doc James mentioned that as a reason to keep the lead updated or to keep refs in the lead. Refs in the lead is rather a style choice he made a long time ago as far as I can tell. "Freezing for the translation project" is a rhetorical device that Sandy is putting on things that, as far as I can see, has no correspondence with reality. (this is what i mean about "speech intended to persuade without regard for truth") Jytdog (talk) 17:28, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
It's like this talk sub-thread and the sub-thread immediately above are two parallel universes. I don't care who might be using "rhetorical devices", because all that anyone has to do is to edit about content without personalizing it. If there are no objections to revising a page when it is not being translated, then that's good, and go ahead and edit it in the normal way. If someone disagrees with those edits on content grounds, as a matter of choice of writing style, then resolve it in the normal ways of working through a content dispute. If someone instead objects to the edits based on any requirements for the translation project, then they need to stop doing that. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:14, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I was responding to the last two sentences of your post above in which you picked up and used the rhetorical device; this is how this kind of thing works; i know you have seen this sort of thing many times, and seen it applied to yourself as well. In any case I agree with the rest, and what you wrote just above. Jytdog (talk) 18:35, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I definitely agree, as I already said there. You put up with a lot of crap (some of which seems to be ongoing above, here at your talk page), and you did indeed show grace in resolving the dispute. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:28, 31 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
(+1) on record lifting Doc up as an example of how I wish I were in regard to criticism.
(+1 ) Screw those bullies - they had a chance to have their voice heard on the videos and they didn't bother to say anything, then they want to get a wild hair up their ass because they "had no say in the videos", please. It was a classic case of "IDontLikeItitis". You handled it way better than I did. I have half a mind to re-do those videos, with the text on the article page itself, verbatim, just to see if the same crew comes back and complains again. К Ф Ƽ Ħ12:57, 3 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, Doc James. It has been a few weeks since I left you a message and wanted to reach back out to you. I know that someone like myself with a COI has no real standing to ask you about a status, but thought I would take a shot anyway. I just added to the Draft:Avner Halperin about his teaching at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his research being cited almost 2,000 times. If you are so inclined, is it possible for you to take a closer look at the draft and let me know if it is suitable to be placed in the main space; or, what changes you would like to see to make sure that it meets Wikipedia guidelines? Thank you so much for your taking your time to help on this. --BennettInCA (talk) 03:13, 5 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Dear James,
I have added the below content on the Telegram (messaging service) page and I request you to tell the reason why it is no long present there
This text you added though is off topic. "This caused inconvenience among users interested in chatting about cryptocurrencies and blockchain. Telegram has appeared as suitable platform for crypto-startups to engage crypto enthusiasts for hot debates" Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:41, 5 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Seasonal Affective Disorder
A recent change seems to be, or at least to include, vandalism. See the "stinkypoo" stuff at the start of the first change HERE. Understanding it and fixing it is above my pay grade. Lou Sander (talk) 13:54, 7 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Doc, would you please take a look at DKMS? The article shows up in the NPP queue, and it's tagged for an admin to merge the draft history. I thought it best if you looked at the article considering it's in your area of expertise regarding content. Atsme📞📧12:41, 8 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Doc James, Why am I writing you on a subject totally out of your field? Because I TRUST you. My son Officer Shaun Diamond was murdered in the line of duty 10/29/14 by a Mongol Gang member. His name is only listed in the Mongol page. I hadn't checked in a while but his name has disappeared from the appropriate pages. Google his name for plenty of resources. Could you/would you help put his name where it belongs? My health is still poor so not up to editing. So much I have edited has been mutilated, I don't know if I will ever be back. I miss it & my 2 missing friends that kept me line ;-). I'll check with you in a few days.
