Talk:Breitbart News

Mention of Milo Yiannopoulos Twitter squabble

I do not think the mention of Breitbart journalist Milo Yiannopoulos's Twitter squabble with actor Leslie Jones is worth mentioning in this article's "Breitbart Tech" section.

Tons of journalists have been in conflicts before, are we really going to mention every single incident involving a NYTimes reporter on the main NYTimes article? How are the personal conflicts of a reporter relevant to the main news organization? The fact that the report identifies who he is as a Breitbart journalist doesn't make it relevant to this article. Marquis de Faux (talk) 20:34, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

Two sentences seems appropriate. He's not just a journalist, he's the editor of the section, and a major figure with the site. Twitter reflects on tech journalism, also. Breitbart interviewed him in response to this incident (per the Guardian source), where he claims this is about not just himself, but all conservatives on Twitter. There are other sources covering this incident as a reflection of the site, also. These could be added if necessary. Grayfell (talk) 21:12, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

I agree that it's a WP:COAT and probably WP:POV, and should be removed. It seems fairly plainly there to say "these guys hire racists". Compare the complete lack of coverage of the firing of Roger Ailes on Fox News. The minutiae and drama of individuals is simply not relevant to an encyclopedic coverage of an organization. TimothyJosephWood 21:21, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

I'm really surprised that's not mentioned at Fox News, since Ailes is absolutely central to that station's identity and history. Far more so than Yiannopoulos is to Breitbart. That seems like something that should be addressed at Fox News Channel, and the comparison doesn't clearly show a weakness in this article. Grayfell (talk) 22:06, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

It's in the lead on Roger Ailes. And how is this Milo fellow even close to fulfilling the role that Ailes did at Fox? Seems a lot like he's just a guy in middle management. TimothyJosephWood 01:26, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, he's not, isn't that what I just said? Yiannopoulos is not as important to Breitbart as Ailes is to Fox (although trying to compare Breitbart to Fox is dicey), but he is a prominent, popular face of the site. His activity on Twitter is significant to both his personal notability, and, I think, to his status as technology editor of the site. Anything more than this would probably be too much, but I don't see a problem with a couple of sentences. On the other hand, this may be a case of recentism, but the sources do make the connection. Grayfell (talk) 02:12, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

I was sortof pointing out how you were making my argument for me. I think if you follow the reasoning to its logical conclusion, than if two sentences for this person's twitter spat are WP:DUE, then so should be two sentences for their apparent involvement in Gamergate, and so should a few sentences on Brandon Darby's FBI involvement, and Greg Gutfeld's remarks on Canadians and the Ground Zero Mosque, and...

Well, you see where this goes. BB is a controversial outlet, that hires controversial people, who are involved in controversies. That's kindof their brand. A body can probably dig up a controversy for nearly everyone named, and include a few sentences per your argument, and the article would become an unreadable bloat of unrelated content. If we agree that that's not appropriate, then I see no reason to make exception for this person.

This of course wouldn't be the case if an argument could be made that this individual is somehow centrally important to the org (as Ailes arguably may have been), but that doesn't seem to be the case. I'm not really seeing any argument for inclusion that, consistently applied, doesn't destroy the article. TimothyJosephWood 13:26, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

The sources plainly illustrate the relevance to Breitbart. Including a couple of sentences in this article seems reasonable to me. Even Breitbart considers it WP:DUE [1] [2].- MrX 14:02, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

And they've also published Gutfeld's sentiments about a ground zero Mosque. So we should include that also? TimothyJosephWood 14:19, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

I think we can and should judge these on a case-by-case basis, and in practice, that's what always seems to happen, anyway. If Darby had been an informant while also being a Breitbart editor, that would almost certainly have gotten coverage specifically in relation to Breitbart. As for Gutfeild, his comments haven't even reached Fox News Channel controversies which says more about Fox than Gutfeild, but again we would judge based on sources. Grayfell (talk) 19:52, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

Oh well. I gave it a try. I still think it's a WP:COAT and WP:POV, but I don't care enough about BB to argue it at length or go to RfC. That's probably where some of the supposed WP bias comes from: no one who lasts long enough to make a difference cares enough about these articles. All the best. TimothyJosephWood 20:02, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't think you're wrong, I just see it as a matter of degree. Sometimes Patience - Apathy = Consensus. It's not a great way to get there, but it's still consensus. Grayfell (talk) 20:14, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

The passage is about a person who is not the subject of the article, therefore it should go in the article about the person, and not the article about which the person is not. That's the beginning and end of my argument as it pertains to policy. If that's not convincing then there's no point pursuing if further. I'm not sure there's really a grey area where you can agree with me and still want to include it. There's not a lot of nuance required. TimothyJosephWood 20:25, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

This is a minor detail which arguably relates to Breitbart as a topic. It is arguable. I see what your saying, and agree that restraint is called for. I would be willing to explain further why I still side with including it here, but it doesn't seem like either of us really wants to bother dragging this on any longer. That's fine, but don't make it personal. These kinds of arguments are frustrating, but I'm not sure what the point of implying in passing that the editors you don't agree with are being biased. We don't agree on this. So what? Grayfell (talk) 21:03, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't mean to imply that you in particular are biased. But I do think that if similar content were to be debated on a non-horse-shit bile-spewing ethnocentric propagandizing pulp-impersonation-of-a-news organization, that it would be fairly uncontroversial. TimothyJosephWood 21:40, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

Well... maybe so, I dunno. Non-horse-shit news sites hold their representatives to higher standards, though, which is why they're non-horse-shit. Maybe this is just more gossip, but when these things happen at more reliable sites, they are handled very differently by those sites, like Vox suspending Emmett Rensin. Breitbart ignores or actively embraces this kind of behavior which seems kind of noteworthy. Maybe that's too WP:OR-ish, but when there are so many incidents like this it becomes frustrating to have an article that doesn't at least attempt to reflect this larger picture. As you say, they appear to deliberately hire controversial people. It's not a coincidence. Yiannopoulos and his activity with Breitbart have been very controversial, but all this article says is that he's technology editor. That's accurate, but it seems almost euphemistic. I don't know how to include this, which is why I say I see where you're coming from, but I still think this helps fill-in a gap in the article. Grayfell (talk) 23:52, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't think it's WP:OR at all, I just think that the WP:DUE weight is questionable given that everyone involved is a propagandist involved in some sort of controversy. TimothyJosephWood 00:00, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Nonsense in the lead section

"Notable events in Breitbart's history have included the ACORN 2009 undercover videos controversy, the firing of Shirley Sherrod, the Anthony Weiner sexting scandals, the "Friends of Hamas" story,[clarification needed] the Nancy Pelosi/Miley Cyrus ad campaign, [clarification needed] and the misidentification of Loretta Lynch.[clarification needed]"

Clarification is needed because without it, these items don't make any sense at all. What was the "friends of Hamas" story? It needs to be explained. The lead has to summarise the article, and it fails to do so with these three things. 5.151.178.168 (talk) 23:34, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

It references this: Breitbart_News#.22Friends_of_Hamas.22_story. It's not perfect, but the tags do nothing to solve the actual problem. This was already discussed. See Talk:Breitbart_News/Archive_2#Lead. Grayfell (talk) 23:40, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

The tags indicate that more explanation is needed before the lead is useful. There is not enough information in it. What is it that you object to so much about tags? They are very common on Wikipedia. 5.151.178.168 (talk) 23:41, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Multiple identical tags applied to routine information in the lead acts as "badges of shame" which undermine the entire article. If you want to help figure out how to improve the lead, please do, but adding ambiguous tags without any additional explanation isn't productive, and is "driveby tagging". It undermines the hard work others have put into the article based on a misunderstanding of Wikipedia's guidelines, such as MOS:LEAD. Grayfell (talk) 23:45, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Maybe you can grasp the point with a bit more illustration. "the "Friends of Hamas" story" basically means nothing. There is no information there. It doesn't do the job a lead section should do. Something like "A story alleging that Senator Chuck Hagel had been paid to speak at an event sponsored by "Friends of Hamas"" actually tells us something. Do you want the lead section to make sense to a generally educated reader, or just readers who already know all about this news network? I assume that people who frequent this page know what its contents are better than I do, so I tagged assuming someone would be able to spare the 2-3 minutes necessary to properly describe these things. I did not expect vitriolic attacks against the very concept of tagging deficient articles! 5.151.178.168 (talk) 23:51, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Tags are indeed a badge of shame. So fix the article and remove them! It's not difficult! There was nothing ambiguous about the tags. Did you read my edit summary? And your insulting "drive by" nonsense is getting boring. Trying to improve an article in no way undermines the work that already went into it. If you think so, you don't "get" Wikipedia at all. 5.151.178.168 (talk) 23:51, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

The lead is a summary of the rest of the article. Not only that, but each of the notable events that you demanded clarification for is linked to an entire article. Two very experienced editors are telling you that your WP:TAGBOMBING is unhelpful. I suggest listening and engaging in article improvement in a more constructive fashion.- MrX 23:58, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

1. It should be a summary! But it is failing to summarise adequately!
2. None of the things I sought clarification of link to an article! Did you read the edit?
3. Were you editing Wikipedia in 2002? I was. Don't talk to me about experience. And don't insult my earnest effort to improve this article. Do you think your behaviour has been constructive? 5.151.178.168 (talk) 00:03, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I'll accept some blame for this getting too heated, but you should've started a talk page discussion instead of reverting multiple times. Edit warring doesn't improve articles, either. If it's not difficult, why didn't you do it yourself or at least also post a talk page discussion about it? Just because it's not ambiguous to you, don't mean it's obvious to everybody else. Article readers don't see edit summaries, so that's not the place to try and discuss nuanced issues, and multiple, identical tags for the same problem just interrupt the article without adding any new info. Someone who does know the content better than you reverted you, because I didn't find your summary informative or helpful, and as past talk page discussions have pointed out, it's not that simple anyway. That's why "driveby tagging" is aggravating. Sometimes it's not as simple as it looks, because if it was that simple, it would've been fixed already. Grayfell (talk) 00:02, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

You may accept all the blame; your aggression in response to attempts to improve the article was surprising and offensive, and you continue to demonstrate bad faith by deleting my posts on your talk page while leaving foolish templates on mine. I am not going to read or respond to any further comments that you make. 5.151.178.168 (talk) 00:07, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Well, that's a shame, but I get it. Your talk page posts were also aggressive, and suggested that you thought you were entitled to my response. Why would you post on my talk page to tell me I was naive and that my input was no longer welcome? What was that supposed to accomplish? I think it's clear we both handled this poorly. Grayfell (talk) 00:17, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 24 September 2016

Breitbart News → Breitbart – Per WP:COMMONNAME. Most sources call the website "Breitbart" and not "Breitbart News". Consensus that the news website is the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for "Breitbart" has been established at Talk:Breitbart (surname). SSTflyer 13:46, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

• Support - Per nominator. Meatsgains (talk) 18:31, 26 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose. The site's official accounts use "Breitbart News", as do its profiles on sites like Politico. On Google News, they're listed until "Breitbart News". Articles about them mostly use "Breitbart News" upon first mention. I don't think it should be shortened; dropping "News" is mostly a colloquialism. Nohomersryan (talk) 17:26, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose Echoing what Nohomersryan said. The vast majority of reliable sources use Breitbart News at first reference, as does the website itself. For example, some recent articles: [3], [4], [5]. FuriouslySerene (talk) 17:33, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
• Support - 'Breitbart' commonly refers to the news website/organization and is prominently the brand in their masthead and copyright notice. It's concise, sufficiently precise, natural and recognizable. Mainstream media routinely refers to the website/organization as just "Breitbart" in their headlines [6] [7] [8] [9] [10].- MrX 17:44, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose. I believe "Breitbart" should continue to exist as a WP:PRIMARYREDIRECT, but titling the article "Breitbart" is less recognizable and precise for a shaky WP:COMMONNAME claim. As said above, the site itself is mainly identified as "Breitbart News" at first reference. The company's own Twitter handle is "Breitbart News" [11] and their editorial articles are frequently credited to Breitbart News. In addition, they have a feature called "Breitbart News Daily". So, the WP:COMMONNAME usage here is questionable. Taylor Trescott - ^{my talk} + _{my edits} 04:06, 28 September 2016 (UTC)