User talk:Jimbo Wales

Osmosis: Wikipedia medical articles hijacked by paid editors working for private foundation

TL;DR summary: Wikipedia -- from wiki meaning quick, and encyclopaedia, meaning not YouTube. As an editor, I should be able to edit the article and quickly change it. As a reader, I should be able to verify facts against reliable sources. I cannot do this if a paid editor uploads and embeds an entire article in video format. It becomes WP:OWNED by a private organisation. -- Colin°^Talk 18:02, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I am very concerned that Wikipedia medical articles now embed videos created by Osmosis. These videos are uploaded by an editor user:OsmoeIt who declares to be paid by the foundation to create and upload them to Wikipedia. Osmosis appears to be funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which is a private philanthropy foundation created by a founder of the American medical firm Johnson & Johnson.

Wikipedia is, I believe, fundamentally a project collaboratively edited by volunteers. While it may link to other websites containing medical information created by third parties, I hope the Wikipedia content itself is fundamentally user created and open to being collaboratively edited. For audio-visual material we have a history of accepting content that is not created by volunteers, provided it is freely licensed. However, this content is mostly images or short video clips which can easily be substituted for another by any editor.

Here, though we have lengthy videos that often comprehensively replace the article content in their scope. Take Epilepsy. Here we do not just have a short video of a person having a seizure, but a nine minute video documentary covering the entire article topic. There are several issues with that:

• The content cannot be edited. [While theoretically, someone can take the CC BY SA video and make a derivative work, it is not realistic to do that as the narrator would be different and it would be very hard to achieve the same visual style].
• The content begins and ends with publicity for a third party.
• The content is unsourced and therefore does not meet our editing policies.
• Some content is outdated, and it is not possible to fix. For example the video uses the outdated term "complex partial seizure"
• The video does not fit with our style guide for medical articles, referring to "patients" rather than "people with epilepsy".
• The video contains American English slang terms such as "spaced out" which would not appear in professional writing and may be unfamiliar to our international audience.
• Wikipedia is primarily an encyclopaedia, not a YouTube channel, nor a documentary. Videos should supplement the article text, providing information in ways that cannot be done by reading alone. Instead here, we have whole article topics in video format.

Here is what happens when an editor challenges the material in one of these videos in Dementia with Lewy bodies:

• Video removed and discussion started on talk: "With no mention of two of four core symptoms, this video is outdated" -- User:SandyGeorgia
• video restored without discussion or gaining consensus "Sure. Will request they update it." -- User:Doc James
• video restored again "I have restored the video. They say they are willing to update it." -- User:Doc James.

Another example to Coeliac disease

• Doc James adds the video to Coeliac disease, which is a featured article. -- User:Doc James
• Video removed by BallenaBlanca and discussion started on talk Talk:Coeliac disease/Archive 5#Coeliac disease video "I do not agree with the inclusion of this video...I repeat, these "old ideas" are “very dangerous” and the reason which most celiacs remain unrecognized, undiagnosed and untreated. So I removed this video" -- User:BallenaBlanca
• Video restored without discussion or gaining consensus "lets see if they are willing to update the video based on the concerns you have raised" -- User:Doc James
• Video again removed by BallenaBlanca and discussion continues on talk.
• User:OsmoseIt says "The target audience of our videos is for medical students" and "We'll implement your feedback in our next revision of the video."
• video restored again by Doc James "It is still useful content" -- User:Doc James
• Video moved out of the lede by BallenaBlanca "This video is the same version, it was not improved. I do not agree its inclusion in the page as it is; if we let it, at least should not be in the lede, I think it has to be left in Pathophysiology section until it is updated." -- User:BallenaBlanca

So we now have content created by a private organisation that cannot be removed by any editor with concerns about its content. Instead the video is forcibly, and without discussion or consensus, restored to the article by edit warring, with just a promise that this third-party will at some point update it.

There are nearly 300 of these videos added to many of the major medical article topics. In addition to the Canadian User:OsmoseIt, another editor User:Tannermarshall is involved, of which we know nothing. But the biggest player here is Canadian User:Doc James. I can find no discussion at WP:MED where Osmosis is discussed as a possible project the community might approve of. Yet the material is added with edit summary "Videos have been released under a CC BY SA license and uploaded as part of a partnership between Osmosis.org and meta:Wiki Project Med Foundation. I can find no mention of Osmosis at meta:Wiki Project Med Foundation. The Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Osmosis page was created by Doc James "We are working with Osmosis to create medical videos under a CC BY SA license." That project page contains almost no discussion -- these videos are not in fact being reviewed by the project or community prior to being added to articles by Doc James. I must conclude that the "we" is Doc James, and not WP:MED nor the Wikipedia community.

While the project to create and add these videos may appear well intentioned, this is not IMO, what Wikipedia is. Would we accept it if our history articles embedded documentaries from the History Channel? Or our current affairs articles contain vidoes by Fox News? A CC BY SA licence, and an educational purpose is not sufficient reason to embed content from private third parties. Wikipedia is being privatised and collaborative editing denied. -- Colin°^Talk 10:34, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

If they were well done, presented the consensus of scholarly opinion, and made available free, why wouldn't we? I checked the dispute on coeliac. I'm at a loss to understand what "danger" BallenaBlanca is talking about. The video is a reasonable description of coeliac as I understand it, as a late diagnosed patient. Obviously BallenaBlanca has a different view, but this is completely mainstream, and one thing that is dangerous is rejecting mainstream content in Wikipedia medical articles because we have a different view. I don't know if BallenaBlanca is medically qualified (Doc James is). Guy (Help!) 12:09, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

If you like it, User:JzG, then sure, link to it as an external link. Doc James is not an expert on Coeliac disease, and since when did we start dismissing editors because they don't publicise their qualifications or are lay. As a lay editor with a Featured Article (Ketogenic diet) I find that rather offensive. But let's imagine you are a medical authority on Coeliac disease. So, exactly how, on this collaboratively-edited encyclopaedia, are you going to edit any mistakes you find, or if you wish to update this in a year's time with the latest consensus advice? And which part of WP:V allows us to replace-in-video-format article content but not apply any sourcing policies? -- Colin°^Talk 12:23, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Actually, User:JzG, User:BallenaBlanca's talk page states "I am a Doctor in Medicine. Gastroenterology Specialist." So not only are your comments on their medical status inappropriate on an encyclopaedia which, last time I checked, didn't require a "MD" after the user's name to be able to edit, but they are also wrong. If we believe the statements made by both these individuals on their qualifications, then Doc James is totally out of his depth, as usual. But fundamentally Wikipedia discussions are not settled on the qualifications (or lack) of editors, but on the sources used to justify article text. In this case, we neither have article text nor sources. It is the anti-Wikipedia. -- Colin°^Talk 13:14, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Park your hysteria, please. I said I didn't know if BB is medically qualified. That is televant simply because medical articles are a magnet for lay activists. As I said, I see nothing dangerous about this content. It seems mainstream to me. Guy (Help!) 13:35, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

User:JzG, you are dealing with this as though it is a content dispute. Concentrating on whether one particular video is mostly OK isn't the point. -- Colin°^Talk 13:58, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

No, I am looking at one of the examples you cited, which is a subject that is important to me (as an adult-diagnosed coeliac), and not seeing any problem. Free content that fairly represents a mainstream view of the subject, does not appear to be a problem to me. Guy (Help!) 17:45, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Inserting any video or other media content into an article is a question of whether there is consensus for inserting it or not on the article discussion page, not of the professional qualifications or prior endeavors of the editors. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 13:06, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

This page never fails to provide regular doses of hilarity. I am in stitches (ha!) at the sight of an amateur encyclopedia author criticizing the lack of medical expertise of an actual doctor. Gamaliel (talk) 21:20, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

@Gamaliel: I know it seems strange, but the problems are based on and evidenced with citations to the most recent, highest quality reliable sources-- focused on content. Problem being the videos don't have to (and don't) meet WP:MEDRS (or even WP:RS). Presumably, when you need a specialist, you go to one rather than a GP, because no one has time to keep up with every medical specialty and all of the publications. Nor should they try to! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:58, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

@JzG: did you read the talk page discussion at Talk:Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB)? Here it is again. They do not present, in that case, the minimum of consensus of scholarly opinion. On the two of two I have checked, they have real errors. There is remarkably clear medical consensus on DLB, that was well established before the video was inserted, and which they apparently were unaware of. (Neither was Doc James, based on the effort it took to get him to understand the issue with REM sleep behavior disorder in that article, its lead, and its infobox.)

There was one installed at FA Tourette syndrome until a few days ago; it is now at tic disorders, but still has issues even in that article. After years of carefully keeping the POV wording, "suffers from" out of the TS articles, there it is, along with an inaccurate description of tics. The medical consensus DSM-5 criteria for TS most clearly states that not all people with TS "suffer" -- there is no significant distress or impairment requirement. Similar to DLB, Doc James is defending these videos without in-depth knowledge of the topic.

So, in three cases demonstrated here now, editors who have in-depth knowledge of the sources on a specific topic are trying to explain to people who don't have in-depth knowledge of those topics why these videos don't belong in our articles. Wikipedia editors have to engage in a dispute (that apparently involves edit warring) to remove an inaccurate video from an external source, indeed, a source that has products for sale and no about us information on their website to establish their reliability. This is COI paid editing with every video providing a website link to their shops with products for sale. I am more troubled that there seems to be no en.Wikipedia discussion about these videos, and yet they are being systematically installed on medical articles by one editor. Not seeing the hysteria from Colin that you mention. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:05, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

• Take a look at WP:MEDRS. You will see that, "well done, presented the consensus of scholarly opinion, and made available free" is nothing like as restrictive as MEDRS is. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:16, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I have been mentioned in this thread, so I will give my humble opinion. I can not delve into aspects that I do not know about Wikipedia and other nuances that probably escape me due to a language barrier. But I will do it from the point of view of the collaborative experience with Doc James and from the medical point of view (yes, as mentioned, I am a doctor, specialist in Gastroenterology and Internal Medicine).

The attacks on Doc James sadden me. I think he is one of the most honest people I know and I admire his selfless work. He is doing an impressive job to facilitate access to clear and understandable medical information to the lay public in all corners of the world, including the offline Wikipeida Medical project, in which I collaborated putting my tiny grain of sand. I think he is a collaborative and neutral editor. Sometimes we agree, sometimes not at all, but it is always a work in cooperation and harmony. I have no doubt about his honesty.

As for the videos, I've seen a couple of them in depth and they have not convinced me. The example that has been mentioned on celiac disease: it would have been a good video a few dozen years ago, not with the current knowledge. I accomplished that they updated a part, but not others that are of fundamental importance. I am annoyed with the user OsmoseIt. I have agreed to keep the video on the page, although in another section, during the time necessary to update it, otherwise I think it should be removed. Two years have passed and I'm still waiting for his answer and he fulfill what was promised. As you can see in the conversation, I took the trouble and the time to explain the wrong points in detail, facilitating current MEDRS references. I do not accept that the video is not improved because it requires a lot of time of work (we will have to dedicate the time that it takes, to have mediocre information and mediocre videos we already have hundreds of websites and videos on Youtube): "To give some perspective, making edits to these videos does not take 2 seconds. The edit we made on your suggestion took a couple of hours of work --OsmoseIt" or because "We feel your other suggestions are an expansion of the scope of the video, beyond what we want to cover for our target audience. --OsmoseIt". This is Wikipedia and we have to comply with Wikipedia policies and objectives, not Osmosis team objetives.

These are the great inconveniences that I see in these videos. The idea is good, but they seem prepared without a suitable specialized supervision and are considered "closed". I could only agree with the firm commitment to update them continuously, basing the information on verifiable current MEDRS sources and listening to the objections / proposals of the other Wikpedia editors, just as we do with the text of the pages. Otherwise, I do not consider them appropriate for Wikipedia, nor as external links (by the way, nor intended for students ...). --BallenaBlanca 🐳 ♂ (Talk) 16:26, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

• Some years ago, Jimmy Wales was pleased to announce that the medical fraternity wanted to become more active on Wikipedia. They would import good, reliable, encyclopedic information. What have we ended up with ? A torrent of subliminal advertising ! I agree with JW on most things but this paid for activity has got to stop.Aspro (talk) 12:16, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

• I'm disappointed that this issue was not raised on WT:MED before being brought here. Looie496 (talk) 13:45, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
  • Looie496, there isn't actually a medical aspect to this issue. It is fundamental to what Wikipedia is. But it would be been nice if WP:MED had even discussed these videos on wiki or with the wider community. -- Colin°^Talk 14:01, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
    • I am seeing it more broadly as a COI issue, in which Doc James is involved with furthering paid editing. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:03, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
      • What you are seeing is the equivalent of Doc James supporting a WiR, as he does for many Wikipedians in Residences and educational efforts. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:03, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Imagine you have worked on an article and taken it to Featured Article status like Tourette syndrome (another example article where Doc James edit warrs over the video). Every sentence is professional-level prose. Every fact sourced. The topic is comprehensively covered in text. Then someone plants a block of text in your lead with a big box round it. The block is titled "Content created by Osmosis". The bold Comic Sans font paragraph covers much of the article topic, but is written for medical students. It gets a few things wrong and out-of-date along the way. It ends with Facebook and Twitter links to Osmosis. Well, you'd be upset and want to either remove or edit it. But when you press the Edit button you get told your edit is denied. Instead you get a web form where you may submit change requests to Osmosis. After describing the problem in the box, you are thanked for your help in improving Osmosis and promised your comments will be taken into consideration for the next version of the video. Whenever that might be.

Wikipedia -- from wiki meaning quick, and encyclopaedia, meaning not YouTube. I should be able to edit the article and quickly change it. I cannot do this If someone embeds an entire article in video format, it can become WP:OWNED by a private organisation. -- Colin°^Talk 13:58, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Per Colin's comment above, it does seem that having a block of embedded content that – practically speaking – can't be modified by anyone except the original uploader is difficult to reconcile with the wiki ethos.

Placing a block of content in the middle of a Wikipedia article that credits an external agency at the beginning and end of the video, and rolls credits naming several contributors at the end, also violates the spirit of WP:WATERMARK and MOS:CREDITS. It highlights that this material isn't really Wikipedia article content, it's just an interstitial ad. (Having watched the video on Lewy body dementia just now, it might as well have ended with Ask your doctor if donepezil is right for you!)

At best, the content in these videos is simply a recapitulation of content that should already be present in the articles. This is functionally a way to circumvent the guidance of WP:ELNO—by uploading their privileged, (practically) unmodifiable content to Commons, they are able to paste their preferred video articles straight into the body of Wikipedia pages. If the videos were hosted externally, we wouldn't link to them at all, as they "...[do] not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a featured article. In other words, the site should not merely repeat information that is already or should be in the article. Links for future improvement of the page can be placed on the article's talk page."

As an aside, Osmosis' use of a round logo with muted blue-green-red color palette is sufficiently reminiscent of the Wikimedia Foundation logo that I actually went to check whether there was an official link between the organizations. While I expect that they're sufficiently distinct for trademark law purposes, I found the design choice to be uncomfortably suggestive, especially as it appears at the beginning and end of each video. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:09, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

On the issue of donepezil, I am slowly working through the DLB article (which was awful), and have not yet gotten to the Management section (or Causes, Pathology, and a few others-- the article was horribly outdated). When I have finished updating the page (need at least another week), I will take issue with other things in that video. Yes, I agree this is an ELNO problem; I don't want to see us furthering the interests of this org, even in External links. And I agree that we need to address videos at WP:V. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:24, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I agree with the OP. It is good to include these as external links (similarly to how The Periodic Table of Videos is included at Osmium), but presenting them as they currently appear at Epilepsy isn't acceptable. It promotes "Osmosis" and is in a location where "wiki" content that anybody can edit is expected. power~enwiki (π, ν) 15:36, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

• User:Colin nice job climbing the Reichstag. Like most who do that, your post misrepresents the situation. You write that there has been no discussion. This is not true - they were discussed here -- Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Medicine/Archive_76#Videos -- and several other times as well as this search shows. Your behavior here is reprehensible. Jytdog (talk) 16:15, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
  • Jytdog, would you believe me if I said that I did not see that discussion in my search results? Perhaps not. Anyway, that discussion involved very few editors not already linked to Osmosis. Such as User:Soupvector who claims he "helped their founders with Osmosis during its early days". The other discussions are quite superficial. -- Colin°^Talk 18:00, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
    • I believe that you came at this emotionally and half-cocked, and the result was a thoroughly incompetent posting. Jytdog (talk) 18:15, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

• Jyt, while your tone is unhelpful, that initial discussion is. The problems with these videos were expressed early on by multiple medical editors, and installed on "consensus" of a minority. Why did the project go forward? Also, a reminder about local consensus; this is not only a medical article issue-- it is one that should concern anyone who cares about COI in paid editing. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:22, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

• PS, that red link raised flags, so I went to check if I needed to file an SPI. No, but the first edit summary is of interest to this discussion. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:27, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Your attack on Doc James above is horrible, and noted. Jytdog (talk) 17:26, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Very interesting to see the Doc James contributions here. When newbie User:Chrisbospher added the words "for profit" to clarify Osmosis's position as a company, he was reverted and taken to ANI. Doc James claimed "The group doing medical videos at Khan has split off and formed an organization called Osmosis" User:OsmoseIt writes on Commons "We are not a spin-off of Khan Academy. Could you point me to where you saw that we were? If that's written anywhere then that is indeed a mistake and I'll fix it, but to my knowledge we've never claimed to be a KA spin-off." So, we have false and misleading information being corrected and improved by a newbie who is then sent for punishment at ANI. The user is dismissed as "someone with an axe to grind" and "only here for one purpose—to have the extremely useful medical videos deleted" and "The claims of "free advertising/marketing tool" are obviously over-the-top". Well perhaps Jytdog if you could stop worshiping the WP:MED deity for a moment, you might think that perhaps uneditable content owned by a private for-profit corporation on all our medical articles, may well simply be freemium teasers for their subscription material. -- Colin°^Talk 18:00, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

You want to go yet further making wild claims and alienating everybody, knock yourself out. Almost everything you have written here is half-wrong and tilted. I will not be responding to you further, as you appear to be too hysterical to reason with. Jytdog (talk) 18:12, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Does this help clarify your stance? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:37, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Is it news to you that I work on paid editing and COI issues a lot? My thoughts on those issues are very clear. They are also not black and white. There is always context and the context-less framing that both you and Colin have put on this is sloppy at best and just ugly at worst. Jytdog (talk) 20:33, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

At Talk:Breastfeeding#Inaccuracies_in_video four months ago, I brought up problems with accuracy, sourcing (i.e. no sourcing), editability (i.e. not community-editable), and excessive advertising in the Osmosis video for the Breastfeeding article.

To focus on one of the inaccuracies, the video claims that "Breast milk contains all the nutrients a baby needs for its first year." The overwhelming consensus among health organizations is that this is not the case, and solids should be gradually introduced starting at around six months. Introducing solid foods too late (which is tempting for parents because solids are a hassle) leads to poor growth, anemia, and feeding problems. [1].

So here we have content in a Wikipedia article that contradicts medical consensus, would foreseeably harm small children, and is not reliably sourced by WP:MEDRS standards. What would you do about that content? (Note: Gandydancer removed the video earlier today, so this is a hypothetical question unless she is reverted.) Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 18:22, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

We now have five or six (?) examples already of videos that don't reflect easily known medical consensus, with several examples now of edit warring to retain them. This is paid COI editing at its worst. How do we go about removing all of them? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:43, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Sure SandyGeorgia, Doc James is corporate shill. There are issues with the videos but you are so busy slathering on resentful garbage that the actual issues cannot be discussed. What a sloppy campaigner you have become. Jytdog (talk) 19:41, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I agree with SandyGeorgia, Colin et al. Yes, the section title is over the top, and yes, that made that it took me longer to make up my mind.

Bit worried about Jytdog personalising the dispute to such a degree.

Re. SandyGeorgia on how to address this most efficiently: WP:COIN? List there, in a new section, editors involved with the organisation that produces these videos, and the articles where these videos were (initially) placed by such editors. Don't know whether consensus would be straightforward on that noticeboard, but doesn't seem impossible. A further step could be that henceforth such videos can not be placed in Wikipedia articles without prior talk page consensus (and certainly not placed by editors with a COI w.r.t. the organisation that produces them). Seems fine to keep these videos at commons though, reachable with a click on the commons link under "in other projects" in the left margin. --Francis Schonken (talk) 19:55, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Francis thanks for your comments. I don't think such videos should be embedded in Wikipedia at all, no matter who wrote them or paid for them. It really doesn't fit our model for article development or policies for sourcing and editing content. Wrt the section title, there are 300 of these videos covering many of the major topics in medical articles. Today's YouTube generation are likely to watch the video and not read the article. So I think "hijacked by paid editors working for private foundation" is quite accurate. -- Colin°^Talk 20:25, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) User:Francis Schonken my thoughts on the video issue are here at WT:MED. This is not some big crisis. What is going on here, is just Colin and SandyGeorgia grinding axes.

This whole thread was kicked off by Colin who is very, very invested in the epilepsy article and it is the video there that kicked off his having a cow over this.

if you read carefully through this you will see both SandyGeorgia and Colin actually targeting Doc James and work he has been doing through the WPMED Foundation to make content available in the developing world - which includes concentrating on the leads of articles about health, getting them translated, and including video content in the lead, which are then all packaged onto cheap hard drives connected to wifi beacons and shipped all over the place.

both colin and sandygeorgia are grinding axes that have little to do with the issue at hand - which again, is not a crisis. Jytdog (talk) 20:28, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Could you convey what you have to say without personalising? As written, drenched in ad hominem, it has zero impact on how I came to think about this issue. This also has nothing to do with Doc James and his work. Commons is far more international than English-language Wikipedia, so if left the choice I'd choose commons as a vehicle for these videos, not a Wikipedia in a particular language. --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:57, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

This whole discussion is only typical reichstag-climbing. I posted my careful thoughts on the issue in the link I provided you above, again here. This "discussion" is invalid from the section-header onwards and should go no where. It is just an effort to mobilize drastic action by skewing the issues and leaving out key aspects. I am posting here only to call out the bullshit. Jytdog (talk) 21:02, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Yes I read that. Screams "Commons!" to me, not "Wikipedia!". --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:09, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. As I wrote there I look at the video thing with askance and I do not have the know-how to participate in editing them (like I don't have the know-how to edit templates in lua, for example). It is also not clear to me if having videos that are recapitulating the textual WP:LEAD(this is actually what they are) intended to serve as an AV equivalent of the LEAD, is a good thing or a bad thing , but there is no room for an actual discussion of that, the way this discussion has been framed and prosecuted by its protagonists. Jytdog (talk) 21:27, 26 March 2018 (UTC) (redact Jytdog (talk) 22:13, 26 March 2018 (UTC))

A kind of Wikipedia:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia 2.0 then (for a limited set of articles, only involving the lead section, but with imagery). Still rather something I would link to (at Commons) instead of using them as a sort of second lead image. I've looked at one now: with the publicity at the start and at the end they should be removed from Wikipedia on sight, with a stern warning (if not more) to those who ever thought it a good idea to place them with these characteristics in an article lead section. If used as a thumbnail image (which I think they should never) the caption should be clearer on what one is clicking in to ("video explaining..." doesn't cut it for me). --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:46, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

@Jytdog:, I am curious why you say these videos are "recapitulating the textual lead", because that is not the case in any instance I have looked at. If that were the case, it wouldn't be necessary to sit through the whole thing(s) to uncover all errors. Do you have an example where this was the case, and do you know if that changed? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:01, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

My sense is that this is the intention -- to serve as an AV version of the lead. I did not mean "take the words written in the lead and videoize them". I meant "provide the AV equivalent of the LEAD". This is kind of an interesting idea to me. Whether the execution of the collaboration is done well or poorly, and whether there is too much benefit for the collaboration partner, are all things that can be discussed, and do not need reichstag climbing in order to discuss. There were other things I wanted to do on content, but instead i have been dealing with this drama/bullshit. There is no crisis. This can be worked through calmly. Jytdog (talk) 22:13, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I get a very different sense from the ones I have seen-- the one now parked at tic disorder is trying to combine various articles (TS, tic and tic disorder). I think. OK, so could we now start discussing real content issues, and real issues that drain editor time and prevent us from working on content ? I guess I am not going to finish treatment at DLB today after all :( Which was my goal, since I pick up five more reviews tomorrow at the clinic. I have as much time at DLB into dealing with issues similar to this in the lead, as I have editing. I hope you might consider that getting WP:MED to focus on content as we very clearly once did is ... relentlessly discouraging. For the person who "founded" MEDRS, and worked a very long time to get it through, I hope you understand Colin's position. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:22, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Could you please cut the "Reichstag" and "drama" and whatnot which you keep repeating? As unhelpful as the "hijacked" in the section title. Thanks. --Francis Schonken (talk) 22:26, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

What I will do is stop commenting here. There is a discussion going on at WT:MED and one is enough for me. I think I have beat my particular horse quite to death here, as you noted. Jytdog (talk) 22:37, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Jyt, could you please calm down the rhetoric? Doc James is not a paid editor; the Osmosis guy is. But Doc James is open to the claim that he is acting on their behalf by edit warring this content in (prior to this discussion, I was unaware that was happening on so many articles). As to sloppy-- this is a huge distraction. I am trying to write an article. Could we keep our priorities, and the discussion, focused on how these videos impact content (and the editors who try to improve it)? There is a clear example at Talk:DLB. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:00, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

@Francis Schonken, I am wondering if an RFC to get them all removed at Commons might be a better option. But I know nothing of how Commons works, and am more interested right now in trying to finish working on one of the articles where this came up :) It is really hard to focus on dozens of secondary reviews with this issue overshadowing. Thanks for the suggestion, though. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:05, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Wouldn't worry about commons: as said, if asked the question, I'd probably keep them there. --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:12, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I agree, they are valid content for Commons, but not Wikipedia. Some editors, I think, have focused too much on "ooh free educational medical videos" and totaly forgotten what Wikipedia actual is. -- Colin°^Talk 20:25, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Meta-discussion, not fun to read

You and Colin are the ones climbing the reichstag and flaming everything. I am calling you out on that sloppy garbage. Both of you. What resentful people you are. Neither of you do anything here for months and months and then you show up screaming bloody murder about all the work that other people are doing. If you want to improve content then do it. Neither of you have come anywhere even close to addressing why these videos were being added. What you have written here is sloppy, lazy, resentful garbage. I do not respect any one of those things. Jimmy's page is the last refuge of scoundrels and campaigners in WP. We see this every day. That is what you've become. Jytdog (talk) 20:16, 26 March 2018 (UTC) I will ask you again to tone down the personal aspects you are bringing to this discussion, remind you that quite a few editors besides Colin and me have raised the same concern (see discussion at WT:MED), and ... gah ... you got me, I have been such a slouch at editing lately! Jyt, one tries to improve content,and is derailed by this sort of thing; it's most discouraging. Perhaps you aren't aware of just how we lost Colin (without whom, we would not have WP:MEDRS today). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:36, 26 March 2018 (UTC) Your call for "civility" is entirely fake, when what you and Colin are doing with this pseudo-crisis reichstag-climbing is just personal ax-grinding. There is no crisis and neither of you have dealt with any nuance in the discussion of these issues. What you are doing here is bullshit - speech intended to persuade without regard for truth, which I am calling you out on, and clearly so. Jytdog (talk) 20:47, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Break 2

• One thing in all of this is certain — this is not going to be settled by arguing on Jimbo Talk. If the videos are such an issue then a couple of editors who familiar with the issue, say @SandyGeorgia and Doc James:, should put together a site wide RfC on whether to include these in articles. Placing these in many articles is a question for the community. Even before we get to the issues of accuracy there is the question of giving Osmosis privileged positioning for their content when there is no evidence of a formal relationship with Wikipedia. At the very least the Osmosis banner needs to be edited out but, I assume that can be done by anyone with a video editor. Jbh ^Talk 20:20, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
  • Jbhunley, in my experience, Wikipedia and Commons are often too quick to make a proposal and then get people voting. That tends to polarise comments and focus too much on any flaws with one solution. The discussion was only opened today and it covers multiple areas of policy: COI, paid editing, proxy editing, sourcing of videos, appropriateness of long videos covering entire article topics, inability to edit videos in a wiki manner, edit warring, bullying. Perhaps there are several possible RFC's. I think they need to be proposed by someone capable of neutrality and discussion prior to making any community proposal. Someone experienced with creating policy and getting consensus. I don't think Doc James is at all appropriate for that job. Nor do I wish it. -- Colin°^Talk 20:42, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
    • @Colin: Hmmm... I can see that. I was thinking of being able to get buy in from both camps but you are probably right that things are already too polarized. The reason I think getting a community wide RfC up is it, hopefully, get a resolution process started before the dispute spreads. I can see the problem with kicking off a poorly considered one in the heat of the moment too.
      I would suggest first addressing where these videos conflict with site-wide policies like RS and V. There is also the question of giving Osmosis a privileged position at Wikipedia. As it stands there are two root issues 1) the Osmosis banner in the video is spammy and, since there are so many articles with the videos, appears to be a Wikipedia endorsement of Osmosis. 2) the videos provide narrative information which is impossible to verify which may contradict information in the article. I would think that these would have failed MEDRS out of the gate and I am extremely concerned that some of our to medical editors seem not to apply the same rigor to the information in these videos as they do to what is in the article. The people most at risk from bad information in the article are the same group who would be turning to these videos to get medical information. Jbh ^Talk 20:59, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
      • • Jbhunley, just for the record, for anyone unfamiliar with who I am, since I don't edit here much any more, I created WP:MEDRS in 2006 and pushed it to an official guideline. So, yes, to see WP:MED support medical content that is entirely unsourced, never mind poorly sourced, is most grieving to me. -- Colin°^Talk 21:17, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
      • @Jbhunley:, thanks for measured responses. I don't see concern for the dispute spreading, but a neutrally framed RFC is needed. Most of the medical editors who have weighed in on this discussion here and at WT:MED are quite experienced editors, and I don't see any risk that many of us are going to go around deleting the videos without consensus (previous edit-warring aside, which will hopefully cease). Since multiple issues have been raised on various pages about all of the various policies and guidelines and aspects of Wikipedia editing that are in play here (I am thinking also of ELNO, MOS:IMAGES, MEDRS, V, RS, WP:WIAFA, and others) an RFC should be drafted, but first with careful discussion of all of the pieces in play. I do not know how much I can participate; I have a medical situation in my family, and edit as I am able to get sources while I am at the hospital. Things change by the day. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:15, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
        • Being neither a medical editor, nor a writer of RfCs, I think that the issue could be addressed with a two-part RfC question:
          • Should long form videos, included in articles and purporting to cover the topic or part of the topic of the article, be subject to Wikipedia's content policies and guidelines.
            • If not all policies and guidelines should they be required to meet sourcing guidelines like WP:RS, WP:MEDRS and WP:ORGIND?

To me the answer is a no-brainer. Anything which purports to represent a topic on Wikipedia must meet our content policies and guidelines. Once that is established it becomes the responsibility to whomever wants to produce such a video to come up with a format. As far as the Osmosis videos go I would suggest that if they are ultimately allowed that the producers be asked to upload versions without the Osmosis branding. If they decline then either a separate RfC on the applicability to ELNO to these videos or simply encourage editors to go through all of the videos and remove the Osmosis branding. They are, after all, freely licensed and if a great hew and cry were raised the arguement that they were spam becomes very strong. Jbh ^Talk 22:05, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

• As a not-anonymous physician-professor who volunteers here with the intent of contributing in concert with others, and having been a pretty severe critic of Osmosis, I really don't appreciate what I perceive to be Colin's veiled aspersions cast above about a COI I might have with Osmosis (at the time they were students they did not tell me of their commercialization plans, and I can assure you that I did not receive a dime or equity). More than others at the time, I was quite critical of the idea of posting these videos - for many of the reasons stated above (proprietary, promotional, un-editable); I sunk hours into editing the Google Docs they posted (after unsuccessfully arguing that the scripts should be in Talk/sandbox space); ultimately, I did think that the ones generated collaboratively were a net positive but likely to become stale. I stuck to content in my area of medical/scientific expertise. I am not sure anyone did more (critical) editing of scripts than I did - but at some point I lost interest because I felt that I was going it alone, and I really did not feel that it was a collaborative effort (and I'm busy). I don't find the tone of the discussion above collegial, FWIW, which may be relevant to those who wonder why it's hard to recruit/retain academic editors. — soupvector (talk) 21:01, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
  • soupvector, thanks for clarifying your position. I don't think my words "that discussion involved very few editors not already linked to Osmosis. Such as User:Soupvector who claims he 'helped their founders with Osmosis during its early days'" were "veiled aspersions cast" as you were open about your link, which is all I stated. The discussion did not bring many fresh eyes from WP:MED and certainly did not involve the wider community deciding that getting a private organisation to redo wikipedia articles as videos embedded in the lead was a good idea. -- Colin°^Talk 21:09, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
    • Thanks for clarifying. The phrase "redo wikipedia articles as videos" seems overstated - these videos did not replace content, simply sat alongside. I think the format is not a good fit for WP for the reasons many have given, but "redo" seems intentionally provocative/territorial. There are many learning styles, and at their best these videos seem like a net positive; I would certainly prefer content of this quality that can be edited collaboratively and that is entirely non-promotional. — soupvector (talk) 21:29, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
      • soupvector, I am struggling to find an alternative than "redo" for content that covers exactly the same topic scope, but in a different format (video). It isn't even all visual in the video, with loads of text in webm. Yes, a major issue is that video documentaries cannot be collaboratively edited in a wiki fashion. Even if the technology existed, one would almost certainly need a computer generated narration, because humans do not all sound alike or talk alike. Can you imagine if a reader had to listen to all the editors of an article read the word's they had contributed. -- Colin°^Talk 21:48, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
• I appreciate this discussion and, FWIW, offer my uninvolved perspective. I am not a medical professional at any level, just an amateur encyclopedia author and avid reader. I do not see hysteria in Colin's presentation. I do see capitulation in aspersion based rebuttals like "climbing the Reichstag", "thoroughly incompetent posting", and the incipient regurgitation of the hysterical label. Nothing says "my argument is weak" more clearly than these fallacies of relevance. Aesthetically, the video's presentation is poor and they are a considerable distraction as a lead element. Especially if you enlarge your text, as I do, to compensate failing vision (the media's frame quickly becomes hugely disproportionate, and its lack of a meaningful caption defies even its own unclear purpose. I resent the island mentality that this issue is the provenance of WikiProject Medicine. The silver lining I see in this grey cloud is that Osmosis may have single handedly ended the infobox war, but the ante and stakes have also been raised. The ensuing cause, however, will not be called lame.--John Cline (talk) 06:28, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Inhouse

Is there no funding for us to make theses vids? Don't think we would need to ask for much cash.....some cash for hosting software so Wikipedia editors could collaborate on making videos of this nature. Having a third party doing this no matter who they are looks bias on our part.--Moxy (talk) 18:03, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Moxy, while we have enormous content problems in biomedical and health articles, I am seeing it is increasingly difficult for editors on Wikipedia to actually work on improving content, as they are distracted by issues like this (and several others) that are taking over medical articles. I am sorry to see so much editing time taken by these videos, which should be an easy delete based on all of our policies and guidelines. I would be more sorry to see even a bigger drain placed on our content by editors instead working on videos that create a difficult WP:V and WP:MEDRS issue. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:22, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I would think It would bring in a new set of editors (those interested in regurgitating content in video format) vs our content editors....I for one don't have an interest in making vids....but millions out there who have zero interest in writing may take up this torch. --Moxy (talk) 18:27, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I see the problem as those editors who seem to "have zero interest in writing ... [have already taken] up this torch". Distractions like this one take valuable editor time away from actually working on our Wikipedia content. Efforts at WP:MED are increasingly off-en.wikipedia focused. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:40, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

So let's bring it back home...take control...get the Graphics lab involved etc.. Let's propose solutions over walls of text about the problem. We have thousands of editors that do noting but mess around with non-content stuff. Let's put out a call to action.--Moxy (talk) 18:52, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

The problem here is we already have too many people involved who are not topic experts, not up-to-snuff on recent high-quality reviews required for sourcing medical articles, so medical misinformation is being spread. I would be happy to have no further distraction to attempts to improve written content. Writing medical articles is hard; what these video problems all have in common is that people are making and spreading them without thorough knowledge of the topics or sources. Let's not encourage more of same! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:06, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Yes we should all go away and let you and Colin do everything. Everyone else is clearly a biased idiot or paid shill. Jytdog (talk 19:41, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

I've tolerated you and your resentful, defensive, abusive juvenile discourse until now because (as Sandy mentions above) there are so few people willing to work on Wikipedia health content: I figured it was better having you here doing it than us having one less editor. I've changed my mind on that. I know one good editor who won't edit Wikipedia medical articles because of you. If you go, you'll probably be replaced by a much warmer, more respectful, more intelligent editor. So, yep, you should go away, or learn some manners and respect. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 12:02, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

Moxy, while creating the content by volunteers would remove some of the issues, it still remains a fundamental problem that this content is not editable and yet is extensive enough to cover whole article topics, rather than illustrate a single point with visual. I have raised concerns about the lack of sourcing for any of these videos at Wikipedia talk:Verifiability. It seems to me that once one goes beyond illustrating a fact or two, the leeway that we give to images wrt WP:V becomes a problem. Wikipedia is a project where editors collaborate to produce articles. And one where anyone can edit easily and quickly. By offering the article in video format, a single user can subvert our policies and editing model, and demand an all-or-nothing approach to its inclusion. While such videos may be acceptable to Commons, they aren't appropriate for Wikipedia. Perhaps there is room for another free-content project where videographers collaborate to produce educational videos, but that isn't Wikipedia, and the output seems more appropriate for YouTube than a hyperlinked fundamentally text-based encyclopaedia. -- Colin°^Talk 20:10, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Avoid using images to convey text? "Moving images" should probably follow the rule (or one similar to it) too, I suppose. --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:21, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps we should have Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Don't replace the entire article topic with a video :-) -- Colin°^Talk 20:29, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

This is BS. Not one article has been replaced by video.

Speaking about distracting medical editors. Gah we have user Colin bringing unfounded statements to half a dozen places.

That user has made at most a couple of dozen edits to Wikipedia articles in the last two years! With two, yes that is correct two edits having been to a medical articles. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:27, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

You might think about that, Doc. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:36, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Rather than spreading conversation out across more places I have provided a more detailed response here. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:59, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

I just wanted to let everyone know that I've read all this with great interest and I am reflecting on it. For me, the allegations about COI and "a torrent of subliminal advertising" require a lot more evidence, as I don't really see it. A charitable foundation creating educational videos under a free license is a good thing. On the other hand, I do think there are interesting (and hard) questions about what happens if such a video has errors or ambiguities or could in any way be improved, since it's quite hard for editors to actually do that with a video. (Text is wonderfully fluid, video is much more frozen in form.)

There is also a valid question about the style of the videos, which is super casual. The first line of the 'pneumonia' video goes like this: "Alright, so checkout this dude,..." Not really an ideal match for Wikipedia's style.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 08:49, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

subliminal advertising" is the art of not making it obvious. I dare guess that you are more more able than most editors to see through to the gist. But having a background in sales and advertising, I suggest your read a 'very old book' : by Edward Bernays. He wrote our bible and was a marketing genius. For instance, he persuaded women the that could be seen smoking cigarettes in public in a time during the 1930's when it was not approved (to promotes sales) and regretted later in life that he doubled the the lung cancer rates. Read the book and then tell me me if medical orthodox marketing knowledge is not doing the same in 2018. I was formally in a world where we earned our salaries by pulling the wool over other peoples eyes. You are in the position where you can get easy access to consult and chin-wag with professors of medicine who have no affiliations to any 'for profit organizations'. WP values proof but after speaking to those that know, you might have some other thoughts about the policing (by a few very active editors) of proof , evidence, and reliability as it applies to WP- if you know what I mean. Aspro (talk) 15:51, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Wrt "A charitable foundation creating educational videos under a free license is a good thing." such material belongs on Commons. Also I don't see the distinction between a private charitable foundation and a private commercial organisation. Both may have goals that do not align with ours. For example, these videos are originally designed to train American medical students, and that is their goal and interest. That does not align with our goal of educating the general readership and an international audience. There is a conflict of interest there, never mind any possible bias or censorship that the foundation may impose on its authors. Wikipedia is only collaboratively edited at the level of text, and is only verifiable via in-text citations, and can only meet its CC obligations for documenting authorship and modification history via textual means. Commons, where these videos are hosted, is not a collaboratively edited project. They just don't fit Wikipedia. There may be a place for them elsewhere in the WMF family. WikiVideo? WikiTube? -- Colin°^Talk 09:19, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Regarding the super-casual tone, which is also typically a cheerful, almost sing-songy tone, I agree it's not appropriate for Wikipedia's style. It's also inappropriate for the content and audience, given that the narrator is often talking about distressing medical conditions that are currently causing suffering to the viewer or their loved ones. Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 15:51, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Enforce the usual watermark policy

We are Wikipedia, which means we are thieves and proud of it, because we serve the People. If we take an old PD book from Google, we edit out their watermark, just because we don't like it. Obviously these leading and trailing logos, taking actual eyeball time, are something we *really* don't like, so the videos should be trimmed by any editor to remove that spammy and unwanted content. Wnt (talk) 14:40, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Yup it is fairly easy to do. The beginning of the video from Osmosis was removed here to take this out. And we have updated that Wikipedia page to include the version without it. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:47, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

(ec) A measured and neutral summary of the issue as always. Thanks, Wnt.

Knowledge Diffusion (the company) would really like to sell subscriptions to their service, Osmosis Prime (enjoy 1, 2, or 4 years for $209, $279, or $419* *best per-month value!). Sticking their Osmosis logo and credits up on videos that appear inline front and center on hundreds of Wikipedia's medical articles (the most-read information resource in the world) is quite the marketing coup.

I've contributed hundreds of thousands of words to Wikipedia over the years; I don't expect or insist that my sentences be separately set off with a TenOfAllTrades banner at the top and bottom. I understand and accept the terms under which I share my writing, images, and expertise with Wikipedia and the world. I don't see why we would change the nature of that relationship between Wikipedia and its contributors – or create, effectively, a new class of relationship for one particular contributor – just because Knowledge Diffusion wants to build brand recognition and sell subscriptions.

If KD doesn't want to release videos under a Wikipedia-compatible CC license because they can't be guaranteed a particular type of marketing opportunity, that's their choice. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:52, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

User:TenOfAllTrades as the videos are all under an open license we can remove the logo at the beginning. I will ask them to do that. We can also remove the credits at the end. And move credits to commons text.

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:18, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

While the promotional logos represent one problem with the videos, it's not the only issue. (See concerns raised above and on WT:MED regarding editability, privileged position in articles, turnaround time and responsiveness in correcting errors, accessibility, tone, compatibility with Wikipedia's mission, etc.) Trying for a quick fix without doing some extensive community engagement and discussion (some of which will probably be uncomfortable) is not likely to resolve the community's concerns.

Incidentally, why are you, Doc James, acting as Wikipedia's representative and point of contact in all of this? I don't question your good faith, but it's not clear to me why you are the conduit we have to work through. Shouldn't there be a representative of Knowledge Diffusion and/or Osmosis who can directly engage with the Wikipedia community about their work? TenOfAllTrades(talk) 19:51, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

@TenOfAllTrades: You make a good argument that this needs to be examined as a standard case of COI editing, not much different from music fansites adding links back to themselves or any other such case. However, that is the situation on Wikipedia. Videos could still be kept on Commons as useful free-licensed content, and edited by users there, and incorporated into Wikipedia articles by anyone without a conflict of interest under the usual bright-line rules. So I don't think a wholesale deletion is necessary -- provided that extraordinary claims about their non-editability made below are duly dismissed. Wnt (talk) 02:39, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

User:TenOfAllTrades I have no formal relationship with Osmosis or Knowledge Diffusion and do not represent them in any manner. I do however generally consider their videos to be useful for our readers. And thus I generally supported adding them and still support keeping them (with modifications). I was involved with convincing them to use an open license and to upload their videos to Wikipedia starting back in 2015. I began this when one of there members (a pediatrician at Stanford) was still working part time at the Khan academy. That organization released three of their videos under an open license as you can see here Khan was not interested in releasing further videos under an open license however. When Osmosis formed they were much more interested in using open licenses and working with us. In these discussion I speak on my own behalf. Happy to ask them to respond here directly if people wish. Looks like some are simply push to remove the videos entirely though. This does not really require them to join in a discussion. Having them join a discussion is only required if people are interested in collaborating. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:15, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

And of course based on community consensus we may simple delete the entire lot of them if the community deems the issues to be so great as to be unfixable. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:18, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

TenOfAllTrades, et al. Can folks remember that these files are hosted on Commons, not Wikipedia. Commons:Watermarks policy includes a serious warning "Legal issues with the removal of watermarks" (which includes prefix/postfix titles and credits and copyright notices) from WMF legal. Don't try this a home folks. When Doc James says "we can remove the logo" he is out of his depth, being neither a lawyer nor your lawyer. The correct approach is to ask the copyright holder to do it, or get explicit permission in writing. -- Colin°^Talk 19:47, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Yes and I have spoke with them and they have agreed to remove both the front bumper and back bumper for us. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:15, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

@Colin: It's up to Wikipedia users to ignore BULLSHIT LEGAL THREATS and just rework Wikipedia content to fit our needs. The claim you're making here is that when an organization, allegedly volunteering their help for us, submits free content directly to Wikipedia for our free use using a state-of-the-art "free license", that even then we don't get to play with that content unless we consult a lawyer and/or beg the authors to authorize any changes. If that is true then Wikipedia is already dead. I mean, there's really not even a POINT to it. Now I'm not denying that a government or a private organization or any scammer could attack Wikipedians; they could. But you're talking terrorism, terrorism imposed by legal means. People could do terrorism in return with knife, gun, and freon torch and it would be more legitimate an exercise of law. I think the lobbying for hidden spy watermarks in documents expressed at that essay is actually more dangerous than the present issue, because it is so diametrically opposite to all the ideas that Wikipedia holds dear -- even if we ignored that these will presumably be used to track and censor documents in the future in ways that we currently don't fully appreciate. Perhaps there is no human right but murder, no mercy but death, but I would hope this is not yet that day. Wnt (talk) 02:33, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

we can remove the logo at the beginning. What a great "we", Doctor James ! Someone occupying a "community-selected" seat introduces a large set of documents that infringe the usual policies. And then conducts an edit war against people trying to remove the infringing documents. A wall of text later, what we have obtained is this great "we". But this "we" is rather unclear. One possible parsing is the imperial "we", meaning that Doctor James, by himself, will remove the offending watermarks before reintroducing these videos. Another parsing is "we=me+you", i.e. me and myself, the sitting trustee, have introduced the offending documents, and you, the standing pawns, are allowed to clean the watermarks (but not to clean the mess any further, since I like these videos). A more precise statement would be appreciated. Pldx1 (talk) 08:12, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

General issue of long article-topic videos

I have created the essay Wikipedia is not YouTube. As with all essays, it offers one viewpoint and set of opinions that isn't necessarily shared by the whole community and has no pretensions to represent consensus (yet!) Constructive edits to the essay by those who share some of the views/opinions expressed are welcome. Editors who have opposing views can rant on the talk page, if they can remain civil, or create their own essay. I would appreciate if big edits were discussed first. It is only a draft at present. -- Colin°^Talk 20:59, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Prior discussions at WPMED about the collaboration

Here are nine prior discussions over the last five years about this collaboration.

• Dec 4, 2013
• Aug 28, 2014
• Nov 26, 2014
• Feb 8, 2015
• July 5, 2015
• Dec 24, 2015
• Feb 8 2016
• Mar 23, 2016
• Aug 30, 2017

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:07, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

An interesting read. About 15 editors total involved over 4 years. Not a single discussion or even proposal for an en.Wikipedia-wide discussion. One indication of understanding of the number of Wikipedia policies, guidelines or purpose being breached is when Jytdog brings up the WP:V problem at July 2015. It is hard to find any understanding in these discussions that Wikipedia exists beyond the walls of WT:MED. And yet these videos are installed in the leads of most medical FAs. Again, without even considering taking it to WT:FAC.

WP:V says

The burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and is satisfied by providing a citation to a reliable source that directly supports the contribution. Attribute all quotations and any material whose verifiability is challenged or likely to be challenged to a reliable, published source using an inline citation. The cited source must clearly support the material as presented in the article. Cite the source clearly and precisely (specifying page, section, or such divisions as may be appropriate). Any material lacking a reliable source directly supporting it may be removed and should not be restored without an inline citation to a reliable source.

But to find the sources for verification, our readers (not all experienced wikipedia editors) need to know how to go to Commons. There, we find not all videos even meet the requirements above (e.g. page no). Many of us challenge a lot of this information. And not all sources meet MEDRS. It appears these videos are removable under WP:V even without going to a full community RFC, or at minimum, removable to the External links. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:00, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

And if you read the discussions, there are complaints that these videos add nothing that isn't already in the article. -- Colin°^Talk 07:48, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

The above links make it appear these videos have been properly discussed with the community. None of these discussions involve the wider Wikipedia community, reflecting a mindset at WP:MED that they own medical articles. The discussions generally involve a few editors. At most, you can say that a handful of those involved in the discussions where generally supportive, and a handful had concerns, which were not addressed.

Open here

Dec 4, 2013 James says Khan Academy are interesting in collaborating. There are no details of what sort of video would be created, but a link to a video on post impressionism is offered. The discussion involves just a few editors and is mostly concerned with the "Smarthistory" project and that if the material is -NC then we have to use external links rather than embed. James proposes Wikipedia should allow -NC so we can incorporate these privately produce videos. Aug 28, 2014 Asks about placement of videos, offers this SimpleShow video as an example. Only a few editors discussed again the problem with licencees. One editor mentioned the video was US-centric and not applicable internationally. James himself noted that "the difficult with video is that they are hard to edit collaboratively". Hmm, isn't that the point of Wikipedia. Nov 26, 2014 James asks which of Khan academy's videos they would like. Of the few comments, one said they did not see a benefit to embedding the video rather than external link. WP Zero is given as the reason. So here we have WP article content being driven by the needs of some outside project. Feb 8, 2015 Three videos from Khan academy added to three articles. Comment: "I don't think these videos add anything of value to our articles. The blood flow through the heart video is simply a repeat of what is stated or implied in the article. There's nothing of educational value that is not already described in detail in the main article. I would be more impressed if you could find a video of a cardiomyocyte beating in a petri dish or in vivo, or something similar that expands upon, rather than repeat, the information in the main text" and "The main issue I have with the Khan Academy is that they are neither a medical organization nor an academic publisher. As far as I know, none of their videos are peer-reviewed" July 5, 2015 Asks about thoughts on videos. "Video content is something that has been requested by many readers.", "But established editors basically hate videos: they're hard to make, hard to control, hard to edit, and hard to customize. And it's not one-size-fits-all: a good drawing can be used across most Wikipedias, and a good paragraph can be translated to any of them, but a good video may need to be re-created for every language and culture.", "I understand that readers may want more "how to" but that isn't what we are about here.... That said, I would be very happy to see an alliance with groups like the Harvard BioVisions group to systematically include their videos in articles - that group's animations on what goes on in cells are super cool and informative" Dec 24, 2015 First time Osmosis is mentioned. The video on liver fibrosis/cirrhosis is "clearly incorrect" and their process for "formal/transparent peer review and feedback" is questioned. "More generally, these videos have no explicit sourcing to MEDRS, they do not come from a recognized secondary source (this is a commercial entity, in fact)", "I've noted another error - in the leukemia video - on its talk page here. This one is more cosmetic, but the nature of the error makes me think that an expert couldn't have reviewed it carefully. "The need for reviews by experts was raised. Some positive comments but only a few participants. Feb 8 2016 Is just a request to review a script for a video. It is very clear that in fact nobody is reviewing these scripts or videos. Mar 23, 2016 Just jtdog praising Doc James. The "we are working with Osmosis" is telling. Who is "we? Not anybody here. Aug 30, 2017 Nothing to do with videos in articles. It is a "how to edit wikipedia" video.

This is a good example of how not to do it. -- Colin°^Talk 12:20, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

From further review:

• We are told scripts are here, but most are not: Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Osmosis
• Early on, in several discussions, we see @WhatamIdoing: is requesting that top contributors to articles be notified. The video was installed at Tourette syndrome (TS) in January 2017 (with NO EDIT SUMMARY), and I can find no indication that I was notified, or that article talk was notified.
• At Wikipedia:Osmosis/Issues, I did enough digging just to know a) how hard it is for a casual reader to uncover sources, and b) there are sourcing issues. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:01, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

References

SandyGeorgia I have removed the video from Epilepsy. It was added by Doc James in this edit with the summary "Added". However, I'm shocked to see that he added the video to Tourette syndrome in this edit with no edit summary at all. He seems keen to add these on the quiet. See my comments at Talk:Epilepsy#Osmosis video. I think all these videos can be removed per WP:V. -- Colin°^Talk 13:08, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

Oops, I just discovered that as well, and posted in the next section about it. This makes me very sad :( :( SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:13, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

WP:NPOV is also core policy. In the year 2000, the requirement for "significant distress or impairment" in Tourette syndrome was removed from the DSM, in recognition that the majority of people with TS are not impaired or distressed. Since 2006, I have kept the POV words, "suffer from" out of the TS suite of articles. Now we have a video with that POV installed at tic disorder IN THE INFOBOX. And I am not allowed to remove it; my efforts over more than a decade, shot, by one external company making money off of a collaboration with Wikipedia. I was previously concerned that we not head down the Infobox Wars path, but the issue here now involves at least two core policies (WP:V, WP:NPOV), so we can forget that comparison. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:09, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

And if they are all like the Epilepsy one, they will all refer to people with a disease, disorder or injury as "patients", which is forbidden per WP:MEDMOS. Our readers are not "patients"; they are "people". -- Colin°^Talk 14:21, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

A contract of sorts

James + one or two others have taken upon themselves to negotiate a contract of sorts. And post it at Wikipedia:Osmosis, which of course nobody here has on their watchlist or even knew about. Without discussion with the wider community, on a project absolutely built upon rapid collaborative editing by volunteers, they have commissioned a private firm (who's agenda is to sell subscriptions to videos) to turn article topics into videos, and in turn promised to insert them in the lead section of our medical articles. We can see now why Doc James is edit warring to keep them in the article and in the leads. He's promised to insert and obliged to keep this material in a prominent place on all our articles.

As part of James' contract with the community (that you didn't know about), these videos were supposed to be reviewed prior to insertion in articles. Thy have not in fact been reviewed by the WP:MED project or anyone else on Wikipedia. Many were stealthily inserted into articles with the edit summary "Add", which hardly notifies watchers that their article has now been converted for YouTube format and their lead section now contains privately generated content they will have to accept.

We can assume the partnership will be in jeopardy if the video content is not kept or moved to, say, the external links section as a link rather than embedded in the article (they fail WP:EL anyway). And what is the benefit of this contract for Osmosis:

https://www.coverys.com/About-Us/Media-Room/Press-Release/January-2018/Coverys-Invests-in-Patient-Engagement-and-Medical

Osmosis is a medical and health education technology company with headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland. It has an audience of more than 500,000 current and future clinicians between its advanced learning platform (www.osmosis.org) and popular YouTube channel (www.youtube.com/osmosis). Osmosis leverages its video learning platform to create and disseminate co-branded video content that is visually appealing, clear, and concise. It also has a strong partnership with Wikipedia, which features Osmosis content on health and medicine articles. To date, Osmosis has focused on medical students but is quickly gaining traction with a number of other critical healthcare provider segments including nursing, physician assistants, pharmacy, dentistry, and others.

User:Jimbo Wales's comment above isn't quite right. This isn't "a charitable foundation creating educational videos under a free license". It is a private firm who got a grant from a charitable foundation. And who see financial benefit in collaborating with Wikipedia to further their business selling educational videos. And what will happen when the grant runs out or when the firm decides its investment in this area is now sufficient. The videos will be left to rot on our website. Nobody here can edit them to amend the content. Wikipedia is not YouTube. -- Colin°^Talk 07:48, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

@Doc James: I have always felt that your efforts, although misguided, were entirely in good faith. Reading this information just now, I am concerned that you inserted this video at TS with no edit summary, and that although @WhatamIdoing: had asked that top contributors be notified, I was not. I understand that mistakes happen, so I will continue to AGF. But we both know that you know that I was not going to be happy about changes to an FA that breach WIAFA, so a missing edit summary is not a good thing to discover here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:11, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

policy

These discussions seem oddly placed - these discussions obviously should have been raised on the project talk page, the sub project talk page, or if Doc James is your issue start at his talk page. WP:DR is the primary policy the the OP, Colin, appears intent on not following. At any rate, addressing the substance, see Wikipedia:Image use policy and MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE for the policy and guideline to consult. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:02, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

Colin started the discussion here. Others continued it in other places, when he linked to it here. This is not an issue with one policy or guideline page, one article, or one person, or videos only; it does not appear that you have read the discussion. It is a breach of multiple policies (WP:V, WP:NPOV), guidelines, and the very intent of Wikipedia as a collaborative text-based project that anyone can edit or verify. That it has become combined with personal aspects, edit warring, bullying, and more has been a side effect along the way. Perhaps it should be at ANI. That would be a circus. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:12, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

No. Your odd claim that I have not read a discussion that I clearly have is the only possible 'bullying' - as for your attempt to cry some-kind of trump mentioning WP:V and WP:NPOV claims - none of those policies dispense with WP:DR, so start following policy -- indeed V and NPOV claims are exact claims for which WP:DR is required to be followed - and yes, if you have a user claim you can end at ANI, but really you will likely not improve anything there having not exhausted WP:DR. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:26, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

Of course, by taking the discussion to all the talk pages of all the policies, guidelines, projects, and articles involved, one is accused of spreading a dispute. My sincere apologies for making you feel bullied, or saying you had not read what you say you have. An RFC will be drafted, and has been discussed in several places. It should be carefully drafted before being launched, with ample time for input from all "sides" before it goes live. We have multiple times discussed that it is unproductive to launch an RFC prematurely, or one that is advanced by only one "side" of an issue. I do not believe I should be the person drafting the RFC. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:31, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

The behavior you're describing is called forum shopping, actually. So, yes, follow DR. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:49, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

Good suggestion. Let's start here, as an example, for the POV and V problems: (From WP:DR) "When you find a passage in an article that is biased, inaccurate, or unsourced the best practice is to improve it if you can rather than deleting salvageable text. For example, if an article appears biased, add balancing material or make the wording more neutral. Include citations for any material you add. If you do not know how to fix a problem, ask for help on the talk page." What is the source of the "suffer from" wording? How would you suggest balancing/repairing the text in a video? How does someone who has the technical know-how even go about fixing the POV wording in the video? Deleting the video, because it was installed in an infobox, is fraught with other issues, and has led to edit warring. Are you suggesting I open myself to further "forum shopping" by posting these questions at the talk page of DR? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:59, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

Well, it is rather plain - if your issue is with inclusion in content at a particular article you raise the issue at the talk page of the article, and if it is not settled, you then proceed through the DR processes. If the issue is with a project, you raise the issues at the project, and you proceed through the different DR. As for editing a video, many people know how to do that, so if you wish to discuss edits to a video, feel free. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:01, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

so you would like to see talk page discussion on 300 article talk pages? It is being discussed at WP MED-- as a precursor to an RFC. The matter of edits to a video is more complex than you imply, and has already been discussed at length. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:11, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

What? If your issue is with inclusion in content at a particular article you raise the issue at the talk page of the article, and if it is not settled, you then proceed through the DR processes. If the issue is with a project, you raise the issues at the project, and you proceed through the different DR. What did you not get about that statement discussing two different situations? One is plainly about an article, the other is plainly about multiple articles in a project. As for editing a video, it's just not complicated -- it is just editing a video, so feel free to suggest edits. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:34, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

This is becoming unproductive. Thanks for the input. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:37, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

RfC about the future of video summaries of diseases on Wikipedia

Started here Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:40, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

Because this post from Doc James follows exactly after and under a discussion with posts from me where I stated:

An RFC will be drafted, and has been discussed in several places. It should be carefully drafted before being launched, with ample time for input from all "sides" before it goes live. We have multiple times discussed that it is unproductive to launch an RFC prematurely, or one that is advanced by only one "side" of an issue.

I want to clarify that Doc James launched a biased, one-sided RFC without giving consideration to input from anyone else-- an RFC which is framed with full reflection of his bias, and no framing of any of the issues raised.

And that kind of behavior shows exactly how WP:MED came to be in the kind of position it is in now. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:19, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

Wow. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 17:30, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

There's something wrong

Hello, when you have an active user with a few more contributions including articles or uploads approved by different other users (and you have some other users in the talk page of the user, they have became troubled due to an indefinite block of the user and they are supporting the user, User:رتور and User:Dandamayev and User:Mohamadr_za and User:BaqBan20 noting that the BaqBan20 is actually the User:Nargess.n had given some special sign to the blocked user previously but had a rename recently by the admins) and the user is blocked forever because had mentioned a simple Image in its user page and has been blocked from editing even its own talk page (by the admin User:Mardetanha) because the user had uploaded the official documents of what had been claimed so even if you were not familiar to the Farsi language you must know for sure there is serious problem with Wiki censorship policy and administration system especially in Wiki Fa however we know there are many problems in west threatening Wikipedia itself but in other wikis such as wiki fa probably and seemingly has less consideration of supervising, the problem is more effective. The indefinite block of a semi-active user is irrational because they know when this user claims something sensitive it will provide the reliable sources absolutely and the content can't be removed later so the user should be blocked forever now.

• https://xtools.wmflabs.org/ec/fawiki/IranianNationalist
• https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:ListFiles/IranianNationalist&ilshowall=1

Previously I could see how some special users use the weakness of inability of talking Persian of others to push their censorship affairs to the English Wikipedia so there is no hope about other sister projects. When there is no guarantee in the admin stage about the project existence so we should say Good bye Wikipedia. Nowadays I will not be surprised to see corruption or political decisions everywhere (the poison for an Encyclopedia) --IsNotNationalist (Welcome) 04:48, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

Activity

Are you still active?

178.135.82.254 (talk) 07:04, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

Yes.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 11:47, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

What do you think of Wikia right now? 178.135.80.78 (talk) 13:37, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

2 new RfAs look good

FYI: The community (~190 !votes) seems interested in the 2 current candidates at wp:RfA, scheduled to end 29 March and 1 April 2018, with over 96% Support. You might want to read results when have time. -Wikid77 (talk) 13:49, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

Signpost issue 4 – 29 March 2018

• Op-ed: Death knell for The Signpost?

• News and notes: Wiki Conference roundup and new appointments.

• Arbitration report: Ironing out issues in infoboxes; not sure yet about New Jersey; and an administrator who probably wasn't uncivil to a sockpuppet.

• In the media: The media on Wikipedia's workings: the good and not-so-good

• Traffic report: Real sports, real women and an imaginary country: what's on top for Wikipedia readers

• Featured content: Animals, Ships, and Songs

• Technology report: Timeless skin review by Force Radical.

• Special report: ACTRIAL wrap-up.

• Humour: WikiWorld Reruns

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:49, 29 March 2018 (UTC)