Talk:Bach Digital

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A fact from Bach Digital appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 28 December 2019 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that according to academic Yo Tomita, the Bach Digital portal website has largely replaced printed reference works as first point of entry for Bach scholarship?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2019/December. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Bach Digital.

Wikipedia

Autograph

I feel that - while autograph is a correct term - the article under that name is focused - in text and image choice - on the meaning "signature", therefore I would prefer to call it manuscript. Thoughts? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:48, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

As said, rather the autograph link, as an invitation to any reader to FIX the problematic situation, until it no longer needs fixing. --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:01, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

What I see is that serious works are covered in manuscripts, - just compare the See also sections and the sources of the two articles. I also don't expect readers on Christmas Day to fix the problems of an article. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:43, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The Manuscript article is completely unusable, e.g. its section on parts is incompatible with the normal understanding of "parts" (= Stimmen in German) when speaking about a musical manuscript.

Holograph#Music would even be worse than the Autograph article, while the section appears to contain some questionable material (though referenced to Grove: don't think whatever is in that reference work is correctly captured in Wikipedia's summary), and the entire article has tags similar to those of the Autograph article.

Re. "...don't expect readers on Christmas Day to fix the problems..."

speak for yourself, please
anyway, the link is in there now, so the invitation starts now, not on Christmas Day (by which time the issue may be resolved).

--Francis Schonken (talk) 10:41, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Its rich of you to tell Gerda to "speak for yourself", when you selectively quoted her comment, omitting the opening "I also don't" (emphasis mine). You are requred to assume good faith and treat other editor with consideration and courtesy. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 19:27, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Whatever word is used FIX is targeted at editors not readers. We generally do not link to articles that will confuse or require the reader to fix something but rather our remit is to give the reader as much accurate information as possible. While the manuscript article does not refer specifically to musical manuscripts it does refer to hand written documents and as such does give the reader general information or an overview and is useful. I believe Gerda says "I don't expect readers too...." which means she is speaking for herself. While I won't add an opinion on which word to use arguments should be accurate per our own guides.Littleolive oil (talk) 12:51, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Seems like I was misunderstood. In large parts of the world December 25 has no special meaning. Also, in those parts where is has a special meaning, it may mean, for an individual person, just a day when they don't have to go to work and have time for their favourite hobby (e.g. edit Wikipedia). Seems a bit presumptuous to have expectations about what other people do, or don't do, on that day. If, on that day, Gerda has no time to do anything of the sort that would be perfectly understandable. Only, she didn't say "I have no time for this on Christmas Day", but turned it around into something she was "expecting" of other people on that day. That's why I said, speak for yourself.

Re. "editors not readers" – on every page every reader is invited to become an editor. On top of the page and next to every section header there is an "edit" button. Those invitations can be more explicit, like in the banner on top of the Autograph page, starting, "This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it ..." (my emphasis highlights the invitation, which BTW holds a clickable link which opens the edit window). In other words, the distinction between editors and readers is rather off-topic.

Re. "... I won't add an opinion on which word to use ...": please rather add an opinion about the topic at hand, than write an entire paragraph of mostly off-topic comments. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:04, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Procedural (autograph topic)

Francis Schonken - there's three people here opposed to your "autograph" wording, and 1 (you) in favor. I ask that you revert yourself. I'll hold off on doing anything until tomorrow morning my time (US Eastern time zone) about 12 - 15 hours from the time of this post. Thank you for understanding. — Ched (talk) 00:14, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Discussions are ongoing, and you miscounted afaics: reverts before a new consensus is formed (which can't be determined by mere vote-counting by an involved party, see WP:!VOTE, WP:CONSENSUS) would be a break of the WP:BRD cycle. I reverted you to alert you to the fact that this discussion is going on (and because your proposed replacement, "handwritten arrangement", isn't even a synonym of "autograph of that work"; and because the article still has two further instances of the "autograph" word, unlinked, and your replacement simply removed the first-instance link). Apart from your inappropriate and incorrect vote-counting you bring no argument on the content of the issue, so I can't even ignore your opinion on the matter, while you didn't even care to express one, apart from posing an ultimatum, which is entirely inappropriate. I propose to continue the BRD cycle: so please discuss, instead of wielding inappropriate ultimatums. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:48, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There's another reason why vote-counting would be particularly ill-advised in this case: I saw some uncoordinated WP:CANVASSing pop up yesterday (surprisingly, while I don't even have that many user pages on my watchlist). I don't say it is, but this could be perceived as an attempt at votestacking: I have, for the time being, no intention to dig that out (it might be nothing more than a perception), so I propose to listen to reasonable arguments, and bring such arguments here, and totally avoid vote-counting. And propose that if WP:APPNOTE type of canvassing on this topic would be advisable in the future, to find a consensus for such notification here, before proceeding with it unilaterally. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:11, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I was hoping we could find a common ground here, but it appears that's not going to be the case. Much of what you post and say seems nonsensical to me, so let me do some research, and I'll get back when I can. — Ched (talk) 16:19, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Sorted

I think I sorted the issue by starting the Autograph (manuscript) page and linking the first occurrence of "autograph" in this article to that new article --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:54, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

"Digital library"

I'm not too fond of the "digital library" qualifier:

manuscripts of the kind that are displayed on the website are hardly books;
they are also rather the domain of archives than libraries (even if quite some of the manuscripts now reside in the Berlin State Library)

Even if the MyCoRe software can be used for digital libraries, and the qualification given by the website itself ("database portal") is, in the Wikipedia article, not listed among the MyCoRe implementations, I'd still think that latter qualification better, also because the "digital library" part of the website is only a limited (though important) part of its scope. "Official" source for BWV numbers after the last printed edition of that catalogue (20 years ago), descriptions and authenticity discriminations about compositions (i.e. the compositions themselves, not only the archived manuscripts) and overview of scholarship on the same, etc, are other decisive features of the website which are not, as such, digital library features. Portal is also correct while the website gives (direct) access to items archived elsewhere (e.g. in London, Berlin, etc.), and to RISM descriptions. Afaik there's also only one source qualifying the website as digitale Bibliothek (German for digital library), but that seems an old one, i.e. from around the time when the website was opened to the public for the first time. It says that the digital library connects to a database: now, that database is as much part of the website as the digital library part. --Francis Schonken (talk) 14:17, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Virtual library is directly from the source. "can be joined together again in a virtual library accessible to everyone."

Virtual library is not "books". I prefer to stick with the source. Littleolive oil (talk) 16:25, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I was rather talking about this edit

Re. "directly from the source" – which source? Apparently not the (only) source that currently is being used for the intro, but a WP:ABOUTSELF source describing project goals (not everything that is a *goal* of the project is necessarily confirmed by independent reliable sources, e.g. I wouldn't use "highly accessible" as a statement of fact in an introductory summary without confirmation in independent reliable sources, while this may be perceived as a bit self-serving and thus failing the first criterion of ABOUTSELF).

Other than that, "virtual library" has similar issues as "digital library": a big part of the website is "library", but saying that the website *is* a virtual library is like saying that an aeroplane is two wings and a landing gear – virtual library is only *part* of the website (nor does the ABOUTSELF source claim to be *only* a digital library; but it *does* claim to be a database portal). --Francis Schonken (talk) 17:05, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There is nothing contentious about this topic and I'd prefer we not treat this article and its content as if it is contentious. The source is a RS for the content about itself and in fact may be the definitive source.

Virtual Library is the phrase used by the source [1] which for this kind of content is reliable and so is a RS for the content we add here. We don't need to create problems where there aren't any.Littleolive oil (talk) 01:31, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It is always contentious to render "we aim at <such and such>" from an article subject's own website as "<such and such>", in Wikipedia's voice, in the Wikipedia article. --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:49, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

On the ground of the matter (disclosure: I've been professionally involved in accessibility assessment of websites), the accessibility of the website is OK: I've seen better, I've seen worse. For instance, if one selects "Advanced search", selects a "catalogue" and enters a catalogue number in the corresponding fields of the search form, one gets, after hitting "search", a list of manuscripts, linked to manuscript descriptions. Not the page on the composition represented by that catalogue number (which can only be reached with further clicks). This makes the website a little less accessible to lay users. The equivalent of such accessibility issue in Wikipedia would be something like when typing BWV 232 in the "Search Wikipedia" field that sends you to commons:Category:Mass in B minor instead of to the Mass in B minor article. So I'd only use "highly accessible" if independent reliable sources say so. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:08, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Shortage of independent sources

I expressed my concerns about the lack of independent sources here (15 October) and here (23 November). On closer inspection the situation might be a bit worse than I estimated in the second of these contributions: both Neue Musikzeitung sources seem to a certain extent based on press releases (although it is difficult to estimate up to which degree); The Carus-Verlag source is hardly independent w.r.t. Uwe Wolf (who became, and still is afaik, Chief Editor at Carus after his work at the Bach Digital website). Similarly, sources from the institutions that co-own the Bach Digital website (Berlin State Library, Leipzig University,...) can hardly be described as independent. Potential sources now in the "Literature" list have all to some degree a similar connection to the subject of the article, so that it is hard to call them completely independent. In short, I don't see a single 100% sure connection-free (potential) source mentioned in the article. I won't post a {{Primary sources}} template or some such for now, hoping that somebody can find some other more substantial fully independent sources, but with the current references there might even be a WP:GNG issue. IMHO this needs to be sorted ASAP, that is, no more than a few weeks. --Francis Schonken (talk) 14:44, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:38, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The author's address, as given in the article, is "Bach-Archiv Leipzig" → not independent
Listing at the European University Institute website: no named author, content entirely based on summaries provided by the Bach Digital website → rather "trivial mention" than "significant coverage" in WP:GNG context
Two-paragraph article at the International League of Antiquarian Booksellers (ILAB) website, no named author, apparently based on exactly the same press release as the 2010 article of the Neue Musikzeitung (neither seems to add anything to that press release, the only advantage for English Wikipedia being that the ILAB two-paragraph summary is in English) → does not really contribute to independent coverage
Another two-paragraph summary, this one at the Börsenblatt website again in German, of, apparently, the same 2010 press release, and again, no named author → does not really contribute to independent coverage
(the .de google link didn't work for me, so giving the .com alternative: https://books.google.com/books?id=RdXPBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA801 ) Bach Digital mentioned in one paragraph which elaborates that IBM sponsors the website: not sure whether this is still true, but anyhow rather seems that Bach Digital is mentioned in passing → rather "trivial mention" than "significant coverage" in WP:GNG context
(.com: https://books.google.com/books?id=i3aQDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT526 ) The book seems to have a single paragraph on Bach Digital (but not at the indicated page which afaics goes to the table of content). The paragraph is a fairly standard summary of information provided by Bach Digital (nothing that isn't summarized from either Projektziel or the 2010 press release) → does not really contribute to independent coverage
(.com: https://books.google.com/books?id=C5C2_2TzTq4C&pg=PA169 ) More interestingly the section titled "Bach Digital" starting at https://books.google.com/books?id=C5C2_2TzTq4C&pg=PA143 – which contains some real (independent!) criticism of the project. → Total count of really independent sources: 1 – GNG however asks for "multiple" independent sources

--Francis Schonken (talk) 06:30, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

To consider:

Shortcut WP:PRIMARYNOTBAD

"Primary" is not, and should not be, a bit of jargon used by Wikipedians to mean "bad" or "unreliable" or "unusable". While some primary sources are not fully independent, they can be authoritative, high-quality, accurate, fact-checked, expert-approved, subject to editorial control, and published by a reputable publisher.

Primary sources can be reliable, and they can be used. Sometimes, a primary source is even the best possible source, such as when you are supporting a direct quotation. In such cases, the original document is the best source because the original document will be free of any errors or misquotations introduced by subsequent sources.... Littleolive oil (talk) 19:40, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the info, but unhelpful. Of course primary sources are not bad, and this article should have a fair share of them. The problem is with an excess of sources that are primary and/or closely connected to the subject of an article, or, on the other hand, not enough secondary (or tertiary) sources that are independent of the subject of the article. There are two separate problems with a disequilibrium of (too many) primary/dependent sources vs (too few) secondary/tertiary/independent sources:

WP:GNG – articles with a stark version of this problem (virtually exclusively based on primary/dependent sources) typically don't survive AfD. That is experience. I've been on both sides in such AfDs, but the result is invariably the same: the article gets deleted (unless there is a way to remedy).
WP:V policy, and in particular its WP:ABOUTSELF section: according to its fifth criterion an article should not be based primarily on (self-published) sources. For the purposes of the Bach Digital article, the Bach Digital website is "self-published" by Bach Digital, a.k.a. a primary source for the article. "not based primarily on" means that at least half of the content needs to come from other sources. WP:NOR, another core content policy, has something comparable (and compatible with the WP:V/ABOUTSELF requirements): "Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them".

In sum, if (approximately) half the content of an article is based on sources that are secondary or tertiary, *and* independent of the subject, then the article is stable against deletion, and conforms to Wikipedia's policies on verifiability and original research. So, finding remedies is what is needed here, not philosophies about the intrinsic goodness or badness of primary sources (intrinsically, they're neither good nor bad: it's how they are used). In its current state the article will not and can not survive an AfD, and it should be largely emptied to restore the balance between primary and other sources. As said, I have no intention to start tagging as long as I see that a remedy is under way, but then we'd need to start applying remedies without further delay, not explaining basic rules for Wikipedia's content. --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:06, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]