Wikipedia:U.S. political contributions transparency project

This is a pilot project proposal to add information tables to the articles of U.S. federal elected officials using open data about the political contributions they have received.

Shortcut

WP:USPCT

Background

Scope

Articles about elected federal officials: Congressional Representatives and Senators

Sourcing reliable data

Opensecrets.org

Presentation (UI)

Mockup

Bot coding

Spec

Pull from opensecrets api
Format a table in Wikimarkup
- Use a template, similar to Template:Infobox
- Centralized updates to markup and template provides structure for data
Insert table at bottom of article above references
Include a formatted citation
Update periodically

GitHub:

Here is the bot that was created. I have no idea if it's valid or valuable. Would love input: https://github.com/h4ck3rm1k3/federal-election-commision-aggregation

Bot approvals group: WP:BAG

Figure out how to reconcile data on Wikipedia vs. data in OpenSecrets
- There are will be discrepancies
  - Added footnotes, links, etc. to individual wiki pages
  - Figure out whether the bot should overwrite users' input, etc.

Community approval

Maintenance

Timeline

Questions

Can opensecrets data be used directly?
Is opensecrets a primary or secondary source for this data?
Are opensecrets categorizations neutral and uncontroversial
Are top-10 donor/donation lists useful and encyclopedic?

Relevant groups

Represent.Us
OpenSecrets.org
Maplight.org
Cato Foundation
Sunlight Foundation
RootStrikers

Participants

Ocaasi^{t | c} 20:41, 3 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Joshuaglynn (talk) 20:42, 3 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Jimgreer70 (talk) 20:45, 3 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]