Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 61

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few editors imposing a new guideline on community without any discussion

Wikipedia talk:Advocacy. Please contribute with your thoughts. To my observation that WP:Policy has been violated, I got a reply WP:IAR. I don't have energy to argue with the editor, so others will have to get involved if the imposed guideline is to be discussed. 212.200.240.232 (talk) 17:12, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Is your complaint against the proposed guideline, or is it that the process to gather consensus needed for adopting new guidelines is incomplete or not being followed? If the former, maybe work it out on the guideline talk page... if the latter, I'm not sure what the right forum is. I'm restoring it to proposal status because it does not seem to have much notice, discussion, or adoption yet.Wikidemon (talk) 19:21, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Note: A tangential discussion was moved to User talk:Jehochman#discussing anonymously --Equazcion •✗/C • 17:20, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)

Time to think about article content inclusion?

I wonder if it's time to address one of the biggest holes in Wikipedia guideline space, the threshold inclusion criteria for when content that otherwise meets Wikipedia's policies and guidelines ought to be put in an article. Repeated attempts to do this in the past failed, and the closest we ever got was a statement that content that is otherwise compliant (i.e. passes WP:V, WP:NPOV, WP:BLP, WP:COPYVIO, WP:MOS, WP:NOT, etc.) may be included if it is relevant to the notability of the subject of the article.

Although we haven't been able to define it quite, I think there's broad consensus that there is some encyclopedic standard for when material does and does not belong in an article. This comes up often when people add trivia or extraneous details, and sometimes things of a POV-ish nature that are not really related to the subject at hand (e.g. coatrack, criticism sections, etc). Someone might remove the content as trivia, then it gets reverted with a note like "please do not remove sourced content". When these things come up it's often hard to point to anything where we say that it takes more than sourcing or even notability - for a verifiable fact to appear on a page it has to belong on that page.

People often use the word "notable" for this, which causes confusion with the WP:N guideline. It seems to translate to something like "has enough reliable sources to indicate its significance and relevance to the subject of the article".

I'm wondering if there's a place to say just that, or we could create one in a guideline or essay. Namely, although there is no single standard for what belongs and what does not belong on a page, content has to be significant enough to be encyclopedic, and relevant to the subject of the article, in a way that adding it to the article increases the reader's encyclopedic understanding of the matter at hand. Something like that.

Please forgive if this is a perennial proposal or already exists.Wikidemon (talk) 09:26, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

We have a Wikipedia:Writing better articles style guide that includes a section telling us to stay on topic. In essence, it says what you want, but it's very unspecific. —JAO • T • C 11:01, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
My rule of thumb is: Is it encyclopedic/relevant/on-topic, and is the space used by the new information the "right amount" given the information's importance and the other items in the article. If I'm adding a tangentially-related item to a short article, it might stick out like a sore thumb, so I'm better off not adding it. If it's a long article, it might fit in quite nicely. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 15:43, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Some policies may need aditional input...

Hi all,

so I've just completed a list of all? policies and their editing statistics. Please take a look, as I think few of them may benefit from additional community input. Second column tells how many unique editors participated in policy page/talk page discussions.

Here is a list of most guidelines (some are missing as I was manually collecting them from guidelines category pages). Among guidelines, there are definitely a few that need more community input.

Why I think they need more input? Because I've noticed in last few years that guidelines have been promoted by a limited number of editors. The more input the better the guideline will be. So find some with few contributors that interests you, and give your opinion!

Thanks!

pps. i see that numbers are not correct in cases where categorized guidelines was linking to a redirect.

212.200.240.232 (talk) 00:12, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Do essays that represent a minority view, even if only held by one or two editors, belong in the WP namespace?

WP:Essay states that an essay represents the opinion of one editor or a group of editors, with no mention of where they belong, other than to say that an author may choose of their own volition to keep an essay is userspace if they don't want anyone else editing it. According to that policy, an essay representing even one sole editor's opinion may stay in WP space. I'm wondering if this policy needs to be changed, since there seem to be a number of editors who feel that essays in WP space need to represent a broad consensus.

This issue has come up at WT:NOMORE. The essay is unpopular, with only one or two supporters, with the majority of editors involved repeatedly trying to redirect or move the page. I've reverted two such attempts so far. If the consensus is indeed that essays need wide support to remain in WP space, I think the relevant policies need to be changed to reflect that. Equazcion •✗/C • 08:27, 6 Feb 2009 (UTC)

We want to move the proposed policy, which is a pointy disruption by a known problematic editor, to his account userspace so that the page consensus for redirect to creep can take place. Anything in nomore that should be added to creep can then be discussed there for addition. Creep has more support and a much larger crowd of editors to review any additions. Verbal chat 08:34, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
It's not pointy and it's not a disruption. The essay's existence doesn't disrupt anything, and it doesn't fit the definition of WP:POINT at all. The author made an essay because he has an opinion he wanted to express. There is no apparent ulterior motive for the essay. Equazcion •✗/C • 08:38, 6 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Seems OK to me, and I think not liking an essay as a reason to do something to it would be not good. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 08:40, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

← I just want to stress that I'm not here to merely discuss this one example of the problem (the issue at WT:NOMORE). I think the larger issue of which essays belong in WP space needs to be addressed, because this is a problem I've seen repeatedly in the past. WP space seems to have a few patrollers who object when certain things appear there, namely essays or policy proposals that don't have much chance of gaining broad support. According to present policies there is no reason to remove such things from WP namespace, but I've seen this cause enough repeated problems that I think it's time to discuss it head-on. Equazcion •✗/C • 08:59, 6 Feb 2009 (UTC)

PS, this is unacceptable. You must wait until this has been discussed before imposing your opinion on policy. Equazcion •✗/C • 09:50, 6 Feb 2009 (UTC)
... as is this. The issue is already being discussed from a policy standpoint here. Let's not splinter the discussion. Verbal, discuss the issue or don't, but either way, stop taking shortcuts. Equazcion •✗/C • 17:59, 6 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Use WP:MFD if necessary. Step one would be to open a discussion on the Wikipedia talk: page recommending userfication to a particular user and/or deletion. If there is consensus to move it out of Wikipedia: space but there is no consensus as to exactly what to do, or if the consensus user-space owner doesn't want it, then take it to WP:MFD with the pre-canned consensus as the recommendation. If there is insufficient debate but you personally want it moved, see if the primary editor will move it to his user-space. If not, then go to MFD with either a recommendation to userfy or delete, but realize the result may be "keep." davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 18:31, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, better the project namespace than the article namespace. --MZMcBride (talk) 18:33, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
I know what to do when there's a dispute about where something belongs in general, but I was hoping to clarify the policy on essays so that such disputes would have some ground to stand on. Those arguments currently don't seem to get anywhere aside from ending up in a poll. Some people ask why it should be moved when it does no harm and no policy requires moving it, and some ask why not userfy it if only one or two people support it. If we had a policy to clearly answer the question, those disputes could arrive at some actual conclusion. Equazcion •✗/C • 18:54, 6 Feb 2009 (UTC)

I think that there's been a gentleman's agreement that frivilous or fringe essays wouldn't be kept in project space, to be backed up by MFDs if necessary, but I don't know that it's been written down anywhere.

If it's really only two editors who support it, then that's pretty fringe. I don't see this as having been frivilous, having read it, and I don't think any less of its writers for having done so. But perhaps it should migrate to userspace. I don't think this needs a stick (MFD) at this time though. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:21, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

How about this guideline written by 8 editors? Should it also be moved to userspace?
Should we change essay template to say that it takes 3? 4? 12? editors for it to be in mainspace instead of 1 or more?
ps. on its talk page, I counted 4 people in support of wp:nomore (half way to the guideline! :O) 212.200.240.232 (talk) 23:37, 6 February 2009 (UTC)


Let me say why I oppose this strongly. If wp:nomore was in userspace, user Equazcion would probably never contribute to it, and as you can see now, his contributions have clarified lots of thoughts expressed in the page and have made it much better. Forcing an essay into userspace prevents it from being improved by other editors. 212.200.240.232 (talk) 08:04, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

The substance of the essay has a lot more to do with it than its number of supporters. If an essay has a valid point to make, no matter how contentious, then it's okay to keep it in project space, particularly if it is clear about the opposing position. If an essay is wildly inaccurate and misleading, and doesn't reflect the actual practice of anyone who hasn't been banned, it doesn't. The question we should be asking about an essay is, "would someone who reads this essay find it useful or interesting, whether or not they choose not to follow its advice?" In this particular case I think the answer is yes, but the essay should also avoid a prescriptive tone, at least until it's proposed as a guideline or policy. Dcoetzee 08:50, 7 February 2009 (UTC)


The opposition to an essay is prehaps more important than the number of supporters. An essay with no dissent/opposition can stay where it likes. An essay with no more than one or two supporters, but with plenty of opposition, belongs in userspace. WP:MFD is a suitable place to discuss cases. Ideally, essay writers should seek to achieve WP:NPOV, and the essay should recognise and address opposing views. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:56, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

The Huffington Post and blogs in general

In the past, I've tried to use The Huffington Post as a source in articles. Each time I was told that HuffPo is a "blog" and as such is absolutely not allowed. President Obama just fielded a question from a reporter with The Huffington Post, so I suppose he has lower standards for reliability than Wikipedia.

Has there been any discussion of the bright-line rule against "blogs" being disallowed as sources? JCDenton2052 (talk) 01:58, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

This isn't really the best place; the right place is WP:RS/N for particular questions, or for policy changes, WT:V or WT:RS. When it's come up at WP:RS/N, opinions on Huffington have been mixed, so I don't think that "absolutely not allowed" is the consensus on them; blogs can be acceptable in some circumstances. In many cases HuPo could be fine IMHO. If they were the only source, say, for a complete Q & A with Obama, rejecting them would be ludicrous.John Z (talk) 05:06, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
People are kind of divided on it. See here. Like John said, it's a question for wp:rs/n. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 05:13, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
It is not a "bright line" rule. Those who told you so should be politely asked to read WP:RS, then you can all discuss the source on its merits. --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 10:44, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
  • The Huffington Post has a mix of content. This mix includes at least 1) publication of wire service news articles, 2) original news reporting, and 3) blogs by various people. Different types of content have different levels of reliability. The wire service reprints are pretty much the same as any established media paper reprinting the wire service content - and generally also available directly from the wire service and from established media. The original news reporting has been spotty; we've seen some that obviously lacked error correction prior to publishing. Their blogs are best treated as self-published sources just like any other blog, used when the author is an established (via traditional media) expert in the topic of the article the source is to be used on. Any number examples of people taking questions at a press conference is not going to meanigfully change our assessment of their original news reporting. What would change that is solid evidence that they have established fact checking procedures and corrections processes designed to provide a reasonable level of asusrance of accuracy. While I know of editors who have asserted that they have such processes, none have ever provided any evidence of it in the WP:RS/N discussions. GRBerry 23:31, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

RFC on notability

There is a request for comment regarding notability, including whether or not it should be used, should be changed, or should be renamed. All input would be appreciated. Thanks! -Drilnoth (talk) 21:29, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Block messages

I notice that there has been a recent change in the software, so that when an editor is blocked the date of the termination of the block appears in the block log rather than the duration of the block. In principal this is fine, but I live in England, and dates are written differently here than they are in the USA. I just found an editor who was blocked until 2009-02-11. On the American side of the pond this means, I realise, until February 11th; over here it means November 2nd. This is going to cause some difficulties, if not with unblock considerations then certainly in the event of a re-block or a block modification being needed. Comments please, but please remember that I have no power to chenge the whole British dating system! --Anthony.bradbury"talk" 22:45, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I believe it has always been that way. Prodego talk 22:48, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
Actually, that's neither an American nor a British date (American would be 02-11-2009). It's an ISO 8601 date. If we have to standardize on a date format, I'd go with ISO. It would be better if it were preferenceable though. Algebraist 22:55, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
Wait, where are you seeing this? The block log looks the same as ever to me. Algebraist 22:58, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
There is no dating system in the world that uses YYYY-DD-MM. –xeno (talk) 13:57, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Indeed. And 2009-02-11 means 11 February in the UK as well anyway. 02-11-2009 would mean November, but that's a totally different format. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 14:08, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Verifiability of Language Reference

I see many articles on Old Testament nouns; people ,places, and things where an editor has referenced Hebrew as the language and Hebrew Bible as the source. Given the Documentary Hypothesis discusses the authorship and approximate period of writing, it should be possible to be more particular about what we are saying

The way the articles are written at present there generally is no thought given to the fact that through most of the Pentateuch Hebrew doesn't exist as a language. Where articles on Hebrew reference its existence as a language as evidenced by a single occurence of a name that occurs only in the tradion of a people the jump to the assumption that there is a body of literature already written in the language seems unverifiable. Most languages aren't considered to exist as a language until there begin to be enough artifacts of that language to distinguish it from others.

That part of the editing that can be identified by colophon as Hebrew should be labeled Hebrew and that part written in Akkadian or Phoenician similarly referenced. If we don't know which language the author was writing in then neither or both labels should be given with the reason given in a reference. I emphasise that if we don't know then we shouldn't say, because that is Wikipedia policy, but I would allow that in fairness we could add a reference to what most verifiable sources say if it isn't speculative.

Its clear that those parts of the story which are contemporary with the Atrahasis occuring in the time it was written are not myth but historical and written in Akkadian

The reference might say whether the author was suspected to be J writing in Akkadian c 950 BC because of the rich narrative style as is found in Genesis 14, with references to ritual objects such as the ark which are mentioned frequently in J but never in E; or E who is somewhat less eloquent and writing in Akkadian c 850 BC focusing on the status of judges (never mentioned in P) and prophets (mentioned only in E and D); or the style of D whose writings are limited almost exclusively to Deuteronomy and tend to be transitional from Phoenician to Hebrew, focus on vocabulary items such as the names of God, or the use of Horeb (E and D) or Sinai

Though all of this is then added to by the commentrary of D the Deutrenomisist, because he is mostly writing about the Law and in Deuteronomy using a distinctive term YHWH Elohainu, and identifying who did what where as a commentary that continues in 1 kings, he can be treated as a special case not really affecting stories from the rest of the Pentateuch. As they are overlain with elements by the D, or Deuteronomist, source; writing c. 650-621 BC, in Jerusalem during a period of religious reform they begin to transform into Phoenician and Hebrew in a period when there is little difference between the two where it can be difficult to tell the two apart, or whether its characteristic of the P, or Priestly, source Aaronid priests writing c. 450 BC in Hebrew.

In light of the above discussion about the use of the word myth, I think its possible to place a bound; lower limit Genesis 10 upper limit Genesis 14 on where the contributions of J are supplanted by those of E. J is apparently writing very close to the time of the establishment of the first temple before Hebrew exists as a language.

Thats the place where the Sumerian and Akkadian myths that go back to the time of Sargon transition to Bible stories in the 18th century BCE Akkadian Atra-Hasis epic. The oldest known copy of the epic tradition concerning Atrahasis can be dated by colophon (scribal identification) to the reign of Hammurabi's great-grandson, Ammi-Saduqa (1646–1626 BCE), but various Old Babylonian fragments exist; it continued to be copied into the first millennium by J.(the J, or Jahwist, source; written c. 950 BC in the southern kingdom of Judah.

There is then a period of transition to the writings of E which go back and forth with J line by line starting around Genesis 10. The E, or Elohist, source is writing c. 850 BC in the northern kingdom of Israel, still not as yet using Hebrew as a language.

For stories where it can be documented that the sources are historical and writing in Hebrew then the word myth shouldn't be used except when referring to the speculations and guesses of the commentators.

These elements from a later date that add covenants, commentaries and attempts to editorialize on the earlier stories, that may be written in Hebrew or Phoenician at a time when there is little difference between the two are the places where we have references to the upper and lower waters of the Elohim, where there are references to Elim and to Elat, where Yahwah has Asherah as his consort and where there are about 40 references of an editorial nature regarding her worship.

There appears to be a point of transition to the story of Abraham from scribes who use Akkadian as their native language to scribes who write in Phoenician and the Hebrew such as P and R. Where we can identify those writing in Hebrew such as P who is dry and legalistic and the redactor R the use of a language label for the story is appropriate, otherwise its just a guess. Rktect (talk) 11:15, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

If you are going to use the Documentary Hypothesis, then you are going to believe that the final form of the tanakh was assembled somewhere between the 7th and 4th C BC. In this period, there most definitely was a 'Hebrew language'. Many words (especially names) may have been borrowed from Akkadian or elsewhere, but at the time of final redaction they had been wholly assimilated into the Hebrew. Hence, it is perfectly acceptable to describe these words as being 'Hebrew'. Whether we then go on to say that a particular word originally comes from Akkadian, Aramaic, Sumerian or whatever is determined by verifiable sources. If the sources state that a word comes from elsewhere, then we not only can, but should, say so.--FimusTauri (talk) 11:35, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Respectfully that makes no sense. The final form is what you have after the assembly is complete c 100 BC, maybe later. Everything prior to that is a different book or books. In some periods you have as many as four separate versions which then get edited together at a later date.
Many names get left in their original form because it was the practice of the scribes not to change a letter when copying. As I recall the policy was to burn the Torah if a mistake was made.
Bible scholars can go through and identify which part was written when and by who up until about the time of the redactor. I'd be happy to allow that the final form of the Hebrew Bible is Hebrew, but the earlier parts are anything but.
Take for example the name of Moses. Strongs concordance identifies that as Egyptian. In the article on Moses that is noted. The same should apply to all other Biblical references to nouns because many of the toponyms and personal names are clearly not Hebrew but retain their earlier linguistic form. Many of the words in the Bible that are written in other languages such as Akkadian, Greek and Aramaic first, and then translated into Hebrew retain their form. As to when there was a Hebrew language Van Sert seems to think that would be after c 500 BC.Rktect (talk) 12:18, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
You seem to be supporting my point. 'Moses' may not be a Hebrew word, but it is the name used in Hebrew. Hence, it is entirely appropriate to use the Hebrew in that article. However, the word comes from Egyptian and there are verifiable sources which state this; hence, it is entirely correct to include the fact that it is Egyptian, with the Hebrew listed after. The point of the parenthetical section in the lead is to show the origin of a word if known with reasonable certainty, along with the translation into other languages where relevant. In the case of Moses, if we did not have evidence to show it is Egyptian in origin, then we would simply state the Hebrew as found in the tanakh (as the primary, notable source). If there was doubt about the origin, or the origin is unknown, then that should feature somewhere in the article.
I have little doubt that there are some articles on WP which incorrectly ascribe the origins of a word (principally names) as Hebrew. However, unless there is reasonable certainty about the origin of a word, all we can do is list the relevant translations. In, for example the case of Noah, where WP has
Noah (or Noe, Noach; Hebrew: נוֹחַ or נֹחַ, Standard Nóaḥ Tiberian Nōªḥ ; Nūḥ ;Arabic: نوح ; "Rest"[1] )
in the lead, it is not stating that Noah is a Hebrew word (although it does state that it means 'rest' in Hebrew - not the same thing). The reason the Hebrew is listed there is because it is the primary, notable source. Only if we have verifiable sources stating otherwise can we insert another language - and that source must explicitly state the origin of the word. Furthermore, that source must reflect the general consensus of scholarly opinion.--FimusTauri (talk) 12:42, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
We aren't in disagreement. Every word has an etymology. Where Sumerian determinative forms are borrowed into Akkadian scholars generally capitalise them, as for example URU KI meanung city place. Later when the Akkadian gets borrowed into Hittite we see the same thing. By the time it gets borrowed into something like the name for Jerusalem in the Amarna letters, URU URU salaam KI, Akkadian is already giving rise to Assyrian, Canaanite, Phoenician, and Ugartic, but still not yet into Hebrew. We know that at one point Jerusalem was a fortified well garrisoned by the Egyptians. We aren't sure what that name was but we can reference what its referred to in Akkadian in the Amarna letters. Where a name in a foreign language is later borrowed into Hebrew its etymology should be acknowledged as from its original source. What you suggest is all I'm asking that we do, reference its origins. Only if we have verifiable sources stating its Hebrew can we call it Hebrew, and we are agreed that source must explicitly state the reason the general consensus of scholarly opinion gives for thinking we know the origin of the word; otherwise we reference the language its borrowed from. Rktect (talk) 15:21, 10 February 2009 (UTC)


Appropriate editing : It's in the sources. No POV, no OR

Do you really need to approach this topic, on this board, with an essay?

Document the facts. Where there are no facts, document scholarly opinion, not your own. If it's opinion, not knowledge, document it as so. Give due weight.

  • I see many articles on Old Testament nouns; people ,places, and things where an editor has referenced Hebrew as the language and Hebrew Bible as the source. Given the Documentary Hypothesis discusses the authorship and approximate period of writing, it should be possible to be more particular about what we are saying.
- You can't say a hypothesis is a given. That's advancing a point of view and doing original research.
A hypothesis cannot, by definition, be a source of authority. If it is appropriate to discuss the hypothesis in an article, then do so, but obviously you have to discuss the other POVs, with appropriate weight.
Discuss appropriate mainstream viewpoints, i.e all of the relevant ones, as documented in reliable sources.
You should be aiming to give the general reader an overview of the subject and the genuine controversies surrounding it.
  • The way the articles are written at present there generally is no thought given to the fact that through most of the Pentateuch Hebrew doesn't exist as a language.
- Is it a fact? What do the reliable sources say? Are they in agreement?
Again, no POV or OR. If it's a fact, reference it. If it's a controversy, document it.
  • the assumption that there is a body of literature already written in the language seems unverifiable
- If there is a genuine controversy, academia will have thought of it.
Seems? To who? To you? Defer to the sources. No OR, no POV.

Same goes for the rest of the post. If there is a problem as to who the reliable sources are, then that is what needs to be addressed. If you're saying there are no reliable sources, then that is a simpler question, although not necessarily an easier answer.

Ddawkins73 (talk) 14:55, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't think its a big deal to ask that no OR, no POV apply to the assumption that everything is Hebrew just because the Bible mentions it. All I'm asking is that like anything else it be a verifiable statement. Rktect (talk) 15:21, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Its in the Hebrew Bible - how more verified can you get?--FimusTauri (talk) 15:29, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Whats in there? That its written in Hebrew? Does it discuss that there is more than one author? I use the Jerusalem Bible. It discusss the authorship in its introduction to the Penteteuch. Most reasonably modern Bibles do the same, drawing the line at the Genesis/Exodus boundary. Rktect (talk) 17:08, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

I believe this discussion might belong to a better place. — Blue-Haired Lawyer 15:51, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't want to get over-involved here with Rktect's continued essays and original research (which I admit I am discussing in far too many other places), just pointing out that the Documentary hypothesis is neither the last word nor does it bear out his claims that parts of the Bible were written in the 18th c. BCE. dougweller (talk) 18:20, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Allowing that the lable WP:OR may sometimes be overused by some editors, I'm curious why we do or don't apply the same standards to religious texts. Is it enough just to say "Its in the Hebrew Bible" or do we get to ask if there are questions of authorship, language, veritability, time frame, and reliance by the author on other uncited older sources. Some people are telling me the Bible can't be used as a citation because its a primary source. The way the Documentary Hypothesis (still called a hypothesis despite its been around for over a century and is generally accepted by most bible scholars) has it its not a primary source its essentially in about its fifth edit. Others have claimed its not the last word and cited John Van Seter. Still others, Ken Kitchen talk about it in term of geo-political context and claim it has textual artifacts such as the form of contracts and the price of slaves. Isn't it best just to presume people have questions and provide references as to the verifiability of the part being discussed, especially where its a part that isn't internally consistant with some other part? Rktect (talk) 19:12, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
I think you misunderstand what a primary source is. In whatever edit, the bible is a primary source as it does not analyse the reported issues in the bible. A secondary source would be a bible analysis by a theologisht. Arnoutf (talk) 19:36, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
"Do we get to ask..."?
No.
No OR.
It's not that you can't or shouldn't mention the Documentary Hypothesis...
"Isn't it best to presume"
No.
"...provide references as to the verifiability"
Of course. Not "best". You should. Or the article is rubbish.
What exactly is the problem?
Ddawkins73 (talk) 19:56, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
If the Bible were a primary source its writer would be reporting something he observed. If the author of a passage in it heard a story from someone who heard a story, from someone who heard a story ...about 500 iterations back, then thats a secondary source. If he copied a story and edited it to say something different then thats a secondary source. I'm not saying we should presume or assume anything. Quite the contrary, Where an article says the language is Hebrew it depends on who said or wrote what when. I'm asking for a reference as opposed to "its in the Bible how much more verified can you get". If its a set of Passages copied from Strongs concordance I take Strongs as a secondary source also and they usually reference the language Rktect (talk) 21:13, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Passages from the Bible are still a primary source even if you get them from an index/concordance/whatever. Just as the Amarna letters are even in translation, something else you disagree about. That's how we define primary source.
I think this is actually about Talk:Location of Aram, am I right? Which is a fork of, and should be a redirect to, Aram-Naharaim. dougweller (talk) 21:38, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Please read primary source and secondary source articles. Arnoutf (talk) 21:59, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Primary source[1][2] is a term used in a number of disciplines. In historiography, a primary source (also called original source) is a document, recording or other source of information(paper, picture,....etc) that was created at the time being studied, by an authoritative source, usually one with direct personal knowledge of the events being described. It serves as an original source of information about the topic. Primary sources are distinguished from secondary sources, which often cite, comment on, or build upon primary sources.

In what way does that apply to the Bible?Rktect (talk) 01:39, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
In what way is this to do with policy and guidelines? Ddawkins73 (talk) 07:03, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Where articles about Bible nouns begin with "Noun (Hebrew)", indicating it is supposed to have been written in Hebrew, and there is no evidence even that Hebrew exists as a language at the time it is supposed to have been written, may we ask for a reference to say where that supposition comes from? Rktect (talk) 11:13, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
As policy? You don't need a policy to edit contentious statements! Just sources. If the statement is inaccurate, document what academia has already thought of, using the sources. What isn't clear about that? Ddawkins73 (talk) 11:44, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Oh, and if you mean guidelines about editing articles on religious texts or historical texts, or in the category mythology, then "may we ask?" wouldn't be the in the text of the guideline, nor would "Hebrew" or any specific language, would it?
I think I've finally deciphered what you're saying. You're not saying "If an article says line x was translated from Hebrew but the extant sources are in Greek, may we ask if it wasn't translated from Hebrew?" - which is what I was answering. You seem to be asking if Hebrew words are Hebrew. Well, ask yourself if the difference between classifying a word as Modern Hebrew or Classical Hebrew is useful in the context of the article itself. Or even meaningful, in many cases, seeing as where Modern Hebrew comes from.
You can't have a guideline where you're not clear what the guideline should be yourself, so I suggest you take this up with the Wiki bible project as was suggested earlier. Ddawkins73 (talk) 12:24, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Break for easy editing

Let me clarify a couple of points.

Where an article is about a religious story, the primary source for that article will always be the relevant canon - if its a Bible story, that means the Bible. This does not mean that the canon is a primary source for the events described therein. However, where there are no other sources, then the religious canon must, perforce, take primacy.

If the primary source is written a specific language, then we can quote that language as source, unless we have conclusive, citeable, unchallenged references that demonstrate that the word comes from a different language. In that case, we can list the original language, with the word in that language, with a reference - and then quote the word in the language of the primary source.

Essentially, words have been quoted as Hebrew because there is no certain alternative. Just because some professor makes a good case for an alternative is not a good reason to dismiss the Hebrew and insert the alternative. In order to that you must demonstrate that there is almost universal acceptance of said professor's opinion. This has been done, for example, in the case of Moses, where it is universally agreed that the word is Egyptian. --FimusTauri (talk) 13:44, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Suggest if OP wants to continue this, he cut n paste to his talk page or relevant project. Ddawkins73 (talk) 14:15, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Although the OP has been indef blocked for OR, this discussion is ongoing at [1] where a policy change is being discussed. dougweller (talk) 18:57, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually, this isn't the same thread that was transferred there... it was the discussion Mythology and Religion which is already on archive #60 of this talkpage. Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 19:11, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Signatures that have no link

It appears to be a new craze. More people are configuring their signatures so they appear on talk pages without a link. It makes it very frustrating for editors to communicate with each other when there is no link to their user page or talk page. Some recent cases have turned up on the Administrators Noticeboard / Incidents page:

At Wikipedia:Signature#Links, it clearly states that signatures must contain a link to the userpage or talkpage. I don't know what the answer is. But it's very frustrating when you want to reply to someone's post but it has no link on the signature. ANI doesn't seem able to deal with it. What can be done? --SteelSkin (talk) 00:00, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

If they don't respond to a polite suggestion, block them. People who deliberately and egregiously make it difficult to communicate with them have no place in a collaborative project. Algebraist 00:11, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Block per Algebraist. But Wikipedia:Signature is a "behavioral guideline" ... presumably we need this element to be described as policy (which I'm sure is part of SteelSkin's purpose in bringing it here. --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:16, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I've noticed this more and more - it's a pain in the arse and should be stopped. --Cameron Scott (talk) 00:18, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
It is possible to be blocked for violating a behavioural guideline. People have certainly been blocked for disruptive editing before now. Algebraist 00:20, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
But we saw argument from, for example, User:Bishonen: "Really? And what , Tom, does "policy/guidelines" stand for—why do you call it that? Do you think WP:SIG is "almost policy", or "policy on a bad day"? It's in fact an editorial guideline Do we really need to display our ZOMG Great Adminz Powerz at every opportunity". --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:22, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
How do we get this made into policy? What is the process?--124.170.250.200 (talk) 00:33, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
By consensus deciding that it is policy. We don't have a process as such. Algebraist 00:36, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Signatures without links are problematic. The functioning of this encyclopedia depends on communication between editors: for collaboration, clarification, editing concerns, dispute resolution and so forth. If signatures are unlinked, then this process is disrupted. Certainly, the user could still be contacted via a search under user name, but this presupposes that their doctored signature is an accurate transcription of their actual user name. (Many people use short forms, symbols, diacritics or completely different names.) It also makes it difficult to verify the message is left by that user, or by someone impersonating that user. The actual poster could be discovered by checking the page history, but this can be difficult on pages with large histories, and almost impossible if it is not correctly date-stamped. (People intent on obfuscating their details might well not datestamp, or enter false ones.) I would support a policy which insists on user links in signatures. Those who do not comply could have their signature-setting preference disabled (if that's possible). Gwinva (talk) 01:22, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Linkless signatures are very annoying. However annoying ≠ block-worthy disruption. --Kralizec! (talk) 01:27, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
The functioning of this encyclopedia depends on communication between editors
Sort of. Obviously there are a minority of editors who do a lot of the vital stitching and glueing etc.
But most editors are unregistered. So how can you block someone who does register but doesn't have a linkable signature?
Ddawkins73 (talk) 01:34, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
1. Unregistered editors can be identified. (Much more easily, too: they cannot set signature preferences!) They couldn't impersonate other editors easily, either. 2. We can block people for other signature-related issues (such as profanities, names which impersonated others) so why not for this signature offence? 3. I was not proposing blocking, anyway, but disabling their signature setting preference. 4. While unlinked signatures might not be block-worthy disruption, they mighht hide block-worthy disruption (such as impersonation), or make it difficult/impossible for others to contact or communicate to warn or discuss concerns. Gwinva (talk) 01:48, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
To me, there is no problem if you can clearly identify the user. My being annoyed isn't grounds for sanctions. Now, if the user can't be clearly identified, and I have to dig through edit summaries, that places a load on the server, consumes an inordinate amount of my time. If enough editors are affected, it crosses the line to disruptive. Solutions vary from politely reminding the user to identify himself to bot-tagging to blocks. I would favor the first two as they are more in line with WP:AGF, WP:BITE, and WP:CIVIL. Personally, I think the "must link" should be replaced with "must link or clearly identify yourself, and should link."

Here's an idea, have signbot treat unlinked signatures the same as unsigned posts and have it append a properly linked signature? --Ron Ritzman (talk) 02:10, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

That's an excellent idea, Ron. Is it technologically feasible?--SteelSkin (talk) 02:23, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Ask slakr. Algebraist 02:26, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Endorse I like the idea of a signbot, but I would allow a global exception if the signature consisted of just the user's username or the user's username with the first letter in lowercase. This would give people who insisted on not having a link in their signature for whatever reason an option. I don't think we should exclude people whose religion prohibits them from putting a link in their signatures from editing :). The important thing is not that there be a clickable link, but that it be very clear who made the comment without checking the history. I also think any bot should limit itself to pages that are already monitored by autosigning bots. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 02:41, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
SineBot already treats non-linked signatures as unsigned. People currently have the option to opt out via {{NoAutosign}}. There is an archived discussion about why I don't think SIG needs to be policy. Also, I've found that the people that don't have a link in their signatures tend to have simply made a mistake and ticked the "raw signature" box in myprefs, and they're usually open to fixing the problem to keep the bot/other people from annoying them. :P --slakr\ talk / 05:22, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
How are the signbots configured in the first place? What do they look for? (I have no idea how they work.) I suggest they add linksigs to any comment that doesn't have a signature that matches the name of the person who made it. In other words, anyone who signs with their username will not have a link added. This allows the editors to "opt out" and allows other editors to find them. -Freekee (talk) 05:26, 12 February 2009 (UTC) Edit: I guess that answers my questions. Slakr's comment wasn't there when I formulated my comment). -Freekee (talk) 05:29, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks, Slakr, for commenting. You said that SineBot already treats unlinked signatures as unsigned, meaning that it will automatically sign them. But that doesn't always seem to be working. If you look at the thread 'ANI case 1', linked on the first post of this thread, there are some unlinked signatures that have been there for about a week, and SineBot doesn't seem to have signed them. I find that some people with unlinked signatures seem to be avoiding discussion with other editors, which may be the motive for such signatures.SteelSkin (talk) 21:24, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Le test. Xeno 21:36, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
^See, signbot didn't annote the signature... –xeno (talk) 21:51, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Of course it didn't. You have over 800 edits, so SineBot (note spelling) ignores you entirely. Algebraist 22:01, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Then, would a solution to this be for SineBot to disallow any exceptions? Remove the threshold of 800 edits after which SineBot is currently disabled. What do we need such a threshold for anyway? The other possibility would be to remove the 'No Autosign' option.SteelSkin (talk) 23:15, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Ah, I didn't realize SineBot had a threshold. –xeno (talk) 23:20, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Yes, currently set at 800 (it assumes you know what you're doing). To re-enable auto-signing, you need to use {{YesAutosign}}. --slakr\ talk / 23:49, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Should the guideline WP:Notability be promoted to a Policy?

Wikipedia has developed a body of policies and guidelines to further our goal of creating a free encyclopedia. Policies are considered a standard that all editors should follow, whereas guidelines are more advisory in nature.

Amazingly, Wikipeida policies do not define what topics are suitable for inclusion as a standalone article. Instead, WP:What Wikipedia is not makes it clear that Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, and just because a topic may exist or is useful does not automatically make it suitable for inclusion in an encyclopedia.

To differentiate between what is indiscriminate, and what is not, Wikipedia employs the concept of '"Notability", an inclusion criterion based on encyclopedic suitability of a topic for a Wikipedia article. The principal underlying notability is the requirement for verifiable objective evidence to support a claim of notability.

Substantial coverage in reliable sources constitutes such objective evidence. By chance or by design, it is the same reliable sources that generations past have used to expand our knowledge of the world around us by understanding the research and works created by notable thinkers of the past, described by the metaphor "Standing on the Shoulders of Giants".

Since WP:What Wikipedia is not and WP:Notability are closely linked, such that they can be described different sides of same coin, I propose that the guideline Wikipedia:Notability should be promoted to a Policy in order to strengthen the First of the Five Pillars that define the character of Wikipedia.

Please make your views known at Wikipedia:Notability/RFC:Reevaluation.--Gavin Collins (talk) 20:04, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

I think it is very fitting that the very next entry is mine. Since notability is the number one reason that articles are deleted, and those deletions overwhelming affect new users. Ikip (talk) 05:32, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Good thing too, otherwise there'd be no one to read any articles. Equazcion •✗/C • 05:42, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)

Policies and Guidelines re Linguistics

Resolved

Reliable sources and language articles

Articles about language belong to the category Linguistics. I have noticed that many editors are not aware that Linguistics is a distinct academic field. That is, they naturally assume 'Linguistics' is the domain of Literature professors, Educational bodies/Boards of Education, or published grammarians. This is understandable, since modern Linguistics doesn't hit 50 until next year.

How best to redress this in the policies and guidelines, and what is the process for getting it done?

Thanks for your replies. - Ddawkins73 (talk) 12:58, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, I've worked out now that the thing to do is to discuss proposals here. As to which pages to add material to, I've found the Linguistics project so I can co-ordinate with them, and come back here with a proposal (Probably just adding a section to RS for Linguistics). Thanks for reading anyhow. Ddawkins73 (talk) 15:14, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Clarification

it seems that there is confusion among some editors about how pages are becoming official guidelines and policies.

WP:CONSENSUS is very clear about it: In the case of policies and guidelines, Wikipedia expects a higher standard of participation and consensus than on other pages.

However, Wikipedia:Policies_and_guidelines#Proposing_guidelines_and_policies unfortunately doesn't mention "high participation".

I have witnessed recently few cases where editors thought that simply posting a thread here was enough exposure, even though very few editors responded to it (or even saw it?).

I think that participation part from WP:CONSENSUS should be restated in the Wikipedia:Policies_and_guidelines#Proposing_guidelines_and_policies section.

212.200.240.232 (talk) 15:29, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

  • Endorse as this has been the consensus for over a year. However, it should be advertised to avoid shouts of hypocrisy. Pick a place to centralize the discussion and I'll endorse there as well. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 15:45, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm not sure which centralized place I should post to, but it should definitely be posted at talk pages of above 2 policies.212.200.240.232 (talk) 17:51, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
Village pump policy (this page) is the most central place there is to discuss a policy change. Anyone who has any interest is likely to be watching this page and notice it here. Equazcion •✗/C • 17:56, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Yes, but to help this get 'high participation' we need to inform other relevant pages! 212.200.240.232 (talk) 18:02, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
Absolutely. That didn't seem to be david's concern though. The opposite, actually -- he seemed to be suggesting that this was a fractured discussion and there might be a single more central place to hold it. I'd say the opposite, that it's already centralized and needs to be spread around, as you say. Equazcion •✗/C • 18:05, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)

Note: A tangential discussion was moved to User talk:Jehochman#discussing anonymously --Equazcion •✗/C • 17:13, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)

  • Endorse. People don't seem to be taking that stipulation too seriously, but I think it's pretty important. Equazcion •✗/C • 17:13, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)
  • Endorse. Absolutely vital. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 17:22, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Policy creep. If people make a good faith effort to involve the community (posting to the pump, relevant talk pages, AN, CENT) and the community doesn't respond, WP:SILENCE applies. Mr.Z-man 17:54, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It's already part of policy though -- high participation is required for new proposals to be accepted, it's already stated. This would just mean putting an additional reminder of the same fact in a related policy. Equazcion •✗/C • 17:59, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose- silence is not agreement, but silence is also not disagreement. I'd rather not codify how policy is written. When we need it, we write. If it is wrong, we rewrite. Jehochman Talk 18:38, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Again, this proposal doesn't constitute a change. It's taking something already written in one policy and mentioning it redundantly in a related policy, to ensure it gets followed. Frankly I wouldn't have even thought asking for permission for such a thing here would be necessary. Putting something in a policy that's already part of established policy would probably not have been challenged had it shown up in an edit summary. I think the only reason to oppose this is if you disagree with that existing portion of policy to begin with, and that's a whole other discussion. Equazcion •✗/C • 19:25, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose per J and Z. If this is already policy, why are we even !voting. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Verbal (talk • contribs) 9 February 2009
    • Because although it is already policy, it seems to be easily ignored in practice. This is an attempt at making the policy stand out more so that it hopefully gets its due attention. Equazcion •✗/C • 20:46, 9 Feb 2009 (UTC)
      • If its ignored in practice, then it isn't really policy. Mr.Z-man 23:36, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
        • That is a good point. However in a case like this it can't (shouldn't?) be quite that clear-cut. Think about it: We're talking about what good practice should be when creating new guidelines. Guidelines are something that some editors might have personal or minority motivations for drafting. If we say that advertising a proposal and high participation isn't really required before promoting it to guideline, we might as well be condoning a practice of people trying to pass guidelines by keeping them more or less under wraps when they know they might be unpopular. I think policy and guideline proposals are different from other consensus issues in that in order for it to be fair and open, we need to start with a rule that says anyone doing it may need to do something that has the potential to hurt their chances for success. Otherwise no one would do it.
The people authoring a proposal will surely support it, so what's their motivation to go to the public and risk defeat? If we just sit back and base the policy regarding proposals on what people are doing -- when what people are doing is what will be most likely to get their proposals passed -- that's really not what's best for the community. And I think whoever wrote this part of the consensus policy foresaw that, which is why this distinction exists there. Equazcion •✗/C • 01:02, 10 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Read my previous comment. I'm not saying people can just make a proposal, let it sit for a few days, then call it policy. I'm talking about if people make the proposal, advertise it to the community, and the community doesn't respond. If people know about it and have objections, but don't raise them, that's their fault, not the fault of the people advocating the proposal. Mr.Z-man 01:45, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
People seem to have ignored the advertising requirement too though. That's the OP's main stated concern. The repetition of the high participation requirement would've been a good way to ensure proper advertisement, since proposers would need to advertise to get the level of participation they need. But I guess... if proposers aren't advertising their proposals... maybe that shouldn't be policy either. Right? Equazcion •✗/C • 02:06, 10 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Well then we agree there. I agree that changes to policy should be advertised I don't agree that policy discussions should require a certain level of participation to be official. Mr.Z-man 02:51, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm glad to have reached at least that agreement with you, however I think the higher level of participation is still essential. And since we've established that this issue is beyond that of merely forming a policy around describing what people are already doing (you want advertising despite the fact that it's not being done), then the participation standard has every bit as much merit. Equazcion •✗/C • 02:58, 10 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Even if they are not advertised, this thread itself is testimony to the fact that major policy change won't slip through the net without anyone noticing. I'm sure plenty of the most active editors know what they "should" be anyhow. The wiki model makes changes that would have no consensus futile. Bold, revert, discuss... it will happen (again, see what happened with Advocacy. Not a problem). I wouldn't worry too much about changing policy about changing policies. Lasting policy changes would be hard to get through... Ddawkins73 (talk) 06:36, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Not really. I see here mostly people who interacted with me recently, and therefore probably were looking at my contributions. I don't see many 'new faces' in this thread. In other words, if this was posted by some other random IP or account, there would probably be fewer responses. 212.200.240.232 (talk) 11:56, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
If policy awareness and consensus were restricted to whether an editor posts in this thread or interacts with you, then you would have a point.
Protecting policy is not a matter of writing it in stone, or "do not touch". Quite the contrary. It's really not a big deal if someone changes policy, for the same reason it's not a big deal if someone vandalizes a page. With policy, you have a high level of awareness and not very many pages to maintain. The implications of the wiki model and a consensus driven community enable a different mindset towards rules. They are as sacred (and only as sacred) as the community makes them.
Making a fuss about someone "not using due process" is not the way to look at it. Look at it as "Is it controversial? Should I reverse it?". If the answer is yes, you can reverse policy, and ask for discussion. Boldness applies to reverts. Undo undo undo. Don't insist upon the process. The process is bold-revert-discuss, simply because there is never explicit consensus from all users. How many new policies and guidelines have been brought in the last two years? I bet it's not many. Ddawkins73 (talk) 17:50, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
From my incomplete list, about 35 current guidelines were started as pages in last 2 years, and about 50 in 2006. I don't know when they actually got promoted to guideline status -- obviously some time after their page creation and before now -- therefore an estimate of about 50-60 guidelines in last two years may be a good one (not even counting pages that were created before 2006 and that may have became guidelines in last 2 years). [2] 212.200.240.232 (talk) 09:49, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

←I think it's valuable to have something in policy that encourages a tendency towards the creation only of policies that already have consensus, rather than encouraging not to worry about consensus since it can all be reversed later. Having a guideline/policy tag on a page is considered sort of gospel-ish, and removing it or making drastic changes once it's already there can be a hassle and create divisiveness. It's like getting married on a whim cause you figure you can just get divorced later. The reversal is a bit more of a process and we'd have even more drama than we do now if it were policy to do things that way.

And by the way, anon is right, that most of the people responding here are doing it for a specific reason, and one that I'm probably not allowed to mention because of AGF. If not for that reason, this posting would have gotten very little response. I'll leave it at that. Equazcion •✗/C • 20:37, 10 Feb 2009 (UTC)

You misunderstand. That's how it is. I'm not suggesting a change. Or encouraging anything, other than not worrying about changing the "don't change policy" elements of policy.
It doesn't matter how few people respond here - I already said that.
Ddawkins73 (talk) 01:11, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
If that's how it is, then are you opposing stating that that's how it is in two policies rather than in just one? Cause that's what this proposal is for. Equazcion •✗/C • 01:52, 11 Feb 2009 (UTC)
  • Comment Policies and guidelines that don't reflect consensus will be reversed in no time. Move "Wikipedia expects..." to the 2nd line of WP:CONSENSUS, above "Silence implies consent", if as I expect that is the focal point of the proposal (cf Advocacy). Ddawkins73 (talk) 21:34, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Support Ikip (talk) 02:00, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Do we have a WP:RS view on Who's Who, the Canadian publication?

I don't believe that the answer is necessarily simple. The selection criteria do not seem to be published, nor is it clear whether the biographies are self authored and submitted, or are written by the publication. Nor is it clear whether they are validated or not.

I have emailed them to ask, but I am not hopeful of an answer.

I'm trying to form a view on an article with a number of woolly sources of which the Canadian Who's Who is the "best". But I am not clear whether it is a sufficient reference to assert and verify notability, and, if it is, whether as the sole decent reference, it is sufficient by itself. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 15:04, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

I think Who's Who is not RS. They are spamming me last few years with emails. ps. i'm refering to american who's who, but guess that's the same thing. 212.200.240.232 (talk) 15:12, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
If they follow the same editorial policy as A & C Black, publishers of the UK edition as cited here then the answer is no as the publisher policy is confined to extending the inviation to submit an entry. The contents of the entry are generally written by the subject, and thus not RS. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:26, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
I was assuming that to be the case. It fits with the mechanism one woudl choose to use in order to collect this load of self puffery! Fiddle Faddle (talk) 15:29, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
I would think the 'Questionable sources' and 'Using self-published and questionable sources as sources on themselves' sections of WP:V apply here. --Onorem♠Dil 15:37, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks. I've put the article up for deletion, and I'd appreciate a good consensus to keep or delete. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 16:43, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Autobiographies

I am confused by an apparent contradiction raised by this:

Normal practice in Wikipedia seems to be to use autobiographies as a source for non-contentious facts about the subject, so I think that WP:SELFPUB read on its own is a misleading summary of the community's consensus.

Do you agree with my conclusion about normal practice? Is this an FAQ?

--Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 15:32, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Autobiographical details which would not reasonably be found anywhere else and are attributed in the article. I can't see any reason to use autobiographical content otherwise. It's hard to think of authobiographical "facts" that aren't potentially contentious.
In no sense would anyone, or should anyone, use a self-published source as evidence of notability.
To answer your question, yes the two conflict. I suspect that it's the BLP part not being explicit enough. If it's not, and self-pub is wrong, then Wikipedia has got it's verifiability in a mess. I'm sure it's the BLP entry that needs changing however. I do hope so. Ddawkins73 (talk) 13:56, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Less strict notability guidelines better or not?

Resolved

moved to the appropriate talk page of the policy page.

There are daily AFD discussions to delete non-notable article. What would be the consequences if the standard of notability for news related articles and people in the news were relaxed? For example, look at this CNN article http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/02/13/plane.crash.victims/index.html which is about a lady who died in a plane crash yesterday, was the widow of a 9/11 victim, and founded a anti-terrorist organization. Her notability is borderline. Yet isn't there no harm to have an article on her.

Basically, if there is a serious newsstory about a person, then they would automatically be notable. Currently, high school are automatically notable.

The purpose of the VP discussion is to discuss whether it is better for WP to loosen standards to permit more articles. Chergles (talk) 16:39, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

See WP:NOT#NEWS. We need more information than just a single news report to determine if this person has further influence. If that organization is notable, there likely would be more sources about it and thus she'd either be mentioned on her own article or in that organization's article. But just appearing in a brief burst of news coverage is not guaranteed for notability. --MASEM 17:13, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Masem's comments misses the purpose of this discussion completely. The question isn't whether this article is notable. The question is what makes the notability and not news guidelines right for Wikipedia? What harm would occur if Wikipedia had serious articles on minor news figures? Chergles (talk) 17:40, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing out the policy. Since it is a policy discussion, the discussion should be made there. Chergles (talk) 17:45, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

"What harm would occur if Wikipedia had serious articles on minor news figures?" Please, never edit a BLP, ever. For someone like that, a Wikipedia article is pretty much guaranteed to be both poorly watched, and in the top 5 google results for the person's name. Any incorrect information (it doesn't even have to be offensive libel necessarily) not only reflects poorly on Wikipedia, but can cause real-world harm to the subject. The same is true for non-BLPs as well, though the possibility for and effect of direct harm is lower. Wikimedia gets dozens of emails per month from biography subjects complaining about inaccuracies and POV in their articles, and that's with the current notability policy. Mr.Z-man 18:27, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

A proposal to remedy en:wp's chronic incivility

Wikipedia talk:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#How_to_raise_the_tone_of_the_wiki

Incivility is standard on en:wp. Actual personal attacks are routine and expected. This drives people away from the wiki and leaves a hard core of borderline sociopaths as the only people willing to put up with each other. This is despite Wikipedia:No personal attacks supposedly being hard policy.

Precis: the AC to warn that it expects better behaviour, and then to start knocking heads together. Likely to start with the admins, as the ones most expected to set a good example.

Commentary at the above link (or even just "great idea!" or "terrible idea!" will likely be read by the AC.

Let's make this encyclopedia project suck less to be involved with. - David Gerard (talk) 20:06, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

I think one way is not to describe Wikipedians as borderline sociopaths :D
Ddawkins73 (talk) 20:18, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
Hey, that would include myself! But I can learn better, so everyone else can too ;-p Any thoughts on the idea itself? - David Gerard (talk) 20:30, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
You mean only sociopaths? :P 212.200.240.232 (talk) 20:20, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
Exactly. More seriously, I presumed action would be taken in such cases as the proposal outlines. Ddawkins73 (talk) 20:28, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm hoping it's a workable proposal. It takes very little incivility to turn n00bs off Wikipedia altogether, and just a sustained bit more to put off a regular. The culture of routine actual personal attacks (see WP:ANI in the last week, for example) is worse - David Gerard (talk) 20:30, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
The point of civility is it leads to more discussion and a better chance that people will be able to benefit by polite constructive criticism. We could institute a WP:NN "no nagging" rule that once you have called something to someones attention you should wait a decent interval to allow them to digest your points before going into full shoot to kill mode, wikistalking, posting negative comments about them on other peoples pages, harrassing, and reverting everything they write. Rktect (talk) 20:32, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
Arguing over "civility" seems to be fractal in its infinite detail in practice. I suggest starting with actual chronic personal attacks, of which there is no shortage - David Gerard (talk) 20:42, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm not aware of any culture of routine personal attacks here. When there is one, it's called out and quelled, usually, in my experience. Maybe this pattern would seem more apparent with some specific examples. Equazcion •✗/C • 20:49, 8 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Read WP:ANI, and then look at the style of editing and edit summaries by regulars outside said board - David Gerard (talk) 20:54, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
If the problem is mainly at ANI, a place with people used to acting as "the complaint department", then I'd say a gradual buildup of incivility was inevitable, as it is in similar real-life institutions. You might make better headway with your proposal by focusing specifically on that forum and others like it. I don't think this is as general a problem on Wikipedia at large, as you've implied. Equazcion •✗/C • 20:57, 8 Feb 2009 (UTC)
It's certainly an excellent place to start. But the proposal - to, y'know, actually enforce WP:NPA - applies there probably as strongly as anywhere, if not more strongly. Look at KPBotany's comments on the above link. Professionals and experts don't want to come here any more - David Gerard (talk) 21:00, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
All I would say about any forum rules is that they make life easier for moderators. That is, good to be able to say "no arguing" and just block/ban where necessary. Good for dealing with extreme cases.
I can't see it affecting general behaviour. 99% of people know how to behave, and if they are uncivil it's because they want to be. Whether as a one-off, sometimes, or in general. I can't comment further because I'm quite new and I've generally found people to be more calm and dispassionate than I am. Businesslike, even. Ddawkins73 (talk) 21:15, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
As a general comment, there is a lot of room for improvement, but Wikipedia is nonetheless one of the most civil forums on the Internet that is truly open and public. AN/I is a place of considerable incivility, but anyone who resorts to that there turns others off and hurts their own case. It's probably a good thing that we see people's true stripes there. Also, AN/I functions as place where people can take their complaints about each other things that, if true, are actionable but if untrue would be a personal attack or WP:AGF violation if voiced elsewhere. Using the legal system and courts as a case in point, you have to give people a safe haven to resolve their differences, rather than punishing them for bringing up accusations that may be incorrect or inactionable, but are nevertheless made in good faith. Wikidemon (talk) 21:22, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
The thing to remember about AN/I is that the non-admin editors who post requests for intervention are usually already involved in a heated dispute before they post there... From the POV of the person being complained about... that the complainer went to ANI is seen as an escallation of the debate... it can even be seen as being a form of a personal attack in itself (ie... so and so attacked me by complaining to the admins). It is natural that discussion at ANI starts off with a high level of animosity. Admins do their best to calm things down, but that is not always possible. Blueboar (talk) 15:27, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

let me add that I think this a good idea in principle but will turn into a real nightmare if put into practice. Civility rules on en:wikipedia (in and out of ANI, as far as I can see) are mostly a game: while the majority of editors try to be civil with or without the rules, there's an obvious core of editors who ignore civility entirely except as a tool to get other people in trouble. easy enough to do - take almost any statement by person A out of context, claim it's uncivil, get a couple of people to back you up, badger an admin, and person A is blocked for a week without any real recourse. get the idea that wikipedia is going to crack down on civility and you're going to see a tremendous upsurge in this kind of crappulence, and that won't be pretty. just my two cents. --Ludwigs2 00:45, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Election notice

Moved to WP:VPT. Equazcion •✗/C • 02:53, 15 Feb 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia as a community alert mechanism

Within the chemicals part of Wikipedia, there appears to be a shift toward using articles as a sort of alert/tracking mechanism, e.g. for enumerating chemical accidents or incidents. The trend is no crisis but it is healthy to get views. Example: the case studies in hexavalent chromium. Another more mature article with an extensive list is dioxin. Other examples exist. The WP:NOT#NEWS recommendations are not very clear-cut on this theme. Part of the challenge with this issue is that editors often have strong feelings about correcting/uncovering great injustices, so efforts to remove such material lead to accusations of suppression of knowledge etc. I would appreciate advice.--Smokefoot (talk) 19:02, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Content_forking#Article_spinouts_-_.22Summary_style.22_articles. Many of these incidents are notable, as large-scale exposure to these sorts of things get a lot of press coverage. The hexavalent chromium article doesn't really have enough to fork, but dioxin does. Toss them in their own article and write up a brief summary mentioning the most major ones and perhaps the trend of exposure. II | (t - c) 19:12, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
The issue that interests me and hopefully policy-setters is not the spinning out large topics, but the potential tendency to use Wikipedia as a "community alert mechanism," enumerating incidents. It is the nature of the content, not the amount of it, that I am asking about - how should editors evaluate chemical (or biological or any) incidents and what features of an incident constitute notability. Editors seeking to uncover injustices or expose malevolent practices have an incentive to enumerate, but that incentive leads to actions that may run counter to the ideals of Wikipedia.--Smokefoot (talk) 23:28, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, it's not up to us to "evaluate…incidents and what features of an incident constitute notability". That would be original research, which is not allowed here. Rather, if the reliable press is reporting on an incident, that reportage defines it as notable, and what is being reported about it is what should go (paraphrased and with citations back to the sources) into the article. As long as we are sticking to chronicling what reliable news sources have said, and not giving undue weight by putting too little or too much emphasis on it (compared to other similar events), we can't go very far off course. And of course, mistakes can always be corrected as more facts are revealed, speculations are discredited, etc. -- Unconventional (talk) 02:44, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
However, it is up to us to try to observe use of categories. I'll just leave that without much further explanation, but the considerations are far from trivial, and discussions of both OR and what is best for the reader come into it (e.g "is/should Chemistry be a separate category to Chemical/Industrial accidents?").
- Ddawkins73 (talk) 15:18, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
If the incidents of dioxin exposure was forked into a new article, say Cases of dioxin exposure, I would not expect that article to be categorized as chemistry.

Conspiracy Policy

What is Wikipedia's policy on conspiracies? Are they considered to have a WP:NPOV? I'm mainly looking for a direct link on wikipedia's policy toward conspiracy articles.Smallman12q (talk) 01:15, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

There is no single policy. Just read all the policies and guidelines and decide for yourself which ones apply in your particular situation.
In general, if the conspiracy itself is notable, such as some some of the conspiracy theories surrounding the JFK assassination, or allegedly conspiratorial organizations such as The Illuminati or the Trilateral Commission, an article may be warranted. In other cases, where the conspiracy theory is marginally notable, the existence of a conspiracy theory may be warranted in a related article. Most conspiracy theories don't get sufficient coverage from reliable, independent sources to even be mentioned, and many that do are not encyclopedic enough to warrant including. See WP:Verify and WP:Reliable sources for more on this. Please bear WP:HARM and WP:BLP in mind when discussing conspiracies involving living people. Also bear in mind that Wikipedia is not a web host, and there are many non-notable or marginally-notable conspiracy theories that shouldn't be mentioned at all or should only be mentioned briefly. Also keep WP:Neutral point of view and WP:Undue weight in mind - any article that mentions a conspiracy theory shouldn't leave the reader thinking it's considered fact by most people. If it were fact, it wouldn't be a conspiracy theory. Wikipedia is not an apologist venue for WP:FRINGE theories. Was there a person on the grassy knoll who shot Kennedy? Did space aliens kidnap Elvis? Maybe, but Wikipedia isn't the place to have that debate or even to give credence to theories like those. I hope this helps. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:48, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
(ec)There is the failed proposal Wikipedia:Conspiracy theory, which did not get community consensus. As long as information is properly sourced and cited to reliable, third-party, published sources, there should be few objections. However WP:NPOV#Undue weight is very clear that while minority views absolutely should be included in articles, they should not be given undue weight or made more notable than they truly are. Expanding on this is the WP:FRINGE guideline, which makes sure that coverage on Wikipedia does not make a fringe theory appear more notable than it actually is. --Kralizec! (talk) 01:49, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
I will keep WP:Source, WP:Fringe,and WP:NPV in mind. Thank you.Smallman12q (talk) 13:53, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

The guideline caveat

I came here because I'm really not sure where to find this specific answer and know that the pump seems to get the widest input.
Each and every guideline begins with the caveat "...is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though it is best treated with common sense and the occasional exception."
I seek clarification on "best teated", "common sense", and "occasional exception".
What specifically do they all mean? How can anything be "best treated" if always ignored? How can one define "common sense" when many editors do not (with aplogies) seem to accept its existance? How does one understand and accept or explain the "occasional exception"?
My own thought is that this caveat is included at the head of each and every guideline so editors may understand that guidelines are not iron-clad laws, and that exceptions may be considered is such would work to improve wikipedia.
However, I have in many times had discussions with editors that absolutley and vehemently refuse to accept THAT part of each guideline as having anything to do with the guideline... editors which then pointedly ignore the caveat or ardue it does not apply.
I am not trying to assert that exceptions ALWAYS exist, only wish to have clarification of when they might be considered, and what the definition of "common sense" might currently be.
I see that this caveat must either be removed form all guidelines if it is never to be followed or considered, or slightly emphasized so editors understand that sometimes exceptions that improve wiki might actually be allowed. So, I am here for input. Thanks, Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 20:44, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
Why are you posting this to the talk page? Doesn't it belong on the pump itself? Algebraist 20:50, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
It should probably be moved, yes. For a short answer, Wikipedia:Ignore all rules is official policy, so "improving or maintaining Wikipedia" takes precedence over any guideline, and that can mean exceptions. Of course, applying IAR without abusing it is kind of difficult (see the essay links from WP:IAR), but on the vast majority of pages, that's not an issue and editors get along just fine. —JAO • T • C 20:54, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
(Moved from talk page. Sorry - First time in the penthouse) Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 23:25, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

What's the deal with Gilbert Lévy?

Is this the proper way to protect a page from re-creation? --JaGatalk 00:46, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

No, it isn't. The page should be deleted as well as protected. Algebraist 02:12, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
OK, that makes more sense, thanks. Where do I go to get that done? --JaGatalk 02:53, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I commented on the talk page that the blank page should be deleted and salted. – ukexpat (talk) 04:07, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Deleted and salted. For those who don't know, once upon a time you couldn't protect pages that didn't exist. So this isn't a totally bizarre error. -- Vary Talk 04:24, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Notability criteria for entries on free software projects?

Recently, the entry on the free software project TurnKey Linux (copy from google cache) was speed deleted, in error, as spam at the sole discretion of an administrator (Efe) who does not seem to understand the concept of a free software project.

Update: the copy of the entry which I copied into User:LirazSiri/TurnKey Linux has been deleted in yet another abuse of process by User:JzG, a zealous deletionist who has threatened twice on User_talk:LirazSiri to block me for "making waves" (I.e., expressing my opinions). I've asked him to reinstate the entry so non-administrators can judge it based on its merits, and more importantly cool down and let someone else weigh in on this matter. - LirazSiri (talk) —Preceding undated comment was added at 12:14, 4 February 2009 (UTC).
For the time being, the google cache for the article can be found here: [3] LirazSiri (talk) 05:34, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

After running into a wall with the deleting administrator, I asked for a review of the deletion. I believed the absurdity of arguing that an entry on a free software project (that obviously isn't selling anything) meets the Wikipedia criteria for spam, would quickly dawn on the community and the entry would be restored.

Instead the entry has jumped from the frying pan into the fire, with a handful of deletionists now arguing that though the entry is not spam, it should still be deleted because it does not meet Wikipedia's criteria for notability despite being independently sourced, the argument being that the cited sources are not significant enough.

More worrisome however is that the TurnKey Linux entry exceeds the de-facto notability standard adhered to by most Ubuntu derivatives and free software projects listed on Wikipedia, only a few of which are sourced independently.

In general, most free software is at a disadvantage here compared with proprietary software because free software projects typically don't have a budget to spend on public relations.

Does this mean literally hundreds of Wikipedia entries on free software are at risk of deletion? Is a "speedy deletion" nomination and oblivious administrator all that it takes? Also, don't count on Wikipedia:deletion review to save free software coverage on Wikipedia because there seems to be a bias there towards deletionism - following a strict and demanding interpretation of the official guidelines seems to matter to more than improving Wikipedia.

I'm writing not just to save the TurnKey Linux entry but also because I am alarmed at what I believe is the very real potential for deletionism to destroy Wikipedia's valuable coverage of all but the largest of the free software projects.

The purpose of the notability guidelines is well intentioned, but like any other guideline it is a vehicle for improving Wikipedia, not an end in itself. In many areas, especially niche areas such as free software, the matter is far from black and white and if you set the bar too high you run the risk of violating Wikipedia's ignore all rules policy which roughly states: "Any policy, guideline, or other rule may be ignored if it hinders improving Wikipedia."

Update: I withdrew my request for a deletion review so as far as I'm concerned the issue is no longer the entry on TurnKey Linux but rather the general notability of hundreds of Wikipedia entries on free software projects which could suffer the same fate. From Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2009_February_3: "Alright, that's it deletionists - you win. I give up! I hereby remove my deletion review request and will refrain from commenting any further on this matter. It seems once they throw the book at you arguing is an exercise in futility. Nevermind that the article has been around informing users for many months with no objections. Nevermind that the original reason for deletion (Wikipedia:SPAM) was absurd and that debate was never sought. Nevermind that capricious and arbitrary nature in which one free software entry is singled out over hundreds of others by a kafkaesque mob that seems eager to ignore the Wikipedia:ignore all rules policy and discounts my arguments due to the poisoned well nature of my contribution to the article or the project it describes. None of that matters because once an entry is deleted (for whatever reason) and reaches review it will be held up to standards which few entries of its kind could meet. I get it now. You win. Good day." - LirazSiri (talk) 13:05, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Could everyone who cares about this please weigh in? What do you think?

—LirazSiri (talk) 01:21, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia, being based on free software, free software ideals, and crowd-sourced development, has an innate bias of editors towards free software. Please remember that when complaining about any bias towards deletion.
However, outside of some large projects, most free and/or open source software is a niche. You said so yourself. It does not get used nearly as much as the press about it would indicate. Most open source projects do not, and will not, meet our notability requirements. It is not about money for advertising and public relations. It is about mainstream attention and documentation. A product that gets used will get attention, reviews, critics and recommendations, and independent documentation.
Wikipedia isn't the place to document most of these projects. There are other wikis devoted to documenting open source projects but I don't know of any universally respected one. Moving the Wikipedia content that has been deleted to another wiki is always an option. Miami33139 (talk) 02:12, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
The requester forgot to mention that they are a developer of the software in question, and that the sources in the article were two mentions in the Ubuntu community weekly newsletter (not independent, sourced fomr the project itself) and multiple pages from the project's website. This was a classic WP:CSD#G11 deletion of WP:COI material with no reliable independent sources cited. As you say, our bias is towards, not against, this kind of software, but software projects are no different from garage bands: no independent sources, no article. And don't write about your own endeavours is a part of WP:BAI as well as WP:COI. Guy (Help!) 08:32, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • The Ubuntu Newsletter has a good reputation, has been operating for years and is read by hundreds of thousands every week. I don't see how the community journalists who put their heart and soul into it are any different from journalists in other media sources. I added that source in good faith because I believed it to be a legitimate reference. I find your casual dismissal of the sources in the article to fit the pattern of arbitrary and abusive callousness that led you to threaten repeatedly on User_talk:LirazSiri to silence me for "making waves" (I.e., criticizing counter-productive deletionism that does improve Wikipedia) and to delete the copy of the entry in question that I put up in my user page for non-administrators to review. Is dissenting opinion from the Wikipedia community so frightening that you would risk your reputation to crush it? Shame on you for abusing your administrator privileges. - LirazSiri (talk) 12:47, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
I can totally see why you'd find it offensive for the article to be defined as 'spam', liraz - and personally I hope it hasn't insulted or stressed you out. I think it was a mistake to call it 'spam' - and fwiw I for one, am sorry that happened. The whole 'notability' thing is a bit harder to figure out - it is important that article subjects are 'notable', but obviously it's important that this is discussed / checked out openly / fairly etc. Sorry if you feel you've been caught up in something, Liraz, I'll certainly take a closer look to see if I think I might be able to help, for what that's worth :-) cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 09:35, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
I've just had a look at the deletion log, and without being able to see the article, I can't really comment on whether the criteria given were actually met. But ISTM speedy deletion wasn't the right route. Moreover, A7 was given in one instance, but from what I can make out it isn't even in the scope of article subjects to which A7 applies. And looking at the deletion review, the only thing I can see that might be a valid reason for the deletion is being the work of a developer of the product, but I'm still not sure about this. Liraz,
  • Are you an actual member of the TurnKey Linux development team, or just a random individual who happens to have contributed something to the project?
  • How much have you contributed to the article that was deleted? Did you create the article, contribute much to it, or just add a few bits here and there?
-- Smjg (talk) 10:24, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Hi Smjg, I created the article and wrote the bulk of its content while adhering closely to Wikipedia guidelines. The article was written in a neutral tone (at least nobody is disputing that) and was properly sourced, though some dispute the reputability of those sources (it was the Ubuntu newsletter). I also prominently displayed my involvement with the project on my user page to promote transparency. I actually don't do a great deal of development for the project (Alon Swartz deserves the credit for that), mostly I help out with the website, documentation and answering questions on the user forums. I wish you could see the entry and judge for yourself but a deletionist administrator that has threatened repeatedly to silence me has deleted the copy I put in my user space (User:LirazSiri/TurnKey Linux). - LirazSiri (talk) 12:30, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • This is the wrong venue for deletion discussion. It's also the wrong venue for special pleading in respect of articles on people's own projects. User:LirazSiri is one of the founders of the software project. It's a recent fork of Ubuntu, and no independent sources have been presented. This looks very much like a perfectly standard case of abusing Wikipedia to spread the word, and frankly we don't need it. Wikipedia is not the place to make something significant or raise its profile, and it is entirely inappropriate for software project owners to start discussions in multiple venues, as Liraz Siri has done, in the hope of getting the answer they want, especially when they show signs of ignoring every answer they don't want - WP:LAWYER and WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT are in play here, as so often in cases of WP:COI. One thing is for sure: I don't see a change in policy being likely in order to support allowing this user to create an article on their shiny new software project, based on sources in the Ubuntu community wiki newsletter and from their own site. And Liraz is entirely wrong to say I threatened a block for making waves, what I said was a statement of fact: that continual self-promotion may lead to blocking. It happens all the time. That's just one example of how Liraz is distorting the facts to portray this as "evil deletionists destroy wonderful content on valid project" instead of "Wikipedia nukes self-promotion by owner of project" which is what actually happened. Since Liraz has now withdrawn the deletion review request, I suggest that further discussion is pointless. Guy (Help!) 13:05, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Sigh. TurnKey Linux is not a fork of Ubuntu. Aside from the occasional billionaire nobody has the resources to do that. Is it so hard for you to understand what a software appliance is?
  • Further discussion is still desirable. I have withdrawn my request for deletion review to neutralize exactly the kind of ad hominem attacks you have used to discount any merit in my objections to the abuse of process that took place in the speedy deletion of the TurnKey Linux entry as blatant spam which was done to save the involved administrators the trouble of going through the regular WP:PROD or WP:AFD channels. I sacrificed my own interest in the matter to allow the discussion to shift away from arguments against/for inclusion of the article I created on a free software project I contribute to and refocus on the larger issue - the notability standards for free software projects on Wikipedia. It is not black and white as you seem to make it. None of the unofficial Ubuntu derivatives (see List_of_Ubuntu-based_distributions) that have entries in Wikipedia would have met the standards you applied against TurnKey Linux and there are literally hundreds of entries (just browse casually through List of open source software packages) which do not meet a deletionist's destructive interpretation of Wikipedia's notability standards. I believe these articles add value to Wikipedia and serve its user base well. Most deletionists would support their deletion, but they're smart enough not to attempt to remove them all at once. They'll use a divide and conquer approach, singling out a handful of articles at a time until only the largest commercially sponsored projects remain. This is a real issue and I think continuing the debate is useful. - LirazSiri (talk) 14:46, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Right, so re-reading this, one possibility is that your article on your own project was deleted so now you want us to delete loads of others just to make a point; the other is that your article on your project was deleted and you want it back because it was clearly the evil deletionist cabal and nothing to do with WP:N, WP:COI, WP:CSD#A7, WP:CSD#G11, WP:RS, WP:NPOV and WP:SPAM, honest. Neither is persuasive, I'm afraid. Your arguments consistently and completely ignore the fact that you are writing about your own endeavours, something that has pretty much always been considered a bad idea. On top of that you are assuming bad faith of everybody who tries to tell you why your advocacy of your project on Wikipedia is a problem, the while believing and taking as gospel any part of any comment that agrees with you. I am here to tell you that pretty much every user I have seen behave like that, is now blocked. That is not a threat, it's a statement of fact. As WP:ROUGE says, Administrators have been known to oppose editors because their edits violate policy, rather than because the admins are conspiring with the Forces of Darkness. Guy (Help!) 15:00, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It sure sounds like a threat, and a suppressive one at that, coming from a powerful administrator such as yourself. Dressing up a threat as "a fact" doesn't make it any less abusive. Editors are entitled to their opinions you know.
  • Editors may express concern for how a particular interpretation of a policy effects the well being of Wikipedia because they are genuinely concerned, rather than as part of a Machiavellian plot to destroy Wikipedia by misapplying the "all or nothing" objection.
  • You know, I don't think I've ever seen so many cryptic references to Wikipedia policies and guidelines in such a short space before. Why not just link to Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines and be done with it? Strange that you accuse me of Wikilawyering. If there ever was the case of the pot calling the kettle black. Anyhow, you seem to have completely lost your neutrality and feign ignorance that opinions counter to your own exist. They do, just reread this discussion, or my talk page, or Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2009_February_3#TurnKey_Linux where at least a couple of administrators voted to overturn the decision to delete. Here's a friendly suggestion from a lowly editor - why don't you stop repeating the same old ad hominem attacks over and over and sit this one out. Cool down a bit. Let someone else share their wisdom with us. I'm sure other areas of Wikipedia need your administrative attention just as badly.
  • One last thing, before you go, please restore the User:LirazSiri/TurnKey Linux entry so that those following this discussion will be able to judge the content of the discussed example entry on its merits. There is no justification for you to use your administrative privileges to censor legitimate discussion on Wikipedia policy by concerned editors. Thank you for your assistance. LirazSiri (talk) 15:43, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
    • The standards are no different to any other page: Our notability policy requires multiple, independent, reliable sources to confirm notability. Such sources are plainly not found in your article. I see no reason to think that there is a problem with our inclusion standards for free software projects. I do agree, however, that neither G11 nor A7 should have been used to delete the article -- PROD/AFD is the way to go for this kind of thing. [[Sam Korn]] (smoddy) 15:53, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Liraz, every time an editor uses the word "suppression" it raises a red flag. It is a remarkably reliable indicator of an agenda being brought to Wikipedia. Guy (Help!) 15:58, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Guy, are you trying to suppress the word "suppression"? Well done. - LirazSiri (talk) 16:06, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Absolutely not, it is one of the most reliable flags around, the last thing I want is for people to stop using it so we have to use other, less dependable cues. Guy (Help!) 18:21, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
The article was basically a short version of a website for the software. The prose may not have been overly promotional, but it only had about 2 sentences of real content, followed by feature lists and a dozen screenshots. This was not an appropriate article. My best advice: Contribute some real content and move on. Trying to get policy changed so your article can be restored is pretty much the wrongest possible thing you can be doing right now, and the amount of time you're willing to spend to get this article restored at any cost makes people question your good faith in the matter. Mr.Z-man 17:38, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Many Wikipedia articles are a work in progress. I seeded the article with verifiable facts and would have loved others to contribute to it.
  • I've given up on restoring the article for now. Why bother. The project isn't going anywhere, and it's only a matter of time before it passes even the strictest standards for notability. Meanwhile, I don't have anything personal to gain from it's inclusion in Wikipedia, and according to the web logs (I'm the webmaster) TurnKey Linux's website only had a handful of visitors from Wikipedia in the last few months. It's really the unsanitary way in which the article was removed that bothers me the most. The arbitrary way in which TurnKey Linux was singled out of all the other Ubuntu derivatives and free software projects. The abuse of process (the article was speedy deleted as WP:SPAM, no less!). The personal attacks, an affront to my reputation implying that I am a spammer, acting out of bad faith, in conflict of interest and merely seeking to promote myself. That's what really ticked me off. It was the last reaction I expected from the Wikipedia community for contributing to a free software project. If the article was deleted in the normal WP:AFD or WP:PROD process after a consensus was reached I wouldn't have cried bloody murder. LirazSiri (talk) 04:57, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
As I commented in the deletion review, IMO this has been an abuse of process by the administrators involved here. It raises serious WP:HONESTY issues that this article was deleted under the speedy deletion criteria asserting that it was spam, yet in the deletion review all arguments in favor of deletion were presenting notability-related reasoning. Further evidence that this has nothing to do with concerns about spam is that other mentions of "Turnkey Linux" on Wikipedia were left intact and only the article itself seems to have been deleted. (see the history of List of Ubuntu-based distributions, for example.)
The article may have deserved deletion under a normal WP:AFD or WP:PROD process. The editor LirazSiri may even be be acting in bad faith, though I have seen no evidence of that to this point.
But it is a far, far more serious thing that the editors involved in this who have administrator accounts appear to be using their administrator privileges in a content dispute - using their administrator privileges to acheive an advantage in a discussion over notability so that they can save themselves the time and effort involved in the AfD or PROD that a non-admin editor would have to go through.
The purpose of admin privileges is NOT to give yourself advantages in editorial disagreements. If you find yourself violating WP:HONESTY in pursuit of administrator tasks or other Wikipedia work it's time to at the very least take a breather from exercising your admin privileges.
Despite LirazSiri's withdrawal of the deletion review I maintain that this article needs to be undeleted and placed into the normal deletion process. If, as is asserted, the topic is not notable it should be extremely easy to demonstrate that in an AfD. If the topic is notable the article should be kept and improved.
To reiterate - I don't care about the article at all, it may well deserve notability-based deletion within Wikipedia process. That's practically irrelevant, the alarming thing about this case is that there are people using their accounts' admin privileges to win editorial disputes with other editors. So far those individuals appear to be flagrantly avoiding the slightest acknowledgement of the impropriety of their actions, which indicates to me that they have no remorse and are probably willing to do it again in the future. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 05:19, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
Point out the abuse of administrator privileges. The article as it stood did not, in the views of several admins who have looked at it now, express notability; some admins might have pushed it to an AFD, others would have acted on the deletion. There is no editorial disagreement involved here; the article was deleted, a deletion review was engaged in and withdrawn and the article remains deleted. Several people are now involved in a running battle that's going to end badly, and this discussion is in entirely the wrong place at present. If you feel there's a problem with the way it's been handled, dispute resolution is thataway. Tony Fox (arf!) 06:00, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
I am pointing out, and thoroughly documenting, the abuse of administrator privileges, and giving the perpetrators an opportunity to respond or ignore it all on the record. Catching malicious or overreaching administrators isn't something that can be done over a single incident, so when you spot things like this what's important is thorough public documentation.
I'm not in a dispute with anyone, which is why I don't need dispute resolution. The individuals whose behavior I've been pointing out have not even deigned to respond to me anywhere. (Except for Guy on LirazSiri's talk page, who rather than addressing any of the process or administrator integrity issues appeared to be attempting to dismiss everything I said as some sort of observation of WP:AGF towards LirazSiri - which it is not.)
I say again, I don't care about the article at all, it's the admin behavior that concerns me. The involved administrators serve my purpose of documentation either way, by responding to my specific descriptions of their malfeasance or by pointedly ignoring them or dissembling.
Unless anyone is saying that an article can be speedily deleted without meeting any of the criteria for speedy deletion there's no question that a violation of Wikipedia process has occurred here. And unless administrators have suddenly come to hold some sort of authority on notability that supersedes community consensus, this is unquestionably an abuse of administrator privileges as well. (My understanding from reading lots of policies and project pages, and observing practice, is that administrators don't have any sort of authority different from other editors: they just have a bunch of extra buttons and pages that show up when they're logged in - it's just a flag on their account, albiet a flag that is applied through community process.)
I'm somewhat surprised that no administrator has taken action to overturn these things and put the article into a standard AfD; that might say something about those administrators as well, but probably more about the system itself: you undoubtedly need to tread lightly around each other if you want to ever be able to get any legitimate work done at all. ;^) So understandably it needs to be us non-administrators who point out this sort of stuff.
(If the dispute area serves as some sort of centralized tracking mechanism for this sort of thing I'll post it there once I'm sure we aren't going to get a response here in VP. But my understanding was that there effectively is no centralized tracking area for this, you have to do lots of searching and reading to get even a partial picture of anyone's behavior.) --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 08:38, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree with you that the criteria for speedy deletion were not met. I strongly disagree that this was an abuse of administrator privileges, because JzG plainly considered this to fall under them. It is hardly a content dispute, unless every administrator action that involves content is a content dispute! I agree that this was not handled optimally, but it certainly was not abusive and the right decision was reached. [[Sam Korn]] (smoddy) 10:02, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
Are you talking about some decision about the notability of the article reached outside of process? By administrators only, effectively, since (if I understand properly) they are the only ones who can delete and undelete articles? I'm not clear how that would not be an abuse of administrator privileges to have ensured that such a decision would govern whether or not the article is deleted.
By saying that this is a content dispute I'm saying that the dispute was about the notability of the article and was never about spam or some similar sort of vandalism that administrators are chartered to combat. It was a dispute over a non-administrator aspect of Wikipedia, one that any editor can have input into. Those are the sort of disputes where administrator privileges must not be used to gain advantage. (I thought this was pretty clear, I am a little bit suspicious at your suggestion that it might be interpreted as being about "every administrator action that involves content"; that seems rhetorical.)
One or more administrators decided on their own cognizance that an article was not notable; based upon a variety of evidence I presented above which has not been challenged so far, it appears that a false pretense was presented so that the article was entered into the speedy deletion process rather than the normal deletion process. So in a span of less than 24 hours, during most of which the actual article content was not available to anyone except admins, a verdict retroactively justifying the original deletion was arrived at by a small, select group of editors. Hardly the standard deletion process where every editor, not just admins, has several days to examine the content and provide input.
That is not how judgements of notability occur on Wikipedia. In this exchange it appears quite obvious to me that between LirazSiri, who would be the party arguing that the article topic was notable, and the one or more administrators arguing that the article topic is non-notable, the party in favor of non-notability obtained massive advantage through use of administrator privileges. In fact, they appear to have basically managed to avoid having to make a real case regarding notability until they had already moved the matter completely outside of LirazSiri's purview and pretty much guaranteed that any meaningful evaluation of the article's notability would only involve admins. A fact made quite clear to LirazSiri and the stated reason for why he withdrew his request for a deletion review; he gave in because he acknowledged the level of effort and frustration he would face to even get a fair hearing in an AfD, much less if he was going to try to actually preserve the article from deletion long-term. I have difficulty believing that this was not the intention from the very beginning.
Can you at least agree that this was not a fair and equitable use of administrator privileges? Also, you didn't respond to whether this was an abuse of process in forcefully routing this into the speedy delete process under false pretenses - so would that mean that in your view this is an abuse of process but not an abuse of administrator privileges?
And apart from the merits of the incident itself - don't you see that allowing things to proceed this way pretty much encourages future abuse of process along the same lines? "Whoops, I miscategorized that as spam instead of a notability problem! Shucks, it's too late." In fact this sort of thing appears to happen pretty frequently to me - perhaps that is the product of admins giving each other a pass on violating Wikipedia process in this way in the past.
And following process here would actually have taken at most a few extra moments if the evidence against notability is so overwhelming - post the AfD, act on the outcome a few days later. I think that may be why there's so much resistance to following process here - because this is actually somewhat of an edge case given the wide precedent for articles on other derivations of Ubuntu, not a slam dunk, and the individuals arguing against notability don't want to have to genuinely establish the case against it the way normal non-admin editors would have to. Why, that kind of stuff is positively plebian.
The mention of "cabal" in Wikipedia policy and project pages is not referring to some sort of secret explicitly-agreed-upon conspiracy. It's referring to exactly what you guys are doing here: a group of admins backing each other up instinctively in trying to prevent this being put through the AfD process - which supposedly will take someone only a few moments today and a few days from now because the evidence against LirazSiri's position is so overwhelming. If you think it's time that administrators should be a more trusted group freed from some of the restrictions placed on other editors, make that proposal above-board. Don't subvert policy and process to get your way.
(And I'm serious - maybe the project is mature enough or large enough that a change like that needs to occur. P.S. I'm going offline now, probably for a day or two; but as you can see I don't have any problem with making lengthy replies, so I will endeavor to respond to any and all comments directed towards me in my absence.) --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 11:26, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
LirazSiri opened a Deletion Review here which he withdrawed himself. I'm going to suggest that he withdrawn, and I'm going to suggest that LirazSiri has (finally) realized that he had little chance of defending the article successfully until he can make it meet wikipedia's notability policy, and so he has decided to wait until he can do that[4] (yeah, I know, this is my interpretation, I can't read his mind).
I'm going to suggest that it's perfectly correct that an admin speedy deletes an article that has no sources showing notability, and with a subject that doesn't appear to the admin to be notable, following the criteria for speedy deletion in the speedy deletion process.
I'm going to suggest that this discussion is a total waste of time because there was never any admin abuse or out-of-process actuations here, just an admin that used in good faith the spam criteria (G11) when he should have used the non-notable criteria (A7).
I'm going to suggest that there is no conspiracy to prevent Ubuntu software articles from reaching AFD, it's just that don't people don't bother bringing them there because they are created with very weak sources and can be speedied without overloading AFD (hint: don't write an article where your only sources are your sourceforge page and a couple of newsletter announcements on some mailing list). --Enric Naval (talk) 16:15, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree with Enric, I think its especially ironic that the people wanting to restore an article on a technicality are the people complaining about an abuse of process. I would suggest they read WP:IAR and WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY. We don't go through process just for the sake of process. People are claiming that admins are deleting in a content disupte; it only became a dispute when people started complaining here. This was a straightforward deletion, not some evil plot to keep Turnkey Linux off Wikipedia. As for "a group of admins backing each other up instinctively" - did you ever consider that maybe your interpretation of how Wikipedia works is wrong, rather than everybody else being wrong? We have 861 admins, suggesting that they all instinctively agree with each other about everything as some sort of groupthink is laughable. Mr.Z-man 18:06, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
So, we can dispense with any discussion of plots or conspiracy. I have explicitly said that I am not referring to any sort of plot or conspiracy hence bringing such things up in reply to me is disingenuous and purely rhetorical. I am talking about admin integrity.
Mr.Z-man, I am certainly open to the possibility that my interpretation of how Wikipedia works is wrong. But I have very completely explained how I think Wikipedia works above in the course of a great many paragraphs, without anyone disagreeing with my statements on how WP works, so I think it's odd that rather than pointing out any flaw in my reasoning you have rephrased everything I've said into "admins all instinctively agree with each other about everything as some sort of groupthink." This makes it appear to me that you are simply trying to pejoratively re-state what I've said above so that you could decry it as "laughable" rather than to make any sincere attempt to enlighten me, say anything about the way Wikipedia works, or discuss the responsibilities that administrators have in a situation such as this. (This tactic is usually referred to as a straw man and within a debate or even casual conversation is considered evidence of bad faith; but you may have not been aware of that.)
An article being speedily deleted under false pretenses is not a matter of technicalities and is not straightforward - certainly a deletion that has to be retroactively justified after the article in question is no longer visible to the community is not straightforward at all. The abuse of process - the actions taken to by default corral the decision about the article's notability into a post-facto admin-only venue - is the entire and sufficient reason for these actions to be reversed and for the article to be placed into the normal, transparent, consensus-based deletion process.
"Not a bureaucracy" does not mean anything like "admins do not need to obey the same rules as everyone else." (And besides that, WP:CSD explicitly states that reasoning derived from WP:NOT is ineligible for justifying speedy deletions.) "Ignore all rules" does not mean "it's okay if admins forget about acting with integrity when it's convenient" nor "If a rule requires you to improve the encyclopedia in a fashion inconvenient or distasteful to you, ignore it." So neither of those rules you cite have bearing on nor provide a reason why the policy-defined process should not be followed here.
Enric, as far as A7 possibly having been a criterion for speedy deletion: that criterion as I read it is referring to articles that don't even try to claim or indicate that their subjects are notable - I don't believe that it means "an admin can speedily delete an article under A7 when it's the admin's personal opinion that the subject isn't notable." As I said above, it appears to me that anyone with a passing familiarity with IT would recognize that as either the only Ubuntu-based virtual appliance distro, or perhaps one of two documented on WP, the subject may be a distinctive open-source representative of a toolset whose use has grown explosively in IT during the last decade, so I think that someone judging this impartially would concede that there's at least a small possibility this subject is notable. Not to mention that as LirazSiri pointed out by the precedents of practice for including Ubuntu distro articles alone consensus might regard this as notable. So these aspects are possibly related to Efe's unfamiliarity with the subject or how it's been handled on WP in the past if what occurred here was Efe trying to judge the notability of the subject on his own cognizance. I think that's exactly why we must not allow subversions of process like this: the process is there so that details like these can be examined transparently, above-board and in public, by the community not just some admins, and so that the article is deleted or not deleted with WP:CONSENSUS among all users, not just consensus involving admins.
As best as I can tell this isn't some outré or distorted view of WP on my part: everything I've ever read indicates is that this is the Wikipedian way of doing things. But if anyone disagrees let them say exactly what they're disagreeing with and state how they believe WP works instead - no more generalized innuendo that I have some basic misunderstanding of Wikipedia, please.
Also, please no more of the "this entire discussion is a waste of time" attempt to unilaterally dismiss all the points under discussion here. The issue of admin integrity is a very important one: in any dispute or disagreement between an admin editor and a non-admin editor the admin basically holds all the cards - not only is there an asymmetry of capabilities due to the admin privileges but there's even an asymmetry of information: the admin can get access to all kinds of stuff other editors can only guess at or are completely unaware of.
So it is very, very important that editors with administrator accounts observe principles of personal integrity meticulously and adhere to the Wikipedian code of conduct even more closely than the average editor: the community as a whole must have confidence that administrative tasks are being handled with integrity. IMO it is extremely damaging to the prime directive of improving the encyclopedia for the community in general or a segment of the community to come to believe that the administrators cannot be relied on for some things. I certainly refrain from making certain types of contributions because it has been my experience and observation that there are some situations where you just can't expect the average administrator to act with integrity and your work will simply be destroyed without a massive investment of time and effort to attract the attentions of an admin who holds themselves to high enough standards of behavior and who can articulate the issue to his or her fellows.
(I had an admin tell me privately, actually, that many admins and other editors actually expedite that sort of thing by maintaining a network of friends and acquaintances who they can bring into a discussion through meat-puppetry. But that route is of course is solving a problem caused by integrity issues by engaging in policy-violating and somewhat underhanded behavior yourself.)
I originally wasn't going to get involved in generalities of admin integrity; I'd thought that a small amount of prodding would be sufficient to get someone to do the right thing, especially since the outcome in all probability will still result in the desired deletion. But since such a large number of admins are being evasive or appearing to not understand what I'm saying, I will get into the basic integrity issues. The up-shot is: if an article or other page that was speedily deleted has been found under consensus to have been justified with false pretenses, whether or not the presentation of false pretenses was in bad faith or good faith, the deletion needs to be reversed and the page put through the normal deletion process. In that case the admin doing the deletion simply blew it, whether intentionally or by accident, and has created a situation where it is not ethical to continue pursuing a speedy deletion by retroactively justifying the deletion with different CSD or with AfD-like criteria. For this type of situation to be handled with integrity someone would have to bite the bullet and spend a few minutes of time putting it through the normal deletion process.
(Because, if a page really, genuinely fulfills one or more CSD, an AfD ought to be a slam dunk. As I see it that's the entire point of the speedy deletion process, to expedite the deletion of articles that would be a slam dunk AfD; speedy deletion is not there to give admins a special way to overcome the objections of other editors, at all. If someone thinks that speedy deletion is there to give admins special powers or jurisdiction outside of the normal community-consensus-based deletion process, they can say so explicitly - please don't imply or indirectly assert that it grants authority to admins, say it openly.) --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 09:16, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
You are saying that we should open an AFD because someone used the wrong CDS criteria, in spite of knowing perfectly that the AFD has no chance of closing as "keep". You see, what you are proposing is jumping throught bureaucratic hoops in the name of whatever ethical or moral reason, but wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, we are writing an encyclopedia here, we are not making a perfect system of justice. If you think that the article has a chance to fulfill notability, then make a draft in your userspace and present it at WP:DRV. --Enric Naval (talk) 17:08, 7 February 2009 (UTC)
No I think he's saying that consensus regarding notability has to be reached by the general Wikipedia public as to opposed to a select group of Administrators, who's judgment may be skewed by the natural tendency to look out for members of their peer group. Ideally Administrators wouldn't regard themselves as separate peer group, and I'm sure many don't, but some some seem to do that, and there is a potential for abuse there. We also have to take into account that Administrators are much more likely to be friends and allies with other Administrators and may support them simply as a matter of good politics (e.g., you scratch my back I'll scratch yours). Also please note it is not unanimously agreed that the article does not meet notability requirements. (e.g., [5]) LirazSiri (talk) 04:10, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
Bureaucracy literally means "rule by the desk." It's when the people in a government or other organization who are charged with administrating a process take unwarranted control or authority by manipulating the process and its outcomes. It's using red tape to take power - like railroading into an admin-only venue decisions that policy mandates must be made by community consensus. You and others are advocating and enabling bureaucracy here Enric, not I.
Speedy deletions made under false pretenses must be reversed. Making objections about possible AfDs that could occur subsequently is begging the question of whether the deletion of the article was policy-compliant or justified - which it was not.
"Perfect justice"? Another attempt at misdirection. You guys avoiding your responsibilities - and avoiding them disingenuously - has made it clear that this is a far larger issue than any particular article. Administrator integrity is something we absolutely must have and is not something you nor any administrator can excuse yourself from. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 06:31, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
And now it has been sent to DRV without finding first better sources *sigh* .... @LirazSiri, in Wikipedia "bureaucracy" means what is written at WP:BURO, no more no less. --Enric Naval (talk) 22:20, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

This discussion on abuse of process and administrator privileges has reminded of a quote by H. G. Wells: The law giver, of all beings, most owes the law allegiance. He of all men should behave as though the law compelled him. But it is the universal weakness of mankind that what we are given to administer we presently imagine we own.. If you observe the conduct of many administrators on Wikipedia you might be forgiven for perceiving that some of them think the rules and regulations are merely petty formalities that stand in the way of a more direct exercise of power. Seeking consensus and having to convince those who may have different interpretations of the law of the land is really such a bother. We know what has to be done, so please get out of our way in a hurry and let us do it. I don't think these problems are unique to Wikipedia. They're inherent in human nature. Power corrupts. It's just that in Wikipedia this gradual corruption of the intended system of checks and balances is happening out in the open. LirazSiri (talk) 13:28, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Rather than merely saying that the corruption is spreading, it should be combatted as per WP:ETHICS.Smallman12q (talk) 17:35, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Evidently listing the article in an AfD wouldn't even require undeleting it so I have created another deletion review to propose that. Hopefully we can just do that quickly and get it over with. For my part, if that was done I would be satisfied that process and policy had been respected here in the end. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 09:15, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't see that anyone noticed that the speedy deletion tag was placed by an IP editor, but I haven't read all the reams of discussion this generated. This affair is a poster boy for requiring AfD when speedy deletion is contested. Simple enough, and far, far less contentious. (AfD can be bad enough). Contested speedy deletion, if undeletion is refused, isn't speedy, and it's much harder for a "losing editor" to accept. I requested the article undeleted and userfied so that people can see it, it's now at User:Abd/TurnKey Linux, and one of the first things I noticed was that the db-spam tag was added by 87.196.76.86. The IP geolocates to Portugal, and it may or may not mean anything that the editor also nominated NUbuntu (speedy denied), and quite inappropriately removed Alinex, a Portuguese distribution, from List of Ubuntu-based distributions. In four minutes on January 29, this anonymous editor created quite a splash. Maybe it's about time the IP gets credit for this. Is this the same editor who tenderly expressed some wishes today with a series of edits, including [6]? In any case, I suspect there are some lessons to be learned from this affair, so I'm starting a page, User:Abd/Open Source notability to examine the issues that LirazSiri attempted to raise here, without all the shouting. Anyone interested, join the salon. Be nice. --Abd (talk) 03:57, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I do agree that WP:N has been a real boon for the Wikipedia:Deletionist, but it is nonetheless a guidline and not a policy.(for now)Smallman12q (talk) 17:35, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Who watches the Watchmen? Wikipedia Admins Internal Affairs Department Required.

I've noticed a trend recently - admins who are reluctant to undo another admins actions without exhaustive discussion and worries about WP:WHEEL issues. We obviously need a group that are outside the admins who have the power to examine admin conduct and rectify any errors without fear of running afoul of those problems.

The group would need to have the following powers and restrictions :-

Powers

  1. - The ability to examine any admin action
  2. - The ability to amend, reverse or supercede any admin action as they see fit without having to worry about WP:WHEEL - such actions must not be reversed by admins (as per WP:OFFICE actions) - see next point.
  3. - The ability in the case of abusive actions, use of admin tools in edit disputes, attempted overriding of Internal Affairs actions or other serious misconduct to temporarily suspend an admins administrative rights for a limited time (this action would then be subsequently examined by ArbCom)

Restrictions

  1. - This group only polices admin actions - it has no jurisdiction over ordinary editing. In the case of frivolous or bad faith attempts to involve Internal Affairs when there is no misconduct, IA to report to uninvolved admins the situation for dealing with through normal channels.
  2. - IA subject to ArbCom oversight.
  3. - All actions to be publically logged for view by any editor - transparancy is mandatory.

This is just a draft at present. Comments, suggestions and constructive criticism welcomed. Exxolon (talk) 17:30, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

What would this do that is not done by ArbCom? Algebraist 17:33, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
Gee, who would watch them? Seriously the community already has the power to do any of those things, they just need consensus. Also, you cannot consider admins to be anything other than regular editors. A group that policed admins(and you are talking about policing) could not be separate from ordinary editing as the two are often inseparable.
It is the job of every member of the community to ensure that we all follow the rules, admin or otherwise. The powers you describe are already in the communities hand. Chillum 17:35, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
Depends entirely on what the action is. I've undone administrator actions (before I was a 'crat) before, simply because the actions couldn't stand on their own. All it takes is just brains or balls (or both), not a policy extension or some committee to be formed. EVula // talk // ☯ // 03:56, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Exactly, the last thing we need is more process wonkery. – ukexpat (talk) 04:08, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
See WP:NOTBUREAUCRACY We don't need anymore sludge to climb through.Admins are generally fairly accurate in their actions. It is not encouraged for admins to undo other admin's actions without a discussion for that reason.Smallman12q (talk) 17:20, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

What admin actions are we concerned about? We already have processes for reviewing admin actions—WP:DRV for deletions, which is not limited to admin participation, Template:Unblock for blocks... Postdlf (talk) 17:25, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Edit War and 3RR

Usually the admins know about edit wars when the the two sides engage in reverting. If only one side revert and the other restrain, the first side will win, and that's not fair. Rules about reverting should be more specific and the admins should consider many factors and not apply the 3RR rule on both sides blindly.

  1. Wikipedia should recommend a single or a few changes per edit for the changes that likely to be challenged
  2. Wikipedia should discourage reverting multiple edits over long period of time. Currently reverting one edit is no different than reverting 50 edits.
  3. There should be a clear path for the process: if user A made an edit then user B reverted, user A should write in the talk page without reverting , If B didn't respond in the talk page then A can revert, If B responded then they should continue to disscuss without reverting, if no agreement between them they should follow the process of dispute resolution , if anybody of them didn't follow the process then the other part can revert.
  4. Exceptions should be considered about specific disputes if the burden of prove rests on one party
  5. rules about the burden of prove should be clear
  6. We should find the most cited reasons for reverting and make a specific rules for each case. One of the cited reasons for example is "this material constitute a fringe theory". We can say the burden of prove rests on you , so you should ask at the relevent noticeboard before reverting. Dy yol (talk) 23:42, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
You discuss it on the talk page. If one side refuses to discuss and acts liek they ownt he article they'll enbd up blocked.--Pattont/c 15:53, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I don't believe its about winning. Instead edit wars are frowned upon by the Wikipedia community. You should instead establish a consensus on the article's talk page. If a consensus cannot be reached, or the edit war continues, the editors should be referred to WP:Dispute resolution. See WP:EDITWAR. Smallman12q (talk) 17:16, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Large files

Are there any precendents for the inclusion of large video files in articles? A user has recently added a video to fuel cell, after few undo exchanges, I raised this to the article talk page after failing to find any precedents myself. User A1 (talk) 13:22, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

There's discussion at m:Video policy; in addition, WP:EL provides some salient points about rich media, even if it technically refers only to externally-hosted videos. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 14:59, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Disable custom signatures

I would support going one step further. We don't need embellishments or distractions on our signatures at all (I used to have a terrible multicolored bold one myself). Just make sure the default signature links to the user page (as it currently does) and appear in standard blue text. If everyone goes around trying to customize their sig, eventually we end up with the zoo currently visible all over WP pages. Second suggestion: also make it link to the user talk page and/or contribs. This would makes it MUCH easier to communicate and follow a user's contribs rather than clicking through several pages or using Popups. Thoughts? Note I've long since re-customized my sig to this, which I think should be the new standard (can you see what I've done?): Zunaid 13:14, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

I see no reason to change the current rules, what do we gain from standardising sigs? Two things we would lose - it can sometimes be useful to follow a particular editors reasoning in a discussion and I find that signature differences make that easier. Also some users choose to have a user page and some don't, so it makes sense to keep sigs customisable so you can tailor your signature to link to your user page if you have one and not to link to it if you don't. Though I don't understand why we need to type ~~~~ at the end of each talk page post, can't we have a software change to automatically sign all posts, with a nosign option for those rare occasions when you don't need to sign a talk page post. WereSpielChequers 13:37, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I like that, though it will be hard to get people to agree. The thing that annoys me the most is when people sign with a completely different name than their user name; what is the point of that? I then see what looks like one person's comments in edit summaries and another's in talk pages, while all the time they're the same user. Is this a kind of low-level sock-puppetry?--Kotniski (talk) 13:40, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
This is a complete separate issue and wouldn't solve the one above it. The stubborn users could just sign manually, i.e. as follows -
 Annoying User ~~~~~
–xeno (talk) 13:44, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
...so you would like to disallow this one, too? ~user:orngjce223 how am I typing? 20:56, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
I currently find custom signatures very helpful. They let you quickly see who edited what simply by the theme/color scheme of the signature. They also add a bit of personality and color to an otherwise bland background.Smallman12q (talk) 21:08, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I like my sig. I see no reason not to have it. EVula // talk // ☯ // 21:17, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm JEALOUS of slick sigs. I'm gonna go to the color-shop and get my pimp on. Ooh, but- the mileage, they do tend to use up more code. Sorry Gaia, I'm a Night Rider, I gotta glow!;-) Hilarleo Hey,L.E.O. —Preceding undated comment was added on 20:10, 17 February 2009 (UTC).

Wikipedia Threat

Is there a policy regarding death, suicide, and bomb threats? WP:THREAT redirects to legal threat and Wikipedia:Threats of violence isn't an official policy. What action should be taken against users who make such threats?Smallman12q (talk) 17:25, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

We have no formal policy on this but many essays including WP:SUICIDE. Nanonic (talk) 17:28, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Essays are nice...but they aren't legally relevant.Smallman12q (talk) 18:06, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Some of those who oppose creating an official policy argue that we should not take an official legal position or do anything that could be construed as assuming legal liability. There has not yet been any consensus around how to respond to threats of violence on Wikipedia. Keep in mind that Wikipedia is just one channel and that such threats can be transmitted in many different ways, no matter what action we take. Dcoetzee 19:08, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Well taking no stance in and of itself would create liability.Smallman12q (talk) 19:26, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Ref Wikipedia:Don't panic. I am not a lawyer and neither are you, and it is the Foundation's lawyer's responsibility to set any policies mandated by legal requirements. Dcoetzee 20:36, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Standard practice is to inform the local authorities and let them deal with it. We haven't encoded that in formal policy, but it is pretty standard. Reporting to WP:AN/I is a common way of finding someone willing and able to contact the authorities (if the person making the threat is logged in, you'll need a checkuser). --Tango (talk) 20:46, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps it could be added to formal policy? Some new editors might get confused.Smallman12q (talk) 20:48, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
(several ecs)What could we do if user:A threatened user:B anyway? We could, in good conscience, inform appropriate LEAs if we know where/when/how the threat would be carried out. But hardcoding something like this into policy would only result in trolls using it to get us to call the cops for no reason. And by having the essay, we can't be said to be taking "no stance". Zain Ebrahim (talk) 20:52, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
That's an interesting point. However, the idea is that policies shouldn't have loopholes. Nonetheless, you do make an interesting point in that trolls might abuse it.Smallman12q (talk) 20:58, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Does anyone have anything they'd like to add?Smallman12q (talk) 21:06, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

RFA commenting

Are supporters allowed to comment on what they believe is the validity of the opposition's argument? (Is it against guidlines/procedure/policy to comment on another supporter's claims?) I'm reffering mainly to some of the comments made to supporters of this RFA Wikipedia:Requests_for_adminship/S@bre#Questions_for_the_candidate. Is it a breach of WP:ETHICS or WP:EQ?Smallman12q (talk) 22:38, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

RfA is a discussion; everything is up for discussion, including the arguments of those supporting the RfA (it's just not as common as, say, commenting on the arguments of those opposing). EVula // talk // ☯ // 23:10, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
It is also more likely to get a negative response from others, but there is no reason why you can't address a supporter.---I'm Spartacus! The artist formerly known as Balloonman 23:12, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm mainly referring to this the comment made by Malleus as seen below
  1. Support. Fully qualified candidate, no issues. The concerns raised by the opposer and by several of the neutral commenters are without merit. Newyorkbrad (talk) 19:20, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
    It is not your place to comment on the merit or otherwise of the opposer's or neutral commentators' views, only on the candidate. --Malleus Fatuorum 19:23, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
    Speak, New York Brad, speak, even if you're speaking against me. --KP Botany (talk) 21:17, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
    Wrong, NYB is free to state if he finds the views of others lacking, in his opinion. Just as we all are. Gazimoff 22:54, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
    In your opinion evidently so, but not in mine. Would you be happy if I were to say to you that I find your opinion to be entirely without merit, or would you go crying to the civility police? --Malleus Fatuorum 23:13, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
    RfA is a discussion; everything is up for discussion.Smallman12q (talk) 00:01, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I have responded, but wanted to know whether his comment was appropriate and how one should respond to such comments in an RFA?Smallman12q (talk) 00:04, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

It is a discussion, so I would have prefered to see a "because..." in the argument. When he just makes a blanket statement like that it should stand as solely his own opinion. Taemyr (talk) 06:49, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
Remember that Malleus is merely stating his own opinion on the matter (he even admits it in his comment, if you read closely). It is not required that you follow it. I would say his comment is not inappropriate, if a bit brusque. —kurykh 06:56, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Drive-By Editorials

One weakness of the Wikipedia's current policy in my opinion is its encouragement of "drive-by editorials". By this I mean editors who come to a page and make no contribution to it other than adding editorial templates like "needs references", etc. These annoying banners clutter up the pages with non-content. In my view editorial remarks should be confined to the discussion page. The content page should have just that: content. Also, my feeling about the matter is that if some jerk thinks there is not enough references he should put in the hours to find them and write them himself instead of defacing the page with his bitching. If an article is devoid of references I can see that myself, I don't need Joe Anonymous to waste my screen real estate informing me of the obvious.

Ultimately what this is about is letting readers just read for themselves without having to be told what to think or having their articles cluttered with the opinions of non-contributors. If an article "reads like an essay" or whatever, fine put it in the discussion, but don't start lecturing me, the reader, about it. In most cases I am there just to read the article so whining at me about the article's supposed shortcomings is not going to get it changed any faster.

Maybe I should repeat this last point to emphasize its importance: most visitors to a page by a wide margin are READERS not contributors so forcing them read banners advising editorial changes is just punishing them and ruining their experience. Contributors read the discussion page and that's where complaints about an article belong, not the content page. John Chamberlain (talk) 02:34, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

The idea behind the tags is to turn the readers into contributors. That's a bad thing? --Izno (talk) 02:38, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Whatever happened to assuming good faith?  – ukexpat (talk) 02:41, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
As a reader I find such tags very useful, they tell me ahead of time that the article has quality issues. As a reader, I want this information right in front of me not on the talk page. Now, if there was a button with a note "this article has x section- or article cleanup markups and Y in-line cleanup markers, click to show/hide," along with a user preference for the default show/hide state, that would be much goodness. But please don't make me go out of the way to see them. Of course, as an editor, they tell me quickly where I can help. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 02:45, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
^That's an interesting idea. Has anyone ever proposed it? Equazcion •✗/C • 02:48, 12 Feb 2009 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#.22show.2Fhide_cleanup_tags.22_button_to_pages. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:09, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
And there's the roads. And better sanitation. Aqueducts, don't forget aqueducts. But, yes, apart from that and all the reasons posted by the users above, I agree with the OP completely. - Ddawkins73 (talk) 02:53, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
(I reckon davidwr's development of the idea isn't bad actually) Ddawkins73 (talk) 02:53, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Do we have any reason to think that these tags actually turn readers into editors? I've been here a long time, and I've never heard anyone say anything like that. Wikitext is basically a programming language, and beyond a newbies abilities, so I don't think "This article needs references" is actually producing any refs. "This article's prose needs work" is kind of self evident. NPOV tags are probably useful to a reader. We use tags as editing motivation, which we shouldn't. Basically, "I'm going to make your article look like crap until you do what I say". - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 03:06, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
As for editing, I'm not sure. If a random article I come across is tagged as lacking references, I don't feel any particular motivation to go looking for references. However if it's a topic I'm interested in, and/or an article I've worked on heavily, it may motivate me to improve it for the sake my pride, so my work doesn't have that "This article sucks because..." banner on it.
I find the tags very useful as a reader though. On Wikipedia there's a certain amount of scrutiny required when reading articles. To know that others have already looked at it and assessed certain problems gives me something to watch out for.
Way back during the ambox migration I suggested that maintenance tags be toned down a bit (smaller, more subtle, something like that), but didn't get much support. Equazcion •✗/C • 03:18, 12 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Sometimes when I'm on random-page-patrol, I see "citation needed" and other tags as a challenge to fix it. Sometimes not. Tags like Notability prompt me to search the web or online books, newspapers, and newspaper archives for possible signs of notability and add them, or if I find none, WP:PROD the article. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 04:33, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree with the OP. In fact, I just left a long comment on the talk page of one of these templates. Someone left one on an article where it, along with an unreferenced tag left only the first five lines of article text visible (at my screen resolution). As a reader, I don't want to read suggestions as to what kinds of things are missing from the article. I think it will be obvious what's missing, once I start reading it. Some templates serve as warnings to readers. This is good, but only in cases where information could possibly be misleading or wrong. Use the tags as warnings, and the less critical the warning, the smaller and less prominent it should be. I like the stub tags because (1) they're a very general appeal for editors, and (2) they're at the bottom.
I also have a problem with the general unreferenced tag used on pages that hardly have any info in the first place. It seems like some newbie editor saw no references on a stub, and thought he was helping. Please, ask for references only when there's info that could be remotely questionable. -Freekee (talk) 05:13, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I.e, everything? --Izno (talk) 05:35, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, all facts are supposed to be referenced. Not just the 'questionable' stuff. Equazcion •✗/C • 05:51, 12 Feb 2009 (UTC)
I disagree. From WP:CITE: Sources should be cited when adding material that is challenged or likely to be challenged... I do a lot of work with album articles. I just saw one that had about two pieces of information that were not taken from the album itself. There is no reason that the album should be provided as a reference for itself. As for the other two pieces of information, one is the release date, which is generally not in question, and the other was a "the album is hailed as" statement. This is the only info in the entire article that should require a reference, yet there's a banner across the top of the article, and not a template pointing out that questionable sentence. That doesn't do the reader any good, and it doesn't lend validity to our encyclopedia in general, when people see these templates on every page. -Freekee (talk) 05:56, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Tags are handy because they warn the reader the article is shit. --Cameron Scott (talk) 12:02, 12 February 2009 (UTC)


I think most tags are fine, but there are few that take half the page, and it's just annoying. Making them smaller would be nice... 212.200.240.232 (talk) 12:46, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Some are find, some are not. We do not, as far as I have ascertained, have any policy on which notices are acceptable and which are not. By way of example, I think it is fine to alert the reader where there is a health warning - the article is not wikified, there are POV issues, citations are needed for bold claims. Others - and I single out {{orphan}} - do not help the normal reader at all (and there's precious little evidence they do any good). These templates simply get in the way and devalue our product. The most important thing about this article is not that it is an orphan.
Ideally we would develop a policy specifying which may appear in article space, and for those which can go in article space, mandate whether they go at the top or bottom of articles. --Tagishsimon (talk) 12:52, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
{{AfDM}} for example needs rework. bottom half of it has no use for readers but is actually needed for users who are placing the tag -- it belongs to relevant instruction page. 212.200.240.232 (talk) 13:18, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
refactored --Tagishsimon (talk) 13:23, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Just to say that I am one editor who was encouraged to become one by the existance of a (actually four) banner(s). Seeing there was a dispute on the article Noah's Ark led me to look at the discussion and then get involved. I may be an exception, but someone asked for evidence that the banners encourage people to become editors.--FimusTauri (talk) 15:10, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
And the banners do tell you that you can edit articles. The "advertising" value, to misuse a word, should not be discounted. - Ddawkins73 (talk) 16:05, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Tags are fine. Drive-by-tagging is fine. I do almost all of my editing by tagging and subsequently fixing, I'm in the top 500 contributors by edit count and have gotten plenty of articles to GA/FA by doing so. They're nowhere near as widely deployed as people imagine and have the positive effect of encouraging readers and editors to improve articles. Readers who object to tags in principle can hide them in their skin prefs. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:24, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
That just does not cut it. If we take the 6,700 articles tagged since November 2006 as orphans, what can we conclude but that the tag does not work. Is the most important thing about the article that it is an orphan? Clearly not. Bragging about edit count does not add to your argument.
As I noted, we need policy: what is important enough to be in article space? What is important enough to be the first thing you read when you pull up the article? A one size fits all "I don't want to see tags" is a blunt indiscriminate instrument and is clearly an insufficient substitute for cogent policy. --Tagishsimon (talk) 16:32, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Actually, an article which is orphaned has a far higher likelihood of being deleted than an article not tagged as such. It is therefore a good idea to make this issue prominent so that it is fixed. If it is not fixed, then making the issue prominent is a good warning to readers that they are looking at an article which is probably neglected, and to adjust their expectations accordingly. To make this clearer, articles which are tagged are frequently bad articles, and the lack of tags on an established article can be taken as an implication of quality. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:42, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Do you have any evidence at all to substantiate that claim w.r.t. {{orphan}}? My experience of orphan articles is that they are no worse or better than non orphans. For very many articles which I've looked at recently from orphan queues, there just is not an article which can bear a link to the subject. A case in point is a warwickshire cricketer from the 1950s ... categories have taken over from lists as means of corralling all such players together. No reason to link from WCC article. No matches he played in have articles, &c. Meanwhile there are other means entirely of finding orphaned articles for those who wish to maintain them. And there's the evidence of 6700 articles having tags for two years to no effect.
I really do not think you can gainsay two things. There should be policy, for the area is contentions and there is not consensus. 2. Ideally there should be evidence that the tags that seek only to get work done and not to warn of the state of the article, work. I think we have this for {{wikify}}. I think it is entirely absent for a tag such as {{orphan}}. --Tagishsimon (talk) 16:48, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Evidence does not consist of guessing about how well they work. Saying there's 6700 articles that have had orphan tags for 2 years is meaningless. How many were there 2 years ago? If there were 6800, it probably isn't working. If there were 15000, it probably is. Wikipedia is not on a deadline. Just because nobody has bothered in 2 years to fix the problem does not mean we should dump the process. Mr.Z-man 17:42, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Exactly. We should at least measure the process to understand if it works. We should not start from the presumption that tagging articles is a good thing. --Tagishsimon (talk) 17:49, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
We should also not start from the presumption that its a bad thing. Mr.Z-man 17:59, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Okay, using Category:Orphaned articles from November 2006 as an example: There are currently 6614 articles in the category (based on a count from the API, rather than the sonetimes unreliable category counts, though its fairly close here). The first database dump to have the category table that includes the internal counts is the July 2008 dump, almost exactly 7 months ago. In that dump, the category count was 8086, so in 7 months, 1472 pages were removed from the category (either deleted or the template was removed, indicating a fix), an average of about 7 pages per day removed from the category since last July. Mr.Z-man 20:39, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the figures; very helpful. Now I want to know to what extent {{orphan}} contributed to that 7 per day. By way of comparison, the job of adding geo-coordinates to articles tagged with the (invisible to the reader) {{coord missing}} is being measured and achieves 176 {{coord missing}} removals per day. It is not enough, as a previous poster noted, to know a single absolute figure, nor the rate at which work is done, but rather we need to know the increment of work done that is attributable to the template. I understand that an evidence based approach may be thought of as a bit much, but anything less is supposition and hunch. --Tagishsimon (talk) 21:04, 12 February 2009 (UTC)


WP:PEREN#Move maintenance tags to talk pages - Something like this comes up about once a month, with pretty much the same arguments for and against each time. Mr.Z-man 17:42, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Which basically says "it's all too difficult to do". 1. It isn't, and 2. I'm not asking for tags to be moved to talk pages. I'm asking for cogent policy on tag use in article space.
I see nothing wrong with the way tags are used right now. If an article needs fixing, and it has a tag, either a) fix it or b) leave the tag and move on. If a user is being pointy by adding tags where unjustified, that is a behavioral issue that needs to be dealt with, but that is not a weakness or a fault of the tagging procedure. We cannot "pre-un-dick-ify" all of Wikipedia, and if someone going to be obnoxious, we shouldn't make it inconvenient for everyone else just to make it harder to be a dick. Otherwise, the tags are useful and helpful; I have been known to patrol the cleanup categories, and find the tags helpful in knowing how to cleanup and improve articles. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:56, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
(e/c)The last 2 sentences of the "Reasons for previous rejection" refer to the difficulty and logistics problems, the first 3 refer to the arguments that have already been discussed here. Mr.Z-man 17:59, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Do we at least agree that there is no policy? Or is there? --Tagishsimon (talk) 18:01, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
There may be no policy, but does there need to be? Equazcion •✗/C • 18:04, 12 Feb 2009 (UTC)
There's no consensus on the matter, only ossified custom. There's no guidance for other projects wishing to visit their hobby-horse banner on article space. Is there some problem with contemplating policy or guidelines? --Tagishsimon (talk) 20:17, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Not at all, I just don't think there needs to be a policy for everything. WP:BURO and all. Assuming we need to limit the issues for which we develop written rules, I think maintenance tagging practice is a relatively trivial issue in grand scheme of things. Equazcion •✗/C • 20:27, 12 Feb 2009 (UTC)
That said, maybe an essay on that would help. Equazcion •✗/C • 20:28, 12 Feb 2009 (UTC)

My 2¢: I am all in favor of tags to warn the reader of potential problems with an article, but some tags require a talk page explanation. Many tags, such as {{POV}} and {{Dubious}}, specifically refer to a corresponding talk page discussion. Tags such as {{unreferenced}} and {{fact}}, however, should be okay to drive-by. Mike R (talk) 18:05, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

I second Mike R with my 2¢ Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 19:04, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

From the above I gather that members who support tags being on the content page seem to think that the "usefulness" of the tag on the content page outweighs the annoyance to some readers at least for some tags. I would dispute that. I find the tags on the content pages to be totally annoying way beyond any utility they have. The argument that users can filter tags is lame because most readers are anonymous (not logged in). To settle who is right I propose that we run a poll with the following questions:

Title: Should Editorial Tags Be Restricted to the Discussion Pages? Vote!

Yes, all editorial tags should be moved to the discussion pages
No, tags are fine the way they are
Some tags need to be moved, develop a policy

This poll should allow anyone to vote without logging in (just like a normal reader) but multiple votes from the same IP should be counted only once.

Of course, we don't need to run this poll to guess what the likely result will be. John Chamberlain (talk) 18:15, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

I appreciate the sentiment, but not all tags are equal. A one size policy does not fit all. My interest in such tags tells me that there is not consensus on all tags that appear in articles, but there is a body of custom and practice which seems to be verging on ossification. Policy or else guidelines would, therefore, be useful. And I repeat that we should ideally be guided by evidence for tags which are not required as a warning or article quality: there should be an obligation on tag owners to account for the quality of their tags, namely is there evidence that the aesthetic & annoyance cost of the tag is outweighed by the incentive it gives to fixing the advertised problem. --Tagishsimon (talk) 18:47, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree, not all tags are equal. Some tags do have a relevant function as warning for editors (e.g. need reference). Some are important to alert editors something is going on (e.g. AfD). Some give a personal opinion of an editor (e.g. {{Nationalhistory}}.
I think the number of templates allowed in mainspace articles should be limited to important tags from the first two categories, with all other tags to be limited to talkpages. Arnoutf (talk) 18:57, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Ok, not all tags are equal, vote the third choice in the poll then. Of course you don't want to do the poll because you know it would show 90%+ of readers would vote choice #1. Let's face facts: drive-by banner tagging is only supported by one small group of users: the graffiti artists who do it. Everybody else wishes they would take their micro-opinions somewhere else (like the discussion page).
---
Drive-by taggers shooting uzi-cites at articles doing nothing but being harmless and sourceless, while readers suffer, the body bags get filled, and mothers weep a vale of tears...
Unsourced material should be deleted. That's what I read. And it makes sense. But people don't like to do that.
As a reader, nice to know, always was nice to know, before I registered, what material might just have been made up.
It's a little learning that is a dangerous thing, and most of us are guilty of it.
Let's "face facts": cite tags are a lot more efficient than discussion pages (Unless you want to duplicate the articles).
I don't think "graffiti artists" is good faith (let alone getting further into a rather unfortunate metaphor). I'm sure some very productive editors use them. Vandals just write nonsense.
Opinions are opinions, unless the people who don't have micro-opinions have macro-opinions.
Ddawkins73 (talk) 00:02, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Ddawkins73 (talk) 00:02, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Some tags serve as warnings to readers about article content. Some tags serve as suggestions to editors. Many tags serve as adverts for new editors. Can we keep only the tags that are most pertinent to readers (the warnings), and move the rest down the page? Compare the ubiquitous stub tag. It's perfect. It implies that there is info missing from the article, asks for help improving it, and is not a big flashing orange banner complaining that the article sucks.

I ask for moderation. Keep tags to a minimum - only the most important, keep as few as possible on the top of the page, consider moving some to the talk page. -Freekee (talk) 04:43, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

  • FYI the Article issues template {{AI}} can be used to combine warnings into a single box, thus reducing the space consumed at the top of the article/section. It can also be used as a generic "multiple issues - see talk page" message. - Pointillist (talk) 13:14, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
The "Article issues" template gives less information to readers about what they can do to help than the normal templates do. If templates are being directed at new editors or potential editors, that one is unhelpful. PSWG1920 (talk) 18:07, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

I would definitely support a policy regarding the use of tags. If there is disagreement about the validity of templates, especially at the top of a sizable article, the onus should be on the editor placing them to justify it. Once one has worked to address issues raised by such templates, there should be a prerogative to demand that they either be made more specific or else no longer be present. Bans on placing tags should be implemented where they are found to have been abused (mainly on individual editors but also on articles if necessary.)

I would also say that any template regarding POV issues should only be on the talk page, if anywhere. As discussed above, cleanup templates are largely aimed at readers who may never have edited before, who may not even realize that they can edit. But such a user is unlikely to understand what a Neutral Point of View means in the context of Wikipedia, especially a concept like WP:Undue weight, and if such a user tries to address what s/he sees as neutrality issues, s/he is just as likely to create more POV problems.

I got into a fairly nasty confrontation over a neutrality tag which was preventing an article from being seriously considered for WP:GA. And earlier, a third user (who was not new but seemed to have a slow learning curve due to a poor command of standard English) made posts on the article's talk page which amounted to soapboxing, and when this was pointed out, s/he cited the neutrality tag and said that the material being posted showed why the article's neutrality was disputed. That is an example of how a NPOV related tag can mislead an inexperienced user. PSWG1920 (talk) 20:12, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps a first step would be that in each and any case of such a template, the template placing editor HAS to open a talk page discussion. Any template placed without clearly identified talk page section may then be removed without further argumentation. (I often notice that these templates refer to a talk page discussion, which does not exist; not even after a long time). Arnoutf (talk) 20:28, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
That is a good idea in the case of POV-related templates. Some other templates are self-explanatory, such as Template:Unreferenced. The problem I had, however, was that an editor insisted on keeping templates at the top of an article even after I had worked and worked and worked to address the issues he had raised originally. To justify keeping the cleanup banner, he pointed me back to earlier discussions and claimed that I had simply found ways of making the problems less obvious. PSWG1920 (talk) 20:45, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
True. But for unreferenced there seems to be a clear criterion, as the template states "does not cite any" So even a single (acceptable) reference would warrant removal of that template. Perhaps for the policy
1) Tags that refer to talk page discussion must be accompanied by a clearly identifiable talk page section, and maybe removed without discussion otherwise
2) A very limited set of tags is self explanatory and can be added without talk page discussion (we need to keep this limited to prevent template creators to just omit the talk page reference)
3) If the "de minimis" requirements of a template conditions are fullfilled the template can be removed without further discussion. (e.g. a template claiming there is not a single reference in an article can be removed as soon as a single reliable reference is provided; e.g. when an AfD procedure has ended the template can be removed). Arnoutf (talk) 21:36, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
The idea is that tags will warn the user of the validity(no references) or of other general problems. It also does help readers into contributors. In addition, I would like to cite somewhat of an example. When you go out(if you do=P), and you look around, you will notice "warning:construction" or "store coming soon" signs. Well these cleanup templates do just that. They let the user know that the Wikipedia community is working on it and that the article isn't fully done.Smallman12q (talk) 21:02, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
But would you agree that if templates themselves are preventing an article from being listed as WP:GA when it otherwise might be, there is a problem? PSWG1920 (talk) 21:34, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
One of the grossly offensive weaknesses of ideologically-driven Drive By Editing is the use of bots to locate every recent edit for investigation. Drive-By Editors tend to tag new edits exclusively. This issue inevitably affects the newest, least experienced Editors- so this practice becomes inimical to the development and training of a Friendly and Bold WP Editorship. We have active Editors complaining they experience much of this 'assistance' as unhelpful- and that's b/c of tone and intent.
At the same time there is a system which evaluates older articles equally for possible improvement. Yet, I'm continually finding older articles that are due for substantial reconsideration- but which inevitably languish for any attention.
This is because those interested in wholesale tagging (as opposed to a more 'Development-driven' Editing) apparently:
1). Assume stable older articles are invulnerable to improvement; and
2). Prefer the quick satisfactions of slapping tags in "hot" areas with higher potentials of altercation with a "live", new and potentially still personally-invested Editor to the alternatives.
Put another way: Tagged articles attract more tags (assuming any Drive By Editor's tags accumulate faster than any Editor can develop valid references), while Drive By Editing only tends to increase- as well as institutionalize incivility in WP. This "Flash-Tagging" is creating novel pressures never applied to an earlier wave of articles and Editors. This lack of balance can not be good for our Community.
More practical might be some etiquette which encourages Editors to aim ideologically-driven tagging at the most somnolent articles, and to consider Editors under the 800-edit limit as novices to be approached gratefully, with the motive of assistance rather than exploitation- "new fish". However as real-world lives grow bleaker, harassment increases.
The difficult and mature work of developing a well-written as well as a referenced work can never match Tagging for video thrills-per-minute; and as our culture's core values currently include growing Polarity, belligerant Defense of every space and the glorification of suicidal Exploitations-none of this is likely to be of any interest. May the time of crisis clear us of fears. Hilarleo Hey,L.E.O.v 22:24, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Editor Impersonation

Is there a policy to editor impersonation. I see there is something in username policy, and in signitures, but nothing dedicated to editor impersonation.Perhaps a guideline should be created.Smallman12q (talk) 02:04, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

The username policy says one editor per account, and it gives room to block "confusing" usernames. There are 3 obvious ways to impersonate, all of which are covered by current policy:
  • Person B takes over Person A. This is immediate grounds for a block.
  • Person B creates a username that looks like a doppelganger of person A, or person B claims to be a doppelganger of person A. The first is "confusing" and grounds for a block until the name is changed. The second is arguably harassment and is definitely fraud, and is grounds for a block.
  • Person A changes his name to Z, then person B changes his name to A, without making it clear they are separate people. Obviously, changing names in the first place requires cooperation, possibly unwitting, from people with advanced user-rights. In the rare cases when this is found to be a problem after the renames, I trust it would be handled, somehow.
Bottom line: We've got it covered. If there is a particular incident, post it on WP:ANI or if privacy is necessary, post on ANI with a generic "how do I report this privately" question.
Can we mark this as "resolved?" davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:00, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm sorry davidwr...not yet, I still have a few comments to say. I think a dedicated Editor impersonator policy should be created.Smallman12q (talk) 21:06, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
There's a general trend to your posts here, Smallman - you're looking for a specific policy to deal with every situation. But Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy and only the most frequent and contentious problems are addressed explicitly in policy, and only as a response to actual problems that need solving; other problems are dealt with via community consensus on a case-by-case basis. We also focus on providing overarching guiding principles, as opposed to very specific guidance. That's the reason we don't have policies about, say, how to write a scientology article, or whether to use pink backgrounds on your user page, or whether articles written solely as a work of postmodern art should be deleted. This is one of those cases where existing policy suffices to cover all cases we've seen so far. Dcoetzee 21:22, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, in a manner speaking, yes I am. Its nice to be able to point out a guideline/policy in which everything is in one place and neatly organized. I do understand that wikipedia does try to keep down on the number of policies as they create problems and may become conflicting. But in some cases such as this one, I believe that a policy would be beneficial. Something I could point out to in one link such as WP:EDITORIMPERSONATION and it would have a list of all the links to go to and procedures to follow. Perhaps I should write my own essay and seek a community approval? It also happens that I find the village pump appealing. =D Smallman12q (talk) 00:58, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, you can write your own essay any time you like, especially if it's based on information that already has wide agreement like the responses you've received here. It may be taken to MfD or userfied at a later time, but it's a very low bar for essays to remain in project space. Dcoetzee 01:47, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
I think I will do that. I'm going to be writing several essays that will hopefully be appended on to current guidelines, or will become policies on their own. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Smallman12q (talk • contribs) 20:14, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Are other encyclopedias reliable?

Are other encyclopedias reliable? I don't see any mention at WP:RS or WP:SOURCES. At WP:PSTS it says Tertiary sources can be helpful in providing broad summaries of topics that involve many primary and secondary sources. Some tertiary sources may be more reliable than others, and within any given tertiary source, some articles may be more reliable than others. I have brought up this question because of a comment made by User:Iridescent at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Agricultural_society_(2nd_nomination).

He says A stub article needs to provide background and context; this provides neither. Deletion doesn't mean "we don't want an article on this subject", it means "there is no version in the article history which is a valid article". We're not a paper encyclopedia, but that doesn't mean we're a list of everything either. Regarding references, I think you're misunderstanding how Wikipedia referencing works. References aren't "a list of other sources which consider the topic notable", they're a list of reliable sources – by our definition – for the facts in the article. Neither Encarta nor Britannica are reliable sources, although Britannica articles (like Wikipedia) generally contain citations to their sources which are usually reliable. (Although they have more restrictions over who can edit, they work to the same basic principles as us.) – iridescent 00:40, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

My question is: Is Britannica considered a reliable and verifiable third party source?Smallman12q (talk) 01:10, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes. WP:RS: "Tertiary sources such as compendia, encyclopedias, textbooks, and other summarizing sources may be used to give overviews or summaries, but should not be used in place of secondary sources for detailed discussion." Dragons flight (talk) 01:29, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
I'll add that (1) reliability for purposes of establishing notability during an AfD is quite a bit different than for purposes of verifying factual claims contained in the content of the article, and (2) notability for parent articles used to organize subjects is a little different than notability for subject articles. In the first case, "Encyclopedia Brittanica has an article on the subject so it must be notable" carries significant weight in my opinion - their editorial decision to cover a subject is not subject to the same concerns that tertiary sources have about reliability. If anything, it is more persuasive, not less, than a newspaper's decision to write an article about the subject. Second, whether to have an overarching parent article that introduces readers to two or more child subjects, to merge the articles, or just to have the child articles, is more of an organizational matter than a notability issue. The subject could be perfectly notable, but editors may decide it is best treated in a single article with other notable things.Wikidemon (talk) 01:54, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
What about a cd or print version?Smallman12q (talk) 21:52, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Feedback requested on a BLP related proposal

Note: don't go vote, read and comment on talk: Wikipedia:Search Engine NOCACHE by default proposal or WP:NOCACHE. The point of it all is plainly simple and obvious. rootology (C)(T) 07:48, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Arbitration enforcement RfC

The Request for Comment regarding arbitration enforcement, including a review of general and discretionary sanctions, will be closing at 0200 UTC on 21 February, 2009. All editors are encouraged to review the RfC and participate before its close. After the closing, the Committee intends to formalize reform proposals within one month.

For the Committee, --Vassyana (talk) 07:50, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

It is worth holding on to...

I see this guy on TV recycling plastic. At the same time I am thinking "After all the searching and complaining I did, they still deleted the Astrosociology article". Foolishly I thought, "If only I knew someone who was an absolute authority on this psychology.." and Pat, this crazy recycling guy on the TV, he was saying "... but it's well worth holding on to..." When hard drive space was awfully limited the wiki wanted to, "collect the sum of human knowledge", which is the total amount of it but these days we often say, "But this bit is black and that bit is white. If it doesn't impress me formidably, it is not even getting in the door. In fact, place a few boots around to help it on its way out." Astrosociology is a waste of space beside the Rouge Cabal and the WikiGnome. But hey! We have a policy here that if something is real enough, actually exists in truth, a part of knowledge, we can shelve and keep that info in some way to protect it, on display for all time, right? There will be obscure stuff on the wiki, even stuff with the tag "This may never be proven to be entirely accurate, complete or unbiased", right? No way! Delete all info of moderate esteem! This is a system of dependence on social hierarchy and if you do not excel, we cannot cope with you! Limited worthy sources? Limited number of active proponents? Ptah! Remove that crap! We do not deal with an unnaproved content in any way and we mean it. ~ R.T.G 19:43, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Try WP:ARTICLERESCUE. Currently, Wikipedia requires that its articles have some notability, and hence a not notable article will be unable to garner support. What you can do is userfy it, and expand the article in your userspace before trying to post it back out.Smallman12q (talk) 20:17, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
While I'm an inclusionist, proponents of the "Wikipedia is not paper" viewpoint frequently fail to see the real cost that articles contrary to our goals have on maintenance, navigation, reverting vandalism, and other human factors. This is the real cost that would have to be addressed in any plan to keep such articles around. Dcoetzee 20:21, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
I do not understand the "Wikipedia is not paper" idea but isn't it fair to say that, regardless of the fact that truly unsuitable articles exist, those which are disputed in value when brought to light are often not dealt with at all and subject to summary deletion? There is an area in that, of course, that articles could cross over into misinformation. Is it necessary to banish all (or any) articles of low notability unless the information be construed as possibly misleading? I cannot say the rate, but it is fair to say that many obscure topics are subject to total exclusion with low tolerance. There is no guideline to say that no article should be deleted unless appears misleading, is there? Low notability articles can hardly bring the wiki into great disrepute but the offence is, perhaps, often classed alongside misinformation. While the problem of misinformation would prevent our goals, is the problem of low notability a minor implication? Seems to be, in some points, a popularity competition. Is that a help or a hinderance? Could we have a guideline that low notability is a weak objection to the inclusion of an article? ~ R.T.G 22:51, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Low notability is indeed a much weaker argument against inclusion than misinformation, a hoax, or an utterly useless article. One can imagine a Wikipedia where consensus is in favor of including all verifiable topics, no matter how non-notable they may be. However, I believe the current consensus represents the (albeit unsubstantiated) position that the human cost to maintenance and navigation exceeds the value provided by such articles to a small number of potential readers. Dcoetzee 01:48, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
Is there room for a guideline on the subject of Exclusion from, or, Lesser requirement for notability? At present the guidelines say the obvious, stuff you made up yourself, like a new drinking game, is not notable. In the example of Astrosociology (undeletion request), it was a topic covered by old NASA guidebooks and a few modern cultural books but the major proponent, a travelling lecturer in the subject, was the main basis through the article. He has not made any Laws of Physics revelations or started any new cultural revolutions. He is a professor and appears the highest regard in the subject, on a mission(?) to revamp it with various international lecture spots and is often hosted by the AIAA. It is listed on http://www.sociology.org.uk/clink.htm?laper.htm and has various other minor points of notability. But this and other stuff was deemed to be non notable, original research dating only a few years serving to advertise some one persons notability. No provision was found to lower the bar of notability beyond what people in the discussion wanted which was mainstream sociology (the bar pinnacle, no?) and therefore it would have to go. To be fair, awareness that the world is round and anticipation of extra-terrestrial contact might never be (return to IMO) mainstream but will always be an interesting topic of minor value, won't it? Perhaps this example in particular would be of great interference to sociology or was too biased but would other examples benefit a guideline on accepting minor notability? ~ R.T.G 15:58, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
Ok. I have a current example of the possible problem. An article which I would suggest merging, only 2 days old, is up for speedy deletion within the same minute at which it was created, with general notability tags. In the template is written "Article about the events of a non-notable gambling website". The guy is refering to Full Tilt Poker Dot Com of which the claims are made that they give out poker jackpots of $2M dollars and quoting, "The most recent FTOPS saw 27,493 participants and a prize pool totaling $11,158,000." The article for speedy deletion is FTOPS V and the "non-notable website" is Full Tilt Poker. The guy who tagged that does this. User:Wuhwuzdat is performing the essential job of tagging hundreds of articles every day. It would seem that wuzdat goes through articles quickly adding tags to bring them to the attention of reviewers. The reviewers will often give these articles the full rigormarole, quality standards to personal taste etc. Guidelines are detailed and do say that stringent notability may be relaxed. They go on to detail the methods to test notability but they do not give details of how and when to relax. Is it best that we as editors use one hand to quote the guideline method for testing notability but hold in the other hand that relaxed concern is down to a new discretion every time? I wont mention any downside to that but I will say that the provision of that end of the guidelines could only serve to document the concensus a bit more? Can anyone suggest a situation that notability be a lower concern? ~ R.T.G 21:42, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
To explain my tagging of the article in question here, please check the version of the article, as it existed at the time I tagged it [[7]], and note the large number (14) of links to different pages on a single website in the references section, and an additional link to what appears to be an online gambling site. It appeared to me to be a blatant attempt at spamming, and I tagged it with a G11 as such. If I am overstepping my bounds, or being overly aggressive in my tagging, please inform me. Feedback is an important part of improvement. Wuhwuzdat (talk) 01:05, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
In my opinion what Wuhwuzdat did was fine. I beleive that the article isn't good enough for stand alone (a series of five of those lists has been added and perhaps they would make a good sub article merged or perhaps not, but...), tagging the article is one thing, you are showing it for examination, delete, merge, all goes to the same place, but when the guys examine it, minor notability will not often save such an article unless serious concern is produced. It is great to see a budding admin listing all the articles but the following process is not geared towards collecting as much factual info as reasonably possible without, granted, being a phone book, guest book, directory of art, etc. Events and science are of great value in cultural interest when a good collection of minor ones are on hand, no? Some things are difficult to aquire the knowledge of but can be equally fascinating? What value is that? ~ R.T.G 02:12, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
I just want to note, current Wikipedia policy has been strongly influenced by bad press and I would encourage not only to prove that press wrong but to fly in its face and excel beyond it. Well worthy of it! ~ R.T.G 02:21, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Good Articles and WP Guidelines

This question relates to a GAR I'm currently involved in, but I'd like a general answer to the question rather than an opinion on the GAR.

My question is, if an article clearly violates a WP Guideline, such as WP:BLP can that be a criteria for removing it from the list of Good Articles? It seems to me that by definition, an article that violates guidelines cannot be classed as an official 'Good Article', but another has argued that unless it specifically contradicts Good Article Criteria (where it is not explicitly stated that Good Articles should follow basic WP guidelines), violating BLP is not an adequate reason to remove it from the list of Good Articles. Some clarification please! Riversider (talk) 20:36, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I think the Good Article Criteria should explicitly state that Good Articles should not violate any Wikipedia policies or Guidelines, but if they do, the rationale should be either self-evident or explained on the article talk page. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:51, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
See Wikipedia_talk:Good_article_criteria#Proposed_criteria_7:_Comply_with_content_policies_and_guidelines. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:59, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
What ever happened to WP:COMMONSENSE? Fore delisting a good article, you should generally establish a consensus first...see WP:GAR. If an article is violating a wikipedia policy/guidline, there are one of two steps to be taken. First, try an correct the article. If the article cannot be corrected, then the offending content should be removed or the article will face WP:AFD.Smallman12q (talk) 01:36, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
Tried to remove problematic content, but my edits were reverted. Seemed to be commonsense to me that it would be preferable to go for GAR, and hopefully see the article improve, than use the 'nuclear' option of AFD. Maybe others see it differently.Riversider (talk) 22:12, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

82.6% of articles put up for deletion were by new users

After a couple of months of compiling data, I finally finished the first section of my research: User:Ikip/AfD on average day, thanks to a dozen admins who gave me a copy of the deleted material. I found what many article squadron members already know, that our current deletion policy overwhelmingly effect new users:

  1. 31 out of 98 articles, nearly one third, which were put up for deletion were created by editors whose very first contributions was the new article.
  2. 66 out of 98 articles, 67%, which were put up for deletion were created by editors who had 100 contributions or less when they created the article.
  3. 81 out of 98 articles, 82.6%, which were put up for deletion were created by editors who had 1000 contributions or less when they created the article.

Any ideas how I can figure out if there is a definite link in the drop in editing since October 2007 to the treatment of new users? Ikip (talk) 05:32, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

You can start by compiling similar statistics for earlier points in time (say, November 15 of 2007, 2006, and 2005). My impression is that the majority of deleted articles have always been by new and anonymous users -- by the time you've accumulated a few hundred edits, you've got a feel for what sorts of articles are appropriate for Wikipedia. --Carnildo (talk) 06:01, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Exactly what I was going to say. It stands to reason that the people most likely to have their articles deleted are those who are least likely to understand the project. The drop in editing since 2007 has a lot more to do with the fact that the "main encyclopedia" is done. There really are only major paths to editing right now: improving existing core articles, which not nearly as many people have the patience for, or creating pop culture articles, which are by far the most likely to face deletion. Resolute 06:13, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
I find it very important that wikipedia retains editors.
I am troubled by what you say Resolute, because I think there is so much more we can write about. Ikip (talk) 06:22, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
With no bar to article entry, in addition to the lack of a bar to editor entry which makes us something of a laughing stock already, I'm not sure we'd have enough of a reputation left as anything that might possibly resemble the shadow of an encyclopedia. So what about retaining readers? Is that important too? Or are we just hoping to coddle authors so they'll feel fuzzy inside and get to have their work appear online for no one to read? Equazcion •✗/C • 06:28, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)
The "main encyclopedia" is done? What a let down. Here I thought I was contributing to a paperless encyclopdia that was stiving to collect the sum of human knowledge? Its done? Human knowledge has ceased? With each new day there is nothing more to learn or share? The "main encyclopedia" is done? Wow. No wonder new editors are discouraged. Why not post a notice on the Main Page? Main Encyclopedia Is Done. Please wait for the next encyclopedia. Inexperienced editors need not apply. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 06:34, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
He didn't mean that literally. That's why it's in quotes. The point is that of course there'll be an observable drop-off in editing over time for an encyclopedia. There was a very large blank slate to fill before, and now there's not. Equazcion •✗/C • 06:41, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)
At that we disagree. There is so much more Wikipedia can be. To even consider that in a world of growing population and history and events unfolding before our eyes that there should be a "slow down" seems add odds to what Wiki's potential is. We should be continually expanding it... unless we have finally run out of paper. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 07:21, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
We are continually expanding. I don't disagree with that. Nevertheless there can never be enough current topics available at a given time to equal the amount that needed to be created to cover history. A drop-off was inevitable, and is for any similar record of information. Equazcion •✗/C • 07:42, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)

Actually, the drop of in article creation have more with our structure than with available topics. Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2009-01-31/Orphans. The slowdown of article creation is caused by a tendency to delete red links and to favor links to broad topics. Taemyr (talk) 06:55, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Indeed. Editors should be encourged to create articles for those redlinks. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 07:21, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
There was once a need to create articles about all the presidents of the united states. Now there's not. There was once the need to create articles about every Hollywood celebrity. Now there's not. Sports players. Now there's not. I could go on. These all needed to be created at one point, and now they don't. An overall drop-off in creation will be observed. Your point might also play a part, but Resolute's is a solid fact of logic. Equazcion •✗/C • 07:02, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)
With repects, I disagree. History is a changing and mutable beast. Okay, about the presidents. At best, barring deaths, we'd have a new article every 4 years. But celebrities, authors, filmmakers, scientists, musicians, sports figures, political and religious leaders, etc, etc... there are continued worlds of information to be captured within these electronic pages. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 07:21, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Yes, continued. I don't contend that. It still accounts for a predictable dropoff. Unless you're saying that in 2007 enough new celebrities emerged to equal the total number that existed prior throughout history. Equazcion •✗/C • 07:26, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)
Absolutely there are new articles about people being created all the time, and many of them are notable. What I meant by the "core encyclopedia" are the traditional encyclopedic concepts. By and large, those topics all exist now, often in fairly good states. Wikipedia's growth to 2007 was driven by the need to fill those topics in along with the expected creation of pop culture, recent history and "in the news" topics. Far fewer people have the desire to work on the "nuts and bolts" of an article - adding citations, prose expansion, doing the core research to fill out the topic. At this stage of Wikipedia's life, that is the type of editor in greatest need, imnsho. The decline in editing activity is not really a concern in my view, as I do not see a decline in quality at this point. Resolute 18:25, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Roughly every other article that I created was nominated for deletion at one point. About 10-15 percent got deleted. If I haven't been persistent about defending them, more would end up deleted. That is quite a frustrating experience for an editor, that when you contribute, someone comes and puts a del tag, instead of trying to improve it. Problem is the dominance of controlling mentality over contributing among a number of editors. Also, deletion discussions drain so much energy that could be focused on article creation/improvements. 212.200.243.17 (talk) 08:45, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

That and posting obnoxious messages everywhere to try and propaganda people into supporting a particular side, rather than making a point in the designated forum like a mature adult and then shutting the fuck up. Not you anon. They know who they are. (that being another problem mentality, in addition to what you mentioned) Equazcion •✗/C • 08:51, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)
To make sense of this I would have to see the percentages of articles not nominated for deletion; otherwise these are useless statistics. Most of my articles used to be nominated for deletion. They were plenty notable, it was just the hovering cloud of overeager new article patrollers. Then I learned to use the {{inuse}} tag, also not to save my articles until I added a few sources. It's kind of a vetting or hazing process. There are a huge number of very notable subjects untreated on Wikipedia. One that comes to mind are major corporations of the world. There are established, publicly traded companies with thousands or even tens of thousands of employees, a billion dollars a year in sales, leaders in their industry, etc., that don't even have an article. Every once in a while I still get a notability tag or even a deletion nomination when I creat one because someone is too lazy to check google. I usually just remove the tags per IAR.Wikidemon (talk) 08:54, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
But User:212.200.243.17, you complain about putting the del tag instead of trying to improve it -- the problem is this. No one can know for every article if something is appropriate for existing on WP. That's why AFD exists in the first place. So either someone, normally in good faith, puts a del tag, or they let it exist here when it's not supposed to. Saying that "they should try to improve it" makes NO sense when they ARE trying to improve WP as a whole by getting rid of the article. Your complaint is especially groundless since you don't say what sort of articles you're adding. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 12:28, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Appropriate statistic would be this: how many articles are proposed for deletion? How many did get deleted? If Deleted/Proposed is low number, then something needs to be done so that many useless deletion discussions are avoided. If Deleted/Proposed is closer to 1, then deletion process already works fine. In my experience, D/P is about .3, and therefore far from efficient or just. ps. Deleted number should NOT include articles which were successfully recreated or renamed/redirected to new titles. pps. I know some articles are kept because RS are found in deletion discussions and therefore argument that deletions resulted in better articles, but finding those on talk pages would be less stressful. 212.200.243.17 (talk) 10:48, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Without knowing *what* was deleted or the quality of the material that was deleted, the numbers are meaningless. --Cameron Scott (talk) 11:09, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
I disagree. If something is deleted, and then successfully recreated, that means improvement in the first place would be more appropriate. If something is proposed for deletion but not deleted, that means proposal could have been replaced with the effort on improvement, or was not justified in the first place. I am not questioning here deleted articles, but articles which are proposed for deletion and don't get deleted and where AfDs mainly waste time of wiki editors. Numbers are useful to measure the 'efficiency' of the deletion process. 212.200.243.17 (talk) 11:12, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Measuring the size of deleted articles would also be useful statistics, as would be the number of the references/sources in the given article at that time. 212.200.243.17 (talk) 11:17, 13 February 2009 (UTC)


Returning to the original question "Any ideas how I can figure out if there is a definite link in the drop in editing since October 2007 to the treatment of new users?", I'm troubled that your stats don't even come close to allowing you to do that. Not least, you have given us nothing on the distribution of number of users into the three categories you've selected - it may well be that more than 82% of users have less than 1000 articles, in which case such users suffer fewer AfD deletions per user than do more experienced users. Neither do you look ay PROD and speedy deletions. But more bluntly, there appears to be an implicit assumption that newbies are maltreated because they are newbies, rather than that articles are deleted because they're not salvageable. So, the figures, on a small sample, are interesting but not illuminating. You'd have to do qualitative work on actual articles rather than statistical work on a subset of deletions before you could hope to draw conclusions. --Tagishsimon (talk) 11:45, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

"rather than that articles are deleted because they're not salvageable." This is a values judgment, which is fraught with much more controversy than what I have presented thus far. Ikip (talk) 12:58, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the link! It's awesome statistics. 212.200.243.17 (talk) 14:05, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
FYI, I posted this message also at: WT:Articles for deletion. It is facinating how both postings take a different path. Ikip (talk) 14:23, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Another question to ask is, out of those deleted articles, how many, giving as far a fair chance as possible, should have been keep or at worst redirected? How many of those were true vanity articles that should have been CSD'd or PROD'd? Obviously the numbers will vary depending on your opinion, but I'm sure there's enough outsider points to figure some parts out. And then the other question to ask: how many articles were created by new users with the same number of edits that have been kept in the same time period? If 98 articles out of 200 created were put to AFD, that's one problem. If 98 articles out of 2000-5000 were, that's less an issue. --MASEM 14:40, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I'd considered conducting a similar line of research, but the complexity meant that I wasn't inclined to tackle it just yet. :) The biggest problem you face is showing that these new editors would have continued to edit had their pages not been nominated for deletion. A qualitative study might be the most revealing approach, but it would be tricky at best. If, on the other hand, you were to take a quantitative approach you would need multiple groups. I'd look at four groups just as an initial trial: new editors who had pages nominated, but where the page survived; new editors who had pages nominated, and the pages were deleted; new editors who didn't have their pages deleted; and new editors who didn't create new pages. This might make the data more interesting, and give a few comparisons which might be of interest. - Bilby (talk) 14:43, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
You have to be careful when drawing inferences from statistics... for example, one could just as easily look at the statistics quoted above and ask the question: "Why has the quality of new users declined so much since the good old days?" (ie drawing the inference that all these deletions are due to a sudden influx of really bad editors, and that new users wrote much better articles "back in the day"). Not that I am asking this... just saying that one could. Blueboar (talk) 14:59, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
How many of our existing long standing Wikipedia articles were created by new users is what we should be asking. I would gladly delete 50 articles if it meant we got one keeper. Chillum 17:55, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
I think it is very important to be kind to new users, so that we can keep growing our community. Making deletion processes less harsh is one way to do that. But I have to say the title is rather misleading: most people with 100-1000 edits are not "new users" at all, they're just ordinary occasional contributors, so I'd consider the 67% figure more accurate. rspεεr (talk) 17:30, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
100-1000 occasional here, just to back up "data" with "anecdote". ~user:orngjce223 how am I typing? 23:54, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Uploading a copy of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 bills

Does wikipedia allow pdf uploads of government bills? Is it suggested? I would like to upload a copy of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 bills to Wikipedia. I'm aware that Wikisource has them, but I would like to upload the actual pdfs from http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/arra_public_review/ Official Bill]. Please let me know if this would be allowed or discouraged.Smallman12q (talk) 17:12, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I think it is allowed, but even so, WikiSource would be the better place for these, no sense being redundant. I would probably recommend deletion at a File-for-deletion discussion because of the redundancy. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 18:59, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia doesn't host external documents in PDF or any other format. They would probably be deleted. If you want to refer to the document, just interwiki link to the Wikisource page. Dcoetzee 19:05, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
What do you mean by Wikipedia doesn't host external documents in PDF or any other format.? You can upload external documents. I'm looking for a policy link mainly.Smallman12q (talk) 20:03, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
You can, it'll let you, but you shouldn't. References are stored on other sites and referenced by Wikipedia; Wikipedia does not store its own references. It only stores information displayed directly in articles, and there are very few PDFs uploaded. Dcoetzee 20:33, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm aware there are few pdfs, but I'm mainly looking for a policy link that says I should or shouldn't. (This isn't just for me, I've noticed other people interested in uploading pdfs related to bills as the government has a habit of moving them around breaking links.Smallman12q (talk) 20:50, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I guess for me the question is what the purpose is. Uploading a bill itself does not serve any obvious purpose that I can see. It isn't encyclopedic content by itself. Used as part of an article, it would be better, imo, to use excerpts and discuss the bill itself, linking to the wikisource copy for those that wish to read it in its entirety. Resolute 21:13, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
There are people who question references from the bill and there are others who would like to read it but are for some reason or other reluctant to go to a 3rd party link.Smallman12q (talk) 21:26, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
The closest thing I could find to relevant policy is at Wikipedia:Creation and usage of media files#Text_files. Dcoetzee 21:35, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Why do they need to be uploaded? If they are US government materials they should be freely available and public domain? – ukexpat (talk) 21:39, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Wikisource wouldn't really be third party. As for why they would be reluctant to go to a third party link, I have to say that really isn't Wikipedia's problem. We need only to source info to what we consider a reliable source. It is up to the individual to judge the accuracy of that source. From my POV, such an upload would fall foul of WP:NOT#IINFO. Resolute 21:56, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps the WP:NOT policy should be changed to reflect that government documents/congressional bills are not to be uploaded. I'm mainly looking for a particular, concise line that says "it is not(or it is) acceptable to upload congressional bills).Smallman12q (talk) 22:32, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
It's rather clear from Wikipedia:NOT#Wikipedia is not a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files (#3 lists laws as an example, and states "Complete copies of primary sources may go into Wikisource, but not on Wikipedia.") and Wikipedia:Do not include the full text of lengthy primary sources. Postdlf (talk) 22:58, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:WPS refers to quotes...not uploaded material. And even then...it says that "omplete copies of primary sources may go into Wikisource"...can that be interpreted as uploading a copy of the bill? And well, Wikisource's inclusion policy at Wikisource's inclusion policy states Wikisource does not collect reference material unless it is published as part of a complete source text. How do I interpret that? WP:NOTMIRROR states complete copies of primary sources may go into Wikisource, but not on Wikipedia. Does that include uploads? Perhaps as of now I believe there needs to be a policy change or a guideline of some sort created.Smallman12q (talk) 00:18, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

It probably should be noted that the bill is already on WikiSource. --Bobblehead (rants) 01:13, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
It does include uploads; uploads should be used in articles, as part of the encyclopedia content, not just as references. See also the link I gave above, which is specifically about uploads. Dcoetzee 01:54, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
It says However, most PDFs should be converted into wikitext. Source documents should be uploaded to Wikisource instead. So I take it, I can upload the actual pdf to wikisource? Well two questions...can I use a transkwiki link to link it back here and I can't seem to find the actual pdf uploaded on wikisource as you(the text is up yes, but not the actual bill with the scrawly handwriting=P).Smallman12q (talk) 02:01, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
Hmm, I don't know - I'd check with Wikisource. They might have rules against redundant documents, or they might encourage it. And yes, you can always use a transwiki link to reference a source in Wikisource. Dcoetzee 21:25, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

What purpose is served by having the pdf files is not served by having the text alone? 121.72.165.27 (talk) 08:17, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Well it would mainly be to have a copy of the official bill. Plus a pdf is more convenient than source wiki.Smallman12q (talk) 23:39, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Copyright Question

This image is the Public Domain per WP:PD (1831 image). However, it is on a liscensed site. Is it or is it not Public Domain? ResMar 17:26, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
If copyright of an image has expired, any claim to copyright is invalid, unless they've added some significant creative element to it. However, a cursory look at that image suggests that it's a composite of several old images and their selection and arrangement may be protected. Dcoetzee 01:33, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
If you are 100% sure it's really a public domain picture, then it stays that way. However, if they modified it in any meaningful way, a new copyright is attached. I don't see any in the image you presented, but this includes some use of visible watermarks, color correction, damage-"restoration," and the like, but only to the extent that their use was creative rather than mechanical. For example, superimposing a watermark of one of the admirals involved in the fighting would probably be considered artistic, superimposing the logo of the Geological Society of London would be considered mechanical in most cases. If they only modify a part of the image, the unmodified parts remain public domain. In this case, if that really is a faithful reproduction of an old image, you are in the clear despite any claims to the contrary. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:22, 22 February 2009 (UTC) Update: I agree with Dcoetzee. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:23, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
OK, thank you for your input. That image is a photocopy of a page from the geological diary of Constant Prévost, depicting the 1831 eruption of Ferdinandea. Since I don't see anything modified from the original 1831 illustrations, I'll be bold and upload it under Public Domain. Thank you for clarifying that up for me. Cheers, ResMar 16:08, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Reports of new policies/guidelines

Didn't there used to be a bot that reported at this page whenever a page was newly marked as a policy or guideline? I marked one as a guideline yesterday and it doesn't seem to have shown up here. (The page is WP:MOSPOL, should anyone wish to dispute its status.)--Kotniski (talk) 11:21, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Material referenced only by a broken cite

Newspapers regularly clean out their archive resulting in broken references. What is the policy on material that is only cited by a broken reference? Should the material remain with the 404 cite? Should the cite be replaced by a (cite) tag? Should the material be removed? What has brought this to mind was this edit removing important material on the grounds that the cite is broken. TerriersFan (talk) 16:37, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

  • WP:DEADREF --NE2 16:44, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
  • If you are lucky, it will be available through a Google News Archives search, possibly behind a pay-wall. You can replace the ref with the paper-reference format with the URL pointing to the summary available via the Google News Archives. If you are really lucky, archive.org will have picked it up, and you can just replace the link with a link to archive.org. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 00:26, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It was a poor edit. The URL in a newspaper article citation is a convenience only. It is not the citation. The important parts of a newspaper citation, that enable one to locate it in the archives of one's choice, are the byline, dateline, headline, and publication. We have an article on citations that explains this. The citation in that edit still had three out of those four.

    If a convenience URL in a newspaper article citation loses its convenience, because the material scrolls behind a costwall or is otherwise lost to side reorganization and suchlike, then the citation does not become any less valid than it was before. It remains just as possible to go to an archive of The Post Newspaper of Zambia, be it on a WWW site, in a national library, or in a local library, and look up an article with the headline "Challenges facing education in Zambia" that had a dateline of August 2007.

    Some people forget that more than lifting just one finger is sometimes the way to find things. Not every action in the world is a mouse click. That's FUTON bias. Combat it as you would combat other systemic biases. Uncle G (talk) 14:42, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

  • There is a problem with some online newspaper articles: For many papers, it's not clear where the article appeared in print, if it appeared in print at all. For a fast-moving story, the article that appears in tomorrow's paper may be significantly different than the online story I'm citing this morning, and the version in the paper may exist online only briefly before being replaced by an updated version. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 17:55, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I must confess a bias against such sources: much of the time the replacement is at least partially because the earlier versions has some inaccuracies or other issues. And if we are going to take verifiability seriously, well, the material must be verifiable somehow. An electronic copy of a print article is verifiable; it just takes more work. An online article that comes and goes without archiving isn't truly verifiable. Mangoe (talk) 18:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
I use http://www.webcitation.org to archive copies of pages that may go offline. – ukexpat (talk) 20:23, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Mangoe: In many cases material is added as new information is available, and still-correct information is removed for space, especially for print editions. Also, for breaking news, the Wikipedia article may be updated before the news hits print, so there is no print edition at the time the referenced is used. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 21:21, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, I'm not one to be a stickler for "verifiability, not truth", after several cases in which I've had to chase after obscure sources to refute a citation containing a patent mistake. But in developing events, where the story itself is changing, it doesn't seem to me that we are doing the world a service by (in effect) promoting early reports that are not repeated. Often (if not usually) they are not repeated because they don't pan out. Mangoe (talk) 04:26, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
The WebCite answer would be great if someone would only implement a bot to automagically submit wp cited sources to WebCite, as suggested in its faq. Any volunteers?LeadSongDog (talk) 05:15, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Appropriate map projection for location maps

Wikipedia currently doesn't seem to have any co-ordination concerning location maps and there isn't much consistency between the kind of maps used in the different country articles. Some time ago there was a dispute over what map projection to use for the location map on the European Union talk page. At that time while most of the larger countries, Canada, the United States, Greenland and Russia, used Robinson projections for their location maps, the EU used a Mercator projection. The result of the discussion was the selection of an orthographic projection as a compromise. The same editor who created the EU orthographic projection posted similar location maps on the countries listed above and they're still there now.

However I feel the issue should be given wider attention and a specific projection chosen for consistent use across English Wikipedia. The three maps which were previously discussed on the EU talk page were:

the orthographic projection
the Mercator projection
the Robinson projection

Any preferences? — Blue-Haired Lawyer 16:19, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I really do not think it matters. Personally I would prefer rotating the orthographic slightly to put Europe slightly to above right of center. The Robinson is less distorted than the Mercator, but really, use whichever anyone wants to use. This is clearly not a policy issue. Apteva (talk) 16:26, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
"The Organization of Cartographers for Social Equality" do have a visually arresting argument. - X201 (talk) 16:39, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
Surely consistent style and layout across articles is a policy issue. If it doesn't fall technically fall within your idea of a policy, it is something which deserves centralised debate. — Blue-Haired Lawyer 18:24, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
Actually as I see it, it is more of a policy to allow individuality - articles are expected to be self consistent with citation style and Brit/US spelling, but not expected to be consistent across articles. Apteva (talk) 20:00, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
If there is to be a centralised discussion, I think it should belong on project countries.
Re projections. Mercator and Robinson are comparable near the equator but distorts areas far away from the equator, Robinson distorts direction and shapes far from the equator. For small countries (e.g. Iceland) far away from the equator a relevant projection flat projection maybe different from a small country near the equator (e.g. Equador). For large areas such as the EU, [[Russia] or the USA and orthographic projection is probably better suited not to show distortions. In other words, different problems ask for different solutions. Arnoutf (talk) 20:12, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Category:Deleted article recreated and advanced to Good Articles Class

I just created this category, and would be interested in people adding articles, by adding Template:Rescued on the article talk page. Is there anyway to find out which good articles were previous deleted, without going through all articles manually? Ikip (talk) 09:35, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

There seems to be an implied assumption here, that we shouldn't delete good articles. Just because an article is advanced to being a good article doesn't mean it couldn't be deleted. — Blue-Haired Lawyer 14:47, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
This seems to be an entirely pointless task fraught with (the potential for) bogus and misleading assumptions. Not least is that in many cases, the deleted article was not rescued at all. The deleted article was crap. Later a new article having no relation to the old article (except for subject matter) was instated. We have plenty enough cruft in Wikipedia: I'd be grateful for some intimation of a purpose behind your endeavors before you continue. --Tagishsimon (talk) 16:16, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
I can see nothing in the template or the category that does not make some sort of point, as I have said in my rationale for nominating each for deletion a short while ago. Each has an almost exactly similar nominator's rationale. I think we would all welcome a full and frank discussion at the relevant deletion discussion pages, both pro and anti deletion to develop whatever the true consensus is on the area. The category is here and the template is here -- Fiddle Faddle (talk) 17:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
Agreed, I think the idea is that the reader goes "oh look, those vile deletionists got it wrong again!" but devoid of context, it's meaningless because many would be deleted due to spam reasons or are unconnected with the article that replaced them. IKip seems to spend all of his time trying to turn wikipedia into a battleground. --Cameron Scott (talk) 17:37, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
I think the category itself should be deleted for undue attention to the bad first version, and for making a point irrelevant to quality of the current version of the articles (should not be in mainspace for that reason!). Arnoutf (talk) 17:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
There is another template, {{Brink}}, in this set. I have also nominated it for deletion here. Again a good discussion is called for. And another category. Yawn. Category:Rescued articles advanced to Good Article status. I am about to nominate that as well. Might as well complete the set. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 22:55, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
Thatis nominated here Fiddle Faddle (talk) 23:01, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

articles that seem to violate Wikipedia policies but are IMPORTANT for science

Resolved
 – nothing to see here, archiving  – ukexpat (talk) 22:27, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Wikipedia's Mistake

This website contains 3 pages originally on Wikipedia. They were important for science. How important? We may not know in our lifetimes. Either my father, W. Jean Micheal, is right or ppl simply don't care. My father thinks the MIC (military industrial complex) pretty much controls everything so if you disagree with anything the MIC wants, you are brushed aside. I happen to object to the LHC (large hadron collider) - we could be spending money on machines that can directly benefit humanity (such as ITER (the international fusion prototype)). But if my small voice protests the LHC and the MIC supports it, I can understand why Wikipedia might want to delete my pages. Thing is, whether my father's right or wrong about the MIC, the pages should have stayed up for science. Read them and decide for yourself.

Micheal_space

Talk: Micheal_space

Deletion Page: Micheal_space

Please read and think for yourselves. Don't swallow conventional dogma and instantly dismiss me. That is not right nor fair. I actually make a reasonable case based on sound and accepted engineering principles.

salvatore gerard micheal&Delta (talk) 20:08, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

We don't publish original research - that's really the start and end of it. Cameron Scott (talk) 20:12, 25 February 2009 (UTC)----
Indeed. We don't publish original research. The rest of your argument, w.r.t. the article, seems a little neurotic. That does not mean that the MIC does not exist and is not very powerful: it merely means there is a limit to its interests. And oddly, the aspirational noodling of students seems to fit into that not-interested class. Science will have to get along the best it can until you can get your work published in peer reviewed journals. You have heard of those at MSU, haven't you? ----

Incidentally, &Delta, you really should remove the Wikipedia logo from your self-hosted mirrors of those deleted pages. Unlike user-contributed article content, which is freely licensed, the Wikipedia logo is copyrighted and a protected trademark. Postdlf (talk) 20:39, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

of course i've heard of 'peer reviewed' journals but they are controlled by the same conventional bureaucratic paper pushing unimaginative overly conservative dogmatic loving MIC obedient goons as Wikipedia 'employs'. no offense intended. sheep. they're all obedient sheep .. as far as the logo is concerned, i'm not financed by Microsoft or other multinational thug-company of the MIC. i cannot afford a decent html editor that does not record key strokes and send them off to big brother. if Wikipedia sues, i have no assets. MSU does not endorse any page it hosts regardless of content. there is no point in 'going after me'; i'm not scared or threatened by your posturing. your condescending comments are not appreciated. i suggest, for the sake of science, you put Micheal_space back up and qualify it up the wazoo if you need (put a 1000 banners warning "speculation" or "nutcase" or whatever you want..) .. if you look carefully, there are Many many pages on Wikipedia that contain 'original content'. Micheal_space happens to be both original - and correct.&Delta (talk) 21:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Dear Mr President, there are too many states these days. Please eliminate three. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 21:14, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm intrigued as to how the MIC works internationally. I don't think the MIC of the US or anywhere is too interested in the LHC, it's not like they're making anti-matter bombs or anything. Verbal chat 21:23, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
I think that &Delta will learn, eventually, that labellng those from whom he wishes assistance "conventional bureaucratic paper pushing unimaginative overly conservative dogmatic loving MIC obedient goons as Wikipedia 'employs'" tends to diminish the probability of such assistance. We are deep into barking mad territory here, though, and so I'll forgo any other comments. --Tagishsimon (talk) 21:27, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Can anyone detect a village pump issue here or shall we sent in the black helicopters and suppress science archive this discussion? --Cameron Scott (talk) 21:41, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've received word that it should indeed be rendered. --Tagishsimon (talk) 21:49, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Proposal to add amendment to Wikipedia:Bot policy

I am proposing to add an amendment to Wikipedia:Bot policy requiring all bots active on Wikipedia to be able to be easily shut down by any user. Details are at User:Exxolon/BotPolicyAddition - all interested parties are invited to comment/vote there. Exxolon (talk) 21:18, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

The proposal has failed. My final statement can be read at User:Exxolon/BotPolicyAddition#Final_Statement Exxolon (talk) 01:40, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Addresses

What are the guidelines regarding adresses? Should they be included in article? I'm look at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. I wanted to know whether putting an address/telephone from the Federal Reserve website would be appropriate? The site is http://www.federalreserve.gov/branches.htm Smallman12q (talk) 21:54, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Both are often discouraged in practice, though phone numbers more strongly objected to than addresses. Two sections of WP:NOT may address this: WP:NOT#Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, or textbook (it's not a travel guide) or WP:NOT#Wikipedia is not a directory (it's not the white pages). But, note Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, where the infobox gives the street address. Postdlf (talk) 22:23, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
There's usually reason to have them on the article; it isn't encyclopedic content (unless you're discussing how a specific subject has moved from one historic location to another, or discussing a specific building), and can just as readily be found by the users on the subject's official website (which, for stuff like the Federal Reserves, there's always one of). The reason that the Boston article has an address is because that's a skyscraper infobox (and for articles about buildings themselves, it does make sense to list the address). EVula // talk // ☯ // 23:00, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Could I add the number to the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston? Or is that discouraged? (Just double checking)Smallman12q (talk) 00:27, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
What number? The address is already there. The phone number? No, that's not a good idea. EVula // talk // ☯ // 00:36, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
Some infobox templates have a line for address, phone number, or contact information. If this is not wanted, the templates should be changed. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 05:09, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
And they absolutely should be as this is just encouraging spam. – ukexpat (talk) 16:23, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree that they should be removed, but I can't imagine how a business' address or phone number being posted to their article encourages spam. EVula // talk // ☯ // 17:02, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
This is the Federal Reserve, I don't believe anyone would have the nerve of spamming them. I also would like to point out that the number is very visible on their website.Smallman12q (talk) 11:05, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
These guys will try to spam and scam anyone. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 15:12, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
What I meant was that having the ability to put contact details in an ibox will encourage even more spammers to write adverts masquerading as articles. – ukexpat (talk) 04:23, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
I think the website definetly should be put under an external links sections as is allowed. The phone is a bit more strange but I would allow it. I think what people are talking about is that putting phone numbers could lead to spamming on wikipedia. I think this is crazy and putting phone numbers of any company that is notable enough to have an article should not be considered spamming. It takes up only 10 or so characters get over it. --AresAndEnyo (talk) 15:14, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
How long have they been at the address? Is the "unencyclopaediac" guideline supposed to prevent stuff like silly information? With respect to the WP:NOT guideline, adding the address will hardly make the site look like an address book. Any other reason that the information should not be possible to reference here? ~ R.T.G 00:09, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
No one in this thread seems to have considered the possibility that telephone numbers will attract the activities of vandals and (worse) criminals, who will substitute bogus numbers for the real ones. Imagine the mischief that can be caused with redirects posing as the telephone number for an Israeli embassy, for example, or a pro/anti abortion organisation. Or the tangible damage of people calling what they think is the headquarters of their personal bank, but is actually the number of someone 'phishing' for account details. In some instances, hijacked addresses could lead to similar problems. There would need to be an immense amount of policing if WP wished to avoid being regarded as a scammers' paradise. Much better, I would have thought, to direct people to far less easily edited sites for such details (federalreserve.gov, in this instance), where security and policing should already be in place. Sure, the mischief potential with the Fed Atlanta as a specific case would seem to be small, but more generally, phone numbers and addresses strike me as a minefield just waiting for the unwary foot. Grubstreet (talk) 01:33, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
Most steady templates are protected and rightly so leaving room to enter anything you want that needs protected. Some people will imagine Wikipedia to be used for finding a phone number and think, "That's ghastly!" or, "That's not encyclopaediac in this Britannica I have!" or terror to thought, "A reporter man laughed at me!", resulting that they have less or no interest in collecting and displaying the sum of human knowledge in an encyclopaediac manner, disseminated to suit reaching all. Is Bart Simpson liable to make mischeif out of phone numbers of American embassies and Russian banks? Well it is about time we started providing him with those numbers then. Anyway, how long are they at the address, how likely are they to move. It is probably fruitless to provide an address for the travelling wilburys but the Federal bank of Atlanta maybe will be interesting and useful information? ~ R.T.G 11:18, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Proposed "mocking" policy

Resolved
 – As User:Sławomir Biała has been permanently blocked, I'm assuming this matter has been resolved.Smallman12q (talk) 01:46, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

There is already a "blocking" policy for those with admin powers against lesser editors. As these have shown themselves to be nearly as capricious and nasty on average as regular editors, I propose a "mocking" option whereby an editor may formally, and without fear of administrative repercussion, {{mock}} an administrator. Since the purpose of administrator powers is only to help ordinary editors of the encyclopedia, clearly a censure process is needed, independently of the biased and self-congratulatory proceedings at WP:AN. How about a general "editors' noticeboard", regarding abuses of the administrative process. Whereas clearly administrators hold most of the cards, ordinary editors are still the ones who build the encyclopedia. Sławomir Biała (talk) 02:28, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

There have been numerous such proposals over the years, none of which came to much. The most recent is User:Tony1/AdminReview, I'd suggest you make your thoughts known there (and, if you seriously want to enact such a mechanism, rather than just bitch about the big, bad admins, I'd suggest deleting the the pointless {{mock}} template). Rockpocket 02:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
Umm... did you just call be a bitch? Sławomir Biała (talk) 02:57, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
He used "bitch" as a verb there to mean "complain." --MZMcBride (talk) 03:02, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
Umm... Correct. But thanks for making my point, Sławomir Biała [8] Rockpocket 03:02, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
People may mock me, however I ask that it be done with civility, in good humor(without anger), and that it addresses specific concerns in a constructive nature. Extra points if it is in the form of a haiku. Chillum 03:06, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Whereas the evidence cited above of behaving like a "bitch" was clearly presented in an outrageously tongue-in-cheek fashion, the issue of being called one still remains. Anyway, as it is evident that the adiminstrative community as a whole rejects my proposal, as well as me personally, I suggest that I should be blocked from editing, for bitching. If not, maybe we can continue this discussion in a more constructive and mature fashion. And, Chillum, if the suggestion of a haiku is sincere, then I would happily oblige. Sławomir Biała (talk) 03:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I didn't call you a bitch or suggest you were behaving like one. Bitch is a noun, I used a verb. I did note that a serious proposal for dealing with admin abuse is welcome, a but simply using a mocking template for bitching (i.e. Unjustifiably complaining) about admins is not. You can decide for yourself which of those best describes your response. Rockpocket 07:21, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
A cabal against
dragons, in the bitter winter.
A new beginning. Sławomir Biała (talk) 03:33, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
 10 pts - haiku
 5  pts bonus - using the word cabal
 5  pts bonus - using the word bitter
-15 pts demerit - I don't feel very mocked

5 points... Chillum 04:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

You asked for it!
Bitch you are.
Minus fifteen points.
Bitch, bitchy. Sławomir Biała (talk) 05:05, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

proper use of a [who?] tag

In Birthright citizenship in the United States of America, an editor wrote an edit referring to "Other senators.." Not knowing who these "Other senators.." are, I attached a [who?] tag to that statement. The original editor removed my [who?] tag with the edit summary "Many senators, too many to list". Are we allowed to use weasel words as long as we justify it with "too many to list"?-65.189.247.6 (talk) 03:05, 26 February 2009 (UTC)y

Given that the sentence is referenced, and since we're describing a debate, I think not providing a list is in this case fine. However I think the Current controversy section of the article has insufficient context to make it comprehensible - certainly I'm no wiser about what the controversy is, having just read it. --Tagishsimon (talk) 03:13, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Having read the actual debate, I remain as confused as ever about who the alleged "Other senators" are. Like you, what the controversy is, exactly, isn't clear because everyone seems to be in general agreement with each other except for these unspecifed "Other senators". It was my hope that if we could identify who these "Other senators" are, we could better explore their side of the debate and, thereby have a much more rounded discussion of the "controversy". The fact that the section is using weasel words to identify the party members on one side of the "controversy" is why, I believe, this section is so muddled in describing the "controversy".-65.189.247.6 (talk) 03:38, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The tag is perfectly appropriate. Senators should either be named or numbered, or the sentence rephrased. Hinting at unspecified persons is the definition of weasel words. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 09:31, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Agreed but I hardly think all the senators need to be listed. Just choose the leading advocates or most notable senators. I don't think "Other senators, such as Joe Bloggs of some where, argued that..." constitutes waesel words. — Blue-Haired Lawyer 11:33, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
I'd be okay with that if the sentence were more like, "Other senators, such as Joe Bloggs and Alfred E. Neumann, argued that..". That is, if "Senators" (plural) is being used, source more than one (two is fine). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.189.247.6 (talk) 12:06, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
It could be better still if it were phrased "several prominent Senators opposed the bill, including..." or "enough Senators opposed the bill to make its passing unlikely...", again sourced as well as possible. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 12:13, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
With respect, neither of those is appropriate. The senate floor debates were over whether the citizenship clause was restrictive enough, not whether it was lax enough. Conness is the only exception to that that I've been able to identify.-65.189.247.6 (talk) 12:40, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Had I been informed of this discussion I might have been able to put it in context. Birthright citizenship in the United States of America, like a number of English Wikipedia's immigration-related articles, has long carried some very weak content. During the recent US presidential election the article was subject to edit warring by some of the same people active on the election campaigns, as Barack Obama's citizenship status was subject to some fringe conspiracy theories. Among other things the article tried to explain the citizenship status of children of legal and illegal immigrants to be a matter of some dispute, and posited that the US Constitution is unclear on the subject, by direct reference (i.e. WP:OR) to arguments made in the 1860s during the debate over the adoption of the 14th Amendment. That is pretty much wrong on all counts. For the past 110 years or so the constitution has been consistently interpreted by the courts to provide with a few exceptions that the children of immigrants born within the US are US citizens. Whether their parents are in the US legally or not, such people are universally treated as citizens. The notion that the Constitution says otherwise is more than a little fringe-y, and the idea of denying citizenship to these people is a fairly extreme (though notable) political movement that has taken slight hold among some conservatives. Appeals to the senate floor debate as a general matter seldom come into the judicial reasoning process, and when they do it is in a specialized legal reasoning form not very easily reproduced in an encyclopedia. We can possibly cover it as a matter of historical interest but it but we would need a reliable secondary source, and should not incorrectly suggest that determining the intent of congress is the way this law is interpreted. WP:WEASEL is about an entirely different issue, whether we can use "some people say" as a matter of characterizing what the sources say. It has nothing to do with the use of "some" rather than enumeration when describing a sourced thing. Wikidemon (talk) 21:08, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The village pump is for discussion of Wikipedia policy and how it affects the presentation of web pages. The central question here is whether using weasel words can be justified with saying that, "[using weasel words] is often better than enumerating things".-99.148.205.139 (talk) 23:27, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
That's a moot point because "some" is not a weasel word in this context. But yes, if it did come to it and using a so-called weasel word, WP:PEACOCK term, etc., conveyed the sourced information in a more faithful way than listing specifics then content would have to prevail over style. WP:WEASEL is part of the WP:MOS. Style guidelines should never get in the way of encyclopedic presentation of content. The IP editor who posted this has been edit warring against my effort to clean up that particular page so it is not an abstract question. Wikidemon (talk) 23:37, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
I don't see any evidence of edit warring on that page. There's no 3RRs that I see. What's your concept of "edit warring"? I think the discussion here at the Village Well indicates that most people support the idea of writing, "Other senators including XXX[1] and YYY[2] argued that.." You have a strong objection to that, but you haven't done a very good job at all explaining what your strong objection is. To move this discussion forward, why don't you do so? -99.148.205.139 (talk) 00:06, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
I've said what happened. I cleaned the article of some fringe-y partisan material on grounds of WP:OR, WP:WEIGHT, WP:V, WP:NPOV, etc. The original poster mischaracterized it as the insertion of a weasel word, in process of partly undoing the efforts, and started this thread without telling me. My objection is as stated above but I'm not going to discuss that in detail here, or the quality of my explanation, or what WP:EW means. This discussion is a process fork at this point. Proposals to improve the article are best made on the article talk page. Wikidemon (talk) 04:06, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
The Village Well is for the discussion of policy, specifically "is the assertion 'too many to list' a justifiable reason for removing a [who?] tag". You've been asked to identify and source two people (so as to justify the use of the plural). Instead, you've attempted to shift the focus away from policy discussion and towards attempting to bait me into personal conflict. Again the question being asked here is whether the claim that there are too many to list is appropriate justification for removing a [who?] tag. While we're at it, we might as well also ask whether it is unreasonable to ask you to identify and source two people as examples to justify your use of weasel words.-65.189.247.6 (talk) 11:57, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm done here. You're just being confrontational.Wikidemon (talk) 15:22, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
I don't know what to do here. Wikidemon won't adhere to policy, continues trying to bait me into a personal confrontation, and refuses to engage in discussion. Is there a conflict resolution process (one that is actually working, people rarely respond to RfCs) available to deal with this problem?-65.189.247.6 (talk) 16:47, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Disabling talk page editing when blocking users

moved from WP:AN by Skomorokh 13:39, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The Mediawiki interface says this: "Allow this user to edit own talk page while blocked. (Disable only for users known to abuse own talk page.)"

I think we need to come up with a coherent policy, or at least a notion, of what qualifies as abuse. Some outstanding questions.

  • Does post block ranting/venting count as abuse, or should we be more tolerant? If so, how much more?
  • Is uncivil conduct on face abuse?
  • Is this a good feature to have anyway?
  • Should the feature be mothballed until we have a clear policy?
  • Should we just wing it?

I know I've opened a gigantic can of worms, but bonus points to anyone who can stop themselves from spinning this off into a larger argument on the place of civility policy.--Tznkai (talk) 02:57, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

We already do have a policy for that. — Aitias // discussion 03:06, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Thats protection policy you've linked, this feature is an extension of blocking.--Tznkai (talk) 03:16, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, it is the protection policy, but it rules the use of this feature. :) — Aitias // discussion 03:28, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Since this came about as a result of my re-blocking RMHED, I feel obliged to add my thoughts. Post block rants are to be expected, and as has been discussed previously (can't remember where) we should be reasonably tolerant of these, with regard to extending the block. That said, the purpose of a users talk page while blocked is really only to request unblocking, or to discuss the block. It is difficult to see anything positive at all in attacking other editors. I do think that clearer guidelings at WP:BLOCK are required to better define what constitutes talk page abuse. Kevin (talk) 03:11, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

That was the proximate cause, but this is an issue I feel has been festering for a while, and having been stung by it in the past, I think its past time we get a real idea of what our expectations are.--Tznkai (talk) 03:20, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
This is merely an extension of the protection policy; its page protection via another button, but its essentially the same thing. If we trust admins to have good judgement on issuing blocks and on protecting talk pages, this seems like something we trust admins to have the good judgement to do also. If we disable the feature, we're all going to just go back to protecting the talk page the old way. Its a moot point, since the protection policy page already covers this. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:46, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
There is an important distinction however, in that using the blocking option is one sided. Allowing others to edit the talk page while the blocked user cannot is not always a good idea. Kevin (talk) 03:57, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
No, but the set of cases where it would be good to fully protect the talk page (allowing admins to edit it, still) but not good to simply restrict the blocked user from editing it is pretty small. In cases like that it would be simpler to just revert unwanted comments made by users (trolling, etc) than have some policy which dictated when to use which protection button. Protonk (talk) 04:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm with Jayron. The policy linked above covers this pretty well. Protonk (talk) 04:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Ditto that for me too. --Kralizec! (talk) 16:11, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Blocked users can edit their own talk page is an old discussion that led to this feature's enabling, might be what Kevin referred to.John Z (talk) 00:48, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
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