Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 3

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Entry for the Bible

Let's discuss the entry for the Bible, removed at Special:Diff/930241923:

Source	Status (legend)	Discussions			Uses
		List	Last	Summary
Bible		1 2 3	2018	The Bible is a WP:PRIMARY religious source that has been unfavourably compared to "a load of crap". A few editors consider the source usable in some cases. Its analysis by Wikipedia editors is prohibited by the policy on original research.	1

The above summary is needlessly inflammatory, and I think we can do better before including it into the list. — Newslinger talk 04:33, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

@Newslinger: The wording can be tweaked, I do not WP:OWN the entry. But, yes, the general view at Wikipedia is that holy books aren't WP:RS. Tgeorgescu (talk) 04:36, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

I'm reviewing the past discussions now. The Bible meets our inclusion criteria, but it will take some time to read through all of the discussions. — Newslinger talk 04:57, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Yup, most germane comments seems to be:

The Bible is a primary historical source document, and should only be used on that basis. It says X, that doesn't mean we can say that X is true, but is verifiable that the Bible says X and that fact can be included in relevant articles. You can't interpret a primary source: "This bit says X and that bit says says Y, therefore Z" is not acceptable; "This says X and that says Y" is broadly acceptable. However, you shouldn't need to doyour own exegesis. Every part of the Bible has been the subject of detailed study by experts. If there's a particular historical event that interests you, experts will have written about it, explaining its context and meaning in minute detail. The works of those experts should be the references for anything other than simply repeating or paraphrasing or summarising what the Bible says. In this the Bible is no different from any other primary historical source. Angus McLellan (Talk) 00:38, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

This one is shorter:

The Bible, is at best, a primary source. I would not be surprised if there was not at least a book written on every single passage in the Bible. Just cite those if you want to mention the Biblical account of things. NW Talk 19:15, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

The reason is that we report Bible scholarship, we don't do Bible scholarship. Tgeorgescu (talk) 05:46, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree. The wording is needlessly inflammatory. Perhaps something like this would be better:

The Bible is a WP:PRIMARY source only suitable for attributed, relevant quotes and in compliance with other Wikipedia content policies and guidelines. Analysis of biblical content by Wikipedia editors is prohibited original research."

- MrX 🖋 13:20, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, this looks much better. The issue that makes classifying the Bible difficult is that the classifications are designed for secondary sources and not primary sources. Any primary source can be quoted with attribution if the content is due and supplemented by reliable secondary sources, regardless of its veracity. It's not the purpose of this list to endorse or rebuke a religion, and I am a bit concerned that labeling the Bible as generally unreliable could negatively impact the list's credibility, when e.g. Hansard (RSP entry) is classified under "No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply". I'm still reviewing the past discussions, and I think we can add more discussions to the list column. — Newslinger talk 16:51, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Would it be worth considering an additional line to the end of MrX's proposal, along the lines of:

Content that interprets or summarizes biblical passages or narratives should generally be cited to appropriate scholarly sources (for example, in the academic field of religious studies) and attributed when appropriate.

--Neutrality^talk 17:36, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

I would support that. I'm not sure how to address Newslinger's concern about classifying the Bible as an unreliable source. From the perspective of the Bible being a collection of historical accounts, I think we can say that is not a reliable (secondary) source. - MrX 🖋 17:45, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Not everything needs to be "classified". Suggest we leave the table row with a white background, and don't include a symbol in the "Status" column. Or leave it off the table entirely. - Ryk72 ^talk 17:52, 11 December 2019 (UTC) added Ryk72 ^talk 23:07, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

It is not a collection of historical accounts. It includes myths, legends, genealogies, wisdom literature, psalms, religious laws and regulations, supposed prophecies, etc. It is a collection of books from various genres, and many of them are not even attempting to offer a historical narrative. Dimadick (talk) 18:17, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Amen. And that highlights the reductive nature of categorising reliability at the level of the publisher or publication; a shortcut which while useful, has its limitations. - Ryk72 ^talk 23:07, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

I'd settle for any option that says that the Bible, Koran, Vedas, etc., are not to be interpreted by Wikipedia editors. This list codifies practice, and it is practice since long ago that these aren't WP:RS. So there is nothing new or original in my proposal. Tgeorgescu (talk) 23:57, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Would that not already be covered by WP:NOR, which, as a core policy, has much more force than this supplement? This page is not, and should not be, the alpha and omega of content policy. - Ryk72 ^talk 00:26, 12 December 2019 (UTC)

It's true, it is covered by WP:NOR, but fundamentalist POV-pushers repeatedly fail to get this point. So yeah, I would go for:

Source	Status (legend)	Discussions			Uses
		List	Last	Summary
Bible and every other holy book		1 2 3	2018	The Bible is a WP:PRIMARY source only suitable for attributed, relevant quotes and in compliance with other Wikipedia content policies and guidelines. Analysis of biblical content by Wikipedia editors is prohibited original research. Content that interprets or summarizes biblical passages or narratives should generally be cited to appropriate scholarly sources (for example, in the academic field of religious studies) and attributed when appropriate. Original research performed by Wikipedia editors upon holy books is prohibited by website policy. All claims about holy books have to be sourced to secondary scholarly sources.	1

Tgeorgescu (talk) 01:39, 12 December 2019 (UTC)

Below is an edited version to cut some redundancy:

Source	Status (legend)	Discussions			Uses
		List	Last	Summary
Scriptural texts such as the Bible		1 2 3 4	2018	Scriptural texts, such as the Bible, Qur'an, and Vedas, are primary sources only suitable for attributed, relevant quotes and in compliance with other Wikipedia content policies and guidelines. Content that interprets or summarizes scriptural passages or narratives should generally be cited to appropriate scholarly sources (for example, in the academic field of religious studies) and attributed when appropriate. Analysis of biblical content by Wikipedia editors is prohibited by the Wikipedia policy regarding original research.

Any objections to this? Neutrality^talk 20:32, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

That looks fine to me, and we can incorporate the remaining discussions into the entry later. I wonder if "No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply" would be appropriate here (since additional considerations do apply), or if the entry would be better with no classification at all. — Newslinger talk 01:34, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

Also, I would format the "Source" column to resemble the other entries, i.e. Scriptural texts (Bible, Quran, Vedas). — Newslinger talk 05:36, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree with either of these versions in general. With regards to the classification, I would consider this to best fit under "generally unreliable", since the additional considerations are essentially the same as those that apply to other sources in that category - you can quote it directly when it's the subject of discussion, etc. I would be especially wary of giving POV pushers a potential way to try and wikilawyer the existence of additional exceptions, which I think other classifications (or even a lack of classification) would do. If there are claims about other primary sources being treated differently, I would point out that scriptures are notoriously unreliable for statements of fact, as is best known for statements relevant to science, while in contrast there is little doubt that (for example) Hansard is generally an accurate reflection of the proceedings that it describes. Sunrise (talk) 12:24, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

That's a good point, and it alleviates my concern. Should the text in WP:GUNREL be amended to say something about primary sources? — Newslinger talk 14:56, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

Maybe? In contrast to your comment above, I don’t think of the criteria as applying to sources differently based on whether they’re primary, secondary, or tertiary. Certainly reliability is affected by which category a source is used under, but that’s a general principle independent of their classification here. Alternatively, I would consider specific cases (such as a source that’s generally unreliable as a secondary source still being reliable as a primary source for the specific purpose of citing its own opinion) to be exceptions to the classifications rather than directly changing them. Anything that this reasoning doesn’t cover would probably be a special case for an individual source and could be described in the summary. That said, I imagine this is a separate conversation. :-) Sunrise (talk) 03:59, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

• Only noting that per the RSP inclusion criteria, our summary here should not contain novel information not included in the linked discussions. I have added one (fairly weak) discussion related to the Quran. Finding a more in-depth and more broadly participated discussion would improve the entry. As to the Vedas, again, per the RSP inclusion criteria, we should not include it in our summary if we are not directly summarizing a separate discussion about the source.

RSP summarizes but does not create consensus regarding the reliability of sources. And it's important that we maintain that distinction to avoid merely duplicating the purpose of RSN. The only consensus RSP should be concerned with is how to best summarize the preexisting consensus. GMG^talk 13:53, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

You're right, none of the discussions on the Vedas meet the inclusion criteria, so the Vedas shouldn't be mentioned in the entry. Scriptural texts (Bible, Quran) would accurately reflect the linked discussions. — Newslinger talk 14:51, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

That all makes sense to me. Is the following OK as a final version?

Source	Status (legend)	Discussions			Uses
		List	Last	Summary
Scriptural texts (Bible, Quran)		1 2 3 4	2018	The Bible and Quran, as scriptural texts, are primary sources only suitable for attributed, relevant quotes and in compliance with other Wikipedia content policies and guidelines. Content that interprets or summarizes scriptural passages or narratives should generally be cited to appropriate scholarly sources (for example, in the academic field of religious studies) and attributed when appropriate. Analysis of scriptural content by Wikipedia editors is prohibited by the Wikipedia policy regarding original research.	—

--Neutrality^talk 17:36, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

Looks great. I've applied the background color, added an id to the row, and added an em dash to the "Uses" column to be consistent with WP:RSP § Wikidata transcluded statements. (See diff for details.) — Newslinger talk 17:49, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

That looks good to me as well. - MrX 🖋 01:48, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Y GMG^talk 16:17, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

 Added. Thanks for your help, everyone! — Newslinger talk 00:35, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

OANN wording tweak

ZiaLater, I noticed your update of the perennial sources list and wondered if this wording should be tweaked:

This does not mean One America News Network can no longer be used, but it should not be used, ever, as a reference for facts, due to its unreliability. It can still be used as a primary source when attributing opinions, viewpoints, and commentary.

I believe this is incorrect. An unreliable source, especially a deprecated one, can only be used in its own article to document its own positions and opinions, and even then only if it is not "unduly self-serving".

With that one exception, all content in our articles must be exclusively sourced using RS. In that connection, if a RS mentions OANN's views, then the RS can be used anywhere to document their views, but we still cannot use OANN directly as the source.

WP:Fringe and WP:Undue weight apply here:

Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. (Bolding added)

Therefore, I suggest the wording above be replaced with something like this:

This means that OANN can never be used as a source outside of its own article. Its views are generally so false, fringe, and have so little weight that they can only be documented elsewhere by using a RS that mentions them. It is the RS which gives them weight enough for single-use mention in that situation.

Both left- and right-wing opinions should be documented here because they can vary a lot without being so extreme that they become counterfactual. "Everyone has a right to their own opinions, but not to their own facts." By contrast, falsehoods simply have no weight here, and they only get mentioned when RS do so, and then only when it's necessary to do so. Generally, they should be ignored.

This is often the only way we are allowed to deal with conspiracy theories, pseudoscience, etc. These things are unfortunately part of the "sum total of human knowledge" we are required to document here, but only if they have enough weight to be noticed by RS. If that happens, we can use the RS to document them. Because Trump is so "factually challenged", this is our de facto way of dealing with many of his statements because, as the legendary User:MjolnirPants (04:57, 2 October 2018) has stated: "The president is possibly the single most unreliable source for any claim of fact ever to grace the pages of WP."

I believe that other listings of deprecated sources should be accompanied by such wording. Does that make sense? -- BullRangifer (talk) 21:16, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: Thank you for the notification. I will take a look in a moment.----ZiaLater (talk) 21:38, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Quackwatch after RfC

Now that the Quackwatch RfC has been closed, we need to determine whether the source's status should be changed. I've updated the description to settle all of the things that were marked as "(disputed)", but the wording may need to be improved. — Newslinger talk 16:27, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

Can anyone give an example of WikiLeaks publishing false information?

I had a look for inaccuracies myself hoping to decide if the ban on them as a reputable source (when sources that deliberately mislead the US public leading up to the war in Iraq and similar were still treated as such) and found none. The opposition to them seems opinion based on inaccurate assumptions at best.

I believe in revealing my biases so I'm an old 70%ish white guy who remembers what the Democratic party used to be before Bill Clinton and the [neocon]/[neoliberal] (same thing) [third way] alliance.

WikiLeaks was loved for exposing corruption until it was "centrist" corruption and I think there is a strong possibility that those most opposing it's inclusion in this site are being paid to do so.

I am aware of my biases however, and wait with baited breath for actual examples of WikiLeaks "getting it wrong." They should exist if the negative reputation is more than the results of a coordinated smear campaign. ~~ TheGrinningViking (talk) 18:32, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

TheGrinningViking, the place to raise this concern is the reliable sources noticeboard. That having been said, from reading our entry for it here, it seems that the primary concern with WikiLeaks isn't that it's inaccurate, it's that it is a primary source. Per our policies against original research, it would thus be inappropriate to cite them for claims directly (although it would be permissible to cite WikiLeaks for say, a verbatim quote from a document provided that a reliable secondary source has published content on it). _signed, Rosguill ^talk 19:17, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Amend summary on The Sun?

The current summary says: "Some editors consider The Sun usable for uncontroversial sports reporting, although more reliable sources are recommended."

The actual RFC doesn't say that at all - there's a line in the analysis "I also note that many have noted that any uncontroversial information which can be sourced to the Sun (sports score-lines et al) can almost-always be sourced to another source of repute." The comments in the RFC include:

I can appreciate a counter-argument that The Sun is good for up to date sports results, and that those are pretty reliable - however, WP:BLPSOURCES correctly states, "When material is both verifiable and noteworthy, it will have appeared in more reliable sources."

That's the only mention of sports.

I note this because some editors seem to think that line in the RSP summary means it's a green-rated sure fire RS as long as the subject matter vaguely relates to sports. (There was a long row about this that ended up at WP:ARCA a short time ago.) And that's not what the summary, nor the comments in the RFC, said or meant - David Gerard (talk) 20:53, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

ping Winged Blades of Godric who closed the RFC, Feminist who first added the sports carveout, and Newslinger who amended it, for clarity - David Gerard (talk) 21:09, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

It's saddens me to think that people detest all of the Sun newspaper, for some reason you included The Irish Sun, and Scottish Sun together when they are in fact different papers with different editorials. Reliability is questioned for every article? I really don't understand why other sources are needed for basic fact reporting. Govvy (talk) 22:28, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Hence why a broad RFC was run on the issue. My question here is about how to correctly describe the deprecation, if you want to change consensus on the question then you want WP:RSN - David Gerard (talk) 00:02, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

I question whether The Sun can be used for reception sections regarding sporting events. Wondering if anyone can clear this up for me exactly.--WillC 23:08, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Even the RFC resolution, as quoted above, says not to if you possibly can - David Gerard (talk) 00:02, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Hence I noted that it was only "some editors" who considered the Sun to be OK for sports reporting, not that it was a consensus between participants at the discussions. Perhaps I should remove the mention of "for sports", because a sizeable minority at the RfC thought that the Sun is OK for opinion etc. without necessarily limiting it to sports. feminist (talk) 01:22, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

I'd suggest removing that line entirely - it wasn't in the RFC text or in the RFC finding, and is observably being misinterpreted as a free-for-all because there are editors who really want to use the bad source cos it's convenient - David Gerard (talk) 09:44, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

a sizeable minority at the RfC thought that the Sun is OK for opinion etc I don't see that present at all in the RFC text - there's nothing in it to support that as a summary either. What are you thinking of here? - David Gerard (talk) 13:18, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Wouldn't there be a moratorium on a thing like this? Isn't there a point where The Sun was reliable and then a point where it ceased being as such. Because I would figure in 2008 it would have been fine. Maybe I'm wrong. I'm not deeply familiar with the source outside or occasional use.--WillC 01:54, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

The Sun has literally always been trash since its inception, decades back. From The_Sun_(United_Kingdom)#Early_Murdoch_years: The tabloid Sun was first published on 17 November 1969, with a front page headlined "HORSE DOPE SENSATION", an ephemeral "exclusive". And read on from there. It hasn't improved - David Gerard (talk) 09:44, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

The problems I see is you are limiting the amount of sources being able to be used on wikipedia. You will end up with articles sourced from a limited amount of news services. Sometimes what The Sun reports on can have a domino effect, with this stupid RfC disregards the first instance of who reported the story and that can be just as important to the story itself. Articles should be primary sourced as well as secondary sourced and The Sun can at times be the primary source and I've seen people removing that primary source. Govvy (talk) 11:24, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

This is not at all about improving WP. It's about a handful of editors finding an excuse to make themselves feel powerful over the Sun or the Daily Mail. It's ego, not accuracy. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:59, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

The place to argue this point is WP:RSN, not here, if you want to argue and change the consensus achieved in the RFC - David Gerard (talk) 14:12, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

What on earth is Andy Dingley going on about?? How is that constructive to the conversation ? Govvy (talk) 16:33, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Can you at least allow The Sun to remain as source for old articles like SummerSlam (2009). At that time it was very reliable, and it had been considered that way for 10 years. It has been cited unreliable in recent time so it should not be used for recent articles. But removing all the information from the older articles destroys the quality of the articles and some of the articles you removed the Sun as a source from had broken links, you do not do any thing about broken links. Are administrators supposed to start calling sources unreliable anytime they want? Just saying, I respect your decision, but please take into account the quality of the older articles which are affected by removing the Sun as source and their recent unreliability is not associated with the Sun being considered an extremely reliable source back in 2009, and the contents were the 2009 contents of the Sun not the present day "unreliable Sun's" contents. Dilbaggg (talk) 17:11, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

The Sun was never at any time "extremely reliable". The place to argue that The Sun is "extremely reliable" is WP:RSN, as I've pointed out a few times. The present discussion is purely about how to accurately represent the consensus that was reached on WP:RSN previously - David Gerard (talk) 21:03, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

See this is what I don't get, the sports section of the paper, basically tells you how a game went down, gives some analysis, etc. To say that every part of the paper is unreliable? I think that's the wrong way to go about it. Wikipedia is just getting political, neutrality of articles will end up being one sided! Besides, I don't know why I bother editing this thing sometimes, half the articles are written so poorly, feels like a robot wrote the articles! Govvy (talk) 13:04, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

I've learnt from bitter experience not to even trust the analysis in the Sun. They make stuff up that can't be verified anywhere else, because they're the Sun. There's a reason they're deprecated, and it's because they're long-term habitual liars who can't be trusted - David Gerard (talk) 13:15, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

The sports section of The Sun then is redundant if that is all it does, and there are more reliable sources that can be used for basic reporting of facts and figures? If The Sun was the sole source for a particular claim, or insight into the game, then you would have to wonder how significant that view is.

However The Sun is still The Sun. So its objectivity and segregation of its editorial policies from day to day news (including sports) are unclear and always have been. Their content is general loaded with hyperbole, and sensationalised titles even for sports, or sports related content (for instance Raheem Sterling a few years ago with the 'gun tattoo') and they have not been above letting responses to front page news influence their back page sports writing (see Ashley Cole and the whole allegation of homosexual acts, for which he sued them). In short, The Sun is a tabloid newspaper of little to no merit. Koncorde (talk) 13:25, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Just a reminder: since this talk page only receives a fraction of the pageviews as the noticeboard, discussions on this page aren't factored into the list entries. If any editor wishes to introduce new arguments, WP:RSN is the correct venue where those arguments can be thoroughly examined by the community.

Responding to David Gerard's original question: I think the sentence in the entry's summary ("Some editors consider The Sun usable for uncontroversial sports reporting, although more reliable sources are recommended.") is an acceptable interpretation of the bullet point in the RfC's closing summary ("I also note that many have noted that any uncontroversial information which can be sourced to the Sun (sports score-lines et al) can almost-always be sourced to another source of repute.") However, it's debatable whether the sentence needs to be in the entry. Over 50 editors commented in the survey section of the RfC, while only 2 editors made positive remarks about The Sun's sport coverage. — Newslinger talk 16:01, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Any substantive objections to removing the sentence, anyone? - David Gerard (talk) 21:35, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Yes. I see no problem with using it for non-controversial sports coverage. While only two may have supported its use for sports coverage then, this thread has already shown more than two users in support (with a sample size of far less than 50). Removing it from "controversial" (?) claims like "This event happened before, but this was the first time it was broadcast on pay-per-view" is ridiculous. You might not like it based on some of your experiences, but a blanket condemnation doesn't seem to be in order. GaryColemanFan (talk) 23:59, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Please start a new discussion on the reliable sources noticeboard if you want new arguments to be taken into account. Descriptions of sources in the list only factor in consensus from past discussions that are indexed in the corresponding entry. — Newslinger talk 03:36, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

This discussion is only about existing consensus in the RFC and the past discussions - present status is that The Sun is generally prohibited, and this discussion is about the description of the RFC and the past discussions. If you propose a change to The Sun's status, as you are proposing, then the place to get that through is at WP:RSN - we can't do a do-over here - David Gerard (talk) 07:29, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

You're the one proposing changing things. Currently, it indicates that some use for sports can be acceptable. If you're asking to remove that sentence, you should take the discussion to RSN. GaryColemanFan (talk) 14:12, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

You show little sign of understanding what we're saying here. That sentence is decided here, 'cos this is the talk page for the summary page. The summary page doesn't set the consensus, that's set at RSN. Just going WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT and repeating yourself isn't helpful or going to change the consensus - David Gerard (talk) 18:49, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Sure, let's talk about the summary. It clearly doesn't reflect the RfC, where a substantial amount of the support was for deprecation of The Sun with the clarification that they would not support an outright ban. Since it's being enforced as an outright ban, a more accurate summary is needed to reflect that, while discouraged, use of The Sun is permitted, and editors should not remove links to it en masse. GaryColemanFan (talk) 14:14, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

Good thing I'm editing according to the RFC conclusion, then - David Gerard (talk) 14:25, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

Network Propaganda: Manipulation, Disinformation, and Radicalization in American Politics

This is an excellent RS and resource:

• Network Propaganda: Manipulation, Disinformation, and Radicalization in American Politics Yochai Benkler, Robert Faris, and Hal Roberts

The insular right wing of the media ecosystem creates positive feedbacks for bias-confirming statements as a central feature of its normal operation. The rest of the media ecosystem comprises sites diverse enough in their political orientation, organizational culture, business model, and reputational needs to create impedance in the network. This system resists and corrects falsehood as its normal operation, even though, like all systems, it also occasionally fails, sometimes spectacularly.

Search that page for various websites and sources. Try Fox. -- BullRangifer (talk) 17:28, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Vox

I changed the Vox entry to remove "It is often considered a partisan source, particularly regarding American politics." which is not supported by the three linked discussions. - MrX 🖋 13:10, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

+1 - David Gerard (talk) 16:43, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Partisanship and bias should not be mentioned unless they cause content to be counterfactual. Mentioning bias just becomes a slur made by editors against a source, and that's not good, especially on a policy/guideline page.

It's perfectly possible for those left- and right-wing sources which are fairly close to center to be biased and still be factual. Bias is only a problem when they get further from center and their bias causes them to ignore facts or actually make false statements. Only then should we mention bias in a policy page. (Mentioning it in an article is often proper because RS do it.)

As usual, opinions should generally be attributed, unless they are identical to facts. Then facts sourced to an opinion article need no attribution. -- BullRangifer (talk) 16:58, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Some sources, including websites operated by advocacy groups, are expected to be used with in-text attribution per WP:BIASED – a section of the reliable sources guideline. This list aims to inform editors of the expectations around using a source, and I see no reason to exclude this information when it is supported by the listed discussions. — Newslinger talk 22:42, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

I totally agree. There is no disagreement between what I wrote and WP:BIASED. There is no requirement for bias to be mentioned on this project page (although perfectly fine on this talk page), but mention of the bias of a source is appropriate in our article about that source since RS do it all the time. Biased opinions should also be attributed. -- BullRangifer (talk) 22:49, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Vox is a perfectly reasonable news site, though, not an advocacy source - David Gerard (talk) 23:18, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Just to be clear, I have no objection to MrX's changes, but wanted to emphasize the importance of describing all sources on the list in a consistent way. — Newslinger talk 23:45, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

The New American

There have been quite a few discussion on The New American (TNA) as a RS (a surprising number compared to the number of remaining uses of the source), and I'm interested in seeing whether it would make sense to make some general statement about it through either the RSN/P or some other method. Discussions so far:

- 2009 RSN conversation: This came clearly to the idea that, at minimum, TNA is a POV source, and every member except one agreed that the source could only be used for statements about the John Birch Society. (5 users)

- 2010 RSN conversation: Unrelated conversation that wound up talking about RS. Every user but one (the same one from the 2009 conversation) who made a comment on the RS determination agreed that TNA is not an RS based on extremist views. (~10 users)

- 2010 RSN conversation: Three users argue for non-RS, and one (the same supporter from the previous conversations) argues for limited usage (4 users)

- 2012 RSN conversation: One user doesn't make a clear statement, one says "at minimum POV," and one says not a RS regarding anything except the John Birch Society(3 users)

- 2014 RSN conversation: Several users say it must be sourced as POV or opinion piece. Two state that it is inadmissible, since it makes false claims. (~5 users)

- 2016 RSN conversation: Off-hand mention that TNA is not RS (mostly about another source). No one disputes the idea that it's non-RS (3 users)

This seems to be pretty consistent opinions: a minority who argue for POV status at a minimum, and a majority who argue that it should not be RS.

I'm new to this territory, so I'm unsure of the next steps. Any recommendations on what the best next step is? Thanks! Jusadi (talk) 03:27, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

@Jusadi: Thanks for your input; I'll definitely see to it that it's added to the list. Feel free to tweak the description I write for it if you feel that it's inaccurate in some way or another. ToThAc (talk) 20:29, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Looks great! Thanks for putting it up. Jusadi (talk) 21:23, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

IGN?

ToThAc, it's a bit weird having a source listed as a green- rated subject-area RS that also excludes a whole group of writers on the site - surely that would be yellow at best - and does it connote notability? - David Gerard (talk) 10:27, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

@David Gerard: It is listed as reliable at WP:VGRS, so... ToThAc (talk) 16:04, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

ehh fair enough - David Gerard (talk) 16:42, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Yeah but we're kind of doing different things. VGRS includes some carve outs that we don't. I think it should be listed on VGRS as reliable. It should also be listed here as additional considerations apply. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:48, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: What kinds of discussions were you thinking of that establishes the "marginally reliable" consensus? ToThAc (talk) 17:54, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

mmm, looking at that it says Because the fields of video game journalism, research, criticism, and commentary are relatively new compared to similar coverage of traditional media, traditional means of sourcing can be somewhat rare. which is uncomfortably close to an ill-sourced area trying to create a special carveout for itself - though the rest of the essay does try to set out sensible ways to judge gaming sources - David Gerard (talk) 19:01, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Index

On Unix it used to be never go anywhere without your aliases, on enwiki it apparently is never add sources on a BLP without checking WP:RS/P first. Minor difficulty, tons of details at the top of the page only relevant for editors of this project age, the all important A…Z index for users (read/only) should be shown near the top before the details. –84.46.52.173 (talk) 15:50, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

You're quite right - I've just added "Click here to check the list of sources" clearly right up the top. (Let's see how long it stays near the top ...) - David Gerard (talk) 16:15, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Resolved

 – by David Gerard, two clicks.^[1] –84.46.53.117 (talk) 17:50, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Zero Hedge Permanently Suspended From Twitter for ‘Harassment’

Zero Hedge Permanently Suspended From Twitter for ‘Harassment’

• "A Twitter spokesperson said in an email to Bloomberg that the @zerohedge account, which had more than 670,000 followers, “was permanently suspended for violating our platform manipulation policy.”"

Zero Hedge should be deprecated completely. -- BullRangifer (talk) 20:12, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Could discuss it at RSN. (I'd consider it a great candidate, fwiw.) 61 uses in article space - David Gerard (talk) 20:56, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Does "depreciation" mean that we can still use it as a reference in its own article (which would be important)? Zero Hedge is an odd one, because on one hand it should not be used as a source (and usually it quotes other sources, so they can be used), as it is a source of wilder theories. One the other hand, it has produced some of the most accurate and insightful analyses of financial markets ever published on the internet. Walk into any trading room (there are still a few left), and almost every screen will have a window open to Zero Hedge. Bloomberg, Reuters, and all the strongest financial RS/P will cover this story because they themselves all read ZH, daily. ZH lives in two worlds – the non-financial conspiratorial alt-right etc. world (not an RS), and a hedge fund/wall street trading world, where it is read daily. Financial stories that appear on ZH move share prices; and in the world of trading, a US-based company like ZH would be shut down and imprisoned, if their financial stories were false/misleading. ZH financial stories do get carried in the major financial RS, per the WP article on ZH. Britishfinance (talk) 21:28, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Britishfinance, the word is "deprecated", and yes, it can still be used in its own article, but nowhere else. Even blacklisted sources can be used in that manner.

What happens at Twitter and here has little effect, and it is their political, not financial, stories which get them in trouble. They are wildly and extremely partisan to the point of being nonfactual. -- BullRangifer (talk) 00:17, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Zero Hedge is not encyclopediac (I don't even think that Zero Hedge would disagree with that). I also note that this bogus Wuhan Institute of Virology story that led to Zero Hedge being suspended on Twitter, began at the Washington Times and The Daily Mail (as per The Guardian and The Washington Post). At least Zero Hedge is a blog, however, RS like the Washington Times is an even more dangerous RS imho, as it tried to masquerade as a WPO, but is really no better than ZH? Britishfinance (talk) 01:43, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Both The Washington Times and Washington Examiner are unreliable sources. -- BullRangifer (talk) 01:54, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Like the Daily Mail, should they not also be deprecated? They seem to be very similar publications? Britishfinance (talk) 01:58, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

That's my opinion, but not everyone agrees. Because they occasionally get it right, their serious problems with accuracy are ignored. I don't get it. -- BullRangifer (talk) 03:28, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Here's the original Buzzfeed article: [2].

I've argued in the past that Zero Hedge can be shown, in reliable sources, to have an avid and notable following, and should at the least be usable with attribution [3]. Perhaps that remains true.

I must say that the referenced ZH article [4] seems to me beyond the pale. Bats are major carriers for pathogens, coronavirus included, and southern China has long struggled with epidemics due to population density, tropical climate, and other factors. Pointing at a researcher who studies these things and accusing them of starting an epidemic is awful and dangerous, since people are dying, clearly upset, and will have difficulty evaluating the veracity of the ZH allegations.

All this said, I don't think we would ever use ZH as a source of fact, even without this event. Instead, it would be used with attribution, as notable for its own opinion and the attention people give the blog. Given this, I don't think deprecating ZH would help readers or Wikipedia. I'm sorry to have to argue this, but outrage is probably the last thing that will lead to good policy. -Darouet (talk) 20:09, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

We should definitely move this to WP:RSN at this stage - David Gerard (talk) 22:03, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

+1 Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:48, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Times of India?

There's no entry on this list, despite the fact that it's one of the major news sources for one of the largest countries in the world. On RSN many editors seem to think it's reliable. Is there enough consensus or should an RFC be started on it? Thanks. buidhe 16:42, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Buidhe, I have encountered the Times of India on clearly paid-for articles so often that I think a closer look on whether the ToI separates editorial and advertising content is warranted. It's clearly an important newspaper, but I'm not at all convinced that it is trustworthy. The lifestyle section is particularly problematic. The examples have all been used as sources in recently created articles: [5], [6], [7], [8]. I' not sure how many of these kinds of sources we have, they are hard to keep track of because the articles where they're used get deleted, but it would be interesting to do some research into what exactly our "least reliable" sources are. I have a hunch that the ToI would make the list. Vexations (talk) 17:07, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

I ran a test to see if my claim that the ToI would make the list. It did. I made a list of all the biographies at currently at AfD, downloaded the articles, and generated a list of all the online sources and sorted them by how often they were used. The top 10 is:

66 youtube.com

24 amazon.com

14 theguardian.com

13 imdb.com

12 nytimes.com

12 discogs.com

11 timesofindia.indiatimes.com

11 sungazette.com

10 thehindu.com

10 books.google.com

The sources used are [9], [10], [11], [12], [13],

[14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19] It's worth noting that none of them are obviously advertising or advertorials. Vexations (talk) 18:00, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Vexations, Thanks for your analysis. I will start an RFC. buidhe 18:18, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

I repeated my experiment on articles that have been tagged with {{tl:Paid contributions}}: [20]. The top 10 looks like

33 timesofindia.indiatimes.com

25 doi.org

24 chathamhouse.org

22 kauppalehti.fi

19 cigionline.org

19 adweek.com

17 nytimes.com

17 highbeam.com

17 arxiv.org

16 sun-sentinel.com

So, the Times of India is the MOST frequently cited source in articles that we have identified as containing paid contributions. That should be cause for concern. Edit: It turns out this is because the ToI was cited 33 times in Aravindante Athidhikal. Vexations (talk) 18:23, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

• Generally reliable. Yes, it gets abused, but that is not its fault. -- BullRangifer (talk) 16:46, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

WP:SHORTCUTS for specific sources

I noticed just now [21] that we have more than I thought of these, WP:BREITBART, WP:WND etc. Should we try to include these as Shortcuts-boxes in the list? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:49, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Could do, I'd probably use them! Is there room in the list layout? Will it get mangled on mobile?

I'd generally put WP:DAILYMAIL as the relevant one for the Daily Mail - it's the most commonly-used link, and it's a deprecation that made worldwide news at the time - David Gerard (talk) 21:56, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps we could add both with some sort of explanatory note? It's an unusual situation.

On placement, I edit from a laptop, so from that perspective I could see them added (for example) in the "uses" column if it's made a little wider. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 22:22, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Tried one:[22]. David Gerard, ToThAc, Newslinger and other interested, what do you think? Perhaps even better under "Source". Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:35, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Workable on desktop :-) - David Gerard (talk) 16:16, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Ok, I hear no opposition as of now. I may add a few more. Right side seems traditional. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:26, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

+1 - David Gerard (talk) 17:18, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Done. It would be more elegant if they were centered in their column, is there an easy way to do that? Also, see what you think of the Daily Mail "solution", [23]. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:48, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

I got inspired and created 2 new ones: WP:RSPYT and WP:RSPSCRIPTURE. Slight glitch with RSPSCRIPTURE, I don't know how to properly get it into the empty Uses-column. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:40, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Oppose. These short cut templates expand the column with wasted white space. Use in a table is not what they were designed for. - MrX 🖋 13:48, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Also, what purpose do they serve? If someone is reading this list, a shortcut to what they are already reading is useless. If they are not reading the list, they can't see the shortcut template, so again, useless. - MrX 🖋 13:51, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

The shortcut is for the use of an editor who wants to tell another editor: Look at this. Like all such templates. You have to know they exist before you can use them. I know that the shortcut WP:RSP exists because this page tells me so. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:14, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

I understand that, but we have anchors for each entry. If an editor hovers over the wikilink in the first column, the anchor is displayed. I know it's not as simple as a shortcut. Maybe there is a compromise in something like this:

Source
Ancestry.com WP:ANCESTRY.COM📌
Breitbart News WP:BREITBART📌
Daily Mail (MailOnline) WP:DAILYMAIL📌 (2017 RfC) WP:RSPDM📌 (This page)

The div could be turned into a template. The benefit is that it does not expand the column width and squeeze other columns. - MrX 🖋 14:59, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

That looks equally useful to me. Slightly less obvious that it's a shortcut. I have no grasp of how the coding works, but if you do, that's not important. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 15:14, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

OK. Let's see what Newslinger, David Gerard, and ToThAc think of this approach. - MrX 🖋 15:20, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm not at all opposed to this. ToThAc (talk) 15:26, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

As long as it's visibly listed, it'll be useful and convenient - David Gerard (talk) 07:21, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Seems a generally good idea, although I'd want to see a fuller mockup before giving my thumbs up. And only have the obvious shortcuts use, not obscure ones like WP:RSPDM. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:19, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

yeah, half the value is when the shortcut name is the paper name, as with WP:DAILYMAIL - this is why I made WP:THESUN, 'cos WP:RSP#The_Sun looks more obscure - David Gerard (talk) 07:23, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Headbomb, WP:RSPDM is a new creation of mine, I wanted a DM shortcut that goes to this page (and shorter than existing WP:Citing Daily Mail) since WP:DAILYMAIL links to the 2017 Rfc per Wikipedia:Redirects_for_discussion/Log/2018_December_26#Wikipedia:DAILYMAIL. In this particular case I'd like both included, with efns like [24]. Similarly I created WP:RSPYT since WP:YT was taken for WP:EL. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:35, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

I also made WP:RSPSCRIPTURE, I didn't feel comfortable "claiming" WP:SCRIPTURE, but maybe I should have. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:59, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

I'd take it - I can't see anything better that would use it, e.g. in the MOS - David Gerard (talk) 11:59, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

No new column, please, but putting a shortcut at the begin of the summary would work for me. –84.46.52.200 (talk) 18:16, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks IP, nobody has so far suggested putting them in a new column. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:13, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Pinging participants David GerardMrXHeadbombToThAc (I'm told IP:s can't be pinged).

It's been a few days, and I'm reading the comments as being neutral to positive to MrX suggestion. I'm ok with them implementing it, it can always be reverted at need. If they want to do a fuller mockup per Headbomb's request that's ok too. Is it best to use wikitext or should a new template be created? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 06:48, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

yeah, go for it. I'd do it in wikitext first to minimise faff with fine-tuning it - David Gerard (talk) 09:27, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

If we use a (local) template, it will be easier to fine tune the styling than if we use the HTML/CSS markup for each entry. I can put a template together a little later today if that will help. Is everyone fine with using the push pin emoji? - MrX 🖋 12:41, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

It seems at worst harmless. Also, I'd like something like this [25] included for clarity, and we may run into other such cases. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 12:55, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

OK, I've implemented a template and invoked it on the live page for Ancestry.com, Breitbart, and DailyMail. The template will need a bit more tweeking, but the results are more or less as expected. - MrX 🖋 14:03, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Looks right. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:44, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

That [26] works too. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 15:31, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Great. The template and documentation are kind of hobbled together so if anyone would like to improve them, please do. - MrX 🖋 15:57, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

This worked out really well. Thank you all for putting this together! — Newslinger talk 13:01, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Script to detect unreliable sources

Main page: User:Headbomb/unreliable

I have (with the help of others) made a small user script to detect and highlight various links to unreliable sources and predatory journals. The idea is that it takes something like

• John Smith "Article of things" Deprecated.com. Accessed 2020-02-14. (John Smith "[https://www.deprecated.com/article Article of things]" ''Deprecated.com''. Accessed 2020-02-14.)

and turns it into something like

• John Smith "Article of things" Deprecated.com. Accessed 2020-02-14.

It will work on a variety of links, including those from {{cite web}}, {{cite journal}} and {{doi}}.

The script is new, and I'm still expanding coverage and tweaking logic, but what's there already works very well. Details and instructions are available at User:Headbomb/unreliable. Questions, comments and requests can be made at User talk:Headbomb/unreliable. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 09:26, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

​I'm using your script and it looks really great! unreliable.js pairs alongside m:Cite Unseen quite well, and I wonder if there is some way to create a shared data store from the perennial sources list that can be used for both scripts, as well as new scripts in the future. — Newslinger talk 13:29, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm looking at making things based on a JSON file, but I don't understand how those work. So maybe that file could be used by the other scripts too. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:40, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

That sounds good. You may be interested in the schema proposal in m:Talk:Cite Unseen#Cite Unseen integrations. I was hoping to automatically parse the table into JSON, but am not sure how to best approach this. There's wikitextparser, but it's in Python, and a user script might be better. Alternatively, a bot could do this automatically. — Newslinger talk 13:49, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Trump White House press releases

White House press releases from the Trump WH should be deprecated. They are no better, and sometimes worse, than RT and Breitbart. We must base all of our content on RS. Notability (Trump and the WH are obviously notable) does not confer reliability, and Trump and Stephen Miller are remarkably notable sources of bottomless misinformation and propaganda.

To include the WH POV, we must do it by citing independent RS which mention the WH POV, just as we are supposed to do when documenting misinformation found in other unreliable sources. We must not use the unreliable source as our reference....ever, with ONE exception, in their own biography. Then self-ref is allowed, even of blacklisted sources, and even then with caveats.

I subscribe to myriad RS, as well as the WH newsletter (not RS), and it's no better than the worst unreliable sources. It is propaganda straight from the source. I sometimes wonder () if some of it is dictated straight from Putin's press officer. We know that Trump shares highly classified info and enemies lists with Putin (and other dictators), and that he obeys Putin, including choice of Secretary of State, so why not? -- BullRangifer (talk) 18:19, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Probably, but that discussion should take place on WP:RSN. This page is only an index and summary of previous discussions. - MrX 🖋 18:26, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

The WH POV can reliably be sourced to the WH press releases. It's certainly not a RS with respect to anything other than their own POV, but there's no reason to deprecate those as far as sourcing the WH POV is concerned. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:31, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

That would apply only to the articles about the White House and WH press releases (if there is such a page). Deprecated sources can be used for such purposes, but nowhere else. -- BullRangifer (talk) 18:50, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Or to any pages related to current American Foreign Policy, or any other range of topics where the viewpoints and official announcements of the WH/Trump Administration are relevant. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:04, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

In those cases, there will be multiple RS we can cite. -- BullRangifer (talk) 20:55, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Obituaries

The addition of "Scriptural texts", which I think was a good idea, was unusual for this page since it's more a group of sources. Based on that, would an entry for obituaries be helpful? It pops up now and then:[27]. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:38, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Then and now, but OBITUARY is taken. –84.46.52.25 (talk) 15:05, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

If necessary, we can always create WP:RSPOBIT or somesuch. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:23, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

2nd thoughts, the "Scriptural Texts" already violate POLA for a list of perennial sources. Adding "Obituaries" would make it worse, when that actually depends on the newspaper, paid vs. voluntary, and private data of minors in "published" obituaries.
Some weasels claim that RS/P is basically some form of essay covered by no community consensus to speak of. Others could claim that a NOTHERE CIR requires a WMF ban. Whatever might be a TRUE TRUTH, unclear new features can backfire. –84.46.53.231 (talk) 06:31, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

That would be the point of the entry, it would say "it depends" in some form (like [28][29]). And I have to disagree that RSP:s "Scriptural texts"-text would shock, surprise, or confuse the average reader. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 06:57, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

A shortcut to a place where this is explained, e.g., on RS/P outside of the alphabetically sorted table, or as an annotation of NOTOBITUARY, makes sense. No bible row under B, because it's scripture under S, is MEH. Admittedly I'd never look for it in RS/P, POLA was exaggerated. –84.46.53.117 (talk) 17:40, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

As a reply to "Are obituaries RS on WP?", WP:NOTOBITUARY is not very helpful. It's outside the topic of RS, and doesn't even mention obituaries. Come to think of it, inserting "Bible" and "Quran" (and possibly others like Torah and Hadith) in the RSP-list (as "See Scriptural texts" ) could be helpful to readers. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:01, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

The list is not an article, so I don't see why WP:POLA would apply. Otherwise, this is by Wikipedia standards long-established practice: the Bible isn't WP:RS, never was and never will be. Even if the US would become a Protestant theocracy, it still wouldn't be allowed, since what theocracies hate most are heretics and Sola Scriptura is a major source of heretical readings. Tgeorgescu (talk) 04:03, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Maybe move the Legend to the top of the source list?

Kind of a pain to scroll all the way down just to figure out what grey/yellow/etc. means. Test123Bug (talk) 20:52, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Or you could just click on the link. Grandpallama (talk) 22:01, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Cheers Test123Bug (talk) 01:38, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

RfC on adding generally reliable sources to the CAPTCHA whitelist

There is a request for comment on adding generally reliable sources from the perennial sources list to the CAPTCHA whitelist, which allows new and anonymous users to cite them in articles without needing to solve a CAPTCHA. If you are interested, please participate at WP:RSN § Adding generally reliable sources to the CAPTCHA whitelist. — Newslinger talk 19:42, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Wikileaks

Does anybody have a reliable source for the claim, that Wikileaks is not reliable? I can provide you with links to erroneous publications in the New York Times and the Guardian. Can anybody show a flawed publication on Wikileaks? —Raphael1 18:43, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Raphael1, in past discussions listed in the entry for WikiLeaks, editors expressed concerns that WikiLeaks does not adequately authenticate the documents they publish, and that some of the non-government documents may be copyright violations, which we are not allowed to link to. WikiLeaks is also a primary source, while Wikipedia articles should be mostly based on secondary sources, especially for contentious claims. If a reliable secondary source confirms that a WikiLeaks document is genuine, and that document is not a copyright violation, then the document can be cited as a primary source if there is consensus to do so. — Newslinger talk 20:10, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Newslinger, why is there a different standard for Wikileaks? How does "expressing concerns" about a source change anything here? I can express my concerns about many news sources. In fact, I can even prove flawed publications on many news sources. How does that change anything? Does that mean the New York Times and the Guardian are no longer reliable sources? Please provide evidence for falsified documents published by Wikileaks. --Raphael1 20:26, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Raphael1, You asked a question and had a response, please do Newslinger (and yourself) the courtesy of considering the response before responding yourself. The link given is to 12 pages of intensive discussion regarding yours, and other's concerns. There is not the remotest chance that you read and understood the arguments of dozens, maybe hundreds, of editors in those archives in the 16 minutes it took you to reply here. Rest assured, the issue has been discussed in great depth and with good faith. That's not to say it's impossible you have fresh concerns not addressed in the record, but please check first? Cheers! Captainllama (talk) 20:37, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

​WikiLeaks is held to the same standards as any other source (the verifiability policy and the reliable sources guideline). There is consensus in the past noticeboard discussions that WikiLeaks does not adequately authenticate its documents, which causes it to fail both WP:V and WP:RS. See discussion #4 for an example of a WikiLeaks document that was rejected by editors due to its questionable provenance. Note that the "burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material", which means that an editor who wants to cite a WikiLeaks document needs to establish that it is authentic, instead of simply asking other editors to disprove the same. WikiLeaks was last discussed in 2018, so feel free to start a new discussion on the reliable sources noticeboard if you believe the consensus has changed. — Newslinger talk 20:51, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Newslinger Are you trying to take me for a ride? An editor, who wants to cite a Wikileaks document cannot do so, because whenever one uses a reference to Wikileaks, a Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources#Wikileaks banner comes up, that that tells you this reference is prohibited. There is currently no way to add a reference to Wikileaks, even if one can provide evidence for the authenticity of the document. --Raphael1 21:09, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Newslinger And what does the Jehova's Witnesses letter have to do with Wikileaks? It has never been published there, has it? --Raphael1 21:19, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

It looks like your attempted edit to the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface triggered edit filter 1034 (hist · log). The warning you saw, MediaWiki:Abusefilter-warning-WikiLeaks, links to WP:RSP § WikiLeaks, but otherwise has nothing to do with this page. Also, the filter does not prevent you from adding WikiLeaks to the article. It is set to warn, which means your edit will go through if you submit the edit one more time after seeing the warning. Pinging JzG for comment on the filter.

You're right in that the Jehovah's Witnesses letter discussion should not have been listed in the WikiLeaks entry, and I've removed it. Please refer to "Is a document from Wikileaks reliable?" (2018), the most recent discussion, for another example. — Newslinger talk 21:36, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Raphael1, there isn't a different standard. This is exactly the same standard we apply to all primary sources with a reputation for publishing material without fact-checking.

The triggering text was:

EFI defines two types of services: ''boot services'' and ''runtime services''. Boot services are available only while the firmware owns the platform (i.e., before the <code>ExitBootServices</code> call), and they include text and graphical consoles on various devices, and bus, block and file services. Runtime services are still accessible while the operating system is running; they include services such as date, time and [[Non-volatile random-access memory|NVRAM]] access. +<code>ExitBootServices</code> is used by the [[CIA]] as a hook to inject their trojan code even before the Operating System is loaded.<ref name="Vault7">{{cite web|url=https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/cms/page_36896783.html | title=ExitBootServices Hooking |website=wikileaks.org |date= |accessdate=2017-03-20}}</ref>

That feels distinctly like WP:OR to me. You could defend it as "a leaked CIA training manual indicates that the CIA may use it..." but even that is dodgy, I'd much prefer a secondary source. Guy (help!)

Pageviews

In the past 30 days, the perennial sources list (27,448 pageviews) has accrued more pageviews than the reliable sources noticeboard (26,094 pageviews). Thank you all for contributing to this page, and for participating in the noticeboard discussions that make this list possible! — Newslinger talk 22:47, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

WikiCred grants for credibility-related projects

I apologize if this is only tangentially related: I wanted to bring this up here since it will likely be of interest to some watchers, and the nature of this grant means it could support projects related to either supporting or building off of our perennial sources list. The WikiConference North America User Group has partnered with the Credibility Coalition, MisinfoCon, and Hacks/Hackers to create the WikiCred grants program. This initiative offers microgrants ranging between $250 and $10,000 to individuals and teams to create and pilot projects on supporting credibility on the internet in relation to Wikimedia projects and the movement. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis. The first deadline to receive funding is April 6th.

In particular for perennial sources, I think there is good potential to develop tools around it, such as structuring the data, or building bots/tools that can perform widescale analysis of source usage across Wikipedia that includes perennial source data. If anyone has any ideas, I encourage you to comment below. If you have any questions, feel free to fill out the form on the site, or drop me an email or message on my talk page. Thanks, ~SuperHamster Talk Contribs 08:06, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for sharing this, SuperHamster! I would encourage anyone who is interested in building scripts, bots, and other tools for Wikipedia from the data in this list to apply. It's a great opportunity to help improve article reliability, and it's a rare chance to get compensated for some of your work on Wikipedia without taking a job with the Wikimedia Foundation. I would apply myself, but have privacy concerns that prevent me from doing so. — Newslinger talk 23:54, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

The Bubble Experiment--The Media Bias Chart, Junk News, Social Media Feeds...

Denver's 9News is running a fascinating experiment to simulate what people would see on their social media feeds if they followed only left, only right, and only center stories. They based their selections on the news source ratings of the Media Bias Chart. (Source: Vanessa Otero)

• The Bubble Experiment--The Media Bias Chart, Junk News, Social Media Feeds, and Resulting Bubbles

BullRangifer (talk) 16:44, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

One more reliable source, and Ad Fontes Media would qualify for a Wikipedia article. — Newslinger talk 13:21, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

There is now an article for Ad Fontes Media. However, on second thought, I don't think the YouTube video is citable, since it is an unlicensed recording and would be prohibited under WP:COPYLINK and WP:ELNEVER. However, the article from Denver 9 News is usable, and it also includes the video. — Newslinger talk 23:58, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

The Independent

At the moment in the list it's written "The Independent, a British newspaper, is considered a reliable source for non-specialist information. In March 2016, the publication discontinued its print edition to become an online newspaper; some editors advise caution for articles published after this date."

This is not exactly true, they didn't discontinue printing, they changed to a tabloid format with a lower case "i" for Independent without spelling it. And are still printing except in a lot lower quantities. Govvy (talk) 10:10, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

i (newspaper) seems to be regarded a separate publication, in that it has its own article. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 12:06, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

I think i should be considered separately, especially since it was acquired by Daily Mail and General Trust in November 2019. — Newslinger talk 23:44, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

So a newspaper when it got rid of it's broadsheet and permanently changed to its tabloid format and you consider that separate? How very confusing. Govvy (talk) 07:06, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Also, no i newspaper on the list. Govvy (talk) 07:09, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Most of the entries on this list are tracked by Wikipedia articles; in the majority of cases, a single entry corresponds to a single Wikipedia article. We generally only combine entries for a parent company and its subsidiaries, only if the subsidiaries do not have different reliability classifications or substantially different descriptions. Examples of combined entries include the ones for Dotdash, RhythmOne, and Vice Media. The Independent is currently owned by Alexander Lebedev, Evgeny Lebedev, and two others, while i is owned by Daily Mail and General Trust, so there is no parent-subsidiary relationship to justify a single entry for both sources.

Feel free to add an entry for i if you can find at least two significant noticeboard discussions per the inclusion criteria, but it will almost certainly be challenging because "i" is very hard to search for. — Newslinger talk 07:35, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

I was having a look at some sources online a little earlier, I suspect i maybe loosing market share, I don't think it will be around that much longer. Might as well close this discussion now as I really don't think it will have much effect. Govvy (talk) 07:40, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Status of WikiLeaks

Two discussions on WikiLeaks (RSP entry) were recently archived. The main objection to WikiLeaks is that it is a primary source, which means that it should be used with caution, and only to supplement information in reliable secondary sources. There is disagreement on whether WikiLeaks adequately authenticates its content. WikiLeaks is currently classified as "generally unreliable". Should WikiLeaks be reclassified as "No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply" to be more in line with primary sources like Hansard (RSP entry)? — Newslinger talk 03:51, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Daily Kos

The website's entry attributes a "far-left bias" to it. However, Daily Kos says: "Daily Kos is a group blog and internet forum focused on center-left politics, the Democratic Party and center-left liberal American politics." It provides zero indication for a "far-left bias" of its content. Rather, it mentions the website endorsing Hillary Clinton, who is far from being a left-wing radical.

Given that American conservatives and right-wingers in general keep spreading propaganda decrying US liberalism, and centrist or centre-left politics in general, as "far left", socialist, communist, Marxist, radical or extremist, which is ridiculously out of touch with the facts, political science and the rest of the world, I smell a rat here. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 13:40, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Agreed, and edited to "progressive." It's certainly a biased opinion site, but it's not remotely on the far-left part of the spectrum. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 15:46, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Yes – I didn't dispute the "bias" part, only the "far-left" part. Thank you.  Done --Florian Blaschke (talk) 13:57, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

One way to avoid disputes around contentious labels is to use the phrase "biased or opinionated", instead. The phrase can optionally be qualified (e.g. "biased or opinionated for politics") for a reduction in scope. — Newslinger talk 13:42, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

The Forbes contributors section conflicts somewhat with WP:BLPSPS

The forbes contributors section description is currently somewhat out of line with current policy WP:SPS / WP:BLPSPS. We should probably expand it slightly to clarify this matter. --TheSandDoctor ^Talk 18:48, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

 Added a mention of WP:BLPSPS to the Forbes.com contributors entry in Special:Diff/949958491, as this issue was mentioned in a couple of the listed discussions. Thanks for pointing this out, and feel free to improve it further.​ — Newslinger talk 13:58, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

That's great, Newslinger! Thank you. --TheSandDoctor ^Talk 16:40, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Sky News

Is there any information of Sky News being a reliable source? Just want to ask, when it isn't mentioned in the article. However, this page proves that it is indeed a trusted news source like for BBC News. Bryn89 (talk) 17:26, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Skimming through the RSN searchresults [30], I get the impression it's considered generally reliable. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:38, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

New rating?

Is there any support for assigning a new rating "commentary/opinion" for sources that are mainstream and have a good reputation but offer exculsively opinion and analysis, without any purely news/non-opinion pieces, so their entire output would be handled by WP:RSOPINION? I am thinking it would be a good designation for sources such as Foreign Policy, Reason.com, New Statesman, or New Republic (RSP entry). This new rating would apply only to commentary with a good reputation for facts; commentary sources that have a reputation for fake news (such as Quadrant (RSP entry)), would be rated "generally unreliable". buidhe 04:59, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

I've always seen the classifications as an evaluation of the reliability of a source's factual claims. Even opinion pieces contain factual claims (e.g. a review of an album is likely to contain claims regarding the artist's history and the songs' compositions). The suitability of a published opinion depends on the accuracy of the facts that the opinions are based on. If an article is considered unreliable for facts, then the opinions in the article are discarded as undue weight unless they are mentioned in a reliable source. If the article is considered reliable for facts, then its presented opinions may be considered for inclusion, subject to due weight. There was a recent discussion of this matter with respect to the Daily Mail (RSP entry) at "Daily Mail and RSOPINION", which led to the discussion at WT:RS § Adding clarifty to RSOPINION. — Newslinger talk 11:23, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Technical idea: make the header row of the table sticky

It'd be nice if the header row of the table stayed on screen, even as you scroll down, similar to what happens at Template:2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data. Does anyone know how to do that? {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 00:19, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

I've brought it to Help_talk:Table#Sticky_table_headers?, where I see I'm not the only one with this question. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 00:32, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Template:2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data uses the position: sticky; CSS value for this. I tried to implement this here (using the style sheet at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/styles.css), but was unsuccessful. The main problem was that anchor links (e.g. WP:RSP#Associated Press) still made the entry flush with the top of the browser window, which caused the entry to be covered up by the header. Also, the sticky header worked on Firefox (desktop), but I wasn't able to get it to work on Chrome (desktop), the mobile site, or the mobile app before I noticed the anchor link issue. — Newslinger talk 13:59, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Wording of inclusion criteria

I think the the wording of the inclusion criteria (WP:RSPCRITERIA)

For a source to be added to this list, editors generally expect two or more significant discussions that mention the source's reliability, or an uninterrupted request for comment on the source's reliability that took place on the reliable sources noticeboard. For a discussion to be considered significant, most editors expect no fewer than two participants for RSN discussions where the source's name is in the section heading, and no fewer than three participants for all other discussions.

should be tightened to:

For a source to be added to this list, editors generally expect two or more significant discussions that mention the source's reliability, or an uninterrupted request for comment on the source's reliability that took place on the reliable sources noticeboard. For a discussion to be considered significant, most editors expect no fewer than two qualifying participants for RSN discussions where the source's name is in the section heading, and no fewer than three qualifying participants for all other discussions. Qualifying participants are editors who make at least one comment on the source's reliability.

The revised criteria would exclude long discussions about other sources from being considered "significant discussions" if they do not mention the source in question. For example, the listed discussions from the former entry for The Spectator are reproduced below:

1. "Is Alex Massie in the Spectator a reliable source for a known and unchallenged legal distinction?" (2016)
2. "Deseret News" (2016)
3. "The Monthly" (2018)
4. "Is Evolve Politics an unreliable/unsuitable source?" (2018)

Discussions 2–4 are problematic because they are not about The Spectator, and each features only one editor who briefly mentions The Spectator. While this technically satisfies the current wording in WP:RSPCRITERIA, I do not think this is consistent with the intent of the original discussion on the inclusion criteria. The proposed new wording would exclude discussions 2–4 altogether.

I've already removed the entry for The Spectator in Special:Diff/952666985, but am just realizing the wording issue now. — Newslinger talk 11:50, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

 Done in Special:Diff/954862044. — Newslinger talk 17:57, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

Semantic Scholar

A Semantic Scholar collaborator has become active on cite template related pages, e.g. User talk:Citation bot/Archive_21#Request to add link to Semantic Scholar s2cid when an open access link is not available. I don't know if that opens an opportunity on learning more about the copyright situation of some of Semantic Scholar's content (which is an issue if I understand the explanation in the RSP listing for this source correctly). --Francis Schonken (talk) 16:47, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

• Special:Diff/942395819 was not aligned with consensus so it should just be reverted. Nemo 17:03, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

   Removed in Special:Diff/954859522 pending resolution of dispute. I personally agree with Nemo_bis in that there is no cause for concern about Semantic Scholar's copyright status, but other editors in the listed discussions ("Semantic Scholar" and "Semantic Scholar clarification request") expressed differing opinions. The dissenting comments were, in my view, enough to would classify the website as "No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply", as WP:COPYLINK is a valid "additional consideration". ​— Newslinger talk 17:55, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

  • Whatever this gets resolved as, it should be made clear that SS is just a general repository that hosts a bunch of papers, there may or may not be a copyright concern, but as far as reliability is concerned, you trace it back to the original publication, not to SS. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:10, 4 May 2020 (UTC)
    • That's a very good point. Semantic Scholar is a search engine like Google Scholar, and the reliability of the indexed documents depends on the reliability of the publications in which they are found. The copyright status of documents hosted by Semantic Scholar is not a reliability concern, but it does affect whether the documents are usable on Wikipedia. — Newslinger talk 11:51, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

RSN discussion on RSP summary wording re: Daily Mail

Regarding the Daily Mail - some felt a proposed changed needed nailing down with an RFC - Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Discussion_on_WP:RSPDM - David Gerard (talk) 10:52, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

NPR

Per discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#NPR, please change NPR to green with the following text:

There is consensus that NPR is generally reliable for news and statements of fact. NPRs's opinion pieces should only be used with attribution.

--Guy Macon (talk) 22:03, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

 Done in Special:Diff/954858539 with minor adjustments. Thanks for guiding the noticeboard discussion. Feel free to adjust entries on your own, since everyone is welcome to edit this list. ​— Newslinger talk 17:39, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

The advice "Feel free to adjust entries on your own, since everyone is welcome to edit this list." isn't working out for me. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#(Infomercial voice) But Wait! There's still more!! (News about The Daily Mail). --Guy Macon (talk) 09:44, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

See below - David Gerard (talk) 10:52, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Good call. That RfC is already producing a lot of productive discussion, and there will be a record of it in the RfC list that is part of The Daily mail entry. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:15, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

While anyone can edit this page, it still needs to adhere to consensus. The change, the revert, and the RfC are all part of WP:BRD, so it looks like the process is working as intended. — Newslinger talk 00:50, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

CGTN

Can we get CGTN added to the list now that the discussion has closed? We have a clear census of general unreliability [31]. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 14:12, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Horse Eye Jack, unfortunately, there has only been one significant discussion of CGTN on the noticeboard, so it doesn't quite meet the inclusion criteria (WP:RSPCRITERIA) yet. In the meantime, feel free to link to the archived discussion: Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 293#CGTN (China Global Television Network). — Newslinger talk 14:45, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, I thought it was the second discussion but after checking you are entirely right. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 14:56, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Add WeGotThisCovered.com as unreliable

Hi, I'm not experienced with editing this page. Per Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_281#Omigosh,_are_Cheatsheet.com_and_WeGotThisCovered.com_reliable? and Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_290#WeGotThisCovered.com_is_unreliable, can someone add WeGotThisCovered as unreliable and reviewed in 2019 and 2020? Scrooge200 (talk) 02:28, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Scrooge200, since the list is already very long, we tend to exclude non-notable sites like WeGotThisCovered.com. The rule of thumb is: if the website doesn't have a Wikipedia article or redirect to an article, then it's probably not important enough to be mentioned here. However, the new page patrol source guide (WP:NPPSG) lists WeGotThisCovered.com as unreliable, and you can also link to the archived noticeboard discussions. — Newslinger talk 14:08, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

Jezebel (website) listing

Newslinger, I don't see that the discussions about the Jezebel site concluded with consensus that it's generally unreliable. The discussions are saying that it is better used for statements of opinions rather than facts. So it's a WP:WIKIVOICE matter.

No need to ping me if you reply. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 01:44, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Flyer22 Frozen, thanks for bringing the Jezebel entry up for review. I'm inclined to remove discussion #2 since it does not meet the current inclusion criteria, because the section heading does not mention "Jezebel" and less than three editors directly commented on Jezebel's reliability. After reviewing the other two discussions (discussion #1, discussion #3), I think Jezebel could be reclassified as "No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply" with a summary along the lines of:

There is no consensus on the reliability of Jezebel. Most editors believe that Jezebel is biased or opinionated, and that its claims should be attributed. Jezebel should not be used for contentious claims, especially ones about living persons.

How does this look to you? Since the most recent discussion was back in 2016, a new noticeboard discussion to gauge the current consensus is also an option.

@Feminist: As the original author of the Jezebel entry, do you have any comments? — Newslinger talk 18:36, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for taking a look. Your proposed wording is an improvement. Regarding "Jezebel should not be used for contentious claims", maybe add in "generally" to reflect the fact that opinion pieces that are sometimes added to articles sometimes express an opinion or other viewpoint that may be contentious (including, for example, a review about a film or an actor's role in that film) or that what is contentious can vary? be debatable? Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 04:30, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

 Done. That sounds good, and I've made the changes in Special:Diff/958530503. Feel free to make adjustments as you see fit. Any other editor is also welcome to chime in. — Newslinger talk 09:26, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

The change makes sense. Jezebel would probably fall at the lower end of "no consensus", but the description is appropriate. feminist | wear a mask, protect everyone 10:10, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Authorship

Can I ask why prominent authors who has written for Daily Telegraph, The Independent, INews, London Evening Standard, etc ones who have also written for Daily Mail. Why are we deleting their cites from Daily Mail, when they have clearly been vetted by other News organisations. There is this blatant disregard of vetting the citations especially from David Gerard who is systematically not reviewing Daily Mail cites, is running a blanket ban and removing all of them without review for date, authorship, straight up quotation, etc. It's is stated that Daily Mail citations are not a ban, yet someone seems to think it is. I've noticed a lot of edgyness from other editors around this recently, I feel we need to review not who the paper is, but the authorship, who wrote the piece is just as important and that is being completely disregarded here. I don't understand why you delete that journalists cites for the Daily Mail and not all the other newspapers. It's bizarre to me that people are not noticing this. Govvy (talk) 22:29, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Discussion participants are concerned that the Daily Mail articles written by these otherwise reliable authors may not have actually been written by the authors themselves, or were subject to editing by the Daily Mail before being published. For what it's worth, I disagree, but this is my understanding based on having read some of the RSN discussions on the Daily Mail. feminist | wear a mask, protect everyone 05:04, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Literally quotes can't be trusted from the DM, they've made up entire interviews before. This has been extensively discussed at WP:RSN - which is the correct board to discuss sourcing issues, and not this talk page. (And you've had this pointed out to you previously as well, when you were defending The Sun.) If you really want the DM rehabilitated, you need to discuss it on the correct board. You seem strangely reluctant to do this - David Gerard (talk) 10:01, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Expecting me or anyone else to read your essay's (go read this policy), pfft, Where is your evidence that they have made up entire interviews? You should point me to the direct evidence, or don't say it at all. Besides I asked about Authorship, you seem strangely reluctant to vet your edits, have a coherent reply, you are one bizarre editor. This edit to me [32] is a true indication you do not vet the sources properly, because if you bother googling the author of that, you will find that Ivan Speck is the journalist who collected those quotes directly, you've taken out the source and content exactly why Robbie Keane went to Inter Milan, you won't be able to find that anywhere else I am sure. That there is why you disrupt article integrity. Good job on your wikipedia destruction, I really don't know why I bother trying to help wikipedia, this place is going to the dogs. Govvy (talk) 10:35, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

You're writing this on the talk page for WP:RSP. On the Daily Mail section in WP:RSP, there's a direct link to fifty-odd discussions of the DM, citing all of this. If you want to discuss any of this seriously, you need to do the basic reading that's directly in front of you - David Gerard (talk) 10:45, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Have you reviewed your edit there? You're linking right back to this page twice! Bizarro-world!! :/ Govvy (talk) 10:50, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Govvy, If only we had reliable sources for the Mail engaging in sensationalisation that crosses into outright fabrication, had fabricated quotes and the like. Guy (help!) 20:49, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Media Bias

On the Reliable sources/Perennial sources list, can there be a column for Bias?

Bias is completely separate from reliability, as a site can be biased, but still reliable.

Many sources mention the bias in their description. For example:

Some editors perceive FOX News to be a biased source whereas others do not; neither affects reliability of the source.

Or

Almost all editors consider Mother Jones a biased source, so its statements (particularly on political topics) may need to be attributed.

I feel like this should have it's own column since there are many good organizations that rate the bias of media, and these sources generally mirror the Wikipedia consensus, but provide more detail:

• Home of the Media Bias Chart - Ad Fontes Media Version 5.0
• Media Bias/Fact Check - Search and Learn the Bias of News
• AllSides | Balanced news via media bias ratings for an unbiased news perspective

Even something simple like "Strong Right," "Lean Right," "Mostly Center," "Lean Left," "Strong Left."

Thanks – Chrisvacc - ✆

Hi Chrisvacc, the original proposal for this list (Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Archive 59 § Casual musing) included a column for political orientation, but the column was not well-received and it was excluded from the list. While many editors on the reliable sources noticeboard appreciate media watchdog initiatives like the Media Bias Chart, Media Bias/Fact Check, and AllSides, there is consensus against using them on their own to label the reliability and bias of other sources (in article space). This list defers to consensus in the linked discussions, rather than to any outside sources.

I am personally not in favor of including specific bias labels (e.g. "left-wing", "right-wing") here, since it leads to disputes like this one. However, mentioning the area in which a source is biased (e.g. "biased or opinionated for politics") or whether a source is affiliated with another entity (e.g. an advocacy organization) is generally accepted if editors mentioned the aspect in the linked discussions. — Newslinger talk 14:28, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

Newslinger, right, because we actually don't care about the direction of bias, we care about the magnitude, and the effect that has on reliability. Guy (help!) 20:53, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

If bias is separate from reliability, why should we bother to try to include it in this list? And are these orgs really good for WP purposes? Who says they are good at what they do? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:33, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

This would be hard as we deal with english language sources from all around the world. There are WP:RS from dozens of countries and not all have systems which map onto left-right as understood by an American or Brit. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 01:57, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

@Horse Eye Jack, Gråbergs Gråa Sång, and Newslinger: The reason is that biases sources often mix opinions in with facts. This sometimes gives Wikipedians a trump card to add spin to an article. Places like CNN or Fox often interject their opinions into factual information and I sometimes see Wikipedians using it as an reason to use some emotionally loaded terms into articles. They say "This is how Reliable sources describe it" but then they'll pick a source with known political motives. Here's an example of how it can leak over into articles that have nothing specifically to do with politics, but are still politically divisive issues with Liberals and conservatives seeing things different ways - Example: there was a massive debate on the Ahmaud Arbery Talk page because Right-wing sources said he was "running" (a word implying he was fleeing the scene) and left-wing sources said he was "jogging" (a word implying he was getting leisurely exercise) - both words were used in Reliable Sources, but each word paints a different narrative. There's a controversy over this current case because the defense claims he may have been attempting to steal something, and 'ran' away from the home, and the prosecution says 'he was just out for a leaisurely jog when he was killed in cold blood.' Neither narrative was yet proven since the case is on-going, but editors were choosing specific wording in order to interject their personal views into the Wikipedia article. And this is often a problem with Liberal sources painting one picture by using subtle language and Conservartives painting another picture using subtle language. Both are using Relaible sources but even within factual sources since there are often multiple ways of looking at something – Chrisvacc - ✆ 18:17, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Which newssources considered RS on WP does not have known political motives? In your running/jogging example, the way to go is to try to apply WP:DUE, which may not be that easy. You seem to imply that sources are either left-wing or right-wing. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:51, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

If multiple reliable sources describe something differently, editors have to reconcile all of the descriptions in a proportional manner. This reconciliation is done regardless of whether the reliable sources are perceived to be biased. Talk:Shooting of Ahmaud Arbery/Archive 2 § Jogging versus running was resolved by excluding both running and jogging from the article's lead section. — Newslinger talk 09:15, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Well we eventually resolved it by just declaring it a Gordian Knot and deleting the section altogether - but this was after about 2 or 3 days of heated debate. What I'm saying is - it would be nice if there was a policy that gave neutral sources like Reuters or Associated Press precedent over sources like Fox or CNN who have their hand in the 'political cookie jar.' Of course all 4 of those aformentioned sources are reliable, but the two latter examples are very clear about their suport for specific political ideologies. They lack neutrality. Another issue is "All Reliable Sources aren't created equal." MoJo (Mother Jones) and Buzzfeed are both considered a Reliable Source, but are they really as reliable as the Associated Press or Reuters, which are basically the gold standards of journalism? In a debate between two things perhaps certain sources should be given more 'reliability weight' than others. We would obviously have to agree upon a sytem that 'measures' reliability but many of those Watchdog initives already have good rankings that I'm confident Wikipedians would agree on. I'm just saying that it might be useful to allow citations from highly respected, gold-standard Journalism organizations like Reuters to take precident over lower ranking sites like MoJo. The Journalism from Reuters is clearly of a higher quality than Mother Jones. – Chrisvacc - ✆ 01:12, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

I agree that widely syndicated news agencies like the Associated Press and Reuters are among the best news sources available. Well-established news outlets that are not wire services rank lower in terms of reliability, but most of them are still considered generally reliable under the news organizations guideline. A five-level reliability classification system has been suggested before, but the main counterargument is that the extra granularity makes it harder to determine consensus.

This is also why I am not in favor of highlighting the direction of bias. Consider One America News Network, which has a talk page full of arguments on whether it should be labeled as "conservative", "right-wing", or "far-right". If we prominently feature specific bias descriptors on this list, the same disputes will surface here. WP:BIASED makes it clear that biased sources are acceptable on Wikipedia. While sources with a stronger level of bias tend to be less reliable, we evaluate reliability independently of bias, and accept all sources that meet the threshold set by the reliable sources guideline. — Newslinger talk 01:49, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

"RT...should be treated as a part of a foreign intelligence service."

FYI.

"they should be treated as a part of a foreign intelligence service."

EXECUTIVE SESSION
PERMANENT SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE,
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
WASHINGTON, D.C.
INTERVIEW OF: JAKE SULLIVAN (bolding added)

MR. HECK: I would very much appreciate it if you had additional ideas about necessary elements that might enable that path forward. I want to ask you as well about RT. It's come in for some controversy. You may or may not have noticed the capitol press corps gave them the boot I think.

MR. SULLIVAN: Yeah.

MR. HECK: As I am told, they are still accredited for attendance at WhiteHouse, Defense, and State Department briefings. Insofar as, on the one hand, this is heavily anchored in the First Amendment society. On the other hand, we are dealing with a propaganda arm of the state which is obviously engaged in practices that are antithetical to our best interests. Would you take any action with respect to RT?

MR. SULLIVAN: My take on RT is that, as long as it remains an integrated element of this multifaceted warfare campaign that the ICA laid out - and they talked about RT specifically in there -- then it is not just like other state TV services from other countries. lt is an offensive weapon as part -

MR, HECK: And what do we do?

MR. SULLIVAN: -- a campaign. I would be open to -- I hadn't thought about the concept of denying them accreditation at the White House and Defense. I would want to think about it. I would put that on the table. I would generally put on the table sort of saying they shouldn't be regulated as a traditional media entity; they should be treated as a part of a foreign intelligence service. And what are the policy implications of that exactly? I am not sure. I don't know, but it's something I would take a hard look at. And I don't think you have to go down the road of saying the same thing about every TV station around the world that's owned by a government. You look to the one that has actually played a role as a particular tool in a campaign against the United States.

Valjean (talk) 01:05, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Arguments posted on this page aren't factored into the entry, but RT is currently being discussed on the noticeboard. — Newslinger talk 20:47, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

I assume the current discussion is this:Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#RfC:_RT_(Russia_Today) --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 23:11, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. I have added my comment there. -- Valjean (talk) 13:38, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Your witness, Jake Sullivan was himself part of, in fact head of, an organization that relies on a foreign intelligence service. TFD (talk) 14:54, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

@The Four Deuces: Come again? Jake Sullivan doesn't seem to have been either of those. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 01:18, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

@The Four Deuces: Either validate or retract, your current text violates WP:BLP in a major way. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 16:03, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Jake Sullivan was Director of Policy Planning at the U.S. State Department. I guess strictly speaking they are not part of the U.S. Intelligence services but are closely connected to it. In this case one would expect that Sullivan was relying for his testimony on information gathered by U.S. intelligence. TFD (talk) 17:23, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

So neither a member of an intelligence agency or the head of one? Yeah, I think you need to retract your untruths per WP:BLP. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 17:25, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

I made the changes. I don't think it is a BLP violation though unless you have something against U.S. intelligence services.

Valjean's argument is that RT must be unreliable because it is an agent of an intelligence agency. But he cites someone who apparently based his opinion on what another intelligence agency told him.

TFD (talk) 12:45, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

WP:RSPSCRIPTURE

Moved to Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard § Scriptural texts (WP:RSPSCRIPTURE)

 – Moved to the noticeboard, as this discussion has introduced new arguments not found in previous discussions. — Newslinger talk 12:36, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

RfC on wording in Wikipedia:Deprecated sources

There is a request for comment on the first sentence of Wikipedia:Deprecated sources § Acceptable uses of deprecated sources. If you are interested, please participate at WT:DEPS § RfC: Acceptable uses of deprecated sources. — Newslinger talk 13:31, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Reason (magazine)

Reason (magazine) now has two qualifying RSN discussions: 1 2. The publication should probably be added to the RSP list, though I am not sure whether it should be concluded as "generally reliable" or "no consensus". feminist | wear a mask, protect everyone 05:26, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Discussion #1 primarily discusses due weight and primary vs. secondary sourcing, and concluded with no consensus on Reason's reliability. Discussion #2 focuses squarely on Reason's reliability, and I see consensus in this discussion that Reason is generally reliable. Because discussion #2 is more recent, more focused on reliability, and more highly-attended, I think Reason should be classified as "generally reliable".

Guy Macon's description from discussion #2 is fine, but I would make a few adjustments to exclude the direction of bias (libertarian) and include a mention of due weight from discussion #1.

Source	Status (legend)	Discussions			Uses
		List	Last	Summary
Reason		1 2	2020	There is consensus that Reason is generally reliable for news and facts. Editors consider Reason to be a biased or opinionated source that primarily publishes commentary, analysis, and opinions. Statements of opinion should be attributed and evaluated for due weight.	1

How is this? — Newslinger talk 00:32, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

I see more of a reliable in context or no consensus for #2. I think the point thats repeatedly been raised that the majority of Reason’s content is opinion and commentary needs to be noted either way, there will be a lot of people confused about why their “article from a WP:RS” isn't usable if we don’t put a disclaimer. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 00:55, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps create two entries for Reason, one for news articles (green) and one for opinion and commentary (yellow)? feminist | wear a mask, protect everyone 12:30, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

I think having it as green is fine as long as we make the wording about commentary, analysis, and opinion pieces more explicit. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 19:20, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

​Do you have any suggestions for wording? Similar entries include the one for Mother Jones (RSP entry) and The Nation (RSP entry). — Newslinger talk 02:16, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

My suggestion would be to slightly modify “that primarily publishes commentary, analysis, and opinions.” to "that primarily publishes commentary, analysis, and opinion articles.” I think thats the smallest most concise change which would get the point I think we should be making across. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 02:22, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Source	Status (legend)	Discussions			Uses
		List	Last	Summary
Reason		1 2	2020	There is consensus that Reason is generally reliable for news and facts. Editors consider Reason to be a biased or opinionated source that primarily publishes commentary, analysis, and opinion articles. Statements of opinion should be attributed and evaluated for due weight.	1

​Does this look good to you? — Newslinger talk 02:25, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Looks good, I just want to make sure we can clearly remove the Reason.com/blog articles like the ones used at The New York Times and Twitter without a whole new argument. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 02:32, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. Feminist, the entry is ready as soon as you give the thumbs up. — Newslinger talk 02:36, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Sure. I don't see anything wrong with it. feminist | wear a mask, protect everyone 02:45, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

 Added in Special:Diff/959891256. Thank you both. — Newslinger talk 02:52, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

The Hill (newspaper) contributors

Previous discussion: /Archive 1#The Hill (newspaper) added as generally reliable

The Hill (RSP entry) includes this:

The publication's contributor pieces, labeled in their bylines, receive minimal editorial oversight and should be treated as equivalent to self-published sources.

I participated in one discussions about The Hill, as did User:Feminist, who wrote this entry. At the time, I researched the subject some more and found this article in CJR by Lawrence Lanahan, who is described as "Baltimore-based freelance journalist". I was going to post additional comment rebutting the claim that contributor pieces are self-published, but the discussion was moved into archive by a bot before I finished my comment.

Anyway, CJR wrote about The Hill's contributor model in 2014 and said The Hill has one editor who "oversees the 200 writers in the network, and gives a light edit to the incoming copy. And because The Hill, given its subject matter, vets contributors for potential conflicts, much of the editor's work takes place before one word is typed."

I'm not sure there was a consensus to include "and should be treated as equivalent to self-published sources" and the statement is just not accurate, because WP:SPS applies to sources that typically lack any editorial oversight.

I'm also not a fan of saying "receive minimal editorial oversight". Sure, that is at least partly accurate, but same applies to the vast majority of op-eds and editorials, including those published in respectable newspapers. For instance, the entry for The Wall Street Journal says: "Use WP:RSOPINION for opinion pieces." While I did not review any archived discussions about WSJ, I'm pretty sure that if WSJ op-eds and editorials were to be discussed now, many editors would say those have minimal editorial oversight.

How about changing The Hill entry to something like this:

The Hill is considered generally reliable for American politics. Use WP:RSOPINION for opinion pieces and contributor pieces, labeled in their bylines.

Many thanks. Politrukki (talk) 08:41, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Based on my understanding, WSJ editorial writers are in a stronger (employment, editorial, etc.) relationship with the newspaper than The Hill contributors are. Basically, The Hill publishes editorials from a much wider range of authors, many of which do not publish regularly on The Hill, or at least not to the extent of WSJ opinion writers. In this regard, The Hill opinion pieces are more akin to Forbes contributor articles than WSJ opinion pieces. This means I prefer the original wording to the proposed change. I welcome input from other editors. feminist | wear a mask, protect everyone 16:12, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for sharing the Columbia Journalism Review report. While I still don't think The Hill's contributors are vetted as well as the publication's staff writers, the fact that The Hill only publishes 5–8 contributor posts per day compared to its 45 editorial staff members (as of 2014) distances The Hill contributors from Forbes.com contributors. Unlike Forbes.com, The Hill appears to use contributors only for opinion columns.

Since this is information not found in the past discussions, do you mind creating a new discussion on the noticeboard that focuses on The Hill contributors? As an aside, I note that some of the past discussions in the entry do not meet the current inclusion criteria, and should be delisted. — Newslinger talk 00:59, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Sure, you can remove the brief discussions. IIRC, I added the entry for The Hill before the inclusion criteria for discussions were implemented. feminist | wear a mask, protect everyone 12:31, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

I would like to avoid all unnecessary bureaucracy. That's why I mentioned the CJR piece even though I knew I was kind of bringing a new argument to the table. I will use RSN if that is the least awful out of all the awful options.

The listing has been used (example #1, example #2) as a circular argument, i.e. contributor pieces are self-published because Perennial sources says so.

Would you and Feminist, or anyone, kindly explain how you, in January 2019, reached the conclusion there was a consensus for listing contributor pieces as self-published, so that I can accept your conclusion or reject it? Politrukki (talk) 09:09, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

I'm striking my proposal, which is not based on the reading of current consensus of past discussions any more than the view that contributor pieces are self-published. Politrukki (talk) 09:04, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

The inclusion criteria have tightened since the entry was created, and some of the listed discussions are no longer considered significant enough for inclusion:

Significance of listed discussions in The Hill's entry

The "Independent Political Report" (2012): Not significant. Only 1 editor comments on the reliability of The Hill. NRA PAC contributions to Congressional candidates (2014): Not significant. Discussion heading does not mention The Hill, and only 1–2 editors comment on the reliability of The Hill. Political wrangling on article: Endorsements for the Democratic Party presidential primaries, 2016 (2015): Not significant. Discussion heading does not mention The Hill, and only 2 editors comment on the reliability of The Hill. Need help to fix an article that is seen as NPOV by several editors (2016): Not significant. Discussion heading does not mention The Hill, and only 1–2 editors comment on the reliability of The Hill. Is there any support for having an annual cull of RS acceptable for Wikipedia? (2017): Not significant. Only 1 editor comments on the reliability of The Hill. The Hill, Fox News, and Daily Caller reliable sources? (2018): Significant Discussion (Breitbart) (2018): Not significant. Only 1 editor comments on the reliability of The Hill. Washington Examiner (2019): Significant John Solomon (2019): Significant Sources at Media bias in the United States for claims of censorship of conservative content (2019): Significant

Among the four significant discussions, editors who refer to The Hill contributors mostly describe them as self-published or equivalent to Forbes.com contributors (RSP entry):

Comments regarding The Hill contributors in significant listed discussions

The Hill, Fox News, and Daily Caller reliable sources? (2018) "that the Hill's various "contributor blogs" are opinions and are not usable except with in-text attribution (much like Forbes's contributor blogs)" Washington Examiner (2019) "These articles should probably be treated the same as Forbes.com contributor articles." and "I'd consider their contributor posts to be self-published sources." "I would consider articles written by The Hill "contributors" to be self-published sources, similar to ones from Forbes.com contributors and HuffPost contributors, since their application process doesn't appear to be very robust" John Solomon (2019) "There's already consensus here that articles written by Hill contributors should be treated as self-published. See WP:RSP." "he is an opinion contributor to The Hill. [...] The fact that that his work is marked as 'opinion' and 'not the view of the hill' does not show that these pieces are treated any differently than other opinion pieces in reliable sources. They should be used in accordance with the standard RS opinion policy." "We already know that The Hill contributors are essentially unedited opinion columns" Sources at Media bias in the United States for claims of censorship of conservative content (2019) "I consider it generally reliable for topics related to American politics, with the usual exceptions (opinion pieces use WP:RSOPINION and non-staff contributor pieces are self-published sources)."

Based on the above, I believe the current summary in The Hill's entry is representative of past discussions. Since you have just introduced new arguments in this discussion based on the Columbia Journalism Review article, it would make sense to start a new noticeboard discussion that focuses on The Hill's contributors. The noticeboard discussion would be indexed in the list and factored into the summary. — Newslinger talk 06:23, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Adding notability to the inclusion criteria

The inclusion criteria currently allows entries for all sources that have been evaluated in an RfC or the required number of significant discussions. Historically, sources that are non-notable (i.e. ones that do not have a Wikipedia article or redirect) and sources that are excessively niche in scope (e.g. standalone books) have been excluded from the list even if they meet the criteria.

With the recent RfC authorization in WP:RSNRFC, we can expect to see many more non-notable sources that meet the current inclusion criteria. Personally, I don't think entries like the one on three peerage websites (discussion and RfC) are significant enough to be included in this list. If we included every self-published or user-generated website that is used incorrectly, the list would be too bloated and cumbersome to use efficiently.

To address this, I am proposing the addition of a notability requirement to the inclusion criteria. The proposed wording also considers RfCs with low participation ordinary discussions, and reorganizes the existing paragraph into list form:

Sources should meet both of the following requirements before being added to the list:

1. The source's name must link to one of the following pages:
   • An article about the source
   • A redirect to an article closely related to the source. The article must not be a stand-alone list, disambiguation page, or set index article.
2. The source must have been adequately discussed on the reliable sources noticeboard in at least one of the following ways:
   • At least one uninterrupted request for comment (RfC) on the source's reliability. RfCs are interrupted if they are withdrawn, deleted, or prematurely archived or closed (excluding the snowball clause) before the standard seven-day period elapses. RfCs with low participation do not qualify for this criterion, and are considered ordinary discussions.
   • At least two significant discussions that mention the source's reliability. For a discussion to be considered significant, most editors expect no fewer than two qualifying participants for discussions where the source's name is in the section heading, and no fewer than three qualifying participants for all other discussions. Qualifying participants are editors who make at least one comment on the source's reliability.

Suggestions for something more specific than "low participation" would be much appreciated.

Is this a reasonable revision, and does anyone have any other approaches? — Newslinger talk 03:26, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

I don't have any real objections to the above, but I'm wondering if a cutoff is really necessary? This may be my computer-literate bias showing, but cmd/ctrl-F searches are equally easy regardless of page length. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 20:57, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Thepeerage.com (one of the three royal sources to be depreciated) is cited nearly 10,000 times on Wikipedia (see thepeerage.com  ), around one third of the citations the Daily Mail had before it was depreciated, and significantly higher than many sources on this list (over double that of RT for instance). I think in order to be included in the Perennial sources list a source should satisfy at least one of two criteria, 1. a notability critera (Point 1. proposed by Newslinger above) 2. a usage criteria (i.e. cited over 1,000 times or some other citation threshold). In addition the source must also satisfy Newslinger's RfC and discussion criteria (Point 2.) proposed above. This would prevent clutter of non-notable sources with relatively few uses, while allowing more obscure, problematic sources with significant usage to remain on the list, and also allowing notable depreciated sources that have had all their citations removed to remain on the list. Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:11, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Not a good idea - we have five usages of The Sun, but it's still deprecated, and editors keep trying to use it - David Gerard (talk) 23:37, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

@David Gerard: I'm not suggesting the citation criterion in isolation from the notability one, my idea is that the two criteria were complimentary, The citation counts should be the maximum number of citations that a source ever had on Wikipedia (provided that the links were added organically, and not spammed), prior to systematic removal (ala the Daily Mail, which you have made excellent progress on) which would reflect the likelyhood that the source would be attempted to be added in the future. Given that Thepeerage.com is cited 9,500 times I think it would also be likely that editors will keep trying to add it also. The Sun is clearly notable and would pass the notability criterion with flying colours, regardless of how many articles it is cited in, and should definitely be on the list. Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:49, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

I see your point. Requiring a source to either have an article/redirect or be cited a certain number of times would allow for the peerage sources, and exclude sparsely used non-notable sources. Where should the line be drawn, in terms of the number of citations? — Newslinger talk 03:57, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

I think that less than 100 is insufficient and over 1,000 is definitely sufficient, maybe 500, 250? You would expect that usage of sources on wikipedia follows a power law distribution i.e many sources are cited only a handful of times (the long tail), while relatively few sources are cited many times. Ultimately where that cutoff is made is ultimately arbitrary, but should probably include the top 10-20% of self-published sources. Hemiauchenia (talk) 13:53, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Somethng like this might be an idea? I'd like a proper RFC before deprecation, I'm not sure it's needed before green/yellow/pink - though those need at least two decent discussions, I'd think. The source need not have an article of its own, that's orthogonal to the issue with a common bad source - David Gerard (talk) 23:40, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

David Gerard, we already have a requirement for RfC before deprecation. I don't see any confusion here: WP:DEPS is for deprecated sources, whatever their notability, and this is for perennial sources, i.e. sources that have been discussed multiple times, regardles of status or indeed notability. I don't mind looking at a threshold for what constitues perennial (I'd say three at least). Guy (help!) 09:12, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

• Wait, am I reading this right, any source which does NOT have a Wikipedia article is presumed to be reliable and cannot be added to the "perennial sources" list as unreliable UNLESS it already has an article? I'm not sure that makes any sense to me. Why does not having an article make a source suddenly reliable? --Jayron32 03:46, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

  ​No, absolutely not. WP:RSPMISSING states that "A source's absence from the list does not imply that it is any more or less reliable than the sources that are present", and the first sentence of RSP describes the list as "non-exhaustive". If an unreliable source is determined not to meet the criteria for inclusion, then it would still be unreliable, but it wouldn't be listed here. There's no presumption of reliability at all. — Newslinger talk 03:53, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

  But if we've already had the discussion on the unreliablity of a source, what is to gain from keeping it off the page merely because it doesn't have an article? How does Wikipedia benefit from people NOT being able to find out the source has been shown to be unreliable? Why would we not want to let people know that? --Jayron32 04:01, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

  The purpose is to keep the list accessible and manageable. The vast majority of websites are self-published sources, and if the entries on this list were proportionally representative of all websites on the Internet regardless of notability, it would be a sea of red drowning out entries of commonly encountered sources. I understand that it's possible to use a web browser to search for specific sources on this page, but making this list indiscriminate would reduce its usefulness for people who read it to learn more about sources that are widely used.

  In my opinion, non-notable unreliable sites that are repeatedly cited in an inappropriate way belong on the spam blacklist. — Newslinger talk 05:10, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

  I'd concur, but it'd be much harder to swing. We regularly get a couple of new Sun links a day, and they're always inappropriate, but would it be SPB material? I suspect that would be very hard to swing, with the regular advocates for deprecated sites insisting it's not a ban even when it should be - David Gerard (talk) 10:08, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

  The Sun is notable, so I'm not suggesting blacklisting it. Non-notable unreliable sources would include personal blogs and websites, such as those peerage sites. — Newslinger talk 10:24, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Newslinger, They can go on WP:DEPS but they don't need to go here because this ios for "perennial sources", not just deprecated ones. Guy (help!) 09:09, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

That sounds like a reasonable compromise to me. — Newslinger talk 08:38, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

What's wrong with the de facto inclusion criteria we have been using?

• Is it a source that editors have asked about on the RSNB multiple times?
• Is it a source that a lot of editors have tried to use and then been reverted for using an unreliable source?

-- Guy Macon (talk) 05:53, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Actually, the de facto inclusion criteria does include notability, since I've been removing entries of non-notable sites (e.g. Special:Diff/927881907) when they appear on rare occasions. If there is consensus in this discussion not to restrict the inclusion of entries in this way, then that would be fine too, but we need to finish the discussion first. — Newslinger talk 06:37, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Hmmm. Liliputing only has two mentions on the RSNB, one in passing. I don't know how many times it was used as a source and then reverted but I would guess very few. Could it be that both sets of criteria give the same result? --Guy Macon (talk) 08:40, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Guy Macon. I'd hope the two defacto criteria he mentions would be enough.

This is an extremely valuable tool, and I'd be against anything that reduces it's value. I never noticed that notability is one of the de facto criteria. To start, how about prominently mentioning other lists, such as the blacklists, within this article?

I've also wondered if we need to find ways to manage the length of this list. Is that a concern driving this discussion? --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 16:18, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes, the length is one of my concerns. The accessibility concerns related to length were previously discussed in Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 1 § Accessibility concerns, and the maintainability concerns were discussed in Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 2 § Criteria for inclusion. The latter discussion resulted in the first version of the inclusion criteria, which this list has been using since January 2019. — Newslinger talk 01:14, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, this list serves the function of forestalling endless rehashing of the same arguments around the 'pedia (Is Breitbart reliable? Is CNN fake news?). I think it's good to focus here on perennia;l (i.e. commonly discussed) sources. Lilputing doesn't qualify IMO.

We also have WP:DEPS for deprecated sources. That can include any source which is deemed to be generally unreliable. DEPS is used to maintain an unreliable source highlighter script, for example, and is linked from filter 869 and its messages. Liliputing does qualify there.

I don't see a problem with this. Guy (help!) 09:19, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose, as most users would use the search engine to check up on a source rather than reading the whole thing. This would limit the checkability of a source and effectively increase its use as the editor in question would find no entry for it and assume its reliable or at least undetermined, imv Atlantic306 (talk) 21:22, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
• The proposal isn't getting enough traction, so I'm going to withdraw it unless more support emerges. My concerns about the length of this list can be partially addressed through technical solutions, and I have a couple of Wikitech-hosted projects in the pipeline that I look forward to sharing in the next few months. — Newslinger talk 02:21, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Vox (website)

Should the entry for Vox have a disclaimer along the lines of Some editors say that Vox is a partisan source in the field of politics, and that their statements in this field should also be attributed? Our article on Vox does note Vox is a liberal-leaning American news and opinion website also the last substantial discussion about it here made mention of it as well. PackMecEng (talk) 15:45, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

How do they identify their opinion articles? I'm not finding any with a quick skim. --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 16:48, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

That is a good question actually, it does not appear to be clearly marked. Only thing I have found so far is this article which says “First Person” or “The Big Idea” are opinion sections. PackMecEng (talk) 17:00, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

I've added Some editors say that Vox is a partisan source in the field of politics to the list. This part of PackMegEng's proposed addition is not controversial, having been noted in previous RSN discussions. Whether the latter part, regarding their opinion pieces, should be added as well, can continue to be discussed here. feminist | freedom isn't free 03:01, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

That covers the main part of concern. The other part I more or less copied from other entries and do not have overly strong feelings about. Thanks for making the change! PackMecEng (talk) 03:05, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

state sponsored Fake sites

Чому в списке только российские сайты и нет ни одного украинского, нет "радио свободы"? Пфе. Ya unikum (talk) 19:14, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

DeepL translates the above statement as:

Why are there only Russian sites on the list and no Ukrainian sites, no "radio freedom"? Pfft.

Hi Ya unikum, the very first source on the list, 112 Ukraine (RSP entry), is a Ukrainian source that is both blacklisted and deprecated. If there are any other sources that you would like to have the community evaluate, feel free to start a new discussion on the reliable sources noticeboard. — Newslinger talk 01:35, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Examiner.com

This site is defunct, and is now a redirect to AXS. Are we keeping it on the list in case someone digs through the Wayback Machine? -- Zanimum (talk) 02:35, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes, and also to serve as a data point for what is blacklisted and designated generally unreliable.​ — Newslinger talk 02:46, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Questioning reliability

WP:NOTSOAPBOX, WP:NOTFORUM

Although I have been around for four years, this page was brought to my attention by User:Philip Cross. I admit I am wet behind the ears. Whose brain-fart was it to ram all of the western corporate media into the reliable pile and all detractors such as RT/Press TV in the "unreliable" pile? --Coldtrack (talk) 21:56, 3 June 2020 (UTC) Simply put because these are state propaganda exercises with absolutely no independence of editorial judgement or ability to think or write freely. "All detractors" is not a term which equates only to the press organs of authoritarian pariah states like RT and PressTV (which doesn't even try to hide its being a mouthpiece for the Revolutionary Guard and their ayatollah mascots). You will notice that the most egregious western corporatists (Breitbart, The Sun, The Mail, et al.) are also rightly marked unreliable. Did you think people thought RT was reliable? I don't believe anyone takes what they say seriously, it's more like a parody or satire. GPinkerton (talk) 04:30, 5 June 2020 (UTC) As you can see on the RSP page, the brain-fart discussions are linked for your convenience. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:17, 5 June 2020 (UTC) Coldtrack, anything that's on the RSP list is there because people have repeatedly come to WP:RSN and asked if it's reliable. We don't add things prospectively. The fact that Russian state sponsored media promotes falsehoods and conspiracy theories is not our problem to fix. Guy (help!) 09:07, 5 June 2020 (UTC) The page was only created in July 2018.[33] I assume the reason was to avoid a repeat of the 2016 U.S. presidential election. TFD (talk) 04:40, 6 June 2020 (UTC) The original proposal for this list is at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Archive 59 § Casual musing. The first comment in the discussion suggested that a list would be easier to reference than multiple "protracted discussions", but the discussion does not mention any elections. — Newslinger talk 08:34, 6 June 2020 (UTC) There doesn't need to be. There are five sources in the original list. All four sources described as right-wing are considered unreliable while the one source described as non-partisan is described as reliable. One editor complained that it was egregious to list position on the political spectrum and that field was omitted in the final list. TFD (talk) 13:39, 6 June 2020 (UTC) Entries in this list are derived from past discussions on the reliable sources noticeboard. See the entries for Press TV (RSP entry) and RT (RSP entry) for details. As discussed in the May RfC on RT, the body of evidence against RT's reliability is particularly strong. — Newslinger talk 08:34, 6 June 2020 (UTC) All right. Question 1 - how does alleged "independence of editorial judgement or ability to think or write freely" mean that those who possess this can be "relied upon". Surely the ability to "write or think freely" would give one the freedom to tell lies, right? If not - what stops him? Similarly question 2 - if a news network happens to report a certain government's position, how does this mean that the source is "unreliable"? Is someone claiming that it is impossible for a government to be right? In particular, a government not favourable to the west. Question 3 - who demonstrated that Russian media promotes so-called "falsehoods" and so-called "conspiracy theories". Question 4 - what the hell does anyone mean "egregious western corporatists (Breitbart, The Sun, The Mail, et al.", this bundle says NOTHING that the so-called "reliable" sources don't regurgitate san evidence. --Coldtrack (talk) 18:14, 6 June 2020 (UTC) I listed 30 in-depth reliable sources in the RfC on RT that explain how RT is a propaganda outlet. The verifiability policy states that "Articles should be based on reliable, independent, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy", and RT is considered generally unreliable because its reputation is the opposite of what is required of reliable sources. If you would like to start a new discussion on RT or any other source, feel free to do so on the reliable sources noticeboard, although it is highly unlikely that the community will find consensus for your view in light of how recent the RfC on RT is. — Newslinger talk 18:24, 6 June 2020 (UTC) Yeah you're damn right I won't find any consensus for suggesting RT is reliable. And that statement brings us a step closer to establishing what is reliable (i.e. "we are the masses and it tickles our ear as opposed to that source"). After all, if it were to be deemed reliable, the whole of Wikipedia would have to be rewritten not to look like a George Soros fanzine. I cannot see the relevance of something being a propaganda outlet unless one can demonstrate why propaganda need be false. And is it as if the "reliable sources" do not promote propaganda? and I mean, copious propaganda? The rest of your statement is a run-of-the-mill regurgitation of site policy which nobody has demonstrated that the "reliable sources" adhere to and the opponents of corporate media (i.e. "the reliable sources") do not adhere to. --Coldtrack (talk) 18:34, 6 June 2020 (UTC) This talk page is for the maintenance of the list itself. If your objection is to the reliable sources guideline, you can propose changes on the talk page of that guideline. If your objection is to the Wikipedia community's evaluation of RT, you can ask for reconsideration on the reliable sources noticeboard. However, new arguments introduced on this page do not influence specific entries on the list, because this list is just an index. Wikipedia is based on consensus, and you must obtain consensus somewhere if you wish to have your point of view represented. — Newslinger talk 18:43, 6 June 2020 (UTC) Thank you Newslinger for burying your head in the sand after yourself raising some issues deviating from the purpose of the article. Survival of the fittest I see. --Coldtrack (talk) 18:49, 6 June 2020 (UTC) You are in the wrong location for proposing the changes you suggested, and I have shown you the right locations for doing so. Whether you follow up in the right locations is up to you. — Newslinger talk 18:52, 6 June 2020 (UTC) All right I take your point. I wish to make one more comment and after this, it really is fine by me if it sits festering with no reply ever as I will not be coming here looking for changes. To be honest, I wasn't really doing so in the first place; I just wanted to know why the BBC & CNN are reliable while RT & Press TV are unreliable. Of course, I am sure defenders of this standpoint will laugh off the list of binaries such as the positions on the White Helmets, the positions on Palestine, the positions on Kosovo, the positions on Venezuela inter alia as a gigantic coincidence. If you ask me, the term slothful induction comes to mind, because if those on the "reliable" list are not Grade A propagandists for the western regimes then someone tell me how pro-west propaganda might look, and what would be different? The A-list say that Russian & Syrian media promote disinformation over the White Helmets. The unreliable "Sun" paints them as the cuddly band of non-dangerous fanatics, and the "reliable" BBC does the same but using different rhetoric. To the person above who questioned whether people believe RT, I'm afraid to inform him/her that RT ranks 2nd for foreign media in the US after BBC World, and ranks 1st for online subscribers and viewers. So yes people do rely on it, while independent surveys (reported in corporate media albeit low-key) show that figures ranging from almost half to well over half of citizens per western state do not believe their media, that is to the the ones you laud as "reliable" (i.e many that were on a Saddam-has-WMD drive even long after the Iraq War). I'm done. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:07, 6 June 2020 (UTC) @Coldtrack: Your questions have already been answered. CNN and the BBC can meet reliability criteria because they are independent news organizations. PressTV and RT are both state propaganda agencies that report what their governments want the world to think, nothing more, never less. Where are you getting your proof from that "almost half to well over half of citizens per western state do not believe their media"? Is that something RT reported? Did you imagine Wikipedia is based on the purported beliefs of "almost half to well over half of citizens" rather than actual global consensus and reliable sources? No-one but Bashar and his wife believes the lunacy Russia puts onto the airwaves about the White Helmets, so you'll not find it in anything normal people would describe as a reliable source. GPinkerton (talk) 06:14, 9 June 2020 (UTC) To be honest, I wasn't really doing so in the first place Yeah, I think everyone is aware of that. Not sure what the purpose of any of that was, other than to froth at the mouth about some great wrongs. Grandpallama (talk) 16:30, 10 June 2020 (UTC) Grandpallama - The "answer to the question" I have been provided does not cut the mustard. The mantra that is being regurgitated over and over (ie. CNN and the BBC are so-called "independent" news organizations. PressTV and RT are "state propaganda" et al) is a distinction without a difference. I responded to that here[34], and to date nobody has demonstrated even one fraction why one is reliable and the other isn't. To be honest, any fair-minded observer is able to see that the so-called "reliability criteria" is framed specifically to single out the sources which please the architects of this project. You would really have to think that the reader is stupid if one is "independent" when he writes for Rupert Murdoch, or that the BBC is "reliable" while Press TV is "unreliable" on the so-called "rectitudes" of the White Helmets or the so-called "Syrian Observatory for Human Rights" when the BBC make no secret of the fact that what they report from Syria adduces those two headsprings. In other words, the "unreliable" sources call them terrorists, and the "reliable" cartel present them as the "cuddly band of non-dangerous fanatics dedicated to saving lives". Result: The White Helmets are good people and not bad, because they say they are. Circular reasoning (see begging the question). As regards where I saw that the majority in the west don't trust their media may have been from a corporate source ultimately, and I think it was, but I spotted it on Twitter a month or so ago. When I find it, I'll post it to your talk. If it were acknowledged on RT it would more likely have been on an op-ed (you know, the ones who write what THEY want and not what the Kremlin tells them) and would likely have been an acknowledgement more than a leading news headline. But then what would it matter if it were RT when nobody has ever provided me with a reason to disbelieve them. --Coldtrack (talk) 18:18, 11 June 2020 (UTC) Please don't post anything to my talk, whether you find it or not. Thanks. Grandpallama (talk) 18:32, 11 June 2020 (UTC) @Coldtrack: A shorter version of the answer you have already received would run something like "so-called facts you have seen on Twitter are not reliable anything, and neither are your opinions about Twitter fit material for judging the reliability of reliable sources". You appear to be obsessed with the usual propaganda produced by Bashar's friends in Moscow and Tehran, whose line runs something like "if Bashar is bombing them, they must be evil (and we must bomb them as well)". Of course there isn't the slightest evidence for their ludicrous claims about civilians in Syria (claims like: "if we, the al-Assad clan killed them, they must be evil") , still less of a global conspiracy of all people everywhere to malign and attack the world's only righteous among the nations: Iran, Syria, and Russia, a clutch of banana republics which one could hardly find in the Africa of the cold war. State propaganda agencies from belligerents and aggressors in a war are not reliable sources for that war, nor for anything else. RT and PressTV take orders from their respective governments' press offices. You may believe them, but most never will, and rightly so. GPinkerton (talk) 19:10, 11 June 2020 (UTC) @GPinkerton: - I heard you the first time when you called Press & RT "state propaganda" so to avoid repeating myself, I refer you to my response which rebuffed this point. Remember the discussion was reliable sources and not the dynamics of the Syrian Civil War. But don't worry, the dog-whistling for your support of the Jihadists (i.e the so-called "moderate" fanatics) was shrieking long before you made the remark. You have not demonstrated one reason Rupert Murdoch is reliable and RT is not. You refer to Russia and Syria as "aggressors" for no other reason than the fact that they are fighting against your "moderate" Al-Qaeda affiliates; my heart bleeds. The rest of the accusations of this block being an aggressor lies entirely within your "reliable source" bundle, ie. corporate media (so by "reliable source", I was grimly mocking your standpoint). If they are not western-regime mouthpieces, someone tell me how might pro-west propaganda actually look. Anyhow I don't know where you get this information that it is only Russian, Syrian and Iranian media which reports as it does: Chinese is exactly the same. I read Ukrainian sources which you would dismiss as "pro-Russian" although in reality they are simply anti-Maidan. I have a Bulgarian wife who knows about the Helmets from Bulgarian media, albeit not pro-government. We also know of at least one Serbian journal to report the way you don't like. Face it, your champagne bubble gets smaller ans smaller. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:45, 11 June 2020 (UTC) PS. Also stop trying to be amusing with your "Twitter not reliable" comments. I said I found the survey on Twitter; it was linked by someone else. I'm not sure how to break this to you but many of your "reliable sources" such as Hilary Clinton use Twitter as well. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:51, 11 June 2020 (UTC) @Coldtrack: Are you now arguing for Bulgarian and Serbian media outlets to be added to the reliable sources list? It's difficult to know what you're suggesting, if anything. I'm not going to defend Murdoch - why would I? Most of his outlets are not considered reliable here, and even so he's a private individual and not an authoritarian pariah state. You make a lot of very strange and wrong assumptions, and I can tell you that your idiosyncratic view of the Syrian war that you learnt about seventh-hand from your wife's interpretation of some unspecified Bulgarian media report (the same Bulgaria well known for having the worst conditions of media freedom almost anywhere in Europe, with the fewest journalists, and the most corrupt?) is not going to right great wrongs and change Wikipedia's entire worldview to a pro-Kremlin or pro-al-Assad position with some catacorner claims about Kiev and cuddly jihadists. You'll wait all your life for that bubble to burst. If you have something to add, find something less laughable to suggest. Where do you see Hilary Clinton listed as a reliable media organization, as you appear to claim? GPinkerton (talk) 19:59, 11 June 2020 (UTC) Where is Hilary Clinton listed as a reliable source? Answer: ALL corporate media regurgitates points that she and her buccaneers make where you're concerned (Syrian Civil War). If you know where she has said one thing about Assad or Moscow and your corporate media have denounced it saying something else, kindly share it with us. You are absolutely right about Bulgaria having poor freedom press, but in saying so you have overshot the runway, because Bulgarian state media also parrots the western narrative. The article denouncing the White Helmets came from an Ataka journal, but then Ataka is far-right so that is a good a reason as any to deem them unreliable - though any sentient human being knows the real reason it would be unreliable is because it does not conform to your pre-determined bias over Syria. Murdoch owns the Times, but Sky was considered "reliable" back from the time he owned it. And lo and behold, they have never questioned Hilary Clinton's position on Russia or Iran or Syria either, nor her husband Bill's, nor Israel's, nor the EU's, nor every other globalist embodiment. It is one monolithic entity, and who dares challenge it is a "crank". Honestly, how dare one raise concerns expounded by the BBC, I mean the BBC - the paragon of unbiased reporting!! Don't make me laugh or my ribs will ache! --Coldtrack (talk) 20:12, 11 June 2020 (UTC) I’ve been interacting with Coldtrack at Nazi analogies and on my talk page after I warned them for edit warring, at this point I think its fair to say that WP:Tendentious is on the table. Editor appears to be here to WP:RGW, we’re getting rants about the Clintons, Israel, and the EU not constructive contributions to wikipedia. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 20:47, 11 June 2020 (UTC) @Horse Eye Jack: Yes the most recent comment puts a name to the POV: they're against "globalist embodiment". (Whatever that process looks like.) And Атака is basically what would happen if you gave Nazism a really low budget, no votes, and lots of Eastern Orthodox religion. What a surprise its media organs lean towards the rather higher budget ultra-nationalist Orthodox regime in Moscow and their Damascene and Iranian friends, and repeat their media outlets! But oh no, it's all (still, somehow,) Hillary Clinton's fault! WP:Tendentious and WP:RGW is definitely the right description, with WP:FRINGE beliefs and sources mixed in. And of course, no Kremlin-backed conspiracy theory could ever be complete without references to George Soros, Israel, and the EU. Presumably these things keeps someone in that Moscow palace awake at night, but that should hardly affect our judgement here. GPinkerton (talk) 21:44, 11 June 2020 (UTC) With regards Horse Eye Jack, I am deeply suspicious about elements of this user's behaviour and I will in due course be raising concerns. Right now, I have business to attend which prevents my ability to draft reports. With regards TENDENTIOUS, I wouldn't go throwing stones in glasshouses. I am very open about my political persuasion and find myself in conflict with opponents who pretend that they are being objective when it is clear that they are apologists for the opposing processes. Neither Horse Eye Jack nor the bulk of editors to post on this thread are in a position to pretend that they are neutral over any political matter because the watchwords they use expose their political orientation. For example, "Kremlin-backed conspiracy theory", really? This assertion carries the burden of proof. One does not meet this burden by claiming, "ah but the reliable sources say it is a conspiracy theory, therefore it must be". That is begging the question, a fallacy. But then the very fact that one should even hold up Israel and George Soros as a force for good really and truly reveals one's own political imperatives. Without asking any of you, I already know your standpoints on Israel, Palestine, the "moderate" terrorists in Syria (covered), Iran, Venezuela, Kosovo, China, North Korea, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, NATO, the EU, Brexit, the UN, western intervention; the list goes on. If either of you wish to shock me by telling me you support Palestinian statehood and that the Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal then go ahead, but do not even try to enter a political debate with me over any of those matters because if you do, I'll blow the bollocks off you. I'll embarrass you all. BOTH my parents are retired diplomats and I know more about the actualities of world events than Joe Public will learn in his entire life. In fact, I do not even need Press TV myself as I am perfectly capable of framing my own argumentations if I did happen to write. I came here merely to talk about reliability standards and unsurprisingly this discussion descended into "our sources are right and yours are wrong; yours support aggression and we only want to bring democracy to places". I would have quit this discussion if others did not add to it to try to proselytise for their preferred media. I'm not exactly sure what GPinkerton means by "Ataka is what you get if you allow no votes and Eastern Orthodoxy" because as far as I am concerned, Ataka is well capable of standing up for its own battles against neo-con domination. Their position being non-mainstream is hardly a factor that must mean, "they are wrong and others are right". Despite being Ukrainian, I am not Orthodox, I am atheist. I have no affiliation to Ataka but GPinkerton deliberately refused to grasp a simple point. First he said, "Bulgarian media standards are poor" and then I notified him that the Bulgarian regime is pro-west, a NATO member and an EU member and their "piss-poor media" lift their world affairs reporting straight out of the CNN playbook. Ataka's publication on the other hand may indeed be a lot of things that GPinkerton and Horse Eye Jack do not stand for as individuals, I'll go along with you there, but it is the exact diametrical opposite of a "government-backed mouthpiece". In short, Bulgaria's state-monitored and not-free media parrot the western narrative, while an independent source from the country reports external matters differently. For GPinkerton in one post to say "Bulgaria is known for poor media standards" (clearly thinking that the criticism of the White Helmets was from BNT) to then denigrating "Ataka" in the next post when he found out it was them slating his darling White Helmets while BNT was peddling their "righteousness" from the start, he suddenly reveals knowledge of Eastern Orthodoxy and a low budget. In other words, his knuckles were dragging the ground from the start, and they still are; he knew nothing about Bulgaria's internal reporting system. He got his tail between his legs over this one, and that is what happens when one is sublimely ignorant. --Coldtrack (talk) 05:59, 12 June 2020 (UTC) @Coldtrack: Definite tendentiousness on show here: to assume that any- and everyone that doesn't join the cult of Bashar must be in league with his/Putin's/the ayatollahs' enemies is a hilarious false dichotomy. The pariah states are in league with each other, but their opponents are the whole world, not some cabal dictated to by Clinton (a has-been for years now) and Soros (a perennial lightning rod for anti-Semitic hatred and conspiracy theories churned out by various far-right sections of eastern Europe). Bulgaria's media is terrible across the board, Bulgarian state-run or otherwise. It's the worst place in Europe to be a journalist. Атака being opposed to the Bulgarian government does not somehow rule out its organs being aligned with Moscow and heavily biased towards Putinist foreign policy, just as many far-right parties are willing to do in exchange for the money and the constant tirade of anti-EU/West/US/Judaism propaganda the Kremlin supplies and which the anti-Western press are everywhere eager to plagiarize. (Israel, Palestine, the "moderate" terrorists in Syria (covered), Iran, Venezuela, Kosovo, China, North Korea, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, NATO, the EU, Brexit, the UN, western intervention - one could hardly compile a more thorough list of Russian hopes, fears, allies and envy!) Your threats of "I'll blow the bollocks off you" (by which I assume you mean win an argument) are amusing but not realistic, judging by the inchoate mass of non-argument opinions you've adduced thus far. Think of something particular you want to discuss about the reliability of some off-Wiki source or quit, though if you're going to try and get Атака's newsletter written up as a reliable source I recommend you not bother and save yourself the wasted effort. Why even bother to edit here if you've inherited knowledge of "more about the actualities of world events than Joe Public will learn in his entire life" from your (presumably Soviet-era) diplomat parents? Who knew one could acquire understanding of today's current events in utero decades prior! GPinkerton (talk) 03:25, 14 June 2020 (UTC) @GPinkerton: TENDENTIOUS simply means editing in an NPOV manner and I can argue the same of you and your acolytes. Of course my parents are Soviet-era diplomats if they are retired. I'm sorry but is that supposed to be a problem? Are we automatically wrong for having sought professional careers within the country we were born? You've got a problem cousin. Everything in the world that does not conform to your pro-Pentagon propaganda and conspiracy theories is automatically "Russian-backed" and by extension, a world evil. So I was right then. I only listed a quick and small portion of world disputes just to prove to you that I knew your position on all of them and lo and behold, you didn't jump onto any to say, "well actually in Yemen I oppose the Saudi actions" or the like. And yet you dismiss a mass hotchpotch of matters around the globe (to which I could have added many many more) as "Putinist foreign policy" forgetting that it is actually your American regime which is fanning the flames of conflict in those regions. As for Africa, don't even get me started. I know the Clintons are has-beens, or have-beens, but what it is they "have been"? Answer: exactly what Trump and Boris Johnson are in 2020 - figureheads. The point I was making about Hilary Clinton is that her public comments on all of the conflicts I specified spawn not one variation from the so-called "reliable sources", so you might as well just declare her a "reliable source" because you are affording the accolade to the ones who genuflect to her. So Bulgaria is a bad place to be a journalist, and yet we see that it produces reports from across the spectrum: there is the government-monitored state media which parrots your "reliable sources", and there are those who work independently without hindrance, as in those who provide reports that frustrate your "reliable source" faithful. So the reality is, there is no fringe because your bubble is not as big as you make out. For a better insight just look at Kosovan and Palestinian recognition: the former is about half/half (more UN members recognise, fewer with non-UN), but the latter is overwhelmingly against your US/Zionist appeal for pity. When saying I would blow the bollocks off you in a debate, it means more than just win, it means I would humiliate you: particularly as you are someone ignorant on world affairs. To take Syria as one example: regurgitating "Assad bad Assad bad" may find it has agreement with a lot of people, but once it becomes clear that you repose faith in corporate media, your dog-whistling for "Pentagon good Pentagon good" will be heard by all ears, and everyone with even the most rudimentary knowledge of Syria will know straight away that "Assad is bad" not because he is accused of committing atrocities against civilians (which he expressly denies anyhow) but because he and Russia are "attacking our guys" (that's what your sources were reporting), and as such you are holding up the "moderate" fanatics (yep, YOUR cartel introduced the word "moderate" to distinguish between terrorist organisations which is why your opponents shame you with it) as the darlings of the conflict. In other words, you approve the nice little Kidnapping for Ransom scheme your "moderate" Al-Nusra were engaging in as a way for masses of non-Syrians pretending to be Syrian to wage war on the Syrian government. Your ally Sheikh Tamim even admitted to your darling reliable Christiane Amanpour for CNN that Qatar was happy to go along with the caper as it supported the cause of Al Nusra and other "moderate" terrorist organisations operating there. So I'm wrapping up by saying, yes the likes of RT present their cases not that they pretend otherwise, but nobody on this thread has produced a single argument as to why BBC, Fox, DW or CNN are "reliable". If you are going to reply, don't bother trying to slate the organisations of this world to whom your globalist powers and their obeisant media are against, but just try building a case for why I or any reader should be convinced that the BBC is reliable. Good luck on your snipe hunt. --Coldtrack (talk) 04:54, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Encyclopedia Britannica

The section about public contributions is quite out of date: they haven't allowed that for over a decade. (Saying that as someone who contributed three articles, and was in the process of writing another when they shut the process down.) -- Zanimum (talk) 02:34, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Since no past discussions have mentioned that the Encyclopædia Britannica Online stopped accepting content submissions from the public, you'll want to start a new discussion about this matter on the reliable sources noticeboard. I see that there is a currently active discussion, so I recommend creating a new subsection at the end of that discussion. — Newslinger talk 02:44, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

 Done. The discussion was archived at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 298 § Encyclopedia Britannica, and I've updated the entry. Please feel free to make further adjustments as you see fit.​ — Newslinger talk 00:37, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks! -- Zanimum (talk) 18:49, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

The Times

Given that The Times is only second to The Daily Mail when it comes to upheld complaints by IPSO should it still be considered a reliable source? 80.47.137.128 (talk) 01:49, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi there, this list only tracks discussions on the reliable sources noticeboard. Other information, including metrics from regulatory organizations, do not directly affect this list. However, if you would like to start a new discussion on The Times, feel free to do so on the noticeboard, where you can bring up the IPSO complaints. Judging from past discussions, I don't think most editors treat IPSO complaints as a major factor in their reliability evaluations. — Newslinger talk 04:41, 23 June 2020 (UTC)