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*:::This isn't for RSP. My goal here is to establish a guide that allows editors to distinguish reputable sources from tabloids and self-published outlets at a glance, as well as to identify particularly relevant conflicts of interest for a given publication. The purpose of this is not to head off discussion about sources, it's to provide a starting point. Of course context matters, but there are also aspects of a publication that remain true in every (or almost every context) and that are worth discussing and recording. <sub>signed, </sub>[[User:Rosguill|'''''Rosguill''''']] <sup>[[User talk:Rosguill|''talk'']]</sup> 20:55, 12 June 2019 (UTC) |
*:::This isn't for RSP. My goal here is to establish a guide that allows editors to distinguish reputable sources from tabloids and self-published outlets at a glance, as well as to identify particularly relevant conflicts of interest for a given publication. The purpose of this is not to head off discussion about sources, it's to provide a starting point. Of course context matters, but there are also aspects of a publication that remain true in every (or almost every context) and that are worth discussing and recording. <sub>signed, </sub>[[User:Rosguill|'''''Rosguill''''']] <sup>[[User talk:Rosguill|''talk'']]</sup> 20:55, 12 June 2019 (UTC) |
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*:{{u|Ahrtoodeetoo}}, are you planning to insert this into more sections on this noticeboard? It doesn't seem directly related. [[User talk:Cygnis insignis|cygnis insignis]] 09:02, 13 June 2019 (UTC) |
*:{{u|Ahrtoodeetoo}}, are you planning to insert this into more sections on this noticeboard? It doesn't seem directly related. [[User talk:Cygnis insignis|cygnis insignis]] 09:02, 13 June 2019 (UTC) |
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:::Yes, I plan to keep objecting to these sorts of surveys, unless/until there's consensus that they're consistent with WP:RS. [[User:Ahrtoodeetoo|R2]] <small>([[User talk:Ahrtoodeetoo|bleep]])</small> 15:25, 13 June 2019 (UTC) |
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*:<small>'''Endorse RfC'''. All four options are fully compliant with the [[WP:V|verifiability policy]], including [[WP:CONTEXTMATTERS]], which still applies for every instance a source is used. Note that the word ''generally'' means "usually", not "always". As I've [[Special:Diff/901356678/901582780#RfC: Header text|documented in the active RfC on the talk page]], there are many editors who want a [[rule of thumb]] for how often a source could be appropriately used. It would be [[WP:NOTBURO|unnecessarily bureaucratic]] to [[Filibuster|deny editors the ability to ask for general guidance]] and to force them to start a separate discussion every single time a source is in question. — '''''[[User:Newslinger|<span style="color:#536267;">Newslinger</span>]]''' <small>[[User talk:Newslinger#top|<span style="color:#708090;">talk</span>]]</small>'' 22:19, 12 June 2019 (UTC)</small> |
*:<small>'''Endorse RfC'''. All four options are fully compliant with the [[WP:V|verifiability policy]], including [[WP:CONTEXTMATTERS]], which still applies for every instance a source is used. Note that the word ''generally'' means "usually", not "always". As I've [[Special:Diff/901356678/901582780#RfC: Header text|documented in the active RfC on the talk page]], there are many editors who want a [[rule of thumb]] for how often a source could be appropriately used. It would be [[WP:NOTBURO|unnecessarily bureaucratic]] to [[Filibuster|deny editors the ability to ask for general guidance]] and to force them to start a separate discussion every single time a source is in question. — '''''[[User:Newslinger|<span style="color:#536267;">Newslinger</span>]]''' <small>[[User talk:Newslinger#top|<span style="color:#708090;">talk</span>]]</small>'' 22:19, 12 June 2019 (UTC)</small> |
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*'''Comment''' An excerpt from ''The Press and Political Culture in Ghana'' by Jennifer Hasty, published by Indiana University Press in 2005 (page 47): "Under President J. J. Rawlings, the premier state newspaper, the Daily Graphic, articulated and reinforced a specific logic of state hegemony: political legitimacy based on state accumulation, populist morality, and benevolent patronage. Participation in the hegemonic project of the state distinguishes the Daily Graphic as a strategic node in the larger "ideological state apparatus" (Althusser 1971) designed to construct and reinforce an official national imaginary...The style of journalism practiced at Graphic throughout the 1990s...was designed to explain government policies and illustrate the positive impact of development projects on grateful communities, generally ignoring political controversies and popular criticisms." I'd lean for option 1, but option 2 might be in order with the consideration of the fact that its reporting of government business might be non-neutral. It is a state-run newspaper, after all. -[[User:Indy beetle|Indy beetle]] ([[User talk:Indy beetle|talk]]) 19:38, 12 June 2019 (UTC) |
*'''Comment''' An excerpt from ''The Press and Political Culture in Ghana'' by Jennifer Hasty, published by Indiana University Press in 2005 (page 47): "Under President J. J. Rawlings, the premier state newspaper, the Daily Graphic, articulated and reinforced a specific logic of state hegemony: political legitimacy based on state accumulation, populist morality, and benevolent patronage. Participation in the hegemonic project of the state distinguishes the Daily Graphic as a strategic node in the larger "ideological state apparatus" (Althusser 1971) designed to construct and reinforce an official national imaginary...The style of journalism practiced at Graphic throughout the 1990s...was designed to explain government policies and illustrate the positive impact of development projects on grateful communities, generally ignoring political controversies and popular criticisms." I'd lean for option 1, but option 2 might be in order with the consideration of the fact that its reporting of government business might be non-neutral. It is a state-run newspaper, after all. -[[User:Indy beetle|Indy beetle]] ([[User talk:Indy beetle|talk]]) 19:38, 12 June 2019 (UTC) |
Revision as of 15:25, 13 June 2019
Welcome — ask about reliability of sources in context! | |||||||||
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Strange Fox News story about AOC and climate change
Some editors are eager to include a Fox News story to the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez article (citing this noticeboard's decision to declare Fox News as a RS).[1][2] The bolded text is the text in dispute:
- Ocasio-Cortez has called for "more environmental hardliners in Congress",[1] describing climate change as "the single biggest national security threat for the United States and the single biggest threat to worldwide industrialized civilization" and stating that the world will end in 12 years unless the problem is addressed.[2][3][4] Her comments referred to the recent United Nations report that established that unless carbon emissions are reined in over the next 12 years, the effects of climate change will be irreversible.[5] In May 2019, Ocasio-Cortez contended that her statements were sarcastic and not intended to be taken literally; she added that “you’d have to have the social intelligence of a sea sponge to think” that the comment was literal. However, a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change.”[6]
References
- ^ Aronoff, Kate (June 25, 2018). "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Why She Wants to Abolish ICE and Upend the Democratic Party". In These Times. ISSN 0160-5992. Archived from the original on December 27, 2018. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
{{cite news}}
: Unknown parameter|dead-url=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ Zhao, Christina (January 22, 2019). "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Warns, 'World Is Going to End in 12 Years,' Reiterating Claims of Recent U.N. Climate Change Report". Newsweek. Archived from the original on February 24, 2019. Retrieved February 23, 2019.
{{cite news}}
: Unknown parameter|dead-url=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ Cummings, William (January 22, 2019). "'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change,' Ocasio-Cortez says". USA Today. Archived from the original on February 7, 2019. Retrieved February 23, 2019.
{{cite news}}
: Unknown parameter|dead-url=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ Ocasio-Cortez, Alexandria (2018). "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Platform: Mobilizing Against Climate Change". Ocasio2018.com (campaign website). Archived from the original on January 16, 2019. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
{{cite web}}
: Unknown parameter|dead-url=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ John, Bowden (January 22, 2019). "Ocasio-Cortez: 'World will end in 12 years' if climate change not addressed". The Hill. Archived from the original on March 5, 2019. Retrieved March 5, 2019.
{{cite news}}
: Unknown parameter|dead-url=
ignored (|url-status=
suggested) (help) - ^ Mikelionis, Lukas (May 23, 2019). "AOC says only a 'sea sponge' would believe her '12 years' doomsday remark, but most Dems bought it". Fox News.
This text does adhere to the language of the Fox News story, but the problem is that the Fox News is absolute trash. For a very simple reason: the poll did not ask respondents whether the world would literally end in 12 yrs (even though the writer of the Fox News story suggests it did - it's such a rudimentary error that it's hard not to assume it's malicious). In their desperation to trash AOC and portray those seeking to curb climate change as lunatics, they ran a story that is completely and intentionally misleading, and now editors on Wikipedia are saying "Oh, Fox News is RS! It's a RS! Go to the RS noticeboard to have it deemed unreliable if you disagree!" while they edit-war to restore this crap content. So: 1. Can I please get confirmation from this noticeboard that this particular story is not valid for inclusion on Wikipedia?
This gets into a broader problem regarding Fox News' RS status: the stunning fact that Fox News is considered a reliable source in general on Wikipedia, but specifically on the topic of climate change. And I'm not talking about the opinion shows (most of whom are climate change deniers), it's the news division that is unreliable (the story above is a Fox News "news" piece). Academic books on the climate change denial movement have covered how the news division at Fox News has promoted falsehoods and fringe views on the subject of climate change:
- Bill Sammon, the Fox News Washington managing editor, instructing Fox News journalists to dispute the scientific consensus on climate change: "A leaked email from the managing editor of Fox News Washington, Bill Sammon, during the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009 reveals Fox’s scepti- cal policy towards climate change. Sammon advised Fox journalists to “refrain from asserting that the planet has warmed (or cooled) in any given period without IMMEDIATELY pointing out that such theories are based upon data that critics have called into question”." Page 174 of Marisol Sandoval. "From Corporate to Social Media: Critical Perspectives on Corporate Social Responsibility in Media and Communication Industries". Routledge.
- Bret Baier, a straight-news anchor -“In February 2010, a paper on sea level rise that had previously been published in Nature Geosciences74 was formally withdrawn75 by the authors because of an error they had identified subsequently in their calculations. Fox News announced the development in this vein: “More Questions About Validity of Global Warming Theory.”76 In fact, the error in the calculations had led the authors to projections of future sea level rise that were too low!77” Page 223 of Michael E. Mann. “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From the Front Lines.” Columbia University Press.
- Bill Hemmer, a straight-news anchor: Promotion of Climategate falsehoods: "“This particular falsehood had been promoted recently by venues such as Fox News , e.g., Bill Hemmer on Fox’s America’s Newsroom, December 3, 2009: “Recently leaked emails reveal that scientists use, quote, ‘tricks’ to hide evidence of a decline in global temperatures over the past, say, few decades." Page 353 of Michael E. Mann. “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From the Front Lines.” Columbia University Press.
See more here[3].
So: 2. Can I please get confirmation from this noticeboard that Fox News is not considered a reliable source on the subject of climate change? Surely if the managing editor of the network is instructing Fox News reporters to push fringe views on the subject of climate change, then it's not a RS on the subject. And this matters, given that editors are as we can see above adding deceptive Fox News stories on the subject of climate change to our articles. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 01:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- News spam is one of our biggest problems overall....not just fox news. Daily news coverage should be used exceedingly rarely overall. The propagation of daily news stories that are incomplete, opinionated are simply incompatible with an encyclopedic entry and result in a dead link in a month or so.... leading to debate over if the source even says what we say. This seems to be an extreme problem in political articles on the United States.....so much a concern.... that the academic community has criticized Wikipedia for blow by blow coverage over analytical coverage.--Moxy 🍁 02:15, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- 1. Mainstream news organizations are often terrible at reporting on public opinion polling and on the sciences. They should be used with caution for those topics even if we generally rely on them for other stuff. 2. Fox is kind of an outlier with their AOC coverage, and it's probably WP:UNDUE to cite them if they are the only major news organization running with a story like this. General reliability is neither necessary nor sufficient for inclusion, and this is a case where editorial common sense should give us plenty reason to exclude this. Nblund talk 02:18, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- In general, we should not be including Twitter-based reactions in ongoing news stories -140 characters is nowhere near enough to derive sufficient context for what the person meant. (This applies both ways). On this, the Wiki text given is missing a key point in both AOC's and the Fox news stories, that she was saying that it was the GOP taking the story seriously or to whom her sarcasm was missed, and that's why the Fox story proceeds to describe how many Dems thought the 12 years were legit. So no, there's no issue on Fox's side outside of the overall media's probably of taking 140 characters to a full length article, and the larger issue is the UNDUE nature of this coverage. --Masem (t) 02:27, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- No, the Fox News story is not right at all. The story is falsely suggesting that Democrats believe that the world will literally end in 12 yrs (which the poll does not at all substantiate), and that therefore AOC believes they are idiots. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 02:34, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Snooganssnoogans what about the USA Today report:
sparked conservative criticism when she said Monday that she and other young Americans fear "the world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change."
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., made the remark during an interview with writer Ta-Nehisi Coates at the MLK Now event in New York City celebrating the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.
Ocasio-Cortez called the fight to mitigate the effects of climate change her generation's "World War II."
"Millennials and Gen Z and all these folks that come after us are looking up, and we're like, 'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change, and your biggest issue is how are we gonna pay for it?' " she said.- There is nothing wrong with this USA Today report. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:14, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- They are reporting what the survey gave. So unless we know the survey's wrong, and Fox is purposely misreporting it, then there's nothing like that in the actual Fox story. The poll results are available (though the breakout by party affiliation is behind a paywell) So no, Fox is not misreporting, they specifically note the context is with respect to the GOP (which you'd think they want to ignore). --Masem (t) 03:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Basically yes, unless user:Snooganssnoogans has a reliable source that proves the survey invalid, I don't see why his personal opinion overrules the reporting.--Rusf10 (talk) 04:19, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- I never at any point said that the poll was unreliable. What are you talking about? What I said was that Fox News are misreporting the poll results. This is the opening paragraph of the Fox News story: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it."[4] Fox News is lying about what the poll says: the poll does not at all ask respondents whether the world will literally end in 12 yrs (i.e. AOC is not calling Democrats idiots). The Fox News story, which is entitled "AOC says only a 'sea sponge' would believe her '12 years' doomsday remark, but most Dems bought it" is not complicated to read. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 09:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- That's "spin", which is common to all MSM. I can read that statement one way and agree that it is completely misrepresenting the survey question, but I can read the same statement in another way to say it is one "colorful" way to phrase it but not actually wrong. They later are more exacting and non-obtusely correct about what the survey question is. This is not unique to Fox. (And yes, headline is extremely clickbait, but this is why we have stated that ALL RS headlines should not be used as a "reliable source" or any type of statement due to the clickbait used nowadays. --Masem (t) 13:38, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- It's a straight-up falsehood, and in this case it has deceived multiple editors, including Rusf10 (who edit-warred the misrepresentation into the AOC page, yet bizarrely also claimed that your comment was correct) and SunCrow (who tried to have me sanctioned for reverting this rubbish). And no, the problem is not just with the headline, so please do not dismiss my concerns with "Headlines are not RS. Everybody move on." I've explicitly referred to the body of the article, and even copied the deceptive text into our discussion here. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 13:47, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- That's what "spin" is, its meant to confuse readers or obfuscate the details. I agree the first paragraph of the Fox article is badly worded to frame the story, but it is not "wrong", because it remains vague on what "end in 12 years" meant, whether it is "earth blows up in 12 years" or "irreversible change" is not clear. I fully agree Fox is cherry-picking its interpretations here between what AOC actually said and what the poll questioned, but that's tactics used in every press room to gain the audience to their side. I point to the later paragraph in the Fox article that is much more direct and accurate "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change. Out of all total likely voters, 48 percent of respondents believed the apocalyptic claim." So again, this is not a wrong story, but it is the type that needs to be understood and the underlying sources evaluated to know what is meant, and that should be done only after considering if this is even UNDUE to include or not (I'm firmly thinking it is not appropriate to include even if it came from the NYTimes - its blithering on a twitter comment which is useless for an encyclopedia). --Masem (t) 13:54, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Ah, ok. So all RS lie and deceive (citation needed), therefore we should accept Fox News as a RS on the subject of climate change, even though the news division puts out deceptive stories about the subject and the managing editor of Fox News has instructed his reporters to cast doubt on the scientific consensus on climate change. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Nearly all media engage in opinionated reporting nowadays especially on issues they show bias on. Doesn't make them non-RSes, but it means we use those RSes with care to work around the spin. This is why the less we actually cover of ongoing controversies (and wait for more academic or time-separated coverage) is far better for the encyclopedia, so that we're not dealing with the mudslinging and spin of day-to-day reporting, making it easier to use sources that have 20/20 hindsight working for them. So yes, any story on climate change from Fox News that is deemed of appropriate nature to include, and not covered elsewhere, I would make sure to double check if there's any collaborating info (here we can validate the poll questions). I don't know what goes on at Fox but I would actually not be surprised if they are told to create a cloud of doubt around climate change, but I'm also of the same concern that editors at CNN and other media also are instructed to create similar clouds of doubt around, say, Trump and so on. When we see such stories, we're not eliminating them as RSes, but we need to get out of that cloud to know how to actually present it. As to the specific bolded addition, I do think it is wrong, as misses that AOC and Fox's story point out that the GOP were taking the "12 years" claim as a fact; its clear Fox news jumped to that poll to go "Well, yeah, GOP does it, but so does the Dems! Look here!" --Masem (t) 14:26, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Ah, ok. So all RS lie and deceive (citation needed), therefore we should accept Fox News as a RS on the subject of climate change, even though the news division puts out deceptive stories about the subject and the managing editor of Fox News has instructed his reporters to cast doubt on the scientific consensus on climate change. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Is
However, a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change.”
considered to be a misrepresentation of the poll? If so, how? - Ryk72 'c.s.n.s.' 13:58, 28 May 2019 (UTC)- This is the opening paragraph of the Fox News story: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Aye. But that's not the text that's in (or out of) our article. The text that being discussed for our article is as I've quoted it above, and that does appear to be supported by the Fox News source. If it's not demonstrably contradicted by the study itself, then I'd say Fox News is reliable for inclusion. Like Masem, however, I think there are better pegs to hang the leave it out hat on. - Ryk72 'c.s.n.s.' 14:10, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The text that's in dispute suggests that AOC is calling democrats brain-dead when she does absolutely no such thing (just like the Fox News story): In May 2019, Ocasio-Cortez contended that her statements were sarcastic and not intended to be taken literally; she added that “you’d have to have the social intelligence of a sea sponge to think” that the comment was literal. However, a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- I pointed this out before but if you go to AOC's original tweet [5], she clearly IDes that quote related to the GOP. The choice of Fox News to leave it out is not making it factually "wrong" - that's what she did say - but it is 100% spin because they didn't give full context. Then they go and use the poll that shows Dems believed the statement (related to irreversible change), which just adds to the spin. Nothing's factually wrong, but it is also not Pulitzer prize-winning, and if that was included in WP in that fashion it would break all NPOV alarms. We just have to look past that. --Masem (t) 14:43, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- And that's a much better peg! - Ryk72 'c.s.n.s.' 14:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The text that's in dispute suggests that AOC is calling democrats brain-dead when she does absolutely no such thing (just like the Fox News story): In May 2019, Ocasio-Cortez contended that her statements were sarcastic and not intended to be taken literally; she added that “you’d have to have the social intelligence of a sea sponge to think” that the comment was literal. However, a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Aye. But that's not the text that's in (or out of) our article. The text that being discussed for our article is as I've quoted it above, and that does appear to be supported by the Fox News source. If it's not demonstrably contradicted by the study itself, then I'd say Fox News is reliable for inclusion. Like Masem, however, I think there are better pegs to hang the leave it out hat on. - Ryk72 'c.s.n.s.' 14:10, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- This is the opening paragraph of the Fox News story: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- That's what "spin" is, its meant to confuse readers or obfuscate the details. I agree the first paragraph of the Fox article is badly worded to frame the story, but it is not "wrong", because it remains vague on what "end in 12 years" meant, whether it is "earth blows up in 12 years" or "irreversible change" is not clear. I fully agree Fox is cherry-picking its interpretations here between what AOC actually said and what the poll questioned, but that's tactics used in every press room to gain the audience to their side. I point to the later paragraph in the Fox article that is much more direct and accurate "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change. Out of all total likely voters, 48 percent of respondents believed the apocalyptic claim." So again, this is not a wrong story, but it is the type that needs to be understood and the underlying sources evaluated to know what is meant, and that should be done only after considering if this is even UNDUE to include or not (I'm firmly thinking it is not appropriate to include even if it came from the NYTimes - its blithering on a twitter comment which is useless for an encyclopedia). --Masem (t) 13:54, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- It's a straight-up falsehood, and in this case it has deceived multiple editors, including Rusf10 (who edit-warred the misrepresentation into the AOC page, yet bizarrely also claimed that your comment was correct) and SunCrow (who tried to have me sanctioned for reverting this rubbish). And no, the problem is not just with the headline, so please do not dismiss my concerns with "Headlines are not RS. Everybody move on." I've explicitly referred to the body of the article, and even copied the deceptive text into our discussion here. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 13:47, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- That's "spin", which is common to all MSM. I can read that statement one way and agree that it is completely misrepresenting the survey question, but I can read the same statement in another way to say it is one "colorful" way to phrase it but not actually wrong. They later are more exacting and non-obtusely correct about what the survey question is. This is not unique to Fox. (And yes, headline is extremely clickbait, but this is why we have stated that ALL RS headlines should not be used as a "reliable source" or any type of statement due to the clickbait used nowadays. --Masem (t) 13:38, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- No, the Fox News story is not right at all. The story is falsely suggesting that Democrats believe that the world will literally end in 12 yrs (which the poll does not at all substantiate), and that therefore AOC believes they are idiots. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 02:34, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
Just a point - this noticeboard did NOT declare Fox News to be RS. It just failed to uniformly ban it as non-RS. It can still be not RS depending on circumstances.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:12, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Another point - this noticeboard didn't declare Fox News to NOT be a RS, and that's why we adhere to WP:NEWSORG which answers the question quite well: News reporting from well-established news outlets is generally considered to be reliable for statements of fact (though even the most reputable reporting sometimes contains errors). The most watched cable news station makes it well-established. Everything beyond that is possibly either opinion-based, or perception-based, a bit of speculation, or easing into DONTLIKEIT territory. Atsme Talk 📧 14:46, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Fox News being the most watched cable news station merely confirms that The Masses Are Asses.- MrX 🖋 15:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Another point - this noticeboard didn't declare Fox News to NOT be a RS, and that's why we adhere to WP:NEWSORG which answers the question quite well: News reporting from well-established news outlets is generally considered to be reliable for statements of fact (though even the most reputable reporting sometimes contains errors). The most watched cable news station makes it well-established. Everything beyond that is possibly either opinion-based, or perception-based, a bit of speculation, or easing into DONTLIKEIT territory. Atsme Talk 📧 14:46, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources#Fox_News kind of disagrees, in that "generally reliable" is about as "high" as we go. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 06:35, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- If the motive here is to declare the most-watched cable news network unreliable based on what...????...political bias? It's time to take a closer look at all news sources and maybe add several more networks/publications to the unreliable list if Fox is going to be added because of "media failures". We may need to look closer at some journalists and maybe a few academics for some of the same reasons per the following articles:
- Harvard about network propaganda
- WaPo writes about made-up Trump quote
- The Intercept...
- Strathprints
- Journal of Gender Studies
- Black Agenda Report
- Politico
- Harvard to NYTimes
- Guardian about Abramson
- AP & NYTimes bungled fact-checks
- There are many more articles that name names and address this very topic. I think the point that needs to be made is the fact that it's not just Fox, there are quite a few others in the same boat. The bigger problems arise when editors fail to closely adhere to our own PAGs, such as NOTNEWS, NEWSORG, RECENTISM, NPOV, V, SYNTH, etc. Atsme Talk 📧 06:44, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Lying about science is not "political bias". Spreading of discredited fringe views is not "political bias". It is just caused by political bias. So, bias alone does not make a source unreliable. Unreliability does. As in: something you cannot rely on. That is what the word comes from, you know.
- When it comes to climate change, Fox News is clearly an unreliable source. --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:08, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- @Atsme: What is the source of that list? cygnis insignis 10:15, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Cygnis insignis - my research sourced it. Atsme Talk 📧 16:53, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Ratings have nothing to do with it - popular tastes denote notability, not reliability. The "everyone are biased" argument is false; the extent of Fox's biases reach so far beyond that of other news outlets, that many scholars don't even consider it "news". Lauren Feldman, Rutgers: "while MSNBC is certainly partisan and traffics in outrage and opinion, its reporting—even on its prime-time talk shows—has a much clearer relationship with facts than does coverage on Fox." Nicole Hemmer, UV: "it's the closest we’ve come to having state TV". Joe Peyronnin, Hofstra: "it's as if the President had his own press organization". Daniel Kreiss, UNC: "Fox’s appeal lies in the network’s willingness to explicitly entwine reporting and opinion in the service of Republican, and white identity." This isn't just "bias", it's a whole alternative agenda that isn't journalism. François Robere (talk) 12:11, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- There are many more articles that name names and address this very topic. I think the point that needs to be made is the fact that it's not just Fox, there are quite a few others in the same boat. The bigger problems arise when editors fail to closely adhere to our own PAGs, such as NOTNEWS, NEWSORG, RECENTISM, NPOV, V, SYNTH, etc. Atsme Talk 📧 06:44, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
I am of the opinion RS policy should be blind,else we just get to exclude stuff we do not like. What we should do is attribute. However the source does not support the text anyway, except its headline. Its clear the text says "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world”". I have no idea to be honest but wwe may need a rule about "No headlines", this has cropped up time and again.Slatersteven (talk) 08:50, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- That is common sense (I hope), headlines can be really crappy sources. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:32, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The problem is not just the headline. This is the opening paragraph: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it."[6] Snooganssnoogans (talk) 11:48, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Sadly then I cannot see a way round this, unless we start to use "but I don't like it". I think in this instance we attribute it, and then provide the quote that is actually about the poll in question. We let the reader decide if Fox is telling porkies.Slatersteven (talk) 11:52, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Not an RS. Fox News is not only a poor source on climate change,[1][2][3][4][5][6] it's also inexorably linked to the Republican party and the White House,[7][8][9] and has a weird obsession with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.[10] Fox News should not be used as a source for anything on climate science or American politics and policy, including individual politicians like Ocasio-Cortez. François Robere (talk) 09:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
References
- ^ Krosnick, Jon A.; MacInnis, Bo (2010). "Frequent viewers of Fox News are less likely to accept scientists' views of global warming" (PDF). Report for The Woods Institute for the Environment. Archived from the original (PDF) on January 1, 2020.
{{cite journal}}
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suggested) (help) - ^ Adams, Guy (2010-12-17). "Leaked memos cast doubt on Fox News' claim of neutrality". The Independent. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-03-08.
{{cite news}}
:|archive-date=
/|archive-url=
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suggested) (help) - ^ Feldman, Lauren; Maibach, Edward W.; Roser-Renouf, Connie; Leiserowitz, Anthony (January 2012). "Climate on Cable: The Nature and Impact of Global Warming Coverage on Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC". The International Journal of Press/Politics. 17 (1): 3–31. doi:10.1177/1940161211425410. ISSN 1940-1612. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020.
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:|archive-date=
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suggested) (help) - ^ Michael Mann gives several examples of this, as well as noting that News Corp, the parent company of Fox News, is "the parent company of several of the British tabloids, Fox News, and the Wall Street Journal that were most active in promoting the climategate charges": Mann, Michael E. (2012). The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 9780231526388. OCLC 785782088.
- ^ Science or Spin?: Assessing the Accuracy of Cable News Coverage of Climate Science (2014) (Report). April 2014.
- ^ Ward, Bob (2018-06-07). "The Times, Fox News and Breitbart still promoting fake news about climate change". Grantham Research Institute on climate change and the environment. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-03-08.
{{cite web}}
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suggested) (help) - ^ Maza, Carlos (2018-11-27). "Fox News keeps breaking its own rules". Vox. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-04-07.
{{cite news}}
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suggested) (help) - ^ Guild, Blair (2018-07-02). "The Fox News employees hired by Trump". CBS News. Retrieved 2019-04-19.
- ^ Inside the unprecedented partnership between Fox News and the Trump White House. PBS News Hour. 2019-03-05. Retrieved 2019-04-01.
- ^ Smith, David (2019-04-12). "Fox mentions Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for 42 days running – 3,181 times". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2019-04-19.
- There's nothing in your comment that I disagree with, but the pro-liberal MSM are at least as bad as Fox. If you can cite Media Matters for America for Fox's "weird obsession with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez", then I can cite NewsBusters for the MSM's obsession with AOC. [7] [8] [9] [10]. You write about Fox's links to the Trump White House, but the MSM's connections to Democrats in and out of power are well-documented [11] [12] [13] [14]. The climate change denial is cherry-picked from the article Fox News controversies, and I could similarly cherry-pick something from CNN controversies, MSNBC controversies or CBS News controversies and criticism. I expect no reasonable editor to cite Fox in a climate science article, considering Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources (science)#Popular press. Deprecating Fox on the basis of climate change denial is WP:CREEP. That said, if it comes up often at WP:RSN, it can be added to WP:RSP. wumbolo ^^^ 12:41, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Très amusante. Can we take turns at picking sources to deprecate? Because I have a few in mind. - Ryk72 'c.s.n.s.' 13:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- As Reliable as any other NEWSORG source - none of them are infallible - attribute as Slatersteven mentioned above. I just noticed that a few sources in the reference list include articles about Trump's connection to and hiring of former Fox News employees. If we're going to speculate on the perceived media influences and biases, then see the following sources and connections of major MSM networks to the Obama administration and in general:
- And there are many other sources which say similar things about MSM & Obama administration that the above sources report about the Trump administration. Repeated attempts to discredit Fox News appear to be politically motivated, inadvertently or otherwise, and really need to stop as it has become a major time sink. Atsme Talk 📧 13:58, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- If the SC report is about how the media likes "Cinderella stories", then that's not the sort of repeated, ideologically-slanted coverage we're talking about with regards to Fox, and you won't find a single scholar who'll equate the two; CNN had its share of controversies, but how does it and how does Fox deal with them?[1]; the Snopes ref you cite contradicts your argument; I'm not familiar with ToF; I've addressed the "media pipeline" in a comment below - 24 active journalists from a single outlet is unprecedented by any measure; the Washingotn Times isn't an RS; political contributions are a thing, but they alone do not denote slanted coverage - see below for a couple of examples of what does; an anchor dating a reporter isn't news in any sense, so I'm not sure why you included it. François Robere (talk) 14:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Oh, I see - the only RS are the ones who support your POV. Excuse me but I can't waste another minute of my time here - there's a backlog at NPP that needs my attention. Atsme Talk 📧 21:26, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- WP:RSP#The Washington Times. François Robere (talk) 13:49, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Oh, I see - the only RS are the ones who support your POV. Excuse me but I can't waste another minute of my time here - there's a backlog at NPP that needs my attention. Atsme Talk 📧 21:26, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- Right. Just to address your sources quickly before getting to the main point:
- None of the Newsbusters items shows anything even remotely close to an "obsession" the order of magnitude of fox (3100 mentions a month for Fox, vs 24 for WaPo), but more importantly: none of them shows evidence of the sort of rabid demonization that Fox is engaged with with AOC. Does the media like a good "upstart" story? Of course they do. Do they like photogenic candidates? They do. Do they obsessively smear a fresh congress rep. as the enemy of the people because of their eco policies? They don't. Another major difference is that mainstream outlets, unlike Fox, continuously self-criticise (eg. this, on the same phenomenon you just raised); compare with Fox, whose ideological hegemony does not allow most any criticisms[2][3] outside of a handful of token news anchors.
- Similarly, none of the "cozy relations" items suggest anything as outrageous as reporters coming on stage in rallies to urge voters to vote for specific candidates or moving to and from the White House (!) ruled by their preferred candidate. Slipping a story to a friendly journalist? Yeah, okay. Interestingly, one the items is about coverage bias for Trump - for the same reasons as AOC (ie. not political reasons); and another lists Jay Rosen and Glenn Greenwald - both of whom have a foot in "mainstream journalism" and severe criticisms against Fox News. If you accept their criticisms towards the "mainstream" media, you ought to accept Rosen's observation that "there's been a merger between Fox News and the Trump government". Your final link, about former reporters working for Obama, lists perhaps a dozen media outlets from which these reporters hail - or about 2 past or present journos for each; for Fox it's more than 12 who were drafted to one while still being employed for the other, in one case being paid by both at the same time as part of a severance agreement. It's not even in the same ballpark.
- There's no cherry picking here. This phenomenon is so severe that there are studies about Fox News ignoring studies. Can you say the same about any of the other networks?
- Which brings us to the bottom line: reputable sources have repeatedly called out Fox for biases at a scale not present in any other outlet (I've added some quotes in a comment below). According to those sources Fox is not "just another network", but an entirely different beast. François Robere (talk) 14:05, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
References
- ^ Raymond, Laurel (2017-06-27). "A tale of two networks: How Fox News and CNN handled recent retractions". Think Progress.
- ^ Shapiro, Rebecca (2012-11-26). "WATCH: Fox News Interview Ends Abruptly After Guest Attacks Network". Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-04-02.
{{cite news}}
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suggested) (help) - ^ ‘You’re a moron’: Tucker Carlson clashes with Dutch historian. Washington Post. 2019-02-21. Retrieved 2019-03-08.
- The OP's claim is false, the writer of the Fox News story did not suggest that the poll asked whether the world would end in 12 years. It is true that the writer said respondents believed that, but the description of the actual poll question and results was correct, so readers had a fair opportunity to decide whether the writer's opinion was justified. Now look at the bolded words and you'll realize they don't include that opinion so WP:RS policy about context was followed, thus the OP's claim is irrelevant as well as false. Please do not give confirmation or encouragement to this. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 14:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Good grief. This is the opening paragraph of the Fox News story: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:20, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Of course Fox News isn't reliable for climate science, but that's not what it's being used for here. So, with regard to the source in question, of course we shouldn't be using such an internally inconsistent, misleading source. That's not [necessarily] a judgment of Fox News as a source, but of this particular article. While there's no consensus that Fox News is, in general, unreliable (and in some cases there has been consensus that it is generally reliable), that still doesn't mean it's reliable for every purpose. With any of this it's contextual. In this specific case it looks like a lousy source. Half the rest of this thread has devolved into standard "all MSM is biased" fare as though that has anything to do with the reliability of this source. If you see an obviously unreliable article on NBC or whatnot, address it. Absolutely no news source is bulletproof, nor should we expect that any source will be right all of the time. Getting into "the liberal media" or the "Fox is evil" stuff doesn't help anything. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 14:38, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- It is clear from AOC's statement that her reference to the end of the world was rhetorical. What she meant was that in 12 years, the effects of climate change would be irreversible, which is what scientists and most Democrats believe. While I am not a fan of blacklisting sources, the fact that it was the only major cable news network to provide this novel interpretation means that it fails weight for inclusion. Ironically, had AOC said that Armageddon was only 12 years away, Fox would give her a regular spot. TFD (talk) 14:43, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Absolutely not - What a horrible sham of a report by Fox News, which until now, I've considered reasonably reliable. It starts off
"Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats"
and supports it with"But it appears that more than two-thirds of surveyed Democrats took her literally. A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change."
Rasmussen asked:"A prominent politician says the United States has only 12 years to aggressively fight climate change or else there will be disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world. Do you agree or disagree?"
I mean, Rasmussen was begging the question, but then Fox took it to a whole new level by shamefully conflating "12 years to avert" with "the world will end in 12 years". This is trash journalism on the level of the National Enquirer and the Daily Mail. No way does this belong in Wikipedia. Jesus!- MrX 🖋 14:44, 28 May 2019 (UTC) - Do not use Whatever the general attitude is towards Fox News, this particular story is shit, and should not be used to reference anything at Wikipedia. Just because Fox News is capable of being a reliable source does not preclude them writing terrible things, and this story is clearly misleading, badly written, and an obvious distortion and should not be used to reference anything at Wikipedia. --Jayron32 14:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Fox News is Generally an RS, though, like all RS, it can be deemed unreliable in a particular case for one reason or another. What about this case? AOC suggests that you would have to be unintelligent to interpret her claim literally. What the Fox report and the underlying poll show is that a majority of democrats interpret the "12 years" part of her statement literally. Is that a good point? Not up to us to say. Fox News seems to think so, and they're generally RS, so I'd defer to them in this case. However, the wording in the article could be more careful to state the point more clearly. Shinealittlelight (talk) 14:56, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
"What the Fox report and the underlying poll show is that a majority of democrats interpret the "12 years" part of her statement literally."
No it doesn't. The pollster did not ask if the world was going to end in 12 years, and they didn't ask anything about AOC's comments. This is not complicated.- MrX 🖋 15:19, 28 May 2019 (UTC)- (FWIW they actually did allude to her comments. The poll question was "A prominent politician says the United States has only 12 years to aggressively fight climate change or else there will be disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world. Do you agree or disagree?" [15].) --Masem (t) 15:23, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- They allude to Bernie Sanders' comments. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 15:32, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Ah, right, my bad. --Masem (t) 15:36, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Actually, they mentioned Sanders in the first paragraph of their report but not in the poll or how they posed the question - see my bold underline:
The actual poll askedVoters tend to agree with Senator Bernie Sanders that America will be in big trouble very soon if it doesn’t aggressively tackle climate change, even though they question the integrity of politicians who champion the issue.
AOC and numerous other politicians are using global warming as an integral part of their platform. She said what she said about the world ending and there's no going back. She was serious when she said it per the RS I have already cited and what's happening now is that editors are willing to dismiss her hyperbole but not Trump's? It's politics - pure politics - and WP editors need to steer clear of it by closely adhering to NPOV, RECENTISM, NEWSORG and by actually attributing the author/source (in-text attribution) when including opinions, etc. Why all the fuss about Fox being a RS? Just follow PAGs and stop trying to make everything with a conservative and/or liberal slant a bad thing. This discussion is running rampant with it. The challenged paragraph is an easy fix and does not require condemnation of a RS as unreliable to fix it simply because the editor who included it used SYNTH.(1) A prominent politician says the United States has only 12 years to aggressively fight climate change or else there will be disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world.
(2) Do most politicians raise climate change issues to address real problems or to get elected?- The first sentence needs to be cited to a RS.
- I've modified the second sentence to not connect to the first sentence and to stand independently as follows:
However,A May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% ofrespondentslikely votersand 67% of Democratsbelieve that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change; 40% disagreed and 11% were undecided.” Cite the report. The End. Atsme Talk 📧 17:59, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Actually, they mentioned Sanders in the first paragraph of their report but not in the poll or how they posed the question - see my bold underline:
- The point remains that, if when AOC said that people should not take her literally, she meant that they should not take "12 years" literally as the time-frame we have to act to avert disaster, well, the poll suggests that lots of people do take "12 years" literally. Maybe that's not what she meant. Maybe she meant that the 12 year figure was meant literally, but the "end of the world" part was not. I can't really tell what she meant, and it's not our place to speculate, it seems to me. Shinealittlelight (talk) 15:51, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- And why 12 years? Not 11 or 13 years? Bus stop (talk) 15:56, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Uh, seriously, thats the original report [16]. --Masem (t) 15:59, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Masem, in that same published report, directly below the 12 yr predicted climate change disaster, The Guardian headline reads Toxic America: Is modern life poisoning us? and goes on to report "Weedkiller in your breakfast cereal. Contaminated drinking water. Carcinogenic chemicals in your furniture." - have you seen the fiasco over at the glyphosate article? 😳 Oh well, bottomline with the 12 yr. prediction - WP:CRYSTALBALL. When left unchallenged we end up with broadly construed interpretations and questionable perspectives. So where did the urgency originate - the UN since that's the report being cited? I remember in the 70s we had the cooling earth scare. Stopping deforestation of the world's rainforests would go a long way. j/s Atsme Talk 📧 19:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The specificity can suggest verisimilitude. Bus stop (talk) 16:05, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Uh, seriously, thats the original report [16]. --Masem (t) 15:59, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- And why 12 years? Not 11 or 13 years? Bus stop (talk) 15:56, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Ah, right, my bad. --Masem (t) 15:36, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- They allude to Bernie Sanders' comments. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 15:32, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- (FWIW they actually did allude to her comments. The poll question was "A prominent politician says the United States has only 12 years to aggressively fight climate change or else there will be disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world. Do you agree or disagree?" [15].) --Masem (t) 15:23, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Does it not smack of WP:original research to say
"the problem is that the Fox News is absolute trash. For a very simple reason: the poll did not ask respondents whether the world would literally end in 12 yrs"
? I thought we relied on sources. You mean now we are experts on polls? Bus stop (talk) 15:45, 28 May 2019 (UTC)- If the Fox News story is claiming that respondents literally believe the world will end in 12 yrs, then yes, it's a pretty big problem if the poll did not ask about that. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- "You mean now we are experts on polls?" No, but I assumed editors had some basic reading comprehension. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- It is not original research if we know source A quotes source X, and we have access to source X and X clearly does not make the claims source A says X does, then we can question what source A is doing. (There's more complexities than that to this situation, but on general, we have this ability to check and corroborate information). --Masem (t) 15:51, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The bottom line seems to be that Ocasio-Cortez can engage in hyperbole but we can't repeat that hyperbole. Bus stop (talk) 15:52, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- That's not what anyone here says. Ironic that a discussion of a source misrepresenting others contains such an obvious misrepresentation of what people are stating. --Jayron32 15:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not misrepresenting anyone. I'm pointing out that a fundamental idea is supposed to be that we rely on sources. We don't second-guess them, as doing so is akin to original research, the only difference being that it is not taking place in article space. Bus stop (talk) 16:00, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- We do second guess them. From the policy:
"Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. ... Proper sourcing always depends on context; common sense and editorial judgment are an indispensable part of the process."
- Fox News has shown us that they cannot be relied on for accuracy, or truthfulness.- MrX 🖋 16:15, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- We use attribution (as previously stated by Slatersteven) to show the origin of the perspective or the material being represented. We don't throw out material just because a source is deemed to be biased. Bus stop (talk) 16:24, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The source isn't being dismissed or thrown out because it is biased. It is being thrown out because it is demonstrably wrong. We don't blindly use sources without regard for whether or not they are correct. Part of reliability is that they are reliably correct. If a particular source can be shown to contain demonstrably untrue things, we don't cite those untrue things, knowing they are untrue. That is part of editorial discretion in choosing which sources to use. If a source is shown to be wrong, we don't use that source. Also, when you said "Ocasio-Cortez can engage in hyperbole but we can't repeat that hyperbole." that misrepresented the current discussion, because not one person made that claim. When you said that, you misrepresented the points being made by people opposed to using this source. When you stated "I'm not misrepresenting anyone.", that was incorrect, because your statement immediately preceding misrepresented the arguments of those who state the source is not reliable. --Jayron32 16:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- A politician is a representative. Does she know the people she represents? Isn't it self-serving to characterize a portion of her constituency as sea sponges after her own hyperbole is called into question? I think it is ridiculous that she can say "12 years" and at a later time say that number was not to be taken literally. Then why did she say it? Is twelve her favorite number? Fox News is merely reporting on the discrepancy between language taken literally and language taken figuratively. Fox's reporting is of good quality, in my opinion, and should be woven into the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez article, using attribution, of course. Bus stop (talk) 16:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- That's entirely out of the scope of this discussion. Discussions about content of specific articles in a general sense are best held in the talk page of that article. We aren't here to discuss the content of the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez article here. We're only here to discuss the reliability of the specific Fox News article being called into question. You're clouding the discussion with mostly unrelated matters. --Jayron32 19:09, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- A politician is a representative. Does she know the people she represents? Isn't it self-serving to characterize a portion of her constituency as sea sponges after her own hyperbole is called into question? I think it is ridiculous that she can say "12 years" and at a later time say that number was not to be taken literally. Then why did she say it? Is twelve her favorite number? Fox News is merely reporting on the discrepancy between language taken literally and language taken figuratively. Fox's reporting is of good quality, in my opinion, and should be woven into the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez article, using attribution, of course. Bus stop (talk) 16:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The source isn't being dismissed or thrown out because it is biased. It is being thrown out because it is demonstrably wrong. We don't blindly use sources without regard for whether or not they are correct. Part of reliability is that they are reliably correct. If a particular source can be shown to contain demonstrably untrue things, we don't cite those untrue things, knowing they are untrue. That is part of editorial discretion in choosing which sources to use. If a source is shown to be wrong, we don't use that source. Also, when you said "Ocasio-Cortez can engage in hyperbole but we can't repeat that hyperbole." that misrepresented the current discussion, because not one person made that claim. When you said that, you misrepresented the points being made by people opposed to using this source. When you stated "I'm not misrepresenting anyone.", that was incorrect, because your statement immediately preceding misrepresented the arguments of those who state the source is not reliable. --Jayron32 16:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- We use attribution (as previously stated by Slatersteven) to show the origin of the perspective or the material being represented. We don't throw out material just because a source is deemed to be biased. Bus stop (talk) 16:24, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not misrepresenting anyone. I'm pointing out that a fundamental idea is supposed to be that we rely on sources. We don't second-guess them, as doing so is akin to original research, the only difference being that it is not taking place in article space. Bus stop (talk) 16:00, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- The bottom line seems to be that Ocasio-Cortez can engage in hyperbole but we can't repeat that hyperbole. Bus stop (talk) 15:52, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- To quell the fear of OR, here are some sources and what they say on FN:
Expert opinions
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References
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- François Robere (talk) 17:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Don't use One of the comedians once joked that Fox was starting a 24 hour AOC channel that only ran stories about AOC, because Fox was running near daily anti-AOC stories after she won. Fox is a poor source for AOC or climate change, and this story is an example of why. I don’t see why we would use FOX for a political story that no one else was reporting. O3000 (talk) 16:02, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Use News sources all have their editorial biases and have been taken to task for either a rush to print (oftentimes never retracting what is later proven to be false) or for misrepresenting information from time to time. No reason one cannot say, according to then follow that with, however, according to. FoxNews reported that...blah, blah, blah. However CNN (or whomever) reported that, Blah, blah, blah. One would think this is a case by case issue, not a blanket ban issue.--MONGO (talk) 17:34, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Reference remarks (not poll) with attribution The fact that Fox News has been deemed RS at this noticeboard is significant. Quoting them with attribution should solve any issues. Readers know what mainstream sources lean left, and which one(s) lean right, and can judge the reliability of statements accordingly. This seems a straightforward issue: what did OAC say, and what did she later say she meant? When OAC first made the claim, she was clearly serious about it, and partisan source The Hill came to her defense with "Her comments referred to the recent United Nations report...". The Hill makes no attempt to source their claim. At the time, (I am the editor who added this "12 year" claim to her article) I could find no support anywhere for the Hills claim that she was citing the UN. Fox News is also a partisan source, and in this case, their report is backed by AOC's actual words. We could also quote her directly by using her tweet. It's sad that media only reports what will help or hurt their chosen saints or villains, rather than simply reporting facts with a NPOV. I don't particularly find this bias cute regardless of whether I agree with their position. I quite despise this era of partisanship-masquerading-as-news from CNN, MNBC, The Hill and Fox. It's challenging to build a NPOV article from only partisan sources, but it certainly cannot be done using only one side. Partisan sources simply won't report, or will twist, news that makes their side look bad. The "12 years" statement was highly notable, so walking it back, or clarifying the intent, is also notable. If Fox is the only media reporting on it, perhaps they should be commended. However the second half of the contested text should not be added; ...a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change. would constitute a SYNTH violation (one that Fox committed, but we don't need to follow suit). "Disastrous and irreparable damage" is different from AOC's (according to WaPo) "all-too-accurate warnings. She said recently that if we don’t start to address climate change aggressively right now, the world will end in 12 years." The poll changes the wording and drastically changes meaning, so it does not apply and shouldn't be included. Just mention her words/tweet (regardless of how it makes her look), per NPOV. I could be mistaken, but if we are simply quoting her, the Tweet itself can serve as RS and replace Fox. OP should open a new thread focusing on whether there should be restrictions placed on content from Fox, such as climate change. petrarchan47คุก 17:36, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Note: "according to WaPo" isn't a WaPo news item or editorial statement, it's an opinion piece by Tom Toles, the Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist for The Post who also blogs and, with Michael E. Mann, co-authored "The Madhouse Effect" about climate and climate change denial. His informed comment is that AOC's warning are "all-too-accurate", but he's clearly not the WaPo. . . dave souza, talk 13:42, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Just for the record, I'm the one that followed your addition with the Hill reference that explained her statement. I felt it was irresponsible to include her few short words that gave the impression that she is some sort of climate change imbecile that literally believes the world will end in 12 years and leave it at that. If you were to include something so unusual as the 12 years statement you should rather rely on a detailed discussion that fully explained her position, not some off the cuff remark. And then to complain that using the Hill was not warranted is totally unreasonable IMO. Gandydancer (talk) 19:41, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not complaining that the story of her remark was fleshed out. My statement was on the partisanship and unreliability of both "right" and "left" leaning sources, and to challenge the notion that sources on the left are automatically more reliable than Fox. At the time, no sources reporting on her statement (that warranted inclusion, IMO, because of the coverage it received) added any reason or back story. I noticed that the Hill threw in reference to the UN report, but it struck me as odd since no other RS was doing that, and there was no indication how The Hill got the information, no mention of an interview with AOC or a direct quote, etc. However I'm not saying it wasn't warranted; The Hill is now considered RS, so I didn't challenge the addition. petrarchan47คุก 06:23, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- Obviuosly not RS. That Fox piece is an obvious piece of devious, manipulative misinformation, as is the summary of it written for Wikipedia as cited above. No matter how reliable Fox might otherwise be, it's a piece of propagandistic junk journalism, and we don't use those. WP:RS is not a suicide pact; even if we had reasons to believe that Fox otherwise has a reliable reputation, we're not obliged to cite junk journalism when it's so self-evidently out of touch with reality as this. Fut.Perf. ☼ 18:03, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Use , Fox is reporting what AOC said. If she didn't like it, maybe she'll think twice before Tweeting or saying something for her Twitter army. Fox's job is to report, same as CNN's or MSNBC's. AOC did say that the world will end in 12 years, that she is backtracking is not Fox's fault. Sir Joseph (talk) 18:16, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Question: Are we judging sources based on our own opinion or that of RS? If we're to judge based on RS, then Fox News is pretty much out (see "expert opinions" above); if we're to judge based on our own opinion, then WP:NOR is out. François Robere (talk) 18:46, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Don't use. Reporting AOC's "12 years" remark as literal when it obviously wasn't is clearly a malicious action on Fox's part. For us to repeat the lie would be at best terrible judgement and at worst a BLP violation. Zerotalk 19:03, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- What about Newsweek? [17] or USA Today, or CNN [18]? Sir Joseph (talk) 19:08, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Reminds me of a great book title I saw once: "If you can't live without me, why aren't you dead yet?" People use metaphor to dramatise their words all the time. No reason for us to buy into the pretence of not understanding that. Zerotalk 05:18, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- Metaphor for what—1200 years? 12,000 years? 12,000,000 years? Numbers are inherently quantitative. Bus stop (talk) 09:24, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- Reminds me of a great book title I saw once: "If you can't live without me, why aren't you dead yet?" People use metaphor to dramatise their words all the time. No reason for us to buy into the pretence of not understanding that. Zerotalk 05:18, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- What about Newsweek? [17] or USA Today, or CNN [18]? Sir Joseph (talk) 19:08, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Do we care that CNN said the same thing, "During an interview the next day Ocasio-Cortez said "the world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change." [19] Sir Joseph (talk) 19:13, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Use as RS but slightly modified as follows:
- The first sentence needs to be cited.
- Second sentence should stand independently as follows:
However,A May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% ofrespondentslikely votersand 67% of Democratsbelieve that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change; 40% disagreed and 11% were undecided.” Cite the report. Atsme Talk 📧 19:48, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
Lets remind users that issue if the claim about the poll, not what Ocasio-Cortez said.Slatersteven (talk) 20:01, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Comment: other factors such as WP:WEIGHT (how much has this been given in all reliable sources?), besides whether or not Fox is an RS for the claim, also bear on whether or not it should be mentioned. -sche (talk) 20:13, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Those discussions should happen elsewhere, like the article talk page. Matters of what material to cover are best held there. This forum is really only useful for discussing the reliability of sources. --Jayron32 20:25, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- I agree :) but I saw that this thread was started following a disagreement over whether the content should be included at all, and I don't want anyone to take this discussion, if it concludes that the source is reliable, to mean that the content automatically gets included. (I have noted the other problems on the article's talk page.) -sche (talk) 21:57, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Those discussions should happen elsewhere, like the article talk page. Matters of what material to cover are best held there. This forum is really only useful for discussing the reliability of sources. --Jayron32 20:25, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Obviously not RS for anything related to the climate - Fox News made that excessively clear with tons of articles full of nonsense. See its article if you need references for that. --mfb (talk) 03:27, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- Do not use- Fox's coverage of climate science is frequently dishonest, and this story in particular is a load of shit. Reyk YO! 07:40, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- Not reliable. I think it's reasonably clear that Fox News lacks a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy today; but it certainly doesn't have the reputation WP:RS requires when it comes to climate science or for adding negative material to a WP:BLP that falls squarely in the scope of its biases. --Aquillion (talk) 04:07, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Usable Mostly per Sir Joseph. Run of the mill peice of gotcha journalism that's been brought up in other newsmedia. WP:UNDUE seems more relevant. --RaiderAspect (talk) 09:20, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Usable No one is a prognosticator of the future. The best scientific sources could be wrong. Fox News is a journalistic source. It is entirely capable of reporting on the facts about something a politician said. Bus stop (talk) 16:22, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- If it was being used as a source for what she said, yes. Its not its being used to make a statement about how people answered a poll (by misrepresentation of the poll).Slatersteven (talk) 16:27, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- AOC has told us that climate change is "our WW2", that if we don't act immediately on climate change we will have "blood on our hands", and that climate change, if left unaddressed, will bring about the "end of the world in 12 years". It is not surprising that some people believe her. She is saying the same thing in more than one way. The language is very fanciful. No scientist would ever speak that way. She is a politician, trying to influence people. What is so surprising about the fact that she actually succeeds in influencing some people? Fox News conducted a survey (a poll) that shows that some people believe her, or at least chose not to express disagreement with AOC. Wikipedia editors did not conduct the survey. Suddenly we are experts on poll-taking? I don't find the results surprising. AOC has deployed exceptionally passionate language and some, when responding to a poll, choose to express agreement over disagreement, whether that is because they literally agree with AOC or because they agree with the spirit of what she is saying. I don't see how the poll is inaccurate and I don't think we should exclude information from the article based on our uninformed, at best incomplete, understanding of the methodology used in the poll. Bus stop (talk) 16:56, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- And what the poll said (according to the source "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change.", which is not the same as saying the believe the world will end in 12 years. Oh and it does not appear to have been conducted done behalf of Fox [[20]].Slatersteven (talk) 17:10, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- This can be explained by considering that respondents may choose not to disagree on specifics with a political leader that they generally agree with. But this problem traces right back to the user of fanciful language. AOC is causing this problem. No responsible scientist would speak this way—and in fact no responsible politician would speak this way. AOC is not deploying language with requisite restraint. Her language is over the top. "Ocasio-Cortez has emerged as the key Democratic voice on how to tackle climate change, proposing the Green New Deal resolution that seeks to radically reorganize the economy to ensure climate change is tackled."[21] She apparently does not grasp that in pushing for the adoption of the position she is spearheading she cannot mix up the literal with the figurative without being taken to task for it. Fox News is reporting on her misuse of speech and the skewed results seen in entirely reasonable polls. A respondent is asked (paraphrasing) Do you accept AOC's contention that the world will end in 12 years if climate change is not addressed? Anyone supporting the general positions of AOC is incentivized to agree with her. This understandably might be the case even if the respondent does not agree with AOC on the specifics. Fox News is simply showing the trouble that her misguided words cause. Why don't we hear other politicians speaking this way? Obviously it gets the speaker into trouble—either by a poll taken or by some other means. A savvy politician speaks with restraint. But AOC does not. Bus stop (talk) 17:45, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
Why don't we hear other politicians speaking this way?
We do, all the time. O3000 (talk) 17:55, 30 May 2019 (UTC)- MMmm, I am rethinking, they do in fact both quote the Poll correctly and misrepresent it at the same time. However this also does not appear to be a poll about her views, but a general one. No, I do not think this is reliable for the claim this poll is related to her comments. It is clear they have spun this (with the claim that they think the world will end in 12 years demonstrating this dishonesty about the poll).Slatersteven (talk) 18:09, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- This can be explained by considering that respondents may choose not to disagree on specifics with a political leader that they generally agree with. But this problem traces right back to the user of fanciful language. AOC is causing this problem. No responsible scientist would speak this way—and in fact no responsible politician would speak this way. AOC is not deploying language with requisite restraint. Her language is over the top. "Ocasio-Cortez has emerged as the key Democratic voice on how to tackle climate change, proposing the Green New Deal resolution that seeks to radically reorganize the economy to ensure climate change is tackled."[21] She apparently does not grasp that in pushing for the adoption of the position she is spearheading she cannot mix up the literal with the figurative without being taken to task for it. Fox News is reporting on her misuse of speech and the skewed results seen in entirely reasonable polls. A respondent is asked (paraphrasing) Do you accept AOC's contention that the world will end in 12 years if climate change is not addressed? Anyone supporting the general positions of AOC is incentivized to agree with her. This understandably might be the case even if the respondent does not agree with AOC on the specifics. Fox News is simply showing the trouble that her misguided words cause. Why don't we hear other politicians speaking this way? Obviously it gets the speaker into trouble—either by a poll taken or by some other means. A savvy politician speaks with restraint. But AOC does not. Bus stop (talk) 17:45, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- And what the poll said (according to the source "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change.", which is not the same as saying the believe the world will end in 12 years. Oh and it does not appear to have been conducted done behalf of Fox [[20]].Slatersteven (talk) 17:10, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
What is so surprising about the fact that she actually succeeds in influencing some people
...Fox News conducted a survey
...that shows that some people believe her
- you cannot possibly be looking at the source this thread is about. If you are, and this is what you took away from it, then that's not great. The poll was based on something Bernie Sanders said, not AOC. Fox didn't conduct it. It didn't ask if AOC's 12 years quote should be taken literally. It asked something different. Fox invented those connections/glosses for this source, which is the problem. It says the poll found something about someone that any critical reading at all makes clear it did not. But you are repeating these claims here... — Rhododendrites talk \\ 22:15, 30 May 2019 (UTC)- The first paragraph which I think we all recognize is terrible writing for a supposedly RS, does make that inference. But when they get to the poll later, they don't mention AOC (but nor does address that the survey was spurred by Bernie's comment). They do try to link AOC's comment that is directed towards the GOP misunderstanding her retort to the poll that show dems were also believing the 12 years thing. Which to me all points to this being mudslinging not appropriate for WP, regardless if it came from Fox, CNN, or any other RS or non-RS. --Masem (t) 22:34, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- AOC has told us that climate change is "our WW2", that if we don't act immediately on climate change we will have "blood on our hands", and that climate change, if left unaddressed, will bring about the "end of the world in 12 years". It is not surprising that some people believe her. She is saying the same thing in more than one way. The language is very fanciful. No scientist would ever speak that way. She is a politician, trying to influence people. What is so surprising about the fact that she actually succeeds in influencing some people? Fox News conducted a survey (a poll) that shows that some people believe her, or at least chose not to express disagreement with AOC. Wikipedia editors did not conduct the survey. Suddenly we are experts on poll-taking? I don't find the results surprising. AOC has deployed exceptionally passionate language and some, when responding to a poll, choose to express agreement over disagreement, whether that is because they literally agree with AOC or because they agree with the spirit of what she is saying. I don't see how the poll is inaccurate and I don't think we should exclude information from the article based on our uninformed, at best incomplete, understanding of the methodology used in the poll. Bus stop (talk) 16:56, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- If it was being used as a source for what she said, yes. Its not its being used to make a statement about how people answered a poll (by misrepresentation of the poll).Slatersteven (talk) 16:27, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Not reliable Given that many of the reliable votes are not even based upon what it is being used for I have to assume that it is knowingly false. We do not repeat lies, even from RS.Slatersteven (talk) 16:27, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- This entire discussion is pointless... whether AOC was speaking literally or was being intentionally hyperbolic, it is UNDUE to highlight her comment. We should be SUMMARIZING her stance on climate change issues, and not mentioning every instance when she addresses the issue. And if we don’t mention it, then there is no need to mention how many people took her comments literally. Note... I have this same issue with bio articles on other politicians (regardless of party)... we need to summarize a LOT more and note specific statements a lot less. Blueboar (talk) 17:24, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- There are some cases where a statement attracts so much attention, controversy and coverage, that to forgo inclusion in leui of a summarized version constitutes a glaring ommission resulting in obvious POV issues. When readers see obvious POV on WP the result is less trust, and fewer donations. This is happening. We need to cover the controversies to remain seemingly-neutral if we continue to call WP and encyclopedia. As another editor here suggested, politicians sometimes make hyperbolic statements not intending to represent science, but to get attention for their cause and to sway the voters. If a politician does this successfully, the coverage garnered, per our PAGs, often will justify inclusion here. Sure, there is good reason to have a readable summary of her position (a position which may be evolving), but to omit notable highlights within that story isn't justified if they received significant coverage, which this has IMO. petrarchan47คุก 22:08, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- While I agree that it's WP:UNDUE, the problem is that Fox has covered it as if it were a big deal; we cannot avoid a decision about whether that coverage implies due weight. I would argue that since Fox is well-known as a partisan source, and since it's been extensively demonstrated that they weigh their coverage in a distorted manner in order to present particular narratives, that Fox alone should never satisfy WP:DUE about anything controversial within American politics (ie. it's a usable source, but always requires another high-quality source to demonstrate due weight, at a bare minimum within WP:BLP articles.) A Fox News criticism that has not seen mainstream coverage can be reasonably interpreted as a line of attack by the target's ideological opponents which did not take off and which is therefore WP:UNDUE. When dealing with extremely partisan or heavily WP:BIASED sources like Fox, due weight has to be assessed with respect to the biases of a source and their willingness to try and push marginal or inconsequential stories as part of a broader agenda. --Aquillion (talk) 03:38, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
"it's a usable source, but always requires another high-quality support to demonstrate due weight"
The implementation of that idea would be tantamount to censorship. I don't think a reliable source can only be used if other, less"partisan"
sources can be found for corroboration. We don't, or at least we should not, omit from the article perspectives based on a lack of support found in non-"partisan"
sources. Bus stop (talk) 13:08, 31 May 2019 (UTC)- But this isn't about percepctives, it's about facts. If an outlet is partisan to the extent that it affects its ability for factual reporting, then by definition it's not as reliable as outlets that aren't partisan. Also, saying "we should not omit from the article perspectives based on a lack of support found in non-"partisan" sources" is the equivalent of saying "we should introduce partisan bias to our articles." François Robere (talk) 13:59, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Even if a source is deemed biased, there is no absolute requirement for corroboration in a source not deemed biased. Bus stop (talk) 14:30, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Because it's obvious..? François Robere (talk) 15:42, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Even if a source is deemed biased, there is no absolute requirement for corroboration in a source not deemed biased. Bus stop (talk) 14:30, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- But this isn't about percepctives, it's about facts. If an outlet is partisan to the extent that it affects its ability for factual reporting, then by definition it's not as reliable as outlets that aren't partisan. Also, saying "we should not omit from the article perspectives based on a lack of support found in non-"partisan" sources" is the equivalent of saying "we should introduce partisan bias to our articles." François Robere (talk) 13:59, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Don't use. It's a clear misrepresentation of information, per MrX, and would come under WP:Synth if it had been written here. Whether or not Fox News is a RS more generally is irrelevant, since we're the ones who decide on that, and a prior, more general judgement doesn't prohibit us from using common sense in a specific case. That said, in theory we could still cite it for the poll figures, though personally I don't think they're particularly notable. ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 12:30, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- (Side note: I'm somewhat sympathetic to those saying it's undue and a summary would be better but until someone actually writes one I don't think there's grounds to remove it. That said, insofar as we're treating the specific comments as notable for now we should probably give the full quote for context.) ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 12:30, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- Don't use, and consider deprecating Fox News like the Daily Mail. Media Matters for America has proven that Fox News's "hard news" side spewed misinformation every day on air from January 1, 2019 to April 30, 2019 as seen in https://www.mediamatters.org/research/2019/05/13/fox-news-lie/223683 and https://www.scribd.com/document/409793749/The-Fox-News-Lie.Jesse Viviano (talk) 06:23, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Not RS for the statement as originally proposed, not RS regarding the 2/3 survey in general, and therefore a bad source to choose for the OAC quote. There can be little dispute that the source either carelessly or maliciously butchered the part about the 2/3 survey. If it's really necessary for OAC's comment to be part of a historic encyclopedic summary of the subject, we would of course be required to include OAC's explanation of that comment. However I doubt it will genuinely pass the 10 Year Test. Alsee (talk) 06:49, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
Dealing with a source that is both factual and misleads at different points
Core to this is not necessary Fox News but the specific article at issue: [22]. For the hypothetical, lets assume this was determined to have the right WEIGHT to include and happened to be the only source that covers it. (As it actually issue, I really don't think we should even include anythng about AOC's comment and how it was taken, even if this was a truly RS source, its a minor quibble over Twitter which is far below NOT#NEWS appropriateness).
We have that:
- It opens with a grossly vague or illogically consistent restatement of the elements at hand: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it."
- It later has a much more accurate statement of the survey: "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change. Out of all total likely voters, 48 percent of respondents believed the apocalyptic claim." This clearly is in alignment with the survey results (outside of what I can't check behind the paywall).
If the article didn't open with that first line, I doubt we'd be here now. The second line is fine and non-controversial within the scope of the survey's findings. But we have this other claim that, while not creating a self-paradox, puts crappy reporting against decent reporting. I would argue that as WPian we can read through the BS and report only on what we know or can judge to be accurate or non-editorial (the second part) and not consider the first part to have tainted the work. We are not that "mindless" to not be able to recognize that problem.
The reason I break this out is that there is the general question of when any source have both good quality journalism and terrible editorizing in the same article, is the entire article now useless? This a question regardless if it FOX or any other nominally RS source --Masem (t) 19:29, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- "I would argue that as WPian we can read through the BS and report only on what we know or can judge to be accurate or non-editorial (the second part)" This is belied by the discussion above where numerous editors claim that the egregiously deceptive opening paragraph of the piece is perfectly fine. There are apparently plenty of editors who cannot distinguish basic facts from falsehoods. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 19:42, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- I'd say that "happened to be the only source that covers it" is, by definition, a strong indication that WP:WEIGHT requirements have not been met. You've described what is, as far as I can tell, a mutually exclusive set of conditions. If something is to appear in such a Wikipedia article as the AOC article, AND only one source is covering it, it is probably WP:UNDUE in nearly every case I could imagine. Doubly so when the reliability of that specific source has been called into question. You're describing things that don't exist.--Jayron32 20:23, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- Not useless, but one that requires extra care. Why? For starters, because biased sources - even the accurate ones - tend to involve heavy selection bias (ie. WP:CHERRYPICKING). The facts themselves may or may not be true, but the overall picture is at best partial; and as we all know, a "cherry picked" picture can be just as misleading as a false one. Case in point: reports covering heavy winters that imply that global warming isn't happening.[23] As Wikipedia is only as good as its sources, using a biased source inadvertently introduces selection bias into our articles even if the core facts are true. Another reason is that we don't want to mis-lead the reader: this item is actually used in AOC's article; the reporting itself is correct, but readers following up on the source will quickly find themselves faced with the ridiculous and misleading comment of Brian Kilmeade and Andrew Pudzer that are embedded in the piece (something about "trains to Hawaii" and Soviet socio-economic policies). In other words: using that source means putting Fox & Friends literally two clicks away from the article, and that's a disservice to the reader and to their trust in us and our policies. François Robere (talk) 20:30, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
Snoogans has been trying to get rid of Fox News here for years. He needs to drop the stick and stop his tendentious war against non-leftist media companies. I recommend a trout for the continued disruption and a stern warning that any future behavior of this nature will be met with sanctions. 174.211.4.175 (talk) 21:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- This noticeboard is for the discussion of article content, not editor conduct. Your complaints should be directed to User talk:Snooganssnoogans. — Newslinger talk 21:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
- And the argument is fallacious: any non-right or non-GOP media must not necessarily be leftist... —PaleoNeonate – 03:00, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- If an article misleads at any point then it is not reliable. If the News outlet has a history of misleading then it too is not a reliable source. people and organisations that tell lies cannot be trusted to tell the truth. It's not rocket science, just basic ethical standards. Bacondrum (talk) 00:58, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
Three notes on the preceding discussion
- Most of this discussion consisted of editors' opinions and explanations, with very few RS to support them. Having brought to the table 26 references which were mostly ignored, I have to ask: are we conducting these discussions based on our own opinions or those of RS? If we're to rely on RS, then Fox News is pretty much out (see "expert opinions" above); if we're to rely only on our own opinion, then WP:NOR is out. Which will it be?
- This whole discussion is an example of what Matthew Yglesias of Vox termed the "hack gap" (see here for a quicker, but less thorough explanation), where Fox's focus on a completely meaningless story drives it deep into mainstream discussion (this is well documented by other sources as well). If it weren't for Fox we wouldn't have spent three days discussing an off-hand comment by a fresh congresswoman.
- Some editors found a solution to this discussion by stating "we shouldn't trust any news media outlet for news on climate change". I find this argument unsatisfactory, as it (conveniently) ignores two problems: first, it sidesteps the fact that Fox does distort the facts on climate change on a regular basis - "distort", not "oversimplify" or "popularize" like other outlets - and this has to be accounted for with respect to how we treat the network in general. Second, this argument ignores the fact that studies are only a part of the picture, and networks do have legitimate uses here: for analysis (eg. policy analysis and expert scientific commentary), as a tertiary source (eg. "The UN today published a report..."), for surveys and opinion polls, or for coverage of public discourse ("the EPA responded by...") - this very discussion was about the latter, not about a study, so the lack of a determination with respect to the OP's specific question doesn't actually solve the problem. François Robere (talk) 12:18, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Arguable a LOT of this would be unnecessary if WPians writing on current events avoiding the "talking heads" part of the coverage. We don't need to, within days or weeks of an event like this, to be trying to slot in opinions from politicians or analysts or the like, which is going to have uneven/biased coverage in the RSes (fox or otherwise) and focuses too much on the "now" rather than the long-term importance. This own issue between Bernie, AOC, and the UN climate change report is the type of thing that really has no place yet to be on WP. Ideally we should be approaching these type of stories like the Guardian does with its "live"-type coverage; strict factual timelines with no color commentary from any random talking head for example. As many have said for this specific story, it likely fails UNDUE for inclusion in the first place.
- Now, months after an event, then we have better hindsight and can write quality summaries using RSes, and this is where Fox is clearly fine as an RS. The comment about about "not trusting any sources for CC" fits into this concept: the UN Report came out (a factual event) and then everyone and their brother tries to broadcast their opinion about it in the short term. We shouldn't at all be talking about those opinions unless they are creating major news stories, or until we have enough hindsight to know if those opinions are part of the longer-term coverage of the story.
- What I'm trying to get at is that we should be questioning RSes that are going deep into opinion and commentary about reactions to an event in the short-term - Fox may be the worst of these RSes, but CNN and many of those others also throw out spin. The best solution is not to even include these pieces so that we don't have to play the RS-questioning game, and just wait until the story has had sufficient time to percolate and where there's little doubt about the RS coverage of past events. That gives us a better sense of what is not UNDUE to include and removes many of the issues of source bias (Fox and otherwise). --Masem (t) 15:03, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Agree 100 percent ...what is need is simply time...not clickbait news with blow by blow coverage that all media have. As an encyclopedia we should be waiting for analysis of topics (in depth coverage or academic review of information. Yes mention of a debate is fine...by day by day ocerverage till an incident is over is simply not compatible with encyclopedic writing. --Moxy 🍁 12:40, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Not reliable by any measure. Fox News may occassionally be accurate, but it has a history of making up facts and even entire stories and thus cannot be trusted. Fox news has a comparable reputation to the Daily Mail, regularly presenting highly partisan commentary, employing discreditied specialists, manipulating video footage with the intent to decieve, photoshopping images in a decietful manner etc etc etc. There are claims here that Fox is like any other organisation, but that is demonstrably false, they are one of the least reliable major news outlets globally. Fox News staff have even been known to vandalised Wikipedia.[1] Bacondrum (talk) 00:44, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
References
- ^ The Guardian, Technology News, Bobbie Johnson (August 15, 2007) "Companies and party aides cast censorious eye over Wikipedia"
RfC - CoinDesk as a source
Should CoinDesk be removed as a source from all articles on Wikipedia? --Molochmeditates (talk) 13:49, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
Survey (CoinDesk)
Previous Discussion: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_251#RfC_on_use_of_CoinDesk
RSP Entry: CoinDesk RSP Entry
Please note: Wikipedia:General_sanctions/Blockchain_and_cryptocurrencies
There is currently no consensus on whether CoinDesk should be considered a [[questionable source. Therefore I do not support the blanket removal of CoinDesk references especially in cases where it leaves statements unsourced and articles incomplete (including several criticisms). Instead, editors should refer to WP:CONTEXTMATTERS.
An experienced editor is removing all CoinDesk references from cryptocurrency related articles on Wikipedia. My question is simply whether there should there be a blanket removal of all CoinDesk references from Wikipedia, even in cases where it is not used to establish notability, irrespective of context? Here is a small sample of 10 affected articles, in no particular order (there are too many to sort through):
- Andreessen Horowitz - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Andreessen_Horowitz&type=revision&diff=899210046&oldid=897849761
- Initial coin offering - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Initial_coin_offering&type=revision&diff=899236284&oldid=878360173
- BitLicense - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=BitLicense&diff=prev&oldid=899205899
- Virtual currency - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virtual_currency&diff=prev&oldid=899205974
- Blockchain - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Blockchain&diff=prev&oldid=899204625
- Petro (cryptocurrency) - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Petro_%28cryptocurrency%29&type=revision&diff=899240624&oldid=898403220
- ConsenSys - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=ConsenSys&diff=prev&oldid=899172771
- CryptoKitties - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=CryptoKitties&diff=prev&oldid=899172717
- Vitalik Buterin - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Vitalik_Buterin&diff=prev&oldid=899039990
- Non-fungible token - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Non-fungible_token&type=revision&diff=899205438&oldid=898660433
So the question is,
- Yes all references to CoinDesk should be removed from Wikipedia irrespective of context
- No do not remove all references to CoinDesk per previous RfC, and instead use the context to determine whether to use the reference or not (e.g. do not use CoinDesk sources to establish notability).
Note: This is not an RfC for individual article cleanup. I am sure we can all agree that many of the cryptocurrency related articles can be improved. --Molochmeditates (talk) 01:42, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- Remove it - speaking as the editor in question, here's what my thinking was:
- In general: cryptocurrency/blockchain articles are magnets for spam and advocacy. And crypto news sites are bad sources, per the previous discussion on this topic - they appear to be specialist press, but function as advocacy. You will see every possible thing being spun as good news for cryptos. We don't need crypto sites - there's plenty of mainstream coverage and peer-reviewed academic coverage to establish notability. Using crypto sites as sources in your article is a bad sign at AFD, and using mainstream RSes and peer-reviewed academic RSes is a good sign at AFD - so the observed working consensus of Wikipedia editors in practice is strongly in this direction.
- In particular: Coindesk has a terrible habit of running articles on things that don't exist yet, barely-reskinned press releases and so on. There are plenty of refs that are entirely factual content! But you can say the same about blogs, wikis and other sources that aren't trustworthy in any practical sense. And this is even though Coindesk has an editor, I know a pile of the journalists and they're honestly trying to do a good job, etc. Quite a lot of the Coindesk refs I removed were to puffed-up nonsense articles, or in support of blatantly promotional article content. So the argument that editors will check the context doesn't work in practice - using the Coindesk articles that happen to be properly-made news coverage only encourages the use of their bad stuff, on the basis of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, which is the most frequent AFD argument from crypto spammers.
- I urge those thinking about this to reread WP:GS/Crypto. Just think what sort of editing would cause that harsh a community sanction to be put into place. Those conditions haven't changed. Letting just a waffer-thin crypto site in the door will invite the spammers back.
- I must note I'm arguably speaking against my own interest here - I make some money as a crypto journalist, often publishing in these very sites. I know my stuff is good and my editors are good! But I also know there's excellent reason it's not good for Wikipedia - when we have mainstream sources. If some subject or fact isn't notable enough to make it into mainstream or peer-reviewed sources, perhaps it's not notable enough for Wikipedia.
- For a recent example that did make the crypto press, check this out. (I spoke to them with my Wikipedia editor hat on for once, not my crypto journalist hat.) That's about spammy interests trying to weasel their stuff into just one page. Repeat for a large swathe of the crypto articles on Wikipedia, 'cos that sort of thing is entirely usual. Mainstream-only is good in practice. (cc Retimuko and Ladislav Mecir, who are also mentioned in that piece.)
- And, really - you think crypto sites should be used for BLPs? We have super-stringent BLP rules also for excellent reasons. I can't see how a crypto site would ever be acceptable as a source for a BLP, except maybe as an accepted subject-published link or similar - David Gerard (talk) 17:36, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- - David Gerard (talk) 17:18, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- @David Gerard: I'm skeptical of your claim
"I must note I'm arguably speaking against my own interest here"
, considering that you published Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain, a book that is highly critical of cryptocurrencies. How would your !vote to remove all references to CoinDesk go against your own interests? Since you"make some money as a crypto journalist"
, wouldn't removing all references to CoinDesk effectively eliminate your biggest competitor and/or adversary from being mentioned on Wikipedia? — Newslinger talk 12:39, 11 June 2019 (UTC)- I mean that my own work in the ones I write for (which include Coindesk) wouldn't be citable. If you think you have a substantiable claim of COI on my part, you know where WP:COIN is, else I'll file that with all the other unsubstantiated claims that not being an advocate means I should stop editing in the area - David Gerard (talk) 17:05, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks for clarifying. Your statement makes more sense alongside the fact that you have contributed to CoinDesk. Ironically, the fact that CoinDesk published your opinion piece "2017: The ‘Butt’ of Bitcoin’s Joke" makes them less biased than I had previously assumed. — Newslinger talk 18:58, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
- I mean that my own work in the ones I write for (which include Coindesk) wouldn't be citable. If you think you have a substantiable claim of COI on my part, you know where WP:COIN is, else I'll file that with all the other unsubstantiated claims that not being an advocate means I should stop editing in the area - David Gerard (talk) 17:05, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
- @David Gerard: I'm skeptical of your claim
- Unreliable source - beyond the issues that David Gerrard lays out above, crypto news sites also have had issues with content being gneerated for pay but not noted as such. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 20:19, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
- to be fair, Coindesk has never been credibly accused of pay-for-play, and there's no good reason to think they'd do that. However, their editorial line has long been basically boosterism for cryptos (IMO) - David Gerard (talk) 06:56, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Keep (do not remove all references to CoinDesk - here's my thinking and take on the matter:
- The previous RfC did a good job of getting consensus on how to treat CoinDesk articles. It clearly stated that CoinDesk shouldn't be used to establish notability but otherwise isn't barred from being used as a source. Why the sudden change in this policy by one editor deciding unilaterally that they no longer wish to adhere to this consensus?
- Yes, we all know the usual criticisms of crypto press. That's already debated and known to editors. If there are individual instances to consider incorrect usage of CoinDesk, e.g. to establish notability, by all means they should be deleted. But as long as it isn't the policy, I don't support a blanket removal of all the material from literally hundreds of articles affected.
- A lot of the material that's been removed is actually criticism of the projects. The bias is easy to understand - a lot of the overly promotional puffery has been removed by diligent editors already. This means removing all the CoinDesk references has made the problem of crypto-puffery much worse.
- Several instances of purely encyclopedic content was removed for using CoinDesk as a purely descriptive secondary source (e.g. discussion on popular standards). This hurts the quality of the articles from an encyclopedic perspective.
- This blanket removal of CoinDesk references already goes against the general consensus previously reached. There are literally hundreds (probably thousands?) of edits to go through, and I don't think it's feasible to go through them all to determine if the removal was justified. In many cases I've reviewed, I think the removal was unjustified, and in several other cases, it was totally justified. It's very hard to review now after these edits.
- In conclusion, yes, there is a problem with crypto puff material entering the articles, but the solution isn't to ban crypto press. Crypto press both has the puffiest pieces and the most critical pieces on crypto projects. As editors, we want to see a balanced article, but that balance gets lost of we cannot cite the criticisms. One editor shouldn't decide to remove criticism and encyclopedic content especially going against previous consensus
I am of course happy to comply with a consensus view that CoinDesk should never be used as a reference on Wikipedia, if that's what comes out of this RfC. In that case, we should edit the RSP entry to reflect this consensus. Also, a lot of articles now have material that are unreferenced. There is a good amount of work to be done to go through these and remove the unsourced material or find other sources. --Molochmeditates (talk) 19:39, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Keep as a source per Molochmeditates. CoinDesk's role in promoting the use of cryptocurrencies is no different from PinkNews's role in promoting acceptance of LGBT communities worldwide. Recognise their bias, and use discretion when citing the source; but do not systemically reject an entire topic area from Wikipedia just because it is in some way problematic or difficult to write about. feminist (talk) 07:28, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
- Most of them should be removed. But it should be done more carefully. A lot of them can be replaced by mainstream sources. Examples:
- Andreessen Horowitz - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Andreessen_Horowitz&type=revision&diff=899210046&oldid=897849761
- Wall Street Journal "blog" about the same thing.
- Initial coin offering - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Initial_coin_offering&type=revision&diff=899236284&oldid=878360173
- "The SEC ruled that celebrity ICO endorsements must disclose the amount of any compensation paid for the endorsement." Covered by Reuters.
- BitLicense - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=BitLicense&diff=prev&oldid=899205899
- There should be zero coin news references used in an article if possible. Like do you really need to use CoinDesk to write a good article about blockchain?
- So if it's an important detail, look for a mainstream source. If it's only on a coin news site you should explain why it's needed on the talk page or edit summary. Blumpf (talk) 21:18, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Delete all references from Coindesk and other cryptopropaganda I'd thought that this was already a settled matter. There are reliable references to cryptomatters, e.g. Bloomberg, Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, the Financial Times, BBC, CBC and sometimes in Fortune and some of the cable news networks. There's no reason not to just use these sources. The cryptopropaganda network is all shills all the time as far as I'm concerned. Smallbones(smalltalk) 22:58, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Do not delete all references. There is not enough evidence to indict CoinDesk as a source that publishes false or fabricated information. While CoinDesk is a biased and non-independent source due to the cryptocurrency holdings of its parent company (Digital Currency Group), I don't consider the content in CoinDesk to be sponsored content, and I don't think a removal of
"all references"
to CoinDesk is justified. In my opinion, a source only crosses the line when it publishes calls to action that support its interests. CoinDesk's articles do not contain that type of promotional language. CoinDesk is much closer to TorrentFreak (RSP entry), which is another specialist publication that assumes the role of an advocacy organization, than The Points Guy's sponsored content (RSP entry), which contains actual sales pitches. However, CoinDesk should not be used to establish notability (per existing consensus), and editors should consider whether content from CoinDesk constitutes undue weight before including it into an article. — Newslinger talk 12:39, 11 June 2019 (UTC) - Remove all, but try to replace with mainstream sources when at all possible, per Blumpf and others. The FRS/Legobot sent me. EllenCT (talk) 19:17, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
Discussion (CoinDesk)
I think we need to be cautious here. Crypto/blockchain is a rather large field, but awash with people fighting over virtual dollars so sources are going to be iffy. But in other fields - for example, video games, we also know there is a lot of specialized media and a LOT of "blogs" trying to be big news sites that we at the VG project reject. That said, reviewing lists of crypto news site lists, a lot are owned by companies directly involved in the crypto game so yes, COI/self-promotion has to be a factor here. Coinbank seems to fall into that but its also the first major site after you get past CNBC and Forbes (which includes their contributors) in this list (which of course may also be suspect). I think we need some strong guidance to white/black-list sites and make it clear that sites that are knownly run by crypto backers should be considered generally a non-RS and certainly not independent for notability concerns. --Masem (t) 23:35, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- "sites that are knownly run by crypto backers should be considered generally a non-RS and certainly not independent for notability concern" - but that's literally all the crypto news sites, though. Every single one. Is there an exception you had in mind? - David Gerard (talk) 07:21, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- I don't know, I have not had any good chance to review them in any depth, their connections, and how others see those sources. For example, if we have non-crypto-based RSes routinely quoting facts from a crypto source, even if that source is not truly independent, that still suggests that that source would be seen as authorative. All the concerns related to WP:NORG obviously should be applied to any crypto-related article, but it still doesn't mean throwing the entire work out if others see part of it as reliable. But I have spent literally only like 10 minutes looking into this, nothing I would consider suitable to say such exist.
- I do worry that this rush of mass removals without a clear consensus is into WP:FAIT territory, even though I suspect 95% of them removals would be proper, at the end of the day. --Masem (t) 14:06, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- I think your point about RS quoting something like CoinDesk is a fair point and I would hope that David Gerrard has stopped removing CoinDesk as a reference while this RfC is being conducted. However, because Crypto/blockchain is a substantial field we have non-industry sources covering notable organizations/developments regularly. We can rely on them without having to figure "Is CoinDesk acting as a booster of the industry here or is it reporting news of significance?" Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:57, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
No, do not remove all references to CoinDesk. As always, reliability is determined in context. Per Obsidi, "They have an editorial staff and an editorial policy. They do issue corrections". Benjamin (talk) 00:34, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- I see one very rarely indeed. A recent worked example of Coindesk being a sloppy and misleading source: [24] It's particularly egregious because literally nothing they claim is new - including the precise technical claim, which was detailed in InfoQ (which is a specialist RS) two years ago and its application to blockchains the same year (though that's a primary source, not an RS, it's the counterexample that Coindesk has repeated a marketing lie unexamined). Will Coindesk correct it? Still waiting ... Coindesk has a long history of repeating any press release nonsense that sounds like good news for blockchain. This means that a Coindesk reference cannot be safely used unless the editor has separately verified that this time they're not just repeating boosterism - at which point you're doing original research and should either find a RS or just not do that - David Gerard (talk) 17:13, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
RfC: LifeSiteNews
Which of the following best describes the reliability of LifeSiteNews?
- Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
- Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
- Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
- Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated as in the 2017 RfC of the Daily Mail
--PluniaZ (talk) 04:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 LifeSiteNews is notorious as an ideology driven arm of the Campaign Life Coalition that routinely publishes false and misleading stories. Snopes describes it as "a known purveyor of misleading information", and carries three articles debunking LifeSiteNews. LifeSiteNews used a defamation lawsuit as a fundraising opportunity. No reputable publication relies on LifeSiteNews as a source for factual information. --PluniaZ (talk) 04:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 - Pretty clear here that we're dealing with a partisan smear site on the order of (if not worse than) Breitbart. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 04:51, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 This website uses false information to promote its ideology. ―Susmuffin Talk 07:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 1 No way. LifeSiteNews is generally highly reliable for factual reporting. Moreover many high ranking prelates, including many Cardinals, trust it and have given interviews. You can't dismiss LifesiteNews because it is conservative, even on Wikipedia. Thucyd (talk) 08:26, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Comment - Which other independent reliable sources say that LifeSiteNews "is generally highly reliable"? NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 13:21, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4. LifeSiteNews repeatedly publishes articles that promote conversion therapy, a pseudoscientific practice. — Newslinger talk 09:01, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Also, the site regularly sources content from Breitbart News (RSP entry), including conspiracy theories related to George Soros in "Breitbart reveals Soros groups registering felons to oppose Moore in Alabama election" and "How billionaire George Soros is trying to hijack the Catholic Church for his progressive agenda". — Newslinger talk 10:51, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 - As noted above this is highly disreputable source. I’ve come across it in news searches and I’m surprised it’s there as it’s so bad. The only use I see it for is to find out what one sect of religious extremists think. But even then you would need to use reputable sources to actually cite facts. I would never trust this source to report accurately. Gleeanon409 (talk) 14:20, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 5 - Reliable when used as a primary source for quotations and similar statements as to the opinions of those contributing to LifeSite, but NOT reliable when used as a secondary source to support the veracity of those opinions. Always use with in-text attribution. Blueboar (talk) 14:46, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Comment - Based on my reading of the rules, Option 4 would still allow LifeSiteNews to be used as a source about material that is published on the site: Wikipedia:Verifiability#Self-published_and_questionable_sources_as_sources_on_themselves. --PluniaZ (talk) 16:47, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 3 and possibly Option 4 - it's a nonsense site - David Gerard (talk) 15:24, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- 4 actually reliable sources universally agree it's a shit site. Good enough for me.--Jayron32 16:21, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Objection to RfC. This RfC violates our verifiability policy. It amounts to little more than a popularity contest and is inconsistent with
WP:CONTEXTWP:CONTEXTMATTERS.Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content.
The TDM RfC was premised on the fact that TDM had already been a perennial source here based on many specific test cases. It is inappropriate for us to go through obscure sources that have only been glancingly addressed here and to decide whether they satisfy the reliability bar absolutely or generally. RSN is the place for individual test cases, and once enough of them have arisen then a case can be made to add a media outlet to WP:RSP. R2 (bleep) 17:43, 30 May 2019 (UTC)- Your quoted sentence is not from WP:V, and I don't think WP:CONTEXT is the link you're looking for. The policy on questionable sources is a part of the verifiability policy, and LifeSiteNews is highly questionable based on the types of content it publishes. Unretracted articles supporting pseudoscience and conspiracy theories taint the entire source's reputation, and reveal the source's
"poor reputation for checking the facts"
and tendency to publish"views that are widely considered by other sources to be extremist"
. For example, the George Soros conspiracy theories are widely denounced by reliable sources as false and would violate the living persons policy if used at face value on Wikipedia, but a search on LifeSiteNews returns dozens of articles propagating them. WP:V also includes WP:ABOUTSELF, which maintains that questionable sources can be used for uncontroversial self-descriptions (e.g. a guest column on LifeSiteNews can be used on the article about its author to describe their views). This RfC does not change WP:ABOUTSELF, which defines the only circumstance LifeSiteNews may be considered usable in a Wikipedia article. — Newslinger talk 19:23, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Your quoted sentence is not from WP:V, and I don't think WP:CONTEXT is the link you're looking for. The policy on questionable sources is a part of the verifiability policy, and LifeSiteNews is highly questionable based on the types of content it publishes. Unretracted articles supporting pseudoscience and conspiracy theories taint the entire source's reputation, and reveal the source's
- All of those arguments can and should be made on a case-by-case basis. I do not think we're in a position to establish a one-size-fits-all, blanket rule about this outlet or most other outlets, nor is this noticeboard the appropriate place to establish such a rule. R2 (bleep) 23:41, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- There is significant precedent supporting the identification of sources that have a pattern of publishing highly questionable material. Editors who support option 4 here would generally oppose the inclusion of content sourced from LifeSiteNews in any situation due to its abysmal reputation for accuracy and fact-checking every time the source is raised on this noticeboard (with the exception of uses qualifying under WP:ABOUTSELF). — Newslinger talk 23:58, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- All of those arguments can and should be made on a case-by-case basis. I do not think we're in a position to establish a one-size-fits-all, blanket rule about this outlet or most other outlets, nor is this noticeboard the appropriate place to establish such a rule. R2 (bleep) 23:41, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 - If we aim for Wikipedia to become anything close to an encyclopedia, we need to stop using these rubbish sites as sources for content. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 20:19, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 2 - LifeSiteNews is a very conservatively-biased news source. However, there's a big difference between promoting viewpoints that many people disagree with, and deliberately peddling false information. (To quote from WP:BIASED: "reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject. Common sources of bias include political, financial, religious, philosophical, or other beliefs. Although a source may be biased, it may be reliable in the specific context.") A tabloid, for example, doesn't care whether their information is true or not, as long as they get readers; but I get the impression that LifeSiteNews does care about what they consider to be "truth" and are trying to report actual news events through the lens of their worldview. You or I may not agree with the biases underlying its articles, but this does not by itself make it unreliable. The reason I say Opinion 2 instead of Opinion 1 is because LifeSiteNews does lean in a sensationalist direction. It strikes me as an ultra-conservative version of something like Slate.com or Salon.com: highly biased news source with a sensationalist approach. Jdcompguy (talk) 21:01, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- The issue is not that the site is biased - the issue is that the site publishes and promotes known falsehoods and nonsensical conspiracy theories when convenient for its political worldview. When you choose to willfully publish lies about people (such as the Soros conspiracy theories cited above), you simply don't meet the standards of accuracy required for a reliable source. It doesn't matter that they consider such nonsense to be true - it factually and empirically is false.NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 21:10, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- You say they "willfully publish lies" and yet they also "consider such nonsense to be true." It can't be both. Jdcompguy (talk) 21:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- What’s the difference? If they delusionally promote lies or maliciously do so makes little difference. They can’t be trusted as a source. Gleeanon409 (talk) 22:18, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- No. A lie is a lie, whether or not the person who utters it actually believes it. "Donald Trump lost the 2016 presidential election" is a falsehood, no matter how much a person might wish it to be so. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 22:32, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Meh... A lot depends on how we phrase things. Writing: ”Trump lost the 2016 election” is an inaccurate statement, but writing “Notable commentator Ima Crackpot believes that Trump lost the 2016 election” can be an accurate statement, if Ima Crackpot actually says this. Attribution changes the statement from being “about” Trump to being “about” Crackpot. Once you attribute, the question isn’t a statement of fact (ie whether Trump won or lost), but one of opinion (what Crackpot believes). This is why you can never have a completely unreliable source... there is always at least one context in which the source is reliable (ie a direct quote). Blueboar (talk) 23:04, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- You say they "willfully publish lies" and yet they also "consider such nonsense to be true." It can't be both. Jdcompguy (talk) 21:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- The issue is not that the site is biased - the issue is that the site publishes and promotes known falsehoods and nonsensical conspiracy theories when convenient for its political worldview. When you choose to willfully publish lies about people (such as the Soros conspiracy theories cited above), you simply don't meet the standards of accuracy required for a reliable source. It doesn't matter that they consider such nonsense to be true - it factually and empirically is false.NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 21:10, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 - More or less per PluniaZ. I had never heard of it, so spent some time on the site. To call it simply "biased" doesn't cut it. It's misleading and inaccurate all over the place in service of that bias. I cannot imagine a situation when this would be considered reliable or to have weight, outside of opinions about itself in its own article. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 22:38, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 I think it has been carefully examined and found wanting. Time to be deprecated. scope_creepTalk 22:39, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- 3 or 4, per Rhododendrites. -sche (talk) 22:47, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4. As far as I can see, the website is full of fringe nonsense, and has been described by RS as unreliable (Snopes says it's "a known purveyor of misleading information", the Advocate says it's "One of the Most Anti-LGBTQ Online Outlets"[25]). I did a brief google search on how this website covered LGBT issues, evolution and climate change...
- Here are some anti-LGBT LSN headlines (all marked "news"):
- "Experts Worldwide Find Gay Adoption Harmful for Children"[26]
- "Ex-gay man: ‘Homosexuality is just another human brokenness’"[27]
- "Expert Research Finds Homosexuality More Dangerous Than Smoking"[28]
- "Expert: ‘Homo-tyranny is upon us’"[29]
- According to the Advocate, LSN frames stories about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church as a problem of homosexuality.[30]
- Here are a bunch of stories casting doubt on the theory of evolution (all marked "news"):
- "Over 500 PhD Scientists Proclaim Their Doubts About Darwin’s Theory"[31]
- "Ranks of Renowned Scientists Doubting Darwin’s Theory on the Rise - 700 Now on Public List"[32]
- "Astonishing 88% of Americans Believe in Creation or God-Directed Evolution"[33]
- "Is Darwinian evolution an idea whose time has come and gone?"[34]
- Climate change:
- There seems to be a pattern of propping up fringe views and falsehoods. Even if the headlines are attributed to some idiot, the body of the articles usually contain straight-up falsehoods and incendiary language by the "reporter", as well as a complete failure to do the minimum fact-checking that shows that the idiots that they are quoting are saying false things. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 23:26, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4. Clearly nonsense. BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 00:16, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 1/2 I find them reliable for facts, but I always assess on a case-by-case basis, which should be done for all cites of scources. They also have a corrections policy and they do issue corrections. I may not always agree with their bias or views and like many, many sources, even mainstream news organizations/publications, you have to consider what is left out (intentional or not) or given undue weight. I don't rely on the headline for any news article (from any source) as they are too often intentionally provocative or, given their brevity, incomplete. If there is good faith controversy on assertions, I generally find it better to balance the presentation by citing sources that offer different and contrary, even if biased, analyses. Archer1234 (talk) 13:14, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 - This isn't about bias, or their weird beef with the Pope or their support for fringe political candidates worldwide, this is about actually publishing falsehoods. I'm saying this because some people are trying to move the discussion towards the reliability of biased sources, rather than talking about actual fake news. And RealLifeNews is a websites that publishes untruths on a regular basis. Snooganssnoogans's post above offers a wide range of examples and I find it difficult to believe that somebody can look over that list and still think this is about discrimination of right wing opinions. PraiseVivec (talk) 13:18, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Option 3 or Option 4 An undeniably biased and intellectually slanted website.
I don’t see it as falling into the Breitbart camp of complete deprecation, however: Media Bias/Fact Check finds its record to be mixed, not complete and total garbage.Basically I’m highly skeptical of using this source for factual reporting, and there’s no reason to use it in that area, if ever. Toa Nidhiki05 14:27, 31 May 2019 (UTC)- Media Bias/Fact Check (RSP entry) is considered generally unreliable because of its questionable methodology. See the September 2018 and December 2018 discussions for details. It's not a good idea to rely on information from that site. — Newslinger talk 14:44, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Option 1. Its journalism has brought bombshells that can be compared to The Boston Globe's. Plenty of WP:USEBYOTHERS, see [38] [39] [40] [41] and even the failing pro-pedophilia New York Times [42]. There is also the policy WP:Child protection, which means that an anti-pedophilic bias is generally justified on Wikipedia. Let's look at the arguments for "option 4". Snopes's characterization of the website as "a known purveyor of misleading information" is the misleading thing here. Snopes only cites one incident for that vast overstatement so let's take a look at it. LifeNewsWire may have presented the strangling as factual even though there has never been a criminal conviction (this is a "he said–she said" situation). But every news outlet presents criminal allegations as factual! It's not a secret. I can't refute "option 4" !votes which do not provide any substantial rationale or evidence (these are mostly WP:IDLI non-arguments), so I am left with the argument that promoting conversion therapy is worse than promoting pedophilia (I won't comment on the veracity of this argument because I am not familiar enough), the WP:OR argument that the Soros story is false (it's actually true according to the magazine New York [43] and Haaretz cites it as fact [44] though stops short of calling the funding intentional on Soros's part; Breitbart does a lot of good stuff and most articles are correct, so one can't say their content is automatically a lie, especially when other sources corroborate the information, which is not an argument absolving Breitbart of any wrongdoing but merely the state of most Breitbart articles), the argument by Snooganssnoogans "According to the Advocate, LSN frames stories about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church as a problem of homosexuality" (the only valid argument IMO in this discussion, though WP:BIASED says that bias doesn't mean a source is unreliable if it has a track record of fact-checking, and that track record is always difficult to establish and belongs to the article Campaign Life Coalition as per WP:FRINGE, but the currently presented information there and here is scant) and Snooganssnoogans's list of LifeSiteNews articles without secondary coverage debunking them. wumbolo ^^^ 16:30, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- The examples of USEBYOTHERS are: (1) quoting a statement made by Carson to LSN[45], (2) quoting a letter sent by ultraconservative bishops to LSN calling Pope Francis a heretic,[46], (3) quoting an anti-Pope Francis LSN story as an example of how ultraconservative Catholics have responded to Pope Francis,[47], (4) mentioning how LSN published an English translation of an Italian Archbishop's polemic against Pope Francis[48], and (5) quoting a LSN interview with an anti-Pope Francis bishop[49]. In none of these instances are other reliable sources citing this website as if it broke news and as if its content is factual. It's cited in the same way as RS would cite InfoWars or Breitbart News: as an organization that plays an active role in the culture wars and gives a platform to prominent fringe actors. I'd also like to note that this is not the first time that you've grossly misrepresented USEBYOTHERS: you also did it in the case of the Daily Wire on this noticeboard last year.[50] Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:49, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- Also, excuse my ignorance: in what way is the NY Times pro-pedophilia? Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:49, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- That remark most likely refers to the NYT's publication of Margo Kaplan's controversial 2014 op-ed "Pedophilia: A Disorder, Not a Crime", which argued that US laws should be changed to disallow employers from discriminating against pedophiles, since pedophilia is a mental illness (and mentally disabled people, with the exception of pedophiles, are a protected class in the US). After publication, the NYT acknowledged the largely negative response to the op-ed. I would not consider the NYT
"pro-pedophilia"
since they describe Kaplan's op-ed as a minority viewpoint, and because the op-ed doesn't even portray pedophilia in positive terms. The NYT is not"failing"
by any measure (commercial or critical). — Newslinger talk 17:42, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
- That remark most likely refers to the NYT's publication of Margo Kaplan's controversial 2014 op-ed "Pedophilia: A Disorder, Not a Crime", which argued that US laws should be changed to disallow employers from discriminating against pedophiles, since pedophilia is a mental illness (and mentally disabled people, with the exception of pedophiles, are a protected class in the US). After publication, the NYT acknowledged the largely negative response to the op-ed. I would not consider the NYT
- Your false and nonsensical rant about the newspaper of record in the United States should disqualify you from ever discussing reliable sources again. It's clear that you have neither an understanding of fact nor an understanding of policy. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 02:25, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 - if only because after reading Wumbolo's nonsense above, the complete opposite *must* be correct.... (Also because LSN prints rubbish, has a clear agenda that affects its factual reporting, and has no record of reliability from anyone else) Only in death does duty end (talk) 07:48, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4, 3 being a distant second choice. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:48, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 per above. X-Editor (talk) 19:32, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Objection to RfC.. No evidence that a dispute made this RfC necessary, no good excuse for overriding Wikipedia policy that context matters, misleading wording since the effect is far more than deprecation. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 17:39, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4. By definition, this is a highly biased news source and thus unsuitable for WP as a reliable source. Britishfinance (talk) 15:25, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- Object to this RfC - I agree with R2 above. This RfC is noncompliant with our PAGs, particularly V policy and RS guidelines, and I certainly hope who closes this will take that into consideration. Yes, the publication has a POV and pro-life stance, but that is not a reason to declare it unreliable. It is no surprise that the political and commercial opposition forces have declared the info false and misleading - they are biased and have a COI. This RfC needs to be SNOW CLOSED. Atsme Talk 📧 18:02, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
- Nobody here has described LifeSiteNews's
"POV and pro-life stance"
as"false or misleading"
. The negative response here is based on the site's penchant for promoting conspiracy theories, fringe theories, and pseudoscience with misleading and poorly researched claims. If LifeSiteNews dropped the low-quality content while retaining its"POV and pro-life stance"
, there would be no issue with using the site as a reference with attribution. — Newslinger talk 19:14, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
- Nobody here has described LifeSiteNews's
- option 4 as I've said elsewhere. Praxidicae (talk) 19:17, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
- Comment re list of options. This page's header suggested such a list as "a common format for writing the RfC question". That was a recent addition, which is being discussed in an RfC on the talk page. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 13:55, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
RfC: MintPress News
What is the best way to describe the reliability of MintPress News? --Jamez42 (talk) 09:02, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
- Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
- Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
- Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated as in the 2017 RfC of the Daily Mail
Survey (MintPress News)
- Option 4
(first choice) or option 3 (second choice). Reliable sources consider MintPress News disreputable:
Quotes about MintPress News from reliable sources
|
---|
"Pro-Russian Bots Take Up the Right-Wing Cause After Charlottesville", ProPublica
"Facebook Trending Just Promoted Another False Story", Craig Silverman, BuzzFeed News (RSP entry)
Interview with Åke Sellström, "Modern Warfare", CBRNe World |
I read through MintPress News's most recent "inside story" ("Microsoft’s ElectionGuard a Trojan Horse for a Military-Industrial Takeover of US Elections"), and I was not impressed with the level of fact-checking done. The article accuses Microsoft of "price gouging for its OneCare security software"
, and links that text to "Microsoft accused of predatory pricing of security software", an article from The Guardian (RSP entry) that describes the exact opposite: "Incredibly, Microsoft has priced themselves almost 50% below the market leader"
. (See Predatory pricing for a definition of the practice.) The MintPress News article then uses its own false claim to assert that Microsoft's "offering of ElectionGuard software free of charge is tellingly out of step for the tech giant and suggests an ulterior motive behind Microsoft’s recent philanthropic interest in 'defending democracy.'"
MintPress News is biased or opinionated, and any use of the source should be attributed. Since it's associated with fringe theories, its content should be examined for due weight and parity of sources should be considered. — Newslinger talk 23:00, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
- MintPress News has also republished 340 articles from Zero Hedge (RSP entry), a blog that propagates conspiracy theories. See the count on the 404 page (under "ZeroHedge.com"), and the list of articles. — Newslinger talk 23:54, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
- The site republishes articles from the Associated Press as well. Syndicated content should be evaluated by the reliability of the original publisher. Direct citations of the Associated Press are preferred over citations of the republisher. — Newslinger talk 04:54, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Mick West's Escaping the Rabbit Hole: How to Debunk Conspiracy Theories Using Facts, Logic, and Respect uses the MintPress News article "No Longer Conspiracy: CIA Admits Plans Of Aerosol Spraying For Geoengineering" as an example of a fallacious argument defending the chemtrail conspiracy theory. West states:
Quote from Mick West's Escaping the Rabbit Hole: How to Debunk Conspiracy Theories Using Facts, Logic, and Respect
|
---|
|
- As a source that pushes conspiracy theories, MintPress News is highly questionable. — Newslinger talk 06:16, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 3 is my impression, I noticed something was strange with this site after only reading a few of its articles, leading me to read on MintPress. When I found out about information confirming my suspicion, I also discovered that it includes reposts of Russian media that is often considered propaganda by other sources (and started a discussion thread about it here per WP:BRD when my edit to the lead was reverted). —PaleoNeonate – 01:56, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 or option 3 at best. We can literally use SELFSOURCE to state that MintPress is widely considered unreliable. They have built an entire fundraising campaign around the fact that Google, Facebook, and the collective "Mainstream Media" denounce MintPress as fake news.(Cite: gofundme.com/fighting-social-media-censorship - which I can't directly link due to an edit filter blacklist on that website.) It's unclear whether MintPress is part of the Russian fake news engine or merely a bunch of "useful idiot" nutters participating in the same content-sharing web of alternative "news" sites, but for our purposes it doesn't matter. If a story runs on MintPress and it appears in a normally Reliable source, I would consider that good reason to consider whether the Reliable Source had a lapse in their quality checks. Alsee (talk) 13:00, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- The GoFundMe campaign uses the polemical article "Obama, Being Black, Was Perfectly Suited to Deliver the Racist Message", which asks,
"Was Obama an avatar of white supremacy?"
, and states,"Obama clearly made a conscious effort to depict blacks as a thing apart, and the children of a lesser God, who were deserving of their material misfortune"
, as an example of the content MintPress News is producing. The site clearly has no ambition to be a reliable source. — Newslinger talk 16:09, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- The GoFundMe campaign uses the polemical article "Obama, Being Black, Was Perfectly Suited to Deliver the Racist Message", which asks,
- Option 4. MintPress News is closer to a fakenews site than journalism. No need to lower the RS bar. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 18:26, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 or * Option 3 Clearly unreliable per presented evidence --Shrike (talk) 20:37, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 although I would settle for Option 3 if there is not a strong enough consensus for the former. MintPress is a cesspool of conspiracy theories and misinformation that should never be cited on an encyclopedia.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 20:42, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 3 I have scanned some other articles on the site and followed the links. We will have to take each article on a case-by-case basis. Walter Görlitz (talk) 20:47, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 4 or * Option 3 Clearly unreliable as per evidence above. I don't think MediaBias/Factcheck or Newsguard are reliable in themselves but are useful starting points. The former rates MintPress as "biased", its factual reporting as "mixed" and notes two failed fact checks1, 2' while the latter gave it a "red" (i.e. fail) rating. FactCheck.org found it to have published a fake story in 2015[51] (see also AFP[52]), and Snopes found it to have published "mostly false" stories in 2015[53] and 2016[54] BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:46, 5 June 2019 (UTC)
- Objection to RfC. This RfC violates our verifiability policy. It amounts to little more than a popularity contest and is inconsistent with WP:CONTEXTMATTERS.
Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content.
The TDM RfC was premised on the fact that TDM had already been a perennial source here based on many specific test cases. It is inappropriate for us to go through obscure sources that have only been glancingly addressed here and to decide whether they satisfy the reliability bar absolutely or generally. RSN is the place for individual test cases, and once enough of them have arisen then a case can be made to add a media outlet to WP:RSP. R2 (bleep) 20:01, 7 June 2019 (UTC)- All four options in this RfC are fully compliant with the verifiability policy, especially in light of its section on questionable sources. The above evidence is more than enough to establish MintPress News as highly questionable. There is no need to go through additional motions when multiple discussions' worth of evidence is presented in this RfC. The inclusion criterion in WP:RSP § How to improve this list is one RfC or two significant discussions. — Newslinger talk 06:25, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- Comment MintPress News has been used several times as a source in articles about the Syrian Civil War and the Venezuelan crisis, among other controversial topics, which is the reason why I started this RfC. --Jamez42 (talk) 17:31, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Citation needed.Peter Gulutzan (talk) 12:33, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Objection to RfC per above. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 22:07, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
- Comment re list of options. This page's header suggested such a list as "a common format for writing the RfC question". That was a recent addition, which is being discussed in an RfC on the talk page. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 13:55, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
Could a source from 1825 be considered a reliable source on Wikipedia?
Could a source from 1825 -- for instance, this book about the geneaology of the House of Bourbon: https://books.google.com/books?id=rjsWAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA483&dq=jean+seigneur+de+carency+1825&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiF7pD-4cniAhWvJzQIHcqBB0wQ6AEIKjAA#v=onepage&q=jean%20seigneur%20de%20carency%201825&f=false -- be considered a reliable source by Wikipedia's standards? On the one hand, this book is extremely dated (being almost 200 years old!), but at the same time, this book has value in the sense that it contains some information that modern books might not have. Obviously this book would be unreliable for information on post-1825 members of the House of Bourbon, but the information that it contains about the House of Bourbon for the centuries before 1825 should still be considered reliable even today, no? I mean, historical genealogy for the House of Bourbon for the centuries before 1825 would still be the same whether the source is from 1825 or from today (2019), no? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Futurist110 (talk • contribs) 16:59, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Ancestry does not change a heck of a lot, so if the book was from a reputable source at the time, it is unlikely that statements of fact will have become wrong. Collect (talk) 17:01, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
Howcheng has been adding a 1735 book as a reference for genealogy in dozens of articles. Frankly, I find that absurd. What counts as a reliable source, according to WP:V, are "academic and peer-reviewed publications" and "reliable non-academic sources, particularly ... respected mainstream publications". I do not think something older than the guillotine can be considered a reliable source for information about the Bourbons. If no modern, academic and peer-reviewed biography contains a specific piece of information, we should not reach for 300-year-old books to justify its inclusion. We should reflect modern scholarship and leave it out. Surtsicna (talk) 17:33, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- These kinds of old sources are very common on history related pages (as primary sources) such as those on the ancient world, medieval world, etc. These old sources are acceptable to be used in wikipedia, but it usually is better to attribute the claims from the source to the source itself if you think that statement on the wikipedia article will be controversial. For example, "According to Nicolas Louis Achaintre, .....". At least it would not treat the source as factual automatically. See WP:Primary for more on how to handle these kinds of primary sources on Wikipedia. In general, the use of primary sources, should be limited, not extensive on most articles. Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 18:34, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Neither of the two sources mentioned here can be understood as a primary source. An 18th century book recounting events from the 14th century is not a primary source. We are discussing secondary sources which, if I interpret the terms "academic", "peer-reviewed" and "respected mainstream publications" correctly, do not exactly meet the reliable source criteria. Surtsicna (talk) 19:20, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Ah I see your point. Nonetheless, they are usable as secondary sources because that is what most historigraphical sources are. See WP:Secondary. Attribution should solve any issues since it places weight on the source itself. Keep in mind that peer-review is a modern practice that caught on mainly in the 20th century [55]. Most works did not go through peer review before that century and that includes the works of Darwin, Newton, Aristotle, Pliny the Elder, Julius Caesar, Plato, Galileo, Thucydides (the father of history), Marco Polo, Columbus' letters, Cortez's letters on the Conquest, etc. This is why I would attribute and leave it at that. Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 19:59, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- In general you are correct, however RE genealogical sources - some of them have more in common with tertiary sources rather than primary or secondary - being in themselves compendiums made up of mostly primary sources (written records where available) with little analysis or interpretation on the part of the author (that is usually required for a secondary source). But it would be source and context dependant. As Collect says above, a geneological book from 1825 laying out the genealogical history of the Bourbons is unlikely to have much changed since regarding statements of fact "X was born Y and married Z". Unless subsequent scholarship has discovered something to the contrary. A historical book discussing say the political and social effects of the Bourbons would be an entirely different packet of biscuits and would depend on context. Only in death does duty end (talk) 18:54, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Ah I see your point. Nonetheless, they are usable as secondary sources because that is what most historigraphical sources are. See WP:Secondary. Attribution should solve any issues since it places weight on the source itself. Keep in mind that peer-review is a modern practice that caught on mainly in the 20th century [55]. Most works did not go through peer review before that century and that includes the works of Darwin, Newton, Aristotle, Pliny the Elder, Julius Caesar, Plato, Galileo, Thucydides (the father of history), Marco Polo, Columbus' letters, Cortez's letters on the Conquest, etc. This is why I would attribute and leave it at that. Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 19:59, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
- Neither of the two sources mentioned here can be understood as a primary source. An 18th century book recounting events from the 14th century is not a primary source. We are discussing secondary sources which, if I interpret the terms "academic", "peer-reviewed" and "respected mainstream publications" correctly, do not exactly meet the reliable source criteria. Surtsicna (talk) 19:20, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
As a note, a Bourbon genealogy written during the Bourbon restoration is an overtly political book. The preface of Volume 1 ends with: "Nous nous estimerons très heureux si notre ouvrage contribuer pour sa part à entretenir cet amour si pur si sincère pour le roi et son auguste famille dont nous pénétrés nous mêmes et dont les François ont depuis tant de siècles d éclatants témoignages."[56] (and contains other political asides, such as, "La maison royale de Bourbon! Y at il quelque chose plus grand de plus noble dans l'univers entier?") Achaintre was primarily a translator of Latin books - it is up to you whether you think that training would make him an useful source for the thing you wish to cite. While I know no reason to think he might be wrong about the particular fact you wish to cite, you might consider a more up-to-date source if one is available. Smmurphy(Talk) 19:17, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Per Age matters, it should not be used. And the authors certainly would have a conflict of interest in portraying the family in the best possible light. Any disputes of legitimate births, or ancient rights and titles held would undoubtedly be resolved in their favor. TFD (talk) 22:19, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Provided the specific fact being cited to it isn't controversial or anything, I think it could be potentially used with an inline citation to describe what people thought at the time. I'd mention the year in the in-line cite to make that clear. The ideal situation would just be to use a more up-to-date source, but finding such sources isn't always possible; and I think it's sufficient for bare-bones uncontroversial genealogy facts. I'd use it with extreme caution, but I don't think it has to be removed on sight or anything. --Aquillion (talk) 18:54, 5 June 2019 (UTC)
- On the subject of pages that are based mostly on sources from a century ago, I just now stumbled upon Chizerots (if anyone wants to help look for more modern sources for it—I'm having a hard time). -sche (talk) 21:43, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
WalesOnline.co.uk
I'd welcome discussion on what editors think about WalesOnline.co.uk as a reliable and reputable source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Littlemonday (talk • contribs) 13:56, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- I've moved this discussion from WT:RSP to the reliable sources noticeboard, which receives more attention from other editors. — Newslinger talk 22:27, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- WalesOnline is owned by Media Wales, and is used in over 4,300 articles. — Newslinger talk 22:30, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- There's a lot of redigested content on WalesOnline, but it's not bad for a local source in my experience. Are there particular issues you have in mind for RSN? - David Gerard (talk) 22:50, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
- Anything that isnt Welsh-specific will usually be covered in more and better depth elsewhere. Its a perfectly good and useful source for Welsh-region articles where you would normally cite a newspaper/news media. Only in death does duty end (talk) 20:35, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- Clearly a reputable source, an online news source for articles published in the dead-tree South Wales Echo (South Wales) and the Western Mail, which are both well-established reputable newspapers dating back to the 19th century. It has several very respectable journalists. I wonder why this subject has been raised here... Sionk (talk) 21:26, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- As per Sionk, I am surprised the question has even been posed here. What's the problem, or issue, exactly? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:29, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
- Probably something to do with this. Nikkimara removed the Daily Mail and sun sources but left the Wales Online one. Not in itself an issue, generally we wouldnt cite the Daily Mail if we can find a better source, and Media Wales is certainly better. Only in death does duty end (talk) 22:17, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
RfC: is "Golden Harvest or Hearts of Gold?" an RS?
Continuing the discussion from the previous RSN thread and Talk:History of the Jews in Poland: is the book "Golden Harvest Or Hearts of Gold?: Studies on the Fate of Wartime Poles and Jews" (2012) an RS? François Robere (talk) 08:35, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- Not an RS:
- The book was originally published by The Facto, a popular press,[57] so no evidence of peer review.
- The translation was published by Leopolis Press, the editor's own publishing house[58] - the very definition of WP:SPS.
- Apparently the translation has so many errors that, according to one reviewer, "[it] has more errors in basic English than any other scholarly book I have read. When authors, editors, and proofreaders – those eyes that view a document before scholarly publication – can't use so rudimentary a tool as spellcheck... the reader begins to assume that the entire text is suspect."[59]
- The book is not listed on Google Scholar, so it's impossible to tell how many citations it has. This is quite unusual; I could find this rare book (which I came upon by literally searching for "rare academic books"), but I can't find that one.
- The first editor is Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, a controversial academic who's been frequently criticised for his ideologically-motivated writing, bias against minorities and association with far right politics.
At risk of losing a $1m endowment earmarked for Chodakiewicz, the University of Virginia opted to "let him go",His positions seem to have played a part in the University of Virginia's decision not to appoint him to an endowed position (instead they suggested Jan T. Gross, a major scholar and a critic of Chodakiewicz), which effectively meant the withdrawal of the $1m endowment from the university and the termination of the position. Chodakiewicz managed to have the endowment passed to a small college in Washington, DC, where he now teaches. - The second editor, Wojciech Muszyński, was also criticised for his far right links.
- The third editor, Paweł Styrna, is a research associate and former student of the first, but is otherwise unnotable.
- The book includes such right-wing staples as Chodakiewicz, John Radzilowski (who used the book to coin the term "neo-Stalinists" in reference to his critics), Ryszard Tyndorf (who isn't an academic) and Mark Paul, a pseudonymic writer (again, highly unusual) which was previously deemed unreliable.[60][61]
- Several of the other authors are either non-academic or unpublished: Bethany Paluk (grad student), Barbara Gorczycka-Muszynska (judge) and Tomasz Sommer (politician and publicist).
- AFAIK the book was only reviewed twice, both negatively.[62][63]
- The original proposer's response to the lack of positive criticisms was that "[the book] is nonetheless cited and engaged with by other scholars as part of an academic discourse".[64] While true, it only establishes notability, not reliability, so it's not enough to justify using the book for statements of fact.
- The OP's other response was that "the reviews, while pointing out that bias, are themselves also likely biased." Unfortunately he did not present any evidence to support this conjecture.
- All in all this book barely passes WP:SCHOLARSHIP, and shouldn't be used. François Robere (talk) 08:42, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- Bias and politics are not reasons for something to not be RS, neither is lack of peer review for books. The translation issue is more problematic. I would say the English translation is not an RS the Polish original maybe. But I am sure we only discussed this a couple of months ago.Slatersteven (talk) 09:48, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- WP:SPS and WP:FRINGE books cannot be used to source such well researched academic field like Polish-Jewish relation.The source maybe reliable for Author own view when its WP:DUE -Shrike (talk) 10:11, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- Not reliable, in WP:FRINGE turf, and WP:UNDUE regardless. This is a well published field - with several manuscripts by established academics in academic presses. The work in question is self-published in English (the first named editor and author is also the publisher - [65] - Leopolis is published by the Kościuszko Chair who is Chodakiewicz - and hasn't published much of anything else). and published by an obscure and small publisher in Polish that is far from academic (see bookdepository). The publisher/first-editor/first-author works in academia are highly controversial,[66][67][68] and is furthermore a far-right activist,[69] profiled by the SPLC.[70][71] Another editor was a m.sc student at time of publication and is presently at SPLC-designated FAIR.[72][73] The book itself is not an academic work, but a collection of polemic essays. Some of the name authors are far-right figures, one is writing under a pseudo-name, and others are nearly unknown - including the author of the book chapter in question (Gorczycka-Muszyńska) - a journal article noting it's not a coincidence she shares a surname with the second editor of the volume. The scant attention this has received in academia - mainly due to many outlandish claims in the book (including a whole chapter devoted to describing American historical studies as "Neo-Stalinist") - has been entirely negative.[74][75][76] Academic coverage also noting factual errors as well as numerous errors in basic English - further calling the publisher's reputation into question (if the publisher is unable to spellcheck and proofread the book - are we to trust them with fact checking?). Finally, the existence of several academically published and well-cited academic works in the field make use of this work even for an attributed viewpoint as WP:UNDUE. Icewhiz (talk) 11:09, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- Given the number of studies in this field, a work that doesn't make it onto Google Scholar isn't the best choice for using. It may be reliable for opinions of each essay's author, but that's going to depend on WP:DUE. At best, it's barely reliable, but given the only academic journal review it received here was scathing... and then an online review by Danusha Goska isn't much less scathing. Add in the non-academic publisher, and we have better choices to use. Ealdgyth - Talk 16:08, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- (I was summoned by bot to the RFC further up this page, and I made the regrettable decision to investigate this one as well.) Not sufficiently Reliable for anything this source is likely to be cited for. To help other new arrivals with this wide-ranging mess: this Wikipedia search currently finds 18 articles or discussions mentioning this source. Note to avoid confusion, Golden Harvest or Hearts of Gold is a response to Golden Harvest (book), so don't make the mistake of searching "Golden Harvest" as I initially did. This mess also involves a currently open Request to open an Arbcom case on Holocaust in Poland. One POV involved is that there are some rather unflattering events in Polish history, including slaughter of hundreds of Jews by Poles, in a city that was bypassed by the Nazi invasion. The other POV involves sources saying that any antisemitism that existed in Poland is because the Jews deserved it, and Jews are to blame because they collaborated with the Nazis via some convoluted chain of logic. The source we are discussing here was edited by Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, who is indeed a Notable Historian. However he appears to have received substantial criticism from other Notable historians for a Pro-Polish-Nationalistic historical revisionism, and numerous accusations of hostile bias against Jews. He appears to have a rather dubious reputation in the field. He appears to be outside the mainstream at best, and perhaps Fringe. The book itself also appears to have a poor reputation. If we're going to cite any of Chodakiewicz's work I suggest we at least limit to something more substantial than a compilation of essays by a non-academic publisher. And if we cite a significant non-mainstream viewpoint, NPOV requires that it be appropriately contextualized with the mainstream viewpoint. Alsee (talk) 18:39, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- Not an RS per persuasive arguments by Icewhiz and Francois. ∯WBGconverse 10:37, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
- Not reliable, for the reasons given. Indeed, an excellent example of what is meant by lack of reliability in this sort of subject. I find it remarkable that this would be seriously proposed as a RS for anything imaginably controversial. DGG ( talk ) 05:12, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- RS. As follows from this discussion: (a) the original version of the book was not self-published, (b) it belongs to scholarship, and (c) it can also be regarded as an opinionated source. Because of (c), it should be used with appropriate attribution. This is a book collecting writings by several professional historians including Chodakiewicz, Piotr Gontarczyk, Peter Stachura, John Radzilowski, and Waldemar Chrostowski. It was published in Polish and translated to English. Do we have concerns that the publications in this book have indeed been written by these historians? No, if I understand correctly. Hence, the book can be used per WP:RS to provide their views with direct appropriate attribution. Are their views due and should be included on specific pages? This is an entirely different question. That depends on specific page and on consensus on the page. Given that at least some of the authors are experts in their fields, I do not see why not. My very best wishes (talk) 20:04, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- Borderline RS. Can be used, but should be used with attribution in case there are any disagreements. To the best of my knowledge, no 'red flags' have been identified in the text, i.e. it makes no outlandish claims. Care should be taken to distinguish bwtween chapters by reliable scholars like John Radzilowski and more problematic ones like the ones by Mark Paul. a person that I was not able to find any biographical informatuon about. I'd suggest not using any content from the more problematic chapters if there is any disagreement about them. We should not silence voices by minor historians. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 02:58, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Radzilowski authored a chapter devoted to labelling American social sciences, historical studies, and several historians as neo-Stalinists. Reception of which (probably the main reason this book received any notice) has been scathing. As noted in a review, he holds a position in a small campus in Alaska, while criticising fields and academics at major institutions. Is this chapter then a RS for "neo-Stalinism" of named BLPs and academic fields?Icewhiz (talk) 03:41, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- The authors of the book can be wrong, reflect minority views, whatever. That does not make the source unreliable. It can only make their views "undue" on pages. Are they due on pages? I do not know. There are American historians who belong to the "revisionist school". But that's irrelevant. My very best wishes (talk) 16:18, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Piotrus,
... should not silence voices by minor historians ...
- they are not professional historians rather historical negation-ists, who suit the Polish side and I don't know about how editors can identify red flag from the texts claims w/o indulging in OR. - The two reviews of the book are scathing and the publishing press does not provide any indication of peer review. No serious academic publisher entertains pseudonymous writers. Folks like Bethany Paluk, Barbara Gorczycka-Muszyńska, Paweł Styrna et al are not any minimally respected scholars in the field and some are not even scholars. Chodakiewicz's work around the locus of Holocaust is a proper example of a national-apologist scholarship, marred with blatant misrepresentations and selective cherry-pickings and whose works have been near-uniformly subject to scathing reviews. Radzilowski's scholarship in this area is controversial and despite the low volume of relevant work, the reviews have been unfavorable esp. w.r.t the Neo-Stalinism issues.
- All of the above are red-flags to me. ∯WBGconverse 08:25, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Piotrus,
- RS but should be attributed since it is BIASed (but BIAS is not RELIABILITY). At the very least the professional historians and scholars in the volume are RS. First, note that
IcewhizFrancois Robere does not back up any of his assertions, past the third one, with diffs or links. In case of living people, making such claims without evidence constitutes a WP:BLPVIO (BLP applies to discussion pages). The authors for the most part are professional historians. One of them, Gorczycka-Muszynska is a judge, but then she's addressing legal questions (albeit in a historical context), hence that's still reliable. Some ofIcewhizFrancois Robere's assertions about the authors are either false or absurd. I'm pretty sure that John Radzilowski didn't "coin" (sic) the term "neo-Stalinist" and as has already been pointed out to Icewhiz amd Francois Robere (edited), Radzilowski does NOT describe "American historical studies" as "neo-Stalinist". Rather he is referring to specific individuals, who do happen to be quite a bit to the left (whether the moniker is appropriate or not is kind of beside the point). Regarding Mark Paul,IcewhizFrancois Robere claims that this author "was previously deemed unreliable". This too is false. In the first RSN discussionIcewhizFrancois Robere links to [77] there is clearly no consensus regarding the reliability. You get the usual split with Icewhiz/FrancoisRobere vs. others. The second link, to an RfC on a specific page was indeed closed with "not included" but mostly for reasons that had to do with the fact that the source was being used for WP:LISTCRUFT. One last comment - User:Alsee, I would ask that you don't base your !vote on the basis of claims Icewhiz has made at the ArbCom Request for Case. Indeed, Icewhiz's tendency to misrepresent editors and sources is precisely why we're likely to have a case. For example, Icewhiz mentions, and you repeat, this AfD, regarding the article Szczuczyn pogrom. Please click on the history of that article (here). Please note that NONE of Icewhiz's edits to that article have been reverted. Please look at the talk page of that article (Talk:Szczuczyn_pogrom). Please note that there are NO objections to any of Icewhiz's edits. Icewhiz is PRETENDING that he is fighting against some POV on this article, pushed by some bad editors. Except these bad editors don't actually exist. Even the AfD nomination was withdrawn once actual sources were added to the article (at the time of the AfD sources were crap). The Szczuczyn Pogrom article is NOT controversial. Nobody's denying it, nobody's rewriting it, nobody's edit warring over it. Pretty much everything that Icewhiz says in that ArbCom Case Request is either false or a gross misrepresentation.Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:02, 9 June 2019 (UTC) - More generally, RSN or not, Icewhiz really needs to refrain from making WP:BLP vios on this page. For example, the statement "At risk of losing a $1m endowment earmarked for Chodakiewicz..." is unsupported and as such a pretty blatant violation of BLP.Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:29, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Volunteer Marek I only skimmed a small bit of the Arbcom case, and all I know about Szczuczyn pogrom is that I skimmed the article and that there was a (failed) AFD. I merely considered that article one datapoint, that there was history that some people might consider inconvenient. Most of what you deny/defend above is things I never heard of (and therefore never believed).
While Robere's and Icewhiz's posts above looked potentially persuasive, I saw this situation was more complex and I went digging. For what it's worth I mostly reached my conclusion while independently searching info on Chodakiewicz and Hearts of Gold. I can't begin to fully investigate the big mess around this subject, and it's possible I'm wrong. However everything I found about Chodakiewicz and Hearts of Gold set off all my redflags on the source.
As another for-what-it's-worth, if this RSN discussion goes against you and the arbcom case ends in your favor, I would be willing to revisit this question to consider any clarity the arbcom case may (or may not) bring to the picture here. But from what I've seen so far this source doesn't seem trustworthy. Alsee (talk) 11:00, 9 June 2019 (UTC) - That was my statement, not Icewhiz's. The story is told in bits and pieces by Radziłowski in Glaukopis 19, p. 281; at the chair's website; in a paper by Thomas Anessi; and at the IWP's website. François Robere (talk) 11:02, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Volunteer Marek I only skimmed a small bit of the Arbcom case, and all I know about Szczuczyn pogrom is that I skimmed the article and that there was a (failed) AFD. I merely considered that article one datapoint, that there was history that some people might consider inconvenient. Most of what you deny/defend above is things I never heard of (and therefore never believed).
- My bad. I made the appropriate correction. All these claims are ones both you and Icewhiz have made, echoing each other, hence the source of my confusion. My entire comment still applies however.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:01, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Francois Robere, in your sentence beginning with "At risk of losing a $1m endowment ..." you make an outright claim that the BLP subject was fired from his job because he did something bad. You can't make that claim without sources. That is an extremely serious WP:BLPVIOlation. In fact this is like textbook BLP vio. If you do have sources you should've immediately provided them. Not only when you're called out on it. But ok, let's look at these source you mentioned: This one DOES NOT mention Chodakiewicz. This source says the chair was transferred to another institute for FINANCIAL REASONS. This source only says the chair was transferred from UoV to AIPC. In fact these two sources state that Chodakiewicz was only holding the chair temporarily while arrangements were made for it to be transferred.
- You know what BLP is. You know this is a topic area subject to discretionary sanctions. This book may or may not be RS. But you can't try to win this argument about reliability by trying to smear the BLP subject! Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:11, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- There's very little to it - you just have to read the talk pages.
- I didn't say Chodakiewicz was fired, I said he was "let go". However, to avoid ambiguity I've now changed that statement. As for the sources:
- Radzilowski clearly states that despite Chodakiewicz's "considerable achievements and experience" (including being the chair's assistant professor) he wasn't even interviewed for the position, and a less qualified candidate - one whose main asset was that "they weren't Chodakiewicz nor had his views" - was chosen. The selection process resulted in the withdrawal of funds and the termination of the Kościuszko chair at UVA. This, per Radzilowski.
- The chair's website describes Roszkowski and Chodakiewicz's strong ties and academic achievements, then makes the following note: "Apparently, some in academia found rather disturbing the dynamic growth of Polish studies outside of the politically correct and bigotedly Polonophobic academic mainstream. In June 2002, finding the ambiance at UVA increasingly less hospitable to his endeavors, Professor Roszkowski resigned his post and returned to Poland". Only then does it mention a problem with funds (despite "considerable increase" in income). The overall impression is that the funds weren't the main problem.
- Anessi states that the initial donor, one Blanka Rosenstiel, withdrew her support in 2008 "after the university both attempted to appoint Jan Tomasz Gross (major scholar from UToronto, and Chodakiewicz's critic. -FR) to the position, and also failed to raise the matching funds needed to fully fund the Chair". Only then was the chair moved to the IWP, where the "conservative" Chodakiewicz accepted it, and it had remained there despite an ongoing shortage of funds several years later. Again, money doesn't seem to have been the main issue.
- The IWP states that Chodakiewicz was "instrumental in the bid to bring the Chair [there]".
- François Robere (talk) 21:33, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- You have not provide a link to Radzilowski. Considering that you misrepresented the three other sources, you'll forgive me if I ask you to provide such a link so that your claim can be WP:Verified, which is required for BLP. Your explanations for other sources STILL fail to document that he was "let go" (which DOES mean "fired" in an academic context), much less that "His positions seem to have played a part". It says SOMEONE ELSE (Roszkowski) resigned. Anessi sources still doesn't even mention Chodakiewicz. "Instrumental in the bid to bring the Chair there" in fact strongly suggests he left of his own accord. This is just you doubling down on your original BLP vio.Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:16, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Of course I did:
Radziłowski in [https://www.iwp.edu/docLib/20091119_20091119_IWP_KChair_info.pdf Glaukopis 19], p. 281
Now, seeing as you opened an AE case against me,[78] there's no eason to continue this discussion here. François Robere (talk) 01:18, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Of course I did:
- You have not provide a link to Radzilowski. Considering that you misrepresented the three other sources, you'll forgive me if I ask you to provide such a link so that your claim can be WP:Verified, which is required for BLP. Your explanations for other sources STILL fail to document that he was "let go" (which DOES mean "fired" in an academic context), much less that "His positions seem to have played a part". It says SOMEONE ELSE (Roszkowski) resigned. Anessi sources still doesn't even mention Chodakiewicz. "Instrumental in the bid to bring the Chair there" in fact strongly suggests he left of his own accord. This is just you doubling down on your original BLP vio.Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:16, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- This discussion is all over the place between RS, NPOV, FRINGE, SPS, USEBYOTHERS and BLP. This needs a more structured format to address these issues individually. If it is true, what is said in the two on-line English language reviews, the source is very problematic indeed, and we need more information on what the paywalled reveiw says. On the other hand, if there is a counter to those reviews (Piortr) mentions a counter but not what it says, and if is true that other scholarly works (not reveiws) have used this source, what do they use it for? I suggest a mediation occur to make a structured RfC, with multiple questions (Perhaps based around each policy or guideline) and laying out all the research in accessible fashion, where the participants in the mediation agree on presentation of the questions and on laying out the research (you will, no doubt, all conduct yourself in good faith in doing so). Also, please don't stop at buzz words like "neostalinist", meaningless to most people, look to the literature and layout what meaning is given to eg., that concept. Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:52, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Being a self published (in English) book by a SPLC profiled individual should be sufficient to preclude this (on RS grounds - SPS, and NPOV / UNDUE / FRINGE). The "Neo-Stalinism" chapter in the book is what tends to be most covered by reviews. As for the paywalled article (actually not a review - a full fledged article) - I have read it in full, and it is quite negative. That this book is receiving any support here is beyond shameful - and has no basis in Wikipedia policy. Needless to say - this is rarely cited by anyone other than the authors (and that includes those who analyze the book itself as a controvesy), and several other highly cited works (published by actual academic presses and journals) are available. Icewhiz (talk) 12:01, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- For RS and I can't think of another policy where it matters, what you consider"shameful" is neither here, nor there. It's also not actually relevant that there would be some kind of 'guilt by association'. We accept both foreign language sources and paywalled sources but when there is inquiry they need to be made accessible by quotes to other editors. As I have noted and your comment confirms again, this is not just RS it cuts across multiple policy/guidelines, beyond the competency and use of this noticeboard. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:59, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- @Alanscottwalker:,quote last two paras (conclusion):
Of course, one could go deeper into some confessions of the authors. But why? There is something farcical about the conception of a crusade against the modern world professed by a few researchers from a marginal research centre,10 which is a recruitment pool of the CIA.11 But could this McCarthyism drenched in the East European “sauce” with the whole peculiar, local color; this “informationdepositary,” as Chodakiewicz and Muszyński state in the introduction, worthy of 1930s right-wing political leaϐlets and then slightly ϐiltered through the 2011 Poland political correctness, survive anywhere else abroad? This collection is more like the material for a seminar of linguists or even scholars of rhetoric and propaganda. The book will not be good nourishment for readers interested in the Holocaust and its third phase, i.e. the basic topics of the essays by Jan Tomasz Gross and Irena Grudzińska-Gross. So what else is left if one disregards the fact that Marek Jan Chodakiewicz and his colleagues have by the sheer keenness of their minds penetrated the laws of history and modern development, that they have read and diagnosed the fears of the contemporary world and even revealed another face of the veiled totalitarianism freely raging by the River Vistula, and if one were to spare oneself Gontarczyk’s technical fireworks? It does not change the fact that one will surely become involved with most of those authors and surely quite often. They are engaged in a persistent dialogue with a numerous group of people who see the world in a similar way and they do not care at all about anybody else."
.Icewhiz (talk) 13:18, 9 June 2019 (UTC)- Thanks. Thus, in a structured discussion all that can be laid out, cross checked, all policies/guidelines engaged, and in respectful discussion even close the gaps between editorial positions. I am on the outside, and I am all for it being, as definitively settled, as possible. The usual form of a question of only RS is here is a Wiki-article statement, here is this source (and here we are dealing with multiple source articles by multiple authors), is it RS for this statement. Now multiply across NPOV, FRINGE, SPS, USEBYOTHERS and BLP, etc., and there is much to settle. --Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:45, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- @Alanscottwalker:,quote last two paras (conclusion):
- For RS and I can't think of another policy where it matters, what you consider"shameful" is neither here, nor there. It's also not actually relevant that there would be some kind of 'guilt by association'. We accept both foreign language sources and paywalled sources but when there is inquiry they need to be made accessible by quotes to other editors. As I have noted and your comment confirms again, this is not just RS it cuts across multiple policy/guidelines, beyond the competency and use of this noticeboard. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:59, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Comment - with regard to the reliability of editor of the book, Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, more generally, I put him in roughly the same category as the American National Review (for which Chodakiewicz writes occasionally) or the British historian Niall Ferguson. Both of these are right of center, they both have made some controversial statements but at the end of the day they're still reliable if BIASed (bias is not unreliability). And similarly to Chodakiewicz, Ferguson has been attacked and criticized by other commentators, with some of this criticism justified and some of it just being based on, well, basically smears. I'd like the people who are saying this is not an RS here, to indicate whether they would consider National Review or Niall Ferguson to be reliable, which would help us get a better handle on what "reliable" actually is suppose to mean here.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:59, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
Reliability of Al-Tabari and Tahdhib-ut Tahdhib in context of Muhammad bin Qasim
I wrote a sub-section in Early Life of Muhammad bin Qasim page, under the title of "[Revolt of Al-Ash'ath and Muhammad bin Qasim]", where I provided modern scholarly sources to refer to the first task this person carried out as an officer in Umayyad army. However, to give the details of the punishment (which is important because a mere mention of punishment could mean a mild fine or anything), I followed the reference cited in the scholarly source to report this event, and then took the details of the punishment (flogging 400 lashes), from that early scholarly sources (al-Tabari and Tahdhib-ut Tahdhib). The editor tagged these sources to be unreliable, while the modern scholarly work heavily relies on the very sources, and they were cited in details of the same event that was referred in modern scholarly source cited before.
Can someone look into this matter and remove the unjust label?
Dr. Hamza Ebrahim (talk) 12:09, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- I think at least your use Al-Tabari is OK per WP:PRIMARY (old reputably published primary source with full attribution stating a simple fact). However, the core issue here may be due weight - if only primary source lists some details that aren´t mentioned in more recent scholarship, then these details probably aren´t worth of inclusion in the article. Pavlor (talk) 09:32, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
- Dear Pavlor,thank you for the input. The question of due weight is also being discussed on the NPOV noticeboard. Dr. Hamza Ebrahim (talk) 14:54, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
Hello! Magazine
I need a question for reliable sources about Hello! magazine, an English version of ¡Hola! magazine. --TheGreen921 (talk) 22:58, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- I need a question too. What is your question? Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 23:28, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
- It's obvious that we would need some context in order to answer usefully. Almost anything can be used as a source, even if not meeting WP:RS, and there are cases where Hello! would have access to material, especially photographs, which other media wouldn't have.
- However it's also most unlikely that Hello! would ever meet WP:RS. It is simply not reliable. So it can't be used to support a contentious statement, where such support is needed before the statement can be made. Especially not if that statement is challenged, or is contradicted by some other source. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:06, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
- Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_47#Online_biographies
- Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_265#¡Hola!_and_Paris_Match_magazine
- Probably not something to be used, but the specific source, article, and content would make it easier to comment. --Ronz (talk) 16:45, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
- It is a reliable source, but what it is used for is important. It would be good for an article about interior design at the White House for example, but not for automobile mechanics. TFD (talk) 01:06, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- Not an RS Hello prints stories that are deliberately biased in favor of their subjects. They have even been shown to fabricate stories: [79] [80]. Britishfinance (talk) 15:08, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- I would rank Hello below the Daily Mail as an RS in the U.K. Britishfinance (talk) 15:31, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- Hello! mostly publishes celebrity gossip, which is discouraged in WP:BLPGOSSIP and WP:NOTGOSSIP. For what it's worth, this magazine tends to publish more positive (and less sensational) content than most gossip magazines. Consider whether the content constitutes undue weight before including it into an article. — Newslinger talk 06:18, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- The fabrication incident mentioned by Britishfinance is concerning, but it appears to be an isolated incident and the magazine retracted the interview after explaining that it was purchased from a third party ("Famous"). If there are any other incidents, they would be worth examining and may suggest a pattern. — Newslinger talk 06:31, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
Reliability of (mostly) Russian news sources for an engineering breakthrough in Russia
I'm reviewing Aluminum internal combustion engine in the new page queue, which has a fair amount of coverage in sources (copyediting issues aside). The problem is that all of the sources are Russian news channels [81], [82], [83]. Additionally, I was able to find coverage in TASS [84], and an English language Sudanese source [85]. I'm normally a proponent of using coverage from state media sources whose reliability is questionable for uncontroversial topics, but an engineering breakthrough (in this case, an all-aluminum combustion engine) is a subject that I could see a state media source wanting to misleadingly promote. My question is thus: are the aforementioned sources sufficiently reliable to count toward notability? Additionally, if anyone is able to find coverage in more clearly reliable sources that would be appreciated, as it would make this discussion moot. signed, Rosguill talk 23:39, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not sure about the notability question, but we should also consider whether building an internal combustion engine mostly out of aluminum is significant enough to merit a separate article. If not, the Aluminum internal combustion engine article should be redirected to Internal combustion engine under WP:OVERLAP. I note that History of the internal combustion engine lists other innovations, some of which don't have their own articles. A short entry in that list for the aluminum engine might be sufficient. It would be great to hear from editors who are more familiar with the subject matter. — Newslinger talk 05:56, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Also, note that the Sudan Vision article is a republication of the TASS (RSP entry) article. — Newslinger talk 06:05, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Addressing the reliability question, if we follow our handling of RT (RSP entry), then the reliability of the Russian news sources depends partly on whether the topic is controversial. Personally, I consider the "first engine" claim to be controversial, since the sources assert that the engineers are the first to build something that appears to be quite mundane, and this claim is not repeated in original reports from sources based in other countries. What makes this engine sufficiently distinct from other internal combustion engines that use different proportions of materials? If an editor who is more experienced with the subject can counter this, please do. — Newslinger talk 07:20, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- I see no relation between the reliability of the sources cited, and the degree of noteworthiness of the subject. Both may be questioned, in this case: on the one hand we have a right to expect at least some English-language references in an English-language article, and/or from a more neutral source; on the other hand, as has already been pointed out, there is nothing so very spectacular about using only one metal to create an engine. In fact I even doubt there has never been any all-aluminium piston aircraft engine before. Thus, my idea is to drop the article, for lack of noteworthiness; the worth of its sources/references becoming a moot point. Jan olieslagers (talk) 06:28, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- A bit "queer" is the use of the US'an spelling "aluminum" whereas most of the world, Russia included, normally spells "aluminium". Jan olieslagers (talk) 06:28, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Actually Russia normally spells "алюминиевый". In cases where the native language doesn't spell it either way, typically we just use whichever variant the article was originally written in; nothing queer about it. 199.19.250.74 (talk) 08:37, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
- I would question the notability of the topic. High-aluminium-content engines are nothing new and this one, at 90% aluminium, does not stand out in the way claimed. Probably the chief technical innovation would be the hardened "coating" to some components but that hardly merits an article about its application. While the sources will be reliable enough to establish that a prototype probably has been bench-tested, the success or otherwise of that testing will not be reported reliably. Also, the proposed aircraft mounts and the claims about significance and manufacturing cost are obvious marketing WP:CRYSTAL ball stuff. At best this article is WP:TOOSOON. I do not think any of it can be merged into the Internal combustion engine or History of the internal combustion engine articles, as they barely mention the materials used. Having said that, the literal topic of the article title is surely notable and long overdue, but the Russian project would deserve a one-liner in there, no more. I have made a start but I just do not have the time and resources to re-purpose it properly, I hope that somebody else can. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 07:52, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- All-aluminium engines have been built since the 1930s, for aircraft engines (see Hiduminium and Y alloy). They were not a success! In particular, aluminium was not viable for either crankshafts or connecting rods, although by today we're seeing aluminium rods on a fairly regular basis.
- An all-aluminium engine is technically interesting. Now per GNG, but mostly WP:V / WP:RS we also need independent sources of these, as the self-published, translated content is inadequately reliable.
- I doubt if WP can make a competent article in this field, as there's no-one to work on it. Andy Dingley (talk) 08:36, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Indeed. I think that regardless of which language the sources are in, there is a much more pertinent question of why journalists or faux journalists simply regurgitating a press release would be considered reliable sources for a claim of engineering priority. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:38, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- While I agree that, from what you say, a competent article is unlikely in the near future, the real question is whether a less-competent stub or similar is better than nothing. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 10:19, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- If the article is left in existence, it should be tagged as a stub. Even then the Russian development totally lacks technical information and specifications. I would rather add a paragraph to an existing article, referring to the particular complexities of creating an engine entirely (or even mostly) from aluminium. Such a paragraph should mostly base upon Andy's excellent comment here, with perhaps a mention of the new Russian initiative. Frankly, my vote would be for marking the current article for deletion; though not primarily for lack of reliable references. Jan olieslagers (talk) 10:29, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- I already tagged it as a stub, and re-purposed it to give a feel for the way it could go if it stays. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 11:13, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- I agree with TooSoon - independent technical verification (not a TV news anchor) would be needed for the usefulness and thus notability for inclusion of the viability of the most stressed parts. These are the crankshaft and gears. Aluminum casing and pistons are common. Aluminum crankshaft seems to be a research subject : Elmarakbi 2014, Stojanovic 2016, and blocked by my browser. If the engine load is low enough (1970ies trainer) and engine life is set low enough, an aluminum crankshaft could be made, but usefulness is doubtful. TGCP (talk) 12:09, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- If the article is left in existence, it should be tagged as a stub. Even then the Russian development totally lacks technical information and specifications. I would rather add a paragraph to an existing article, referring to the particular complexities of creating an engine entirely (or even mostly) from aluminium. Such a paragraph should mostly base upon Andy's excellent comment here, with perhaps a mention of the new Russian initiative. Frankly, my vote would be for marking the current article for deletion; though not primarily for lack of reliable references. Jan olieslagers (talk) 10:29, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- Thank you to everyone for their contributions. It looks like we're reaching SNOW territory, so I've gone ahead and opened an AfD discussion for the article. In response to people who were confused reliability vs. notability, my question was whether the sources were reliable enough for coverage in those sources should count toward notability. signed, Rosguill talk 16:43, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
The Daily Stormer
I would ask for request for comment about the Daily Stormer, which is contain neo-Nazi and supremacist website, which is compared to a defunct Der Stürmer magazine, which is impact of hate, then I suppose that source is reliable, unreliable, depreciated or spam, as I gave the consensus on English Wikipedia, and I will suppose for help. --119.94.166.126 (talk) 00:11, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Blacklisted: The Daily Stormer is currently on the spam blacklist under the entry
\bDailyStormer\.name\b
(dailystormer.name). — Newslinger talk 00:19, 9 June 2019 (UTC) - And quite rightly so, we don't need to be including nazi websites as sources on Wikipedia. Simonm223 (talk) 13:57, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
A wake-up call
Answer to What people make you ashamed to be a human being? by Sean Kernan
A reminder that context is important, especially when deciding whether to rely on an article in a mainstream publication. feminist (talk) 01:26, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Quora is very clearly not a Reliable Source. It's all SELFPUBLISHED. Anything posted there may or may not be true, and you need a proper source before making any related edits here. Alsee (talk) 11:08, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- As far as I know it is user generated content with no editorial controls, not an RS.Slatersteven (talk) 11:15, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- I think this discussion should be moved to the talk page (WT:RSN), or everyone will simply note that Quora (RSP entry) is a self-published source with user-generated content. (See the article on Noa Pothoven for context.) On this noticeboard, some editors have suggested an enforced delay on citing news sources to help prevent errors like the situation described here. I'm not sure how well that would work in practice, but it's something to consider. — Newslinger talk 11:48, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- I agree with the other two editors here. I think that Quora is a decent source for personal use, but certainly not a good source to cite for wikipedia since it is a self-published source by average people. Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 20:57, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
- Those commenting on the reliability of what I just linked are missing the point. I have no intention to cite this in any article, this is just a reminder that mainstream news media should not be considered automatically reliable for topics outside their expertise, especially when compared to more specialist news sources. feminist (talk) 11:23, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- There may be edge cases where Quora can provide useful input, although not as a direct source : a reputable scientist may reply on Quora about the quality of a regular scientific source (not made by that scientist). Such a reply would not itself be a Reliable Source for Wikipedia, but it could be quoted on Wikipedia as a way to measure the quality of a good source, as described in (RSP entry). Media reports may well be misleading, and even science reports may have low quality. Identities on Quora are sometimes as recognizable as those on Twitter.
- For context; I consider the Noa article to be mostly resolved, but could include the Dutch law clarification about self-determination of fate. The "Sean Kernan" qualification as law, medicine or media expert is not clear. TGCP (talk) 20:08, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- I see that you guys are still missing the point. feminist (talk) 13:17, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- You'll get more relevant feedback if this discussion is moved to WT:RSN. Although the talk page gets fewer pageviews than the noticeboard page, discussions on the talk page stay active for a much longer time before they get archived. — Newslinger talk 21:42, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- I see that you guys are still missing the point. feminist (talk) 13:17, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
Heshmat Alavi
According to The Intercept, it is now alleged that the personality of Heshmat Alavi is not real, and the writings under his name are actually written by a team of people at the political wing of MEK. Should this warrant removal of all Alavi writings from Wikipedia articles? JSH-alive/talk/cont/mail 06:28, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- If confirmed (by another independent high quality source), then yes. If my count is right, his articles are used in Iranian involvement in the Syrian Civil War (references amount of Iranian help to the Syrian regime) and Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr (BLP; references his current occupation). In both cases, there are probably better sources, so replacing Heshmat Alavi with another source(s) to support the same content should not be a big issue (or even controversial). Pavlor (talk) 10:31, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
- @Pavlor: I'm not that level of expert in Middle East affairs, so I don't know if I could touch on that more. But I added Alavi allegation in the People's Mujahedin of Iran article, and tagged the questionable sources in other articles you mentioned with appropriate template. JSH-alive/talk/cont/mail 05:44, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- @JSH-alive: Tagging these sources is a good interim solution. However, redirecting name of the person in question to the accusations in the MEK article looks like a possible BLP violation (these accusations aren´t confirmed by another independent source, opinion of former MEK members is certainly a weak source for such grave BLP claim). I think without support in sources other than the original The Intercept article, this redirect should be deleted. Pavlor (talk) 06:26, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- @Pavlor: Didn't think of that. Requested for speedy deletion for now. Also, just noticed that my addition in the People's Mujahedin of Iran article was reverted. JSH-alive/talk/cont/mail 15:16, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- @JSH-alive: Tagging these sources is a good interim solution. However, redirecting name of the person in question to the accusations in the MEK article looks like a possible BLP violation (these accusations aren´t confirmed by another independent source, opinion of former MEK members is certainly a weak source for such grave BLP claim). I think without support in sources other than the original The Intercept article, this redirect should be deleted. Pavlor (talk) 06:26, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- @Pavlor: I'm not that level of expert in Middle East affairs, so I don't know if I could touch on that more. But I added Alavi allegation in the People's Mujahedin of Iran article, and tagged the questionable sources in other articles you mentioned with appropriate template. JSH-alive/talk/cont/mail 05:44, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
LinkSearch: prnewswire.com
If you're bored and looking for bad sourcing to clean up - do a Special:LinkSearch on prnewswire.com. This is a good way to find literally press releases, and there's thousands of usages in article space. It is possible some are relevant (e.g., citing the fact of a press release) - but in almost all cases, they'll be an excellent way to find bad sourcing, advertising and promotional puffery - David Gerard (talk) 19:54, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
Is the statement properly backed by the source?
Is this statement supported by the source?:
"According to European Intelligence and Security services, Iran's Ministry of Intelligence networks attempt to entice former opposition group members into denouncing and vilifying their former compatriots,
Source:
"To enhance these capabilities, during the 1980s, Iranian MOIS operatives were trained in psychological warfare and disinformation techniques by instructors from Eastern Bloc countries using methods developed by the Soviet KGB. In Europe, the organization established intelligence networks targeting Iranian refugees, political exiles, and others affiliated with regime opposition groups. According to European intelligence and security services, current and former MEK members, and other dissidents, these intelligence networks shadow, harass, threaten, and ultimately, attempt to lure opposition figures and their families back to Iran for prosecution.
Additionally, these networks attempt to entice or coerce former opposition group members into denouncing and vilifying their former compatriots"
Thank you for the feedback. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 00:18, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
I've seen Quadrant Magazine listed as a source a few times recently and I'm dubious on its use. Which of the following best describes the reliability of The Quadrant Magazine?
- Generally reliable for factual reporting
- Unclear or additional considerations apply
- Generally unreliable for factual reporting
- Publishes false or fabricated information
Bacondrum (talk) 00:49, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- It is not a news source, I don't think the classifications are how it should be viewed. The publication has produced content that might be used with attribution to its author, sort of option 2, but after a certain period was shown to be unreliable in editorial selection and elementary checks (a Sokal-like article that was published, literally fabricated information). cygnis insignis 03:21, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Fabricated information is a serious concern. Do you have links to examples of these articles? — Newslinger talk 23:42, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- The editor is named in an outline of the hoax this news item [in a Murdoch organ, if that matters, I can provide better] cygnis insignis 06:57, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks. I've changed my position, although I note that the article still describes Quadrant as a
"respected right-wing journal"
despite the incident. For other interested editors, a more detailed description of the incident is at Keith Windschuttle § Hoax, but the incident is not yet mentioned in the Quadrant (magazine) article. If there are any other incidents that would establish a pattern of poor editorial controls, please share them. — Newslinger talk 08:14, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks. I've changed my position, although I note that the article still describes Quadrant as a
- The editor is named in an outline of the hoax this news item [in a Murdoch organ, if that matters, I can provide better] cygnis insignis 06:57, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- Fabricated information is a serious concern. Do you have links to examples of these articles? — Newslinger talk 23:42, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Objection to RfC. This RfC violates our verifiability policy. It amounts to little more than a popularity contest and is inconsistent with WP:CONTEXTMATTERS.
Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content.
The TDM RfC was premised on the fact that TDM had already been a perennial source here based on many specific test cases. It is inappropriate for us to go through obscure sources that have only been glancingly addressed here and to decide whether they satisfy the reliability bar absolutely or generally. RSN is the place for individual test cases, and once enough of them have arisen then a case can be made to add a media outlet to WP:RSP. R2 (bleep) 20:44, 12 June 2019 (UTC)- Endorse RfC. All four options are fully compliant with the verifiability policy, including WP:CONTEXTMATTERS, which still applies for every instance a source is used. Note that the word generally means "usually", not "always". As I've documented in the active RfC on the talk page, there are many editors who want a rule of thumb for how often a source could be appropriately used. It would be unnecessarily bureaucratic to deny editors the ability to ask for general guidance and to force them to start a separate discussion every single time a source is in question. — Newslinger talk 22:17, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- TDM is what, The Daily Mail? cygnis insignis 07:07, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
Option 2. Quadrant publishes mostly opinions, which makes it a biased or opinionated source, and all of its statements should be properly attributed. The source consists of both online and magazine editions; in the past two decades, the magazine has released 10 issues per year. Quadrant has 10 listed authors on its editorial team, but most of its online content is submitted by non-staff contributors. On average, the online edition publishes 1–3 articles per day; the low volume allows the site to publish higher-quality content than Forbes.com contributors (RSP entry) and HuffPost contributors (RSP entry). Quadrant isn't a good source for facts; outlets that focus on factual reporting are better. — Newslinger talk 23:16, 12 June 2019 (UTC)- Option 2 for articles written by staff, option 3 for articles written by non-staff contributors. The incident described in Keith Windschuttle § Hoax casts doubt on the quality of Quadrant's fact-checking process for contributed articles and reveals that the magazine does not properly verify the identity and credentials of its non-staff contributors. The editor-in-chief promised to be more careful in the future, but did not offer details on how the publication would do so. Contributed articles should be treated as self-published sources, with exceptions for established subject-matter experts. — Newslinger talk 08:14, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 3. It is an opinion magazine, and might be quoted for notable opinions properly attributed to a notable contributor. It's articles are not a useful source for factual claims, and it's not prominent enough to make the opinions automatically notable. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:29, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
RfC: Daily Graphic and graphic.com.gh
Which of the following best describes the Daily Graphic (Ghana) and its website, graphic.com.gh? signed, Rosguill talk 05:28, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
- Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
- Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting, may include gossip or other trivial tabloid content presented as factual reporting
- Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, primarily publishes gossip, or does not guarantee the accuracy of information that it publishes as factual reporting
- This is a difficult one. It is definitely a news site, and people rely on it for up to date and accurate news. According to Course Hero and Boamah, Mavis, Impact of online newsportals on the patronage of newspapers in Ghana, GRIN Verlag (2018), p. 7, ISBN 9783668719965:
- As the political agenda of Gold Coast journalism radicalized, newspapers began reaching out beyond the circle of elites, appealing to rural leaders and the urban poor with a more accessible language and fiery oppositional outcry. In 1948, political activist Kwame Nkrumah started The Accra Evening News, a publication stating the views of the Convention People's Party (CPP). Largely written by party officials, this inflammatory newspaper incessantly repeated the popular demand for "Self-government Now!" while launching angry attacks against the colonial government. In contrast, the London Daily Mirror Group, headed by British newspaper magnate Cecil King, established The Daily Graphic in 1950. The Graphic sought to maintain a policy of political neutrality, emphasizing objective reporting by local African reporters. With its Western origin, The Graphic sought to position itself as the most professional newspaper in the Gold Coast at the time.
However, this master thesis by Dzineku, Theorose Elikplim (PRINT MEDIA REPORTAGE OF THE ALAVANYO NKONYA CONFLICT:A CASE STUDY OF DAILY GRAPHIC AND GHANAIAN TIMES NEWSPAPERS.[in] Academia) provides a thorough criticism from page 32. I'm nudging towards Option 1 but would be interested to read what the community thinks.Tamsier (talk) 11:43, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Objection to RfC. This RfC violates our verifiability policy. It amounts to little more than a popularity contest and is inconsistent with WP:CONTEXTMATTERS.
Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content.
The TDM RfC was premised on the fact that TDM had already been a perennial source here based on many specific test cases. It is inappropriate for us to go through obscure sources that have only been glancingly addressed here and to decide whether they satisfy the reliability bar absolutely or generally. RSN is the place for individual test cases, and once enough of them have arisen then a case can be made to add a media outlet to WP:RSP. R2 (bleep) 17:18, 12 June 2019 (UTC)- Ahrtoodeetoo, the purpose of my raising this RfC is to get a baseline assessment of reliability so that editors engaged in page reviewing (or other topic-hopping maintenance tasks) who are unfamiliar with a given region or topic (in this case Ghana) can more reliably make decisions that comply with community consensus. I agree that the result of this discussion should not be posted to RSP; I intend to summarize the results of this discussion at WP:NPPSG, which is supposed to centralize information from RSN that potentially reflects a weaker consensus than RSP. In hindsight, this makes option 4 an arguably inappropriate inclusion in the survey, although given the responses so far this is a non-issue. Moreover, looking at the comments in the discussion so far, this is hardly a popularity contest: so far we have two well-thought-out comments drawing on high quality sources. I'm open to criticisms that this should be handled through a different process (a differently worded RfC prompt is likely in order), but these sorts of discussions are a net positive to the project and will particularly help us cover subjects that are systemic-bias blind spots. signed, Rosguill talk 20:13, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- The problem is that context really does matter per WP:RS, and you can't assess context without discussing specific article content. Moreover, the community has to look at a lot of article content, not just one or two examples, or even worse none, before drawing any conclusions about an outlet's general reliability. That's the very premise behind RSP. Those are outlets that have come up again and again. Not never. R2 (bleep) 20:43, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- This isn't for RSP. My goal here is to establish a guide that allows editors to distinguish reputable sources from tabloids and self-published outlets at a glance, as well as to identify particularly relevant conflicts of interest for a given publication. The purpose of this is not to head off discussion about sources, it's to provide a starting point. Of course context matters, but there are also aspects of a publication that remain true in every (or almost every context) and that are worth discussing and recording. signed, Rosguill talk 20:55, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- The problem is that context really does matter per WP:RS, and you can't assess context without discussing specific article content. Moreover, the community has to look at a lot of article content, not just one or two examples, or even worse none, before drawing any conclusions about an outlet's general reliability. That's the very premise behind RSP. Those are outlets that have come up again and again. Not never. R2 (bleep) 20:43, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Ahrtoodeetoo, are you planning to insert this into more sections on this noticeboard? It doesn't seem directly related. cygnis insignis 09:02, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- Ahrtoodeetoo, the purpose of my raising this RfC is to get a baseline assessment of reliability so that editors engaged in page reviewing (or other topic-hopping maintenance tasks) who are unfamiliar with a given region or topic (in this case Ghana) can more reliably make decisions that comply with community consensus. I agree that the result of this discussion should not be posted to RSP; I intend to summarize the results of this discussion at WP:NPPSG, which is supposed to centralize information from RSN that potentially reflects a weaker consensus than RSP. In hindsight, this makes option 4 an arguably inappropriate inclusion in the survey, although given the responses so far this is a non-issue. Moreover, looking at the comments in the discussion so far, this is hardly a popularity contest: so far we have two well-thought-out comments drawing on high quality sources. I'm open to criticisms that this should be handled through a different process (a differently worded RfC prompt is likely in order), but these sorts of discussions are a net positive to the project and will particularly help us cover subjects that are systemic-bias blind spots. signed, Rosguill talk 20:13, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse RfC. All four options are fully compliant with the verifiability policy, including WP:CONTEXTMATTERS, which still applies for every instance a source is used. Note that the word generally means "usually", not "always". As I've documented in the active RfC on the talk page, there are many editors who want a rule of thumb for how often a source could be appropriately used. It would be unnecessarily bureaucratic to deny editors the ability to ask for general guidance and to force them to start a separate discussion every single time a source is in question. — Newslinger talk 22:19, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Comment An excerpt from The Press and Political Culture in Ghana by Jennifer Hasty, published by Indiana University Press in 2005 (page 47): "Under President J. J. Rawlings, the premier state newspaper, the Daily Graphic, articulated and reinforced a specific logic of state hegemony: political legitimacy based on state accumulation, populist morality, and benevolent patronage. Participation in the hegemonic project of the state distinguishes the Daily Graphic as a strategic node in the larger "ideological state apparatus" (Althusser 1971) designed to construct and reinforce an official national imaginary...The style of journalism practiced at Graphic throughout the 1990s...was designed to explain government policies and illustrate the positive impact of development projects on grateful communities, generally ignoring political controversies and popular criticisms." I'd lean for option 1, but option 2 might be in order with the consideration of the fact that its reporting of government business might be non-neutral. It is a state-run newspaper, after all. -Indy beetle (talk) 19:38, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
RFC for: Awardgoesto
Today I came across awardgoesto in several articles, many of which are BLPs. There are more than 166 links in mainspace on enwiki alone and more than 500 elsewhere. This, per my link earlier, is nothing more than a hobby blog and there is no indication that it is reputable or has meaningful editorial oversight but before I start removing it, I'd like to request a review or I guess, RFC? I was going to provide options but really it's nothing more than "yes it's reliable" or "no" because I personally do not believe this can or should even be used for primary statements as, again, it appears to be a hobby blog. Praxidicae (talk) 15:11, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Ignore my last statement, though I still feel it to be true, for the sake of following what seems to be an SOP here:
- Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
- Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
- Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
- Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated
Thanks! Praxidicae (talk) 15:13, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
Yep looks like just another blog to me.Slatersteven (talk) 15:14, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Objection to RfC. This RfC violates our verifiability policy. It amounts to little more than a popularity contest and is inconsistent with WP:CONTEXTMATTERS.
Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content.
The TDM RfC was premised on the fact that TDM had already been a perennial source here based on many specific test cases. It is inappropriate for us to go through obscure sources that have only been glancingly addressed here and to decide whether they satisfy the reliability bar absolutely or generally. RSN is the place for individual test cases, and once enough of them have arisen then a case can be made to add a media outlet to WP:RSP. R2 (bleep) 17:19, 12 June 2019 (UTC)- Endorse discussion. All four options are fully compliant with the verifiability policy, including WP:CONTEXTMATTERS, which still applies for every instance a source is used. Note that the word generally means "usually", not "always". As I've documented in the active RfC on the talk page, there are many editors who want a rule of thumb for how often a source could be appropriately used. It would be unnecessarily bureaucratic to deny editors the ability to ask for general guidance and to force them to start a separate discussion every single time a source is in question. — Newslinger talk 22:19, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Please note that option 4 (deprecation) is normally only presented in RfCs in order to show stronger consensus for adding an edit filter or auto-revert rule. — Newslinger talk 22:41, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 3. The about page shows that Awardgoesto is just one person's blog, which is a self-published source. There is no evidence that the author is a subject-matter expert. Under WP:BLPSPS, Awardgoesto should not be used for any claims related to living persons. — Newslinger talk 22:41, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Blacklist. Additionally, a large number of these links were added by a single editor, Ashishbpatel (talk · contribs · count), whose username is close match to the name of the blog's author (Ashish Patel). — Newslinger talk 22:46, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- I've submitted a blacklisting request at WP:SBL § awardgoesto.com. — Newslinger talk 22:55, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Blacklist. Additionally, a large number of these links were added by a single editor, Ashishbpatel (talk · contribs · count), whose username is close match to the name of the blog's author (Ashish Patel). — Newslinger talk 22:46, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
- Newslinger That's actually part of why I started an RFC, last few times I asked to have clear spam/sources such as this blacklisted they required an RFC first. Thanks! Praxidicae (talk) 14:42, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- Option 3:, it is a blog and thus not an RS period.Slatersteven (talk) 07:57, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
- Comment re list of options. This page's header suggested such a list as "a common format for writing the RfC question". That was a recent addition, which is being discussed in an RfC on the talk page. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 13:55, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
Obituary headline for reportedly unknown date of death
At Talk:Deaths in 2019#Linda Collins' DoD, I've proposed qualifying Linda Collins-Smith's entry with a "(body found on this date)", since multiple sources say things like "It’s not clear when Collins-Smith died as her remains were decomposed", "It’s not known how long she had been dead when her body was discovered" and "It still remains unclear how, when, or why she was killed".
Three other editors contend this obituary's headline is sufficient to cancel out such widely-reported uncertainty. I say the source itself doesn't mention a death date, and believe the date they see is simply for organizational purposes.
The diff is just this. Or in reverse.
Any advice? InedibleHulk (talk) 19:49, June 12, 2019 (UTC)
- I am Not sure this is an RS, this is (in effect a notice of a funeral).Slatersteven (talk) 08:00, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
Benzinga
Has anyone looked at Benzinga? https://www.benzinga.com/ A newsish site for "fintech", so not just cryptos ... Has a founder listed, none of the usual editorial structures. And the affiliate scheme makes me wonder a bit.
An attempted Wikipedia article on Benzinga from 2011/2012 was deleted repeatedly as promotional content, and a later attempt has been rejected as a draft.
I'm inclined to "probably not a very reliable source" - but does anyone here have experience with Benzinga's content? - David Gerard (talk) 11:44, 13 June 2019 (UTC)