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Inline citations in Lede
Why are there no inline citations in the lede/opening sections? Seems odd, considering the volume of attention surrounding the subject. Crescent77 (talk) 22:04, 16 January 2023 (UTC)
- See WP:LEADCITE. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:34, 16 January 2023 (UTC)
- Exactly. Quoting such: "statements about living persons that are challenged or likely to be challenged must have an inline citation every time they are mentioned, including within the lead". Seems pretty clear that there should be inline citations in the lede. Crescent77 (talk) 00:13, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- See Wikipedia:Featured article review/J. K. Rowling/archive1 and WP:CONSENSUS. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:27, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- Please stop with the WP:Spam. Nothing in your link indicates why the lede rewrite removed all inline citations, and I see no consensus supporting that course of action.
- It seems that inline citations should be included in the lede so that stabilizing edits(particularly reverts) by longstanding editors don't veer into WP:OWNership territory. Crescent77 (talk) 01:13, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- This is the pre-FAR lead; the text that was cited is no longer in the lead. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:25, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- And the text that is now in the lede should be cited. Crescent77 (talk) 01:35, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- Crescent77 could you please read WP:THREAD? I've had to fix the threading on every post you've made. I believe the lead now conforms just fine with both WP:LEAD and WP:LEADCITE; pls gain consensus if you want to change that. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:37, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- And the text that is now in the lede should be cited. Crescent77 (talk) 01:35, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- This is the pre-FAR lead; the text that was cited is no longer in the lead. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:25, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- See Wikipedia:Featured article review/J. K. Rowling/archive1 and WP:CONSENSUS. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:27, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- Exactly. Quoting such: "statements about living persons that are challenged or likely to be challenged must have an inline citation every time they are mentioned, including within the lead". Seems pretty clear that there should be inline citations in the lede. Crescent77 (talk) 00:13, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
Please stop with the malicous redirects SandyGeorgia. WP guidelines clearly indicate inline citations are appropriate in the lede. If you disagree, please indicate why. Crescent77 (talk) 01:50, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- Sandy has already pointed you at the two sources for why we don't have citations in the lead. WP:LEADCITE which states
The necessity for citations in a lead should be determined on a case-by-case basis by editorial consensus.
, and Wikipedia:Featured article review/J. K. Rowling/archive1 where through the numerous discussions as part of the 2021/2022 featured article review a strong consensus was developed that because of the strong citations in the body, citations were not required in the lead. Sideswipe9th (talk) 04:01, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
Once again, there is no indication there of a consensus cocerning inline citations in the lede, the lack thereof actually appears to be an oversight that occurred during the review. Crescent77 (talk) 06:28, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- Both counts above – a) that there is no indication of a consensus and b) that the lack thereof actually appears to be an oversight – are incorrect. The FAR had an unprecedented, to my knowledge, level or participation from about two dozen editors, including probably more than a dozen experienced FA writers, none of whom engage in overcitation of leads. I can indicate where you can find samples of other vetted content written by the main editors of this article if that would help. In FAs I've been the main author on, you will see I cite hard data and direct quotes in the lead. In this case, most of what was cited in the former lead was hard data, which was removed from the new lead. We were constrained by a recent RFC on one sentence, and discussed that at length. Reviewers felt it was too soon to revisit such a highly attended RFC, so we did not rewrite that one sentence. We did discuss revisiting it when better sources were available. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:59, 18 January 2023 (UTC)
Thank you for taking the time for that thorough explanation.
I'm simply indicating, and it sounds like you may generally agree, that inline citations should be in the lede if there is any significant possibility of reasonable disagreement, as there is here.
I can understand why they may have been left out during the review, especially with the expectation that another review could happen again in the not to distant future.
My concern is that newer editors here are not provided appropriate context. Providing inline citations would give them some immediate material to start with.
I would even go so far as to say that in the case of an article expected to undergo significant redevelopment in the future, overcites may be the lesser of two evils. In a system developed on the concept of open editing based on readily sourced RS, providing an overabundance of information for future discussion seems much better than the exclusion of such. Crescent77 (talk) 17:06, 19 January 2023 (UTC)
- FYI, I have a back injury because a tree fell on me, and must limit my daily time sitting at a real computer. I am frequently iPad editing, and two days ago, my iPad bluetooth keyboard gave up as well. Some editors who know my typing difficulties have learned to put up with my frequent typos and brevity :) I got a new bluetooth iPad keyboard yesterday, which doesn't mean my typing will get any better! We are between a rock and a hard place with the transgender sentence, because of the unfortunate and very poorly planned, yet widely attended, RFC. When it is time to reconvene, this time we will discuss discuss and discuss before launching an RFC, should we need one. On the one hand, it may be time to reconvene and revisit that text so we can attach citations to contentious bits (do others feel enough time has passed?). On the other hand, we just had a look and found there are still not very good scholarly sources. I looked again yesterday, and fear we still don't have a lot to work with. We should see what others think as to whether we should discuss reconvening, and if we do, I can ping the entire FAR list to get involved once we have enough of a start to be worth bothering others. I'd rather hear from the main editors first: @Vanamonde93, AleatoryPonderings, and Olivaw-Daneel: SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:19, 19 January 2023 (UTC)
- PS, which bits of the lead do you think are likely to be challenged? Are we talking only about the transgender sentence? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:22, 19 January 2023 (UTC)
- I have always preferred to cite everything in the lead: the way I see it CITELEAD does not prohibit it, and I typically need to make an edit a week reverting someone who has tagged a lead as needing citation or removed content claiming it to be uncited. However, I recognize I'm in the minority here; and also that on a topic this broad, the level of summary and synthesis required in the lead does not lend itself easily to citation. So color me ambivalent. Vanamonde (Talk) 17:27, 19 January 2023 (UTC)
- Vanamonde93 I'm also interested in hearing whether you think it is time to revisit the one sentence in the lead, that we avoided changing because of the RFC. If we were to do that, I would suggest a very structured approach like we took on the FAR, where we didn't even think of crafting text until we had agreed on sources, and I fear we still don't have enough scholarly sources. I'm also wondering how people are in terms of time commitments for undertaking this just now. Barring anything unforeseen, my time is good. But also need to see what else Crescent77 wants to see cited ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:39, 19 January 2023 (UTC)
- I searched for sources last month after a comment on the talk page (see above, you participated too) and I did not find enough to justify reframing. I'm open to persuasion, however, as I'm a little busy in RL haven't been able to dive as deep as I'd like. Vanamonde (Talk) 18:18, 19 January 2023 (UTC)
- In terms of timing, we're probably far enough away from the last RfC that we could hold one to address the deficient sentence. As for the sourcing question, I've not seen much change on the scholarly side with regards to this, though there are more lower quality media sources available than we looked and which usually coincide with something controversial that Rowling has tweeted.
- I think the important question is, with the potential sourcing options that we do have available, can we workshop better prose than what the 2021 RfC left us with? If the answer is yes, then maybe we shouldn't let the perfect (ie more academic sourcing) be the enemy of the good (ie the best available sourcing we have right now). And if so, then once we have workshopped a sentence we could, if we feel as though it is needed, structure an RfC in such a way that it addresses the deficiencies of the previous one, and also gives us more freedom to write a hypothetical third version should the better sourcing we've been hoping for become available.
- Or if we're feeling really radical, we could IAR this, workshop a new sentence, form a local consensus around that, and just put it in place? Enough time has passed that it would be pretty easy to argue that consensus had changed even without an RfC. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:36, 20 January 2023 (UTC)
- If we were to come to local consensus, and if we were to install and not be reverted, then theoretically we wouldn't need an RFC. Lots of if in there ... it could be worth a try. Still want to see what others have to say. As most of us know, it will probably be about six weeks of work for one sentence (or two). Is it worth it to do that now, or do we continue to wait/hope for better scholarly sources? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:06, 20 January 2023 (UTC)
- Well, I for one am on the side of 'wait for more sources, good enough for now'. Crossroads -talk- 18:40, 20 January 2023 (UTC)
- If we were to come to local consensus, and if we were to install and not be reverted, then theoretically we wouldn't need an RFC. Lots of if in there ... it could be worth a try. Still want to see what others have to say. As most of us know, it will probably be about six weeks of work for one sentence (or two). Is it worth it to do that now, or do we continue to wait/hope for better scholarly sources? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:06, 20 January 2023 (UTC)
- Vanamonde93 I'm also interested in hearing whether you think it is time to revisit the one sentence in the lead, that we avoided changing because of the RFC. If we were to do that, I would suggest a very structured approach like we took on the FAR, where we didn't even think of crafting text until we had agreed on sources, and I fear we still don't have enough scholarly sources. I'm also wondering how people are in terms of time commitments for undertaking this just now. Barring anything unforeseen, my time is good. But also need to see what else Crescent77 wants to see cited ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:39, 19 January 2023 (UTC)
- Based on this MOS discussion, it's not true that such citations are mandatory. I'd lean no, for the same reasons people give in that link, e.g. the lead is supposed to summarize an already-cited body, as is the case here. If certain bits have to be cited twice, as XOR'easter says,
"contested" is itself, well, contestable. How many people have to be upset with a sentence for it to qualify? (There's always somebody...)
. Olivaw-Daneel (talk) 19:37, 19 January 2023 (UTC) - I agree with Olivaw-Daneel. It's okay not to cite the lead and we if decide to cite it, someone will delete the citation per leadcite, so there's really no winning. Not sure what the OP is asking to be cited. Every statement in the lead or only specific statements? Victoria (tk) 20:25, 20 January 2023 (UTC)
Errington 500
I own Errington <gulp - expensive>
- Pages 1 and 2, A1 (a): 26 June 1997 an edition of 500 copies published simultaneously with A1 (aa)
- Pages 7 and 8, A1 (aa) paperback: 26 June 1997 5,150 copies published simultaneously with A1 (a)
More importantly, page 8 does go on to state that neither the hardback nor the paperback "has bibliographical priority", so the "old statement [about 500] is exposed as woefully inaccurate". So, this edit is correct, and I will add a footnote. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:46, 27 January 2023 (UTC)
- Done, thank you TelepathicTwelve for catching that. When I accessed Errington originally, I was misled by the Timeline source, and missed the additional content of pages 7 to 8. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:56, 27 January 2023 (UTC)
My pleasure! I'm no Wikipedia editor so very happy the change to an important article was approved with no fuss & I broke nothing in the process. Your new footnote is very helpful in explaining the matter better than how I left it.
I'm lucky enough to have met Errington! - delightful fellow TelepathicTwelve (talk) 19:22, 28 January 2023 (UTC)
- Awesome; thanks again! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:24, 28 January 2023 (UTC)
- This looks better, thanks again! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:52, 28 January 2023 (UTC)
- =D
- Just to explain the reasons behind the latest changes - i removed the link to that website claiming 500 copies (Timeline?), didn't feel we needed to provide an example of someone giving the false number, given that p. 8 of Errington itself discusses the widespread false belief
- Your new footnote said: Old claims that the initial run of 500 hardbacks had "bibliographic priority" are "woefully inaccurate"
- But what Errington really says is "woefully inaccurate" is the idea of 500 copies printed in total
- Thanks once again, couldn't have formatted a footnote without you TelepathicTwelve (talk) 21:06, 28 January 2023 (UTC)
- This looks better, thanks again! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:52, 28 January 2023 (UTC)