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==How has Daily Mail affected accuracy of Wikipedia articles?== |
==How has Daily Mail affected accuracy of Wikipedia articles?== |
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{{atop|{{nac}} Inappropriate discussion for this noticeboard. [[User:Beyond My Ken|Beyond My Ken]] ([[User talk:Beyond My Ken|talk]]) 19:33, 15 February 2017 (UTC)}} |
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Can anyone provide examples of where using ''Daily Mail'' articles has resulted in inaccurate information being presented in Wikipedia articles? [[User:The Four Deuces|TFD]] ([[User talk:The Four Deuces|talk]]) 18:25, 14 February 2017 (UTC) |
Can anyone provide examples of where using ''Daily Mail'' articles has resulted in inaccurate information being presented in Wikipedia articles? [[User:The Four Deuces|TFD]] ([[User talk:The Four Deuces|talk]]) 18:25, 14 February 2017 (UTC) |
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:I'm not certain that RSN is the right venue for that kind of discussion, this board is for discussing the reliability of sources, not if unreliable sources have ever wormed false information into wikipedia. In any case, what would it prove? If someone answers yes; well, they print inaccurate and in many cases fabricated information, why should it be a surprise that some of it ends up here? If nobody that visits here has specific examples that doesn't mean it hasn't happened, nor that it won't happen in the future. If your [[WP:POINTY|point]] is that wikipedia editors are pretty good as sifting through mixed bag sources, and that because of this we don't need the restrictions on the daily mail, that is a poor argument indeed, and in any case that ship has sailed, the RfA is closed. <span style="font-family:monospace;background:lightgrey;border-radius:10px;"> '''''[[User:Insertcleverphrasehere|Insert]][[Special:Contributions/Insertcleverphrasehere|CleverPhrase]][[User talk:Insertcleverphrasehere|Here]]''''' </span> 21:09, 14 February 2017 (UTC) |
:I'm not certain that RSN is the right venue for that kind of discussion, this board is for discussing the reliability of sources, not if unreliable sources have ever wormed false information into wikipedia. In any case, what would it prove? If someone answers yes; well, they print inaccurate and in many cases fabricated information, why should it be a surprise that some of it ends up here? If nobody that visits here has specific examples that doesn't mean it hasn't happened, nor that it won't happen in the future. If your [[WP:POINTY|point]] is that wikipedia editors are pretty good as sifting through mixed bag sources, and that because of this we don't need the restrictions on the daily mail, that is a poor argument indeed, and in any case that ship has sailed, the RfA is closed. <span style="font-family:monospace;background:lightgrey;border-radius:10px;"> '''''[[User:Insertcleverphrasehere|Insert]][[Special:Contributions/Insertcleverphrasehere|CleverPhrase]][[User talk:Insertcleverphrasehere|Here]]''''' </span> 21:09, 14 February 2017 (UTC) |
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::::::I understand your view, which was stated so eloquently by Donald Rumsfeld: "evidence of absence is not evidence of absence." But that's not what editors argued. Anyway, as delightful as it is to discuss why you do not want to answer my question, I posted in the hope that someone would answer it. [[User:The Four Deuces|TFD]] ([[User talk:The Four Deuces|talk]]) 19:13, 15 February 2017 (UTC) |
::::::I understand your view, which was stated so eloquently by Donald Rumsfeld: "evidence of absence is not evidence of absence." But that's not what editors argued. Anyway, as delightful as it is to discuss why you do not want to answer my question, I posted in the hope that someone would answer it. [[User:The Four Deuces|TFD]] ([[User talk:The Four Deuces|talk]]) 19:13, 15 February 2017 (UTC) |
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:::::::NO this isn't why people argued against the daily mail, they argued against it because POLICY is against it. Specifically under [[WP:RS]] and [[WP:VERIFIABILITY]] the DM disqualified itself due to the willful inaccuracies that it has printed (not accidents). Again, this section is inappropriate, as this board is not the correct location for such a discussion and the RfC on the Daily Mail is closed. Can I please request that an uninvolved editor or admin close this section please. <span style="font-family:monospace;background:lightgrey;border-radius:10px;"> '''''[[User:Insertcleverphrasehere|Insert]][[Special:Contributions/Insertcleverphrasehere|CleverPhrase]][[User talk:Insertcleverphrasehere|Here]]''''' </span> 19:24, 15 February 2017 (UTC) |
:::::::NO this isn't why people argued against the daily mail, they argued against it because POLICY is against it. Specifically under [[WP:RS]] and [[WP:VERIFIABILITY]] the DM disqualified itself due to the willful inaccuracies that it has printed (not accidents). Again, this section is inappropriate, as this board is not the correct location for such a discussion and the RfC on the Daily Mail is closed. Can I please request that an uninvolved editor or admin close this section please. <span style="font-family:monospace;background:lightgrey;border-radius:10px;"> '''''[[User:Insertcleverphrasehere|Insert]][[Special:Contributions/Insertcleverphrasehere|CleverPhrase]][[User talk:Insertcleverphrasehere|Here]]''''' </span> 19:24, 15 February 2017 (UTC) |
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== Forbes Articles == |
== Forbes Articles == |
Revision as of 19:33, 15 February 2017
Welcome — ask about reliability of sources in context! | |||||||||
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Colin Heaton's biography of Hans-Joachim Marseille
The source in question is Heaton, Colin; Lewis, Anne-Marie (2012). The Star of Africa: The Story of Hans Marseille, the Rogue Luftwaffe Ace. London, UK: Zenith Press. ISBN 978-0-7603-4393-7.
It is used several times for lengthy paragraphs in Hans-Joachim Marseille#Marseille and Nazism to make the case that Marseille was "openly anti-Nazi". I have argued at Talk:Hans-Joachim Marseille#Evidence for Marseille's "anti-Nazi" stand that these passages in Heaton's bio are almost exclusively based upon personal reminiscences by former comrades and Nazi persona like Karl Wolff, Artur Axmann, Hans Baur and Leni Riefenstahl, which are renowned for being talkative about the Nazi era and being apologetic at that. Their stories are not supported by other sources, but in fact appear to be very unlikely, if not impossible. Heaton's gives dates which contradict themselves and commits obvious errors. The stories he relates about Corporal Mathew Letulu [sic!], i.e. Mathew P. Letuku, contradict much better documented secondary literature. Apart from interviews, possibly conducted by himself, which is difficult to tell given the rudimentary nature of the footnotes, Heaton relies almost exclusively on two biographies, one by military pulp writer Franz Kurowski, the other a "tribute" by some Robert Tate. Based upon this evidence Heaton draws far reaching conclusions, namely that "Marseille was perhaps the most openly anti-Nazi warrior in the Third Reich." (p. 4) Given its focus upon oral evidence, collected somewhat 40 (?) years after the events, its poor editing and obvious errors, I consider that biography to be an unreliable source that should not be used excessively (and it is used for many more dubious claims) in a GA in the English Wikipedia, because it is misleading.--Assayer (talk) 20:14, 28 December 2016 (UTC)
- I agree with you that this source is very weak for an article on a Nazi era figure. I wouldn't have a problem with it being mentioned as "some biographies say", i.e. carefully attributed. It seems to be overused at the moment. Itsmejudith (talk) 21:26, 28 December 2016 (UTC)
- It seems to be usable only as evidence for what unreliable sources say, and I'd use it only when it is explicitly described as unreliable. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:38, 30 December 2016 (UTC)
- Nothing but opinions from an agenda-driven Wikipedia editor. Assayer wants Heaton off Wikipedia. He has failed to show Heaton unreliable. Those are the facts that matter.
- I am also concerned with the comments from Itsmejudith. What do you know about the literature of aerial warfare in World War II? And how could you say that about a book you've never read?
- I'd encourage people to have a look at the talk page of Hans-Joachim Marseille - where the complainant makes accusation and assertion with no evidence. Dapi89 (talk) 11:12, 1 January 2017 (UTC)
- See WP:HISTRS. Popular books by non-historians are not reliable for the history of WW2. Itsmejudith (talk) 12:20, 3 January 2017 (UTC)
- It seems to be usable only as evidence for what unreliable sources say, and I'd use it only when it is explicitly described as unreliable. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:38, 30 December 2016 (UTC)
- You are miss quoting what is a guideline; see section: What is historical scholarship. The question as to the book for evaluation is whether it is considered WP:RS or not; I do not know this work and therefore cannot offer an opinion. Kierzek (talk) 18:46, 26 January 2017 (UTC)
- Unfortunately, biographical works by academic historians on members of the Wehrmacht or SS below the rank of general can be numbered on the fingers of one hand, so WP:HISTRS is useless and we must fall back upon the traditional methods of evaluating a book and its author like use of primary sources, use of puffery or biased language, etc. All that requires actually reading the book more thoroughly than a Google snippet can allow. I've never read Heaton so I really don't know if I'd consider him RS or not. Personally, I'd be most interested to see what Wübbe has to say.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:19, 3 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Sturmvogel 66: On Wubbe, here's input from an editor familiar with this work:
The book is 20% text and 80% pictures and copies of the original documents plus newspaper clippings.
Source: User_talk:Dapi89/Archive_1#Hans Joachim Marseille. I.e. it's about 80% primary material, including unreliable war-time propaganda, and 20% commentary, also potentially unreliable given the slant of the publisher. The book was published by Verlag Siegfried Bublies -- de:Verlag Bublies, "a small, extreme-right publisher from Beltheim". K.e.coffman (talk) 17:24, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- @Sturmvogel 66: On Wubbe, here's input from an editor familiar with this work:
- He doesnt have a biography here, but from what I can google online he probably passes muster as a reliable source. Ex-military, ex-history professor, current historian and consultant for TV/Film on WW2. He is qualified in the area, has been published on the subject as well as earning a living from it for a significant time. If the only thing being held against him requires second-guessing him, thats not how WP:V works and is bordering on original research. Only in death does duty end (talk) 14:36, 3 January 2017 (UTC)
- As to the argument that Heaton is "qualified in the area": According to Heaton's own CV on his own commercial website he holds a BA and two MA degrees in history, was consultant and adjunct professor to the online American Military University and guest historian for a single episode of a History channel programme. That's not very impressive. What is more, I looked for reviews of his works and could not find much. It seems, however, that Heaton regularly uses "oral testimony" from people involved. That is stressed by Stephen M. Miller in a recent review of Heaton's Four-War Boer for the Journal of African History (2016), commenting that the information of the interviews are not substantiated in the text or in the notes ("unfortunately") and Horst Boog, reviewing Heaton's Night Fighters (which is his MA thesis at Temple Univ.) for the Militärgeschichtliche Zeitschrift (2010). Boog also points to numerous errors, for example Heaton's estimate of 1.2 million civillian German bomb victims. (The highest estimate is actually 635,000 victims, recent research (Richard Overy) estimates 353,000 victims.) I might add that by now I am challenging the reliability of the book for a certain, controversial characterization of Jochen Marseille. Thus one does not need to read the whole book (which I did), because I refer to a couple of pages which are cited at length in the article, I point to the sources and how they are used and I point to the language.--Assayer (talk) 17:05, 4 January 2017 (UTC)
- The above is a combination of original research which we dont do and actual genuine concerns. If multiple reliable sources have cast doubt on his credibility (critical reviews, peers countering his claims etc) then that does shed doubt on his useability in an article. Could you make a list of the sources critical of him/his book? Only in death does duty end (talk) 17:19, 4 January 2017 (UTC)
- I've looked. Nothing. I did say earlier in this thread, this claim of unreliability is just an opinion of one editor. This type of personal attack on sources has been made across multiple threads and articles with the same old result. Heaton qualifies as reliable. Dapi89 (talk) 13:07, 6 January 2017 (UTC)
- I'd like to add that you could find critical reviews about facets of any one of these academics work, even Overy and Miller. Using the differentials in casualty figures, which vary among all academics is a weak argument (never mind what the latest, supposedly new, research has to say, which doesn't automatically make it accurate anyway). And can you define victims? Anyone who suffered a gash from an air attack can be considered a victim. Such vague descriptions are unhelpful. Opinions are also unhelpful. Assayer is well aware of what is required here. Does this editor have reviews that are directly critical or not? Dapi89 (talk) 13:28, 6 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Only in death: Could you please elaborate where you draw the line between OR and "genuine concerns"? Neither do I use unpublished sources nor do I come to a conclusion on my own. I simply hold what Heaton says against what other published sources say. Isn't that what User:Sturmvogel 66 asks for, if we don't have biographical works by academic historians at hand? How else could we evaluate the reliability of a publication, that is ignored by historiographical works? Please do also take into account how the material sourced to Heaton's biography is presented in the article, namely as factual accounts. Of course this is what Heaton does in his work: He weaves lengthy quotations of various anecdotes related to him through interviews into a coherent narrative. These anecdotes are not supported by third party sources and Heaton does not discuss their reliability. Thus many of the information can only be traced to oral testimony. Do we have to accept that as reliable, simply because Heaton does?
- @Dapi89: Although I chose to ignore your continuous personal attacks I have to say that remarks like "Anyone who suffered a gash from an air attack can be considered a victim" are highly inappropriate. And the literature on aerial warfare in World War II is not that "vague".--Assayer (talk) 17:29, 8 January 2017 (UTC)
- It's not an attack it is an observation on your behaviour. Those comments are entirely appropriate unless you feel the wounded don't count. I didn't say it was vague. I said you're vague. All this is hot air. You're trying to use discrepancies and differentials in accounts and figures, and unbelievably spelling differences (!!), to try and have an author discredited. OR is being kind. You're views are personal and tendentious. You're a polemist. End of story. Dapi89 (talk) 20:16, 8 January 2017 (UTC)
- I'd like to add that you could find critical reviews about facets of any one of these academics work, even Overy and Miller. Using the differentials in casualty figures, which vary among all academics is a weak argument (never mind what the latest, supposedly new, research has to say, which doesn't automatically make it accurate anyway). And can you define victims? Anyone who suffered a gash from an air attack can be considered a victim. Such vague descriptions are unhelpful. Opinions are also unhelpful. Assayer is well aware of what is required here. Does this editor have reviews that are directly critical or not? Dapi89 (talk) 13:28, 6 January 2017 (UTC)
- I've looked. Nothing. I did say earlier in this thread, this claim of unreliability is just an opinion of one editor. This type of personal attack on sources has been made across multiple threads and articles with the same old result. Heaton qualifies as reliable. Dapi89 (talk) 13:07, 6 January 2017 (UTC)
- The above is a combination of original research which we dont do and actual genuine concerns. If multiple reliable sources have cast doubt on his credibility (critical reviews, peers countering his claims etc) then that does shed doubt on his useability in an article. Could you make a list of the sources critical of him/his book? Only in death does duty end (talk) 17:19, 4 January 2017 (UTC)
- As to the argument that Heaton is "qualified in the area": According to Heaton's own CV on his own commercial website he holds a BA and two MA degrees in history, was consultant and adjunct professor to the online American Military University and guest historian for a single episode of a History channel programme. That's not very impressive. What is more, I looked for reviews of his works and could not find much. It seems, however, that Heaton regularly uses "oral testimony" from people involved. That is stressed by Stephen M. Miller in a recent review of Heaton's Four-War Boer for the Journal of African History (2016), commenting that the information of the interviews are not substantiated in the text or in the notes ("unfortunately") and Horst Boog, reviewing Heaton's Night Fighters (which is his MA thesis at Temple Univ.) for the Militärgeschichtliche Zeitschrift (2010). Boog also points to numerous errors, for example Heaton's estimate of 1.2 million civillian German bomb victims. (The highest estimate is actually 635,000 victims, recent research (Richard Overy) estimates 353,000 victims.) I might add that by now I am challenging the reliability of the book for a certain, controversial characterization of Jochen Marseille. Thus one does not need to read the whole book (which I did), because I refer to a couple of pages which are cited at length in the article, I point to the sources and how they are used and I point to the language.--Assayer (talk) 17:05, 4 January 2017 (UTC)
- Unfortunately, biographical works by academic historians on members of the Wehrmacht or SS below the rank of general can be numbered on the fingers of one hand, so WP:HISTRS is useless and we must fall back upon the traditional methods of evaluating a book and its author like use of primary sources, use of puffery or biased language, etc. All that requires actually reading the book more thoroughly than a Google snippet can allow. I've never read Heaton so I really don't know if I'd consider him RS or not. Personally, I'd be most interested to see what Wübbe has to say.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:19, 3 January 2017 (UTC)
If Horst Boog, one of the most respected German authorities on aerial warfare during WW II, devotes a whole paragraph of his review to a list of errors, concluding that there were even more errors, then this does not add to an author's reliability as a source. I take notice that this biography is predominantly cosidered to be a "very weak" source, to say the least. One editor questioned the applicability of WP:HISTRS in cases such as this, while yet another considered the evaluation of certain claims against the background of other published sources as OR. The contradictions between these different approaches were not resolved. One editor rather commented on me than on the content, so that my evidence remains unchallenged. Maybe, as a piece of WP:FANCRUFT, the article in question is fittingly based upon anecdotes told by veterans and former Nazis. I find it troubling, however, that this is a GA by Wikipedia standards and short of FA status only because of the prose, not because of dubious content or unreliable sources.--Assayer (talk) 21:12, 12 January 2017 (UTC)
- I've previously raised concerns about Heaton on the Talk page (Talk:Hans-Joachim Marseille#Unreliable sources tag) as a WP:QS source, due to problematic POV he exhibited in one of his articles. He has called an action of a German commander an "act of humanity". A "daring raid" or "skillful military ruse" would be okay, but "an act of humanity"? That is just bizarre. (See: Talk:2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich#Heaton. Comment from another editor was: "
Heaton removed as biased pov and non WP:RS
").
- A related question, does Heaton indeed cite Franz Kurowski in his work? If yes, how extensively? K.e.coffman (talk) 03:53, 17 January 2017 (UTC)
"the applicability of WP:HISTRS" Assayer, what applicability? The link leads to Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources (history), which is an essay, neither policy, nor guideline. Per Wikipedia:Essays: "Essays have no official status, and do not speak for the Wikipedia community as they may be created without approval. Following the instructions or advice given in an essay is optional. There are currently about 2,000 essays on a wide range of Wikipedia related topics."
And this particular essay does not discount works of popular history: "Where scholarly works are unavailable, the highest quality commercial or popular works should be used." Dimadick (talk) 07:59, 17 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Dimadick: I did not bring WP:HISTRS up, but User:Itsmejudith. I did find that comment more helpful than others, though, because it provided at least some kind of guidance. I did not argue, however, that "highest quality commercial or popular works" should never be used. In general the comments during this discussion were contradictory. But how would you determine the quality of sources?
- @K.e.coffman: Heaton considers Kurowski's bio of Marseille to be "very good" (p. xiv). Given the number of Heaton's footnotes I would say about a third of them refer to Kurowski. I did not check every footnote, what and how much material he borrowed. Heaton's main source are his interviews. In chapter 4 "Learning the Ropes", for example, there are 21 references, six refer to Kurowski, the rest refer to interviews.--Assayer (talk) 19:59, 17 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Dimadick: Does the editor consider Heaton to be high quality commercial / popular work? K.e.coffman (talk) 16:46, 18 January 2017 (UTC)
- If you mean me, I am not particularly convinced of Heaton's quality. I just noted that the discussion was using an essay to ban popular history works. Dimadick (talk) 16:49, 18 January 2017 (UTC)
- Thank you for the clarification. K.e.coffman (talk) 00:57, 19 January 2017 (UTC)
- If you mean me, I am not particularly convinced of Heaton's quality. I just noted that the discussion was using an essay to ban popular history works. Dimadick (talk) 16:49, 18 January 2017 (UTC)
- Assayer and K.e.coffman have used Wikipedia to attack sources about any German serviceman who served in World War II if it dares to complement their personal bravery or service record. Coffman has opposed the advancement of these articles, namely the Knight's Cross lists and has deleted hundreds of articles about these recipients. It should come as no surprise that their singular agenda here is to degrade and delete portions of the article that doesn't fit with their opinions. Assayer in particular has scoured the internet for anything he can find that is critical of Heaton. The tiny and weak tidbits of those academic(s) (just the one?) that are critical of small aspects of his work is nowhere near enough to decry Heaton. Virtually nothing else.
- This attack on Heaton should be treated for what it is: OR and opinion by a pair of anonymous internet users. And they don't get to decide who is admitted to Wikipedia and who isn't. I'm glad at least one other editor can see that. Dapi89 (talk) 19:24, 18 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Dapi89:
"at least one other editor can see that"
-- Which other editor is that? K.e.coffman (talk) 01:00, 19 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Dapi89:
I found a review of Heaton's book on Marseille from Aviation History. Mar 2013, Vol. 23 Issue 4, p62-62. 1/2p.. It reads in part:
- "Writing the biography of a 22-year-old, most of whose life remains undocumented, isn't easy. The only way to turn it into a book is lots of photographs (Kurowski's method) or this husband-and-wife team's choice, spending way too many pages reciting the exact details of 158 aerial combats…which in turn requires suspension of disbelief on the part of readers. How, exactly, did the authors know which rudder Marseille kicked and what the airspeed read, whether he pulled full flaps or skidded to avoid a pursuer's rounds, just what Marseille saw through his windscreen and exactly when he saw it?"
K.e.coffman (talk) 06:01, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
- Which editor do you think? Or do you ignore posts you don't like?
- So? If K.e.Coffman knew anything about Marseille, he'd know that through interviews with his commanding officers, and pilots in his units, Heaton is able to understand how he approached air combat. Marseille shared his knowledge with all those around him. I've seen interviews with Korner and Neumann that explicitly discuss Marseille's unorthodox tactics, some of which are sourced in the article. Simple really. Dapi89 (talk) 10:55, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
- Perhaps K.e.Coffman needs to remember (if he knew, which I doubt), that 109 of the 158 claims filed by Marseille are recorded which included many combat reports with short but vivid descriptions of how he engaged the enemy in successful combats. Dapi89 (talk) 11:00, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
- Editor Dapi89 state that criticism of Heaton was
"nothing but opinions from an agenda-driven Wikipedia editor"
. I have provided a 3rd party review of Heaton's work on Marseille, which points out that the work is close to being historical fiction in its depictions of the areal battles ("requires suspension of disbelief on the part of readers"). Is this review also wrong? K.e.coffman (talk) 20:52, 22 January 2017 (UTC)
- Editor Dapi89 state that criticism of Heaton was
- That says what exactly!? I repeat; the reviewer and it's number one wikipedia fan don't seem to understand that actions, tactics and the subject's point of view are quite easy to record.
- And even if this reviewer had something insightful and factually accurate to say, using it to attack and remove another source from Wikipedia shows the agenda driven nature of the attacking editor. It shows K.e.Coffman, you're not interested in researching the subject for its own sake, but scratching around for dirt you can throw at Heaton. It is absurd to contemplate labelling Heaton unreliable because he receives some form of criticism from someone who likely is not an authority on Marseille. Heaton is.
- It should be obvious the reviewer, whoever they maybe, is too ignorant to be entertained. Dapi89 (talk) 23:26, 22 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Dapi89: please see: WP:no personal attacks.
- The review is of the work under discussion, it's by "Wilkinson, Stephan" from the Aviation History magazine. Unless the magazine is not reputable, I don't see how a 3rd party review can be dismissed on the grounds that (in the opinion of one editor) it's been shared by
"agenda-driven"
contributor to"scratch around for dirt [to] throw at Heaton"
. K.e.coffman (talk) 23:49, 22 January 2017 (UTC)
- It isn't an attack. It's an observation. Understand the difference. I've lost count of the number of editors that have said the same thing.
- Once more, you are using a non-expert source to attack the credibility of biographer. That is OR and Tendentious. You can see why a score or more of editors regard you as agenda driven. You've spent the last few months doing this type of thing. Your efforts to destroy the article on German personnel won't be tolerated without exceptionally good reason. Dapi89 (talk) 07:32, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
Summary on Heaton
Summarising, as the discussion has been long and involved:
this source is very weak for an article on a Nazi era figure
via ItsmejudithIt seems to be usable only as evidence for what unreliable sources say, and I'd use it only when it is explicitly described as unreliable
via Richard KeatingeHe doesnt have a biography here, but from what I can google online he probably passes muster as a reliable source. Ex-military, ex-history professor, current historian and consultant for TV/Film on WW2
via Only in deathI've never read Heaton so I really don't know if I'd consider him RS or not
via Sturmvogel 66I am not particularly convinced of Heaton's quality
via Dimadick
K.e.coffman (talk) 02:36, 26 January 2017 (UTC)
- How many times do you have to be told, that you don't get to decide whether a source is reliable. Neither does anybody else, unless they can provide good cause.
- The personal opinions of Wikipedia editors are useless. Dapi89 (talk) 21:36, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Only in death: I was able to clarify that evaluation of sources is not original research; please see this discussion: Wikipedia talk:No original research#Evaluation of sources. K.e.coffman (talk) 23:42, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
- You were not evaluating a source. You don't like it. You made a decision it had to go, then scoured the internet for anything that would support your pre-existing prejudices against sources that write about German military personnel and that don't label them Nazis or falsifiers of their own records. Using anonymous reviews, from non-experts to ban sources about which they offer only the very slightest of criticism is tendentious AND OR. Dapi89 (talk) 13:18, 28 January 2017 (UTC)
- Please visit Wikipedia talk:No original research#Evaluation of sources and engage with the editors there. K.e.coffman (talk) 00:11, 29 January 2017 (UTC)
- I don't need to. You're behaviour encompasses more than OR, also Tendentious and selective editing. Dapi89 (talk) 12:48, 29 January 2017 (UTC)
- The above comment incorrectly identifies historian Horst Boog as a "non-expert". He was the pre-eminent expert on the Luftwaffe operations during World War II, having contributed to three volumes of the seminal series Germany and the Second World War.
- General note: this is a noticeboard to discuss reliability of sources, not user behaviour. For the latter, please see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:55, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
- I don't need to. You're behaviour encompasses more than OR, also Tendentious and selective editing. Dapi89 (talk) 12:48, 29 January 2017 (UTC)
- Please visit Wikipedia talk:No original research#Evaluation of sources and engage with the editors there. K.e.coffman (talk) 00:11, 29 January 2017 (UTC)
- You were not evaluating a source. You don't like it. You made a decision it had to go, then scoured the internet for anything that would support your pre-existing prejudices against sources that write about German military personnel and that don't label them Nazis or falsifiers of their own records. Using anonymous reviews, from non-experts to ban sources about which they offer only the very slightest of criticism is tendentious AND OR. Dapi89 (talk) 13:18, 28 January 2017 (UTC)
- @Only in death: I was able to clarify that evaluation of sources is not original research; please see this discussion: Wikipedia talk:No original research#Evaluation of sources. K.e.coffman (talk) 23:42, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
- This discussion has been going on for more than a month now. It is fair to say that no consensus has developed that this source is unreliable. Let's close this discussion per WP:DROPTHESTICK. --Nug (talk) 09:52, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
- I do not see it this way.
- Three editors expressed concerns about the source (see above).
- The nom expressed concerns.
- I've not considered Heaton to be reliable since encountering content cited to him at SS Division Das Reich.
- One editor stated that Heaton is probably RS and expressed concerns over OR in evaluating the source, but have not come back to the discussion.
- One editor has expressed an opinion that Heaton is RS.
- Thus, the rough consensus seems clear to me that Heaton is not a suitable source for the claims in the article. K.e.coffman (talk) 20:10, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
- Expressing a concern isn't the same as declaring it unreliable. You have misrepresented what the various editors have said in your summary. For example you quote Itsmejudith:
this source is very weak for an article on a Nazi era figure
but omit her next sentence:I wouldn't have a problem with it being ... carefully attributed
. Only you have openly stated this source is unreliable, but two stated it is RS, well make that three since Itsmejudith thinks it okay if properly attributed, actually make that four as I think Heaton is a reliable source for his own opinion that "Marseille was perhaps the most openly anti-Nazi warrior in the Third Reich." --Nug (talk) 21:03, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
- Expressing a concern isn't the same as declaring it unreliable. You have misrepresented what the various editors have said in your summary. For example you quote Itsmejudith:
- He's a reliable source for the decades-later reports of people with a strong point of view. This does not suggest that his interpretations are reliable for the sort of judgements that are being made about "anti-Nazi" attitudes in the early 1940s. He is on the margins of usability, and then only when appropriately framed and very carefully used. Richard Keatinge (talk) 14:29, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
- I started this debate to get some additional input whether this particular source is reliable for the content it supports and I would like to thank you for the input. As a reminder: In the article in question Heaton's biography of Marseille is not simply used to present Heaton's opinion. Instead numerous anecdotes and stories related to Heaton through interviews and quoted by him at length are presented as facts.(Perma) It seems fair to summarize that Heaton is a reliable source for his own opinion and for the decades-later reports of people with a strong point of view. Thus the consensus of this debate is that these opinions and reports are to be carefully attributed.--Assayer (talk) 00:24, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
- No I don't think that is a fair conclusion. While Heaton's opinion with respect to Marseille's anti-Nazi sentiment should be attributed, there is nothing to suggest that the numerous anecdotes and stories related to Heaton through interviews and quoted by him are unreliable. In fact a review of his book by the journal Military Review in the March-April 2015 edition states "A well-written, insightful, quality book, it entertains while it educates; it is highly recommended."[1] --Nug (talk) 02:32, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- @Nug: Since you seem to offer dissent to my conclusion that opinions and "decades-later reports" were to be attributed, please clarify: Do you argue that the anecdotes and stories that can be found in Heaton's bio are to be accepted as fact and presented as such in a Wikipedia article? Because my argument is that anecdotes and "decades-later reports of people with a strong point of view" are in general biased and opinionated and thus should be dealt with according to WP:BIASED, i.e., with WP:INTEXT at the least, although in regard to the details I would point to WP:ONUS and WP:EXCEPTIONAL. That anecdotes by former Nazis and comrades are quoted at length by Colin Heaton may add color to the picture, but does not transform their anecdotes into truthful, objective, reliable, and accurate representations of historical truth. I have specified my concerns on the talk page of the article, so you might look for examples there.--Assayer (talk) 15:06, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
- No I don't think that is a fair conclusion. While Heaton's opinion with respect to Marseille's anti-Nazi sentiment should be attributed, there is nothing to suggest that the numerous anecdotes and stories related to Heaton through interviews and quoted by him are unreliable. In fact a review of his book by the journal Military Review in the March-April 2015 edition states "A well-written, insightful, quality book, it entertains while it educates; it is highly recommended."[1] --Nug (talk) 02:32, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- I started this debate to get some additional input whether this particular source is reliable for the content it supports and I would like to thank you for the input. As a reminder: In the article in question Heaton's biography of Marseille is not simply used to present Heaton's opinion. Instead numerous anecdotes and stories related to Heaton through interviews and quoted by him at length are presented as facts.(Perma) It seems fair to summarize that Heaton is a reliable source for his own opinion and for the decades-later reports of people with a strong point of view. Thus the consensus of this debate is that these opinions and reports are to be carefully attributed.--Assayer (talk) 00:24, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
Reliability of s:The Imperial Gazetteer of India (cont'd)
restoring the post, as there was no conclusion.
Hello all,
It seems the editor User:Sitush feels that the source s:The Imperial Gazetteer of India is biased, or as he says "unreliable". I have found a similar discussion with this editor from a few months ago, where the previous opposition made a few good points (albeit in a crude manner), and cannot find any valid rebuttals by Sitush in that thread before it was derailed. I note that at least one editor asked why the source was unreliable and did not get a reasonable response.
I also note that many of the sources discussed, including the one provided by Sitush himself in the discussion above, all are in general agreement with the text that is being cited in the article Phulkian sardars (Bhati Rao of Jaisalmar was a Rajput [forget the golden fort part for now], and this was the branch responsible for the Sidhu Jats). Since it does seem that Sitush is of a religious denomination that may have some conflict with the legitimate content that is supported by British sources, in no small part due to the history and evolution of British rule in India, I am asking if others can objectively contest whether the Imperial Gazetteer of India is unreliable.
It seems this is a good source used for many articles involving India, and provides us with some confidence that there is corroboration of claims from a non-ethnic source. Is this wrong? I note this source is also on wikisource. Surely the editor has erred? Also, it seems William Wilson Hunter (the visionary behind this compendium) isn't somebody whose life work we dismiss with blanket arguments like "Raj sources not reliable"? I have not seen anything from the opposition that provides strong counter claims to what is provided in the multitude of sources supporting the content he disputes.
Some articles I've found that this source is used in:
- Richard Burn (indologist)
- North≤western Provinces
- Great Famine of 1876-78
- Agra Province
- Imperial Service Troops
- Presidencies and provinces of British India
- Saiyid Khurd
(etc)
It really does seem this is a good quality source that the opposition does not like due to the content, and not the source.
edit: Hello everyone. It seems User:Sitush and User:Bishonen are ignoring Wikipedia ettiquette, where item (3) on What is Wikisource? article clearly states wikisource provides wp:RS, thus refuting alleged bias claimed by these editors. Can we please get some action on this matter? It seems Bishonen was involved previously as well, and as an administrator he is ignoring the established criteria of Wikisource. I also find it very curious that Bishonen called following protocol 'disruptive editing'. I will be posting htis on the administrator's noticeboard as wel. Thank you.
- Wikipedia:Wikisource identifies three categories of sources it holds. It says that, of the many things Wikisource contains, some are reliable sources. And if you head to the original full page of which that is just a summary, here, and from there to here, you'll see that Wikisource contains a lot of sources in various categories. So a source contained in Wikisource might be a (1), might be a (2) might be a (3), or might be something else which is not included in that brief summary. It does not say that everything held by Wikisource is a (3) and that everything held in Wikisource is a reliable source. Also, "reliable source" is not a yes/no option, and what are reliable sources for some things are not reliable for others - they need to be individually assessed in the context in which they are to be used. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:43, 22 January 2017 (UTC)
- Hi, well, nothing stated in that source is disputed by the others in the previous RSN discussion. The source originally used by User:Sitush (given here) to argue that the original content was invalid (on the basis of "Raj source"), was self-contradicting because the "non-Raj" source said the same things as the sources used previously (which are now also supported by the s:Imperial Gazetteer of India, which was not used in the prior discussion).
- I also find it curious that User:Bishonen attacked my english here, when he deemed the previous editor's concerns over Sitush's ethnicity as a personal attack even though it seemed more about conflicts of interest.
- Such a conflict is apparent here, where User:Sitush and User:Bishonen claim the sources are not reliable, yet have been supported by a multitude of references.
- User:SageRad suggested that criticising others' English comprehension was a personal attack, and the previous editor was banned as a result. As an administrator who was intimately involved in the previous situation, User:Bishonen should know better than to use the same tactics as the previous editor, especially when others deemed it as a personal attack (I do not, but a violation is a violation).
- Is this not a double standard, where the perpetrators are now behaving in the same manner as their previous opposition? Sitush wastes no time attacking other authors, and I have yet to see any body of work that he has produced that validates his stance. He seemingly disregards any source that is British, even though for this specific tribe (Phulkian), the most reliable of sources would be British (given their alliance as early as 1803&endash;predating the cis-Sutlej states by two years)
- I think what you need to decide is whether you want to use this noticeboard to try to get a consensus on the reliability of this source for the context in which you want to use it, or whether you want to use it to attack two other editors. The former is what this board is for. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:27, 22 January 2017 (UTC)
- Hello User:Boing! said Zebedee, thank you for engaging.
- I disagree that I am attacking anyone. I think if anyone is being attacked, it was User:Bishonen attacking my english comprehension (as the other editor did towards Sitush, resulting in him being banned) instead of demonstrating the insufficiency of the source.
- Now I will get back on point regarding reliability of the sources.
- It is simple, really. One day, User:Sitush decided to delete legitimate content using "Raj sources unreliable" (a recurring theme if you inspect his edit history). Someone obviously took offense to that, as it is an attack on the reliability of the documentation of their family history.
- As stated above, User:Sitush was originally challenged on this point (re: what made the cited content unreliable) by User:SageRad, and he did not muster an acceptable response, which presumably frustrated the (now banned) editor into asking about his english comprehension.
- I think it is being charitable to say that Sitush's response[1] to User:SageRad was arrogant, as it attacked prominent authors (among them James Mill, who fathered one of the greatest liberal philosophers of our time John Stuart Mill), but never answered the original question about what made the content of the source insufficient.
- Was the (now banned) editor's response arrogant, as well? Sure, but it seems they correctly point out that the source Sitush provided to demonstrate the (removed) source's purported unreliability actually contradicted his point, as it contained support for the content that he removed
- I think it is being charitable to say that Sitush's response[1] to User:SageRad was arrogant, as it attacked prominent authors (among them James Mill, who fathered one of the greatest liberal philosophers of our time John Stuart Mill), but never answered the original question about what made the content of the source insufficient.
- I find it hard to believe that the British would sacrifice the high quality of s:The Imperial Gazetteer of India (evidenced by its archival as a wikisource) by exercising bias (and thus being "unreliable") on this specific matter, especially after reading the source User:Sitush provides as evidence for the unreliability.
- Secondly, I want to say, as the previous (now banned) editor also did, that this entire fiasco does feel like an embodiment of the history cited in s:The Imperial Gazetteer of India is on display here. Simply put, there were a select group of people who were fortunate enough to be allied with the British:
But the British Government, established at Delhi since 1803,
intervened with an offer of protection to all the CIS-SUTLEJ STATES;
and Dhanna Singh gladly availed himself of the promised aid, being
one of the first chieftains to accept British protection and control. [2]
- To suggest that the Phulkian sardars' alliance with the British did not result in the majority of their history also being told by the British isn't reasonable. This alliance resulted in the Phulkians fighting Muslims, Hindus, and even Sikhs! (see below)
- This clan did not like Maharaja Ranjit Singh (an alleged Sikh), and were suspicious of his plans after his friendliness with Muslims (whose history of griefing Gurus was still fresh at that time).
- Thus, it is not a personal attack to show concern for removed content that is rigorously and multiply-sourced when the opposing editors are (likely) of faiths who are still sensitive about the events that occurred during the times documented by the s:The Imperial Gazetteer of India.
- Lastly, and at the risk of belabouring the main point: the content unjustifiably removed by Sitush has multiple sources (the most recent of which is a wikisource).
- After analysing the source provided by Sitush provided in the previous RSN, it is difficult to fathom that multiple "Raj sources" are all incorrect on this matter when they are consistent with what he originally provided.
- In light of this, how can a reasonable person not infer the editing behaviour surrounding this content as a "Sitush knows [the] best [legitimate sources]" attitude? I feel I have taken a measured response that addresses the faulty criticism levelled by Sitush against s:The Imperial Gazzetteer of India.
- This is not an attack on Sitush or Bishonen. Rather, it is an assessment of former & latter's behaviour on the earlier and current RSN[3] respectively.
- This response is simple Baconian induction of what they've provided.
- I believe what was added originally was impartial and stuck to reliable sources, which are only disputed by those of religious denominations that were at conflict with the British (and consequently, the Phulkians) at the time.
I felt that what was added yesterday only emphasised the correctness of the content originally removed by Sitush and Bishonen approximately three months ago. Thank you for your time— Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.76.118.151 (talk) 16:36, January 22, 2017
References
- In general 'historical' sources are unreliable in some areas due to the changing culture, further research, distance and time from events giving a more accurate and broader view, classified documents may have been released etc etc. For historical India, most contemporary sources have been superseded by newer ones. A historical source may be accurate for the opinion at the time, but not necessarily for facts (in fact more than likely to be not, given the historic bias in most publications). This is why RSN requires three things: Article, reference, content supported by reference. Please provide these three with a short explanation of why you think the source is reliable for the content. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:01, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
-
- They've been using a number of IPs, only one of which is blocked as a proxy. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:00, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
- Hello User:Only in death. I believe all three have been provided above, and while I respect your decision to not read it all (for whatever reason), I can only do so much I'm essentially repeating the above..
- Article: Phulkian sardars
- Reference: s:The Imperial Gazzetteer of India
- Content supported by references, using the article modified by Sitush on December 2015 (commentary: if it was so "unreliable", why did Sitush not remove it all in December 2015, instead of inexplicably deleting it entirely in September 2016 when someone added a source?) :
- Rawal Jaisal's descendents were of Sikh origin, and were Sidhu Brars: Here are four separate sources [1][2][3][4] (note, again, s:The Imperial Gazetteer of India is a wikisource).
- Hello User:Only in death. I believe all three have been provided above, and while I respect your decision to not read it all (for whatever reason), I can only do so much I'm essentially repeating the above..
- I feel it is completely reasonable to hold User:Sitush and User:Bishonen accountable for their deliberate misinformation. I have shown four separate sources supporting the claims that Sitush left alone after his massive December 2015 edit, which he inexplicably deleted entirely in September 2015 after a single source was provided. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.109.239.64 (talk • contribs)
- Accusing User:Sitush and User:Bishonen of deliberate misinformation is another personal attack, and I have already warned you about that. So you are now blocked, and you will be blocked for longer should you repeat it when your short block expires. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:41, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
References
- ^ "Ferozepur District". p. 89.
About the time of the first Muhammadan invasions a colony of Bhatti Rajputs from Jaisalmer settled in the neighbourhood of Mukhtsar, and the Manj, a branch of them, ousted the Ponwars and became converts to Islam about 1288.
"Ferozepur District". The Imperial Gazetteer of India. Vol. 12. 1908. p. 90.About the end of the sixteenth century the Sidhu Jats, from whom the Phulkian Rajas are descended, made their appearance; and in the middle of the seventeenth century most of the Jat tribes were converted to Sikhism by Har Rai, the seventh Guru.
{{cite book}}
: Cite has empty unknown parameter:|1=
(help) . Vol. 12. 1908. - ^ Temple, R. C. "Article VIII:Raja Rasalu". Calcutta Review. 79: 390–392.
The Siddhu story is that they are descended from the Bhatti Rajput prince Jaisal, the founder of Jaisalmer, and the families that claim this descent in the present day are in order of seniority Kaithal, Jhumba, Arnauli and Sadhowal, descended from Siddhu's eldest son Dhar, then Nabha and Jind descended from Tilokha, the eldest son of Phul the senior eponym in descent from Siddhu, and the branches of Jind, Badrukhan and Dialpura... This gives us seventeen leading families from this one stock alone. Fortunately the dates of the leading names in the tree up to Jaisal are well ascertained, for Jaisal himself died in 1168. A. D and was succeeded by his eldest son Salbahan (not the great Salbahan), while his second son Hemal (died in 1214), sought his fortunes, in the Punjab and founded the Siddhu tribe, through Siddhu the sixth in descent from him. From whom the ninth is Barar, at which point the Faridkot line breaks off calling themselves Barar, and then twelfth from Barar comes Phul (died in 1652) from who the great families all spring.
- ^ Massy, Charles (1890). Chiefs and Families of Note in the Delhi, Jalandhar, Peshawar and Derajat Divisions of the Panjab. p. 28-29.
The ruling family are of the same stock as those of Patiala and Jind, being Sidhu Jat Sikhs, counting back to the illustrious Phul. The foundations of the house were laid by Hamir Singh, who joined his Sikh brethren in the capture of Sarhand about the middle of the last century, and obtained as his reward the pargana of Amloh.
- ^ Lethbridge, Roper (1893). The Golden Book of India: A Genealogical and Biographical Dictionary of the Ruling Princes, Chiefs, Nobles, and Other Personages, Titled Or Decorated of the Indian Empire. p. 2B (369).
Born in 1843; succeeded to the gadi 9th June 1871. Belongs to the great Sidhu Jat family, known as the Phulkian family, from its founder Phul; which has given ruling families to Patiala, Jind, Nabha, Bhadaur, and other Punjab states. The Raja of Nabha is descended from Tiloka, eldest son of Phul; whose great-grandson, Hamir Singh, founded the town of Nabha in 1755 A.D. He joined the Sikh Chiefs in the great battle of Sirhind, when Zain Khan, the Muhammadan Viceroy, was slain; and established a mint at Nabha, as a mark of independence.
- I would be highly unlikely to trust those sources for statements of fact about geneology, descent, or any other ethnic/race/caste/dynastic related facts - given the time period and biases (cultural as well as literal). Personally I would also exclude the information if they were the only sources available and look for better more modern ones to replace it with. If none are found, I would think a bit harder about if this material is worth including at all. Only in death does duty end (talk) 10:26, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
- Again, it is your job to provide EVIDENCE that these claims are wrong. You clearly ignored the part above that clearly states that the family/genealogy in question would likely only be documented by a "raj source" given the alliance made. I've provided four solid sources that you, like Sitush and Bishonen, have claimed are biased without any basis.
- Also want to add the fact that Sitush made the reversion no less than a minute after the revision was made, which I believe was insufficient time for him to process and analyse the sources rigorously. Even for the most initiated scholars on this matter, it would take them longer than a minute to interpret the claims before reverting. This further suggests that User:Sitush had no interest in doing that, as again it does not fit his narrative. I've now seen him refuse to participate in this discussion and use an abusive administrator User:Bishonen to avoid accountability for his actions.
- Regarding User:Only in death's "support" for Sitush (if one wants to interpret it as that), I've answered this time and time again and it continues to be ignored due to the inconvenience. this "tribe" was allied with the "Raj" as early as the late 1700s, thereby making the documentation and discussion of their history almost exclusively Raj. The continued ignorance around this fact is astounding (as is User:Bishonen's personal attack that got the previous editor banned, and yet he goes unpunished [arguably "lifted" the idea from the original opposing editor]). --unsigned--
I have no comment on the particularly sourced involved, particularly since there seems to be little point looking into the source when others who are more trustworthy have said it isn't and you've made such a flawed claim that there's no reason to think you have any ability to gauge if a source is a reliable.
To elaborate further, I agree with others that plenty of things in wikisource aren't going to be reliable sources. Your claim that the linked page claims all content there are reliable sources is a clear misreading. That page doesn't say all wikisource content are reliable sources, it simply says some stuff is, and one of the purposes of wikisource is to act as a repository for reliable sources where possible.
This is further reaffirmed if you follow the wikisource page Wikisource:Wikisource:For Wikipedians which says "Instead, professional publication is necessary for a work to be added to Wikisource. Wikisource also hosts source documents of historical importance, regardless of publication history". Neither of these criteria are enough to make something a reliable source, nor is there any other criterion which requires something is a reliable source for wikipedia.
(Which would mean they have to defer to discussions here on deciding whether something can be included. And makes no sense anyway since there are multiple wikipedias each with their own ultimately unique definition of reliable sources and while the en.wikisource is mostly likely to be used by en.wikipedia, it could also be used by simple or any other language wikipedia so if you they were to bar stuff based solely on it not being a reliable source on en.wikipedia, they might be excluding stuff which will be acceptable at other wikipedias. And as mentioned by others, even here 'reliable source' isn't a binary. Maybe a source or parts of a source are suitable for some things but not for others.)
Therefore wikisource itself is saying that not everything there is a reliable source. And while you can't necessarily trust them if they say that everything is a reliable source, it's definitely wise to trust them when they say, with good reasons, that not everything there is a reliable source.
- I can't imagine any way that the Imperial Gazetteer remotely qualifies as a neutral, third-party source, when you consider that the British had a very strong agenda and POV that they were pushing. First Light (talk) 04:00, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
- The sources are questionable for a reason. A highly biased point of view is most likely present within British sources during this time period in that region of the world. I recommend using more modern academic journal articles and more modern academic books pertaining to this topic. Otherwise you have to gain consensus for using these sources, and so far that has not happened. Also, Wikisource is not generally a reliable source but is a repository for original published works of years past. If you could find other unbiased sources that say what is of value, or what is accurate, within the sources you presented- that might work. I suppose using Wikisource material is possible, if the information is not dated and no bias is present. There are probably other useful applications of Wikisource material, but it depends on the material and the reason for its use in an article. Why has it been accepted in other articles is WP:OTHERSTUFF by the way. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 06:30, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
- I know that WP:HISTRS still unfortunately only has the status of an essay, but quite a lot of work went into it from editors interested in history, including professional researchers and historians. All works of history written before 1945 have to be treated with great caution because they are often biased with nationalist and ethnic assumptions. That is not being disrespectful to their authors. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:07, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
- Reliable in principle, but on a case by case basis when applied to particular content. I think there have been far too many racial and cultural stereotypes and biases on open display here. The administrators of British India required accurate honest data and facts about those it ruled for it to function, it did not require propaganda or data massaged to fit alleged biases. It also had the self-confidence to feel it had no need for the production of such propaganda. In addition, the study of both contemporary and historical events from a viewpoint free from nationalistic or ethnic assumptions or biases was pioneered in Britain (though this standard has still not reached many corners of the world - in many countries, including India today, history is deemed to be subservient to national interests and requires rewriting and editing whenever it disagrees with that national interest). 19th-century British derived sources are likely to be more reliable than any other 19th-century sources. The kneejerk dismissal of this source as "Raj source" has no credible argument behind it - it is just editors expressing their political or cultural biases. However, it is always better to use more recent rs sources since they may have access to more source materials or new discoveries or be written in the light of newer writings. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 17:33, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
- But the information was not reliable. That's why they got into such a mess. For examples, see Census of India prior to independence, James Tod, H. H. Risley etc. The Brits were duped, usually by Brahmins and other high-caste groups (or groups claiming a high caste). They even believed tripe such as about Rani Padmini, which belief subsequently turned folklore into "truth" and has resonated in India with riots as late as this week. - Sitush (talk) 17:44, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
- The problem with the Raj sources is endemic and indeed systematic. They got the wrong end of the stick in so many ways, right from the beginning, and persisted in their notions. The only way they can be deemed reliable is if a modern academic cites them for a specific point and in that event we wouldn't need the older source anyway. - Sitush (talk) 17:52, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
- User:Tiptoethrutheminefield, I think that for most of us who have been pointing out the non-neutrality and non-third-party relationship of the British in India, there is no "racial or cultural stereotype." We are simply pointing out an important Wikipedia policy and its application in this instance. In fact, some of my best friends are British :-). This WP policy would certainly explain one reason why the Imperial Gazetteer has been shown to be so unreliable — and thus why it's such an important policy for reliable sourcing. Sitush alludes to another RS policy explanation for why the Gazetteer is unreliable — not all of it was compiled and written by experts in history, race, and census-taking, so they were easily duped. First Light (talk) 04:36, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
Are there people here who aren't signing their statements, or is half the above thread just really weirdly indented? It's hard to follow. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:44, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
- Both. Plus the OP has been blocked. And then it forked off into whether Wikisource is a Reliable Source, even though it's just "The Free Library." A bit like asking if a library is a reliable source. Now it's back to whether The Imperial Gazetteer is a reliable source, with a minor sidetrack of accusations of political and cultural bias. Just trying to save you some time and eyestrain. :-) First Light (talk) 11:21, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
- In this case no, its not reliable for statements of fact (which is what the IP wants to use it for) due to its historical bias given the circumstances at the time. This does not make it 'unreliable' in totality, it could be useful for current events (at the time) happening and so on, but any editorial content is hopelessly skewed by the historical situation. Its certainly not useful itself for historical (even to the 19th century) geneological/ethnic issues other than as a primary source 'this is what the people who wrote the Imperial Gazetter thought'. That itself may be useful to modern historians who want to analyse the mood/prevailing thought of the time, which is why we would cite a modern historian. Sitush has said it in deeper detail previously, so perhaps the history wikiprojects could get him to write a guideline specific to Raj-era source use. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:09, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
- Alleging "bias given the circumstances at the time" is just another example of the editor biases I am objecting to here. If you are going to allege this you need to be specific, cite sources that specify what "bias" and what "circumstances" and what "time", not just vague statements containing generalities based on your cultural stereotypes. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 15:15, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
- So, did you read the articles that I mentioned? Eg: Risley's obsession with scientific racism, Tod's obsession with Rajput fairytales, or Indian suspicion about British data gathering and their desire to manipulate such gathering to improve their position? I feel sure we have had this discussion before somewhere, Tiptoethrutheminefield - has anything changed? - Sitush (talk) 19:55, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
- Articles you mentioned? All you did was make some wikilinks. Wikipeda articles do not count as sources or as sources for opinions on sources. Nor do your personal claims of "obsession" - a word beloved by tabloid-newspapers since it implies incorrect behavior or views without having to bother to detail any hard evidence. Rather like many of the opinions in this thread. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 02:57, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
- More importantly, you have detailed NOTHING that would justify a blanket ban on this source. Where are your sources condemning the accuracy or veracity of The Imperial Gazetteer of India or of its editor William Wilson Hunter? I think what we have here so far are nothing more substantial than editors' personal prejudices and ideology. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 03:08, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
- The articles have the sources and plenty of people have weighed-in here. You just don't like it and, as Only In Death intimates in their comment of 16:58, 7 February 2017, it might be simpler just to ignore your opinion in future because it is so out of kilter as to be merely a time-sink. - Sitush (talk) 06:15, 8 February 2017 (UTC)
- More importantly, you have detailed NOTHING that would justify a blanket ban on this source. Where are your sources condemning the accuracy or veracity of The Imperial Gazetteer of India or of its editor William Wilson Hunter? I think what we have here so far are nothing more substantial than editors' personal prejudices and ideology. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 03:08, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
- Articles you mentioned? All you did was make some wikilinks. Wikipeda articles do not count as sources or as sources for opinions on sources. Nor do your personal claims of "obsession" - a word beloved by tabloid-newspapers since it implies incorrect behavior or views without having to bother to detail any hard evidence. Rather like many of the opinions in this thread. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 02:57, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
- Ah, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dasti (tribe) was one such discussion, although I think there may be others. You were on the wrong side of consensus then and, seemingly, now. There comes a point when even you have to accept consensus, otherwise we'll just keep on reinventing this wheel. - Sitush (talk) 20:07, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
- Tiptoethrutheminefield, It's clear that this Gazetteer is not a reliable source for statements of fact, particularly regarding history, census numbers, and caste (geography, maybe, but I'm only guessing). Whatever the underlying reason for the problem — naiveté, written by non-experts, cultural/religious/racial bias, or the desire to present a POV to enforce government rule — is an interesting subject, but the bottom line is "not reliable." First Light (talk) 03:11, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- Frankly Tiptoe, to educate you on Indian & British Imperial history to explain the socio-political issues would take far too long and I highly doubt you would change your mind anyway. If you do not already by your own research understand why the Gazetter is not a reliable source for many statements of fact, there is little benefit to further discussion. Only in death does duty end (talk) 16:58, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
- I see little in your editing history that qualifies you to be "educating" anyone on history-related subjects. Your editing reveals little interest in history in general - you seem to mainly frequent noticeboards. In contrast to you, most of my editing here concerns addressing problems associated with the manipulation and distortion of history for political aims. Contemporary India stinks of that problem. There, history is now required to do what contemporary Hindu extremist ideology dictates. I suspect that the desire to blanket-exclude this source is grounded in a desire to exclude all sources from an era that is off-message for the extremist ideologies that are now rampant in India. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 17:49, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Literally no one has suggested blanket-excluding the source. Are you having problem reading? Only in death does duty end (talk) 17:58, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- I see little in your editing history that qualifies you to be "educating" anyone on history-related subjects. Your editing reveals little interest in history in general - you seem to mainly frequent noticeboards. In contrast to you, most of my editing here concerns addressing problems associated with the manipulation and distortion of history for political aims. Contemporary India stinks of that problem. There, history is now required to do what contemporary Hindu extremist ideology dictates. I suspect that the desire to blanket-exclude this source is grounded in a desire to exclude all sources from an era that is off-message for the extremist ideologies that are now rampant in India. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 17:49, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- So, did you read the articles that I mentioned? Eg: Risley's obsession with scientific racism, Tod's obsession with Rajput fairytales, or Indian suspicion about British data gathering and their desire to manipulate such gathering to improve their position? I feel sure we have had this discussion before somewhere, Tiptoethrutheminefield - has anything changed? - Sitush (talk) 19:55, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
- Alleging "bias given the circumstances at the time" is just another example of the editor biases I am objecting to here. If you are going to allege this you need to be specific, cite sources that specify what "bias" and what "circumstances" and what "time", not just vague statements containing generalities based on your cultural stereotypes. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 15:15, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
- In this case no, its not reliable for statements of fact (which is what the IP wants to use it for) due to its historical bias given the circumstances at the time. This does not make it 'unreliable' in totality, it could be useful for current events (at the time) happening and so on, but any editorial content is hopelessly skewed by the historical situation. Its certainly not useful itself for historical (even to the 19th century) geneological/ethnic issues other than as a primary source 'this is what the people who wrote the Imperial Gazetter thought'. That itself may be useful to modern historians who want to analyse the mood/prevailing thought of the time, which is why we would cite a modern historian. Sitush has said it in deeper detail previously, so perhaps the history wikiprojects could get him to write a guideline specific to Raj-era source use. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:09, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
- I think Only in death has pretty much said what I was thinking (not in the comment immediately preceding this, but much further above). Nevertheless, I would appreciate a link to a discussion or decision that establishes that existing consensus is indeed that "Raj sources" are not reliable. It seems remarkably broad-brush – I would imagine that some of them are reliable for some purposes --Andreas Philopater (talk) 23:33, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Specifically on the issue of the Imperial Gazetteer, I can see why it would not serve as a source of history or anthropology, but would imagine it reliable enough for Presidencies and provinces of British India, or for articles about postal services or railways or other infrastructure of its own time. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 23:36, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I agree with this. Blanket removal of sources just because they were written by British people about India between 1600 and 1947 is very unconstructive. So-called "Raj sources" would be more reliable than others in the administrative structure and the relations the British authorities had with other states, for example. --Joshua Issac (talk) 16:41, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- No-one has said that they're unreliable for everything. There are exceptions and you will note that I have edited articles and left them in (including, I think, the one that you link). Common sense is all it takes. Broadly speaking, I remove them for history and social issues but not, for example, for basic governance matters that were contemporaneous with their publication. You will note that my user page screed linked way, way above relates to "Caste sources". - Sitush (talk) 13:23, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
Milosevic trial
There's been a long-running dispute on the Slobodan Milosevic trial page, currently at the 3RR board, about including information from the ICTY ruling in a separate case, in which reference was made to the former Yugoslav presidents role in the Bosnian war. Basically one editor is insisting not only that the court judgment in the case of Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic (a primary source) be included but that what it says justifies the Milosevic trial page, including the lead, stating that there is no evidence Milosevic committed war crimes. Per this section on the talk page, the judgment simply doesn't say that.
The question is two-fold really:
- Is the ICTY judgment a reliable source for the page at all? I guess it stands generally as reliable, but it is as noted about a different case.
- Does the phrasing preferred by User:JamesJohnson2 accurately reflect the source material?
This could just as easily go to the NOR noticeboard I guess, but it seems to fit here too, as we do have a source. N-HH talk/edits 12:29, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
- No and No. A primary source in itself is not forbidden, but it must be used with care, and it should relate directly to the subject, which is not the case here. Secondly, the ICTY document says there was not sufficient evidence presented in that case that Milosevic agreed with that specific plan. This falls far, far short of saying there was no evidence overall he committed war crimes overall during the war. --Dailycare (talk) 09:59, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- the phrasing linked is not supported by the source. Jytdog (talk) 02:38, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Not beyond the quote and 100% No. I suppose you could rephrase the quote to 'cleared in this specific case ', but it is complete misrepresentation to say that the findings were 'no evidence of war crimes'. Pincrete (talk) 15:14, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
Friends of the Article V Convention
Source [2]
Article List of state applications for an Article V Convention
Content Any part of the page above that is reliant on this source.
I'm very troubled by the quality of this source. Also, the WP article seems almost as if it is an extension of their site! Please let me know what you think and correct me if I'm mistaken.Calexit (talk) 19:56, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- I have no proof, but the referenced web page/site seems to be produced by one person. If there isn't at least one other reference for some of the claims made in the Wikipedia page, I'd consider cautiously trimming it to see what happens. Explain your actions on the Article's talk page. I'll put a watch on the article.--Jim in Georgia Contribs Talk 00:56, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
On "fact-checking"
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I commend editors who believe that major newspapers are paragons of accuracy to examine:
- http://rrj.ca/a-checkered-present/ from 1999.
- http://articles.baltimoresun.com/keyword/newsweek Newsweek dismantled its fact-checking staff in 1996.
- https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2016/02/14/you-cant-have-a-healthy-democracy-without-well-informed-citizens-honderich.html Do not expect Google or Facebook to fact check anything.
- https://www.chapman.edu/law/_files/publications/CLR-11-davidanderson-lillianbevier-caroldarr-eugenevolokh-johnleo.pdf "Nor is it helpful to try to distinguish blogs on the grounds that they aren’t edited or fact-checked, and are thus more likely to be inaccurate. To begin with, many op-eds and newspaper columns are at most lightly edited and fact-checked, if that much. Some magazines maintain professional fact-checking staff, but most newspapers don’t."
- http://www.designnine.com/news/content/news-downsizing-affects-reliability "The larger point made by Smerconish is that the pranksters behind the hoax got away with it in part because downsized news organization no longer have the staff to check this kind of stuff. In the "old days," newspapers particularly had a fact checking staff that made sure that what reporters put in their articles was actually true. "
In short, "fact checkers" other than the political ones who surface every four years, are almost extinct. Collect (talk) 17:32, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
I commend editors who believe that major newspapers are paragons of accuracy
If I ever meet any, I will let them know that you think highly of them.- To be clear: Are you contending (which may have been the word you were looking for, but still isn't quite the right word for that usage. I would suggest "challenge" as the most appropriate word.) that the mainstream media is unreliable, or that all media is unreliable? Neither contention is in line with WP policies and norms, but I want to be sure I understand what you're getting at. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 17:42, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- Try Merriam-Webster "to recommend as worthy of confidence or notice". I am pretty good at English after all these years. Really. Is there a reason you wished to interpolate a quite different word and meaning? Collect (talk) 17:58, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- Your syntax is still very unclear for usage in that sense (it would have been better to phrase it "To editors who believe that major newspapers are paragons of accuracy, I commend you to examine:"). But it doesn't really matter because I obviously understood what you meant. I asked you a question, do you intend to answer it? ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 19:03, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- I trust my syntax was, in fact, both clear and correct. In fact, your odd suggestion of starting with a prepositional phrase is rather odd. I had a mom who was a Latin teacher, and went through four years of Latin, including a half year of Greek, as well as French and German. I stated, and iterate, that there exist absolutely no genuine "reliable sources" for "Celebrity Gossip" which I favour allowing for BLP article. Nor do I believe that headlines are an integral part of any newspaper article, reliably conveying the context of such article. Collect (talk) 20:53, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- For the most part, I have to agree that celebrity gossip material probably shouldn't ever be aloud in a BLP. The one exception I can imagine is if the subject of the gossip in some way draws attention to it by very publicly addressing it to such a degree that the whole matter becomes significant enough for inclusion. I'm thinking particularly here of maybe lawsuits or similar, when it might be reasonable to allow quotes from the gossip piece if those quotes are directly relevant to the lawsuit or whatever. I also tend to agree that, with maybe a few exceptions, like "Dewey defeats Truman" and others of that type which clearly summarize the content, headlines are often not the best sources. Also, I suppose, maybe, from what I remember, article writers don't always choose the headlines, so ascribing a headline to the writer of the article might be potentially problematic. John Carter (talk) 21:25, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
In fact, your odd suggestion of starting with a prepositional phrase is rather odd.
It was the only way to make your bizarre word choice make sense, syntactically. The way you phrased it, it's the editors you're commending, not the examination. Even though you clearly meant the examination. I think perhaps you should not rely on your mother's command of Latin, French and German syntax to inform your use of English syntax.I stated, and iterate, that there exist absolutely no genuine "reliable sources" for "Celebrity Gossip" which I favour allowing for BLP article.
You iterated, eh? I'd like to see where you repeated yourself even once, let alone enough to call it iteration. But that's beside the point. Could you quote the part where you mentioned celebrity gossip in the OP? I've read it a dozen times and the phrase (or any synonymous phrase) continues to elude me. It must be my comprehension difficulties. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 21:39, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- I trust my syntax was, in fact, both clear and correct. In fact, your odd suggestion of starting with a prepositional phrase is rather odd. I had a mom who was a Latin teacher, and went through four years of Latin, including a half year of Greek, as well as French and German. I stated, and iterate, that there exist absolutely no genuine "reliable sources" for "Celebrity Gossip" which I favour allowing for BLP article. Nor do I believe that headlines are an integral part of any newspaper article, reliably conveying the context of such article. Collect (talk) 20:53, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- (e-c) I think most of us know already major newspapers can be flawed, to put it mildly. Janet Cooke and Jayson Blair come to mind quite quickly. I've been involved in a few other "discussions" (again, being mild) here about some newspaper articles which facts indicate are flat out wrong as well. Unfortunately, except in a few cases where we know the sources are problematic, we here will have some difficulties in trying to determine exactly which generally reliable newspapers are and are not reliable in any particular instances. Except in those cases where the sources are discussed here or elsewhere at length, I think we do have to kind of "default" to accepting them for material of a breaking news type, and, unfortunately, we have to my eyes altogether too much of that here.
- I remember that early editions of Encyclopedia Britannica didn't include any articles on living people. I kind of wistfully wish we were able to do the same here, but I can't believe that will ever happen. John Carter (talk) 19:05, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- That pretty much sums up my thoughts. I have no doubt there are tons of factual errors in each day's news. But the news (specifically, the highly reputable, mainstream news) still remains the most trustworthy source for the news which we have. I'm not sure if I agree or not with your sentiments about BLPs, but it doesn't seem to be difficult to make a case for their exclusion. (I imagine the same could be said of current events.) ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 19:12, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- Sigh. Is Collect still pushing this garbage reframing? Daily newspapers don't have -- and, as far as I know, never really have had -- dedicated factcheckers. By the very nature of their publishing deadlines. it's not practical: a newspaper reporter is assumed responsible for the accuracy of reporting, backstopped by desk editors and copy editors. Awhile back, Collect made the breathlessly silly assertion that the New York Times "had laid off all of their factcheckers" -- something, again, they never had -- and just to confirm I ran it past an actual New York Times reporter I know. He agreed with me that the statement was, indeed, bullshit.
- But then again, Collect has a history of playing games with sources when it suits him, for which he was sanctioned.
- I assume that this is yet another around his topic ban, or at least stir up doubt around inconvenient political facts. --Calton | Talk 14:39, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- That pretty much sums up my thoughts. I have no doubt there are tons of factual errors in each day's news. But the news (specifically, the highly reputable, mainstream news) still remains the most trustworthy source for the news which we have. I'm not sure if I agree or not with your sentiments about BLPs, but it doesn't seem to be difficult to make a case for their exclusion. (I imagine the same could be said of current events.) ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 19:12, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- Your syntax is still very unclear for usage in that sense (it would have been better to phrase it "To editors who believe that major newspapers are paragons of accuracy, I commend you to examine:"). But it doesn't really matter because I obviously understood what you meant. I asked you a question, do you intend to answer it? ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 19:03, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- Try Merriam-Webster "to recommend as worthy of confidence or notice". I am pretty good at English after all these years. Really. Is there a reason you wished to interpolate a quite different word and meaning? Collect (talk) 17:58, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- Perhaps you fail to understand what NO PERSONAL ATTACKS means? The New York Times, for example absolutely did have fact checkers - so your cavil that "'Daily newspapers don't have -- and, as far as I know, never really have had -- dedicated factcheckers" is absurd. In fact, we refer to having fact checkers as something which is good for a "reliable source." Your "actual reporter" was likely not around in the 70s when the NYT still had them. Was he there back then? Or is this aside pure BS. Your commentary here has less than nothing whatsoever to do with actual discussion, and is purely an attack. Collect (talk) 16:50, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I agree that the commentary above constitutes a personal attack and should be struck. I also content that when one claims to represent what another has said or written and uses quotation marks to indicate this, that the bit enclosed in quotation marks actually be a quotation. The purported quote "No newspaper ever had fact checkers" does not appear in the comment above. Indeed, the version there is more nuanced and generalized: "Daily newspapers don't have -- and, as far as I know, never really have had -- dedicated factcheckers." and is not the explicit, unambiguous claim of fact which was responded to. It is both more specific ("Daily newspaper" vs "No newspapers") and left open as a heuristic (via the use of the adjective "really"). ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 17:46, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I fixed the quote to be exact. The word "never" is in the original. Regret the Error should be read, by the way. The NYT and most dailies did in fact use proofreaders and fact checking, so "never" seems a reach indeed. My uncle worked for newspapers, my grandfather owned a newspaper, my cousins owned several newspapers, and one cousin was an executive at the NYT. Collect (talk) 21:58, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
The word "never" is in the original.
Yes, and it's part of the expression "never really" which we both damn well know means something very different than "never". But regardless, the thing you don't seem to understand is that your railings against the mainstream media are falling on deaf ears. I've asked you directly about this only for you to ignore the question, but I've noticed you have never said anything to indicate that you include the 'alternative media' in your assessment (indeed, you seem to specifically exclude it through your selection of examples), and despite all your railings, you have explicitly endorsed at least one (mainstream, in case you weren't aware) right wing bastion of yellow journalism. So I'm forced to look at what makes that outlet different, and can only conclude that it is the political leanings that make the difference for you.- So the one part of Calton's post that I don't take issue with is the suggestion that this is your way of pushing your political ideology without violating your topic ban. Which is fine enough, I suppose (I wouldn't argue that you should be sanctioned for it), except that you've -frankly- made quite a mockery of your own argument with your rhetoric and syntax. Of course, I'm open the possibility that we're currently experiencing a recession of news media reliability. Even ignoring the issue of fake news, it seems to me like it wouldn't be too hard to make the case that the media in general is unreliable now. Or at least is much less reliable than it used to be in the mid-to-late 20th century. It seems a viable hypothesis to me, though not one to which I currently subscribe.
- But you're not making that case. Not even close. You're only making the case that people who believe that aren't good judges of reliability. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 13:45, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- I fixed the quote to be exact. The word "never" is in the original. Regret the Error should be read, by the way. The NYT and most dailies did in fact use proofreaders and fact checking, so "never" seems a reach indeed. My uncle worked for newspapers, my grandfather owned a newspaper, my cousins owned several newspapers, and one cousin was an executive at the NYT. Collect (talk) 21:58, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I agree that the commentary above constitutes a personal attack and should be struck. I also content that when one claims to represent what another has said or written and uses quotation marks to indicate this, that the bit enclosed in quotation marks actually be a quotation. The purported quote "No newspaper ever had fact checkers" does not appear in the comment above. Indeed, the version there is more nuanced and generalized: "Daily newspapers don't have -- and, as far as I know, never really have had -- dedicated factcheckers." and is not the explicit, unambiguous claim of fact which was responded to. It is both more specific ("Daily newspaper" vs "No newspapers") and left open as a heuristic (via the use of the adjective "really"). ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 17:46, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Perhaps you fail to understand what NO PERSONAL ATTACKS means? The New York Times, for example absolutely did have fact checkers - so your cavil that "'Daily newspapers don't have -- and, as far as I know, never really have had -- dedicated factcheckers" is absurd. In fact, we refer to having fact checkers as something which is good for a "reliable source." Your "actual reporter" was likely not around in the 70s when the NYT still had them. Was he there back then? Or is this aside pure BS. Your commentary here has less than nothing whatsoever to do with actual discussion, and is purely an attack. Collect (talk) 16:50, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
Comment Is there a question here somewhere? Pincrete (talk) 15:28, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- No, just railing about mainstream media, attempts to call out the failings in the logic and the odd personal attack. I think this thread needs to be closed. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 17:04, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
Material sourced to Daily Mail in "St Paul's Survives"
In response to the close of the Daily Mail RFC I have been "encouraged to review" our article on St Paul's Survives to "remove/replace [citations to the Daily Mail] as appropriate". I think it would be helpful to sound out what is appropriate in this case. The DM sourcing seems to be: (1) to attribute the photograph discussed which is hosted at File:Stpaulsblitz.jpg with a non-free use claim. (2) A statement by Herbert Mason, the photographer, in DM. (3) An article by Max Hastings sourced to dailymail.co.uk in 2010.[3] What removal or replacement is required? An alternative source of reference might be Blitz on Britain although that is authored by "Daily Mail" but published by Transatlantic Press, ISBN 978-1907176715.[4] Is this publisher a reliable source and, given the authorship, this book itself? Thincat (talk) 09:19, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I would consider citing the Daily Mail for a quote from an article subject, or someone closely related to the article subject, would fall under exceptional circumstances. I don't think there was any belief in the RFC that the Daily Mail fabricates interviews. No comment on the rest. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:37, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'd be wary of removing the Max Hastings material. He's a pretty well-known and respected writer who's written multiple books about the Second World War. He is a regular contributor to the Mail, and the paper is unlikely to have fabricated his columns. He's a good source, and the Mail in turn is a good source for what he says. (and this of course shows why this issue is not as black and white as the RfC tried to paint it) N-HH talk/edits 09:49, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- You are free to have the opinion that this issue is not as black and white as the RfC tried to paint it, but the five experienced and uninvolved administrators who are listed in the closing comments do not agree with your opinion. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:14, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Well no, they summarised the consensus, which was indeed probably in favour of a blanket, or near-blanket, ban (while also noting that there were indeed cases where it might be appropriate to use of course). Neither administrators nor RfC contributors are infallible – nor do they claim to be. I happily stand by my opinion that most of the latter, including those who declared "kill it with fire", have called this wrong, and even more so that this example shows the issue was indeed not so black and white. I don't see how any rational person could come to any other conclusion, but whatever. Even you don't seem to disagree in fact, in the context of this example. N-HH talk/edits 19:05, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- You are free to have the opinion that this issue is not as black and white as the RfC tried to paint it, but the five experienced and uninvolved administrators who are listed in the closing comments do not agree with your opinion. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:14, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- (EC) Actually numerous examples were in the RFC about the Daily Mail directly falsifying quotes from people (to Amanda Knox for an example) and was a significant reason for objecting to it, but thats largely irrelevant here. However this would be a case where Max Hastings reputation supersedes the Daily Mail's. Were Hastings to have written this content *anywhere* even on a blog it would likely be useable given his status and published works on WW2. Also given the subject of the article is a photo taken by the Daily Mail staff photographer, its not unusual to expect them to have information on it (albeit possibly with a slight bias - not that I am saying that exists here, but it wouldnt be unexpected). Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:53, 9 February 2017 (UTC) Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:53, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes, from third parties with no direct relationship to the paper (like lots of papers have been caught doing). I am well aware of that. But as I explicitly pointed out, Hastings is a regular contributor, so the context is entirely different. N-HH talk/edits 10:01, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Sorry I was in the middle of expanding my comment which largely agrees with you. Only in death does duty end (talk) 10:04, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I Strongly disagree with the statement "I don't think there was any belief in the RFC that the Daily Mail fabricates interviews" The Daily Mail fabricated interviews, direct quotes, photos, and entire articles. Any argument that boils down to "I don't think TDM lied this time because..." goes against the result of the RfC. On the other hand...
- I Strongly agree with the conclusion that Max Hastings reputation supersedes the Daily Mail's and that we can use something he writes even if he wrote it in The Daily Mail or on a personal blog. I could buy a theory that TDM fabricated a Max Hastings column (they can't be trusted for anything) but I cannot buy a theory that TDM fabricated a Max Hastings column and Max Hastings has stayed silent about it for seven years. So I say retain, based solely upon the reputation of Max Hastings. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:09, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Is this what you intended with your "Kill it. Kill it with fire Under NO circumstances should the Daily Mail be used for anything, ever." !vote or have you changed your mind? Thincat (talk) 13:17, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I have not changed my opinion in any way. Perhaps you are under the mistaken impression that when someone on the reliable sources noticeboard ask whether a source may be used for a particular purpose I will respond by express my opinion. Wrong. When you asked whether a source may be used for a particular purpose I respond by explaining what the result of the RfC was as defined by the closing statement, countersigned by five uninvolved administrators. I would have given the same answer even if my personal opinion was that using TDM is fine. "I will abide by the result of the RfC and advise other to do the same" and "I agree with the result of the RfC" are completely different concepts. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:02, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Is this what you intended with your "Kill it. Kill it with fire Under NO circumstances should the Daily Mail be used for anything, ever." !vote or have you changed your mind? Thincat (talk) 13:17, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I mentioned Max Hastings among others during the RfC discussion, I regret that the supporters didn't say anything at the time, he was not excluded from the ban. By the way, I don't see all five of the countersigner names in the list of administrators. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 16:09, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Primefac, Jo-Jo Eumerus and I are administrators, Tazerdadog and Sunrise are not. Per this 2012 RFC, there is no requirement that RFCs be closed only by admins; non-admin closures carry equal weight. Yunshui 雲水 16:20, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yunshui, I know that, I added my comment because Guy Macon made a false claim that the five countersigners are uninvolved administrators. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 16:28, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Fair enough, but I would interpret the statement less as a deliberate falsehood and more of a misunderstanding (I generally assume RFC closers are admins). Either way, it's not particularly relevant to the discussion itself. Primefac (talk) 16:57, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I simply made an error by assuming without checking. I apologize for the error. I will now start saying "five uninvolved editors" instead. The main effect is to make any challenge slightly more likely to succeed, but have not seen anyone actually challeng the close, so it is a moot point. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:29, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Fair enough, but I would interpret the statement less as a deliberate falsehood and more of a misunderstanding (I generally assume RFC closers are admins). Either way, it's not particularly relevant to the discussion itself. Primefac (talk) 16:57, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yunshui, I know that, I added my comment because Guy Macon made a false claim that the five countersigners are uninvolved administrators. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 16:28, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Primefac, Jo-Jo Eumerus and I are administrators, Tazerdadog and Sunrise are not. Per this 2012 RFC, there is no requirement that RFCs be closed only by admins; non-admin closures carry equal weight. Yunshui 雲水 16:20, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Sorry I was in the middle of expanding my comment which largely agrees with you. Only in death does duty end (talk) 10:04, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes, from third parties with no direct relationship to the paper (like lots of papers have been caught doing). I am well aware of that. But as I explicitly pointed out, Hastings is a regular contributor, so the context is entirely different. N-HH talk/edits 10:01, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'd be wary of removing the Max Hastings material. He's a pretty well-known and respected writer who's written multiple books about the Second World War. He is a regular contributor to the Mail, and the paper is unlikely to have fabricated his columns. He's a good source, and the Mail in turn is a good source for what he says. (and this of course shows why this issue is not as black and white as the RfC tried to paint it) N-HH talk/edits 09:49, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Part of the conclusion of the RFC was that the Daily Mail was more accurate in the past and that it could be cited as a primary source when the Daily Mail itself is the subject of discussion ("The Daily Mail may have been more reliable historically, and it could make sense to cite it as a primary source if it is the subject of discussion.") An interview from 1940 about an incident involving a Daily Mail reporter clearly falls under both exceptions. --Aquillion (talk) 21:10, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
Original poster here. Since this particular topic has now gone quiet and no changes have been made to the article or the corresponding file, I'll say what my take is on this. No one has suggested that any of the references to the Daily Mail should be removed or replaced and some people have suggested that some references should not be removed. It seems in at least one case the person is replying in a way they consider is indicated by the close of the RFC rather than their personal opinion. Thank you everyone very much. If there are further comments I shall still be keeping an eye open here. Thincat (talk) 21:24, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Good idea. I can't see any particular reason why this material shouldn't be used. The RFC does, after all, allow for exceptions. The Land (talk) 22:14, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
Have we boycotted a mainstream news outlet before?
Before this recent Daily Mail thing? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 16:23, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- No. Not as far as I can tell - not even Bolivarian Venezuelan "media." Collect (talk) 16:37, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Thank you, Collect. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 16:56, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Collect - I have removed TeleSUR cites and other such propaganda outlets before, as have other editors, because of their lack of reliability. Neutralitytalk 18:01, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Individual editors selectively removing specific misinformation cited to certain publications is not a site-wide instituted boycott. Softlavender (talk) 18:10, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- What evidence is there that the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday are mainstream? On medicine and science topics they're very much WP:FRINGE. . . dave souza, talk 16:39, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- It is a member of the Independent Press Standards Organisation and belonged to its earlier incarnations. An article in The Guardian credits IPSO membership for the Daily Mail publishing a retraction. Books about newspapers in the UK typically mention it as a "middle market" newspaper (along with the Express), ranking mid-way between the quality broadsheets and the popular tabloids. See a circulation chart of national newspapers including The Mail.[5] Generally scientists and medical practitioners do not use daily newspapers for their information, and they should not be used for medicine, science or articles about any other academic discipline except in exceptional circumstances. TFD (talk) 17:20, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Whether of not it is mainstream, it fabricates material. It certainly is one of the largest (is it the largest?) sources we have decided are unreliable for any use (which means it can still be used in situations where blogs, tweets, and other unreliable sources can be used). "Boycott" isn't the right word. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:52, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- All mainstream sources publish stories that turn out not to be true. Sunday Times and the Hitler diaries, the New York Times and Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, all U.S. cable news and Sanders supporters throwing chairs at the Nevada convention. The Daily Mail is the first and only publication we have decided is unreliable for any use. TFD (talk) 18:55, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Whether of not it is mainstream, it fabricates material. It certainly is one of the largest (is it the largest?) sources we have decided are unreliable for any use (which means it can still be used in situations where blogs, tweets, and other unreliable sources can be used). "Boycott" isn't the right word. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:52, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Daily Mail is a 120-year-old middle-market newspaper and the second biggest-selling daily newspaper in the UK. Of course it's mainstream. One doesn't have to like, agree with, or even generally trust a publication for it to be mainstream. Fox News is mainstream; that doesn't mean I generally watch or cite it, but I have cited it at least once (interview with a financial leader in Davos). -- Softlavender (talk) 18:07, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- BTW, Softlavender, I saw your comments in the RfC (someone posted the Guardian article on Facebook). I may not have been able to see all the nuances on my tiny screen, though. I agree with you at least in spirit to some extent, but the documented blunders in the DM seem to have won the day for the opposition. I'm not as much a crusader against the DM like John is, but I also remove it when I run into it in BLPs. Drmies (talk) 18:22, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- And right after commenting here I go to Recent changes, and run into this edit. Drmies (talk) 18:24, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Daily Mail story says, "Not since Dick Whittington has a cat caused such a stir for a Lord Mayor....Police were called to investigate a complaint of alleged offensive behaviour against his third wife Lin, who has also been branded a 'slut'.[6]
- The Evening Standard story says, "NOT since Dick Whittington has a cat caused such a stir for a Lord Mayor....Police were called to investigate a complaint of alleged offensive behaviour against his third wife Lin, who has also been branded a "slut"."
- I commented at the RfC, "It would be wasteful to change all the references to the Daily Express, which is almost identical to the DM and find it is banned as well. [07:02, 24 January 2017] The closing administrators replied, "Singling out one source does not deal with the other poor sources that are currently permitted. This point is outside the scope of this RFC." The broadsheets are unlikely to carry this story.
- TFD (talk) 19:12, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
Not that I am aware, but maybe we should start.Slatersteven (talk) 19:02, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- And that edit on the Ian Luder page highlighted by Drmies shows exactly the problem here. The Standard (which is part-owned by the same publisher as the Mail, and was wholly owned by them at the time of the cited report) is no better a paper or source than the Mail. On top of that, both articles seem to be pretty much the same copy (quite possibly a PA file originally, or a shared piece) simply reposted by each site but with a few changes/additions. I'm not sure a lot of people who have weighed in here recently and/or who think this kind of change solves any problems (and there are real problems, I accept that) understand how the media actually works. N-HH talk/edits 19:15, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- we cannot legislate clue. Yes some people are going to just swap some other low-quality source for the Daily Mail instead of removing the content as it has no sourcing in high quality sources (for good reason). Just part of the larger struggle between folks aiming for a high quality encyclopedia conveying accepted knowledge and folks abusing WP to transmit gossip or grind some axe. In the big encyclopedia context, it is trivia and gossip that Luder got into a dispute with his neighbors about some cat. WP:NOTGOSSIP. Jytdog (talk) 19:28, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Agreed. But that's why this approach fails. Sometimes, very occasionally, the Mail will be OK; sometimes other sources are just as bad, in terms of the things they cover and the way they approach them. You could argue this is a first step in dealing with that wider problem but there were other, broader ways of doing that – not least by enforcing existing rules a bit more consistently – and, as noted, kicking this off with a move based on animus towards the Mail alone has already led us, per the below, to people asking for barring other sources that people happen to dislike. N-HH talk/edits 20:01, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Can we deal with Ma'an News next? They routinely post false stories, never retract errors and in general has no fact checking as other sources have. Sir Joseph (talk) 19:33, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- ... and the The Independent[7] (as reported by The Guardian) but they did apologize.[8] I would be able to claim that all UK papers are unreliable but that would be my OR because my cite is to an unreliable source.[9] Thincat (talk) 20:01, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Jytdog, when you say that Wikipedia should not cover information that only appear in tabloids, while that does not exclude banning sources, it requires changes to RS policy and notablity. True crime stories get little coverage in UK broadsheets, but are covered in tabloids. TFD (talk) 22:57, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Important point - we have not "banned" citing the DM... the close simply limits citing it. However, it also acknowledges that there are circumstances and contexts where the DM is reliable and can be cited. Blueboar (talk) 00:38, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes There was a similar prohibition against the use of the Huffington Post for a while.--Mark Miller (talk) 04:49, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- That's interesting, Mark, given that they are on opposite sides of the political spectrum. I don't suppose you recall when or where that discussion occurred? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 03:01, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- They didn't black list it but when questions about Huffington Post were referred to this board the usual thing was to direct the editor to consensus discussions (a few actually) from this board. If you feel it worth while I can search them out again for this discussion. The consensus changed when Huffington became more than a mere blog and had actual writers and journalists authoring works that they had expertise in or were credentialed journalists.--Mark Miller (talk) 04:14, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- If you feel like doing a summary with links, that would be valuable perspective for us now and for future historians, Mark. Pete at The Signpost would be interested, I'm sure. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 04:40, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Thanks for the ping Anthonyhcole. We are indeed working on a story, and I'm sure Milowent, TeeVeeed and GamerPro64 would be happy for any additional analysis. Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/In the media -Pete Forsyth (talk) 22:59, 11 February 2017 (UTC) PS -- Actually, this is probably a better link, for discussion about how to approach the story; Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions#Coverage_of_the_.22ban.22_of_the_Daily_Mail_as_a_reliable_source -Pete Forsyth (talk) 23:22, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- If you feel like doing a summary with links, that would be valuable perspective for us now and for future historians, Mark. Pete at The Signpost would be interested, I'm sure. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 04:40, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- They didn't black list it but when questions about Huffington Post were referred to this board the usual thing was to direct the editor to consensus discussions (a few actually) from this board. If you feel it worth while I can search them out again for this discussion. The consensus changed when Huffington became more than a mere blog and had actual writers and journalists authoring works that they had expertise in or were credentialed journalists.--Mark Miller (talk) 04:14, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- That's interesting, Mark, given that they are on opposite sides of the political spectrum. I don't suppose you recall when or where that discussion occurred? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 03:01, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Are tabloids mainstream? K.e.coffman (talk) 05:58, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Daily Mail is not a tabloid. It is a 120-year-old middle-market newspaper, and the second biggest-selling daily newspaper in the UK. Of course it's mainstream. Like many other newspapers and journals (e.g. New York Daily News, Village Voice), it is in tabloid newspaper format rather than broadsheet newspaper format, but it is not a tabloid (tabloids would be The Sun, Daily Express, etc.). Softlavender (talk) 06:08, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Both the Express and the Mail used to be described as middle-market, but things have changed. It doesn't make sense to call the Express tabloid and the Mail still middle-market. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:26, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- It does if it is, and it is. If you don't or can't discern the difference between the Daily Mail as a whole, versus the The Sun as a whole and the Daily Expressas a whole, then I don't know what to tell you. In my experience there is an enormous difference between the content of the first and the content of the last two. I have never viewed or found anything even remotely valuable or citable in the last two, but I have often found valuable and neutral citable exclusives in the Daily Mail. I think any discerning and experienced editor can tell what is a valuable and neutral citable exclusive. Softlavender (talk) 04:47, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Both the Express and the Mail used to be described as middle-market, but things have changed. It doesn't make sense to call the Express tabloid and the Mail still middle-market. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:26, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Daily Mail is not a tabloid. It is a 120-year-old middle-market newspaper, and the second biggest-selling daily newspaper in the UK. Of course it's mainstream. Like many other newspapers and journals (e.g. New York Daily News, Village Voice), it is in tabloid newspaper format rather than broadsheet newspaper format, but it is not a tabloid (tabloids would be The Sun, Daily Express, etc.). Softlavender (talk) 06:08, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes I can't remember exactly when, or why, but a few years ago I noticed people assiduously removing references to 3 News (before its recent name change); and that's a more reliable source than the Daily Mail. Daveosaurus (talk) 04:48, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Bottom line: there was never a blacklist of the Puffington Host, only discussion, whereas the DM has been blacklisted for all intents and purposes. Funny, the Original Fake News was the New York Times' Walter Duranty, who for years wrote Fake News on the New York Times that Socialist Russia under Stalin was not mass-starving his people, and in fact got a Pulitzer for it. Socialist Russia starved 2.5 to 7.5 million people to death. In two years. The NYT later admitted oops, its fake news was pretty "some" of "its worst" reporting. The point is that all media, even the holier-than-thou media, pushes fake news from time to time. XavierItzm (talk) 18:11, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
Huffinton Post
I brought this up and someone asked so I thought I would link to at least one very early discussion about the Huffington Post in regards to whether or not it was considered a reliable source. By 2008 discussion of it was already something that came up often.--Mark Miller (talk) 04:28, 11 February 2017 (UTC).
Master list of "known to be very unreliable" sources?
Now that the DM has been banned as a source, is there a master list of banned sources? Rjljr2 (talk) 18:02, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Who are you, Sean Spicer?? Softlavender (talk) 18:13, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- LOLz. -- Softlavender (talk) 18:15, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is no such source. We could use such a list, but it would be more than just a list of "banned sources", since there are many nuances. It would be a list of sources that have been discussed at RSN, with a brief summary of consensus, and links to those discussions. Someguy1221 (talk) 18:23, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- E/c I raised this question in the thread (or another related one) and I think the answer is that no such list exists - at least not for newspapers. DrChrissy (talk) 18:26, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Perhaps we could have a WP:Index of Prohibited Sources :) It just is pretty crappy as a source of reliable facts and we have to acknowledge that. Dmcq (talk) 18:28, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Wikipedia:List of self-publishing companies is something along these lines, for identifying self-published (and likely unreliable) sources. Alcherin (talk) 19:58, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Something like WP:BEANS should apply here (and in the Daily Mail ban as well). For example, I think the following is typical of an inference that we're likely to start seeing: "Politicususa is not listed in the banned sites, so therefore it's reliable." Sławomir Biały (talk) 20:02, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Indeed. The whole point of the current RS policy is about context and judgment. We shouldn't be in a position where some sources are always unreliable and hence banned while some are, by implication, always reliable. As for the accuracy of the term "ban", the RfC on the Mail was proposed as a "prohibition", which is pretty much the same thing. N-HH talk/edits 20:07, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- @N-HH: this came up so frequently with the Daily Mail, and the typical answer - not a great source but context matters - seemed fine. I didn't participate in this discussion because I was sure the answer would go the same as in all previous cases. It's not such a big deal for relatively experienced editors and intelligent people to parse sources like they always do. -Darouet (talk) 20:12, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is an essay, Wikipedia:Potentially_unreliable_sources, but of course it isn't policy. Generally speaking, while there are a few other sources we could probably stand to enact similar "general prohibitions" against, I'd be opposed to making these a general policy and introducing them in large numbers. The logic behind why it is safe to prohibit a few clearly-unreliable sources ("if something were worth covering, it would be reported in a better source") starts to become weaker if you prohibit sources in large numbers. It's also important to point out that the reason we had a big RFC on the Daily Mail was because it was exactly on the cusp where some people felt it was always unreliable and others disagreed - there are definitely worse sources out there (eg. Infowars), and it's not really possible to enumerate all of them. Most of the time, simply applying the policy in WP:RS and having a casual discussion here when one or two people have a disagreement is enough to handle those situations. --Aquillion (talk) 21:01, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Aquillion, I'm afraid I can not agree with you here. A long time ago, I used the Daily Mail as a source (for some innocuous information on animal populations I think). I have a certain set of detractors who came down on me like a ton of bricks for doing this. Even today, several years later, this single use of the Daily Mail is raised by these detractors in attempts to prove that I am incompetent. Whether or not the Daily Mail should be on a list, editors, especially new editors, should be informed that some sources are widely, widely disagreed with before they start editing and perhaps attract problems they don't wish to receive. DrChrissy (talk) 21:15, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
WP:External links/Perennial websites covers a few extremely common websites, evaluating them both as external links and reliable sources. --Ronz (talk) 00:52, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- discussion at RS: Wikipedia_talk:Identifying_reliable_sources#Daily_Mail Jytdog (talk) 02:22, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
Everybody in this discussion please take a look at WP:PUSperhaps an inadvertently appropriate acronym. It may not be necessary to create a new page for this purpose. Daniel Case (talk) 17:24, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
Public perception OF Daily Mail RfC
I am not entirely sure if this is the correct page to be posting this, however, I urge people to google the words "wikipedia daily mail ban" (without the quotes). The media are clearly interpreting this as a ban, no matter how nuanced the closing remarks and comments at the RfC were. DrChrissy (talk) 22:54, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- The media is also calling it "a welcome rebuke to terrible journalism". K.e.coffman (talk) 22:56, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- Let me find my tiny violin... Only in death does duty end (talk) 23:23, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- ... look no further. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:31, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is a cartoon (click on the image to enlarge) in the current edition of Viz which sums up how many Wikipedians view the Daily Mail. No doubt we will be seen as members of the "libtard sneering-elite" for doing this. I don't have a problem with steering clear of the DM by a mile when WP:BLP issues are involved, but the ban looks like singling out the DM when there are plenty of other unsuitable sources.--♦IanMacM♦ (talk to me) 08:07, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- This is a common argument and was addressed substantially in the RFC. In short the Daily Mail is worse than most (even amongst other 'bad' sources), has been proven to be worse (in terms of lawsuits, IPCC etc) that it justified singling it out. WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS exists for a reason. The existance of other problems does not invalidate or lessen the one in front of us. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:02, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is a cartoon (click on the image to enlarge) in the current edition of Viz which sums up how many Wikipedians view the Daily Mail. No doubt we will be seen as members of the "libtard sneering-elite" for doing this. I don't have a problem with steering clear of the DM by a mile when WP:BLP issues are involved, but the ban looks like singling out the DM when there are plenty of other unsuitable sources.--♦IanMacM♦ (talk to me) 08:07, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- ... look no further. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:31, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
- I only heard about the "ban" once it had been imposed, so was unable to vote against what I regard as a deeply irritating bit of left-wing politicking. The closed discussion above states, "Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page". Which is "the appropriate discussion page"? Perhaps a link could be provided to enable those who hope to reverse this illiberal decision to make their voices heard. 45ossington (talk) 09:49, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Well to be fair, everyone short of Hitler is left-wing according to the Mail. So thats 99% of the population. (I am allowing a 1% 'probably as bad as Hitler' group) Only in death does duty end (talk) 10:35, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Skipping over Godwin's Rule, it looks as though 45ossington missed the essence of the debate and decision. The reason for Wikipedia to cease accepting the DM as a wp:reliable source has nothing whatever to do with its politics or editorial leaning. It is entirely that the DM is simply not reliable, that it makes stuff up. See discussion above for a raft of examples. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 11:28, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- True, but (1) this is going to be perceived by most of the outside audience as "left-wing politicking" (the proportion of article readers that will take time to familiarize themselves with policies such as WP:RS will be negligible), and (2) had the DM been left-wing, I suspect the "ban" (not really a ban BTW, since the closure asks for a "warn" edit filter) would not have passed. Of course, (1) is irrelevant to our internal policies, and (2) is idle speculation on a counterfactual - I can think of no significant left-wing press with a history of outright fabrication. TigraanClick here to contact me 11:56, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- My post was perhaps couched in unnecessarily provocative terms, but it did contain a genuine question: where is "the appropriate discussion page"? (As for inventiveness on the left, what about Pravda?)45ossington (talk) 12:43, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- At the moment, this is it. There is an appeal process somewhere but, given how exhaustively this RFC has been discussed, I would not expect any change on procedural grounds. Yes, I agree re Pravda - I suggest you add it to the growing list below. Same applies to RT. Historically, the Daily Worker was expert in 'alternative facts' too but the Morning Star is not as obvious, though personally I'd need to be convinced and would look for additional citation. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 13:09, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- My post was perhaps couched in unnecessarily provocative terms, but it did contain a genuine question: where is "the appropriate discussion page"? (As for inventiveness on the left, what about Pravda?)45ossington (talk) 12:43, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- You are a bit late bringing up Godwin's Rule - the ban proposer compared the DM to the house organ of the Nazi party. That was the intellectual level of the ban-it brigade's arguments. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 03:40, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- True, but (1) this is going to be perceived by most of the outside audience as "left-wing politicking" (the proportion of article readers that will take time to familiarize themselves with policies such as WP:RS will be negligible), and (2) had the DM been left-wing, I suspect the "ban" (not really a ban BTW, since the closure asks for a "warn" edit filter) would not have passed. Of course, (1) is irrelevant to our internal policies, and (2) is idle speculation on a counterfactual - I can think of no significant left-wing press with a history of outright fabrication. TigraanClick here to contact me 11:56, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- What Do You Care What Other People Think? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:32, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
Sadly, "ban" is a 3-letter word. Newspapers love short words, even if they might not capture all the nuance.
The Daily Mail is claiming this was politically motivated. See the last three paragraphs in the latest update of the Guardian piece. [10]
“All those people who believe in freedom of expression should be profoundly concerned at this cynical politically motivated attempt to stifle the free press.”
--Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 07:28, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'm pretty sure that in ten years, there will be a well-known law of the internet which says "As the number of people referring to a website's content as bullshit increases, the odds of that website blaming it on a liberal conspiracy approaches one." In fact, I'm naming it Mjolnir's law right now. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 07:41, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- True, though I'd swap 'liberal conspiracy' with 'political conspiracy' as I see liberal news that are called bullshit calling 'right wing conspiracy' all the time too. Otherwise I agree totally. Lots of blaming on political conspiracies going on all over the place. InsertCleverPhraseHere 23:28, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- To be fair, the Daily Mail never suggested our conspiracy was of a liberal variety. It could have been the Green Party. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:49, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- And to be fair again, the response also – entirely legitimately – notes the problems that can and have arisen with the reverse situation, of journalists using Wikipedia as a source, given the serious problems with reliability and accuracy on this site. I don't think anyone here should be too smug about any of this. N-HH talk/edits 10:55, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Smug? We should was glad to hear the DM, said in it's response that it 'banned' its reporters from using Wikipedia a few years ago 'as a single source' (since Wikipedia does not claim to be reliable, by policy), the only wonder is why it took them so long and why its reporters needed to be told, at all (are they fools?). Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:20, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- [Informed, accurate and witty answer redacted due to WP:BLP concerns.] ᛗᛁᛟᛚᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 00:34, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Smug? We should was glad to hear the DM, said in it's response that it 'banned' its reporters from using Wikipedia a few years ago 'as a single source' (since Wikipedia does not claim to be reliable, by policy), the only wonder is why it took them so long and why its reporters needed to be told, at all (are they fools?). Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:20, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- And to be fair again, the response also – entirely legitimately – notes the problems that can and have arisen with the reverse situation, of journalists using Wikipedia as a source, given the serious problems with reliability and accuracy on this site. I don't think anyone here should be too smug about any of this. N-HH talk/edits 10:55, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
limiting more yellow Journalism
OK, maybe it is time we did just ban all newspapers (and indeed any TV news programs/channels) that have a reputation for making stuff up and telling out right lies.
(Soapbox alert)
The standards and integrity of modern journalism has (I think) reached an all time low, much lower then when Wikipedia was first established (and even then it looked upon the press through rose tinted glasses).
As such I think we actually need to either have a blanket change of policy on RS (not new organisations unless it can be shown they have a reputation for accuracy and fact checking) or widen the "daily Mail rule to include other (currently) RS. I prefer the latter, and as such.
Blanket warning message on all news outlets
I can see a reason for this given that even some major news outlets (such as CNN and Fox) do seem to just repeat any damn lie. But it may not be practicable.Slatersteven (talk) 10:47, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- I would support stronger limits on how we use news sources... but oppose banning news outlets. Blueboar (talk) 11:27, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- I agree with Blueboar. I propose an informal test, The Daily Mail test: "If an article is indistinguishable from one that might appear in The Daily Mail, then it is probably not a reliable source." Sławomir Biały (talk) 13:26, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- I think limiting the scope of recent news sources would be extremely beneficial to the quality of the articles (i.e. in topics X use sources from Y rather than news sources). Banning would be impractical. Nergaal (talk) 23:28, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
11:27, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Content derived from news and other media outlets (including state run press agencies and governmental websites) from countries whose media is judged Not Free should not be considered RS (except under exceptional circumstances which should be discussed on a case by case basis). Content derived from the official press or governmental agencies of a country whose media is judged Partially Free should not be used (except under exceptional circumstances which should be discussed on a case by case basis) unless their claims have also been reported in independent news outlets located outside the Partially Free country in question. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 17:46, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
Warning message for specific news outlets
The Daily Express
The Daily Express. It tries to copy the Daily Mail but does not have the staff or ability to do it properly (not that the DM is a role model) (this is a shame given it's once great reputation).Slatersteven (talk) 10:30, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- @Slatersteven: Per WP:PUS#News media, the Express and Sunday Express are to be "treated with even greater caution" than other British tabloids.
Perhaps we need a shortcut to that section à la the existing WP:DAILYMAIL link, something like WP:DAILYEXPRESS? Daniel Case (talk) 17:14, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
TheLocal
- TheLocal, all editions. thelocal.se is utter tripe bullshit made-up news; Austrian version when I last checked reported hackers hacking a hostel's locks, people trapped inside. Except people weren't trapped inside because the doors could be opened from inside. That's how locks work, ffs. Any references containing thelocal, delete at sight. --Sigmundur (talk) 10:41, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Comment Fox News, Russia Today, etc etc. Existing policies cover all of this.--♦IanMacM♦ (talk to me) 12:38, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
The Onion
If we are going to compile a list, we need to include the ones that everyone agrees are unreliable such as The Onion.
Let me do a quick check...
I didn't get a warning from an edit filter. It seems wrong to get a warning when using The Daily Mail as a source but not when using The Onion as a source. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:45, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Is it ever used as a source?Slatersteven (talk) 12:52, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Actually, it is. We cite the Onion a few times in our article about The Onion, where it is used as a primary source for statements about the Onion itself - its content and staff. Note that in this limited context, the Onion is actually not just a reliable source, but the most reliable source possible. This is why we have to be careful about using words like "ban" when talking about sources. Context matters. A source can be completely unreliable for use in most situations, and yet perfectly reliable in specific limited situations. No source is ever 100% unreliable. Blueboar (talk) 14:04, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Onion is already mentioned at WP:PUS#Sites that may appear to be reliable sources for Wikipedia, but aren't, noting clearly that it's a satirical news site and that occasionally other media have taken its reports as real. Daniel Case (talk) 17:18, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Unless I am misunderstanding, wouldn't that make it appropriate for The Onion to be useful as a citation in the context of a news organization taking an article as real? --Super Goku V (talk) 19:28, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Onion is already mentioned at WP:PUS#Sites that may appear to be reliable sources for Wikipedia, but aren't, noting clearly that it's a satirical news site and that occasionally other media have taken its reports as real. Daniel Case (talk) 17:18, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Actually, it is. We cite the Onion a few times in our article about The Onion, where it is used as a primary source for statements about the Onion itself - its content and staff. Note that in this limited context, the Onion is actually not just a reliable source, but the most reliable source possible. This is why we have to be careful about using words like "ban" when talking about sources. Context matters. A source can be completely unreliable for use in most situations, and yet perfectly reliable in specific limited situations. No source is ever 100% unreliable. Blueboar (talk) 14:04, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- We would have to search all deleted edits to answer that, because as soon as someone uses it as a source they will most likely be reverted. My point is that, once we have an edit filter in place for The Daily Mail, we should have it apply to sources that everyone agrees are are worse than The Daily Mail. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:01, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Ahh, seems fair enough.Slatersteven (talk) 13:06, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- "everyone agrees are are worse than The Daily Mail" - everyone? I look forward to many hours of bed-time reading over this agreement! Martin of Sheffield (talk) 13:37, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Ahh, seems fair enough.Slatersteven (talk) 13:06, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
Banning The Onion seems a bit ridiculous to me and a sign that the discussion is derailing. Since The Onion is satire site it is obviously not a news source and we should start arbitrary things because they aren't news sources. Otherwise we're starting to ban literature and comedians and who knows what else. Also note there are other reason than news to cite a source, which will be affected by the filter as well. A link to The Onion is certainly needed in an article on The Onion itsself. There might be articles on comedy or satire topics and authors were citing The Onion might be appropiate.--Kmhkmh (talk) 05:19, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Your comment is perplexing. The comments above were not for a absolute ban of the "Onion". The recent DM discussion did not result in an absolute ban of DM. If there is any "derailing", it is actually getting worked up about an absolute ban, when there is no absolute ban (even in the recent DM discussion), and our policies and guidelines have had various cautions about many, many sources, and these policies and have been strengthened over years of working with many, many sources. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:13, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Onion is often mistakenly used as a news source. Remember, Nobody is talking about "banning" The Onion, The Daily Mail, or any other source. We are talking about displaying a carefully worded warning, which wiil no doubt explain when using a source is and is not acceptable. The editor can ignore the warning and use the source, anywhere on Wikipedia. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:23, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- So all the filter is supposed to do is to produce a warning? In that case a message pointing out that the Onion isn't news source is of course appropriate. I must admit I probably got a bit lost in the lengthy discussion. Anyhow if the idea is just to create a warning, I'd suggest the the section ttitles should reflect that. If somebody comes across the discussion a bit a later, browsing, he probably reads "ban" as an actual ban rather than creating warning.--Kmhkmh (talk) 18:41, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- WP:SOFIXIT. :) --Guy Macon (talk) 00:34, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- So all the filter is supposed to do is to produce a warning? In that case a message pointing out that the Onion isn't news source is of course appropriate. I must admit I probably got a bit lost in the lengthy discussion. Anyhow if the idea is just to create a warning, I'd suggest the the section ttitles should reflect that. If somebody comes across the discussion a bit a later, browsing, he probably reads "ban" as an actual ban rather than creating warning.--Kmhkmh (talk) 18:41, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
Forbes.com
Since this seems to be a wish list, I nominate Forbes.com. While never great, the website now seems to be borderline WP:ELNO#EL3 bad. Sławomir Biały (talk) 21:42, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- A key thing with Forbes is distinguishing between its paid staff editors and its contributors; pieces by contributes do have some editorial insight but far less than the rigors of the paid staff, and past consensus is that unless it is for its opinion, Forbes contributor pieces should be considered unreliable. I haven't see anything about the rest of the work (paid staff submissions) that would make it more or less the same with most other mainstream sources now-adays. --MASEM (t) 21:48, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- I don't know about your EL3 accusation, but Forbes.com is already listed at WP:PUS as a potentially unreliable source, since as Masem points out much of the content there is really just blogging. See the sixth bullet in the News Media section. --Krelnik (talk) 21:50, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes, that does a nice job of detailing some questionable sources. Does it go far enough? Perhaps we shall know before long... Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:25, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
radixjournal.com from Richard B. Spencer and National Policy Institute
I am at present attempting to expand the article on Julius Evola. A source that I think would be of value is JULIUS EVOLA, AN INTRODUCTION by E. Christian Kopff. Kopff is a notable academic, who has also provided introductions to English translations of Evola's works.
My reason for proposing the inclusion of this site as a reliable source is its inclusion of many notable writers. Kopff is one of them, also among them, according to its contributor list, are Alain de Benoist, Paul Gottfried, Guillaume Faye, James Howard Kunstler, Ricardo Duchesne, and Samuel T. Francis, as well as authors that editors might take more issue with, like Kevin MacDonald and Alexander Dugin.
Given the above, another question is - if the author is notable, can a writing of his hosted on the site of the NPI be cited? That is, some of the authors of articles might be rejected, but the articles of notable authors could be cited.
I seek editorial consensus prior to proceeding with a controversial decision.Gggtt (talk) 15:38, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Full text of the same thing is on archive.org here. Zero need to link or cite a WP:FRINGE site for this. Fyddlestix (talk) 16:22, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- This article seems to come from The Occidental Quarterly - [12]. If people think this is a better source, then I will use it. If not, I would like to enquire as to the possibility of using the work of authors from sites like this if they are notable, while rejecting non-notable authors from sites like this.Gggtt (talk) 16:43, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Anything a site like that posts is incredibly unlikely to be a reliable source for anything except "So-and-So accused Jewish people of eating gentile babies for breakfast" with a link to So-and-So's article "The Truth About Lox" at that site. --Orange Mike | Talk 20:29, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- This article seems to come from The Occidental Quarterly - [12]. If people think this is a better source, then I will use it. If not, I would like to enquire as to the possibility of using the work of authors from sites like this if they are notable, while rejecting non-notable authors from sites like this.Gggtt (talk) 16:43, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
If we can be confident that the site really is publishing the work of those notable academics, then it is a reliable source for those authors' opinions only. And notable only because of the particular authors, as you are proposing. With such controversial opinions, the author should be attributed in the WP article. A higher quality source would be better if available. First Light (talk) 02:53, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
Can we have clearer guidance on what sort of sourcing from the Mail is and isn't OK?
I realize all that will really be happening is that an edit filter will be in place letting editors know that the Mail is extremely problematic as a source. But ... the practical effect will be as the media worldwide has been reading it: no use of the Daily Mail whatsoever. So there will be editors who apply this overbroadly, much as the caveats on linking to YouTube have been understood by too many editors, even established ones, as a blanket prohibition (I have made that link more times than I can remember to explain a reverted edit).
To be perfectly clear I have no objection to this decision. We need not explain it in our own words; all that is necessary is this quote from the Gawker exposé cited multiply in the discussion that led to it:
In August 2013, a few months after I started work, the Mail was sued by a woman whom the Mail had identified as a porn star with HIV. The only problem with that was that the woman was not a porn star and did not have HIV.
You can't serve that one any drier. One is reminded of the Soviet-era Armenian Radio joke with the long punchline that ends "But in theory, you are correct" (or begins with "in principle, yes", as Armeniapedia has it).
I was aware, even from the other side of the ocean, of the Mail's issues, and from discourse here in the past I had frankly thought this decision had already been taken in some form (I just could never find where, although I thought this 2011 discussion was enough. And that the Mail's sports coverage was excluded from such disfavor for some reason (not that it affects any editing I do, to be honest). I have not hesitated from enforcing this myself in the past.
However, some articles I've developed do have some reliance on sources from the Mail, and in one case I would ask that the source be kept.
I started, years ago before the movie even came out, and have done most of the work on the article about the film version of The Devil Wears Prada. One of the sources I found (footnote 17), some time after the movie's initial release, was a piece in the Mail by Liz Jones about her time as editor of the British edition of Marie Claire and the perspective it gave her on the movie's depiction of fashion journalism (Shorter version: it's a lot easier to become Miranda Priestley than you might think, even if you have no prior experience in fashion and don't think you're all that and potato chips). I would argue that in this case it should be kept, since it is a)the first-person perspective of a notable person who verifiably had the experience she described and b) is undeniably relevant to an aspect of the article subject.
Can things like these be considered before we unleash some of our more obsessive editors on the 12,000+ reported citations of the Mail in our articles? I would argue that we need to view the Mail decision as not a prohibition but a stricture, with content from that source evaluated on a spectrum of credibility.
At one end would be things like, in declining order of skepticism-worthiness:
- Controversial allegations about an otherwise non-notable living person that paraphrase the alleged source rather than quote them directly, and/or neither identify the source or sources or even give some good context as to how the source might know what they're not talking on the record about (For instance "a source in a position to know" should not be good enough, whereas in sports stories "a source close to PLAYER", which is widely understood to mean the player's agent (or, less commonly, a spouse or other family member), would be)
- As above, but about notable living people whom we have, or otherwise would have, articles on regardless of whether the Mail (or any other otherwise facially reliable and mainstream source we might wish to subject to this sort of strict scrutiny) has reported on their alcohol-fueled fits of temper and/or sexual indiscretions with staff (well, not exclusively those things, but you get the idea).
- Per the first bullet point, but allegations either (or preferably both) sourced to named individuals, again with the context as to how they would know this, or directly quoted.
- Above, but about notable people.
- Allegations sourced to documentary sources (including audio and video) rather than, or in addition to, individual people's recollections (An exception would be things alleged in affidavits in withdrawn lawsuits, since that's basically a perfectly legal way to smear someone in the media without having to worry about being held accountable for doing so; of course they're going to report it since well, the affiant said it in a document which they swore to under oath, so they're off the hook for its veracity. But we can hold ourselves to a better standard).
- Allegations sourced to documentary sources that the news outlet shares with readers on its website to allow them to independently judge the credibility of its interpretation (A practice I'd like to see more of).
At the other end would be things like the sort of first-person pieces I discussed above, and matters of pure opinion like reviews of artworks, editorials and op-eds (as long as those are based on real facts).
Another suggestion I have might be that reportage from certain publications about certain things be required to be attributed to those sources inline rather than stated as if they were established (i.e., "The Daily Mail reported that X" instead of just "X"). Daniel Case (talk) 18:56, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Or we could simply say "no source is reliable for 'celebrity gossip' " and be done with it, of course. Collect (talk) 23:44, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- Erm, avoid as much as humanly possible? K.e.coffman (talk) 00:12, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- I do recall that a user had mentioned earlier that the DM does have some sort of review on theater performances. Those could be allowed on a case by case basis per the closing to the RfC. --Super Goku V (talk) 02:44, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- OK, that's the sort of thing I'm talking about ... Daniel Case (talk) 07:57, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- I do recall that a user had mentioned earlier that the DM does have some sort of review on theater performances. Those could be allowed on a case by case basis per the closing to the RfC. --Super Goku V (talk) 02:44, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Just avoid it. If there is some reason you Absolutely Must Use it, you would be wise to post a notice at the article's talk page that you intend to use and provide a very clear reason as to why you Absolutely Must Use it. If your reasoning is great nobody should object. Jytdog (talk) 04:38, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Please refer to the top of my post, where I did make that sort of justification for one use. But ... the sort of people who tend to do these sort of edits also tend not to look at article talk pages, as they sort of get in the way of their "I will obey my programming ... I will fulfill my Prime Directive" mentality. And then when you try to argue these points with them, they start throwing tantrums and this does no one any good (this already happens with YouTube links). What I would really like is some sort of central place where these exceptions can be catalogued and backed up by consensus, like this section, that I can point to in that instance. Daniel Case (talk) 07:52, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- I see exactly the same problem. In particular when we get to situations, where people otherwise uninvolved with article topic start to remove content that was sourced by the Daily Mail without really bothering much to assess its veracity and appropriateness of the content or to look for alternative sources.--Kmhkmh (talk) 18:45, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Please refer to the top of my post, where I did make that sort of justification for one use. But ... the sort of people who tend to do these sort of edits also tend not to look at article talk pages, as they sort of get in the way of their "I will obey my programming ... I will fulfill my Prime Directive" mentality. And then when you try to argue these points with them, they start throwing tantrums and this does no one any good (this already happens with YouTube links). What I would really like is some sort of central place where these exceptions can be catalogued and backed up by consensus, like this section, that I can point to in that instance. Daniel Case (talk) 07:52, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Gawker story is slightly misleading. The Daily Mail published a story titled, “PORN INDUSTRY SHUTS DOWN WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT AFTER ‘FEMALE PERFORMER’ TESTS POSITIVE FOR HIV.”[13] The article says, "The performer was not immediately identified and officials didn't say when the positive test was recorded." They included a stock picture, which happened to be of a "soft-core porn actress" , with the caption, "Ban: The Adult Production Health and Safety Services is conducting tests to see if the virus has spread to more porn actors." Bad as that may be, it is not as if there was anything inaccurate in the story. TFD (talk) 20:52, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- That's the Mail's spin on it. Yes. the Gawker piece should have clarified that the issue was about the accompanying photograph and not the story itself, but the underlying point was unchallenged: that the Mail committed not only a serious breach of journalistic ethics but a textbook example of (at least under US law) false light defamation by so recklessly using the photo in its story to imply that the identifiable woman depicted was the HIV-positive porn star described in the text (because, of course, that picture got more eyeballs on the story). When you do that, the accuracy of the story is beyond the point. Daniel Case (talk) 19:03, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- I've no wish to add very much to the acres of text about TDM expended already on this page, but I completely endorse Daniel Case's point that clarification is needed about this 'ban' (many high quality RS describe it as a 'ban'). Might I suggest that the scope of that discussion should also embrace the issue that the RfC closure avoids, namely other sources with almost equally bad reputations for reliability and (just as serious IMO) for tendentious reporting and trivis-philia. If all this ban achieves is pushing editors into using other low quality sources for the same garbage (see examples above of other papers echoing TDM content), and ignoring those occasions when TDM is 'high quality', (such as notable guest contributors), then it will really have been a waste of everbody's time. Pincrete (talk) 17:39, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
Citation via image & HTML comment alone
Does this constitute an adequate citation? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:36, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- If the link is to an image with the name therein quite clear, "cn" becomes a tad snarky. That template should only be used where the claim is not reasonably backed by a source. Collect (talk) 22:57, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is no link to such an image. Please confirm which source you think "reasonably backs" the claim. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:09, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Frankly you are being tenditious at this point. (For a link to the actual WP article, see here.) Firstly the article that was citing the sentence includes a picture of the front page of the newspaper with the editors name clearly visible. Unless you have a suggestion that the Guardian was mocking up (lying about) front pages of other newspapers this suffices. Secondly said front page of the newspaper *was already in the wikipedia article* as a picture, again with the editors name clearly visible. Thirdly the fucking newspaper itself is a valid primary source for the author of the article in the damn newspaper. If you are just complaining that the 'headline' was not necessarily written by the author, the diff above is just being pedantic given the mail online also publishes it with that title, article credit to Slack. Stop wasting peoples time with this shit. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:19, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- The "fucking newspaper itself" is not given as a citation in the article. Nor is the name legible in the image of it used in the Wikipedia article in question. The name is legible in the image shown in the Guardian article. My question is whether the edit I quoted in my diff - relying on an image on one source, in another - constitutes an adequate citation. It's troubling when an editor thinks a reasonable question about the quality of a citation (for the authorship of a newspaper article, not its headline, which issue was resolved in an earlier edit), here on the reliable sources noticeboard, is a waste of time; doubly so when they express that thought so abusively; even towards an editor who is not easily bullied into silence as some. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:27, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Did you see the picture of front page in the article yes/no? Did you read the source which included a picture of the front page yes/no? Does the front page include the editors name yes/no? Because you either a)didnt look at the reference used, or b)looked at it and decided that an article on the front page of needs an inline citation to say who its author is, despite it being available in a source referenced on the wikipedia article. Ask stupid questions and expect to be treated as such. Only in death does duty end (talk) 00:12, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- The "fucking newspaper itself" is not given as a citation in the article. Nor is the name legible in the image of it used in the Wikipedia article in question. The name is legible in the image shown in the Guardian article. My question is whether the edit I quoted in my diff - relying on an image on one source, in another - constitutes an adequate citation. It's troubling when an editor thinks a reasonable question about the quality of a citation (for the authorship of a newspaper article, not its headline, which issue was resolved in an earlier edit), here on the reliable sources noticeboard, is a waste of time; doubly so when they express that thought so abusively; even towards an editor who is not easily bullied into silence as some. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:27, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Frankly you are being tenditious at this point. (For a link to the actual WP article, see here.) Firstly the article that was citing the sentence includes a picture of the front page of the newspaper with the editors name clearly visible. Unless you have a suggestion that the Guardian was mocking up (lying about) front pages of other newspapers this suffices. Secondly said front page of the newspaper *was already in the wikipedia article* as a picture, again with the editors name clearly visible. Thirdly the fucking newspaper itself is a valid primary source for the author of the article in the damn newspaper. If you are just complaining that the 'headline' was not necessarily written by the author, the diff above is just being pedantic given the mail online also publishes it with that title, article credit to Slack. Stop wasting peoples time with this shit. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:19, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is no link to such an image. Please confirm which source you think "reasonably backs" the claim. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:09, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes, "British newspapers react to judges' Brexit ruling: 'Enemies of the people'". The Guardian. 4 November 2016. Retrieved 3 February 2017. is an adequate citation for the sentence. It meets the policy WP:BURDEN. If an editor sees a problem with the sufficiency of the citation, then they could articulate the specific problem so that discussion could arrive at a consensus solution. Perhaps the citation could be improved by adding the |at= parameter to describe what portion of the page supports the statement. Or a second citation could be added. --Worldbruce (talk) 01:12, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- I've indicated that a second citation should be added, and have been reverted. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 23:41, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
Maxisciences
Is Maxisciences, a French website, a reliable source?. I am currently improving the article Breakout (video game), and I have found this source, whose contents are useful for verifying content in the gameplay section, but I need a confirmation that it is a reliable French source before I use it. Thank you. Gamingforfun365 03:56, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Doesn't look like it. It's run by the masculine lifestyle portal "Gentside", which provides info about "reach" and "brand", and how to advertise on the site, but nothing about editorial standards or identity. I've just randomly looked at a few of the "science" articles, and notice poor sourcing and a tendency to sensationalism ("mysteries", "amazing discoveries", etc.) --Andreas Philopater (talk) 12:43, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
Fringe theory pushed and mainstream view marginalized
The mainstream view on the term "Kurd" is that was originally the designation of Iranian nomadic tribes, and that the Persian name was adapted into Arabic as "kurd-". One user is marginalizing the mainstream view (claiming it is the view of "some others", and moving the mainstream view to the end of the section), and pushing fringe theories most likely taken from ultra-nationalist websites.
His sources for the fringe view is a British empire era scholar from the 1920s ("Driver, G. R. "The Name Kurd and Its Philological Connexions") and a fringe nationalist writer ("Mirawdali, Kemal. KURDISTAN & KURDS. The Kurdish Information Centre. p. 11.").
Are these sources really strong enough to use them in the beginning of the section, or even use them at all in the article?
The same fringe theory is pushed in the article Origin of the Kurds and Kurds by the same user, and the mainstream view is also marginalized in these articles.
As seen on other pages (for example [14]), the user seems to be part of a group of meatpuppets who are pushing anti-christian [15] [16] anti-turkish [17][18][19] [20], anti-muslim[21], , anti-iranian[22] , anti-woman [23][24] and ultra-nationalist [25] edits in all kind of articles.
- Might be better raised here Wikipedia:Fringe_theories/Noticeboard.Slatersteven (talk) 20:10, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
Sigh...The anon from "France"(!) is Turkish nationalist sockmaster Lrednuas Senoroc with an another "proxy"-stalking the same Kurdish nationalist editor Ferakp again. I'll add that proxy sock to SPI. 46.221.181.198 (talk) 00:07, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- PS: Those additions, except Driver, were already reverted per WP:RS about 12 days ago. 46.221.181.198 (talk) 00:23, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Kurdish Information Centre is not going to be a RS for theories on linguistics or toponymy at the best of times. And in this case it is additionally inappropriate because it will have a vested interest in promoting a name-origin claim that essentially says that Kurds have antiquity as an identifiable people. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 03:51, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- I do not care about etymological origin of ethnonym "Kurd". That's is not my point. I have just said that the ip is an another proxy sock of a notorious sockmaster and the additions/sources mentioned by him were deleted 12 days ago, except Driver. Plus, I have seen similar fringe theories regarding "etymology" on other articles. 46.221.160.64 (talk) 06:09, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- This is a place to discuss sources, not sockpuppetry allegations - so your point is off-topic for here. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 17:05, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- And I will point out you are a single use IP account.Slatersteven (talk) 09:51, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Nope. I reverted and warned his Kurdish antagonist Ferakp many times in the past and mapping out a WP:TBAN request for him: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. In fact, the actions/contribs of banned editor correspond to that term, if you take a look at the previous and current SPI case. 46.221.193.180 (talk) 11:21, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- I do not care about etymological origin of ethnonym "Kurd". That's is not my point. I have just said that the ip is an another proxy sock of a notorious sockmaster and the additions/sources mentioned by him were deleted 12 days ago, except Driver. Plus, I have seen similar fringe theories regarding "etymology" on other articles. 46.221.160.64 (talk) 06:09, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- The Kurdish Information Centre is not going to be a RS for theories on linguistics or toponymy at the best of times. And in this case it is additionally inappropriate because it will have a vested interest in promoting a name-origin claim that essentially says that Kurds have antiquity as an identifiable people. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 03:51, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
This board can only comment on the sources. The Kurdish Information Centre is an advocacy group and in no way reliable for etymology. Driver was a distinguished scholar but his work is completely out of date now, so I would not support including anything based solely on him. Pre-1945 history is often nationalistic, or is spun for nationalistic ends. Concerns about meat-puppetry need to be discussed elsewhere. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:45, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
“The Kurdish Information Centre” source was already reverted 13 days ago per WP:RS, but for some reason, the IP mentioned it here. That is to say, we are discussing the reliability of an inexistent source now. As for Godfrey Rolles Driver, the source was published on 1923 and seems outdated. Plus, as far as I can see, user Ferakp was warned by @Doug Weller: on his talk page regarding reliability of the same source on 30 January. However, despite the warning, he added the same source on an another article on 31 January 1. 46.221.187.227 (talk) 13:51, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
Daily Mail vs Huffington Post
Can somebody explain to me how we got to the point where the Daily Mail article covers Wikipedia's "banning" with a Huffington Post? I see something severely wrong if we put ourselves in a position where we reject a printed source but enable blogging-style sources like Huffington Post. Nergaal (talk) 23:34, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
- Well reliability isn't exactly decided by blog or not, but by the average quality of writers' content, their fact checking and proper editorial supervision. Blog is ultimately just a format, that is increasingly used by all news publishers.
- As with all so sources (but maybe from now on less so for the Daily Mail) the assessment of reliability depends on the exact context and usage. So is there anything in particular with that HuffPo article you have reliability issue with? And/or is there an alternative "higher quality" source reporting on the same topic?--Kmhkmh (talk) 00:28, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Let me rephrase my question: we are treating Huffington Post as more reliable than Daily Mail? Nergaal (talk) 02:33, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Can you list three examples where the Huffington Post outright fabricated a story (see the RfC for multiple examples of the Daily mail doing so). I am not being argumentative; I have never read the Huffington Post and really want to see the evidence. If you can show that, we can start an RfC about treating it the same as the Daily Mail. BTW, I am apolitical, but doesn't the Huffington Post lean what the US calls left while the Daily Mail leans what the US calls right? If so, it will be interesting to see how many editors have a different standard of evidence for the two sites. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:11, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- The original HuffPo in the US started out as "liberal", but i'm not sure how much that still holds. However the HuffPo publishes also in other countries/languages, where its content and political attitude/perceptions differ significantly. The German version of the HuffPo is considered libertarian with rightwing populist tendencies.--Kmhkmh (talk) 22:16, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Generally speaking, biased sources are still usable in certain situations as long as you keep their bias in mind and note it when it could be relevant; see WP:BIASED for the relevant policy. The problem with the Daily Mail wasn't that they were biased, it was that they were outright fabricating stories (which, unlike bias, genuinely makes them useless as a source.) This doesn't mean HuffPo is a great source, and I'd agree with the general idea of "use a better source of possible", but we don't blacklist sources the way we did with the Daily Mail purely because they're biased. To be 100% clear here - if people are seriously going to push for a ban on the Huffington Post, I have a pretttty big list of sources I'd also want to see banned for bias, and I'm pretty sure lots of other editors here would, too. But I don't think it's a good idea to go down that road. First, it doesn't reflect policy (again, bias alone doesn't make a source unreliable as long as they broadly have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy). Second, as I said above, it's safe to (effectively) ban a few highly-unreliable sources on the grounds that if something is worth covering, better sources exist; but if we start applying these not-quite-bans frequently, that logic falls apart, especially if we start banning solely for bias. The key question shouldn't be whether a source is biased, but whether it allows that bias to interfere with its journalistic integrity to the point where it no longer has the reputation for fact-checking and accuracy that WP:RS requires. --Aquillion (talk) 21:39, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- The original HuffPo in the US started out as "liberal", but i'm not sure how much that still holds. However the HuffPo publishes also in other countries/languages, where its content and political attitude/perceptions differ significantly. The German version of the HuffPo is considered libertarian with rightwing populist tendencies.--Kmhkmh (talk) 22:16, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Can you list three examples where the Huffington Post outright fabricated a story (see the RfC for multiple examples of the Daily mail doing so). I am not being argumentative; I have never read the Huffington Post and really want to see the evidence. If you can show that, we can start an RfC about treating it the same as the Daily Mail. BTW, I am apolitical, but doesn't the Huffington Post lean what the US calls left while the Daily Mail leans what the US calls right? If so, it will be interesting to see how many editors have a different standard of evidence for the two sites. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:11, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Let me rephrase my question: we are treating Huffington Post as more reliable than Daily Mail? Nergaal (talk) 02:33, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- Two notes: Personally, I prefer not to use HuffPo if other sources that have more age to them exist about the same topic - it's just too new to have the history of something like NYTimes or BBC (But as Guy Macon points out, it also has no black marks on its jouralistic efforts that we readily know about compared to the DM). But the whole issue of DM vs Wikipedia is covered in other major sources like the Telegraph that I would consider better than the HuffPo here. --MASEM (t) 05:26, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- The HuffPo started as a news aggregator with blog postings, but now has its own reporters. The news articles are reliable. I see no reason not to use it and it is more accessible than the New York Times and Washington Post, that require subscriptions. To me, that is an advantage, because readers can click on the links to read more information. TFD (talk) 03:44, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- The problem with the Huffington Post is one that is common these days on many news websites. They publish legitimate news stories by professional reporters and they also publish blog style "stories" or opinion pieces of widely varying quality written by people who have little interest in quality journalism. Each article must be evaluated for reliability. I am unaware of professional reporters at the Huffington Post writing completely false stories as is common at the Daily Mail. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 03:59, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Also I find the notion of free access over quality/reputation that seem to implicitly expressed here rather troubling. If possible quality/reputation should always take priority, free online access is merely an optional convenience. However I understand allure of providing as much online as possible as a service to readers. To avoid that this leads to the use of weaker sources, I'd suggest to provide 2 sources covering the same content. One being the highest quality/reputation that was available to the editor/author (they can always utilize WP:REX) and the other being of lower but still acceptable quality/reputation and available online for free.--Kmhkmh (talk) 04:40, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Why would you assume that the New York Times is more accurate than the Huffington Post? Lydia Polgreen, the editor of the Huffington Post was previously editorial director for NYT Global, which is the the New York Times "international digital growth team." Do you not think that she would apply the same standards of accuracy in online articles in both publications? TFD (talk) 14:54, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Didn't HuffPo give a 98.4% chance Clinton would win while other sources gave slightly more conservative estimates? Nergaal (talk) 15:48, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Anecdotal data. AFAIK none has come around making a serious evaluation of the various pollsters (which is a shame, because it seems mathematically easy - take a set of binary events for which each pollster took a guess; everyone scores the logit of the probability they affected to the event; higher-ranked wins). TigraanClick here to contact me 15:03, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Didn't HuffPo give a 98.4% chance Clinton would win while other sources gave slightly more conservative estimates? Nergaal (talk) 15:48, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Why would you assume that the New York Times is more accurate than the Huffington Post? Lydia Polgreen, the editor of the Huffington Post was previously editorial director for NYT Global, which is the the New York Times "international digital growth team." Do you not think that she would apply the same standards of accuracy in online articles in both publications? TFD (talk) 14:54, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- They like every other news outlet explained that their projection was based on polls. The polls happened to be wrong. In hindsight, mainstream media should have questioned the polling methodology which identified likely voters based on past voting activity. They assumed that black and progressive voters would turn out in the same numbers as 2012, while assuming that angry right-wing voters who had not voted before would stay home. But I do not see how this affects reliability. we would not say Clinton has a 98% change of winning. We would use something like the article in Nate Silver's site that reported the various estimates of different publications. Because policy says we should not report opinions as facts, we need to present various opinions according to their prominence in reliable sources and we should use secondary sources in preference to primary ones, in this case articles in publications presenting their estimates. TFD (talk) 18:23, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Note that the HuffPo has had major reductions in staffing. According to "reliable Google" it now has a total of 200 employees. [26] indicates HuffPo used to have far more employees. Fortune: HuffPo has even downsized it video unit which was supposed to save it. HuffPo is not the same as the NYT by a mile. It has a small staff, and no dedicated fact checkers for its articles. And it uses press releases. [27]. Collect (talk) 16:08, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
I haven't looked in detail but maybe these cases are worth studying:
- 2011 story "Huffington Post Forced to Issue Retraction, Apology After Falsely Accusing Andrew Breitbart of Doctoring Video"
- 2014 story: "A discredited old yarn resurfaces about who 'invented' email"
- 2013: "the news organizations that published the recent pieces — Gawker, BuzzFeed, The Huffington Post and Mashable among them — do not see invented viral tales as being completely at odds with the serious new content they publish alongside them"
Nergaal (talk) 15:49, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Nergaal's evidence is spot on. Huffington Post puts out fake news, but lefties don't notice because it is part of the Team. Daily Mail may have erred here or there, but because the DM fires on all comers (i.e., the very definition of "independent"), and often hits the left's sacred cows, the lefties hate it. So, DM gets blacklisted, Huffington Post does not. XavierItzm (talk) 18:35, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'm not seeing the same kind of evidence of deliberately and maliciously fabricated facts and interviews that were the nail in the coffin for the DM, I'll say it again that there was little political discussion in the RfC on the DM, and that the comments were generally very focused on facts that the daily mail deliberately fabricated (and for the record I'm not a leftist). InsertCleverPhraseHere 19:15, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- I was involved in the discussion that led to the Daily Mail not being considered a reliable source (often incorrectly labeled a "ban" in the media) and I am completely apolitical. This wasn't about politics. It was about repeated fabrication of stories. Post an RfC asking whether Huffington Post should be treated the same as the Daily mail, and if the evidence is anywhere close to being as strong as it was in the DM RfC, I will support the same restrictions. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:13, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Every news outlet publishes the occasional retraction. All reliable news outlets publish corrections. Indeed, this is a sign of a reliable source (as defined by WP:NEWSORG) as opposed to an unreliable one. I would agree that not every article published by HuffPo (or many other news aggregators) is reliable. I think that our general WP:NEWSORG guideline needs to be rethought in light of the fact that many outlets have different departments, with very different editorial standards despite being published under the same general umbrella organization. Now, while HuffPo is a far cry from a categorically reliable source (I don't think any news organization is), it is also not a categorically unreliable source. (That was more or less the outcome of the DM RfC, although I disagree with that conclusion as well.) Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:47, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Arguments such as these always hinge upon the assumption that we have a (secret?) list somewhere of "known reliable sources" and all you have to do to support is claim is show that it is sourced to one of those. Well, we don't. Huffpo has it's problems (I happen to be a politically-left guy who finds them utterly distasteful in a number of ways, though this has little to do with their politics), but we've seen time and time again that if a claim is published in Huffpo, it's often also published in other sources whose reliability is less questionable. Plus, we don't take a claim as gospel truth simply because Huffpo made it. We look at the details of the claim, and the details of the source, and weigh and judge them based on what we know about the claim, verifiability and the reliability of Huffpo. If the source is found lacking, we don't use it. This is the same process used for the Daily Mail, and it is this very process and the very clear results of repeating it countless times which caused us to label DM as "generally unreliable" while not labelling Huffpo the same. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 19:54, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Being a reliable source is not the same thing as being infallible. News reports frequently contain errors due to deadlines and on-line news, whether in the Huffington Post or the New York Times website, but they correct their stories. And the error rate for crime and celebrity news is by its nature higher than reporting sports and election results or official announcements. Does anyone remember that early stories about the Quebec City mosque shooting said the attack was carried out by two Muslims? The New York Times carries retractions every day. TFD (talk) 20:33, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes. While the two sometimes overlap in subject, the HuffPo is in general more reliable and contains far fewer spelling and grammar mistakes. In the past, I have easily been able to replace DM sources with HuffPo sources. Also, The HuffPo has the same titles in an article (page and header), whereas the DM often has two, which can cause confusion in citing. The DM is also more photo-heavy.--Auric talk 21:04, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'd like to take issue with the "they correct their stories" verbiage. It is not as if the DM does not issue corrections. In fact, The Guardian reported that in 2016 the UK press regulator IPSO forced the DM to issue two corrections (out of 500,000 news pieces reported). Looks like the DM blacklisting is, up to a point, a penalty for being a high-volume conveyer of news. XavierItzm (talk) 22:11, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- The real question is: How many corrections did they make on their own, without being forced to, and how many times were they wrong about something without issuing a correction? With Huffpo, the former is rather large (an indicator that they care about being factually accurate), and the latter only a bit larger. With DM, the former is incredibly small, and the latter enormous. This is a difference of degrees, not a fundamental difference. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:12, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'd like to take issue with the "they correct their stories" verbiage. It is not as if the DM does not issue corrections. In fact, The Guardian reported that in 2016 the UK press regulator IPSO forced the DM to issue two corrections (out of 500,000 news pieces reported). Looks like the DM blacklisting is, up to a point, a penalty for being a high-volume conveyer of news. XavierItzm (talk) 22:11, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- Yes. While the two sometimes overlap in subject, the HuffPo is in general more reliable and contains far fewer spelling and grammar mistakes. In the past, I have easily been able to replace DM sources with HuffPo sources. Also, The HuffPo has the same titles in an article (page and header), whereas the DM often has two, which can cause confusion in citing. The DM is also more photo-heavy.--Auric talk 21:04, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- HuffPo (like Buzzfeed) poses a challenge for us. Both of them have moved into "serious" coverage of current affairs which so far as I can tell basically has as much merit as anyone else's - but still both have a long tail of utter junk . Thinking about UK politics which is the subject where I'm most familiar with most of these sources, some of HuffPo's news coverage is traditional lobby correspondent fare (by our standards, usually RS) - though more of it is "LOOK AT THIS THING SOMEONE SAID ON TWITTER" (beneath our notice). That said, "traditional" media are moving far more towards this mixed model these days as well! The Land (talk) 12:46, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
OK, convince me. Start with this story:[28] Find the place in the Huffington Post that the story refers to and post the URL. Is it presented as material from the Huffington Post (you know, the way the Daily Mail has done repeaedly) or is it a "Buzzfeed said" article? --Guy Macon (talk) 15:52, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I did a google search for
+Thanksgiving +plane site:huffingtonpost.com
and got the following result: - No results found for +Thanksgiving +plane site:huffingtonpost.com.
- Link to the search results. For those not familiar with the syntax of google, that search should return all pages located at huffingtonpost.com which contain both the words "thanksgiving" and "plane". ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 16:29, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I strongly suspect that the Huffington Post clearly presented it as a "this was tweeted on Twitter" story. It might even be that it wasn't a story but a retweet. Again, I am completely open to giving the Huffington Post the same treatment we are giving the Daily Mail, but I need some real evidence that the Huffington Post not only publishes fabrications, but does so in such a way that you cannot tell whether a particular story is or is not a fabrication. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:40, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I did that last bit in a hurry, and I just realized I should try some synonyms for "plane". So I found a hit for "airplane" which opens with:
- UPDATE 12/3: Elan Gale revealed on his Twitter account on Monday night that his supposed airplane feud with Diane was, in fact, all a ruse.
- Note the link to the story all about how this was fake was in the original, and has been since the day the second story was written. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 16:53, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I did that last bit in a hurry, and I just realized I should try some synonyms for "plane". So I found a hit for "airplane" which opens with:
- I strongly suspect that the Huffington Post clearly presented it as a "this was tweeted on Twitter" story. It might even be that it wasn't a story but a retweet. Again, I am completely open to giving the Huffington Post the same treatment we are giving the Daily Mail, but I need some real evidence that the Huffington Post not only publishes fabrications, but does so in such a way that you cannot tell whether a particular story is or is not a fabrication. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:40, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Viral stories are a big problem in general, not just with the HuffPo. The less newsworthy a story is, and more places it appears, I think the less reliable it is. That goes somewhat against the conventional Wikipedia wisdom however. I do think some caution should be added regarding viral stories. Guidelines already do discuss reprinting wire stories not counting as independent, but I don't think that adequately addresses the problem of stupid viral news. Sławomir Biały (talk) 17:20, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I agree. We should have a specific policy regarding viral news. That being said, for the specific question of whether a particular source should be treated the way we are now treating the Daily Mail, whether or not the source pretends that the viral news is original reporting is all-important. If they make it clear that they are reposting something from twitter, any reasonable editor would be able to identify it as unreliable.
- The basic question "why just the Daily mail? Why not source X?" is a valid question, but those asking the question really need to find a better "source X" than the Huffington Post. Some site where when I ask "where is the evidence?" it is a simple matter to give multiple examples of fabrication made to appear like legitimate reporting. Find me such a site and I will be happy to post an RfC similar to the Daily Mail RfC. If the site has a different political POV than the Daily Mail, all the better. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:13, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- The situation with viral news can be remedied (among many other issues around fake news and other problems) is reminding editors that we are not a newspaper and there is no deadline. If there is a viral story going around, we do not have to include it that day, and likely have much better insight after a few days or a week or so has passed to know how that fits into the larger picture. This can help eliminate weight on stories that completely drop out of the picture after a day or so, compared to stories that truly should be included. But getting editors to remember these principles is difficult, since there's a bit of pride to be "first to publish". --MASEM (t) 18:20, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- The problem is that, unlike many viruses in nature, viral stories don't just disappear after they've made the rounds. They have a habit of lingering, showing up in articles (AfD discussions, etc) years down the line. Big viral stories never really die, they just keep circulating (often in other languages, etc). Sławomir Biały (talk) 18:28, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- The situation with viral news can be remedied (among many other issues around fake news and other problems) is reminding editors that we are not a newspaper and there is no deadline. If there is a viral story going around, we do not have to include it that day, and likely have much better insight after a few days or a week or so has passed to know how that fits into the larger picture. This can help eliminate weight on stories that completely drop out of the picture after a day or so, compared to stories that truly should be included. But getting editors to remember these principles is difficult, since there's a bit of pride to be "first to publish". --MASEM (t) 18:20, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
Worldfolio
Is [29], which states "went on to study at both Harvard University and Dhaka University in Bangladesh", a reliable source for setting the infobox parameter alma mater in Samson H. Chowdhury to include the value University of Dhaka? (Dhaka University and University of Dhaka are synonyms, that is not the question.) An obituary in a well-respected newspaper says something similar, that he participated in "a Management Training Course jointly conducted by the University of Dhaka and Harvard University," but the nature of his participation is not stated. It could have been as a student or, for example, as a speaker.
Worldfolio (formerly IFC Reports)[30] is a subsidiary of AFA Press. The "about us" and "careers" pages of the three stress being a "content provider", "delivering the content ... [for] reports that promote ...", and "our country reports, which are featured in leading newspapers around the world".[31][32][33][34] Worldfolio supplements are inserted into well-known newspapers, but I haven't found Worldfolio cited in any reliable source.
I think their reports are advertorial. The older reports, such as [35] and [36], are clearly labeled as advertising, but newer reports are not, merely stating that the newspaper with which they are bundled is not responsible for the supplement's content.[37] Individual stories taken from the old and new reports are uniformly presented on Worldfolio's website as news, without any advertising disclosure.[38][39][40]
Should this Worldfolio story be treated as reliable news reporting, opinion, something more like a press release, or what? --Worldbruce (talk)
- It is not a good source. Use the obituary in the mainstream newspaper instead. I would read that as him participating in the course as a student - if he had been a lecturer that would have been notable enough to be specified. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:27, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
Article on "Tiger Forces" relies heavily on bias, non-verifiable source
The wikipedia article on the Tiger_Forces, a special forces unit in the Syrian Arab Army relies only on blog articles from
The article is found here Tiger_Forces
Long passages such as
After successful operations in Latakia and Hama, Colonel Suheil al-Hassan was tasked a special project by the Syrian Armed Forces Central Command in the fall of 2013—to train and lead a Special Forces unit that would work primarily as an offensive unit. Colonel Hassan handpicked many of the soldiers that would later form the Tiger Forces.
are cited to one blog article http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/colonel-suheil-al-hassan-tiger-forces/ that is unverifiable and unsupported.
The author of these articles is Leith Fadel, who has a strong bias in favor of Bahar Al-Assad and the forces supporting him. Al Masdar news is a blog written by Leith Fadel and articles do not provide any type of verification. These articles do not provide verification and cannot be considered either reliable or verifiable. Furthermore, Leith Fadel has a history of making unverifiable claims, some of which have caused harm to other individuals. Evidence of this is found in this article:
Example
Mr. Fadel, whose Facebook profile photograph shows him with the Syrian ambassador to the United Nations, tempered his criticism of Mr. Mohsen on Wednesday, saying, “Whether he is a former fighter or not, I cannot confirm — but I am happy his son is safe.” Still, the pro-government journalist’s Facebook post appears to have helped spread the rumor that Mr. Mohsen was either a supporter or a member of Nusra far and wide.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.178.3.79 (talk • contribs) 02:49, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- That NY times article is almost a textbook example of yellow journalism at its worst. It uses just about every sly trick of the trade. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 17:22, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- I agree that this is not a good source. Irrespective of the political slant, our article on Al-Masdar News describes it as a "news aggregator". Can you suggest any other sources? Itsmejudith (talk) 11:22, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
Appropriate referencing for steel-reinforced straw men made by an ice cream manufacturer
Hello all. I have just noticed some edits to Snugburys that reference this Daily Mail article. On a search I can't find any other sources that make particular reference to the things which are sourced to the DM articles (and nor can User:Mike Peel). Equally, applying normal editorial judgement there appears to be no reason to doubt the Daily Mail's article: it is consistent with a number of other sources, and giant straw scupltures is not known as an area in which the Mail is prone to exaggeration, fabrication, or bias. How should one approach this issue in the light of the Daily Mail RfC? Regards, The Land (talk) 22:23, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
- I don't see anything in that DM article from a quick glance that's not already on Snugburys' website [41]. Unless there's something controversial about these, there's no reason we couldn't use the official website, though if there are no sources outside the website and DM, it should not be given much weight (part of the conclusion of the DM rfc was not just that DM is unreliable, but that it should not be used to determine notability. I would extend that rationale to weight as well). Someguy1221 (talk) 02:54, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- @Someguy1221: check again - I used the Snugbury's website reference first, but it doesn't cover some of the earlier sculptures, while the Daily Mail article gives the date of the first sculpture they did. I've only used the DM ref for the extra info it contains over the official website. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 11:06, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
Is Google Maps a reliable source for boundaries of a neighborhood?
This Google Map is being used at the article NoMad, Manhattan to support the claim that the neighborhood's northern boundary is 30th Street, while a clearly reliable source from The New York Times cites 29th Street. In this edit, Beyond My Ken (who I hope will comment here), has used both sources and stated that different northern boundaries are cited.
While I think that this edit is balanced and appropriate, the basic question is the underlying reliability of Google Maps as an arbiter of the boundaries, as I have no idea where Google has gotten its information. Alansohn (talk) 02:38, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Using google maps seems profoundly unwise for this sort of thing. I guess it's published in a sense, but it's ephemeral (specifically in that it can change without notice and with no traceable history of changes), and the means by which information is gathered and reviewed is totally opaque. I don't think it could qualify as a reliable source. Someguy1221 (talk) 02:50, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Some other sources seem to give a wide range of 'roughly defined' boundaries. Here is a source that cites it as 'roughly 24th-30th' as does this one. The Business insider backs up google maps and defines it as 'roughly 25th to 30th'. This source seems to include 25th- 30th street (like google maps) but not the area from madison to lexington in the east (and includes a map). Several of these sources say it is 'roughly defined' so this is a complex problem indeed. I agree that google maps isn't a great source, and some of the others here are not great either, but they illustrate that it isn't as simple as google maps vs NYT. InsertCleverPhraseHere 03:04, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Oh and get this. a different article from the New York Times also defines it as 25th-30th. InsertCleverPhraseHere 03:09, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- The necessary background to this is that neighborhoods in New York City have no legal status, and their boundaries are not set by the city, so the only way to determine those boundaries is by common usage, articles in the press, and those given in other sources. This is complicated by the fact that the real-estate industry is always trying to sell their product by associating it with a more hip or notable neighborhood rather then a down-scale one, and even go so far as to invent new neighborhood names, hoping that they'll catch on. Further, NoMad is a relatively new neighborhood that started in exactly that fashion, but which was picked up sufficiently by the press to have a real existence.In short, unlike long-standing neighborhoods, where one can consult texts such as the Encyclopedia of New York City or Jackson and Manbeck's The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn and similar sources, one can only determine the boundaries of newer neighborhoods by looking at newspapers, magazines, maps, tourist guides, real estate maps and so on. So, certainly, as Alansohn mentions, The New York Times, which put the northern boundary at 29th Street, is an excellent source, but so is the Wall Street Journal, which put the northern boundary at 32nd Street. (I rejected that because as a former inhabitant of the area, I know that Koreatown is there -- I know that's WP:OR, but (again) the problem of new neighborhoods requires at least a bit of personal information to help sort out the wheat from the chaff). So, we have the Times and Google Maps disagreeing on the northern and eastern boundaries, and in the absence of a definitive source to decide between them, the article gives both: that the northern boundary is 29th or 30th and the eastern boundary is Lexington or Madison Avenues. This is, as I understand it, the solution that is preferred when two sources disagree: absent a reason to prefer one over the other we give both.In time, the boundaries of NoMad will firm up as people begin to generally agree on what is and isn't part of "the neighborhood", and when that happens, we'll have multiple sources to support those boundaries. In the meantime, things are in flux, and our article should indicate that. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:09, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Edit conflict @Beyond My Ken, I found a different source by the NYT, (above) that cites 25th-30th, so if we want to make a quick solution to this issue, lets just replace the google citation with the second NYT citation and call it a day. InsertCleverPhraseHere 03:13, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Sounds fine to me. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:16, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Done. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:22, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Interestingly, the second NYT article illustrates well the problem that NYC neighborhood boundaries present. The writer says: "By one popular definition, NoMad runs from 25th Street to 30th Street, and from the Avenue of the Americas to Lexington Avenue." Obviously, the writer is implying that there are definitions, maybe even "popular" definitions, other than this one. It'll be interesting to see if the 3rd edition of the Encyclopedia of New York City (if there is one) includes NoMad. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:28, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Indeed, Compass.com gives very different boundaries for Nomad... 23rd-31st and 6th-Park ave InsertCleverPhraseHere 03:39, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Travel and leisure gives '26th and 30th Streets, Park Avenue and Broadway' as the boundaries. I'm inclined to think that there really is no deffinition, and that people are just making it up as they go along. It seems like every possible definition of an area 'north of madison square park' has been used by somebody. InsertCleverPhraseHere 03:47, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Interestingly, the second NYT article illustrates well the problem that NYC neighborhood boundaries present. The writer says: "By one popular definition, NoMad runs from 25th Street to 30th Street, and from the Avenue of the Americas to Lexington Avenue." Obviously, the writer is implying that there are definitions, maybe even "popular" definitions, other than this one. It'll be interesting to see if the 3rd edition of the Encyclopedia of New York City (if there is one) includes NoMad. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:28, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Done. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:22, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Sounds fine to me. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:16, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Edit conflict @Beyond My Ken, I found a different source by the NYT, (above) that cites 25th-30th, so if we want to make a quick solution to this issue, lets just replace the google citation with the second NYT citation and call it a day. InsertCleverPhraseHere 03:13, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
True, we seem to have become a little too focused on this particular issue, and have sidelined your original question. I would say that Google maps is generally a reliable source, but where it conflicts with another more conventional reliable source, we should go with the other one (as they are likely an aggregator, much like Wikipedia). Moreover, most of the time the information contained in google maps would be found in other more reliable sources, such as government maps or archived data. I would be very much in opposition to saying that google maps is in general an 'unreliable' source, particularly because sometimes they are cited for material which is original and not found elsewhere (I have seen street view images which randomly found something notable become highly cited primary sources, though I can't remember where). So in short, yes, I would consider it generally reliable. But when other reliable sources exist that conflict with it, I would assume that Google maps made a mistake, and cite the other source instead. That being said, even in this case, it doesn't appear that they have made a mistake, their definition seems to be more or less an average of other popular definitions and identical to another one cited in the NYT, which adds credibility to the accuracy of Google maps.Someguy1221 however, makes a good point that google maps can change without notice and does't track changes, which is an issue, and another reason that in cases of conflict i would trust other sources more highly. InsertCleverPhraseHere 06:10, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I would generally agree with that, which could be summed up as "Google Maps is a reliable source of last resort." BTW, my personal experience with them is that they are quite careful about changing things. I once needed to change the name of a school in my area, since an older school had closed and a newer one had taken over the building, and they wouldn't take my word for it, I had to provide them with links to articles in the New York Times before they would make the change. Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:55, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- Might I also suggest that once this conversation is archived from this page that a permanent link to it be created and placed at Talk:NoMad, Manhattan under a section such as 'Boundaries of NoMad discussion on RSN', so that the information contained here remains easily accessible from the talk page. InsertCleverPhraseHere 00:22, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- The real question is of course, 'Who lives on 30th, and why do they not want it in the adjoining Neighbourhood?' - is it a 'lower class/poorer' area that would effect house sales? Does it have a higher crime rate? And so on... These are the reasons estate agents/realtors market houses in specific areas. Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:54, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
Article Bio website as a source
A new user recently added a citation [42] to Logan Browning from a "news" source called Article Bio. Deeply concerning is the 404-error located at the privacy policy and homepage parts of this site. No "About" section can be found leading me to believe it should not be a reliable source.--☾Loriendrew☽ ☏(ring-ring) 03:07, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Eh, that's a really sketchy source. The content looks good and it's even licensed under creative commons, but incompatibly with Wikipedia (CC-NC). But that's where the good parts end. Their articles are uniformly unsigned, no about us page, website was only founded in 2013, and the parent company, Top Nepal International, is a totally unknown entity [43]. The only possible saving grace would be if this website has a demonstrable reputation for fact checking and accuracy, which seems unlikely given it is not even four years old. I looked, and I found an entire six articles on outlets I've never heard of [44]. That means that some writers are at least aware of the site, or at least found it on a google search, but no one is actually talking about the site itself. When you do a general web search, outside of articlebio itself and its mirrors, I only find people linking to it from social media posts. So in summary, many red flags, and no evidence of reliability. Someguy1221 (talk) 03:25, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I wouldn't trust it, and generally agree with everything that Someguy1221 has summarized above. InsertCleverPhraseHere 06:13, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
How has Daily Mail affected accuracy of Wikipedia articles?
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Can anyone provide examples of where using Daily Mail articles has resulted in inaccurate information being presented in Wikipedia articles? TFD (talk) 18:25, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'm not certain that RSN is the right venue for that kind of discussion, this board is for discussing the reliability of sources, not if unreliable sources have ever wormed false information into wikipedia. In any case, what would it prove? If someone answers yes; well, they print inaccurate and in many cases fabricated information, why should it be a surprise that some of it ends up here? If nobody that visits here has specific examples that doesn't mean it hasn't happened, nor that it won't happen in the future. If your point is that wikipedia editors are pretty good as sifting through mixed bag sources, and that because of this we don't need the restrictions on the daily mail, that is a poor argument indeed, and in any case that ship has sailed, the RfA is closed. InsertCleverPhraseHere 21:09, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- While cleaning up DM citations recently, I found a cite that used a chart from it to say that the US had the lowest underage drinking rate in the industrialized world. I didn't spend a huge amount of time researching it before removing it (because the source itself didn't actually say that, it was someone's original research from the chart), but from my quick searches it looked like that was untrue, depending on how you quality "underage" - the US is on the low end due to its legal minimum of 21, but many countries are lower, including Iceland, Italy, and Belgium. This is only a partial example (again, the DM itself didn't actually explicitly say what it was being cited for there), but it's the most recent one that comes to mind. --Aquillion (talk) 21:57, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- I'm not commenting on the reliability of that pdf, but I just wanted to point out that the second page is titles "Dartmouth in the 1970s..." and consists of a single photo with a 2000's model car in it. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 22:01, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Presumably the reason for banning the Daily Mail is that it is not a reliable source for Wikipedia articles, i.e., that there is a chance that its use as a source has led to inaccurate information being added. We need to establish to what extent if any that has happened in order to determine the urgency of the mission to change 12,000 citations. And going forward, it would set a benchmark so that we would have good reason to ban even less reliable sources.
- Here is your edit. A chart in the DM article, "A nation of bad parents: Britain's youngsters amongst world's worst for drinking, smoking and teenage pregnancy, warns the OECD," accurately reflects chart b in Figure 2.16 on p. 54 ("b. Percentage of 13- and 15-years-old children who have been drunk at least twice, 2005/06") of the OECD report, "Comparative Child Well-being across the OECD". At the highest, 33.0% of 13 to 15 year olds in the U.K. had been drunk at least twice, compared to 11.9% in the U.S. which was the lowest. The Daily Telegraph also covered the report in "Britain leads the world in under-age drinking, OECD study shows."
- So the DM accurately reported a study by a prestigeous organization, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, as did at least one other news organization. The Johns Hopkins report uses a different year (2007) and different age group but provides similar information. In its chart on 15-16 year olds who had drank in the last year, the U.S. ties for last with Iceland. I am rating the DM story "true."
- TFD (talk) 23:11, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- Any responses that you get here are going to be inherently anecdotal in nature. The only way to get the information you desire would be to examine all of the Daily mail citations that have ever been attempted and then gauge them on truthfulness, and then thats even if you can verify that what they have written is true rather than a fabricated story that nobody caught. I don't care a wit if this story above is true or not, or any other that may be dredged up, the fact remains that this is not the place for such a discussion, nor is such a discussion likely to bear any fruit due to the anecdotal nature of any examples that might appear. The urgency of the 12,000 citations is up to whoever has the time and inclination to go after them, but they need to be assessed per the closing remarks of the RfC in any case. InsertCleverPhraseHere 02:51, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- It should be more than anecdotal because it was the basis for banning the Daily Mail. We should be able to identify the damage that using this source has caused in order to determine the urgency of addressing the problem. While each editor will make their own decision on what effort to expend on this, it would be helpful to them in making this decision to know the extent of the problem. TFD (talk) 15:12, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- I don't suppose it has occurred to you that we can take an action in order to prevent future damage instead of as a result of previous damage. And before you go claiming that we'd need to prove that the DM can damage the encyclopedia before we take preventative measures, note that most people don't have to shoot themselves in the face with a shotgun in order to be pretty certain that not pointing a shotgun at their face and pulling the trigger is good way to prevent oneself from being shot in the face with a shotgun. We don't need to prove that damage has happened to know with great assurance that damage can happen. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:28, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- I understand your view, which was stated so eloquently by Donald Rumsfeld: "evidence of absence is not evidence of absence." But that's not what editors argued. Anyway, as delightful as it is to discuss why you do not want to answer my question, I posted in the hope that someone would answer it. TFD (talk) 19:13, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- NO this isn't why people argued against the daily mail, they argued against it because POLICY is against it. Specifically under WP:RS and WP:VERIFIABILITY the DM disqualified itself due to the willful inaccuracies that it has printed (not accidents). Again, this section is inappropriate, as this board is not the correct location for such a discussion and the RfC on the Daily Mail is closed. Can I please request that an uninvolved editor or admin close this section please. InsertCleverPhraseHere 19:24, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- I understand your view, which was stated so eloquently by Donald Rumsfeld: "evidence of absence is not evidence of absence." But that's not what editors argued. Anyway, as delightful as it is to discuss why you do not want to answer my question, I posted in the hope that someone would answer it. TFD (talk) 19:13, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- I don't suppose it has occurred to you that we can take an action in order to prevent future damage instead of as a result of previous damage. And before you go claiming that we'd need to prove that the DM can damage the encyclopedia before we take preventative measures, note that most people don't have to shoot themselves in the face with a shotgun in order to be pretty certain that not pointing a shotgun at their face and pulling the trigger is good way to prevent oneself from being shot in the face with a shotgun. We don't need to prove that damage has happened to know with great assurance that damage can happen. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:28, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- It should be more than anecdotal because it was the basis for banning the Daily Mail. We should be able to identify the damage that using this source has caused in order to determine the urgency of addressing the problem. While each editor will make their own decision on what effort to expend on this, it would be helpful to them in making this decision to know the extent of the problem. TFD (talk) 15:12, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- Any responses that you get here are going to be inherently anecdotal in nature. The only way to get the information you desire would be to examine all of the Daily mail citations that have ever been attempted and then gauge them on truthfulness, and then thats even if you can verify that what they have written is true rather than a fabricated story that nobody caught. I don't care a wit if this story above is true or not, or any other that may be dredged up, the fact remains that this is not the place for such a discussion, nor is such a discussion likely to bear any fruit due to the anecdotal nature of any examples that might appear. The urgency of the 12,000 citations is up to whoever has the time and inclination to go after them, but they need to be assessed per the closing remarks of the RfC in any case. InsertCleverPhraseHere 02:51, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
Forbes Articles
There is an RfC going on at the article concerning Tomas Gorny. Some individuals (whom I suspect are possibly paid to oppose the inclusion of an article published on Forbes) are opposing the inclusion of this article, potentially in order to WP:GAME the system. I suspect this because one editor is a newly created SPA account and another editor who has not edited in a while both voted to delete the source. Now, the Forbes article is written by a Forbes staff writer, Susan Adams, who has received notable accolades for her work there. Your non-partisan commentary at the RfC discussion would be duly appreciated. Happy Valentine's Day (or Singles Awareness Day, whichever you prefer), Eliko007 (talk) 20:11, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- They're right, unfortunately. Regardless of their reasons, it looks like that article was published under Forbes Trep Talks, which is a blog and part of their Forbes Contributor System. See WP:NEWSBLOG. It can only really be used as a source for the opinions as the author (presented as opinions), not for facts, and even then there could be WP:DUE issues. (Basically, Forbes only exerts minimal curation for its blogs, so being published there doesn't carry any particular weight.) I'm also a bit startled that you'd accuse the people trying to remove the interview of being paid editors; given that it looks like a puff-piece interview on a newblog (a very low-quality source even in the best of conditions), I think the insistence on trying to include it is much more strange... and it seems far more likely to me that a self-described entrepreneur like Gorny would hire someone to polish his article with low-quality sources like that, rather than some shadowy cabal being paid to inexplicably remove it (outside of us pedants about Wikipedia policy and sourcing, who would even benefit from that?) --Aquillion (talk) 21:33, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- This post by Eliko007 also seems a bit WP:CANVASSY to me. InsertCleverPhraseHere 21:50, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is a distinction between forbes staff and contributors - this is an interview by a forbes staff member, regardless of where on the site it is actually published, so should be useable for uncontentious info or for what we would allow a primary source to reference. What is the material this is being used to support? Only in death does duty end (talk) 17:16, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- I went and found out: "Gorny was born in Poland in 1975. When he was 15, he moved to Germany with his family to take care of his grandmother. In Germany he began selling protein and health bars at school.[5] He also worked washing dishes after school at a restaurant and delivering papers.[5] When Gorny was 16, he had saved up enough money to start a business selling PC parts and computers.[5] He was doing $100,000 in revenue and $10,000 in profit a month.[5] Since he was in a rush to get to America, Gorny sold his customer list for $25,000.[5]" So its part background and part puffery, the basic information 'Born in poland, moved to Germany, teenage activities, emigration to the US can all be sourced to a primary source if we wanted to - attributed correctly, so there is no problem with it being sourced to an article by a staff member of forbes (rather than a contributor). The 'He was doing 100,000' bit is more problematic as it is obviously an interesting claim that serves to emphasis his business nous. So I would want a better source for that. But the source itself is not unuseable, it does need work in how its used. Only in death does duty end (talk) 17:24, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
Donald Trump–Russia dossier
I'm poking this noticeboard, since it seems far more active than WP:NPOVN noticeboard. After a few days of waiting for a third opinion there, I've given up. A recent article led to a bit of back and forth at Donald Trump-Russia dossier, and I've had a bit of an unusual interaction with the locals there regarding the use and misuse of the Paul Gregory Forbes.com piece. This is not strictly a reliable sources question, although my understanding is that Forbes.com in general is not regarded as an acceptable source. I believe that it is a reliable source in the present context, which is for the opinion of its author, but the question remains what WP:WEIGHT to assign that opinion. Please opine at Talk:Donald Trump–Russia dossier#Forbes / Paul Gregory, if you are so inclined. Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:18, 14 February 2017 (UTC)
- It is a contributor piece, so basically a blog with little editorial oversight. Generally Forbes contributor pieces are not considered a reliable source (see above sections for a discussion of this actually). Possibly for the opinions of the author. I don't know who this guy is or why his opinion might or might not be notable, so I won't comment on whether his opinion is relevant to the article in question or notable enough to warrant inclusion. InsertCleverPhraseHere 00:15, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- It would be better to post it at WP:NPOVN. Per WP:NEWSORG, this type of source is usually reliable for the opinions expressed but not for facts. However how various opinions are presented is an issue of weight. TFD (talk) 19:18, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
Reliable
I know this is hyper partisan, but is it otherwise reliable?
Benjamin (talk) 01:17, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- Reliable for what? Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:28, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- The views of the speaker, or organization, or event, perhaps? I'm not sure what you're asking. What else would it be for? Benjamin (talk) 02:11, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- Benjamin Read the top of this page. You need to provide the content that the source is being used to support {you haven't}, the source itself (which you have provided), and the article that it is to be used in (you haven't). Without this information it is near impossible to judge the reliability of a source in a vacuum as the reliability depends on context and what its being cited for.
- As for the location of publication, while partisan, (like most news sources these days), a quick look at its website does seem to indicate that they have editorial oversight. I wouldn't consider it any worse than Fox news as a publisher from what I've seen here. The author's bio indicates that he has also written for Forbes (though possibly just as a 'contributor'-the Forbes blog section), Discovery News, and a few other low impact places. He seems reasonably reputable, though is clearly labeled as a conservative in the bio (not that it is an issue in and of itself). Nothing strikes me as a huge red flag, but again, we need to know where and how you intend to use this source. InsertCleverPhraseHere 02:38, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- The views of the speaker, or organization, or event, perhaps? I'm not sure what you're asking. What else would it be for? Benjamin (talk) 02:11, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- In general: probably not. Looking very quickly at that site, its headline formatting looks like pure clickbait. As the article named seems to be claiming that a living person said something offensive, and you yourself admit that the site is 'hyper-partisan', it definitely shouldn't be used for any claim about a living person per WP:BLP. In any case, I think that anyone who can make this sort of edit [45] should steer well clear of any contentious racial topic. Daveosaurus (talk) 06:41, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- It's not out of character for Yusra Khogali to have said that [46], but I fear that adding that to the Black Lives Matter page would be overestimating her significance. Khogali, whom people who hate her like to refer to as a "Black Lives Matter leader" is one of multiple founders of a single chapter of BLM in a single city. In the grand scheme of things, her twitter and facebook rants are not that important. Even her most inflammatory rhetoric seems to garner only marginal media attention, and even then only in the form of partisan sites and some blogs, as far as I can find. So, maybe an unreliable source, probably a BLP violation, and definitely undue weight. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:28, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- @Someguy1221 Three points, first; it seems to be an established fact that she did, in fact, say the things purported in this article (at least some of them are clearly visible as social media screenshots and there is no reason to think they have been fabricated, indeed this sort of thing isn't even out of character), how exactly would it be a BLP violation?
- Undue weight for the BLM article I can easily understand, though she is a rather outspoken member of the BLM group, she isn't what I would call a 'founder', you are correct that she founded only one small group.
- As for the reliability of source for general use in the Black Lives Matter article, it may by highly partisan, but so is Salon for example (in the opposite direction), which is cited 3 times in the Black Lives Matter article. Partisanship then, clearly doesn't disqualify a source, and indeed we should be careful to maintain an equal balance of partisan sources from both sides if we don't want political articles to become a one-sided joke. The article on SJW for example needed a complete overhaul of sources last year as it had become a soapbox of leftwing preaching, thankfully now paired down to a balanced article. Indeed we need to consider that for many politically charged issues, partisan sources are often the only sources that bother reporting at all, and we can't avoid citing them, the key is to maintain balanced coverage to satisfy WP:WEIGHT. InsertCleverPhraseHere 08:29, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- The potential BLP violation would be to have the only mention of this woman on Wikipedia being the worst thing she has ever said. That might be an entirely neutral, if the nasty posts are the only notable thing about this person, but for something so inflammatory, I think we'd need more substantial sources. And yeah, partisan sources have a place, opinions can be significant, I just err on non-inclusion regarding living people. Incidentally, I found plenty of non-partisan people, or at least people on the other side of the partisan divide, also complaining about her comments, but nothing that IMHO rose to anything worth reporting on Wikipedia. Someguy1221 (talk) 08:54, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- It's not out of character for Yusra Khogali to have said that [46], but I fear that adding that to the Black Lives Matter page would be overestimating her significance. Khogali, whom people who hate her like to refer to as a "Black Lives Matter leader" is one of multiple founders of a single chapter of BLM in a single city. In the grand scheme of things, her twitter and facebook rants are not that important. Even her most inflammatory rhetoric seems to garner only marginal media attention, and even then only in the form of partisan sites and some blogs, as far as I can find. So, maybe an unreliable source, probably a BLP violation, and definitely undue weight. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:28, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
- Does not appear to be generally an RS, and especially not for this particular instance (used here). Note, past discussion on this source in 2014 can be found at the archives. The about page does not indicate much in the way of editorial oversight. The Team page has people with titles of editors, but from what I can tell, they're not editors in the traditional sense. Kyle Becker, the managing editor, has a job duty described as "he helps package content to develop the website's social media presence. He is frequently among the top individual publishers in the world on social media on a daily basis". Others with "editor" in their title have similarly vague job descriptions.
- That said, even if I assume the best and that they do have editorial oversight, the author of the article is questionable at best. Michael Miller is basically a blogger. This, with BLP considerations, make me think this article and author are not a reliable source for a very contentious BLP claim. I agree with the WEIGHT arguments above, but that's an issue for the articles talk page I think. EvergreenFir (talk) 17:11, 15 February 2017 (UTC)