Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Archive 20

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Media bias exposed

Media bias exposed: "[http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Story?id=6099188&page=1 Media's Presidential Bias and Decline; Columnist Michael Malone Looks at Slanted Election Coverage and the Reasons Why," By MICHAEL S. MALONE, Oct. 24, 2008. --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 13:33, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Do you have a proposal for improving this guideline on reliable sources, or is it just for general information? WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:15, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I asked a simmilar question below. The bias inherent in mass media sources is not in question. There needs to be major amendments in many of WP policies such as verifiability, notability, original research and reliable sources. We need to exclude biased and unreliable sources of inforamtion such as many in mass media published sources and make provisions for unpublished sources of information and means by which editors can contribute original verifyable research. This is holding WP back in terms of important information that is excluded and popular information of questionable integrity that is included. For any of these policies to even suggest that they are not concerned with truth, only verifiability, is a huge factor contributing to systemic bias on WP. WP must be concerned with all information, both specific and broad of varying degrees of significance with the utmost importance placed on truth, fact and reality rather than hiding behind policies such as these to escape difficult discussion and work to create a truly reliable and factual, all-inclusive encyclopedia. Why aim so low WP editors? Things can be so much better. Nick carson (talk) 04:25, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Let's have the entire discussion below, in one place. There's no reason to split it up all over the page; it will just confuse people. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:45, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

DYK proposed rule change

There have been incidents of questionable sources used to support DYK hooks. A change has been proposed to the DYK rules to address this. Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know#Proposed_rule_change. Thank you. Kablammo (talk) 16:02, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Self-published sources

I don't understand the push to include this wording. WP:SELFPUB is pretty clear. What is wrong with a simple edit summary that says: "Removed per WP:SELFPUB" ? Why should it be necessary for an editor to have to re-explain a policy every time he or she makes an edit according to policy? Why make it more difficult for editors to follow policy? Dlabtot (talk) 18:28, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

The current wording says it is "helpful", not that it is required. And it would not be difficult to do so; you could simply cite the number of the

restriction you believe it violates. PSWG1920 (talk) 18:32, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't agree that it is 'helpful', for the reasons I stated above. Quite the opposite. Dlabtot (talk) 19:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I dont see the usefullness either since selfpublished sources are only able to be used in very circumscribed ways. (An I am not really sure what is being referred to by "simply cite the number of the restriction". There is nothing useful here or in Self-published sources which is "numbered".)-- The Red Pen of Doom 18:47, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

The restrictions of WP:SELFQUEST are numbered, 1 to 7. And pointing out which is specifically violated can help inexperienced users. PSWG1920 (talk) 18:50, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I am not seeing how that would be any more helpful than understanding that self pub in general are not appropriate. Most attempts to use self published sources violate at least 6 of the 7. And the most important part of self pub "may only be used as sources about themselves" isnt numbered at all.-- The Red Pen of Doom 18:59, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Let me briefly explain my history here. Several months ago, an editor deleted a bunch of references in an article I was working on, noting that the sources were self-published and labeling them as unreliable. This perplexed me a bit since they were only being used to show the viewpoints of the writers. I found WP:SELFANDQUEST (then known only as WP:SELFPUB), pointed it out, and asked him to note which of the restrictions he felt were violated in each case (which could have easily been done in the edit summaries.) He refused to do so. Although I now see that he was probably correct in most or all of those deletions (but for reasons which are still not clearly articulated by any policy or guideline), this experience really affected me negatively as a new user. I'm trying to help others avoid that. PSWG1920 (talk) 19:29, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Red Pen, I doubt that I'd find it very helpful for you to explain how I violated SELFPUB. Probably, the only thing I'd need was "Hey, did you realize that this source was self-published?"

But it's not reasonable for us to assume that a newbie editor knows that this policy even exists, much less that it applies. If you just say "violates SELFPUB," many newbie editors will give up in frustration. These editors would likely benefit from education, and it doesn't hurt us to encourage explanations. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:22, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I can't see any reason that wouldn't apply to every policy. Should every revert require a explanation of policy, rather than a link to the actual policy? The policies themselves, with wording honed by a large number of editors, and representing a broad consensus, seem to to be better explanations than anything that could be put into an edit summary. Dlabtot (talk) 01:24, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

As long as the edit summary points to the relevant policy or policy section, that should be enough. If further explanation is needed, the editor who wants to add the source can ask for clarification on the talk page. Blueboar (talk) 03:18, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Dlabtot, I do some clean up of external links. I think that an edit summary like "Rm link to internet discussion forum per WP:ELNO #10" is a sufficient explanation. You can click the link, find #10, and see for yourself that internet discussion forums are to be avoided. By contrast, an explanation like "Rm links per WP:External links" is noticeably less specific and less useful -- and WP:External links#Maintenance_and_review briefly encourages explanations. The primary reason for the explanations is WP:BITE: external links are often added by newbies that honestly don't know any better.

I see a similar situation here. SELFPUB is violated primarily by incorrigible POVers and newbies. We can WP:AGF by assuming that they are all newbies who didn't know any better. But "Deleted per WP:SELFPUB" is not so helpful -- particularly when the confused newbie sees that the use of self-published and questionable sources is allowed. There's a lot of nuance in this policy. I think it would be much more helpful for the newbie to get an explanation, like "This is a WP:SELFPUBlished source. We can only use it to say that 'John Smith says that'..."

And -- do you actually think that the occasional "try to explain" encouragement will hurt anything? WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:44, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Are all scientific journals reliable?

How does one go about deciding if a scientific journal is a reliable source? With a bit of money, what stops anyone starting a "Journal of Hocus Pocus" and trying to look genuine - especially if there are financial stakes? I ask because some articles cite the Journal of Essential Oil Research described here as a "Trade magazine [...] devoted to the publication of essential oil research and analysis." Could someone please advise? Thanks. pgr94 (talk) 19:24, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Institute for Scientific Information is the most high profile of a couple groups that measure journal impact. They have inclusion criteria for scientific publishing that often serve as a useful baseline for deciding whether a publication is really scientific journal. See their Master Journal List. In this case the Journal of Essential Oil Research does meet their criteria [1], while something like Energy and Environment (a mouth piece for global warming skeptics) does not. Of course being recognized by the ISI does not necessarily make a journal good (there are lots of low-quality journals), but it does suggest that it is not crap. Dragons flight (talk) 19:43, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply Dragons flight. I'm glad I checked here first! pgr94 (talk) 20:14, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

A discussion regarding the primary source or secondary source classification of highway maps

Wikipedia talk:No original research#Regarding maps being "primary sources" according to this policy --Rschen7754 (T C) 06:36, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Mass media sources as reliable / Reliable unpublished sources

Many sources of information that comply with this policy and may be very well known and established may not be entirely accurate or truly reliable and may be subject to bias. What provisions are there for this in this policy, if any? Also, why does this policy persist with excluding independent and unpublisised material and information? There are many significant, important, notable, influential and even popular, writings, musicians, films, etc that may not have the financial means to gain mas media attention to be publisised in order to comply with this policy and as such WP inevitably excluse vital information of encyclopedic importance. Nick carson (talk) 04:22, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Unpublished materials are excluded because it is impossible for anyone to figure out what an unpublished source actually says. For example: I kept a diary briefly when I was about ten years old. In it, it says that my brother is a toad. Shall we use that as a source for anything, even for the fact that the statement was made? How would you possibly find out whether or not I just made that up? (I did, by the way. It doubtless contained similar complaints, but the diary itself was probably tossed in the trash twenty years ago, so I have no actual idea what was in it.)

As for the rest: It's apparently your personal opinion that mass media is horribly biased. Your view is not widely shared. The consensus is that while the mass media makes mistakes, and has certain fairly well understood limitations, it's much better than most of the alternatives when dealing with current events: e.g., what happened, when did it happened, who did it, where did it happen.

You might want to consider this fact: this policy does not hold the mass media up as the single best source for anything and everything. It's pretty weak for most scientific and medical details. I understand that people writing about philosophy and religions have similar complaints. "Published" does not just mean "in a mainstream newspaper," and other good reliable sources are not excluded merely because we permit the inclusion of mainstream media where appropriate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:33, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

It goes without saying that in the case of unpublished material, guidelines (just like this policy) would have to be established to determine if that source was reliable. For example; your diary would not as it can be proven not to be true that your brother is not and was not a toad by simple observation alone. What about all the information out there that is notable, important, significant and has never been the subject matter of any published material? Nick carson (talk) 06:58, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Nick, what you are talking about goes against one of the core policies of Wikipedia... information that we include in Wikipedia needs to be verifiable. From your comments here and at other policy pages, it seems as if you have a problem with several of our core policies. Perhaps you would be more at home editing some other wiki. Blueboar (talk) 14:03, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Nick, you still haven't explained how you would find out whether or not such a statement was even made in my old diary. Using unpublished sources lets any liar put down anything he wants, and add a completely fictional reference. How would you ever figure out that it was a made-up reference? You wouldn't be able to prove that my diary didn't contain a statement about my brother's slimier qualities. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:53, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Firstly, a 10-year-old's old diary would most likely not be notable, even under what I am suggesting, so it's not a good example to discuss. Please understand that I am not suggesting that information on WP should not be verifiable, rather, I'm asking questions and trying to generate discussion to include alternative forms of verifiable information.

It's also important to remember that not everyone who contributes information baed on OR is lying, be it intentionally or unintentionally, and to assume the worst case is a slack way of dealing with problems, the fact that this model is accepted in many facets of society means little in the way of its quality.

In addition, as I have explained in other discussions; It would be apathetic of me to avoid such problems by leaving Wikipedia. I wouldn't be asking these questions if I didn't genuinely think there were better ways these policies could be structured. What I would like to see is some discussion regarding these questions rather than witness the acceptance of these policies as absolute. Surely they are subject to progression and amendment? Nick carson (talk) 10:28, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

← There are sources that can be considered reliable in the overall sense and sources that can be considered reliable in the narrow, subject specific sense. One example of a "overall" would be Time magazine. An example of a "Narrow, subject specific" would be Fangoria. It can be broken down further as well to localized publications such as the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times or down to area specific publications such as the LA Weekly, The Village Voice or the Detroit Free Press. There are numerous publications that can be used for sources of information, both for fact verification and to aid in establishing notability of a subject. As an example, if a musical artist appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone it would be fairly easy to establish that artists notability. If an artist was mentioned in the "Hype Monitor", that is only online and part of the The Rolling Stone New Music Blog, than not so much. But if that same band had a cover story or featured article in a magazine such as Flipside, BAM, Ink Disease or Ben Is Dead notability could be established as well. There are obvious reasons why self published sources such as press release and websites should not be used. Also the ability to use an official website to verify something such as a tour date is fine. Using a list of live dates from any source to establish notability should not be done. Soundvisions1 (talk) 00:59, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

The Internet Movie Database as a Reliable Source

Over a year ago, an attempt was made to set a policy on the situations in which IMDb could be used as a reliable source (if any). The discussion is here WP:CIMDB. A heated debate on this has just started up again. Anyone wanting to contribute is invited to do so: here. GDallimore (Talk) 11:22, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Reference library category

In order to help facilitate easier location of potential sources of offline information to help verify the notability of article subjects and contents, I have created Category:WikiProject reference libraries and placed into it all of the reference library pages of which I am aware. Please add more project reference libraries to this category if you know of more. Additionally, feel free to create new reference library pages for any particular project as well. They can be very useful. ···日本穣^{? · Talk to Nihonjoe} 20:04, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Help please.

Today, I got information on a John Isaac Hawkins from a website. I understand that if not cited correctly, my info will be challenged. Since I already know were my info came from, how do I cite it correctly? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Superhalofreak (talk • contribs) 21:12, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Use the {{cite web}} template. Instructions can be found on the linked page. Gary King (talk) 21:30, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

consesus documents are more reliable than journal articles, this policy should reflect that

Reports written by consensus bodies like the National Academies of Sciences are much more forceful and should be taken into account much more than any individual journal article. In addition, review articles represent a document on "the accepted state of the art" written, often at the invitation of the editor, by an acknowledged expert in an area. These too are far more reliable than an individual article.

Why doesn't this policy recognize this? PDBailey (talk) 02:20, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

It isn't that this guideline (it isn't a policy) does not recognize this... its that it concerns itself with a more basic issue... explaining what is and is not considered reliable. Since the different types of sources you list (individual journal articles, review artices and reports writen by consensus bodies) are all considered reliable, there is no need to discuss which are more reliable than the others. Obviously, for any given article, we hope that editors will use the most reliable sources that apply. Blueboar (talk) 04:18, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

And when they conflict? i.e. Peter Duesberg has had some success getting articles published claiming that HIV does not cause AIDS, but that doesn't mean much in light of consensus at places like CDC and NIH. PDBailey (talk) 14:19, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

That's why we have core policies like neutral point of view and what Wikipedia is not. See WP:NPOV and WP:NOT. If someone wants to push a fringe view and improperly imply that it is an accepted view, their edits can be challenged and reverted under the principle that Wikipedia is not a soapbox. --Coolcaesar (talk) 15:53, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

I think what you are saying is that it is so obvious, it does not require saying. I guess I can understand that, especially given the desire to keep the length of the policies to a minimum. PDBailey (talk) 19:30, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Actually, we are saying exactly the opposite... It is so not-obvious that we can not make a rule on it. We are saying that determining which sources are more reliable than others in any specific field is a matter of editorial judgement best determined by those who are knowlegible about that field, and so can not be legislated by policy... When two sources disagree, and both are reliable, then we discuss what all sides in the debate have to say. However, we also trust our editors to determine how much weight to give to each viewpoint (see WP:NPOV and especially its subsection on Undue Weight. You may also want to see WP:FRINGE which seems to apply in your case.) Blueboar (talk) 20:22, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

One of my cases is actually Radiation hormesis, where I argue the National Academies of Sciences represents the most forceful consensus, defining what is main stream. My co-editor argues that hormesis is not fringe. I have argued essentially this same thing many times. When there is an important policy question, I think the scientific consensus is defined by NAS, not a bunch of people getting little journal articles published, most of which will be debunked, buy only after the four year queue of the journal finally allows the publication. PDBailey (talk) 02:29, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that it may not be possible to come up with a generic rule as you wish. If one simply said "consensus body reports are more reliable than journal articles", then what is to stop someone using that to promote the opinions of a blatantly biased (or thoroughly discredited or disrespected) consensus body? If it were to be specified as "national consensus body", then what would happen were the consensus bodies of different countries disagree? As such, these decisions must be left to those editors with the most knowledge of a field. Unfortunately, you are right though - there are major problems with this approach and its interaction with the greater wikipedia system. LinaMishima (talk) 04:06, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I often leave radiation hormesis alone for several months and then come back to find it a huge list of articles, mostly in questionable journals, and when I try to bring the article back to some semblance of NPOV I end up in an edit war with the most recent editor who has read some articles on the topic and now things that it is a suppressed truth. The other editors who edit the page are mostly in agreement with them (this topic is such a non-starter for the main stream, who would want to edit it?) and then every time I have to argue that the United Nations and US Congresses consensus bodies are not filled with hacks. I would argue this policy is badly needed, but I might be alone in having these types of problems, and maybe radiation hormesis isn't an important article to have be accurate. In response to your complaint I would say that bodies that consensus are official and commissioned by a state or the UN have more weight than those that are ad hoc. PDBailey (talk) 13:07, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

You are certainly not alone with this problem - I was once involved in the mess that is (was?) homeopathy, and I know full well the problems that questionable sources being promoted can bring. The problem is that there is a risk that a UN commissioned group could go off on a tangent not supported by the rest of the scientific community, or that a state commissioned group would only write to benefit its state. As such, a general rule really could cause more harm than good, even though it might help in the short term with a specific article. Sadly there is little advice I can give other than to work on getting WP:FRINGE to monitor the article. I admit, it is tempting to offer to monitor the woo myself, however I no longer actively edit on a regular enough basis to offer much support (and I know exactly how damn depressing it can get :( ). Perhaps look to see if there is a specific editing group in existance (or create one, spanning other articles with good anti-woo editors) to guide your articles, and get them to agree (as it would consist of people with knowledge of the field) on rankings for sources. LinaMishima (talk) 14:41, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

If you have not seen it... check out Wikipedia:Scientific consensus, a very good essay that deals with some of these issues. Blueboar (talk) 14:46, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

That's brilliant, thanks for the link! I've created the shortcut WP:SCICON, since that essay looks to be rather useful, and a good summary of arbcon decisions on the matter (and I remember shortcuts better :P). LinaMishima (talk) 14:52, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Official bodies have agendas, and statements of consensus from national academies, and legislative advisory groups, and similar organizations, cannot be assumed to be free from political considerations. The NAs statements on matters of public policy can be in some cases informed by as much public policy and prudence as by pure science. They inherently tend to be the conservative views of establishment scientists. Sometimes this is a problem, sometimes not. I'm thinking in the medical field now, where the consensus statements about appropriate medical treatment in the UK and the US can be very different--the UK being somewhat less likely to come to consensus to accept as a standard things that require large amounts of money. There are a great many articles and subjects where it is naive to say there is a single scientific consensus.08:24, 22 November 2008 (UTC) DGG (talk)

Very good point about the political aspects. Academic politics can also get dirty at times.

Another difficulty with identifying consensus is the differences between subjects. In science there is at least the possibility that hypotheses can be refuted, either empirically or by indentfying clear errors in maths, methods, etc. Even that is only partially true, for example in "big-bucks" physics (particle colliders, Hubble telescope, etc.) allocation of funding is a political process. In non-scientific academic subjects this is not generally possible and debates go on much longer with no clear copnclusion. In non-academic subjects, it's very difficult to see whether there is anything even vaguely approaching a consensus. I'd go along with Blueboar's comment (20:22, 20 November 2008) that "determining which sources are more reliable than others in any specific field is a matter of editorial judgement best determined by those who are knowlegable about that field, and so can not be legislated by policy."--Philcha (talk) 10:04, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

(Undent) In this particular case, you might be able to get some help from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rational Skepticism. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:03, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

DGG worte, "The NAs(sic) statements on matters of public policy can be in some cases informed by as much public policy and prudence as by pure science." I don't know that "public policy" is in the sense it is used the second time, but, I would argue that using prudence when you are on the frontier and the convincing work has yet to be performed is okay because sometimes you just need to make a decision now. Gathering together experts in the field and some excellent scientists from outside the field is about the best way I can think of to do this. I would challenge DGG to give a good reason to believe the following claim, "a journal article can be expected to be better than a NAS study in the topic of [fill in the blank]" PDBailey (talk) 02:18, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Pdbailey, would you like to read Russian Academy of Sciences#USSR_Academy_of_Sciences and come back here after you're done with the bit about "However starting in 1928 the Politburo started to interfere in the affairs of the Academy..."?

The fact that the United States National Academy of Sciences doesn't currently admit to government interference mean that no National Academy of Sciences has ever suffered from this problem, and it's certainly possible that an outfit that sends a major annual report to the US Congress might make the occasional politically motivated statement. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:36, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

That's exactly the point I was making. I think in this specific case, Pdbailey should probably look to find a wikiproject to assist in this matter. Wikiprojects within them can reach a consensus on how to advise on the reliability and correctness of sources. Plus, getting additional editors on board would help with the underlying issue of point of view pushing by opposing sides. LinaMishima (talk) 03:41, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing, I think you know that you intentionally misinterpreted my statement. I specifically was talking about the US NAS. There is little reason to consider the the opinions of a country's NAS when it is not independent of the government. My challenge stands and I think you are being obstinate not to admit NAS has an unparalleled history, and Wikipedia should recognize that. PDBailey (talk) 04:23, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

(deindent) Hello, I am the other editor of radiation hormesis that is mentioned above.

In this case, PDBailey decided that the consensus body opinion that there is no hormesis is more valuable than a boatload of good journal articles that suggest that there might be hormesis. Hormesis is not a fringe opinion, just the opinion of a significant minority, and this is a case where there is no real consensus yet.Likebox (talk) 21:46, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Folks, this really is an issue of having multiple reliable sources that disagree with each other. The argument stems from trying to determine which of these reliable sources are more reliable than the others. As several editors have stated above, this is not an argument that can (or should) be resolved here on this page. It simply isn't a policy issue. Please take the argument back to the talk page of the article involved. Blueboar (talk) 14:23, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Again question about mass media

I want to ask, what we should do if say, in several newspapers or monographies a politician called "nationalist" or a businessman called "oligarch" or a state authority called "thief" or "criminal" or "traitor" and there is no refutal from the other side? Should we represent this point of view as the only correct? Do things change if the media belong to a political group?

For example, if Goerge Bush called "war criminal", Putin called "dictator", Abramovich called "oligarch" etc? Are there any general rules? --Dojarca (talk) 01:15, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

To some extent this depends on the reputation of the newspaper that is applying the label. If it is a fairly mainstream paper, then there is a good chance that the paper has a reason to apply the label. If it is not mainstream, then we should probably be warry of repeating it.

As to your question about the lack of refutation... we can not talk about the other POV if there is no published sources (ie no refutal). That said, we do not need to represent the negative POV as being "correct"... we can present it as being an opinion. Blueboar (talk) 01:26, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

1. What to do if the editors disagree over reputation?

2. If the newspaper is mainstream and calls Putin "dictator" or Saakashvili "insane" or "mad", should we add Putin to the category "dictators" and place in the lead of Saakashvili's article that he is mad?

3. Yes we can represent the negative POV as opinion, but other users may say that since there is no refutal or other contradicting source then we should present this POV as a fact.--Dojarca (talk) 01:41, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

1. Discuss what reliable sources say, not what editors say.

2. No, we can note that the newspaper calls them a "dictator" or "insane"... but should not place them in a categorize them as such without more solidly reliable sources (see: WP:BLP).

3. Yup... it is not always easy to maintain a balance when people want to POV push. Point them to WP:NPOV. Blueboar (talk) 02:51, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

1. WP:NPOV does not say anything about that we should attribute any opinion. Or am I wrong? So I can point them here but with no result.

2. What if professional psychiatrists say Saakashvili is insane? Look here [2] and here [3]. The one is professor of psychiatry and the other is the head of psychology chair of Institute of Psychiatry. So we can represent this as a fact in the article about him?

3. Okay, what about objects, not people? For example, why Yodok called "concentration camp" in Wikipedia and Guantanamo camp called "detention camp"? Both widely called "concentration camp" in the media, and there is no refutal, so it seems Wikipedia is taking sides here? Is there any general rule how to deal with such cases?--Dojarca (talk) 11:56, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

It comes down to this... If a reliable source uses a label to discribe someone or some thing, we should note that the source does so. If different reliable sources use different labels, we should note this as well, attributing the labels so the reader knows who says what. When categorizing people, priority is given to "self-identification". There are some restrictions on all of this, especially when discussing living people (see WP:BLP), but that is the basics. Does all of this sometimes lead to arguments? Yes... in which case you need to argue it out in good faith, compromise and reach a consensus. Blueboar (talk) 16:18, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

The problem is there is no source that Bush does not "self-identify" himself as war criminal or Putin as dictator. They simply do not comment on such accusations. What we have is only media, papers etc that make lebels. So why Kim-Chung-Il or Milosevic is "dictator" in Wikipedia, but Putin is not? I suppose all of them did not identify themselves as dictators, but there is no source. Also I suppose Saakashvili do not identify himself as insane, but there is also no source.

You say we should attribute opinions, but please give me a link to the rule that requires attribute any opinion. For example recently a user added in Viktor Alksnis that he is ultranationalist with a reference to some publications of his opponents. Do the rules require us to attribute such claims in the text itself or we should present it as fact with references?

Also it seems Wikipedia supports double standards? If a camp belongs to the USA, it's "detention camp" but if it belongs to N. Korea, it's "concentration camp", yes? Because there's consensus among editors, correct?

Simply there are no rules to solve such problems in unified manner, so such problems are solved by the voting of Wikipedia users (this called 'consensus'). --Dojarca (talk) 19:24, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Regarding "concentration camp" vs. "detention camp", and without expressing an opinion regarding bias within WP based on whether or not a particular camp belongs to the USA (Guantanamo Bay detention camp) or to North Korea (Category:Concentration camps in North Korea), or to India (Hijli Detention Camp), Bosnia and Herzegovina (Manjača camp, described in the article as a "detention camp"), or was a Nazi concentration camp, or was one of those instituted by Lord Kitchener during the South African war of 1899-1902, etc., I'll opine that discussion of this question would probably better placed on the Talk:Internment page than here. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 01:09, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Australian copyright and YouTube questions

Mark of the Year is at WP:FLC now. It has multiple references / links to YouTube videos of the different marks (spectacular catches in Australian Football League games). The question is whether these refs / links are allowed, but their copyrtight status is unclear. Could someone who knows more about Australian copyright please take a look at the article and provide feedback on the video reference links at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/Mark of the Year? Thanks in advance, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 04:24, 29 November 2008 (UTC).

It looks like the links to youtube have been removed. Blueboar (talk) 18:00, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Help in clarifying a BLP/RS/NPOV issue

Hello.

User:Wikidemon and I, among others, are having a spirited debate as to whether or not using the self-published blog of Martin Kramer, the externally published blog of Ron Kampeas, and a letter to the editor by Thomas Lippman, are acceptable sources to allow the article on Rashid Khalidi to say that the above three state that Khalidi misrepresented the facts when he (Khalidi) denied being an official of the PLO. The debate starts at Talk:Rashid Khalidi#Explanation of recent edits and is rather involved with point-by-point discussions of specific phrases. We all would appreciate it if some clarity could be demonstrated as to whether or not the sources brought are sufficient, as we are trying to balance BLP and NPOV on either side of the discussion, and our respective discussions have devolved into repeating the same assertions of the others' incorrect application of policy, so fresh voices would be welcome.

Thank you. -- Avi (talk) 03:46, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Help with in-text cite for online comments re-printed in a newspaper

Increasingly newspapers are publishing online as well as in print, and as they do so some are permitting reader comment online, and some are then printing selected comments in the paper. I think I understand WP:RS with respect to newspapers and blogs and blog comments, but how about when an anonymous online comment is reprinted in a newspaper? I could use some guidance as to the proper treatment of this as a source for an article.

Of course my first idea is don't, but suppose you had an insistent editor. I understand a ref tag would unacceptably obscure the iffy nature of the source, and that minimally some kind of in-text citation would be required. I'm guessing "as reported in the Someplace Herald-Tribune" would not be accurate, nor would "according to the editors of the S H-T." Maybe something like "according to anonymous online commenters on the S H-T website"?

Thanks.Hugh (talk) 21:15, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Your last suggestion is okay; you could also say, "according to anonymous comments reported in The SHT". WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:31, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Websites of towns

In this discusssion: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Towns.27_websites_as_a_source_for_history, different opinions have been stated regarding the use of towns' websites as a RS for history articles in wikipedia. Though currently most editors think these websites are not a RS, one editor thinks they are, and several editors think they are under certain conditions. Because WP:RS is one or even the core of wikipedia, the policy should be clarified to not give room to such various interpretations. Authors must definetly know what they can use as a RS and what not. Skäpperöd (talk) 21:47, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

"Though currently most editors think these websites are not a RS"

Could you name them and show their statements confirming so ? So far all editors besides you and Karasek who cooperates with you believe them to be reliable enough to warrent inclusion in articles.--Molobo (talk) 21:51, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

So far, Karasek, Dlabtot, Collect, and Skäpperöd say towns' websites are not a RS for history, Molobo says they are, Drilnoth, Blueboar and Piotrus say they are only under certain conditions, with every one of these editors proposing different conditions (Piotrus: for temporary use, Drilnoth: not for notability, but for everything else; Blueboar: for attributed statements regarding the town's oppinion about itself). That's why I think the policy ought to be clarified. Skäpperöd (talk) 22:08, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

"Dlabtot, Collect"-where do they state this ? "Piotrus: for temporary use"-under the condition that "reliable" source is found. Anyway the bottom line is that everyone besides you and Karasek are in agreement that it can be used. --Molobo (talk) 22:15, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Please reread the thread and reconsider. Skäpperöd (talk) 22:17, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

I read the thread carefully and your claims are unsupported by it. Best regards,--Molobo (talk) 22:19, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe you use your browser function and search the site for the usernames above. If you find them, read what they stated. Feel free to remove the part of this thread that is only about your misunderstanding, including my posts, when you are done. Skäpperöd (talk) 22:28, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Please remain civil. The names are well known to me and I have read the comments of those users. They do not support your claim. The overwhelming consus is that official statements of authorities of locations are notable enough to be used as source of information. In case of different versions the proper claims and their representatives should be marked. This seems to be the obvious solution.--Molobo (talk) 22:33, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Dlabtot:"No -- is not a "third-party, published source with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy""

Collect:"Town websites are not a "primary source" but the reliability on other than obvious facts might be questioned." Skäpperöd (talk) 06:14, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

To repeat what I stated at RSN ... a town's website is a self-publish source. Thus, when figuring out reliability we look to WP:SPS. They are considered reliable for some things, but not for others. It's that simple. Blueboar (talk) 20:10, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

As you can see from the RSN thread, this is not accepted by some. According to WP:SPS, the town's website would not be reliable for historical information. It fails to meet the exception criterion "self-published by an established expert on the topic of the article, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications". It also fails the criteria listed in SPS "about themselves" - e.g. towns' websites are self-serving and they do make claims about third parties. Yet, many editors do see it as an RS.

Per the above, I would have to remove the source from the article and probably mark the information introduced from this source with a cn-tag. This would most certainly be followed by reverts of editors who have stated other oppinions in the RSN thread. How am I to proceed now without starting an edit war? Ineither want edit war nor do I want to help non-RS be introduced into wiki as a source, which I would do if leaving the website in place as a source. That's why I asked for a policy clarification. Skäpperöd (talk) 08:39, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Not so fast... Self-Published sources such as town websites can be exempt from the exclusion criteria about experts... You have to read the rest of the section in the policy ...

Using self-published and questionable sources as sources on themselves

Self-published or questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, especially in articles about themselves, without the requirement that they be published experts in the field, so long as:

1. it is not unduly self-serving;
2. it does not involve claims about third parties;
3. it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the subject;
4. there is no reason to doubt its authenticity;
5. the article is not based primarily on such sources;
6. the source in question has been mentioned specifically in relation to the article's subject by an independent, reliable source.

Since town websites are published by the towns... they can be used in articles or sections about the town... so long as they meet the qualifying criteria. My guess is that in your specific situation, the town website may not meet some of these qualifying criteria (especially the last one)... but if it does meet with all of the qualifications, then it most certainly can be used... even if it isn't written by an expert. Blueboar (talk) 15:37, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Let's examine if these criteria are all met by towns' websites about their history (or is it sufficient to meet one?).

1. Towns' websites are of course self-serving, the web presence is not primarily to inform, but to attract investors and tourists. One might argue about "unduly".
2. Towns' websites do make claims about third parties in their history section. Even if one understands the town throughout its history and all its historical inhabitants as "one party" (which is not my understanding), the history websites involve claims about people not from the town (e.g. dukes, kings, neighboring towns/villages, architects etc). If one does not understand the town and all their historical inhabitants as "one" party, but only the author, all towns' websites on history will fail this criterion.
3. This is met.
4. This is met.
5. depends.
6. Most websites will certainly fail this criterion.

This analysis shows that towns' websites on history are excluded from being usable in wiki already by definition and could be removed per WP:SPS. They all fail the "it does not involve claims about third parties" criterion, and most fail the self-serving and mentioned-by-another-RS criterions. Skäpperöd (talk) 13:02, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

No, your analysis shows that some (perhaps even most) town websites should be excluded... but others should not. It depends on the specific town website. It also depends on the statement that is being made in a specific article that we are sourcing to the town website. We should not make broad, sweeping statements about town websites. Remember, there are very few sources that can be deemed as "always unreliable" (ie not reliable under any circumstance or in any context). Blueboar (talk) 15:00, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Sources about media are regarded as more reliable than the media themselves?

It has always puzzled me when someone requires a "reliable source" for texts in an article about a book, a recording, or a movie. Are not these (media) considered to be the primary, foremost (i.e., reliable) sources themselves? If a movie or a book are readily viewable, say, in a Library, why should one disregard them and look elsewhere for someone's written opinions or reviews instead? To read a book, to listen to a recording, or to watch a movie, and write about what one has read, heard, or seen, just cannot be regarded as "original research", as anyone can verify the validity of any assertions by doing just the same: read, hear, or watch it (just IT, and no other materials). That is, by the way, one of the basic pillars of the Scientific Method: the ability to duplicate any observation anywhere, anytime, given the proper conditions. If you have the time and patience, I'd like to read comments on this policy and the WP:NOR policy in view of the above reasoning. Perhaps these ought to be revised, or expanded? Regards, --AVM (talk) 18:55, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, they are indeed primary source... Whether they are reliable sources, depends what you saying about them. If you are saying "the plot of the book is X" or "the album contains song Y", then the book or album (or what have you) is without a doubt the most reliable source. If however, you want to say some thing like: "the book takes the lead character on a journey into his inner most psyche which leads him to a new understanding of himself" or "song Y is a cry for social justince and equality" then no, because these are interpretatory conclusions that are not necessarily obvious to any reader. We need a secondary source to verify that someone besides yourself has reached these same conclusions. See WP:NOR for more on this. Blueboar (talk) 20:07, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, Blueboar. I agree. The doubt had arisen because many editors seem to believe that by tagging, tagging, and just tagging, thay are doing a service to Wikipedia, and I've found many a tag complaining "quotation needed", and "unreferenced", and "NPOV violations" attached to factual information about a film, a book, or a music record, where the work itself is a sufficiently reliable source as you explain above. Patience... Regards, --AVM (talk) 19:00, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Third party link appears to go to unrelated page

I was reviewing the RS guidelines and wanted to learn more about what "third-party" means. As best I can tell, WP:RS does not define the term. However, at WP:RS#Overview it does link to Wikipedia:No_original_research#Primary.2C_secondary_and_tertiary_sources. Superficially this seems related, but upon consideration they seem unrelated. I'm interested in "third-party" (and presumably related terms like "first-party"). The linked page talks about primary, secondary, and tertiary sources. Just a simple difference in language and "third-party" is the same as "tertiary source?" Maybe, but I can't reconcile WP:RS telling me "Wikipedia articles should use reliable, third-party, published sources." and WP:NOR telling me "Wikipedia articles should rely mainly on published reliable secondary sources and, to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources." As such, they cannot be the same thing. So 1) I believe the link in question should be removed, as it is likely to lead to confusion. Any objections? 2) Could someone direct me to a guideline or policy that does define third-party? (If one exists, I would obviously replace the link instead of removing it.) Thank you for any assistance. — Alan De Smet | Talk 23:12, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

A third party source would be one that is not connected to the topic of the article. As an example, if you were writing an article on the history of Mickey Mouse, the Disney website would not be a third party source, but a book written by an expert on cartoons would be. Blueboar (talk) 23:29, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

That's my intuitive understanding, but I was hoping for something a bit more formal. I remain interested in a more formal guideline or policy that defines it if anyone can direct me to one. Meanwhile, I've been bold and removed the link that is likely to cause confusion and doesn't really doesn't add anything. I'd normally be hesitant to edit such a widely referenced guideline, but I don't think eliminating a link is terribly risky. — Alan De Smet | Talk 06:29, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

See wikt:third party, second definition. See also the first definition here and the second definition here. And if that is an adequate explanation for you, then please add the Wiktionary link to the article, because this is the third or fourth time recently that someone's assumed that the word relates to some special Wikipedia-specific definition instead of the plain old definition that you'll find in any dictionary of the English language. Otherwise, please try to help us understand what would be more useful to you. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:06, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

My apologies, upon reflection I was unclear, probably because I hadn't sorted it out well in my head. Your comment has helped me sort it out a bit, thank you. I think I can now express the area I still see as undefined. Is third-party relative to the subject of the article or the claim being cited? By way of example, obviously in the Academy Award article, the official site at http://www.oscars.org/ would be first-party and not what we're looking for. But would a link to the 2006 awards on the official site be an appropriate citation in the article Happy Feet for the claim, "Happy Feet won an Academy Award for best animated feature film of the year?" My guess is yes, because the Academy Awards are third-party to the subject of the article, the film Happy Feet. (And it certainly seems a good citation, as no one can be more official than the Awards. All any other source can do is repeat what the Academy announced.) But an alternate interpretation is that the Academy's site is first-party to the claim itself, and thus is a bad citation. I'm asking because my understanding was the former, but another editor believes the latter is correct. (It's actually a different topic, but it is about a group that issues awards. If you're really curious this is the discussion.) Upon having my belief challenged, I sought out the relevant guidelines to learn if one of us was operating under a mistaken understanding, but I'm not finding a clear answer either way. Thanks for your time! — Alan De Smet | Talk 02:40, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

If you are editing the article Happy Feet... then I would say that oscars.com is a legitimate third party source for the statement "Happy Feet won an Acadamy award for best animated feature film" (the first party source would be the official website of the movie, or its production company). While I suppose oscar.com might be considered a primary source for who won an Oscar, this is a perfect example of the appropriate use of such a source. Blueboar (talk) 17:29, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

The reliability of (any) sources are (always) determined relative to the specific claim being cited. Our mantra that "no source is universally reliable" means that no source is universally independent, universally third-party, universally accurate, universally neutral, etc. The appropriateness of a source is only evaluated in relationship to how it's being used. A source that is being used to support a single sentence does not need to bear the burden of the entire article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:21, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm interpreting your first sentence as being "Third-party is considered relative to the claim being cited." So if I understand you, WhatamIdoing, the "Happy Feet won an Oscar" example I gave above would be a bad citation. Assuming I got that right, I appreciate your point of view. But it appears to be different from what Blueboar (and admittedly I) would expect. Thus my desire for a more formal definition in a guideline or policy. I'm not currently finding a formal definition, so I suspect that one does not exist. I think Wikipedia would benefit from such a definition, although I expect hashing out consensus to make such a change would require more than just the three of us. (That mantra is new to me. &hl=en&filter=0 It doesn't appear to be especially used on Wikipedia. If by "our" you mean Wikipedians as a whole, I'm not sure I'd call it "our mantra." Still, I like it. It's a good, memorable summary of an important idea.) — Alan De Smet | Talk 06:38, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

There are different ways of saying it, but it's a constant theme at RSN. All the entries that begin with "Is my source reliable?" get a reply along the lines of "It depends on how you're using it." No source is universally reliable is just a more formal way of expressing it.

While I consider the Academy Awards website to be an authoritative source for who won what, it's clearly not a third-party source for that information. The people giving the award are the first party in that award-giving exercise, and the people receiving the award are the second party. The fact that a first-party source could be reliable, and even more authoritative than a third-party source, is one of the reasons that we permit the use of first-party sources in limited ways. Does that clarify my position? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:42, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that clarifies your position... and I think what you say here is correct. While the bulk of Wikipedia should be cited to independant third party sources, a first party source might be reliable (indeed, in some circumstances, it may even be the most reliable source) and may be cited, with limitations. Blueboar (talk) 13:23, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Blueboar and WhatamIdoing for your time and thought! — Alan De Smet | Talk 23:43, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

back dent<---- The definiton of Primary/Secondary/Tertiary sources and if it means First/Second/Third party sources needs to be clear in WP:RS and WP:V. I'm still confused and trying to discuss it at WP:RS/N right now on congressional memos. Very frustrationg. It should be very explicit in both articles. We shouldn't have to dig around talk archives and get various shades of opinion, as the above here, to figure it out. And I don't think I've quite figured it out anyway. Newbies will have even more trouble and be discouraged from editing if old times throw the phrases around to make their points. Thanks. CarolMooreDC (talk) 19:09, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

These terms are not synonymous. (For one thing, the "first party" and "second party" (terms that derive from legal proceedings) would both produce primary sources.) Could we persuade you to read the regular Wikipedia articles on, for example, Primary source and Secondary source, and the Wiktionary definition of wikt:third party? We're using the normal, everyday, well-established definitions of these words. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:00, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Blogs vs Podcasts

Usually we do not use blogs as sources, unless the blogger is a recognized expert in the field. So, what about podcasts? Should we apply the same understanding? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:48, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

The important difference is between audio interviews and written interviews. Anybody could sit down and create an exchange and claim it to be an interview. It would be far more difficult to stage a faked audio interview, so that there is a presumption of reliability in an audio interview that doesn't exist in a printed interview. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 19:51, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Whether it's a blog or a podcast is irrelevant. The question you should be asking is, "Is it reliable?" Most aren't. Some are. -Chunky Rice (talk) 19:58, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Reliability is an attribute of the source in which the podcast is published. A podcaster that is not notable should not be used as a source or as an external link, otherwise anyone can be "interviewed" and use that interview in a WP article. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:00, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

We're discussing an external link here, not a reliable source issue, so this is probably the wrong page. But even if this were about reliable sources, why wouldn't we use an interview with an article subject? Unless there is a reason to to think that an audio interview is faked, it's reliable, regardless of the notability of the interviewer. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 20:08, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

That does not seem to be a good argument. Anyone can be "interviewed" by a non-notable podcaster. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:09, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Take this example: Mr. XYZ a knonw neo-nazi, gets interviewed by a podcaster who has an online website and who is not an expert in the field. Will that interview be suitable for a source and/or external link in the article about Mr. XYZ. I don't think so. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:12, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

A podcaster does not need to be notable to be reliable. If the podcaster is, for example, an editor at an established newspaper and the podcast is an official podcast of that newspaper, then we should consider the material therin to be reliable, just as we would the newspaper. Same with a blog. Blogs and podcasts are just words to describe a specific way to deliver content. They don't describe the content in any real way. -Chunky Rice (talk) 20:13, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Of course blogs and podcasts published by reliable sources are themselves reliable, to the extent of postings by authorized representatives of the source (any section for commentary by the general public isn't reliable). However, most blogs and podcasts are self published, have no editorial control, and may not even be restrained by libel laws, if the blogger is using a series of open proxies and/or a publicly accessible computer that will hinder the discovery of his identity. John254 20:40, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that's why I said that the question is whether the material is a reliable source or not. Whether or not it's called a "blog" or a "podcast" has no bearing on the reliability of the material. The reason we wouldn't use a self-published blog with not editorial control is because it's self-published and has no editorial control, not because it's a blog. -Chunky Rice (talk) 20:42, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

It's quite easy to stage a faked audio interview, simply by finding someone with a voice that sounds similar to the purported interviewee. Since a self-published audio blog/podcast/etc has little reliability of its own (unless published by the interviewee himself), the only means by which we could verify the alleged interview would involve audio analysis whereby we would perform a qualitative and spectral comparison between the voice in the supposed interview and a known voice sample of the alleged interviewee, attempt to find any abrupt cut-outs which might indicate the splicing together of audio clips in a misleading fashion, etc. Because we would be performing our own determination of whether the purported interviewee's voice was authentic, and not relying on the representations of the source (the blog in which the audio interview was published), such audio analysis would constitute original research. Even if acceptable for articles concerning video games, or similar non-critical purposes where there would be little incentive to fabricate an audio interview out of whole cloth, the use of third-party audio blogs as sources should especially be avoided for the purpose of making controversial claims concerning living persons, where the temptations to fabricate an audio interview for the purpose of defamation are high, and the damage done to the subject of the controversial claims by the inclusion of bogus information from a faked audio interview may be considerable. Indeed, Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons#Reliable_sources and Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons#Using_the_subject_as_a_self-published_source expressly prohibit the contemplated use of third-party audio blogs in biographies of living persons. John254 20:17, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

In the page under discussion, the subject is an active editor on Wikipedia. If the interview had been faked it's reasonable to assume that he would say something. The assertion that it's "quite easy to stage a faked audio interview" seem unsupported. Do we have any evidence of any faked audio interviews? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 22:38, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

The creation of a fake audio interview is self-evidently as easy having voice actors read from a script. It really shouldn't be necessary to create a fake audio interview, and upload it to Wikipedia, just to demonstrate that it can be done. Fortunately, Wikipedia requires positive evidence of source reliability, rather than assuming reliability as a null hypothesis unless a counterexample can be provided. Per Wikipedia:Verifiability#Reliable_sources,

Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Reliable sources are necessary both to substantiate material within articles and to give credit to authors and publishers in order to avoid plagiarism and copyright violations. Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in an article and should be appropriate to the claims made: exceptional claims require high-quality sources.

In general, the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; university-level textbooks; magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses; and mainstream newspapers. As a rule of thumb, the greater the degree of scrutiny involved in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the evidence and arguments of a particular work, the more reliable it is.

Academic and peer-reviewed publications are highly valued and usually the most reliable sources in areas where they are available, such as history, medicine and science. Material from reliable non-academic sources may also be used in these areas, particularly if they are respected mainstream publications. The appropriateness of any source always depends on the context. Where there is disagreement between sources, their views should be clearly attributed in the text.

We aren't going to accept an audio interview as reliable when it appears in an otherwise unreliable source such as a third-party self-published blog or podcast, simply because Will Beback idiosyncratically asserts that an audio interview would be difficult to fake, without providing a shred of evidence to support this claim. The statement that "the subject is an active editor on Wikipedia. If the interview had been faked it's reasonable to assume that he would say something" is solidly within original research territory, since we would effectively be relying on a non-source, and a novel synthesis of circumstantial evidence, for evidence of the interview's authenticity. We might as well have Will Beback interview the subject himself, and upload the resulting audio recording directly to Wikipedia. While it's quite likely that such an audio interview would be genuine, that wouldn't render such original research any less offensive to our fundamental policies. In practice, we might tolerate a little bit of OR in writing about relatively non-critical subjects such as television episodes or video games. When it comes to biographies of living persons, however, original research must be stomped out. John254 02:42, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

One peice of this puzzle is missing... Is the person being interviewed considered an expert in the field he is being interviewed about? Blueboar (talk) 22:55, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

It's linked from his biography (are we experts about ourselves?). The article in question is Rick Ross and here's the relevant thread: Talk:Rick_Ross_(consultant)#Media.2Fnews. The actual subject of the podcast is Ross' field of expertise, "Destructive Religious Cults". ·:· Will Beback ·:· 00:48, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

PS: The blog is called "Dogma Free America",[4] so presumably has an anti-religoin POV. I can't find an "About" page with more info. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 00:50, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Specific discussion about specific articles, should go on that article's talk page. Here we are discussing basis as they apply in general. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:29, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Even general discussions need to be grounded in specifics, especially if the intent is to use this duscussion as a basis for action in a specific dispute. The fact that it is the subject of a BLP being interviewed is certainly an important detail. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 03:43, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

@Blueboar: If the interviewer was an expert in the field, we may make an exception as pr WP:SPS, but that expert as per policy must had "previously been published by reliable third-party publication." ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:31, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

The interviewee has certainly been published in reliable 3rd-party sources. Soince this is for his own BLP, he's certainly an expert on his own opinions. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 03:43, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

No no no... The policy refers to the blogger (In this case the interviewer) to have been published in third-party sources in relation to his area of expertise. You got this wrong. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:54, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Basically in a BLP we can mention the LPs opinions published in SPSs as long as these are not related to third parties. Read the policy carefully. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:57, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I think we may need a new section in the Guideline

You know, I don't think we have ever addressed the issue of podcasts before... so let's go slow here and really think about this issue carefully. What we say here will be used in future debates, so let's get it right. Here are some initial questions that I think need to be answered before we can figure this out...

1. Fill in the blank: radio:podcast as newspaper:_____. (blog?...website?...what?)
2. If a person says something on radio (or TV), how do we treat this as far as RS is concerned?
3. How are podcasts different than radio (or TV) broadcasts?
4. Does it make a difference if the person making the statement is the subject of the Article? Blueboar (talk) 03:17, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

It is quite simple, really, and we have the backing of existing policies and guidelines. Same as we do not use blogs or other self-published material (unless the blog is an expert in the field, and his work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publication. See WP:SPS), we do not use podcasts, vcasts, YouTube or any other user-generated content. Basically, the issue of "reliability" is directly connected to the editorial control that a reputable publisher will use. Bloggers and podcasters do not generally have any of that in place, and as such we would be crazy to accept any material "published" by them in an encyclopedic article, unless the material is used in an article about the blogger or the podcaster (if they are notable enough, that is). We may need an extension to the WP:V, which I will add. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:24, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

This is no different from any other personal appearance or writing by a biography subject. Per WP:BLP#Using the subject as a self-published source: Self-published material may be used in biographies of living persons only if written by the subject himself. Subjects may provide material about themselves through press releases, personal websites, or blogs. It is self-evident that the subject is the interviewee, and that the interview is a reliable source for his own opinions from his own mouth. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 03:47, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe, but we have a caveat, namely we do not allow comments about third parties in SPS. An interview is no different than a written piece. Does the interview refers to third parties? If so, we do not use it. Is that simple, and as I said previously, we have existing policies that deal with this. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:52, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Nobody is proposing to use this as a source for 3rd parties. It's being used as a link in the interviewee's biography. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 04:04, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Yes, I think we can assume that the vast majority of podcasts are self-published. They should be evaluated like any other source. We'd accept an audio recording on the National Public Radio or BBC World Service websites a refs because they're properly "published" for our purposes. If I record something and stick it up on my own website, that's not really "published" as far as Wikipedia is concerned. The medium itself is not the problem: it's the (lack of) publication. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:55, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

But this specific issue is an audio interview with the subject of a BLP. If I have a regular podcast, and interview a notable person, why shouldn't that interview appear in the external links of that person? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 04:04, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Because we have guideline that describe what to link to and what not to link to which describe self-published sources as links; and because anyone can have himself "interviewed" to make claims about himself/herself and about third parties. This is an encyclopedia, not a promotional platform, or a place to publish information which has not been published in reliable sources. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:08, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it is as simple as Jossi makes it out to be ... a podcast interview is more like an amature radio interview than it is like a blog. A blog has a definite author and everything is filtered through that author's words. This is not true of a podcast. In a podcast interview there is more than one person speaking and making comments... the podcaster, and the person he is interviewing. The podcaster may be an amature, but the inteviewee (podcastee?) might be a pro... an expert in the field he is being interviewed about.

With a radio broadcast (which we consider reliable), we can quote or paraphrase what the person being interviewed says during the interview (and we cite to that interview), so why is it suddenly different when the same person says those same words in a podcast interview? At minimum, I would say that the SPS limitations should apply to both the podcaster and the person being interviewed. If the person being interviewed is a published expert in the field he is being interviewed about, his words can reliably be used for a statement as to his opinion. No? Blueboar (talk) 04:12, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, no. Look at it this way: Say Mr XYZ published a blog and in it he makes allegations about Mr ABC. Per SPS, we will not use that blog (neihther as a source, not as as EL) on Mr. XYZ's article in Wikipedia. So, the same would apply if Mr. XYZ is interviewed by Mr Podcaster. No? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:19, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

What if he made the same allegations in an interview on BBC radio? Could we link to BBC radio as a source? If so, how is this different from a podcast? Same person speaking, same statement... the only thing changing is the venue. Blueboar (talk) 04:32, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

It all comes down to Wikipedia:BLP#Using_the_subject_as_a_self-published_source policy, does it not? To wit:

Self-published material may be used in biographies of living persons only if written by the subject himself. Subjects may provide material about themselves through press releases, personal websites, or blogs. Material that has been self-published by the subject may be added to the article only if:
1. it is not unduly self-serving;
2. it does not involve claims about third parties;
3. it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the subject;
4. there is no reasonable doubt that the subject actually authored it;
5. the article is not based primarily on such sources.
These provisions do not apply to subjects' autobiographies that have been published by reliable third-party publishing houses; these are treated as reliable sources, because they are not self-published.

Now that is policy. As per policy, an autobiography on the subject's website is off-limits for use in the article subject's BLP (let alone as a source for articles on other people) as soon as it strays into making claims about 3rd parties, contentious issues, etc. I don't see an interview as being any different there. If it was a BBC radio interview, a recording of which is hosted on the BBC website, then it will have gone through their vetting process, there was editorial oversight, etc., just like there is with an autobiography published by a reliable publishing house. If I just stick it up on my website, there is none of that, and if it is self-serving, makes contentious claims about 3rd parties, etc., it's curtains. It's really a kind of quality control function: after all, I can tell my mate that I am the greatest mathematician of the century, and my friend may mutter in agreement; then he puts the recording of our conversation up on his site, and bingo, a great external link for my article on myself ... the BBC, however, is unlikely to broadcast an interview with me claiming to be this century's greatest mathematician. Jayen466 11:05, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

As another point, WP:SPS also states

Self-published sources should never be used as third-party sources about living persons, even if the author is a well-known professional researcher or writer; see WP:BLP#Reliable sources.

So even if the podcaster were a well-known radio journalist, his self-published podcasts on his private website would be unacceptable as sources, while the same journalist's work hosted on his radio station's website would be fine. There is oversight on the radio station's website; there is none on his private site. Jayen466 11:17, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

A German source may be highly reputable, in Germany, but how many of our readers and editors will actually read it? Wikipedia only works when we can rely on many people to catch mistakes and NPOV. If we find that not many editors are actually listening to the whole podcast to catch mistakes and POV, then our policing system breaks down, and it's not a good source for us, even if it's a good source in theory. I'd be a lot happier talking about the reliability of a transcript of the podcast, and I wonder about the quality of podcasts that no one does transcripts for. - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 04:28, 19 December 2008 (UTC):

I came here from the notice at WP:VPP. IMO, Blueboar has it right: there's nothing "special" about a podcast that makes it different from any other interview as far reliability is concerned. Also IMO, Jossi is needlessly confusing the issue by trying to make some sort of demand that the interviewer be an expert in the field. Consider this example: If John Stossel interviewed Stephen Hawking, by Jossi's reasoning we couldn't use anything Hawking said about physics because Stossel isn't a physics expert. I'm also not convinced of Jossi's interpretation of WP:SPS in relation to Mr. XYZ and Mr. ABC; is it really that the source may not include Mr. XYZ's opinion of Mr. ABC, or is it just that we may not use that part of the self-published source? Anomie⚔ 06:06, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Hawking really is a very bad example here, because he is unable to speak and uses a synthetic voice. If I saw a Hawking interview on the BBC website, I would be reasonably sure that it was Hawking who authored what his electronic voice is saying. If it's some podcast on a private website, frankly I would assume that it wasn't Hawking and that the electronic voice might be telling a lot of tosh. Hawking is unlikely to spend hours writing interview segments for an interview with a podcaster; it's a very laborious process for him. Jayen466 11:32, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Congratulations on completely missing the point. Anomie⚔ 15:41, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I am sorry. My tongue was planted firmly in my cheek. ;-) But seriously, I would not use an interview of a notable person located as a podcast on a private website, any more than I would use a purported affidavit alleging wrongdoing that only exists on a self-published website and is not discussed in any reliable source. Jayen466 00:37, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Is that a joke? You and Jossi proposed that a purported affidavit that was never discussed in a reliable source, that alleged wrongdoing, and that was published only on a self-published site was itself a reliable source.[5][6] ·:· Will Beback ·:· 00:49, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Will, I explained it in the arbcom case, did you not read my response there? To recap, the affidavit you are talking about did not allege wrongdoing on the part of a third party. If an affidavit which is only present on some private website, and which to date has not been covered by any published RS, states that someone mistreats his subordinates, is mentally unstable, is cruel or has committed some crime, then that is not an acceptable source for stating in the BLP of that person that he has been accused of being mentally unstable, a criminal, etc. Such accusations become relevant only if RS repeat such allegations. (To give an example of inappropriate use of an affidavit, the second para in David_Miscavige#Other_matters is sourced to an affidavit that does not seem to have been covered in any RS. Either a secondary source should be found, or the paragraph dropped.) The affidavit we were discussing all those months ago did not contain any such allegations about a third party. Rather, it was an official and formal retraction of allegations the man had made some time prior in a press article. We saw a record of the affidavit on the court website. This is a completely different situation. We did not use this affidavit to add derogatory or any other type of information to a BLP. Rather, we said that if someone alleges one thing in March and in September signs an affidavit averring that he made it all up, then we shouldn't present the earlier allegations as reliable, especially not in a BLP. Again, the principle is to err on the side of caution in a BLP. Jayen466 01:29, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

The purported affidavit is only published on a private, self-published site, and it has never been mentioned in a reliable source. It was presented by Jayen and Jossi as a reliable source to impeach another source. The claim that you would never use a self-published affidavit as a reliable source does not appear correct. If I misunderstand you and you now think that the affidavit in question should be ignored then please let me know so we can settle that sourcing question. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 01:50, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

I apologize for the sarcasm in my reply, but you're still missing the point. Jossi claims that an interview is not "acceptable" unless the interviewer is an expert in the field. So I used the example of a co-anchor of a nationally televised news show interviewing an acknowledged expert in a highly technical field to point out how ridiculous that claim is. I suppose I could have made it explicit that I was talking about an interview distributed in the standard manner for that interviewer (i.e. national broadcast television), but I had thought that would be obvious. Anomie⚔ 02:27, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

You may have misinterpreted what I say. Podcasts are no different than blogs as it pertains to reliability of the source, when speaking about self-published sources. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:31, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

It depends on where they come from. A PodCast of The CBS Evening News would be just as reliable as the on-air version. A podcast of Joe Bob's Local Cable Access Show would be just as reliable as the on-"air" version. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 06:10, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I think what we are narrowing in on is the idea that not all podcasts are equal... some are reliable and others are not. Most are self-published, but not all are. In the case of a podcast interview, we have to look at several factors: who created the podcast (What editorial control is there? is it likely that they edited it to twist what was actually said?); what is the reliability of the person being interviewed (are they an expert in what they are talking about?); where is the podcast hosted (what is the reliability of the website where we found the podcast? does it violate copywrite?); what was said in the interview (did the interviewee say something about a third person?); What article are we citing the podcast in (a BLP? if so, is the subject either the interveiewer or interviewee?); and probably several other factors that I am not thinking of.

In other words, perhaps we can't make hard and firm rules that apply to all podcasts, the best we can do is apply our guidelines and policies to a specific podcast. Blueboar (talk) 17:07, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. Substitute "Podcast" with "source" and we are back to our existing guidelines. A podcast is just a content-delivery system, and content-delivery systems do not affect the reliability or non-reliability of the content. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 02:06, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. Same applies to blogs, i.e within the caveats expressed in policy regarding WP:SPS and WP:BLP. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:09, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't think there's a clear consensus for your change to WP:V, which should have been discussed on that talk page. Audio or video interviews, in which there is no question that the people are who they say they are, seem like an obvious exception to rules intended to cover printed secondary sources. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 03:58, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

As expressed above, the medium is irrelevant. It is the publisher, its reliability what counts. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:58, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I suppose any remaining confusion that I have comes from determining who the "publisher" is when someone says something on a podcast? Blueboar (talk) 17:21, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

It might make sense to consider it "self"-published with respect to both the interviewer and the interviewee. A similar situation obtains if I have my own private website and a friend writes a text and allows me to put this (otherwise unpublished) text up on my website. I'd say that neither I nor my friend can claim that the hosted text is anything other than self-published. Jayen466 17:44, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

In that situation, I would certainly agree with saying that it is "self-published"... but let's take a more complicated senario... Ronald D. Moore, the director of the TV show Battlestar Galactica, often posts podcasts about the show on the Sci-fi Network's website. Suppose he asks a friend of his who is a physicist to join him on one of his podcasts, to explain some aspect of physics that impacted how Moore filmed a particular scene. Who is the publisher of the physicist's comments? Moore? The physicist? Sci-fi Network? Some combination of all three?

Part of the issue with self-published sources is that the author is the same person as the publisher (or is at least directly responsible for the publication of what he wrote)... with podcast interviews we have a bit more of a grey area. Say a noted physisist agrees to be interviewed by some kid (perhaps the kid lives next door, or is going to the same grade school that the expert went to) and the kid posts a podcast of the interview on his personal website... I don't think we can say that the expert is "self-publishing" his remarks in this situation. And I think there is a good argument that the expert's remarks are reliable (he is an expert after all), even if the venue in which they appear is not. As I said... grey zones. Blueboar (talk) 18:43, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Any time a person is self-evidently speaking, whether in print in their own blog, or in a podcast, or on a video, they are a reliable source for their own statements. In those latter cases, the publisher is irrelevant, but it is analogous to being self-published. Take your example of a notable physicist interviewed by the kid next door. If he describes details of his own youth, like what schools he went to, that don't appear in any other sources then I'd consider that interview to be a suitable source for the information. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 19:04, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely not, Will .... if the person is making claims about third parties, his SPS is unacceptable as per current policy. If he names the name of his dog, that is not disputed. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:23, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Basically, the kid's interview in your example, can only be used IF: 1. it is not unduly self-serving; 2. it does not involve claims about third parties; 3. it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the subject;. I am sure you would agree with that. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:26, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't matter if the interview includes unduly self-serving material, makes claims about 3rd parties, or claims not related to the subject. Like with any primary or self-published source, we wouldn't use such assertions in articles. But they don't disqualify the source. Those are two separate issues. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 20:48, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

? I don't understand what you are saying. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 21:28, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

To take only the first in your list (the principle is the same for all of them): You seemed to be implying that any unduly self-serving comments would invalidate the entire source. As with any self-published source, we shouldn't use an interview as a source for self-serving assertions but we can use other parts. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 21:39, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Sure, but with caution, in particular if the source is self-published, and the source is primary as an interview. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 21:51, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

OK, let's take the same senario, except instead of being posted on the kid's website the podcast is posted on kid's high school website. Same interview, same questions and answers, all that has changed is the venue where we can find it. Has the publisher changed? Is what the physicist said suddenly more reliable? What if the kid sells the podcast to a network news outlet and they put it on their website. Is it still self-pubished? If not, what changed? Blueboar (talk) 20:02, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

If a reputable publisher republish the interview, that will change everything. After all, a reputable publisher will surely exercise caution and editorial judgment on what they publish from that interview. For example, if the interview contains libel, repeating the libel in their publication will make them liable. Again, it does not matter if it is a written piece, an interview, a video, a podcast, or an essay. What matters as it pertains to WP is the publisher. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:27, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Needless to say, an interview is, by definition, a primary source, about which certain caveats apply. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:33, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

So the publisher is the owner of the website where we find the podcast? Blueboar (talk) 21:13, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

What do you think? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 21:28, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I think it makes sense... but I want to know if this agrees with what others have been thinking and if we have consensus. Reliability issues put to one side for a moment... This has an impact on whether podcast interviews should be considered "self-published" by the interviewee or not. If we consider the publisher to be the owner of the webpage, and there is no known connection between the owner of the website and the interviewee, then we can not say that the podcast interview "self-published" by the interviewee. It might still be self-published in other ways, but I am taking this one step at a time here. Are we agreed on this?

A podcast is only a format. Take as an analogy a pdf file. A pdf of an article in a good academic journal is an irreproachable RS. A pdf of something I just made up for a laugh isn't. A podcast of Jeremy Paxman interviewing Gordon Brown, hosted at the BBC is RS. A podcast of me interviewing my friend isn't. Itsmejudith (talk) 17:39, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

OK... I raised this issue at WP:V, and I think people there are in agreement. With podcast interviews, the website can be considered the publisher, the interviewee can be considered the author of his/her remarks. And, of course both author and publisher form aspects of "the source" when determining RS. Blueboar (talk) 21:55, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Duplicating sources in articles when they can be found in other wikipedia articles that are linked

Some time ago (see Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/archive 18#Wikipedia as a source?) as part of a greater discussion I asked for views about having to include in articles reliable sources by citing references which also appear in other articles that have links to them in the article being considered. So, Article A contains a claim (in the examples I am thinking of, they are that a certain person, living or dead, was a resident or was born in a particular place). Article A, in making that claim, links to Article B which contains a reliable source that verifies the claim made in Article A. The relevant bit of the view offered to me was this:

"The argument that, as long as a piece of factual information is cited in the main article on X, we do not need to repeat the citation in other articles when we repeat that information, is (to some degree) valid... but it may not be the best practice. It really depends on the information, and whether it is at all contentious. If it is contentious, then best practice would be to repeat the citation (if only to avoid constantly having to say... "but it is cited... see the main article"). In other words... the citation does not have to be repeated, but it probably should be."

by Bluebear, for which I am grateful. I especially appreciate that this situation is a little different from the one about using wikipedia as a source, though it is clearly closely related.

From this, and discussions in other places which cannot now easily locate, I derived a practice that has been put into effect in Warrington, Frodsham. and Macclesfield. Recently a dispute has arisen on Talk:List of people from Yorkshire and the associated AfC discussion which argues that since the way of working I suggested has not obtained concensus, there is no reason why one should supply any references for claims when a wikilink leads to another article which verifies that claim.

I consider that this is not helpful: an article cannot rely on another for verification of its cloaims, especially when each article is supposed to "stand on its own" on wikipedia, and especially when a consequence of not asking for verification at the point of each contested claim leads to the situation where an article could change to containing unverified material when a change were made to a different article in a way which may be quite difficult to detect unless one watches and notes why one is watching a succession of articles. Furthermore, avoiding the small amount of extra work in duplicating references can lead to an much increased workload on anyone wo wants to get the article in question up to GA or FA status, and anyone who has worked on matters of writing adequately cited material knows it is always more difficult to find and add citations some time after they have been added, especially if one was not involved in adding the claim in the first place.

So, I would like to see whether people would consider it useful to clarify the matter in the reliable sources pages. For myself, I would much prefer it if it was explicitly stated that wikilinks to other articles are not sufficient verification for claims, even if the other articles contain, at the time, adequate verification of the claims, and that the verification by citation of suitable reliable sources should be duplicated.

I would welcome comments about this. Now it may be relevant to WP:V as well as this page, but I raised it here as it had been raised on these pages before.  DDStretch  (talk) 20:16, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

The problem here is that the threshold for inclusion of information is Verifiability and not verification... ie whether it can be verified, not whether it actually is verified. As long as something is able to be verified, it can be included, and a link to another article means that it can be verified.

On the other hand, the threshold for removal of information seems to be more along the lines of whether it actually is verified... ie verification.

I think this is actually a good thing... it balances the inclusionists and deletionists. You can put something in an article as long as it is possible to verify it, but if you don't actually do so it can be removed. Blueboar (talk) 21:55, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

My gripe was quite localised initially, although I think DDStretch is onto something which is quite widespread. As I understand it, providing references in each individual article (duplication if you will) actually makes for a better encyclopedia for us all, and is never going to be a bad thing. If a reference exists in one article, then, well, it takes ten seconds to copy, paste and save it into another. What I think is bad for Wikipedia is (particularly in lists of things) this whole argument that "rv. references are in their respective articles". Firstly, in most cases I've found that actually isn't the case. Secondly, expecting readers and editors to navigate to other articles to verify content is a burden on them, and surely bad practice. Thirdly, at GA and FA level, articles are formally assessed as stand-alone pieces - that "references are in articles linked" will just not cut the mustard at that level. All in all, what I'm asserting is that the benefits to upping citation is never going to be a bad thing - the advantages far outweigh any disadvantages (dare I say, laziness). --Jza84 |  Talk  23:14, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Are you talking about someone removing a reference from a list or an article, and saying that this is OK because a linked article has it? If so, I would say that is definitely wrong. Blueboar (talk) 19:01, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Not so much that. More on the side of people adding more content to new articles and lists with the explanation that a reference exists elsewhere on WP. As I said, in most cases I've found that is rarely true anyway, but even if true I think it's bad practice per above. Indeed, if this is going to be the case in the future which article takes primacy to hold the source? --Jza84 |  Talk  03:43, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Each individual article needs to have its own list of the sources that support each important piece of information. "Oh, the ref was somewhere or another in Wikipedia" is not good enough. (What if the other page gets edited or even deleted?) WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:46, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Agreed, and I think that's what DDStretch is arguing: it needs to be made clearer in the main WP:RS page. This phenomena has popped up a few times for me in the last few months (more so than ever before); people are effectively using Wikipedia to reference Wikipedia to circumvent normal citation arrangements and being hostile about it.

To give an example of the localised opposition I would face I'd point to the List of people from York. If I was to make a move to remove the unsourced content (which is... the whole page) it will be quickly restored on the premise that sources exist in each of the people's articles (which, just look randomly at say Mark Addy, and you'll see it isn't so, although that's a seperate issue of WP:V and WP:BLP I guess). I think DDStretch and I are asserting that sources must be provided on a page-by-page basis, and that should be made clearer in our guidelines. --Jza84 |  Talk  14:54, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) I thinks Jza (and others above) hint at an important distinction, between Lists and non-list content. In my opinion, a blue-linked entry in a list (whether stand-alone or embedded) does not require an in-line citation IF the "target" article listed has the cite to support the inclusion in the list. This is not using Wikipedia as a source, it is using wikipedia to navigate to the (non-Wikipedia) source: a big and often overlooked difference. The alternative, repeating all the citations in the list, seems extreme (List of Dartmouth College alumni is almost 200KB because of this). On the other hand, if the target article makes no mention of the charateristic on which the list is based (e.g. the article on a person who is listed on List of bow tie wearers makes no mention of bow ties, let alone a cited mention) I think an in-line source should be in the list (and one needs to question how encyclopedic the list is, but that is a different subject . . .). In non-list content, which seems to be behind DG's original start of this thread, I think the citation should be repeated: that seems to be what a reader would expect. UnitedStatesian (talk) 17:14, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

To some degree, this can be left to the judgement of the editors of the list. I know of several lists that have set out inclusion criteria that require citation with additon. In most cases these are lists where inclusion is controvercial. (I even know of one List that requires multiple citations... to show that the list's defining term is "commonly used"). I also know of List articles without a single citation. Which is correct? I think that often depends on the individual list, and how likely that people will challenge inclusion or not. If challenges are likely, the we should require citation in the List. If challenges are unlikely and as long as the information is cited at the blue link, I don't see a problem with leaving it uncited in the list.

As for your example of List of people from York where inclusion is probably not all that controvercial... I suggest you go slowly. Don't do a massive clean up, all at one go (as that tends to upset many editors, who become overwhelmed by such a massive deletion). Instead, try removing only one or two people a day. Make sure to include an edit summary that notes that inclusion in the list is not supported by a citation at the main article. Something like: "Unsoursed - and not sourced at [[name]] either." This will give other editors a chance to look into the problem and resolve it (by either leaving the name off the list, or finding a citation) before you move on to the next problem. Blueboar (talk) 19:37, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Various Road Sites

We at WikiProject U.S. Roads have run into a small problem determining how reliable a few sites are. Ahead I have written an explanation of all 4 sites and what we believe of them. They are the following:

Alpsroads.net's NJ route log

Located here, this is a log of all highways that existed in New Jersey since 1927. The problem is, this is mainly written by a former Wikipedia editor and is also not citing any of his sources. What is the case here? (It should be noted that the log has been partially verified and/or updated with field evidence remaining in the state of New Jersey.)

NYCroads.com and such sites

Located here (NYC), here (Philadelphia), here (Washington DC), here (Boston), and here (Montreal), Steven Anderson has compiled pages about highways in the metro areas of different cities. He does cite his sources, but does not cite which fact goes to which source. Is it possible this is a reliable source? (It should be noted that errors have been found on these pages, but contrarily many facts are found here and nowhere else.)

Jimmy and Sharon Williams NJ routes

Located here, Jimmy and Sharon Williams have compiled information on the original 1920s routes in New Jersey before the 1927 renumbering of highways. They source laws and such, and use the evidence of existing remnants of the original routings (i.e., highway bridges). The problem is, one of their sources is a former Wikipedia user. Can we have some detail into the reliability of this one?

Pennsylvania Highways by Jeff Kitsko

Located here,this one is ultimately the biggest that should be a reliable source. Jeff Kitsko has used Pennsylvania Department of Highways and Pennsylvania Department of Transportation maps to source lots of his information. He also uses newspapers. His site is often used by cops, lawyers, newspapers and ultimately PennDOT and Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. He has been in many news stories. This news story says a lot about the site.

Kurumi's Connecticut Roads

Located here, a person named Scott Oglesby or Kurumi has compiled information on all of Connecticut's highways. He sources all his information in the logs, but there are no access to the original sources. I do believe that this is a reliable source, but I want to check it out.

Can I have replies about each of these? It will help us in our article work. Thank you.Mitch32^{(Go Syracuse)} 03:18, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Probably not reliable, except where they reproduce primary sources (such as the 1920s New Jersey laws). --NE2 05:02, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps this should go to the noticeboard? --Rschen7754 (T C) 19:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Moved. --Rschen7754 (T C) 05:36, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

High-quality news organizations?

In articles about living persons, only material from high-quality news organizations should be used. Is there a list/examples of those which are considered high-quality and which are not? What is the criterion? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pvjames (talk • contribs) 17:13, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Basically, what's the organization's reputation for fact-checking, fairness, editorial balance, etc. Joe's News Blog probably fails the first criteria, The New York Times, despite its bias on its opinion pages, passes when it comes to hard news. There are no fixed criteria, and there is a large grey area in the middle where some people will claim a source is reliable and others will not. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

News Organization

WhatamIdoing and ZimZalaBim, you cannot make general claims that news organizations have lifted parts of Wikipedia. You must have a specific cite that I or anyone else can read, with examples. You have not provided this. A citation is necessary. Anything else is an unproved allegation. News4a2 (talk) 23:49, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

This is a content guideline, not a part of the encyclopedia. The citation needed tag is for use in articles, not on pages like this. Tom Harrison ^Talk 00:50, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Tom is exactly right.

I've suggested before that relatively inexperienced editors (User News4a2 and I met on Physician assistant, where his/her notion of reliable sources has been the subject of a very tedious dispute) might benefit if we actually wrote down this widely accepted fact on this page. Perhaps something very straightforward, like "Wikipedia's policies and guidelines do not have to provide reliable sources for the advice they give." WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:29, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Can I guess that neither of you can cite Wiki policy on these blanket statements as opposed to the other blanket statement. Or is it your joint professional, experienced, enlightened opinion that balderdash and unproved allegations are acceptable on Wiki policy pages??? 15:55, 4 January 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by News4a2 (talk • contribs)

News4a2, you are missing the point... Policy pages are effectivly exempt from the very policies they outline.

Now, you can object to the statement... and we will consider your objection, but please stop asking for a citation. Blueboar (talk) 16:19, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Primary sources

"Primary sources are not considered reliable for statements of interpretation, analysis or conclusion"

This is a misunderstanding of WP:PSTS see Wikipedia talk:no original research#Lost in the wash --PBS (talk) 18:25, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Agree... this needs clarifying. Primary sources may be used reliably in support of statements about the interpretations, analysis or conclusions that are contained within the primary source. What they should not be used for is to support our own interpretations, analysis or conclusions, ie our own original research (see: WP:NOR). Blueboar (talk) 18:33, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

That's not my reading of WP:PSTS. "Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. Without a secondary source, a primary source may be used only to make descriptive claims, the accuracy of which is verifiable by a reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge." This suggests to me that primary sources are not to be used for statements of interpretation, analysis, or conclusion. RJC ^Talk_Contribs 00:16, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

RJC, you've got it right, but you're missing the point. Wikipedia editors can't interpret/analyze/conclude on the basis of a primary source. If the primary source itself does some interpreting/analyzing/concluding, then our editors can "make descriptive claims" of the interpretation/analysis/conclusion in the primary source. This conversation, however, ought to be unified over at WT:NOR. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:34, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

If the source is interpreting something, it sounds like a secondary source to me, not a primary one. RJC ^Talk_Contribs 02:17, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

The definition of primary and secondary source is actually something of a constant debate... different accademic feilds use different deffinitions... so there are sources that include analysis, interpretation, or conclusions that are considered primary. Take the famous quote about the battle of Waterloo being "the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life." Wellington is a primary source on the battle of Waterloo (he was a participant after all). On the other hand the statement is clearly Wellington's expert conclusionary analysis of the battle. It would be rediculous for us to say that we should not be able to include Wellington's analysis, even though it comes from a primary source. The key to the dilemma is that the conclusion does come directly from the source... it is the source's conclusion, not yours or mine. What we can not do is make our own analysis or conclusion based upon Wellington's statement. For example, we could not cite Wellington's statement about Waterloo for a comparison between Waterloo and the Battle of the Bulge, or Agincourt. Blueboar (talk) 04:08, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Not only do different fields have different standards -- I believe it was Blueboar who attempted to convince me that an encyclopedia (a classic example of a tertiary source) can be a primary source if it's old enough -- but primary sources often do a lot of analysis. Consider a basic report on a lab experiment: Here's my data, here's my conclusion (followed by "here's my plea for further funding"). WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:57, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

(As someone who could use some further funding ... I propose that all requests for funding be considered highly reliable!) Blueboar (talk) 21:08, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

TV Guide episode recaps

I was not able to figure out if these "episode recaps" on the TV Guide site are just blogs or if they have the official oversight of TV Guide and can be considered reliable sources? [7] What is the community consensus? -- The Red Pen of Doom 05:18, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

You should post this question at WP:RSN. Be sure to tell them what article(s) you're dealing with, and how you want to use the source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:38, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

I assume you're talking about the article Baby Not On Board. The items in the cultural references section of that article all refer to songs. Frankly, editors should have no trouble identifying songs themselves. If there's really a disagreement, you can go to a source, in this case, Alex Rocha of TVGuide. In the future, you may want to take note of the top of this page, which says, "To discuss reliability of specific sources, please go to Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard." --Pixelface (talk) 06:39, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

re: wrong place - oops my bad - I had searched on the main article page to see if there was direction to a notice board and didnt find any instruction there, but missed it at the top of this page. Is there an appropriate way to link to the notice board from the article page? -- The Red Pen of Doom 18:50, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I added it in our "see also". If there is a better place or format, feel free to correct my edit. -- The Red Pen of Doom 20:53, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm inclined to suggest that tv guide episode recaps definitely don't constitute reliable source. Nick carson (talk) 02:57, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Transfer WP:PSTS to WP:RS?

At Wikipedia talk:No original research#Remove PSTS altogether? it was suggested that WP:PSTS (currently part of WP:NOR) should be removed. I disagreed with total removal. However it might be a good idea to transfer WP:PSTS to WP:RS (including the redirect), so that everything about selection and use of sources is in one place. My reasoning is that WP:NOR and WP:V are pretty easy to grasp in principle, but the detailed rules about use of sources are not, and a one-stop-shop would be easier to look-up and to keep consistent. Please discuss at Wikipedia talk:No original research#Remove PSTS altogether? --Philcha (talk) 12:39, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

I'd go in the complete opposite direction. The current text at WP:RS on PSTS is quite misleading and what isn't just duplicates NOR. Consider:

"Primary sources are considered reliable for basic statements of fact as to what is contained within the primary source itself (for example, a work of fiction is considered a reliable source for a summary of the plot of that work of fiction). Primary sources are not considered reliable for statements of interpretation, analysis or conclusion (for example, a work of fiction is not a reliable source for an analysis of the characters in the work of fiction)."

Remove the words "reliable" in the above and it is OK, and just repeats WP:NOR. A novel is not a source for an analysis of the characters. Period. Secondly, the sentence "Primary sources are not considered reliable for statements of interpretation, analysis or conclusion" should be clarified to say ".. for article text where the topic is the primary source itself". Without that clarification, one couldn't use a primary source to quote or attribute someone's analysis of a topic. Really the whole section should go. It doesn't belong here. Reliability isn't the issue. NOR is. Colin°^Talk 18:15, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Something about primary sources does need to be included here... looking thought the history here and at WP:RSN a lot of people seem to think that primary source = unreliable... we need to make it clear that this is not the case. The most common version of this argument keeps comming up in debates over plot summaries in works of fiction. People keep taging them as needing citation or challenging them as unreliable... when such summaries are quite reliably citeable to the work itself.

Yes, we want to approach the "using primary sources" issue from a different angle than is done at NOR, but we do need to address the issue. Blueboar (talk) 18:35, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Some mention of it belongs in WP:NPOV as well. It gets extremely tiresome trying to explain how it is near impossible to have a neutral article that is sourced almost entirely with primary sources. On the other extreme, it's frustrating to see epic pov disputes over what could be easily settled with more reliance upon tertiary sources. --Ronz (talk) 18:42, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Agree... primary sources are tricky to use appropriately, and almost all of our policies need to address this trickiness from different angles. Perhaps that is part of the reason why the current PSTS section (at NOR) is so controversial... perhaps it is attempting to do too much: combining into one policy statement issues that really need to be discussed seperately at several policy and guideline pages. Blueboar (talk) 18:51, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Agree. I'm not sure where the main PSTS discussion should be. WP:SELFPUB is just a type of primary source where the community has come to a consensus on some very strict rules. WP:OR, WP:RS, and WP:NPOV definitely need to address the issues. Perhaps PSTS should be it's own article? --Ronz (talk) 19:04, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

To the extent that 'transferring' PSTS to RS downgrades it from mandatory policy to optional good advice, I oppose this change. But I agree that we need to do a better job of educating people about what constitutes each type of source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:10, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm... Perhaps what we need are several brief PSTS statements in each policy/guideline that requires one (which would ensure that the concept retains policy level weight, where appropriate) ... as well as a seperate guideline that focuses on explaining what the different types of sources are, and summarizing the various policy and guideline statements. Blueboar (talk) 04:36, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Guilt by association.

A source is not "reliable" because it was "published" by a source that WP:IDONTLIKE. 78.145.187.95 (talk) 01:32, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

You're going to have to tell us what you're actually talking about, I think.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 09:38, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

crap

crap is very crap case otherwise it wouldn't be crap. There are parts of crap which aren't as crap as crap but its generally total crap. If it wasn't crap then you wouldn't call it crap cause it wouldn't be crap . —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cool mebby (talk • contribs) 20:52, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

 :) davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 02:03, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Does the Relaible Sources Policy apply to photos?

It seems like it should. Can someone clarify? Lawyer2b (talk) 01:32, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

The reliable sources guideline does not really apply, at least not in the same way one should cite sources for statements contained in mainspace articles. Anyone can upload an image and if the user clicks on the "Entirely my own work" option the current process does not require the user do anything other than choose a free license. The only source issues that come into play is where the image came from so, for example, who is to say your parents are not a "reliable source" of providing a picture of you when you were a baby? Images uploaded for use at Wikipedia would fall under the original research - "Original images" policy as well as the Copyright - "Image guidelines" policy. If there is a concern about the source of an image the orginal author or copyright owner can obtain an OTRS ticket number in order to confirm they are the source. While not exactly the same process of verifiability one needs for article text it is what is currently in place for images. Soundvisions1 (talk) 08:02, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

AFAIK WP:V is less strict about images than about text. However there are some cases where adding a citation to the file's Description page is advisable and it would not surprise me if it became mandatory in such cases - diagrams used in scientific articles are one example. In addition articles about biological species usually have photos, and you may need to back up the identification of the species by citing e.g. a spotters' handbook / field guide. I've seen FA reviews where confirmation has been "requested". Quite often the sources you're citing in the corresponding text will do, so just copy and paste when you you upload. That will will save you the hassle of having to deal with challenges later. --Philcha (talk) 11:05, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

However, I will note that WP:V can be applied to captions. If you think a caption is questionable, you can challenge it. Blueboar (talk) 00:54, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

miisuse by cherry-picking single words and sentences possible

Ought there be a guideline about the current practice (found in many articles) of using RS as a reason for using specific single words for inline cites in much the same way old time theater producers chose single words from reviews? And ought there be a requirement that the RS be substantially related to the article, rather than the current practice of using Google to find books with as little as a one line mention of a person, and then using that as a basis for a whole section of a BLP? Perhaos "A reliable source used to support a claim in an article must have presented that material in more than a passing reference. Use of single word quotes from any reliable source is discouraged." Collect (talk) 13:56, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Sometimes it is necessary to cite a single word... especially when that word is controvercial. However, you do have a point about cherry-picking and taking single words or short phrases out of context. Thankfully we have a policy statement that covers this... WP:NOR states:

• Citing sources and avoiding original research are inextricably linked: to demonstrate that you are not presenting original research, you must cite reliable sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and that directly support the information as it is presented.

and

• Even with well-sourced material, however, if you use it out of context or to advance a position that is not directly and explicitly supported by the source used, you as an editor are engaging in original research.

So... there is no need to restate this policy level requirement here in the RS guideline. Blueboar (talk) 14:50, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Which would be well and good except for editors using sources which are "officially reliable" but where the cite refers to a passing remark rather than to the focus of the source. Thus the suggestion that "passing remarks" should not be used. I know I try to use sources which have at least a few paragraphs on the topic or claim, but it appears I am in the minority. Collect (talk) 15:39, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's such a bad thing in every case. Say that you're reading a long technical essay. It contains a statement about a tangentially related subject. You happen to be aware that the statement is widely considered accurate. You could certainly cite that passing remark, even though it's just a passing remark. An ideal source specifically on that subject might exist, but Wikipedia's requirement is only to WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT. Wikipedia's goal is verifiability and neutral (accurate and balanced) presentation of the state of expert opinion in the field, not to create a list of ideal sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

About.com

Perhaps we could get some input about the reliability of a source for a discusion at [[8]]. There is an argument that this is a reliable source [[9]] inpite my having used the linked forum to ask the author about the issue of Obama's denomination here [[10]]. In her reply, the author of the page admits she needs to update the page. In this one instance, would this be a reliable source for Obama's current denomination?Die4Dixie (talk) 20:25, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Note that Die4Dixie's challenge to the reliability of about.com is based on a forum comment, not allowed as a source of information on Wikipedia (and even the forum comment does not say anything about whether Obama's denomination should be changed in the article). There probably are thousands of reliable sources cited on Wikipedia whose authors would like to update the source. That does not render the source unreliable. To challenge a reliable source, you need another reliable source. And a forum is not a reliable source. Ward3001 (talk) 20:36, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

I expect they can read. I did mention that. Also the form is sponsored by the article's author and about.com, where she is the moderator. The forum links from the page and also the author's name on that page. So your agrument is that we should use a source that the author says is inaccurate and needs to be updated. I guess we'll just let these good folks do the job the volunteered for.BTW, I don't want to use the forum as a reliable source to use in mainspace editing like you reference to policy would indicate, but rather to refute the reliability of the source in question. A very different matter.Die4Dixie (talk) 20:40, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

These good folks hang around at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard. Second door to the right, folks. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 20:45, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks.Die4Dixie (talk) 20:47, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Google or other search as a source

As an established editor here, I realize that using a search engine result as a source is generally not a very good idea, however, in some cases, I think it can be reasonable. If there is a mention in an article that a public opinion is held on a topic, a search result, especially one with a concensus showing the opinion is existant or debated, can serve a reasonalble purpose. Now, I know that you can't say.... XYZ person is a racist or XYZ company made bad products and source it as a fact, but you could reasonably assume that if there is 1000 Ask.com articles saying XYZ person is a racist or XYZ company made bad products that there is a public opinoin about it.... sourcing one particular blog or answer site is not sufficient, and I would personally delete any such sourcing as not being credible, but sourcing dozens or even hundreds can show, if used properly, that a prevalent opinoin exixts, so long as one is not trying to establish it as fact. I don't think that it would conflict with Wikipedia's goal of verifiable and neutral information. Wjmummert (KA-BOOOOM!!!!) 01:13, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

No, you can't cite your own research (in this case, a google search) to support something in an article. WP:NOR Dlabtot (talk) 01:19, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, definitely sounds like OR --Insider201283 (talk) 01:52, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Obviously, you never READ my post. If you did, your answer would not be so short. Wjmummert (KA-BOOOOM!!!!) 02:51, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Wjmummert, it's more complicated than that. If you (a Wikipedia editor) find a bunch of complaints online about something, and you (a Wikipedia editor) draw conclusions from that (for example, that there are a lot of complaints online relative to what you personally expect for a good product), then that is, indeed, a violation of WP:NOR.

The individual complaints are self-published and cannot be cited as reliable sources. If you want to cover information about complaints, you need to find a properly published reliable source that specifically addresses the complaints -- because if some random journalist says, "There are a bunch of complaints online," then you (the Wikipedia editor) didn't do the research and therefore aren't violating WP:NOR. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:37, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

For the most part I agree. Let me explain my line of thinking.... If I said that Volkswagen has a bad reputation for check engine lights coming on, (which is true, since I work for them) it's difficult to find a source that says directly and only that, even though it is true. By that same token, if I said VW has been heavily critisized by the public, I can not use the results of one blog or answer site, but I though that maybe, just maybe, sourcing lots would, and a search would do so without adding nine references to the end of a sentence. At this point, I guess my thoughts were not as well received as I had hoped they would be, I just thought I'd explain my line of thinking. Wjmummert (KA-BOOOOM!!!!) 15:32, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it sometimes seems unduly restrictive, but if the information isn't covered in a proper reliable source, then we really can't use it. This is part of what we mean when we say that information must be "verifiable", not True™. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:42, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I have read Wjmurmmert's post... and I have to agree with those who say this is OR... search results often are determined by how you choose to phrase your search request. For example, if you simply type XYZ+racist you will end up with every hit that mentions XYZ (the good or the bad) as well as every hit for the word racist (even if the website does not discuss XYZ)... then there are "duplicated" hits... mirror sites for the same page, various book selling sites that all sell the same book. etc. So to draw any conclusions about search results definitely qualifies as OR.

Where search results can be useful is in talk page discussions (since WP:NOR does not apply to talk pages)... If, in the course of a talk page discussion, you need to show that something is widely repeated in multiple sources, a google or ask.com search can demonstrate that fact... at which point you can choose two or three of the most reliable of those hits for citation in the article. Blueboar (talk) 04:46, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Duly noted.... I did not think about that.... FYI I am not trying to make a change to policy, just state what I feel is a valid point. Wjmummert (KA-BOOOOM!!!!) 15:24, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I read your post. Dlabtot (talk) 16:08, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

For clarification's sake, since the hypothetical examples aren't getting the point across well, the article is The Bachelor (TV series) and this is the Google search in question. The issue is racism on the show. I removed the addition several times on the basis that it was not reliable, but the user kept insisting that it was. I maintain that it is not and, when you actually look at the search and the results, only two of the first ten hits has anything remotely to do with the issue and one is an answers.yahoo page and the other a forum post that can't even get the network right so, even if a case could be made to use search engines as sources, it still wouldn't pass. --13² 23:37, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Citations for freeware and shareware and open source software

I would welcome clarification on the guidelines regarding reliable sources for the above types of software. By their very nature most 3rd party references will be fan sites, personal pages, forums, etc. If these are to be ignored then it is likely that most pages relating to these types of software should be deleted, leaving only commercial programmes that can afford advertising and thus get reviewed in the media. Should these categories of pages be considered WP:EXCEPTIONS when there are a substantial number of such 3rd party references. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:22, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

No they are not exceptions. You are assuming that none of the reliable trade magazines and review sites review freeware and shareware. I don't think this is true. Several do. It may take a bit more time for new shareware or freeware to come to the attention of the trade media (as the developers lack advertizing resources to promote it), but that simply means the specific freeware or shareware programme is not yet notable enough for Wikipedia. Blueboar (talk) 16:52, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Okay, so how would someone determine what is a reliable review site? All those that I have seen have been very much "one-man bands". Again this is not surprising given the nature of freeware, etc. Jezhotwells (talk) 12:34, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I would start with the print magazines (as opposed to looking on line). For the online review sites, reliability is determined by editorial policy and oversite, as well as reputation. A "one man band" personal website is usually not reliable, unless the one man has a very high reputation (ie is generally acknowleged as an "expert" in the field). Again, I think you are making an inaccurate assumption that the mainstream computer magazines and review sites do not cover freeware. Blueboar (talk) 16:35, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I think you are making an assumption that mainstream computer magazines cover freeware or shareware that much. They don't. I have had a subscription to PC World magazine for years. I had a subscription for years to InfoWorld magazine awhile back. --Timeshifter (talk) 08:08, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I've seen freeware and shareware reviewed in Macworld. I'd be surprised if it never gets mentioned in Linux-oriented trade magazines. Certainly there are specific pieces of software that can't be sourced that way, but then there are specific commercial products that I don't think I'd be able to find proper third-party published sources for, either.

One question I have is whether you're trying to establish notability, or to provide support for individual specific facts in an article. The sourcing burdens are different in quality for this. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:25, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Officially, a review site is "reliable" if there is sufficient fact checking and editorial control. In practice, it's just about impossible to prove there is fact checking and editorial control, and the level of sufficiency is not definable, so various heuristics are used: it's declared "reliable" if it's closely associated with a dead tree publication, if it has been around for a while and makes enough money that people get paychecks as writers and editors, (sometimes) if it's run by someone well-known for writing reviews for dead tree publication or other reliable sites, or (sometimes) if it happens to be credited more than a few times by other "reliable" sources; otherwise, it's declared "unreliable". This means that non-academic subjects that don't have a large subscription audience and don't have large companies marketing products are often left with few usable online sources. Anomie⚔ 16:57, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

It is circular as you said. Kind of like "peer review" in medical journals where the drug companies pay for the ads. Follow the money. Wikipedia shouldn't be following the money. Please see my comments here:

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Comparison of wiki farms (3rd nomination)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Software/Free Software#Difficulty of establishing reliable sources for freeware --Timeshifter (talk) 09:22, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Anomie⚔ and Timeshifter - the usual assumptions that certain sources have effective QA processes fail WP:V, and WP:RS favours sources with big budgets, but that means they also have commercial interests that may bias both their choice of what to cover and how they cover it. If anyoone is interested, I can give examples of unrelibability of big-bugdet sources in the fields of chess history and computer games.--Philcha (talk) 10:07, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

So, I detect a lack of consensus on interpreting the existing guidelines and some who feel that the existing guidelines could be considered flawed as they do not factor in the real world situation where commercial products get exposure because they buy advertising. Where do we go from here? Jezhotwells (talk) 23:37, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

If a commercial product only gets coverage because it buys coverage, then IMO that rag is not a reliable source either, and it too fails our standards. Notability requires independent notice. No notice = no article. In practice, this means that not every object, product, or organization on earth will have a Wikipedia article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:36, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) Then does Wikipedia mainly cover big evil companies like Microsoft? I thought Wikipedia was nonprofit, used MediaWiki freeware, and thus might have a little more sympathy for freeware, shareware, free web hosting, free wiki farms, and open source. There are plenty of online review sites for all this stuff. But for some reason there is a bias against using them as references. It seems that many of the software articles on Wikipedia have only a few token entries for freeware, shareware and open source. There should be more. Wikipedia is not paper. See WP:NOTPAPER. You know, that's funny, because not only is Wikipedia not limited in size like a paper encyclopedia, but it shouln't be so limited in how many online (non-paper) sites it allows as references. Wikipedia needs to more fully join the digital age. We are not a paper encyclopedia.

To put this in context please see: Talk:Comparison of wiki farms. There has been a multi-year effort to either delete this article (4 AfDs) or reduce it to a few token entries of big wiki farms such as Wikia. I am a volunteer admin at Wikia, so I am sensitive to the COI this would be if tried to make this into a short token list. But it would be wrong in so many ways to only point people to the big wiki farms. Wikipedia is better than this. We should just cite the sources (both print-based and online-based) and then let the readers decide as to their biases. That is the WP:NPOV way. It is obvious that the print publications are not necessarily more reliable if they are biased toward their advertisers. There are some projects and pages helping to counteract all of this systemic bias:

• Portal:Free software
• Category:WikiProject Free Software --Timeshifter (talk) 16:08, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Ummm, the systemic bias here is Wikipedia lending undue weight to minor websites because they happen to have the same sort of goal as Wikipedia; it isn't that reliable sources don't exist because we're not looking for them in the right place. People who complain that subject X does not receive appropriate coverage in reliable sources typically fail to note than the reason for this is that said subjects really aren't as important in the real world as they're made out to be; the reason that most freeware applications receive little coverage in mainstream publications is because they're nowhere near as commonly-used as their commercial cousins. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:31, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Are sources "closer" to the subject preferred?

I was hoping for some guidance concerning the desirability of a finding a source whose overall subject is related to the statement being cited, but did not find it in this guideline. Is this treated elsewhere, and it not, is it worth adding?

Perhaps it is best illustrated by a recent example. A user was adding citations to preexisting statements in the hymen article, and for a one sentence definition of the imperforate hymen he provided as reference (1) an unpublished master's degree thesis addressing social, medical, and legal issues surrounding virginity in Turkey and (2) an encyclopedia of Jewish medical ethics. Both sources do contain an appropriate definition of the condition, but it is equally well defined (and then further discussed) in a myriad of Ob/Gyn medical texts. In fact, the statement receiving the new citations was an entry in a list, and was simply a rewording of a nearly identical sentence that appeared in the opening paragraph of that section -- one which was already provided with two citations referring to medical texts. When I pointed out it would be better to cite a reference who's overall subject was related to the statement, the user responded that, "there are legal concepts, scientific concepts, and philosophical concepts that may be convergent or disparate. All are equally valid so long as they are sourced to a reliable medium. We don't need a tyranny of science pushing out all other voices." There is no issue of divergent concepts here -- the definitions he cited are sound and in agreement with those given in medical texts -- so I assume he is suggesting that we benefit from having "convergent" concepts cited by a wide range of references. This lead me to look to the guidelines for advice, but I don't see the issue addressed. -- Kirk Hilliard (talk) 20:14, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I would have thought that all other things being equal (and that's important), a source is more likely to be correct on its core subject than on a tangential subject - which would be a point in favour of the "closer" sources you describe. However, there would be many circumstances where a generally reliable "distant" source would still be preferable to a questionable "close" source. To take an extreme example, if covering mortality rates from certain cancers, I would rather cite an article on heart diseases in the British Medical Journal that happened in passing to compare them with cancers than an article specifically on cancer cures in the Weekly World News. Not all choices will be so extreme, of course, and I think it must frequently come down to editors' judgment rather than a definitive guideline. Barnabypage (talk) 20:30, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

For the specific sources, here's what I would consider:

• WP:V flatly rejects unpublished sources. The master's thesis must go.
• WP:PSTS discourages tertiary sources like encyclopedias. This isn't a particular bad use of one, but it isn't the single best type of source in general.
• WP:MEDRS strongly discourages the use of non-scientific/non-medical sources to present medical or scientific facts and information. I assume that definitions would count as "facts and information". WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:00, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Sources which are provably false or half-truth

Hundreds of years ago, Wikipedians would have been unable to document the discovery that the earth is round, because the majority of published sources claimed it to be flat. Would conclusive evidence from Copernicus be enough to override sources previously considered reliable? Or does the policy really mean 'majority-view sources'?--MartinUK (talk) 12:16, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Good point - in fact if you had stated that the world was round, you might have been burnt at the stake in some jurisdictions. As has been stated before and above Wipedia prefers dead tree sources, and prizes scholarly ones highest. This is probably because no one has thought of a a better system of defining what is and isn't reliable.Jezhotwells (talk) 18:02, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually, Copernicus proposed the heliocentric model of the universe, not the round earth theory (even in Copernicus's time, most educated people knew the earth was round)... but that is a nit-pick... if we substitute "that the earth traveles around the sun" for ""that the earth is round" you point is valid.

The fact is, had there been a Wikipedia at the time of Copernicus, we would have dubbed the heliocentric model a Fringe Theory, and we would have given more weight to the Aristilian model (earth centered universe)... at least initially. Over time, as more and more scientists examined and accepted the Copernican model, we would have given it increasing weight... until the scales tipped, and it became the majority view. In fact, as time passed, and scientists examined the universe even further, they found flaws with Copernicus, and his model faded from being the majority view (for example, we now know that the sun isn't the center of the universe... the current theory is that there really isn't a "center" at all.)

We can not see into the future. All we can do is discribe the past and present. If, in the present, a theory has not been accepted, we can not give it more weight than the majority view... no matter how "true" we think it might be. That may change sometime in the future... the theory may gain acceptance. And if it does we can edit the article to reflect that change.

So, no, new "conclusive evidence" does not immediately "override" sources that are currently considered reliable. It only does so once other reliable sources start to agree that it should. Blueboar (talk) 01:34, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

1st: WP does not simply present the "majority view" but many articles have the grace to permit significant competing views. But not all...

Now then: What about the case where there's significant evidence supporting a "progressive" view- but prejudiced "reliable sources" maintain a status quo despite "clear evidence"? I'm thinking of the generations' of gathering epidemiologic data on cigarrette smoking- for decades dismissed as unrelated and suppressed- until by 1980 it became apparent the industry had bought science, press, and government processes so that anti-tobacco legislation was born. As "reliable sources" are inherently wiggly, Should WP support our cultural staus quos or reach for a broader neutrality when available?

Fascinating to me that this thread begins with the matter of cosmology. The article "Plasma cosmology" has been locked in an analogous situation. For years the great majority of a parade of Editors have favored liberalized view of the topic but have been frustrated by an unchanging minority of reverting Editors who demand a Catch-22. Essentially the minority defines "reliable sources" as "big names", and defines all unapproved editing as hostile. This page has a long history of WP dispute processes- which failed when a mediator abandoned the matter in frustration...

The resulting article is incomprehensible to non-experts- yet the model is intuitively apprehended via less-academic science-popularizer sites like [Thunderbolts.info]- one of many links repeatedly disallowed by the minority as non-academic. Should a pointy "accuracy" be followed at the expense of general potato-head "usability"? Hilarleo (talk) 14:00, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Again, it is not our job to examine the "evidence" to determine if a theory is "true" or not. That is the job of accademia (or similar experts). Our job is to simply discribe what the reliable sources say on the topic, giving more weight to the majority view and less weight to minority views (or, in the case of extremely Fringe views, no weight at all).

That said... this isn't really an RS issue... but one for WP:NPOV.Blueboar (talk) 14:51, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I think you're confusing policies. "Sources which are provably false or half-truth" cannot be used as reliable sources for factual evidence, and can be challenged on that basis. What they can be used for is verification for what a particular subject said about something; thus, opinions which are demonstrably not in line with factual evidence can still be represented in articles and may even receive more coverage than "the truth" if most people believe them. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:18, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia's editors are not permitted to use their own standards and judgment to determine that the newly presented idea is, in fact, clear or conclusive evidence of X. That violates the policy prohibiting original research. And frankly, if you can't find a single published source that says that it's clear evidence of X, then it's probably not.

In addition to WP:CRYSTAL, it's worth remembering that WP:There is no deadline. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:59, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

New tool for finding references

Next time you need a reference for a fact, please try the WRS project's search engine. It is based on Google but only shows results from a few hundreds "reliable websites", making it faster to find a good reference. Open the search page and enter a fact (for instance: Obama born in 1961). Your feedback is most welcome :-) Thanks Nicolas1981 (talk) 02:15, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Press releases concerning peer-reviewed material

Can we cite a peer-reviewed journal (in indirect quotation) if we have only had sight of a press release issued by the journal publisher concerning the content of an article in the journal? What about a press release issued by the university that employs an academic who has contributed an article to the journal - should that be considered a step further away from 'peer-reviewed' and 'verified'? Barnabypage (talk) 22:00, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

No. You have to WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT. If you read the press release, cite the press release. (If the statements aren't controversial, citing the press release is probably sufficient to meet WP:V's minimum requirements.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:47, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

question

if there are 2 extremely reliable, 1st party sources that over-ride a conflicting 3rd party sources, what happens? reply on my talk page. 70.242.179.192 (talk) 04:05, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Simple answer: mention both views with attribution as to who says what. More complicated answer: a lot depends on specifics... what article we are talking about... what sources we are talking about... how are you using those sources... and a host of other issues. We would need to know the specifics of what you are talking about to give you a definitive answer. Blueboar (talk) 14:39, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

the case may be that those 1st party sources aren't extremely reliable.WhatisFeelings? (talk) 22:38, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

David G. Campbell author of The Crystal Desert references wrong David G. Campbell

Author of the Crystal Desert is professor of Ecology at Grinnell College not David G. Campbell, the federal judge.

Um... what article are you talking about? The page on the judge does not mention The Crystal Desert, and I can not find a page on the professor of Ecology. Blueboar (talk) 14:36, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

YouTube mirrors of news reports

Hi. What's the official(?) word on news reports that are posted to YouTube by users, i.e., not by the news agency that broadcast the report in the first place? Is there a way that we generally handle that kind of situation? Is this a terrible place to ask this question? -GTBacchus^(talk) 23:49, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The source in this case is not YouTube, but the original news agency. So the cite is actually to the news agency, although WP:CITE#SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT requires the YouTube link. This is analogous to something that has been reposted on commondreams.org, e.g., for this story although the url is commondreams, the publisher is AP. jmho Dlabtot (talk) 01:56, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Two questions need to be asked... 1) does YouTube have permission to host the original news agency story (ie is there a copyvio if we link to it) and 2) Can we be sure that the person who posted the you tube video has not edited the video in any way (ie does it match the original news agency version). If the answer to either of these questions is no, then we should not link to YouTube, and should instead find and link to the original. Blueboar (talk) 02:27, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Question number 1 is more complicated that it appears. Fair use comes into play, as does the existence of the DMCA takedown mechanism. I know that YouTube receives many takedown notices and that makes it tempting to assume that if such videos remain up, the copyright holder doesn't view it as a violation. But that might be assuming too much. Question number two... if the material is not contentious, it appears moot. If the material is contentious, then again I would look to my commondreams example for illustration. In that case, commondreams does have a reputation for reliably reprinting news articles. However, in the youtube example, it is the uploading user who would need to have a reputation for reliability. Which in almost all cases would not be so. Dlabtot (talk) 02:38, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for your replies. That's very helpful. -GTBacchus^(talk) 15:34, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Self-published sources section

Keep it similar to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Self-published_sources_.28online_and_paper.29 WhatisFeelings? (talk) 18:10, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

In your edit summary, you said "independent" differs from "self-published" - well, yeah. If an item is notable, it will have been reported on by an independent, as opposed to a self-published source. Dlabtot (talk) 18:19, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

I give up for now. Taking this off my watchlist. Dlabtot (talk) 18:29, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Do you want "notable" or "helpful" or does not matter? Currently it is "helpful." I don't care either way if you want to use the specific wiki definition of notable.WhatisFeelings? (talk) 18:31, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Since you give up, I'm going to keep it in line with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Self-published_sources_.28online_and_paper.29 (I don't want problems later though)

WhatisFeelings? (talk) 18:40, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Well you havent said WHY you are doing what you are doing, you've just said that you are doing it. I have to get some work done today so I don't have time for this. But my silence should not be taken as assent. There is a reason that we have this guideline and it is not here to just say the same thing as the verifiability policy. à la prochaine Dlabtot (talk) 18:55, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

The reason why we have this guideline is to further explain what is meant when we use the term "Reliable Sources" in the Verifiability policy (and in other policies). While we don't have to completely ape the language used in WP:V, we do have to be careful to avoid having this guideline say something that contradicts WP:V. Blueboar (talk) 20:03, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Exactly. And nothing in this guideline contradicted anything in WP:V. Dlabtot (talk) 19:47, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Notability is a criteria for having an article about a topic. It is not necessary that every single statement within the article be notable on its own. I might write an article on photographic developers, which is easily a notable topic. An article titled "Misprints in Anchell & Troop's The Film Developing Cookbook" would not be notable, but I might nevertheless use errata published on Troop's website (with attribution) in the photographic developer article. --Jc3s5h (talk) 20:56, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Adult Survivors of Munchausen by Proxy

I have searched for any research/information regarding the lasting effects of MbP and found nothing. I am a survivor of this and would like to see if any interest has been shown in the psychological impact on the children that survived.--Faeriefinething (talk) 10:11, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Here's a little bit. Fred Talk 17:40, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Looking again at "online only" sources that use a blog-style format

While it's accepted universally that certainly online-only sources are fine for RS, such as the award-winning Talking Points Memo, a lot of news sources are now shifting to online-only formats due to the real world. A Denver newspaper is gearing up to go online-only, and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has now also made the shift. The question is going to inevitably come up more and more of this, and the old lame "NO BLOGS!" mantra that some people use is no longer appropriate--that was all when blogs were still new to the wider, general public (despite some dating back now literally a decade), and it was gauche to consider them 'news'. However, some actual blogs are authoritative in their sphere of knowledge or coverage, and some major media organizations are switching to the format, simply since it's so popular. ABC News is a great example of this, on the national level.

On the local level, for example, Seattle has a wide array of such news sites, often focusing on individual neighborhoods. The trend has been growing more and more for more online news sources to replace the old dying media methods. These neighborhoods often have individually tens or even a hundred thousand people living in them, with no dedicated "newspaper" that covers them--but the gap for news reporting and RS for our purposes has been filled online. A community of the size of any of these would be a decent sized city, and in years gone by (pre-Internet, pre-Craigslist) could have supported a smallish print daily or weekly easily. Some examples: [11][12][13][14][15], and there are still more, and that's one major city. There are more for LA, San Fran, NYC, almost certainly for international locations like London, Paris, Tokyo, and so on. Most are so focused on minutae they wouldn't be of much use here in most cases, today, but in some cases will be. For example, look at this for population data on Seattle neighborhoods. The Central District alone--one neighborhood, and not the most populous--had 28,000+ people in 2000, and that number has climbed. One neighborhood in the 12th (I believe) most populous city in one country.

Based on this, I think it's basically past time to specifically put in a notation that the "apparent" scope of an online-only source and anything to do with the format/structure they employ should not be allowed as a factor against their being considered RS. Thoughts? rootology (C)(T) 21:34, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The Blogosphere is a huge and growing part of the internet, and just because it is mostly a diary type of media doesn't mean it should be excluded out of hand. Many are turning to using the blog format because the software is easy to use, IOW their website is just as reliable as the old "normal" websites, but just happens to be hosted by a blog service and uses blog formatting. The significant difference is that we can't normally allow the "comments" portion (similar to "letters to the editor") to be used as a source, and that is still a good policy. More and more organizations, politicians, and public persons use a blog as their website. We shouldn't exclude these sources just "because it is a blog." The time has come to make sure our RS policies include a phrase about considering them on a case to case basis, while retaining the cautions about not using the comments portion. -- Fyslee (talk) 22:37, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

I think we care about (and have always cared about) editorial control, not the software used in the background. What an individual puts up on his/her own website is always going to be self-published -- whereas Slate.com and Salon.com, while also online-only publications, are not. (In short, I don't think any real change is necessary.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:44, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

My concerns about this are related to the once-justified negative attitudes toward using blogs as sources, regardless of editorial control. The very word blog as an odious tone to it here. That is no longer justified. While caution is still appropriate, we need to modify the language in our policies and focus attention even more on editorial control and notability of the author, rather than website format. -- Fyslee (talk) 22:44, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

You know, I find it interesting that so many people think we have a "No Blogs" rule... we don't. Nowhere in our polices and guidelines do we say "no blogs"... what we do say (in WP:V) is:

• "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, newsletters, personal websites, open wikis, blogs, forum postings, and similar sources are largely not acceptable".

The key phrase here is "largely not acceptable". That means that there are times when such sources are acceptable. I will also note that this caution about blogs is part of WP:SPS... and that context is important... when we say that blogs are largely not acceptable, we are talking blogs in the context of self-published sources. Most of the "blog-style" webpages that you are concerned about (such as those from major media outlets) are not self-published. And even self-published blogs can be considered allowable under some circumstances, if they meet certain criteria.

In short, I don't think we need to change the policy... we need to encourage a better understanding of the policy. Blueboar (talk) 13:27, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Bingo! Thanks for the well-worded reply. I just wish that there was some way to dispel the common notion you mention, that there is a "no blogs" policy. You are quite correct in your understanding, and that's what I was getting at, but nevertheless there is a very common misunderstanding of the policy, and I feel that a few well-chosen modifiers might remove some of the excuses for that misinterpretation of policy. When something is so commonly misunderstood, then something isn't clear enough, and we should be proactive in our attempts to improve policy. In this case it isn't a matter of changing it, just improving the wording. -- Fyslee (talk) 23:27, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

I for one would like to see these as "largely not allowed" period without the caveat. Reputable online publishers (i.e. the BBC's "stream of consciousness" diary reporting) would be allowed because it makes sense to allow them, but online op/ed pieces should be treated with great care, regardless of who publishes them. Some of the "nonblogs" hosted by reliable sources are smear pieces written by people that take no care to hide their bias and are obviously unreliable sources unless being used as a primary source of "this is what so-and-so said." SDY (talk) 15:29, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

I think that goes a bit too far... the reliability of an op/ed piece really depends on its author and not its publisher. An opinion piece written by a published expert writing in his area of expertise is likely to be both reliable and noteworthy, no matter what format it is published in. However, I agree that the key to all this is in how you phrase what we write in Wikipedia. Material based upon an opinion piece should be phrased as being the author's opinion, and not as blunt fact. Blueboar (talk) 14:53, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

I have no problem whatsoever with these sources being used as primary sources (i.e. "so-and-so says whatshisface is the best dentist"), but I think they should be only used in WP:IAR cases if they support facts in an article (i.e. "whatshisface is the best dentist"). SDY (talk) 02:53, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

I would use them freely, with the same credit I would give the author if it were published in more conventional form. As commentary, the same rule applies to any commentator--the credit depends on both him, and on the sponsorship of the blog; one assumes , for example, that the NYT has responsible columnists and their opinions to be taken seriously. But some think the editorial bias of the NYT unbalanced, so the affiliation must be given --- and similarly for opnion from the WSJ, possibly unbalanced in the opposite direction Context is important. DGG (talk) 15:28, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

NPOV#Neutral_point_of_view solves the problem. It's not up to us to judge the sources, merely to present them according to their weight. Ty 02:41, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that many of these sources are used in articles where NPOV is hard to come by, and clear policy helps "right make might." That allows biased editors to say they don't like it but agree that it matches policy and choose to do something more productive than an edit war. Either that or they can find better sources, and better sources make for better articles. SDY (talk) 02:53, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Regarding "largely not allowed" above, Wikipedia:BLP#Sources is rather more prescriptive: "Never use self-published books, zines, websites, webforums, and blogs as a source for material about a living person etc". Ty 02:57, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

It allows exactly the same caveat for the quasiblogs, which tend to be less than journalistic in quality and tend not to be high quality sources. SDY (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

If a reasonable source is hosted by an unreliable source?

The page [in question. This is an op/ed piece from the New York Post (aka pagesix.com) hosted by somebody's online art gallery. I'm very leery of it since there really isn't any guarantee that the piece hasn't been edited since it is being hosted by someone other than the original publisher and the host is not primarily in the business of archiving. How should this reference be presented, or should it be allowed at all? SDY (talk) 15:29, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

First, if you think it likely that the web page being cited has edited the material, then I would advise checking it against the original NY Post piece (it should be in their archives). Even then, it would probably be better to cite the original NY Post page than to use a transcription found on the webpage for an online art gallery.

The original NY Post op/ed piece would be reliable as an opinion piece... ie: for an attributed statement as to the opinions of its authors. It would not be reliable for a statement of blunt fact. Whether that opinion is worth noteing in an article is another matter (see WP:NPOV). Also, as it concerns a living person... see the limitations layed out at WP:BLP . Blueboar (talk) 16:13, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

The article in question has all sorts of problems on those grounds with the sources it uses, but for now I've been picking at the edges where there are purely technical problems rather than value judgments. SDY (talk) 19:54, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

It is necessary in case like this to cite both the original publication and also the place where you saw it. If you do find the original, you should consider citing it alone, using the POV site as merely a guide. This is often the case with book reviews of a publisher's site: some of them will be unpublished blurbs, and cannot be used at all; some will be reprints of real reviews, and can help find them. (in the case of publishers, one must find the real reviews, as publishers almost invariably user excerpts. That same caution might apply here, but usually if an apparently complete article is reproduced, it has not been tinkered with--such cases have happened, but they are rare. It may not always be clear though if the page is in a special section ofsome sort, and it is therefore worth checking. DGG (talk) 13:51, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

I checked on the NYP's archives, and they confirm that an article exists but you have to pay to get the full article. The summary they give has nothing to do with the title, though, so I'm just a little confused. SDY (talk) 01:15, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

I've just accessed it in the NYP archives without paying.[16] If you can't, then cough up a couple of dollars! Ty 02:48, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

I would strongly question the use of the Post at all for BLP information. Page Six, as a gossip column in an openly sensationalist source, should be right out. --Vassyana (talk) 03:34, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

journals not in citation indexes

There are reasons why a good journal might not be in a citation index: Just thinking quickly,

1. It might be in a field citation indexes do not cover well, such as the humanities, history, or descriptive biology
2. It might be in a languageexistingcitation indexes do not vover well, such as the Slavic and Japanese languages. WoS in particular will not cover a journal unless it has english abstracts.
3. it might be from a country relatively ignored by citation indexes, such as India.
4. It might be a journal published before the advent of modern citation indexes. Scopus, for example, is very patchy before 1996.
5. It might be a journal very important in the past, but not presently.
6. It might be a journal whose title has changed, and where coverage is discontinuous.
7. It might be from a new journal. in order to have a JCR impact factor, a journal must by the definition of impact factors have been published for more than 2 years, and WoS will not therefore generally cover a new title.

Therefore, not being in a citation index is not a conclusive sign of unimportance. There is no way of judging reliability without a full knowledge of context. DGG (talk) 21:19, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Extremist sources

I have edited the secton on Extremist and Fringe sources so that it matches the language at WP:V (specifically WP:QS) more closely. Note that this change does ease up on the restrictions this guideline placed on these sources. However, I feel it is very important that this guideline not conflict with the policy that governs it, and the old language did that. If you strongly object to the change, I suggest that you raise the issue at WT:V before simply reverting. Rewording my change so that the secton matches WP:V even better is (of course) to be encouraged. Blueboar (talk) 14:55, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

How did the old version conflict with policy? Not all differences are conflicts. It is the nature of guidelines to clarify and amplify on policy. If this guideline were less restrictive than the policy in a way that seemed to say that some material prohibited by the policy is actually premissible in article space, then there is a conflict to iron out. I this guideline is more restrictive than the policy, either by naming a different class of materials deemed unreliable, or resolving ambiguity or details in a way that disfavors fringe material, then there is no conflict. Consider the relationship of WP:NFC and WP:NFCC. The policy states the broad, key terms of avoiding use of copyrighted material. The guideline, through a series of examples and counterexamples, effectively prohibits a number of types of non-free images that, but for the policy alone, would arguably be admissible. So one can say the guideline amplifies on the policy. In this instance, the verifiability policy discourages fringe material for factual reasons - a fact is not verified with any certainty by a low quality source. The very purpose of RS is to describe clearly, and in more detail than the policy, when a source is of sufficient quality to rely on. That is mostly a matter of WP:V, but also pertains to notability, weight, NPOV, and other concerns. A frequent concern is that fringe sources not only print material that is possibly untrue (and therefore unverifiable), they also take things out of context and attach undue importance to facts that are unquestionably true but of no relevance or importance to the subject at hand. The guideline establishes a threshold for admitting material based on its sourcing. It should not be read to fully enable material just because it passes that threshold - there are other policies, guidelines, and editorial choices to make.Wikidemon (talk) 21:58, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

The major conflict was that RS still contained the old language about only using questionable sources in "articles about themselves". WP:V has moved away from that language... WP:QS (correctly) allows for limited use of such sources in other articles (articles not necessarily about the source or its author (ie "themselves"), but about something that is directly related to what the questionable source is discussing.) Blueboar (talk) 13:40, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Advocacy groups, governments, etc

Where do statements from advocacy groups, governments, resistence groups, companies, and so forth stand in terms of being reliable sources? The reason I group these types of source together is that they typically have vested interests. As such, I would assume that statements from such groups should only be quoted as the opinion of the respective bodies. Expect perhaps in the case of the publications of ministries or research units that have a reputation for reliability and fact-checking. The reliability of such sources is a frequent source of dispute on article talk pages. Ryan Paddy (talk) 05:45, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

For the vast majority of such sources you are correct, they are reliable for statements as to the opinion of the group on their topic of interest, but not for unattributed statements of fact. That said, it really depends on a) what you are citing them for and b) the reputation of the specific source for fact checking and accuracy. There are individual advocacy groups, government agencies, companies, etc. that have a high reputation for fact checking and accuracy, and these can be considered highly reliable... and others that should be avoided completely (even for a statement of opinion) as they have a very poor reputation. An article's Talk page is the correct place to argue whether a given source should be used, and how it should be used. If a second opinion is needed, you can ask at WP:RSN. Blueboar (talk) 13:21, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with that approach. I think it would be valuable for the guideline to cover this subject. Ryan Paddy (talk) 21:17, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I came to this page to ask much the same question. Here's the stuff which was to form a new section:

The article has sections on three different kinds of sites:

1 News organizations

2 Self-published sources

3 Extremist and fringe sources

I'm one of the editors of Internet censorship in Australia, and a lot of the citations in this article are to sites which do not seem to fit any of these three categories. An example is Electronic Frontiers Australia, which I guess is the Australian equivalent of the US Electronic Frontiers Foundation. These site are obviously POV, but the quality of their analysis and commentary, while POV, is in my opinion often superior to that of the MSM. Is it possible for such an organization to be regarded as a RS, and, if so, how is this established? I realized that there are also many similar organizations which are not reliable, so it would be good to have a way to distinguish between them. Consensus of WP editors may be one way. Some organizations such as EFA are relevant to a large number of WP articles, so that it would be good to not have to debate these for every article. cojoco (talk) 00:04, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Back again: in reply, Blueboar has said that these organizations are not reliable for "unattributed statements of fact". I would disagree with this in some circumstances, because it is sometimes in the interest of advocacy organizations such as EFA to present an accurate picture of the current state of affairs to assist in their advocacy role. For example, while you could not expect the EFA to give a balanced view on the relative benefit of a free internet versus protecting children from viewing adult material, I believe you would expect that their legal analysis on ways that a government could achieve its aims of internet censorship would have no reason to be inaccurate. The reason that I bring up this specific example is that the EFA's analysis of the situation was presented many months before the MSM, and their analysis has proved to be extremely accurate in this instance. cojoco (talk) 02:49, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Politically incorrect vs. Extremist

At what point can we try to distinguish politically incorrect sources from extremist sources ? If I follow the libertarian Jimbo Wales approach, many extreme sources would maybe not be so extremist if they were simply understood to be politically incorrect. Conversely, being politically incorrect does not really prevent material from being NPOV, when it is merely exposing the relevant minority views. There is a latin saying called Audi alteram partem, which means that you should always try to hear the other side, at least in most situations. I would personally not hesitate to quote Russian, Chinese or Arab sources if they expose relevant material in a grammatically correct fashion. ADM (talk) 03:33, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Can you give some examples of what you would call "politically incorrect" as opposed to "extremist"? Blueboar (talk) 16:04, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

When I said Russian, Chinese and Arab, I was thinking of Information Telegraph Agency of Russia, Xinhua and Al Jazeera, which might sometimes be considered extremist in the West, when in fact it is probably closer to being politically incorrect. Other than that, any source which exposes some kind of government corruption, such as Deep Throat/W. Mark Felt, might be prone to accusations of being an extreme source, when it too is probably closer to being merely incorrect politically. ADM (talk) 20:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Xinhua's reporting is fine for reporting on who won medals at the olympics, for example. It's mostly a question of what the source is being used for. Xinhua's coverage of public opinion in Lhasa is more likely to be questionable. Especially in countries where press freedoms are constrained or reporters live under substantial fear of retribution it may be more than a question of "parity" it may be a question of "do we believe them?" SDY (talk) 01:38, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I would agree with SDY on the foreign sources... as to sources which make allegations of corruption etc., I would be much more hesitant to say they are reliable. To some degree it depends on who the author is and how they publish their allegations. If we move the Watergate scandal to modern times, and have Deep Throat/W. Mark Felt post his warnings about the "current" Nixon administration in a blog or on a personal website, that blog or website would not be considered a reliable source (it would also run afowl of WP:BLP) The Washington Post reports that were based on his information, on the other hand, would be. In general, allegations of wrong doing need to be reported on by a solidly reliable source intermediary (such as the mainstream media) to be considered reliable. Blueboar (talk) 15:30, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

In terms of sources, "Deep Throat" would be a primary source that is only allowed when interpreted by a reliable secondary source per WP:PSTS, so this is already policy. SDY (talk) 23:45, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

a source isn't reliable unless it has a wikipedia article?

i think as a general rule of thumb, a "sources are not reliable unless they have an associated wikipedia article" might be a good metric for deciding the reliability of a website. for example, if the BBC mentions something, there's a good chance it's reliable, unless it's a WP:ONEEVENT or WP:NOTNEWS type thing. if some comment to a news story on BBC says something, that wouldn't be reliable unless the person who made the comment had a wikipedia article (which of course there'd be no way to prove that the comment was made by a particular person unless they said so on their own website, at which point, you'd cite the website - not the comment). does that seem like a reasonable generalisation? might not always be true but it might be a good rule of thumb Misterdiscreet (talk) 02:07, 25 March 2009 (UTC) i've elaborated on my position at [17] Misterdiscreet (talk) 02:29, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

No way, not at all. There are valid sources that may not have articles--you don't have to be notable to be an authority per se, but there are so many niche journals, publications, and professionals in various fields that don't have articles, that it would be a grotesque metric (no offense). In addition, it would lead to an arms race that would be disruptive:

"He's a fine source."

"He's not notable."

"Now he is, I made his article."

<AFD>

"He's not notable and therefore not reliable." <EDIT WAR>

<DELETED AT AFD>

<DRV>, <MORE EDIT WARRING>, <INCIVILITY>, <RFAR>, <CATS AND DOGS LIVING TOGETHER>

Etc, etc. Notability is not a metric of reliability, or else some sources would fail, as anyone may argue, depending on who you ask. rootology (C)(T) 02:33, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Rootology about notability and reliability being quite different. Also, online newspapers that are not located in English-speaking countries are less likely to have articles about them, but may be excellent sources about events that occur close to their headquarters. --Jc3s5h (talk) 02:38, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

his citation isn't notable if the article on him isn't notable. also, as per [18], consider the discredited killian documents. any article treating them as being genuine is not, now, reliable. that, however, is of little consequence - that the killian documents were seen by notable sources as being reliable for quite some time is itself notable. whether or not the sources are reliable is immaterial. what people of note were saying at the time, even if wrong, should be (and indeed is) discussed.

ultimately, i believe the whole concept of reliability on wikipedia is a bit of a misnomer. admins would, i'm sure, consider themselves to be reliable. anything they say may violate WP:SPS, but if they weren't reliable, they probably wouldn't be admins (Essjay aside). yet there opinions should still be discounted all the same. not because they're liars, mind you, but because what they have to say is not notable. what they have to say, no matter how correct it might be, does not matter, whereas what FOX news has to say, regardless of how correct it is, does matter. if nothing else, it helps characterise the media's perception of an issue. whether or not that perception has anything to do with the truth is immaterial Misterdiscreet (talk) 02:40, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Reliable publishers like the New York Times are capable of deciding who should be quoted on a topic, and we may rely on their judgement. If 10 years from now, the New York Times writes that "according to astronomer Peter Fillibuster, an asteroid the size of Central Park passed within 50,000 kilometers of the earth" we can put that in a Wikipedia article, even if there is no Wikipedia article on Peter Fillibuster, and he is not notable enough to write a Wikipedia article about him, because the New York Times investigated the matter and decided he was worth quoting. --Jc3s5h (talk) 02:50, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

at that point, it's not peter fillibuster you're citing - it's the new york times. the new york times has the wikipedia article and that's what maters. that peter fillibuster does not have a wikipedia article is immaterial because you're not citing his blog - you're citing the new york times.

if in contrast peter fillibuster were cited by the new york times hundreds of times he might be worthy of a wikipedia article. of course this whole wikipedia article is just a rule of thumb and that boundary cases may exist does not detract from its being a potentially useful rule of thumb Misterdiscreet (talk) 03:02, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

• Of course the presence or absence of a Wikipedia article is completely irrelevant to the question of whether a source should be considered reliable. On the other hand, any source that is reliable is also by definition notable enough to have a Wikipedia entry. But that doesn't mean it is certain to exist. Dlabtot (talk) 03:27, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

• I think it would be more accurate to say that any source that is reliable is affiliated with an entity that is notable enough to have a Wikipedia entry. The records of the town clerk of Baltimore, Vermont (population 250) are a reliable source for the birth dates of people born in that town (since, by law, towns are responsible for accepting and permanently storing birth certificates). The town clerk's office of that town is probably not notable enough for a Wikipedia article, but the town as a whole is. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jc3s5h (talk • contribs) 03:56, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

• • i like that generalisation better than the one i proposed Misterdiscreet (talk) 05:19, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I would definitely disagree with linking the concept of reliability to that of notability in any way shape or form. There are reliable sources that are not notable... there are notable sources that are not reliable... and there are sources that are both reliable and notable. The two concepts have nothing to do with eachother. Blueboar (talk) 14:40, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I also think this is a bad idea. Not every textbook deserves a Wikipedia article, but many hoaxes do. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:00, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

IMDb.com

There is debate at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of Victoria's Secret Fashion Show models‎ about WP:RS as it relates to www.imdb.com. For 2001-2007, the primary source for seemingly complete and exhaustive rosters of models for those years is imdb. Many discussants feel that since imdb is user generated it can not be relied upon for any and all details included therein. I contested that for cast and crew details, it has historically been quite reliable. Although for information such as biographical trivia, it is not an RS, that the case could be made that it is reliable for cast and crew. We need feedback on this issue.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 07:32, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

From whence comes the assertion that imdb is user-generated? I don't believe that is accurate. There is some user content on imdb, such as the aptly named 'user comments', but info such as cast lists are produced by imdb's editorial staff. imdb does have a good reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Dlabtot (talk) 08:06, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Would you care to chime in at the FLC above?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 08:20, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

It is user-generated because users can add or modify most of the information, including cast and crew members. Albeit, the updating process goes through some sort of filter (I assume someone actually looks at what has been submitted and approves it, so there's no "I. P. Freely's"), but I also doubt (and know from personal experience) that they do not always have a method for confirming user updates and additions. Like I said, I have no way of knowing exactly how this user-generated content is fact-checked, but in my opinion that is the problem. Since we don't know how or if content is fact-checked, and we don't know the source of some random piece of information (via staff or user), we cannot assume it is reliable for that content. Drewcifer (talk) 16:37, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

It is user-generated because users can add or modify most of the information, including cast and crew members That isn't so. Dlabtot (talk) 16:43, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

There's an "Update" button, at least for registered users, accompanied by the message: "You may report errors and omissions on this page to the IMDb database managers. They will be examined and if approved will be included in a future update. Clicking the 'Update' button will take you through a step-by-step process." -GTBacchus^(talk) 16:51, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Exactly. You submit information to their editorial staff. Which then makes the decision as to whether to include it. That's not 'user-generated' content, it is user-submitted content. I also have the ability to report errors or omissions to the New York Times. Dlabtot (talk) 17:00, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

And at that point, the question becomes, "Does IMDb have a reputation for accuracy, and for getting these things right?" I think they do. -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:19, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

← In my own personal experience, the reliability of "user-submitted" content (if that's what we're calling it), is a bit sketchy. I myself have an IMDB page, and so I know for a fact that there are errors on it. I have tried to submit corrections in the past, but only some of them have actually been fixed, while other errors are still there. I have also tried to add other people's names to various crew lists, with varying success. Sometimes it has worked, sometimes it hasn't. Logically, it is also obvious to assume that the IMDB staff does not have access to all of the millions of movies on their site. If they did, they could just pop in the DVD, and double-check the credits to assure that the user-submitted content reflects the actual credits from the film. But they don't have every movie ever on-file, so in many cases even if they wanted to fact check a submission they couldn't. There are also many films still in production that have cast and crew lists. Those films have not been released and many cases even haven't even finished shooting yet, but somehow they have cast and crew lists. Obviously, these are made entirely up of user-submitted submissions, unless some IMDB crew member went on-set and did a head count. Obviously not all of these points apply to the Victoria's Secret list mentioned above, but they all combine to make me hesitant to ever call IMDB reliable, as Wikipedia defines it. Drewcifer (talk) 18:49, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Your experience seems to confirm that they retain editorial control. Your assertions, such as, obviously, these are made entirely up of user-submitted submissions seem to be unfounded, however. Dlabtot (talk) 18:57, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I never said they didn't have editorial control; indeed, it's not a wiki. And my assessment of projects still in production was perhaps a little strong. Let me rephrase: "since no credit-sequence has been made yet, there is no official record available to the public as to who worked on what film. Therefore, the crew and cast lists are made up of either user-submitted content, hearsay, or bonafide news (such as the Post saying "Brad Pitt is set to star in Star Wars 10"). The first two are suspect, while the last one is probably fairly reliable. But how do we know which is which when IMDB doesn't cite its sources?" Drewcifer (talk) 19:20, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Again, you've made an assertion, but it looks to me to be unfounded. Dlabtot (talk) 19:22, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

True, it is an assertion, but one based on personal experience. But that's not the point: the burden of proof lies in proving a source to be reliable, not in simply discounting any arguments otherwise by labeling them as "unfounded". Besides, the same could be true to the contrary: that it is equally unfounded that IMDB is reliable. The fact that my assertions have the potential to be true for any factoid coming from IMDB is the issue, not whether my assertions are true in every case. Drewcifer (talk) 22:03, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Another red herring. No source has ever been 'proven' to be reliable. Rather, editors make judgements about whether a source has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, per WP:RS. But even a source with such a reputation will not be 100% reliable - witness Jayson Blair, Judy Miller, et al... Dlabtot (talk) 00:03, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

For both FAC and GAN, IMDb.com is not considered a reliable source for anything other than the most basic information. It does not have a clearly stated fact checking policy, the information on the site is not copyrighted, and at least some of it is user generated. I have had input into the site, and if I can, anyone can. —Mattisse (Talk) 22:18, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Exactly the point I've been trying to make, but stated much more clearly. Drewcifer (talk) 03:48, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

• When user created content does appear, as on this page, it appears with a warning: The content of this page was created by users. It has not been screened or verified by IMDb staff. Dlabtot (talk) 17:23, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

• These COLLABORATIVE EDITING SERVICES TERMS AND CONDITIONS for IMDB.com are not those of a reliable news organization or other fact checking source. —Mattisse (Talk) 17:49, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

sources are not reliable vs unreliable in a black/white way--IMdB is a source of medium reliability, and uncontroversial material there is generally accepted as correct unless there's an actual challenge to it. What I've found is that it is often incomplete, and something not being there is no evidence it isnt actually real. DGG (talk) 00:19, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Are you sure that this information cannot be found in any other sources, online or offline? Dabomb87 (talk) 20:43, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

The information exist with the company surely. I don't know where else it exists. I don't know of any alternate pD sources.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 20:56, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

LET'S FOCUS The question is not whether IMDb.com in general is reliable. The question is whether it is reliable in terms of cast and crew for a list of models who have partaken in the Victoria's Secret Fashion Shows this decade (2001-2007, and incomplete for 2008). I.E., Do we believe that the names they list were models in the show. We are not concerned about whether a plot summary is biased or accurate, or whether biographical trivia is truthful. I would not rely on WP for a FL for the latter two. For a list of cast and crew I consider anything in it to be reliable for the reasons above. I.E., since the first pass at a cast and crew is done by the IMDb editorial staff I trust it although it will sometimes be incomplete. I am calling to question the following. Please either support or oppose the following statement. IMDb.com is a reliable source for listings of models in Victoria's Secret Fashion Shows in the sense that all persons it names as models are believed to have modelled in the show althoug it may exclude some models.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 08:27, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

• I agree that this is probably the best source for this information (and possibly the only source), however I do not believe it is a reliable source under our rules, in that it accepts user contributions. We simply can not verify that the information is accurate. So I guess I have to !vote opposed. Blueboar (talk) 23:03, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Comment You are not focussing. This is not an attempt to veryify whether all information on IMDb is reliable. All that is at issue here is cast and crew for the VS Fashion Shows. We all understand that certain types of information on IMDB is not reliable (especially its biographical trivia). However, no one (even Drewcifer) has presented any evidence that objective information such as cast and crew information is unreliable.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 00:02, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

No, I was quite focused... you asked for third party opinions, I gave mine... Because it accepts user contributions, I do not think that IMDB can be considered reliable for citing the cast and crew for VS Fashion Shows, or anything else. Blueboar (talk) 02:09, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed; we're not here to make exceptions or take things on a case-by-case basis. What applies to one source should apply to them all. So asking us to stay focused on your problem is a little short-sided and missing the point completely. Drewcifer (talk) 16:50, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

• oppose i have not heard a convincing arguement that would put me on the side of considering IMDB as a reliable source. We do not know which items have recieved the fact checking and which have not. Reliable sourcing should not be a crapshoot.-- The Red Pen of Doom 22:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

School newspaper?

Would a college campus' student written newspaper be considered a source? Something like the Highacres Collegian from Penn State University, is what I'm thinking of. An on-campus newspaper. Just wondering. Thanks! CarpetCrawler (talk) 18:22, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

A source for what? You have to take it in context. Could be reliable for some mundane fact about its home University. It's probably not reliable for a controversial fact about some random celebrity. It probably doesn't demonstrate the significance of a point of view on national politics. Again, you have to look at it in context. Someguy1221 (talk) 19:05, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I was basically looking for a review on a song that is hard to find many newspaper reviews of (It's a song from 1974, "Captain Jack (song)".) and there was an article in the Penn State student paper about a review of the song, as well as others. CarpetCrawler (talk) 19:14, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

First, all reviews are opinion pieces... and the appropriateness of discussing someone's opinion really depends on the expertise and reputation of the author more than the venue in which it appeared. In most cases, the opinion of a student reporter is not going to be notable or reliable... on the other hand, if the review was written by the Chairman of the School's music dept. or by a student who later went on to become the main music critic for Rolling Stone, or something like that... it might be. From what you tell us, I don't think this is the case... so no, I don't think it is reliable.Blueboar (talk) 19:52, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

However, reviews also include facts (the tracks on an album, the publisher of a book, the language of a film, etc. etc.), and a journalist whose opinion doesn't count as expert can still be a reliable source for those facts. Barnabypage (talk) 11:35, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, that stinks. :( Thanks for the clarification! :) CarpetCrawler (talk) 20:03, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

To echo blueboar... what he said. For other details, such as those specific to the school, or in particular local news for their area, or certain case-by-case facts beyond that, it can be fine. The prestige of the paper and school would also figure in, surely. Something like Yale Daily News, for example, would generally be a fine source. rootology (C)(T) 01:15, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

"Reliable sources are credible published materials with a reliable publication process; their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand." While authoritative would be a stretch, there is no reason to think a music review in a school paper isn't trustworthy. I'd say it would be a fine source. From a notability viewpoint it wouldn't buy much IMO. but that some source chose to review it would have _some_ weight. Hobit (talk) 04:56, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Incorporating WP:BLP into WP:RS#Statements of opinion

Due to a recent discussion at RSN (See: WP:RSN#Use of personal attack from professor’s blog) I have amended the above named section by adding a short paragraph to account for BLPs. While in most cases statements of opinion can be sourced to a self-published source written by the opinionator, WP:BLP makes it clear that such sources may NOT be used in BLPs. With my addition the entire sub-secton now reads (New material in bold):

Some sources may be considered reliable for statements as to their author's opinion, but not for statements of fact. A prime example of this are Op-ed columns that are published in mainstream newspapers. When discussing what is said in such sources, it is important to directly attribute the material to its author, and to do so in the main text of the Wikipedia article so readers know that we are discussing someone's opinion.

There is, however, an imporant exception to sourcing statements of opinion: Never use self-published books, zines, websites, webforums, blogs and tweets as a source for material about a living person, unless written or published by the subject of the biographical material. "Self-published blogs" in this context refers to personal and group blogs. (see: WP:BLP#Sources and WP:BLP#Using the subject as a self-published source).

Hopefully this clarifies things. Blueboar (talk) 14:24, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

List of liqueurs

Hi. I asked a question over at WP:EL, and they directed me this way. The question regards this edit. There are a number of liqueurs that do not have Wikipedia articles, and one editor is suggesting that we should document them by including "the best available links", which in this case are to commercial sites, selling products. I've been disagreeing, saying that we really need independent, non-commercial sources, and that when those can't be found, we don't need anything. I'd like to see what people here think. Thanks in advance for any input. -GTBacchus^(talk) 18:11, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I looked at the first disputed source as an example, which is a chocolate-coconut liqueur called Afrikoko. I don't see why the sources have been restricted to websites. I get 39 hits for Afrikoko at books.google.com; Amazon.com gives me nine books. Why not cite a book, if the manufaturer's website seems too commercial for you?

(Also, all of these bare links should be reformatted as proper <ref>erences whenever someone has a few minutes.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:51, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, the editor has claimed that the commercial sites are all they can find, but I tend to the opinion that we shouldn't link to a site selling a product if that's all we can find on that product. I think this is a fairly well-supported view, but the editor in question seems not to agree with it. Maybe he doesn't know about google books. I'll point him here. -GTBacchus^(talk) 21:59, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I think that weak sources are better than zero sources, and the information (major ingredients, which the manufacturer of a product really ought to know) is strictly uncontroversial. But perhaps you'd take this question to WP:RSN. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:16, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I would agree with this, as this is the most reasonable course of action, especially when documenting phenomena such as liqueurs or commercially produced foods, where only the very most famous ones are covered in scholarly or book sources. We are not trying to source that a particular liqueur "tastes great," only that it exists, its nation of production, and its ingredients. I'll mention again that for each liqueur I look very hard for the best sources, then use only those. Note also that the Pepsi article, typical of our articles on commercially produced foods and beverages, does have references directly from the PepsiCo official site; I would not support the removal of those where they are the best sources available for the portions of the Pepsi article's text they support. Badagnani (talk) 23:09, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

If the ingredients and nation of production of the "Afrikoko" liqueur are available at superior sources to the one removed (what are the sources you found?), the editor wishing to remove the original source should clearly replace the source with the better one. This is why collaborative "Discussion" is so important. Badagnani (talk) 23:12, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

While I don't see any problem with citing the manufacturer for existance or ingredients, it is not difficult to find this informtion elsewhere. For Afrikoko, try cocktailsoftheworld.com... or if you want a print source try the "Sierra Leone directory of commerce, industry, and tourism", p. 23... which can be viewed at Google books here. Both sources took me all of 30 seconds of surfing to find. I am sure similar sources can be found for the other ligueurs. Blueboar (talk) 12:10, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Dated sources

This is a problem I have seen with a handful of Wikipedia articles, they can make use of extremely dated sources. Edward the Elder makes use of a reference from 1845! Possibly a relatively minor character like Edward hasn't had many biographies written about him, but this appears to be a general history of Anglo-Saxon England, there must have been many such competent histories written over the years. Should we have a template like "DATED" to add to such articles? PatGallacher (talk) 14:42, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't think we can judge the reliability of a source purely by its age... Yes, the older the source, the more likely it is that its information is outdated, but we can not assume that this must be the case. When we come across an older source, we need to check what it says against modern scholarship, to see if it actually is outdated.

The real issue is whether a "dated source" is still considered accurate given modern scholarship. Has a new information come to light since the source was written, information that has changed the way historians view the subject? Has someone come up with a new analysis of existing documents that has change accademic consensus on the subject? If not, then an older source is probably just as good as a newer one... in fact, in some cases an older source might be the best source (some old sources are still considered the definitive source for their topic). Blueboar (talk) 18:33, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

The age itself of sources is fine. What if you wanted to write an obscure today but notable at the time event from 1845? What if no one has written anything major or new since 1900? rootology (C)(T) 02:26, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

The blog thing, again

Based on this discussion I made this edit. We would be insane to disqualify a source from an otherwise fine and reputable news publisher based on the "technical" formatting they use or the layout style they use for their stories. rootology (C)(T) 02:25, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Blogs as sources, WP:BLOGS

Since I still keep coming across issues where people falsely say "blogs can't be sources"--an out and out incorrect statement--I've whipped up Wikipedia:Blogs as sources/WP:BLOGS as a quick reference distilled from RS & BLP policy pages to give a quick clue on how blogs are allowed to be used from certain websites, and how on what articles. Any feedback on the talk is appreciated there. rootology (C)(T) 03:07, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

WP:BLOGS would be fine as an essay, summarizing what is said in various existing policies and guidelines (suggest that you include what WP:V has to say on the matter). However, I would oppose promoting it to guideline status. We don't need yet another guideline to discuss something is already discussed both here and at WP:V. Blueboar (talk) 18:28, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Miss Isabelle Biography

People who don't have the right informations, PLEASE stop writting false informations. HAVE A BIT MORE RESPECT FOR THE ACTORS AND ACTRESS Tank you!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.93.51.193 (talk) 22:56, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

When sources are not required

The Russian version of this policy, which is essentially an translation of English original has "When sources are not required" section that deals with "obvious or easily verifiable things". I cannot seem to find a corresponding section in this policy. Can you please help me? Please answer at my talk page. Netrat (talk) 23:40, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Technically, you always need a source if challenged by anyone from an IP on up. While I could write a 10,000 word article of Featured quality with not one source, anyone could then put if up "under the law" for AFD if it was unsourced. Or, if I wrote, "The Earth revolves around the sun," it's basic science and common knowledge 101, but someone could toss a fact tag up on it. Not having a section like this is a help though--what if someone argues that something doesn't need a source, and to their perspective but everyone else's it does? Keeping all 'facts' on a level playing field is a better idea. rootology (C)(T) 01:13, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Information that no-one will ever challenge doesn't need a source. However, since proving the negative "no-one will ever challenge this" is impossible, in practice it's still a good idea to give sources for common sense info, and if you're putting an article up for a review don't be surprised if you are requested to give a source or two for the basic info sections of the page. --erachima talk 01:21, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree it's good practice. it slows down writing, and makes article unreadable. Sometimes its necessary--in politically (or other) controversial topics, someone who thinks something ought not be important will sometimes challenge every possible source, and it's easier providing them than to argue whether it's necessary. In such topics, it can be well to provide them at the start, but normally I think it's unnecessary. What people want in reviewing sometimes bears very little relationship to my idea of a good article. DGG (talk) 01:27, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Slows down writing, yes. Makes the page unreadable? Not if done well. If you want to/are asked to source basic information, then it's not like something contentious where you need an in-line ref every half sentence, you'll just need a general citation for the section. --erachima talk 03:04, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Since the FA and GA processes are completely optional, they are free to have stricter requirements than policy requires. WP:V only requires inline citations for quotes and things that are challenged or likely to be challenged; everything else needs to be verifiable but not not necessarily directly supported by sources in the article. — Carl (CBM · talk) 01:35, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Primary vs Secondary Sources

The policy says: "This means that we only publish the opinions of reliable authors, and not the opinions of Wikipedians who have read and interpreted primary source material for themselves."

So, what do you do when you've seen the primary sources and they tell you that all the secondary sources are wrong? In my view, this policy overestimates the reliability of conventional secondary sources, and does not do justice to the ability of Wikipedia and its user community to set the record straight. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mhkay (talk • contribs) 08:50, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

This sentence goes directly to the concept of WP:No original research one of our core policies. Wikipeida is not the place to "set the record straight"... our job is simply to report what reliable secondary sources say. If you think that "all the secondary sources are wrong" (a highly unlikely prospect) there are lots of options available to you... You can rant about it on forums and chat rooms; you can create a website; write a book, or (best) write a scholarly paper about it and submit it to a scholarly journal for publication... and if you can get your ideas published in a reliable source, then we can include it in Wikpedia. Blueboar (talk) 12:48, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Nonsense. Taking information directly from primary sources is not original research, it is source-based research. Deciding whether one viewpoint emerges from the sources as the clear winner, or if several confliciting viewpoints deserve to be mentioned with direct attribution, is also source-based research. Whether primary or secondary sources should be followed depends on the nature of the information and the relative reliability and impartialitiy of the sources. Everything else being equal, if several reliable new secondary sources disagree with one old primary source, follow the new source. If several secondary sources praise and cite a primary source, but only one gives a particular bit of information from that source, and it seems to be a transcription error, follow the primary source. --Jc3s5h (talk) 00:13, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

While simply taking information from a primary source is not original research... analyzing it, interpreting it or drawing a conclusion based upon it is. Blueboar (talk) 00:52, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Getting back to the question "so, what do you do when you've seen the primary sources and they tell you that all the secondary sources are wrong?", it really depends on the kind of information and the nature of the sources. If the question is "is global warming real?", follow the secondary sources. If the question is a highly technical question, and the answer is defined in a standard, it might be better to follow the standard rather than several articles in the popular press that give an overview of the subject. One problem with the guideline is that one could argue endlessly over whether a standard issued by an organization such as ISO, IETF, or IEEE is a primary or secondary source. --Jc3s5h (talk) 14:46, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Still a problem with quotations

Once again I'm looking at this and seeing that there is no mention of quotations. It is a basic rule of citation that quotations should be cited from the original source whenever possible, because no other source can be as reliable. For example, if it is said that a website says thus and-and-so, the most reliable source for that statement is the website itself. Mangoe (talk) 10:42, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely... with the caveat that we should Say where we got it. In other words, we should not cite the original unless we have seen the original. Blueboar (talk) 11:38, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

A question of Youtubery

Well, I was told that Youtube was an unreliable source. But the news that I have (that a movie adaptation of a book is going to be made) came directly from the author. Would this still qualify as unreliable? And how would you cite such a thing? Because I'm not very good at citing... (If you need to see the video, it's at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XG4AwOwnSZQ I don't know how to make an external link on here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Random Checkhead (talk • contribs) 01:24, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Encyclopædia Britannica reliable?

List of sultans of the Ottoman Empire uses Encyclopædia Britannica to source the following: "Mehmed VI later tried unsuccessfully to reinstall himself as caliph in the Hejaz.", "Abdülmecid II died in Paris, France on 23 August 1944.", and "On 18 November, the Grand National Assembly (TBMM) elected Mehmed VI's cousin Abdülmecid II, the then crown prince, as caliph."

The use of the encyclopedia as a reliable source has been questioned at the list's Featured list candidacy, but the author and nominator has said "Encyclopædia Britannica is certainly a reliable source, and is used to reference very non-controversial claims. I thus think it should be kept." Is this a fair statement or is it indeed an unreliable source? Matthewedwards :  Chat  07:05, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

The EB is definitely a reliable tertiary source. I think the issue here is that the folks who do FA reviews prefer reliable secondary sources, and turn their noses up at tertiary ones. In other words, they are not saying that that the EB is unreliable... they are saying that the same information should be cited to "better" sources. Blueboar (talk) 11:52, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

I was the one who brought this up at FLC. The thing is, is this the best source that could be used, and is the info used from the source unreliable? Dabomb87 (talk) 13:01, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

As I said... it probably is not the best source that could be used, but the source (and thus the info taken from it) is reliable. Blueboar (talk) 13:52, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

It seems to me that Dabobm87 is saying that only people with access to university libraries should propose that an article become a featured article. --Jc3s5h (talk) 14:43, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Please do not put words into my mouth and make unfounded assumptions; having said that, please notice the FA criteria's requirement for an FA to be "well-researched: [i.e.,] characterized by a thorough and representative survey of relevant literature on the topic". (I realize that we were talking about featured lists) Dabomb87 (talk) 00:31, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

See WP:RS - Tertiary sources: "Tertiary sources such as compendia, encyclopedias, textbooks, and other summarizing sources may be used to give overviews or summaries, but should not be used in place of secondary sources for detailed discussion. Wikipedia itself, although a tertiary source, should not be used as a source within articles." Regards, —Mattisse (Talk) 22:12, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Is Wikipedia itself considered a reliable secondary source

Is Wikipedia itself considered a reliable secondary source? That is to ask, can a cited reference to another WP article, in general, support the requirement for verifiable, cited sources sufficient to back up a claim in another article? I looked for existing guidelines or policy on the matter but could not locate anything. N2e (talk) 21:11, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a reliable source for Wikipedia articles. If there is some information in another article, it should be cited there, and the citation can be imported along with whatever information depends on it, if that seems to otherwise be a good idea. Naturally, some articles will simply send readers to other articles for information, but that is not the same as using Wikipedia as a reliable source, because the facts simply have to be verifiable in a non-Wikipedia source, wherever those facts happen to appear. -GTBacchus^(talk) 21:25, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. See WP:RS - Primary, secondary and tertiary sources: "Wikipedia itself, although a tertiary source, should not be used as a source within articles." —Mattisse (Talk) 22:09, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks BTBacchus and Mittisse! I just looked at the guideline you quoted and believe it is quite clear. Sorry I missed seeing it previously. N2e (talk) 19:48, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Western Mail obectivity

Re discussion archive 33 re Western Mail[[19]]

I have attempted to engage OFenian in discussion about his removal of information regarding Gerry MacLochlainn. I have acknowledged that perhaps the problem arose from problems of protocol arising out f my inexperience. I note teh discussion supported my contention that the Western Mail was a legitimate source and not a tabloid as claimed by O Fenian. I also note that another person referred to letters held in the National Library of Wales of Gerry MacLochlainn whilst in prison. This makes it very strange for O Fenian to continue to justify removing mentions of MacLocchlainn's time in prison with several sources albeit of varying quality quoted but named and dated sources from the Western Mail and Abergavenny Chroicle confirm the claims I have made. I have asked O Fenian to discuss with me the entry that he would not remove and have not posted the pieces again. If he does not respond I feel that I have the right to repost the sections although I will attempt to edit them and source them better.--86.131.127.183 (talk) 22:15, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Ilan Pappe

I've posted a question on the RS noticeboard about whether the Israeli historian Ilan Pappe counts as a reliable source within the terms of the sourcing policy. Any input would be appreciated at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Is_Ilan_Pappe_a_reliable_source.3F. Cheers, SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 20:18, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Legal reporting

In terms of information about old legal cases, what are treated as reliable sources?

I'm assuming,

1. London Times (or equivlant) broadsheet newspaper legal reports. (London times has specfic coverage of major appeals court rulings)
2. Offically published transcripts.
3. Legal textbooks published contemparanously with the cases concerned

? 62.56.99.187 (talk) 12:05, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Newspapers are usually reliable for this.

Transcripts are iffy... They are primary sources and so have limitations on reliability (essentially you can cite them in support of a statement that a person said something during the trial, but not as a citation for a statement that what they said is fact. Transcripts should be treated similarly to Op-Ed pieces, and viewed as the opinion of the witness). The Judge's rulings and the final Decision are considered reliable.

As for Legal text books... yes, if they talk about the case in question... so you should probably look at those that have been written after the case is over, not contemporaneous text books. Blueboar (talk) 12:25, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I would like to post Brooklyn Law's current tuition on the wikipedia page, with a link to www.broohlaw.edu as a citation.

Also, I would like to disclose that the dean of a nearby law school, New York Law School, is the chairman of the board of accessgroup.org, a company which originates private loans to law students at brooklyn —Preceding unsigned comment added by Berknyc81 (talk • contribs) 00:31, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

If journalists work for reliable sources (news agencies), are they themselves reliable sources?

Fox example, if Roger Ebert broke a story for the Chicago Sun-Times that said which actor will play the bad guy in the next Batman movie, we all would accept his reporting as a reliable source. If Ebert left the Sun-Times and still broke that story but for a website (and not a news agency), wouldn't it still be from a reliable source? (Weswilson4 (talk) 19:36, 4 May 2009 (UTC))

Yes, he would qualify as a recognized "Expert" writing in his field (discussed at WP:SPS). However, if Ebert expressed his opinion on Japanese art history on his webpage, it would not be a considered reliable source, as Ebert is not known as an expert on Japanese art history. Blueboar (talk) 19:44, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

If your example is your real case, it seems clearly yes. If that example is hypothetical, I am hoping most editors would say "usually but it depends" on the context. I say so because news scandals in recent years make it obvious that some organization with "reliability prestige" have not been able to really maintain reliability of its writers. Take Jaysen Blair and Judith Miller. And RS says this:

Reliable sources are credible published materials with a reliable publication process; their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand. How reliable a source is depends on context. As a rule of thumb, the more people engaged in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the writing, the more reliable the publication. Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in an article and should be appropriate to the claims made; END --Ihaveabutt (talk) 20:45, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Russian scholarship from Soviet-era

There is a dispute in an article about Russian history. Two editors are claiming that the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, published by Russia's Academy of Sciences, written by Russia's top scholars, and translated by Macmillan Publishers, is not a reliable source. It should be noted that many Wikipedia articles cite this source. Wikipedia Precedent confirmed the reliability of such sources. I find allegations concerning the BSE's alleged unreliability to be baseless because all Western-based scholars have used soviet-era scholarship in their work. Kupredu (talk) 22:09, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

"Sources" are never reliable or unreliable, it is the use of the source that is either reasonable or not. Given the way the source is being used, I have some suspicions myself. As a source on Russian geography, ancient Russian history (i.e. the pre-Tsarist era), Russian secular art and music, etc... it's a very reasonable source. Given the documented censorship of the document, I would agree that it is a dubious source on any Soviet era individual that had any political activities. The "head of part of the anti-Bolshevik White forces during the Russian Civil War" as the article describes him, is never going to get a reliable treatment from a Soviet era document. SDY (talk) 15:13, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

More simply, if a topic had, in the minds of the Soviet leadership, any political implications, or if the author had any reason to be concerned that the Soviet leadership might later decide a topic had any political implications, I'd treat the GSE's coverage of the topic as unreliable. So I'd disagree with SDY's statement that coverage of pre-Tsarist history could be trusted, because pre-Tsarist history would have obvious causal connections with Tsarist-era history; and IIRC many pre-Tsarist Russian city-states were pretty standard early Middle Ages trading towns, so their history would be interpreted according to Marxist-Leninist doctrine about early medieval society. And if Communist Party in-fighting led to a re-interpretation of Marxist-Leninist doctrine ... --Philcha (talk) 15:49, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

This was discussed several times in the past (ex. Wikipedia_talk:Reliable_sources/archive_16#Nazi_and_Soviet_sources (including a subsection on GSE). I think it is high time to add some note that sources from totalitarian regimes need to be treated with extra caution, and readers are directed to articles like Soviet historiography for a detailed discussion of which areas are not considered reliable. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 11:50, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Totally agree with "Use with extreme caution"... with the understanding that this is not the same as "Don't use... ever". Reliability is not black and white. There are vast areas of grey. Such sources can be reliable for some statements in wikipedia and not reliable for others. Blueboar (talk) 14:29, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Indeed. Comments appreciated at Template talk:Communist era sources. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 14:32, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Yikes... that definitely is not a good template. It assumes that all Communist era sources are questionable, and that simply is not the case. Of greater concern is the fact that the template has been broadened in scope... it could now be applied to any article that sources from a "totalitarian regime". Yet there is no definition of what that means... would an article that uses documents issued by the Vatican get this tag? Most people would agree that it shouldn't, but the Papal States can be considered a totalitarian regime. Blueboar (talk) 15:52, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

no source is wholly reliable or wholly unreliable. Even for fields contaminated by ideology, such as Slavic archeology, the descriptive work is I think still regarded as high quality Sometimes the problem merely amounts to realizing that they are using specific 19th century terminology & fitting things into the preset scheme of development that needs to be translated into standard. All historical, sociological, and anthropological work is subject to cultural and political bias. In a sense the soviet work is easier to deal with because it is known in which direction the bias is likely to be. DGG (talk) 16:15, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

"I think it is high time to add some note that sources from totalitarian regimes need to be treated with extra caution, and readers are directed to articles like Soviet historiography for a detailed discussion of which areas are not considered reliable." (Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus)

The idea overall of the Template has merit, though I'm sure most Wikipedia editors know about reliability issues (the Soviets are often used as the exemplary country defining such practices re Censorship of images in the Soviet Union, etc.). There are also the obvious unreliable sources, such as Joseph Stalin's 1948 "Falsifiers of History" and the obvious problems in Eastern Bloc information dissemination.

I might change the Template file name to "Totalitarian Regime sources" from "Communist era sources" sources, though you may want to include "sources generated in countries ruled by Communist regimes" (or the Eastern Bloc, North Korea, etc.) in a list in the tag's explanatory text (inclusive rather than exclusive list). A few reasons: (i) in terms of reliable sources, we're really concerned about Totalitarian regime sources in general, i.e., such regimes control information flow making information generated in secondary sources therein generally unreliable (though certainly not necessarily false); (ii) you may get bogged down in arguments about what is really "Communist" -- e.g., some claim that Kim Il-Sung's North Korea was somehow not actually Communist and someone just today claimed that Tito's Yugoslavia wasn't Communist in a talk page discussion (not that I agree with either point in any regard, but it avoid that argument).Mosedschurte (talk) 16:42, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

There is also a discussion of the template. The bottom line: any Soviet/totalitarian sources where heavily censored by state organizations like Glavlit and therefore should be considered unreliable, especially when they tell about the enemies of such regimes, such as White movement, enemy of the people, etc. Soviet sources on such subjects can be define as a propaganda, not scholarship. As a side note, this entire discussion was initiated by a sock of banned user.Biophys (talk) 16:55, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

The problem is not the bias. The problem are totally invented events or data produced explicitly for disinformation. The most common example are totally invented statistical data about the "successes" of socialist economy.Biophys (talk) 17:06, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I think the real issue with communist era sources is one of Wikipedia:RS#Self-published_sources, since communist regimes exercised total editorial control over the content of publications such as the Great Soviet Encyclopedia. See the brief discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_33#Great_Soviet_Encyclopedia. Martintg (talk) 18:03, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

No, government published sources are not considered SELF-published under WP:SPS. Are such sources always reliable? no... are they always unreliable? No. They lie in the grey zone of "it depends". Blueboar (talk) 18:20, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

There is a distinction between government published sources and party published sources. Western government bureaucracies tend to be somewhat independent of the political party that happens to be in power at the time. You don't see some government department altering facts and figures on order of their political masters, certainly not without a scandal. On the other hand in totalitarian communist regimes, the political party micromanaged every aspect of a government department's work, particularly its publications. Imagine the Republican Party exercising such control to the extent that if you wanted to be an historian, you first had to join the Republican party, and if you wrote a history of the Iraq war your draft would be edited by a Republican party committee before publication to ensure that it followed the party line. In this case such a history book would really be no different from a party pamphlet, and as such ought to be considered a self-published source. --Martintg (talk) 23:11, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I think WP:SELFPUB is a good summary of the problems with sources published by totalitarian governments. Διγουρεν_{Εμπρος!} 06:23, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

It still does not mean they got everything wrong or that there are no situations in which they would be considered reliable. You are trying to make a generality where one can and should not be made. For example, Soviet sources in the sciences are usually very reliable. Blueboar (talk) 00:21, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Well even science wasn't immune from the dead hand of totalitarian communism. A whole field of science in the area of genetics was branded "bourgeois pseudoscience" and several geneticists were executed, while fringe scientific theories were promoted to the detriment of Soviet agriculture, see Lysenkoism. But it is true that some fields of science and engineering were reliable, Nazi rocket science was highly valued by the USA. But the original discussion was about Soviet history, not science, and as reliable as some areas of science were, you just can't extend that to Soviet history. --Martintg (talk) 00:52, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

That's my point... some things that came out of the Soviet Union are reliable and others are not. You can not just lump them all together and say "Communist = Unreliable" as is being argued.

I can agree that we should be cautious and sceptical when it comes to history written during the Soviet era. I can agree that sources from that era need to be carefully examined. I can even agree that a lot of what was written during the Soviet era can be deemed "unreliable"... What I can not agree to saying ALL history written under the Soviets is unreliable, simply because it was written during that regime. Such sources need to be examined on a case by case, source by source basis... they need to be compared to other (non-soviet) sources, and each judged on its own merits. Blueboar (talk) 12:58, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Wrong. Reliability is the quality of being consistently accurate. Soviet sources are unreliable because they are not consistently accurate. But some of them are accurate, and this means that with care, some of them are suitable to be used under the Wikipedia policy that is, in a bit of a misnomer, called the Reliable Source Policy. Διγουρεν_{Εμπρος!} 15:06, 18 May 2009 (UTC)