![]() | This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Should the wording of WP:BDP (the "Recently dead or probably dead" section) be
Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 19:06, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Note. To be clear, if consensus is for option 3, only one of the three durations would be added. I used the slash instead of writing three separate options for the sake of brevity (and to allow Legobot to transclude properly) Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 19:06, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Note Rephrased choice 3 to fix ambiguity. Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 18:24, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
BLP and, by extension, BDP is one of the most frequently cited, watchlisted, and read policies on enwiki. Despite this, comparatively little attention was given to the rewording at the time. The sentences in BDP in question were changed in April 2021, possibly due to an ANI discussion.
The current wording has been used before, such as at this RfC on 2023 Nashville shooting. However, it is possible many users, including sysops, are acting using the prior wording of BDP. 1
Various discussions, including, but not necessarily limited to, WT:BLP#Small but significant change in BDP wording from about 2 years ago, WT:Biographies of living persons/Archive 48#Is WP:BLP applicable to recently dead people? Not clear, and WT:Biographies of living persons/Archive 52#BDP is useless, have taken place on what wording should be used. Despite the multiple discussions, none were formally closed to support either maintaining the current status quo or a change. Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 19:20, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale.VQuakr ( talk) 22:09, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
[The BLP resolution] may not be circumvented, eroded, or ignored by Wikimedia Foundation officers or staff nor local policies of any Wikimedia project.It's not "my" definition. I linked the policy above. VQuakr ( talk) 00:05, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
a flat "it applies for 6 months and longer by consensus", as that would seem to both encompass what the scope of the policy point was prior to the unannounced change, and address the confusion that lead to the 2021 change. Sideswipe9th ( talk) 18:11, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
The only exception would be for people who have died within the last six months. This period may be extended by editorial consensus to one year, or two years at the outside.I think the current wording of option 3 is very unclear and tries to do too much, even after the fix. Loki ( talk) 02:05, 10 December 2023 (UTC)
based on editorial consensuswas made without consensus (see Wikipedia talk:Biographies of living persons/Archive 55 § Small but significant change in BDP wording from about 2 years ago). It would be bad to have policy changes effectively snuck in and stay due to mere WP:SILENCE, i.e. "caught you not looking", but especially counter to WP:PROPOSAL:
The existing practice is to not require that a new consensus be established at every bio upon death, and doing so creates a bureaucratic mess.â Bagumba ( talk) 05:58, 16 December 2023 (UTC)Most commonly, a new policy or guideline documents existing practices, rather than proposing a change to what experienced editors already choose to do.
The clue is in the name: So rename it. Or move WP:BDP. That's not a reason for outright deletion of policy text that's existed for over a decade.â Bagumba ( talk) 13:54, 23 December 2023 (UTC)
Should this be listed at VPP and CENT? -- Masem ( t) 12:57, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
listing of ongoing discussions, specifically those which have potentially wide-ranging impacts, which this definitely would have, so yeah. Sideswipe9th ( talk) 18:05, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
VQuakr and I had a long side conversation about this, and it seems that there have been concerns that "by editorial consensus" will be (mis)interpreted. The process that (I think) we want looks like this:
What we don't want looks like:
The old wording doesn't achieve the first, because it's unclear about applying automatically. It says that it "can be extended", which means that it does not always do so. (Consider: "I can improve that article, but I won't.") If editors (e.g., Masem and Sideswipe9th) want it to be automatic, then it shouldn't say that it "can" apply; it should say that it "does" apply.
None of the options above solve the lack-of-clarity issue. A single, invariable time period (e.g., "a year and a day") would accomplish that. Setting a minimum and requiring explicit agreement in a talk-page discussion for any extensions would also accomplish that.
Overall, my conclusion is that it needs to be re-written almost from scratch to provide clarity to editors. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 22:39, 11 December 2023 (UTC)
Just throwing this out there to see if the cat licks it up;
I've been through a bunch of BLP's where folks have basically uploaded publicity photos or "glamor" photography for their BLP's. Seems to me that if WP:MUG tells us to not use images that are falsely disparaging, we probably should also avoid images which are falsely glamorous. I'm not sure if we already have a policy on this, but if we do, I can't find it.
I propose after the WP:MUG paragraph we add a WP:NOGLAMOR paragraph reading something like this :
Any thoughts? NickCT ( talk) 18:14, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
When we have conflicting dates of birth, but are unsure of the reliability of a source, is it safe to use the subjects social media for verifiability? WP:DOB says it can be used if it is from a verified account, but also states if independent reliable sources differ on a date, it should be noted. I've noticed this on several pages, but the one I am currently involved in is Michael Jai White. In all interviews, and on their social media, the age is consistent with a 1967 birthday. However, the AP posted about the person being born in 1964. I consider it to be trivia with little to no fact checking, and the subject to be the most reliable source for their date of birth, but wanted to gain consensus either way. A previous RfC was completed in 2021 regarding using social media posts to confirm birthdates, which consensus was found in favor if it was verified. A second RfC with a similar issue to verifiability seemed to be geared towards if there wasn't a primary source to confirm the date of birth and were differing published dates, what to do. However, that one did not seem to address the issue of what to do when the subject mentioned their birthday in a WP:ABOUTSELF or WP:BLPSELFPUB manner. Pinging @ Daniel Quinlan who opened the talk page discussion back up for consensus.
Awshort ( talk) 21:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
Michael Jai White, who was HBO's Tyson and the superhero Spawn, is sizzling hot. This month, the 32-year-old martial artist is a serviceman with Morgan Freeman on NBC's Port Chicago Mutiny.
people last remember Michael Jai White as the actor who played Mike Tyson in HBO's biopic. ... I didn't realize it until I started going to comic book conventions all around the country to promote the movie," says the 29-year-old former martial artist. What White found was a cult following.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1967, White...
Now 32, he continues to thirst for more martial arts knowledge.
Men's Journal spoke with White about the new movie, balancing his filmmaking responsibilities with his fitness, casting UFC fighters, and how he's maintained his incredible high-flying physique at 55 years old.
The 55-year-old admitted that early in his training days, he spent more time than he should've focused on exercises like bench presses in an attempt to build an imposing, chest-forward physique.
Celebrated my 50th birthday and the 20th anniversary of Spawn over the weekend in New York City. Good times.
Original research must not be used to extrapolate the date of birth., which I believe trying to determine someone's birth date from the year they graduated more than qualifies as original research.
Do you consider the Associated Press reliable for his birthday? If so, why? They do not state where they get their birthdays, there have been instances where they have issued corrections when inaccurate items are pointed out to them (like Rebel Wilson, or Brett Young having a 2 month difference in his listed date and actual birthday)
Multiple sources should not be asserted for any wire service article. Such sources are essentially a single sourcefrom [[WP:NEWSORG], and I believe they are not reliable and made an error in their original reporting. If this was from an interview or a magazine article, I would definitely agree that it is a reliable source that causes concern in relation to his birth date.
An editor who repeatedly restores their preferred version is edit warring, regardless of whether those edits are justifiable.Additionally, I understand your frustration, but posting multiple lengthy comments often discourages participation. We're talking about a birthdate addition to a minor celebrity's article, and talk page discussions for these kinds of articles are often slower and lower in volume. Having some patience helps. It can also help to have some other, hopefully less contentious, Wikipedia projects to work on. Regards. Daniel Quinlan ( talk) 09:32, 10 February 2024 (UTC)
We had a consensus on the talk page between me and the other editor that was looking at the birthday sources, Kcj5062
In the absence of sufficient reliable sources, it might be best to add a caveat, mention both dates as possibilities, or simply omit his birth date.ďżź, which they added as a footnote on Dec 30. On Jan 7, they posted on BLPN asking for advice. I am missing the existing consensus portion though, but either way I removed the note because of this line
And a couple archive links from the webpage of the high school he went to list him as a alumni of 1982 which imply a 1964 birth year.since it was WP:SYNTH and violated the No Original Research policy by being on there. Looking back on the edit now, I should have left the newspaper in per WP:DOB, because even if it wasn't reliable in my eyes, without discussion it is still considered a RS. And I should have listed the BLPREMOVE portion specifically with regards to FilmandTVFan28, even though both edits note RS, and the second specifically states SYNTH.
Edit: I am having trouble pasting links today for some reason, so removing the diff links I had originally included. Awshort ( talk) 20:56, 11 February 2024 (UTC)
What is wrong with our standard "teach the controversy" stance? State that sources conflict on whether his birthdate was 1964 or 1967 and cite reliable sources for both dates. If that causes difficulties for infoboxes that can only easily report a single date, tough. If we only have reliable sources for one date then that is the one we should use regardless of whether we believe it; we are here to report on what reliable sources say, not to determine the truth for ourselves. â David Eppstein ( talk) 21:04, 11 February 2024 (UTC)
WP:BLPSPS is quite clear: "Never use self-published sourcesâincluding but not limited to books, zines, websites, blogs, and social network postsâas sources of material about a living person, unless written or published by the subject of the article." Something I've noticed several times is a self-published death announcement for figures who are unlikely to attract e.g. explicit obituary coverage. (I assume death announcements by definition cannot be published by the subject of the article.)
This is especially common for academics: a colleague or friend often publishes an "in memoriam" post. In such cases, there is no reasonable doubt as to its authenticity, but by my reading of the policy we cannot edit the subject's Wikipedia bio to say they have died, use past tense, etc. I believe WP:BDP does not apply here, because the nature of the death announcement means the person isn't "confirmed dead by reliable sources". Is my reading of the policies correct? Assuming (as will be true in the vast majority of such cases) that no reliable sourcing of the subject's death will ever be published, when can we edit the page to list them as deceased? (115 years after their birth year?)
Am I understanding the policies correctly, or do I have a misconception here? The specific case that triggered this is Don Ihde and this death announcement; I have no idea who is correct here. I assume this is a common question, but I wasn't able to quickly find an answer among the policies. Thanks for any insight! Suriname0 ( talk) 05:11, 8 February 2024 (UTC)
GoodDay ( talk) 05:04, 16 February 2024 (UTC)
I have a question on point 2 of BLPSELFPUB as it relates to family. If all the other points of SELFPUB are met, is it appropriate to use a self-published source by an article subject to provide the names and birthdates of their non-notable minor children? Or are they considered third parties? Nikkimaria ( talk) 01:06, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
There's currently a discussion at MOS:INFOBOXES that effects infoboxes for a variety of different articles. Please feel free to comment. Thanks! Nemov ( talk) 01:54, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
I brought this up
before, and people were generally supportive, but there were some concerns over whether it was necessary. It has come up again in discussion on
Talk:Sweet Baby Inc.; essentially, there was an internet kerfuffle where one dimension, at least as discussed on Twitter, involved outrage about certain tweets and comments by living individuals. Secondary sources have not focused on or even mentioned those things. An editor is arguing that they can be included under
WP:ABOUTSELF. This is obviously inappropriate for a variety of reasons, but it would make situations like this much easier to explain if there was a clear-cut sentence in
WP:BLPSPS about not using self-published primary sources in ways that could harm the reputation of the source. Currently, "you can't pull a quote off of Twitter and cite it as a primary source in a way that implies that someone is a bad person" is something present in the intersection of
WP:SYNTH,
WP:OR, and
WP:BLP; but given the importance of not doing it, I think it is worth a single sentence - something like Quotes that are likely to harm the author's reputation should not be cited to primary sources, only to secondary ones
. --
Aquillion (
talk)
07:29, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
Here, the important caveat being noted for the reader is "unless written or published by the subject of the article". That being the case, I think the bold text should begin with "unless", rather than "the". I'll admit this is a minor point, but I think beginning the bold text a few words earlier in the sentence would do a better job of emphasizing that this is the lone exception to an important rule. Joefromrandb ( talk) 23:27, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
Following the fiasco at Where is Kate? (see the first AfD, BLPN discussion, deletion review, first requested move, second AfD, and third AfD), I propose an additional paragraph to WP:BLPGOSSIP. This is a rough draft to encapsulate what I'm thinking:
Sometimes, an event in a living person's life attracts significant coverage in the media. These events rarely require standalone articles from the living person's biography: they should generally only be spun-off from the living person's biography when the biography cannot provide appropriate encyclopedic coverage of a major event. Beware of recentism.
IgnatiusofLondon (he/him ⢠âď¸) 14:57, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
In general, it's best to be very careful about covering events in a living person's life while news is still breaking. Breaking news, even from generally reliable sources, is often less reliable than usual, and even in cases where such reporting is reliable for facts, sources published before all the facts of an incident have been reported can inadvertently create a misleading picture of a situation.
Avoid spinning off events in a living's person life to separate articles until media coverage of the event has subsided enough for its long-term significance to be established. Making a new article for every controversy is more likely to lead to a problematic WP:POVFORK than it is to generate worthwhile encyclopedic coverage.Loki ( talk) 21:13, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
must be fair to their subjects at all times(see also WP:NOW).
I have a question about the BLP information in the WikiProject banner shell that displays at the top of a talk page. If the article in question is about a person who has recently died, in particular under controversial circumstances, should living=n or living=y be specified? If living=n is specified, it says that the biographies of living persons policy does not apply to the subject, but that it does apply to other persons who are mentioned. The page that I am looking at is Talk:Death of Nex Benedict. It says that the BLP policy does not apply to them, but it does. They is* a person who has recently died, and who is entitled to the same status as if they were still alive. Should I change it to blp=y? Should the instructions for the template be changed? Robert McClenon ( talk) 02:35, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
Such extensions would apply particularly to contentious or questionable material about the subject that has implications for their living relatives and friends, such as in the case of a possible suicide or particularly gruesome crime.". While "possible" is mentioned here, I think it's clear from the next "particularly gruesome crime" part that we're talking about a case where someone is dead, but it's unclear whether the cause is suicide or something else. In any case, "particularly gruesome crime" part seems to be clearly talking about cases where the person is dead rather than it being unclear if they are dead. So not only is the family explicitly mentioned, but it's also clearly talking about cases where the person is indisputably dead rather than where it might be a mis-report. The Nex Benedict example seems to definitely be a case where this comes up. From the beginning, there was no dispute that they were dead. However the details were very murky and it was right to be particularly strict in BLP terms not only for other living persons directly affected (since the details often had implications for other individuals) but for Benedict too no matter that there was no dispute they were deceased. Nil Einne ( talk) 12:12, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
Robert McClenon ( talk) 02:35, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
The simplest solution (for the general situation that at any given time there will always be some people who "deceased recently", regardless of whether or not the specific case mentioned above is still within "recently") might be to add, alongside the options of living=n or living=y, the option of living=bdp, for use whenever BDP applies. -sche ( talk) 06:26, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
![]() | This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Should the wording of WP:BDP (the "Recently dead or probably dead" section) be
Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 19:06, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Note. To be clear, if consensus is for option 3, only one of the three durations would be added. I used the slash instead of writing three separate options for the sake of brevity (and to allow Legobot to transclude properly) Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 19:06, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Note Rephrased choice 3 to fix ambiguity. Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 18:24, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
BLP and, by extension, BDP is one of the most frequently cited, watchlisted, and read policies on enwiki. Despite this, comparatively little attention was given to the rewording at the time. The sentences in BDP in question were changed in April 2021, possibly due to an ANI discussion.
The current wording has been used before, such as at this RfC on 2023 Nashville shooting. However, it is possible many users, including sysops, are acting using the prior wording of BDP. 1
Various discussions, including, but not necessarily limited to, WT:BLP#Small but significant change in BDP wording from about 2 years ago, WT:Biographies of living persons/Archive 48#Is WP:BLP applicable to recently dead people? Not clear, and WT:Biographies of living persons/Archive 52#BDP is useless, have taken place on what wording should be used. Despite the multiple discussions, none were formally closed to support either maintaining the current status quo or a change. Sincerely, Novo Tape (She/Her) My Talk Page 19:20, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale.VQuakr ( talk) 22:09, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
[The BLP resolution] may not be circumvented, eroded, or ignored by Wikimedia Foundation officers or staff nor local policies of any Wikimedia project.It's not "my" definition. I linked the policy above. VQuakr ( talk) 00:05, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
a flat "it applies for 6 months and longer by consensus", as that would seem to both encompass what the scope of the policy point was prior to the unannounced change, and address the confusion that lead to the 2021 change. Sideswipe9th ( talk) 18:11, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
The only exception would be for people who have died within the last six months. This period may be extended by editorial consensus to one year, or two years at the outside.I think the current wording of option 3 is very unclear and tries to do too much, even after the fix. Loki ( talk) 02:05, 10 December 2023 (UTC)
based on editorial consensuswas made without consensus (see Wikipedia talk:Biographies of living persons/Archive 55 § Small but significant change in BDP wording from about 2 years ago). It would be bad to have policy changes effectively snuck in and stay due to mere WP:SILENCE, i.e. "caught you not looking", but especially counter to WP:PROPOSAL:
The existing practice is to not require that a new consensus be established at every bio upon death, and doing so creates a bureaucratic mess.â Bagumba ( talk) 05:58, 16 December 2023 (UTC)Most commonly, a new policy or guideline documents existing practices, rather than proposing a change to what experienced editors already choose to do.
The clue is in the name: So rename it. Or move WP:BDP. That's not a reason for outright deletion of policy text that's existed for over a decade.â Bagumba ( talk) 13:54, 23 December 2023 (UTC)
Should this be listed at VPP and CENT? -- Masem ( t) 12:57, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
listing of ongoing discussions, specifically those which have potentially wide-ranging impacts, which this definitely would have, so yeah. Sideswipe9th ( talk) 18:05, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
VQuakr and I had a long side conversation about this, and it seems that there have been concerns that "by editorial consensus" will be (mis)interpreted. The process that (I think) we want looks like this:
What we don't want looks like:
The old wording doesn't achieve the first, because it's unclear about applying automatically. It says that it "can be extended", which means that it does not always do so. (Consider: "I can improve that article, but I won't.") If editors (e.g., Masem and Sideswipe9th) want it to be automatic, then it shouldn't say that it "can" apply; it should say that it "does" apply.
None of the options above solve the lack-of-clarity issue. A single, invariable time period (e.g., "a year and a day") would accomplish that. Setting a minimum and requiring explicit agreement in a talk-page discussion for any extensions would also accomplish that.
Overall, my conclusion is that it needs to be re-written almost from scratch to provide clarity to editors. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 22:39, 11 December 2023 (UTC)
Just throwing this out there to see if the cat licks it up;
I've been through a bunch of BLP's where folks have basically uploaded publicity photos or "glamor" photography for their BLP's. Seems to me that if WP:MUG tells us to not use images that are falsely disparaging, we probably should also avoid images which are falsely glamorous. I'm not sure if we already have a policy on this, but if we do, I can't find it.
I propose after the WP:MUG paragraph we add a WP:NOGLAMOR paragraph reading something like this :
Any thoughts? NickCT ( talk) 18:14, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
When we have conflicting dates of birth, but are unsure of the reliability of a source, is it safe to use the subjects social media for verifiability? WP:DOB says it can be used if it is from a verified account, but also states if independent reliable sources differ on a date, it should be noted. I've noticed this on several pages, but the one I am currently involved in is Michael Jai White. In all interviews, and on their social media, the age is consistent with a 1967 birthday. However, the AP posted about the person being born in 1964. I consider it to be trivia with little to no fact checking, and the subject to be the most reliable source for their date of birth, but wanted to gain consensus either way. A previous RfC was completed in 2021 regarding using social media posts to confirm birthdates, which consensus was found in favor if it was verified. A second RfC with a similar issue to verifiability seemed to be geared towards if there wasn't a primary source to confirm the date of birth and were differing published dates, what to do. However, that one did not seem to address the issue of what to do when the subject mentioned their birthday in a WP:ABOUTSELF or WP:BLPSELFPUB manner. Pinging @ Daniel Quinlan who opened the talk page discussion back up for consensus.
Awshort ( talk) 21:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
Michael Jai White, who was HBO's Tyson and the superhero Spawn, is sizzling hot. This month, the 32-year-old martial artist is a serviceman with Morgan Freeman on NBC's Port Chicago Mutiny.
people last remember Michael Jai White as the actor who played Mike Tyson in HBO's biopic. ... I didn't realize it until I started going to comic book conventions all around the country to promote the movie," says the 29-year-old former martial artist. What White found was a cult following.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1967, White...
Now 32, he continues to thirst for more martial arts knowledge.
Men's Journal spoke with White about the new movie, balancing his filmmaking responsibilities with his fitness, casting UFC fighters, and how he's maintained his incredible high-flying physique at 55 years old.
The 55-year-old admitted that early in his training days, he spent more time than he should've focused on exercises like bench presses in an attempt to build an imposing, chest-forward physique.
Celebrated my 50th birthday and the 20th anniversary of Spawn over the weekend in New York City. Good times.
Original research must not be used to extrapolate the date of birth., which I believe trying to determine someone's birth date from the year they graduated more than qualifies as original research.
Do you consider the Associated Press reliable for his birthday? If so, why? They do not state where they get their birthdays, there have been instances where they have issued corrections when inaccurate items are pointed out to them (like Rebel Wilson, or Brett Young having a 2 month difference in his listed date and actual birthday)
Multiple sources should not be asserted for any wire service article. Such sources are essentially a single sourcefrom [[WP:NEWSORG], and I believe they are not reliable and made an error in their original reporting. If this was from an interview or a magazine article, I would definitely agree that it is a reliable source that causes concern in relation to his birth date.
An editor who repeatedly restores their preferred version is edit warring, regardless of whether those edits are justifiable.Additionally, I understand your frustration, but posting multiple lengthy comments often discourages participation. We're talking about a birthdate addition to a minor celebrity's article, and talk page discussions for these kinds of articles are often slower and lower in volume. Having some patience helps. It can also help to have some other, hopefully less contentious, Wikipedia projects to work on. Regards. Daniel Quinlan ( talk) 09:32, 10 February 2024 (UTC)
We had a consensus on the talk page between me and the other editor that was looking at the birthday sources, Kcj5062
In the absence of sufficient reliable sources, it might be best to add a caveat, mention both dates as possibilities, or simply omit his birth date.ďżź, which they added as a footnote on Dec 30. On Jan 7, they posted on BLPN asking for advice. I am missing the existing consensus portion though, but either way I removed the note because of this line
And a couple archive links from the webpage of the high school he went to list him as a alumni of 1982 which imply a 1964 birth year.since it was WP:SYNTH and violated the No Original Research policy by being on there. Looking back on the edit now, I should have left the newspaper in per WP:DOB, because even if it wasn't reliable in my eyes, without discussion it is still considered a RS. And I should have listed the BLPREMOVE portion specifically with regards to FilmandTVFan28, even though both edits note RS, and the second specifically states SYNTH.
Edit: I am having trouble pasting links today for some reason, so removing the diff links I had originally included. Awshort ( talk) 20:56, 11 February 2024 (UTC)
What is wrong with our standard "teach the controversy" stance? State that sources conflict on whether his birthdate was 1964 or 1967 and cite reliable sources for both dates. If that causes difficulties for infoboxes that can only easily report a single date, tough. If we only have reliable sources for one date then that is the one we should use regardless of whether we believe it; we are here to report on what reliable sources say, not to determine the truth for ourselves. â David Eppstein ( talk) 21:04, 11 February 2024 (UTC)
WP:BLPSPS is quite clear: "Never use self-published sourcesâincluding but not limited to books, zines, websites, blogs, and social network postsâas sources of material about a living person, unless written or published by the subject of the article." Something I've noticed several times is a self-published death announcement for figures who are unlikely to attract e.g. explicit obituary coverage. (I assume death announcements by definition cannot be published by the subject of the article.)
This is especially common for academics: a colleague or friend often publishes an "in memoriam" post. In such cases, there is no reasonable doubt as to its authenticity, but by my reading of the policy we cannot edit the subject's Wikipedia bio to say they have died, use past tense, etc. I believe WP:BDP does not apply here, because the nature of the death announcement means the person isn't "confirmed dead by reliable sources". Is my reading of the policies correct? Assuming (as will be true in the vast majority of such cases) that no reliable sourcing of the subject's death will ever be published, when can we edit the page to list them as deceased? (115 years after their birth year?)
Am I understanding the policies correctly, or do I have a misconception here? The specific case that triggered this is Don Ihde and this death announcement; I have no idea who is correct here. I assume this is a common question, but I wasn't able to quickly find an answer among the policies. Thanks for any insight! Suriname0 ( talk) 05:11, 8 February 2024 (UTC)
GoodDay ( talk) 05:04, 16 February 2024 (UTC)
I have a question on point 2 of BLPSELFPUB as it relates to family. If all the other points of SELFPUB are met, is it appropriate to use a self-published source by an article subject to provide the names and birthdates of their non-notable minor children? Or are they considered third parties? Nikkimaria ( talk) 01:06, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
There's currently a discussion at MOS:INFOBOXES that effects infoboxes for a variety of different articles. Please feel free to comment. Thanks! Nemov ( talk) 01:54, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
I brought this up
before, and people were generally supportive, but there were some concerns over whether it was necessary. It has come up again in discussion on
Talk:Sweet Baby Inc.; essentially, there was an internet kerfuffle where one dimension, at least as discussed on Twitter, involved outrage about certain tweets and comments by living individuals. Secondary sources have not focused on or even mentioned those things. An editor is arguing that they can be included under
WP:ABOUTSELF. This is obviously inappropriate for a variety of reasons, but it would make situations like this much easier to explain if there was a clear-cut sentence in
WP:BLPSPS about not using self-published primary sources in ways that could harm the reputation of the source. Currently, "you can't pull a quote off of Twitter and cite it as a primary source in a way that implies that someone is a bad person" is something present in the intersection of
WP:SYNTH,
WP:OR, and
WP:BLP; but given the importance of not doing it, I think it is worth a single sentence - something like Quotes that are likely to harm the author's reputation should not be cited to primary sources, only to secondary ones
. --
Aquillion (
talk)
07:29, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
Here, the important caveat being noted for the reader is "unless written or published by the subject of the article". That being the case, I think the bold text should begin with "unless", rather than "the". I'll admit this is a minor point, but I think beginning the bold text a few words earlier in the sentence would do a better job of emphasizing that this is the lone exception to an important rule. Joefromrandb ( talk) 23:27, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
Following the fiasco at Where is Kate? (see the first AfD, BLPN discussion, deletion review, first requested move, second AfD, and third AfD), I propose an additional paragraph to WP:BLPGOSSIP. This is a rough draft to encapsulate what I'm thinking:
Sometimes, an event in a living person's life attracts significant coverage in the media. These events rarely require standalone articles from the living person's biography: they should generally only be spun-off from the living person's biography when the biography cannot provide appropriate encyclopedic coverage of a major event. Beware of recentism.
IgnatiusofLondon (he/him ⢠âď¸) 14:57, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
In general, it's best to be very careful about covering events in a living person's life while news is still breaking. Breaking news, even from generally reliable sources, is often less reliable than usual, and even in cases where such reporting is reliable for facts, sources published before all the facts of an incident have been reported can inadvertently create a misleading picture of a situation.
Avoid spinning off events in a living's person life to separate articles until media coverage of the event has subsided enough for its long-term significance to be established. Making a new article for every controversy is more likely to lead to a problematic WP:POVFORK than it is to generate worthwhile encyclopedic coverage.Loki ( talk) 21:13, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
must be fair to their subjects at all times(see also WP:NOW).
I have a question about the BLP information in the WikiProject banner shell that displays at the top of a talk page. If the article in question is about a person who has recently died, in particular under controversial circumstances, should living=n or living=y be specified? If living=n is specified, it says that the biographies of living persons policy does not apply to the subject, but that it does apply to other persons who are mentioned. The page that I am looking at is Talk:Death of Nex Benedict. It says that the BLP policy does not apply to them, but it does. They is* a person who has recently died, and who is entitled to the same status as if they were still alive. Should I change it to blp=y? Should the instructions for the template be changed? Robert McClenon ( talk) 02:35, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
Such extensions would apply particularly to contentious or questionable material about the subject that has implications for their living relatives and friends, such as in the case of a possible suicide or particularly gruesome crime.". While "possible" is mentioned here, I think it's clear from the next "particularly gruesome crime" part that we're talking about a case where someone is dead, but it's unclear whether the cause is suicide or something else. In any case, "particularly gruesome crime" part seems to be clearly talking about cases where the person is dead rather than it being unclear if they are dead. So not only is the family explicitly mentioned, but it's also clearly talking about cases where the person is indisputably dead rather than where it might be a mis-report. The Nex Benedict example seems to definitely be a case where this comes up. From the beginning, there was no dispute that they were dead. However the details were very murky and it was right to be particularly strict in BLP terms not only for other living persons directly affected (since the details often had implications for other individuals) but for Benedict too no matter that there was no dispute they were deceased. Nil Einne ( talk) 12:12, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
Robert McClenon ( talk) 02:35, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
The simplest solution (for the general situation that at any given time there will always be some people who "deceased recently", regardless of whether or not the specific case mentioned above is still within "recently") might be to add, alongside the options of living=n or living=y, the option of living=bdp, for use whenever BDP applies. -sche ( talk) 06:26, 3 April 2024 (UTC)