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Why is this article in the weasel words category? -- Blue Tie 14:29, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
On the Nick Baker (prisoner in Japan) article an editor is using the "exceptional claims" provision to exclude information that was published in Metropolis (English magazine in Japan). The removed claims are here: [1] Talk about the claim is here: [2]. In this case my position is that the removed claims support the major claim that Baker lied to the public, and that the removed claims are not exceptional claims in their own right. Another way to put this is: do supporting claims on a BLP also need multiple sources?
I have had some confirmation that these claims are not exceptional before [3] but the issue keeps coming up and I would be very grateful some more advice and comments. Thank you. Sparkzilla 06:15, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
The past two days have seen some pretty strange editing on List of groups referred to as cults in government reports with different editors giving different reasons why this is not a government report: Cover Page CRS Report No. 79-24 GOV 1/23/79 Addendum II CRS-45 and why the ...FBI and GAO don't write Government Reports... I'm sorry but that is a very odd statement, on top of odd logic implying it was my idea to remove them. I've been asking this editor and some others to explain why CRS a division of the LOC isn't WP:RS or WP:V. Can someone explain why it isn't a RS? (Granted it should not be used to imply that all groups in the report are still even in existence and those that are may have changed so it needs to be qualified.) I realize WP:V is discussed on that page, so I'm not bringing it up except to say that they are pretty easily verfied. Anynobody 09:35, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
I completely agree with your definition of a government report, and have asked them to provide some examples of their definition of a "Government Report". Their main contentions are that it should represent the opinion of "the government" and hold it's Imprimatur. They have also indicated a belief that CRS is a "private" arm of the LOC. The example provided of what they consider it to be was a Congressional report. When I pointed out that a Congressional report fails their own definition (it only represents Congress) it seemed to make no difference.
I've tried explaining that their are no reports which express the opinion of the entire federal government. Such a report would need to be from all three branches (Executive, Legislative, and Judicial) and that's not really possible because the Constitution, the only official document which affects all three, makes no provisions for it.
The whole situation is almost surreal because if they are right, all the articles citing anything produced by the government has gotta go. Anynobody 01:48, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
I really appreciate your input, Askari Mark (Talk) and Blue Tie. Do you know if anyone has ever doubted the reliability of this type of information? I found that there isn't much said about gov't sources, probably because it's assumed most people "understand". Anynobody 04:28, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
My thoughts exactly. Anynobody 04:45, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
So, do they write good reports? Probably. Are their reports respected? Probably. Do their reports "speak for the government"? Absolutely not! Their reports are no more "special" than the reports of any expert or academic. Remember please where Anynobody et al would use these reports. In an article entitled Groups referred to as cults in government reports and since we already have the more general article, List of groups referred to as cults, the opposing editors want to reserve the former for actual reports that bear the seal, literally or figuratively, of the issuing government. The CRS reports clearly do not fit in that category. -- Justanother 00:40, 13 May 2007 (UTC)CRS, like the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), as parts of the Legislative Branch, serve the Congress but do not “speak for it.” Only documents provided by these agencies pursuant to specific statutory mandates might be said to be “official government reports” – an imprecise term. Even those documents, however, cannot necessarily be said to “carry the weight or tacit approval” of the Congress.
CRS reports represent our response to congressional legislative needs and in no way represent “what the legislative branch of government says” on a given topic. The 435 members of the House, the 100 Senators, and the delegates and committees that together make up the Congress have no single voice, save through legislation, nor has the Congress vested in CRS the authority to speak for it on any matter.
Thank you, Crockspot. That's one of the things I've been saying. Anynobody 01:21, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
No one is disputing that these reports are reliable sources that can be used in Wikipedia articles. They are, of course. The dispute is about the labeling of these as "Government Reports", as if they represent the view of the government or an official commission. When asked, the Coordinator of Communications of the CRS responded with this unequivocal statement: ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 01:30, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Dear Mr. ----,
The Director has asked me to respond to your email regarding the “status” of CRS reports. While I’m not sure I can “settle an argument” for you, I can provide you some general thoughts regarding the role of the Congressional Research Service (CRS) vis a vis the Congress and the nature of its reports.
CRS works exclusively for the Congress of the United States. It has no public mission. All of its reports are therefore produced for and provided to Members who are then free to distribute them as they deem appropriate.
As you know, the Congress is a body made up of individual Members – Senators, Representatives, and Delegates – and there is no single voice for the Congress, either for the body as whole or for the individual chambers. Only through the passage of legislation can it be said that the Congress “has spoken.”
CRS, like the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), as parts of the Legislative Branch, serve the Congress but do not “speak for it.” Only documents provided by these agencies pursuant to specific statutory mandates might be said to be “official government reports” – an imprecise term. Even those documents, however, cannot necessarily be said to “carry the weight or tacit approval” of the Congress.
CRS reports represent our response to congressional legislative needs and in no way represent “what the legislative branch of government says” on a given topic. The 435 members of the House, the 100 Senators, and the delegates and committees that together make up the Congress have no single voice, save through legislation, nor has the Congress vested in CRS the authority to speak for it on any matter.
_______________
(name removed)
Coordinator of Communications
Congressional Research Service
It appears that List of groups referred to as cults in government reports is a redirect to List of groups referred to as cults in government documents. So what's the problem? Maybe it should further redirect to List of groups referred to as cults in government-produced documents? This is hair-splitting to the extreme. Come up with a name for the list that suits everyone, and move on. - Crockspot 01:37, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Justanother has a point about the age of the list report in question, which is why I've been saying it needs to be mentioned because indeed the groups may have changed. As a historical document though, there is no reason it should be excluded (discussing the phrasing of a source is all that's needed. Removing it is overkill and actually is against WP:NPOV. Anynobody 07:08, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Lsi john added this to the guideline: It is important to note that, while 'Reliable Sources' is a guideline, and verifiability is a policy, neither should be used to justify including (or keeping) material in an article. Regardless of how well sourced an item is, satisfying the criteria for reliable source and verifiability alone does not provide sufficient reason to include material in an article. Common sense must be applied, and editors should ask themselves if the material being cited is both relevant and noteworthy.
Lsi john 03:16, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Lsi john, I was actually editing there first so "following" somehow fails to describe the sequence of events.
As I said in the edit summary, your edit should have been discussed on the talk page first. That being said if you do add your comment to the project page, without discussing it on the talk page, I'll revert it again. In a
WP:3RR situation it's up to you to prove a consensus when adding new material.
Anynobody 01:53, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm honestly not trying to hassle you Lsi john, after all I didn't say it couldn't ever be added just that it needed discussion as 2005 is saying. Are you forgetting that even though it's a guideline the entire wiki will be using it? WP:BOLD applies to articles, not policies and guidelines. If it did, I could boldly remove all of them and cite it as an excuse. Anynobody 04:05, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
In my short history at wikipedia, I have witnessed a large number of editors revert with edit comments like: "the material is highly sourced", "do not remove sourced material", "highly sourced".
To me, these seem to be falacious and circular arguments. Based on the fact that so many of these arguments are presented in edit-comments for reverts, it seems to me that there is a general misunderstanding and misapplication of the WP:RS guideline.
For example, if WP:RS is justification for including material, then we could include the fact that a second stage scuba mouthpiece works at roughly 100psi, in an article about the mating habits of the North East Woodpecker.
Because so many editors are using WP:RS as a reason to include or keep material, it seems that there is a general misunderstanding of what WP:RS is and what it is not.
By giving a definition for what is acceptable, it is basically a guideline for what not to include.
It is not a guidline for what to include. And does not provide justification for including material solely on the basis of WP:RS.
I believe that it will be both beneficial and helpful to the wiki community to include a brief paragraph on this in the guideline.
Lsi john 02:30, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Specifically I suggest the following wording be added as a 3rd paragraph:
"It is important to note that, while 'Reliable Sources' is a guideline, and verifiability is a policy, neither should be used as sufficient reason to justify including (or keeping) material in an article. Regardless of how well sourced an item is, satisfying the criteria for reliable source and verifiability does not provide sufficient grounds, by itself, to include, or retain, material in an article. Common sense must be applied, and editors should ask themselves if the material being cited is both relevant and noteworthy."
Lsi john 03:31, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't know, this seems a bit pointless to me. WP:RS and V are about what types of sources it is appropriate to use, relevancy is another question altogether and it would seem to me that it's already self evident that material added to a page must be relevant to the article topic. Gatoclass 07:37, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
"*Keep. This death was discussed in reliable sources, so it should be included"
There is a problem with this proposal--the link to WP:N creates a circular reference, because there it says:
I would also avoid referring to that guideline anyway, as it has been perpetually disputed. I think the point about relevance is valid, but such a long winded lede is over-the-top. A brief mention in the body, or a footnote should suffice. Dhaluza 10:35, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable and relevant published sources. This page is a guideline, not a policy, and is mandatory only insofar as it repeats material from policy pages. The related policies on sources are Wikipedia:Verifiability, Wikipedia:No original research, and Wikipedia:Neutral point-of-view.
Anynobody 01:31, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
We could, except that doesn't really address my concern and would raise additional concerns by tying relevance into RS. I'm suggesting a disclaimer statement which clarifies' that RS is a requirement but is insufficient as justification. Lsi john 01:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
Actually, never mind. I think your claim that WP:RS, alone, can be used to justify including material only further illustrates the need for a statement here. WP:RS is not justification. There are lots of reliably sourced things which are not relevant, not significant, and not important.
Justification is a reason, which stands on its own merits and needs nothing else to support it.
WP:RS only means that the person who said it is qualified to make the claim. WP:V means that the information is verifiable. If material isn't WP:RS then we can't include it. But just because it meets WP:RS doesn't mean we must allow it, and thus WP:RS isn't justification.
I really can't explain it any better than that. Perhaps someone else can. Lsi john 03:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
Source | WP:RS | WP:V | not WP:OR | cite WP:RS? |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 Most situations | ||||
2 Exception (rare) | ||||
3 Ineligible | ||||
4 Ineligible | - | |||
5 Ineligible |
Anynobody, I see no reason to continue going back and forth. You keep rewording my point and then arguing against your version. Your table doesn't show any case where WP:RS is the only argument. Lsi john 11:52, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Respectfully, Lsi john I never said WP:RS by itself (without passing WP:V and WP:OR concerns) was enough justification to add or keep a source. This is why I've asked several times if your statement is assuming a source that does meet all requirements or not, see above table for specifics. I guess I just figured everyone understood that a source has more than one requirement to satisfy.
The irony is by claiming that I am saying only WP:RS needs to be satisfied, it is in fact you who are trying to change my words. Anynobody 22:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and other news sites regularly have online votes on a whole range of issues. Although these news sites are generally considered reliable sources, these online votes are completely unreliable. The news sites even state that they are unscientific polls. The problem is that online voting contains very significant self-selection bias. Some political campaigns specifically email supporters and ask them to go the the news sites and "vote for candidate X" after a political debate. I believe Wikipedia needs to clearly state its policy regarding the use of unscientific online voting. These unscientific poll results are already being used in the some of the articles about Presidential candidates. -- JHP 07:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
A follow-up: The reason unscientific polls should not be used is because they are not reliable. To quote the Wikipedia article on the subject, "A voodoo poll is an opinion poll with no statistical or scientific reliability and which is therefore not a good indicator of opinion on any given issue. A voodoo poll will tend to involve self-selection, will be unrepresenative of the 'polled' population, and is often very easy to rig by those with a partisan interest in the results of the poll." -- JHP 03:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Recently a number of experts testified that there might be some issues with our reliable sources guideline, at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/James D. Nicoll (2nd nomination).
While many wikipedians interpret this guideline as saying that this article is either "non-notable" or has no "reliable sources", experts in the field have been so kind as to point out that this is a notable person who deserves an encyclopedia article.
-- Kim Bruning 18:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
I think the main issue most people had there was that many editors were disputing the acceptability of usenet sources to substantiate that the subject of the article is, essentially, a usenet celebrity. Clearly, this kind of source ought to be considered acceptable, as it is the medium such sources are most likely to be published in. Other issues were the recent removal of a number of self-published sources from the article that had provided key biographical details about the subject. Clearly, again, these should be accepted. There is little or no doubt that they were originally written by the subject, and if he isn't authorititive on (e.g.) his own date of birth, I don't know who would be. See, for instance the comment by User:121a0012 [4]. Also see User:Shimgray here and User:Pnh ( Patrick Nielsen Hayden) here (although his comments speak more to notability requirements than reliable sourcing requirements). Also see Shimgray here and User:Bth here.
The other comment is that when we're writing an article about a subculture that doesn't get discussed in traditional reliable sources in very much detail, the type of source you need to use is likely to be non-traditional. This doesn't mean it's unreliable; in this case the reliability of the sources wasn't questionable, only whether or not they conformed to the rules. Frankly, that's not how this project is supposed to be run and there's a good reason for that. One of Wikipedia's strengths is that it can harness all of these unusual sources to provide coverage that is much broader and much deeper than any other encyclopedia ever has. We can cover the personalities of online science fiction fandom if we want, because there are authorititive sources that talk about them. Unfortunately, the rules we have here (and, to a lesser extent, at WP:V) tend to get in the way of that. JulesH 20:12, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
Aside from the notability angle, this also highlights a problem with approaches to verifiability: over-zealous (and selective) insistence on policies intended to improve the accuracy of articles can actually have the reverse effect. I'm afraid this comment turned out longer than I'd intended...
Let's start with a bit of heresy: notwithstanding BLP, it is absurd to insist that every bit of data - even in a living-person bio - can or should be cited, and not a single Wikipedia editor actually does so. Looking at George W. Bush, the first paragraph alone contains half a dozen uncited facts. No citation is given for his birthdate, that he's the oldest brother, that he's the 43rd President rather than the 42nd or 44th... I could go on, but you get the idea, and you will find similar uncited material in any BLP worth reading.
This is not for want of scrutiny; it's because applying that standard of citation would make it so tedious to write new material on Wikipedia that nobody would do it. Further, even if we could do it without effort, waving a magic wand at the article to get everything cited, it wouldn't actually be an improvement. The only thing we'd achieve is to bury the article content under an unreadable mess of citations.
So let's agree that this is not a desirable or achievable goal (I may change my mind on this if somebody can show me even one featured article where all facts are cited). Let's also agree that as far as controversial information is concerned - anything where there is a reasonable likelihood somebody might be upset by what the article claims, anything where two editors in good faith maintain a disagreement about a fact in the article, anything that puts a significant positive or negative light on somebody - cites are in order.
Those two points acknowledged, it's time to take a more pragmatic attitude to uncontroversial information, and in particular to first-party sources. On controversial points, first-party sources are unsatisfactory for reasons that don't need explanation. On uncontroversial points - minor biographical details, etc - they are probably the most reliable sources we could look for.
As an example, the article on James D. Nicoll (best known from USENET) listed his birthdate, citing a USENET posting by Nicoll as the source. Leaving aside the point that most birthdates given in WP have no citation at all and this doesn't seem to bother anybody, it is absurd that this sort of citation should be rejected without some evidence to the contrary. Is there a reason why somebody else would impersonate Nicoll and lie about his birthday? Is there a reason why Nicoll would lie (or be mistaken) about his birthday? Is there any risk of Nicoll suing WP for defamation in the event that it is mistaken about his birthday?
If not, then perhaps we should be treating this sort of information as more reliable, rather than less, on account of its source. (And I would suspect that most of the 'reliable' sources we customarily accept as authorities on such things just take the subject's word for it anyway, unless they are known to be untrustworthy; I don't know of a lot of journalists who go around checking birth certificates as a matter of course.)
Here's another example: the article on Patrick Nielsen Hayden, a well-known SF editor. On January 27, an editor added a large chunk of material to Hayden's bibliography; along with a lot of correct information, it contained an error: it listed 'Yolen and Greenberg' as editors on a book where it should have listed Yolen alone.
The error sat there undetected for two months until Pnh - i.e. the subject of the article - corrected it. In response, he was asked not to do this sort of thing, but to go through the more roundabout path (and less obvious to a newcomer) of posting on the talk page to ask that somebody else do it.
If he had been posting about awards he'd won, sure. But on a minor point of fact which the guy can be expected to know? At best, this attitude encourages people to correct their own entries anonymously, or nudge a friend to do it. At worst, it hurts accuracy by discouraging those who are best placed to correct this sort of detail from doing so. These are hardly isolated incidents; every time something like the Nicoll AFD kicks up a discussion about this somewhere, I hear half a dozen stories about people who've given up on trying to correct uncontroversial data in their own articles - like, say, the spelling of their name - because of the opposition to first-party edits. It's hardly going to stop the unscrupulous ones, who'll just create a sock.
When Wikipedia started out, this sort of thing was less of a problem. Put simply, anybody who was notable enough to be mentioned in WP probably had better things to do than edit it; when somebody did edit their own entry, it was often for bad-faith reasons. With WP's growing profile and importance, there is more and more legitimate reason for notable people to take an interest in their own articles. While acknowledging the potential for bias on certain types of information, we should welcome proofreading of uncontroversial data by the people best qualified to do so. -- Calair 02:37, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Footnote: As I should've noted before, WP:BLP does allow some circumstances in which first-person sources may be used, but these would still exclude both the examples I gave above. The first requirement is that the information in question "is relevant to the person's notability" - which rules out things like birthdays and the exact spelling of somebody's name - and the third is that it "does not involve claims about third parties", which the Hayden example does. -- Calair 04:16, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
I invite comments from expert members on this forum about defination of reliable source in context of forced divorces there is a discussion about a blog of a person who has stated that he was forcefully divorced by a cult group, this however is not accepted as reliable source by some editor's. Wiki say's clearly that blogs are accepted incase they are from reliable source, can anyone explain who can be a reliable source incase of forced divorces other then the person himself ?
-- Shashwat pandey 09:57, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Tnx for the info.
-- Shashwat pandey 13:49, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
If blogs are unacceptable, why do we have an article on Groklaw? -- Kim Bruning 23:11, 19 May 2007 (UTC) I wonder if I'm violating WP:BEANS , WP:POINT and several as yet unwritten metapolicies by mentioning that ^^;;
Would infromation from another wiki (not from Wikimedia) be considered a reliable source or not? Ashura96 19:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm proposing a clarification for WP:RS. The problem that seems to arise is that the policy, as it is now, allows for agenda-pushing. A good example of this is what has been happening for months on the Georg Cantor article. The debate is whether or not it is correct to categorize/refer to Georg Cantor as "Jewish." It seems that some sources write off Cantor directly as "Jewish." They're mostly Jewish-culture oriented websites, sometimes newspapers or magazines. However these sources seem to leave out the whole story, and when you read into Cantor's biographies you learn that his father was Lutheran, his mother Roman Catholic, his family somewhat anti-semitic, and only an ethnically Jewish grandfather to qualify him as "Jewish." In other words, he was neither self-identifying nor substantially of ethnic descent. A frequent excuse used to during the debate is that anyone who removes the categories/qualifications is being a vandal because they're removing sourced information (even though there is OTHER sourced information contesting it). This debate extends to many other articles and also is closely related to WP:BLP issues.
Is there any way we can get something like this into WP:RS? --Tellerman
I am currently involved in what is becoming an increasingly tiresome and long running edit-war with user:Dark Tea over material related to the mid 20th century anthropologist Carleton Coon, whose works DT seems to hate with a passion. I would be glad of some input, since DT keeps quoting WP:RS regarding Coon. It is worth nothing that some editors do treat Coon as a current "reliable source" on racial categories (see Nordic race for example). This is problematic to say the least, but the issue concerns inclusion of his work in accounts of the history of racial theories, as for example on the Australoid article. DT seems to want to delete all reference to the history of the theory (except, oddly Thomas Huxley) on the grounds that early theorists are not Reliable Sources. As far as I am concerned this is as barmy as deleting all references to Aristotle in accounts of the history of physics or biology, because Aristotle is no longer a reliable source on these subjects. Paul B 15:01, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
For articles about web topics, many of the most reliable sources are published online. Online magazines often call themselves "blogs," even though they have paid editors and reporters. We should not be biased by the publication media; our criteria should be editorial review and fact checking.
We do allow self-published sources for experts commenting in their field of expertise. We also allow self-published sources as primary references. As such web forums and personal blogs can sometimes be reliable sources, in some situations.
My concern is two-fold: (1) Can we improve our policies and guidelines so people understand these fine distinctions? (2) User:SandyGeorgia suggested that I start a thread here to draw more attention to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Search engine optimization, a situation that needs comments on the reliability of online sources. There is a concern about promoting this article to WP:FA because it relies on web sources, but those are the best available sources for this topic. How do we resolve this? Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 16:03, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
whilst the strict "no blogs" rules are laudable, especially since it prevents linking to blogs that were set up last thursday (and are then never updated), this rule falls apart when we are dealing with the early blogs which now have 5 year (or more) archives. since a lot of political discussion is happening on the blogs right now, then to ignore the impact of blogs is a weakness in wikipedia entries. For if a story breaks on a blog and then ends up in the MSM, the wiki narrative only shows the MSM "reliable source" and not the blog that broke the story. Maybe , rather than the "no blogs" rule, might we have a "age rule" , where only blogs that have consistent archives going back 5 years are considered as a ref links? It is a difficult one to square I admit - as this could open up the floodgates and break the NPOV attitude of wikipedia. But it is becoming increasingly hard to ignore. What do others think about this? Joflaitheamhain 21:20, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
We could use a weigh in at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/University High School (Los Angeles, California).
The article in question is protected after an edit war and we're now attempting to get consensus on whether or not school newspaper articles are RS. Until such a time... Miss Mondegreen talk 00:42, May 24 2007 (UTC)
I'm involved in a dispute over whether any, all, or none of the following sources can be considered reliable. Any comments or opinions are appreciated. - Crockspot 17:10, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
WorldNetDaily is famous for having a heavy bias, and they have a tendency to report stories not picked up anywhere else. I'd try to find a second source to corroborate anything they post in less inflammatory terms. Night Gyr ( talk/ Oy) 15:19, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
Per #A reliable source committee?, and to answer questions just as that above, I would like to create Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard, where editors could post questions about whether given source(s) are reliable, and editors interested in reliability would answer. In essence it would be a non-binding RfC for reliability and a place to gather all discussions about specific sources, freeing this talk page to more theoretical discussions.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk 17:23, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
This useful page - linked from here - seems partially forgotten, and has no clear status, I have labelled it with 'proposed'. See also my comments at relevant discussion page.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk 17:30, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
Do not include the "tag" characters "<" and ">" in your comments. I just archived a piece of this page and those characters were in it, and totally whacked out Wiki when followed by something I suppose vaguely looked like a command or ambiguous expression. Well by "totally whacked-out" I just mean it cut off the rest of the page and threw-up some weird error in the text body. Wjhonson 14:57, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
Do we consider Conservapedia a WP:RS? I've noticed it's been used in some articles (e.g., [6] [7]). My instinct tells me a tertiary source -- especially one that is self-declared as having a non-neutral point of view -- should not be considered a RS for objective information. Raymond Arritt 00:53, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
Is al Jazeera considered a reliable source? Thanks in advance, -- Samiharris 16:50, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
Al Jazeera is seed funded by the Emir of Qatar how does that make it "reliable" over an individuals blog? Is it the case that Al Jazeera just has more money pumped into it over the individuals zero-cost blog, so therefore money infusion makes it more "reliable"? In other words , being a bilionaire buys you "reliabilty" on wikipedia?
Another question: What about using the Opie & Anthony radio show, in the context of the "Criticism" section of Tucker Max?-- Samiharris 18:13, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
Due to the conflict in Sri Lanka, we often experience edit wars centered around the reliability of Sri Lanka related sources. Earlier this year, Wikipedia:WikiProject Sri Lanka Reconciliation started a section Classification of sources, which was largely respected across the spectrum of Sri Lanka related editors. Since these were only recommendations, it was inevitable that some day some editors would ignore them. This happened lately, which lead to a long, fruitless discussion on WP:ANI#Removal of RS sources. I pointed that discussion here because I believe this talk page is a more appropriate place for deciding if sources are reliable. — Sebastian 18:07, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I propose to split the problem in two (or more) parts:
This guideline distinguishes two kinds of sources: Reliable and unreliable sources. For Sri Lanka conflict related sources, unfortunately, this distinction is often practically impossible. The reliability of many sources is constantly under dispute between the two factions. Compliant with the Wikipedia policy for Attributing and substantiating biased statements, the members of Wikipedia:WikiProject Sri Lanka Reconciliation therefore decided unanimously to recommend a third option, which was called "Qualified Source" (QS). This option allows citing QS only with explicit attribution and an agreed qualification, such as "The pro-rebel Tamilnet.com reports that ..." ( see details). This has been successfully implemented in many articles. However, the problem is that it is not an official WP guideline, so there are some editors who only respect this recommendation when it fits their partisan agenda.
Therefore, I hope that QS can become a guideline for Sri Lanka conflict related articles. — Sebastian 19:34, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Thank you, these are good points. In particular, I agree with the point of the Al-Qaeda and Nazi examples that sources can be reliable, but biased. I now realize that the concept of QS as we defined it may not be optimal because it lumped together reliability and bias, and we may need to distinguish between the two. However, this distinction opens a new dimension of complexity. Few cases are so black/white as Al-Qaeda and Mein Kampf. To stay with the example of Nazi Germany, and to illustrate the other extreme: Suppose, it's 1944. The Nazis successfully fooled the world. Suppose, a Jewish organization had published detailed reports of concentration camps, and one of our editors quoted from that. The Nazis, of course, would denounce the Jewish organization as "biased". Would we have to remove that information?
But let's move away from Nazi Germany, which was an extreme case. There is a wide range of uncertainty between these extreme examples, which probably is part of why we saw continuous edit wars (at least until we we defined QS). WP:RS curently does not address this dimension, so we need to spend some thought about how and where to draw the line. I now lean towards only allowing reliable sources, but distinguishing between:
The experience of SL conflict related articles shows that that would work as a guideline. I don't think we need to explicitly specify certain contexts of applicability; that was never a point of contention in the conflicts so far. (Presumably because it would be strange to contest a claim such as "party X killed civilians of party Y" with the argument that it's not pertinent to an article about terrorism and massacres.) — Sebastian 05:38, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I believe Tamilnet is a reliable source and it does not violate WP:RS because it has
But it is also a biased source hence , it should be used with attribution. Following are the views of 3 neutral editors about this news site.
Thanks Taprobanus 17:44, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
In response to Taprobanus' points, the People's Daily also satisfies 1 and 2. In respect to 4, many things that are not RS are used as primary sources by all sorts of reputable information. Otherwise where do all the journalists get all their leaked CIA reports, cabinet reports etc from...from backroom bureaucrats leaking bits and pieces. These guys do not then become reliable of their own accord. Blnguyen ( bananabucket) 01:03, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
As far as ANI goes, there is consensus by "neutral editors" that it is not RS. By neutral you obviously mean to exclude people from the ethnicities involved in the SL conflict(Sinhalese and Tamil). If that's what you want, then the only person who wants these websites is FayssalF. For those who think that these are lobby groups, we have Y, Dineshkannambadi, Sarvagnya, Nishkid64, Blnguyen, Sir Nick who are not of the conflicting parties. Blnguyen ( bananabucket) 01:03, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Tamilnet is not only partisan but it is invalid as a source for wikipedia purposes because it is not even a bonafide news service or website( flimsy pdfs that prove nothing notwithstanding). It is claimed that it has an editor and editorial board, but we arent told who they are. Nor has anybody demonstrated that they are affiliated to any 'official' press bodies and the like. In other words, I am not sure if we should be putting all 'partisan' sources in one basket.
For example, Times of India may be biased in some cases... they even have plagiarised from Wikipedia(Blnguyen's own content).. they are loved and they are hated.. but at the end of the day, we cannot wish them away as a bonafide source. They have editors and journalists accredited by relevant press bodies working for them and all the right affiliations. So we can be sure that there are checks and balances. We can be sure that they are held accountable by someone somewhere. Same with FOX. And CNN. And BBC and The Hindu, Deccan Herald(all of which have covered the Sri Lankan conflict and are as neutral as neutral can be in the affair). The same cannot be said of Tamilnet. Tell me, what is the difference between Tamilnet/tamilnation etc., and the random blog? Yes.. tnet and tnation may get a gazillion hits. But that can only make them " notable" not " RS"
Another reason why tnet and tnation are useless as sources for wikipedia is because, they blog about nothing but Tamil. Tamil-this, tamil-that, tamil, tamil, tamil. Nothing else. And afa Tamil is concerned, we dont believe them. Period. Not even with truckloads of salt. Is there anything other than Tamil related stuff on those blogs that we could salvage? I looked. But I didnt find any! Sarvagnya 06:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
(reply to sarvagnya) We are not synthesizing the source. What I have written is verbatim reproduction of independent research. Not my research. OTOH, all your points are baseless claims without any attribution. Praveen 15:12, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
been critized by LTTE. The argument that Tamilnet covers story from "Tamil Eelam" does not make in not RS.
(unindenting) I don't think anyone would doubt that the sources argued over above are biassed; one of the open secrets of jounralism is that all newspapers, radio, television & internet sources are biassed to some degree. The trick is whether a given source will overcome their innate bias sufficiently enough to report the truth -- even if it unfavorable to them.
The problem is that in many parts of the world, the reporting is (to put it one way) polemical: if the truth isn't good enough, the reporters are "encouraged" to improve on the truth. There aren't any reporters who could observe, report what they see, & get it splashed over the front pages of every newspaper in Europe & North America in these parts of the world. So we end up with accounts where one party claims one thing, & the opposing party claims its complete opposite: one -- or both -- of these two sources is obviously lying. This is where NPOV comes into play: we report what both parties say (on the assumption that even a blind pig finds the occasional acorn), & leave it to the reader to figure out the truth. (And if a better source comes along to present an account that more accurately rflects the truth, hopefully there will be an editor with the skill & wisdom to integrate this POV into the article.) -- llywrch 02:12, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
Take the debate elsewhere please... the consensus on this page is that Tamilnet IS essentially reliable. Whether it violates NPOV, or some other issue is to be debated in other forums. Further arguments for and against are getting tiresome and will not lead to any additional resolution. Blueboar 16:52, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
To be honest, I no longer care... as long as there is consensus, great... go follow it. My point was: take it elsewhere. Blueboar 19:54, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
(unindent)Blueboar - There is no need to take it anywhere else. And blueboar, dont simply keep repeating that there is a consensus that tnet and other such sites are reliable. There is NO such consensus either here or on ANI. On the contrary, there IS a consensus that they are NOT reliable sources.
tnet is a self styled news service with no affiliations and no accountability. It is an out and out advocacy site. Its views are radically different not just from those of the SriLankan government, but also other 'definitely' RS sources like BBC. For example, neither the BBC nor the mainstream Indian media or any respectable news source uses terms like "genocide", "ethnic cleansing" etc., to describe what is happening in SriLanka. Tamilnet and its clones on the other hand use such terms 'matter of factly' all the time. And what are the credentials of those running these sites? We dont even know who the editor is. Tamilnation, for example is run by one of the terrorists' lawyers who says on his site that "he bows his head humbly to those leaders"(sic).
The question here is not of NPOV at all for us to take it to WT:NPOV. NPOV is established by using reliable sources. You dont bring NPOV to a USA vs Bin Laden article by citing some pamphlet by Taliban or some other Islamist fundamentalist group. Some people here are talking as if NPOV can be used as an alibi to circumvent RS! No. RS is non-negotiable. Whatever NPOV you want to achieve in the article will have to be sourced from RSes. And a source doesnt become RS simply because they have a slick website or a high traffic website. A non-RS is non-RS even if it got a billion hits a day.
In the case of the Sri Lankan conflict, though the Sri Lankan military cannot be taken as totally unbiased, their site is a RS(simply because they are a bonafide organisation whose owners(the SL govt.,) is accountable to fora such as the SAARC and UN). So, if editors use the SriLankan military site as a source, in the interest of NPOV, I'd expect them to a) filter the 'commentary' out b) double check what a 'neutral' source like BBC or Reuters or The Hindu or Indian Express says about the issue and factor it in while writing the article. That is the way to achieve NPOV. Not by citing propaganda pamphlets and advocacy sites and claiming that you're 'balancing' it! Sarvagnya 21:05, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
I'm pretty sure that reliable, published sources are necessitated for compliance with WP:V ("Articles should contain only material that has been published by reliable sources.") and WP:NOR ("Articles should only contain verifiable content from reliable sources without further analysis."), but the question of what constitutes a reliable source is left up to guidelines to decide. I think the lede of this piece should be changed to point out that reliable sources are mandatory, though this is only a guideline on what constitutes one. Am I missing something? Night Gyr ( talk/ Oy) 15:38, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
Is there any possibilty of there being made a list of sites that are "unreliable", thus making it a rule not to use them? What I'm aiming at is that many history-related articles are propaganda-infested by sites with a clear inclination towards Historical revisionism, far right attitutes and so on. As it stands, anyone can simply write some massacre didn't happen and then link to a far right source that confirms that claim. Shouldn't there be a mechanism to prevent this? - The Spanish Inquisitor 09:14, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I had occasion to cite a public records database of Los Angeles County as a source. Another editor reverted this with the comment "Database searches are not reliable sources; as I said, we need something that is not ephemeral." The database is an official public record; that's how the county publishes business license information. Are public records databases reliable sources? -- John Nagle 18:40, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
John Nagle has misstated the issue; the issue was original research, as was plainly stated many times - the edits summaries were consistently "remove original research", e.g. [11] [12], and I said the same in the Talk: page comments: [13] True, in my final comment I accidentally used the phrase "reliable source" rather than "original research", but the issue has been clear from the start. It's baffling why John would try to present the issue this way now. Jayjg (talk) 23:15, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
The relevant discussion is at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New York City Public Transportation#Fact Checking on Station Opening Dates. http://nycsubway.org/ has opening dates for all stations, but many of them are incorrect. Can it be cited for other stations where we don't have another source? -- NE2 22:48, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
I recently tried to trace down the sources of some dubious statements in an area that I know something about -- the history of medieval astronomy. After spending some time on line, searching the bibliographies, and getting books at the library, I identified what seems to be a common factor underlying such dubious claims.
These dubious claims tend to cite tertiary sources written by people with little historical expertise -- sometimes web-based articles, sometimes popular printed books, sometimes books and articles published by little known publishing houses and journals. The replies to the claims tend to be by qualified historians and usually appear in well respected, extensively documented books and articles published by well known publishing houses and scholarly journals with well-established reputations.
The key here is that we can find an indicator of the dominant scholarly opinion by comparing the quality of the rival sources. What I'm getting at is that when there's nothing better, we have to rely on whatever sources are available. However, when there is disagreement among the sources, the "best sources" carry more weight. At some times we can even use the "best sources" to justify dismissing the fringe point of view presented in sources of lesser quality that might formally qualify as "reliable sources".
Shouldn't this article -- or a related one -- address the concept that meeting some technical standard of reliability isn't always an adequate criterion for inclusion? There are a lot of sources out there; we're writing an encyclopedia; so we should use the best available sources. -- SteveMcCluskey 01:43, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
I have seen a similar problem as to what Steve describes in articles on the Greco-Roman world, which I have a bit of background in. There used to be quite good descriptions of primary, secondary, and tertiary sources here in WP:RS that have been moved to WP:NOR. It strikes me, however, that WP:NOR aims at quite a different thing: excluding the loopy, weird, and/or novel. But the emphasis here should be on having a resource that helps us educate editors about how to make articles better. semper fictilis 13:38, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Don't use MySpace as a source redirects here, but there's nothing in the guideline that says so directly. Could this be changed? -- SatyrTN ( talk | contribs) 03:48, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
This would be covered by WP:V#Self-published and questionable sources in articles about themselves, the last of the criteria listed being the kicker in this case. - Crockspot 03:00, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
I think we're going to need to develop some specific policy on this, per llywrch. MySpace has a mechanism to allow celebrities to thwart impersonators, but I haven't noticed any system by which outsiders can confirm the supposed celebrity is who they say they are. That's only half of a proper editorial overview, one that allows insiders to know about themselves, but preventing outsiders from being able to rely on claims. Could we, as an 800-lb (400-kg) Internet gorilla, ask MySpace to provide a confirmation mechanism, like an on-page seal that they (not the user) control, or a central list of identity-confirmed users, that outsiders can use? This would be a win-win-win, since it would increase the confidence outside sources have in (some parts of) MySpace, protect the celebrities, and probably be highly desired by the MySpace community. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 10:49, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Is Newsmax considered a reliable source? I'm not familiar with them. They've been used in some articles, and whenever I've followed up the references their coverage often is strongly slanted. Raymond Arritt 02:45, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
Are BBC, CNN, New York Times etc. 'reliable sources'? Because the evidence shows them to be unvarnished liars when the Establishment demands it (the killer point being that they contradict *their own reports* when this becomes politically necessary)
One glaring example: http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/milospeech.htm
PS, I'm being slightly facetious in my question -- I know full well what the conventional answer is, but I think it sucks (and is inaccurate) that Wikipedia gives Establishment media a 'carte blanche' for accuracy.
Mind you, I can probably predict a response that *not* to do so would open a 'can of worms' -- there probably is something to this, but I think it ought to be brought to people's attention that, as is shown by the above article, Establishment sources are not always reliable sources.
Cheers everyone -- feel free to discuss this issue on my talk page if this isn't an appropriate forum. Jonathanmills 14:10, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
At La Toya Jackson ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), Rhythmnation2004 ( talk · contribs) added a bunch of awards and accomplishments for La Toya Jackson (see this edit) with the sources being a bunch of scans and photos to Imageshack. How does this stand in terms of reliable sources? I removed them because I don't feel that they are too reliable, especially since you can barely read some of the awards in the photos. In my opinion, these are not reliable sources and that these statements should be sourced with some sort of news coverage or press release of the organization giving the award that states she received it. Thoughts? Metros 13:44, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
If you want to have some fun cleaning up an article, take a look at the "references" at the Royal Rife article! -- Fyslee/ talk 12:29, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
I just removed the following sentence "When sourcing, be careful not to attribute a statement to a source that may have itself originally taken the same information from Wikipedia (either with or without acknowledgement). This applies especially to self-authored third-party websites;" the sentence was recently added by anon IP 86.136.194.161 without any discussion on this page. While I agree with the sentiment, I have no idea how an editor is supposed to avoid this "circular sourcing," so I think the sentence obfusctates more than it clarifies. Any efforts at a clearer guideline are welcome. UnitedStatesian 13:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
-- Ksyrie( Talkie talkie) 05:13, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
I assume you are asking if an op-ed collumn is reliable. It is reliable - with the following caution: an op-ed collumnist is writing his or her opinion on matters, and not necessarily a factual article. So, any citation to such a collumn should be expressed as the author's opinion and not as pure fact. It is best to attribute statements the collumnist makes... example: "According to New York Times collumnist Thomas Freedman..." Blueboar 18:37, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Lots of fancy flags have already been deleted, but the problem has surfaced again. Image:GokturkFlag.png is taken from an unreferenced Flags of the World page purporting to depict flags of the "Sixteen Great Turkish Empires", the vast majority of which are fanciful and uncited. No scholarly reference is given for this flag. I have a hefty monograph on the Gokturks which mentions in passim that the war standard of the Gokturks contained the image of the golden she-wolf, but this data is not referenced as well. Briangotts nominated the image for deletion on Wikipedia:Images and media for deletion/2007 June 11. The discussion has been inconclusive so far, but User:Quadell suddenly removed the ifd tag from the image with the edit summary "not deleted", claiming on his talk page that the picture is "sourced". I would welcome input from those people who understand our RS policy better than I do. -- Ghirla -трёп- 14:26, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Government documents (e.g., court filings) often are not easily accessible from their official sources, but may be available second-hand from web pages that discuss related topics. What's the view on convenience links to such sites? And what if the web site has a point of view on the matter? Even in the latter case, I'd think it would be unlikely that anyone sane would forge legal documents given the legal liabilities of doing so. In case anyone is wondering the specific matter I'm interested in is here. Raymond Arritt 20:04, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Some Roman Catholics say AlterNet is not a reliable source and keep reverting edits. What do you think? --BMF81
We continue to have a lot of questions of the "is X a reliable source?" variety... and in the vast majority of cases these have been answered with ... "it is reliable for a citation to back a statement of opinion, but not a statement of fact" Often advising the editor to include a text attribution as in "According to noted person Y: 'quote of Y's opinion'<citation to where Y says it>". It would be very helpful to have a section in the guideline that discusses this "grey zone" of reliability (with an example or two) that we could point to in answering such questions. Thoughts? Blueboar 12:48, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
A sentence used to say:
Wikipedia relies heavily upon the established literature created by scientists, scholars and researchers around the world. Items that fit this criterion are usually considered reliable. However, they may be outdated by more recent research, or controversial in the sense that there are alternative scholarly explanations. Wikipedia articles should point to all major scholarly interpretations of a topic.
After this edit by SlimVirgin, with the edit summary "tidied writing, removed bits that made little sense or stated the obvious", the meaning is very different:
Wikipedia relies in part on material written by scientists, scholars, and researchers around the world. These may be outdated by more recent research, or may controversial in the sense that there are alternative scholarly and non-scholarly treatments. Wikipedia articles should therefore ideally rely on all majority and significant-minority treatments of a topic, scholarly and non-scholarly, so long as the sources are reliable.
Do we really need the "non-scholarly" part? I think scholarly treatments should always outweigh non-scholarly ones. A "significant minority" (who decides how significant it needs to be?), or even a majority could say anything, and be opposed to anything that modern science has established. Dinosaurs did not evolve, they were created on the sixth day; blacks are born criminals; Sumerian evolved from Ukrainian; Hitler was really a nice man; alligators dwell in New York City's sewers. The "so long as the sources are reliable" bit doesn't help that much, because the current definition of "reliable" only requires that the author should be "generally regarded as trustworthy" or "authoritative" (if "generally regarded" means "regarded by everybody", the criterion is unsatisfiable, if it means "regarded by most", it is unfalsifiable). The "peer-reviewed" criterion was a lot easier to apply. -- Anonymous44 14:43, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
Blueboar, could you give me an example of these "knowledgable and highly reliable sources" who were not academics? Anyway, I can see how mainstream media, investigative journalists etc. are or may be reliable sources, but I think this should be restricted. The current wording explicitly endorses non-scholarly views when they contradict the scholarly ones. It's on the verge of saying: "You and your group may not like the mainstream scholarly treatment/view about something. Feel free to add an alternative non-scholarly treatment/view that suits you better, provided that you find its author trustworthy." My impression is that "alternative non-scholarly treatments/views", aka cranks, are among the greatest dangers for Wikipedia's reliability. -- Anonymous44 21:07, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
I disagree strongly with this rewrite and am disturbed that it occurred with no discussion and such a misleading edit summary. I propose the more accurate version:
Does this sound reasonable? TimVickers 02:44, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't want to get much involved in this discussion, but it seems to me that this page has two signficant problems. First, it should somewhere acknowledged that articles can always be improved with regard to their sourcing. Second (and more importantly), it probably aims at something that is not realistic: a single guideline about sourcing for all subjects. It seems to me obvious that the rules about what sources are best for an article about the Peloponnesian War will be completely different from those on abortion or pokemon or Hillary Clinton. Now, I think scholarly-vs.-none-scholarly is not a helpful division when in comes to Hillary--sourcing will be main-stream-media and opinions are those of notable commentators. But for the Peloponnesian War, we should be able to aim for peer-reviewed history articles and books in university presses, a standard that would be completely unrealistic for pokemon articles. I have no concrete plan of action, but I wonder whether WP:RS shouldn't be blown into a dozen different guidelines: one for ancient history, another for popular culture, another for contemporary politics, etc., etc. semper fictilis 04:02, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Many good points. I've made the following revision in attempt to take these into account:
Clarifications, corrections, etc. of course welcome. Thanks to all for thoughtful discussion of this important topic. Raymond Arritt 13:42, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I've shortened this a little, and removed the restatement of WP:UNDUE, which is unnecessary - we don't need to highlight one other policy to follow as we should follow all the other policies. TimVickers 13:57, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't much likes "wikipedia welcomes". How about "The best articles rely on material published…"? semper fictilis 14:04, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
In many technical fields the academic journals only cover leading edge technology. These scholarly journals are unlikely to report on the early commercial products that used this technology. The technical trade press, manufacturer's brochures and product service manuals, taken together, are reliable sources in tracing the history of a technology's introduction to the real world. What did a typical mini computer cost in 1970? What was the feature set? What types of semiconductors were used? Who was the leading supplier? This is the history of engineering and science, not popular culture or current events.
Moore's Law was published in Electronics, a trade magazine, not a peer review journal. Does someone want the tag the article as having dubious sources? -- SWTPC6800 19:50, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Version 1
Version 2
I like the second version better, but I disagree with its assertion that scholarly sources cannot be found for "popular culture". There is good, scholarly material out there about all sorts of popular culture, and we shouldn't imply that there isn't. Therefore, I have no !vote. — Brian ( talk) 04:52, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't particularly like either. But I think they both miss important points. Anyone can call himself a scholar or researcher. The practical test is whether other scholars think you are one or are writing scholarly level material . They overemphasize the place that something is published - saying that the most reliable material is ... published in peer-reviewed journals and academic presses implicitly belittles works not found there. Again a better test is whether the person or theory is taken seriously in such places. Examples of non-academics in the sciences who are taken seriously by academia are Julian Barbour and James Lovelock. A major category of exception is journalists who write academic level works e.g. reviewed in scholarly journals and used as standard histories - e.g. the late Ze'ev Schiff "just a journalist" writing on Arab-Israeli conflict, who often wrote histories with another journalist Ehud Ya'ari. It is hard to think of any scholar of the subject who was more respected across the board. John Z 09:14, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
We have to move this discussion to Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability. That's the policy page; this one isn't. Note that every attempt to change the wording based on what's decided here is being summarily reverted, because it conflicts with WP:Verifiability. And when anyone tries to change WP:V, it's summarily reverted because the discussion was here, not there (which is reasonable). So the discussion has to be moved to Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability or we're simply wasting our time. Raymond Arritt 12:54, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
The discussion above has been useful, but Wikipedia:Verifiability is the actual policy page. It's disconcerting that the words "peer reviewed" appear nowhere on that policy page, much less the relevant merits of peer-reviewed and non-peer reviewed sources. To all who have been involved in this discussion, shall we continue continue at Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability? Raymond Arritt 01:49, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
Is there a tag similar to the [citation needed] tag that can be placed inline in the article when a more reliable source is needed? Wrad 16:29, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
There used to be a template "betterfact". It might be useful to read the WP:TFD discussion and see if those concerns can be addressed. Gimmetrow 07:04, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
I added a new section to this page: Frequently used sources that do not qualify as reliable. Feel free to edit it, improve on it, or remove it and discuss it here. Cheers. Sala Skan 11:14, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Something like that. Most people don't know what is and isn't reliable. We should explain it. This is just a start. Wrad 15:49, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
The idea of including wikiprojects is a good idea. But in practical terms how do we see this developing? Presumably the guidelines will develop on a wikiproject page or subpage. But once it reaches consensus, how would it be linked back to WP:RS? semper fictilis 12:45, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
This 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. |
Archive 10 | ← | Archive 12 | Archive 13 | Archive 14 | Archive 15 | Archive 16 | → | Archive 20 |
Why is this article in the weasel words category? -- Blue Tie 14:29, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
On the Nick Baker (prisoner in Japan) article an editor is using the "exceptional claims" provision to exclude information that was published in Metropolis (English magazine in Japan). The removed claims are here: [1] Talk about the claim is here: [2]. In this case my position is that the removed claims support the major claim that Baker lied to the public, and that the removed claims are not exceptional claims in their own right. Another way to put this is: do supporting claims on a BLP also need multiple sources?
I have had some confirmation that these claims are not exceptional before [3] but the issue keeps coming up and I would be very grateful some more advice and comments. Thank you. Sparkzilla 06:15, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
The past two days have seen some pretty strange editing on List of groups referred to as cults in government reports with different editors giving different reasons why this is not a government report: Cover Page CRS Report No. 79-24 GOV 1/23/79 Addendum II CRS-45 and why the ...FBI and GAO don't write Government Reports... I'm sorry but that is a very odd statement, on top of odd logic implying it was my idea to remove them. I've been asking this editor and some others to explain why CRS a division of the LOC isn't WP:RS or WP:V. Can someone explain why it isn't a RS? (Granted it should not be used to imply that all groups in the report are still even in existence and those that are may have changed so it needs to be qualified.) I realize WP:V is discussed on that page, so I'm not bringing it up except to say that they are pretty easily verfied. Anynobody 09:35, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
I completely agree with your definition of a government report, and have asked them to provide some examples of their definition of a "Government Report". Their main contentions are that it should represent the opinion of "the government" and hold it's Imprimatur. They have also indicated a belief that CRS is a "private" arm of the LOC. The example provided of what they consider it to be was a Congressional report. When I pointed out that a Congressional report fails their own definition (it only represents Congress) it seemed to make no difference.
I've tried explaining that their are no reports which express the opinion of the entire federal government. Such a report would need to be from all three branches (Executive, Legislative, and Judicial) and that's not really possible because the Constitution, the only official document which affects all three, makes no provisions for it.
The whole situation is almost surreal because if they are right, all the articles citing anything produced by the government has gotta go. Anynobody 01:48, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
I really appreciate your input, Askari Mark (Talk) and Blue Tie. Do you know if anyone has ever doubted the reliability of this type of information? I found that there isn't much said about gov't sources, probably because it's assumed most people "understand". Anynobody 04:28, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
My thoughts exactly. Anynobody 04:45, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
So, do they write good reports? Probably. Are their reports respected? Probably. Do their reports "speak for the government"? Absolutely not! Their reports are no more "special" than the reports of any expert or academic. Remember please where Anynobody et al would use these reports. In an article entitled Groups referred to as cults in government reports and since we already have the more general article, List of groups referred to as cults, the opposing editors want to reserve the former for actual reports that bear the seal, literally or figuratively, of the issuing government. The CRS reports clearly do not fit in that category. -- Justanother 00:40, 13 May 2007 (UTC)CRS, like the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), as parts of the Legislative Branch, serve the Congress but do not “speak for it.” Only documents provided by these agencies pursuant to specific statutory mandates might be said to be “official government reports” – an imprecise term. Even those documents, however, cannot necessarily be said to “carry the weight or tacit approval” of the Congress.
CRS reports represent our response to congressional legislative needs and in no way represent “what the legislative branch of government says” on a given topic. The 435 members of the House, the 100 Senators, and the delegates and committees that together make up the Congress have no single voice, save through legislation, nor has the Congress vested in CRS the authority to speak for it on any matter.
Thank you, Crockspot. That's one of the things I've been saying. Anynobody 01:21, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
No one is disputing that these reports are reliable sources that can be used in Wikipedia articles. They are, of course. The dispute is about the labeling of these as "Government Reports", as if they represent the view of the government or an official commission. When asked, the Coordinator of Communications of the CRS responded with this unequivocal statement: ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 01:30, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Dear Mr. ----,
The Director has asked me to respond to your email regarding the “status” of CRS reports. While I’m not sure I can “settle an argument” for you, I can provide you some general thoughts regarding the role of the Congressional Research Service (CRS) vis a vis the Congress and the nature of its reports.
CRS works exclusively for the Congress of the United States. It has no public mission. All of its reports are therefore produced for and provided to Members who are then free to distribute them as they deem appropriate.
As you know, the Congress is a body made up of individual Members – Senators, Representatives, and Delegates – and there is no single voice for the Congress, either for the body as whole or for the individual chambers. Only through the passage of legislation can it be said that the Congress “has spoken.”
CRS, like the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), as parts of the Legislative Branch, serve the Congress but do not “speak for it.” Only documents provided by these agencies pursuant to specific statutory mandates might be said to be “official government reports” – an imprecise term. Even those documents, however, cannot necessarily be said to “carry the weight or tacit approval” of the Congress.
CRS reports represent our response to congressional legislative needs and in no way represent “what the legislative branch of government says” on a given topic. The 435 members of the House, the 100 Senators, and the delegates and committees that together make up the Congress have no single voice, save through legislation, nor has the Congress vested in CRS the authority to speak for it on any matter.
_______________
(name removed)
Coordinator of Communications
Congressional Research Service
It appears that List of groups referred to as cults in government reports is a redirect to List of groups referred to as cults in government documents. So what's the problem? Maybe it should further redirect to List of groups referred to as cults in government-produced documents? This is hair-splitting to the extreme. Come up with a name for the list that suits everyone, and move on. - Crockspot 01:37, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Justanother has a point about the age of the list report in question, which is why I've been saying it needs to be mentioned because indeed the groups may have changed. As a historical document though, there is no reason it should be excluded (discussing the phrasing of a source is all that's needed. Removing it is overkill and actually is against WP:NPOV. Anynobody 07:08, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Lsi john added this to the guideline: It is important to note that, while 'Reliable Sources' is a guideline, and verifiability is a policy, neither should be used to justify including (or keeping) material in an article. Regardless of how well sourced an item is, satisfying the criteria for reliable source and verifiability alone does not provide sufficient reason to include material in an article. Common sense must be applied, and editors should ask themselves if the material being cited is both relevant and noteworthy.
Lsi john 03:16, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Lsi john, I was actually editing there first so "following" somehow fails to describe the sequence of events.
As I said in the edit summary, your edit should have been discussed on the talk page first. That being said if you do add your comment to the project page, without discussing it on the talk page, I'll revert it again. In a
WP:3RR situation it's up to you to prove a consensus when adding new material.
Anynobody 01:53, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm honestly not trying to hassle you Lsi john, after all I didn't say it couldn't ever be added just that it needed discussion as 2005 is saying. Are you forgetting that even though it's a guideline the entire wiki will be using it? WP:BOLD applies to articles, not policies and guidelines. If it did, I could boldly remove all of them and cite it as an excuse. Anynobody 04:05, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
In my short history at wikipedia, I have witnessed a large number of editors revert with edit comments like: "the material is highly sourced", "do not remove sourced material", "highly sourced".
To me, these seem to be falacious and circular arguments. Based on the fact that so many of these arguments are presented in edit-comments for reverts, it seems to me that there is a general misunderstanding and misapplication of the WP:RS guideline.
For example, if WP:RS is justification for including material, then we could include the fact that a second stage scuba mouthpiece works at roughly 100psi, in an article about the mating habits of the North East Woodpecker.
Because so many editors are using WP:RS as a reason to include or keep material, it seems that there is a general misunderstanding of what WP:RS is and what it is not.
By giving a definition for what is acceptable, it is basically a guideline for what not to include.
It is not a guidline for what to include. And does not provide justification for including material solely on the basis of WP:RS.
I believe that it will be both beneficial and helpful to the wiki community to include a brief paragraph on this in the guideline.
Lsi john 02:30, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Specifically I suggest the following wording be added as a 3rd paragraph:
"It is important to note that, while 'Reliable Sources' is a guideline, and verifiability is a policy, neither should be used as sufficient reason to justify including (or keeping) material in an article. Regardless of how well sourced an item is, satisfying the criteria for reliable source and verifiability does not provide sufficient grounds, by itself, to include, or retain, material in an article. Common sense must be applied, and editors should ask themselves if the material being cited is both relevant and noteworthy."
Lsi john 03:31, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't know, this seems a bit pointless to me. WP:RS and V are about what types of sources it is appropriate to use, relevancy is another question altogether and it would seem to me that it's already self evident that material added to a page must be relevant to the article topic. Gatoclass 07:37, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
"*Keep. This death was discussed in reliable sources, so it should be included"
There is a problem with this proposal--the link to WP:N creates a circular reference, because there it says:
I would also avoid referring to that guideline anyway, as it has been perpetually disputed. I think the point about relevance is valid, but such a long winded lede is over-the-top. A brief mention in the body, or a footnote should suffice. Dhaluza 10:35, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable and relevant published sources. This page is a guideline, not a policy, and is mandatory only insofar as it repeats material from policy pages. The related policies on sources are Wikipedia:Verifiability, Wikipedia:No original research, and Wikipedia:Neutral point-of-view.
Anynobody 01:31, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
We could, except that doesn't really address my concern and would raise additional concerns by tying relevance into RS. I'm suggesting a disclaimer statement which clarifies' that RS is a requirement but is insufficient as justification. Lsi john 01:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
Actually, never mind. I think your claim that WP:RS, alone, can be used to justify including material only further illustrates the need for a statement here. WP:RS is not justification. There are lots of reliably sourced things which are not relevant, not significant, and not important.
Justification is a reason, which stands on its own merits and needs nothing else to support it.
WP:RS only means that the person who said it is qualified to make the claim. WP:V means that the information is verifiable. If material isn't WP:RS then we can't include it. But just because it meets WP:RS doesn't mean we must allow it, and thus WP:RS isn't justification.
I really can't explain it any better than that. Perhaps someone else can. Lsi john 03:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
Source | WP:RS | WP:V | not WP:OR | cite WP:RS? |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 Most situations | ||||
2 Exception (rare) | ||||
3 Ineligible | ||||
4 Ineligible | - | |||
5 Ineligible |
Anynobody, I see no reason to continue going back and forth. You keep rewording my point and then arguing against your version. Your table doesn't show any case where WP:RS is the only argument. Lsi john 11:52, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Respectfully, Lsi john I never said WP:RS by itself (without passing WP:V and WP:OR concerns) was enough justification to add or keep a source. This is why I've asked several times if your statement is assuming a source that does meet all requirements or not, see above table for specifics. I guess I just figured everyone understood that a source has more than one requirement to satisfy.
The irony is by claiming that I am saying only WP:RS needs to be satisfied, it is in fact you who are trying to change my words. Anynobody 22:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and other news sites regularly have online votes on a whole range of issues. Although these news sites are generally considered reliable sources, these online votes are completely unreliable. The news sites even state that they are unscientific polls. The problem is that online voting contains very significant self-selection bias. Some political campaigns specifically email supporters and ask them to go the the news sites and "vote for candidate X" after a political debate. I believe Wikipedia needs to clearly state its policy regarding the use of unscientific online voting. These unscientific poll results are already being used in the some of the articles about Presidential candidates. -- JHP 07:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
A follow-up: The reason unscientific polls should not be used is because they are not reliable. To quote the Wikipedia article on the subject, "A voodoo poll is an opinion poll with no statistical or scientific reliability and which is therefore not a good indicator of opinion on any given issue. A voodoo poll will tend to involve self-selection, will be unrepresenative of the 'polled' population, and is often very easy to rig by those with a partisan interest in the results of the poll." -- JHP 03:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Recently a number of experts testified that there might be some issues with our reliable sources guideline, at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/James D. Nicoll (2nd nomination).
While many wikipedians interpret this guideline as saying that this article is either "non-notable" or has no "reliable sources", experts in the field have been so kind as to point out that this is a notable person who deserves an encyclopedia article.
-- Kim Bruning 18:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
I think the main issue most people had there was that many editors were disputing the acceptability of usenet sources to substantiate that the subject of the article is, essentially, a usenet celebrity. Clearly, this kind of source ought to be considered acceptable, as it is the medium such sources are most likely to be published in. Other issues were the recent removal of a number of self-published sources from the article that had provided key biographical details about the subject. Clearly, again, these should be accepted. There is little or no doubt that they were originally written by the subject, and if he isn't authorititive on (e.g.) his own date of birth, I don't know who would be. See, for instance the comment by User:121a0012 [4]. Also see User:Shimgray here and User:Pnh ( Patrick Nielsen Hayden) here (although his comments speak more to notability requirements than reliable sourcing requirements). Also see Shimgray here and User:Bth here.
The other comment is that when we're writing an article about a subculture that doesn't get discussed in traditional reliable sources in very much detail, the type of source you need to use is likely to be non-traditional. This doesn't mean it's unreliable; in this case the reliability of the sources wasn't questionable, only whether or not they conformed to the rules. Frankly, that's not how this project is supposed to be run and there's a good reason for that. One of Wikipedia's strengths is that it can harness all of these unusual sources to provide coverage that is much broader and much deeper than any other encyclopedia ever has. We can cover the personalities of online science fiction fandom if we want, because there are authorititive sources that talk about them. Unfortunately, the rules we have here (and, to a lesser extent, at WP:V) tend to get in the way of that. JulesH 20:12, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
Aside from the notability angle, this also highlights a problem with approaches to verifiability: over-zealous (and selective) insistence on policies intended to improve the accuracy of articles can actually have the reverse effect. I'm afraid this comment turned out longer than I'd intended...
Let's start with a bit of heresy: notwithstanding BLP, it is absurd to insist that every bit of data - even in a living-person bio - can or should be cited, and not a single Wikipedia editor actually does so. Looking at George W. Bush, the first paragraph alone contains half a dozen uncited facts. No citation is given for his birthdate, that he's the oldest brother, that he's the 43rd President rather than the 42nd or 44th... I could go on, but you get the idea, and you will find similar uncited material in any BLP worth reading.
This is not for want of scrutiny; it's because applying that standard of citation would make it so tedious to write new material on Wikipedia that nobody would do it. Further, even if we could do it without effort, waving a magic wand at the article to get everything cited, it wouldn't actually be an improvement. The only thing we'd achieve is to bury the article content under an unreadable mess of citations.
So let's agree that this is not a desirable or achievable goal (I may change my mind on this if somebody can show me even one featured article where all facts are cited). Let's also agree that as far as controversial information is concerned - anything where there is a reasonable likelihood somebody might be upset by what the article claims, anything where two editors in good faith maintain a disagreement about a fact in the article, anything that puts a significant positive or negative light on somebody - cites are in order.
Those two points acknowledged, it's time to take a more pragmatic attitude to uncontroversial information, and in particular to first-party sources. On controversial points, first-party sources are unsatisfactory for reasons that don't need explanation. On uncontroversial points - minor biographical details, etc - they are probably the most reliable sources we could look for.
As an example, the article on James D. Nicoll (best known from USENET) listed his birthdate, citing a USENET posting by Nicoll as the source. Leaving aside the point that most birthdates given in WP have no citation at all and this doesn't seem to bother anybody, it is absurd that this sort of citation should be rejected without some evidence to the contrary. Is there a reason why somebody else would impersonate Nicoll and lie about his birthday? Is there a reason why Nicoll would lie (or be mistaken) about his birthday? Is there any risk of Nicoll suing WP for defamation in the event that it is mistaken about his birthday?
If not, then perhaps we should be treating this sort of information as more reliable, rather than less, on account of its source. (And I would suspect that most of the 'reliable' sources we customarily accept as authorities on such things just take the subject's word for it anyway, unless they are known to be untrustworthy; I don't know of a lot of journalists who go around checking birth certificates as a matter of course.)
Here's another example: the article on Patrick Nielsen Hayden, a well-known SF editor. On January 27, an editor added a large chunk of material to Hayden's bibliography; along with a lot of correct information, it contained an error: it listed 'Yolen and Greenberg' as editors on a book where it should have listed Yolen alone.
The error sat there undetected for two months until Pnh - i.e. the subject of the article - corrected it. In response, he was asked not to do this sort of thing, but to go through the more roundabout path (and less obvious to a newcomer) of posting on the talk page to ask that somebody else do it.
If he had been posting about awards he'd won, sure. But on a minor point of fact which the guy can be expected to know? At best, this attitude encourages people to correct their own entries anonymously, or nudge a friend to do it. At worst, it hurts accuracy by discouraging those who are best placed to correct this sort of detail from doing so. These are hardly isolated incidents; every time something like the Nicoll AFD kicks up a discussion about this somewhere, I hear half a dozen stories about people who've given up on trying to correct uncontroversial data in their own articles - like, say, the spelling of their name - because of the opposition to first-party edits. It's hardly going to stop the unscrupulous ones, who'll just create a sock.
When Wikipedia started out, this sort of thing was less of a problem. Put simply, anybody who was notable enough to be mentioned in WP probably had better things to do than edit it; when somebody did edit their own entry, it was often for bad-faith reasons. With WP's growing profile and importance, there is more and more legitimate reason for notable people to take an interest in their own articles. While acknowledging the potential for bias on certain types of information, we should welcome proofreading of uncontroversial data by the people best qualified to do so. -- Calair 02:37, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Footnote: As I should've noted before, WP:BLP does allow some circumstances in which first-person sources may be used, but these would still exclude both the examples I gave above. The first requirement is that the information in question "is relevant to the person's notability" - which rules out things like birthdays and the exact spelling of somebody's name - and the third is that it "does not involve claims about third parties", which the Hayden example does. -- Calair 04:16, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
I invite comments from expert members on this forum about defination of reliable source in context of forced divorces there is a discussion about a blog of a person who has stated that he was forcefully divorced by a cult group, this however is not accepted as reliable source by some editor's. Wiki say's clearly that blogs are accepted incase they are from reliable source, can anyone explain who can be a reliable source incase of forced divorces other then the person himself ?
-- Shashwat pandey 09:57, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Tnx for the info.
-- Shashwat pandey 13:49, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
If blogs are unacceptable, why do we have an article on Groklaw? -- Kim Bruning 23:11, 19 May 2007 (UTC) I wonder if I'm violating WP:BEANS , WP:POINT and several as yet unwritten metapolicies by mentioning that ^^;;
Would infromation from another wiki (not from Wikimedia) be considered a reliable source or not? Ashura96 19:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm proposing a clarification for WP:RS. The problem that seems to arise is that the policy, as it is now, allows for agenda-pushing. A good example of this is what has been happening for months on the Georg Cantor article. The debate is whether or not it is correct to categorize/refer to Georg Cantor as "Jewish." It seems that some sources write off Cantor directly as "Jewish." They're mostly Jewish-culture oriented websites, sometimes newspapers or magazines. However these sources seem to leave out the whole story, and when you read into Cantor's biographies you learn that his father was Lutheran, his mother Roman Catholic, his family somewhat anti-semitic, and only an ethnically Jewish grandfather to qualify him as "Jewish." In other words, he was neither self-identifying nor substantially of ethnic descent. A frequent excuse used to during the debate is that anyone who removes the categories/qualifications is being a vandal because they're removing sourced information (even though there is OTHER sourced information contesting it). This debate extends to many other articles and also is closely related to WP:BLP issues.
Is there any way we can get something like this into WP:RS? --Tellerman
I am currently involved in what is becoming an increasingly tiresome and long running edit-war with user:Dark Tea over material related to the mid 20th century anthropologist Carleton Coon, whose works DT seems to hate with a passion. I would be glad of some input, since DT keeps quoting WP:RS regarding Coon. It is worth nothing that some editors do treat Coon as a current "reliable source" on racial categories (see Nordic race for example). This is problematic to say the least, but the issue concerns inclusion of his work in accounts of the history of racial theories, as for example on the Australoid article. DT seems to want to delete all reference to the history of the theory (except, oddly Thomas Huxley) on the grounds that early theorists are not Reliable Sources. As far as I am concerned this is as barmy as deleting all references to Aristotle in accounts of the history of physics or biology, because Aristotle is no longer a reliable source on these subjects. Paul B 15:01, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
For articles about web topics, many of the most reliable sources are published online. Online magazines often call themselves "blogs," even though they have paid editors and reporters. We should not be biased by the publication media; our criteria should be editorial review and fact checking.
We do allow self-published sources for experts commenting in their field of expertise. We also allow self-published sources as primary references. As such web forums and personal blogs can sometimes be reliable sources, in some situations.
My concern is two-fold: (1) Can we improve our policies and guidelines so people understand these fine distinctions? (2) User:SandyGeorgia suggested that I start a thread here to draw more attention to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Search engine optimization, a situation that needs comments on the reliability of online sources. There is a concern about promoting this article to WP:FA because it relies on web sources, but those are the best available sources for this topic. How do we resolve this? Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 16:03, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
whilst the strict "no blogs" rules are laudable, especially since it prevents linking to blogs that were set up last thursday (and are then never updated), this rule falls apart when we are dealing with the early blogs which now have 5 year (or more) archives. since a lot of political discussion is happening on the blogs right now, then to ignore the impact of blogs is a weakness in wikipedia entries. For if a story breaks on a blog and then ends up in the MSM, the wiki narrative only shows the MSM "reliable source" and not the blog that broke the story. Maybe , rather than the "no blogs" rule, might we have a "age rule" , where only blogs that have consistent archives going back 5 years are considered as a ref links? It is a difficult one to square I admit - as this could open up the floodgates and break the NPOV attitude of wikipedia. But it is becoming increasingly hard to ignore. What do others think about this? Joflaitheamhain 21:20, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
We could use a weigh in at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/University High School (Los Angeles, California).
The article in question is protected after an edit war and we're now attempting to get consensus on whether or not school newspaper articles are RS. Until such a time... Miss Mondegreen talk 00:42, May 24 2007 (UTC)
I'm involved in a dispute over whether any, all, or none of the following sources can be considered reliable. Any comments or opinions are appreciated. - Crockspot 17:10, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
WorldNetDaily is famous for having a heavy bias, and they have a tendency to report stories not picked up anywhere else. I'd try to find a second source to corroborate anything they post in less inflammatory terms. Night Gyr ( talk/ Oy) 15:19, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
Per #A reliable source committee?, and to answer questions just as that above, I would like to create Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard, where editors could post questions about whether given source(s) are reliable, and editors interested in reliability would answer. In essence it would be a non-binding RfC for reliability and a place to gather all discussions about specific sources, freeing this talk page to more theoretical discussions.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk 17:23, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
This useful page - linked from here - seems partially forgotten, and has no clear status, I have labelled it with 'proposed'. See also my comments at relevant discussion page.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk 17:30, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
Do not include the "tag" characters "<" and ">" in your comments. I just archived a piece of this page and those characters were in it, and totally whacked out Wiki when followed by something I suppose vaguely looked like a command or ambiguous expression. Well by "totally whacked-out" I just mean it cut off the rest of the page and threw-up some weird error in the text body. Wjhonson 14:57, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
Do we consider Conservapedia a WP:RS? I've noticed it's been used in some articles (e.g., [6] [7]). My instinct tells me a tertiary source -- especially one that is self-declared as having a non-neutral point of view -- should not be considered a RS for objective information. Raymond Arritt 00:53, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
Is al Jazeera considered a reliable source? Thanks in advance, -- Samiharris 16:50, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
Al Jazeera is seed funded by the Emir of Qatar how does that make it "reliable" over an individuals blog? Is it the case that Al Jazeera just has more money pumped into it over the individuals zero-cost blog, so therefore money infusion makes it more "reliable"? In other words , being a bilionaire buys you "reliabilty" on wikipedia?
Another question: What about using the Opie & Anthony radio show, in the context of the "Criticism" section of Tucker Max?-- Samiharris 18:13, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
Due to the conflict in Sri Lanka, we often experience edit wars centered around the reliability of Sri Lanka related sources. Earlier this year, Wikipedia:WikiProject Sri Lanka Reconciliation started a section Classification of sources, which was largely respected across the spectrum of Sri Lanka related editors. Since these were only recommendations, it was inevitable that some day some editors would ignore them. This happened lately, which lead to a long, fruitless discussion on WP:ANI#Removal of RS sources. I pointed that discussion here because I believe this talk page is a more appropriate place for deciding if sources are reliable. — Sebastian 18:07, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I propose to split the problem in two (or more) parts:
This guideline distinguishes two kinds of sources: Reliable and unreliable sources. For Sri Lanka conflict related sources, unfortunately, this distinction is often practically impossible. The reliability of many sources is constantly under dispute between the two factions. Compliant with the Wikipedia policy for Attributing and substantiating biased statements, the members of Wikipedia:WikiProject Sri Lanka Reconciliation therefore decided unanimously to recommend a third option, which was called "Qualified Source" (QS). This option allows citing QS only with explicit attribution and an agreed qualification, such as "The pro-rebel Tamilnet.com reports that ..." ( see details). This has been successfully implemented in many articles. However, the problem is that it is not an official WP guideline, so there are some editors who only respect this recommendation when it fits their partisan agenda.
Therefore, I hope that QS can become a guideline for Sri Lanka conflict related articles. — Sebastian 19:34, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Thank you, these are good points. In particular, I agree with the point of the Al-Qaeda and Nazi examples that sources can be reliable, but biased. I now realize that the concept of QS as we defined it may not be optimal because it lumped together reliability and bias, and we may need to distinguish between the two. However, this distinction opens a new dimension of complexity. Few cases are so black/white as Al-Qaeda and Mein Kampf. To stay with the example of Nazi Germany, and to illustrate the other extreme: Suppose, it's 1944. The Nazis successfully fooled the world. Suppose, a Jewish organization had published detailed reports of concentration camps, and one of our editors quoted from that. The Nazis, of course, would denounce the Jewish organization as "biased". Would we have to remove that information?
But let's move away from Nazi Germany, which was an extreme case. There is a wide range of uncertainty between these extreme examples, which probably is part of why we saw continuous edit wars (at least until we we defined QS). WP:RS curently does not address this dimension, so we need to spend some thought about how and where to draw the line. I now lean towards only allowing reliable sources, but distinguishing between:
The experience of SL conflict related articles shows that that would work as a guideline. I don't think we need to explicitly specify certain contexts of applicability; that was never a point of contention in the conflicts so far. (Presumably because it would be strange to contest a claim such as "party X killed civilians of party Y" with the argument that it's not pertinent to an article about terrorism and massacres.) — Sebastian 05:38, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I believe Tamilnet is a reliable source and it does not violate WP:RS because it has
But it is also a biased source hence , it should be used with attribution. Following are the views of 3 neutral editors about this news site.
Thanks Taprobanus 17:44, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
In response to Taprobanus' points, the People's Daily also satisfies 1 and 2. In respect to 4, many things that are not RS are used as primary sources by all sorts of reputable information. Otherwise where do all the journalists get all their leaked CIA reports, cabinet reports etc from...from backroom bureaucrats leaking bits and pieces. These guys do not then become reliable of their own accord. Blnguyen ( bananabucket) 01:03, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
As far as ANI goes, there is consensus by "neutral editors" that it is not RS. By neutral you obviously mean to exclude people from the ethnicities involved in the SL conflict(Sinhalese and Tamil). If that's what you want, then the only person who wants these websites is FayssalF. For those who think that these are lobby groups, we have Y, Dineshkannambadi, Sarvagnya, Nishkid64, Blnguyen, Sir Nick who are not of the conflicting parties. Blnguyen ( bananabucket) 01:03, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Tamilnet is not only partisan but it is invalid as a source for wikipedia purposes because it is not even a bonafide news service or website( flimsy pdfs that prove nothing notwithstanding). It is claimed that it has an editor and editorial board, but we arent told who they are. Nor has anybody demonstrated that they are affiliated to any 'official' press bodies and the like. In other words, I am not sure if we should be putting all 'partisan' sources in one basket.
For example, Times of India may be biased in some cases... they even have plagiarised from Wikipedia(Blnguyen's own content).. they are loved and they are hated.. but at the end of the day, we cannot wish them away as a bonafide source. They have editors and journalists accredited by relevant press bodies working for them and all the right affiliations. So we can be sure that there are checks and balances. We can be sure that they are held accountable by someone somewhere. Same with FOX. And CNN. And BBC and The Hindu, Deccan Herald(all of which have covered the Sri Lankan conflict and are as neutral as neutral can be in the affair). The same cannot be said of Tamilnet. Tell me, what is the difference between Tamilnet/tamilnation etc., and the random blog? Yes.. tnet and tnation may get a gazillion hits. But that can only make them " notable" not " RS"
Another reason why tnet and tnation are useless as sources for wikipedia is because, they blog about nothing but Tamil. Tamil-this, tamil-that, tamil, tamil, tamil. Nothing else. And afa Tamil is concerned, we dont believe them. Period. Not even with truckloads of salt. Is there anything other than Tamil related stuff on those blogs that we could salvage? I looked. But I didnt find any! Sarvagnya 06:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
(reply to sarvagnya) We are not synthesizing the source. What I have written is verbatim reproduction of independent research. Not my research. OTOH, all your points are baseless claims without any attribution. Praveen 15:12, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
been critized by LTTE. The argument that Tamilnet covers story from "Tamil Eelam" does not make in not RS.
(unindenting) I don't think anyone would doubt that the sources argued over above are biassed; one of the open secrets of jounralism is that all newspapers, radio, television & internet sources are biassed to some degree. The trick is whether a given source will overcome their innate bias sufficiently enough to report the truth -- even if it unfavorable to them.
The problem is that in many parts of the world, the reporting is (to put it one way) polemical: if the truth isn't good enough, the reporters are "encouraged" to improve on the truth. There aren't any reporters who could observe, report what they see, & get it splashed over the front pages of every newspaper in Europe & North America in these parts of the world. So we end up with accounts where one party claims one thing, & the opposing party claims its complete opposite: one -- or both -- of these two sources is obviously lying. This is where NPOV comes into play: we report what both parties say (on the assumption that even a blind pig finds the occasional acorn), & leave it to the reader to figure out the truth. (And if a better source comes along to present an account that more accurately rflects the truth, hopefully there will be an editor with the skill & wisdom to integrate this POV into the article.) -- llywrch 02:12, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
Take the debate elsewhere please... the consensus on this page is that Tamilnet IS essentially reliable. Whether it violates NPOV, or some other issue is to be debated in other forums. Further arguments for and against are getting tiresome and will not lead to any additional resolution. Blueboar 16:52, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
To be honest, I no longer care... as long as there is consensus, great... go follow it. My point was: take it elsewhere. Blueboar 19:54, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
(unindent)Blueboar - There is no need to take it anywhere else. And blueboar, dont simply keep repeating that there is a consensus that tnet and other such sites are reliable. There is NO such consensus either here or on ANI. On the contrary, there IS a consensus that they are NOT reliable sources.
tnet is a self styled news service with no affiliations and no accountability. It is an out and out advocacy site. Its views are radically different not just from those of the SriLankan government, but also other 'definitely' RS sources like BBC. For example, neither the BBC nor the mainstream Indian media or any respectable news source uses terms like "genocide", "ethnic cleansing" etc., to describe what is happening in SriLanka. Tamilnet and its clones on the other hand use such terms 'matter of factly' all the time. And what are the credentials of those running these sites? We dont even know who the editor is. Tamilnation, for example is run by one of the terrorists' lawyers who says on his site that "he bows his head humbly to those leaders"(sic).
The question here is not of NPOV at all for us to take it to WT:NPOV. NPOV is established by using reliable sources. You dont bring NPOV to a USA vs Bin Laden article by citing some pamphlet by Taliban or some other Islamist fundamentalist group. Some people here are talking as if NPOV can be used as an alibi to circumvent RS! No. RS is non-negotiable. Whatever NPOV you want to achieve in the article will have to be sourced from RSes. And a source doesnt become RS simply because they have a slick website or a high traffic website. A non-RS is non-RS even if it got a billion hits a day.
In the case of the Sri Lankan conflict, though the Sri Lankan military cannot be taken as totally unbiased, their site is a RS(simply because they are a bonafide organisation whose owners(the SL govt.,) is accountable to fora such as the SAARC and UN). So, if editors use the SriLankan military site as a source, in the interest of NPOV, I'd expect them to a) filter the 'commentary' out b) double check what a 'neutral' source like BBC or Reuters or The Hindu or Indian Express says about the issue and factor it in while writing the article. That is the way to achieve NPOV. Not by citing propaganda pamphlets and advocacy sites and claiming that you're 'balancing' it! Sarvagnya 21:05, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
I'm pretty sure that reliable, published sources are necessitated for compliance with WP:V ("Articles should contain only material that has been published by reliable sources.") and WP:NOR ("Articles should only contain verifiable content from reliable sources without further analysis."), but the question of what constitutes a reliable source is left up to guidelines to decide. I think the lede of this piece should be changed to point out that reliable sources are mandatory, though this is only a guideline on what constitutes one. Am I missing something? Night Gyr ( talk/ Oy) 15:38, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
Is there any possibilty of there being made a list of sites that are "unreliable", thus making it a rule not to use them? What I'm aiming at is that many history-related articles are propaganda-infested by sites with a clear inclination towards Historical revisionism, far right attitutes and so on. As it stands, anyone can simply write some massacre didn't happen and then link to a far right source that confirms that claim. Shouldn't there be a mechanism to prevent this? - The Spanish Inquisitor 09:14, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
I had occasion to cite a public records database of Los Angeles County as a source. Another editor reverted this with the comment "Database searches are not reliable sources; as I said, we need something that is not ephemeral." The database is an official public record; that's how the county publishes business license information. Are public records databases reliable sources? -- John Nagle 18:40, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
John Nagle has misstated the issue; the issue was original research, as was plainly stated many times - the edits summaries were consistently "remove original research", e.g. [11] [12], and I said the same in the Talk: page comments: [13] True, in my final comment I accidentally used the phrase "reliable source" rather than "original research", but the issue has been clear from the start. It's baffling why John would try to present the issue this way now. Jayjg (talk) 23:15, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
The relevant discussion is at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New York City Public Transportation#Fact Checking on Station Opening Dates. http://nycsubway.org/ has opening dates for all stations, but many of them are incorrect. Can it be cited for other stations where we don't have another source? -- NE2 22:48, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
I recently tried to trace down the sources of some dubious statements in an area that I know something about -- the history of medieval astronomy. After spending some time on line, searching the bibliographies, and getting books at the library, I identified what seems to be a common factor underlying such dubious claims.
These dubious claims tend to cite tertiary sources written by people with little historical expertise -- sometimes web-based articles, sometimes popular printed books, sometimes books and articles published by little known publishing houses and journals. The replies to the claims tend to be by qualified historians and usually appear in well respected, extensively documented books and articles published by well known publishing houses and scholarly journals with well-established reputations.
The key here is that we can find an indicator of the dominant scholarly opinion by comparing the quality of the rival sources. What I'm getting at is that when there's nothing better, we have to rely on whatever sources are available. However, when there is disagreement among the sources, the "best sources" carry more weight. At some times we can even use the "best sources" to justify dismissing the fringe point of view presented in sources of lesser quality that might formally qualify as "reliable sources".
Shouldn't this article -- or a related one -- address the concept that meeting some technical standard of reliability isn't always an adequate criterion for inclusion? There are a lot of sources out there; we're writing an encyclopedia; so we should use the best available sources. -- SteveMcCluskey 01:43, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
I have seen a similar problem as to what Steve describes in articles on the Greco-Roman world, which I have a bit of background in. There used to be quite good descriptions of primary, secondary, and tertiary sources here in WP:RS that have been moved to WP:NOR. It strikes me, however, that WP:NOR aims at quite a different thing: excluding the loopy, weird, and/or novel. But the emphasis here should be on having a resource that helps us educate editors about how to make articles better. semper fictilis 13:38, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Don't use MySpace as a source redirects here, but there's nothing in the guideline that says so directly. Could this be changed? -- SatyrTN ( talk | contribs) 03:48, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
This would be covered by WP:V#Self-published and questionable sources in articles about themselves, the last of the criteria listed being the kicker in this case. - Crockspot 03:00, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
I think we're going to need to develop some specific policy on this, per llywrch. MySpace has a mechanism to allow celebrities to thwart impersonators, but I haven't noticed any system by which outsiders can confirm the supposed celebrity is who they say they are. That's only half of a proper editorial overview, one that allows insiders to know about themselves, but preventing outsiders from being able to rely on claims. Could we, as an 800-lb (400-kg) Internet gorilla, ask MySpace to provide a confirmation mechanism, like an on-page seal that they (not the user) control, or a central list of identity-confirmed users, that outsiders can use? This would be a win-win-win, since it would increase the confidence outside sources have in (some parts of) MySpace, protect the celebrities, and probably be highly desired by the MySpace community. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 10:49, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Is Newsmax considered a reliable source? I'm not familiar with them. They've been used in some articles, and whenever I've followed up the references their coverage often is strongly slanted. Raymond Arritt 02:45, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
Are BBC, CNN, New York Times etc. 'reliable sources'? Because the evidence shows them to be unvarnished liars when the Establishment demands it (the killer point being that they contradict *their own reports* when this becomes politically necessary)
One glaring example: http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/milospeech.htm
PS, I'm being slightly facetious in my question -- I know full well what the conventional answer is, but I think it sucks (and is inaccurate) that Wikipedia gives Establishment media a 'carte blanche' for accuracy.
Mind you, I can probably predict a response that *not* to do so would open a 'can of worms' -- there probably is something to this, but I think it ought to be brought to people's attention that, as is shown by the above article, Establishment sources are not always reliable sources.
Cheers everyone -- feel free to discuss this issue on my talk page if this isn't an appropriate forum. Jonathanmills 14:10, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
At La Toya Jackson ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), Rhythmnation2004 ( talk · contribs) added a bunch of awards and accomplishments for La Toya Jackson (see this edit) with the sources being a bunch of scans and photos to Imageshack. How does this stand in terms of reliable sources? I removed them because I don't feel that they are too reliable, especially since you can barely read some of the awards in the photos. In my opinion, these are not reliable sources and that these statements should be sourced with some sort of news coverage or press release of the organization giving the award that states she received it. Thoughts? Metros 13:44, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
If you want to have some fun cleaning up an article, take a look at the "references" at the Royal Rife article! -- Fyslee/ talk 12:29, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
I just removed the following sentence "When sourcing, be careful not to attribute a statement to a source that may have itself originally taken the same information from Wikipedia (either with or without acknowledgement). This applies especially to self-authored third-party websites;" the sentence was recently added by anon IP 86.136.194.161 without any discussion on this page. While I agree with the sentiment, I have no idea how an editor is supposed to avoid this "circular sourcing," so I think the sentence obfusctates more than it clarifies. Any efforts at a clearer guideline are welcome. UnitedStatesian 13:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
-- Ksyrie( Talkie talkie) 05:13, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
I assume you are asking if an op-ed collumn is reliable. It is reliable - with the following caution: an op-ed collumnist is writing his or her opinion on matters, and not necessarily a factual article. So, any citation to such a collumn should be expressed as the author's opinion and not as pure fact. It is best to attribute statements the collumnist makes... example: "According to New York Times collumnist Thomas Freedman..." Blueboar 18:37, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Lots of fancy flags have already been deleted, but the problem has surfaced again. Image:GokturkFlag.png is taken from an unreferenced Flags of the World page purporting to depict flags of the "Sixteen Great Turkish Empires", the vast majority of which are fanciful and uncited. No scholarly reference is given for this flag. I have a hefty monograph on the Gokturks which mentions in passim that the war standard of the Gokturks contained the image of the golden she-wolf, but this data is not referenced as well. Briangotts nominated the image for deletion on Wikipedia:Images and media for deletion/2007 June 11. The discussion has been inconclusive so far, but User:Quadell suddenly removed the ifd tag from the image with the edit summary "not deleted", claiming on his talk page that the picture is "sourced". I would welcome input from those people who understand our RS policy better than I do. -- Ghirla -трёп- 14:26, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Government documents (e.g., court filings) often are not easily accessible from their official sources, but may be available second-hand from web pages that discuss related topics. What's the view on convenience links to such sites? And what if the web site has a point of view on the matter? Even in the latter case, I'd think it would be unlikely that anyone sane would forge legal documents given the legal liabilities of doing so. In case anyone is wondering the specific matter I'm interested in is here. Raymond Arritt 20:04, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
Some Roman Catholics say AlterNet is not a reliable source and keep reverting edits. What do you think? --BMF81
We continue to have a lot of questions of the "is X a reliable source?" variety... and in the vast majority of cases these have been answered with ... "it is reliable for a citation to back a statement of opinion, but not a statement of fact" Often advising the editor to include a text attribution as in "According to noted person Y: 'quote of Y's opinion'<citation to where Y says it>". It would be very helpful to have a section in the guideline that discusses this "grey zone" of reliability (with an example or two) that we could point to in answering such questions. Thoughts? Blueboar 12:48, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
A sentence used to say:
Wikipedia relies heavily upon the established literature created by scientists, scholars and researchers around the world. Items that fit this criterion are usually considered reliable. However, they may be outdated by more recent research, or controversial in the sense that there are alternative scholarly explanations. Wikipedia articles should point to all major scholarly interpretations of a topic.
After this edit by SlimVirgin, with the edit summary "tidied writing, removed bits that made little sense or stated the obvious", the meaning is very different:
Wikipedia relies in part on material written by scientists, scholars, and researchers around the world. These may be outdated by more recent research, or may controversial in the sense that there are alternative scholarly and non-scholarly treatments. Wikipedia articles should therefore ideally rely on all majority and significant-minority treatments of a topic, scholarly and non-scholarly, so long as the sources are reliable.
Do we really need the "non-scholarly" part? I think scholarly treatments should always outweigh non-scholarly ones. A "significant minority" (who decides how significant it needs to be?), or even a majority could say anything, and be opposed to anything that modern science has established. Dinosaurs did not evolve, they were created on the sixth day; blacks are born criminals; Sumerian evolved from Ukrainian; Hitler was really a nice man; alligators dwell in New York City's sewers. The "so long as the sources are reliable" bit doesn't help that much, because the current definition of "reliable" only requires that the author should be "generally regarded as trustworthy" or "authoritative" (if "generally regarded" means "regarded by everybody", the criterion is unsatisfiable, if it means "regarded by most", it is unfalsifiable). The "peer-reviewed" criterion was a lot easier to apply. -- Anonymous44 14:43, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
Blueboar, could you give me an example of these "knowledgable and highly reliable sources" who were not academics? Anyway, I can see how mainstream media, investigative journalists etc. are or may be reliable sources, but I think this should be restricted. The current wording explicitly endorses non-scholarly views when they contradict the scholarly ones. It's on the verge of saying: "You and your group may not like the mainstream scholarly treatment/view about something. Feel free to add an alternative non-scholarly treatment/view that suits you better, provided that you find its author trustworthy." My impression is that "alternative non-scholarly treatments/views", aka cranks, are among the greatest dangers for Wikipedia's reliability. -- Anonymous44 21:07, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
I disagree strongly with this rewrite and am disturbed that it occurred with no discussion and such a misleading edit summary. I propose the more accurate version:
Does this sound reasonable? TimVickers 02:44, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't want to get much involved in this discussion, but it seems to me that this page has two signficant problems. First, it should somewhere acknowledged that articles can always be improved with regard to their sourcing. Second (and more importantly), it probably aims at something that is not realistic: a single guideline about sourcing for all subjects. It seems to me obvious that the rules about what sources are best for an article about the Peloponnesian War will be completely different from those on abortion or pokemon or Hillary Clinton. Now, I think scholarly-vs.-none-scholarly is not a helpful division when in comes to Hillary--sourcing will be main-stream-media and opinions are those of notable commentators. But for the Peloponnesian War, we should be able to aim for peer-reviewed history articles and books in university presses, a standard that would be completely unrealistic for pokemon articles. I have no concrete plan of action, but I wonder whether WP:RS shouldn't be blown into a dozen different guidelines: one for ancient history, another for popular culture, another for contemporary politics, etc., etc. semper fictilis 04:02, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Many good points. I've made the following revision in attempt to take these into account:
Clarifications, corrections, etc. of course welcome. Thanks to all for thoughtful discussion of this important topic. Raymond Arritt 13:42, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I've shortened this a little, and removed the restatement of WP:UNDUE, which is unnecessary - we don't need to highlight one other policy to follow as we should follow all the other policies. TimVickers 13:57, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't much likes "wikipedia welcomes". How about "The best articles rely on material published…"? semper fictilis 14:04, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
In many technical fields the academic journals only cover leading edge technology. These scholarly journals are unlikely to report on the early commercial products that used this technology. The technical trade press, manufacturer's brochures and product service manuals, taken together, are reliable sources in tracing the history of a technology's introduction to the real world. What did a typical mini computer cost in 1970? What was the feature set? What types of semiconductors were used? Who was the leading supplier? This is the history of engineering and science, not popular culture or current events.
Moore's Law was published in Electronics, a trade magazine, not a peer review journal. Does someone want the tag the article as having dubious sources? -- SWTPC6800 19:50, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Version 1
Version 2
I like the second version better, but I disagree with its assertion that scholarly sources cannot be found for "popular culture". There is good, scholarly material out there about all sorts of popular culture, and we shouldn't imply that there isn't. Therefore, I have no !vote. — Brian ( talk) 04:52, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't particularly like either. But I think they both miss important points. Anyone can call himself a scholar or researcher. The practical test is whether other scholars think you are one or are writing scholarly level material . They overemphasize the place that something is published - saying that the most reliable material is ... published in peer-reviewed journals and academic presses implicitly belittles works not found there. Again a better test is whether the person or theory is taken seriously in such places. Examples of non-academics in the sciences who are taken seriously by academia are Julian Barbour and James Lovelock. A major category of exception is journalists who write academic level works e.g. reviewed in scholarly journals and used as standard histories - e.g. the late Ze'ev Schiff "just a journalist" writing on Arab-Israeli conflict, who often wrote histories with another journalist Ehud Ya'ari. It is hard to think of any scholar of the subject who was more respected across the board. John Z 09:14, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
We have to move this discussion to Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability. That's the policy page; this one isn't. Note that every attempt to change the wording based on what's decided here is being summarily reverted, because it conflicts with WP:Verifiability. And when anyone tries to change WP:V, it's summarily reverted because the discussion was here, not there (which is reasonable). So the discussion has to be moved to Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability or we're simply wasting our time. Raymond Arritt 12:54, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
The discussion above has been useful, but Wikipedia:Verifiability is the actual policy page. It's disconcerting that the words "peer reviewed" appear nowhere on that policy page, much less the relevant merits of peer-reviewed and non-peer reviewed sources. To all who have been involved in this discussion, shall we continue continue at Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability? Raymond Arritt 01:49, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
Is there a tag similar to the [citation needed] tag that can be placed inline in the article when a more reliable source is needed? Wrad 16:29, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
There used to be a template "betterfact". It might be useful to read the WP:TFD discussion and see if those concerns can be addressed. Gimmetrow 07:04, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
I added a new section to this page: Frequently used sources that do not qualify as reliable. Feel free to edit it, improve on it, or remove it and discuss it here. Cheers. Sala Skan 11:14, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
Something like that. Most people don't know what is and isn't reliable. We should explain it. This is just a start. Wrad 15:49, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
The idea of including wikiprojects is a good idea. But in practical terms how do we see this developing? Presumably the guidelines will develop on a wikiproject page or subpage. But once it reaches consensus, how would it be linked back to WP:RS? semper fictilis 12:45, 24 June 2007 (UTC)