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Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 350

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Latest comment: 1 year ago by Fishnagles in topic Allsides.com media bias chart, revisited
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Is Garden.org reliable

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

I am not sure if Garden.org is reliable because they have an edit link above the info. SVcode(Talk) 01:24, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

It looks like a multi-user blog, or basically the equivalent of that. It might be a wiki too. Unreliable in either case. WIKINIGHTS talk 02:01, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Nope, it's a Wiki. Anyone can register an account and edit. As a result it's not reliable as a source. Canterbury Tail talk 21:41, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

Perseus Digital Library

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion

is the website considered as a reliable source here? a good part of their articles seem to be from outdated sources. 176.54.42.186 (talk) 16:21, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

They just host, like many other such sites we would judge the book, not the hoster.Slatersteven (talk) 16:30, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
but some of its articles do not have any sources/authors - just short paragraphes. 176.54.42.186 (talk) 16:40, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
Then we would look at it and say "that article is not an RS".Slatersteven (talk) 16:44, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

WP:NDTV

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments3 people in discussion

I know it doesn't exist, but I want Wikipedia to create NDTV as a reliable source here Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources. --2409:4061:2D46:D1C1:2968:8E8B:BE20:71BF (talk) 14:56, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

Why? Do we use it? And who are they?Slatersteven (talk) 15:00, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Results 1 – 20 of 10,993
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?search=insource%3A%22ndtv.com%22&title=Special:Search&profile=advanced&fulltext=1&ns0=1 2409:4061:2D46:D1C1:2968:8E8B:BE20:71BF (talk) 15:08, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
So has it been challenged?Slatersteven (talk) 15:12, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
NDTV is one of the major news sources in the world's biggest democracy. A clue to its role as mainstream media that sometimes gently criticises the government, like NYT/BBC/Guardian/CNN, is the pair of sentences in NDTV, With the ascendancy of Narendra Modi to the premiership of India, advertisers with NDTV began to be pressurised to disassociate with the company and an array of litigations were initiated against the company.[68] The government pressure against the news broadcaster was seen as part of a wider pattern of attacks on media freedom in the country.[68][69][70] The sources are NYT, Al Jazeera English, and Deutsche Welle, so that gives a reasonable spectrum of generally accepted RS. Of course, "mainstream" media doesn't necessarily mean "reliable". The issue of whether any source is reliable should ideally come from the peer-reviewed literature. A fallback is consensus among Wikipedians' opinions. If there's no dispute on a source, I don't see a need to give it an entry in the perennial sources table. There's no need to overburden an already imperfect process. Boud (talk) 21:34, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

"You live where?" (iUniverse)

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments4 people in discussion

You Live Where? - Interesting and Unusual Facts about where We Live from self-publishing house iUniverse appears in about 150 articles as a source for "(placename) has been noted for its unusual place name" with a link to a raw multi-page list of names. This is clearly an unacceptable source, but I wanted to get some input from others before doing a mass removal. –dlthewave ☎ 19:27, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

Here is what we have to say about the printer/publisher. IUniverse. As self published material it is not reliable. —¿philoserf? (talk) 21:35, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
I think you know the answer here. Clearly not a reliable source. Canterbury Tail talk 21:45, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Support removal. I'm familiar with this situation, and yes, the inclusion is essentially meaningless because it's a list with no context in a crappy source. Hog Farm Talk 22:56, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

Is meetcrete.com a RS for El Greco's supposed birthplace and a nearby chapel?

Latest comment: 3 years ago8 comments5 people in discussion

The El Greco article has a photo of a chapel in Fodele with the caption:

Chapel opposite the museum, next to birthplace of El Greco, Fodele, Crete, Greece

with two footnotes referring to meetcrete.com.

There are several problems here (already mentioned in Talk):

  • Meetcrete is a self-published site as documented on the site itself.
  • The only source (so far) for a connection between El Greco and this chapel is on this site.
  • Even if we accept that as a source, the site is repeating hearsay, things that the museum guard said to the writer.
  • Even if we believe the hearsay, the museum guard's claim is based on anonymous "scientists from Spain", with no documentation.
  • Even if we accept that this is the chapel the being referred to, the only claim is that he "grew up in [its] shadow".
  • The body of the article reports that it is in dispute whether El Greco was born in Iraklion or in Fodele. A photo caption shouldn't contradict the article.

Thanks, --Macrakis (talk) 20:03, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

  • I'm opposed to inclusion, at present. The onus here is on those arguing for retention to bring reliable sources confirming the claim. Ceoil (talk) 21:04, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
  • No. Weak source for a dubious conclusion; should be removed from article. Hog Farm Talk 22:55, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
    • For what its worth and out of respect for this small town there are other potential inclusions:[2], [3], [4], all essentially saying it's El Greco's hometown...Modernist (talk) 23:29, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
      • All three of those are simply stock photo websites, so I'm not sure that I'd call those particularly strong, either. Hog Farm Talk 23:55, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
        • None of them are strong; they certainly are not the NY Times, but IMO they are valid, and out of respect, I think the image of either the museum or the Chapel should be included in the El Greco article...Modernist (talk) 00:17, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
          • I'm not sure what you mean by "valid". They are far from reliable sources in the WP sense. And I don't understand at all what you mean by "respect" -- we are not obligated to defer to the wishes of the tourist promotion committee of Fodele. On the other hand, a picture of the museum is fine -- it is unquestionably a museum devoted to El Greco, whether Fodele was his birthplace or not. --Macrakis (talk) 19:20, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
  • No, definitely not. It's a personal website intended to promote the island, so even if we allowed it it would clearly be WP:BIASED in regards to any statements it makes that plays up Crete's significance; but even beyond that, as a WP:SPS I think this would fall under unduly self-serving, meaning we can't cite it to them at all. --Aquillion (talk) 00:22, 15 August 2021 (UTC)

Unreliable journal used by reliable government agency

Latest comment: 3 years ago6 comments3 people in discussion

Hi everyone. In this edit I've added a Norwegian government report. It's a report by the Norwegian Scientific Committee for Food Safety in response to a research assignment by the Norwegian Food Safety Authority. That's pretty typical government business for those two bodies. However it was published in a Sciencedomains journal, which is apparently on Beall's list. Thoughts? Invasive Spices (talk) 21:41, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

This is WP:SOURCE FRUIT, so no, it's not reliable. (I'm assuming you are correct that the journal is unreliable.) {{u|Sdkb}} talk 23:22, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Ok but that's the opposite of the situation here. The original source of the info is the good part here. Invasive Spices (talk) 17:00, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
    Sorry, I misunderstood, and am still not entirely clear—if the original source is reliable, then why not just cite the original source rather than going through an unreliable intermediary? {{u|Sdkb}} talk 20:10, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
    Both sciencedomain.com and sciencedomains.com are listed at the poorly maintained git repository list of predatory journals (Beall's list is not maintained; one or more volunteers are needed to maintain the git repository list - e.g. propose, consense and implement a sustainable procedure for adding/removing entries). The formal publication at the apparently predatory publisher says outright that the "publication" is grey literature, which consists of "materials and research produced by organizations outside of the traditional commercial or academic publishing and distribution channels".
    It's clear that the sciencedomain.com "paper" is really just a long abstract - which contains the URL of the real report. I propose that you use the actual URL: https://vkm.no/download/18.2994e95b15cc54507161387c/1498130953747/Assessment%20of%20antimicrobial%20resistance%20in%20the%20food%20chains%20in%20Norway.pdf and its archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210814205315/https://vkm.no/download/18.2994e95b15cc54507161387c/1498130953747/Assessment%20of%20antimicrobial%20resistance%20in%20the%20food%20chains%20in%20Norway.pdf . It won't count as peer-reviewed, but as Sdkb says, it's the original source from a generally reliable governmental type agency (keeping in mind that the government agencies of some countries tend to be more reliable than those of others, statistically relating to the RSF Press Freedom Index, which rates Norway as very free; Norway's SARS-CoV-2 counts show no sign of missing noise: Zenodo: 4765705, PeerJ, 2021, in press). Boud (talk) 21:09, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

New York Times

Latest comment: 3 years ago10 comments10 people in discussion
No support for this proposal. starship.paint (exalt) 14:44, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I know Wikipedians consider Nytimes as a reliable source.

But for some time they are coming in support of terrorists, so it should not be used as a neutral source in Asia related articles, where they show bias for Islamists.

I am not saying that, all NYtimes sources should be removed.

  1. https://nypost.com/2019/09/11/new-york-times-deletes-tweet-saying-airplanes-took-aim-at-towers-on-9-11/ New York Times deletes tweet saying ‘airplanes took aim’ at towers on 9/11
  3. New York Times gives voice to Taliban. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/20/opinion/taliban-afghanistan-war-haqqani.html. Those editors who will defend the above article, will never defend an opinion piece published in dailymail "What we- Ku Klax Klan" want.
  5. This article is like jealous of China's medal tally, and USA's medal list is decreasing due to China. . "The Chinese Sports Machine’s Single Goal: The Most Golds, at Any Cost China relies on a system that puts tens of thousands of children in government-run training schools. Many of the young athletes are funneled into less prominent sports that Beijing hopes to dominate." www.nytimes.com/2021/07/29/world/asia/china-olympics.html
  7. The New York Times Company will consider qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local "Fair Chance" laws. https://nytimes.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NYT/job/Washington-DC/Domestic-Correspondent_REQ-010181-1

Some editors will say, there is freedom of media in USA. Freedom doesn't mean that NYtimes will support terrorists and criminals. 2409:4061:2E8E:11B3:980B:14BE:5C6A:CD3C (talk) 05:56, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

#1 is just the NYPost being itself. It's a one-off oddity on social media. #2 (I haven't read) is surprising, but can be considered a primary source. They have labeled it as opinion. #3 is legitimate journalism. A slight bias does not invalidate a source. For #4, a misdemeanor does not suddenly make one a poor journalist. Perhaps they are just complying with laws. WIKINIGHTS talk 07:10, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Nonsense, none of this indicates "support for terrorists and criminals" whatever that means nor does it have anything to do with reliability. Tayi Arajakate Talk 07:46, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
I'd have to concur here with posters. What matters in RSP is not advocacy for a certain group as much as factual accuracy.
I'll add my two cents to this:
ad 2. Any newspaper has freedom to give platform to whoever chooses to submit the opinion pieces, and we might not know the story behind it (was it connected with some death threat, for example?) Even if there is none, opinion pieces do not determine RSP quality. If Proud Boys decided to publish a piece in Weekly Standard, well, so be it if it wasn't a regular fixture. Neither is Taliban in NYT.
3 is, as was said, legitimate journalism.
ad 4: It seems to be the law in NYS, see § 296 section 15. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 11:18, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

My thoughts: 1) the NY Post has a known history of sensationalizing minor events and making a large fuss over trivial things; likely just a social media oddity. 2) opinion piece, shouldn't be treated as RS, so long as they aren't publishing this regularly I don't think its a bad sign 3) legitimate journalism 4) standard practice for most US businesses that don't work around children or high-risk materials. Hog Farm Talk 14:14, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

  • Is OP suggesting that companies shouldn’t people with criminal histories? I would note that the courts in the US have generally found discriminating against a whole class of people like that to be reprehensible. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:30, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
  • I propose closing this thread as frivolous, —PaleoNeonate – 19:31, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
  • The New York Times is reliable, period. That their tweeter at twitter (not the New York Times, maybe an intern) tweeted something that had to be corrected is not an issue at all. The source we look at is the Times, not Twitter. Publishing the Taliban is not a problem either.--Hippeus (talk) 13:44, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Many companies will consider applicants with various types of criminal histories. If someone got convicted for "minor in possession of alcohol" at 19, and is now 38 and hasn't gotten in any more trouble, why should that disqualify them from employment somewhere like the NYT? So far as the idea of "terrorism", the NYT did in fact publish the Unabomber manifesto, unedited: [5], so it certainly has printed material written by US domestic terrorists, not just foreign ones, and some such things will be newsworthy. For #3, the person disputing that here has not provided any assertion that the article about Olympic athletes contains any factual errors, let alone any evidence to support such an assertion, so I see no reason to consider that further. So far as the tweet, well, we don't consider tweets from NYT (or any other news organization) to be particularly reliable sources to begin with, nor was it particularly wrong; some people just didn't think they worded it clearly and apparently NYT agreed with them and rephrased it. That's about the definition of a nonissue. So, I see nothing here necessitating a reevaluation of NYT's status as a generally reliable source. Seraphimblade Talk to me 22:01, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Another unreliable Haaretz article

Latest comment: 3 years ago135 comments26 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
This has gone way too long and wasted too much of editors' time. The article is by all indications an opinion piece, and all rules regarding opinions should apply accordingly; since it is an opinion piece, it has no bearing on Haaretz's general reliability of coverage. Users are reminded not to use RSN as a WP:FORUM for sharing religious beliefs or views on religious/political groups. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 15:05, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

Take a look: "The Myth of Haredi Moral Authority Haredi Judaism isn't our forefathers' religion, but a radical and dangerous new cult.". Link: https://www.haaretz.com/shahar-ilan-judaism-s-extreme-makeover-1.5266176 This fringe view does not belong on Wikipedia. How much sense is this making? Pinging Debresser IZAK155.246.151.38 (talk) 17:53, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Haaretz, a radical left-wing ultra-secular piece of junk journalism, is citing a dangerous revisionist view. Haredi Judaism is part of Rabbinical Judaism, if not the main part of it, and it's thousands of years old. Not a "cult" -- just because Jews, and religious, or Haredi Jews, are only a small minority of the world's religions does not make them a "cult" that borders on slander and hate and is totally false. IZAK (talk) 18:04, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
“a radical left-wing ultra-secular piece of junk journalism” I don’t think it is, what exactly are you basing that on? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:10, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Here are some diffs [6] [7]155.246.151.38 (talk) 18:15, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Comment Guess I must be a radical left-wing ultra-secular consumer of junk journalism (scratches head). Haaretz is RS, last time I looked. I would treat that article as an opinion piece by the VP for Hiddush, For Religious Freedom and Equality, whatever that is. Selfstudier (talk) 18:16, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Anyone who calls Haredi Judaism and Jews a "cult" is a prejudiced observer and is unreliable as they are not neutral observers and have an obvious axe to grind. While for example, Reform Judaism is given a free pass. Many secular Israelis just HATE the Haredim and spout their hatred shamelessly. WP should not swallow such journalistic junk as a "RS". IZAK (talk) 21:11, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Given that you are talking about a living person and yourself denigrating an entire religious movement, I would tread carefully. Dumuzid (talk) 21:20, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
What "living person" we are debating the obvious hatred of a journalist for Haredim and Haredi Judaism by calling them a "cult". You mean the guy in Haaretz is denigrating Haredim and Haredi Judaism, which is it? So you agree with me then? It takes two to tango. IZAK (talk) 22:10, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
There is a difference between things said on and off wiki. You are certainly entitled to your opinions; you are not entitled to air all of your opinions on Wikipedia. Dumuzid (talk) 22:12, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Sure it takes two to tango but if only one of them is on Wikipedia then only one of them is going to bet blocked or banned for BLP violations. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:35, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
No, I said anyone who calls Haredi Judaism a "cult" is guilty of all those things, just as anyone who would call Catholicism or Hinduism a "cult" is equally guilty. People who accuse major religious groups of being "cults" are guilty of prejudice, hate, and worse, deserve to be condemned and called out! Besides, what "BLP" is there about this obviously anti-Haredi journalist? IZAK (talk) 20:13, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
IZAK, I am sorry -- you may attack this person's opinions as much as you like, but this is now definitely running afoul of WP:BLP. Please be a bit more careful and consider striking or redacting the previous statement. Dumuzid (talk) 20:32, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
@Dumuzid: I just modified my original comments. IZAK (talk) 20:38, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
IZAK, genuine thanks for that, but I believe the description above starting with "insignificant" is just as bad, if not worse. Dumuzid (talk) 20:42, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Dumuzid, I now amended that too. IZAK (talk) 20:45, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Seems to me this is obviously an opinion piece of Shahar Ilan, not something the source claims is factual news reporting. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 18:23, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Issue is Haaretz is not labeling this as opinion.155.246.151.38 (talk) 18:27, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
This would be a problem if Wikipedia were using it to substantiate some sort of fact, but I am not seeing that. As an opinion piece in a bibliography giving an admittedly non-mainstream perspective, I think it is fine. Reasonable minds may differ. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 18:32, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
The statement at the bottom "The writer is the vice president of Hiddush, For Religious Freedom and Equality." clearly indicates it is not a staff writer (and click through his name , this is clear in his biography "Shahar Ilan is the former Haaretz correspondent for religious affairs. He is now the vice president of research and information for Hiddush, an organization for the promotion of religious tolerance.") In general for RSes, any work not done by a staff writer is considered an op-ed. --Masem (t) 22:03, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Its leftwingyness is not a reason to say its unreliable (and is a good reason to reject any argument based on such reasoning, as to whether or not it is an opp-edd. It does not seem to be lable as one, so usable with attribution I think.Slatersteven (talk) 18:35, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Would you be perfectly fine with an article saying "According to Haaretz Haredi Judaism is a radical and dangerous new cult"?!?!
This is a violation of NPOV and a whole bananza of wikipedia policies.155.246.151.38 (talk) 18:41, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Yes I would be fine with that, and I fail to see why it would violate any policies. Haaretz is an RS and they appear to have taken ownership of this peice.Slatersteven (talk) 18:45, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Yup, WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV is the solution when rational, reality-based WP:RS disagree. According to WP:RSP Haaretz is generally speaking reliable. tgeorgescu (talk) 18:48, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
I don't know about saying that it is Haaretz's view as opposed to allowing an opinion piece to be published. I think saying the "x person writing in Y says this". 3Kingdoms (talk) 21:59, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Comment Haaretz is a reliable source, but given this is an opinion piece it should reflect that. However I feel calling them a dangerous cult to be somewhat fringe. They are vert strict religiously, but that does not make a cult. Futhemore they are an assortment of groups that hold numerous different views just look at Neturei Karta compared to Shas. 3Kingdoms (talk) 20:10, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

I basically agree with this, but all I can find it currently used for is in a bibliography to represent a view out there in the world. I think that's an appropriate use. If it were cited to for a factual assertion, we would indeed have to be very careful. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 20:19, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
  • It looks like an opinion article. If you read reputable American or British media, even there you may find opinion articles (or sections of articles that are mostly opinion) without it being explicitly labeled as opinion. Haaretz is not a scholarly source and, in this case, is not a good enough source to include in an encyclopedic summary (aka article) when there is so much better scholarship out there. Even if this was published in a peer-reviewed journal by an established expert, it would be too extreme a claim to assert it as fact. WIKINIGHTS talk 22:31, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Having read the article I really don't think its worth having. Its polemical and full hyperbole without explaining his issue with them. One section is just about them declaring only one type of Kosher food to be kosher. 3Kingdoms (talk) 23:04, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
  • So we should not represent this as fact. We should not represent this at all, as a matter of fact. We do write about every opinion on Wikipedia. And surely not about such a fringe opinion. Debresser (talk) 22:55, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Some parts of it are a bit hyperbolic and I think its clear that this person is writing in their capacity as the vice president of Hiddush (a notable and *non-fringe* nonprofit) not as a journalist for Haaretz or something like that. That being said on the reliability front there are no technical inaccuracies so I’m not really seeing that argument. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:17, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
I think it is more of a case of undue weight and fringe. When you here cult you usually think of Mason family, Waco, FLDS Church, etc. Here it just seems that he doesn't like some of the actions of these people, thinking that they are elitist and hold regressive views on interactions between the sexes, one might not agree, but it fairly mainstream point of view, but that hardly makes them a cult. 3Kingdoms (talk) 23:30, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Cult is a subjective term, what is a legitimate religious organization to one person might be a cult to another. I think most observers prefer cult like when talking about Haredi social structures but in an opinion piece a bit of license is given. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:41, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
It is subjective, at the same time claims of mainstream religions like Catholics, Mormonism, or Ahmadiyya, is considered a bigoted statment. I don't wish to imply that the writer of the article, but I think using the term cult makes the article more fringe/ undue. "Cult like" might be better, but I am mixed on it. 3Kingdoms (talk) 23:48, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
It is? Don’t most atheists consider all religions to be cults? I hardly think that they’re bigoted, its an entirely subjective term like heathen or patriot... One person sees a heathen and another sees a true believer one person sees a patriot and another sees a terrorist... Both are accurate interpretations of a situation from their perspective. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:52, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
I don't think so, most atheists I know don't consider all religions cults. 3Kingdoms (talk) 23:57, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
Thats interesting then, maybe I just know angry atheists. They do seem to use the wider cult, I’m not suggesting that they’re saying that religion is a destructive or doomsday cult (what most people first think then they hear “cult”) but it is most certainly still a pejorative. I guess one question to ask is how literally is it meant to be interpreted? For example should we exclude any opinion piece about American politics which refers to a “Trump cult” as fringe because the group they’re describing is very obviously not a traditional Waco style cult? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 00:05, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
A Trump "cult" would be a cult of personality,(unless someone decides to form a religion around him), which is secular in nature. If you in that case if the article was from a reliable source and good quality it could be used. My issue is more that this article really doesn't have much of a clear focus or why we should consider them a cult. 3Kingdoms (talk) 00:45, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Because they reject modernity? tgeorgescu (talk) 00:48, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
How so?
With all due respect the line you’re drawing between religious and secular cults doesn’t exist and even if it did would be irrelevant for our purposes. Religions and the religious are not a protected class here. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:05, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Cult of personality Cult this site treats them as separate. This site strives for NPOV. 3Kingdoms (talk) 14:02, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
A cult of personality can be religious and a regular cult can be secular, I’m not seeing the legs to this argument... Remember you’re arguing that religious and secular cults are completely different and that we can’t compare them in any way. Yes this site strives for NPOV, and NPOV means including all significant opinions as reflected in reliable sources... Like the significant opinion at hand here in a reliable source. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:40, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
The point is when someone hears cult they think specific things.Haredi Judaism is not a single group but groups of people with ever different views, examples of I raised above. I never claimed that the two are mutually exclusive. I don't object to citing it a just the view of the writer although I think it might be undue. 3Kingdoms (talk) 02:04, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
When it comes to Haredi Judaism the vast majority of things people think when they hear cult apply... At best they’re fringe fundamentalists with some pretty stone age views about women[8], family, and personal freedom. Nobody is trying to use it BTW, thats not among the language under contention it was just brought up because its also in the piece. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:33, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
Strictly religious does not equal cult. Their views are considered odd and out of date by people, but that does not make them a cult. Maybe some groups of Haredi could be, but then that would go under that groups page. 3Kingdoms (talk) 20:24, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
Again, nobody is trying to use this piece to call them a cult... They aren’t even trying to use this piece to say that in X’s opinion they are a cult. I understand that in your and my opinion they aren’t a cult, but we can’t push our POV on others like that... We are required to respect the opinion that they are a cult because its a valid and widely held one. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:35, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
I think we might be talking around each other. If we used this has his opinion that would be fine, even if it is a minority opinion. My bigger issue is the article itself which doesn't really provide any strong reason for calling them a cult just strictly religious. It just feels like a week opinion and undue weight. 3Kingdoms (talk) 20:36, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Haaretz is a reliable source. Unlike most of the right-wing Israeli sources that are cited frequently, Haaretz usually labels articles as "news" or "opinion", but this time neither label appears. We are allowed to judge what it is and this article is obviously "opinion". Therefore, the only requirement for Haaretz reliability is that they accurately reported it. If it is used in articles, the correct attribution is "according to Shahar Ilan". Someone above proposed "according to Haaretz". That would be a citation error, though a very common one, as it is not Haaretz' opinion. Only the official editorials that Haaretz publishes should be attributed as Haaretz' opinion. Zerotalk 05:57, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Even if it reliable for the view of Hidush movment who said it WP:DUE to include? --Shrike (talk) 09:03, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Until we are shown a proposed edit on the mainspace sourced to this article, this is all just intellectual masturbation. JBchrch talk 15:22, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

If you ask me, when a cult becomes large in number of believers and in time (history), it gets called a religion. So: cults are small, religions are large, that's the only difference. tgeorgescu (talk) 12:16, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

I think the Catholics sometimes refer to themselves as a cult. The term itself isn't always negative. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:24, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Perhaps a religion is a cult with an army and navy? - Ryk72 talk 12:26, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

Canvassing

@155.246.151.38: this series of posts [9][10][11][12][13] would appear to violate our behavioral guidelines around on campaigning and votestacking. I take it that you were not aware of the existence of our Wikipedia:Canvassing restrictions? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:34, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Also come on... "Contacting journalists and reporters will be very helpful because sunlight is the best disinfectant when it comes to wikicrats who like to hide behind what they claim to be policy.” is going to get you blocked in two seconds flat... You can’t be encouraging people to take off wiki action to further a policy dispute you’re involved with. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:53, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

This is dangerous and if not stopped now, all of Judaism will be under attack! And the source of all this antisemitic propaganda is claimed to be a Jewish newspaper. See above about WP:BATTLEGROUND. The IP seems to believe that the worst enemies of Jews are Jews. Take a look at [14]. tgeorgescu (talk) 00:30, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

As does this [[15]], which pings a lot of users, and can be seen as a call to arms with comments like (in this post [[16]]).Slatersteven (talk) 09:51, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

  • I mean, give me a break! This "new" guy is all over the place, canvassing, edit warring, even coming here to RSN (no less!), and calling it "Anti-Semitism"!? The gall! Just look at the latest edit warring on clearly religious fundamentalist issues here and here. I'd urge admins to block this in a jiff, because this guy is not "new" at all, just a new religious fundamentalist sock-puppet, in my view. warshy (¥¥) 21:24, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
I mean, to call a clear opinion piece in Haaretz "anti-Semitism" all over WP, where could such deranged craziness come from? I've seen more and more examples of this here (in the English WP) in the past year. It takes admins a while to catch up on this, but I've seen it happen also. Just trying to help them along. Thank you, warshy (¥¥) 21:47, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Note the IP is also a sock.Slatersteven (talk) 09:55, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

RS status not in question, and yet...

As I've noted elsewhere recently (diff), and perhaps this bears repeating, Wikipedia considers Haaretz to be Israel's Paper of record (for some reason). That it often indulges in SJW excesses (and snobby paywall'ing) is to its discredit, I'd argue, but that's just my opinion. El_C 14:47, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Are both Hebrew and English versions considered Paper of Record? (the only one in the list in 2 langs) I know English sources consider it as paper of record but I think they may mean the English version, go to for diplos, lawyers and so on. I have heard that the Hebrew version has at least 10 readers, would that disqualify it? Selfstudier (talk) 15:02, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
The Times has a least 10 readers, the BBC has at least 10 viewers, I assume therefore that was a joke.Slatersteven (talk) 15:05, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
) Heh. The left is rather out of favor in Israel.Selfstudier (talk) 15:07, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
English version-what? Someone tell, I dunno, Le Monde, that they need an English version so as to cement their English Wikipedia Paper of record creds, stat! El_C 15:18, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
With Haaretz I see a clear split between the news and editorial/opinion pieces (similar to what I see with the WSJ) with the editorial/opinion pieces being significantly progressive/left with the actual reporting being centrist. I think most people consider Haaretz to be a paper of record, although perhaps not the only one. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:01, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
I think most people [outside of Israel] consider Haaretz to be a paper of record. Fixed! El_C 17:20, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
I’m not sure I’d agree with that, even those who consider Haaretz to be deeply problematic also seem to regard it as a the paper of record and its problematic (as they see it) nature to be all the more concerning because of it. Yedioth Ahronoth and Israel Hayom have wider readership, but both are tabloidy with a focus on gossip and unclear editorial standards. Perhaps the Israeli market is too diverse and young to really declare any to be a paper of record but if we only count papers which are old enough to qualify there are only a handful of them, of which I generally consider Haaretz and JP to be the most reliable with Yedioth Ahronoth also reliable for most everything. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:49, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Davar, if you read this... I love you, marry me! El_C 17:58, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Horse Eye's Back, if I can sharpen: what makes Haaretz that special so as to be deemed Israel's sole Paper of record? Is it that much more groundbreaking than, say, Maariv (similar circulation)? If so, how so? Weird how those standards are set, as if by magic. I also think that, with regards to the newcomer, Israel Hayom, it has gotten better since the more skethcy early days. Not sure I'd call Yedioth Ahronoth tabloidy, though they do carry supplements that can be hilariously tabloidy. But, in my view, that isn't the same. El_C 22:04, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
If you want my opinion the concept is outdated in the digital age, newspapers don’t have discrete geographic catchments like they once did but its a designation that still seems to matter greatly to a certain generation. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:10, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Maybe, but at the same time, you can't compare those publications to, say, Walla! or Mako and so on. And I'm not just saying that because those are online-only news sources, since obviously Davar now also is online-only (though, I'm biased there, my grandfather was very much a Davar man). As an aside, even as online Haaretz was paywall'd, online TheMarker was not. Which was great. I'm a fan. I have several of their magazines (in print), and in more than one occasion used them as citations on the project (with confidence). Anyway, I presume the dicks at Haaretz put an end to that, because now of course it's paywall city.  El_C 22:35, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
I always thought the Paper of Record had a section for Hatches, Matches and Dispatches. Can't get by without knowing these things ("certain generation" :) Selfstudier (talk) 10:02, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Me + Davar =   Wedding invitations forthcoming. Festivities will put https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/research/olympic-britain/monarchy/hatches-matches-and-dispatches/ to shame! Unfathomable hats required. El_C 14:38, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

Popel keep on saying this is an Op-edd, its not marked as an opp-edd. This is the opinion section https://www.haaretz.com/opinion, and it does not seem to be there.Slatersteven (talk) 18:00, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Don’t we generally treat all pieces by guest writers and such as opinion regardless of how they’re labeled? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:04, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
In any case, that little screed at the bottom of the page is H's get out of jail free card. They don't normally do that for news pieces, I think.Selfstudier (talk) 18:10, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Not as far as I know, they take full township of this, and thus it is published by an RS. I agree it should be attributed (to the writer) but it is published in the name of an RS, so is an RS. It is an article, not a news item, no different from any other article they might publish.Slatersteven (talk) 18:13, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

What Haaretz published does not have to be gospel truth, but secular Jews are allowed to criticize fundamentalist Jews. All this fuss is about an aggressive campaign saying that secular Jews who criticize fundamentalist Jews are self-hating Jews. tgeorgescu (talk) 19:02, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Why does one dodgy quasi-opinion piece from 2012 define the entirety of Haaretz's reporting? Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:19, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Umm tgeorgescu, it's about secular (Chiloni in Hebrew) Jews versus religious Jews (Dati = religious in Hebrew or Charedi = Haredi or "Ultra-Orthodox" [Ultra-Orthodox is not used on WP for decades since it's a negative term]) so stop using the term "fundamentalist" as that too is a loaded pejorative with only negative connotations. IZAK (talk) 20:24, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
You may look at https://www.britannica.com/topic/fundamentalism/The-Haredim . It is under Jewish fundamentalism in Israel. Britannica says Haredi are fundamentalists. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:24, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
Britannica is entitled to its opinions, but it is definitely not an authority on religion, certainly not on Judaism. WP's Fundamentalism article says: "Depending upon the context, the label "fundamentalism" can be a pejorative rather than a neutral characterization" so that when you use the term you must make clear how you intend it since you speak for yourself. IZAK (talk) 21:54, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
That article was written by https://umaine.edu/anthropology/faculty-staff/dr-henry-l-munson-jr/ tgeorgescu (talk) 22:00, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
From an Anthropology dept? As an authority on religion? What's that got to do with the price of tea in China? IZAK (talk) 22:08, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
As you can read with your own eyes, he is an expert in fundamentalism. tgeorgescu (talk) 23:25, 10 August 2021 (UTC)
As you can read with your own eyes WP's article on Fundamentalism notes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamentalism#cite_note-8 "Boer, Roland (2005). "Fundamentalism" (PDF). In Tony Bennett; Lawrence Grossberg; Meaghan Morris; Raymond Williams (eds.). New keywords: a revised vocabulary of culture and society. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing. pp. 134–137. ISBN 978-0-631-22568-3. OCLC 230674627. Archived from the original (PDF) on September 10, 2008. Retrieved July 27, 2008. Widely used as a pejorative term to designate one's fanatical opponents – usually religious and/or political – rather than oneself, fundamentalism began in Christian Protestant circles in the eC20. Originally restricted to debates within evangelical ('gospel-based') Protestantism, it is now employed to refer to any person or group that is characterized as unbending, rigorous, intolerant, and militant. The term has two usages, the prior one a positive self-description, which then developed into the later derogatory usage that is now widespread." And these authors are also experts! So watch how you throw the term around! IZAK (talk) 01:56, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

List of WP:RS:

WP:CITED by tgeorgescu (talk) 02:46, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

  • Jews and Judaism are always a minority versus a majority, so huff and puff away! IZAK (talk) 02:50, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
    • To be sure, I am not an atheist, but I find this applicable: [17]. Also, this isn't a debate of Goyim against Jews, it is a debate mainly between secular Jews and fundamentalist Jews. Secular does not mean atheist, a believing Jew (in Judaism) who endorses modernity is secular.
    • Although brought up as a Goy, I have myself Jewish roots and I have nothing against Jews, but I am not appreciative towards fundamentalists, be them Jewish, Christian, Muslim, or otherwise. I mean: I do not appreciate pushing a fundamentalist POV inside Wikipedia.
    • Some Jews believe in fundamentalist religion, that's their legal right in a free country. Other Jews don't buy into fundamentalist religion, that's also their legal right in a free country. tgeorgescu (talk) 07:02, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
You’ve just been provided with a half dozen sources which discuss Jewish fundamentalism, which ones did you read and fail to find enlightening? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:43, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Haredim are nothing more or less than the majority of Orthodox Jews at the present time, and as such, I see nothing that explains how Orthodox Judaism is now viewed as "fundamentalism". It's like calling all seriously observant Muslims or Hindus "fundamentalists" -- it explains nothing and it just manages to cast hundreds of millions, if not billions of people in a negative and pejorative light! IZAK (talk) 19:21, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Thats not what the sources are saying, the only source saying that appears to be IZAK. Setting your own opinion aside do you accept that there is a consensus among scholars that the Haredim are fundamentalists? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:45, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
But that's what some of the WP:RS claim: the Haredim think that Orthodox Judaism is not good enough for them. The Haredim are engaged in a process of othering, wherein traditional Orthodox Jews are seen as unfaithful Jews. That's their Galileo gambit: Orthodox Jews who don't adhere to the Haredim will be shunned as unfaithful. If an Orthodox Jewish man uses the same sidewalk as women do, he will be shunned. If the Haredim succeed in depicting traditional Orthodox Jews as fakes, then the Haredim get in control of Orthodox Judaism. That's what is at stake. If an Orthodox Jew breaks the rules newly invented by the Haredim, he gets labeled an infidel. So, they don't have an axe to grind just against secular Jews, but also against Orthodox Jews who are unwilling to abide by brand new rules.
They are of course free to radically reform Judaism, but this radical reform won't go unnoticed. We don't pretend that nothing has happened. There's no law against reforming religion; there is also no law against noticing that it happens. tgeorgescu (talk) 12:42, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
tgeorgescu you spend so much time spinning your wheels to discredit Haredim that you fail to see how this fits into a spiral doing to the Haredim exactly what you claim Haredim are doing to others. These claims of your are utterly ridiculous: "If an Orthodox Jewish man uses the same sidewalk as women do, he will be shunned." Huh? You are painting all Haredim as being like a small group in Meah Shearim, that just shows you have never lived among or near large numbers of Haredim. In Jerusalem and New York City and Los Angeles and Chicago, Haredim walk on the same sidewalks as everyone and anyone else, men and women together. Then you are obsessed with "Haredim getting in control of Orthodox Judaism" and "who's the boss" that sounds more like fears from a former dictatorship in Europe than anything to do with any form real life Jewish reality. Haredim have not made up any "brand new rules" what are saying? You must tone down your attacks on Haredim. IZAK (talk) 02:02, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

Is that particular Haaretz reliable or not?

After days of discussion, still have not gotten a clear answer. Have been hearing all sorts of wiki disputes about opinion or not opinion. Is it Haaretz or not. This user wants a clear answer. Is this particular article reliable or not?155.246.151.38 (talk) 00:56, 11 August 2021 (UTC)

Whether cult or otherwise, the Haredim are clearly fundamentalists, according to an expert in fundamentalism published inside Britannica. Haaretz and Hiddush are here vilified for making the same claim as Britannica, namely that the Haredim are radical fundamentalists. So, whether we WP:CITE Haaretz or Britannica it boils down to the same point: the Haredim are radical fundamentalists.
As for claiming that both Britannica and Haaretz indulge in antisemitic propaganda, you have an extraordinarily high standard for evidence to clear. Stated otherwise: your criticism of these two sources is preposterous and risible. tgeorgescu (talk) 01:48, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Reliable for what, exactly? It's an opinion piece and ought (imo) to be attributed to the fellow that wrote it, Haaretz are responsible for carrying it but not for the content, afaics. If any claim in it be considered extraordinary such claim could be considered undue absent additional evidence. Without a use case, the question is ill-posed.Selfstudier (talk) 09:06, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Yes it is, with attribution.Slatersteven (talk) 09:17, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
The point the Haaretz article hammers is that the Haredim are radical fundamentalists. As I have shown above, such claim is vanilla among the analysts of religious fundamentalism. Many more sources can be found at books.google.com. It is far from being a secret, and if anything is certain about the Haaretz article, that is that it isn't original in its claim. It is simply the restatement of a fact known to both Jews and Gentiles for many years. tgeorgescu (talk) 10:13, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
If there are scholarly books about that then why use Haaretz? Shrike (talk) 11:04, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Good question. I have WP:CITED 8 WP:RS (including Haaretz). If things cool down that can be trimmed to only 2 or 3 sources. tgeorgescu (talk) 11:15, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Nothing is reliable in the abstract. It is only reliable or unreliable in connection with a particular claim one is making in a specific article. JBchrch talk 10:17, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
What the experts in fundamentalism will complain about is that Wikipedians spent several days for reinventing the wheel. The experts knew the claim from Haaretz is true for decades before it got published therein. tgeorgescu (talk) 10:40, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
If you allow me to be blunt, I don't know and I don't care, because this not a forum to discuss contemporary judaism. JBchrch talk 10:52, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
If the claim is neither new, nor a minority view, but widely endorsed by experts, the logical conclusion is that the WP:RS is reliable for the claim it is used to WP:Verify. tgeorgescu (talk) 10:56, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
Its reliable for the view of the author whatever its WP:DUE and should be included in the article its another question -Shrike (talk) 11:03, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
That's why in the article I have WP:CITED 7 other WP:RS to verify its claim. tgeorgescu (talk) 11:05, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
If seven reliable sources verify the claims, this one opinion piece is not needed to be cited at all. As I noted above, with the sole use of being cited to make a direct attribution to the author for the purpose of showing that he said what he said, opinion pieces should not be cited to represent plain facts in Wikipedia's own voice, even if other actual sources are also being used to do so. If it's the only source, it's not good enough, and if there are seven other good sources, it's not needed. Note that this has nothing to do with it being Haaretz. It's an opinion piece. It can only be used to attribute the opinion to the writer. Whether in any article in particular we should be attributing said piece is a WP:DUE issue, and not one of WP:RS. --Jayron32 14:25, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
The article now says However, secular critics describe the Haredim as radical fundamentalists. So, it is not even presented as objective fact. It's not in the voice of Wikipedia. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:49, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
  • tgeorgescu, the Jews throughout their history have been accused of being different nasty things by their foes, in the Middle Ages they were accused of bringing the Black plague, and today's Haredim as Jews are no different in that they get blamed for being things that they are not by people who do not understand them. Constantly hurling the accusation around at Haredim for being "radical fundamentalists" is akin to screaming about the proverbial "Yellow Peril" or the "Red Scare" and borders on fear-mongering that fosters a conspiracy theories mentality. Haredim are basically pacifists and live peacefully in their communities and almost all are peace-loving people who follow Judaism in its purest form, they are not a threat to anyone, certainly not to you or to Wikipedia as you falsely claim. IZAK (talk) 20:04, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
    • As I told on the talk page of the article, Jehovah's Witnesses are radical fundamentalists. They are also pacifists and nonviolent. Basically, fundamentalism is a rejection of modernism (modern historiography, higher criticism, gender equality, theory of evolution, and so on). tgeorgescu (talk) 21:59, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
      • So why does that make them bad and into villains in your eyes? That is why they are who they are, they have a different lifestyle and thought system, what do you have against different theologies and religions? You defend modernism as if it was "gospel truth" like a hardliner. Open your mind a little. IZAK (talk) 00:41, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
      • By the way, you make sweeping accusations about how Haredim as Jews deal with "modern historiography, higher criticism, gender equality, theory of evolution, and so on" while the reality is more complicated and nuanced. Take Evolution for example, WP has a good article on Jewish views on evolution that shows just how complex the subject is within Judaism and the Jewish heritage that Haredim follow. Or take gender issues, the WP article Gender and Judaism grapples with this subject. As for higher criticism yes Haredim reject it and that is because Torah study is their domain and it's absurd to say they are somehow guilty of an anti-modernist "crime" since Torah scholars have their own highly sophisticated intellectual methods. So you need to broaden your horizons to this. 01:09, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
        • I have never insinuated that the Haredim commit crimes or that they should follow higher criticism. This is a WP:MAINSTREAM encyclopedia, based upon WP:SCHOLARSHIP, and we simply render what multiple WP:RS say about the Haredim. For the rest, they remain free to practice their religion as they see fit, since it is their legal right, and I do not advocate for changing the laws of Israel. Wikipedia is neither a PR outlet, nor a parliament of nations. Denying what it is obvious for decades is not our job. Our mission is not denialism of the common wisdom of the mainstream academia. tgeorgescu (talk) 02:44, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Was this RS written by a non Jew?Slatersteven (talk) 09:28, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
  • tgeorgescu as long as the Haredi POV and what they say about themselves and criticism directed at them is also reported accurately in an article about them. IZAK (talk) 19:45, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
    • What does radical mean? It means they want to have stringent rules and an austere morality. It's a free country, so they are free to do so.
    • What does fundamentalist mean? It is about who's the boss:
      • Epistemological: God + Scriptures + conservative clergy rather than science + humanities;
      • Political: God + Scriptures + conservative clergy rather than the will of the electorate. tgeorgescu (talk) 05:25, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Why this lengthily discussion? This piece is simply an opinion piece by someone associated with Hiddush which is a NGO promoting secularism. It is not scholarship, it is merely an opinion.--Hippeus (talk) 13:31, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • tgeorgescu so now you are saying that Haredim are enemies of science, humanities, and democracy, making them sound like cavemen, and boors. Never anything flattering. FYI Haredim rely on science, they use technology and rely on modern medicine for example. They are as human as anyone else and since when does everyone have to agree with everything in the humanities? In the USA there are Haredi scientists, doctors, and professionals of all sorts. They support the democratic process, participate in politics, and respect the will of the electorate, as can be seen in Israel and the USA where they are mainly based. Haredim are NOT the Taliban or the Mullahs! And you must stop trying to tar and feather them on WP. Shabbat Shalom! IZAK (talk) 19:35, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
    • You asked what fundamentalism means, I offered a definition. Of course, I am not WP:RS, so my opinion is not authoritative for Wikipedia.
    • Do you understand that Jehovah's Witnesses are radical fundamentalists, but they are also nonviolent and they obey the laws of the land, they do not seek to overthrow the government? That was my comparison.
    • Any believer can rely upon science and technology as long as these do not go against the dogmas of their religion. I think that Muslims use more smartphones than the Haredim, with their Kosher phones. tgeorgescu (talk) 11:30, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

This is not a soapbox, we are discussing this source, not users or any religious sects.Slatersteven (talk) 10:26, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

  • Comment. Questioning Haaretz's as RS is pointless. IZAK ruined his own case by weaving one more variant on the 'radical left-wing/antisemitic' discursive claptrap to challenge views he finds distasteful. An accommodation, as suggested by Zero, i.e., 'According to Shahar Ilan', is possible, as a particular secular view. There is no serious dispute that the 'fundamentalists' describes what Haredim are. Ilan's opinion that Haredi Judaism is a 'cult', however, is totally unacceptable, and as an abuse of descriptive language, not appropriate. It is a strong-defined subculture within Judaism, and should be treated neutrally as we do any other culture. Nishidani (talk) 12:51, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Dismiss and close. No point in continuing this dicussion. Per @Hippeus and others, it's just an opinion piece and should be treated as such. Alaexis¿question? 15:48, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Kim Kardashian vs Hunter Biden

Latest comment: 3 years ago14 comments9 people in discussion
It was determined prior that Newsweek, post 2013, is not a reliable source, for reasons already outlined in the linked RFCs. The previously missed NY Post citation to the Kim Kardashian article has also been removed. --Jayron32 15:12, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Why is it that pagesix.com is a reliable source for Kim Kardashian's sex tape, while Newsweek isn't a reliable enough for Hunter Biden's butt-naked pillow talk with a hooker? In this pillow talk with said hooker Hunter recounts "crazy f***ing sex" with other hookers, and mentions another laptop he lost earlier, possibly stolen by Russians to blackmail him. According to some editors, this video and all other laptop related material should be considered "conspiracy theory" because the 2020 Biden campaign said so - even though Hunter is quoted in CNN as saying the laptop this video was pulled from probably his [18], and even though Politico says the US government has delayed actions in investigating the case for the sake of not messing up the 2020 elections [19]. CutePeach (talk) 18:51, 15 August 2021 (UTC)

“ because the 2020 Biden campaign said so”. Come on. This is a personal attack on an uncountable number of good-faith editors. Firefangledfeathers (talk) 18:56, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
The argument that "the party said so" is so completely farcical, it beggars belief. This is my first forray into American politics on Wikipedia and I am profoundly unimpressed. I thought we had it bad in the Philippines. My comment was not a personal attack on any other editors, and I sincerely apologize if it was taken that way. I have tried to engage positively with these editors, asking how a party line can be accepted as reality, as the government hasn't even completed its investigations yet. No response to that yet. CutePeach (talk) 19:02, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
I apologize for bringing up the conduct issues here, and I'll bring them up separately on your user talk. For the reliability question, I echo TFD's response below. Firefangledfeathers (talk) 19:23, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Per Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources, neither source is reliable. The fact that some articles continue to use unreliable sources does not justify using them in other articles. TFD (talk) 19:05, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Newsweek is not unreliable, it's "no consensus". Alaexis¿question? 19:25, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
I am not sure that's true. The close of the RfC said, "This is not a "no consensus" close, because there is clear consensus that Newsweek is not generally reliable post–2013." Firefangledfeathers (talk) 19:34, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Yeah, I see, it's confusing. Anyway, it's probably as good a time as any to look at Newsweek again now that some time has passed since they separated from IBT and assess their reliability anew. The RSP entry says "so consensus is to evaluate Newsweek content on a case-by-case basis." Alaexis¿question? 19:48, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Perhaps this is an opportunity to discuss the reliability of sources like Newsweek for noncontroversial claims, like the existence of a video of a guy naked in bed. It would be good to engage the community on whether we can trust Newsweek reporting for stories that are easily verifiable independently. When editors are claiming this is all part of a grand conspiracy, it's important for us to have these kinds of commonsense discussions. Good night, I really have to go to sleep now. CutePeach (talk) 19:27, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
(edit conflict) This smells like forum shopping. You received this response by TFD which essentially answers your initial question: The fact that Newsweek and other questionable sources are used on other Wikipedia articles does not mean either of them should be considered generally reliable for controversial claims. "Other stuff exists" is not convincing argument here.
Based on Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources § Newsweek (2013-present), Newsweek is not considered a consistently reliable source, and its content should be evaluated "on a case-by-case basis". In this case, the article you're referencing is repeating a claim from the Daily Mail, a tabloid which RSP absolutely does not consider a reliable source. WP:BLP absolutely requires high-quality sourcing for allegations like this, so we should either find a better one which also makes this claim, or not say it at all. RoxySaunders (talk · contribs) 19:52, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
They're both bad sources, and neither should be used in Wikipedia for issues about living people - David Gerard (talk) 21:05, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
  • It was absolutely unacceptable to use the New York Post / Page Six for plainly BL-sensitive claims about Kim Kardashian, and I've replaced it. Since the incident was so high-profile, I was able to effortlessly find an academic paper on the topic, no less. But that also points to why that (definitely bad) citation survived so long - while it was a low-quality source, and the claim was technically BLP sensitive, it was also completely uncontroversial in the sense that almost anyone who has ever heard of Kim Kardashian would know that it is plainly true and undisputed. Sources for controversial, disputed, and WP:EXCEPTIONAL claims receive more scrutiny, as they should; "Kim Kardashian made a sex tape", while it is something we should use BLP-quality sourcing for, is definitely not controversial given that it is a major part of her notability. Conversely, everything about the Hunter Biden story is naturally highly controversial, leading to caution among higher-quality sources that we have to reflect - I do not think you can replace Newsweek with a higher-quality source as effortlessly as I replaced Page Six. --Aquillion (talk) 06:34, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Two wrongs do not make a right.Slatersteven (talk) 09:23, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Joshuaproject.net

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments4 people in discussion

I just reverted the addition to one article, Sinhalese people, of a footnote sourced to The Joshua Project's website. I ran a link search, [20], and found hundreds of other footnotes linked to this site.

This source has been discussed here before: [21][22][23][24][25]. The first of these discussionhs followed the removal by an editor of numerous links to the source. It seems to me the consensus was that the data on that site isn't reliable. A mix of opinions can be found in other discussions.

As far as I could discern from my skimming, though, none of these sources mentioned the six disclaimers at the bottom of the source's own pages:

1. Joshua Project data is drawn from many sources and of varying accuracy depending on source and editorial decisions. Populations are scaled to the current year. Other data may have varying ages. We welcome suggested updates.

2. A displayed zero can mean true zero, a very small rounded number or sometimes unknown. Blanks mean an unknown value.

3. The data is sometimes not as precise as it appears. Values for %Christian Adherent and %Evangelical (which determine unreached status) are often informed estimates, some more accurate than others. We recommend against using %Christian Adherent and %Evangelical to calculate absolute numbers.

4. Joshua Project makes every effort to ensure that the subject in an image is in fact from the specific people group. In rare instances a representative photo may be used.

5. Joshua Project may be able to provide more information than what is published on this site. Please contact us.

6. On-the-ground reality may vary from what is presented here. Before making travel plans based on data presented here, please confirm with other sources to the extent possible.

I'm reading this as a virtual acknowledgement by the organization itself that the site doesn't rise to the level of a reliable source for our purposes.

What do you all think of this source in light of these disclaimers? Is this sufficient justification to remove all these footnotes? Largoplazo (talk) 11:35, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

I actually think this disclaimers are a sign of a robust methodology and disclosure of their method. However, I am quite concerned by their about page which basically states their aim as a missionary group and describes the project itself as "a small team of three staff members. No staff receive salaries; each is responsible for raising their own personal funding, just as traditional missionaries do.", which is a bit above a personal website but not by much.--Eostrix  (🦉 hoot hoot🦉) 13:25, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
I thought we had deep sixed the Joshua Project already? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:02, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
All figures for ethnic groups and languages are self-declared "informed estimates" and "ballpark". Such numbers should never be cited, and removed if only sourced to Joshua Project. For all non-numerical data (such as ethnic group X living in country Y), there is almost always a better source available. So best practice is to remove JP references with the data; on a case-by-case base, {{bcn}}-tagging or retaining the data with a {{cn}}-tag is also an option. Personally, I prefer to delete stuff that's only sourced to JP. –Austronesier (talk) 20:24, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
Responding to myself: I'm thinking that the number of discussions that have been held over this source warrants adding it to Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources. Largoplazo (talk) 21:21, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

RetailDive.com

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

This website seems to primarily be a press release aggregator. They have a news section and employ journalists, but I'm not sure if their content is editorially independent. What type of reliability does this source have?

The specific article in question from this source is this, to be used for Dick's Sporting Goods. ––𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗹𝗗𝘂𝗱𝗲 talk 15:43, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

It looks as reasonable as any other specialized industry publication. It seems that the press releases are labeled press releases, the sponsored content is labeled sponsored content, and they have a named team of journalists and editors. As long as it's not being used to source anything exceptional or extraordinary I think it's probably fine. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 15:53, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
The press releases are clearly marked. This is a press release. The one you linked isn't. No comment on reliability. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 15:54, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

RfC - Moneylife

Latest comment: 3 years ago8 comments3 people in discussion

I’ve been researching Indian institutions in the past couple of weeks for a personal project. I noticed that Moneylife has been used as a reference on Indian-related pages and came here to check its credibility. I first spotted it on the National Stock Exchange of India. After that, I found it on a few other pages, as seen below.

University of Mumbai List of chairmen of the State Bank of India

There doesn’t seem to be anything controversial about the coverage that I’ve found so far, but I’m a bit unsure about its editorial standards and therefore accuracy. Should its use as a reference be discouraged or is it okay to use? FelixFLB (talk) 12:58, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

FelixFLB, I'm not sure if this qualifies for an RfC. There hasn't been any previous discussion on it and there is no visible dispute over its use.
Regarding the source itself, I am familiar with it and in my opinion it's a tabloid equivalent in financial news. I would recommend skepticism towards it in general and avoiding it in anything that might appear to be controversial. Their coverage can be quite misleading at times, for instance they tend to sensationalise the initiation of any investigation or even mundane penalties as a primer to a big "scam". There are also potential BLP issues in there. That said, I don't remember them reporting something that's outright false, so I would say its reliability is something along the lines of "additional considerations apply". Tayi Arajakate Talk 14:07, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
My concern is similar to yours, is it just a tabloid-style publication or is it worse than that. I also found Sucheta Dalal, who seems to be the Chief Editor. She refers to herself as a scam investigator on her website. I get the feeling the more I look at it that it's just a blog for her dressed up as a major publication? I've continued looking into this, so will post a more in-depth comment shortly. FelixFLB (talk) 15:31, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

Comment - To expand on my initial post, Moneylife and Sucheta Dalal made allegations about National Stock Exchange of India in 2015, which can viewed on Wikipedia here. It led to a defamation lawsuit by NSE against the publication shortly afterward. Moneylife then set up a dedicated topic on its website here where it lists various articles about the stock exchange and even has the topic in its navigation bar (seems highly unethical?). The majority of the articles in the topic/section are titled "scam" or "illegal." FelixFLB (talk) 15:54, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

FelixFLB, okay looking at their coverage of the NSE colocation controversy, I'll revise what I had stated before and just say that they are generally unreliable, i.e should not be used anywhere. There are glaring inaccuracies in these articles, for instance the site calls it an "algorithm scam", colocation itself has nothing to do with the use of algorithms in trading. There are articles in there which practically allege fraud and malpractice against officials at NSE and state that NSE was fined by SEBI due to that. The allegations themselves are unproven, if it were otherwise they would face jail time, SEBI dropped the charges and never took it to court, NSE was fined for not implementing adequate safeguards against exploits in the system.
Although the site isn't per se a blog (has multiple authors and supposedly has an editorial process), this is blog quality, probably worse. The NSE article also needs some cleanup. Tayi Arajakate Talk 18:42, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
I agree with a lot of that. This was the main article today on the homepage, again about NSE. No other news outlet seems to have picked it up, and the grammar is terrible. "brokers have a membership of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) they are suspended by that exchange too." FelixFLB (talk) 14:20, 16 July 2021 (UTC)
I've been going through some of their recent articles and here are a few observations from that. They seems to have a disproportionate focus on the stock market, most of it is not attributed to any author but to "staff", there's poor research and frequent typos. This is neither really a financial news outlet or a personal finance website, and their editorial oversight is clearly inadequate.
Honestly, it appears somewhat predatory, as in its content looks like its targeted towards a specific type of small stock traders who are apprehensive of institutions and larger players. They have this disclaimer, which does not invoke confidence. They just repeatedly state that they are not liable for the accuracy of their material. Tayi Arajakate Talk 19:20, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

The actual reliability of a source is it's expertise and objectivity with respect to the item which cited it. IMO any overall generalization about any source is faulty. Such should be eliminated and certainly not expanded. North8000 (talk) 23:38, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

Misues of unreliable sources to push fringe views on Flamenco

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion

I am coming here to raise concern over the aggressive POV being pushed in the article Flamenco by TagaworShah that Flamenco is at its origin Romani music and only Romani music.

The origins of Flamenco have been studied in great detail by numerous academics in what is known as the field of Flamencology which involves a number of historiographical currents. Although there are a number of theories on possible roots of the musical genre (which encompasses a range of sub-genres known as palos and none of which are mutually exclusive) the general academic consensus is that its roots are syncretic and unique to Andalusia's history with influence from the Byzantine period, medieval Islamic period, Jewish, Berber and sub-saharan African, gitano/romani together with various modern influences specific to their time (reorientalizing casticismo etc).

Flamencologists such as Manuel Bohórquez [26] are categorical in stating that Flamenco does not originate in the Romani people and others such as Austrian Flamencologist (perhaps one of the most renown professors of flamencology) agree with this in their academic studies on the origins of Flamenco which he traces to the Byzantine period, roughly 8 centuries before Romanis started migrating to Spain.[27] I could go on but since there are many such specialist professors in the in the field of flamencology and this is a rather mainstream view. Among these its worth mentioning Hipolito Rossy - perhaps the father of modern flamencology who explains how the roots of flamenco lie in the fusion of christian/Mozarabic, Jewish, Muslim and Romani musical traditions in the lower Andalusia.[28]

The point is that, since the 28th of June when TagaworShah (an editor also interested in Romani activism and seemingly unacquainted with Spanish, Andalusian or Gitano culture) first completely rewrote the stable version of the article without seeking consensus, leveraging dubious sources coming from obscure Romani activists such as Ronald Lee, Ian Hancock and dance teachers in Mid-west US universities (typically Americans interested in Romanticism associated to Gypsies such as this person [29]) to aggressively pursue the line that actually all flamencologists are wrong and that Flamenco is, in fact, a Romani art form and it originates with the Romani people, pushing this in the lead of the article.[30][31] Almost surreally, he claims that anyone who works with Spanish public universities are inherently biased and they are less credible than his artsy non-specialist activist sources - please read his justification carefully here:[32] This tactic of using the ignorance (for lack of a better word) of non-specialist, activist or enthusiasts to trump peer-reviewed studies in order to aggressively push fringe views is common enough on wikipedia and I am wondering how to deal with it and whether there is any policy to deal with it. I reitirate none of the sources (except Leblon and Holguin) provided by Tagawor are reputable academics in the field of Flamencology nor does he provide any citation from any study to support his claims. Interestingly one of the few reliable sources he claims to rely on (Holguin) does not support the POV he is pushing as shown here: [33], i.e. he is systematically misportraying the statments of the few reliable sources he can get his hands on and flooding the article with sources that do not meet WP:RS.

I understand the policy of "wrong version" (I forgot its exact name) but I would ask User:Cwmhiraeth to unprotect the article since I have already stated that I personally do not intend to revert any more edits by this user. I will simply provide additional sourcing, understanding that edit wars through reverts are a wrong way to approach activist users.Cristodelosgitanos (talk) 18:51, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

Again you are misconstruing my points. I have never once said Flamenco was purely Romani, In contrast I literally recognized it’s not a purely Romani dance.[34] Cristodelosgitanos is a single purpose account that has contributed to engage in disruptive editing, edit warring my good faith additions while I asked to reach a consensus and misusing WP:Stable. It is policy to boldly edit articles in good faith which is what I am doing. I have proven in the talk page the merits of all my sources and how they completely fit within WP:RS guidelines. This user has repeatedly engaged in personal attacks against me and just purely mocking me for my interest in Romani people as we can see in the talk discussion. They have also used an IP to make their reverts instead of their accounts which is also problematic and say they have been an editor since 2006 which leads to suspicions about abuse of multiple accounts. I have tried multiple times to reach consensus and have a civil conversation but this user has refused. All my sources are from peer reviewed well regarded academic sources from specialists in ethnomusicology, flamenco, and the Romani people. Cristodelosgitanos has not given any adequate reason as to why these sources shouldn’t be included in the article except that they are written by “hippies” which is far from the case. Also Holguin does support my stance here “The music, born of gypsies in the country’s southern regions, was embraced by foreigners long before it became a national symbol”[35]. This user has repeatedly cherry picked my sources and outright lied about my intentions. In addition he has also canvassed the entire Wikiproject:Spain with a clear POV violation[36] I ask that careful consideration be taken when looking at our conversation, I have proven that all my sources fit WP:RS guidelines while this user has refused to follow Wikipedia policy when it comes to content disputes and has now taken the matter here when I was trying to reach a consensus. TagaworShah (talk) 19:18, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

Here is a copy of me proving that all my sources are reliable and not a fringe theory: “Bonnie C Wade was an esteemed professor of Ethnomusicology at some of the top universities in the United States, her work was published in the peer reviewed and very well respected Oxford University Press. The Encyclopedia Britannica, including it’s online version has an incredible reputation of fact-checking and reliability. They recruit editors who they recognize as specialists in the domain and have extensive peer review by the editors. Just like any Encyclopedia, it relies on the current academic consensus and it being updated fairly recently provides that this is the current academic consensus. Ninotchka Devorah Bennahum Ninotchka Devorah Bennahumis an associate professor of communication studies, performance studies, and theater at the Brooklyn campus of Long Island University. This means she is in her tenure track and has a reputation to uphold which according to Wikipedia reliable sourcing guidelines makes her a reliable source. She has also been a professor at UC Santa Barbara.[37] She is a specialist on Flamenco co-authoring the book “Flamenco on the Global Stage: Historical, Critical and Theoretical Perspectives”[38] as well as writing the books “Antonia Mercé "La Argentina": Flamenco and the Spanish Avant-Garde.” and “Carmen, a Gypsy Geography” also about Flamenco and from the well respected Weseleyan University Press. Encyclopedia Britannica has recognized her as an expert in Flamenco so unless you have any evidence to dispute that, that’s what she is. Sandie Holguin is a European cultural and intellectual historian with a focus on modern Spain. Her research is supported by the US National Endowment of the Humanities. She agrees that the dance was birthed in the 18th-19th century by the Calé Roma mixing various Gitano and Non-Gitano traditions as my edits suggest. Her work Flamenco Nation, published in the peer reviewed and well regarded University of Wisconsin Press, was met with widespread critical praise.[39][40][41][42][43] a Flamenco dancer and scholar wrote this about Holguin, “I did not have to read very far to find reassurance in the depth of not only her research, her mastery of primary and secondary sources, but also her understanding of Flamenco as a complex and multifaceted art form.[44] Now, Holguin does make clear that Flamenco is not a purely Romani dance, as does my edit, but she does recognize the part of the Calé Roma in birthing the dance by combining various cultural elements.[45] I would be happy to include her stance in an origins sections that “While Flamenco originates in the folkloric traditions of the Calé Roma, it incorporates aspects of various non-Roma Andalusian dances, as well as , dances from continental Europe, Latin America, the Caribbean and, later, from African American dance forms.” I think that would be a proper compromise. I’m also willing to work with you to create a broader origins section here on the talk page. You seem to agree that Bernard Leblon is reliable so I’ll skip discussing him.” This is straight from the talk page, as you can see I explicitly said that Flamenco is not a purely Romani dance unlike what Cristodelosgitanos suggests. He has also never given any argument on why these sources shouldn’t be included except that they are from “hippie activists.” He insists that only his POV is fact and refuses to engage in meaningful middle ground conversation.TagaworShah (talk) 19:25, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

Note that I have added new and in depth explanations on all my sources and why they meet WP:RS guidelines in the talk section here:[46] under the Subsection Tagaworshah’s WP:RS in the Edit of June 28th discussion, so please check that out on why my edits cannot possibly be considered unreliable sourced or fringe theories.TagaworShah (talk) 04:08, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

Reliability of The Times Bulletin

Latest comment: 3 years ago6 comments5 people in discussion
Unusably nonspecific query from banned sockpuppet - David Gerard (talk) 10:42, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Hi everyone I have an interesting article to create and I am not sure about the reference can I give The Times Bulletin as an reference?  This is the the link https://www.timesbulletin.com/ Is The Times Bulletin a reliable source for nrws reference for an article? Boti2481 (talk) 01:13, 20 August 2021 (UTC

I would be much easier to give a proper answer if we know what the subject is and what specific claim about the subject the source was being used for.--65.93.194.2 (talk) 01:41, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

:I got some biography on an actor with his latest movie and soap opera with some additional information Boti2481 (talk) 01:47, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

Can you please be more specific? There could be a significant difference if you were planning to use the proposed source to offer critical commentary on one of their films from a reviewer or if you were trying to use the source to post about a potential scandal (ie claims that they were paying off reviewers for better coverage, an affair with a costar, domestic violence accusationsm etc). Like I said earlier we would need specifics to give a proper answer.--65.93.194.2 (talk) 04:17, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
timesbulletin.com    
added duses. Walter Görlitz (talk) 04:49, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

Note: this section was opened by a now-banned sockpuppet account. I've struck their comments above. Firefangledfeathers (talk) 06:11, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

RFC Tghat.com

Latest comment: 3 years ago10 comments5 people in discussion

Greetings! Can you all weigh in on the reliability of this source > https://www.tghat.com/victim-list/ and whether it's should be deprecated or blacklisted? It is being used for articles related to Tigray war (claimed) massacres such as Adi Hageray massacre, Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 05:57, 17 July 2021 (UTC)

The very few reliable sources are mentioned several times over on the list, seemingly to inflate the number of reliable source, even inflated it makes less than 10%(estimate) of the list.

The Tghat source is also used at Sheraro massacre, February 2021 Wukro massacre, Grizana massacre, Dansha massacre and ​potentially more articles, where they cite Tghat Relatives and Eyewitnesses which has no external sources beyond Tghat.

Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 05:57, 17 July 2021 (UTC)

No apparent editorial oversight; this appears to be a place for people to go to self-report. I would say it should never be used directly by WP, and I'd be surprised if reliable sources are using it for more than digging out anecdotal reports. —valereee (talk) 09:12, 17 July 2021 (UTC)
Tghat (https://www.tghat.com/) is a relatively new news site based on community (redacted) contributions.
The argument made here is that Tghat’s verified list of civilian victims of the Tigray War (https://www.tghat.com/victim-list/) and Tghat's article on the Adi Hageray massacre (https://www.tghat.com/2021/03/19/a-preliminary-report-on-an-adi-hageray-massacre/) would not be reliable, and should not be used as WP references.
For the Adi Hageray article the argument is that its content isn't reported by any other independent media outlet and so should not be taken as reliable. I am not aware, indeed, of any other media outlet reporting on that; unfortunately the war situation and censorship by the Ethiopian Media Authority (https://twitter.com/EUinEthiopia/status/1415692335099305994) make access to and reporting of massacres a difficult task.
Yet, there is sufficient evidence that Tghat is duly checking the veracity of the information and that they do a serious effort to make sure documentation of massacres is accurate. Here are some examples of massacres documented by Tghat and by international media, where, thanks to their local network, Tgat was first to document the massacre.
Hence the facts reported by Tghat were later confirmed by media outlets. We can conclude that reliable sources are using Tghat for more than digging out anecdotal reports. And also that, so far, internationally recognised journalists reporting on massacres in the Tigray War never contradicted Tghat’s findings.
On the victim list, the argument is that Tghat’s sources are the family of victims and social media. The information on victims whose sources are family or relatives are confirmed by Tghat calling them. Information including relevant social media posts by family members and friends are kept because they are useful contacts for future investigations.
Tghat’s victims list is a sourceless list, mainly because no media has been allowed for months and even when allowed, they couldn't do too much stories because of the security situation. Victim collection initiatives in other conflicts also rely heavily on accurate keeping of personal contributions.
Until Dawit S Gondaria comes up with information/data that contradicts Tghat’s reported massacres or victim list, or provides other hard evidence that this painstaking accounting of massacres and victims is flawed, Tghat should be considered as a reliable and even one of the top sources when it comes to casualties of the Tigray War. Rastakwere (talk) 08:16, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Rastakwere's summary is fair: Tghat is often the first to report specific war crimes in the Tigray War, and its reporting is later followed up by mainstream Western media and by academic sources, with no obvious significant discrepancies. There does appear to be editorial oversight.
Regarding the specific comment by Dawit Ethiopian Human Rights Comission is mentioned 24 times(same source 24 times) which is one pdf source published by Addis Standards (sic): the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has gained in indepedendence and resources since former political prisoner Daniel Bekele's nomination as its head. It unfortunately only publishes its reports, such as the Humera, Dansha and Bissober report, on a GAFAM-run etherpad instead of on its own website, but that doesn't make it an unreliable source - it only shows that the EHRC lacks basic internet skills and understanding. However, the fact that Addis Standard ("Standard", not "Standards"; a major Ethiopian English-language newspaper with a reputation for independence from the various federal governments that Ethiopia has had) hosts an identical copy of the pdf (same sha512sum) adds to the EHRC's credibility rather than weakens it. Tghat publishes its victim list on the same GAFAM-run etherpad; this again is unwise and violates both authors' and readers' privacy and security, but it does not make the general reporting itself unreliable. Boud (talk) 16:15, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
I'm concerned that the victims list published by Tghat seems to be primarily sourced from Facebook. —valereee (talk) 17:25, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Basing a list off Facebook is of concern.JoeZ451 (talk) 18:33, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Look i feel really bad responding to this, i even feel guilty to some extent discussing about war crimes and victims and i even thought about foregoing this discussion, hoewever since i iniated this discussion because of all the reasons mentioned above, i'm hoping Rastakwere can adress the concerns i mentioned earlier such as the discrepancy when Tghat cites the very few reliable sources and gives a different casualty number on the Tghat site, than from the reliable source.●@Boud if you read carefully i never doubted the EHRC & Addis Standard as a reliable source i mentioned them as the few reliable sources on Tghat, hoewever the EHRC has been mentioned in the Tghat list 24 times for the same event. I just pointed out Tghat inflating the mention of reliable sources by listing the same event and the same source more than twice. With that said i will now respond to Rastakwere summary:
  • Your first point about supposed confirmed by Guardian, Quote: The testimony comes primarily from three individuals but is difficult to confirm in all its aspects. it is more appropriate to say it's alleged, not confirmed. Also question marks about the content of Tghat report vs the Guardian report.
  • I have no acces to the telegraph, but i'm interested in reading it, so i'm going to ask Wikipedia Resource Exchange whether they can provide the article. I'm also interested to see whether this World News has been reported by other reliable sources. Update i received the article thanks to Resourche Exchange. This article mentions Quote: a pro-Tigrayan

blog reported Ethiopian soldiers had killed 100 civilians at the same monastery on Jan 5. no credit given to Tghat by name and not corresponding with the date given by @Rastakwere, but i stress, there's no doubt killings happend at Debre Abay since this is a video footage, and according to the article under investigation by EHRC.

  • About the Bora massacre, the LA times describes Tghat as quote: Tghat, a news site run by pro-TPLF activists, reported on the Bora killings Jan. 12, along with another massacre that reportedly took place in an area called Debre Abay. puts into question about the neutrality of Tghat as a source. The LA report also said, quote: “However, the verification of this information was, and remains, extremely challenging,” Pau Sole said. so probably more appropriate to say it's alleged. I searched whether it has been reported by a reliable source elsewhere, it has been mentioned in a opinion piece by the Guardian [[47]], don't know if this falls under the Guardian blogs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources. Also question marks about the content of Bora report by Tghat vs that of LA times.
For all the reasons mentioned above, i think it would be better to mention directly mention reliable sources than through Tghat Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 18:59, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Clarification needed: The original posting of this RfC leads to confusion about whether the discussion is about the reliability of Tghat in general, or Tghat's victim list. I think that further comments should clarify if they're about Tghat or rather about Tghat's victim list. My main comment above was about Tghat in general, not about the victim list, though I did comment in my side comment that posting the victim list on a GAFAM-run etherpad is unwise. The victim list itself is in the spirit of the Iraq Body Count project. Boud (talk) 19:47, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Clarification given: It's about Tghat in general that is why i put Tghat.com in the title, but i specified the problem of the victim list because it was actually used as a source on several articles(mentioned above and potentially other articles) which has not been mentioned by any reliable/indepedent sources at all. Here's for example a preliminary report published by Tghat based on eyewithness accounts [[48]] & [[49]] the same is on the victims list, Relatives and eyewitneses without external sources. So Tghat and the victims list are interlinked. Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 20:17, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Reliability of The Straits Times

Latest comment: 3 years ago30 comments18 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
Additional considerations apply. There is consensus that The Straits Times is generally reliable so long as the Singapore government is not involved in its coverage. However, since Singapore has a poor record on freedom of speech and press, and given known practices of self-censorship and political meddling into coverage, news related to Singapore politics, particularly for contentious claims, should be taken with a grain of salt. (non-admin closure) Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:51, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

The Straits Times is the largest newspaper in Singapore. How should we consider its reliability?

{{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:09, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Survey (Straits Times)

  • Option 2. I would deem it reliable except in cases of political controversy relating to the opposition, where the reporting may be slanted in favour of the government. Seloloving (talk) 03:10, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2. For local politics, sometimes it might be better to read such articles in tandem with related articles from other local media sites. – robertsky (talk) 05:06, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2. Per Seloloving and robertsky. General facts and information relating to Singapore are reliable. Political events might be biased in favour of the government. Justanothersgwikieditor (talk) 07:07, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2 I'd be surprised if any news outlet in Singapore met the option 1 criteria given the restrictions on democracy, free speech and media freedom there. This newspaper is about as good as it gets for Singapore though. Nick-D (talk) 08:35, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 4 Singapore is a highly repressive one-party authoritarian state which lacks civil and political rights as well as press freedoms, as shown in its extremely low press freedom rankings. Its state-controlled media network which The Straits Times are a part of is a mouthpiece of the Singaporean government and constantly engages in propaganda and disinformation. The government constantly puts up a facade by masquerading editorial independence and democracy especially when international observers are concerned when in reality the situation is similar to other authoritarian states such as Belarus, China, Venezuela and Russia, if not worse at some aspects. Option 2 is just not the solution, it should have been deprecated a long time ago like CGTN, RT and Telesur. IpohLang (talk) 11:51, 13 August 2021 (UTC) Blocked sock. John Yunshire (talk) 21:34, 17 April 2022 (UTC)
    • I find it highly intriguing that a brand new account (named after a Malaysian state) makes a few edits to userspace, including placing a large Malaysia flag on their user page, and then launches into a diatribe about press freedoms in Singapore. Of course I cannot guess what their intentions may be, but something feels quite off here. ~ KN2731 {talk · contribs} 14:08, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
    IpohLang, examples of propaganda and disinformation would be appreciated. – robertsky (talk) 16:28, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2 While largely reliable and authoritative, it still have some pro-government tones when reporting on politics and opposition parties. (And hence must be treated with caution) On a whole, it is still acceptable as a reliable source as reputable news outlet. As far as I know, The Straits Times does not outright report falsehoods.--ZKang123 (talk) 12:41, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2 The degree of political bias in the articles vary dependent on topic, but most news articles (and not commentaries) are generally factual and reliable. I would leave it to individual editors to discern for themselves the facts from political fantasies. Pentagon 2057 (T/C) 13:55, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2. Generally reliable as a newspaper of record, but the obvious links to the government means common sense should be applied when using as a source on local politics, and statements in that topic area should preferably be attributed. ~ KN2731 {talk · contribs} 14:08, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
KN2731 I'm curious how do we determine if a source is a newspaper of record in a particular country? Is it just the newspaper with the largest circulation in that country? And are such newspapers generally reliable owing to their circulation numbers?VR talk 14:53, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
There's no fixed criteria for a newspaper of record, but it tends to be a country's oldest-running/most prominent/most-read/most-trusted newspaper, and usually have international recognition as a source on the happenings within that country. Consequently, they are taken to be more reliable than other newspapers or news sources. Whether they are actually more reliable depends on the context – for Singapore, the extensive regulation of media through the Newspaper and Printing Presses Act, and more recently the introduction of the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act, has created a culture of self-censorship around topics known as out-of-bounds markers. ~ KN2731 {talk · contribs} 08:02, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2. I generally agree with what has been expressed above. The Straits Times is Singapore's only local English-language broadsheet, so there really aren't many alternatives when it comes to secondary materials. CNA and Today, the other two major sources of local information, are both owned by Mediacorp which is itself owned by the Government through Temasek Holdings, so they are in the same position. — SGconlaw (talk) 15:07, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2, per others but I'd recommend even more care than others have suggested with a government controlled news source in an authoritarian state, as in it should not be used in anything the Singapore government might have a stake beyond just local politics. But of course it's a major source of information for Singapore related topics and is authoritative enough to be used in uncontroversial circumstances. Tayi Arajakate Talk 18:33, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 1. According to Oxford University's Digital News Report, The Straits Times is Singapore's paper of record. In my experience it is reliable, and it seems to be treated as such by other reliable sources. No one in this discussion has presented any evidence of unreliability – bias is not the same as unreliability, and being published in a country with an authoritarian government is also not the same as unreliability. If anyone has evidence that The Straits Times is unreliable, I would be interested to see it (please ping me as I don't have this page watchlisted). —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 19:07, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Option 2. It tends to sometimes shift towards the position of the government when reporting local politics, but it's a reliable source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sea Ane (talk • contribs) 17:25, 21 August 2021 (UTC)

Discussion (Straits Times)

Please see above for rationale about why I am opening this discussion. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:05, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Any evidence it had a poor reputation?Slatersteven (talk) 18:07, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Slatersteven, when Singaporean wiki editors generally going for option 2 caveating on political news, it does say something. – robertsky (talk) 16:33, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Not evidence, but see below.Slatersteven (talk) 17:06, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Notified: WT:Singapore. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 23:24, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Some observations:
  • Singapore as a country ranks “very bad” in the Press Freedom Index.
  • Also according to the PFI, the owner of The Straits Times, Singapore Press Holdings, is "supposedly privately-owned but the government appoints those who run it. As a result, self-censorship is widespread, including within the alternative independent media, which are intimidated by the judicial and economic pressure."
  • Media Bias/Fact Check says of The Straits Times, "We also rate them Mostly Factual in reporting due to proper sourcing and a clean fact check record, but limited by government censorship and the promotion of state propaganda."
––𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗹𝗗𝘂𝗱𝗲 talk 02:18, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
@FormalDude: Please don't cite Media Bias/Fact Check for questions on source reliability per WP:MBFC. It's basically one guy, and his methodology is questionable. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:26, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
@Hemiauchenia: I think it tends to be good for finding instances where the organization has failed fact checks, as they normally provide a list of links to each one. I agree though that their ratings ultimately should be taken with a grain of salt. ––𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗹𝗗𝘂𝗱𝗲 talk 19:31, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Failed fact checks don't indicate a record of unreliability. Even reputable news organisations are likely to get it wrong on occasion. For news organisations that publish large numbers of articles, a handful of fact checks are likely statistically insignificant. For example MBFC rates The Guardian as "mixed relability" [50] which they state is largely based on 10 failed fact checks, when that only represents a tiny fraction of their total reporting output. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:53, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
I'm not saying failed fact checks indicate a record of unreliability, nor that no failed fact checks indicate a record of reliability. I'm just saying that it is useful information to analyze in the context of a media organization's reliability. They can point you to where the organization usually makes mistakes, and what their correction-making process looks like, which are both helpful in painting a bigger picture. ––𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗹𝗗𝘂𝗱𝗲 talk 19:58, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

Personally I did consider opening up a discussion at least on WT:SG on the general reliability of local sites individually (i.e. Strait Times, Newpaper, Mothership, The Online Citizen, The Independent, etc), but it isn't done yet as I have yet to do an analysis on the use of these sites on Wikipedia. (I just got back from an excursion at AfC. Many fires to put out here. xD) I am pretty sure that there are other sg based editors wanting to do a discussion as well but are busy/occupied with their own editing tempos. – robertsky (talk) 05:06, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

The truth is, given the rather heavy restrictions on speech and press freedom, there is no totally independent reliable news source. The Straits Times, Today and Channel NewsAsia however are quite reputable, and they can be generally trusted. The problem with most of the other so-called independent outlets, like Mothership, is that they are self-published and does not have the reputability compared to "official news sources". --ZKang123 (talk) 12:48, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

RfC: reliability of Crunchbase News versus Crunchbase's user generated information

Latest comment: 3 years ago20 comments8 people in discussion

Should Crunchbase News be treated differently than Crunchbase on the reliable sources noticeboard? Here's a link to an earlier discussion I tried to start without making it an RfC, and it had a limited response: Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 321#Crunchbase News And here's a link to the page describing the difference between Crunchbase and Crunchbase News, trying to show journalistic independence. [[51]] TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 23:35, 14 July 2021 (UTC)

Well, it selects journalists and signs up to an ethical policy. It's clearly not user-generated content, although that doesn't necessarily mean it's reliable. It doesn't appear to advertise a complaints process or policy. On reliability, how does Crunchbase News compare to sources like Techcrunch? ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 14:31, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
You can click on news.crunchbase.com     to see all the different Crunchbase News articles that are used as sources on Wikipedia, to decide whether you think they are reliable or not. In my experience, the news reporting, both with Crunchbase News and TechCrunch, is reliable, and no more promotional than other reliable sources. They combine company announcements with interviews and independent reporting. The reason this is someone important is because another editor is mass removing all Crunchbase sources, based on a determination that the main Crunchbase is unreliable, and has included at least one Crunchbase News article as well. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 16:09, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
It may be no more promotional than many other sources we use, but that's not saying much. If it's a RS, then that only applies to the independent reporting-. DGG ( talk ) 18:04, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
Agreed, which is why each source must be considered on a case by case basis, in the context that it's used. But we certainly don't want blanket wholesale removal of Crunchbase News sources, based on an unrelated determination that user generated Crunchbase is unreliable. And IMHO, even though it's a different conversation, Crunchbase is no more or less reliable than IMDB. Much is user generated, but the underlying info can be easily checked with independent sources. For example, Crunchbase reports on total funding by adding up the different rounds. If three reliable sources say that series A, B and C were $10M, $20M and $70M in order, and then Crunchbase says total funding to date is $100M, it's easier to source the aggregate total using Crunchbase than hunting down the three different announcements in third party press. That should be considered reliable, yet that's the type of info that is being wholesale removed. But first things first - back to Crunchbase News. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 23:51, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
Yeah, I don't know why Crunchbase is deprecated, since I agree it's equivalent to IMDb. Deprecation is a bit arbitrary, though. Techcrunch is okay but it can be a bit promotional. At minimum I wouldn't use Techcrunch to source controversial information, or to source things that sound too hyped up or futuristic, and am unsure if they ever do straight PR. Sourcing a fundraising amount or owners of a company? Seems fine. Sourcing information in Artificial intelligence, or some related exceptional claim about a company? Ehh... ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 19:58, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
The IMDB isn't an independent source, so if Crunchbase is like that, it's a good thing it's not accepted as a source. Crunchbase News seems to be run differently from Crunchbase, though, so whether it's an independent source depends on who writes the news, whether they fact-check the information, whether the content is sponsored by the companies being written about, etc. A proper news source should have a clear editorial policy. If the company obscures this kind of information, there may be reason for concern.—Anne Delong (talk) 18:05, 24 July 2021 (UTC)
Crunchbase News claims an editorial policy, but almost the entire content is press release churnalism - David Gerard (talk) 19:24, 24 July 2021 (UTC)
Here’s their editorial policy. [[52]] Seems pretty straightforward to me. Even Forbes uses their coverage in their articles. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 19:47, 24 July 2021 (UTC)

TechCrunch isn't a clear RS - it's yellow-rated, because it's boosterism that fails WP:ORGIND per previous discussions, linked from WP:RSP#TechCrunch. There's no reason to presume Crunchbase News should be treated as an in the clear NEWSORG, given its parent fails to clear the bar.

There's no discussion yet of the actual usages of Crunchbase News on Wikipedia. We have 82 usages of Crunchbase News. The content used is mostly barely-churned press releases (e.g., [53] [54] [55] [56] [57]) with a bit of the sort of "analysis" that's indistinguishable from boosterism (e.g., [58]). You'd have to be really stretching to consider this in any way comparable to independent third-party journalism on the companies.

Even if we declare that the "news" site isn't technically deprecated, it's the sort of stuff that's at best a slightly worse version of the primary sources it's based on. Unusable for notability - it's precisely the sort of promotional boosterism that leads to funding rounds having been considered not usable for notability or WP:CORPDEPTH - and barely usable for facts.

I should note also: going through the Crunchbase backlog, a disproportionate number of these articles are just corporate spam, or barely above that. I keep hitting things warranting PRODs and speedies, orphans created by an SPA and not substantively edited in the several years since their creation, undisclosed paid editing, etc. I keep having to apply {{advert}} and/or {{puffery}} tags. Even in non-spam articles, Crunchbase or Crunchbase News adds information primarily of interest to the company's boardroom.

As far as Wikipedia goes, Crunchbase is in practice a trashy source largely used for puffery, and looking for Crunchbase links is a good way to track down promotional editing - David Gerard (talk) 08:25, 16 July 2021 (UTC)

@David Gerard: Thanks for sharing your perspective. I also spend a lot of time editing company articles, and I think you can find paid editing by tracking any publication. I'll take another shot at clarifying the difference between Crunchbase and Crunchbase News. The former is a highly visible crowdsourced data repository that summarizes company information in one place, and the info can be easily checked and corrected. Like Bloomberg, they make their money selling access to the info, but thanks to crowdsourcing and open access to the data, Crunchbase is more up to date. For my VC friends, Crunchbase is their go-to source for funding info. Crunchbase info is collected like Wikipedia, except at Wikipedia, it's considered more reliable because we show our sources. Crunchbase News is an independent news organization that, like any other media outlet, might use a press release as the starting point of any story, but they also add independent reporting and info they get from interviews. I'm curious if you have any examples of any of the info you removed from articles that was sourced using either Crunchbase or Crunchbase News being incorrect, and not simply because the info changed since it was originally added to our articles? Just as an example, the first item you linked, which sourced Greenlight Financial's $215 Series C, was actually used as a source by Forbes in its followup coverage, confirming the info you removed.[[59]] If it's good enough for Forbes, it should be good enough for us, right? Nonetheless, I'd be OK with adding a separate line to the reliable sources noticeboard for Crunchbase News and assigning it the same yellow rating as Techcrunch. That way, its reporting can be considered on a case by case basis and not blanket removed. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 22:54, 16 July 2021 (UTC)
I'd say Wikipedia has nothing to be gained by adding Crunchbase News, except more corporate spam. And TechCrunch should be moved to "generally unreliable" in the manner of a tabloid that hasn't been caught actually fabricating information, but whose content is basically trash. Because it, and Crunchbase News, are basically trash. You were seriously claiming these could be placed with reliable NEWSORGs, and that's just incorrect. They are press-release churnalism that should be removed from Wikipedia, and absolutely not encouraged - David Gerard (talk) 14:36, 17 July 2021 (UTC)
Can you address my points? TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 05:32, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Your proposals don't propose anything that would add to independent third-party RS coverage in Wikipedia. I don't think either belongs as a source in Wikipedia except in unusual circumstances, for the reasons I stated. Do you understand why churnalism is only a slight laundering of straight-up press releases, and is a net negative to Wikipedia that should not be enabled or encouraged? - David Gerard (talk) 09:57, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
The source you surprisingly removed again from Crunchbase News in spite of this discussion being ongoing was used to show where the subject’s company was located, and how many people it had. [[60]] Are you implying that that information is incorrect? And indeed, would you please show me the inaccuracies in any of the sources you are mass removing right now, so we can see the harm you are claiming? I already showed above how one source you don’t like WP:IDONTLIKEIT was used by Forbes, so please address that. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 18:25, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Yes, I removed it editorially with due consideration as churnalism - that is, a press release reprint being presented to readers as a journalistic source of quality, which it isn't. Do you understand why churnalism is only a slight laundering of straight-up press releases, and is a net negative to Wikipedia that should not be enabled or encouraged? - David Gerard (talk) 19:41, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
I don't see the problem with using it for such noncontroversial information. Benjamin (talk) 04:06, 19 July 2021 (UTC)
Also, I want to say RS is what sets the criteria, so whether any work counts as RS depends on context and that work and that can overcome the reputation of whatever venue it appears in and whatever general remarks RSN has about the venue. That NYT printed an opinion piece by John Doe does not make that content any more RS than John Doe because the context is John Doe as author covering John Doe opinion. That SkyNews printed a statement by BP does make that statement more RS, because the context is SkyNews editorial control and the reporter editing it portraying it as fact. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 11:56, 5 August 2021 (UTC)
  • To the question (Should Crunchbase News be treated differently than Crunchbase on the reliable sources noticeboard?), clearly yes. Which level of reliability Crunchbase News has, I have no idea, but it does not fall under WP:UGC. MarioGom (talk) 10:23, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

Location hypotheses of Atlantis

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

Over at Location hypotheses of Atlantisthere are a number of sources is used for a number of claims, the source is Atlantide è il blocco continentale Sardo-Corso sommerso durante i Meltwater Pulse and (by the same author Luigi Usai,) La mappa di Atlantide. Quartucciu, Sardinia (as well as an attempt to use another of his books. They may be (as both the first one and the one I have now removed are "Independently Published" ([[61]]) SPS. So are these works in fact RS for any claim about Atlantis being Sabrina?Slatersteven (talk) 14:59, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

There are no reliable sources for Atlantis being anywhere. A source may be reliable for a statement that a specific person made a claim regarding a supposed location though. And if the person making the claim is the writer of said source, it almost certainly is reliable for that. I'd have thought that the more important question was whether this claim was of any significance. Which would almost certainly depend on whether others had commented on such a claim. Articles on fringe topics shouldn't be dumping grounds for the opinions of anyone and everyone who supports the theory. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:09, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
SPS are SPS. So unless this Luigi Usai is a recognized expert in whatever field he claims to work in (in this case I suspect archeology or history) he would not be an RS, even for his own claims. The question is, is he an SPS?Slatersteven (talk) 15:14, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

Cydonian Civilization Hypothesis

Latest comment: 3 years ago10 comments7 people in discussion

What makes these sources unreliable? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chantern15 (talk • contribs) 05:22, 21 August 2021 (UTC)

A brief glance at our article on Research Gate should answer that question. For me this is not only a no, it's an absolutely not. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 05:48, 21 August 2021 (UTC)
This is a conference talk, which is not necessarily peer-reviewed, and even well-respected publishers have been known to publish quack — there recently was a juicy discussion at WP:FTN about a bizarre study in the well-known Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology which claimed that cephalopods are aliens. This claim is way too exceptional to be given due weight in the absence of secondary sources, and in this case, we do have explanations for these isotopic anomalies — for example, the unexpected abundance of 40Ar quoted in the abstract is also present on Earth, and is well-explained by radioactive decay of 40K,[1] a naturally occurring radioactive isotope with a half-life of 1.25×109 y.[2] –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 06:42, 21 August 2021 (UTC)
What explains the anomalously high radiation in the northern hemisphere of Mars?Chantern15 (talk) 07:44, 21 August 2021 (UTC)Chantern15
Here's how you can find that info yourself. Look in the reference section of the weird Martian nuclear war conference talk and see where they got the idea of anomalous radioactivity from in the first place. They cited that to a conference talk by someone else, Taylor et al 2003, which is not fringe. Read that and you'll get the mainstream explanation. Geogene (talk) 08:34, 21 August 2021 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Emsley, John (2003). Nature's Building Blocks: An A-Z Guide to the Elements. Oxford University Press. p. 45. ISBN 0198503407. Retrieved 12 June 2020.
  2. ^ Audi, Georges; Bersillon, Olivier; Blachot, Jean; Wapstra, Aaldert Hendrik (2003), "The NUBASE evaluation of nuclear and decay properties", Nuclear Physics A, 729: 3–128, Bibcode:2003NuPhA.729....3A, doi:10.1016/j.nuclphysa.2003.11.001
Thanks! I'll check it out!106.215.127.75 (talk) 11:16, 23 August 2021 (UTC)Chantern15
In any case they are just conference papers so they don't meet our criteria. Doug Weller talk 12:27, 21 August 2021 (UTC)
It did get published in AIAA, but I understand what y'all are saying.106.215.127.75 (talk) 11:17, 23 August 2021 (UTC)Chantern15
It is perfectly possible, in fact likely that there was an enormous amount of fission reaction on Mars in the past. See Natural nuclear fission reactor. And Mars would show stuff from much older times. So probably some good science behind this. Mixed with an awfully vivid imagination ;-) NadVolum (talk) 21:43, 21 August 2021 (UTC)
Hopefully, there can be a manned mission to this area to determine exactly what transpired at some point in the future.106.215.127.75 (talk) 11:16, 23 August 2021 (UTC)Chantern15

2019 Pentagon Videos

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Can there be an edit made to the 2019 Pentagon Videos section under the Pentagon UFO article which adds the words: "the object flickered on their screen" before "before it eased into the water"? Because that's what it seems to do when you look at the video towards the end.106.215.127.75 (talk) 11:26, 23 August 2021 (UTC)Chantern15

Snopes in light of the latest revelations

Latest comment: 3 years ago28 comments17 people in discussion

Snopes is considered a reliable source now. Recently it turned out that their owner published dozens of plagiarised stories on the website [62]. To their credit, they admitted it and suspended him. Having said that, the articles themselves are still there (they plan to add notices to them) and in general this puts their editorial oversight in doubt. I suggest to move them to "No consensus" for now and add a note that some of the articles have been plagiarised. If/when they clean up this mess and we see that they are still cited by other reliable sources they can be moved back to reliable. Alaexis¿question? 14:24, 15 August 2021 (UTC)

Plagiarism and unreliability are not the same thing.Slatersteven (talk) 14:30, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
I do think it shows issues with their editorial oversight because of it. If they plagiarized it I think it is reasonable to assume they did not properly vet the information. PackMecEng (talk) 14:41, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Lol, what? "Plagiarism" isn't a synonym for "fabrication", the fact that he did not properly attribute his writing doesn't alter the reliability of the underlying material. He was cribbing from reliable sources, at least. Zaathras (talk) 14:33, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
No, but we should not be using content that is knowing plagiarized even if the material is based on reliable sources. That's a copyright problem (eg why we don't want people linking to questionable article duplication sites when we can just use the original source). Also, that they were plagiarized and not given sources also does raise some question of other articles by this one writer of how much fact checking they used, so in that subset of articles, reliability is an issue. I think its fair to at least temporarily mark Snopes unreliable until it is clear they have marked all suspect articles and then we can add that caution while re-instating Snopes to reliable after that. --Masem (t) 14:37, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
This notice board is about reliability, not legality. And no, it does not raise any question about how much fact-checking they did, it just means they were too lazy to write it themselves. Unless it can be shown the stories were false this is not a reliability issue.Slatersteven (talk) 14:41, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
A site that may be incorporating material either legally or ethically beyond their copyright (well beyond fair use) is a clear issue with regards to editorial oversight. I would fully expect that a site with such oversight would try to check for such issues if plagiarism was in play. That this is still likely content that from the original works are still reliable and likely what we would still include, its fair not to remove Snopes fully (nor remove current uses from existing articles) until we know what articles are tagged, and then go through, strip those ones (if they are used) with better corroborating sources, and then we can re-mark Snopes as reliable outside those marked as such. --Masem (t) 15:05, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
If they've removed the plagiarized content, then we don't have to worry about linking to plagiarized content. If we have footnotes linking to previously plagiarized content, then they're now dead and should be removed rather than rescued from archives. Largoplazo (talk) 22:56, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
They are fact-checkers. I think we need to hold them to high editorial standards. If they allowed this to happen, which wouldn't have happened in a traditional newspaper, their editorial processes are not great. If we see that other media continue to cite them, we can restore their status. Alaexis¿question? 14:42, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Can you offer an example where their fact checking was wrong? That seems to be the thing that would relate to their reliability. The fact that articles were plagiarized doesn't make them less accurate. It also doesn't necessarily shine poorly on any internal fact checking, as the stories contained checkable facts and references to the actual sources that were referenced in the plagiarized articles. If they fact checked the claims, they would have checked out. Detecting plagiarism often requires actively looking for it, and that isn't what their job would normally entail. No reason to believe that this was a systemic problem rather than the work of a single author as it appears to be. NonReproBlue (talk) 15:13, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Well, there was a story with the Babylon Bee when they labelled satire as false news and they were criticised for their handling of the $2000 checks story ([63]). Not enough to make them unreliable but not exactly a stellar record either which confirms doubts about their editorial processes. Alaexis¿question? 15:42, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
That would hold more water if people didn't routinely fail to understand that the Babylon Bee was satire and share articles as though they were real news. It quite literally is fake news, even if it is explicitly done for satire. Also "criticized for their handling" doesn't mean "wrong". As an American I can say that I fully understood from the outset that the two checks would total to $2000. Many people didn't. That's not Snope's fault. Their fact check was correct. NonReproBlue (talk) 16:16, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
This is your personal opinion. I gave you examples when others didn't find their fact checks correct. Alaexis¿question? 17:02, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Your link is to a blog. Do you have any reliable sources on the subject? I am skeptical when people cite blogs as evidence of unreliability because in practice it amounts to little more than "this random person disagreed with their reporting" - unless the error is trivially clear, we need to see other sources of reasonable weight saying "they actually got this wrong." As far as the satire story goes, Snopes said that they fact-check satire in situations where there are people who believe it is real; in that case, they also updated the fact-check to make it more clear. Both these things are marks of a WP:RS. --Aquillion (talk) 06:23, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
Dismiss. As I have mentioned in an earlier discussion, the question of editorial oversight is a proxy for quality but is not the only measure of quality, nor is it a direct one. The behaviour from Snopes is for now appropriate and something I would expect for an outlet that cares about its integrity. If anything, any caveats should apply for these 54 articles only; and even then quality isn't impacted by the fact someone employs Ctrl+C+V and a thesaurus for "writing" fact-checks (as it would be the case if they were citing some garbage sites, per GIGO principle).
I agree that fact-checkers should uphold to the highest standards possible; but it seems they a) are going to clean that cock-up, which was connected with one author only; b) won't and don't make the fact checks now of any worse quality; c) this mishap alone does not force Snopes out of RS territory. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 15:32, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Note that the Buzzfeed article ends by paraphrasing a journalism professor: "Many prominent news organizations, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, and BuzzFeed News, have acknowledged plagiarism in their own pages and publicly corrected the record, as Snopes is doing now." We cannot expect that reliable sources will always live up to professional standards. TFD (talk) 16:00, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Yeah but in those cases it is generally not from the co-founder/editorial staff, this is a higher level. Which calls into question their editorial decisions. PackMecEng (talk) 16:03, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
What about the incubators in Kuwait, the WMDs in Iraq, and some of the stories about Clinton-Sanders, Trump-Russia and misinformation on COVID-19? (I am referring to items reported as news that were later retracted.) Do you think this was the result of rogue reporters? TFD (talk) 19:17, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Generally speaking yeah mostly and some maybe not, but that kind of misses the point that I was making. None were by co-founders or that level. PackMecEng (talk) 19:39, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
My point is that reliable sources, particularly for current events, are not as reliable as people think they are. Inevitably, there will be inaccurate information in articles, particularly for current events. Fortunately with snopes when it is wrong we can determine that by checking their sources. A typical article will have a claim and compare it with a reliable source. We can then go to the rs. TFD (talk) 23:35, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Wait and see - There's no immediate evidence of inaccuracy and their editorial team is addressing as they should. Since this is still a developing story I think it would be best to wait until we know exactly which articles are affected so we can reference the original sources instead.
Buzzfeed shines a light on what's been going on at Snopes over the past few years, and one quote in particular illustrates a shift towards clickbait that I (and others) have noticed lately: "In other emails from around the same time (2014-2015), Mikkelson described his vision for the site’s future 'as a platform for traffic-generating junk that people would complain about if it were on ‘classic’ snopes,' including articles copied from 'viral item of the day' sites.'" On the other hand, comments from former employees show a strong sense of ethics on the editorial team, which gives me hope that they'll be able to correct the problems caused by one "bad apple" of a founder. Once the dust settles around the plagiarism issue, I think it would make sense to reassess Snopes' reliability to see if their recent work upholds the same standard of accuracy that they were known for. Since fact-checking has become more mainstream we can probably source a lot of things to major outlets such as CNN instead of Snopes. –dlthewave ☎ 16:36, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Wait and see, as several people said above. One individual, even the co-founder, is not enough to discredit an entire source provided the source's editorial controls and other safeguards ultimately work as they should - part of the purpose of several of the requirements in WP:RS is to ensure that there are sufficient safeguards to ensure that the source does not simply serve as a mouthpiece for the views of its founders or owners. --Aquillion (talk) 06:23, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Wait and see. Per the multiple explanations above. There's no reason to immediately go to no-consensus. ––𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗹𝗗𝘂𝗱𝗲 talk 06:28, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Wait and see. The yardstick for a reliable source is not "perfection" it is "what is their response when they screw up?" In the immediate aftermath, it appears the editorial team at Snopes is responding correctly, and we need to see if they follow through with plans for retractions, etc. --Jayron32 15:14, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
  • At this point it seems limited to one author, one time period that's several years over, and probably a part of the site, we would not readily use anyway -- when we use such fly-by-night stuff, which should not be often, we have better sources for, '“breaking” and “odd” stories on various subjects originally reported on by other news organizations'[64], one would hope. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:23, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Wait and see At the moment, we simply don't have the information to judge how bad the damage was, though it's a reasonable guess that if the problem was plagiarizing for clickbait, then the affected topics might be pretty incidental. XOR'easter (talk) 17:42, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Still reliable unless there are further expositions of bad practice at Snopes, barring of course the articles they are still tidying up. I commented more on this here. Their comprehensive response to BuzzFeed's story, rather than making a superficial PR comment "We dispute these claims", is consistent with a high-quality reliable source that cares about fact-checking. However, I do understand that these recent developments are shocking, do damage Snopes's credibility and I think that it would not be unreasonable to begin an RfC on Snopes either now or after some waiting period recommended by editors above. At such an RfC I would hope to lay out the strongest possible case to keep it at "generally reliable". (I'd welcome a ping to any such discussion.) — Bilorv (talk) 12:10, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Still reliable, RfC not needed and would likely be pointy at this stage. Plagiarism isn't a reliability concern - fabricating information would be, but there have been no claims of fabrication/lying/misleading against this one individual here. There's no reliability concern to start with - but even if there was, Snopes has acted exactly how we would expect a reliable source to do - suspend the person, begin issuing retractions and appending notes to articles to explain, etc. But again, plagiarism isn't even a reliability issue - it may call into question the editorial processes of the source, but plagiarism is, in many cases, hard to find. Automated tools are... to put it bluntly, quite crap at it, and a respected editor/writer isn't going to be run through an automated tool for every article they write, much less have a human review the results of that. I doubt anyone can show me a source that has never had a writer plagiarize something - it's how they respond that matters, and they're responding correctly. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez (User/say hi!) 00:06, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

Is Stundin a reliable source

Latest comment: 3 years ago30 comments11 people in discussion

There is an RfC at Talk:Julian_Assange#RFC_inclusion_of_Sigurdur_Thordarson_claims. A major source is Key witness in Assange case admits to lies in indictment. A person said "I don't see any discussion as to whether Stundin is or is not (generally reliable)" Should Stundin be considered a reliable source in general or for this? Thanks. NadVolum (talk) 21:12, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

Is there any reason not to consider it a normal WP:NEWSORG? - David Gerard (talk) 21:27, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
Not that I know of but it has been questioned so I'm here. Their description ofthemselves is at About Stundin, you'd have to translate that to English, they only do a little in Englsh including the queried article. NadVolum (talk) 21:40, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
Via google translate, the organization does seem to have editorial oversight. Their "objectives" section seems to be saying that they are an "independent" formed after a group of journalists resigned from DV (newspaper) "after a hostile takeover of the media due to the coverage." Is there someone in Iceland who might be able to interpret that for us? —valereee (talk) 09:01, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
@Krun, do you have any familiarity? —valereee (talk) 09:05, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
I would generally consider it to be reliable, as far as news outlets go, probably better than most small news outlets and less likely to be swayed by special interests than the larger ones. Of course, every news outlet has some sort of angle or bias. Stundin has a declared purpose of avoiding special interest bias and has certainly striven (and managed, I think) to steer clear of big business influence. See here for a list of shareholders (and shareholders’ shareholders) as well as Stundin’s editorial policy, as published by the Icelandic Media Commission. I believe Stundin leans a bit toward skepticism of corporations and institutions and would probably rather err on the side of the “common man”, private citizens, whistleblowers, etc., but I don’t think they would print something unless they trusted the source. – Krun (talk) 18:35, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

The issue is not (for me) can it be used for a claim, the issue is can it be used to A, say this claim is a fact as in "On 26 June 2021, Stundin, an Icelandic newspaper, reported that a key witness in the United States’ case against Assange had admitted to giving false testimony used in the superseding U.S. indictment". And, B, does it (alone) carry enough weight to pass wp:undue and wp:not news?Slatersteven (talk) 08:44, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

The Washington Post consider it a reliable source; they have done secondary reporting on Stundin content, as has UK current affairs publication Private Eye。Cambial foliage❧ 09:51, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

No the Washington post reported what they had said, as in "they have claimed this we can't confirm it" in fact it makes it clear that the claim he is a key witness is not true. As such it implies the Stundin article is not accurate. So a reputable RS has said this is not a reliable source.Slatersteven (talk) 09:58, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
No, you've completely failed to understand the text of the article; perhaps try reading it again. Washington Post confirm that Stundin is reliable by their secondary reporting of the content of the interview. They disagree with the characterisation of the witness as key, and this is stated in the current use of the source. A reputable source considered the content of the interview reliable and worthy of reporting on. They disagreed on a specific detail and this is noted. Try to keep up.Cambial foliage❧ 21:26, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
I looked at the article talk page and only found two different links to the Washington Post [65] and [66]. The first doesn't seem to refer to Stundin AFAICT. The second refers to this interview [67]. Your comment also seems ambiguous, you first said "they have done secondary reporting on Stundin content" which seems to imply they did this multiple times. But you later said "their secondary reporting of the content of the interview." In the absence of someone providing links to the different times the Washington Post have done secondary reporting on multiple different Stundin content, I'm going to assume you initial comment was poorly worded and they only did so a single time. I don't think the Washington Post choosing to report on one single interview by a source proves that they think the source is point blank reliable. The point of reliable secondary sources is they are supposed to assess sources and fact-check where necessary. So this means from the evidence presented this far, IMO at best, we can maybe conclude they think think Stundin is reliable for this one interview. Which isn't actually that difficult, you have to be a terrible source to lie about what someone said in an interview. Perhaps the Daily Mail reaches that level but many non RS do not. Indeed plenty of RS report on stuff Daily Mail claim anyway. Point being, the Washington Post may very well think Stundin is generally unreliable. Or more likely since they have limited experience with Stundin, have formed no firm conclusions of their reliability. I'm not even sure that we can conclude they've concluded Stundin can be trusted for the entire interview anyway. Realistically, if they're only reporting on one aspect of that interview, the only thing they need to be certain of is that Stundin are not lying about that part. Note I have no specific comment on how to handle the content of the interview. Since this is RSN and the question was about the general reliability of Stundin, I feel it is reasonable to comment on that aspect. In fact, I don't even have an opinion on whether Stundin is generally reliable other than that if Stundin is, the fact the Washington Post chose to report on a single interview they conducted, is almost useless as evidence for that. IMO David Gerard etc above are heading in the right direction to assess the general reliability of Stundin. Nil Einne (talk) 21:26, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
In this confused and lengthy text you attempt to replace the limited information we have about what the Washington Post does think (report of interview accurate; framing of certain implications they disagree) with unfounded speculation on what they might think. You implicitly admit this is based on nothing. You also claim several implications in the text to which you respond that do not exist (e.g. "they have done secondary reporting on Stundin content" does not imply multiple instances). Gerard and valereee's comments are certainly appropriate to assessing reliability. The Washington Post (and Deutsche Welle)[1] taking the interview report seriously is also a factor bolstering its reliability. Cambial foliage❧ 10:04, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

Well you can see the problem at the RfC and why I raised about being a reliable source here. The Washington Post is the only major media source which covered it. There are lots of other reliable sources but they are not major media sources. The current text quotes Stundin as saying he is key and also the Wshington Post saying it disagrees. The other sources are being dismissed as not giving any weight for inclusion and the whole paragraph has an RfC saying it should all be completely deleted. As to the actual facts there's Thordarson's own words in the Icelandic version and many of them are corroborated by an ex Icelandic Interior Minister in tanscript of YouTube interview on CN-news - but that's not a major media source. The lack of coverage in major media has been noted in for instance FAIR - Key Assange Witness Recants—With Zero Corporate Media Coverage. If the major media sources don't cover something but many others do is it then undue to include it? NadVolum (talk) 10:43, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

It probably meets rs but the issue is weight. What weight do we give a story that appeared in an Icelandic bi-weekly publication that has only been picked up by only one major news source (the WP), considering that the topic (Assange) regularly receives extensive coverage throughout the world?
To put this in perspective, a witness against Assange has been reported to have retracted his statement. Assange's defenders say this invalidates the case against him. Had this received widespread coverage, media would have published a range of opinions and we could inform readers what bearing the story would have on the case against Assange. At present we don't know and Wikipedia articles should not get involved in the debate by giving prominence to stories that for all we know have little or no relevance to the case.
TFD (talk) 10:52, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
Is the problem that there are not many sources like the Washington Post saying the evidence is not key? If anything the text gives that more prominence than in the various reliable sources. WP:WEIGHT doesn't say anything about removing stuff because it does not have enough sources saying it is wrong! NadVolum (talk) 11:10, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
There have been widespread coverage in reliable sources. The problem is the lack of corporate media coverage. WP:WEIGHT does not say we should only use corporate media sources. That is why some media critique sites have written about this as a kind of media blackout. NadVolum (talk) 20:05, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
Are you suggesting a conspiracy? SPECIFICO talk 20:15, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
Have a read of the various media critique sources given and you'll see they raise a range of possibilities. The FAIR cite above is of the opinion that the mainstream media have decided to side with the security state. NadVolum (talk) 20:59, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
Having looked at WP:WEIGHT again, as far as I can see it not only says nothing about mainstream press being decisive, it actually says practically the opposite in "Keep in mind that, in determining proper weight, we consider a viewpoint's prevalence in reliable sources, not its prevalence among Wikipedia editors or the general public". Mainstream media as a criterion emphasises prevalence in the general public. There is no assumption a widely read newspaper is more reliable. NadVolum (talk) 20:59, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
The relevant section of WP:WEIGHT says, "An article...should strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject." Washington Post, an Icelandic newspaper that isn't even among the country's top ten newspapers,[68] and a handful of alternative media most of which fail rs is not the body of material on the subject. Iceland's population btw is 370,000, or about 1/10th of 1% of the U.S. population. While the size of the country may not be the only factor in determining weight, Stundin does not have much readership outside Iceland, since few people understand Icelandic.
Also, we don't assume that being widely read is necessarily important since tabloid newspapers such as The Sun have massive readerships. What we should consider is how influential it is in other reliable sources. So for example when the Oxford University Press publishes a book about the Afghan war, most of the news sources used will be major mainstream media.
TFD (talk) 22:55, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
You're still going by numbers. And how would you expect a biweekly to compete on web numbers? There's a discussion on this page about Mail&Guardian, a South African paper, and it looks like that is considered reliable, and it has a story by John Pilger on this very matter Julian Assange: A day in the death of British justice. Your criteria removes anything like that. And no I doubt many of the factual or biographical books I have ever mention the major media as sources. I wonder if your rasoning has contributed to another thing I was looking at just recently on Wikipedia, a theory of wealth inequality covered in Scientific American and discussed by Bill Gates which implies to me a lot of government thinking is counter productive - but it isn't covered at all in WIkipedia, even the basis from 25 years ago hardly gets a mantion. One might have thought something like that would be covered by the Economist or the Financial Times or Wall Street Journal at some stage. Though mainstream would exclude the Economist I suppose. NadVolum (talk) 10:00, 21 August 2021 (UTC)
+ [69] in Jacobin (magazine) too which is being discussed above, but it seems to rate a 2 because of its strong ideological stance. Just shows how widespread it is in non corporate sources if it was in two that are being discussed here at this time.. NadVolum (talk) 21:55, 21 August 2021 (UTC)
The policy does not exclude Mail & Guardian or Stunden as sources. The reasoning for the policy is that given a huge amount of facts and opinions about major topics, editors have to be selective in what is included and what is left out. The criterion mandated by WEIGHT is to report facts and opinions based on the weight assigned to them in reliable sources. If a specific fact or opinion is almost totally ignored in the vast majority of reliable sources, then it lacks weight. That may mean that relevant facts and opinions are ignored because sources have largely ignored them. But what is relevant is a matter of judgment. What you consider important, I may not and vice versa. If you and i for example were to write a 500 word essay about New York City, chances are that the two essays would not contain the exact same facts and opinions. That's because each person has a different view of what is important. Because different editors will have different biases, there must be some way to determine what is included and excluded. For better or worse, that determination is based solely on the degree of coverage in reliable sources. Some people disagree with the policy because it means that articles about current events will reflect the bias in legacy media. If you don't like that, then you need to get the policy changed. TFD (talk) 04:31, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
See the CBC article, "Canadian Nobel scientist's deletion from Wikipedia points to wider bias, study finds." It says, "The Wikimedia Foundation, which funds Wikipedia, acknowledges that articles on the online encyclopedia are not representative of the impact that women have had throughout history, saying that mirrors the world's gender biases." Something similar can be said in this case. TFD (talk) 05:23, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
If that policy was applied uniformly to the article it could be chopped down quite a bit. For instance someone in the RfC produced a link to the Intercept and I queried how it would get past this business of major media sources. But looking at the article I see some things are based solely on that publication. Cut out all the ones not in 2019 Newspaper web rankings and worries about space should be relieved. I agree one can't have things which have too little weight in the context. But WP:WEIGHT does not attach weight amongst the general public as a considertion, only weight amongst reliable sources and then only for whether things are trivial or fringe. It is not the approprite policy if there is one to support what you are saying. NadVolum (talk) 10:03, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
I am sure many of us would think that was a bad thing given how bloated that article is.Slatersteven (talk) 10:08, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
Then the guidance in Wikipedia:Article size indicates it should be split into a main article with summaries and sub articles. NadVolum (talk) 18:30, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

NadVolum, from what you have said above, your view seems to be that corporate media are not inherently reliable to assess WP:DUE on this issue. This is an interesting argument, however, it is not the view of Wikipedia. Size of circulation is absolutely one of the criteria we use to assess reliability of news organizations. See WP:NEWSORG and WP:RSVETTING.— Shibbolethink (♔ ♕) 18:34, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

NEWSORG does not mention it at all that I can see. RSVETTING says "Size doesn't prove anything, but it's a data point", and that's about it. "Absolutely" is a bit of an exaggeration as far as I can see, it is one option but certainly not the most important in RSVETTING. NadVolum (talk)

Stundin seems to be a reasonable WP:NEWSORG, and the attempts to keep it out seem querulous. No reason not to use it; put an attribution on if necessary - David Gerard (talk) 19:55, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

No reasons whatsoever have been provided to doubt its reliability. Alaexis¿question? 06:56, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Fürstenau, Marcel (2 July 2021). "Hoffnungsschimmer für Julian Assange" [Glimmer of Hope for Julian Assange]. Deutsche Welle (in German).

Can plausible, unsourced statement rely on sourced statement?

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

Don't know if this is the right place to put this. I'm interested in a couple of sentences from a previous version of the article, "Soul patch," on Wikipedia. Here is the version: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Soul_patch&direction=prev&oldid=1040092104. One sentence of interest reads, "Jazz flute players who disliked the feel of the flute mouthpiece on a freshly shaven lower lip often sported the look." This sentence does not have a citation supporting it. The next sentence reads, "On the other hand, jazz trumpeters preferred the goatee for the comfort it provided when using a trumpet mouthpiece." This sentence does have a supporting citation.

I am wondering if the sentence about flute players is sufficiently supported by the sentence about trumpet players, i.e., if trumpet players got comfort from facial hair, is it reasonable to think that jazz flute players would have gotten comfort from a soul patch even if the particular statement about jazz flute players is not supported with a citation, and hence leave the statement about jazz flute players in the article? I have looked for articles that support the statement about jazz flute players and can't find any. Thanks for feedback Greg Dahlen (talk) 20:41, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

It is reasonable, sure, but it is a synthetic or confected argument. We need a reliable source making the claim, rather than connecting the dots ourselves, no matter how plausible it might seem. --Pete (talk) 20:50, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
Technically there is no rule or policy the disallows the addition of unsourced statements. It only becomes an issue when someone challenges it. Personally I think this sentence is plausible (and interesting) enough I would tag with {{fact}} not delete it, but that can't stop others from doing so. As always, if you want something to stick on Wikipedia, a source is the best pushpin -- GreenC 03:33, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

answering-islam.org

Latest comment: 3 years ago18 comments9 people in discussion

This site is used in a number of articles.[70]. If you look at this subpage[71] it appears to be a hate site, and IMHO should be both deprecated and blacklisted. Doug Weller talk 15:47, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

Oh jeez we should not be using them, they are most certainly an anonymous hate site. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:33, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
Yikes, no that is A) not a reliable source and B) we shouldn't be giving them any more publicity. They're blatantly anti-Islam. We should be actively removing those links and as you say, blacklisting the site. Canterbury Tail talk 19:59, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
answering-islam.org     shows that it is used in 41 mainspace articles. Someone should probably clean up. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:19, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
I've started. Is there anyone here who is able to get it added to the blacklist? Canterbury Tail talk 22:21, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
@Newslinger:, who'd done a lot of work here, and might know the process. Vanamonde (Talk) 06:02, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
Having skimmed a few uses, it would seem that they are hosting work by very many authors unaffiliated with them, and so the sources may not all be bad; however, it also might be a copyright concern in some cases. Vanamonde (Talk) 06:10, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
I have contributed to about 20, all gone now anyway – for now, I'm sure they will be back :-( Yes, WP:LINKVIO says that we can't link to copyright theft sites. Either way, it is not a wp:RS and should be on the blocklist. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 09:34, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

I glanced at the sites using it as a source and the first one I looked at, Muhammad in Islam, also uses Answering-Christianity.com which also looks terrible. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:14, 24 August 2021 (UTC) I also found and deleted one citation of answering-Islam.com. I presume these sites are all related. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:17, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

Just the very front page of that Answering-Christianity is terrible. I'm not even going to quote what it says. Yes that should all go as well and be black listed. Canterbury Tail talk 12:06, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
Yes, deprecate and blacklist all above mentioned "answering-XXX"-sites. These are obvious hate sites, and provide nothing but caricatures both of their own self-declared faith, and of the faiths they attack. –Austronesier (talk) 13:43, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

Agree with deprecating the whole bunch.Slatersteven (talk) 14:01, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

In the course of clearing out, I've come across a few that looked like probable good faith, so I wonder if the domain registration lapsed and has been recycled? I certainly found a site (muslim-canada.org) mentioned in the same sentence that goes to some football page. Not that it really matters, we can't let non-RS links stand. (btw, they hadn't all gone, {{duses}} has just turned up a bunch more. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:42, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

[edit conflict] Whoops, the "bunch more" was because I used .com second time round. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 16:04, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
I've known "answering-islam.org" for more than 10 years, and no, I don't think they have been hijacked. It's always been a mixture of sexed-up descriptions of the ugly face of Islam that undeniably exists, classic Islamophobic tropes, and self-praise for Christianity as the noble and peaceful antithesis of Islam (yeah, sure). –Austronesier (talk) 16:11, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
Interestingly someone tried to blacklist Answering-Christianity 11 years ago and it didn't get carried through. So it's been going on for some time. We should get every one of these variations blacklisted. Canterbury Tail talk 16:00, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
Just found one using a German version of the site, www.answering-islam.de. It's clearly the same group, down to the logo and layout, just in German. So there may be others. Additionally I've found a load of pages using the book "Answering Islam: The Crescent in Light of the Cross" as sources, and this book appears to be more of the same, using made up stuff about Islam and again is not a reliable source. Canterbury Tail talk 19:54, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

Reliability of Social Blade

Latest comment: 3 years ago15 comments6 people in discussion

Clearfrienda​ questioned the reliability of Social Blade, which is used to update almost every Internet personality's subscriber, follower, and view stats; some major examples of articles using Social Blade are Cr1TiKaL, TommyInnit, and That Vegan Teacher (the origin of the discussion). Pokimane also uses Social Blade, just not in the infobox. L33tm4n (talk) 00:27, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

The information is clearly not made up, and thus is reliable. It's only really useful as a source in a limited number of contexts (eg to source statistical/historical numbers, etc.), but for those use cases it's reliable. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 00:33, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
@ProcrastinatingReader: Thanks. :) L33tm4n (talk) 03:44, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
Social Blade is reliable – this kind of information (views etc) is really easily scrapable, so the numbers on these kinds of websites are generally accurate across the board. One thing I'll note is that you can't trust websites purporting to show twitch subscriber counts: these numbers aren't public, and require a bit of guesswork and for you to be monitoring each accounts page 24/7. For instance, see twitchstats.net and twitchtracker.com, which give wildly different numbers; I don't think either one of them is reliable. Social Blade doesn't do this though, and from what I understand can be trusted. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 12:27, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
We need to take care of the difference between "are the numbers accurate per the listed sites", and "are the numbers usable in Wikipedia". We could get view counts or subscriber counts directly from the sites in many cases, e.g., YouTube; we don't, though, because those numbers are trivial to inflate. So even if SocialBlade don't fabricate the numbers, they can't connote notability. I definitely wouldn't call them an "RS" in Wikipedia jargon, because that term does rather more work than that - David Gerard (talk) 13:29, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
Indeed, it can’t be used for notability, but that’s mostly owing to the fact it provides no substantial information. We can’t write an article based on “X is a YouTuber with Y many subscribers. Last month, he had Z many subscribers.” ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 14:08, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
I don't agree that the website is reliable. I've looked at it before and I can't answer the questions: who owns the website, who works on it and how is the information checked for accuracy? What is the process for correcting errors that people notice? It doesn't have to be malicious for a complicated programming tool to be buggy. To be reliable, a source has to demonstrate a basic degree of trustworthiness and a fact-checking process. It doesn't matter how much we believe the information is accurate if they cannot demonstrate this. — Bilorv (talk) 11:15, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
It has a reputation for accurate historical data. Their data is cited by The New York Times (and again), Vogue, The Washington Post (and again), Dexerto, Press Gazette, etc. See WP:USEBYOTHERS. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 13:29, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Per USEDBYOTHERS "If outside citation is the main indicator of reliability, particular care should be taken to adhere to other guidelines and policies, and to not represent unduly contentious or minority claims.” USEDBYOTHERS is not a trump card, we still need to apply the whole range of guidelines and policies. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:38, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Like what? In particular, what is the main evidence of unreliability, or of the information being "unduly contentious or minority claims" (for example)? ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 13:56, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Besides the fact that they’re a small for-profit business with no reputation for fact checking and opaque policies? We wouldn’t source wheat production figures to a comparable small for-profit wheat market analytics/consulting/farm management firm. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:21, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Why is being for-profit relevant here? The New York Times is also for-profit. Most sources are for-profit.
It does have a reputation for fact checking. WP:USEBYOTHERS is a way of determining the reputation of a source for fact checking. In fact, I think it's the only non-topical way of determining this, that is explicitly codified in policy. Social Blade is used and cited by top-tier RS sources that I listed above. There is no evidence presented here of Social Blade ever fabricating data. There is no evidence presented of them failing to meet a specific PAG. AFAICS there's no good reason to prohibit its use on Wikipedia or consider it unreliable. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 14:30, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
The business and news side of the NYT and comparable papers are separated by Chinese walls, editorial independence policies, etc. I see no evidence that this source does that. WP:USEBYOTHERS is a way of finding evidence about the general reputation of a source, it isn’t specifically about fact checking. Also again on its own you can’t determine anything from USEBYOTHERS. If I had evidence that they had fabricated data then I would be arguing for deprecation not simple unreliability. Also note that this appears to be a discussion about the whole site not just their data, are you saying that their company blog is a WP:RS? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:42, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Unreliable, Social Blade is a business which provides some of its “statistics” to the public but there is literally no reason to believe that they are a WP:RS and they fulfill basically none of our criteria for a reliable source. We don’t use niche commercial companies for this sort of information for any other topic area that I’m aware of. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:21, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Their reliability also appears to have been in question in 2016 when this Kotaku article was published "SocialBlade says their metrics are reliable. They pull data directly from YouTube’s API. But over Twitter on Monday, YouTube accused some third party apps of poorly representing subscriber activity, pointing directly to SocialBlade. SocialBlade fired back that they don’t make up data, adding that “our data is only as good as what we’re able to get from you:).”” Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:58, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

Wellheim Formation: Slightly confusing sources situation; address it expressly in the article?

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments1 person in discussion

I've come here to ask advice in a quite complicated case.

To say it in layman's terms:
This is about some rocks that are 91+ millions of years old.
There is a single mining company that exploits and sells the deposit.
For some reason they have repeatedly claimed that their product is purely mineral and has a purely mineral origin.

The contention is about the last part: purely mineral origin
Some employees have published expertises, studies and articles propagating the purely mineral origin claim,(see article) a few apparently independent authors have repeated those claims, citing the company's pulications. (Lüttig, 2007; Römpp, 2015)
The recent, independent, scientific sources we used in creating the article all unanimously state and emphasize the biogenic origin for which this geological formation is special and known.

To illustrate how far the contention and confusion goes in this case, you may for example look at this source: Groteklaes, Michael (ed.). "Kieselerde, RD-11-01037". RömppOnline. Retrieved 2 January 2015. This German geology glossary first gives a definition of Kieselerde (diatomaceous earth) as being generally of a biogenic origin, but then has an extra paragraph for making an exception only for the deposit at hand, claiming it has purely mineral origins. They cite the company's website (with a date of 2005) for this statement.

On the talk page of Wellheim Formation I have proposed a sub-section that clearly states this contention and puts it in relation to independent mainstream research.
In other words: The company's claims about a purely mineral origin have no serious scientific support.
I have little experience in these matters and this case appears special to me.
What do you think would be a proper approach that is least misleading to the interested reader?
— Preceding unsigned comment added by ΟΥΤΙΣ (talk • contribs) 22:05, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

I'm sorry, this is a complicated matter for me, as I am not a studied geologist. One our studied geologist supporters already explained to me on the talk page what the full picture is. I didn't want to mislead you, I'd just forgotten the following:
The origin of these rocks is mixed. Over millions of years there were several additions of new biogenic material (dead animals and plants) which were then mineralized over time. So it is more correct so say:
The origin of these rocks is of a mixed biogenic and mineral nature. Just wanted to be complete, here. Insisting on a purely mineral origin is still misleading in this case, in my opinion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ΟΥΤΙΣ (talk • contribs) 22:11, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

I added two unsigned templates for my own posts. --ΟΥΤΙΣ (talk) 22:22, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

Just a short addition:
I do not want to embarass the producing company, but I also do not want to mislead our readers. Do you think it would be okay to include a disclaiming note (perhaps within a footnote) that clarifies the sources situation, as explained above? --ΟΥΤΙΣ (talk) 15:21, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

biographypedia.org

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

I have an aversion to any websites that claim to know an individual's net worth, so when I saw https://biographypedia.org/who-is-helene-joy-biography-husband-net-worth-family/ added as a reference of a subject's age to the article on actor Hélène Joy by АРК9367 (talk · contribs), I was suspicious. The article has an author, Benjy P., but then it seems that all of the site's content is from that author. There is no statement to indicate if there is editorial oversight. There is no board and it seems no way to correct any errors that may be in the articles they publish. Most concerning, there is no indication how the information is gleaned. Can the source be used for BLPs? It is currently only being used in one article: the one I saw it used in. Walter Görlitz (talk) 16:42, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

No indications of reliability and looks like an ad-infested tabloid site. I wouldn't consider it a reliable source for any article, much less a BLP. (Note that the single author, Benjy P., used to write for Daily Mail.) Schazjmd (talk) 16:48, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Rule of thumb: any article that is entitled "Who is/The truth about/what happened to X, biography, net worth", or similar is an unreliable source, it's the same kind of headline you find in chumbox ads, and is a sign of low quality clickbait journalism. There are loads of websites like this, and they're all totally unsuitable for a BLP. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:30, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

Various sources relating to Board Games (Opinionated Gamers, xgn.nl, reich-der-spiele.de)

Latest comment: 3 years ago7 comments7 people in discussion

Firstly we recently had a deletion discussion for CirKis that ended with no consensus. Probably the key point was that NemesisAT found two foreign language sources that may help to prove the notability of the game: xgn.nl and reich-der-spiele.de. If we cannot establish notability, then I or Piotrus will probably re-raise the AfD.

The second issue relates to the newly created page Evolution (board game). Notability is not in doubt because we have sources from Ars Technica, The Guardian, The San Francisco Chronicle and the science journals Nature and Evolution. None of these were adequate to source a description of how the game is played. So I used some posts from the Opinionated Gamers site which I found very helpful for describing game play and some of the background history. ICv2 provided a bit more about the history, but quite frankly I am not sure how reliable they are because they seem to be just rehashing press releases to me. I believe Opinionated Gamers is probably pretty reliable, but as it is essentially a collective of blogs (and I think received free copies) I would not trust it with regards with regards to notability. To keep things simple in the telling, I have mixed up the order in which sources were applied and not mentioned some, but the key question is that our use of Opinionated Gamers was challenged in the new page review process, and I would like a second opinion on that.

More generally we are trying to systemize our evaluation of the reliability of sources, which is a particular project of Blue Pumpkin Pie. Slimy asparagus (talk) 19:36, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

Hmm. This is an area where it's really challenging to work out what's a usable hobbyist review site vs a non-usable hobbyist review site. Personally I'd agree that Opinionated Gamers and ICV2 are not great sources and would not normally consider them 'reliable', but also I don't object to using them to flesh out some uncontroversial details. Indeed most places where Opinionated Gamers is used as a source, you could just as well use the game manual as a source. However, this does point to something which is really a content issue rather than a sourcing issue - does an 8-point gameplay summary really belong in one of our articles? (The two non-English sites I can't comment on the value of). Thanks, The Land (talk) 19:55, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
At this moment, the board game industry is still very closely attached to the board game community/fanbase. I sometimes believe that certain industries recognize Wikipedia and will provide more sources. It hasn't grown or had a huge market. ICv2 is recognized as a valid source in other Wikipedia such as WP:VG and WP:ANIME. I don't know if reliable sources need to have. I know we have to be more strict when it comes to adding review/opinions. Either way, the industry is slowly growing and more reliable sources may become available with more higher quality creentials. I admit Opinionated Gamers and ICV2 aren't the most high-quality articles, but they may be situational sites to use.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 03:01, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
WP:VG/RS (and RS in general) can be useful here. In general, foreign language sources are fine, the problem is that not all game review sites are reliable. We have to check if they are not just blogs. Are authors anonymous or not? Is there evidence of an editorial control? Any indication that they reviewed the game positively for compensation? Do they acknowledge how they acquired a copy of the product? Honest reviewers often will.
As for 'how to play', frankly, game manual will do just fine. It's a primary and not independent source, for we accept such sources for claims about entities, nobody should cry foul here. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:32, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
wp:sps if out side RS consider the persons view notable than hey would be an "aknowlgded expert" otherwise no theyc are not.Slatersteven (talk) 09:43, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
  • For the game rules and gameplay, the game manual itself is sufficient sourcing. There's no need for third party sourcing here; indeed the best source is the game rule book itself. --Jayron32 12:23, 26 August 2021 (UTC)
Agree with above. What however may be useful on a case by case basis would be including as an external link one of the sites above if they give a good breakdown of how a game actually plays in practice. (a how-to guide for example). Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:08, 26 August 2021 (UTC)

Allsides.com media bias chart, revisited

Latest comment: 1 year ago7 comments6 people in discussion

Both AllSides and Ad Fontes Media have been discussed before, although Ad Fontes Media ended up being listed as unreliable at WP:RSP while Allsides was largely ignored. I would like to revisit this.

So they seem similar on the surface. Ad Fontes Media's chart is more granular and also provides an evaluation of reliability as well as bias. AllSides just groups sources into 5 categories (left, leaning left, center, leaning right, and right) without making any judgment about reliability. In my view, it isn't granular enough, because sources like CNN and NYT get grouped in the far left column along with Mother Jones, and National Review ends up being grouped in the far right column along with Brietbart News. That just seems weird.

The problem I see is that both sites use volunteer responses as inputs.

  • Ad Fontes Media accepts analysts but you have to apply and meet some qualifications.[72]
  • Allsides has a place where anyone can become an analyst in their blind survey inputs to rate news sources.[73]

So, if our consensus has been that Ad Fontes Media is unreliable, should that consensus extend to Allsides? ~Anachronist (talk) 18:07, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

Based on what you've said, I would say yes because it would be applying the same logic to a site with a nearly identical purpose and methodology. If anything, it would seem even less reliable, based on your analysis. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 18:19, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
  • I think AllSides is reliable as an attributed source (something like a Metacritic for political bias), ideally combined with other reliable sources to more fully describe the consensus or range of views on political biases of different sources, e.g. "ABC News has been ranked as left-leaning by AllSides,[74] and as centrist/least biased by X". The chart alone may be too simplistic to cite, but AllSides publishes detailed methodology for their rankings, and are under staff and editorial control (see National Review and ABC News). I don't think AllSides uses volunteer user data as inputs: the Rate Your Bias survey appears to be just for fun, and their methodology states: "Users can indicate whether or not they agree with our ratings, but our ratings are not determined by community votes. Instead, community feedback simply acts as a “warning system” that our current bias ratings may be off." See also a a recent discussion of AllSides and Ad Fontes by the Poynter Institute. Full disclosure, I started the AllSides Wikipedia article. I don't know the Ad Fontes system well enough to have an opinion at this time. --Animalparty! (talk) 01:14, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Uhh... why is Ad Fontes unreliable? Wikipedia editors shouldn't judge the methodology of sources, this is not in our purview, just as we don't judge the methodology of primary journal articles. Classifying a source as unreliable because editors don't believe in the methodology seems like a NPOV issue IMO. The statements shouldn't be made in wikivoice, but both sources are perfectly reliable for their own opinions. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 00:37, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
    There have been at least 4 discussions listed in the past for the Ad Fontes Media Bias Chart, and consensus every time has leaned towards "unreliable for use in Wikipedia". A significant minority of respondents have argued it may be used well-attributed statements of the "According to Ad Fontes Media..." type, but in every discussion the greater consensus is that we shouldn't use them. You can follow all of this at WP:RSP. If you want to start a fifth such discussion, feel free, but history is not on your side. --Jayron32 16:28, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
    As I observed at the top of this discussion, there is no real difference between Ad Fontes and AllSides. Both claim to use objective scientific methodologies and each claims theirs is superior. The output of each is different; the Ad Fontes chart (if it were deemed reliable) is actually useful, while the AllSides chart is nearly useless due to its aggregation of fringe with run-of-the-mill bias and combining reliable and unreliable sources into a single group.
    I started this discussion because I have no idea why we would treat them differently. I also looked at the past discussions about Ad Fontes and I found nothing definitive, no solid consensus, no formal vote or anything, just a few comments from a few editors spread across a few discussions — certainly nothing that would warrant an entry in WP:RSP. @Jayron32: Would you point to the definitive discussion where this was decided to list at RSP? Because I couldn't find one. In my view, the Ad Fontes entry should be removed from RSP pending a real discussion about it. ~Anachronist (talk) 15:53, 26 August 2021 (UTC)
    Just figured I would add note and opinion to the discussion now that I reviewed all of this. I had previously cited Ad Fontes and had considered it reliable but now I see it is on the WP:RSP. I first learned of Ad Fontes Media by watching an interview on Cable television's News Nation, pretty reliable show. One of the reporters interviewed the CEO who explained the methodology used and its seemed very unbias IMO. I was surprised to discover it is pretty much deprecated now. I agree that if Ad Fontes doesn't make the mark, AllSides should probably also be deprecated. The virually no difference between the two. Fishnagles (talk) 03:52, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

Source concensus

Latest comment: 3 years ago13 comments4 people in discussion

Dear fellow editors, please see [75] (Source consensus section) Thank you. - GizzyCatBella🍁 05:11, 28 August 2021 (UTC)

That's a sightseeing guide, and this is the mass murdered of hundreds of Ukrainian civilians in the Pawłokoma massacre. Some Polish tour guide is not reliable. There is some denials of this massacre by Polish hard liners, but Polish government apologized and scholars are in consensus over Biss. Just search for Biss and Pawlokoma in books and papers.--Erin Vaxx (talk) 05:47, 28 August 2021 (UTC)

Please note - Erin Vaxx is a brand new account, they removed my note with an edit summary "Wrong, place it on yourself", so I’m posting the diff here -->[76] - GizzyCatBella🍁 06:26, 28 August 2021 (UTC)

I registered my account on October 19th, 2020. Almost a year ago. Your post above is false.--Erin Vaxx (talk) 06:40, 28 August 2021 (UTC)
When you began editing this article, already showing in depth knowledge of Wikipedia, you had ... 27 edits. The question isn't about reliability of sources but the POV nature of your edits which are not supported by sources. Volunteer Marek 20:46, 28 August 2021 (UTC)
I'll add that one of those first edits of "Erin Vaxx" was in the area where I was editing where they arrived to revert my edit -->[77]. It appears, and it's possible, the person who may hide behind the new account "Erin Vaxx" is following me around (as now, around 100's of new accounts do since 2019). - GizzyCatBella🍁 22:16, 28 August 2021 (UTC)
Stop these meritless accusations, I am not hiding. I undid once, months ago, in an edit in which you added the Soviet Union to the Axis powers. A ludicrous addition, because the Soviet Union was one of the main Allied Powers, contributing greatly to the Allied war effort. The Soviet Union liberated most of Europe. The Soviet Union suffered the most war casualties of any Allied Power.--Erin Vaxx (talk) 06:08, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
PLEASE CONFINE THE CONTENT/CONDUCT DISPUTE TO THE TALK PAGE. THANK YOU. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:10, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

Please do not export content/conduct dispute to RSN. It isn't going to help anyone. As for the specific source in question (the tour guide). The publisher seems to specialise in the Carpathian-related topics and I'd take their word for recognition in the field of Carpathian tour guides, but his contribution to the topic in peer-reviewed publications in history of Galicia or Volhynia is close to none, or none, and, according to the short biogram on Polish Wikipedia, he's a biologist and only after that a historian. That said, I have found praise of his works from a historian at least of one of his other series of books. From the ArbCom ruling, a high-quality source is such that belongs to either of the three categories: "an article in a peer-reviewed scholarly journals, an academically focused book by a reputable publisher, and/or an article published by a reputable institution". Theoretically, it's closer to the second, but I can't really say it's academically focused. However, the fact his books are quite well cited in scientific publications, and that endorsement makes me think that it just hovers on the threshold of high-quality and marginally reliable for the purposes of the sourcing requirements. In that case, use with care, possibly attribute. Btw, if you are looking for some more sources, here are some in Ukrainian: [78] [79] [80] and in Polish: [81], [82] - should be treated similarly to Rąkowski

As for the fragment you want to source, the second paragraph is still unsourced, as I could not find the fragment where Biss fights in the villages mentioned, and even then "defended the Polish population from UPA attacks" is non-neutral wording. But that's not an RSN issue. The first paragraph can be sourced without attribution. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 03:13, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
Thank you. Check carefully the diff. again Szmenderowiecki -->[83]. Which paragraph I am trying to source to the book in question again? This --> On the 26 of July 1944, during the Operation Burza, his troops stopped the attack of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS near the town of Siemianówka ONLY - The rest has been entered by someone else and remains unsourced. - GizzyCatBella🍁 07:07, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
OK, the first paragraph can be sourced using the guide; since you didn't really specify which paragraph you were going to cite using that source, I was analysing both. That's it for me. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:09, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
What exactly is “non neutral” about “defended the Polish population from UPA attacks”? Volunteer Marek 07:29, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
That's not an issue for RSN. I'll pass it to the talk page. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:07, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

Reliability of The New Zealand Herald

Latest comment: 3 years ago32 comments20 people in discussion
Consensus is that The New Zealand Herald is a generally reliable source (Option 1).  Spy-cicle💥  Talk? 23:43, 27 August 2021 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The New Zealand Herald is a daily newspaper based in Auckland and the largest newspaper in New Zealand. How should we consider its reliability?

{{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:09, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Survey (NZ Herald)

Discussion (NZ Herald)

Please see above for rationale about why I am opening this discussion. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:05, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Any evidence it had a poor reputation?Slatersteven (talk) 18:07, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Just glancing, but being a paper of record in New Zealand, seems like its fine, just when you use opinion pieces cite them as such. If NYT, WP, and WSJ are considered papers of record in the USA and labeled reliable don't see why not for this. 3Kingdoms (talk) 20:14, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
Notified: WT:New Zealand. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 23:21, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
NZHerald is generally reliable. It's not really my favourite source personally, but honestly I couldn't argue that any biases the Herald has (especially in opinion pieces) are excessive compared to most other newspapers that I can think of. I think the only major issue in terms of WP:RS is that I remember occasionally they syndicate articles from sources like The Sun, but this might not be current practice (I couldn't find any after a quick search), but the Herald's in-house articles should be totally fine. --Prosperosity (talk) 01:18, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • So it seems like this discussion is just here to confirm that the source is reliable, so we can add it to a list of sources? There isn't really anything I would consider unreliable about the paper, maybe of course as mention, be careful of using opinion pieces to reference controversial stuff in BLPs but that is covered by WP:BLPSOURCES and WP:NEWSBLOG. That doesn't make the whole paper unreliable.— NZFC(talk)(cont) 02:11, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • Can I point out that despite its name it is firmly confined to the northern portion of the North Island and also despite a (very expensive for the owners) few sales outside the Herald's home region. Eddaido (talk) 03:07, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
  • I'm wondering whether a similar discussion should be opened for Stuff.co.nz? Like IdiotSavant I use both as preferred sources for NZ content, and Stuff.co.nz is often not recognised by foreign editors and assumed to be an unreliable source (the name doesn't exactly inspire confidence). RSF flags concerns about editorial integrity but those seem to relate to the Australian ownership of Fairfax, and Stuff.co.nz returned to NZ ownership in 2020. Just a thought. Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 04:46, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
I don't understand why you are bringing this up. No one questions its reliability. Are we going to go through the tens of thousands of sources used for articles and rate each one? We should only do this where there are frequent discussions. TFD (talk) 04:55, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
@The Four Deuces, this discussion on my talk has additional details if you'd like more beyond what I said above. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 07:21, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Per Eddaido, The New Zealand Herald is an Auckland-based newspaper and its main circulation area is in the upper North Island. The Dominion Post in Wellington and The Press in Christchurch are generally the newspapers of record for their respective areas. All three newspapers are members of the New Zealand Media Council, and all have a formal complaints process plus an independent adjudicator in the Media Council. Lcmortensen (mailbox) 07:07, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
As others said, each major centre has a newspaper based in it and then there is a lot of regional based too, all I would consider reliable. There is a List of print media in New Zealand and under the dailies, I would quite happily use any of them. I know this was started about the NZ Herald but it could really get bloated as there is also The Spinoff, Newsroom, Newshub and TVNZ that all have web based news that you could include as well and all have been used in New Zealand based articles on Wikipedia.— NZFC(talk)(cont) 12:19, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
User:Sdkb, after reading your comments in other threads I want to ask whether you really just want to know if it is considered reliable or whether you actually want to know whether it is the newspaper of record for NZ (for which its reliability is merely a prerequisite)? Nurg (talk) 08:39, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
@Nurg, for these threads, I just want to know the direct question that is asked, which is on reliability. We'll be seeking input on the selection of newspapers of record down the road—the only reason I've been talking about it here is that it seems necessary to stem the flood of complaints. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 16:03, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
Has anyone actually complained about the Herald? --IdiotSavant (talk) 23:29, 14 August 2021 (UTC)
User:Prosperosity mentioned the Sun but NZ Herald also used to pick up junk from the Daily Mail. E.g. [84] [85] [86] [87] [88] [89] [90] [91]. I think they must have stopped this since it use to be trivial for me to find a Daily Mail article by going to their page and looking for a headline that seemed Daily Mail esque but this failed just now. (Still a bunch of news.com.au, BANG! Showbiz and Daily Telegraph stuff with the occasional NYT stuff which are premium. I think they also have Washington Post stuff or maybe that's only Stuff. Of course AP etc too.) Although NZ Herald isn't unique in this regard and it's something editors should always be on the lookout for, it's probably worth mentioning in any RSP write up that editors should check the byline and make sure it's actually a NZ Herald story IMO, IIRC there have been at least two instances when I've seen someone citing the NZ Herald for a news.com.au story. Nil Einne (talk) 15:53, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Anyway although the clear Daily Mail etc ones are easy to deal with, there are IMO more complicated ones like [92] and [93] and [94] and [95] and [96]. These are stories marked with the NZ Herald byline. But to my eye, they're often re-write of tabloid stories, e.g. [97] [98]. While I know many sources do this to some extent, in the past I've been particularly unimpressed with some of NZ Herald's examples. (But since I wasn't thinking of Wikipedia at the time, I never recorded any of them.) Some of them seemed to be almost word for word copies of Daily Mail stories to the extent I could copy some lines and find the original Daily Mail version. I think they've improved since when I looked just now, and also back in May, I couldn't find any that bad. (It doesn't help that they've still got heck of a lot of news.com.au junk which is almost as bad such that when I check out a story that looks bad it's probably news.com.au.) Still while I agree real NZ Herald content should be considered clearly reliable, I'm not so sure about this content marked as NZ Herald but which seems to be mostly repeating some tabloid story. I've never been convinced the review used by NZ Herald is particularly robust, frankly, I've sometimes wondered if they really do anything or it's actually some syndicated content from someone which they didn't properly mark. Particularly in the past when you could find almost exact duplicates elsewhere. Unfortunately short of banning all NZ Herald content not about NZ and Pacific neighbours and Australia, I don't know a simply way to differentiate other than "I know it when I see it". Nil Einne (talk) 16:34, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Why is the bias for all these sources heavily favored towards left wing politics?

Latest comment: 3 years ago24 comments14 people in discussion
Nonspecific claims of bias from an account whose edits are substantially on fringe COVID-related topics. This is as much a waste of RSN time as it has been every other time the topic has come around. Such discussions need to be specific and actionable. They also need to keep in mind that the world is a very big place - David Gerard (talk) 17:01, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I'm scrolling through the source "ratings" and it is quite clear that these are all heavily biased towards liberal/left leaning political views. The new york times is considered "reliable", yet they published numerous fake stories, colluded with the NSA to hide spying on american citizens etc. Then we look at right wing sources and see the opposite, complete distrust simply based on them being conservative.

If wikipedia is supposed to be objective, this is a red flag on how biased the editors here are. There needs to be a balanced/centrist view that looks at both sides of an issue, not pushes a one sided view point with stigmatization of the opposing one. Since former Wiki founder and others have discussed the bias at wiki, this would be a great place to start fixing things by rating this list with a far more balanced viewpoint.Asailum (talk) 11:02, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

I'm guessing you meant to post this on the talk page? Selfstudier (talk) 11:06, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
First off, we have many right-wing RS (such as the Times or The Telegraph). Secondly, spying or bias is not the issue, it is factual accuracy. Thirdly, if you have a source in mind you need to discuss that, not make a general complaint (see wp:soap). Now if you have examples of the new york times publishing outright fake stories and not retracting them can you please give some examples?Slatersteven (talk) 11:09, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
Well, Wikipedia is a global encyclopedia, and there are many more view-points than two. To say that New York Times is "left wing" is a very USAnian perspective; from where I am sitting, it is centre-right. And every source that is generally reliable is sometimes unreliable, so it is always about the context. --bonadea contributions talk 11:18, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
Did you consider the possibility that the causality is in the other direction? Maybe right-wing publications are, on average, factually less reliable, and Wikipedia is doing the right thing in declaring them so? After all, to stay in line, right-wing media need to propagate several indefensible pseudosciences such as climate change denial and COVID-19 misinformation‎, as well as back up the most dishonest ex-president in US history. You cannot do all that and remain reliable. If the causality goes in this direction, it would be irresponsible of Wikipedia to pretend those sources are reliable. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:29, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
This is not a new complaint. However, there is some validity to it. I think it accurate to say that, as a community, we are somewhat left leaning. And yes, this bias does impact how we assess sources. Fact is, we do tend to be more forgiving when it comes to factual inaccuracies in more liberal sources.
That said, I don’t think the solution is to relax our standards. We shouldn’t allow flawed right leaning sources. Instead, we need to be stricter about assessing the flaws in the liberal sources (that align with our own biases). We over-rely on news media anyway. Blueboar (talk) 12:53, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
Then we need to see evidence they do it as a matter of course. All sources make mistakes, the issue is do they continue to push them after they have been told it's a mistake (or in other words now a lie).Slatersteven (talk) 14:34, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
There is definitely a community bias, although I’m not sure our bias really maps well onto the American political spectrum (Americans may be the plurality but they are far from a majority after all)... I would note that one major difference is that wikipedia is extremely tolerant of religious sources when the traditional American left is not. I would also note that demographically we are in theory more conservative than we would be if the gender ratio was flipped or equal so the “not conservative enough” argument is inherently heavily gendered. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:45, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
There actually is no left in mainstream American politics. The most "liberal" Democratic Party congressperson would be classed as centre-right anywhere else in the western world. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 15:02, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
In American politics there is a left. It is to the left of the right wing. It does not matter what the rest of the world has. PackMecEng (talk) 15:04, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
The key word there is “mainstream” and its a true sentence, there is no seat at the table for the global left in mainstream American politics. For instance you will not find any Marxists in the American congress but you will find them in most European parliaments. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:07, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
For sure, I was just keeping it local to American politics as I think that is what the OP was referring to. PackMecEng (talk) 15:13, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
Isn’t the OP’s main mistake looking at Wikipedia in the context of American politics when this isn’t the American wikipedia? I’m not sure how continuing to use a lens thats flawed beyond measure gets us anywhere. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:17, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
Depends on the context. If they are talking about articles on American politics it should be though an AP lens. For instance if they are talking about a left wing figure in an AP topic area we would not say they are right wing by other countries standards. PackMecEng (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
We wouldn’t say anything of that nature unless a WP:RS said it, but if a non-American source called an American “leftist” a centrist we would not change what they said to fit the American context. I would note that both centrists and the left are to the left of the right, it isn’t just the left. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:24, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
True but if a non-American source called an American "leftist" a centrist it would probably lack due weight. A centrists is also to the right of the left. PackMecEng (talk) 15:26, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
It might lack due weight in some cases, but I think probably is a stretch. I would note that this is very common outside of the US (US norms tend to pervade political reporting about the US regardless of where its from), for instance there is no consensus in the international media on whether Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen is a centrist or a leftist... Both can technically be right, politics is entirely subjective at the end of the day. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:32, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
Which is why we should obviously standardize on the American system. Also related to that, ditch the metric system. It is the only logical choice! PackMecEng (talk) 15:48, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
I might be not very much relevant with my European insights here, but really, where you stand depends on where you sit. We must not assume an America-centric approach, even when describing American politics, and the reason for that is that we often never know if a person editing an article on American politics is a European, Canadian or American. (As a side note, it is common knowledge to say that US is among the more conservative developed nations as a whole). From an American perspective, NYT is quite strongly left-of-centre to left-wing; from a European standpoint, it would get just a very subtle left-wing tilt, and only because of editorial stances on societal issues, which often echo what is already done for quite a while in Western Europe (some of which are implemented in the more liberal US states).
But to return to the topic, you claim that The new york times is considered "reliable", yet they published numerous fake stories, colluded with the NSA to hide spying on american citizens etc. Then we look at right wing sources and see the opposite, complete distrust simply based on them being conservative. Three observations on that: the choice not to publish a story does not mean that the source becomes unreliable; the list of "fake stories" w/o corrections issued afterwards is wanted here; the list of "right wing sources" that do "the opposite" of the behaviour you believe to be incompatible with RS is also requested from you. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 16:14, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

You question really should be why is that so many right wing sources are unreliable? And then hold them accountable for being unreliable. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:54, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

This right here. For example, ask yourself why so many conservative sources are spreading disinformation about COVID-19. What's in it for them? Why lie about about something in a way that's literally killing their own audience? Four conservative talk show hosts have died of COVID in the last week. Caleb Wallace, who became infamous for railing against masks and vaccines, died last night - yeah, of COVID. Your ideology's worldview is incompatible with a fundamental accounting of the facts, and Wikipedia cannot solve that problem for you.
"Masks are cheap, safe, and effective at reducing COVID transmission" and "Masks prevent oxygen from reaching the brain and are a tool of Nazicommie domination" are not equally valid ideas and we are not required to treat them as if they are. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 16:11, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

Becuase on average those who edit Wikipedia are more likely lean to the left. Therefore, whether aware or unaware (of said implict bias), they more likely vote left leaning sources as reliable and right leaning sources and unreliable. Just have a look at the difference between the Pinknews and Fox News RfCs. But then there is the fact the many right leaning sources are geniunely unreliable as well.  Spy-cicle💥  Talk? 16:07, 29 August 2021 (UTC)

As I recall evidence was produced of Fox news faking pictures, what was the evidance Pinknews published actuialy fake content?Slatersteven (talk) 16:10, 29 August 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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