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Free Republic.com message board posts as RS

Are forum posts a reliable source for Wikipedia, such as on www.freerepublic.com/forum/a39a525043cb8.htm ? Various users are adding forum posts as RS here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Free_Republic&action=history and claiming they are RS-compliant. Lawrence Cohen 18:40, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Can you give a more specific example? Going back a few from the current version is this with some FR links. The text is mostly discussing things on FR; are the links to the discussion being mentioned, or which of them is a problem? -- SEWilco (talk) 19:09, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Typical: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Free_Republic&oldid=186162142#_ref-20 SELFPUP prohibits such sources when discussing other parties. In this case, they're discussing Tony Snow. In this case: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Free_Republic&oldid=186162142#_note-25 they're linking to a copyvio of another news source that discusses Free Republic. The problem is that I don't think a message board's post, as they have no editorial oversight or control, and as an extremist site similar to http://www.stormfront.org, should not be used as sources for anything but exclusively material to themselves from non-forum posts by random, anonymous individuals. Lawrence Cohen 19:44, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

In general, I agree. But you're deleting whole sections of the article that are "Exclusively material to themselves," such as the frequent disruption of their forum by varuious trolls and "agents provocateurs," also they could not reasonably be described as "extremist," certainly not like Stormfront. Unless you consider the US Republican Party to be "extremist like Stormfront." I've been reading a lot of FR threads since becoming interested in this article, and they seem very mainstream. The "extremists luike Stormfront" get banned for making racist remarks. You're not familiar enough with the subject matter, or you wouldn't make claims like that. Samurai Commuter (talk) 20:51, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

The fact remains that the leftist/agents bit is 1) sourced to message boards, which are useless for an encyclopedia and inherently unreliable; 2) discuss other individuals besides the article subject; 3) are unverifiable, and have no editorial oversight; 4) are the same edits routinely pushed by a banned editor; 5) editing on the behalf or to advance the desired edits of a banned user is not allowed, and is grounds for banning. Thats a lot of reasons this material is inappropriate for Wikipedia. And yes, the "Freepers" are extremists, as sources say. Lawrence § talk/edits 21:15, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

See last post of previous section by Septentrionalis: "When the fact being sourced is that Poster X said Y, then I have to agree the post proves it reliably. The difficulty is that this fact, by itself, is rarely of encyclopedic interest." "Rarely" is not "never." In an article about that forum, such facts may frequently be of encyclopedic interest. Also, WP:SELFPUB is policy and trumps WP:RS, which is only a guideline. Samurai Commuter (talk) 19:35, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Lawrence, they're obviously self-published sources. Anybody here could sign up and make comments there and what one person says is just a personal opinion -- which is the tiniest "minority opinion" there could be. Editors adding FreeRepublic posts as "reliable sources," should be told they're wrong and if they edit war, they should be blocked. It's a good thing you came here, Lawrence, but it's unfortunate that you'd actually have to come here for such an obvious violation of policy and it's pretty sad to see several editors here actually defend this vandalism. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:34, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

The neatest trick would be to sign up and post something anonymously on such a bulletin board, then come to wiki and cite yourself for the source of an assertion. I suspect that was going on in the WyldCard business. Eschoir (talk) 07:48, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Also, the existence of FreeRepublic is notable. What goes on there, however, is not. The "forum controversies" posted there belong on Encyclopedia Dramatica -- not here. I took a quick glance at the Daily Kos article (since it's a similar topic) and that article also seems to suffer from similar problems. A lot of that stuff isn't notable and needs to be cut down. Fortunately, the Kos article hasn't started being sourced with user comments. Any admin needs to just carry a big stick and beat all of the political pundit trolls down. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:40, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

OK I've read through most of this and I have to point out a few things. The article linked is in-fact an article about the internet forum itself. Self-published statements by a subject, presented as the views of that subject, are acceptable, provided they are not presented as facts or reveal certain personal information about living people. Imagine this scenario: We have an article on Anne Coulter and she has a blog where she says "Edwards is a faggot". We can certainly quote her, from her blog, on her article to show what her beliefs are. I see this case as similar. To present a "biography" of FreeRepublic it would be acceptable to quote posts from the board, presenting them as quotes of the board, not as facts. I'm open to having my mind changed on that. I'm not fully sure I'm interpreting policy correctly here, but this is my first stab at this new type of situation.Wjhonson (talk) 08:49, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

We can quote Coulter saying 'Edwards is a faggot' only if that quote is considered suitable notable elsewhere. BLP implies that anything contentious about a living person must be sourced to an RS, not a SPS, even if the article is about the maker of the statement, not the subject. In this example, if Coulter had merely said "E is a faggot" and it had been noticed all over the blogosphere and nowhere else, it should not even be in the Coulter article. Relata refero (talk) 14:05, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

You're right, Wjhonson, but here's what we can't do:

• "FreeRepublic is a racist and fascist organization" (a string of sources to user comments)
• "Daily Kos is an anti-semitic, anti-american organization that hates the troops" (a string of sources to user comments)

Those are extreme hypothetical examples, though that's what somewhat seems to be going on. They're referencing "forum controversies," but who's to say that any of these controversies are notable and how can they be independently verified?

Political pundits on the left, such as the folks at Democratic Underground have been guilty of the former and political pundits on the right, such as Bill O'Reilly and Michelle Malkin have been guilty of the latter.

Also, looking at the article on Democratic Underground, again, I see the same nonsense. Any rouge admin just needs to carry a big stick and clean out the troll mobs. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 22:18, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I point out that the selection of those user comments would be OR, would it not? And, insofar as the anonymous user comments were primary sources, it would be impermissible to synthesize them to advance an argument. Eschoir (talk) 01:32, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes I agree with both your statements. We cannot analyze or synthecize the comments. We can quote them however. We can select, selection is an editorial process much like paraphrasing, joining, copyediting. We do not quote entire works, we select quotes. Now how do we reconcile that with the question of OR in the selection process? Here is how. Primary material can illustrate an issue brought forward by a secondary source. It cannot be used to introduce a brand-new issue. So if a verifiable, secondary source states that Free Republic is fascist, we could then point to certain posts to illustrate examples of that. If no secondary source states it, then we cannot. That's the basic approach. There's always fine-tuning on a case-by-case basis and with consensus. As far as commentary from both sides, imho I would quote both sides with attribution. This provides the basis of the situation, with a neutral point of view. As above, we must ensure that the *basic* issue has been mentioned in a secondary source. Wjhonson (talk) 18:52, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem is identifying which particular posts are fascist, of course. That's where OR might come in by the back door. Relata refero (talk) 14:05, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

You are a genius. But let me put you anonther case -- Regency publishes a book saying Clinton raped Juanita Brodderick. There are plenty of posts at FreeRepublic to illustrate that, but they would nnot be admissible. Case in point, someone used FR email to extract compromising info from a MD GOP staffer and gave it to the Washington Post. There are plenty of posts at FR saying that it was a certain democratic official. They would not be usable? Eschoir (talk) 22:52, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Hell no. Freep postings are on roughly the same WP:RS level as witticisms in black marker on a bathroom stall. The only possible circumstances in which a Free Republic board posting might be a source would be if the posting itself was the subject of commentary in third-party reliable sources, or if the posting came from Free Republic admins and was sourced for an article about Free Republic. Otherwise, Wikipedia needs to treat this stuff like radioactive Kryptonite and stay far, far away. <eleland/talkedits> 19:59, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Do we accept forums that are likely _the_ source for a statement - not just _a_ source?

Initially I've asked a similar question at the policy village pump. After a quite fruitful discussion an editor suggested to ask here for expert answers on the reliability aspect of that particular question. For reference there's also a discussion about verifiability going on here on the WP:V Talk page.
Here goes. In the EVE Online article an editor recently posted a link to a forum topic in the EVE Aurora forums. Aurora is an organization that helps the developers and game masters of EVE Online organize in-game events. The question is whether we accept this source. Here is what the discussion over at the village pump brought.
We are talking about forums here. They are self-published content and therefore "largely not acceptable" as WP:V puts it. The only exception could be content that has been also published by "reliable third-party publications". However, as a fellow editor pointed out, "There aren't going to be much if any paper sources." Or other forms of third-party publications for that matter. I would think that even if there are no other sources this forum is not a reliable source. What do you think about this? Do we accpet this source with regards to its reliability?
-- Aexus (talk) 07:10, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

You ask an interesting question, Aexus. Here's a few quick thoughts:

• First, chat fora have no editorial oversight or emphasis on fact-checking, so you'll never really know what you're getting in terms of facts (the person could be talking nonsense). I also think it's a bad idea to start citing e-mails for "notable opinions," too, but there seems to be some disagreement among editors on that score.

• Second, I use something called the "acid test." If a news search engine (e.g., Factiva, Lexis-Nexis, Google News), academic journal article search engine (e.g., JSTOR) or book search engine (e.g., Worldcat) fails to produce any sources linked to that subject or forum conversation, then we can safely infer that virtually no one thought the subject or fact was worth discussing. Hence, on notability grounds, it really shouldn't be included in Wikipedia. Resorting to an e-mail forum post --- where there are sadly few legal implications to worry about --- in order to verify facts seems pretty dangerous to me on several levels.

• Finally, we went through a similar issue when editing the Essjay Controversy page. Some editors wanted to cite private Essjay e-mails and chat fora and other miscellany in the article. Purists rejected this idea, and edit wars sometimes ensued. The only way that we were ever able to include "unpublished" Essjay e-mail and chat forum comments without a fight was when they were (ironically) cited by third-party journalists and academics. Go figure. (^_^) J Readings (talk) 11:07, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

When the fact being sourced is that Poster X said Y, then I have to agree the post proves it reliably. The difficulty is that this fact, by itself, is rarely of encyclopedic interest. Our article is usually implying that poster X said it first, which requires an independent source; or that poster X is actually notable person Z, which can be clear for a single-person blog, but is much harder for a forum post, although if the poster can be shown to be, say, an EVEonline developer, that would count. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:45, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

No, they aren't verifiable and they only represent the opinion of one person. Take a look. Like Wikis, forum posts can also be changed relatively quickly.

Just ask yourself, "WWBD?" (What would Britannica do?)

Can you really imagine a group of credible encyclopedia editors, sitting around a desk, with one of them using random results on Google or forum posts as reliable sources? Of course not.

If anybody else tells you otherwise, you should first attempt to change their minds through rational discussion invoking the assertions above. If they make vague appeals to relativism, subjectivism, absurdism and other sophistry, then you should ignore them. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:52, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Per WP:PSTS and WP:SPS we can use self-published anything as a primary source for to support the fact that the source exists or says what it says it says, as long as we take care to make sure that anyone without any specialist knowledge would agree if they looked at it. MilesAgain (talk) 21:46, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Nope, not quite. We also need to ensure there's a secondary source backing up our interpretation or our choice of extracts. Relata refero (talk) 14:06, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for your opinions! The conclusion I take with me back into the EVE Online article is that the Aurora forums do not meet Wikipedia's reliability standards as they are self-published content. They don't meet the reliability standards even if we consider that they're likely the only source for a statement - being the only source doesn't make them less of a self-published source. Thanks!
-- Aexus (talk) 20:32, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

What constitutes an "independent third party source"?

What constitutes an "independent third party source"?

I am considering requesting deletion review of a pair of articles on a pair of Guantanamo captives.

I've discussed this with the closing administrator. He or she said they didn't have a problem with considering Summary of Evidence memos complying with WP:VER. But he or she said that "these sources were clearly not independent or neutral."

I am going to assume that the closing admin, and others who have expressed this concern, were not aware that the Bush Presidency set up an independent body, the Office for the Administrative Review of Detained Enemy Combatants, which was under the oversight of a civilian, the "Designated Civilian Official", to administer the CSR Tribunals and Administrative Review Boards. Similarly, the staff who prepared the memos in question were not under the command of the JTF-GTMO Commandant.

I told the closing admin:

One could argue that this arms-length status, under Civilian oversight, did not really make them independent. But, since they were independent, on paper, I don't think one can say that they "clearly weren't independent". As I wrote above, this is a judgment call. IMO, editorial decisions, based on unreferenced judgment calls, don't comply with WP:NPOV, whether the editorial decision is the insertion of a conclusion, or the decision to suppress the use of certain references.

I'd welcome the opinion of others.

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 16:05, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

A civilian authority is an improvement on, say, a military review board; on the other hand, to be truly independent here, it would need to be independent of the President, under whose authority and with whose support the military is acting. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:32, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

By that reasoning wouldn't we be restricted from covering any person who relied on the defense of a court-appointed attorney?

No offense, but, as I said to the closing admin, the conclusion OARDEC is not truly independent is a judgment call. We'd put a {{cn}} tag, if anyone was to write, in article space:

"It is obvious that since OARDEC is staffed by military officers, and that the "civilian official" it reports to is a Deputy Secretary of Defense, it is not truly independent from the US military."

Unreferenced -- this would be a big-time lapse from WP:NPOV. It would be a violation if it substituted "widely accepted" for "obvious".

No offense, but the very first line of the verifiability policy states that the wikipedia aims at "verifiability, not truth".

• One of the consequences of that policy is that there can be times when we have to present material that we know is verifiable, that we personally believe is totally untrue.
• If we have verifiable, authoritative sources, that assert something we personally believe is totally untrue, and have no references to back up what we believe is true, we have to live with the article referencing the the verifiable source we personally disagree with. Period. That is policy.
• Even a broad hint that the verifiable source makes doubtful assertions would be a violation of WP:NPOV -- when we have no references.
• We are totally entitled to have doubts about the independence of the OARDEC memos.
• We are totally entitled to hold the personal belief those OARDEC memos are biased against the captives.
• But, making editorial decisions based on our personal belief would be, IMO, a violation of WP:NPOV. As I wrote above, the decision to suppress the use of these verifiable sources is just as much an editorial decision as the decision to insert unreferenced doubts. This is, I believe, an instance where we have to rely on what we can reference, not our gut feelings. Geo Swan (talk) 19:43, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Aren't the two mentioned by say, Amnesty International, or some other non-gevernmental organization, ideally outside of the United States? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:37, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't know. Maybe. The DoD uses a non-standard Arabic --> English transliteration scheme. And JTF-GTMO had a habit of changing its official spelling of the captives names. So it is not really possible to definitely say there are no non-DoD sources describing the captives.

But I don't think that should matter, if the judgment that the OARDEC memos aren't independent only relies on "gut feelings". I think this question came from the helpful impulse to find a solution that circumvents the need for a deep discussion of policy. I was hoping there would be a discussion of policy. Geo Swan (talk) 19:43, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

If person X is arrested or detained by a government (or the military branch thereof) and is tried by that same military, and all documents and information about person X are only available from (and filtered by) that same military (or the government directly controlling it), then this does not constitute independent and neutral sourcing as required by Wikipedia, especially for biographies of living persons.Fram (talk) 20:47, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I would like to remind the respondent, above, that the goal of the wikipedia is "verifiability, not truth". Respondent above does not seem to recognize that their conclusion, above, is a judgment call -- one not referenced to a verifiable reliable source. We are not allowed to insert unsupported material that is only supported by our gut feelings. Doing so does not comply with WP:VER, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV. And those same policies prohibit us from removing material based solely on our personal gut feelings of what is true.

Concerning independence -- I'd like respondent to spell out, exactly who they think OARDEC would have to be independent from, before they would regard documents they prepared as sufficiently neutral and independent. Are they arguing that OARDEC would have to be appointed by, and under the oversight of the UN? Would they accept appointment and oversight by NATO? What if they were appointed by and overseen by the US Congress? By the Department of Justice? Would they accept that OARDEC was independent then? What if the Secretary of Defense created a brand new agency, with new staff, with the sole task of reviewing the evidence about the captives's status?

I suggest respondent review the wikipedia's coverage of alternate theories about the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The wikipedia has a referenced article on the official Warren Commission inquiry into the assassination. And the wikipedia has companion articles like Kennedy assassination theories. The wikipedia's articles coverage of those other theories are all adequately referenced. If respondent thinks he or she can document this lack of independence and neutrality they assert exists, shouldn't they produce those references?

Cheers! -- Geo Swan (talk) 17:33, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I am not sure of this. I think it oversimplifies the complexities of the military and the government. there is a difference between the Deputy Secretary and a military officer. different parts of the government and different parts even of the military often operate in opposition to anther. True, the opposition is limited. True, for the purposes of criminal law it can well be argued that they do not have the necessary independence of judicial objectivity--but that is rightly a much higher standard than for WP sourcing, such as avoiding BLP does not require the "beyond a reasonable doubt' of criminal justice. Ultimately, one could argue that all political and judicial organs of a given country are not truly independent--the same US senate confirms judicial appointments as military commissions. And personally i would regard this as a quite reasonable argument why the allegations against US violations of international law must be tried by a court beyond direct US jurisdiction. But that does not mean we can report nothing on the US unless we find it it another nation's newspapers. We just have to be aware of the possible biases. DGG (talk) 08:51, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Primary source, or secondary source?

I forgot to ask, above -- I question the label several of my correspondents applied to these memos -- "primary sources". All of these Summary of Evidence memos were based on multiple documents. In some instances we know they were based on dozens of primary sources from over half a dozen other agencies. So why shouldn't we consider the summary memos "secondary sources"?

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 19:43, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

For a source to be considered secondary there must be some form of significant and original artistic construction within it. If the summaries are something like a bibliography, this is considered a form of mechanical action, requiring no original artistic effort. I.E. five bibliographies prepared by five authors from the same underlying sources would mostly generate identical final products. If the summaries are something like paragraph-or-larger abstracts, and were *not* writen by the authors of the underlying individual sources, but rather writen by the author of the final product, then this would be a secondary source. To expand, mere repetition of underlying abstracts created by the authors of the underlying sources is a mechanical reproduction, not artistic, not a secondary source. Based on this reasoning, would your source be secondary? Wjhonson (talk) 19:54, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

• These documents were written by entirely different people, in an entirely different chain of command -- not documents written by same people who wrote the originals The original documents came from JTF-GTMO, the CIA, the FBI, the military's Criminal Investigation Task Force, the Department of State, the office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs, the Department of Homeland Security, and various foreign intelligence services. The DoD released Board Recommendation memos for about 200 captives whose repatriation or release was authorized by the Designated Civilian Official in 2005 or 2006. All of those memos that I have reviewed, so far, said the Boards considered the input from at least three of the above sources. Feel free to check for yourself if you like.
  • "Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT) and Administrative Review Board (ARB) Documents". OARDEC. September 2007. Retrieved 2008-09-29.

• By artistic effort I assume we are not talking James Joyce or Shakespeare. I assume that at any effort that required understanding and intelligent paraphrasing would satisfy this criteria? These summaries did require an intelligent understanding of the original documents to prepare. IMO some of these authors were better at bringing intelligent understanding to their summarizing and paraphrasing efforts than others. Some authors summaries contain errors that showed they tried and failed to bring intelligence and intelligent understanding to their preparation of these summaries. Even artisitic failures require artistic effort. Your neighbour whose garage band makes a demo tape covering some pop songs, that is a total artistic failure, in unlistenable, has still made an "artistic effort". His or her demo tape is as fully protected by copyright law as Lars Ulrich, or Britney Spears.

• For example, a large number of the captives had their detention justified because their name was found on some kind of suspicious list. For some reason, probably security, the source of these suspicious lists was usually obfuscated. The authors of the Summary of Evidence memos made editorial decisions about how much obfuscation to apply. The authors of the Summary of Evidence memos made editorial decisions about when to assume similar sounding allegations were separate, distinct allegations, and when the source documents they were summarizing were describing the same basic allegation.

• Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 16:45, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, imho, summaries of the type you outline above would be considered secondary sources.Wjhonson (talk) 06:37, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

MMFA - Media Matters for America

Is Media Matters for America [MMfA] a reliable source? Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. I believe MMfA fails at least one of those elements.

I raise this because I recently saw an article making certain claims and citing mainly to MMfA or to other sources like it or worse. I was trying to determine the factual accuracy of the statements made in Wikipedia but I found the MMfA pages to be biased, one-sided, and confusing, as if they were covering for a lack of an ability to clearly support the assertions they were making. Since every MMfA cite linked suffered from the same defects, I felt that the editor who added them had not provided sources to prove the truth of the matter he/she inserted into the wiki article.

And the matter being asserted was one of racial hatred. A claim of racial hatred was being supported by several links to the MMfA articles as I have described them.

I thought incendiary statements of racial hatred should be removed if that cannot be supported, and the MMfA links did not provide that support for the reasons I gave. Further, one would think if racial hatred was involved, there would be main stream media sources to cite, as opposed to only MMfA. However, I did not want to remove the material without first asking here about MMfA.

I read the material here about MEMRI because that seems to most closely fit the MMfA situation, and MEMRI has not faired well so far.

So I seek input here before I take action to remove the MMfA links I saw. I feel this is especially necessary since some of the editors have in the past admitted bias against the subject of the wiki page, and they occasionally edit in a fashion that disfavors the wiki page's subject without reliable sources. So I know ahead of time if I remove the MMfA links I will become instant persona non grata, again. I am here to get my ducks in order.

Thank you for your input. --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 23:11, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Here is more on my concerns: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:American_Family_Association#Some_Source_Material_Looks_Biased

Thanks. --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 23:13, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I see the matter is even discussed on the MMfA talk page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Media_Matters_for_America#Media_Matters_as_a_source --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 23:19, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Wow. I just read that on the MMfA talk page. It seems MMfA is not a reliable source. But I will await what people have to say here on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard, perhaps a better location to discuss such issues than the relevant page's talk page. --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 23:28, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

No, they are an advocacy group, just like the right-wing Newsbusters and are not a reliable source. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 05:45, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I would argue that they could be a reliable source in some instances and not in others, and arguing that they never or always can be used as a source is a little extreme. Mostly what MMfA does is simply publicize errors, mis-statements, and gaffs (real or preceived) by other media organizations. That being case, articles might as well just cite the original media rather than MMfA. In the specific case brought up by LAEC, I think the question is not whether they are a WP:RS—clearly they are the most reliable source for their own opinions, which is what they are being used as a source for in the article—but rather the question should be whether their opinion/criticism of AFAJ is notable enough for inclusion in the article. Yilloslime (t) 06:23, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

That is a good point to make. Is the opinion of an extrememly politicially biased website notable for inclusion? MMfA is used as a source of criticism for just about anyone or any organization having what they view as conservative leanings. So much so in some articles, that the article becomes little more than a sounding board for MMfA. Arzel (talk) 14:48, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I basically agree with Yilloslime. It is a quesiton of notability. I believe that they can be used if the incident was also reported in a more notable, mainstream source. Otherwise, like Zenwhat said, it is just advocacy. MrMurph101 (talk) 20:50, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree in part with Yilloslime: the first section of his analysis is correct to say that much of the time that Media Matters might be used as a source for some series of facts about a broadcast or newspaper article, it would be better to cite the original broadcast or article instead. As far as the notion that MM's opinions might not be notable, with a link to WP:N, it's important to realize here that WP:N is not the standard for inclusion of material within articles. As the guideline itself says, "These notability guidelines only pertain to the encyclopedic suitability of topics for articles but do not directly limit the content of articles." Some of MM's opinions are surely not worthy of inclusion, but EACH of their opinions should not be presumed unworthy just because of the source. It would be an absurd paradox to say that because a person or organization has a clear point of view or is partisan, we refuse to report on their opinion. We represent the opinions of partisans all the time here. Croctotheface (talk) 21:23, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be good to differentiate the idea of what is notable. There is WP:N as it relates to whether an article is worthy of being kept or not. In this case the idea of notability is whether information Media Matter's opinion or anyone else with an opinion on something is worthy of inclusion. My position is that it is ok to just mention that "Media Matters frequently criticizes Pundit X by (use a couple of examples)" but not to use them to make a laundry list all the alleged bad things someone/something has done unless it there is more coverage of it by other, (ideally) non-editorializing sources. MrMurph101 (talk) 21:44, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I want to make clear that the initial reference to notability WAS linked to WP:N. I see this a lot, where some editor refers to "notability" just as an English word and not in the context of WP:N and nonetheless links to WP:N. I want to be very clear lest people reading such comments get the wrong idea about what WP:N does and does not apply to. Anyway, I don't believe that everything Media Matters says (or everything ANY person or group says) is worthy of inclusion by definition. So no laundry lists, that's for sure. However, the opposite is also true: we should likewise avoid declaring that MM's opinion can never be worthy of inclusion or that it always must be covered by other sources. I do readily concede, though, that of the hundreds or thousands if items that MM publishes, very few will tend to be both noteworthy and not receive any coverage in other places. Still, I don't think there's any basis for saying that we can never report on MM's opinion in any kind of depth unless it's out there in some other form. Croctotheface (talk) 23:08, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Croctotheface in that my linking to WP:N was inappropriate, since that policy applies specifically to topics that are the subject of articles. Sorry, my bad for linking to a policy page that I hadn't looked at very closely for quite some time. Still, I think my basic point is valid: the question is whether MMfA's criticism of AFAJ is noteworthy enough for inclusion in the article on AFA, not whether MMfA is a reliable source in general. Also agree that it's probably only rarely that MMfA is the only source to document an otherwiese noteworthy news item. Yilloslime (t) 23:39, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Advocacy sites are fine when they are used for one of both sides of an issue being presented. It's basic WP:NPOV here. What is the specific use being asked about? MilesAgain (talk) 15:27, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I am not sure advocacy sites are "fine" for the use stated. Recall [a]rticles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy.

Specifically, an entire section of an article is based on two MMfA links and 2 links from other sources that I would be shocked if they had a "reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." Remember, this is an encyclopedia, not a platform for people to publicize their biases against the subjects of wiki pages.

Please, look carefully at that section I just linked, consider the four links supporting it, and see if any of you do not get the feeling something is amiss, as in adherence to wiki policies and guidelines, what have you.

Anticipating the argument that wiki rules are meant to be broken, does that mean claims of racial hatred should remain and be based on the weak underpinnings as illustrated in this example? --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 00:21, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Look at this -- a WorldNetDaily link was summarily cut out in 6 minutes with an editor saying "worldnetdaily is not a reliable source." It only took 6 minutes to remove the WND link. Yet the link provided balance, was from a reliable source, was directly on point, and WND has a reputation for accuracy and fact-checking or it simply would not be as highly rated as it is; WND is the Internet's largest private news organization, or something around that. If WND gets cut out in 6 seconds, what does that say about MMfA? --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 01:03, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

You're comparing apples and oranges. For starters, MMfA does not purport to be a news organization, they transcribe and comment on the media. As such, there are limited instances when they are acceptable as a source of quotes (their transcriptions have not been found to be inaccurate) and very limited instances when their commentary is acceptable (as opinion, not news). Worldnetdaily on the other hand pretends to be a news organization but does not adhere to any journalistic practices. This has been discussed extensively here (read through the archives). I have no idea where you got the idea that worldnetdaily has a "reputation for accuracy and fact-checking" or what sort of rating you're referring to when you talk about how highly rated they are. --Loonymonkey (talk) 02:10, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

You pointed out to me how WND was already discussed here. I wish there was an easy way to see what was already covered. --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 02:58, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

There is a bot which emits an index of section headlines. It might be listed in WP:ARCHIVE. -- SEWilco (talk) 04:14, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Internet polls as a reliable source???

I'm wondering if a consensus can be reached on banning internet polls as reliable sources. I remember taking an advanced research methodology course during my graduate school days. The statistics professor outlined all the ways in which internet polls on places like CNN and local news sites are completely unreliable compared to the more professional polls conducted by mainstream newspapers and government organizations:

The top 4 reasons are:

• It's difficult to control for sockpuppets and meatpuppets distorting the responses to suit their organized political agendas (i.e., someone who passionately believes in a particular answer or subject is more likely to take the poll, get friends to take the poll, and/or answer the poll repeatedly from different IP accounts if necessary, than someone who is not so trying to skew the responses, is apathetic, or simply didn't find the poll.)
• The questions can be vague or posed in such a way that the replies can be skewed in a certain direction.
• There is no control over the sample size, so from a statistical point of view, it's impossible to determine how representative of the total population such a poll is.
• The internet poll is skewed towards the readership of a given site, which may attract certain types of readers with certain values or levels of education or political interests, etc.

There were a few other reasons why internet polls were unreliable, but these were the top points. I raise this issue because occassionally I come across WP articles where internet polls were cited or someone insists on using an intenet poll as represenative of what "people" must be thinking about something. When last I checked, this issue is not addressed in the reliable source gudelines. What do others think? J Readings (talk) 00:03, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, methodologically the polls are worth less than the screen they are displayed on. However, many newspaper polls are equally unreliable (and there the method is usually hidden, while in an internet poll you at least know what it is). I would treat these reluctantly, but they could be cited as a spicy folklore to comment on the topic of the article (but not as a sociological method of estimating the population's views). Pundit|utter 03:21, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't believe that internet polls are reliable in any way, and agree that they should not be used. There is also the question of notability. However, I suppose one could anticipate a circumstance where an otherwise reliable source mentions an internet poll in the context of an article, and it would probably then be acceptable to include it.

I am a bit unclear about Pundit's comment about "newspaper polls". Do you mean the polls that newspapers announce in their pages to get their readers opinions on a subject (e.g. call this number and vote yes/no on some question)? To my mind these have the same flaws as those listed by J Readings above, and should not be included. But if you mean polls commissioned by newspaper from reputable polling companies, there is a fair amount of information available about the polls and polling, and since they are also generally published and commented on in the media, they reach much higher levels of notability and verifiability than the internet/internal newspaper polls. --Slp1 (talk) 14:56, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry to be unclear. Many newspapers conduct own polls, which barely satisfy any methodological requirements. Of course I'm not referring to the newspapers simply citing reliable research centers' survey results. The simplest criterion I use for deciding if the poll is of any use is whether they publish the methodological background and assumptions for the poll (if the newspaper cites the results, they usually don't give the full legend, but it is still possible to find it after going to the source). Pundit|utter 20:43, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I think that only polls carried out by reputable polling organisations, published in reliable sources, should be accepted. I find that articles like Films considered the greatest ever and Films considered the worst ever, which rely almost completely on anonymous, self selecting internet and phone-in polls, are particularly problematic. But try to do something about it, and you'll be bitten by those editors who WP:OWN the article.[1] Chris Bainbridge (talk) 15:10, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate the comments. So far, it looks like we're all basically in agreement that internet polls are absolutely worthless, methodologically. Not surprisingly, I've never encountered a serious academic publication citing internet polls as an authoritative source for interpreting any claims made. Then again, I've never encountered mainstream newspapers trying to do it either (but this doesn't mean that it never happens on some rare occasion.) I sympathize with Chris Bainbridge's frustrations (even though I wasn't thinking about the IMBD when I posted here) and, while I'm being a bit frank, I was surprised to read how one editor managed to override the collected opinions of several other established editors who made rational arguments against internet polls and who were able to cite policies and guidelines in support of those arguments. This recurring problem on Wikipedia just reinforces the need to revisit the guidelines for "self-published sources" by anonymous users and clarify the language, I believe. J Readings (talk) 00:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Gun Politics, Kruschke book

Over on the Gun Politics article, this book has been questioned as a non-reliable source. Kruschke, Earl R.. 'Gun Control - A Reference Handbook. ABC-CLIO Inc. 1995. ISBN 0-87436-695-X. I am curious of other editor's opinion on this. SaltyBoatr (talk) 02:16, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

The book is one of several books written by a political science professor at a reputable university. It is published by a mainstream publisher, ABC-CLIO. There are few reviews but those that are recommend it. Appears a reliable source to me.--Slp1 (talk) 14:08, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. According to JSTOR, Kruschke is quite an active political science professor, but I couldn't find any academic reviews of this particular book. For what it's worth, other academics favorably reviewed his other books including The Right to Keep and Bear Arms: a Continuing American Dilemma (1985). J Readings (talk) 14:30, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Kruschke is a reliable source, SaltyBoatr. However, considering the fact that the article currently cites:

• Frontpage magazine
• Ted Nugent
• Haciendapub.com
• John Lott, Jr. (a study that was later disavowed by his co-researcher and criticized for inaccuracy)
• Wayne LaPierre, President of the NRA
• A number of political opinion pieces, including the one above from Japan

I think we have a lot more bad sources to worry about than that book from Kruschke. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 15:27, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I commented on the talkpage. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 15:38, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

When X source quotes Y as saying "foobar", can we cite it as "X says foobar"?

The particular issues here are controversial and inflammatory, but in the section header I've tried to summarize the general principle.

We have a paper from the National Science Foundation quoting CSICOP's listing of various topics as pseudoscience. Here is the passage (quote):

What Is Pseudoscience?

Pseudoscience is defined here as "claims presented so that they appear [to be] scientific even though they lack supporting evidence and plausibility" (Shermer 1997, p. 33). In contrast, science is "a set of methods designed to describe and interpret observed and inferred phenomena, past or present, and aimed at building a testable body of knowledge open to rejection or confirmation" (Shermer 1997, p. 17). According to one group studying such phenomena, pseudoscience topics include yogi flying, therapeutic touch, astrology, fire walking, voodoo magical thinking, Uri Gellar, alternative medicine, channeling, Carlos hoax, psychic hotlines and detectives, near-death experiences, Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs), the Bermuda Triangle, homeopathy, faith healing, and reincarnation (Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal <http://www.csicop.org/>). (unquote)

Is this a reliable source for the assertion that "The National Science Foundation lists homeopathy as a pseudoscience"? thanks, Jim Butler^(talk) 09:57, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• The context of this quote isn't just that the NSF is providing the perspective of CSICOP, but rather that they are adopting CSICOP's formulation as expert evaluators. Considering this, it is absolutely appropriate to say that the NSF considers these topics to be pseudoscientific. The way the statement is phrased is most telling: "According to one group studying such phenomena..." This sentence asserts that the phenomena of pseudoscience can be studied (that is, it is subject to basic demarcation). This is alternatively a straightforward pronouncement of general consensus or, if viewed by true believers, a provacative acceptance as experts of the POV of a skeptical organization. The NSF paper is not quoting CSICOP in order to distance themselves from the claim; rather they are quoting CSICOP as an authority more equipped to provide a list for all the weird and bizarre beliefs that get promulgated as pseudoscience. Ripping this quote out of the paper without reading the rest of the report can mislead readers into misinterpreting this report as being "more conservative" that CSICOP, except they go on to adopt CSICOP studies (for example, the nine-year-old debunking theraputic touch) as plain statements of fact. ScienceApologist (talk) 12:19, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• (edit conflict)No. The extract is written very carefully so we cannot, in fact say that the NSF thinks the CSICOP is the only group studying such phenomena, that the CSICOP is the main group studying such phenomena, or that the NSF agrees with the CSICOP about the list. We can at best say "A CSICOP study quoted by the NSF says that homoeopathy is pseudoscience."

If elsewhere they quote the CSICOP as an authority, then elsewhere they quote it as an authority. They do not do so in the matter of the list, and that's that. Relata refero (talk) 13:57, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• • The NSF in no means was even attempting to indicate that CSICOP was the only or main group. The statement LinaMishima (talk) 14:47, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
• The key text is "According to one group." Before this text, NSF is defining Pseudoscience, but is choosing, at least for the time being, not to label anyone as such. The NSF, never says that they are adopting the CSICOP's formulation, and for good reason. These are the claims of a skeptical org and not a scientific body. A prestigious scientific body like the NSF would never take the wholesale claims of a skeptical organization and blindly adopt them. Anthon01 (talk) 13:53, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
  • I have dealt with this on the homeopathy talk page. You clearly displayed a complete lack of understanding of formal writing there, and continue to do so here, claiming 'wholesale claims' would be 'blindly adopted' if the correct interpretation was followed. LinaMishima (talk) 14:47, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• I find you comments humorous. You think because you make a statement on a talk page its true or that its dealt with? There are no mastadons here. Please note who brought this issue to this page. That person doesn't agree with you either, even after you "dealth with it". Anthon01 (talk) 14:58, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• In general, the answer to the question is no, of course. Deborah Lipstadt is quoting David Irving, but to criticize him, not to adopt his statements. In this case, however, the NSF adopts Shermer's definition and the context makes it clear that they also support the classification of homeopathy as a pseudoscience. See the section on Alternative Medicine further down in the statement. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:59, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Then quote the wording in that section. Relata refero (talk) 14:07, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• The key thing here is that this extract comes from a definition of scope. In definitions of scope, references are either disputed, synthesised in whole or in part into a concluding definition, or used in full. As no concluding definition is drawn, it is clear that they are supporting all three definitions presented for pseudoscience. This is certainly not the case with all similar situations. LinaMishima (talk) 14:47, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• Again that's OR on your part. Anthon01 (talk) 15:00, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Unless the NSF states somewhere that they are adopting the CSICOP's formulation, we can not assume they are doing so. We can say that they quote it and discuss the context of how they quote it, but we can not draw unsupported conclusions from that. Blueboar (talk) 15:05, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Sometimes quoted definitions are left as quoted definitions by the quoting body precisely because they do not want to give those definitions additional sanction. We have no way of determining whether this was or was not the case in this instance. `Relata refero (talk) 15:10, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Sometimes? Always on wikipedia when dealing with minority opinions. ;-) Anthon01 (talk) 15:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• This an exceptional claim to make against a profession, that is actively participating in scientific research to help establish if and where homeopathy might have some application. The text in question, is at best ambiguous in supporting the claim that the NSF labels homeopathy pseudoscience. Such a claim require exceptionally clear, explicit statement by the NSF or another nationally recognized scientific body in order for that claim to be verified. Anthon01 (talk) 15:13, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
• I'll say what I already said at Talk:Homeopathy: any reasonable reader should understand that the NSF paper uses the CSICOP list as examples of phenomena that meet the definition of pseudoscience that they employ earlier. But for some reason, there are many Wikipedia editors who insist on unreasonable interpretations of texts, and refuse to believe that a text means something unless it's spelled out in the most literal fashion. By the logic that says the NSF is not adopting CSICOP's formulation, we must also say that they are not defining "pseudoscience" or "science"--because they quote another authority (Shermer) for those definitions rather than speaking in their own voice. Obviously, that's ridiculous.

Let me echo Stephan by saying that the paper has an extensive section on alternative medicine. The vast field of alternative medicine apparently falls into the NSF's definition of pseudoscience. And here's a quote from that section: "Alternative medicine is another concern. As used here, alternative medicine refers to all treatments that have not been proven effective using scientific methods. A scientist's view of the situation appeared in a recent book (Park 2000b): 'Between homeopathy and herbal therapy lies a bewildering array of untested and unregulated treatments, all labeled alternative by their proponents...'" Again, even though homeopathy is mentioned in a text quoted by the NSF, it's clear that it's one of the "treatments that have not been proven effective using scientific methods," i.e. pseudoscience. A bit further on, the NSF summarizes another study: "Furthermore, among the 16 therapies included in the study, the largest increases between 1990 and 1997 were in the use of herbal medicine (a 380 percent increase), massage, megavitamins, self-help groups, folk remedies, energy healing, and homeopathy." Again, homeopathy is included among unscientific methods. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:17, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not quite ridiculous to say the NSF does not define pseudoscience, if they in fact do not do so, but quote Shermer. I don't see the problem; if Shermer is good enough for the NSF, he should be good enough for us. Ditto, if CSICOP is good enough to quote by the NSF, if not directly endorse, then its good enough to quote for us. Why is there a problem?

There is a reason why a politically-appointed body might not wish to take a strong stand on pseudoscientific methods. We have to accept that their publications are unlikely to come out and say things directly, and work around that. Simply put, the NSF can direct us to reputable sources that we can then use. For example, we can use the summary Akhilleus quotes, but to derive from that that the NSF agrees with all the assumptions of the study it's summarizing wouldn't be justifiable. And why should we? Why fetishize the NSF? Relata refero (talk) 15:26, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

This discussion is moot because CSICOP has, in the words of WP:V, "a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy," and is thus a reliable source in its own right. MilesAgain (talk) 15:42, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Indeed... remember that the question was whether we can say that the NSF has stated that homeopathy is pseudoscience based upon their qouting CSICOP doing so. The answer to that question is: "No" ... we can only say that they quote CSICOP as doing so, and in what context they quote it. There is, however, nothing wrong with stating that CSICOP has labled homeopathy as such. Blueboar (talk) 15:56, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

No, Jim. You can't because it's a false claim. The NSF did not say that. The NSF cited a source which said that. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 18:29, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Also, before somebody says "verifiability, not truth." Yes, I know that. Don't insult my intelligence with such a cliche remark. What I mean is that according to WP:V, we should state what the sources themselves say. In this case, there is no source of NSF saying, "Pseudoscience is X." They simply invoke that definition in one of their papers, therefore the claim has not been verified.

It is a fairly reasonable definition, though. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 18:31, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• The NSF did not state "pseudoscience topics include X," they stated "According to one group [CSICOP] studying such phenomena, pseudoscience topics include X." That's a very clear distinction. Granted, the context makes it clear that NSF took CSICOP's view seriously, but they didn't state it as their own view. Claiming that the NSF stated CSICOP's view as their own is outright misrepresentation of the source. <eleland/talkedits> 20:04, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

The NSF doesn't really say anything is anything period. They fund research in a variety of areas. This project was undoubtebly with funding from the NSF, thus when the report comes out it is noted that funding comes from the NSF, but the actual research is coming from CSICOP. The NSF is just reporting on NSF funded research. Arzel (talk) 20:14, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Undoubtly what? Is that you opinion or do you have a source to support that? Anthon01 (talk) 23:20, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

For Arzel: I don't see any evidence that the NSF funded CSICOP's "research" here. --Jim Butler^(talk) 20:53, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

• As the question is put, "When X quotes Y saying Foobar can we cite "X says foobar"? -- In general, the answer is no. And in this case, it is a close call, but I have to agree that unless the National Science Foundation actually says, "This is our opinion" we cannot cite something as their opinion, even if they quote it. Their quote specifically attributes to another entity and though it suggests agreement it does not actually grant it the same authority as a NSF statement. --Blue Tie (talk) 00:00, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

• Much appreciation for feedback above. For the record, I agree with Zenwhat and Blue Tie on this, and would answer "no, not quite" to the question I posed. In practice the only thing that is impacted by this question is the presence or absence of the category:pseudoscience tag at Homeopathy (for an explanation of why this is the case, see Talk page there, or more concisely, User:Jim_Butler#Categories). We can still cite the source truthfully, and explain the arguments in the article. regards, Jim Butler^(talk) 20:53, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

It is worth pointing out that, in addition to Akhilleus' noted additional instances above, similar language appears in the Science & Engineering Indicators reports from several other years. I do not think that it would be mischaracterizing the tone of the report to cite as such, though 'NSF SEIND cites ...' is more pedantically accurate. Eldereft ~(s)talk~ 08:53, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Bollocks on that - pedantically correct is the best correct. This NSF report is obviously critical of homeopathy and lends credence to its classification as pseudoscience. The fact that they cited CSICOP favorably in this matter lends WP:WEIGHT to CSICOP's findings, but does not comprise a policy statement. They do not themselves make any specific assessment or assertion for homeopathy in the same way that they do for e.g. astrology and magnet therapy. Eldereft ~(s)talk~ 22:33, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

• I don't think this essay was written with much rigor at all, frankly. The definition given for pseudoscience is "claims presented so that they appear [to be] scientific even though they lack supporting evidence and plausibility," as quoted by one author, but then, in the same paragraph, CSICOP is quoted as listing faith healing as a pseudoscience. While I am sure there are some individuals who might claim a scientific basis for faith healing, on the face of it, it is belief, not science, and therefore should not be called pseudoscience (most who practice a similar type of healing with a claimed scientific backing would not be calling it faith healing). This is evidence for a very lax standard of analysis and must be taken into account if one is going to use this quote to represent the NSF's opinion; this is an informal essay giving voice to some sector of the NSF. The definition of pseudoscience starts with "is defined here [emphasis mine]" -- i.e., in this essay -- the author clearly did not want to even appear to be making a policy statement. Friarslantern (talk) 21:32, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Page archived

I've archived the previous version of this. No way am I editing a page when it takes 30 seconds for each letter to appear when I'm typing. You regulars really ought to know better than to let a page get to more than 500k in length. x_x Jtrainor (talk) 04:04, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Just so you know, some of those threads were still live. Silly rabbit (talk) 04:16, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Err, yes. several of them were. I had archived some threads already. I'm going to restore some now. Relata refero (talk) 06:08, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Allegations of state terrorism committed by the United States

This page has extensive problems with biased, POV sources that violate WP:REDFLAG, and there's an edit war going on over it; one editor is attempting to clean up material and sources that violate policies, and the WP:OWNers of the page are reverting everything he does. I've dropped by to aquire some outside input on the subject as to which sources/references in the article are reliable under the current policies. Hopefully doing this will help fix the ongoing problems there. Jtrainor (talk) 04:04, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Well there are 184 sources in the article. Can you be a bit more specific?Bless sins (talk) 04:12, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

The actual problem (speaking as another editor who has worked on the article, and I differ with Jtrainor here) is that User:Raggz (to whom Jtrainor is referring) misunderstands an aspect of the verifiability policy, namely the "redflag" section, and attempts to use it as a means to delete sources that generally meet our standards for reliability. Much of the dispute on the talk page is over the understanding of the "redflag" section of WP:V. If someone wants to help out with the dispute it would be appreciated. I can try to give a more full accounting of the situation if that's the case.--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 04:41, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I concur with Bigtimepeace, here. The various contested claims, raised per Redflag, have withstood scrutiny and have been substantiated by various other scholarly sources. For example, see here for a list of additional sources found to support the claims made about Cuba that were being contested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:BernardL/Sandbox4 What I think we see here is that a case of some editors who simply "don't like" what is being said, and therefore they must be right (their own opinion), and the sources must be wrong.:) Hence, since they don't agree with it it must be "exceptional" in nature, and they argue has to be echoed in the mainstream US popular press (which is not what policy says, not to mention these are not really exceptional claims to begin with).Giovanni33 (talk) 05:33, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I've just looked over the talkpage, and it appears that the loci of the dispute are several quotes. The most prominent example accuses the US of financing state terrorism through aid to Israel and committing it by bombing Afghanistan. (The same quote also mentions the Palestinian "national liberation struggle".) I'm not sure that too exceptional a claim, but even so, its from a well-known peer-reviewed journal, and written apparently by a professor of international law who's prominent in the field. I have no opinion on the use of the quote, which must have been taken out of context because otherwise it sounds a little silly (or perhaps dated, to early in the Second intifada), but as far as the source goes, I don't think I can claim that it's anything but excellent. Relata refero (talk) 18:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

ghthesoap.com

This site is being used to support claims in a few different articles, notably Supercouple and List of supercouples. There has been discussion at Talk:List_of_supercouples#References.3F and Talk:Supercouple#OR_and_bad_sources, where admin Jossi (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has tried to point this out to no avail. From the site's own "About us" page - "All information displayed on the site is fan driven. The production team behind the website will keep our opinions and views restricted to such media as articles."[2] Pairadox (talk) 08:04, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Blacklist it. MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#Proposed additions

You especially can't use fan-sites in WP:BLP. The site is also used on the articles on Kelly Monaco and Maurice Benard. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 18:10, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

It's been added. MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#ghthesoap.com ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 18:26, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I proposed to add it but that addition was rejected. You'll just have to remove it and hope they don't linkfarm again, even though they probably will. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 06:49, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

futoncritic.com

A couple, not a whole lot, of user are using Futoncritic.com as some sort of bible when it comes to future episode airings. It's gotten to the point of problematic and the user has been told a number of times by various editors to stop using it. As she keeps insisting that it is reliable, I felt it was time to bring it here. (Thanks Pairadox for leading me here). See this comment [3] where apparently she believes you "can't get more reliable than the futon critic." The privacy policy at Futon critic seems to indicate that it's a pay to have your stuff site. I didn't think that counted as reliable sourcing. Can we discuss? IrishLass (talk) 18:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. This is a tough one to answer. My first impression was to laugh and say, "Get rid of it," but I read they're about us page and it's somewhat convincing. They've been up for 10 years, they're good enough that they sell ads independently, they focus exclusively on TV information, and they do original stories. Wikipedia shouldn't discriminate against New media so long as it's reliable. The only thing I'd add is: Check to see if it's cited by reliable third-parties. FutonCritic on Google pops up 404k results, suggesting it's pretty widely-used, despite the silly name. About their privacy statement, I think you misunderstand it: They collect information from users to sign up on behalf of their clients, the advertisers. It's not like Digg where anybody can sign up and upload content. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 00:43, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Discussion of interest on hard to find, archaic sources

FYI, this section is fascinating here. Please read and weigh in there. An editor is asserting it could be OR and unacceptable to make an article from sources that wouldn't be readily available to everyone, or using old harder to find sources. Lawrence § t/e 00:56, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

This is true. I.E., not too long ago I dealt with somebody trying to use a Korean newspaper that wasn't published in English or archived online. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 04:28, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Blogs of respectable news organisations?

There's a dicussion underway [Talk:Stormfront_%28website%29#What_the_hell_is_going_on_with_this_.22blog.22_thing.3F here] as to whether apparent blogs of the BBC and CNN are reliable sources, and also if an article from a reliable source (New Times) that is hosted on a third party website is reliable. The relevant links are [4], [5] and [http://www.stormfront.org/dblack/racist_021998.htm]. Expert attention very much appreciated as it is a controversial article. Skomorokh ^confer 02:17, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, these are not Blog postings... they are news reports posted on the website of legitimate news outlets. There is a difference. These are reliable sources no different than if they appeared on the television report (in fact, they often are little more than transcripts of television reports) or in a print newspaper. Blog postings appearing on the web sites of mainstream media outlets such as CNN or BBC are equivalent to Op-Ed pieces appearing in major newspapers. The news orgainization is acting as the publisher of the posting author's opinion. Such postings would be reliable for statements as to the opinion of the author, but not for statements of fact. As for the NYT article... why use a third party?... better to use the NY Times article itself. Blueboar (talk) 02:25, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

As Blueboar noted, the BBC article is an article, not a blog entry, and so is as reliable as the reporting agency and their sources (being the BBC, this is likely very highly reliable). However, it must be noted that the BBC does have a blog network [6]. The key test when evaluating blogs of a respectable source is to check for a line such as "the views expressed here are the opinion of the author and do not represent the views of the organisation as a whole". It should be noted that the BBC blog network does not have such a disclaimer, meaning they are likely to have internal policies about writing entries, requiring that facts are stuck to and speculation must be based off evidence and existing research (rather than a fanciful whim - unless stated, of course). With a disclaimer, professional hosted blogs by respected journalists are personal opinions only, whereas without they are endorsed editorial commentary. LinaMishima (talk) 02:48, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

But since they are editorial commentary they should be presented in our articles as opinions, not as facts. We can say: "according to columnist Joe Journalist, of CNN, such and such is fact"... but we can not bluntly say "such and such is fact" and cite to the blog. A print newspaper's editorial column or op-ed page would require the same attribution.Blueboar (talk) 02:59, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

• Some are editorial commentary. The Washington Post has a number that largely aren't. So as always, it depends. If a BBC blog provides some data as a fact, I think it meets RS requirements. But opinions would need what you've stated. Hobit (talk) 03:20, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

That said, I have heard the Chicago Tribune blogs are pretty awful and unmonitored. Adam Cuerden ^talk 03:24, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

There are also so called blogs where the start is a news article or a responsible editorial--and then the comment from the public follows. The lead-off article would be a RS. The Chronicle of Higher Education News Blog is one such example DGG (talk) 04:31, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Usually the piece placed to start off the blog discussion is an excerpt from the newspaper itself, and the original article would be the better source. Itsmejudith (talk) 13:50, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Generally, yes. But sometimes the blog publication is earlier (CHE is a weekly, not a daily), and sometimes it is the only free online version, or even the only online version. Of course is such case both the authentic version and the convenience online version should be cited.DGG (talk) 19:28, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

SoapCentral.com

I was going to post this in the ghthesoap.com section above, but decided to give this topic its own section. What about www.soapcentral.com? There really aren't many soap opera sites out there that Wikipedia considers reliable. Soapcentral.com, while some may call it a fansite, is extremely reliable, as seen with articles like As Strike Winds On, Soaps Are a Hot Commodity and WGA Takes Issue With Soap Opinion Column. And Wikipedia's soap opera articles rely heavily on it. It's right up there with soapoperadigest.com in its reliability and I'd like to get some feedback on it now, as I would hate to see it banned (you know, blacklisted) from Wikipedia without most of us who use it knowing. It's considered a reliable source by WikiProject Soap Operas. And it serves articles such as Todd Manning well, where some of the information may not be available elsewhere on the internet in reliable sources, and when access to magazine articles where the same information could be accessed is unavailable to the editor simply because they don't have or know about the article. I'm unaware of if this site has been brought here for discussion before, but I felt now was as good as time as any, if that isn't the case...and so I can know either way, considering that if it has been brought here for discussion before, I don't know about it. Flyer22 (talk) 04:22, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

From their Terms of Use: "SOC is a distributor (and not a publisher) of content supplied by third parties and Subscribers. Accordingly, SOC has no more editorial control over such content than does a public library, bookstore, or newsstand. Any opinions, advice, statements, services, offers, or other information or content expressed or made available by third parties, including information providers, Subscribers or any other user of soapcentral.com, are those of the respective author(s) or distributor(s) and not of SOC. Neither SOC nor any third-party provider of information guarantees the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any content, nor its merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose." Just for the curious.... Pairadox (talk) 04:45, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

All that said, again I point out that this site is extremely reliable and is a great asset to many soap opera articles on Wikipedia, such as reporting the firing of Richard Culliton and what went down with the controversy over character Frankie Stone, information that I cannot find anywhere else in a reliable source on the net but everyone knows about...as it's been stated in several soap opera magazine articles. I don't have access to any of those articles where he responded to the controversy about his character creation Frankie Stone's death...or specific articles on his firing in 2002, but soapcentral.com has information on that. Losing this site on Wikipedia would be a great disservice to many soap opera articles. I've worked with several excellent editors who know Wikipedia like the back of their hand and none felt that soapcentral.com was a source that I shouldn't use, such as when getting feedback on the Bianca Montgomery and Maggie Stone article (an article that I will be nominating for GA or FA status soon after a few more tweaks), and soapcentral.com is extremely important to that article when adding information on Richard Culliton's part in writing characters Frankie and Maggie Stone. This site is very important for sourcing soap opera-related articles, and as such I cannot see any good in discontinuing its use. Flyer22 (talk) 05:46, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Are there any FA or GA soap opera articles that used soapcentral.com at the time of their elevation? That would indicate that a wider slice of the community has already weighed in on the reliability of it. Pairadox (talk) 06:07, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Hey, Pairdox. And, unfortunately, no, because we don't have that many soap opera articles that have been elevated to GA or FA status. We have Pauline Fowler (FA), EastEnders (GA), and Coronation Street (previous Featured Article). And that's all...I think. But neither of those articles need soapcentral.com because soapcentral.com is an American site with no part of their site dedicated to those three British topics I just mentioned. I suspect that any soap opera article that I've worked on to improve, and then I were to nominate that article, with it using soapcentral.com, would be the first to have that source under scrutiny. But, really, there have been other great editors that have "scrutinized" the sources I've used in the articles I've been working hardest on, where soapcentral.com is used and none felt that it was unreliable. Bignole, for instance, who worked on me with the Bianca Montgomery and Maggie Stone article, checked that article up and down, and I feel that he would have mentioned soapcentral.com needing to be yanked if he felt that it was unreliable. He elevated the Jason Voorhees article to FA status, and I trust him. Maybe my best bet is to just take one of these articles I've worked hard on to the GA or FA nomination process and see what happens there, with these articles using soapcentral.com as a source. Flyer22 (talk) 06:29, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

I can point to a minimum of four errors without checking for soapcentral.com and it is updated by fans. I know this because I had to contact them regarding one of our trolls from here, a Mr. Grant Chuggle. They base a lot on opinion, their own, and not true storylines. My favorite glaring error is this one [7], last paragraph where Brandon left Harmony. For those unfamiliar with Days of our Lives, the show is set in Salem, not Harmony. Harmony is Passions. If they can't get something so simple correct, I don't feel they are a reliable source. Also, and this is a big pet peeve, they make up SORAS ages. People want to use soapcentral.com ages but they aren't based in fact, they are based on speculation. I am curious where they have no control over content came from, or maybe I'm reading that wrong. They do the editing and even advertise for fans to update the daily summaries. I find that to be a fansite and nothing more. They regurgitate rumours as fact and then respected agents have to run around like mad men explaining their clients' contracts because people think soapcentral.com is gospel. While they are an okay site, they aren't complete and they pick and choose too much. I would say, absolutely no on a reliability level unless we can pick and choose. They aren't reliable on ages, their spoilers are iffy and even some of their character histories are wrong. What are they right on? IrishLass (talk) 13:51, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

IrishLass, they are right on everything else. Their character bios, like you just pointed out, may be mostly fan-updated. But those editors are chosen carefully. I've also contacted them about such. Soapcentral is seen as the gospel by users because it is extremely accurate in its news reports and articles, like I linked to above. It isn't the most visited soap opera news site for nothing. It's control is no different than a library, as it says, "SOC has no more editorial control over such content than does a public library, bookstore, or newsstand." They are a distrubutor of content supplied by third parties and subscribers...who happen to be very reliable. No different than a library. And soapcentral really is indeed like a library for everything soap-related (American, I must admit). Most of their information is not speculated. They are often the first to report big happenings in the soap world, which turn out true every time. The only thing I've seen that may be a problem is their character bios, but even those are 99.9% correct. Our project, WikiProject Soap Operas, can include to exlude that, but this site should absolutely not be excluded from Wikipedia. Surely, you know how much losing this site on Wikipedia would harm soap opera articles. There aren't many soap opera sites out there that Wikipedia would consider reliable. Soapcentral is one of the more reliable ones out there, and losing it would truly be a sad hit to soap opera-related articles on Wikipedia. Flyer22 (talk) 19:11, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree losing it would be bad, for some information. But what about the ages and changing of the dates of birth? How do we address that because they admit they guestimate those. The age issue is really my sticking point on using it. That and the character bios that are blatently wrong. IrishLass (talk) 19:16, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

We clearly need to come up with a guideline at our project, where we exlude character bios from that site. That's the only problem I've seen you have with that site. Like the characters' birth dates, for instance. Although, they happen to be right on the birth date concerning Erica Kane and others, and I'd hate to lose using that site as a means for sourcing birth dates that most viewers, not just soapcentral, have trouble keeping up with. But if we can't trust their character bios as often as we think, then we should exclude the use of that if it will allow us to keep using the very valuable aspects of that site, such as its news reports and news articles. Perhaps we should get Elonka to help us out on this. Flyer22 (talk) 19:29, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I think we've reach an agreement point. My issue is not about the day of the birthdates, it is making up the years. They have Bo Brady born in 1963 and that's impossible. He's not 45 with a 30 year old son that was born when Bo was nearly 30. You know what I'm saying. If we can establish that years of birth via soapcentral cannot be used and character history should have a second source (another example is the phrasing of that EJ/Sami night that gives us such fits) when it's not plot point but opinion, I could be persuaded to agree. But, you are completely right, Elonka should be brought in to this and I do have a huge issue with the ages thing. BTW, the Erica thing cracks me up. I'm sure at 61 Susan Lucci thinks it's great someone thinks she's 46.IrishLass (talk) 19:51, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, we've most definitely come to an agreement. We should discuss this further at the project. And, yes, the Erica thing cracks me up as well. But, hey, the show did de-SORAS her. Flyer22 (talk) 23:31, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

The news articles on that site are most definitely needed for Wikipedia soap opera articles. Those are reported by people such as Elizabeth Albanese and Dan J Kroll (the site's creator), etc., and are always reliable. I've copied-and-pasted this topic at WikiProject Soap Operas for further discussion. I'll still weigh in here if more comments are stated here about this topic. But just so everyone knows, it's there too, so that WikiProject Soap can tackle this. Flyer22 (talk) 00:16, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

are birth date discrepancies necessarily errors of the source? I though such things happened frequently in soap opera plots--they are mentioned in a number of the articles? DGG (talk) 05:01, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

LOL, DGG. You mentioned what I mentioned above, that birth dates are something that most viewers have trouble keeping up with when it comes to soap opera characters, not just soapcentral. Anyway, if you mean are soap opera birth dates mentioned in a lot of Wikipedia soap opera articles, yes. But soapcentral isn't used for the majority of those. It's usually some random IP address filling in the ages of soap opera characters on Wikipedia, without any sources. As for soapcentral, their articles don't usually include stuff about a character's birth date, unless it's character bios we're talking about. Soapcentral's articles are usually either news articles or critical commentary articles. Their character bios, which are written more so by fans (though well-selected fans), have more of a chance of being wrong. Although, from what I've seen of them, they are often right. I mean, it's not like any of the character bios are blatantly made up. I'm sure soapcentral would throw out any editor who was making up a character's history. The thing is, though, their character bios can be wrong about things such as a character's birth date. I had never seen a character bio there wrong about the town a character lives in, but IrishLass has pointed out above where that has happened. I look at it more as a typo, however. Either way, it seems that the best thing to do is to restrict or somewhat restrict using soapcentral when it comes to character bios, but to continue using it for news information. Flyer22 (talk) 05:25, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Another thing... IrishLass, are you sure that the matter over what seems like soapcentral's confusion over Bo's age doesn't have to do with him or his children having been SORASed? Like his children having been SORASed, which in turn de-SORASed him, no matter how much of a young age we are to believe he conceived a child. Flyer22 (talk) 05:48, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

It'd probably be best if you answered that at the project, IrishLass. Instead of answering here and there too, or copying and pasting your answer there too. Flyer22 (talk) 06:19, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Megalommatis

Is Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis a WP:RS? He presents himself as: Orientalist, Assyriologist, Egyptologist, Iranologist, and Islamologist, Historian, Political Scientist, Dr. Megalommatis, 49, is the author of 12 books, dozens of scholarly articles, hundreds of encyclopedia entries, and thousands of articles. He speaks, reads and writes more than 15, modern and ancient, languages.[8] Now I personally don't think he is reliable, but some Wikipedians are trying to insert his articles as some sort of reliable source in various Wikipedia articles. Some of the articles he is currently featured in (as source, external link or otherwise): Anuak, Bibliography of the Darfur conflict, Kush, Colombia. Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL Google scholar only yields one hit. He seems like a fraud or a con-artist to me and should be excluded from all articles on Wikipedia. Some of the claims he has made are quite hilarious though: The Assyrian and Israelite Origin of the Northern Europeans and Americans does anyone really believe that? — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 23:05, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

An accurate description of this gentleman might be an independent writer. He does not seem to hold an academic post or to publish articles in peer-reviewed journals or books with good publishers. The onus is on those who want to refer to him to show that he is reliable. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:46, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Come again? Gentleman? You bestow this guy such a lofty title? He presents himself as an Assyriologist, Egyptologist, Iranologist, Political Scientist, and yet he doesn't have any real academic or scholarly books published, and you consider him to be a gentleman? Clearly, there's something very fishy about this guy and he does not seem to be whom he claims to be. I say he's most definitely unreliable. So what should we do with the articles where he's cited/linked to? — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 02:20, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

If he is being used as the only source for contentious claims, remove him. Relata refero (talk) 13:17, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Mark Juergensmeyer

Is Mark Juergensmeyer a reliable source for the inclusion of N.Irish terrorism in Christian terrorism? He is a highly respected expert on religious terrorism, with hundreds of relevant publications to his name. The cited source in which he regards N.Ireland terrorism as religious in nature is published by the University of California Press. To quote WP:SOURCES "In general, the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; university-level textbooks;" However, User:Mamalujo is arguing that Juergensmeyer is fringe and should be disregarded. I would welcome some other editors weighing in on Talk:Christian_terrorism. The contrast between the inclusion criteria for this article, where university published academics are rejected in order to shorten the list, and Islamic terrorism, where the views of general pundits are accepted, is a blatant violation of neutrality. Chris Bainbridge (talk) 23:42, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Juergensmeyer is certainly a reliable source... what we would call an 'expert' in the field. If there is a question as to the factualness of something he says, it can be expressed as his opinion ("according to Mark Juergensmeyer... etc."). Blueboar (talk) 23:50, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Dr. Herman Daly and monetary economics

This is the easiest version of the source to access:

• Daly, Herman. "Ecological Economics: The Concept of Scale and Its Relation to Allocation, Distribution, and Uneconomic Growth" (PDF). University of Maryland. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2008-01-11. Retrieved 2008-01-11.

This is the academic vetting of the source:

• Peer-reviewed by CANSEE in 2003 and during the The Global Conscience Conference (Copenhagen, May 2004, ISBN: 87-89843-66-5). Also, published by both Anthem Press and Edward Elgar Publishing. In addition, can be found in the bibliographies of the following: a scholarly writing at the Simon Fraser University, another published by the Royal Society of New Zealand (Mar 2004), a doctoral dissertation submitted to the Instituto Superior de Ciências do Trabalho e da Empresa, another submitted to the Università degli Studi di Verona, the Local Environment (2005) journal, the International Journal of Sustainable Development and World Ecology (2005), etc. and has been accepted into curriculum of various universities.

Dr Daly's general credentials can probably be found here:

• Herman Daly
• Born in 1938, Daly earned his B.A. at Rice University (1960) and Ph.D. at Vanderbilt University (1967). From 1968 to 1988 he taught economics at Louisiana State University. Then he served as Senior Economist in the World Bank's Environmental Department until 1994, when he became a professor at the University of Maryland's School of Public Affairs, his current position.

The source is being used to quote Dr Daly's overview of the monetary policy that is presently used in the United States.

Although the material used from the source has no derivation from any economic theory (it's just an observation of processes that are used nearly everyday in the US), an editor is particularly troubled by this source because of the general economic theories that Dr Daly subscribes to.

The editor accepts that the source was published in the manner recommended by WP:RS. However, the editor continues to contend (from their own personal knowledge) that Dr Daly is an unqualified source of any information pertaining to monetary economics, and, more specifically, that Dr Daly is unqualified to draw conclusions about US monetary policy. Despite the vetting of the source, the editor is unable to provide any academic publication that disputes Daly's conclusions about the costs of monetary policy in the US.

Is this source usable in ways that avoid any discussion involving economic theories? Is it proper to dispute the reliability of material within a source that has been published reliably, if none of the writer's peers make objections? BigK HeX (talk) 14:59, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

The work by Herman Daly seems to be a conventionally-published book, so to that extent it meets WP:RS. Over at Talk:Monetary policy of the USA, I see that editors are discussing its credibility as a work in economics. If the submitter believes a noticeboard discussion about the Daly book is needed, Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard is a more appropriate place. Otherwise, anyone interested could certainly join in the RfC over at Talk:Monetary policy of the United States#RfC Daly. Whether the Daly work should be cited in that article is more a question of WP:UNDUE weight, since we may ask ourselves whether views that are far off the mainstream should enjoy a central position in what appears to be a plain-vanilla economics article. In that kind of an article, we would normally expect to find mainstream material. We should find non-standard views only if they are widely recognized and commented upon in the field generally, which does not appear to be the case. (Daly's work does not seem to attract comment from conventional economists, a fact that is already quoted from Daly's own book by a participant in the RfC). Daly could be appropriately cited in an article that focuses on a minority viewpoint in economics such as Ecological economics. EdJohnston (talk) 16:19, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Well .. that's the thing. No information that derives from ecological economics (nor even neoclassical economics) is used in the wiki article at all. The argument arises specifically because the specific material in contention is not really a matter of opinion or any kind of subjective view.

"Daly's work does not seem to attract comment from conventional economists"

Well, it would seem that if Daly made egregious errors in relation to monetary economics, then it seems that any of his peers could have pointed out such a problem. Despite the vetting, none have done so.

In the end, I guess I'm wondering whether the discussion of heterodox economics, somehow 'taints' all of the other non-theoretical information within Daly's area of education. I suppose an analogy involving something fringe could be maybe ... an air force pilot's de-classified military report, which describes his encounter with an extraterrestrial UFO. If, within this fringe topic, he describes the difficulty of executing the Herbst manuever in modern jets ... would non-fringe statements within his area of expertise be impeached by his belief in extraterrestrial visitors?

Perhaps WP:BALANCE is a problem, but overall, the source seems reliable for the context in which it is used, no? BigK HeX (talk) 16:59, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Daly's work has been recognized by very notable peers. There was once a famous interchange involving him and Nicolas Georgescu-Roegen [[9]] against Joseph Stiglitz. It was not specifically about monetary but did criticize neoclassical assumptions. There was never any sense among the two other great economists that Daly did not belong in the discussion. That's just one example off the top of my head. Moreover, over the years mainstream economics has been obliged to recognize many of the ecological economics ideas that Daly pioneered, even if some of them do not so overtly. BernardL (talk) 19:42, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

The point is not that Daly's work is contentious in the field of ecological economics. It is, however, being used to support a specific phrasing in monetary economics. There has been a specific, longstanding request to provide a cite that makes the same point from a credible mainstream source; this has not been provided. If there was, for some reason, a shortage of academic work on monetary policy, one might understand, but in this context citing an ecological economist is undue and out of place. Please note that the article which is being cited is not even on the subject of monetary policy or economics, but treats it only tangentially.

The point above about pointing out "errors" is a classic in terms of turning around the question: it can be technically correct (I reserve judgment for this space on whether it is or not) and yet totally irrelevant; no-one has disproven it precisely because it is outside any normal phrasing. And yet, of course, this precise phrasing is important enough that it absolutely must be retained - because it is biased and emphasizes something that mainstream sources do not.

The question that arises should be: what is so "unusual" about the specific citation in question that a mainstream quotation cannot be found that makes the same point? No attention is paid to it whatsoever in monetary economcis. Using it in an article in monetary policy is wp:undue.--Gregalton (talk) 20:17, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Whoa, whoa. There are *multiple* mainstream sources (textbooks, and such) provided that support the exact same conclusion on monetary policy. The "specific phrasing" is provided from Daly because a certain editor demanded an explicit quote, and made it quite clear that nothing less would be acceptable to him/her. Summations of mainstream sources were not satisfactory to the opposing editor ... now, even direct quotes from experienced economists are not sufficient. Also, Gregalton has never explained what is so "unusual" about the specific branch of "monetary economics" that an experienced economist cannot touch into basic concepts of that area without explicit specialization. BigK HeX (talk) 20:37, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Provide those other sources then please. It's not that monetary economics is so unusual, but ecological economics, which Daly himself repeatedly notes is outside mainstream economics.--Gregalton (talk) 04:43, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

.... back on topic (the Daly source), maybe? :o(

This *is* extremely helpful feedback. Thanks to everyone so far! BigK HeX (talk) 06:47, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

I've issued a posting on this matter about User:BigK HeX on WP:ANI. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 07:11, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

This discussion has taken place (inadvertently) on several pages (here, fringe notice board, talk page. I would like to summarize the responses:

• BigK Hex: Supports use of this source.
• BernardL: Notes that source is a credible source in economics; unclear whether yes/no for undue or usage in this particular article.
• EdJohnston: Using Daly is undue in this context.
• Gregalton, EGeek, Relata refero, ZenWhat: opposes source as undue, not appropriate source in this context, clearly heterodox.
• Haemo: has not commented specifically on Daly, but believes article has POV issues.

There is clear support for Daly as a source in this particular context only from the editor that inserted the text in question. I note that the specific formulation in question has been used by that same editor since essentially the first revision of this page - only the source has changed in response to requests; see 7 January version: see this version for example.

There is one editor who has not responded to the specific question, the appropriateness/reliability in this context.

There are five editors who specifically say that using Daly in this context is undue or inappropriate.

Is this summary in any way unfaithful to the discussion? I believe this summary makes clear that there is unambiguous support only from one editor, and the source should not be used.

For those who have not been through the history, from the January 7 diff: "Despite the arguments of many "myth debunkers," Americans actually do have to pay for the money that is printed by our government. This payment is in the form of the interest that is charged on the bank loans - loans which are required in order for money to be injected into the economy, and even simply for existing money to be maintained (as noted in "Step 7" in the above process)." This is the specific argument used before Daly got into the picture; this is a clear indication that the issue has been finding a source, any source, that supports the statement the editor wants to make, rather than finding a neutral, credible source or determining what the mainstream view is.--Gregalton (talk) 17:05, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

"I believe this summary makes clear that there is unambiguous support only from one editor, and the source should not be used." .... Err ... riiiight. At best, you've only opened the door to regarding this as a minority viewpoint and then a new discussion revolving around whether it is a significant or not, which would determine its ultimate fate. So, far there look to me to be:

• at least 2 that likely support significant inclusion,
• probably 4 that likely support removal, and
• 1 that is questionable, but probably supports that the viewpoint is significant, even if only held by minority.
• So, at 3 supporting inclusion with better balance, versus 4 supporting removal, that pretty much equals No Consensus.

In any case, Jimbo has been paraphrased as saying, "If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents;"

Prominent adherents that have been directly quoted in drawing the same conclusion include:

1. Herman Daly;
2. a notable former Chief Economist for the minority staff of the House Budget Committee;
3. Congressmen Jerry Voorhis and John Rarick;
4. many prominent conspiracy theorists, such as Jacques Jaikaran, G. Edward Griffin, Chris Martenson, among many others.

This doesn't even include authors and works where the conclusion is developed gradually (which I *think* applies to Irving Fisher). In all, even if this were to be treated as a "minority viewpoint" then it still would seem to deserve coverage for its notability, if nothing else. BigK HeX (talk) 18:59, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you could identify which specific editors I have misclassified or mischaracterised.

As for the text, I could possibly live with the source remaining and being clearly identified with prominent conspiracy theorists.--Gregalton (talk) 21:00, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

I bet you could "live with that." Let's ignore the respected academics. Awesome BigK HeX (talk) 21:27, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Amazon.com as a RS for merchandise?

Is Amazon.com a reliable source to prove the existance of merchandise? (as in Sasuke_Uchiha#Reception) -Malkinann (talk) 02:25, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Do we really need a source to prove that such merchandise exists? If so, then yes... a link to any major merchandizing outlet selling the product in question would be reliable, and amazon.com is a major outlet. However, the standards might be higher if you were trying to do more than just say it exists. Blueboar (talk) 02:42, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Given the way WP:FICT is going, proving the existance of merchandise may yet become important as a support for fictional characters' notability. -Malkinann (talk) 02:50, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Possibly... although not everything that is for sale is notable. Wouldn't you need to show that people are buying the item before you could say it is notable? Blueboar (talk) 05:25, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

How're you sposed to show that, when sales figures are kept under wraps? It's not so much to show that the item itself is notable. It's supposed to show that character X had stuff made of them, therefore X is slightly more notable than Y, a character who had no merchandise. Kind of a "He who dies with the most toys" philosophy, I guess. -Malkinann (talk) 05:45, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

How do you know they actually have it for sale? They list books they don't have, based entirely on bibliographic entries in other peoples' catalogs, they list books before they are published, why should they be believable about toys? if they publish sales rank, i believe it is actually there, not that that says anything for notability.DGG (talk) 06:50, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Knowing how well it sold would be nice, but the question is if the listing of an item on Amazon.com is enough to reliably prove it exists. -Malkinann (talk) 08:14, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

*picard face-palm* ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:06, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

I'd have to say yes, if the existence of an item has become a point of contention, than a link to any site hosting/selling/displaying it would be sufficient to prove the item exists. If the existence is not contentious, then such a link would be superfluous and possibly deleted. We don't want to open the floodgates for Amazon employees to co-opt our project and add a thousand links a day to their products. Wjhonson (talk) 01:17, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

MobyGames

Is MobyGames considered a reliable source for video games? -- Mentifisto 03:33, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

• It looks a lot like a public wiki to me, so I'd say not generally, though if there are staff articles those might be reliable. Hobit (talk) 03:46, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Thing is, many video game articles out there have it as the only external link. -- Mentifisto 03:56, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Rotten Tomatoes Critic Blogs

At Cloverfield (creature) various users have attempted to add that the "creature"'s name is "Clover" and other such details. The source of this comes from this website: [10]. It directs you to "click here for the production notes." That takes you to a page that has a list of quotations, but no mention of authorship, copyright, source, nor any verifiable set of information. The section that claims the crew believed the monster was called "Clover" is not quoted nor given a direct citation. The author of the page, "Jeff Giles" does not back up his data or cite sources, and that I believe he is a blogger, since he is posting in a user area for regular user critiques of movies, and that his homepage, according to [[11]] is the continuation of his blog, "http://www.jefitoblog.com". I do not believe this meets Wikipedia verifiability, because there is no knowledge of the owner, no knowledge of the author, and the individual comment (the production crew calling the creature "clover") appears once and is not attributed to any one person, without any claims of its legitimacy. It appears that it is a piece of rumor inside an unverifiable source linked via a blog. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:05, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Note source is under discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Films#Rotten Tomatoes, and is not at all well-represented above. Rotten Tomatoes does have user-generated content, but it's kept separate from articles by credentialed reporters. This is not user-submitted content. -- Vary | Talk 16:47, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, but there is no evidence to suggest that he is a credible reporter, outside of your own opinion, that is. Furthermore, he only hosted the document, and there is no proof that he can authoritate it in any regard. There is also no mention by Rotten Tomatoes that they stand by what is cited as correct, nor do they have an exclusive system. As listed in his user page, his only publications are "PUBLICATION(S)• Bullz-Eye.com • Rotten Tomatoes" Neither of these meet the standard of Wikipedia verifiability. But, as Vary has stated, the document has been hosted on other sites, so it cannot be attributed to him, or anyone, so there is no verifiability standard met there, either. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:39, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree that the 'Production notes' document that is found at http://images.rottentomatoes.com/images/spotlights/cloverfieldnotes.doc seems to lack the editorial imprimatur of the Rotten Tomatoes web site. They are treating it like a 'found' document, and they hint that it came from the movie producers, but I don't see them attesting that the information is correct. I don't think the normal credibility that we associate with the edited content at Rotten Tomatoes should attach to this source. Anyone who would like to spend a pointless half-hour is invited to Google for the opening phrase "On the eve of his departure for Japan" and then see if any website that hosts that comment will take responsibility for it or say who the author is. EdJohnston (talk) 18:08, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

In this article, a regular contributor to the site's news page presents them very explicitly as the film's production notes; in the article the notes are linked from, he announces that he's publishing "25 new stills, two new TV spots, and -- spoiler(s) alert! -- 38 pages of Cloverfield production notes". He very explicitly states that they're genuine; he doesn't call them 'found' documents or in any way imply that they might not be authentic. It's true that nobody who's hosting them lists the author, but that's probably because such marketing materials often don't have an author listed. -- Vary | Talk 18:21, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Can we attribute them as, "In a set of production notes that appeared to emanate from Paramount Pictures, though not explicitly acknowledged.."? That would seem to make for a very weak reference, and I don't know how many WP editors would feel like adding such a vague reference to an article. EdJohnston (talk) 18:30, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I really don't think there's any serious doubt that they're genuine. Information from the document has popped up in a vareity of major media publicataions - and given that production notes are compiled to help journalists write their articles, that's not a surprise.

On the google suggestion, the Rotten Tomatoes Critical Review page uses that first paragraph as the film's synopsis, and lists it as "© Paramount Pictures". I didn't bother checking if anyone else who's using that text does the same. -- Vary | Talk 18:38, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

1. That does not prove that it came from the document, or that the document is not a collection of such things by a fan. 2. You have not proven that there isn't doubt that they are genuine by proving that they are genuine. Verifiability does not say "if no one objects to it being verifiable, than it is". Obviously, there are doubts beyond just me to its genuinity. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:58, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Deindenting. Just noticed your edit summary, Ed; you're right, Paramount's coyness has been complicating matters. Let me put it this way: Giles is a regular contributor of content that Rotten Tomatoes stands behind as 'news'. If, in that article, he had merely taken a few chunks of information from the document as 'quotes' from the production notes, would that information have been usable, and that article considered a reliable source? And if so, why would a full document that RT (and a handful of other solid film sites) has said are (spoiler alert!) the film's production notes not be acceptable? Given that Giles is a reliable contributor to a reliable site, why isn't this particular contribution reliable, as well? -- Vary | Talk 19:11, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that no-one is taking responsibility for those notes. Giles did not write them himself, and he is not saying who wrote them. Documents that have no author are puzzling to cite. EdJohnston (talk) 19:17, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Giles is presenting them as marketing materials from Paramount. Marketing materials frequently lack an author. And my understanding is that when there's no author available, the publisher (in this case, Paramount Pictures) should be cited. -- Vary | Talk 19:19, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

And without an author to attribute it to, there is no knowledge of who at Paramount would have released it. If it was the security guard who sits at the gate, then it is not verifiable. Furthermore, without establishing who at the crew nicknamed the creature, or if they had the authority to give the creature any kind of label, then that information cannot legitimately be placed in Wikipedia, or it would violate rules about Trivia and Rumors. Ottava Rima (talk) 19:26, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

You think they let security guards write press packets?

This discussion is not about the content, but about the source, but since you brought it up: the document states that the production crew 'affectionately nicknamed' the creature clover. That's all I said. That's not a particularly earth-shaking claim. If I were using this source to justify renaming the article or treating it as the creature's official name, that would be different, but that's not what I'm doing.

Your recurring arguments about the statement not being part of a direct quote or attributed to a particular person like some other parts of the document puzzle me. Either the document is acceptable, or it's not. You can't say that the bits in quotes are okay, but the rest isn't. That doesn't make sense. -- Vary | Talk 19:43, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Objectively prove that it was a press packet, and not something sent out by someone else. The quotes were easy to find among countless articles where the actual producer, director, etc, were interviewed. Thus, it would be easy to fake. The document is not acceptable as a whole, because the quotations are independently verifiable beyond the document itself. They come from actual news articles from actual interviews that have been documented by actual respectable organizations. They are not third hand from an anonymous source. Ottava Rima (talk) 19:49, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

You've got it backwards, Ottva; that information is included in articles because they were in the press kit. Most of that information (as well as the stills that went with it) hadn't been seen anywhere else prior to the document being posted online. And why would RT risk their credibility by posting a dubious document as having come from the movie's press kit? That's the thing about credibility: you gain it slowly (as RT has) by providing accurate information. You lose it very quickly by perpetuating hoaxes. -- Vary | Talk 19:57, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

• I've only read the above discussion, not looked into the matter, but I'd say yes, this looks like a document provided by a reliable source who is standing behind it. It is just "PR stuff" and so doesn't do much for notability. But as reliability goes, I'd say it's fine. Hobit (talk) 01:40, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

If thats your claim Hobit, please answer the following: Who wrote the PR. How do you know it wasn't faked? Who was the group that labeled the creature? Do they have legitimate approval to name the creature? Why is none of this on the official website? If you can't answer one of those questions, then you cannot declare it is a reliable source. It also doesn't fit proper copyright terms as a source, so it cannot be used just like any pictures without directly copyright information attached to the actual document. Ottava Rima (talk) 02:48, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

• If a NYT's author quotes a source who is unnamed, we take it yes? It is the reliability of the author and the paper that we trust. While this case is less clear-cut, the same notion applies here in my opinion. Thoughts? Hobit (talk) 13:04, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

The NYT has a reputation to lose as with millions of dollars. They have a very long tradition. A website that is mostly opinion based is not the equivalent of the New York Times. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:01, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Agreed, but it is a similar idea. Do you have reasons to believe RT as a site isn't reliable? Hobit (talk) 15:30, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Rotten Tomatoes is not the source. So they cannot be considered as part of it anyway. But Rotten Tomatoes is not reliable, as they do not have any fact checking policy. They are an opinion website for critics. Verifiability points out that famous newspapers, magazines, publishing houses, universities, and government websites are the most reliable because of their reputation for fact checking and willingness to correct themselves. Ottava Rima (talk) 16:06, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Okay, that is quite simply not true. RT hosts opinions and reviews, but they're clearly labeled as such and don't go in the 'news' section. That's where this article was. The editors at WP:FILM have overwhelmingly found this source acceptable and reliable. And yet we're still hearing the same arguments from you about it coming from an 'unreliable' 'opinion website'. -- Vary | Talk 16:22, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Any blog can have a section titled "news". Furthermore, the editors at WP:FILM weren't actually informed. And overwhelmingly? You mean two? Why do you feel the need to misstate things constantly? I recommend you take a time off, because you are too personally involved and you are exaggerating too heavily. Wikipedia has set standards about reliability. Rotten Tomatoes does not have a fact checking policy. Therefore, Rotten Tomatoes cannot meet such standards. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:11, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

I invite the reader to review the discussion at the relevant wikiproject and make up their own mind about who's 'exaggerating.' -- Vary | Talk 17:50, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

You had two people respond to you about the topic, and you didn't actually provide any information for them to read about the topic. Yes, that is exaggerating, and no, that is nothing even close to a consensus. As an Admin, you should know better than to continue with such persistence and exaggerations. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:05, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Ottava, I gave the editors at WP:FILM everything they needed to make their decision on their own. If, by 'information', you mean a 1.5K argument that uses the words 'blog' or 'blogger' to refer to the news article in question no less than five times, then no, I didn't. I didn't present your side of the argument in the thread. I didn't present mine, either. I posted a question that I was very careful to word in the most neutral way I could.

After I posted the link to the article at WP:FILM, in this diff, three different editors agreed that using the document linked from that article was completely acceptable. So could you maybe stop accusing me of lying? -- Vary | Talk 18:13, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

By "everything" you mean that you didn't include context of the information, direct links, or even a link to the discussion it deals with, let alone not put it in the right forum? And there are only two editors. That is not a consensus. Ottava Rima (talk) 19:40, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

To pitch in here, when Vary mentioned using production notes, I wasn't aware that he was referring to the ones at Cloverfield (creature). I had added information from the production notes myself, and I find it hard to believe that the production notes would be at all questionable. Reviewing the .doc, it's clearly the marketing packaging. It's also linked at ComingSoon.net and SciFi Japan. Really, there's no issue with citing this document. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 19:53, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Except that you just a) showed your bias on the situation and removed Vary's claim by one, b) have failed to prove who created it, why it wasn't copyrighted, and why it would be a doc file, and c) why unspecified "crew" would be deemed an appropriate source without a direct quotation nor verification that the title could be deemed legitimate and not just "trivia" or "rumor". Ottava Rima (talk) 20:34, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I see. I was 'exaggerating' about the number of editors who weighed in at the discussion on WP:FILM because you'd decided that one of them didn't count. Well, why didn't you say so? -- Vary | Talk 21:01, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Please follow WP:CIVIL. If you are unwilling to accept that two people does not fit the qualification for being "editors at WP:FILM have overwhelmingly", then you do not understand what WP:CONSENSUS is either. Ottava Rima (talk) 21:35, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

When I came across the production notes, I made a judgment call based on reasons I've explained that it was acceptable as a reliable source. My judgment call precedes all of this, so bias is hardly applicable here. I think that your assessment is a bit harsh for what amounts to descriptive information about the film. I don't have the answers you're looking for, but I strongly doubt that the production notes are false. A quick Google search shows that these notes are widely distributed and have no issues (as far as I can see). I don't disagree that a more indisputable source could be found, as I've attempted to review the official site for the sake of resolution, but I believe in the scheme of including information related to the film, there really should not be a stink raised over this. —Erik (talk • contrib) - 22:24, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Is this source reliable?

[12] Hoponpop69 (talk) 01:55, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Missing Link Records would be a reliable source on which albums have been published by that particular label. Tim Vickers (talk) 22:59, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

SPS to show existence

Hi, can this: http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=nwn2modulesenglish.Detail&id=75 be used as a source to show that there exists a NWN module based on the pen-and-paper module of the same name? Thanks. Hobit (talk) 13:01, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Did you ever read WP:SPS? Also note that your link is offering up an ad for a handphone before it fesses-up the target page. These are why I've removed it. Do not put it back again. --Jack Merridew 13:11, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Jack, your opinion is well known here. As you and I are the ones arguing, I came here to get another opinion. Hobit (talk) 14:35, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Known to you, yes; I don't believe I've ever posted to this page before, so I would not expect most readers here to know my views. --Jack Merridew 14:58, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Can you post which article this is in relation to? I would think, considering the source indicates the fact that the module exists, that this would be common sense and not necessarily require a citation. --neonwhite user page talk 14:52, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

See Red Hand of Doom and here and here where I removed the link. Cheers, Jack Merridew 14:58, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

If I am reading the target of the above link correctly, it describes a computer module which is self-published by a forum user called Sgt_why. Unless it's of tremendous interest within the context of the Red Hand of Doom article, I don't see why a personal project (not apparently cited by others) would merit a link in this article. If this module gets recognition from reliable sources we might be able to cite those sources. The forum discussion which is found through the above link includes some comments on Sgt_why's NWN module, but individual user comments in a forum are not reliable sources. EdJohnston (talk) 16:55, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

• My reasoning behind the link was that it is of interest that the module was made for NWN (that's a big undertaking, 500+ hours most likely) and those interested in the RHoD article might also be interested in the NWN module. Also my history with Jack and one other involved editor has indicated it is wise to source everything. For example, see this http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Dinosaur_%28Dungeons_%26_Dragons%29&oldid=186095137 that they left for us to clean up. Also the talk page for the RHoD article might be worth looking at too. Hobit (talk) 18:59, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

The NWNVault allows anyone to upload modules, and as such is generally considered a SPS. However, those modules which reach the top-ten or so might be worth talking about. The bigger issues here are the notability of the reference, and of the article itself. I would recommend making a "List of DnD modules" article and placing the RHoD article contents into that list. You would hence neatly skip the entire notability debate for now, and yet keep the entire article contents live and and searchable ;) LinaMishima (talk) 20:21, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

EN World

Just wanted some outside input about this website. While it does have facilities for any person to offer reviews on products, there are also a set of "staff reviewers" [13]. It's unclear as to the exact procedure/qualifications about becoming a staff reviewer. I'm looking for input as to whether product reviews from these staff reviewers (not some random user) would be considered as reliable sources. This is partly stemming from the continuting disagreement (shall we say) on the references for Red Hand of Doom (and likely other articles). Thanks. --Craw-daddy | T | 15:45, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

To be honest, the editorial style of the reviews themselves, the presentation style, and the inability to easily access only staff reviews makes it unclear as to the overall quality of the site in terms of being a reliable source. LinaMishima (talk) 17:28, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

In addition it says on the link you have provided that "Any registered EN World mamber may post a review on any product." I think this, plus the fact that the reviews are presented using an Internet forum, and that members who post reviews can be anonymous classes EN World as a source of self published material, and fails RS.--Gavin Collins (talk) 10:03, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but my point is that not everyone is a Staff Reviewer, and this is what I'm asking about here. --Craw-daddy | T | 10:20, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I can see no special details regarding staff reviewers (aside from the link you provided), it is unclear if reviews are managed by a central editor, no assurances of quality, no easy means to only view staff reviews, and no indication that staff reviewers will only conduct official reviews. As such, whilst the site might be potentially made more reliable, it is for now not a reliable source. LinaMishima (talk) 12:44, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Online e-zines

I'm sure this has likely been hashed over many times, but what are some general guidelines for online e-zines, mainly in terms of WP:V? I'm thinking of a magazine such as Pyramid which moved to a totally online format ten years ago (or so). The reliability, I think, isn't the issue as it's published by Steve Jackson Games (focussing on the gaming/role-playing game market). There were about 30 issues printed on paper, but now it's completely online and subscription-based. So in other words, any material quoted from an article can be verfied by someone else that also has a subscription, but not necessarily *any* Joe Q. Public. I would think this is considered as verfiable, similar to a (smaller-town) newspaper, for example. (I could verify something that appeared five years ago in the Poughkeepsie Journal, for example, but it might not be so easy to do, and it might cost me some money to do so, I haven't thoroughly searched their site to see if their archives are available and/or if it's a service that I would have to pay for.) --Craw-daddy | T | 15:45, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

It would depend upon the notability, reliability, verifiability and respectability of an individual electronic magazine. Certainly the Pyramid and The Escapist should be considered usable publications, in my opinion, reliable for certain uses. LinaMishima (talk) 17:21, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Irfan Shahid

Resolved

Is Irfan Shahid a WP:RS? He has a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard and a Ph.D from Princeton,[14] which should make him a reliable source. However, some of his claims seem to be political in nature and suspicious. For instance, he has apparently claimed that Julia Domna was of Arabic descent, and her father, of Arabic descent. At the time, in Syria (where Julia was born), the region had barely any Arabs and the lingua franca of the area was Syriac (a dialect of Aramaic). I've Googled and found nowhere else, any mention of Julia Domna being of Arabic descent. It was after the Muslim Conquest when Arabs became more dominant in Syria. During the dominance of Graeco-Roman times, Arabs were of no importance in Syria. Shahid might be some kind of Arab nationalist or something, who is trying to Arabize history in conformity with the current Arab nationalist regime of Syria. What do you guys make out of this? — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 09:09, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

A person is not a "reliable source", a publication is. It doesn't matter whether the author has a PhD, what matters is whether the publication in question was published academically. dab (⁳) 09:32, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

All right, thanks for the lesson in semantics. I expressed myself a bit poorly. In any case, the source in question is: Shahid, Irfan (1984). Rome and The Arabs: A Prolegomenon to the Study of Byzantium and the Arabs, pp. 167... ISBN 0884021157 — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 09:36, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I notice that EliasAlucard is removing academic references, without even discussing his doubts on Talk:Julia Domna. And yes, of course there were Arabs in Syria, for example Philip the Arab. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 09:40, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I also notice that Pieter Kuiper is on his usual morning WP:STALKing of my edit history, despite that he's been given a warning for this. How's that working out for you, Pieter? I removed the source, as I pointed out in the edit commentary, until a consensus has been reached here. I did not say there were no Arabs in Syria at the time, just that they weren't at all common. — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 09:42, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

A book that specifically discusses Arabs in the Byzantine world, published by Harvard University Press, and part of an extremely influential series reviewed favourably in the Journal of the American Oriental Society, the Journal of Roman Studies, and four or five others? Why is this even being questioned? Relata refero (talk) 10:03, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

"Byzantine world" should not be confused with the Roman empire during the third century. Also, it would be nice to see what primary sources Shahid is pointing to, when he claims that Julia Domna was of Arabic descent? The reason I'm questioning this, is because this kind of politicizing of history is not uncommon. A good example is the article Kurdish Christians, which for some time, due to Mehrdad Izady being used as a source (a Kurdish nationalist of some sort), claimed that the Nestorians and the Jacobites were Kurdish Christians who spoke a dialect of Aramaic... Well that's the reason I want these sources to be carefully examined before being used with full authority in the articles. And look, just because he has a history in Harvard doesn't mean his books should be considered unquestionable. Also, the book in question is not published by Harvard University, but rather, by Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 10:13, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Does the word "prolegomenon" mean nothing to you? In this case, this is the first volume of a series that tackled the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th centuries.

I am well aware of the problems of politicised history, thanks. I have no opinion as to whether this is part of that, merely that the source is impeccable.

The book is published by Harvard U Press. The Dumbarton Oaks series is that imprint's flagship series on the later classical period, similar to the Loeb Classics and the I Tatti series. Each is named after a villa or library owned by Harvard. Relata refero (talk) 10:23, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I see Glen Warren Bowersock also seems to think Julia Domna Augusta was of Arab extraction. Relata refero (talk) 10:06, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Got a source for that? — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 10:13, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Certainly. Roman Arabia, p126. Relata refero (talk) 10:23, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Since you seem to have the source ready at hand, could you please look up to whom Glenn is referring to? Always good to use the primary sources. — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 10:31, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

"Emesa... with the last of his names, he clearly tried to forge a link with the ultimate Antonines, who were the Arab emperors from the family of Julia Domna"; "..a suitable occasion for, like Philip and the grandsons of Julia Domna, restoring the Arab domination of central government"; and several others. Relata refero (talk) 10:41, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Well, clearly, it doesn't say anything about her ethnicity, but rather, that she had family who were considered Arabs; that's very ambiguous. I still think this case needs to be more thoroughly investigated, but I'll leave these two sources intact for now. — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 10:52, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't think anything more definitive is even possible. Relata refero (talk) 11:12, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Spoke too soon. Maxime Rodinson, The Arabs, U. of Chicago Press, 1983, p 55. "Septimus Severus married an Arab from Emessa whose sons and grand-nephews ruled Rome." I don't think you can ask for anything more than that. Relata refero (talk) 11:16, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I am well aware of the problems of politicised history, thanks. I have no opinion as to whether this is part of that, merely that the source is impeccable. — The source doesn't necessarily have to be the problem here. It could be the Wikipedia editor (Ugarit (talk · contribs)) who added the statements into the article(s) and his own POV interpretation. I personally think the Glenn Warren source, while being reliable in itself, shouldn't be given WP:Undue weight as to whether or not Julia Domna herself was an Arab. Mixed marriages were common back then as well, and just because she had some in her family who were Arabs doesn't necessarily have to mean that she was Arab herself. Also, have you Relata refero, checked up what Shahid has written on Julia Domna and what his own primary sources are? — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 11:12, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

(deindent)I dont have the Shahid book in front of me, but the citations of it indicate that, among other things, he studied the etymology of her name, the content of edicts, and so on. It doesn't really matter: what matters is that there are several unimpeachable sources, and that, in fact, the Shahid book is frequently quoted in reference to the bios of Julia Domna and her descendants. Have a look at various biographical dictionaries. Relata refero (talk) 11:20, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

All right then, with the Maxime Rodinson source, I think we can consider this case resolved (for now) until something else will resurface in the future. — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 11:22, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Great!! By the way, you did exactly the right thing bringing this here. Relata refero (talk) 11:32, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Daniel Pipes

Daniel Pipes is a prominent political commentator, so presumably his opinions may be cited (with proper attribution) when they appear in newspapers, books, and other similar sources. However, should opinions published on his blog be permitted in Wikipedia articles? In particular, on the Prophet of Doom article, this blog post was used as a source for the statement that "Muslim agitators have circulated a petition to have the book banned and censored" (stated without qualification) as well as Pipes' own opinion on the subject. The group allegedly circulating this petition, Islamic Educational and Cultural Research Center, doesn't even have an article on Wikipedia and there is no evidence that the group or petition was notable. Anyone can start an online petition. Under WP:V, blogs are generally considered to be unreliable sources, but someone insists on putting this back in again and again, arguing that Pipes' "opinion on the subject is inherently notable." *** Crotalus *** 04:19, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I'd say his blog shouldn't be cited for such things. The lack of third-party fact-checking on blogs gives us a standing presumption against citing them, and that's particularly the case if the blog is the only source for the cited information. To quote WP:V, articles relating to questionable sources "should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources." And as WP:V goes on to say, "if the information in question is really worth reporting, someone else is likely to have done so." If the information has been reported by a mainstream source, it's potentially usable, but not if it comes solely from a personal blog. -- ChrisO (talk) 15:40, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Pipes is a borderline source at best; he has qualifications in the relevant field, but he explicitly casts himself as opposed to it - to the point of calling for some kind of purge of the entire Middle Eastern / Islamic Studies academy. In my view, information from Pipes' more scholarly works can be included as an attributed opinion, ie "according to Daniel Pipes, blah blah." However information from his personal blog has two strikes against it - it's coming from a dubious source to begin with, and it's only something he dashed off without review or oversight. It should probably be excluded, and it certainly shouldn't be stated as fact. At the very least it needs to be qualified "According to Daniel Pipes's weblog..." <eleland/talkedits> 19:45, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

It should perhaps be noted that there are many who consider Pipes an extremist Zionist with an agenda for Israel (and with good reason). While I do agree with a lot of things he says on Islam, I think it would be foolish to not keep in mind that he is politically motivated and not always suitable for WP:NPOV policy. On the other hand, for simply citing his opinion in compliance with NPOV policy would probably work out fine. Oh and, I seriously doubt his blog is peer reviewed. — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 21:45, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Clearly Daniel Pipes blog is not a reliable source for facts, but is a reliable source for his attributed opinions, and making a judgement as to whether his articles are "scholarly" is irrelevant -- the subject of The Prophet of Doom and reaction to it is current events and politics, not archaeology or particle physics or any other scholarly dicipline. Since it is not suggested that there be an article on the petition or the organization "Islamic Educational and Cultural Research Center" "notability" in the sense of WP:N is irrelevant to the question of whether they may be mentioned -- WP:N is a criterion for article creation, not content. It is relevant to whether a Prophet of Doom article may exist, but if it is established that that subject has multiple independent RS notability and otherwise should exist then the decision as to whether to mention Pipes' opinions of it is a question of rough consensus as to the significance of his opinions to the subject, i.e. ordinary editorial discretion, not policy. Andyvphil (talk) 13:03, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

No.

The part to which I say 'no' the most is that " the subject of The Prophet of Doom and reaction to it is current events and politics, not archaeology or particle physics or any other scholarly discipline". As a matter of fact, political science and public affairs are fairly well-known scholarly disciplines, with departments and, frequently, large graduate schools in most major research universities. The SSRN lists over two hundred scholarly journals in those disciplines. We are not reduced to using Pipes' blog.

In other 'no's, I understand you reject 'notability' as a criterion for using his opinion. Very well. I don't understand what follows from it. If there are multiple RSes that have pronounced on the subject, only then will we have an article on it. If multiple RSes have pronounced on it, why use an unreliable source subsequently?

"The decision whether to mention Pipes' opinion...ordinary editorial discretion, not policy." Certainly. Ordinary editorial discretion when unchallenged, is paramount. Policy exists to allow people to solve disputes with a certain amount of uniformity. If nobody ever challenges Pipes in an article, thats fine. If someone does, then we apply WP:V and WP:RS and WP:NPOV and all those lovely things and discover that Pipes, a marginal scholar, writing on his blog an opinion/facts unsupported elsewhere might not make the cut. Relata refero (talk) 19:57, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

No.

No, policy does not exist in order to allow uniformity in settling disputes. Policy, properly defined and recognized, may allow certain classes of disputes to be settled in a uniform manner, but that is almost never its purpose. E.g., WP:BLP exists to protect Wikipedia from legal exposure. Not to settle content disputes.

No, the so-called scholarship of such misnamed fields of employment as Political Science has nothing in particular to say on the subject at hand, which is whether in an article on The Prophet of Doom, should one exist, we are proscribed from mentioning that Daniel Pipes (notice the blue link, please) has written "...I do think it vital that they and others be able to conduct a freewheeling discussion about the Koran, jihad, radical Islam, Islamist terrorism, and related topics, without fearing a reprimand from the U.S. government or a loss of their livelihood. (The same applies to another case I have previously discussed, publication of Craig Winn's Prophet of Doom: Islam's Terrorist Dogma, In Muhammad's Own Words.)<para> Americans are seriously discussing the nature of the enemy and how to defeat it...<para> Especially at a time when establishment institutions are so timid or even deceptive, nothing can be off limits in this debate; and there must be no penalty for those who express their views."[15] In case you don't recognize it, this is what is called opinion. It's significance depends solely on Daniel Pipes' status as an individual whose opinions in this area (public policy) are significant, which we measure on Wikipedia by the attention accorded those opinions in multiple RS, and which you can judge by following the blue link and reading his article and comparing what you find there with the relevant part of WP:V: "...produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications." He's Daniel Pipes[16], we're sure he said it, subjecting his opinions to peer review is a category error, and trying to block mention of his opinions runs counter to the pupose of this or any other encyclopedia. Andyvphil (talk) 10:58, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

• BLP is the sole exception to that rule. Other foundational policies exist to give an encyclopaedic character to this project, and to make sure that we can work together, and settle our disagreements.
• Daniel Pipes is a notable person. He is not a reliable source. He occasionally writes in reliable sources. When his opinions are notable, they will be in reliable sources.
• Daniel Pipes is not a mainstream scholar. He is notable enough for an article here, but he has no institutional affiliation, and no tenure review. As such, he is an individual whose opinions might be of interest, but he is not an 'established expert'. He is the equivalent of a science journalist with a PhD writing a blog; we would be very picky about what from that blog we should put in our articles, and the same is true in this case.
• "So-called scholarship of such misnamed fields" doesn't help your case, it merely seems to indicate that you believe that certain opinions are shut out of the mainstream academy which demonstrates bias. This is often a signal of tendentiousness; I urge you to remember that Wikipedia is not the place to fight that sort of battle.
• If Pipes' opinion on something notable is relevant, I am sure that he will have no trouble publishing it in a reliable source.
• Again, the SSRN lists over two hundred scholarly journals in relevant disciplines. If those are not available, then there are art last count over forty major book reviews in the US and UK. IF those are not available, we have whatever reliable sources serve to make the subject of the article under discussion notable. We are an encyclopaedia, and are not reduced to using someone's blog posts. And even if we were, I think we could do better than the sort of person who insists on being called "Dr. X" everywhere and whom someone with tenure once called "basically a second-rate unemployed scholar", and, even more memorably, a "Neanderthal publicist". Relata refero (talk) 18:00, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Primary source, or secondary source?

I forgot to ask, above -- I question the label several of my correspondents applied to these memos -- "primary sources". All of these Summary of Evidence memos were based on multiple documents. In some instances we know they were based on dozens of primary sources from over half a dozen other agencies. So why shouldn't we consider the summary memos "secondary sources"?

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 19:43, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

For a source to be considered secondary there must be some form of significant and original artistic construction within it. If the summaries are something like a bibliography, this is considered a form of mechanical action, requiring no original artistic effort. I.E. five bibliographies prepared by five authors from the same underlying sources would mostly generate identical final products. If the summaries are something like paragraph-or-larger abstracts, and were *not* writen by the authors of the underlying individual sources, but rather writen by the author of the final product, then this would be a secondary source. To expand, mere repetition of underlying abstracts created by the authors of the underlying sources is a mechanical reproduction, not artistic, not a secondary source. Based on this reasoning, would your source be secondary? Wjhonson (talk) 19:54, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

• These documents were written by entirely different people, in an entirely different chain of command -- not documents written by same people who wrote the originals The original documents came from JTF-GTMO, the CIA, the FBI, the military's Criminal Investigation Task Force, the Department of State, the office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs, the Department of Homeland Security, and various foreign intelligence services. The DoD released Board Recommendation memos for about 200 captives whose repatriation or release was authorized by the Designated Civilian Official in 2005 or 2006. All of those memos that I have reviewed, so far, said the Boards considered the input from at least three of the above sources. Feel free to check for yourself if you like.
  • "Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT) and Administrative Review Board (ARB) Documents". OARDEC. September 2007. Retrieved 2008-09-29.

• By artistic effort I assume we are not talking James Joyce or Shakespeare. I assume that at any effort that required understanding and intelligent paraphrasing would satisfy this criteria? These summaries did require an intelligent understanding of the original documents to prepare. IMO some of these authors were better at bringing intelligent understanding to their summarizing and paraphrasing efforts than others. Some authors summaries contain errors that showed they tried and failed to bring intelligence and intelligent understanding to their preparation of these summaries. Even artisitic failures require artistic effort. Your neighbour whose garage band makes a demo tape covering some pop songs, that is a total artistic failure, in unlistenable, has still made an "artistic effort". His or her demo tape is as fully protected by copyright law as Lars Ulrich, or Britney Spears.

• For example, a large number of the captives had their detention justified because their name was found on some kind of suspicious list. For some reason, probably security, the source of these suspicious lists was usually obfuscated. The authors of the Summary of Evidence memos made editorial decisions about how much obfuscation to apply. The authors of the Summary of Evidence memos made editorial decisions about when to assume similar sounding allegations were separate, distinct allegations, and when the source documents they were summarizing were describing the same basic allegation.

• Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 16:45, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, imho, summaries of the type you outline above would be considered secondary sources.Wjhonson (talk) 06:37, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Radio interview sources that have been unofficially archived online

For the Project Chanology article, a very useful source would be a radio interview that was conducted on January 30, 2008. Now, this radio inteview was not archived and made available in an official capacity on the radio station's website. On the other hand, certain listeners recorded the interview in MP3 format, and hosted it on their own sites, so the interview, completely unedited, can be found online, including at such places as this link: [17] (there are others as well, all unofficial)

My question is, is this interview a Reliable Source? It was conducted by a mainstream member of the media and broadcast to a large recieving audience, but is only available online in an unofficial capacity. I assume that any researching graduate student would be able to contact the radio station (assuming we cite the radio station properly, which is par for the course) and obtain a copy that way, just like a reasearcher would be able to contact, say, the New York Times for a back issue. The New York Times is, of course, available online and this is not, but why should online availability factor in?

Comments please? Fieari (talk) 23:25, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

The reliability of a source is independent of the ease of obtaining it. The interview itself is a reliable source for citing statements made in the interview, and you're allowed to just cite the interview; the interview itself is the source, not the website hosting it. There is no stipulation that verifiable means "verifiable via the interenet." Providing unofficial links within an article to web hosted versions is useful, although it may violate the external links guideline, specifically the part barring links to known copyright violations. It would still certainly serve as a convenience link to drop to anyone requesting such on the talk page, for his own personal verification. The only thing you really should avoid in this situation is using the interview to cite any BLP-violating or otherwise controversial claims that don't have other sources to support them. I don't know if you can make a policy-based argument there, but it's just a bit of common sense: don't use difficult to verify sources where a content dispute is likely/ongoing. Someguy1221 (talk) 23:47, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Indeed... cite to the original broadcast (giving as much information as you can, such as the program name, the station, air date and time, etc.) ... and then list the most reliable of the "unofficial" websites as as convenience link. Blueboar (talk) 01:03, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Use of court documents as reliable sources

Hello folks, a few questions have arisen on the Ilchi Lee talk page about use of court documents as reliable sources, specifically under two circumstances: First, when posted second-hand on a site that is not agreed to be a legitimate source itself. Second, when available only by calling the county to request a copy through the mail. Does anyone have any information about how to judge the verifiability and reliability of official documents in these cases? Thanks! Forestgarden (talk) 04:11, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Court papers are primary sources, and should only be used with great care, and without interpreting them. Final court decisions are reasonable, but depositions have much lower value and probably shouldn't be used at all. If the court papers are scanned then there's little opportunity for changes, but if they are transcribed then there's a chance that it's been altered. If this is the only source for a controversial assertion then it's probably not good enough, IMO. But if it's just a minor, supporting assertion that supports what is found in secondary sources. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 05:07, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! That is helpful, although of course not conclusive. I have had trouble finding Wiki policies about primary sources -- can anyone provide a specific reference? And Will, the documents in question are scanned not transcribed (which increases their value) but one is just the initial set of accusations by the prosecution (which decreases its value), one is described as a coroner's report (does this increase or decrease the value?), and I haven't been able yet to access the third, apparently including a "Register of Actions" which might include a final decision of some sort. Does that information help with determining useability of the documents? Forestgarden (talk) 07:52, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

The policy/guideline is at WP:PSTS. It's hard to set clear boundaries. One thing that helps is to attribute assertions - "The coroner's report said X". The other thing is to avoid drawing conclusions from primary sources. The last point is to find secondary sources that say the same thing. If there's a newspaper report on the same issue, then the primary source might be used to add a detail with less risk of overstepping. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 08:36, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I do not think that court rulings are exactly primary sources as originally envisioned. I do however, think that laws should not be quoted and then interpreted, that would be original research. Opinions from the bench however, are reviews and opinions and interpretations of those laws. I think depositions can be used as sources of statements of the deposed, but should not be taken as statements of fact. --Blue Tie (talk) 10:47, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Opinions from the bench are opinions. They state the conclusions of the judge in question, who works by a certain set of rules devised to settle controversies. Typically in important cases the opinions are appealed, and appeal courts often render divided verdicts. I would never quote a court decision about a controversy without saying something like:. "The court held in its verdict that ....". A court is reliable on what its verdict is. The reason they are used so much is that it is a fixed rule that they can be quoted without exposing oneself to libel. DGG (talk) 00:47, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

• In my opinion, a court document would be reliable, and depending on the topic, a secondary source. (If the topic were the court, it would be primary). But if the document itself is in doubt, it can't be called reliable at all. So a posting on an unreliable site of a supposed court document would not generally any more useful than anything else from that site. 01:43, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

I just realized I didn't explicitly mention that the article using the sources in question is an article about a living person... Citing prosecution documents with strongly critical claims about the living person in question doesn't seem in keeping with the "do no harm" principle, especially for the third set of documents I mentioned above, where the case that was settled/dismissed with no judgement of guilt.

One question in including court documents is whether the entire legal case is notable or significant. Court documents alone don't show that someone's legal difficulties or allegations made about them in a lawsuit are notable or have substance. Agree it poses WP:BLP difficulties to comb through court documents and report details of unvetted allegations, particularly if (a) the trial is not reported on by newspapers or similar reliable third-party sources (which provide evidence the allegations are considered notable or significant) and (b) no verdict (which provides evidence they've been verified as reliable). I completely agree with DGG that when citing a judicial opinions, the judge or court should always be identified and attributed with "according to..." or similar language. The ruling of a lower court can always be reversed on appeal, and judges are experts in law but not necessarily in all the subjects they offer opinions on. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 18:43, 4 February 2008 (UTC) Additional comment: It appears that some of the lawsuits against Ilchi Lee were reported in the media and others were not. As a rule of thumb, I would include the lawsuits that were reported in the media in such a case and not include ones which weren't. I would also not use court documents to go much beyond the allegations the media report, although I would think it perfectly appropriate to use them to describe the verdict if there was one. I would be particularly disinclined to include a lawsuit that was settled or dismissed without verdict and without attracting media attention. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 18:49, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Judge rulings, as long as you follow any appeals chain, are generally highly reliable. Filings by either side, however, are only really reliable with respect to the claims of those sides. As such, prosecution filings should not be used as evidence for someone's actions. Current ongoing court cases must also be treated with extreme care. LinaMishima (talk) 18:58, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Thank you all for your input. Your comments were very helpful, and I think we are working things out with the article. If any further questions arise, I'll come back, and thanks! Forestgarden (talk) 17:55, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Wiktionary a source?

What do you think of this?[18]--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back (talk) 14:13, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Wiktionary:Pornography is a legitimate source! Chessy999 (talk) 14:23, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

I already know what you think of the source; I'm attempting to solicit more opinions.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back (talk) 14:25, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Am I not allowed to participate in the discussion your highness? Chessy999 (talk) 14:30, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Wiktionarian here: No, of course not. Likewise Wikipedia is not an adequate source for Wiktionary. Of course it may be useful to link to the Wiktionary entry, but that should be done through {{wiktionary}} or a similar template, and should be presented as supplementing rather than substantiating the article. -- Visviva (talk) 14:33, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Indeed... wikis in general, which would include our sister projects such as Wiktionary and Wikinews are not considered reliable sources for citation in Wikipedia, due to their nature (edited anonimously, subject to frequent change, no editorial oversight or peer review, etc.) ... even Wikipedia itself is not considered reliable. Blueboar (talk) 14:39, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Makes sense. I got rid of the reference, but I placed the wiktionary template near the lead paragraph (since the lead paragraph discusses the definition of the word at length).--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back (talk) 14:41, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Chessy999 still doesn't like it[19]. Let's continue this discussion on the Talk:Pornography page. I'm copying this thread there. --The Fat Man Who Never Came Back (talk) 14:48, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

I believe the discussion should stay here and we will copy and paste it over later. The discussion has just started, leave it here for a week, until we build a consensus on the question. Chessy999 (talk) 14:56, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

This is a simple issue that has already been resolved. Please don't edit war.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back (talk) 15:02, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

A good explanation of why wikis are not considered reliable can be found at Wikipedia:Reliable source examples#Are wikis reliable sources. The bar on wikis is also repeated at the policy level at WP:V... see WP:SPS which reads: Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, newsletters, personal websites, open wikis, blogs, forum postings, and similar sources are largely not acceptable. This should be an open and shut case. We should certainly have a prominent link to the definition in our sister project, but we can not use it as a citation. Blueboar (talk) 15:17, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

I've removed the archive tag, in case there is further discussion on this matter.Wjhonson (talk) 01:20, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

• Remove See WP:SPS, "Articles and posts on Wikipedia may not be used as sources." BETA 05:42, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Polemic and Apologist Sources #2

Separately: How would one detect and thus discriminate between polemic, apologetic and "objective" sources? (Each side would call their favored sources "objective".)--Blue Tie (talk) 11:14, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Sources are only more or less reliable, or more or less mainstream as far as we're concerned. Relata refero (talk) 13:16, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the tendency for certain sources to be prone to poor fact-checking and bias is a part of WP:RS. In that regard, objectivity is relevant. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:05, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

FAct-checking=reliability;bias=mainstream/marginal. Relata refero (talk) 22:50, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

I'd suggest, one measure of when to attribute, would be how contentious other editors find the material. Wjhonson (talk) 17:00, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Humane Society on polar bears

Is this page from the Humane Society a reliable source to include this sentence in the article on Polar bear?: "The result of the effects of global warming are thinner bears, a decrease in reproduction rates, and lower survival rates in juvenile bears." Torc2 (talk) 19:29, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

It is certainly a reliable source for a statement that this is the opinion of the Humane Society. I am less sure about using it as a source for a blunt statement of fact. I would rephrase the statement with attribution... to something like: "According to the Humane Society of the United States, the result of the effects of global warming are..." etc. Blueboar (talk) 19:48, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

The Polar bear article includes actual scientific papers by bear experts such as Ian Stirling, so it's not clear that the Humane Society's view (which is not attributed by them to any particular scientist) adds much from the perspective of field biology. A Google search for 'polar bear survival' produces a deluge of newspaper references. On this issue the Humane Society of the United States serves as an activist group so our usual cautions should apply. EdJohnston (talk) 20:26, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Naggar

Is Professor Dr. Zaghloul. R. M. EL-NAGGAR a reliable source? According to his CV, he has been professor King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals, Kuwait University, King Saud University and Qatar University. He has also been research assistant at University College of Wales and Robertson Research Laboratories.Bless sins (talk) 05:13, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

For others: Please also note that according to WP:RS, he satisfies none of the requirements:

• The material has been thoroughly vetted by the scholarly community. This means published in peer-reviewed sources, and reviewed and judged acceptable scholarship by the academic journals.
• Items that are recommended in scholarly bibliographies are preferred.

In short, this is just an Islamic apologist with a degree and a personal website. None of his work has been published in academic journals, or has been peer reviewed. He is no different from anyone else having a degree which many people have but are not necessarily RS's. The same applies to Maurice Bucaille, and William Campbell. People are reliable sources if they are respected in their community for their expertise. If its a strictly personal localized affair, it doesnt fly because everyone can qualify for that. But not everyone has stuff in academic journals. Please also note that this is a guy who is trying to prove a connection between science and Islam. Also since he's a religious/partisan source, he would not qualify under WP:RS#Extremist sources, which says "Organizations and individuals that are widely acknowledged as extremist, whether of a political, religious or anti-religious, racist, or other nature, should be used only as sources about themselves". Naggar is a religious source obviously. His personal website is plenty proof of that. --Matt57 ^{(talk•contribs)} 05:43, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Please note that being a "religious source" is different than being an "extremist source" or "extremist religious source". The last two are clearly unreliable, but merely being "religious" doesn't automatically disqualify one as a reliable source.Bless sins (talk) 05:47, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

It is still a religious partisan source and we are told to avoid them usually because of their bias. Also, the fact remains that none of his work has been reviewed by the scientific community or published in academic journals. I will let other uninvolved editors comment further on this. --Matt57 ^{(talk•contribs)} 05:54, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Please note that your suggestion would mean that authors such as Daniel Pipes are unreliable when not publishing in "academic journals".Bless sins (talk) 06:06, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

ROFL, what a horrible last name. Bless sins, did you really have to put it all in caps, lol. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 08:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I just copied it straight from his CV (I know I was being lazy, I din't want to misspell it).Bless sins (talk) 19:30, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Where do you want to quote him? Relata refero (talk) 15:29, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I want to use him for providing a scientific perspective on the Qur'an. I think he should good for that because of his association (and high posts in) the following organizations: Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs, Cairo, Egypt; Islamic Academy of Sciences, Amman, Jordan; and The Muslim Association For The Advancement of Science, Aligarh, India. These are all mainstream organizations reflecting the views of mainstream Muslim scholars.

Ofcourse, his views will be attributed, and won't be treated as facts. I understand that he is definitely not an ideal source, but not all sources on wikipedia are published in peer-reviewed journals and university presses.Bless sins (talk) 19:30, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Here's a list of fellows at the IAS in Amman. (That's just this year.) The MAAS at AMU is basically a social organisation, which does great work in trying to get Indian Muslims more interested in science and tech, but little more than that. I don't know about the Egyptian thing. Here's what I think: this is a person more notable as a Muslim scientist than as a scientist who happens to know something about Islam-related science/the Qur'an. There is a difference. If he is quoted in articles as we would quote - in, say, articles about Genesis - scientists notable for trying to reconcile their Christian faith with the Biblical narrative, I'd have no objection. Relata refero (talk) 20:29, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Notability doesnt imply anything about reliability. Naggar made a personal website and lectures and what not. Ofcourse he'll then be notable because Muslims will be touting his stuff around as facts. Ali Sina and Robert Spencer are notable as well, Spencer being more notable than Naggar but he was labelled as an extremist source and therefore not reliable. It seems if its anything anti-Islamic, the label "extremist" is quick to be applied but if its pro-Islamic people are more lenient. This guy Naggar has nothing other than a few degrees in Islam and science. No peer reviewed stuff, no academic journals or commentary by the scholarly community. He's a single guy, Islamic apologetic, trying to prove the link between science and Islam. Being members of a some Islamic organizations means nothing - they're a dime a dozen. Anyone can form an Islamic organization. Reliability means that a person is known in that area and recognized by other people of the same area in a scholarly way. Does this apply to Naggar? Not at all. Just another guy with a PHD and even if that was true, it doesnt imply reliability. There are some basic requirements for reliability which say "Can we depend on this guy for making this opinion? Who is he? Is he someone authentic or just an Islamic apologist with a degree?" The latter is the case here. If Naggar was published in recognized academic scientific journals, he would be acceptable. Otherwise this is just a personal essay from a guy who has a PhD no different than all of our friends here: Category:Wikipedians with PhD degrees --Matt57 ^{(talk•contribs)} 16:31, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Just want to pick you up on something: no academic, peer-reviewed journals? Did you miss the 100+ journals listed on his CV? I have no problem with sticking to RS material which mentions El-Najjar, but I was under the impression that a professor of Geology could be used for at least geology-related analyses. ITAQALLAH 17:47, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, there appear to be quite a few journal articles listed, many of which are Western, as well. Relata refero (talk) 18:50, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree we should not quote this guy for facts. However, the article in question "scientific perspective on the Qur'an" is apparently religious, opinion. Hence, if we have to have such an article (do we?), then I'd have thought he was ideal. Only the Islamic apologetic should be included, unless you have a problem with such people of course. PR^talk 17:29, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Not only the apologetics. But they're presumably relevant. As I said, he shouldn't be quoted as a scientist, but as an writer of apologetics. Have a look at Gary Habermas. This guy's the equivalent, except as a scientist where Habermas is a historian. Relata refero (talk) 18:50, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Regarding what Itaqallah said, I didnt know he had journals published. In that case we should only use articles which have been published and not persona essays. Thoughts? --Matt57 ^{(talk•contribs)} 05:28, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Matt57, much of reliable content is found outside academic journals. For example, BBC, CNN, Time magazine etc. are reliable but not academic journals. Do you agree?Bless sins (talk) 06:08, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Nobody who was not an over-credulous mouth-breathing idiot would ever agree with that. No true Scotsman even patronizes that form of information delivery, as it is inherently unreliable. There is a conflict of interest within them, drawing them towards both entertainment and money on the one hand, and objectivity on the other. Guess which one wins every time, when you talk about a profit-seeking entity? Go ahead, guess. Are you guessing yet? --76.202.254.96 (talk) 07:51, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

The BBC is a nonprofit. Relata refero (talk) 18:21, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

If he's being used to present a scientific perspective on the Qu'ran, as was indicated above, then his relability definitely needs to be judged by the standards of the academic, scientific community and his reputation for reliability in that peer community. But if he's being used to present a Qu'ranic, Islamic perspective on science, then his reliabity needs to be judge by the standards of Islamic religious scholarship and his reputation in that peer community. He needs to be considered reliable for the subject-matter and perspective he's being brought in to represent. He might possibly be reliable in one or the other communities, both, or neither. (Journalists have their own communities, and so on.) Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 01:57, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Warped Tour 2008

Another editor and I are having a disagreement as to whether the MySpace links are reliable. I know that MySpace is not a reliable source, but I can't convince this other editor of that. Could I get some supporting arguments and other eyes here? Corvus cornix_talk 06:16, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Okay this guy really needs to let this go now. First of all, I have been doing this for 2 years now and nothing has EVER been reverted on this page. This guy won't let up and has gone so far now as to open this up for no reason at all. Secondly, the "non-reliable" sources that he is claiming that we are using are in fact from OFFICIAL sites with OFFICIAL information straight from the tour. This has become nothing but a petty showing on this editor's part. DX927 (talk) 06:19, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

MySpace isn't an official site. Corvus cornix_talk 06:23, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Myspace notwithstanding, there is also the issue that "official information" like this is considered a primary source, and hence not necessarily reliable. --Bradeos Graphon Βραδέως Γράφων (talk) 06:47, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[Personal attack by anonymous editor removed]. The Evil Spartan (talk) 07:51, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

It would've been nice if you had removed the harsh remarks instead of the points that clearly prove that it is in fact a reliable source. I'll repeat for him, how can you imply that Group A's own information about Group A's own itinerary is "not necessarily reliable" and imply that some other group's information about their itinerary could be? DX927 (talk) 18:16, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Myspace is definitely not considered a reliable source. That said, I think Bradeos Graphon is over-stating the unreliability of primary sources. Priamary sources most definitely can be reliable. The relevant policy statements here are WP:SPS and WP:PSTS (sub-sections of WP:V and WP:NOR respectively). The use of primary sources are somewhat limited, and they should be used with caution... but they can be used. It really depends on the nature of the statement you are backing with the source. Blueboar (talk) 15:05, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

My statement was a caution too, "not necessarily reliable", against uncritical acceptance of primary sources. In a general sense, the caution should address notability issues, spam, pov, etc. P sources should certainly be used, but with conditional or at least attributive language. I consider them reliable if independently confirmed. --Bradeos Graphon Βραδέως Γράφων (talk) 15:27, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Ah... that was not clear to me. In that case I agree with your assessment. Blueboar (talk) 18:25, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Brahmin and dozens of related articles

A somewhat dicey question, so I'm bringing it here for ideas.

Looking through a couple of articles on Indian ethnicities and castes, I noticed that a large number of them, particularly on various kinds of Brahmins, are heavily dependent on a particular reference. The reference in question is usually given as "A History of Brahmin Clans (Brāhmaṇa Vaṃshõ kā Itihāsa), in Hindi, by Dorilāl Śarmā,published by Rāśtriya Brāhamana Mahāsabhā, Vimal Building, Jamirābād, Mitranagar, Masūdābād, Aligarh-1, 2nd ed-1998". The usual reference is usually followed by the line "This Hindi book contains the most exhaustive list of Brahmana gotras and pravaras together their real and mythological histories." Almost all of the cites have been added by User:Vinay Jha sometime last year.

Now I can't find a reference to this book or Dorilal Sharma anywhere, though I admit my ability to look through Hindi RSes isn't the best. It doesn't seem to be published by an authentic academic publisher, but by a communirty organisation. I don't think the latter is particularly notable either - there's a political party called the "Brahmin Mahasabha" in the relevant state, and lots of smaller towns have their own caste-based associations generally called mahasabhas, but I don't know of, and cannot discover antecedents for, this one.

Further, Dorilal Sharma doesn't seem to be a particularly well-known scholar, subject to the same constraints I mentioned earlier.(As in, I can't find him at all. I can't even find him on WorldCat.)

Now, normally I would have gone ahead and removed this and excised whatever material was dependent upon it, but I am far from sure in this case. Subject to the normal corrections of wording involved in ensuring that it is crystal clear what is traditionally assumed and what is historically known, it doesn't seem that any particularly broad claims are made with reference to the book. It may not sound 100% right to me, but I don't claim to have a perfect intuition about these things.

In addition, an undeniable fact is that the articles seem to me at least to be more informative and encyclopaedic thanks to a solid rewriting heavily dependent on this book; Here's a revision of a typical article just before User:Vinay Jha started editing, and here's the revision when he's done.

So I'm torn. I've seen some of these caste-based histories, and a lot of them are truly awful - one on Agrasena and the Agarwals still gives me nightmares - but I cannot be certain that this is one of them. It appears that the editor who used the source has largely stopped editing, but I'm leaving a note on the talkpage anyway. In the meantime, some suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Relata refero (talk) 18:48, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

user:Vinay Jha understands and respects the idea of encyclopedicity. The problem is in the materials he has used, and that too isn't really his fault, except for the credence he may want to give them. There are a gazillion "Brahman Mahasabha"s, and obscure publishers in Hindi are legion. The best we could hope for is that Dorilal Sharma is/was an academic with access to archive materials; if he's a traditional Pandit, all bets are off. (My point here being that Brahmins are not above propagandizing, and any outfit labelling itself a "Mahasabha" should ring warning bells at once.)

The inherent problems are more deep-seated, though. Details such as gotras and pravaras are important only to Brahmins themselves. Academic works focusing on historical or sociological issues may omit enumerating them. So one is somewhat forced to rely on "traditional" sources for the information. Further, in general, it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to find anything approaching WP:RS on Brahmins that for any given work isn't any more than regional in scope. Except for some fairly trivial things, Brahmins defy generalization, and most communities have thoroughly apocryphal origins. Source materials of historical value are restricted to things like land grant records or inscriptions, genealogical records of community ghataks (e.g. among the Maithili -- of whom VJha happens to be one:) -- who are scrupulous about consanguinity constraints on marriage), direct testimony of community elders on things like connubial or commensal gotras and pravaras (as they know them), temple records, etc. But these go back only so far, and are not free of prior invention now encrusted with a mantle of "tradition". Alongside this, there is a vast swath of pseudo-history and patently aggrandizing myth-making enshrined in puranas and (local) upapuranas, which continue to serve their purpose well whenever a "history" has to be whipped up in short order.

As far as I can tell, VJha has used Dorilal Sarma's book for information on Brahmins in the Gangetic basin. I'd say then there's a decent chance that the information is accurate, but veracity is a different matter entirely. There's a difference between what Brahmins believe about themselves, and what can actually be verified as historically valid. rudra (talk) 00:13, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Dorilal Sharma has wasted years on collecting materials on this topic almost single-handedly, and he may be dubbed as a non-academic source because he is not a university professor, but I could not find a more exhaustive and more reliable source on this topic. Dorilal Sharma collected materials from all sorts of sources, academic as well as non-academic, and I tried my best to use his materials cautiously according to Wiki norms. Most of the brahmins are now not interested in maintaining records of their gotras and pravaras, and much of historical records are being destroyed for ever. Academics have little or no interest in this field, although it is an important branch of sociology and anthropology. Rudra relies upon surnames, but I do not like his calling me a Maithil Brahmin because I did not marry and do not belong to any matrimonial community or caste. I keep a safe distance from three 'w's : wine, women and worshipping idols. If Rudra perceives me to be a casteist source, he is free to revert everything I ever contributed to Wiki. I deliberately used my surname in username so that enlightened persons should single me out for witch-hunting. I would have liked to contribute to articles on other castes as well, but I do not possess reliable materials (in most cases there is a lack of material). It is due to DAB's hurried and misinformed editing of my contributions to Indian astronomy and related topics that I stopped editing Wiki; he could not allow me to finish a paragraph and edited me midway without bothering to discuss. VJha (talk) 02:20, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

X³: Terran Conflict

Resolved

 – I'm watching it to see if more verifiable sources occur. MBisanz ^talk 22:11, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Right now the only source for this article is an "official" forum press release. I don't think its a reliable source, per our usual guidelines on web forums, but wanted to check here before I used it as a basis for an AfD. MBisanz ^talk 21:39, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

I did some checking, and indeed it is official, it seems, no bunny ears required. However, it is not a third party source, which is what WP:V requires. Be aware that the article is likely to be created again with reliable third-party sources in a few months, as the games press cover this matter. LinaMishima (talk) 21:51, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Okey, I'll leave it watchlist and hope it isn't vaporware. Given how forums work, I'm personally loath to call anything on them official, but thats just a style thing. MBisanz ^talk 22:09, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Well a post by an official representative on an official forum is really no different then a blog entry IMHO. They should be used with care but can easily be reliable sources. Nil Einne (talk) 08:42, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Deep Purple record sales

I have been accused of vandalism because I have repeatedly removed poor quality (IMHO) references to recrds sales. THe matter has been discussed on the discussion page and most who have commented agree, and yet a few editors keep added these links. A similar dispute on the Pink Floyd entry has quietened down recently with the accepted Reliable Source link still in place.

I'm not prepared to carry on reverting this to what I believe is a valid entry without some back up from more senior users - or to be told that those links do meet the standard! --C Hawke (talk) 16:28, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Sigh. I don't know what you can do, man. There are more anon IPs than you. They aren't discussing the edit with you either, am I right? And the link is obvious nonsense. You won't be able to get the page semi-protected to stop this. And if you edit-war, you'll get blocked. That's how Wikipedia works.

My suggestion: Let them have the page. There's nothing else you can do. And instead focus instead on helping others with WP:RS problems and reforming policy to help deal with this kind of thing. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 00:57, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

the problem with letting them have the page is then other site will use what is here, repeat it, and be seen as further evidence to back the claim! --C Hawke (talk) 07:49, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

that's obviously not true. Keep reporting the vandals at WP:AIV, if all else fails, ask for semi protection at WP:RFPP. Corvus cornix_talk 19:48, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Alas, it is not vandalism as would be counted as "Stubbornness" Wikipedia:Vandalism#What_vandalism_is_not

--C Hawke (talk) 20:23, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

The IP editor who charged User:CHawke with vandalism was mistaken. A content dispute is never considered vandalism. Besides, the discussion at Talk:Deep Purple#100 million? is a Talk page consensus against using 100 million as the number of sales. It appears to be strong enough grounds to request semi-protection at WP:RFPP. Whoever requests it should include the talk thread at Deep Purple and this RSN discussion as references. Another option is for CHawke to invite all the IP editors who've been working on that article to join the discussion here at RSN and explain why they choose to believe numbers that have no reliable source. EdJohnston (talk) 21:21, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

FYI for anyone who has commented above... please take note: Editor CHawke also edits as 74.77.222.188 (talk · contribs · WHOIS). On the Deep Purple article from January 21 to January 25 the user alternated between IP 74.77.222.188 and the CHawke account and blanked valid citations from the Deep Purple lead-in no less than 13 times. At which point Wikipedia Administrator User:Wiki alf stepped in and attempted to halt the 74.77.222.188/Chawke edit war with this edit and the edit summary "EMI music publishing corporation is a good enough cite". IP 74.77.222.188 reverted the Administrators decision here with the edit summary "A publicist is the LEAST reliable source". When this citation blanking was reverted User CHawke reverted with this edit and the repeated edit summary "A publicist is the LEAST reliable source"... the exact same wording he had used earlier in the day as IP 74.77.222.188. At which point an administrator recommended a report be filed at WP:SSP as it was clear 1 user was editing using multiple means. An administrator declared the references valid and another editor placed a {more citations req'd} tag on the article to try and promote more solid referencing for the article. IP 74.77.222.188 was blocked earlier today for breach of WP:3RR and a WP:SSP report is being compiled. An administrator reviewed the article in question in this discussion and found the cite to be a valid one. 142.166.250.247 (talk) 02:47, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

two points - none of that was talked about on the discussion page and the reason "the exact same wording" was use by myself and IP 74.77.222.188 is that is was lazy and simply used the same wording that another editor had used in the past. If "as it was clear 1 user was editing using multiple means" why was nothing ever said on my page? I only ever use my named account and do not hide behind IP addresses like some do, including the other editor who, whilst sharing my views, seems to break the rules, including the WP:3RR - which is the reason I stopped editing the page and have attempted to get some clarity from editors outside of the discussion

It may be that an admin had declared the links valid, but consensus on the discussion page is that it is not. As I said I am staying clear until I can find a valid link that confirms this one way or another. --C Hawke (talk) 08:11, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

One final question to 142.166.250.247. Are you, as I am , prepared to accept the consensus on this page over what is and what is not a credible source for record sales for the Deep Purple, Pink Floyd and any other entries where such disputes take place? If so then I will place a comment on those pages discussion pages to point here to invite anyone else who has views to come here, where those editors who have more experience on what meets the standards than either of us, can join in as well. If you are happy with this then my point over the EMI cite is that I would be happy(er) with it if EMI had been the bands label for their entire career. Which is not the case.--C Hawke (talk) 09:16, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

It appears that doing the math for these 100 million records alleged to be sold would be tedious, and might not be worth a lot of editor time. I've observed that the 100 million number is widely quoted on the web, but some of the web sites that give that number qualify it with cautious wording. For example, www.rockcrypt.com: They are claimed to have sold over 100 million albums worldwide. How about if we do the same thing. We can qualify it as a 'claimed number,' and reference EMI as the source of the claim. It would be different if we can find a skeptical source that has actually done research into the number. If so we might quote that source. EdJohnston (talk) 04:33, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

I have looked at the article history it appears as though only one editor has taken offence to a reference that has been replaced by several other editors calling the citation deletes vandalism. The edit history does show that an administrator reviewed the citations and deemed the EMI link as a reliable source. And the EMI link is now supprted by 3 other references that are not Wikipedia mirrors sites but stand-alone resources. One link is used in the Best selling music artist page and has not been rejected by the regular editors of that article. The links provided are passing the grade by an overwhelming consensus and it seems that only one editor has taken offence to the links. The IP/user mentioned above has blanked the page citations twice already today against this consensus for keeping links. Four independent sources and at least six editors replacing the sources after they've been removed versus 1 IP/user who keeps removing them leans the debate more towards a single user edit war over an argument over reliable sources. The statement should stay as should the links. Peter Fleet (talk) 11:26, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

For info the user in question is not me (so there are more than one of us who think these links are poor) - I have given up, plus the debate needs raising above individual entries as there are loads of these cites all over the place. Personally I would be happy with a "claimed" sales figure with some cites and then later a credit where particular LP get any sales based awards. But I am not getting involved as in doing so I have been accused of vandalism and sockpuppetery by one single editor who seems unwilling to debate the issue in the relevant pages. But for the Deep Purple one if the consensus is the EMI cite is valid it has to stay.--C Hawke (talk) 12:14, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Spammer

82.131.201.136 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) has done a spamming spree on anime-related articles. The spam link, http://www.animeisland.extra.hu/index.php?x=animek/, is a non-English (appears German) fansite and I would like to see it blacklisted. If this is the wrong noticeboard, could someone point me to the correct one? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 18:13, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Not German. Hungarian, I believe. Corvus cornix_talk 23:50, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Well whatever it may be, should it be blacklisted? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 03:33, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

All the links added by this IP editor seem to have been removed, and no new ones have been added since 9 February. If you still think the link should be blacklisted, you could post at WT:WPSPAM and see what those editors think. EdJohnston (talk) 20:14, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Seattle Parks and Recreation

At Seattle Parks and Recreation, someone seems to be unhappy that the extent of the Seattle parks system (acreage, number of parks, number of golf courses, etc.) is the Department itself rather than a third party. Given that I've never heard of anyone seriously calling the department's veracity into question, it's really hard to imagine what other source could be more reliable than the department itself. I would imagine that any other "usually reliable source" would simply be reproducing the department's own numbers. - Jmabel | Talk 19:41, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

This looks like an appropriate use of a primary source. As you say, any secondary source is likely to have taken the figures from the department anyway. SlimVirgin ^{(talk)(contribs)} 19:59, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

I've allowed a couple of days, there seem to be no other comments, I've proceeded accordingly. - Jmabel | Talk 17:46, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

another wiki?

Can the Citizendium wiki be used as a RS as in this edit [20]?--Hughgr (talk) 23:22, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Citizendium claims to have the sort of peer review that could establish a reliable source, but Wikis should usually be avoided as references. And the thing is, if it actually is a reliable source, then it doesn't need to be referenced! Because if it's reliable, then its claims must be backed by references of their own, and it is these that should be cited. Someguy1221 (talk) 23:55, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

I think thats the problem, we don't have references, nor does Citizendium, to corroborate the inserted text. So the question becomes, if Citizendium doesn't have a ref that we can use, is citing the Citizendium Wiki acceptible? --Hughgr (talk) 02:23, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

At this point, we can use the reference until better sources are found. Quack Guru 02:27, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

The only problem that could arise here is if an editor actually has reason to suspect the information is false. If there's a dispute, you can just apply your editorial discretion and seek dispute resolution if that fails. Someguy1221 (talk) 02:38, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Listing Larry Sanger as the author is completely misleading, as he had nothing to do with the writing of it. Pairadox (talk) 03:31, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

I fixed it. I changed it to Citizendium community. Quack Guru 04:44, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

My limited experience tells me it's a bad idea to directly cite Citizendium as a source at this point. Example: their article on Vitamin C megadosage is written primarily by a devotee of Linus Pauling previously active here on Wikipedia, who left because he was unable to work within the strictures of WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, WP:V, etc. The resulting article, last I looked, appeared to be quite similar to his preferred version of the Wikipedia article, which multiple editors had problems with. In other words, it was almost a POV fork. Granted, Citizendium may mature to the point where it's a respectable reliable source for citation here, but at the moment, given its lack of an established track record of accuracy and my look at the Vitamin C article in particular, I'd suggest Citizendium should not be cited directly as a reliable source. MastCell ^Talk 17:09, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Agree that a Citizendium article can't be treated as a reliable source. So I agree with Someguy1221 and MastCell but not QuackGuru. I can imagine a Citizendium article being used as an external link, to provide general background, but not as a reference for a question of fact. If the Citizendium article cites reliable sources, those could be brought over in the usual way. The converse is surely true: Citizendium should not treat a Wikipedia article as a reliable source (assuming they employ the same terminology), but they might use a WP article as an external link. EdJohnston (talk) 18:41, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Agree... fine for an external link, but not as a citation. Blueboar (talk) 18:59, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Mastcell, EdJohnston, and Blueboar. Fine as an external link; not fine as a reliable source.--Tafew (talk) 13:42, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Citizendium seems to be one gigantic POV-fork to me. The articles I have read a mostly rubbish that wouldn't be allowed on wikipedia. It shouldn't be RS and I strongly doubt it should be an external link unless in unusual cases. If there is anything worth linking, then it can be linked directly, not via Citizendium. Mccready (talk) 03:23, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them

The aforementioned book is being used as a citation for the incident where Rush Limbaugh allegedly joked that Chelsea clinton was the 'whitehouse dog'. Limbaugh claims it was a technical error; others claim it was intentional. The problem i see is that the book is not a reliable source for the facts of the incident. the book is a collection of political commentary and satire; it's a polemic about all things not-liberal, so claims about what did or did not actually happen (and i know of no truly reliable source for these details) fall into the realm of opinion, not fact. thoughts? Anastrophe (talk) 22:55, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

There seems to be plenty of mainstream newspapers that confirm the incident[21] SaltyBoatr (talk) 23:04, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

thanks, but that answers a question i didn't ask. Anastrophe (talk) 23:09, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

It just proves that the incident is plainly verifiable. But to answer your actual question, no, books authored and published with a blindingly obvious political agenda are not reliable sources. That said, it can still present notable viewpoints, and these can be included as an editorial matter in articles that aren't about the book. But the unreliability of the claims should preclude using it as a citation for potentially BLP-violating material. Someguy1221 (talk) 23:30, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Obviously, the book can not be used as a citation for a statement that Chelsea Clinton was actually the "whitehose dog". If the issue is that Rush Limbaugh made this statement in the book, then it certainly can be used. The book itself is a reliable source for statements about what is printed in the book. But, if we are attempting to say something more... discussing Rush's motivation for including the statement in the book... then we need to look to other sources that discuss this issue. We can quote Rush saying it was an error, and we can quote others who feel it was deliberate. One final comment... it also depends on what article is. It probably would be fine to discuss all this in an article on Limbaugh (as the issue can be seen as an example of his political satire and backlash against it), it would not be fine to discuss it in an article on Chelsea Clinton. Blueboar (talk) 02:40, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

i've unwikilinking of the title of this section that another user put in place. i should have stated that this referred to the use of that book as a citation in the Chelsea Clinton article - not that this question pertained to the book's article. Anastrophe (talk) 02:54, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

OK... I think some context is needed here for people to comment correctly... first, the book is not being used to back the fact that Limbaugh said Chelsea was a dog... it is being used to back his statement that this was a technical error. In this case it is acceptable... the book is where he says this. What has occurred is that people have added commentary to that blunt statement. Here are some of the diffs to show what the situation is: Originally the citation was an acceptable use of the source... Limbaugh says the comment was an error, and the citation is where he says it. We then get this edit, which added commentary not found in the book. Things go back and forth a bit, until this edit removes both the comment and the citation. To me it is obvious that the original version is correct here... Limbaugh said it, so we should cite where he said it. The question of whether Limbaugh's statement is credible or not is a different issue, and needs its own citations to be included. Blueboar (talk) 03:40, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

there seems to be some confusion. limbaugh did not state that it was a technical error in "lies and the lying liars who tell them". the author of that book is al franken, not rush limbaugh. at most, franken could have reproduced limbaugh's claim within his book, but franken is not even a secondary source for that - limbaugh's statement that it was a technical error was made within the popular press. the incident occurred in 1992 or 1993, franken's book was published in 2003. Anastrophe (talk) 05:04, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Definitely we should use coverage of the statements in the press rather then in the political book as the sources. The book may be useful for Franken's POV on various issues however Nil Einne (talk) 08:34, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Ah... my mistake. My appologies. In which case, we need to do one of the following... find a source for Limbaugh's statement (preferred), attribute Franken's statement about what Limbaugh said to Franken, or cut the entire sentence as being not all that important to the article. Blueboar (talk) 13:56, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

the article for franken's book points out that he mixes commentary with fiction - which means the book is pretty much useless as a reliable source for anything besides itself. Anastrophe (talk) 17:37, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

I looked up the ciation on Amazon, which has a "preview", and also looked elsewhere for sources. The original quotation and incident regarding Chelsea Clinton have ben covered in numerous reliable sources. The article now has another source for that. The book is being used as a reference for Limbaugh claiming it was a mistake. Only it's second hand - Franken reports on an argument he had with Sean Hannnity in which Hannity asserted that Limbaugh had made a mistake. I'd thought to re-waroding the text in the article to try to attribut that but it seemed like to much of a distraction. Since this article isn't about Limbaugh I think we can leave out the part about his alleged mistake. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 18:58, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Wayne's World said it first! KoshVorlon ".. We are ALL Kosh..." 20:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

BIOCAB

Who thinks this is a suitable Wiki source for a representative take on the opinions of science educators. [22] I draw your attention to: 1) Global Warming being included on the list of pseudosciences on the page cited above (as is naturism) and here as well [23]; 2) their definition of life/death [24]; and their guide to getting rid of swallows. [25] TheLaPesca (talk) 00:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Wikis are self-published therefore are larely unreliable. See WP:SPS. --neonwhite user page talk 01:26, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

It's not a wiki exactly, but a private web site. The question was whether it was suitable for use on our Wiki, WP. This particular site is essentially no more than a private site on scientific subjects run by a commercial research organisation having a branch "dedicated to the distribution of biological products and health reinvestments". Most of the material is written by the head of the group, Nasif Nahle, and his staff and associates. His credentials are a 'C1-L by Harvard University in Scientific ICAM Research.", something I can not assign to any known academic program.The website presents a variety of scientific topics at what they say to be a high school level. There are distinct POVs present: anti-global warming, pro-evolution, (naturism , by the way, is one of the pages they haven't written yet, so I do not know what they plan to say about it--the site was apparently written in Spanish, translated roughly into English, so i am not sure how exact the vocabulary is). the definition of biological death starts as a not very clear statement of the 2nd law of thermodynamics, and then interprets something called "Biotic field' in thermodynamic terms--in a way I can not match up with any ordinary usage in either science or pseudoscience. some of the astronomy seems pretty odd, also. Put briefly, it is not a RS for anything except the beliefs of the authors of the site--and I have my doubt that they are notable. a new category for us, semi-science, which i also could call half-educated-science. DGG (talk) 03:40, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, I don't think the editor who suggested it wants to use it anymore anyway. I think we can consider this issue resolved. ThanksTheLaPesca (talk) 10:22, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

"Crap" is a fair summary, this can't be used as a reference for anything. Tim Vickers (talk) 17:32, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

"Crap" is not a fair summary. And it is not civil. Even if you do not think it is RS, please be civil.RonCram (talk) 01:52, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Background items in news reports

I'm questioning the reliability of:

• "Willie Nelson: I Question Official Sept. 11 Story". Associated Press. February 05, 2008. Retrieved 2008-02-07. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)

for the purpose of quoting the last paragraph, [Jones] "is sometimes described as a "conspiracy theorist." He regularly rails against globalism, the United Nations and World Bank on satellite and Internet radio." This is background information about a person not the subject of the news article, and is probably only vetted for "can anyone sue us for this", rather than for accuracy. — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 00:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

What is the citation for? I assume fox news would be considered verifiable.--neonwhite user page talk 01:24, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Well, the sources on Alex Jones's page also refer to him as a black helicotper conspiracy nut, suggest he believes in far-out theories, and has claimed that the 9/11 hijackers, despite what the authorities say, were trained at American military bases; and that the towers did not collapse because of burning fuel and weakened steel but because of a controlled demolition caused by pre-set bombs. I have to call this one like I see it; looks like a conspiracy theorist, quacks like a conspiracy theorist, and the AP says he's a conspiracy theorist. Seems fine to me. It would be nice, though, to actually have a few sources that explicitly did so, to put that AP citation into context. Someguy1221 (talk) 05:40, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Opinion pieces should not form the basis of encyclopaedia entries. AP is undeniably more neutral and reputable than the political views of individuals. You might as well describe Protestant Christians as anti-Vatican "conspiracy theorists". --Hereward77 (talk) 17:16, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

This is not an Opinion peice... it is a news report. Both the AP and Foxnews are reliable sources by Wikipedia standards. If they say Jones is considered to be a conspiracy theoriest, we can report that. I could see attributing the statement, but the source is reliable. Blueboar (talk) 17:38, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

The AP report does not call him a conspiracy theorist. The report says: "Jones, an Austin-based talk show host on the Burnsville, Minn., Genesis Communications Network, is sometimes described as a 'conspiracy theorist.' [i.e. mainly by his enemies] He regularly rails against globalism, the United Nations and World Bank on satellite and Internet radio." Fair enough. --Hereward77 (talk) 18:43, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Good point... in which case we must adjust what we say to match what is said in the source... that "Jones is sometimes discribed as a 'conspiracy theorist'." However, this does not change the fact that the source is reliable for that fact. Blueboar (talk) 19:09, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

The article already states this in the introduction, I put it there. For some reason, Rubin has objections to this wording. As I said before, the AP report "is undeniably more neutral and reputable" than the opinion pieces submitted earlier. --Hereward77 (talk) 19:18, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

No, I object to the references to the accuracy and notability of his opposition to the UN, without a reliable source. I question whether "background" is a reliable source. There are dozens of reliable sources that he's a conspiracy theorist. — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 20:21, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

As it is mentioned by the Associated Press and Foxnews, I would say the accusation is notable... and probably accurate. Blueboar (talk) 20:28, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Tobacco company spam?

Although I have been reverting vandalism for a while, I haven't really ever needed to report anything on a noticeboard, so pardon me if I'm not reporting this correctly.

Recently, I noticed a bunch of users posting very similar content on various tobacco-related articles. The content seems to possibly be sublimely advertising for 3 specific brands: Bugler, Top, and Kite. Here's some of the affected articles: Top Tobacco, Roll-your-own, Bugler (tobacco). There's a bunch more floating around.

Each article has a slightly different version of the text. Many contain phrases such as "Since the beginning of the 21st Century" or "roll your own tobacco" or "#1 selling tobacco" somewhere in the article.

Other editors have marked some of these pages as needing sources, or some cleaning up. Is it possible that a ring of sockpuppets is doing this? Or is it just one user? It's hard for me to tell. — ThreeDee912 (talk) 00:06, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

This board is more for questioning the reliability of sources. If the text in question is not sourced and is in blatent violation of WP:NPOV, you are free to removed it. Top Tobacco and Bugler have a serious lack of notability so i will nominated them for deletion. --neonwhite user page talk 01:11, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

New World Translation Sources

Heya, Im one of the mediators for the current case that this page is involved in and i wanted to check peoples opinions on whether these sources are seen as reliable?

The way that these sources are intended to be used by a user is to gives the names of translators that are supposed to have translated the NWT. Now the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society (the publisher of he NWT) has not released the names of the translators themselves, the information comes from 2 former members of the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses. The first William Cetnar, and the second Raymond Franz.

Sources

The Primay Sources are as follows:

William Cetnar as told by author E. Gruss

“From my observation, N. H. Knorr, born 4/23/1905, baptized Cedar Point, OH, and died 6/5/1977 age 72; F. W. Franz 4th President born 1893, Albert D. Schroeder. G. D. Gangas, and M. Henschel met together in these translation sessions. Aside from Vice-President Franz (and his training was limited), none of the committee members had adequate schooling or background to function as critical Bible translators. Franz’s ability to do a scholarly job of translating Hebrew is open to serious question since he never formally studied Hebrew.” (Gruss E, We Left The Jehovah’s Witnesses, 1974, p. 68)

Author Ray Franz

“The New World Translation bears no translator’s name and is presented as the anonymous work of the “New World Translation Committee.” Other members of that committee were Nathan Knorr, Albert Schroeder and George Gangas. Fred Franz, however, was the only one with sufficient knowledge of the Bible languages to attempt translation of this kind. He had studied Greek for two years at the University of Cincinnati but was only self-taught in Hebrew.” (Franz R, Crisis of Conscience Third Edition, Commentary Press, 2000: 54)

The Secondary Sources are as follows:

Author Ron Rhodes

“In view of the broad censure this translation has received from renowned biblical linguistic scholars, it is not surprising tht the Watchtower has always resisted efforts to identity members of the translation committee. The claim was that they preferred to remain anonymous and humble, giving God the glory. However, such anonymity also prevented scholars from checking their credentials.

“When defector Raymond Franz finally revealed the identity of the translators (Nathan Knorr, Frederick Franz, Albert Schroeder, George Gangas, and Milton Henschel), it quickly became apparent that the committee was completely unqualified for the task. Four of the five men in the committee had no Hebrew of Greek training and, in fact, had only a high school education. The fifty—Frederick Franz—claimed to know Hebrew and Greek, but upon examination under oath in a court of law in Edinburgh, Scotland, was found to fail a simple Hebrew test.” . (Rhodes R, The Challenge of the Cults and New Religions, The Essential Guide to Their History, Their Doctrine, and Our Response, Zondervan, 2001, p. 94)

Author Walter Martin

“From this pompous pronouncement it is only too evident that the Watchtower considers its “scholars” the superiors of such great scholars as Wycliffe and Tyndale, not to mention the hundreds of brilliant, conscecrated Christian scholars who produced the subsequent orthodox translations. Such a pretext is of course too absurd to merit refutation, but let it be remembered that the New World Bible translation committee had no known translators with recognized degrees in Greek of Hebrew exegesis or translation. While the members of the committee have never been identified officially by the Watchtower, many Witnesses who worked at the headquarters during the translation period were fully aware of who the members were. They included Nathan H. Knorr (president of the Society at the time), Frederick W. Franz (who later succeeded Knorr as president), Albert D. Schroeder, George Gangas, and Milton Henschel (currently the president). None of these men had any university education except Franz, who left school after two years, never completing even an undergraduate degree. In fact, Frederick W. Franz, then representing the translation committee and later serving as the Watchtower Society’s fourth president, admitted under oath that he could not translate Genesis 2:4 from the Hebrew.” (Martin W, Kingdom of the Cults, Expanded Anniversary Edition, October 1997, Bethany House Publishers, p. 123)

Author Tony Piper

“The Society states that the names of the translators of the NWT have never been made public to ensure that all the glory goes to God and none to man [Proclaimers p. 608 note]. While this is no doubt most laudable it has two not so laudable riders - (i) that the credentials of the translators can never be checked, and (ii) that there would be nobody to assume responsibility for the translation.

“The translators' names, however, have never been a total secret. William Cetnar, who was working in the Brooklyn Bethel (the Society's International Headquarters) in 1950 when the work was first begun, and whose story can be found in Edmond Gruss' book We Left Jehovah's Witnesses, states that the names were well known to be Nathan Homer Knorr (the then president), Frederick William Franz (vice-president and president from 1977), Albert D Schroeder, George D Gangas and Milton G Henschel, all high-ranking Society officials and later members of the Governing Body. It is Cetnar's opinion that no one but Franz, whose training was limited, had had any adequate schooling or background to function as critical Bible translators. The following, cited in We Left Jehovah's Witnesses (pp. 74-5), supports this view.

“From the Scottish Court of Sessions, November 1954:

“(The attorney) Q. Have you also made yourself familiar with Hebrew? (Franz) A. Yes… Q. So that you have a substantial linguistic apparatus at your command? A. Yes, for use in my biblical work. Q. I think you are able to read and follow the Bible in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Spanish, Portuguese, German and French? A. Yes. [Pursuer's Proof, p. 7] Q. You, yourself, read and speak Hebrew, do you? A. I do not speak Hebrew. Q. You do not? A. No. Q. Can you, yourself, translate that into Hebrew? A. Which? Q. That fourth verse of second chapter of Genesis? A. You mean here? Q. Yes? A. No. I wouldn't attempt to do that. [Pursuer's Proof, pp.102,103].” (Tony Piper, The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society and the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures, published online by Reachout Trust)

Author James Penton

“On thing which has brought much criticism of the New World Translation is that that New World Translation Committee has refused since 1950 to reveal the names and academic credentials of its members. Of course, this has very little to do with the quality of the translation itself which deserves to be examined on the basis of its own merits rather than on who and what its translators were or were not. It may be, however, that the anonymity for the committee reflects more than a spirit of humility among its members. From page 50 of Crisis of Conscience Raymond Franz states that the members of it were his uncle, Frederick Franz, Nathan Knorr, Albert Schroeder, and George Gangas. Then he notes: ‘Fred Franz, however, was the only one with sufficient knowledge of the Bible languages to attempt [a] translation of this kind. He had studied Greek for two years in the University of Cincinnati, but was only self taught in Hebrew.’ So to all intents and purposes the New World Translation is the work of one man—Frederick Franz.” (Penton J, Apocalypse Delayed Second Edition, University of Toronto Press, 1999, p. 173-4)

Author Mike Spencer

“The New World Translation committee consisted of four members of the Jehovah’s Witness religious sect. Their names and scholarly qualifications are as follows: Nathan Knorr: President of the Watchtower Society (no academic training in any Biblical language) Fred Franz: (no academic degree in any Biblical language, though he did study Greek for two years at the University of Cincinnati) Albert Schroeder: (no academic training in any Biblical language) George Gangas: (no academic training in any Biblical language)” (Mike Spencer, The New World Translation: God's Word?, published online by Spiritwatch Ministries)

Editor Michael Marlowe

“The publisher of this version has never made public the names of the translators. But former members of the Governing Body of the Jehovah's Witnesses organization have identified the members of the committee as Nathan H. Knorr (President of the organization), Frederick W. Franz (Vice-President), George D. Gangas, and Albert D. Schroeder. According to Raymond V. Franz, the "principal translator of the Society's New World Translation" was Frederick W. Franz. (1) According to M. James Penton, "to all intents and purposes the New World Translation is the work of one man, Frederick Franz." (2) Franz afterwards became the President of the organization, from 1977 to 1992, and was responsible for the revisions.” (Michael Marlowe editor, The New World Translation, published online by Bible Research)

Comments

There is currently an RfC on this but i felt it might be of more gain to ask here as this page is source specific and i wanted a wider community opinion on this. Thank you for your time on this. Seddon69 (talk) 00:04, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Seddon69: For sake of accuracy, 1) only the source Ray Franz was a governing body member. The source William Cetnar held a high rank but he was not a governing body member. Though Ray Franz and William Cetner held different positions at different times, each held positions within the organization that published the NWT Bible. 2) The intended use of this information is to express no more and no less than what these high-ranking insider sources (Ray Franz and William Cetner) expressed as firsthand knowledge to them. This is how all the secondary sources above use this information.--Marvin Shilmer (talk) 01:32, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

The reasoning book, also published by the society states:

"When presenting as a gift the publishing rights to their translation, the New World Bible Translation Committee requested that its members remain anonymous. The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania has honored their request. The translators were not seeking prominence for themselves but only to honor the Divine Author of the Holy Scriptures.

Over the years other translation committees have taken a similar view. For example, the jacket of the Reference Edition (1971) of the New American Standard Bible states: “We have not used any scholar’s name for reference or recommendations because it is our belief God’s Word should stand on its merits.” "

The fact that he has published this information against the explicit request of the translation commitee means that he either wants to be vindictive, which makes him biased and unreliable on this issue, or that he honored the request and published an untruthful version to appease people. He may not have even been on the committee himself.

BETA 14:43, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

BETA: I appreciate that you have taken time to comment on this subject. However, you have offered a false dilemma (false bifurcation), which is fallacy.

An alternate reason for either of the sources to offer the information on NWT translator names is to share information that is accurate in order to help reviewers analyze the whatever is the scholastic expertise of responsible parties for the Bible version. An additional alternate to the either-or bifurcation you present (and assert a conclusion from) is that sources Ray Franz and William Cetnar simply wanted to share what they knew.

If the NWT translators wanted to remain anonymous then they had a duty to take reasonable measures to maintain anonymity. As it turns out it was common knowledge inside the publishing corporation (the Watchtower organization) that certain individuals were working as or with the NWT translation committee. Within a large corporate publishing corporation it is unreasonable to expect anonymity to remain intact if authors/translators allow it to become common knowledge who they are. In this case, author Tony Wills (a Jehovah’s Witness himself) knew and published years in advance of sources Ray Franz and William Cetnar one translator’s name. Hence this information was already leaking out prior to anything published from Ray Franz or Cetnar. --Marvin Shilmer (talk) 17:33, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

A few things. I'll repeat my belief that this detailed material really deserves it's own seperate article. Much of the above should be presented, but doing so in the main article would be imho undue weight. The article now doesn't seem to even mention that there's a controversy. Next, of the above, the works should be checked for, are the works published by a third-party, not self-published. Are the authors polemic, extreme, do they make bizarre claims? Do any of the works give a balanced overview? Or is each one a diatribe? If you feel that you must narrow the scope to one or two sources, than the more balanced and neutral ones should be used.Wjhonson (talk) 17:17, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Wjhonson: Thanks for your input. Just for clarification, no editor is suggesting that all the source information above should be used or discussed at length in the article on the New World Translation.

The dispute centers around a singular issue of whether the names put forth as translators for this Bible version deserve a place in the article on the New World Translation, as sources present those names. Historically these names were in the article, and left virtually undisturbed for years. The article has these names in the main text. Recently a editor began deleting these names altogether. As a compromise I placed the names into a footnote with the reference section. But the other editor still insisted these names should not be used in the article. The source information above is only to demonstrate the veracity of the information, and how secondary sources published by third-party reviewers have used the information.

Unfortunately this dispute has gone on far too long. It all boils down to what sources say, who those sources are and how those sources have presented the information in question. One editor (Cfrito) has made all sorts of claims as why these sources are unreliable and/or irrelevant to the subject. Unfortunately this editor has failed to provide a single source agreeing with him that this information is either unreliable or irrelevant to the subject. Contrarily, as you can see from the sampling of sources above, there is considerable secondary and third-party sources using this information as reliable and relevant to the subject of the New World Translation. This other editor has sought mediation, and the mediator and I had no disagreement. I submitted a RfC and the minimal response the subject attracted again agreed with me in full. There is one editor asserting an opinion on this subject, but that editor has failed for weeks to present any sources (other than his opinion) that his objections have any support in sources.

Because the dispute has gone on for so long and become so fragmented, I created a user sandbox page in an attempt to organize the issues for reviewers, and to continue working on the article in the meantime. You can view it here. --Marvin Shilmer (talk) 17:53, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

The names of the translators seem to be mentioned in sources which would seem to be reliable, and certainly as notable. On that basis, I cannot see any good reason not to included them. It could be stated as something like, "Although they were not specifically named as being the translators, sources have indicated the translators include...." John Carter (talk) 15:20, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

MBA rankings

So I've done a good deal of work on Hofstra University related topics. At Talk:Frank G. Zarb School of Business an anon. IP is asking about adding a ranking of the school since he received an MS there and has this source [26]. Normally I wouldn't hesitate to make a call and put it in or not, but I'm an MBA student there now. While its a big university, I'm thinking that something as narrow as MBA rankings for the program I'm in, is probably a COI. So is this source reliable or not and how should it be phrased if it is. MBisanz ^talk 21:01, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't recommend adding that. Several more important and notable rankings exist: The Financial Times', BusinessWeek's, the Princeton Review's, and of course US News. Relata refero (talk) 09:41, 15 February 2008 (UTC)