Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

Welcome — ask about reliability of sources in context!

Before posting, check the archives and list of perennial sources for prior discussions. Context is important: supply the source, the article it is used in, and the claim it supports.

Sections older than 5 days archived by lowercase sigmabot III.

List of archives

, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9
10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19
20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29
30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39
40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49
50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59
60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69
70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79
80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89
90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99
100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109
110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119
120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129
130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139
140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149
150, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159
160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169
170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179
180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 189
190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199
200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209
210, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219
220, 221, 222, 223, 224, 225, 226, 227, 228, 229
230, 231, 232, 233, 234, 235, 236, 237, 238, 239
240, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245, 246, 247, 248, 249
250, 251, 252, 253, 254, 255, 256, 257, 258, 259
260, 261, 262, 263, 264, 265, 266, 267, 268, 269
270, 271, 272, 273, 274, 275, 276, 277, 278, 279
280, 281, 282, 283, 284, 285, 286, 287, 288, 289
290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299
300, 301, 302, 303, 304, 305, 306, 307, 308, 309
310, 311, 312, 313, 314, 315, 316, 317, 318, 319
320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326, 327, 328, 329
330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 335, 336, 337, 338, 339
340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 345, 346, 347, 348, 349
350, 351, 352, 353, 354, 355, 356, 357, 358, 359
360, 361, 362, 363, 364, 365, 366, 367, 368, 369
370, 371, 372, 373, 374, 375, 376, 377, 378, 379
380, 381, 382, 383, 384, 385, 386, 387, 388, 389
390, 391, 392, 393, 394, 395, 396, 397, 398, 399
400, 401, 402, 403, 404, 405, 406, 407, 408, 409
410, 411, 412, 413, 414, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419
420, 421, 422, 423, 424, 425, 426, 427, 428, 429
430, 431, 432, 433, 434, 435, 436, 437, 438, 439
440, 441, 442, 443, 444, 445, 446, 447, 448, 449
450, 451, 452, 453, 454, 455, 456, 457, 458

Additional notes:

• RFCs for deprecation, blacklisting, or other classification should not be opened unless the source is widely used and has been repeatedly discussed. Consensus is assessed based on the weight of policy-based arguments.
• While the consensus of several editors can generally be relied upon, answers are not policy.
• This page is not a forum for general discussions unrelated to the reliability of sources.

Start a new discussion

More on the reliability of BtVA

The Anime and Manga Wikiproject does not consider Behind the Voice Actors to be a reliable source. Can the perennial sources list stop calling it reliable now? Eldomtom2 (talk) 15:20, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Do you have a link to the discussion where the reliability was discussed? The most recent such discussion here, From March, 2022 concluded that it was reliable. While such discussions don't have to happen here; they need to happen somewhere and if there is a new consensus, we all need to see what discussion came to a new consensus. --Jayron32 15:48, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Near as I can tell, the discussion is in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Anime and manga/Online reliable sources/Archive 1 and consists of two users. It's from more then a decade ago and as mentioned has only two participants, including the person who asked if it's a RS. --(loopback) ping/whereis 16:10, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Per WP:LOCALCONSENSUS and also per WP:TIMETRAVELISN'TPOSSIBLEASFARASWEKNOW, an older discussion in a less-broadly-attended corner of Wikipedia cannot override an existing consensus which was established later. If Eldomtom2 wants to start a new discussion over the reliability of the website in question, they can feel free to do so, but unless and until someone does that, it appears the March 2022 discussion is the prevailing one.--Jayron32 16:40, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

The second one is a red link. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 20:40, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

It's a blue link if you're browsing from before 2015. After The Fracture happened and Dr. Nixon broke the timeline with her first trip we deleted it. When there's a timeline collision we sometimes get people from 2008 linking to it when we try to warn them about the snakes. --(loopback) ping/whereis 21:26, 2 February 2037 (UTC)

Don't tell people about the snakes. It destabilizes the time loop and every time it happens we have to revdel the entire 2040s. jp×g 10:54, 9 April 2051 (UTC)

It won't be if you go back in time and fix it. --Jayron32 13:31, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

I have made multiple attempts at starting discussions here and they have failed to receive attention.--Eldomtom2 (talk) 21:47, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that there was a well attended RfC for it here less then a year ago. It seems the community here largely doesn't feel like it needs to be reopened at this time. Is there something that's changed about the source in the last year, or do you just disagree with the conclusion? Because the former may catch more discussion but the latter is likely to elicit crickets if editors don't feel anything is substantially different to when we did this before. --(loopback) ping/whereis 06:42, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

I disagree with the conclusion. It was waved through with little investigation.--Eldomtom2 (talk) 22:34, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm sorry, are we looking at the same RfC? I would like to draw your attention specifically to Compassionate727's fairly exhaustive dive into their structure and editorial methods. That is exactly the the type of examination we expect around here, and it did seem to hold quite a bit of weight with participants. If you were talking about a different RfC that's understandable, but if you meant the March 2022 one and think there was 'little investigation' then I don't think you are quite on the level. --(loopback) ping/whereis 06:02, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

If you think it was an "exhaustive dive" you can think that, but I don't think "they say they have some sort of standards (that they won't clarify) that they apply to user submissions" is good enough to say something is a reliable source.--Eldomtom2 (talk) 20:49, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

Just want to point out that WP Anime does consider Behind the Voice Actors to be reliable in most circumstances. You would see this if you actually read the entry at WP:ANIME/ORS#Situational. Link20XX (talk) 00:30, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

It actually says "Roles and lists that are not check-marked (covered by a screenshot), despite being listed under that actor, cannot be used", which means that BtVA is unreliable, since the only thing it is considered reliable for is providing screenshots of the primary source that is a show's credits.--Eldomtom2 (talk) 11:25, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

StatMuse

StatMuse is the eponymous interactive AI (Chatbot) of the StatMuse company (basically a ChatGPT with a sports focus). Is its use on articles such as List of National Football League players with multiple 1,000-yard receiving seasons appropriate? It appears that someone asked the AI "Which Wide Receiver Has The Most 1000 Yard Receiving Seasons" and we're now using that answer as the only source on the article. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:01, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Not a WP:RS... Probably needs to be formally deprecated or blacklisted. —DIYeditor (talk) 06:33, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

"lmao" is all I'll say about that last sentence. The things we see! DFlhb (talk) 19:11, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

I would also note that the details in the table doesn't even match the reference. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 20:39, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Which may be because the source is dynamically generated and therefore can be expected to keep changing. Another reason to avoid these sites. DFlhb (talk) 21:02, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Definitely, a nonstable source can not be verified. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 21:15, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Is there any copyright concern over republishing tables generated by StatMuse, or would they be to generic as they are just statistics? -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 21:17, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

RfC

Which of the following best describes the StatMuse chatbot?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:06, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Not sure RFCs on individual chatbots are the right approach here. WP:LLM (a draft) declares them all unreliable in one fell swoop, which seems more appropriate, since I doubt there are any specifics that would make one chatbot more reliable than another. DFlhb (talk) 21:11, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm seeing use on well over 500 pages, to me that means there really does have to be a formal centralized discussion. If it was under 100 I would do it myself but I'm just not comfortable being *that* bold. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:15, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

A search "only" yielded 211 pages for me, hence my reply. But yes, in that case, Deprecate or at the least GUNREL. DFlhb (talk) 21:19, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Did you add in the variants like "stat muse"? Search on wiki is not my strong suit. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:22, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

I searched insource:"url=https://www.statmuse.com" so it only picks up the URL parameter of {{cite web}}. Otherwise you get articles like Terry Crews that contain the words "stat" and "muse" but no citation to that site.

Can also do that in PetScan, "Other Sources" tab, "Search query" field, and it gives a nice list. DFlhb (talk) 21:30, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Ok so the cleanest search I can find is insource:"www.statmuse.com" which returns two eighty something without any apparent errors. The more specific search misses lazy cites like the one at Tom Van Arsdale. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:39, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

If it's necessary to have the RFC and not just declare all such sources unusable for referencing purposes, then Deprecate. The other problem these seem to raise is of OR, take this for example. It's currently in use and uses a complex set of criteria, those criteria are being set by the editor. No other sources is publishing the specific details, it brings to mind a discussion above were an editor has written code to prove a particular algorithm. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 21:53, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

I think the OR question is inherent in the category of incredibly niche lists and the Chatbots just allow it to be smoother, see List of college football coaches with 150 NCAA Division I FCS wins for example. If we check the edit history we find that it was not made because there was coverage of the topic in WP:RS or anything else which would indicate notability but because they "Decided to create a list I've wanted to add for a couple of years." and worked backwards from there... Thats a problem whether you piece it together from databases yourself or use a chatbot to piece it together. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:02, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

At least on those cases someone has actually published the statistics, I wouldn't count them towards notability though. In this case the editor is creating the reference to meet the content they want to add, that's extremely problematic. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 22:07, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Yeah but that "someone" is primarily a defunct SPS now available only in archive form, example [1]. Almost everything down this hole is problematic, chatbots are just the new lowest level of hell. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:20, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Those chatbot prompts are particularly deadly. AI chatbots give you whatever answer you're looking for. I just asked ChatGPT which US President had a chihuahua. It said "none". I told it: "I thought Eisenhower had one." And it said: You are correct! President Dwight D. Eisenhower did have a Chihuahua named Heidi. Thank you for bringing this to my attention. But all Eisenhower had was a Weimaraner. Chatbots are like a child being asked leading questions by a policeman.

Any super-specific question, like the one you link, is extremely like to lead to confabulation. How long until one of these bots claims it was abused by Satanists? DFlhb (talk) 22:44, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

It's clear to me that this discussion is based on my actions. I did not start the article, but I noticed the page was inaccurate and I figured that StatMuse was better than no source. I'm not going to argue one way or another for StatMuse but I do have a couple of questions. What makes this site a "chatbot"? It's a self-proclaimed artificial intelligence company, but it doesn't communicate with you. It fetches information from a sports database based on queries that you enter. Also, why was this listed Media, the arts, and architecture instead of Society, sports, and culture? I think it's important that the sports group be involved in the discussion. Hey man im josh (talk) 15:22, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

The problem is the "artificial intelligence" part, many instances of which have been shown to make up facts as a way to answer questions. If this was just a way of cross referencing details in a database it wouldn't be so probelmatic. StatMuse are obviously not going to say exactly how their chatbot works, so caution is required. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 15:36, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

I see what you're getting at regarding the AI part. Though I will say again, I don't believe this fits the definition of a chatbot. Hey man im josh (talk) 17:43, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

It interprets your language via AI, builds what it's believes you mean into a database search, and returns I'm the results back via AI into language. It's a chatbot. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 17:51, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

I could understand not classifying StatMuse as a reliable source, but I'm hung up on the phrasing of a chatbot here. I view it as a searchable database whereas I guess I look at a chatbot as something that's trying to carry on a conversation. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:06, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

A chatbot is defined by it's interaction with users using natural language, which is what is happening here. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 18:32, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

There's also the question of OR / undue. If no-one else has published these statistics before you ask the question then you are creating a reference to support the article text, and that sounds extremely problematic. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 17:53, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

I did have concerns about OR when using StatMuse as a reference, but I believed that it was better than nothing (again, I didn't create the article, just was trying to improve it). I can absolutely understand how this could be problematic. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:06, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

It's is definitely better to have nothing that to have text supported by an unreliable source. Instead of adding OR, the text should be removed if it can't be supported by a previously published reliable source. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 18:30, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

You're right, and I'm going to go ahead and blame the lingering brain fog I have from COVID. I should have nominated that article for deletion when I stumbled upon it instead of trying to salvage it. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:56, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

There's nothing negative about trying to save an article. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 19:02, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

You ask it a question in natural language (in this example "which player has the most 1000 yard receiving seasons"), it provides an answer in natural language (in this case "Jerry Rice played the most seasons with 1,000+ receiving yards, with 14 seasons."). How is that not communicating with you? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:11, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Chatbot mentions communication back and forth, but StatMuse does not converse with you. It fetches information based on a query, much like a search engine does. Hey man im josh (talk) 17:43, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

It replies "Jerry Rice played the most seasons with 1,000+ receiving yards, with 14 seasons." in response to your question (the very definition of back and forth) isn't communication what is it? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:59, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

I guess I'm hung up on the conversational aspect of it. For the query (found here) it doesn't just list Jerry Rice, as your comment might imply. It brings up a list and creates a table out of them. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:06, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

You ask it a question in natural language, it answers in natural language (in addition to other things as you said), you and the chatbot just had a conversation. It doesn't have to be lengthy to be a conversation, not all chatbots are set up like that. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:11, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

I think this is one I'll need to mull over and let bounce around in my head for a bit. On the one hand, it's an ask and answer back and forth (in a way via searching). On the other hand, it adds a lot of "extras" which is likely why I'm having a tough time looking at is as a chatbot. Never the less, I do understand why you're referring to is as such after this back and forth and my view of what is and isn't a chatbot may change after giving some more thought. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:26, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Its not a very advanced one, its much more 2017 than 2023 but thats what it is. Note that is also meant to be used with voice not text, one of the key features is that it talks to you in the voice of various NFL player. In the intended use case it is much more conversational. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:36, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Wow, I wasn't aware of that feature. Guess I may have been using it in a way that's not the norm. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:46, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Based on your replies, it seems that StatMuse ought to be compared to Google’s Answer Box than to ChatGPT. The Google Answer Box takes info from one of the search results, and displays it in natural language (and is sometimes inaccurate, taken from an inaccurate site).

The key question, therefore, is: is StatMuse’s database accurate? What’s their WP:UBO? DFlhb (talk) 21:54, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Option 2: Additional considerations apply Treat them as a WP:PRIMARYSOURCE. If a stat was important enough, then it generally should have been mentioned by WP:SECONDARYSOURCEs. We don't want to provide WP:UNDUE weight to random stats.—Bagumba (talk) 15:25, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Option 4: Deprecate It's not transparent where they get their information from. Human-made sources have at least the advantage that humans normally shy away from publishing things that others might see as ridiculous. Rsk6400 (talk) 17:43, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Here it states they get information from a company named SportRadar. On the company's website it shows various partners, including several major sports leagues (such as NBA, NHL, MLB). Hey man im josh (talk) 17:50, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Just FYI Sportradar is primarily a service provider to the gambling industry, they're not generally what we would consider a WP:RS. This makes the question of where the data actually comes from murkier, not clearer. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:03, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

I agree that it's murky since we aren't able to audit the information ourselves. I do think we can infer that the information provided by Sportradar is likely accurate given its use in the gambling industry (FanDuel & DraftKings). Though I understand that inference may not be enough to establish reliability. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:15, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

• 4: Deprecate. For the obvious reasons of reliability, accuracy, and OR. JoelleJay (talk) 20:02, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
• Comment: Given that the website is primarily based around sports statistics, I still believe this should be listed at Society, sports, and culture instead of Media, the arts, and architecture. Hey man im josh (talk) 17:59, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 per Bagumba. I'm generally sceptical of LLMs because of their tendency to fabricate facts or pull from unreliable sources. However, this use case with a closed data source seems fairly low risk and more akin to the search/analysis tools that are already built into many databases. This is a primary source that doesn't contribute to notability or weight. It might be useful for citing standard statistics for infoboxes etc (although surely there are better sources for these), but we certainly shouldn't be using it to add trivia like this or this. I'm struggling to think of a use case where there aren't better sources that are readily available. –dlthewave ☎ 18:29, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

RFC: Frontiers Media

Which of the following best describes Frontiers Media?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

RFC Before Previous Discussion 1 Previous discussion 2 Selfstudier (talk) 14:47, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Survey (Frontiers)

• Option 3, generally unreliable Unlike established academic publishers (Elsevier, Emerald, Springer, Sage, Wiley, Taylor & Francis, etc.), Frontiers is pay for publishing. Most respected academic publishers also offer the option to pay for open access but, crucially, that has no impact on the peer reviewing nor on the editorial decision, and authors are bot required to pay. Not so for Frontiers, where payment is compulsory and the peer-review is "fast and easy". It does not mean all research published in Frontiers is wrong (much may be correct) but it does mean that it is payment, rather than the result on the peer-review process, that decide the outcome. As such, it is generally unreliable in academia. Jeppiz (talk) 14:55, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Payment is compulsory for essentially all gold OA journals, including very respectable journals. One could easily make the same critique of Scientific Reports, which is also full of both junk and excellent research, but no one seems to be clamouring to make it generally unreliable. Hemiauchenia (talk) 16:16, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Open the discussion on Scientific Reports then, now that you've pointed out that its not generally reliable there will be some sort of clamor... Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:28, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure most people who cite SciRep are well aware of its mixed reputation. It's also published by Springer Nature, which is a generally reliable publisher, which makes the case for classifying it as "generally unreliable" more difficult. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:33, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 2 i.e. Status quo (WP:CITEWATCH#Frontiers Media). There is excellent research in frontiers journals. There's also garbage research. It's a mixed enough bag that you can't summarily rule it out as a source. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:58, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
• If it is “pay to publish”, then I would not call it generally reliable. It might qualify as specifically reliable (context is important)… but, even then, I would treat anything they publish as SPS by the author. In-text attribution would be important, and WP:DUE would come into play. Blueboar (talk) 15:23, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
• #3, generally unreliable. With regret, because they have published some valuable articles, too. But my limited experience has taught me that utter crap is also found in Frontiers journals, published either for payment or because you're friends with the journal's chief editor and no serious journal will publish you. — kashmīrī ^TALK 15:53, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 per HB. HB really knows what he's talking about when it comes to academic journals, and he regularly removes actual predatory journals. I don't cite frontiers very often, but I occasionally do so if the authors are subject matter experts (which means that the work is standing up on the reputation of the author rather than the journal). If it is judged generally unreliable, then there will be no room for nuance regarding these cases. Hemiauchenia (talk) 16:16, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3, generally unreliable. The poor reputation at RSN discussions has persisted for years. Where is the evidence they have done anything to improve their editorial process? Bad reports continue to come out,[2] and they are now being disregarded by some universities.[3]. In most RSN dicussions, the consistent advice I am seeing is that they shouldn't be cited for biomedical stuff[4] and other "important" stuff, yet that's the majority of their output. It's difficult to see why they should not be deprecated. - Hunan201p (talk) 19:44, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 I tend towards Headbomb's logic. Some Frontier journals are highly respected (e.g. Frontiers in Immunology which acts as the journal of the International Union of Immunological Societies), some are not. I wouldn't want a situation where use of very good, solid, peer-reviewed review articles in Frontier in Immunology can't be used. Red Fiona (talk) 21:25, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
• 3 or 4 - Yes, sometimes garbage journals publish good work. Sometimes they publish useful work frequently enough to be tempting to us as Wikipedia editors. Is the defense here that because its a convenient journal, despite its problems, we should be citing them anyway? It's an extraordinary and supremely rare rare situations where we absolutely need to be on the cutting edge of research, and therefor need to cite a primary source from a predatory journal where no better sources exist. Grayfell (talk) 07:27, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2: The status quo of 'use with caution' is the most practical approach. Frontiers has dozens of journals, and the case for any given journal, in any given subject area, is going to be different. The assessment of that should remain case-by-case, and be performed by editors willing to put in the legwork of scrutinizing the quality of individuals papers, their authors and the reviewers. Iskandar323 (talk) 09:48, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 is the most sensible option, per Headbomb. Papers should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. WP:MREL, with the footnote being highlighted by Headbomb's unreliable.js tool, should be enough to drive people to discuss these on the talk page and determine whether a paper should or shouldn't be used. DFlhb (talk) 10:02, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 The CiteWatch entry above does not seem to be invalid; no evidence has been presented that the situation has changed positively or negatively. Problematic, but not a "never use" option. --Jayron32 14:18, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
• 2. I'm sympathetic to the argument that Open Access journals where the content is free-as-in-libre content for all don't jive with funding methods relying on paying to access content and so other funding options have to be explored and is at least philosophically different then pay to play. I would not hold that against them to the full extent of a predatory/pay to play journal. That said for some of them the intentionally wide net they allow does merit caution. The current situation seems to take that into account. --(loopback) ping/whereis 14:55, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 Agree with Headbomb. Every publisher publishes some garbage. I have read perfectly good review articles in Frontiers journals. I would be more concerned about the original research published there, which we shouldn't be using much anyway. Pelirojopajaro (talk) 21:34, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 per Headbomb. GretLomborg (talk) 15:29, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3 with a short list of acceptable journals carved out. Arguments have been made that good articles can be found in Frontiers journals. That is true. The high proportion of bad stuff, however, makes it all suspect. Darts thrown randomly at a target do occasionally hit a bullseye. That doesn't make the dart thrower reliable. ~Anachronist (talk) 04:21, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Discussion (Frontiers)

I understood that one still can cite as SPS/subject matter expert even if the publisher is WP:GUNREL, is that wrong? Selfstudier (talk) 16:43, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

If it's a generally reliable publisher, it isn't self-published. If the source is challenged in the talk page, you could certainly point out that the publisher is generally reliable and the author is a subject matter expert. Jc3s5h (talk) 16:57, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, my fault, using these dratted abbreviations, GR meaning WP:GUNREL as opposed to WP:GREL. Fixed. Selfstudier (talk) 17:53, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Headbomb, Hemiauchenia, Selfstudier - like Selfstudier says, option 3 would not exclude ever citing articles in Frontiers. However, option 2 (and 1) makes it a free for all. Perhaps our fields are different, but for me, if there is "excellent and garbage research" (as I agree there can be), I don't think we should say it's all fine. If a restaurant served some dishes that were delicious and some that were poisoned, I would not eat there. A hallmark of virtually all good academic publishers is that they don't publish garbage. I would still keep an open mind to cite experts who had published in Frontiers - but strongly caution against the status quo that anyone can cite anything from Frontiers and shrug it off by saying "it's unclear". Selfstudier, Falk was a serious researcher and whatever the outcome of this discussion, I would not use it to disqualify Falk. Jeppiz (talk) 16:54, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

All publishers at least on occasion publish garbage research. Is Elsevier generally unreliable because it once published a paper that suggested that octopus were space aliens? [5] and which one malacologist described as pseudoscience and nonsense [6].? Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:07, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Also publishers have better and worse journals, and bad research gets published. Again, we are in very different fields, but in my field no good journal (none of the top 200) requires payment, and all have proper review process. That is not true for Frontiers. It doesn't mean everything in Frontiers is bad or anything in Elsevier good, but it does mean they are different kinds of publishers. For Elsevier, the research has to be good (and payment for open access is optional); for Frontiers, the payment has to be made (and research quality is optional). That is not comparable. Jeppiz (talk) 17:33, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Pay-for-publishing Gold OA is standard for many major publishers used in paleontology, like PLOS One and PeerJ, both of which have reasonable peer review standards. The idea that a source should be looked down on because it is pay for OA, regardless of peer review standards, is not tenable across the whole of academic publishing. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:42, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

To add to Hemiauchenia's point, lots of funding bodies are moving towards "you have to publish in open access". Red Fiona (talk) 21:26, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

"And be sure to include that in your budget proposal because we'll pay for it as part of your funding." (I'm not setting aside the impact this move toward pay-for-publishing has on self-funded researchers, graduate students, independent scholars, etc. - just noting that including this as part of your budget request for research grants has quickly become the norm in those disciplines where this is occurring.) ElKevbo (talk) 03:29, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

As someone who works in an adjacent field, all I get is scientists complaining :) Red Fiona (talk) 00:02, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• Comment: Here is a discussion on researchgate about Frontiers, originally shared by @Zero. It's quite interesting, with posters reporting a range of experiences with Frontiers, including many reporting experiencing a long and thorough review process with very serious reviewers. Also at least one poster who had a paper rejected (one out of four), and other interesting details about Frontiers apparently waving costs or offering cost discounts - much of which squares poorly with it being a slapdash, cash-for-publication outlet. Iskandar323 (talk) 09:44, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

On the other hand, an actual participant in the review of a Frontiers study has given a different perspective.[7] - Hunan201p (talk) 14:31, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

As noted at the talk page, that is not at all persuasive. Selfstudier (talk) 14:51, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

• Comment As an editor for several journals including Zookeys and a reviewer for many (eg CCB, PeerJ, Plos, Zootaxa, etc.) I think people need to understand some of the drivers in scientific publication. Most academics these days are assessed every year by their Universities (employers) on the metrics of their publications. Impact Factor and several other metrics are big drivers. Those with enormous grants, often for example molecular studies, have the funding to pay for paid publishing. Paid Publishing is an unfortunate paracite on science which takes advantage of the situation academics are in, publish or perish basically, so you are going to see a lot of these journals. It was commented that people are being encouraged to publish open access, that is free for the reader not the author. To have a journal article be open access as an author I have to pay often many thousands of dollars for this, to compensate the journal for them not being able to sell the pdf. So this is all the norm for the moment, love it or hate it. Individual articles are better judged according to the information and apparent review of their article, rather than journals as a whole. Exception to this is clearly predatory journals they should be avoided. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) ^talk 14:20, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Question/Suggestion

Given that pretty much everyone agrees that Frontiers is problematic, but some users point out that some of its journals are decent enough, surely the best option would be to make that distinction? If we all agree that several journals are "garbage", it should be an easy decision to decide that they are not RS, while still keeping an open mind on the Frontiers journals identified as reliable. Jeppiz (talk) 21:06, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

It's not even journal by journal thing (though some journal are worse than others), it's a paper by paper thing. Nearly every Frontiers journal lands in a 'sort of ish I guess maybe?' grey area. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:23, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Seconding Headbomb's comment about these journals landing in a grey area. My only addition is that the amount of fringe in a given Frontiers journal is often directly proportional to the amount of fringe in a field, if its a wacky field it might get pretty wild. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:28, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

How is this different from what is already written at WP:CITEWATCH#Frontiers Media --Jayron32 12:53, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

@Headbomb and Horse Eye's Back: In reality this seldom happens. Mostly, the bad science just keeps piling up, and the good editors exhaust themselves trying to fix the articles while the socks and the IPs wear them out. From my experience, most genetics articles on European and Asian ethnicities have sat littered with outdated pre-prints and garbage interpretations of poor sources for years. People know where the really bad citations are, but don't have the time or the energy to explain why and remove them. The idea that a website like Wikipedia with thousands of high-volume research articles (but only a handful of competent and unoccupied editors) is going to "sort everything out on a case by case basis" is extremely unrealistic and impractical. - Hunan201p (talk) 14:45, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

That's more a problem that would need a WP:GENRS akin to WP:MEDRS to solve than it is a problem requiring a ban on Frontiers journals being cited. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:24, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Either route is unlikely to succeed though, as long as people favor a "grey zone" approach to source reliability. Nobody wants to compromise and set standards for the other sciences, lest that we lose the privilege of citing that one magic paper that stood out from the rest. - Hunan201p (talk) 17:26, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

This exactly matches my observation as well. I've guessing every experienced editor has had to explain why they removed bad sources. Imagine how much more tedious it is when a source is in a supposed "grey area". Nobody has that kind of time.

Human genetics articles have a specific problem where they include undue details that shouldn't be included even when supported by the best primary sources from the best journals in the field.

Being generous, I think a lot of editors just want to share their own enthusiasm for their field and lose sight of the big picture. Anyone who edits in this area knows that there is also a more sinister problem of cherry-picking to support ideological conclusions. There is no clean way to differentiate between these two motivations, but getting rid of predatory journals seems like a reasonable starting point. Grayfell (talk) 02:16, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

RFC: Scientific Reports

Which of the following best describes Scientific Reports?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

Previous discussions: [8].Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:57, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Survey

• Option 2 Whether or not a paper from SciRep should be used is very field and author dependent. While undoubtedly a lot of good and valid research is published there, so is a lot of dubious stuff, more so than other journals in the SpringerNature portfolio. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:57, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2: many scholarly articles should be given little weight on Wikipedia anyways, regardless of publisher or reliability, as primary sources (WP:PSTS). A primary article that describes a new species, like this one, is reliable enough to show the species has been validly published, even if subsequent taxonomists disagree or reclassify it. But a research paper in the same journal that seeks to upend an existing classification scheme of a family or phylum based on a newly sequenced blip of RNA should be weighted accordingly with other sources. --Animalparty! (talk) 23:13, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3, though some things published there may be usable via WP:SELFPUB. It is reasonably clear from its history that it exerts practically no editorial controls whatsoever; therefore it is a textbook non-WP:RS and publication there will never lend any iota of reliability. I can understand people stating that this is 2 (because sometimes highly-regarded experts do publish things through it, which can be used via WP:SELFPUB) but my concern is that our ratings are generally considered to be for the source itself - SELFPUB is a separate consideration that allows certain things to be used regardless of the reliability of the venue they were published in, not something that changes the fundamental unreliability of a journal with essentially no editorial controls. And the fairly rigid structure WP:RSP has evolved into could mean that a "yellow" rating there would lead to people arguing that publication there sometimes lends reputability, or that it is disputed whether it lends inherent reliability. It never does, not ever, which means that option 3 is the best choice with the caveat that things by established experts can be used as normal via SELFPUB (true in general for things published in non-RSes) - essentially, anyone who wants to use a paper from there has to start from the presumption that it is unreliable and construct a SELFPUB argument otherwise on a case-by-case basis. --Aquillion (talk) 04:28, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2 Should be assessed on an article-by-article basis. Some may be useful as primary sources alongside secondary sources that themselves reference material published there, but for the most part we should not be using scientific papers without a supporting secondary source that puts the primary research into context. It's probably fine for linking in cases where we reference the material in conjunction with its discussion in secondary sources, but like ALL scientific journals, per WP:PRIMARY, "Do not analyze, evaluate, interpret, or synthesize material found in a primary source yourself; instead, refer to reliable secondary sources that do so." --Jayron32 13:50, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3 Misusing primary sources is already rampant on wikipedia. The journal has a checkered history, so I agree with Aquillion that articles should basically be treated as self published. Sativa Inflorescence (talk) 21:03, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3 Primary sources like research papers should only be used with special care to begin with, and this journal fails the use-with-caution standard. Aiming for quantity indiscriminate of field is a big red flag. Peer review requires trustworthy subject-specific expert review, which is dubious when the journal as a whole disregards subject specialization. Our article Scientific Reports appears to indicate the quantity-over-quality approach bearing poor fruit. Note that this should not count against any paper published there, surely much of that work is fine. It just means publication in Scientific Reports adds little to any other publication or authority the work may otherwise have. Alsee (talk) 22:28, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

I suppose given that as of 2020 SciRep was publishing 7,500-10,000 papers every year, is looking at the raw number of controversies an appropriate metric? Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:26, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 2 - Other considerations apply. (Not sure this needs a RFC -- Is there really a 'perennial' need about this source ? But in any case hers is my input.) As always, WP:CONTEXTMATTERS and whether the source is authoritative depends largely on what content it is being used for. What the venue is should not be a universal up or down item. That said, I'm dubious about the value of citing a study to an article, it generally seeming a work in progress and typically technical item of no large note. (And I'm even more dubious about those of note or WP:WEIGHT as being suspect for sensationalism or publicising rather than scientific note.) Cheers Markbassett (talk) 06:36, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 4, deprecate: there is not enough time to evaluate the merits of this publisher's studies on a case-by-case basis, and where this does happen it usually involves protracted edit wars, cliques, drama, etc. Wikipedia's quality and user experiences improve tremendously by setting higher standards for sources. What little value that might be lost will be more than compensated for by removing the big pile of bad studies, as well as the bloat of material that just isn't notable enough to be included in a tertiary source. What has been published by Scientific Reports that was truly important or worthy of inclusion in an encyclopedia? - Hunan201p (talk) 20:44, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2. Retractions and weak articles are happening in all scientific journals, even the best ones. That is not a proof of anything. Given the description of their editorial process [9], they have a peer review process and editorial oversight. But yes, the additional considerations must apply, as always, i.e. one should check if specific publication makes exceptional claims, contradicts general knowledge in the field, not supported by other sources, etc. My very best wishes (talk) 01:21, 13 March 2023 (UTC)
• Option 2. For me, this is a no-brainer. Scientific reports is a huge website covering a lot of ground. One cannot compare mathematics to sociology in terms of the ability of a reader literate in both to be able to validate for one's self whether something is true or not. But as always, caveat emptor applies, and in general it is nonsense to judge a book by its cover, and asking if a source is reliable is actually nonsense. CarlWesolowski (talk) 06:54, 13 March 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3. Scientific reports covers a very wide range of areas but like all primary sources, WP:PRIMARY will apply. We shouldn't be analysing or interpreting sources, which is why reliable secondary sources are much more acceptable. Having said that, I think it's important to remember that context is still important (WP:CONTEXTMATTERS), and they can still be used to supplement other sources. Starlights99 (talk) 20:42, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Discussion

• I'm not sure we have a color code for "quite frequently unreliable, but reliability can be established on a case-by-case basis in fairly standard ways". The various arguments for 2 and 3 that are currently up there seem to agree to a large extent on how the journal ought to be treated in practice; the difference is how to translate that into suitable Wikipedia jargon. XOR'easter (talk) 16:36, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
• Unless Sci Rep has started publishing review articles, is this more of a "people using primary sources when they shouldn't" problem? Red Fiona (talk) 00:09, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
• Do Not List In RSN - this seems not usable for RSP results. Unless there are a number of past instances where this was one "whose reliability and use on Wikipedia are frequently discussed" then by definition it does not belong in RSP. If there *are* past discussions, then they should be described by the RFC as the reason for the discussion and not as a generic search link that returns false hits on the phrase "scientific reports". In this case the generic search seems to have 4 which actually question SR, and only one case came to a conclusion which was that particular study was just that -- a first-person report of a study which did not suit the article CONTEXT of MEDRS. In WP sense, this seems -- not an entry for RSP, and utility depends on context. But really, just stop asking about every venue there is. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 18:03, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

• Scientific Reports is a well respected fast publishing journal for particular types of studies. Personally I have published in it. That said it has received criticism for inadequate review in some areas. They do not publish opinion pieces and try to publish the original research of authors. Like all publications they should be used judiciously and without bias. I do not see why this has been brought up as an RFC as the way to treat publications applies to any publication. Many scientists even see Nature itself as not much more than a flashy magazine filled with titles and little content. However its impact factor keeps people publishing in it as scientists grant access depends on a high impact factor. I recommend closing this as the premise of the RFC is actually not relevant to the issues with journals. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) ^talk 14:05, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

The Wire (Indian Publication) and Meta Controversy

With the increasing use of The Wire as a source for citation for various articles, we should assess The Wire as a reliable source for Wikipedia. Attached are some links below to go over the controversy.

Scroll Explainer

Meta's Report SpunkyGeek (talk) 03:16, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm a little confused here. Is there any reason anyone on this planet should believe anything Meta says? I mean, come on.

If there's more to this, we certainly need a much better source than Meta. :bloodofox: (talk) 03:47, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Are there other issues with Wire that require an assessment of their use on Wikipedia? Wire-Meta seems premature for the community to discuss as even the tech community appears to be divided/confused as to what's going on, per the scroll source. Slywriter (talk) 04:15, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

The Wire has conceded that there was a breach of moral conduct. The printed story seemed politically motivated because it was pursued with fabricated evidence.

Hence the question that the story it publishes is reliable enough to cite as a source.

https://thewire.in/media/the-wire-editorial-to-our-readers-an-apology-and-a-promise

https://www.newslaundry.com/2022/10/27/the-wire-issues-apology-cites-deception-by-a-member-of-our-meta-investigation-team SpunkyGeek (talk) 04:55, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

• We obviously can't just take the fact that Meta itself (as a primary source) disputes the Wire's coverage as evidence that there's some problem the Wire is unreliable; this, at least, is an obvious WP:MANDY situation - if the simple fact that the subject of a piece denied things was enough to render a source unreliable, no source that reports on anything controversial could be reliable. And even if there was secondary coverage saying that the Wire got this particular thing wrong (and the Scroll article - which isn't particularly impressive as a source - says no such thing, it just reports competing claims), that wouldn't necessarily impact their status as a WP:RS, because a source's reliability is based on its overall reputation for fact-checking and accuracy and not one particular incident. Do you have any reason to think that the Wire's overall reputation has been harmed by this, as opposed to them just saying some things that Meta disputes? --Aquillion (talk) 04:16, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

  Agreed we cannot take Meta's statement as the truth. However, the issue is that The Wire conceded that there was a breach of conduct from one of their employees (fabricating the evidence). Reporting something wrong and fabricating something to prove a story are different things. SpunkyGeek (talk) 04:59, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

  It's not just meta saying things; it's The Wire fabricating things and destroying their reputation. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 20:32, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

• Is there any indication (ideally from a reliable source) that we should consider this to be more than a deplorable, yet individual incident? Der Spiegel is by consnesus generally reliable, inspite of the mass fabrications by Claas Relotius. –Austronesier (talk) 06:14, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

  @Austronesier: See The Economist, which notes that The Wire destroyed its reputation in this whole affair. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 20:33, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

• Still reliable They did a story and took it back with a notice. There is nothing wrong with that. Capitals00 (talk) 06:21, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

  The Economist provides credible information that there was an intentional breach of journalistic morals (fabricating evidence). SpunkyGeek (talk) 22:10, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

• Every source screws up at least once. It's only the response to the screw up and the pattern of behavior that matters, not a singular event. The Wire's response seems appropriate as to what a reliable source does when one of its employees engages in bad practices; this is a sign that they are reliable, not the other way around. --Jayron32 13:45, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
• Deprecate Generally unreliable Poorly worded opening post, which lacks any background. The issue is not that Meta disputed their report. MANDY is horribly misapplied here. The issue isn't that they made a "mistake", either, or that they were hoaxed by an employee (which happened to the most reliable outlets). The issue is that

• an employee completely fabricated evidence used in news stories that had multiple senior editors on the byline
• that this fabrication was so blatant that the most basic fact-checking mechanisms would have caught it
• that these senior editors publicly stood by the story, saying that it was based on two separate sources.
• that the outlet as a whole (not just the fired journalist) vociferously quadrupled-down on the fabricated story
• and that this "explosive" news story is exactly the kind of story that actual WP:RS would either jointly investigate with other WP:RS, or at least scrutinise very deeply. A good example is this competent joint reporting by The Guardian and other outlets.

This fiasco could never have happened at a reputable outlet. The Wire's editors admit that they never bothered to verify the sourcing, despite public claims otherwise, and despite that being journalism 101. We judge reliability based on the level of editorial scrutiny. This story shows that The Wire has none, and firing the at-fault journalist does not address this. The Economist says The Wire fell for a "massive conspiracy", and blames The Wire's partisanship. WaPo notes growing questions about The Wire’s integrity and accuracy. The Editors Guild of India, their national journalistic association which had previously stood by The Wire, now calls out their circumvention of journalistic norms and checks.

We simply cannot treat an outlet that lacks proper "journalistic norms and checks" as reliable. Let's not be lenient on this. DFlhb (talk) 15:22, 17 February 2023 (UTC) changing from Deprecate to GUNREL, since this isn't an RFC 22:16, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

India has no reputable outlets left, not a single one. The irony is that even after all of this The Wire is probably still the most reliable Indian news source... If we were to move to prohibit the use of every source as reliable or less we would be prohibiting the entire Indian media industry. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:58, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Only 194 to go.

More seriously, thanks to those who have clarified this is more than a simple dispute. Based on the above fact set, I would support some form of downgrading of the Wire, though not sure we are in deprecate territory yet. Slywriter (talk) 18:50, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

I have to kindly disagree. India has many reputable sources and reliable outlets like The Indian Express, The Hindu, etc.

Breach of journalistic ethics by The Wire in the above case contradicts your argument. SpunkyGeek (talk) 21:37, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Agreed with most of the points presented.

Will make sure more background is provided in the future. SpunkyGeek (talk) 21:41, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

@DFlhb: For what it's worth, deprecation can only be achieved by formal RfC. I'm not sure that I would support outright deprecation (this is probably fine for run-of-the-mill facts) but I do think the question deserves discussion. Do you think that it would be wise for me to open up a standard four-option RfC below? — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 21:56, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

In that case, I'll change my !vote to "generally unreliable". It's indeed pretty reasonable for outlets to be declared GUNREL before being considered deprecated, so proper scrutiny can be applied for each "downgrade". Also, I'll likely have little time to contribute over the next few weeks, except watching my watchlist, so I won't be able to do the kind of more in-depth analysis I like to do in RFCs. DFlhb (talk) 22:14, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

• Not generally reliable. Like Jayron32 says above, the response to the screw up and the pattern of behavior matters most when determining whether a news group has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. But, looking at the response to the screw up and the pattern of behavior here, I am struggling to draw lines between The Wire's response and that of Rolling Stone following its publication of A Rape on Campus; for various reasons including the lack of rigor in Rolling Stone's editorial standards for that topic area, we have WP:ROLLINGSTONEPOLITICS. DFlhb lays out a persuasive case that The Wire no longer possesses the reputation for fact-checking that generally reliable sources do, and the reputation of The Wire seems to have taken a hit inside of even the more reliable Indian newsrooms, following both its fabricated October reporting about Meta and its fabrications relating to Tek fog:
  CNN-News18 and NewsLaundry give a decently long summary of the extent to which evidence was fabricated for the October story regading Meta:
  1. The Wire had alleged that an Indian government official more or less had the power to remove posts on Instagram. Meta denied the story.
  2. When Meta initially denied the story, The Wire posted fabricated screenshots stating that a user had "X-check" privileges. Meta responded by stating that the "X-check" privilege did not actually allow what The Wire said it did (previous reporting did not indicate that the privileges could actually be used to take down posts), and that the screenshots contained a fabricated url on a page designed to look as if it were something related to Instagram.
  3. After Meta responded saying that the url and website were deceptively fabricated and the privileges shown in the previous screenshots did not do what The Wire claimed, The Wire released a doctored video to back up its reporting that falsely claimed to show one of its journalists having access to Instagram's backend.
  4. Aside from all of this, both experts The Wire claimed it received access to an email from Meta executives, which the Meta executives denied. The Wire claimed that it had conducted checks with specific experts in cybersecurity to verify that the content of the email was legitimate, but those experts themselves say that they never talked to The Wire or that they explicitly refused to run the verification. The Economist, linked below, notes that the email was written in painfully broken English, which is not exactly expected of senior anglophone Meta executives, and this should have been a bright red flag for The Wire.
  5. Within two weeks of publication, the entire meat of the story had been publicly shown to have been a total and utter fabrication, and CNN-News18 notes that The Wire has been accused of fabricating evidence to validate its report after the fact.

After this whole fiasco, The Economist wrote that The Wire had shattered its own credibility and criticized the Indian news website's editors for their stupidity of choosing partisanship over process. If you have access to The Economist, I hope you read the whole article, as it's truly eye-opening regarding this news source. The Washington Post, in their esposé on the issue, also tore into the doubling-down and tripling-down, suggesting that basically every attempt by The Wire to provide evidence just kept raising more questions in The Wire's reporting.

Next, let's look at a summary of the (under review but not officially retracted) Tek Fog story, which India Today correctly notes is even more damaging than the Meta controversy:

1. The Wire, in January 2022, published a story alleging that a secret app, called "Tek Fog" was allegedly being used by the BJP and by the Indian government to harass female journalists.
2. The story was quickly picked up internationally, particularly in the opinion sections of Washington Post and Bloomberg, a academic blog post from London School of Economics, as well as nationally on Indian TV and among other Indian news organizations.
3. At the time, the Editors Guild of India expressed significant concerns regarding the treatment of women journalists in India.
4. After the whole Meta scandal, news organizations systematically re-evaluated the reliability of the Tek Fog reporting. In light of the battered reputation for fact-checking within The Wire's investigative reporting, the issued a statement saying that serious questions on the veracity of their reporting and called upon news groups to resist the temptation of moving fast on sensitive stories, circumventing due journalistic norms and checks. Bloomberg news even retracted(!) an opinion article on Tek Fog because it had been based on reporting from The Wire.

Both of these stories alleged extremely serious violations—and wound up being of extremely questionable factual accuracy. The response to criticism of the October investigation into Meta was simply to double- and triple-down on the fabrications that they had published. And so too was their response to Tek Fog; until the Meta story completely and utterly fell apart in front of their very eyes ten months after they published the Tek Fog piece, The Wire's editorial staff had refused to issue a correction—despite the report being extremely factually dubious. This is a sign that the organization has irresponsible oversight from editors, and the organization frankly does not have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy in its investigative journalism. For reasons of having systemic deficiencies in editorial oversight and editors from the paper repeatedly and publicly insisting that false and fabricated content was true until the weight of criticism against them became too great to handle, and several well-respected publications more or less saying that The Wire's credibility is totally shot following this charade, this should source not be considered to be generally reliable—and I would have great concern about using this whatsoever with respect to WP:BLPs. This isn't a case where we're dealing with simple errors or misinformation; these stories well appear to be intentional political disinformation attempts. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 19:12, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. This is a case of intentional manipulation for political goal-scoring where it seems even the top leadership has a role. SpunkyGeek (talk) 21:50, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

RfC: The Wire (India)

Which of the following best describes the reliability of Indian news website The Wire (direct url)?

• Option 1: generally reliable for factual reporting
• Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
• Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated

— Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 02:02, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Survey: The Wire (India)

• Option 3. As I've noted in my large comment above, what we have here is a website that was exposed for creating hoaxes out of whole cloth in order to engage in political disinformation. The set of fabrications published by The Wire are of such a complex scale as to be compared to infamously fabricated Rolling Stone piece "A Rape on Campus", and many of the same deficiencies that plagued Rolling Stone at the time appear to be plaguing The Wire. When Meta contested the reporting from The Wire, the website outright accused Meta of fabrication rather than admitting its mistakes promptly. They only withdrew the story after doubling- and tripling-down on baseless allegations that were supported by fabricated evidence; rather than doing their due diligence before making extraordinary claims about Meta, The Economist correctly observes that The Wire's editorial staff undertook the stupidity of choosing partisanship over process and in the process shattered its own credibility. Responsible news organizations don't attempt to cover up their mistakes by continuing to fabricate evidence; after being asked to retract the piece, as The Washington Post notes, The Wire also published screenshots of emails it said were from independent experts vouching for its authenticity, but those emails showed incorrect dates from 2021. The images were edited to show the correct dates [(i.e. 2022)] after the story published, but not before readers caught the error. And lo and behold, those emails were indeed fabricated; everyone who The Wire claims to have sent them an email either explicitly stated that they refused to work with The Wire or stated that they had not been contacted by The Wire. This is a total failure of editorial integrity, from the reporters who initially made the incorrect reports, to the editors who knowingly allowed a doctored email to be published in an attempted cover-up rather than admit their mistake.
  It isn't just foreign observers who lack confidence in The Wire following these revelations. The Editors Guild of India has noted that issues with factual accuracy extend deeper into the website's investigative reporting, noting serious questions on the veracity of their reporting in The Wire's investigation of Tek fog, an alleged app that allegedly allowed people to send automated messages to harass female journalists, and reminding the media organization to resist the temptation of moving fast on sensitive stories, circumventing due journalistic norms and checks.
  All in all, this was a total and utter failure of fact-checking on topics that allege significant (and perhaps criminal) wrongdoing against specific parties, on multiple occasions, both on topics with explicit political relevance. This goes beyond sloppiness or misinformation—this was disinformation that appears to have been conducted and approved by both the journalists who wrote the original report as well as the editors who initially attempted to cover that very same report up. I would never want to cite this source for facts about a WP:BLP, nor for contentious facts. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 02:02, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

No reliable secondary sources accuses the editors of covering up or political disinformation nor do they mention accusations on those lines by any third party. To the contrary, the Washington Post article features a comment by the main person (the CIS co-founder) who unraveled the fabrications, where he says that the editor "maintained his personal integrity". This is pertinent because you have missed a key fact that we would not be certain that those emails were fabricated if the editor had not co-operated and disclosed the identities of the senders (they were kept anonymous).

If they really wanted to, they could have forgone accountability and easily rode on their reputation and it would have remained a debated issue among tech experts. Most of the retractions and commentary came after their own retraction. The structural conditions, i.e pressures on journalistic organisations, the need to protect sources, outstretched resources and the state of press freedom is in far severe condition in India than in the United States (read this article by NYT), so any comparison is misguided.

And saying that "foreign observers lack confidence in The Wire" (or reliable Indian ones) is inaccurate and there isn't much substantive evidence for it. It should be noted that The Economist piece is an opinion column that is making an appeal to The Wire and in general, and compares their reporting to things like Russian interference in US elections and the Cambridge Analytics scandal related to Brexit, describing them as similar mistakes, as far as I understand these are still debated over if not accepted. The full EGI statement is also a reference to the reporting on the Tek Fog app specifically; it says "Since the Wire has removed those stories as part of their internal review following serious questions on the veracity of their reporting, the Guild withdraws the references made to all those reports". It shouldn't be conflated as a judgement of The Wire general reporting. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 09:05, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1 Fabrications and deception by one of their employees (who was subsequently sacked) shouldn't be conflated with the news publisher as a whole. Both the stories whether Tek Fog or the one on Meta were retracted and an apology published. This is standard practise when journalistic misconduct does occur and is an indication of a reliable source.

They otherwise have a solid track record of investigative journalism and reputation as a high quality news publication, consistently receiving both major Indian and international awards. A lot could be written on this but I'll give one prime example that shows that they are considered authoritative and clearly demonstrate that it's a reliable source. BBC News has the most extensive coverage of any high quality international news publisher in India and they regularly, in nearly every major (and extremely contentious) story on India, use The Wire as a source for important related facts, without seeing the need for any attribution or qualification (such as describing it as a claim) and simply with hyperlinks directly to "thewire.in", some instances (note that these are hard to collect since they don't come up in searches, but are rather abundant):

1. hyperlink at "ensure that Muslims stop wearing skullcaps"
2. hyperlink at "called Muslims demons", another one at " people have been held over tweets" and another one at "held for putting up posters"
3. hyperlink at "criticism"
4. hyperlink at "a vendor was beaten up", etc etc

Other international outlets have a similar practise, using it as a source and present its reporting as facts, a few instances below.

1. this report in Columbia Journalism Review on threats to journalists during the 2020 Delhi riots, it was used as a source for facts (see "...fifty-three people, the majority of whom were Muslim, had been killed..." ("fifty-three people" is hyperlinked to a thewire.in article).
2. this piece (hyperlink at "disaffection") in the The Diplomat uses it as a source for facts on jurisprudence regarding the sedition law in India
3. this Coda Media report (hyperlinks to 4 articles at "rebuke", "had", "observed" and "maintained") uses it as a source for facts regarding migrant workers during COVID-19 pandemic and inconsistencies in the government's claims
4. this piece in The Verge on net neutrality
5. this report from The Independent on the Haridwar hate speeches, and many more.

In addition, to give few examples of their reputation, as in how they are described, in the Columbia Journalism Review report on news media in India, The Wire was extensively covered and specifically described to have carried "award-winning reporting", the International Press Institute in a a report during the pandemic had stated that it "is providing some of the best coverage in the Asia-Pacific region on the impact of the coronavirus and the lock-down on disadvantaged and disempowered Indians", Foreign Policy in one of its columns described the publication as "Indian's most respected online news service", etc. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 06:54, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

All of these links are from before the controversy. DFlhb (talk) 11:38, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Kindly Disagree. This was not journalistic misconduct. It is a case of fabrication of evidence for political goal-scoring. All the cases that you have provided where The Wire has been cited as a source is before October 2022. I highly doubt that any credible news agency has used their story after this expose. SpunkyGeek (talk) 12:07, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

It demonstrates that they had a reputation for fact checking and accuracy and any determination of the source as unreliable would mean one would have to discard all articles from this period.

It also doesn't appear anything has changed post—October 2022, in December 2022, they won 2 Red Ink Awards, one for their contribution in the Pegasus Project collaboration as it's Indian partner (which they still are, and it includes reputable publications from around the world) and one for their report on transgender prisoners. The BBC documentary, India: The Modi Question (which is very high stakes), released in January 2023, features the editor of The Wire in an authoritative capacity. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 13:22, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

India: The Modi Question documentary is a controversial documentary. The Wire has a known history of political bias against the present government in India hence much of its reporting is in that particular space. The documentary is a critique of the present Indian government's domestic policies. Most of the journalists who are currently part of The Wire have presented their critical analysis on the then Gujarat government (2002) and the present Indian government, therefore are part of the documentary. (We are not discussing the authenticity of their analysis here)

The Wire fabricating a piece of evidence to pursue a story with biased editorial oversight is a whole different case. Why I said 'biased' is because there have been no repercussions for senior editors or the board members of The Wire. SpunkyGeek (talk) 20:40, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

It was controversial with supporters of the present Indian government, but it was also accurate and reliable. What exactly is the issue you take with it? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:18, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

What issue I have with the documentary is irrelevant to the discussion. The Wire has practiced unethical journalism is the story here. SpunkyGeek (talk) 00:58, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 3, see my detailed reply in the pre-RFC discussion, which I won't summarise here. The Meta story was genuinely ludicrous; all the tech experts I follow on Twitter immediately questioned its veracity. Why didn't the outlet? This is far worse than A Rape on Campus, which was at least a little plausible. The Meta story had several senior editors (including a founding editor) on the byline. When Meta said sources were fabricated, these senior editors should have checked (indeed, any outlet would have done so before initial publication). Instead, they vociferously quadrupled-down, called Meta's denials "obfuscation", and wrote about Meta's denial in a shockingly combative way (alleging that Meta was trying to "goad" them into revealing their sources). The Wire's editorial failures go far beyond the fired journalist, and four months later, still haven't been addressed. They pledged "transparency", yet haven't publicly announced any changes to their editorial process. Firing a journalist doesn't solve their lack of editorial oversight. The Tek Fog story hasn't been corroborated by other outlets, relied on the now-fired journalist, allegedly has "glaring holes", and yet is still not retracted (only "removed from view"). It's on them to prove they addressed their editorial issues, not on us to assume they did.

Let's see what third-parties think:

• "Unprecedented polarization, the trumping of ideology over facts, active hate-mongering or pamphleteering, and the death of nuance — particularly in prime time television — all make up the new normal. Journalists are increasingly either chamcha ya morcha: sycophants and shameful supplicants to power, or activists dreaming of regime change." (Semafor)
• "a once-dependable news website", "sheer irresponsibility" (Slate)
• URLs shown in the report didn't actually exist (a MarketWatch reporter)
• "The Wire did not ask Meta for comment [...] ahead of publishing" (a Buzzfeed News reporter); that's egregious!

I'm not alleging that this was a deliberate hoax on The Wire's part. But I don't need to. I evaluate sources based on their editorial practices, and theirs just aren't good enough. DFlhb (talk) 12:41, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

This is easy to say in hindsight but the fact is tech experts were uncertain and divided. Even Sophie Zhang, someone who had understanding of Meta's systems was for a time convinced by the journalist's conviction despite her initial doubts. It's also inaccurate to say they have announced no changes, they did in the apology they published.

In the end there's a simple question, can you (or anyone) bring any news report of theirs or any reliable secondary coverage that questions their reporting and is not in the context of this controversy, this one journalist, or these retracted and/or withdrawn (or "removed from view" if you will) reports?

There is so much evidence that demonstrates that they have a "reputation for fact checking and accuracy" which is how we determine which sources are reliable, not on our own ideas of their internal workings (based on one episode that is), one should at least be able to show a pattern across the organisation. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 13:22, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Zhang had left Facebook two years earlier, and had no understanding of Facebook's then-current systems. She also falsely claimed that the docs must have been faked by a Facebook employee, which is... understandable, given her dislike of the company, but was completely baseless. Meanwhile, independent observers and proper journalists were skeptical from the start, and were harassed by The Wire's supporters.

The fact is, trust is earned, not given. It's true that they're among the better Indian outlets, but declaring them GENREL means they can be used as sourcing in BLPs, and everywhere else. Here, "business as usual" is not tenable. The polarisation pointed out by Semafor means that it's no longer a case of outstanding independent journalists on one side, and government propagandists on the other side; sadly, the independent side is no longer fully trustworthy either. DFlhb (talk) 14:37, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

That doesn't answer my question, you are just showing me twitter comments and opining on them. With the evidence you have the only articles that shouldn't be used for BLPs and elsewhere are the ones that can't be used anyways because have been withdrawn/retracted. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 15:36, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

The argument that a news outlet is printing against a government can be termed as a reliable source is meaningless in this context.

Here we have a specific case where it seems that the top leadership of The Wire has participated in the intentional fabricating of evidence. Giving them amnesty would not only set a wrong precedent but will also put a question mark on WP:RSP guidelines. SpunkyGeek (talk) 19:52, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

The Wire was also ordered to take down 14 (not 1 or 2) of its stories by the Telangana Court for reporting against Indian vaccine manufacturers (Bharat Biotech, COVAXIN). Yet no action was taken by the "internal editorial board" of The Wire.

(Such were the violations that Telangana Court also barred The Wire from further reporting)

See:Telangana Court orders The Wire to take down its stories

If you are claiming this is to be a one-time incident then I have to kindly and strongly disagree with that. SpunkyGeek (talk) 21:07, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

An Indian court ordering a news source to take down a story does not mean that story is not true; indeed, given recent events, it may even be more likely that it is. Black Kite (talk) 22:23, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

If the stories were authentic, don't you think The Wire would have gone to the higher courts?

Also, many other publications would have supported them to pursue this. SpunkyGeek (talk) 23:13, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

DFlhb In fact, the very Slate article you quoted here shows them having a solid reputation even in midst of the controversy. I hope you read it in its entirety. Some full quotes from it:

1. "The Wire has done important, noble work under duress, and its best writing remains a brilliant exemplar of what Indian journalism can do best. But going forward, it’ll be so much harder to do this type of journalism."
2. "To be clear, informed analysts of the saga did not tend to believe the Wire acted maliciously in order to defame Meta. Rather, they said this was probably the result of an elaborate scheme planned by someone with a vendetta against the Wire. Or, as Stamos put it, “an extremely successful op against opposition journalism.”"
3. "Misinformation from BJP foot soldiers at all levels make it so sites like the Wire are the only way anyone outside India can get an accurate view of one of the world’s most important countries."
4. "Wire had become one of the most dynamic Indian publications of the Modi years, a singular bulwark against the flood of false and propagandistic “news” that took over so much of Indian media. Along with outlets like the Caravan, Scroll, Alt News, the Print, and Cobrapost, the Wire offered detailed, incisive reporting on the realities of modern-day Indian life and politics."
5. "The pressure is high in the subcontinent, and the Wire’s most intrepid writers doubtlessly face daily threats of the kind few American journalists are familiar with. Yet that also makes their rectitude all the more imperative."

They are treating it like a reputable publication that has made a mistake, which is exactly what we should be doing. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 14:32, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I did read it in its entirety, and this misdirects us into the weeds. The fact that The Wire faces threats by the government, or that they weren't outright malicious, or that "their best writing" is good, has nothing to do with their editorial standards, which is what we judge here. The two Slate quotes I give earlier do address The Wire's reliability. Note that beyond publishing an apology, "promising" to vet their stories better, and retracting the Meta story, they still haven't shown any evidence of changes. They still haven't retracted or re-examined their TekFog story, and the founding editor on the Meta byline is still employed. DFlhb (talk) 14:44, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

It has everything to do with "editorial standards" and is exactly what we should be looking at. Coverage from reliable secondary sources is how we determine their reputation and their editorial standards. It doesn't matter whether you find it trustworthy or what you imagine their editorial standards to be. The article is more or less describing their journalism as one of the best and one of the few where you can get actual news in the country, that very very clearly shows that they are considered a reliable source.

WP:REPUTABLE and WP:USEBYOTHERS are guidelines on reliable sources, and by now it's clear that they more than comply with both. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 15:36, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

There's a difference between a website's stated editorial standards and the extent to which they are put into practice. If extremely senior people are disregarding editorial standards (such as happened in "A Rape on Campus"), then that reflects much, much more broadly on the quality of the organization's editorial oversight than a mere blurb of text that the news organization claims to adhere to. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 15:41, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I second your point @Red-tailed hawk. The leading editors in this fiasco have faced no inquiries or consequences. The same editorial board is now reviewing the misconduct. This alone should be shocking for an editor with some journalistic standards. SpunkyGeek (talk) 20:58, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• Observation What would be the optics of Wikipedia declaring a news source unreliable, when that news source has been one of those recently harrassed by the Modi Government (the most recent was the BBC, whose Indian HQ was invaded by "tax inspectors") because it prints news that show the Government in a bad light? I suggest those optics would be very poor. Black Kite (talk) 15:03, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  Nobody here is arguing that the source unreliable because it shows the Indian government in a bad light. We're arguing that it's unreliable because of failures of editorial control and fact-checking, and that responsibility for this goes all the way up to the top. I hope that answers your question. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 15:29, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

The irony here is that BBC itself seems to be find them reliable. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 16:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Why are we considering optics here? Whom are we trying to satisfy here? The only thing that should matter is if a news outlet has participated in journalistic malpractice that too intentionally on the highest level, then there should be repercussions for it.

Those who want to consider optics should also consider that if grave misconduct by a news outlet is gone unscathed what precedent are we setting here? SpunkyGeek (talk) 20:00, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

My concern is that two (yes,two) incidents are being used to turn one of the few reasonably neutral Indian news sources into "unreliable" and put it on the same footing as actual Indian fake news sites such as Republic TV. This isn't the Daily Mail or Russia Today that we're talking about here. Black Kite (talk) 20:47, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

See:Telangana Court orders The Wire to take down its stories

Another violation for your reference.

Also, your argument does not provide any substance to nullify points made by @Red-tailed hawk and @DFlhb. SpunkyGeek (talk) 21:11, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I see. Well, on the same subject, perhaps you could give us a run down of this edit of yours, explaining why the mainstream news services there are unreliable (I am well aware that Reddit and forums are no good, it's the other sources I'm interested in). Black Kite (talk) 22:20, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

The context of this forum is The Wire's reliability.

However, the content written was opinion based rather than having encyclopedic language. I would be happy to work with you on that article if you have some suggestions. SpunkyGeek (talk) 22:59, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1 per Tayi_Arajakate. They have a lot of quality content and the response to the Meta incident shows that they have editorial standards and act upon them. Alaexis_¿question? 20:05, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1. It's the response including take down and corrective measures that test a publication's reliability. The case where a publication themselves intentionally fabricates is where it is deemed unreliable. The Wire was deceived by one of their own thus causing a fiasco, the publication didn't intentionally fabricate. They took it down and took corrective actions. Unreliable sources don't — DaxServer (t · m · c) 21:41, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3 I think arguments made by @Red-tailed hawk and @DFlhb are spot on. There has been no accountability for the senior editors in this incident. What can be more shocking is the same team is reviewing this debacle. (Not the first time that The Wire is under severe scrutiny). An impartial inquiry is needed which seems highly doubtful here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SpunkyGeek (talk • contribs) 23:10, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1. The Wire has screwed up big time, but their ultimate response has been that of a reliable news organization, and the tenor of the most detailed pieces, such as the Slate article, suggest they have been hoodwinked rather than that they've engaged in intentional malpractice. If something similar happens again in the future, it might suggest that there's a systemic issue here, but otherwise it's too soon to deprecate. Vanamonde (Talk) 22:38, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  The Slate article is a Future Tense column. We recently discussed these sorts of columns on this very noticeboard; the pieces are characterized by Slate itself as daily commentary published on Slate, and the piece from Slate isn't exactly straight news reporting. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 06:31, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

It's quite inaccurate to charecterise Future Tense as a column (columns are personal or editorial opinion sections of particular columnists). This is a newsletter under a wide collaboration, which includes commentary (and reportage) and brings in expertise with it. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 11:10, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1 we shouldn't rush to judgement on the basis of one incident allegedly involving one rogue reporter. The wire has been painted as an anti-Mohdi publication and is therefore subject to intimidation, demonization and propoganda including from pro-Mohdi sources in the same way as many other respectable sources have been including the BBC. See these two articles from The Guardian for some context here and here, imv Atlantic306 (talk) 22:22, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1: for an organization that won prizes for its journalism in the past, and issues corrections when they make mistakes. Mottezen (talk) 22:48, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1: The situation that led to this RFC is very bad, but it is still singular. The organization took the steps one would expect such an organization to take when the problem became known. Long-term, institutional problems have not been demonstrated beyond this event. Yes, it is not good, but it is still just one incident. --Jayron32 14:12, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
• Comment Then how about Option 2: exercise additional caution for tech-related reporting? That’s a small minority of their stories; and the founding editor admitted that the main reason for this fuckup was a general lack of tech expertise among their staff, who would have caught it if they had better domain-knowledge. This would also allows us to keep using them for Indian politics, since it’s true that they’re one of the few independent publications left in India, and have done some good work. DFlhb (talk) 07:33, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

No, that's a bad option and just unnecessary, it would bring into question their coverage in the Pegasus Project collaboration, for which there is no evidence that there's anything wrong with it. The rest of their other tech related news coverage is just very basic "who said what" reporting; for example this report or this report, there aren't any problems with these either.

After what happened, it's highly unlikely that they are going to try to pursue any tech related story on their own again, for the foreseeable future. And if any issue arises in the future, we can always revisit this. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 09:25, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1 The Wire has retracted the problematic reporting in question. You can find problems in just any source which has published thousands of articles until now. Unless there is a pattern of biased reporting I don't think we should be really discussing this. Capitals00 (talk) 02:51, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1 - It is reliable enough for a news website. I don't see evidence to the contrary even after reading the whole discussion above. Abhishek0831996 (talk) 04:49, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1 Per Tayi and Atlantic306.
  Even giants like NYT (Jayson Blair) and WaPo (Janet Cooke) have fell victim to hoaxes courtesy rogue reporters but such episodes are blips in a stellar record of journalism across the years. Much has been made out of the fact that the outlet had "quadrupled down" on the story in face of adverse comments (before coming to retract it) but such a defensive response is natural when one considers the sorry state of media freedom in India — anyway, for a comparison, Cooke's story had raised quite a many red flags in the newsroom and even by external observers but her editor chose to not buy them and instead nominated it for a Pulitzer!
  On the overall, I have a hard time believing that the OP has followed any media scandal in the past couple of decades. The RfC is misguided and unless The Wire develops a track record of producing similar dubious stuff, we shan't be revisiting this. TrangaBellam (talk) 05:49, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

• Let us see what a domain-expert who aided in debunking the fake story says:

  I do not think that The Wire as an organisation was complicit in this, if nothing else, because their behaviour was not consistent with that assumption. For instance, The Wire provided the identities of the experts to other people to verify. If you knew that these were forged, it is unlikely you would do that—you would make up an excuse about their safety and say, “We can’t tell you who it is,” or something like that.
  — Zhang, Sophie (2022-12-01). "What the Wire-Meta saga means for the future of tech-reporting". The Caravan.

• It is blindingly obvious that the publication was taken by a reporter — who has since been documented to have highly dubious antecedents and a propensity for pathological lying — for a ride. This gullibility does reflect poorly on the organization but it was possible only because — as Zhang notes — tech journalism has not yet developed in India. TrangaBellam (talk) 06:44, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

• I am also fascinated by the OP's attempt to discredit the Slate article in reply to V93 while bandying about the opinion-column in the Economist by Dominic Ziegler. Maybe they do not know about the "Banyan blog" but given their unusual confidence, I doubt it. TrangaBellam (talk) 07:02, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  Are you saying that the piece from The Economist isn't from their newsroom? — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 16:33, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

  Yes. TrangaBellam (talk) 18:07, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

  I had been thinking that it was. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 18:52, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1. Even the best publications like The Lancet (the Wakefield "vaccines cause autism" hoax) and The New York Times (the Jayson Blair incident) have, at some point or another, had these kind of screwups. What tells us if they are reliable is not that they never make an error, even a big one, as over enough time, they will. Rather, it is whether they own up to it, appropriately publish corrections and retractions, and generally seem to care that they made the error and commit to doing better going forward. If this becomes a pattern, we can revisit the issue, but that hasn't happened yet. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 15:23, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1 The best of news organizations get taken in by a story that's too good to pass up (Hitler diaries and the venerable The Sunday Times and Stern (magazine) come to mind). Unless there is a pattern of misreporting and poor editorial judgement, there is no reason to downgrade an otherwise respectable source. --RegentsPark (comment) 16:51, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  With all due respect, but Stern doesn't belong in the league of "green" sources. I've checked WP:perennial sources with relief not finding it there. They fell for Kujau's forgeries for a reason, and would have fallen for all other Kujaus to come; they were just spared because other potential Kujaus wouldn't choose Stern because of its borderline reputation, thus being a bad venue for propagating "high-quality" hoaxes. –Austronesier (talk) 21:23, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1 per Tayi, TrangaBellam etc. I have asked in the pre-RfC discussion if there is "any indication (ideally from a reliable source) that we should consider this to be more than a deplorable, yet individual incident?" and since then haven't seen anything that comes even close. Instead, I see a narrative that attempts to present The Wire in an undifferentiated manner as a wilful agent of fabricating false information, when no source actually support such a claim. Yes, it was reputation-shattering event, but no-one has provided evidence of a pattern of low editorial standards in their previous or subsequent output. –Austronesier (talk) 21:14, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1 - The problems that arose were in one narrow section of technology invesigative reporting, where the editorial board lacked sufficient expertise. I judge that The Wire handled it responsibly after problems were discovered. There is nothing here to castigate the media house. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 00:43, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
• Comment: I am not familiar enough with the source and haven't looked through all of the links but it seems to me that nobody arguing for options 2 or 3 is basing it on any pattern pre- or post- the recent Meta reporting. Use by others up to October 2022 suggests it was widely considered reliable until then. The very upfront and prominent apology suggests that lessons have been learnt. For us to move to anything other than option 1, I'd need to see evidence outside of the Meta stories. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:57, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1, they had a serious issue and according to the reliable sources they adequately addressed those issues and they are not indicative of widespread issues with their other reporting. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:21, 24 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 1. It is absurd for us to be even considering deprecating an otherwise reputed and trustworthy news website as unreliable for a solitary instance of a slip-up, where they not only retracted the story and formally acknowledged the oversight, but took corrective measures to guard against future recurrence of it. That, if anything, reflects credit on thier journalistic ethos. The Wire, indeed, for long have distinguished themselves, amongst all the partisan noise, with thier elaborate reportage, critical and erudite commentary and critique, high journalistic and writing standards. It would be a travesty to downgrade this eminently reliable source of information. MBlaze Lightning (talk) 19:42, 24 February 2023 (UTC)
• Option 3 per SpunkyGeek, Red-tailed hawk and DFlhb this is not a one time incident. Its reporting is very controversial it has been subject to several ongoing defamation suits by businessmen and politicians the number of cases disproportionately high for a website of its size.Here for example Bharat Biotech has filed 100 Crore ongoing suit against it here and Telangana court ordered them to take down 14 articles hereand herePharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 02:03, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

  Oh, come off it. That's such an absurd proposition and a travesty. Defamation suits by rogue "businessmen and politicians" ought not be construed a blemish on the The Wire's character; it is, if anything, a testament to their bold, intrepid and undaunted investigative journalism. Those are the earmarks that beckon amidst the jarring context of a conspicuous decline in press freedom in the country, where, paradoxically, an obtrusive section of the predominantly docile media hobnobs with a rogue, Hindu nationalist regime to boot, and disseminates disinformation to bamboozle a credulous populace. The Wire's investigative journalism has, notwithstanding the context, stood out as a torchbearer of journalism in the country. MBlaze Lightning (talk) 07:28, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

Being a target of legal cases is no evidence of unreliability, if this is so then most independent press in the country would become unreliable. Do you have any secondary reliable source documented anything wrong with the articles related to these cases? To my knowledge, there is none whatsover. To the contrary secondary reliable sources (including scholarly ones) describe them as instances of harassment, intimidation, attacks on press freedom, strategic lawsuits against public participation, etc.

Here the takedown order isn't even any kind of judgement, it's an ad interim ex parte injunction, i.e a temporary order (for the duration of the case) granted solely on the basis of one party's concern. In 2017, the same injuction was applied on a different case and dismissed after two years, it means absolutely nothing. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 10:00, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

• Option 1 (Weak vote) I am definitely not informed enough to make a unqualified !vote on this. There's clearly editors with agenda participating in this discussion, which seems to have driven up the back-and-forth engagement through the roof. However just reading all the arguments (and not having done enough background research of my own), I'm not convinced at all by any argument in favour of Option 3. There's a few facts that are being recycled through over and over in the hopes of convincing others, without addressing most of the core issues brought up by others. I'd request any closing admins to scrutinise policy behind the arguments very heavily. Soni (talk) 04:29, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• Option 3: I am moved by Red-tailed hawk, especially his reference to one of the most credible media outlets out there, The Economist, which not only lambasted The Wire's coverage on Meta and Tek Fog for "choosing partisanship over process", but also defined it as an anti-BJP religious bigot with the following, "wanting to believe is a fine quality in a pilgrim but a lousy one for holding power to account." Fayninja (talk) 10:05, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

References

Discussion: The Wire (India)

• @SpunkyGeek, Horse Eye's Back, Jayron32, Capitals00, Austronesier, Aquillion, Slywriter, and Bloodofox: I'm pinging you to notify you about this RfC, as you have all contributed to the discussion immediately preceding it. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 02:05, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
  • @DFlhb: as well. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 02:06, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  If I've missed someone who participated in the preceding discussion, feel free to ping them. I tried to go from bottom to top and think I got all the users who participated in the discussion, but it doesn't hurt to check. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 02:07, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• Note, I've left notices at Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Journalism regarding this discussion. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 14:04, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
• I never got your ping. Capitals00 (talk) 02:45, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  That's odd. You're in the list above (and I think other editors got their pings?). Has this issue affected anyone else? — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 16:29, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

I didn't get mine. Wasn't an issue though. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 01:58, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

@Red-tailed hawk, I suspect that your ping failed for everyone. This page lists the triggers for pings to work. Because your edit began with a change to an existing line—even though you added lines later on—I'm guessing Echo skipped it. The same thing probably happened with this edit as well. Woodroar (talk) 02:20, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Well, I guess I've learned what not to do. Thank you for the link; I'll keep it in mind the next time I try to send a mass ping. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 03:46, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Fox News Knew It Was A Lie: Fox News Purposely Pushed Deception On 2020 Voting

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

---

In case anyone hasn't noticed, the discovery process in the Dominion vs Fox case has uncovered damning info about how Fox knew Trump's "stolen election" Big lies were bogus, yet kept pushing the company's Murdoch agenda. “The messages exposed Fox News as a propaganda network.” Rupert Murdoch and his talking heads at Fox News all knew how ridiculous Rudy Giuliani sounded, and knew how wrong the big lie was, but they helped spread it.

As we have known for a long time, this is not an occasional "bug", but a "feature" of Fox News. For them, telling the uncomfortable truth in politics and science in the Trump age is only an occasional thing that gets the offender punished by their own colleagues and management. They must toe the party line.

Rupert Murdoch told Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott that they should try not to “antagonize Trump” by reporting the truth about bogus voter fraud claims and instead should focus on helping elect Republicans in the Georgia runoff elections. Fox has no written editorial guidelines. This is what distinguishes Fox News from an actual news organizations.

Hosts on Rupert Murdoch's propaganda channel Fox News, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, & Laura Ingraham, didn't believe the allegations of voter fraud in the 2020 election but chose to amplify the BIG LIE, according to court filings in Dominion's $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit.

Here are a few sources, all properly formatted for immediate use. Do not remove the "name" function:

It's too hard to maintain this list here, so I have created a subpage. Please look there for the growing list:

Isn't it about time we actually deprecate Fox News?

1. This was not accidental, or "all networks make mistakes".
2. This is not "misinformation", but deliberate "disinformation".
3. This is, and has been for a long time, a normal "feature" of their modus operandi.
4. It's not a one-time thing, but an autopsy over long-standing behavior.
5. It reveals their "journalists" have no moral scruples. The good ones have abandoned them.

They totally fail requirements for consideration as a RS. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:04, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

To me, the most alarming thing here is that Tucker Carlson demanded that Jacqui Heinrich be fired for fact-checking him, and the fact that Kristin Fisher, who since left the company, was disciplined for fact-checking Rudy Giuliani. These are alarming because those two were supposed to be part of Fox's news side, not its talk / opinion side; and our decision to leave some parts of Fox as WP:MREL for politics rather than unreliable or fully deprecated depended entirely on the assumption that Fox maintained a divide between those two parts. These things indicate that that's not the case; if there's a general pattern of the news side being essentially run like the talk side then that's a clear reason for another RFC given that the previous one's conclusion depended on at least some editors arguing that that wasn't happening. --Aquillion (talk) 04:14, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

While I'm not clamoring for another RFC just yet, I certainly agree with Aquillion's observation and Valjean's analysis. I'd be interested to hear from some of the editors who believed that status quo was a good outcome from the prior RFC (not from the "Fox is GENREL crowd" who I assume will never change their minds no matter what happens) whether this changes their mind at all. The previous RFC found a consensus that Fox News was not reliable, but did not find a consensus to pronounce it generally unreliable. In my mind, many of the arguments hinged on the idea that many news media are also unreliable (which is not an accurate or substantive argument in my view), the closer also said that there seemed to not be a general consensus of the level of standard we hold media to (or at least, what it would take to be "generally unreliable") I'm probably paraphrasing badly, but I think any new RFC should have a close read of the prior RFC's arguments and closing, and see if any of the "status quo" crowd could be persuaded before we engage in an endeavor that will likely end in a fruitless stalemate. Andre🚐 04:21, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Well, since WP:RS is about a source's overall reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, the main thing to do is probably to wait a bit and see if these things impact Fox's. Of course, I'm already on the record as saying repeatedly that I don't think Fox as a whole meets the threshold of having that reputation; but at the very least if followup coverage shows a clear decline in its overall reputation for fact-checking and accuracy among top-tier sources, then people who argue that it did meet that threshold, or came close enough to it to be WP:MREL in the case of politics, should have to explain how it continues to do so - especially if there's sustained coverage emphasizing the pressure on the news side to cover things inaccurately, coupled with evidence that the network's overall reputation for fact-checking and accuracy has been harmed as a result. --Aquillion (talk) 04:49, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I agree, I like the wait and see approach. This story is fresh and will likely have a protracted impact as more info comes out and analysis. Andre🚐 04:53, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Another thing that comes to mind, after reading coverage a bit more: One aspect I'm seeing a lot of focus on is the idea that Fox measurably changed tactics in response to the backlash from its base after it called Arizona for Biden - that is, there was a serious, deliberate shift at the top level to reposition the news side away from straight reporting and more towards essentially backing up the things said on the opinion side, at least when it came to the election. If that proves to be a broader and longer-term shift, and coverage reflects it, it might be worth having a future RFC be for post-2020 Fox coverage of politics, since this gives us a reason to think that the aftermath of the 2020 election and the backlash to Fox's news coverage there may have lead to changes that reduced its reliability. --Aquillion (talk) 21:13, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Good point. That also was mentioned last RFC. The 2020 Arizona call was offered as support for Fox's supposed quality reporting, which if that is the sea change point, therefore now a sign of the opposite. Andre🚐 21:40, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Not for nothing, but isn't basically all this does is confirm that the late night talk show hosts are not reliable, which is already the case? There's no question that there are serious factual errors with Hannity, The Ingraham Angle, and Tucker Carlson Tonight that render the programs unfit for citing on Wikipedia... but that's currently already what we note at WP:RSP. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 04:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

As stated above, most of the links provided above related to the TV talk shows (Fox News Channel), not the news website. Pertinent to for our purposes is what Aquillion lays out with the interference into the operation of the actual news portion. Curbon7 (talk) 04:27, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

First, we should be careful about using deposition testimony where claims haven't been challenged etc to decide that the news branch isn't reliable. This is especially true if the Dominion legal team is releasing this information in order to shape the public understanding before a trial or to push for a better settlement without a trial. Second, as others have noted, this seems to fit what we have already said, Fox talk shows are not reliable. I would also ask, what problem would further moves on Fox News solve? It's rarely cited as many editors treat it as if it's not reliable already. Springee (talk) 04:52, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

@Springee: I think you may have meant to say Fox talk shows aren't reliable. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 05:32, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that is what I meant. Corrected above! Springee (talk) 05:52, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

To pile on to an already spaghetti-like thread...

If the late hosts are already deprecated then what's to fix? The dominion complaints are against them. I hope the late night hosts for CNN, MSNBC, etc are also deprecated; those "journalists" are certainly anything but, and there are plenty of examples since 2016 (eg Russian interference, Hunter's laptop, "don't say gay" vs "parental rights in education").

Fox News is a multi-media corporation, and the tone and quality they place at Fox New Channel and the written material at Foxnews.com are markedly different. That is to say, the Channel is pretty bad and shouldn't be used really for anything (which is apparently already the case), but, on the other hand, the articles at foxnews.com are no more or less reliable than other major news outlets, like NYT, CNN, MSNBC. They've all apparently picked a side at this point, and should be skeptically read. There's quite a few of these liberally sided media companies that get the kid gloves when it comes to reliability assessments here on wikipedia. This unfortunately affects the articles' NPOV, since verifiability is prioritized over truth and there being more liberally sided media outlets over conservatively sided gives impressions of undue weight when conservatively minded sources are cited. If the ethos of due weight is widely held opinions on the topic, then the number of media outlets is not really the point, but the proxy. The point would be those that hold that opinion. Like it or not, when it comes to politics, conservative political opinions are grossly under-represented in terms of number of media outlets. So in this regard, if any "sided" media should get kid gloves if should be conservative media, so that there can be due weight.

I doubt I'll find any here who'd agree with that. How's about applying reliability metrics evenly and honestly in the first place? I have trouble taking a bathwater request about foxnews while the likes of CNN are cited carte blanch. A reassessment of our existing legacy media would be more appropriate. HC (talk) 23:37, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

NYT, CNN, and MSNBC are considered generally reliable, with 0 evidence to the contrary provided, but you may start a thread on those if you wish. Currently, Fox News (the news website) for politics, is considered marginally reliable and should not be used for contentious topics. The question here was that the Dominion case has shown that Fox News is propaganda through and through, and the "not news" side exerts an influence on the "news" side. So should Fox be downgraded even further? Some say it should. Some do not. But you seem to be confusing bias or slant with reliability. Some slanted sources, like Reason magazine, or Mother Jones, are considered reliable for facts but should be attributed for opinion (WP:RSOPINION). One conservative source that is reliable is the WSJ. Fox News.com is not considered generally reliable. Andre🚐 23:46, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

This sounds eerily familiar: "Fox News could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and boldly and knowingly lie about everything, and it wouldn't lose any voters, OK? It's, like, incredible." -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:28, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• We already don't use Hannity or Carlson or talking heads for factual reporting, and advise caution per Fox News political reporting per WP:FOXNEWSPOLITICS. This doesn't seem to concern Fox's straight news coverage. Are we to believe that that Kyle Jacobs is NOT dead or Bruce Willis does NOT have dementia just because Fox News reports it? Beyond jumping on the Fox News Hate Train and venting how much we despise Tucker, what more can Wikipedia do? --Animalparty! (talk) 04:47, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  That's neither here nor there because it concerns entertainment. The last RFC was constrained to science and politics. We should probably constrain any hypothetical or current discussion even further to just politics. Most Fox science content already fails MEDRS. Andre🚐 04:55, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

"Most Fox science content already fails MEDRS. " This is not unique to Faux News. The current standards for MEDRS in Wikipedia requires us to avoid most popular press articles on medical topics: "The popular press is generally not a reliable source for scientific and medical information in articles. Most medical news articles fail to discuss important issues such as evidence quality, costs, and risks versus benefits, and news articles too often convey wrong or misleading information about health care." Dimadick (talk) 07:45, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I know, that's why I meant if we had an RFC to downgrade Fox we should do so only for politics, since science probably isn't much use anyway. Andre🚐 19:31, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• Are we to believe that that Kyle Jacobs is NOT dead or Bruce Willis does NOT have dementia just because Fox News reports it?

This is a meaningless comparison, as sources that we have already deprecated also produce factual content too. That doesn't change the fact that they were deprecated for a reason, which is due to actively producing disinformation that meant they couldn't be trusted as a generality, even if they might technically produce factual content as well. Silverseren^C 05:42, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• Has Fox News been used for anything remotely controversial since the last RfC? If the answer is no, then our process already work and there is no need to expend the time and energy necessary to further split the hair.Slywriter (talk) 05:15, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

• A key word in all these reports is court filings. These are unproven claims. I know its really tempting to jump on these to use to dismiss Fox News, but we cannot use such court documents as valid source to speak of something in Wikivoice. --Masem (t) 14:45, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
  • Masem, the commentary from RS is about the actual evidence, the internal Fox News/Murdoch communications that reveal they knew they were pushing crazy BS. We do not need to wait for any legal judgment. We have what RS say, and they say a lot, including about how this isn't just about the talking heads we already ignore, but about how the Fox News organization operates, including the news division. They literally have no written editorial policy. They just follow Murdoch's agenda, and it has always been anti-democracy and make money by any means possible. That's the history of Murdoch and his empire.
  • Fox News threatens, punishes, and fires those employees, including in the news division, who fact-check BS pushed by the news division. Complaints between each other is kept private and separate from what is revealed to the public. Open fact-checking is discouraged and punished. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

    Its evidence in a court case. We cannot assume the evidence is true until it has passed through the court, where if they are true, it will be part of the court's decision. This is a requirement of how we handle information from any ongoing court case, so we absolutely have to wait until the court decides to then take the court's decision and stance on this evidence as true. I will stress that I personally think the evidence is all true, and the court case against Fox is very much falling against them, but from being a Wikipedia editor, I have to recognize that we don't presently have the appropriate filter (the final decision) to treat it as truth.

    Besides, as Blueboar points out, even if this all proves too, this doesn't change how Fox News would be classified at RSP; we still have to use extreme caution of using Fox News non-opinion works for politics. Masem (t) 17:32, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  • I don't think there is any proposal to directly use court documents to write article content about Fox News in Wikivoice. We absolutely can use evidence which does not meet RS standards to evaluate a source on RSP. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 07:50, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• No need to change anything - We already say that Fox’s coverage of politics is unreliable, and we already say that opinion journalism from the likes of Hannity and Carlson is unreliable. Blueboar (talk) 15:11, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

To be clear, we currently list Fox's coverage of politics as yellow / WP:MREL, not unreliable. Many people, including people contributing to this discussion, have used this to argue against the removal of plainly controversial things related to politics that are cited solely to Fox, or to argue for using it in situations where it is the only source saying something. --Aquillion (talk) 19:34, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Indeed, it has come up at least a handful of times since the last RFC, such as the Twitter Files and the Hunter Biden laptop controversy. There are still those who want to use Fox News for plainly controversial political topics. Andre🚐 21:44, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Factual items reported by Fox but few others should be what then? Discarded? MREL is a reasonable place to put it, especially since liberally sided media that's arguably just as bad is rated better. HC (talk) 23:46, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Do you have an example of a factual item that was carried by Fox or the likes of Daily Wire, The Blaze, Breitbart, et al, but ignored by mainstream reliable source? Andre🚐 23:52, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

You quote some yourself... Twitter's liberal bias has been alleged by conservative media for a decade, and is coming to a head with the twitter files, while legacy media more or less pretends it's not happening while they rail against their once loved Musk and his Teslas. The NYP was literally blocked over the laptop story. Everyone else in the legacy media seized on it as "Russian disinformation", and now like usual more or less pretend it's not happening. The lab leak theory was also heavily censored and criticized, while conservative media explored it. And again, years later, some quiet recognition that it's possible and there maybe should be some investigations... Conservative media was on these things long before the others. The trouble with labeling the handful of semi-reliable conservative media as unreliable for "controversial" topics is that wikipedia then gets filled with the much larger number of semi-reliable liberal media outlets on these topics and almost never gets the controversy actually cataloged. This becomes a due weight problem. There should be more conservatively sided media quoted on these controversial topics, since the fact that there's a second popular opinion is exactly the reason there is a controversy in the first place. A bathwater toss for fox news will not bring better NPOV to wikipedia, but more likely the opposite. HC (talk) 00:08, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

Those are examples of using controversial, politically charged topics, where Fox should definitely not be used by consensus. This applies to pretty much all of the items you just listed. So you're basically proving my point. Fox News should not be used to justify right-wing fringe conspiracy theories like the lab leak theory, the Hunter Biden conspiracy theory, or the completely lacking in substance Twitter Files story. These are all right-wing conspiracy topics that absolutely should not be covered in Wikipedia the way they are covered in Fox News. Andre🚐 00:45, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

First, like it or not, they are not fringe ideas. A very large chunk of American voters and their reps, senators, and governors hold some assessment of these issues that is in stark contrast to what you see from say the NYT or CNN. These conservative assessments are underrepresented in the media, which is to say, among the list of wikipedia RS, not many of those are willing to talk about them. Conservative media however is dominant in talk radio, but citing and using talk radio as a source is very hard, in addition to the similar quick dismissals like yours here. Secondly, they aren't "conspiracy theories" like they don't exist or something. They are real things with real facts around them that are more or less ignored by the wikipedia list of RS. So, by wp:weight they absolutely should be discussed, and by Fox currently being at wp:MREL they certainly can be used when those assessments are based on facts. Further, your quick "fringe conspiracy theories" label is not only wrong, but you are using it to discard the WP:BABY with the bathwater.

You use the word "controversial" in the same way, as if the very definition of that word precludes certain kinds of opinions from validity, when in fact validity of the conflicting opinions is difficult to ascertain and easy to misrepresent. This usage is very typical of liberally sided media; conservative opinions are controversial, when actually it is the topic that is surrounded in controversy, as in, there are conflicting opinions. HC (talk) 20:11, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

It really doesn't matter if there is a 30% of the United States population of eligible voter that believes crazy stuff. This is Wikipedia. Weight is proportional to prominence of RS. We are looking for academic sources, reliable books, reliable news (NOT conservative talk radio). This is NOT going to change - ever. Andre🚐 21:46, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

We should be very much aware that if the opinion about a topic is that fundamentally split to that great of a degree that we should cover it, but at the same time, the coverage of the counter-point (eg what the 30% believe) should be documented to RSes, if those RSes are doing a reasonable objective coverage of a topic. EG: The NYtimes still is generally good here that they explain "proponents of the bill believe X. opponents believe y", and important rarely try to judge which side is right if it is non-opinion piece. That's good, that's the type of reporting we want.

But in today's media we have both problems with accountability journalism that will belittle points that do not agree with the writer's or newspaper's stance, or that they will give almost no time to the other side, assuming their side is correct. If there is a controversy, we on WP should be aiming to coverage the basic arguments on both sides (without assigning weight or correctness) before getting into opinions about the controversy, and even then we should be avoiding the inclusion of too much opinion of more recent controversies per RECENTISM. Most of the time, we can achieve this coverage by RSes but there is the potential for cases where the media gives zero representation about the factual beliefs of the other side. In which case, using a source like Fox News to explain the conservative's side of an argument to give sufficient balance. I stress this is not going into opinion and quote-heavy responses (that starts to get into unduly self-serving territory), just enough to be able to define, neutrally and concisely, why there is this controversy in the world. But again, this is only a possibility that I can see happening with the media trending as it is, and more cautionary than anything else. I think its key to remember that we have created the RS and RSP rules to quickly limit the use the bad sourced for 99% of the cases editors seem to want to use them for, so they serve a purpose, but they are also not hard and fast rules, and even if we make Fox News fully unreliable, I would think there are still applicable IAR in hypothetical cases. Masem (t) 22:03, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

the factual beliefs? soibangla (talk) 22:17, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

A statement of fact regarding one's beliefs. Eg "Christians believe Christ died to absolve them of their sins." In wikivoice, that doesn't give any factual weight to "Christ died to..." but it does give factual weight to this being a core tenet of Christianity. Masem (t) 22:26, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

We can argue about where the line exists, but using a source like Fox News to explain the conservative's side of an argument to give sufficient balance. sounds dangerously like a WP:FALSEBALANCE. If every source is ignoring a story or giving it limited weight and it's getting disproportionately covered by partisan attack sites that are marginally or barely reliable, that is a good reason not to want to cover it much or at all. Andre🚐 22:18, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

A one sentence summary of a side's position against a one sentence summary of the other side's position in a controversial situation is the minimum I would expect. That's not a FALSEBALANCE. What would then become a false balance would be trying to justify the side that has nearly no coverage in RSes by pulls lots from non-RSes, as to try to balance out when the other side with lots of RS coverage. Once you have the one-sentence-type summaries for both sides, there's no more need to have tit-for-tat in any further additions, and otherwise DUE should be followed appropriately. But to only give explanation for one side and nothing for the other is a non-neutral stance, as it infers the one side with all the explanation must be right. Masem (t) 22:24, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Certainly, this tit for tat form is far too common on wiki articles. It makes for terrible choppy reading that doesn't really explain much. That's really why I started editing only a month ago, trying to get a pretty bad article that was mostly accurate, but just awful to read. When explaining a position that is popular, but maybe quacky, and in our current media scape where most text news (the easiest to cite) is going to be liberally minded, we have to remember that the most accurate descriptions of one side of a controversy are going to be from that side itself. Unfortunately, a lot of wiki articles leave very bare explanations of the conservative side, mostly because wikipedia is very hard on those conservative sources. In other words, WP:MREL is just about right. (After that, we'd have to watch for wp:weasel words, like "X claims, without evidence, ..." Well, they do provide evidence typically, it's just disagreed what that evidence means, hence the controversy. HC (talk) 22:40, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• It's absolutely WP:FALSEBALANCE if no reliable sources cover it. The premise of your argument is that any position taken by "the conservative side" is always valid and worth reporting on for any given topic, which is simply not true. Climate change, COVID, and the 2020 election are the most obvious examples and are cases where I would strenuously oppose including any mention at all of a position that can only be cited to Fox, since they are clearly unreliable for those things. If all reliable sources say something is uncontroversially true, WP:NPOV means we are required to reflect that in our articles, and it is inappropriate to imply otherwise by shoehorning in an unreliable source. Keep in mind that in most cases, where there is an actual debate, we can cite the bare existance of a debate to secondary sources - for something to be only citable to Fox, that means that every reliable source in existence treats it as totally settled or as a nonissue. Using a low-quality source like Fox, alone, to argue otherwise would be a clear WP:NPOV violation. And I have a deeper concern about your expressed desire to boil things down to one-sentence summaries of what you personally see as the "two sides"; not everything boils cleanly down to two sides. By dividing everything into two camps, identifying Fox as the standard-bearer for one of them, and insisting that the "Fox side" be represented on every topic where Fox weighs in, you're effectively saying that every article should be structured around that two-sides worldview and framing regardless of the sources. That's a NPOV and TONE violation; we structure our articles around the preponderence of sources. When there is a clear debate, the sources will say so; when there's a minority view worth discussing, we'll be able to find WP:RSes at least covering it. But if the sources overwhelmingly do not treat something as a controversial left-right American political issue, asserting that it is and shoehorning in a single Fox piece dissenting from all other coverage would be inappropriately inserting our own worldview into articles and giving undue / WP:FALSEBALANCE weight to Fox specifically and to the viewpoints used as a framing in general. The simple reality is that on some topics, and in some fields, the left-right perspective is not relevant - and we determine when it is or when it isn't based on high-quality sources, not based on "one MREL source exists somewhere that disagrees with this." --Aquillion (talk) 22:49, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  "The premise of your argument is that any position taken by "the conservative side" is always valid and worth reporting on for any given topic" I did not say that... I'll rephrase and try to say it in less words. In descriptions of controversies, the opinions are going to be most accurately described by those that hold the opinions, and they certainly won't be accurately described by opponents.

  "I have a deeper concern about your expressed desire to boil things down to one-sentence summaries of what you personally see as the "two sides"". Well, first, I said the opposite about one sentence summaries. That they make bad tit-for-tat reading. Secondly, that misconception led you down a deep rabbit hole that is not sensibly relevant to anything I said. HC (talk) 23:22, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  Ah, I was replying to Masem, not you (check the indents.) My objection is that, by my reading, the implication of Masem's argument is that we must always include the "conservative side" (or, to be fair, the "liberal side" or whatever) of any issue provided it exists somewhere, regardless of whether the sources support it being significant or relevant. That isn't how we write articles - we determine what aspects we cover based on the level of coverage in WP:RSes. I don't think that the bare fact that something has been covered by Fox News automatically makes it worthy of inclusion; and I certainly I object to their argument that we must automatically include it so its "side" is always represented. In reality, when something breaks down into multiple sides worth discussing, we should be able to find WP:RSes saying so. As far as your comments go, I broadly agree with you that tit-for-tat stuff is dangerous, but it's also important to point out that WP:DUE weight is relative, so in certain situations - where there is coverage for multiple divergent viewpoints of roughly equivalent weight - it is appropriate to either add it all or remove it all, but would be inappropriate to include just one (I only object to Masem's presumption that that is automatic, not to the idea that we should often write articles that way.) Removing it all can avoid the "editors arguing in the main page by proxy" problem that I think you're correct about, but sometimes for one reason or another that's not an option - in that case all we can do is weigh things according to coverage in the sources. And there are also cases where top-tier coverage is so utterly one-sided and clear about XYZ being the facts (climate change being the obvious example) that presenting it as "something with two sides" or framing the facts as opinions or the like would be a WP:NPOV violation. --Aquillion (talk) 23:41, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I have long stood on the principle that if we (Wikipedia) are describing something as a "controversy" then we should have a very very brief statement of what each side in the controversy should say - here, a one sentence summary - and after that, DUE coverage takes over. We are definitely not like a debate where each side gets the same amount of time (that's a false balance), but we're also not that lobsided in coverage to not speak of a basic single sentence of what one side claims (if zero RS talk about it) and yet say is a controversy is a problem. Again, there should be enough in present RSes that we can make a single statement to the RS's majority.

  And And there are also cases where top-tier coverage is so utterly one-sided and clear about XYZ being the facts (climate change being the obvious example) ... No, we cannot do that without breaking neutrality, particularly when talking about subjective and controversial facets that are within the realm of RECENTISM. There's still a way to write that nearly all RSes all agree on a point ("X is widely considered ..." rather than "X is..." and keep our language neutral. The notion "RSes are always infallable" is simply incompatible with NPOV, while simple easy language changes make wikivoice still reflect reality nor give the fringe opinions any time maintains our respect for RSes without necessarily worshipping them as perfect sources. Masem (t) 00:02, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

  Just to be completely clear, are you asserting that we must include "both sides" even in the case of climate change, and that the view that it is happening must be presented as mere attributed opinion anyplace it appears simply because Fox News publishes pieces that disagree? I could be getting my wires crossed, but I was under the impression that in previous discussions you asserted that climate change was different somehow. I wouldn't usually even ask, since it's a clear-cut and extremely well-settled matter, but I noticed that you included my parenthetical about how it is a clear-cut case in the quote you said you disagreed with. If you're now saying that we must present what you consider "both sides" even for that, there's not really anything to discuss; certainly you must be aware that your argument is extremely far outside of our current Wikipedia practice and policy - there are some things worth debating when coverage is minimal but falls short of being WP:FRINGE; but at a bare minimum WP:PROFRINGE and WP:FALSEBALANCE clearly and unambiguously forbid us from both-sidesing anything where one perspective is unambiguously fringe, while WP:NPOV unambiguously forbids us from presenting clearly-established facts as opinions. You can argue over what's fringe, or what's clearly established fact, or the like; but if you're arguing that nothing can be presented as fact as long as anyone anywhere disagrees, then your argument has no possible basis in policy. And if you're not arguing that, then you'll have to be more clear about where you want to draw the line. Even in less clear-cut disputes - while RSes are not always infallabe, per WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS it is inappropriate to try and use Wikipedia to try and "correct the record." We can include something based on the argument of "this has significant representation in the sources, even though it's a minority view"; the argument of "I think Fox is an RS and therefore we can use it for minority viewpoints", while I think it is wrong, is at least defensible under policy. But the argument you're presenting here seems to go beyond that - we are never permitted to write articles from the perspective of "yeah, the sources all clearly agree that X is true, but I personally think they might all be wrong or biased in this topic area, so we need to shoehorn in any disagreement that I can find, no matter how low-quality or obscure, and present the overwhelming consensus of sources as opinion no matter where it appears." That's simply not how we work - ultimately, our coverage is decided by sources, not personal beliefs or skepticism. --Aquillion (talk) 04:59, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, I'm glad that's not up to just you. HC (talk) 22:48, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• The current consensus is that Fox talking heads on cable TV != the Fox News website, and nothing here seems to contest that. While I believe that our policy on WP:PARTISAN sources is far too forgiving, this doesn't seem like it changes anything. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 15:04, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

The site routinely posts primetime content without being disclosed as opinion, attributed to "Fox News Staff."[10][11][12] soibangla (talk) 15:52, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I think the point was, what do WE need to change in the way how we treat Fox? Slatersteven (talk) 15:57, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Fox News threatens, punishes, and fires those employees, including in the news division, who fact-check the news division when it pushes BS, and it does. Internal complaints are kept private and separate from what is revealed to the public. Open fact-checking is discouraged and punished. Murdoch dictates that for everyone, including the news division.

What we need to change is to make it official that Wikipedia deprecates Fox News. What we do and our policies must be in sync with each other. We need to stop giving Fox a "Trump exemption" which protects high-profile right-wing BS here. Fox is no more sacred than Trump, and we finally, after far too long, acquiesced to the overwhelming weight of RS that confirmed Trump is a pathological liar and started doing what RS did, to call him a "liar" in wikivoice. We should have, without question, right from the beginning, followed what RS said, but we didn't. Our history of giving right-wing sources a longer rope than left-wing sources is a spot on our reputation.

We need to officially stop giving them a free pass. We need to be able to point to an official position, just as we do with any other source that pushes BS. Why treat Fox differently for the same crimes as New York Post, Daily Mail, The Federalist, OAN, Drudge Report, Breitbart News, Newsmax, RedState, InfoWars, The Daily Wire, The Daily Caller, Conservative Tribune, and Townhall? There is no justification for treating Fox News differently. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I’m not sure how you can say we give Fox a “free pass” when we explicitly state that Fox is considered unreliable for certain topics (politics being highlighted). Blueboar (talk) 17:47, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Because we deprecate other sources guilty of knowingly and consistently pushing BS. Accidental or occasional misinformation happens to all RS, but a sustained pattern of real disinformation? No, that's where we draw the line, EXCEPT for Fox News. That's so wrong. Why make an exception for Fox News? They cannot be trusted.

Sure, they also report accurate news, while they deliberately ignore and refuse to report on topics that go against the Murdoch/GOP/Trump agenda. They sin by omission an awful lot. Unlike other networks, Fox is Murdoch's machine, not a real news organization. It's a propaganda network. His agenda is the editorial policy, which explains why they have no written editorial policy. Murdoch instructed them to not antagonize Trump.

Is there really no sin bad enough to get Fox News deprecated? Do they really have to "shoot someone on 5th Avenue" and we still won't deprecate them? That's what you're telling me. How long will we completely ignore our own requirements for a RS? Tell me where your red line is located in this matter. There seems to literally be no bottom, no red line, that will cause us to ever deprecate them. Please tell me that's not true. Where is your red line? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:12, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Ah… I see, you want to see the magic word “deprecated”. Meh… I don’t see the need. We already say Fox should not be used for politics… that restriction is effectively deprecation where it matters. Using a magic word is pointless. Blueboar (talk) 18:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Let's be clear, the distinction is not simply semantic. Currently Fox News is considered not generally reliable and should not be used for controversial statements in politics. We haven't declared it generally unreliable and generally should not be used for any politics. In my view, a downgrade would move it from Option 2 to Option 3 for politics. That is not the same as deprecated - it would move from WP:MREL to WP:GUNREL for politics. Andre🚐 18:36, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Whether it's "deprecated" or just "Option 3", let's just move it down. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:40, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Meh… I guess we will just have to agree to disagree. I think the previous consensus (current statement) adequately restricts how and when to use Fox, and am content to leave it as is. Blueboar (talk) 19:15, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I'm of this opinion also. MREL is fine. Regarding about politics, I think there's an argument to up that placement before there's one to downgrade it. I posted above about it. HC (talk) 23:52, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

There was a time when the network's mendacity was largely limited to its primetime hours, but in more recent years it has metastasized throughout the day, from Fox&Friends in the morning to Outnumbered in the afternoon to Jesse Watters leading into primetime. It's now pervasive and the sheer volume of it can be hard to keep up with. Fortunately there are several folks on Twitter who watch all of it and post video clips throughout the day. The network "went big" on mendacity to adopt the "say anything" Trump style and is now overwhelmingly propaganda sprinkled with some "real" news here and there, but there's copious examples of even that being poisoned with lies. The entire enterprise, including its website that reflects and amplifies its programming, simply cannot be trusted on anything. That it is the 800-pound gorilla of conservative media matters not. soibangla (talk) 18:59, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Are you saying we should trust random and likely ideologically motivated people on twitter to aid in making our choices? Isn't that like using Libs of Tiktok to define the views of those on the left? Springee (talk) 19:05, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

"is now overwhelmingly propaganda sprinkled with some "real" news here and there" That much of their political content is propaganda has been rather clear for years. But I am under the impression that their crime coverage tends towards sensationalism and alarmism. I keep coming across online articles which note that the Fox news audience is convinced that there is some kind of crime epidemic. Dimadick (talk) 08:08, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

You could say the same about other topics and other news sites. News sites that have a more generous wikipedia reliability rating. eg, I'd bet the CNN audience thinks thousands of unarmed black men are killed by cops annually. Including the armed and all races, it barely breaks 1000. [13]. Sensationalism and alarmism are the coin of the realm, they just favor different sensations and alarms. HC (talk) 23:56, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Statista is GUNREL... JoelleJay (talk) 00:27, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

• This is just court filings around talk shows which we deem unreliable already not much to see here. Again editors conflating the talk shows with the website.  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 19:33, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  Well, it’s not just the talk shows if the talk show hosts got a news division reporter fired for fact checking their narrative. The current rating for Fox News (politics and science) is “reliability unclear”. Is it really still unclear after all the resignations, revelations, books, etc.? Also, it appears some editors believe the website is the same as the news division. But, it looks more like the talk shows with attacks against one party for years. Last time this came up, I asked for the names of the people considered in the news division and don’t think I got an answer. I can’t find this on Google as I keep getting Hanity, Carlson, etc. Who are the people that are considered green at RS/PS? O3000, Ret. (talk) 20:02, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  I would list Bret Baier as probably the most prominent name in their news division. Blueboar (talk) 13:38, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

  Blueboar, I agree. NPR wrote this:

  "On Nov. 5, 2020, just days after the election, Bret Baier, the network's chief political anchor texted a friend: "[T]here is NO evidence of fraud. None. Allegations - stories. Twitter. Bulls---."

  and we have this:

  Bret Baier and Chris Wallace Complained to Fox News Heads About Tucker Carlson Capitol Riot Special (Report)

  Good for them, but even as news anchors, they were not allowed to publicly express such views. Wallace is now at CNN. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:59, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

  Objective3000 asked for the name of someone in the News Division, I gave one of the more prominent ones. More to the point, Baier is someone at Fox who does not engage in the sort of crap complained about in the lawsuit. I would consider Baier’s reporting very reliable. If you think otherwise, please explain why? Blueboar (talk) 22:14, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

  Blueboar, I agree. He's good. Unfortunately, he's not the only one there, and the corporation mixes the opinion and news stuff in deceptive ways ALL THE TIME, and when good people like Baier object, they get told to keep their opinions off-air or they get in trouble.

  They can tell the truth about non-GOP, non-Trump, non-COVID, non-vaccines, non-climate change, topics ad libitum, add nauseum, so that really means we have no use for them and should tell editors and the world we can't trust them to tell the truth all the time, and can't trust them to tell the truth when it's against their fringe right-wing political agenda and their anti-science agenda. There is no justification for not downgrading their status. If we don't deprecate them, we should upgrade Daily Mail and some other deprecated sites that are better than Fox News. Fox's popularity makes it a dangerous site. I don't think we should do that, so I still think we're violating our own policies and sending a horrible message to the world by not deprecating them, especially in light of all these solid revelations.

  The world looks to Wikipedia, and our quibbling here is visible and will be compared to the internal quibblings by the Fox News people, and those who refuse to deprecate will end up looking like Hannity and Carlson, who refused to tell the truth. We know that editors end up getting named in the press. I got hung out by Breitbart as a "Russiagate truther" because I still think Russia interfered in the 2016 elections. (I'll take that as a badge of honor, considering it's from Breitbart!) -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 00:48, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

  Did they actually get anyone on the news side fired or did they just talk about it between a few hosts? This is one of the big issues with internal coms like this. Things said in the context of anger/frustration can be presented as carefully laid plans by an opposing party. So far it looks like the news side did what we would want it to do. It reported the facts even though it didn't align with the talk shows. Springee (talk) 20:20, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  They attempted to get her fired calling Suzanne Scott, the network’s chief executive. Instead, the post she made factchecking Trump was deleted. That is they did not report the facts that didn't align with the talk shows. O3000, Ret. (talk) 20:52, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  The top story on the site right now is Ronny Jackson, a hardcore Trump supporter, alleging a coverup in Biden's health report.[14]] Is that news, or conspiracy theorizing? Anyone ever taken a look at Jackson's twitter feed? Whoo-boy. This is typical of the site. soibangla (talk) 20:41, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  [15] soibangla (talk) 20:29, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

  That is a link to a previous post of yours. How is that meant to be interpreted in context of Spy-cicle's comments? Springee (talk) 20:32, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

"Fox News Knew It Was A Lie". Yes. And we knew they knew. That's why they're considered unreliable for politics. Nothing changed here. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:20, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

It's interesting how many people claim Fox News is already considered unreliable, full stop, for politics. However, the close of the last RFC found it was marginally reliable and should not be used as a high-quality source for controversial claims. Which is one notch more reliable than generally unreliable. If we think it is generally unreliable, we should write that and reflect that. Andre🚐 21:42, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Bingo! Sadly, above I asked Blueboar:

"Is there really no sin bad enough to get Fox News deprecated? ... Tell me where your red line is located in this matter. There seems to literally be no bottom, no red line, that will cause us to ever deprecate them. Please tell me that's not true. Where is your red line?"

Still no answer. Our policy on how we define a RS should be enough, but it's being ignored when it comes to Fox News. They are Teflon. Sad. I want an answer from Blueboar: "Where is your red line, since deliberate disinformation isn't enough?" -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 00:03, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

I don’t actually HAVE a “red line”. I have never liked the concept of “deprecation”, because I strongly believe in judging sources on a citation by citation context. And even the “worst” sources can be reliable in specific contexts… Just as the “best” sources can be unreliable in specific contexts. To judge whether a source is reliable, you need to examine the specific statement we are attempting to verify with that source, and ask whether the source is reliable in that specific context. The more extraordinary the statement, the more extraordinarily reliable the source must be.

I agree that Fox does not rate as an “extraordinary” source (and even that it is a “poor” source)… and so 100% agree with saying it should not be used for verifying extraordinary claims (and the claims about election fraud in 2020 certainly qualify as extraordinary). But then, that is a criticism I think is true for ALL media outlets. Blueboar (talk) 01:22, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• What this comes down to is that there is a network that calls itself a “news network” watched by hundreds of millions of people worldwide that allows, and apparently pushes, outright falsehoods to be published saying that United States elections are a fraud, Covid restrictions are a fraud, etc. – and we allow it to be used as a source. Folks, drop any biases you may have and remember that this is an encyclopedia. There are so many sources that have proved their ability to correct errors, use multiple sources, gain Pulitzers for exposing problems on both sides of any aisle. Let us use them and not bother with (and give credence to) a corporation whose management allows (at the least) lies and misinformation -- misinformation that dangers democracy and health (among other problems). What do we lose by reducing the rating of a dangerous source when there exist so many that have proved their worth over a very long time? And please, let us stop this claim that all media sources do what Fox does. There is no evidence that anything this dramatic is occurring in what we call RS.. O3000, Ret. (talk) 01:43, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Here's a Fox "News" story. What's the first thing readers see? A Jesse Watters clip.[16] And in this "news" story? Laura Ingraham[17]. And here's another "news" story entitled "Black Lives Matter at School Week of Action kicks off for thousands of U.S. schools." Sounds reasonable, right? But what do readers see first? A Tucker Carlson clip with guest Candace Owens calling BLM a scam.[18] And here's Paul Gigot and Kim Strassel et al. of the WSJ editorial board in a "news" story.[19]. And Hannity with a "news" story.[20] It just goes on and on. See how they insidiously inject their opinion programming into their "news" site? It's baked in. By contrast, at minimum MSNBC shows in their URLs that their stories are from opinion shows, and typically displays that on the page or notes it's an opinion piece. soibangla (talk) 03:21, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

It is completely inappropriate to consider what the website version delievers, particularly when the labeling of the video is clear it is not related to the story given by the headline. It's why when evaluating reliability we ignore everything like the headline itself, ads, etc - all that matters is the copy of the article text. They are not the only website that forces video on the reader, and while most other websites usually include video of the story that the article talks about, they have other content in that video block carosel (eg: like at CBS News [21]). BTW, Fox News absolutely does delineate opinion from news pieces in terms of what they present at text. There are other sources like the AP that does not do this.

Remember that every media source is fighting for viewers and drawing readers to their site. Some are more ethical about that, but every bit of trying to grab viewership draw rather than focusing on the news weakens the site's integrity. Masem (t) 03:51, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

It is completely inappropriate to consider what the website version delievers I don't understand, we're talking about links to the site that some editors want to use as references here

particularly when the labeling of the video is clear it is not related to the story given by the headline There is no video labeling. Readers click the story and are presented a video that is ostensibly "the news," but actually it's the view of a mendacious polemicist. Many people (particularly since 54% of American adults cannot read to a 6th grade level) will likely watch the 2-minute clip rather than read the article, and walk away thinking they got "the news." But they haven't, they've been fed partisan opinion. By contrast, when CNN includes a clip in a story, it's from a straight-up newscast that conforms with the more extensive text reporting beneath it.

all that matters is the copy of the article text Oftentimes on its front page CNN shows headlines with a little "play" icon, denoting a video news report with just a short caption, not a text story. If an editor were to write "CNN reported..." would it be impermissible to use that source because it's not text?

while most other websites usually include video of the story that the article talks about I can't think of another news site that uses clips other than a news clip to accompany the article text. Fox News commonly presents opinion clips, without disclosure.

AP that does not do this I'm not aware AP publishes opinion pieces that writers submit, but if they do I suspect those opeds would be clearly labeled as such.

Fox News absolutely does delineate opinion from news pieces in terms of what they present at text As text, perhaps. But not holistically, including their video content, as I've demonstrated, and CNN doesn't do what Fox does, where readers click a story to what might be legitimate news and instead get Tucker Carlson. This is not by accident, it's by design, and if legitimate news outlets also do it, I haven't seen it. It's a devious practice that Fox News uses to insinuate its editorial stance into everything their audience sees on the network, and its site. This might be imperceptible to some who are not paying close attention. soibangla (talk) 16:16, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

The Fox videos have a bolt title and a brief description immediately below the video, impossible to miss. That's the labeling.

See #opinion pieces published by the AP? for the recent determination that AP offers unlabeled opinion pieces.

And I stress that we do not focus on the embellishments in the web presentation of a prose story. Videos, ads, pictures, interactive features, etc. Not just for Fox News but for all media website.

Now I can fully accept the "by design" argument that Fox News wants to push certain content, that's obvious, but every news website is also playing the drawing of eyes to keep viewers on their pages. Maybe not to the same degree as Fox, and not to their opinion pieces, but they do the same thing of trying to distract you from wanting to leave their website. --Masem (t) 16:25, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

What I meant by label was disclosure as opinion, not content summary. There is no disclosure.

Wow, AP published an oped, I'll be damned. How common is that?

we do not focus on the embellishments but does that mean the CNN scenario I described is impermissible?

There is a big difference between engagement/retention and systematically insinuating opinions into news. soibangla (talk) 16:47, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

The fact that some Fox News articles also have clips of opinion programming says nothing about the reliability of the underlying article, and as long as we are citing only article content, not the talking head video, then the only reason to complain about the source is moral panic about "what if viewers are exposed to bad opinions?" It's like wanting to deprecate Playboy (which is GREL) because people clicking a link to an interview might see nudity. Sources sources don't even need to be online to be reliable. We could cite a Fox News article without including a convenience link, or a rare undigitized academic library book that happens to be shelved next to a copy of Mein Kampf, without affecting reliability at all. --Animalparty! (talk) 05:05, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

• Comment I find myself in agreement with Aquillion and Andrevan's concerns. I would not prefer an immediate RfC for total deprecation but we ought to keep a close watch at this news-cycle. TrangaBellam (talk) 18:20, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Keep in mind that Fox News is still refusing to cover this scandal. We do need an article about it: Fox News "voter fraud" scandal. When this Dominion trial is finished, we can do this better, but there is already enough RS coverage to start the article.

The mark of a RS news agency or other news source is not that they never make mistakes, but that they immediately correct and apologize. Fox News, RIGHT NOW!!!, is refusing to do this. They would lose face too much with their Trump base. They tied their news and opinion sides together with Trump as the only guiding light, and down the rabbit hole the whole Fox News enterprise went. Now they can't admit it publicly to their viewers without it being such a major catastrophe that they fear sinking their own ship. So they are doing what they have always done, hiding the inconvenient facts from their viewers, because Trump has told them that all other sources are fake news. Those viewers will continue thinking that "all this mainstream talk about Fox News hosts thinking Trump was lying about the election" is just fake news.

In the face of all this, Wikipedia still refuses to deprecate or downgrade them, even though, on much flimsier grounds, we deprecated The Daily Mail for far less serious offenses. We should upgrade The Daily Mail (only a tiny bit) and deprecate Fox News. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:10, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Why wouldn't Fox cover this story? They are being sued over the core of this story. One of the things any competent legal team will tell their client before a trial is make no public statements. Covering this content would be exactly that. It would totally ignore the reality of the legal issues to expect Fox to cover claims that they libeled Dominion before the trial. That is akin to saying, "if the suspect is innocent, why doesn't he take the stand and say so?" Springee (talk) 21:22, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Oh snap! Springee, you make a good point. What a pickle, not that they would apologize even if not being sued, but we can't know. What we know is that their listeners will continue to believe what has been reported, and even though Fox will likely not dare continue to repeat "stolen election" lies, they will not be able to correct the record. Fox viewers will continue in their delusional bubble and refuse to believe what all other sources are reporting. What a situation! That guarantees Fox News continues to remain an unreliable source that should be deprecated. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 01:03, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

The impression I had from the last RFC is that some people who actually agree Fox News is unreliable believe that it helps Wikipedia to appear as less biased to have Fox News be listed as yellow and marginally reliable. Because even though Fox News is generally unreliable for politics and most people proceed as though this is the case in almost every case, they don't want to hear the screams of the drive-by trolls lamenting Fox News' "unfairly" maligned status. Because these people are thinking with their emotions and not with logic, so we can't reason with them. So, we take the tiny tiny sliver of cases where Fox News is reporting on some information that no other source has the very same information, and they extrapolate that to the idea that the reliability of Fox News for politics is unclear, given that occasionally, Fox News does publish accurate and mundane information about politics. When in reality the reliability of Fox News for politics is listed as unclear. It's generally unreliable, a category that prohibits mundane use but there are still plenty of exceptions where use might be allowed. Andre🚐 21:35, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Can you point to any specific examples of that? I don't recall that but I also wasn't really looking for it. Springee (talk) 21:39, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

I have a few comments in mind but I'd rather not ping them to the discussion because I suspect it would be unwelcome. If they show up on their own later I will be happy to discuss that. Andre🚐 21:51, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

As I recall there were something like 100+ respondents. If we are talking about one or two replies I'm not sure that means much compared to the larger consensus. Springee (talk) 21:53, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

NPR wrote this:

On Jan. 5, 2021, the day before Congress was to ceremonially affirm Biden's win, and an angry pro-Trump mob sacked the U.S. Capitol to prevent it, Rupert Murdoch forwarded a suggestion to Fox News CEO Scott. He recommended that the Fox prime time stars - Carlson, Hannity and Ingraham - acknowledge Trump's loss. "Would go a long way to stop the Trump myth that the election was stolen," he wrote. They did not do so. "We need to be careful about using the shows and pissing off the viewers," Scott said to a colleague.

Even Murdoch can't get them to publicly admit their failure. At that time, the "stolen election" conspiracy theory was still in somewhat of its infancy (not really...) but just think of how much Fox News has added to the size of that lie since then? Wow! Now they have added to their complicity so much more. In Japan, these people would have been called into the corporate headquarters, forced to kneel in a row, been handed knives, and committed hara-kiri. Seriously.

Of course, Wikipedia still supports Fox News. We are sending a signal to the world, a really bad signal. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:17, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• Wait - We should wait until either the case goes to trial and a ruling is made (in which the facts of the case will be laid out), or until this is widely verified by other RS (preferably some right-leaning ones). Until then, it could be argued that we are doing WP:SYNTH by using deposition testimony and discovery evidence (WP:PRIMARY) to make conclusions. If we let the conclusions be made for us, we're in the clear. All that said, this is bordering on WP:BLUE given that some of the evidence is verbatim text messages and emails. EvergreenFir (talk) 20:22, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
  • No one is proposing we perform OR or use primary sources. See that long list of what we call "reliable sources" above? We are actually allowed to use them to create content here! What an amazing idea. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:24, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

    It is 100% OR because it is only evidence in a ongoing case. No matter how much RSes write about it, it has not been validated under a court of law as being valid and/or truthful.

    Is it likely truthful? Heck yes, but we cannot jump to conclusions like this. Masem (t) 20:33, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

    Reliable sources are what we're all about, not jury decisions. Sometimes juries convict innocent men. soibangla (talk) 20:44, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

    We absolutely do not rely on reliable sources for the determination of legal matters like the Dominion VS lawsuit that this evidence was submitted for. Only the courts can make that determination. Masem (t) 20:48, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

    Is that codified in PAGs? soibangla (talk) 22:29, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

    For BLPs, it is definitely codified at BLPCRIME. "Innocent until proven guilty" should obviously extend to organizations as well. Unless the court decides what guilt is there and if any Fox individuals were complicit in it, we should be very wary of treating evidence provided by one side of the case as factually true, even though we probably all agree it is actually true. That's why we have trials so that the deeper truth can be determined. Perhaps this was all machinations of one person at Fox rather than the organization as a whole. Masem (t) 16:42, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    This isn't about guilt, it's about evidence that has been reported by numerous solid RS. Imagine the consequences for Dominion attorneys if they filed false documents with a court. Disbarment, careers over. soibangla (talk) 16:57, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    The RSes are reporting on the evidence, they have no legal insight to whether the evidence is legit or not or appropriate for the court. Its why, at least in the more prestigious RSes, they state that all these are alleged claims. The RSes are of course coming to their own conclusions as to what it all means, but they have no legal authority here, and we absolutely cannot take their assessment as the legal truth, no matter how many RSes claim it. That's the "innocent until proven guilty" we have to abide by.

    And it is not necessarily that the evidence may be false, but it also may not paint a full picture. For example, wholly separate, when Elon released the "Twitter Files", it was all "evidence" that pointed to Democratic interference, but as has been reported later, there's a fair number of Republican cases that happened as well, so what the Twitter Files was was not the whole story. Similarly, the legal council for Dominion has likely put together a package of files that strongly backs the defamation claims, but Fox may have additional evidence that creates a different picture that may point away from defamation. That type of action by Dominion's lawyers is not a violation of any legal code. (Keep in mind, I strongly believe Fox is guilty of defamation and intentional malice here, but I can't take it as fact until the case is resolved). Masem (t) 17:07, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    The potential legal consequences are irrelevant. The fact the communications have been publicly released and widely reported by RS is all we should be concerned with. Others in the press can speculate on what the legal implications might be, but that's not in our purview. soibangla (talk) 17:13, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    Our purview is to be neutral, impartial, and dispassionate. Editing based on "innocent until proven guilty" is absolutely key to this. I know that the evidence is very damning against Fox and suggests more action on RSP should be taken, but that would be violating our neutrality policy to jump on that before the legal matters are resolved. Masem (t) 17:22, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    Are you arguing weight for inclusion in the Fox News article or if we should use this information to judge their reliability? If you want to suggest this is DUE in the article then all the coverage basically makes this a slam dunk for inclusion. However, if you are arguing this proves the news desk can't be trusted, then we need to ask why Dominion is releasing this before trial. Ask how does it benefit them to release it if, in theory, the jurors are going to only evaluate what is shown in court? Would Dominion have motive to release things in a way that makes it look worse than it really is? Would they have motive to hold back and exculpatory messages etc? If yes, then we aren't in a hurry. We can see how this plays out. Other than the satisfaction if sticking it to a disliked source, how does this help wikipedia? Springee (talk) 18:38, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    lolwhat. Trying to apply BLPCRIME here is an incredibly unserious claim - David Gerard (talk) 18:25, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    It's perfectly reasonable. Please see my example where the Grimshaw legal team presented information that was damaging to Ford Mo Co in a way to shape public opinion. Only much later did we see that what the public was presented was misleading. Springee (talk) 18:34, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

    Corporations aren't living people. Andre🚐 18:39, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

  I would say this tangent is embarrassing. Anything about legal cases, guilt, and results are pretty much off-topic here. Lest I be misunderstood, of course BLPCrime is important, but not here. No one is discussing (except for Masem) the case itself or questions of guilt. We are discussing what secondary independent RS say about the revelations coming out about Fox News internal discussions and views demonstrating their deliberate malfeasance and refusal to allow fact-checking their lies. THAT's the topic, so don't muddy the waters. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:42, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

  From a legal and logical standpoint, the RSes are only reporting on 1) past events that were visible from outside Fox News and 2) the evidence provided by Dominion's legal counsel to support Dominion's case. They do not have the full picture as they are missing the evidence Fox News will use to defend itself. As such, whatever the RSes are reporting right now is their speculation, definitely not fact that we can state in Wikivoice. It doesn't matter how reliable these sources are, they are not the judicial branch and what claims they make cannot be taken as facts.

  I realize that nearly everything from the past that's been known before this point, and with the evidence given, that there is likely no way that Fox will be found to be complicit in propagating the false narrative and will be liable for the defamation charges they face, and thus my complaint may be prolonging the inevitable facts we can state. But this type of nuance is a core part of NPOV and NOR that we must hold to, despite the weight of evidence that suggests otherwise. This is basically, like, saying that Arbcom took up a case against editor X, where dozens of editors all provide evidence that X is wrong, and pre-stating that X must be guilty before Arbcom actually issues its decision about X. Let's wait to see what the whole picture is based on the legal case, from which we then can evaluate.

  And I stress what has been pointed out before: what does this change about how Fox is already handled on RSP? it's already a highly questionable source for politics (from its news side), and its talk show content already disallowed. Masem (t) 19:34, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

  whatever the RSes are reporting right now is their speculation is incorrect, but there is likely no way that Fox will be found to be complicit in propagating the false narrative and will be liable for the defamation charges is speculative. soibangla (talk) 20:22, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

  Masem, you again write "what does this change about how Fox is already handled on RSP?" It makes a big difference. Right now we have no official deprecation. Instead, we rely on an unofficial ad hoc way of dealing with it, understood only by experienced editors, each time someone wants to use Fox News. The burden is on the editors involved, without them having the recourse of pointing to an official community consensus. The individual editors have to take the full brunt of accusations here at Wikipedia, and outside, for making such decisions. I paid such a price for opposing Breitbart here by having Breitbart feature me as a "Russiagate truther" for believing that Russia did interfere in the elections. What we do here gets noticed. We just know that we cannot trust Fox News when they speak, and we can trust that when they are silent it is usually for political reasons. It is a propaganda organization, not a true news organization, so we should officially classify it as such. Knowing this, yet not acting, is negligence and tacit protection. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:25, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

  Just because novice editors may get Fox News's usage wrong should not mean we need to rush any change prior to the decision of the court case (again, the statement "Fox News is a propaganda organization" is a non-legal conclusion that we can't use, we need the court's evaluation the evidence.) If anything, I would suspect the bulk of those editors are not here to start to build an encyclodedia and instead want to counter the left bias that we naturally have from the result of our known RSes. You're throwing out the baby with the bathwater, though this is likely still a case that once the courts legally issue their ruling, we'll want the baby thrown out too.

  Here's the problem which this and the Breitbart shows - we have be reactive and follow events, not try to be proactive. If you expressed belief re Russian interference before it was proven out by other sources in order to change P&G or mainspace, that's a problem. This is not a problem limited to you or Fox News, but far too pervasive throughout WP; that editors strongly for or against certain topics too often lose the necessary perspective we expect of all editors to prevent disruption (The current ArbCom case is yet another example). It is 100% fair to peg Fox News as a developing problem in light of the provided court evidence, but until we know the conclusion of that story, acting on it is rushing matters. I've said before that I may poking on nuances here and delaying what will ultimately happen, but we need these processes more than ever to isolate us from the growing cultural war, and react instead of predict. Masem (t) 03:31, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  This thread is primarily about using Fox as a reliable source -- not stating in the Fox article in WikiVoice that Fox is crap. If a source is questionable, we shouldn't use it. There are plenty of other sources. If the only source for something is questionable, then what it says is questionable and we should wait instead of using a questionable source. We are an encyclopedia, not a new aggregator. Time is on our side. O3000, Ret. (talk) 11:49, 22 February 2023 (UTC).

  The thing is, while Fox’s reporting on the 2020 election and it’s aftermath is questionable, a lot of its other reporting is not questionable at all. This is why “other considerations apply”. We need to look at the specific information being verified by citing a Fox report, and ask “is Fox reliably reporting this specific information”? I am fine with saying “Don’t cite Fox for information relating to the 2020 election and its aftermath”… I am not fine with saying “Don’t cite Fox for anything”. Blueboar (talk) 12:36, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  Doesn't that mean, in practice, that you have to check a Fox source against other, more reliable sources, and only use Fox if it agrees with them? Then, what do we need it for, if we have better sources? --Hob Gadling (talk) 17:16, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  Bingo! Since we can't trust it, even on basic matters, we only know by checking actually RS that don't deliberately push fake news for ratings. We do not need Fox News. Period. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:20, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  I think we CAN trust it on basic matters… it’s specific matters where we can’t trust it. Blueboar (talk) 17:29, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  For those who are digging into this material, ask who released it and why? Who does the release of this material benefit? Was it released with the other side being given a chance to argue about the content? Do we know if the releases were full and complete or selective? One of the very successful strategies the plaintiffs did in the infamous Ford Pinto lawsuit (Grimshaw v. Ford Motor Co.) was release a memo which was in reality a response to the government, using government provided numbers and framework trying to assess the cost vs benefit of new rollover protection standards. Since Ford could provide a good estimate on the vehicle cost side of things they were doing that. However, the Grimshaw legal team successfully convinced the public that the memo was proof that Ford didn't care about lives and calculated it was cheaper to pay off the dead vs pay for safety in the cars[22]. It was a totally false narrative but thanks to Mother Jones it stuck. When one side or the other releases a bunch of evidence we need to ask, is it because it helps them make better arguments in court? No, it's because they are hoping to taint the jury pool. Even if we take the evidence at face value all it's doing is verifying what we already have concluded. Springee (talk) 21:31, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

  Obviously we cannot foresee the result of a trial. So, we cannot say they are guilty of anything. We most certainly can make our own determinizations of the reliability of a source and we can use RS for that purpose without the help of the legal system. O3000, Ret. (talk) 22:28, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

• Comment Fox is biased in my mind, but can be used for simple fact verification; airplane xyz crashes on xyz date. Beyond this, they tend to spin a story so it suits a certain narrative. Oaktree b (talk) 02:24, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

When Fox executives referred to their "brand" being damaged (they did it in many ways), they are saying it in the context of "Our brand is WE DELIBERATELY LIE ABOUT ELECTIONS and don't dare stop!" Seriously, read the sources and see what Fox executives said about their "brand" and especially when they said it. You can't make this stuff up. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:43, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

The older editors all see the trajectory FOX is on. The question for you is, and please take your time to think about it, where should this source be categorized as a result? That's what I think was missing from your original post, and that would help some of us see your intent more clearly. Cheers. DN (talk) 03:53, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

DN, as an older editor I have indeed watched this. Before Trump, Fox was just a popular purveyor of normal right-wing stuff, back when the most left-leaning members of the GOP actually straddled the center and had a lot in common with the most right-leaning Democrats. Trump came along and radicalized the whole right, and Fox with it. (see Overton window) Then Fox discovered that Trump, as a fighter, would really boost their ratings if they were loyal to him. That pushed them, and the GOP, into a far-right position and the favored position as nearly the only source trusted by Republicans. We see the consequences of that. Now there are very few Republicans between Trump and the center, and it's a huge gap. The Democrats, OTOH, haven't really moved very much toward the left, at least nothing like the move by the GOP. Many Dems still straddle the center..

In the light of all the latest revelations, that things are much worse than we realized (they actually deliberately and constantly lied, as a de facto operational policy, to everyone, and punished any employee who resisted or fact-checked), I have already expressed my wish for a formal deprecation. They are arguably worse than The Daily Mail. They fail our standards for a RS. Not only no fact-checking, but refusal to allow it. No correction when their false reporting was constantly criticized. Until they completely crucify Trump and all of his lies, especially his "stolen election" Big Lie, they won't be in the same universe as what we require of a RS. Every day we delay this deprecation is a day we signal to the world that Wikipedia sides with Trump's lies, and editors who resist, risk getting named and excoriated in mainstream articles by the journalists who watch what we are doing here. We are being super inconsistent by extending the common Trump exemption to Fox News. They should not enjoy any form of protected status here. Treat them as we'd do any other source guilty of the same things they are doing. BTW, you are now a Yeoman Editor! -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:35, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

• Fox News are innocent. Innocent, I tell you! And there's nothing you can say or do that'll change my mind! François Robere (talk) 19:33, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

  Appears to be an illustration of a goodly part of the problem. O3000, Ret. (talk) 22:52, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

• No need to change anything 1. Court filings are not a matter of law and should not be treated as absolute. 2. It has already been established that specific opinions of some of their hosts such as Carlson, Hannity, etc. are not considered reliable to Wiki. Grahaml35 (talk) 20:16, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

A good summary:

Fox News is in no meaningful sense a news organization. Just for starters, engaging in a journalistic race to the bottom with an outlet like Newsmax—a wall-to-wall dreamscape of MAGA fabulation now fending off its own Dominion defamation suit—is something any remotely legitimate news-gathering operation should automatically lose by definition.

It is not a "legitimate news-gathering operation". -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:44, 20 February 2023‎ (UTC)

• No need to change anything and close this thread Not this again. Wasn't there a giant RSN RFC recently that already beat this dead horse? Fox News talk shows are already deprecated: WP:RSP#Fox_News_(talk_shows) and its other political reporting is WP:MREL with significant caveats and restrictions. Honestly, I think this thread should be closed per WP:NOTFORUM, since is turning out to be little more than an opportunity to gripe about a shared dislike in a pseudo-RSN-RFC format (headed with the traditional set of options, except they're all "yes"). The last RFC covered this ground and ended, lets give it a rest. GretLomborg (talk) 22:42, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  OK, I will ask this for the fourth time. Who are the Fox News non talk shows hosts that haven't resigned? Out of 24 hours a day, how much time do they take? I look at their website and it reads like a propaganda site. And reread WP:AGF. O3000, Ret. (talk) 23:06, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

  GretLomborg, this is a totally new situation. I'm going to just AGF that you are ignorant of recent events that cast Fox News in a totally new light. The RS are abundant. Look above. I have collected 47 RS now.

Fox News knew their election coverage was totally false, yet, to keep their audience from fleeing to far-right sources like OANN and NewsMax, and to keep Trump's favor and their ratings up, they chose to lie about it all. They continued to push election lies for over two years, and now it's all blown up in their face with all their internal communications telling the true story.

This is not about just the talking heads. It's also about the news division. So this thread is based on a totally new set of evidence. Literal fake news and deliberate disinformation. Internal fact-checkers were threatened into silence. They totally fail all we consider to be a RS. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 23:08, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

The RS are abundant. Look above. I have collected 47 RS now.... about "Fox News hosts," "Fox News stars," "Tucker Carlson," etc... - GretLomborg (talk) 23:27, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

Sigh. READ them, not just the headlines. This affected the news division. They were not allowed to contradict what Carlson, Hannity, et al were saying. Fact-checkers were threatened. The top executives and CEO knew, and their decisions applied to the news division. Read the sources. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 23:55, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

I did read a few, and I remain unconvinced that there needs to be any change in the status quo. Those articles are almost exclusively focused on what the already deprecated opinion show hosts beleived. They also tend to be a little sloppy and not make the distinction we make (between the news and opinion divisions), sloppyness which is very unhelpful here. The little that is there about the news division, while not great, is also not grounds for depricating the news division. It's totally fine for a reliable source not cover some true news to the degree desired by some Wikipedia editor or even omit it completely, especially since there's no way to cite the absence of a story on here in an article. The line is more or less "publishes false or fabricated information," and even that can (and is) tolerated for sources where a line can be drawn in such a way to salvage reliable reporting in other areas (like the line here around the opinion hosts). Then there's the separate issues that the structure of this discussion is so flawed that there is no way for it to reach valid result, and there there was already a massive better-structured discussion about these same issues where the admin-closer clearly discouraged repeats without a clear on-wiki motivation (which this discussion also seems to lack), because of the waste of limited governance capacity they entail. Let's stop beating this dead horse. GretLomborg (talk) 05:25, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

What is now plainly evident that was not previously has less to do with what Murdoch, Scott and the news division did than what they didn't do: they didn't push back against any of lies the hosts were knowingly peddling. Nary a word to report The Big Lie everyone else was reporting. Bret Baier, ostensibly the "real journalist" at the network, said privately there was no evidence of election fraud, but did he report that? The silence of the news division is just as damning as if it was actively promulgating the Big Lie and makes clear it is not a news organization and should not be treated as one here. If "sometimes Fox reports real news," then surely editors can find sources other than Fox to use here. soibangla (talk) 23:57, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

I agree with what soibangla, Valjean, and O3000 have written, but I am not surprised to see some editors who aren't interested in any evidence that would show Fox doesn't report it fair and balanced, even enough to be marginally reliable. Even though this is an example of Fox blatantly falsifying information and toeing the party line. That is not enough to persuade people who already have made up their minds and don't have a red line. Andre🚐 03:26, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

• All of which simply reinforces that Fox is not reliable when it comes to the 2020 Election and its aftermath. I think we all agree on that. I don’t think anyone is arguing that they are reliable on that topic. However, there is no evidence that they fabricated their news coverage of other stories. Seriously, I challenge you to look through their news coverage over the last week (or even month), and tell me where they fabricated the story.

Sure, there are other reliable outlets that cover these stories, and yes we could use them instead (I have no problem with swapping one reliable source with another)… but… that’s not what we are being asked to determine. We are not being asked what the best news source is… or even whether there are better news sources than Fox. We are being asked to determine whether Fox is generally reliable or unreliable (as opposed to being specifically unreliable on one topic). I still think Fox is, generally, on the reliable side of the line. The existence of other reliable news sources (hell, even news sources that are more reliable) does NOT equate to Fox’s coverage being unreliable. Blueboar (talk) 00:37, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

...not reliable when it comes to the 2020 Election and its aftermath. Or Covid, climate change, gas prices, the economy.... You can say not reliable for politics or science; but everything these days is tinged with one or both, and that includes plane or train crashes (where Trump is now and about which MTG is loudly calling for impeachment). O3000, Ret. (talk) 01:44, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

This gets us back to asking “what are we verifying when we cite a source?” That the train derailed? I think Fox reliably reported this. That Trump visited the town? Same. Are you saying that Fox did not reliably report both facts? Are you saying they fabricated these stories? Blueboar (talk) 03:42, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Blueboar, they lie about the really important things. We can use other RS for the small stuff. We do not forgive perpetual liars. You have clearly not read the sources, so here's the constantly updated list. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:51, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

@Valjean You said that I should ping you if I found any errors. You quoted Murdoch as saying, "[what matters] is not red or blue, it is green.”

However, the article you provided as a source for that comment is titled: "Rupert Murdoch Did Not Say ‘It Is Not Red or Blue, It Is Green’"

It seems that you have somewhat contradicted yourself.

It appears that, rather than Murdoch actually producing that rather poetic and memorable quote, it was the lawyers for the Dominion Voting Systems Corporation. Murdoch voiced that he agreed with the sentiment, of course, in the sense that Fox News is a corporation that makes revenue from advertising. This is not much different from most cable-news corporations in the United States, which often make their money through advertising products during intermissions between programs.

As such, if you think Murdoch's agreement with the statement by Dominion's lawyers is proof of Fox's disreputability as a source, you must also agree that MSNBC, CNN, ABC, and many other corporations are also disreputable sources, as they make money through advertising.

I am, of course, only going off of the source you provided. Harry Sibelius (talk) 08:37, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

All of which simply reinforces that Fox is not reliable when it comes to the 2020 Election and its aftermath. I think we all agree on that. - do we actually agree that Fox News, as a whole, is not reliable when it comes to the 2020 election and its aftermath? And if so, can we add that to its RSP entry? Because I feel like I have absolutely seen people attempting to cite it to that and using its (currently) MREL status to argue that it is usable; if we're in agreement that Fox should never be used for things related to the 2020 election, I feel like that should be stated unambiguously. I would also push to add COVID as something Fox is strictly forbidden as a source for as well (as I recall in the last discussion, I turned up extensive coverage that the news side was pushing misinformation about that.) --Aquillion (talk) 22:24, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

I oppose both of those suggestions in principle. On the election, because Fox does report heavily on elections with unrefuted mundane facts all the time. On COVID, because of the catchall nature of the topic (how so much of everything is COVID related), and on the basis that some media and govt in RS are now catching up to other reporting FOX and others had already done, wrt vaccine and mask safety and efficacy, virus provenance, etc. Fox and others are also reporting this heavy incongruent messaging from the government and other news outlets, that is usually in the form "well, we reported this months ago and were chastised, now see they put out data that agrees and quietly changed their official stance". These facts are hard to add to wikipedia because these media and govt entities won't point it out about themselves, naturally, but the places willing to point it out are not on the RS list. We'd have to use wp:synth to get these facts into the articles. HC (talk) 23:07, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Tucker Carlson's texts, released to the public due to the Dominion lawsuit, show him calling Syndey Powell a liar, which he also did publicly, during this episode of his show:

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/tucker-carlson-rudy-giuliani-sidney-powell-election-fraud

How is it a sign of Tucker Carlson's dishonesty that he said the same things in public as he did in private?

Many of the anti-Fox posters here seem to be making a really very obvious error. They say that, because a Fox employee had promoted a claim of election interference, say, for example, that ballots were printed for Biden at the last minute while he was losing, but denied another claim, say, that the Venezuelan-Chinese agents hacked voting machines for Biden, that they are hypocrites. But there is no hypocrisy here, because these are two different claims.

Some personalities on Fox News seems to have vociferously attacked claims that the election was stolen for Biden by Venezuelan Chinese communists, while others on the network promoted them. This is normal.

The fact that not all employees of a news organization voice the same opinions as other employees, nor those of the organization's owner, is not convincing evidence that the organization is generally untrustworthy.

If an organization has 300 employees, and each one, including the CEO, believes that the Earth is flat, would that make it a reliable source to Wikipedia, because the source never contradicts itself?

Much of what is reported on Fox News is likely untrue, and much of it maliciously untrue, I do not doubt; but this is no less the case with the likes of The New York Times, which in 1983 declared, as the result of a lawsuit brought on by William Peter Blatty, that their list of "best-sellers" are not actually based on what books have sold well, but simply books chosen arbitrarily by the editors of The New York Times, that often have not sold well at all. Harry Sibelius (talk) 08:26, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

There is no objective way to accurately measure book sales, and the list is certainly not "arbitrary". And where did you get the idea the book list is "maliciously untrue"? O3000, Ret. (talk) 13:59, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

this is no less the case with the likes of The New York Times, especially supported solely by a dubious interpretation of Blatty, is amusing. soibangla (talk) 14:28, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

O3000, The New York Times disagrees with you. "The suit was filed after the book was not included in the Times’ weekly list of best-sellers, which the paper says is based on computer-processed sales figures from 2,000 bookstores across the nation." (source)

Soibangla, this was actually not Blatty's interpretation, but the opposite: it was the defense that the lawyers representing the NYT used in their defense against Blatty.

There is also, of course, the case of Amy Robach admitting that ABC suppressed the Epstein story because of pressure from the British royal family, and because they would not be allowed to interview members of the British monarchy anymore if they were to do so.

There are a number of Wikipedia sources, considered "generally reliable", which lie intentionally. Understanding that much of what you read or see on television, regardless of political alignment, is a lie, is a part of a growing up.

Fox News is already downgraded as a source for political and science related issues. I don't know why. Why should it be further downgraded because it has platformed diverse opinions on the 2020 election, affirming and negating both claims that it was legitimate and claims that it was rigged? Particularly when it is already downgraded when it comes to political subjects, which the 2020 election is? Harry Sibelius (talk) 04:34, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

Robach did not "admit" this, she asserted it, but ABC senior management said Giuffre's exclusive, explosive claims could not be corroborated, potentially exposing the network to defamation suits. Robach was confident she had the story, management disagreed and spiked it, happens all the time. Giuffre years later admitted her story about seeing Clinton on the island was untrue[23] and years later admitted she might have made a mistake in accusing Dershowitz.[24] Maybe Robach now feels fortunate her story was spiked. If you are confident our reliable sources intentionally lie, you should rush to RSN and make that argument. Otherwise it is a hollow allegation that deserves to be ignored. soibangla (talk) 05:23, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

"Reliable" means "you can rely on it". Not "you have to check a long list of subjects first, and if the subject in question is not on the list yet, maybe you can rely on it, or maybe it will be added to the list later, who knows?" --Hob Gadling (talk) 14:01, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Flip it… It’s actually a very short list of things they are not reliable on. Blueboar (talk) 14:42, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Not true. This is about their main focus, the topics they focus on and choose to deliberately ignore. American politics is their main focus. Minor stuff might add up to a long list of individual items that is longer than the list of problematic areas, but those areas are far more significant. The small stuff is always covered by other sources where we don't need to double-check whether they are deliberately lying to us. We always have to do that with Fox News. We lose nothing by deprecating Fox News. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:29, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Well, there’s sports (when race isn’t involved) and entertainment (when competitors aren’t involved). Looking at the first section of the NYT today, articles on immigration, Biden, NATO, McCarthy and Tucker Carlson, climate change, Ukraine/Russia, Israel, same sex couples, arms to Taiwan, train derailment (Obama made new regs and Trump removed them), Trump criminal inquiries, gun violence, Proud Boys, several election articles, Twitter law suit in the USSC, early inmate release, death penalty. These are all areas where Fox is a questionable source. O3000, Ret. (talk) 17:30, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Good points, so striking part of my comment above. Of the areas they actually do cover, there are very few that aren't problematic. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:15, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe:

“I have never seen a defamation case with such overwhelming proof that the defendant admitted in writing that it was making up fake information in order to increase its viewership and its revenues,” Tribe told the Guardian. “Fox and its producers and performers were lying as part of their business model.”

Pretty damning. He makes the case for deprecation. He ticks off all the most important boxes we require for a RS. Fox News fails each one. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:20, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

It's pretty obvious that Fox News at least should be generally unreliable if not deprecated and blacklisted altogether. They indeed have fabricated information on many occasions. It's quite clear that their top brass have created an atmosphere designed to push advocacy and propaganda. It should not be trusted for any topic but particularly not for politics. However, because we need a stronger consensus than last time to actually change the status quo, I suspect we'll have to bring this topic up again in the future. Andre🚐 04:03, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

Why only Fox News and not the whole Murdoch "press"? Trigenibinion (talk) 13:15, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

The Sun is deprecated. The NYPost is considered unreliable for facts. The WSJ is considered generally reliable for news, outside of the opinion articles. It has received Pulitzers. Personally, I think it has slipped; but I am a subscriber for financial news. O3000, Ret. (talk) 14:17, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

Australia is also rotten by such "press" and there are still a couple other outlets in the UK. Trigenibinion (talk) 14:27, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

Canada has a similar problem in that 90% of the newspapers are owned by an American conglomerate. Trigenibinion (talk) 13:19, 1 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't think a source which is "only" half propaganda should be tolerated. Trigenibinion (talk) 14:30, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

We've discussed the Australian Murdoch papers here previously. The Australian is a pompously serious paper and is green-rated on WP:RSP, but with caveats. Various city tabloids have been discussed and considered sources to apply with caution and not at all for opinion, e.g. Andrew Bolt columns, but not in a proper RFC as such - David Gerard (talk) 21:10, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

If you only ban Fox News, syndicated content can come from any other property. Trigenibinion (talk) 21:28, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

This really shows Wikipedia's anti-self-published stance is wrong. Trigenibinion (talk) 20:14, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

It bears noting that two of the major purveyors of The Big Lie under the Fox Corporation umbrella, Maria Bartiromo of Fox Business and Fox News, and Lou Dobbs of Fox Business, are characterized in their BLPs as news anchors. This is not the case with Carlson, Hannity, Ingraham or Pirro. So we're not talking only about hosts on the opinion side. It's the news side, too. soibangla (talk) 05:32, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

• a source that will deliberately and consistently lie about any topic if it benefits that source's benefactors is not a reliable source. Maintaining a list of topics that they are supposedly reliable on is inadvisable, because there is no guarantee that it will stay that way, or that the reporting won't be biased in some other way that may be harder to detect in individual cases. If we can get whatever information we need from elsewhere without that risk, that is always the better choice. I will however note that I would have said this before 2016 as well, so my opinion here doesn't really change the balance. This is just another (worse) example of a pattern that has pretty much always been there. ----Licks-rocks (talk) 11:57, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Here is why this matters Talk:January 6 United States Capitol attack. Slatersteven (talk) 14:32, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Since Carlson's views are already considered unreliable what needs to be fixed? If RSs say this changes the understanding of events then include it. Springee (talk) 14:46, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Because its not just Carlson. Slatersteven (talk) 14:49, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

References

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

Glaukopis

A previos discussion on Glaukopis was disrupted by a SP and didn't deliver a consensus. Glaukopis is currently used as RS in at least 17 WP articles (listed here). In their controversial article on Wikipedia’s Intentional Distortion of the History of the Holocaust, Jan Grabowski and Shira Klein devote two pages to discussing Wikipedia's use of this source, which they claim caters to, and is led by, the Polish extreme nationalistic right. WP:SCHOLARSHIP says that "Care should be taken with journals that exist mainly to promote a particular point of view". Is Glaukopis reliable? Gitz (talk) (contribs) 12:20, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Grabowski&Klein were themselves shown to be unreliable sources (more literally: utterly refuted), so should we believe them about Glaukopis? Are there some really reliable sources that agree with them about that journal? a!rado🦈 (C✙T) 14:28, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

I must have missed that, can you link the article which refutes them? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:03, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

For example, here (WP:EXPERTSPS applies). To clarify: my point is not that Glaukopis is a relible academic journal, but that we make too much fuss because of Grabowski&Klein&Icewhiz's academic shitposting. Nevermind though, I'm just one of hundreds of Polish nationalist editors who flock here to commit distortion~ (according to pan Grabowski) a!rado🦈 (C✙T) 05:05, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

And what exactly are they a subject matter expert in? What are their qualifications? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 05:21, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

IDK, but maybe in the subject of G&K&I's article? Something like "Coverage of Holocaust in Poland on English Wikipedia"? I don't see why some historian, briefed by banned LTA, can knew more about that than one of the most expirienced editors in that topic area. Maybe you can explain to me? a!rado🦈 (C✙T) 06:18, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Can I start horseeyesback.substack.com and cite myself as a subject matter expert on coverage of Taiwan on English Wikipedia? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 08:33, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for asking me first, I allow you. Now is the time to give interview to some professor of Chinese history about how you and thousands of Chinese nationalist editors distort the history of White Terror. Have fun refuting his forthcoming article! a!rado🦈 (C✙T) 09:42, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

I'd love both to be interviewed for and to read that article, we do actually have issues with coverage of KMT era atrocities on wikipedia and we need way more academic coverage of wikipedia not less. Not sure how that would make me a subject matter expert though, you're gonna have to explain that one. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:14, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Note: Icewhiz's intent was to make Glaukopis unrealible for Wikipiedia. That's what Icewhiz always wanted, because scholars who publish in Glaukopis don't accommodate Icewhiz's POV. The previous discussion on Glaukopis was disrupted by that globally banned user (BobnotSnob - SP of Icewhiz) who again advocated for the dismissal of Glaukopis as WP:RS. - GizzyCatBella🍁 15:06, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Glaukopis is in fact unreliable for most use on Wikipedia. This weird position you've adopted where you're against everything Icewhiz was ever for is disruptive. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:06, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• No - It appears from the reception section that there is an unanimous consensus among scholars that the journal disseminates far-right viewpoints. TrangaBellam (talk) 18:07, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• Not reliable per above and the reasons in the last RSN. It's one of those fake far right journals like Mankind Quarterly. Levivich (talk) 18:09, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• No it does not seem to have a reputation for fact-checking. Slatersteven (talk) 18:13, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Between having a very particular POV and not being cited very often it fails the sixth point of WP:SCHOLARSHIP. Unless someone can show peer reviews by the wider academic community it shouldn't be considered a reliable source. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 19:14, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• No mostly per ActivelyDisinterested. The non-sequitur about Icewhiz makes little to no difference about the assessment of the source. --Jayron32 19:15, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't have a dog in this fight, but IMO if someone is in fact socking for some viewpoint, you should double-check the argument they are socking just in case. It definitely makes that much difference. The socked viewpoint could still be correct, it's just that increased suspicion of that viewpoint is the natural counterbalance to socking.

  I mean, if you disagree with that, I'm sure Singsduntil will back me up here. Dingsuntil (talk) 21:00, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• In general no, especially for articles like Żydokomuna where it's currently used. As with other problematic sources, there might be some acceptable uses. Alaexis_¿question? 21:36, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• Non-RS: no reputation for accuracy or fact-checking; has been known to publish materials outside of the mainstream. --K.e.coffman (talk) 03:54, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
• Not reliable. I think that it's fair to mention that an editor has socked in the past to try and get us to stop using this source, since we have to evaluate the way potential misconduct could slant the sources when eg. looking at our section on the source in our article on it (and since it serves to alert closers that potential socking could occur here.) It is important to WP:DENY repeated socks influence on our processes. But it is even more important to uphold WP:RS. The broad range of sources skeptical of it are persuasive, and no matter how we slice it nobody has presented any sort of source or argument supporting its reliability outside of "it's a peer-reviewed journal", which is not enough on its own when sourcing is so uniform on it lacking the reputation for fact-checking and accuracy that WP:RS requires. Another small irony that occurs to me: The previous discussion seems to have been headed to a clear consensus of "not reliable" even without the sock, which means that despite their intent, the only reason we still even used this source until today was because of their disruption. --Aquillion (talk) 06:33, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
• Not generally reliable per ActivelyDisinterested and Glaukopis#Reception. Siawase (talk) 19:40, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
• A few words from en.wiki's newbie. While writing various articles on pl.wiki, I rather try to avoid using "Glaukopis" as a source. With no doubts it is apologetic regarding the history of National Democracy and its heirs, history of Polish-Jewish relations etc. Also, it was granted the status of academic journal by the Polish Ministry of Education and Science, but only in 2021 and this decision sparked some controversies (see: [25]). However, in the past, historians who have no ties with Polish far- or moderate right sometimes published some interesting articles in "Glaukopis". Two examples: Hubert Kuberski[26], who is now one of the leading experts regarding the history of the Oskar Dirlewanger unit and Nazi war crimes in occupied Belarus, or Andrzej Jankowski[27] a historian and judge who investigated Nazi war crimes in Świętokrzyskie region of Poland. Imao It would be shame not to allow use their articles as the sources. Probably I could find some similar examples. To sum up: generally not reliable, but I would not advise banning it totally. I would rather focus on particular authors and recommend not to use "Glaukopis" as the sources in any article that may spark the controversy.Dreamcatcher25 (talk) 12:12, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

  Generally unreliable rather than deprecated is a balanced assessment. Gitz (talk) (contribs) 00:23, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

• WP:Biased. Based on the description by G&K, this is a WP:Biased source, and as such it can be used with care and with appropriate attribution. Saying that, I just removed it from a couple of pages where it simply was not needed. Sure thing, while using biased sources, one should exercise good judgment (as always!). For example, this is hardly a good source for page Żydokomuna. My very best wishes (talk) 01:05, 13 March 2023 (UTC)
• Not reliable I actually think this should be deprecated because it's WP:FRINGE pseudo-scholarship with a clear aim of promoting hate-filled historical revisionism under the guise of academic research. Muszynski and others are either part of IPN or otherwise close to the government. Its editorial board, branded as independent and consisting of five people (three of whom have doctoral degrees), is not associated with any major or reliable academic institution and yet it was inexplicably awarded 70 points in the most recent ranking of research publications compiled by the Ministry of Education--indicating national reputation--in a blatant attempt to legitimize the journal and other right-wing outlets. In addition to the above: 1) founders of Glaukopis claimed several years ago that the journal was meant to "reject political correctness" 2) as noted by Przemyslaw Witkowski, the journal "praises Polish pre-war fascism," promotes conspiracy theories related to freemasonry and discriminatory concepts like 'judeoskepticism', and whitewashes Adam Doboszynski who organized the Myslenice raid targeting the Jews, among other findings 3) and then there are the public musings of Wojciech Muszynski, its former editor-in-chief and current publisher, who declared that the members of Razem, a left-wing party in the Polish parliament, would be dropped into the ocean from helicopters in 1970s Chile, casually alluding to Videla's "death flights" (if you read Polish: "W Chile w 1973 roku członkowie partia (sic!) Razem zostaliby helikopterami przewiezieni nad ocean i tam puszczeni wolno (30 km od brzegu") (1) and posts such images on Facebook. I really don't see how this publication would be considered reliable, let alone scholarly, in any serious academic setting. Ppt91^talk 01:57, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

On the other hand, as you conveniently forgot to mention, Mr. Witkowski, represents the Polish radical left. I would rather suggest quoting the criticism from academic circles, then from no-mainstream left-oriented weekly magazine. Nevertheless, I generally agree that citing of "Glaukopis" should be limited as far as possible. At the same time, I would avoid the "punishing" the authors without political associations, who with their good will (I believe) published some of their works on non-controversial topics in "Glaukopis" (as mentioned in my comment above).Dreamcatcher25 (talk) 08:24, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps I should clarify: the main argument against the reliability of this journal is the opaque and fundamentally biased peer-review process limited to three scholars--with the editor-in-chief and publisher having previously declared their need to "reject political correctness"--and lacking additional editorial oversight. There is simply not enough transparency or POV balance to consider this journal reliable.

Any scholar willing to undergo methodological and historiographical scrutiny (i.e. the kind accepted by mainstream academia) would be welcome to publish their findings in a reputable journal, regardless of their personal politics. No one is really punishing them, as far as I see it.

As for Witkowski, I am perplexed by the "conveniently forgot" ad hominem bit. He studies ideological extremism on both sides of the political spectrum and describing him as a representative of "radical left" is hyperbolic. Ppt91^talk 16:16, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

Witkowski is an expert on political extremism, but I've never seen it suggested that they themselves are a political extremist. Certainly left of center but do you have a source for Witkowski representing the Polish radical left? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:55, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

• Generally unreliable/biased per Gitz, MVBW, Dreamcatcher, etc. I midly wonder about use in uncontroversial context such as military history (I removed Glaukopis used as a source here in this context because I initially couldn't find the cited work under English translated title of "Beginnings of Polish armored weapons", but later I found it in Polish under "Początki polskiej broni pancernej" [28]). pl:Witold Ławrynowicz doesn't seem like a right-wing radical... but it could be that his article is an exception to the rule as far as this journalis concerned. I certainly support actively removing this source for anything controversial. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 07:01, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Can I return this amendment?

Fixed lead line as per better source Karsan Chanda (talk) 09:07, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

I suggest you discuss the issue at the articles talk page, both the original source and it's replacement are from respectable publisher and are recently published. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 12:38, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

@ActivelyDisinterested: Will it have to be nominated for discussion? -- Karsan Chanda (talk) 15:02, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what you mean. My point was that at first glance both sources seem reliable, so it would be best discussed at the articles talk page. The best way to handle such situations is WP:BRD, so you could revert but should make sure to start a conversation about why you did so. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 15:12, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

Film credits from video on pCloud

This edit [29] to the filmography table at Lollu Sabha Maaran cites a video clip posted on pCloud to verify that Lollu Sabha Maaran is in the 2023 film Kannitheevu (not the 1981 film of the same name linked at Kanni Theevu). The video clip shows the end credits from the film. It appears to be a genuine clip from the film, but pCloud appears to be a hosting service where users can upload files to share. So not knowing who posted it, does that make it WP:UGC and therefore ineligible to be used a reliable source?  — Archer1234 (t·c) 10:58, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

A clip posted to a video sharing platform by a random person isn't a reliable source. I suggest removing the reference and adding a {{citation needed}} tag. It does appear they she was a caste member but I can't find a reliable source for it, maybe someone else will have better luck. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 19:48, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

Streets.mn

Can someone here tell me if Streets.mn is a reliable source for defining "non-conforming" housing in the Minneapolis article's Neighborhoods section? At the time, 70 percent of residential land was zoned for detached, single-family homes, though many of those areas had "nonconforming" buildings with more housing units. I am asking because the site's About page says, "The website Streets.mn makes no representations as to accuracy, completeness, currentness, suitability, or validity of any information on this site." The city's website uses the term but never seems to explain what it means as Streets.mn does. They might sneak under the wire as subject matter experts. Thank you in advance.

References

-SusanLesch (talk) 19:04, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

Specifically yes, generally the question is slightly murkier. They have an editorial board and policy, but that policy makes clear they do not fact check submissions and rely upon community feedback for corrections. They're articles have been recirculated by Strong Towns, which is itself a reliable source, and lends extra credibility. So they could be a source for simple details, such as noncomforming buildings, but nothing more controversial. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 19:45, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

deadpresidents.tumblr.com / Anthony Bergan

1. Source. https://deadpresidents.tumblr.com/post/169723571407/are-there-any-books-on-franklin-pierce-that-you

2. Article. Garry Boulard

3 Content. Anthony Bergen in the website Dead Presidents.com has called Boulard's Pierce book "Detailed, fast-paced, and filled with fascinating anecdotes that give a little more color to the life and White House of one of our most obscure Presidents."

I have been going through the sources in Garry Boulard to weed out puffery and I found material cited to Anthony Bergan's tumbler page. Bergan does not appear to have any academic credentials as a Presidential historian, however, he is clearly knowledgeable about the history of US Presidents and is cited by authors in books published by more traditional sources.[30] Would he be a subject-matter expert per WP:BLOG? -Location (talk) 20:29, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

Doesn't matter if he's an expert on Pierce or not, because he's not being used to comment on Pierce. He's commenting on the work of Boulard, who is a living person. WP:BLPSPS applies, so this self-published source is a no-go. --Nat Gertler (talk) 20:41, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

Paul Chrystal

Can Paul Chrystal, or more specifically, his Women at War in the Classical World be considered WP:RS for historical topics, and an obscure one a that such as the Kambojas? I would say no per the following reasons;

1. ) The book does not have an academic publisher. Its publisher is the obscure, "small, independent" Grub Street Publishing [31]
2. ) The vast majority of his works, if not everything, does not have any academic publisher.
3. ) Nothing suggests that he is an expert in the field. He makes a huge variety of books on random subjects (Secret York, The History of Sweets, Secret Middlesbrough, In Bed with the Romans, etc), as seen here [32]. Here [33] it says that he "studied Latin and Greek at the University of Hull and then specialized in Latin love poetry for his MPhil at the University of Southampton." Not really relevant for historical topics.
4. ) I literally can't find a single, academic source that actually cites his work, let alone the Women at War in the Classical World. Which further reinforces that this is not WP:RS, and thus I fail to see why we would use it when academic sources doesn't even do it.

HistoryofIran (talk) 23:51, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

1) The book itself does have an academic publisher Pen and Sword Books which specialises in military history.

2) Same as above

3)As stated in my talk page 1) He has a degree in Classics which specialises in the Study of ancient greek and roman history, language etc 2) the fact that he publishes books in multiple genres doesn't mean that his books and knowledge in a specific genre should be discredited. 3) He has since been history advisor to local visitor attractions such as the National Trust in York, writing features for national newspapers, and broadcasting on BBC Radio York, BBC Radio Manchester, BBC Radio Tees, on the Radio 4 PM programme and on the BBC World Service

4)Citation of a source doesn't mean his word should be discredited if he doesn't have any. Also considering how he is a secondary reference who cites ancient historians such as diodorus and isn't as well known of an author. Trigarta (talk) 00:06, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

Pen and Sword Books is not an academic publisher, which can easily be seen in their Wikipage or official page for that matter [34]. --HistoryofIran (talk) 00:11, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

It literally says on their wiki that they're a British publisher and also states it was published by them on the book... https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=VMWIDwAAQBAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&dq=kambojas+alexander&source=gbs_navlinks_s Trigarta (talk) 00:18, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

"British" and "academic" are two different words. --HistoryofIran (talk) 00:20, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

A publisher is a Publisher, please explain to me the difference. And since you haven't replied to the other 2 points ive said I'm going to assume you agree on my points and weve reached consensus there. Trigarta (talk) 00:26, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm done explaining stuff to you, if you can't tell the difference and importance between an academic publisher and one who isn't, that's your own problem. No, I think your two "points" are utter nonsense, and I expect others to think the same. I just don't want you to WP:BLUDGEON this thread. Don't assume stuff on my behalf again, thanks. --HistoryofIran (talk) 00:32, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

Academic Publishing is a subsection of a Publishing. And them not specifically stating they're specially an 'academic publisher' doesn't mean that the books under their name should be discredited especially as a long established publishing company owned by the even longer established Barnsley Chronicle Trigarta (talk) 00:42, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

Academic Publishing is a subsection of a Publishing, but Pen and Sword Books is not an academic publisher. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:59, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

But not all publishers are equal, some will publish any old crap, some will publish if you pay them, some have agendas. Slatersteven (talk) 10:36, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

I am deeply skeptical. Pen & Sword aren't an academic publisher; that's not inherently proof that they are unequivocally unreliable, but we should definitely prefer academic sources if possible. Women at War in the Classical World doesn't seem to have had any academic attention that I can find. Chrystal doesn't seem to have any substantial record of academic publications, and his degrees (BA in classics, MPhil in Latin love poetry) are only tangentially related to his publications. All of that together would make Chrystal a less-than-ideal, but not unusable, source. However, my previous exposure to Paul Chrystal's work was at Cleitagora, where he apparently got his information from Wikipedia. Given that, I would advise being extremely cautious about using his work.

In this particular case, the Chrystal page in question is basically just two long quotes: one from Diodorus Siculus and one from K.S. Dardi's These Kamboj People. If Dardi is a reliable source we can cite him directly, and if he isn't then laundering him through Chrystal doesn't change that. As for Diodorus – I am unable to track down the source of the text that Chrystal quotes, which makes me highly suspicious. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 10:55, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

• No for reasons elucidated by HOI and Caeciliusinhorto. TrangaBellam (talk) 10:50, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Film credits from pricebaba.com

This edit [35] to the filmography table at Lollu Sabha Maaran cites a "news" article from pricebaba.com to verify that Lollu Sabha Maaran is in the 2023 film Kannitheevu (not the 1981 film of the same name linked at Kanni Theevu).

The pricepaba.com "news" articles (all under pricebaba.com/blog/) appear to be technology product announcements, including announcing when films are to be released for digital streaming. Those film streaming release announcements typically include cast listings. Some of the news articles appear to be legitimate reporting based on other news sources. For example, this news article on GM planning to use ChatGPT cites other reports from Reuters and Semafor.

That particular pricebaba.com news article regarding Kannitheevu was triggered, apparently, by a tweet from the streaming service provider, Simply South, that the film is now available for streaming outside of India. Following the tweet [36] leads to a sub-tweet [37] that provides a link to the service provider's web page for that film [38], which lists the cast and crew, but the list does not include Lollu Sabha Maaran. I have no reason to doubt that Lollu Sabha Maaran is in Kannitheevu, but I do not know if this particular source or individual report is reliable enough to use.

Btw, pricebaba.com appears in 13 articles.  — Archer1234 (t·c) 17:37, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

Any thoughts on whether pricebaba.com is reliable?  — Archer1234 (t·c) 00:59, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

What if all the sources are wrong?

I have a curious situation while working on the list of governors of Minnesota. All sources - even ones dating back to at least 1908 - say Stephen Miller took office on January 11, 1863. Every. Single. One.

And yet. I can show that these are completely wrong, with two links to one book:

• One, that Miller was sworn in around noon on January 13: [39]
• And, one that Swift (his predecessor) was still considered governor on the morning of January 13: [40]

So, how do I handle this? I thought about just linking the above and changing the date to January 13, but if that goes ahead I feel like we should explain something to the reader? Or, would this count as original research? One thing I know we can't do is uncritically offer January 11 as the date. --Golbez (talk) 21:26, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't have an answer for you... but checking The Weekly Pioneer And Democrat for the timeframe, they don't mention the swearing in of the Governor (but they do mention the choice of new officers on the 13th).... but they don't say anything about the House or Senate doing anything on the 11th, which is unsurprising as it was a Sunday. So I really think you found the truth, but might have to report that "sources disagree". --Nat Gertler (talk) 22:03, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

The sources you have linked, at least, do not appear to me to be of particularly high quality. For example, it appears that the pages on the Minnesota Legislative Reference Library are drawn from secondary sources (not, as one might have supposed, from official Minnesota government records), making this a tertiary source, and the same is true of the National Governors Association page. In addition, I see that the St. Cloud Democrat reported on Thursday, January 14, 1864 (Newspapers.com), that Governor Miller was inaugurated on Wednesday. So this is just a matter of quality of sources, and the best sources are telling us without question that the date was January 13. John M Baker (talk) 23:12, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

Oh, wait, 1864? That's why I wasn't finding any discussion of the new Governor in the 1863 source I was looking at. here is a link to the St. Cloud Democrat source he mentioned, for reference purposes. --Nat Gertler (talk) 23:25, 14 March 2023 (UTC) And here is the Weekly Press and Democrat giving the date of his inauguration message as the 13th in the issue of the 22nd, as well as the mention of the inauguration in the work of the House that day.... although oddly elsewhere in the paper it's among things listed as happening "yesterday" which would be the 21st (but I presume they transcribed an article without update.) --Nat Gertler (talk) 23:38, 14 March 2023 (UTC) Oh, and if you need the same information in German... --Nat Gertler (talk) 23:52, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

In the immortal words of Emily Litella, "Oh! That's very different! Nevermind." Banks Irk (talk) 00:10, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Erp. Sorry. I've been staring at these numbers for so long that they are really bleeding together. --Golbez (talk) 02:38, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Well that's disappointing, about the Minnesota library. Ugh. You'd think states would care more. After discovering two weeks ago that every source on the inauguration of Massachusetts governors is wrong, I've lost all faith in them. Alabama and Arkansas spoiled me; curse them for being at the start of the alphabet. Thanks. I have it in my notes to re-evaluate all the "official" sources on my next pass through the articles. --Golbez (talk) 02:41, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

The earliest mentions of Miller taking office on January 11, 1864 that I could find are two 1876 books: The Legislative Manual of the State of Minnesota and The Centennial Northwest: An Illustrated History of the Northwest. I wonder what earlier editions of the The Legislative Manual of the State of Minnesota might state. Is it possible that he would have been recognized as governor on a certain date prior to taking the oath by some weird rule/law (similar to the 25th Amendment minus the resignation or death of the previous office holder)? -Location (talk) 00:20, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

OK, I didn't check any of the sources, but looking at the overall situation, it's possible that you are a Boltzman Baby, in which case all the sources are imaginary and we generally treat imaginary sources as unreliable. On a more practical level, this happens with birthdays sometimes, and the general practice is to be like "Smith was born January 11^[sources] or January 13^[sources]..." If the reader doesn't need detailed info, that's good enough. If she does, she can drill down into the sources and make her own decision. My 2c. Herostratus (talk) 00:45, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

A list of the Legislative Manuals of the State of Minnesota can be found here and the first list of governors appears in the 1871 issue found here (see pages 90-91). It has Miller's first day as January 11, 1864. I would use a footnote to state something like: "Official sources note that Miller's first day in office was January 11, 1864. The journal of the Minnesota House of Representatives notes that Miller gave his inaugural speech after being sworn into office by Chief Justice LaFayette Emmett shortly after noon on January 13, 1864." FWIW... -Location (talk) 02:23, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Inviting comments in a RFC about RS policy

Not an appropriate use of RSN. Hemiauchenia (talk) 02:54, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Eyferth_study#Request_for_comment_on_hereditarianism_subsection This initially began as a RFC about whether to restore content that was removed from one article, but it has recently turned into a more general RFC about removals from a large number of articles, and the approach to sourcing these mass removals are based on. The argument that's been accepted to justify the removals, that's now being reviewed in the RFC, is that the reliability of a source depends primarily on what viewpoints it presents. Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Scholarship currently says: "Material such as an article, book, monograph, or research paper that has been vetted by the scholarly community is regarded as reliable, where the material has been published in reputable peer-reviewed sources or by well-regarded academic presses." Depending on the RFC's outcome, this part of the policy may have to be amended to say that sources from reputable academic publishers and journals are sometimes unreliable sources depending on the viewpoints they include. Whether that's true is a question of great importance to RS policy, so I invite readers of the RS noticeboard to comment in that discussion. --AndewNguyen (talk) 08:08, 15 March 2023 (UTC) I strongly recommend at this point that you re-review the arbitration decisions on this topic area before attempting to relitigate them - David Gerard (talk) 12:09, 15 March 2023 (UTC) What do you mean? The most recent time this matter was brought before ArbCom, they responded that the proposed amendment was not a useful way to address the sourcing issue, and their only decision was that someone should make a new arbitration request narrowly focused on that issue. It isn't clear how Mosi Nuru's effort to resolve it by a community discussion contradicts that instruction. --AndewNguyen (talk) 13:51, 15 March 2023 (UTC) @AndewNguyen: How do you know that Mosi Nuru –– a brand new user with almost no edits outside this very narrow topic –– had the intention to resolve a matter that was brought before ArbCom almost a year and a half ago? Did they communicate this to you privately? Generalrelative (talk) 19:59, 15 March 2023 (UTC) No, the only thing I know is that it's a RFC about the same general issue that was brought before ArbCom: the assumption, which seems widespread among Wikipedia editors, that WP:FRINGE takes priority over WP:V and/or WP:RS. --AndewNguyen (talk) 00:30, 16 March 2023 (UTC) Nonsense. The RfC is about Should the "hereditarianism" subsection of "Eyferth study" be restored? The OP, Mosi Nuru, has given no indication that they have even read –– let alone understood –– these policies and guidelines. And no one has given any indication that the relevant parts of WP:FRINGE (that is, WP:FRIND and WP:ONEWAY) aren't working precisely as intended. If you and a handful of other SPAs and LTAs refuse to WP:LISTEN, that is an annoyance but not a problem with the P&G themselves. Generalrelative (talk) 01:14, 16 March 2023 (UTC) Soliciting editors to weigh in on a RFC elsewhere is not the purpose of RSN or even of its talk page. Somebody with sufficient stripes on their sleeve hat this please. Banks Irk (talk) 02:09, 16 March 2023 (UTC) Another reason to hat: it's not a good thing that the RfC is being used to further a dispute about other articles. That participants have decided to use the RfC to advocate for project-wide change is undesirable, and it shouldn't be encouraged. No legitimate consensus can form in this one-article RfC that would affect others. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 02:36, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

AI-generated reference

This edit [41] to Google Workspace cites a source that is a "news" article at JBNews with a byline of "AINews". AINews is described as:

AINews
AI Bot for generating articles that will be edited by the Jenbn Team. Don't hesitate to contact the Jenbn Team if you notice any misleading information in this contents.

Is this acceptable to cite? I am inclined to say it is not but would like to read what others say.  — Archer1234 (t·c) 10:28, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Given the 'submit a post' link [42] on the JenBN home page, I doubt that any of their content meets WP:RS, even if not AI generated. AndyTheGrump (talk) 10:44, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Absolutely not a reliable source. Woodroar (talk) 14:36, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Is the New York Post reliable when used for a direct quote?

Hi all. In this diff, Oncamera reinstated some material, including a quote, sourced to the NY Post. It had previously been removed by Peaceray. I definitely side more with Peaceray on this one, but I understand Oncamera's rationale to some degree, so I would appreciate any thoughts on whether the Post as used here is exempt from its generally unreliable status. Thanks all. Dumuzid (talk) 14:04, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

As per Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive_312#RFC: New York Post (nypost.com) :The general consensus seems to be 3, Generally unreliable for factual reporting especially with regard to politics, [...] I think that this certainly applies to this case. I searched in Google, Bing, & duck.com for the "Any tribute to her must be removed to protect our family and the public from the continued sham" quote, & it originated with the NY Post & was quoted as from that source at whiskeyriff.com. It does not appear elsewhere. If we are to follow the consensus delineated at WP:NYPOST, we would remove the whole quote & citation. There are two questions about the quote. Is it accurate? Is its inclusion justified by WP:IGNORE Peaceray (talk) 14:26, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

The Independent also used the NY post in their article for the same quote. See here. They are a reliable news agency.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 14:29, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

That definitely does lend some more reliability to the quote, but I will confess that as The Independent specifically attributes it to The Post, I still have qualms. Happy to go wherever consensus leads, though. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 14:32, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

It's a direct quote from the sisters and attributed as such in the Sacheen Littlefeather Wikipedia article. I can understand how the NY Post can be unreliable in other cases but this case seems pretty straightforward. It's being used the same as how the Independent used the source.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 14:35, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

I would be more comfortable with using the Independent as a citation, & quoting that source's attribution to the New York Post. Peaceray (talk) 14:37, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

If quoting New York Post, the best thing to cite is New York Post per WP:RS/QUOTE. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 16:35, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Bad sources are not trustworthy, including for direct quotes. Find a quote made to an RS, not one reblogged by some other outlet - David Gerard (talk) 18:53, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

The NY Post interviewed the sister directly and it's her direct quote being sourced in the article. I don't see how that's not trustworthy when they just printed what the person said. WP:RS/QUOTE says The accuracy of quoted material is paramount and the accuracy of quotations from living persons is especially sensitive. To ensure accuracy, the text of quoted material is best taken from (and cited to) the original source being quoted and that's how the source is being used.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 20:19, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Because we don't trust generally unreliable gossip rags to report even quotes accurately. The NY Post is a trash-tier source given to fabrication, and only just escaped full deprecation. If it said the sky was blue, you should look outside. It's not a source to use for any claim about a living person - David Gerard (talk) 23:55, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Can you link me to the part of the discussion that says direct quotes from the interviewed person by the post can't be used? I couldn't find such a claim in the discussion linked. Wikipedia policy WP:RS/QUOTE says it's preferred.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 00:39, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I believe that would be included under general unreliability for factual reporting. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 00:44, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Just noting here that I agree with this interpretation and would not cite the New York Post for any reason in a BLP. Loki (talk) 00:49, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, Sacheen is dead and BLP is for the living.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 01:50, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

WP:BLP by its own terms also applies to (at least some) recently deceased people. We can debate whether that applies here, but her passing is not a reason for using the Post. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 04:12, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

That's fair, but her sisters are still alive. Loki (talk) 17:49, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

The status of the NYPost means it has zero weight in how we determine the due weight of the content. It would be better to use a RS, even if they originally got it from the Post. If no other sources picked it up, then we would not use it at all, with the exception of ABOUTSELF, where we could use the Post speaking about itself as content in our New York Post article. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:06, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

See my comment in next section. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 06:09, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

The Independent cites the NY Post for the same direct quote above. Should I just switch to that reference in the article and be done with this discussion if that's an acceptable solution?  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 04:47, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

RS/QUOTE and unreliable sources

This is a tangent to the above, so I'm starting a subsection. I've seen the WP:RS/QUOTE argument used before, as it is above, to insist that generally unreliable sources (or even deprecated sources) be cited for quoted material that they originally published. I'm not loving this argument. RS/QUOTE says "To ensure accuracy, the text of quoted material is best taken from (and cited to) the original source being quoted." For accuracy to be at issue in these situations, we'd have to believe something like:

• A person said something (uncontested)
• A generally unreliable source has accurately transcribed the something said (I would have thought this to be the sketchiest part)
• A generally reliable source has inaccurately copied the text from the generally unreliable source (this is surprisingly the point some people have an issue with)

This is especially hard to swallow when all the sources involved are online and accessible. We can be sure that the generally reliable source is accurately copying the quoted material from the unreliable source.

To me, there is a distinct cost, paid in the overall trustworthiness of the encyclopedia, to every citation to an unreliable source. What is the benefit? Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 04:28, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

On the FAQ on the talkpage of Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources, it says Are there sources that are "always reliable" or sources that are "always unreliable"? No. The reliability of a source is entirely dependent on the context of the situation, and the statement it is being used to support. Some sources are generally better than others, but reliability is always contextual. In regards to WP:RS/QUOTE, looking at the context and actual statement being cited can make an "decidedly" unreliable source acceptable at times, imo.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 04:51, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't disagree with that at all. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 04:56, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

In the absence of any doubt about accuracy, and no BLP issues, I don't disagree either. I will strike my comment above as contextual reliability trumps most any other argument. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 06:07, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Can we please not dragged Trump into it? EEng 20:40, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Right. That's an argument for putting the quote in. My argument earlier (which was not the argument that Firefangledfeathers claimed someone was making) was that if you're putting the quote in, you should follow the Wikipedia guideline. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 13:57, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't see much benefit at all, frankly. If no reliable source includes an exact quote, then it's very hard to say that our including an exact quote would be warranted. "Contextual reliability" just sounds like an escape clause to justify putting any quote under any circumstances. It's a quote, therefore the source is momentarily reliable, therefore we should include it! This is uncomfortably close to a get-out-of-deprecation-free card. Yes, WP:RS/QUOTE says To ensure accuracy, the text of quoted material is best taken from (and cited to) the original source being quoted. Then it goes on to say, If this is not possible, then the text may be taken from a reliable secondary source. I'm rather fine with regarding deprecation as a reason why citing a publication is not possible. Physically, it can be done, but so can the insertion of BLP violations and all sorts of other nasty things, but it's not possible to do that and be encyclopedic at the same time. XOR'easter (talk) 15:12, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I think the quote should be removed. To use a deprecated source violates BLP. We cannot be sure that the Post has accurately quoted the sisters. Surely if the sisters requested that the Academy remove the tribute, there should be some other source. An article entitled "'Liar' Sacheen Littlefeather's sisters: Leave her out of Oscars' In Memoriam" reeks of tabloid journalism. We should be able to do better. Peaceray (talk) 05:57, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, now, that was not hard to find! I have removed the quote & the NY Post citation, & replaced it with material derived from a new source, The Mercury News that does adhere to WP:RS. Peaceray (talk) 06:36, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Allpar.com

The use of allpar.com (a web site on US-based car manufacturers and their products) as a source came up in a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Good article reassessment/February 2023. Searching for insource:allpar.com finds currently 433 articles using it, many or most as a reference. According to https://www.allpar.com/about/ it is an open forum, of a type that I think WP:ELNO #10 and maybe more relevantly WP:USERGENERATED forbid. I didn't find anything about it in the archives or perennial source list. Can it be used as a reliable source, or should efforts be made to remove those 433 links? —David Eppstein (talk) 00:31, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Looks like a wide open pseudonymous forum that has been formatted to superficially resemble a news site. Fully WP:USERGENERATED and the about page shows it's not in line with WP:RS at all: "The beauty of online forums is the information is peer-vetted. Our members have read the content, commented, replied, and helped maintain active conversations around the accuracy of the content you might be reading. In addition, our team of moderators and administrators are looking out for “fake news” and “shill posts” from unauthorized sources." Moderators to remove the most obvious spam is nothing like an editorial process. Siawase (talk) 09:41, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I would be careful when looking at it's use and what's being cited. Allpar fits into the group of online information sites that are often topic specific and contain a mix of user/forum submitted content, archives of material that may have been published elsewhere (brochures, article scans etc) and articles published by the site. In that last case how/where is the line between a topic specific news site vs something like the site in question? Personally I might go with looking at the context of the claim. If the claim is 'BLP subject stole money from Chrysler' then I want strong sourcing. If the claim is "in 1973 the Cordova's rear axle ratio was 3.55:1" cited to something outside of the forums then I don't see an issue with this source. If it's being cited as a repository for a citation to an old brochure then it treat it as a repository. Nothing should be cited to the forums. I think all of this is compatible with our RS principle of context matters. Springee (talk) 15:16, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

According to similar reasoning it would be ok to use Wikipedia articles as reliable sources for claims that, in the article in question, are sourced to something outside Wikipedia. But it's not ok. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:10, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

OK, I just looked at the website and it wasn't what I remembered so I looked at the history of the site. It has changed owners and appears to have moved from a site with edited articles and forums to a forums only. The current site owners say they are a company that owns a range of online forums. As such I would no longer endorse it's use. However, I would investigate the links rather than whole sale removing them. Allpar historically was a good site and cited by others in the automotive space such as Hemmings [43]. I suspect most links predate the sale of the site and have no idea if they still link to old content. Replacing the references with cn tags rather than removal of the supporting claims seems like the proper option. Springee (talk) 21:19, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Looks like a standard WP:USERGENERATED case to me. It seems on a par with media fansites; hobbyists can be passionate about gathering detail, but we don't regard Memory Alpha as reliable for our purposes, either. XOR'easter (talk) 17:55, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Screenshot Media

Is this article from Screenshot Media reliable for the Cody Ko article? — VORTEX³⁴²⁷ (Talk!) 09:57, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I would say yes, especially given their editorial code (which can be found half way down their terms and conditions page). The only point I'd make is that they report on culture and entertainment, so a better source might be necessary if it's for any contentious topic. For reporting on Cody Ko it's fine. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 12:13, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

So, for example, it should not be used for the controversy on Noel Miller it mentioned? — VORTEX³⁴²⁷ (Talk!) 22:38, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

In the BLP for Cody Ko? It seems the the controversy was mostly about Miller not Ko, so it might not be WP:DUE. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 23:09, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

news.jagatgururampalji.org

Hey everyone!

I've noticed that users have attached this source news.jagatgururampalji.org to a handful of Hinduism articles that I've been editing and I'm questioning it's reliability for a few reasons:

1. per WP:Verifiability - cannot identify if the writers are professionals
2. The blogs on this website also revert back to their guru's (Jagat Guru Rampal Ji) teachings and according to this BBC article there is some controversy behind Jagat Guru Rampal Ji.
3. per WP:Questionable Sources - when looking at the about us page it looks quite opinionated. I feel this is not suitable for general content on Hinduism articles.

Would appreciate your input! Chilicave (talk) 17:30, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi @Chilicave,

I've just had a look at the source. The link you've put takes you to the homepage. I've had a look at a few article pieces and agree that it's hard to verify the authors and/or professionalism. In general, it's best to stay away from primary news sources as nothing has been verified by a third party.

They also have a section saying "Sant Rampal Ji defeats other spiritual leaders and exposes their cults". The language feels quiet biased in my opinion. I would say it's not reliable.

Thanks,

Starlights99 (talk) 19:47, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

As a follow up on this:

I noticed the source also talks about World Wildlife Day and how to avoid being reborn as an animal. The source says that "salvation is attained by doing Sat-bhakti of Real God Kabir", and states one should go to Sant Rampal Ji for "the true Guru’s divine blessings".

I don't think this is a reliable source based on the notion that they are actively promoting worship to Sant Rampal Ji and refer to him as the true guru. Wikipedia articles cannot maintain WP:NPOV if the sources themselves are also biased.

Thanks!

Starlights99 (talk) 20:12, 17 March 2023 (UTC)