Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

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• Daily Mail fakes own historical front pages --Guy Macon (talk)

Quote from WP:DAILYMAIL: "The Daily Mail may have been more reliable historically"

We need to modify our handling of old pages from The Daily Mail to say that care must be taken to cite the original historical material and watch out for modern, edited versions. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:23, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

Christ on a stick, what is wrong with them? This is exactly why some of us do not think the "discouragement" goes far enough.Slatersteven (talk) 15:27, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

Strongly suggest removing the text "Some editors regard the Daily Mail as reliable historically, so old articles may be used in a historical context" from WP:RSP, or cautioning also that they literally fake their own historical articles. Never trust the DM - David Gerard (talk) 16:29, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

That's bizarre. Instead of using their own historical material, they took the trouble to invent fakes that look "old-timey" (and they buried a vaguely-worded disclaimer four pages down). Do they think that slightly yellowed images won't bring in the clicks? Is fabrication simply their instinctive course of action? In any case, I support David Gerard's suggestion. XOR'easter (talk) 19:55, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

I could formulate a rewording ... but idiots try to drive trucks through anything that looks like an exception. So I'd suggest this behaviour is egregious enough to remove the sentence. If people want to argue it case by case they can show they went to a microfilm archive or something, 'cos we literally can't trust the online version or reprints not to make stuff up - David Gerard (talk) 22:27, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

That would be my take, There are archive versions not held by the Daily Myth. Thus any use if the DM must be independent of the DM.Slatersteven (talk) 22:36, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

@XOR'easter:, in this case BoingBoing seems to be insinuating that the Mail may have been trying to make themselves look less pro-Nazi, so there is a motive beyond a contempt for journalistic integrity. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 23:00, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

To be fair it looks more like a case of "our readers are so shallow they cannot understand anything not couched in modern terms and style". What I do not understand is why bother to make so much effort to create a "Fakesimalie". They could have done a "Yay for us 70 years ago" without "faking" a front page so totally (such as "for King and Empire").Slatersteven (talk) 09:44, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

Remove wording. This is yet another reason why we cannot trust this source. buidhe 01:10, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

Done.[1] --Guy Macon (talk) 12:42, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

I would rather this had been given more time for wider feedback, not that I disagree.Slatersteven (talk) 12:53, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

• I am tempted to revert that for 2 main reasons: 1. The inclusion there is the result of two RFC's. The wording is a summary of those RFC outcomes. By changing the wording fundementally in that manner, it no longer reflects the RFC. What that change does is prohibit (at least that is what it will be taken to do) all uses of Daily Mail historical material. It certainly needs a bigger discussion than the brief one here. 2. Its using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. The Daily Mail despite its more recent faults has plenty of decent reporting over the decades previous. We cite the original publication, not The Daily Mail's reworked version of it. A more appropriate response would be adding wording to ensure the material cited has been verified from copies of the orignal. We take it on good faith anyway that written sources we dont have access to say what the editor says they do, and any editor using this as an excuse to misrepresent sources would be rumbled pretty quickly. Only in death does duty end (talk) 23:07, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

Personally I would we rather used a nuclear bomb over such blatant crappyness, but I get your point, and said as much myself early on. Yes I would rather you reverted and this was made a formal RFC to overturn the last two.Slatersteven (talk) 09:04, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

See [2].

Looks like I need to start a new Daily Mail RfC in order to make any changes to the Daily mail entry in the perennial sources list. --Guy Macon (talk) 09:51, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

See below - David Gerard (talk) 10:08, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

So we are using a situation source (Boing Boing) to determine the RSP entry of the Daily Mail, that seems rather odd. Regards  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 11:58, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

It would if that were an accurate summary of the above. Fortunately, it isn't - David Gerard (talk) 12:09, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

That is an accurate summary of the above and additionally there's no proof. According to a source as good as boingboing.net The Times (apparently the May 2 1945 New York Times is meant) said "London newspapers received the announcement of Hitler's death just as the early editions were going to press but the second editions went 'all-out' on the news, with long obituaries of Hitler and biographical sketches of Doenitz ...". Thus the copy with the label "4A.M. Edition" might well greatly differ from what ends up in archives, and layout might greatly differ too if the early-morning audience was more inclined to visuals. The boingboing.net accusation is far more plausible but in the absence of a reliable source, or a copy of a "4A.M. edition" that differs from the picture, it's not established fact. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 13:53, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

The term for it is historical negationism which has an illustrious history of practitioners. It is beyond the pale given it is an attempt to rewrite their own history as Nazi sympathizers. -- GreenC 13:20, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

RFC: Remove "reliable historically" sentence from WP:RSPDM summary

The WP:RSP summary on the Daily Mail includes the sentence "Some editors regard the Daily Mail as reliable historically, so old articles may be used in a historical context". However, the Daily Mail also presents altered versions of its historical content, as documented above. (At the bottom of the altered content was a small single-sentence disclaimer noting it had been "specially edited and adapted" - which was not noticed by many members of the general public.) This leaves readily available historical versions of Daily Mail content questionable - as well as its untrustworthiness per the 2017 WP:DAILYMAIL RFC and its 2019 ratification, the site dailymail.co.uk appears not to be trustworthy about the Daily Mail's own past content.

Suggested options:

1. Remove the "reliable historically" sentence from the summary on WP:RSP
2. Add a qualifier: "Note that dailymail.co.uk is not trustworthy as a source of past content that was printed in the Daily Mail."
3. Do nothing
4. Something else

10:08, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Suggested action on WP:RSPDM

• Remove the sentence - David Gerard (talk) 10:08, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
• Remove as the material they did publish might be reliable, they are just not reliable for having published it. But if it is reliable someone else would have written about it. Thus (and given the possibly of accidental or deliberate abuse) I have to change to remove, if they cannot be trusted over what they themselves have published they cannot be trusted over anything.Slatersteven (talk) 10:14, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
• Remove per David Gerard's reasoning below. As a secondary consideration, we should be discoraging use of historical newspaper sources anyway. buidhe 10:39, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
• Remove, with the caveat that the print edition may pass, so a print archive might be acceptable? Guy (help!) 11:44, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

So (in essence) remove and add qualifier?Slatersteven (talk) 11:59, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

I wouldn't even add suggested ways to use the DM, they'll be taken as blanket permissions - David Gerard (talk) 12:54, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

It doesn't look likely to pass, but an official WP consensus opinion that dailymail.co.uk is not a reliable source for the content of the Daily Mail would certainly be interesting - David Gerard (talk) 19:11, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

• Remove the qualifier, per Slatersteven, and also the notion that these sort of qualifiers confuse the situation. --Jayron32 14:29, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
• Add a qualifier (though perhaps not needed as obvious). If the dailymail is unreliable, that may extend to their own historical content. But if you pull a dailymail piece off a microfilm archive or online archives not run by the mail ([3], [4]) then there shouldn't be any problem in that regard.--Hippeus (talk) 14:32, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
• In my opinion, the best answer is [A] just remove all mention of historical from the Daily mail entry of RSPDM, and [B] have the closing summary of the RfC you are reading now specifically mention that a microfilm archive or online archives not run by The Daily Mail is as good or as bad as the source where you read it. Having this subtlety in the RSPDM will indeed lead to misuse. Having it in the RfC closing summary will allow any editor to use the historical page (assuming that her local library's microfilm collection or www.historic-newspapers.co.uk are reliable sources for what was printed all of those years ago; if some other source starts faking historical newspaper pages we will deal with that specific source in the usual way). So I !vote Remove. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:55, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
• Bad RfC I will not say "support" or "oppose" because that might suggest respect for the WP:RSP essay-class page, which I do not have. It is in fact quite easy to see document images for back copies of the Daily Mail via Gale. (I did so for the May 2 1945 front page via my local library site for free, I assume that others have good library sites too.) WP:DAILYMAIL makes it clear that editors have a right to use such material in some circumstances, regardless what people say in this thread. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 17:44, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
• Remove the sentence, and add a statement that historical content on dailymail.co.uk may have been significantly modified from its original version. XOR'easter (talk) 00:08, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
• Add a qualifier It is possible to trust archives that were archived by trusted sources such as a national library, at the time of publication. Trustworthy archives exist as evidenced by the original BoingBoing post that found the original. -- GreenC 13:24, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
• Something else - Clarify, do not make false statements. PRESERVE the indication of where there is good content of Daily Mail. I do not see support given re their current print about history, but if you need precision that the good is historical items not current items about history, it should per WP:BATHWATER clarify the good is older published work. These might not be readily available elsewhere, as there simply isn’t much historical sources, and if the guide indicates the previously acknowledged good data is bad, then it’s just a case of the guide is giving false information. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 19:17, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

• There is certainly good content from the Daily Mail... but there is no indication of which content that is. The OP didn't point out the old content is good, but that it cannot be trusted. They aren't going to put warnings on their stories saying, "This content is okay, the rest is a bit dodgy." It's just not going to happen. This is how these papers compete with each other. They wind up people who otherwise like to believe they don't want to be informed about reality, but warned about reality. They aren't worried about Wikipedia. They are worried about Facebook and Twitter. It feels like they are being thrown out. They aren't even here. They've little to no interest in what this site represents. They just want to make a splash in the pond, not write an encyclopaedia. ~ R.T.G 10:08, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

• Add the reality, or what is the point? Anything less is just covering it up more. ~ R.T.G 10:08, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
• Add a qualifier that the Daily Mail may change their historical content, making it unreliable. Best practice would be to use another source, or link to a reliable archiving service. LK (talk) 01:19, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
• Remove per nom, or add a qualifier as the second-best option: since they're faking their own historical content, they're not a reliable source even for that. As for the idea of saying that historical content can be cited if one finds and cites the original in a library (and not the current Daily Mail's provably unreliable claims of what the original was)... under what circumstances is a (say) 1951 edition of the Daily Mail going to be both a and also the only reliable source we can find for something, anyway, and under what circumstance is information only reported in one so old edition of them going to be WP:DUE (or, in the case of an article as a whole, WP:NOTABLE)? I think, if anyone is trying to leave open some use of the Daily Mail as acceptable, I'd like there to be a concrete example of that being necessary and not just a contrived hypothetical. (Off-topic, discussing using very old documents as sources makes me think of Chizerots, which has three sources, from 1870, 1909, and 2008 respectively, discussing how "the most beautiful" among them is a "type [that] seems more Arabian than Berberic".) -sche (talk) 15:56, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
• Add a qualifier. The fact that the Dailymail online cannot be trusted for archives for its past copies does not make their past copies inherently less reliable. You can still find physical copies that can be used for archives. If someone can provide actual evidence of the Daily Mail publishing false stories historically that can be justify the removal of this section. However, that is not the case this situation just makes finding archives of the Daily Mail harder which does not affect reliablity. Regards  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 09:25, 2 June 2020 (UTC)
• Remove. The Daily Mail has never been a trustworthy publication. There is zero reason to ever source anything to it. Anything notable to include will be sourced elsewhere, and anything that only ever appeared on the Daily Mail is likely fake. No qualifiers; there's absolutely nothing usable about it. oknazevad (talk) 17:10, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

  Do you have any evidence that suggests this? How do you know say a 1905 archive copy of the Daily Mail is "likely fake"? Regards  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 23:36, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

• Remove. In addition to the above, the clause as currently written also invites debate about what counts as "old", which isn't great in terms of guidance. The Perennial Sources page already has "Context matters" in the lead, and "generally prohibited" within the Daily Mail section, both of which already invite wiggle room for instances in which an old edition may be the best source. CMD (talk) 15:08, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
• Why are we discussing this - To be honest, this looks like Guy Macon returning, yet again, to this topic on which he has been so vocal for so long ("burn it, burn it with fire!"). We get it, you hate the DM, but what is the actual article-content issue being discussed here? None is presented. FOARP (talk) 10:40, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Clearly you failed to notice the fact that my explanation as to why we are discussing this has been in this thread fo over a month, so let me repeat it for you.

Let's talk about the basic error in thinking that led us here. Again and again I see people claiming that they "just know" that:

• The Daily Mail wouldn't lie about a direct quote,
• wouldn't fabricate an interview,
• wouldn't lie about whether the person who's name is on the top of an editorial is the author who actually wrote those words,
• wouldn't lie if that "author" has a sufficiently famous name,
• wouldn't lie if doing so would result in a lawsuit or fine,
• wouldn't lie about material being original and not plagiarized with a few errors thrown in to make better clickbait,
• etc., etc.

Those who "just know" that there are times when the Daily Mail isn't lying expect the rest of us to find, not just multiple examples of The Daily Mail lying. but examples of them lying in every conceivable situation.

Last month I had no idea that The Daily Mail might lie about the contents of their own historical pages but I knew from experience that they lie in all situations. Now I have an example of them lying in this new specific situation.

I am getting sick and tired of playing Whac-A-Mole. At what point do we simply conclude that those who "just know" that The Daily Mail doesn't lie in some situations "know" no such thing and that The Daily Mail will lie about ANYTHING? --Guy Macon (talk) 09:50, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree, every argument made about how the Daily Mail is sometimes reliable has been shown to be flawed. It is ridiculous we have this every time the Daily Mail is source or removed "but its reliable for this one thing". It just cannot be trusted for anything ever, at any time.Slatersteven (talk) 10:40, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy, you're not playing Whack-a-mole. There is no actual content issue presented here, just a bunch of hypotheticals. You're proposing overturning RFCs that you were the biggest proponent of because you don't think they go far enough. FOARP (talk) 10:05, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• Add qualifier; perhaps a note that the dead tree version can be relied on as a historical document of the time. Although that might be hard to "police". (In which case, just Remove, as I doubt we would be losing much in the long-term.)——Serial ^# 10:51, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion on WP:RSPDM

I think we should just remove the sentence. It's ill-defined and not well supported in the RFCs themselves - when, precisely, was the DM not terrible? By what measure? - and IMO, encrusting a qualifier with further qualifiers is not clear. And qualifiers have historically been used by editors who want to use bad content as an excuse to add otherwise-unusable content - David Gerard (talk) 10:08, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

I was thinking that there are things they are notable for (such as the photo of St Pauls), but then if its notable others would have noted it, we don't need to use the (well this) Daily Myth).Slatersteven (talk) 10:19, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

If the result here is "Remove", it would probably also make sense to include an explanation that prevents this from being interpreted as contradicting the original conclusions. Maybe something like, "The original WP:DAILYMAIL RfC left open the possibility that it may have been more reliable historically, but a subsequent RfC [link to this discussion] determined..." Sunrise (talk) 12:56, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

certainly - it'll be linked as a third listed RFC, link it from WP:DAILYMAIL which is the 2017 RFC ... there will be various sensible ways to handle it. The present text has been modified in uncontroversial ways before, e.g. I noted other "dailymail" domains which aren't the DM, and dailymail.com used to be a proper newspaper, the Charleston Daily Mail, which is in fact used as a source in Wikipedia, before the DM bought it from them - David Gerard (talk) 14:19, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

certainly not - that would modify the closed and archived WP:DAILYMAIL RfC even though the subject here (read the topic, read the questions) is not about that, and even if it were it would not be legitimate here. If you want to overturn what the closers concluded in WP:DAILYMAIL your recourse is WP:CLOSECHALLENGE. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 14:12, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

I think WP:RSPDM in general is not as well written as it could be, and undermines itself in significant ways. In particular, it does not cite its sources or attempt to justify its objections. In order to find those sources we are presumably expected to trawl through a total of 45 separate discussions.

The Daily Mail is a well-established newspaper with relatively wide circulation. It is well known that it is biased, and it is also well-known to be disliked by precisely the sort of demographic that (one would assume) would edit Wikipedia. Given the zeal with which the DM is removed, it is quite easy for someone not intimately involved in the debate to conclude that the issue is not so much that the DM is unreliable, but that editors who denounce it do so for POV reasons. Particularly when the text being removed is something inherently subjective (e.g. a movie review) or where it is used as an example with explicit attribution (e.g. in a section on press coverage of an event).

It might therefore be useful to augment WP:RSPDM and WP:DAILYMAIL with a new essay, putting the reasons for our attitude to the DM and giving appropriate examples so that editors less familiar with the history can catch up and understand why it is being removed. Kahastok talk 15:10, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

No, that's nonsense. The DM has similar politics to the Times and the Telegraph, but - and this is the key point - those behave rather more like papers of record that aren't given to fabrication.

The primary objection that Wikipedia-type people have to the DM is that they are repeated, habitual liars who make stuff up, and are extensively documented as doing so. Do you really not understand that that's the problem? - David Gerard (talk) 22:24, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

I suppose it's probably too much to expect you to actually read what I wrote before writing an abusive response. Kahastok talk 10:38, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

• Seems just silly, RSP is lazy and obviously a blanket statement will be sometimes flawed by giving false conclusions. Instead of examining specifics of an item in context per RS, or dealing with Mail had some bits accepted as RS, this just further pursues the false dichotomy of everything published by X is bad in every way or everything published by X is perfect in every way. Silly. The real question should be at what point are we to just ignore the WP:RSP supplement entry in favor of using the senior guidance WP:RS and/or get actual specific judgement of WP:RSN instead ? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 19:33, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

As this RfC has elapsed, I've submitted a request for closure at WP:RFCL § Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#RFC: Remove "reliable historically" sentence from WP:RSPDM summary. — Newslinger talk 06:25, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

• Topsy-turvy logic - If I get the logic here, it's that the RFCs "proved" that the DM is a bad source that should be banned, but the proposers disagree with what the RFCs say now because they didn't "prove" that it was ever good. No, if you want to re-open this issue then you reopen the whole issue of the DM ban, you challenge the whole of the analysis of the RFCs, not just the parts you agree with. You want to over-turn an old RFC that basically banned a source (lets not kid ourselves that this isn't what happened or how it's being used - see the eradication campaign details below) because it didn't go far enough, when there was quite a lot of opinion voiced at both RFCs (dozens of editors in both RFCs - many more than have thus far spoken in favour of further extending the ban) that actually it was going too far, you cannot pretend that this ban is uncontroversial except for the parts you think didn't go far enough and that opposition to it never existed. The oppose votes in the previous RFCs must be taken into account here. FOARP (talk) 10:51, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Additional RfC Question: Under what conditions can we trust The Daily Mail?

(Background discussion moved from section above. See below for the actual additional RfC question)

Let's talk about the basic error in thinking that led us here. Again and again I see people claiming that they "just know" that:

• The Daily Mail wouldn't lie about a direct quote,
• wouldn't fabricate an interview,
• wouldn't lie about whether the person who's name is on the top of an editorial is the author who actually wrote those words,
• wouldn't lie if that "author" has a sufficiently famous name,
• wouldn't lie if doing so would result in a lawsuit or fine,
• wouldn't lie about material being original and not plagiarized with a few errors thrown in to make better clickbait,
• etc., etc.

Those who "just know" that there are times when the Daily Mail isn't lying expect the rest of us to find, not just multiple examples of The Daily Mail lying. but examples of them lying in every conceivable situation. Last week I had no idea that The Daily Mail might lie about the contents of their own historical pages but I knew from experience that they lie in all situations. Now I have an example of them lying in this new specific situation. I am getting sick and tired of playing Whac-A-Mole. At what point do we simply conclude that those who "just know" that The Daily Mail doesn't lie in some situations "know" no such thing and that The Daily Mail will lie about ANYTHING? --Guy Macon (talk) 15:55, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

You will of course believe that this is precisely a problem I keep hitting in DM removals. "Surely it's reliable for his words!" No, why would you think that, it's the DM - David Gerard (talk) 17:17, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Based upon the above, I propose the following:

There are no situations where the post-1960 Daily Mail is reliable for anything. See below for claims about itself.

• If TDM publishes an interview, that does not establish that the interview happened or even that the person interviewed or the person doing the interviewing actually exists.
• If TDM publishes material under a byline, that does not establish that the person named wrote it, even if the person s famous or a paid TDM contributor. TDM can and will fabricate any material and publish it under any byline.
• If TDM publishes material, that does not establish that TDM has the right to publish it or that it was not plagiarized from another publication. All material published by TDM should be treated as a possible copyright violation.
• If TDM plagiarizes material from another publication, that does not establish that TDM did not edit it, introducing false information.
• Regarding using TDM as a source about itself, we can write "On [Date] The Daily Mail wrote X", but we cannot use any internet page controlled by TDM as a source for that claim. TDM cannot be trusted to not silently edit pages it publishes without changing the date or indicating that the page was edited. We should instead cite the Internet Archive Wayback Machine snapshot for that page. For printed pages, we need to cite a source that TDM cannot modify, such as an independent online archive or a library's microfilm collection.
• (added on 19:54, 8 May 2020 (UTC)) In particular, the dailymail.co.uk website must never be used as a citation for anything, including claims about the contents of the dailymail.co.uk website or the print version of The Daily Mail. We are not to assume that what we read on any dailymail.co.uk page is the same as what was there yesterday, nor are we to assume that the content will be the same tomorrow, nor are we to assume that there will be any indication that a page was edited. We also are not to assume that users in different locations or using different browsers will see the same content.
• Even in situations where we have yet to catch TDM publishing false information, TDM is not to be trusted.

Note: I picked post-1960 because 1960 was when David English started his career at TDM. If anyone has evidence of TDM fabricating material before then, we can change the cutoff date. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:53, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Additional RfC Question Discussion

• Support as proposer. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:53, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
• Support As it is becoming clear that they cannot even really be trusted for their own opinions.Slatersteven (talk) 16:56, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
• The "1960" date - or any other date, or possible or impossible excuse - will absolutely be taken as a green light for open slather on filling Wikipedia with DM cites - I base this claim on the spectacular examples of DM fans trying to find loopholes in the words "generally prohibited", including one earlier today who claimed that "generally prohibited" didn't mean completely prohibited, therefore his use was probably good.

So I would not support listing a date without strong support for the DM ever having been good at any previous time - that is, clear positive evidence, rather than a lack of negative evidence.

Examples of all the things they do would probably be good too.

I would also explicitly note that the dailymail.co.uk website (by name) literally cannot be trusted as a source for the contents of the Daily Mail, amazing as that sounds - David Gerard (talk) 17:10, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Point well taken. I just removed the "post-1960" wording. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:41, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

I also added a paragraph covering the possibility of TDM serving up different content to different users. There are documented cases of e-commerce sites giving you a high price if you are using an iPhone and a low price if you are using Windows XP, higher for Beverly Hills and lower for Barstow, etc. It would be technically possible for TDM to serve up different content regarding, say, Brexit to UK, US, and EU readers, and really hard for us to detect them doing so. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:07, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

See below for what DM advocates are like in practice. I could do with backup here from those who can actually read policy - David Gerard (talk) 23:34, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

• Support without the post-1960 wording - David Gerard (talk) 19:46, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
• Support without the post-1960 wording, per above. Let's not waste any more time on this garbage source. buidhe 20:37, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
  • BTW, if people really want to get rid of DM references - talk on WP:RSN doesn't have any effect against dedicated DM warriors (and there really are dedicated DM warriors). The refs need to be got rid of, one edit at a time, and their removal defended (using literally our actual policies). This search is a good start - just start at the top and work down, judging usage and removing or replacing per the RFCs. If a few people even did ten a day, that would help improve Wikipedia greatly - David Gerard (talk) 20:43, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - please respect the seniority in guidance of RS and RSN, and a comment section within a RFC is not a valid RFC. What is in RSP is just some editors opinionating and phrasing, not necessarily a summary or strong consensus of views. If it was wrong in this case is just another example of such is imperfect and limited. I have always found the RSP idea simply too dogmatic and plainly a lazy and silly premise that there can be a perfect dichotomy of all-perfect or all-wrong that applies to all content of a publisher for all time. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 19:45, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
• Support It's important that we highlight the level of fabrication we're dealing with here, to help good-faith editors understand why the usual exceptions for attributed quotes aren't applicable to DM. –dlthewave ☎ 02:24, 22 May 2020 (UTC)
• Support without 1960 wording. There are zero places where the Daily Mail can be trusted. They're as bad as the National Enquirer. oknazevad (talk) 17:16, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Is this unique to the DM?

Do other news sources do this? If so, we probably need to address it at the policy (WP:RS or WP:V) level. Blueboar (talk) 13:59, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Ish, I seem to recall that mock newspapers are common enough, but something tells me they are rather more obvious about not being genuine. But yes I can see this may need to be more general.Slatersteven (talk) 14:12, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

We would have to find a source that [A] Is willing to lie about/fake anything at any time, and [B] has been around for over 100 years. Infowars will lie about anything but nobody is going to believe a claim that something was published by Infowars in 1917. The New York Times might say "we published X in 1917" but they haven't shown themselves to be willing to lie about anything and everything. As far as I can tell, there is only one source that fits both [A] and [B]. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:06, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Mmm, the NYT flaws are something RSP supposedly should note, (e.g. they have a thing on for Trump,) and RSP supposedly was/is to capture RSN discussions, not go off and try to evaluate 100 years of publishing where there is no article usage in question. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 19:52, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Typically you'll see a scan or image and then the actual original text as text - you won't see the actual thing the DM did, which was to say in the headline:

Read history as it happened: Extraordinary Daily Mail pages from the day Adolf Hitler died 70 years ago this week

and then - as a tiny text box in the bottom right corner of the fourth cover image:

SPECIALLY adapted and edited from the original Daily Mail editions of May 2, 1945 and April 30, 1945

without even the original images. And with the text of the articles changed from the 1945 text.

If you wanted to claim this is something that other newspapers do, requiring a general solution, I think you'd need to first provide evidence of other papers doing this - David Gerard (talk) 17:21, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

No this is totally not unique. If you are from the USA, hear this, people know in the UK and Ireland that the tabloids are sensationalist. Sensationalism is not a dirty word in the newspaper media over here. All national sized newspapers are openly biased in one way or another. The least sensational is the London Times (not the Irish Times, the Irish-only national papers are almost as bad as the British ones). This does not mean they are like the National Enquirer or the Weekly World News. That is not what a tabloid is over here. The newspapers are all walking the sensationalist line over here. Like your TV news. Ours is the other way around. Our TV news is almost impeccable. Newspaper news used to feature a teenage girl with her boobs out every day. Get it. Understand. It's not a secret. Our TV news over here is like your National Geographic. They are impeccable, documentary style, highly esteemed. Our newspapers are like, boobs out, SPLASH SHOCK EVERY SINGLE DAY HEADLINES, every single day. You can rely on them for daily gambling news. Newspapers here are the actual authority on that. One of the less popular daily tabloids, the Daily Sport, is nothing but gambling and boobs. There have been sitcoms about British tabloids since maybe forty years ago. They are not ashamed of what they are. It is simply what they are. ZOMG LET ME ASK YOU AGAIN CAN I HEAR THIS RIGHT???? Yes. Just like that. It has muted over the years, but it is still obvious. They run conflicting stories, they sensationalise, *they are often an important informative part of culture*... not simply nonsense like the Weekly World News, always based in fact... but that is as far as they can be surely trusted. If they say a bomb went off, you can be sure one went off... If they say the sky has fallen down, yes, get your umbrella out. Do they receive letters from Elvis on Pluto... no that is not what people are saying about them. Can you trust them to word and check facts as an impeccable source of information? No!! They are sensationalist. They actually try to walk the line between being honourable and being in court. They are not ashamed of that. They exhibit personality, bias, seriously... people do not respect them at all... people love them... You've watched or seen Japanese gameshows, and thought, maybe a lot of the Japanese are actually crazy, right? But RTG... how is newspaper culture supposed to compare to crazy Japanese gameshows??? Well... we can't do Jerry Springer and Oprah like you can... can we. It's like having a different accent. We stress different words. We have different attitudes about different individual things. Overall, it's pretty much the same insofar as it can be. It's like getting to know a different city. It might be north-south. It might be east-west, or it might be none of the above. ~ R.T.G 17:34, 11 May 2020 (UTC)

Re "Our TV news over here is like your National Geographic. They are impeccable, documentary style, highly esteemed", see [5] and [6]. I'm just saying. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:02, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Okay, well you can't win them all, but the non-regional newspaper press defaults to popular sensationalism, not impeccable documentarianism. We rely on these sensationalist journals because they are popular and free on the internet, but they are off the cuff, and that is not what Wikipedia is trying to be. Good grief, did I delete the part where I pointed out that we have "newsagents" instead of "drugstores"? Newspapers are very useful to culture over here to inform people of incidents and events in the world around them, but they exist to sensationalise. ~ R.T.G 14:25, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

I just saw this discussion while trying to figure out what provoked the sudden onslaught against conservative RS and whole publications that led to the creation of WP:RS/Perennial. It has been consuming a great deal of our time and energy, and I'm not quite convinced that it's all for the good of the project. I don't know anything about the DM or which way it leans but I found the information provided by RTG rather enlightening. I was a bit taken back by the Skeptical Inquirer link that Guy Macon provided to counter RTG's opinion of NatGeo, so I did some research which quickly led me to this NYTimes article. I will also add the following: “Scientific results are always provisional, susceptible to being overturned by some future experiment or observation. Scientists rarely proclaim an absolute truth or absolute certainty. Uncertainty is inevitable at the frontiers of knowledge.” ~ National Geographic Magazine I'm of the mind that as editors of an encyclopedia, we should not let our biases be the determining factor in the sources we choose to cite. No source is perfect - in fact, I don't know of anything manmade that is perfect which is why we are always striving for perfection, and I see that as a good thing. It is when we stop striving and focus only on dismantling and destroying that concerns me. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 13:04, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

You are now at the stage of positing a conspiracy theory against "conservative" sources (actually against sources extensively documented as engaging in fabrication), and seem to be getting to the stage of WP:RIGHTINGGREATWRONGS and trying to out-post your perceived opponents. I urge you to reconsider whether this is the page for that sort of editing behaviour - David Gerard (talk) 15:33, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

User:RTG Agree, at least for recent history. Newspapers in the U.K. were more restrained and respectful before the 1970s. In the United States, for many years mentions have noted that television news switched to being entertainment and sensationalizing, and newspapers reliability and neutrality were in decline in the 1990s as another ‘death of truth’. Newspapers seem to largely be BIASED, going past individual specialties (e.g. Wall Street Journal covers business) into catering to their local market or playing to a subscriber audience. (e.g. NYT runs anti-Trump, Washington Examiner runs pro-Trump). In some ways that makes it easier for WP to find the POVs, but in general it is a WP issue as editors proclaim EVERYthing from NYT is not just RS but also TRUTH and WEIGHT because NYT said so — or proclaim EVERYthing from Mail is FALSE so not RS and large WEIGHT POVs get obliterated. Seems like 80% or so of what U.K. population sees is deemed non-existent right now. Unless it’s BBC or London Times, it just isn’t acknowledged to exist. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:15, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure what there is to be done about that. It seems maybe even dangerous, not to have any biases in media at all, and that is because the people themselves cannot be strictly trusted. The people themselves are no more worried about their information services building an encyclopaedia than the Daily Mail is. I struggle with it. What is the popular meme? Even if you tell the people the best thing to do they won't do it. Jimbo Wales has been trying to start a people-driven news service for years. The current iteration is https://wt.social/ ~ R.T.G 11:50, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

• It is not unique to the DM, but the reason we have these sorts of discussion (as I said way back in the original RFC) is that they have a specific combination of prominence and unreliability that is comparatively rare. We can't individually depreciate or ban every single unreliable source; the purpose of these centralized RFCs is to address a situation where a source that is patiently unreliable in any context where we would want to use it is, nonetheless, being extensively used by some editors who try to insist it is reliable. I don't think we can address that in a sweeping sense at a policy level because whatever category we create or define, a source's defenders will insist it doesn't fall into it. When there's a significant disagreement over the facts as they relate to a specific source, and it's leading to constant issues over whether / where it can be used on Wikipedia, a centralized discussion like this is really the only option. --Aquillion (talk) 15:25, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

• The issue is we're dealing with this is an emotive way ("Burn it! Burn it with fire!" to quote the leading advocate of these bans) stripped of any context. Let me give an example of a situation in which it is perfectly OK (in my view) to quote the Daily Mail in article: the film A Welcome to Britain, which taught WW2 US GIs about the UK was shown to a number of British newspaper critics who gave commentary on it. This included a reviewer from the Daily Mail. The Daily Mail reviewer's commentary (as a writer for a widely-selling newspaper) is obviously relevant to quote, alongside other commentary, in the article, as to how it was received. FOARP (talk) 09:01, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

dailymail.co.uk reversion: eyes wanted

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.

---

Problem at For Your Eyes Only (short story collection) - see reversion with dismissive edit summaries, ignoring obvious policy issues, and personal attacks on Talk:For Your Eyes Only (short story collection). More eyes needed.

I'll flag more of these in this section as they come up - I assure you, this is an absolutely typical example of the genre: ignore all policy and guidelines, dive straight into the personal attacks - David Gerard (talk) 22:56, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Stop being a disruptive little edit warrior and stop with the outright lies. If you’d bothered to read the bloody message on the talk page, you’ll see that I said I would replace the source. Stop being such a dramah monger. - SchroCat (talk) 23:16, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Please desist in your personal attacks - these are a violation of the policy WP:NPA. I believe my claims are fully supported by the material in the history and on the talk page - you reverted against policy and strong consensus, and made personal attacks. You also responded to citation of policy with citation of essays. Have you considered following Wikipedia hard policy, such as WP:BURDEN? - David Gerard (talk) 23:22, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

No personal attacks, and stop being so disruptive. I have said I will find a replacement in the morning (I first said it about 5 or 6 posts ago, but you've ignored it and kept disruptively pressing your point). Take your little crusade elsewhere until I've had the chance to look properly. It's 12:40am and I'm off to bed, but (for the nth time), I will look again in the morning. In the meantime, reflect that there are ways and means of doing things, and you are not doing things terribly well. - SchroCat (talk) 23:39, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

www.dailymail.co.uk is not an acceptable source. You say you have a better source? Then use that source. Do not re-insert any citation to The Daily Mail. Also, please don't make obviously false claims like "No personal attacks" when 23 minutes earlier you posted a personal attack ("Stop being a disruptive little edit warrior... Stop being such a dramah monger.") --Guy Macon (talk) 01:22, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

FFS... You really don't bother reading what people say, do you? "You say you have a better source?" I've not said that at all. On several occasions I have said that I will look for one,after a night's sleep. If you are looking for the best way to piss people off with your little crusade, you've found it: an inflexible approach of edit warring to instantly remove information that has been in place for several years, without allowing a few hours for that information to,be replaced? Get a fucking sense of perspective. As to the supposed PAs: I have given a fair description of your approach to this situation. Now back the fuck off for a few hours to allow for a search for a new source. - SchroCat (talk) 04:10, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Or you know, you get a sense of perspective and re-read WP:BATTLEGROUND/WP:CIVIL. Leave the unreliably sourced information out until you have reliable source to back it up. Like everywhere else on Wikipedia. The world will not end if those passages are missing from the article for a few hours. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 05:09, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Seconded. SchroCat, I don't even need to leave this thread to see you ignoring policy and being combative and disruptive. Guy Macon clearly read what you wrote, he fucking quoted your personal attacks! If "dramah monger" really does fall under WP:SPADE, then it would be perfectly reasonable for the rest of us to suggest that you're the one starting the drama as if out of some sense of blind entitlement, and being a hypocrite in expecting others to give you a few hours to bring in a replacement source instead of just letting the page not have that information during that time. Ian.thomson (talk) 05:26, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

• He obviously didn't read it, given what I've said, but if you want to back up a disruptive process by using personal attacks to call me a hypocrite with a "sense of blind entitlement". then I guess the blindness is thick on the ground here and the PAs are fine to throw around. As I said on the talk page, the information has been in the article for several years, and to a source that is not banned (and yes, Headbomb, the world will also not end if those passages remain in the article for a few hours while an alternative is sought - particularly as some was removed and some left with a cn tag - no logic there at all. And I'll let you strike your sentence saying the information was "unreliably sourced": it wasn't). I had acknowledged that I was going to look for an alternative source, and yet that still gives someone the right to edit war, rather than a few hours grace to find an alternative? Common sense has been replaced with the crusading zeal way too much. You lot have an apexcellent way of pissing people off by not bothering with common sense and choosing the most inflexible and disruptive path that inconveniences readers. - SchroCat (talk) 05:49, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

BTW, I've struck the lie in the title: I am not an advocate for the Mail and never have been. I voted in favour of the ban of the source and I'm glad to see it being removed, but it's the manner and method of that removal that is disruptive. Find a different way to deal with it, rather than edit warring and then calling me a "DM advocate". (That also falls under NPA, but I don't expect anyone will bother with leaving stupidity messages to warn Gerard about civility with name calling). - SchroCat (talk) 05:54, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Looking at the 2017 RFC and 2019 RFC, I don't see you on either. Did you change usernames? - David Gerard (talk) 19:56, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

• Comment This edit removed a reference to the Mail on Sunday. Has the Daily Mail ban been extended to the Mail on Sunday? While they have the same owner they are editorially distinct as far as I am aware. From what I recall of the discussion all the evidence of falsified stories/quotes related exclusively to The Daily Mail title and its online presence. Betty Logan (talk) 06:38, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Neither WP:DAILYMAIL or WP:DAILYMAIL2 covered the Mail on Sunday and there has been no RfC since then that would mean the source is unsuitable. Nice to know the disapprobation of the above (not to say the edit warring and grief) has been over the illicit removal of information cited to a source that is not deprecated. - SchroCat (talk) 07:06, 9 May 2020 (UTC) p.s. I've tweaked the title again to reflect the reality. - SchroCat (talk) 07:09, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

SchroCat,

• Did you make this edit?[7]
• Did that edit add the source www.dailymail.co.uk?
• Did you also add "work=Daily Mail" in that same edit?
• Is www.dailymail.co.uk the URL for The Daily Mail?
• Did I revert you with this edit?[8]
• Was my edit summary in any way unclear?
• Did you then edit war to re-insert the source www.dailymail.co.uk?[9] again?

These are simple questions. You should be able to provide yes or no answers to each of them, but please do feel free to explain, in detail, why your edits actually added (and were reverted for adding) The Daily Mail] but you are now claiming[10][11]that they only added The Mail on Sunday? --Guy Macon (talk) 08:56, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

• Was this or this removing a banned source? Yes or no? Did this whole annoying mess start with the boundaries of WP:DAILYMAIL and WP:DAILYMAIL2 being pushed to delete information removed from a legitimate source? Why, when you removed the www.dailymail.co.uk source (rightly), do you feel it suitable to edit war to delete information cited to a legitimate source? These are simple questions. You should be able to provide answers to each of them.

And again, it comes down not just to the removal of information (some of which was removed illegitimately, some legitimately), but in the crass and inflexible way it was done. As the information has been there for over a decade, was it urgent that it was removed immediately, even after I had said I would look for an alternative after a night's sleep? Again, this is a simple question. You should be able to provide an answer for it. - SchroCat (talk) 09:04, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

A less easy to answer question is how many illicit removals have been made of information sourced to the Mail on Sunday? I do hope that a concerted effort is made to replace the information that should not have been removed. - SchroCat (talk) 09:27, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Evasion noted. I will take your refusal to give a straight answer as an admission that in this edit[12] you did indeed insert a citation to The Daily Mail. Again, please stop claiming that you only added a citation to The Mail on Sunday.

Re "Why, when you removed the www.dailymail.co.uk source (rightly), do you feel it suitable to edit war to delete information cited to a legitimate source?" First ONE REVERT IS NOT EDIT WARRING. Please retract your false accusation and apologize. Second, I am not required to carefully examine your edits and remove only those portions that violate Wikipedia policy. It is your responsibility to make edits that follow policy. If someone reverts an edit of yours that contains a policy violation along with other material, It is your job to create a new edit that only contains non-violating material. Instead you purposely re-inserted the citation to www.dailymail.co.uk -- a citation that you yourself admit is not allowed. --Guy Macon (talk) 11:15, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

"One revert is not edit warring": yes it is, despite the shouty caps and bolding, if there has been a back-and-forth a couple of times and you join in, then you were as guilty of edit warring and me and Gerard. So no, no retraction, and certainly no apology. As you seem to be trying to avoid any responsibility for removing information cited to a legitimate source, there is little I can (or wish) to say or do. But you keep telling yourself you are perfect and I am the bad guy, if that's the way you want to go. You were in the wrong for some of these actions. Your evasion on the question of how much legitimate information has been removed is noted. No surprises. I'm off; I'll leave you to have The Last Word - I'm sure you'll enjoy that. - SchroCat (talk) 11:22, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

And again you misrepresent Wikipedia policy. WP:EW says "An edit war occurs when editors who disagree about the content of a page repeatedly override each other's contributions... What edit warring is: Wikipedia encourages editors to be bold, but while a potentially controversial change may be made to find out whether it is opposed, another editor may revert it. This may be the beginning of a bold, revert, discuss (BRD) cycle. An edit war only arises if the situation develops into a series of back-and-forth reverts." (emphasis added). Making false accusations against other editors is a form of personal attack. I think it is becoming clear that your behavior is something that needs to be dealt with at WP:ANI. Given the previous blocks in your block log for edit warring and personal attacks, an indefinite block is likely. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:22, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

I misrepresent nothing. I was actually blocked for undertaking one revert in an edit war between two others, so feel free to take that case up on my behalf. And if you honestly think that going to ANI is a beneficial step, crack on and do just that. Or is it an empty threat and a way to raise my block log? Don't ping me to this page again, I really have no desire to discuss anyone so willfully obtuse who refuses to acknowledge that they have erred even in the slightest (I have admitted it, by the way: it's just you who are trying to evade any sense of doing anything wrong.) - SchroCat (talk) 12:31, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

• Follow-up comment I think there are two issues that emerge from this discussion:

1. It appears that Mail on Sunday is not proscribed by either RFC, and as such citations to it should not be removed without further discussion.
2. There is then the manner in which the sources to The Daily Mail are being culled. While a consensus exists to remove it as source I cannot honestly say this edit exemplifies good practice. The problem with The Daily Mail is that it is untrustworthy, but much of what they report is still accurate. This was acknowledged in the RFC, and one of the arguments advanced by editors in favour of a ban was that an alternative source could be located for credible claims in most cases. Unfortunately this solution is being thwarted by an aggressive culling campaign. This edit removed legitimate encyclopedic information, which is probably to the detriment of the article. In the case of non-controversial claims that are not about living people would it not be better practice to simply remove the source and replace it with a {{citation needed}} tag? While SchroCat technically shouldn't have restored the source I get the sense from him that what he was really doing was restoring the information, and he eventually located alternative sources. Is this not the most desirable outcome?

Betty Logan (talk) 19:40, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Betty Logan, the Mail is deprecated. That means it's untrustworthy. If something is only in the mail, we can't use it; if it is in another source as well, use that instead. Don't use the Daily Mail as a source. Or any tabloid, for that matter. The print edition of the MoS may be considered reliable case by case. But is still a tabloid so a better source is always preferred.

I have two particular problems with the Mail as a source for Wikipedia. The first is how it's used, which is often for trivia, especially salacious trivia (that's their speciality, google "all grown up"). The second, and related, is the notorious "sidebar of shame". I have a serious problem with linking to any site carrying that kind of bullshit from any Wikipedia article. Guy (help!) 10:27, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

So a "quality broadsheet", e.g. The Times, The Daily Telegraph, etc., which quotes the Daily Mail as it's sole source would be acceptable? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 10:42, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Martinevans123, yes. They can be expected to have fact-checked it. But calling the Telegraph a "quality broadsheet" is a bit of a stretch these days. Guy (help!) 11:26, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

How would you describe it? Next on the list to be a banned? Martinevans123 (talk) 12:37, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Guy, no-one is claiming that the Mail should be retained as a source. Two RfCs (in which I voted to ban its use both times) have confirmed that. What we are talking about is two different things here: 1. Much of this grief started because Gerard edit warred to remove a citation from the hard copy Mail on Sunday. That should not have been removed, and he has still to account for that. 2. The process when information from the Damily Mail or dailymail.co.uk is flawed. In this case the information has been in the article for over a decade, and yet it was suddenly necessary to delete it immediately without providing an adequate window to find a replacement? No. That's just dumb. It doesn't help our readers and it annoys the crap out of people. I said on the article talk page right at the start that I would find a replacement, but this was ignored, and the edit warring continued. How does that help anyone? As it was, the information was finally left in the article overnight (UK time) until I was able to find a replacement in the morning. I cannot see any benefit in the inflexible, unthinking immeditate removal-without-the-option approach. The information is still in the article, and all now connected to a reliable source (two sources at one point). The best outcome has been achieved despite the fervour for the inflexible and immediate approach. - SchroCat (talk) 10:47, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

I had always assumed that anyone removing a DM source was supposed to search for an alternative source, or add a {{cn}}, or both. Not just remove both DM and the info itself wholesale in one edit. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:01, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

I do not recall that ever being said, and will make more work as at some point the unsourced material might have to be removed (per wP:v.Slatersteven (talk) 11:05, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

As opposed to "make more work" by having to search for the info and a fresh source all over again? Isn't one expected to search for a better source for information sourced to any unreliable source? Isn't that normal procedure? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:13, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Tagging with {{Deprecated source}} would also have had the desired effect of highlighting the problem. If such a tag had been left on there for a day or so, that would also have avoided all the kerfuffle; as it is there has been a lot more work invoved because someone edit warred to remove a source that is entirely legitimate`. - SchroCat (talk) 11:07, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

True, but it is a users choice if they wish to remove badly sourced information or tag it. There is no policy that even implies you should add back badly sourced information. We gain nothing with tags all over the pace saying "bad source" "dodgy information" "BorisJophnsonsaidit", we do however (I would argue) lose. Wikipedia has a reputation for unreliability. If our articles are littered with crap even we think is unreliable that image is hardly going to improve.Slatersteven (talk) 11:14, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

I certainly wasn't suggesting we "add back badly sourced information". Quite the reverse. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:35, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Martinevans123, no, the onus is on the person including content to find reliable sources. It's an instance of BRD. There have been attempts to claim this by people who fundamentally oppose the entire idea of deprecation, but it's not policy. Guy (help!) 11:27, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Some of this information was added when the DM was still considered to be WP:RS? Martinevans123 (talk) 11:35, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

So? If it is now a dodgy source its a dodgy source.Slatersteven (talk) 11:38, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

So Guy said "the onus is on the person including content to find reliable sources". I'm just saying that when it was originally added the person may well have been justified in using the DM as a reliable source. A person just removing the source now isn't adding anything. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:09, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

No they are removing something we now know cannot be trusted for information. What Guy said applies just as much to wanting to add information back (or indeed retaining information). This is why the DM was deprecated, because of its massive over use. We now have to clean up that mess.Slatersteven (talk) 12:16, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

But there is absolutely no need to do it in such an inflexible and disruptive way. When Gerard removed a legitimate source and edit warred on it, there was no mess to clean up. When two editors decided to delete information supported by the Press Association and a Scottish newspaper, we're crossing a line between responsible housekeeping and disruptive editing. The orginal title of this section was "‎DM advocate". I'd rather be called a cunt that a DM advocate, but such is the mindset of a small group of zealots that anyone who asks for an 8-hour moritorium on removal is the subject of abuse and lies. Your call on whether you think this is an ideal pathway for the inhabitants of the RS board to behave, but I suggest the approach needs a rethink. - SchroCat (talk) 12:24, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

We seem to be talking at cross purposes. It looks to me to be a rather odd case of WP:BRD. I'm just suggesting that removing material and a DM source wholesale, without any attempt to find an alternative source, might do more harm than good. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:37, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

True, but wp:brd is clear that once material, has been removed it is down to those who wish to include it to make a case at talk, not just add it back with a change of source (you are right, by the way, the new sources should have been enough as far as I can see). Thus (whilst) the DM part of this debate is about RS, the rest is not.Slatersteven (talk) 12:33, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Ah. So all those instances where I've followed David Gerard round and re-added stuff with a good source (and which he's consistently thanked me for), I should have instead taken to the Talk page? Martinevans123 (talk) 12:47, 10 May 2020 (UTC) And it's not like I've really "followed him round" at all. I've seen his standard edit summary about DM pop up in my watchlist and when I've gone to look at the deletion I've thought "oh that looks like a very reasonable claim, there must be at least one other RS source that supports that...."

That's taking a misreading of BRD too far for any common sense approach. If the source is being challenged, then replacing the source is sufficient, even if that is just replacing exactly the same information, including qquotes. - SchroCat (talk) 12:50, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

We also have wP:agf, I have no idea abvout this case but I have had trouble finding sources others have found. You are assuming no effort was made.Slatersteven (talk) 12:52, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

A more useful edit summary might say "I've looked for a better source and I can't find one, so am removing"? Martinevans123 (talk) 13:00, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Three things: firstly, I was talking in general about providing a different source when material is challenged. (Don't forget that the verification policy says that @Material that fails verification may be tagged with {{failed verification}} or removed". There is, written into policy, a way that information does not have to be unthkingly removed as a matter of course. It can be tagged for a short period to allow for a replacement to be made. Secondly, If it is removed, there really is no reason to have to discuss replacing it with an alternative source on the talk page. Replacing the information with a new source is entirely appropriate. Thirdly, it seems that a few people have said they can't find the information (although raising AGF is a bit of a straw man here). I found it in two sources and Sarah SV found two sources using variants of the quote made to different journalists; I also found another variant on the official Bond site. Just because the person desparately removing as many DM sources as quickly as possoble didn't find an alternative (and yes, that does pre-suppose they bothered looking), it doesn't mean the infomation isn't there to those who know how to look for things properly. - SchroCat (talk) 13:01, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

SchroCat, Oh, so David's actions resulted in better sourcing. So we're good then. Shall I close this? Guy (help!) 11:33, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes, may as well gloss over the removing of a legitimate source and the sub-standard way people are demanding the immediate removal without thought to the loss of legitimate information. The lack of flexibility is always a given when a crusade is in progress. - SchroCat (talk) 11:49, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Can we please only discuss the DM, anything else just confuses the issue.Slatersteven (talk) 12:33, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

As long as we are clear that the Mail on Sunday (paper version, not online) should not have been removed. At. All. Neither should the other sources. Part of the problem is that I have seen no comment from Gerard to acknowledge that they were wrong to remove it in the first place and doubly wrong to edit war to remove it a second time. I hope this disruptive approach is not something that is going to be repeated. In terms of the DM info, allowing a short moritorium on finding a new source seems to be a common sense way of approaching this, rather than such an inflexible approach that is currently in favour. - SchroCat (talk) 12:44, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

This RFC is about the daily mail, only the DM and just the DM. If you have other RS issues start a new thread. If you have issue about user conduct this is not then place.Slatersteven (talk)

Actually this sub-thread is (currently) titled "dailymail.co.uk reversion: eyes wanted". Since its opening post it has been nothing to do with the RfC (as such it should never have been a sub-thread of the RfC in the first place; the topic of discussion has not essentially changed since the first post, given we are still discussing matters relating to the opening post). We can change it from a sub-thread to a full thread if you prefer? - SchroCat (talk) 13:10, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

As this is not (and does not appear to be) an RS issue, but rather an issue over user conduct this is not the right venue anyway.Slatersteven (talk) 13:13, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Very true. Once has to question way it was opened in the first place, and why a personal attack was used as the original title. Never mind - but I really don't have high hopes that this has made any difference, and will not be surprised when it inevitably happens again. - SchroCat (talk) 13:19, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

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

Another unreliable source? (www.dailymail.co.uk and www.mi6-hq.com)

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 this edit,[13] SchroCat (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) replaced a citation to [ www.dailymail.co.uk ] with a citation to [ www.mi6-hq.com ]

[14] says "We are a not-for-profit fan website, maintained by men and women passionate about the subject."

[15] says "Want to join a community of Bond experts that has been growing since 1998? MI6 is made more diverse, engaging and current thanks to it's regular contributions by guest authors. We are constantly on the look out for authors, photographers, artists, videographer, podcaster or reviewers, all with a passion for James Bond in print or on the screen. If you have an original idea for a feature, or some tidbit to share, please get in touch with our team."

So, generally reliable or self-published fan site?

The quote "it relates to the fact that if you don't have that Quantum of Solace in a relationship" comes from [ www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-510171/Live-Let-Dye-Daniel-Craig-turns-clock-darkened-hair-007-photocall.html ] (25 January 2008). mi6-hq.com published it at [16] on 30 January 2008. This highlights one of the problems with replacing citations to The Daily Mail; if you search for other sources that say what DM said, you find a bunch of low-quality sources that pretty much parrot what was on the DM page a few days earlier. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:22, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Pretty obviously not an RS, no - David Gerard (talk) 22:25, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

I am getting the usual insults and refusal to follow Wikipedia policies at Talk:For Your Eyes Only (short story collection)#Replacing one unreliable source with another? (www.dailymail.co.uk and www.mi6-hq.com). Normally I would report this at ANI, but I am still recovering from my recent Cardiac Arrest and I don't think the stress would be good for me. Would someone else here be willing to file it? --Guy Macon (talk) 23:30, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

It gets worse and worse. He now claims that in the last few days you went to a library, found not just one but two sources that by an amazing coincidence just happen to contain the exact same quote from The Daily Mail that he edit warred to keep in, and yet for some inexplicable reason he cannot remember who Daniel Craig said it to or when he said it. Meanwhile, the person he says authored the source (Noah Sherna) doesn't seem to exist, but in yet another amazing coincidence, Sherna Noah writes for The Daily Mail.[17] --Guy Macon (talk) 01:38, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Don't lie. I have claimed nothing of the sort. I have also made no comment on who Craig said it to, so I am unsure where these falsehoods come from. I have advised exactly how you can verify the source, so try reading what I have said properly and use the link provided. - SchroCat (talk) 01:48, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, Sherna Noah works for the Press Association. The Guardian also has a version of the same quote; I've left it on the talk page. It appears to be the same point made during an interview with a different reporter. SarahSV ^(talk) 03:08, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, someone needs to read WP:FANSITE. Guy (help!) 10:21, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Guy, no they don't. Macon needs to ensure he posts all the facts and 1. doesn't miss out key points (like two other reliable sources were added shortly afterwards), and 2. he doesn't lie, like he has above (I did not claim I went to the library and I did not say anything about who Craig was talking to; feel free to look at the article talk page to find out where I have said either of those things. They are entirely false). BTW, FANSITE shortcuts to Wikipedia:External links, which isn't the guideline you are after - you mean WP:UGC, which advises against, but it certainly doesn't provide a blanket ban against all such sites. - SchroCat (talk) 10:50, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

SchroCat, mi6-hq.com isn't a fansite, then? Someone should tell the person who maintains it. Wikipedia isn't a fansite either. These articles would mostly be improved by being about half as long. Guy (help!) 11:25, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Guy, that's not what I said. I was pointing out the link you provided, to FANSITES, actually discusses the addition of fansites in external links, not within articles. The pertinent link on this occasion WP:UGC, which advises against, but it certainly doesn't provide a blanket ban against all such sites. - SchroCat (talk) 11:46, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

When you tell a person to verify a sources by going to a library, meanwhile refusing to say where you checked the source, a reasonable person would conclude that you checked it in a library. (later you decided to reveal that you checked in using an online source). When you repeatedly refuse to answer the simple question of where and when Daniel Craig said that, a reasonable person would conclude that you most likely can't answer the question. When you quote WP:UGC, claiming that it allows use of fansites (the actual wording is "Content from websites whose content is largely user-generated is also generally unacceptable") a reasonable person would assume that you are either incapable or unwilling to follow Wikipedia's rules (something we have already seen with Wikipedia's rules againstr personal attacks). When you repeatedly claim that if you make an edit that violates Wikipedia's sourcing policies, the person reverting you is somehow required to carefully search your edit for any portions that don't violate Wikipedia's policies, and you just flat out ignore it when you are told again and again that there exists no such requirement, a reasonable person would assume that you are either incapable or unwilling to even discuss whether you are following Wikipedia's rules.

This all started with you edit warring to retain [ www.dailymail.co.uk ] as a source and with David Gerard asking you to follow our rules.[18] and correctly identifying [19] that your behavior is typical of someone who fights to keep The Daily mail as a source. Your subsequent behavior here has demonstrated that he was right. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:31, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

"When you tell a person to verify a sources by going to a library": I didn't. I told you to go to THE library - the one we have on WP. I even fucking linked it for you. If you're not able to click on the link despite it being handed to you a second time, I do begin to wonder just why you are being so obtuse. Other inaccuracies here include "you quote WP:UGC, claiming that it allows use of fansites": you'll have to read what I said a little more closely. I said "WP:UGC, which advises against, but it certainly doesn't provide a blanket ban against all such sites", and actually there is some deliberate leeway in the wording of the guideline (for example, if such a site was being written by one individual who was a published expert in the area, then it would be a point for discussion). "incapable or unwilling to follow Wikipedia's rules" another tedious PA you like to throw out, and hopelessly wrong too, ditto the link to IDHT - all tiresomly inaccurate.

More nonsense follows; "This all started with you edit warring to retain [ www.dailymail.co.uk ] as a source". Again, that's a straight lie. This started when Gerard removed a reference from the paper version of the Mail on Sunday. A legitimate source. I'll keep repeating that a legitimate source was removed until it finally sinks in and you stop telling porkies. "your behavior is typical of someone who fights to keep The Daily mail as a source" Another straight out falsehood. I don't know how many times I have had to say that I support the ban on the Mail (that I voted for twice) and the idea it should be removed: it's the crass and inflexible way it is being done that it disruptive. Now, if you're done with trolling and telling lies, I'll leave you to it. There is nothing contructive to be had in listening to more falsehoods from you - you appear to be in competition with the Mail to see how many inaccuracies you can cram into each line. - SchroCat (talk) 15:46, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

[self-reverted] --Guy Macon (talk) 16:38, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, this is thoroughly out of order. SchroCat, it would be better not even to respond. SarahSV ^(talk) 16:51, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

• I have already asked you once not to ping me to this page. Stop. You are behaving like the worst sort of disruptive troll. Stop. - SchroCat (talk) 16:41, 10 May 2020 (UTC)
• mi6-hq.com? Is that Mike Corley? Guy (help!) 10:20, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Mike Corely appears to be focused on conspiracy theories involving MI5 persecution. I don't think he has much interest in James Bond, but of course mi6-hq.com is a fansite where anonymous users can post content, so you never know. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:31, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Can we please not discus 15 different sources in one thread?Slatersteven (talk) 15:34, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

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

Daily Mail: The halving

In Q3 2018, there were 27,336 uses of the Daily Mail as a reference on Wikipedia. At this moment, there are 13,630.

The cleanup of the backlog of bad sources continues. Please use a search something like this one, and help improve Wikipedia. If a few people can each do even ten a day, that'll make Wikipedia a noticeably better place - David Gerard (talk) 21:13, 11 May 2020 (UTC)

Daily Mail: It's below 10,000

This deprecated source's backlog has less than 10,000 entries remaining! Your assistance is most welcomed - start at the top of this list (or wherever you like really), and see if you can knock off five - David Gerard (talk) 19:20, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be sensible to remove the cited information when you remove the citation, if you doubt its validity? It doesn't make Wikipedia a better place if you replace thousands of inline citations with "citation needed" templates. It's my understanding that MailOnline citations can continue to be used, for non controversial info. Sionk (talk) 23:58, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

I can assure you that editors have insisted on every possible response as the one and only sensible thing to do about deprecated sites: do nothing, add a tag, replace with a tag, do nothing unless you can replace the cite, remove the info, etc., etc., etc. But it completely varies case by case. It literally always depends and requires editorial judgement - David Gerard (talk) 00:58, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

most pleased to see others joining in with this, even if I can't work out who it is :-) Number as of this moment: 8,145 - David Gerard (talk) 15:24, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

7,646. Holy crap, we're knocking down this awful backlog - David Gerard (talk) 07:58, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

RfC: Facebook

Should Facebook be subject to a warn edit filter, and/or added to User:XLinkBot/RevertReferencesList, which reverts the use of a source in <ref>...</ref> tags (Note: Does not include external links) for unregistered and new users under 7 days old (Per the IMDb discussion on this noticeboard) to discourage misuse? Facebook is currently cited over 60,000 times on Wikipedia per facebook.com  . Facebook is currently described at RS/P as "Facebook is considered generally unreliable because it is a self-published source with no editorial oversight." 15 specific Facebook pages are currently on the MediaWiki:Spam-blacklist. Facebook is also specifically cited at Wikipedia:Reliable Sources as an example of "unacceptable user-generated sites" Hemiauchenia (talk) 16:31, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Responses (Facebook)

Please state clearly if you support or oppose the use of an edit filter, XLinkBot/RevertReferencesList, or both

• Oppose as it is acceptable for self source of minor details such as date of birth, imv Atlantic306 (talk) 17:17, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

That's odd. My facebook page has my date oif birth wrong. Thank goodness it isn't being used as a source for my date of birth. -Roxy the elfin dog . wooF 17:22, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

@Atlantic306: is this an oppose for XLinkBot/RevertReferencesList, which only reverts the use of sources in references for unregistered and new users with less than 7 day old accounts? Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:28, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

• Support warn edit filter and XlinkBot Facebook is almost entirely user generated content, and is extensively used in WP:BLP articles, which require high quality sourcing, which Facebook falls far below. While I agree that it may be useful in limited WP:ABOUTSELF circumstances, Facebook links should be used only with caution by experienced editors and preventing new users from using Facebook would help curb problematic usage. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:15, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support per Hemiauchenia - Admittedly I've used Facebook I believe twice here so extreme caution should be used with it and I agree with Hemiauchenia only experienced editors should be able to add it and even then if should only be added if necessary and in exceptional circumstance. –Davey2010^Talk 20:42, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose since I oppose the use of edit filters in principle. Debresser (talk) 21:41, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support both—the cases where Facebook should be cited are very rare, inexpienced users are most likely to misuse. I think the helpful effects outweigh the harms from this filter. buidhe 22:03, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support - I wouldn't spam-filter it (yet), it has its uses, but an edit filter is definitely appropriate. Do we have an edit filter as yet that completely blocks additions by IPs and non-autoconfirmed users? - David Gerard (talk) 22:44, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose setting such an edit filter to disallow. Support setting it to warn. Oppose the bot because it sounds needlessly bitey. — Wug·a·po·des​ 23:31, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose bot. When I saw this, I immediately thought of a potential use — a notable person who has a Facebook account but doesn't have anything close to an official website. In general, I believe it would be 100% appropriate to link that person's Facebook site: either the person doesn't care about his privacy and makes lots of stuff visible, or he does care and restricts what's online. With this in mind, bots shouldn't go around removing newly-added Facebook links, since a likely good-use situation exists. Maybe do a filter that warns and tags, but new users can still be productive in this kind of setting, so at most we ought to warn them that it's a bad idea most of the time, and make it so someone can easily go around checking such edits. Nyttend (talk) 00:41, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support: It is a social media website in which people can claim anything without any verifiability and others would believe them. Even its owner has admitted the spread of fake news and hoaxes over it and has done little to curb it. A website with such content should not be allowed here. Also if it is listed on WP:RS as unreliable, allowing to use it will give users and readers the impression that we don't follow our own policies. I disagree with Nyttend over a notable person having only a Facebook account. Even if they do, they can create a LinkedIn profile which would be more acceptable. Fully agree with David Gerald about an IP filter. IPs are mostly the cause of vandalism here and I've seen only a few IPs who contribute something worthwhile. They should be encouraged to create an account none-the-less. It is not like you have to pay to create an account. One can stay anonymous under an account as well. I also support the bot only if it warns the user after it removes the Facebook link from the article. If the User continues, they can be warned from an actual user and then reported at WP:ANI for disruptive editing.U¹ _quattro TALK 01:00, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support blacklisting - unless anyone can prove that Facebook is reliable enough. Not only is it unreliable due to the nature of content monitoring, but it is also being overrun by conspiracy theorists and fake-news-wielding communalists (people who discriminate by religion) in the USA and India respectively. RedBulbBlueBlood9911Talk 02:40, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose both, Facebook is still a useful, albeit unreliable, source, and including a warning filter for everybody would create the presumption that it should never be used, which is just plain wrong. Automatic reversion is also a bad idea, as that is Bite-y and would harm content more than help it, since there are quite common legitimate reasons to cite Facebook. this is an absolutely awful idea. Specifically, it would decimate articles on politics, very often a person has an account on there which serves as a campaign website. Also, this is not even going into the fact that Facebook can function as a perfectly good primary source. Blacklisting Facebook or putting a filter on it is an absurd overreaction that would have horrible consequences for Wikipedia. Devonian Wombat (talk) 02:50, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

  Devonian Wombat, eh? No it wouldn't. It would simply remind people before they add Facebook to check WP:SPS. Guy (help!) 08:34, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

  That’s a good reminder for me to double-check what the person making the proposal is actually saying. Devonian Wombat (talk) 10:48, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

• Support warn+tag as MediaWiki:Tag-deprecated source, oppose bot as only humans can verify whether a Facebook link is appropriate. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 03:47, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support filter for new users, oppose bot as it would be biting to automatically remove content that new editors think that they have added. – Majavah ^{talk · edits} 06:21, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support this. A "warn" filter doesn't stop it being used, but it will remind people that citing Facebook groups and other such crap is a Bad Idea. Looking at filter logs for 869, the XLinkBot addition is also justified. Guy (help!) 08:33, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support both. There are legitimate use cases for Facebook links — for example, I've seen professional organizations make announcements on their Facebook pages before/instead of their own websites — so we should allow such links in principle, but guard against them being introduced willy-nilly. XOR'easter (talk) 19:56, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support including blacklisting or any other restriction. There is nothing reliable about Facebook, as it applies to being a source. Any information can be fudged, verifying accounts is not easy (and in some cases, not possible). Nothing about it qualifies as a primary, secondary or tertiary source. From the perspective of sourcing, it is actually less reliable than a forum. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:33, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose I think the reliability depends on who is posting on what on Facebook et al. For example WIN News posts news stories to their Facebook pages - example at "RUGBY UNION". Win News Sunshine Coast. Maroochydore: Win Television. 25 May 2020. Retrieved 26 May 2020. --RockerballAustralia (talk) 00:55, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

• I should've pointed out the stories are posted to those pages after they have been broadcast on TV. --RockerballAustralia (talk) 00:56, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose autorevert/blacklist, warning is ok I hate Facebook on many grounds but there is insufficient evidence given of these links being a bad enough problem to warrant interfering with editor judgment in such drastic ways. Per WP:PRIMARY, a self-published post usually isn't a good source; but per the same WP:PRIMARY, it sometimes is. Wikipedia should run on good judgment on these matters, rather than mechanized bots and filters. 2602:24A:DE47:BB20:50DE:F402:42A6:A17D (talk) 07:18, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support If the only good source for a claim is Facebook, then it is not notable enough. For discussing personal posts, it is not good enough per WP:BLP.--ReyHahn (talk) 16:47, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose both, but especially the bot, since auto-reversion is an extreme measure that should be reserved for specific, extreme cases. In general, I don't see any evidence of a problem requiring a solution here. An official Facebook page is not any more reliable than an organization or individual's website, but neither is it any less reliable. For the classic situation of notable person/organization using their Facebook page (alone) to post a noteworthy fact or statement, the best practice is what it always has been: to link to both the actual primary source and a reliable secondary source discussing it. But best practices aside, just as bad content is better than no content, bad sources are better than no sources. Quality is iterative, and any measure that discourages editors from providing the actual source where they found information is iterating us in the wrong direction. -- Visviva (talk) 20:36, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
• Warning may be helpful, automated removal or preventing of edits is opposed It's settled policy that there are limited situations in which specific material in Facebook might be acceptable as a source or external link. If editors want to change that policy then that should be done explicitly and clearly and not through the imposition of an edit filter or other technical means. ElKevbo (talk) 03:24, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support both, and change the policy to get rid of this and other commercial "social media" apps completely, for multiple reasons. 1. Social media services are unreliable. 2. Social media services are not Web sites, they're apps: they won't load properly without running their non-free malware-spyware JavaScript, so anything sourced to them is unverifiable for everyone who cares about that; linking to them is incompatible with the Wikipedia idea of free culture. 3. Social media apps are inherently advertisements for their own services, making links to them spam. —{{u|Goldenshimmer}} (they/them)｜Talk｜Contributions 05:25, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support edit filter. A spot check indicates that most of the existing citations to Facebook do not qualify under the WP:ABOUTSELF policy, and should not be used to support article content. — Newslinger talk 11:18, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose both per Visvisa. Facebook is fine in certain cases, such as WP:ABOUTSELF information, and statements by organizations. In my experience, municipal- and county-level officials and departments often release statements on Facebook first, and sometimes only on Facebook. I also want to add that we've already drifted way too far from being the encyclopedia anyone can edit. We don't have nearly as many active editors as we should. We don't want to be scaring newbies off - oftentimes excellent contributors start out with well-meaning but misguided edits. The last thing we need is even more hoops for newcomers to jump through. Lastly I want to object to Goldenshimmer's 2nd and 3rd reasons for supporting these proposals. Verifiability doesn't mean it has to be free on a noncommercial website with no tracking scripts. That would block off almost all of the Internet. In research for articles I've written I've used material from numerous local newspapers whose websites look like 2004 came to life on my screen, with obtrusive ads blocking almost all the content so that I have to use "inspect element" in order to actually read the text. Many widely used sources are behind paywalls - The Times of London, the Economist, etc (I don't count NYT/WaPo/etc because their paywalls are easily bypassed by pressing ESC at just the right time during pageload). Sources don't even have to be on the Internet - books are widely used, and often they are more reliable than Internet sources. Our primary goal isn't to promote free-software culture. Our goal is to build the world's largest collection of easily accessible knowledge using any tools available to us, regardless of our personal feelings on their profit model or use of javascript. −−− Cactus Jack 🌵 05:32, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  CactusJack: 1. I think you misunderstood me: a Web site using tracking scripts doesn't necessarily make it inappropriate to use, mainly because of their ubiquity (as you point out). Rather, requiring these scripts to run is the issue. Most Web sites will work with such scripts blocked. Social media apps generally will not, and therein is the issue. — 2. I'm not sure why you bring up offline sources; I generally would consider them preferable to online-only sources because they have a longer lifespan and generally reliable access through libraries. — 3. Wikipedia's goal, at least as it presents itself, is first and foremost to promote free culture; it is "the free encyclopedia" after all — promoting free-software culture is an important part of free culture. —{{u|Goldenshimmer}} (they/them)｜Talk｜Contributions 05:56, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Support edit filter: occasionally better than nothing for basic information about public figures per WP:SPS. An edit filter should not discourage these genuine uses, but instead discourage the much more numerous poor uses. — Bilorv (Black Lives Matter) 12:47, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support both. Especially when dealing with biographical articles about living persons, at very least a warning about the general unreliability of such self-published sources, and very likely a revert, is appropriate. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:08, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support both. Not a reliable source, high probability information found there is factually inaccurate due to its reluctance to employ rigorous fact checking. Acousmana (talk) 19:03, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support edit filter, oppose bot. There are plenty of instances where Facebook is a reliable source for WP:ABOUTSELF type statements and some basic facts by organisations that are the subject of an article who have an official facebook page. I'm not aware there is any method of algorithmically determining what type of Facebook page is being cited from the URI. Thryduulf (talk) 13:15, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Constant attempts at scrubbing and obfuscation at Falun Gong articles: Falun Gong, Shen Yun, The Epoch Times, Li Hongzhi, New Tang Dynasty Television, etc.

Many of you here are no doubt familiar with The Epoch Times at this point, but far fewer editors are familiar with the broader organization behind this media entity. Here's a brief overview from a recent article from Los Angeles Magazine:

Both Shen Yun and Epoch Times are funded and operated by members of Falun Gong, a controversial spiritual group that was banned by China’s government in 1999 … Falun Gong melds traditional Taoist principles with occasionally bizarre pronouncements from its Chinese-born founder and leader, Li Hongzhi. Among other pronouncements, Li has claimed that aliens started invading human minds in the beginning of the 20th century, leading to mass corruption and the invention of computers. He has also denounced feminism and homosexuality and claimed he can walk through walls and levitate. But the central tenet of the group’s wide-ranging belief system is its fierce opposition to communism.

In 2000, Li founded Epoch Times to disseminate Falun Gong talking points to American readers. Six years later he launched Shen Yun as another vehicle to promote his teachings to mainstream Western audiences. Over the years Shen Yun and Epoch Times, while nominally separate organizations, have operated in tandem in Falun Gong’s ongoing PR campaign against the Chinese government, taking directions from Li.

Despite its conservative agenda, Epoch Times took pains until recently to avoid wading into partisan U.S. politics. That all changed in June 2015 after Donald Trump descended on a golden escalator to announce his presidential candidacy, proclaiming that he “beat China all the time.” In Trump, Falun Gong saw more than just an ally—it saw a savior. As a former Epoch Times editor told NBC News, the group’s leaders “believe that Trump was sent by heaven to destroy the communist party.

Source: Braslow, Samuel. 2020. "Inside the Shadowy World of Shen Yun and Its Secret Pro-Trump Ties". Los Angeles Magazine. March 9, 2020. Online Archived 26 May 2020 at the Wayback Machine.

And according to NBC News:

The Epoch Media Group, along with Shen Yun, a dance troupe known for its ubiquitous advertising and unsettling performances, make up the outreach effort of Falun Gong, a relatively new spiritual practice that combines ancient Chinese meditative exercises, mysticism and often ultraconservative cultural worldviews. Falun Gong’s founder has referred to Epoch Media Group as “our media,” and the group’s practice heavily informs The Epoch Times’ coverage, according to former employees who spoke with NBC News.

The Epoch Times, digital production company NTD and the heavily advertised dance troupe Shen Yun make up the nonprofit network that Li calls “our media.” Financial documents paint a complicated picture of more than a dozen technically separate organizations that appear to share missions, money and executives. Though the source of their revenue is unclear, the most recent financial records from each organization paint a picture of an overall business thriving in the Trump era.

Source: Collins, Zadrozny & Ben Collins. 2019. "Trump, QAnon and an impending judgment day: Behind the Facebook-fueled rise of The Epoch Times". NBC News. August 20, 2019. Online Archived 23 August 2019 at the Wayback Machine.

This is also happening here in Germany:

In the United States, the Times bills itself as the newspaper that President Donald Trump views as “the most credible” and the only one he trusts. The U.S. version of the newspaper is a far tamer version than its German cousin, but it has won over fans in the far-right with its exhaustive coverage of “Spygate,” a theory pushed by the president who claims the FBI “spied” on his campaign and a “criminal deep state” sought to undermine his presidency. Revenues for the newspaper have doubled since Trump took office, according to the group’s tax filings.

Source: Hettena, Seth. 2019. "The Obscure Newspaper Fueling the Far-Right in Europe". New Republic. September 17, 2019. Online.

Anyway, currently quite a few Falun Gong articles—Falun Gong, Shen Yun, The Epoch Times, Li Hongzhi, New Tang Dynasty Television, Society of Classical Poets, and several more—are either in a state of either reading as essentially promotional pieces for the new religious movement or are the subject of daily attempts at scrubbing, like this attempt from today. This often occurs from single-subject, new accounts, or accounts with very new edit histories.

These articles could really use a lot of work with reliable sources outlining developments in these circles since 2016, particularly the topics mentioned in the quotes above. If nothing else, these articles all really need many more editors keeping an eye on them to ensure that they do not revert back to promotional pieces parroting the talking points of the organizations they outline. :bloodofox: (talk) 23:00, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

I have a few comments below:

• User Bloodofox's edits on the FLG articles were not proper.

Bloodofox made a huge change to the lede of the Falun Gong article on May 18.[20] Other users（not me）tried to cancel the edit. Their reasons have nothing to do whether those sources were RS or not, but were as one user explained on the article talk page on 5 June:

"With respect to WP:BURDEN, a reminder that the lede section was very stable for years. It was substantially altered by Bloodofox beginning a few weeks ago. Legitimate concerns were raised regarding Bloodofox's edits with respect to WP:LEAD, WP:V, and WP:NPOV, including WP:WEIGHT. These concerns have been repeatedly raised, and never addressed. Instead, users have edit warred to enforce their preferred version, and repeatedly accused other editors of acting in bad faith. This is not a platform for activism, and it is not a battleground."

• User Bloodofox​​​​​​​ has misrepresented his own sources:

As I commented on the talk page on 5 June, NYT and NBC were misrepresented. Aside from that, the line "The Falun Gong administers a variety of extensions in the United States and abroad" and the line "The new religious movement also operates Shen Yun" Bloodofox added to the lead section of the article, also cannot be supported by any of the 6 sources provided , including these above 3 sources Bloodofox​​​​​​​ posted. But Bloodofox​​​​​​​ reverted any correction of his misrepresentations.

• Bloodofox​​​​​​​ is not supposed to copy the long paragraphs of his preferred sources on RSN. Plus the views from those sources are different views from other reliable sources. For example, reference a said "In 2000, John Tang and a group of Chinese Americans started The Epoch Times in his Atlanta, Georgia basement. ​​​​​​​", which was contrary to the LA Mag Think Blog source. Bloodofox removed many reliable sources [21] that say to the contrary to his views. Here are some of the deleted sources by Bloodofox.

• http://newsweekly.com.au/article.php?id=56301%7Carchive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140223153614/http://newsweekly.com.au/article.php?id=56301
• https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-21/what-is-the-falun-gong-movement-and-does-china-harvest-organs/9679690
• https://freedomhouse.org/report/2017/battle-china-spirit-falun-gong-religious-freedom
• https://web.archive.org/web/20140223153614/http://newsweekly.com.au/article.php?id=56301
• https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewelinaochab/2019/06/17/the-china-tribunal-pronounced-its-verdict-on-organ-harvesting-in-china/
• http://www.nbcnews.com/id/3340868/ns/world_news/t/falun-gong-thrives-us/

Based on NPOV, different views from different RS should be proportionally presented. Bloodofox seems to have a strong viewpoint on FLG related topics. He promoted his favorite sources, misrepresented those sources and deleted other correctly represented reliable sources that express views contrary to his. He should stop advocating his own views in Wikipedia and blocking others’ legitimate edits. Precious Stone 21:25, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

There are some issues with the sources listed above:

1. "Be The People News" is the personal website of conservative analyst Carol M. Swain, and the podcast episode is a non-independent interview of Dana Cheng, the co-founder and vice president of The Epoch Times (RSP entry).
2. Forbes.com contributor articles (RSP entry) are considered self-published and generally unreliable, unless the contributor's "work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications". Can you link to where this is the case for Ewelina U. Ochab?
3. There is disagreement on whether the News Weekly is a reliable source. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 38 § Australian News Weekly. and Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 288 § newsweekly.com.au for details.
4. Freedom House is a think tank, which is not necessarily unreliable, but should be attributed in-text for any controversial claims.

Can you clarify how the other sources are "contrary" to Bloodofox's proposed wording? — Newslinger talk 22:16, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for checking the details of these sources and letting me know some of them may not be reliable. Here is only one "contrary" example (there are a few other examples):

1. as Bloodofox posted in this RSN page above from the LA MAG City Think Blog

"In 2000, Li founded Epoch Times to disseminate Falun Gong talking points to American readers. Six years later he launched Shen Yun as another vehicle to promote his teachings to mainstream Western audiences."

.

2. But the NBC report Bloodofox used for other info said

“The publication had been founded nine years earlier in Georgia by John Tang, a Chinese American practitioner of Falun Gong and current president of New Tang Dynasty.The publication had been founded nine years earlier in Georgia by John Tang, a Chinese American practitioner of Falun Gong and current president of New Tang Dynasty.”

3. The SF Chronicle report said

"Shen Yun was formed in 2006 by followers of Falun Gong, which Li Hongzhi had founded in China in 1992 and drew on the tradition of qigong, in which breathing, meditation and movement foster good health or spiritual enlightenment."

.

(Please note in my post above, the Newsweekly source were typed twice, which was a typo I made on this RSN page - one time should be used for this SF Chronicle source - that was used in the article and was deleted by Bloodofox)

Bloodofox's info that Epochtimes and Shen Yun were founded or launched by Li is quite different with the NBC source and the SF Chronicle source, which said Epochtimes and Shen Yun were founded by John Tang in 2000 and by followers of Falun Gong in 2006 respectively. There are many other sources confirming such info. Precious Stone 03:50, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

I don’t see the conflict between sources you describe, they seem to be in almost complete agreement on the important details. Are you trying to argue that Shen Yun and The Epoch Times aren’t part of the FG movement? Horse Eye Jack (talk) 18:38, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Above shows the LA Mag City Think Blog info is contradictory with other sources. Aside from that, I have said to you many times that the line "The Falun Gong administers a variety of extensions in the United States and abroad..." and the line "The new religious movement also operates Shen Yun" Bloodofox added to the lead section of the article, also cannot be supported by any of the 6 sources provided. you disagree with me. it is simple, please follow WP:V, and show every one here.

All material in Wikipedia mainspace, including everything in articles, lists and captions, must be verifiable. All quotations, and any material whose venerability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citation that directly supports the material

.Precious Stone 21:18, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

This intractible dispute needs to go before the Abitration Committee, I don't see how it's going to get resolved otherwise. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:29, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps, but meanwhile there is a new RfC at Talk:Falun Gong#RfC on describing Falun Gong as a new religious movement. Doug Weller talk 09:40, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

RfC: Fox News

Which of the following best describes the reliability of the reporting of Fox News? (as separate from their cable pundits) foxnews.com   has been cited over 15,000 times on Wikipedia.

• 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 as in the 2017 RfC of the Daily Mail

Additional questions:

• Does FOXNews.com have a separate reliability from their cable news reporting?
• Do local affiliate stations have a separate reliability to the main Fox News operation?
• Is Fox News reliable for US Politics?

The last RfC on Fox News was in 2010, Fox News is currently described at the RS/P as:

FOX News was determined by consensus to be generally reliable per WP:NEWSORG. The network consists of 12 news bureaus worldwide, including their New York headquarters. Several shows in the channel's news lineup include America's Newsroom, The Daily Briefing, Bill Hemmer Reports (replaced Shepard Smith), Special Report with Bret Baier, The Story with Martha MacCallum, and Chris Wallace anchoring Fox News Sunday. Some editors perceive FOX News to be a biased source whereas others do not; neither affects reliability of the source. Editors should always exercise caution when choosing sources, and treat talk show content hosted by political pundits as opinion pieces, avoid stating opinions in Wikivoice and use intext attribution as applicable. The Fox News website maintains a form for requesting corrections.

Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:20, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Responses (Fox News)

• Option2: In view of recent events, their reporting seems biased towards information discrediting the protests. However, their factual reporting of non politically charged subjects stays adequate. That being said, I noticed that they give a lot of weight to POTUS since it was revealed that he was a regular watcher. Being nearly the only network giving him interviews. Feynstein (talk) 18:33, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Fox News is a standard WP:NEWSORG, yes it may contain a bias (most RSs do), but does not mean it is not reliable. Fox also issues corrections which further indicates fact-checking. At this point it is beating a dead horse unless some substantive evidence can be presented on the contrary. Regards  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 18:48, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 or 3 (lean towards 2), the quality of the core network’s reporting has declined over the last decade. Care must be taken though, most network affiliates (such as WTIC-TV) remain generally reliable sources and I want any downgrade to be clear about that. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 18:54, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• Options 1/2. Option 1 for straight news reporting. Fox News's straight news reporting is very different from their talk shows like Hannity, Ingraham, etc. Their news department's bias appears more in what things they choose to cover than in how they cover it. This bias doesn't make it unreliable - almost all news orgs have some form of bias. However, given the network's close ties with Donald Trump, I think option 2 is warranted for coverage of Trump in particular.
  I don't think any outcome of this RfC should apply to content produced by local bureaus affiliated with Fox. In my experience those bureaus are no more or less reliable than other local news bureaus. −−− Cactus Jack 🌵 19:00, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Per User:Spy-cycle. Fox News does appropriate fact checking on their reports. This establishes reliability of their works in general and the fact that it is cited quite a lot means that most in wikipedia understand that it is a standard news organization. Furthermore, the others who say that it is not as reliable are going to argue based on subjective measures of not liking it with no empirical metrics. The fact that Fox News tends to have notable commentators like senators, representatives, etc that are notable right wing and left wing on shows like Tucker Carlson and Hannity's shows means they are not like Daily Mail. Also some heavy members of government like Mike Huckabee (ex governor and ex presidential candidate) and Jason Chaffetz (ex congress member) actually host some of the programs and this gives the network insider access to details on developing news. Furthermore, emotional reporting done by CNN and MSNBC does not demote them either. The point on reliability is not whether their stories end up to be true, it is do they have fact checking. Many news stories are developing so the details get confirmed and then rejected as time goes on and as more information emerges. CNN and MSNBC were wrong about Russian Collision, Muller Report, impeachment proceedings on Trump, and other stuff, but they would not be unreliable in Wikipedia's eyes either.Ramos1990 (talk) 19:22, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1, except for prime time "pundit" reporting about Trump. Speaking generally about, for example, articles posted to the website, Ad Fontes, an organization that analyzes and compares news sources, considers the website reliable. I agree with CactusJack. --Bsherr (talk) 19:29, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Bsherr:You might want to double check that source... They put Fox News in the “Red Rectangle: Nonesense damaging to public discourse“ [22] which is their lowest category, they rate it below Daily Mail and I see no indication that they endorse Fox New’s reliability (at most they say “Reliability scores for articles and shows are on a scale of 0-64. Scores above 24 are generally acceptable; scores above 32 are generally good.” while assigning Fox News a score of 26.75). Can you elaborate? Horse Eye Jack (talk) 21:01, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 - (less pundits) didn't we just have an RfC about Fox News a few months ago? Did the OP check to see before calling this RfC?? Fox News is as reliable a source as the other cable news networks that also host pundits. The news is reliable, the pundits are opinion. See the write-up at WP:RS/Perennial sources. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 20:53, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  Adding links to demonstrate that Fox political commentary (not it's newscasts) is very much like that of all other mainstream media except with a conservative bias; the latter of which is not a valid reason to demote a RS anymore than it is valid to demote CNN for it's liberal bias. The US has a two-party system so biased opposition is expected. Pew Research demonstrates the stark partisan split of Fox News Channel viewers, noting that it is by far the most watched cable news channel. Pew states: Liberal Democrats are far more likely than conservative or moderate Democrats to say they distrust Fox news (77% vs. 48%). The Game of the Name, A Slobbering Love Affair: The True (And Pathetic) Story of the Torrid Romance Between Barack Obama and the Mainstream Media, Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News, The Rise and Fall of the Obama-Media Romance ^{16:10, 15 June 2020 (UTC)}

  Sidebar note to closer (for clarity) - I just want to distinguish between the political pundits that headline Fox News Channel's primetime line-up vs actual news reporting by Fox news anchors, such as Special Report w/Bret Baier, Fox News at Night w/Shannon Bream, Bill Hemmer Reports, America's Newsroom w/Ed Henry and Sandra Smith (reporter), Fox News Sunday w/Chris Wallace, etc. This RfC is supposed to be focused only on the newscasting, not the political commentary by political pundits on The Five, Hannity, Carlson, Laura Ingraham, Fox & Friends in the mornings, etc. but several of the iVotes indicate that the two have been conflated. CNN refers to their political pundit Don Lemon as a news journalist despite the fact that his show is not a newscast, rather it is biased political commentary not unlike the political pundits on Fox News Channel, and the same or similar applies to Wolf Blitzer, Chris Cuomo, Anderson Cooper, Jake Tapper, etc. none of whom anchor a newscast; rather they host commentary/opinion. We would not downgrade CNN News because of their political pundits. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 22:08, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3. You can track how Fox's news output has moved over the last three to four years from a right-leaning mainstream source to part of the conservative media bubble. It's extensively documented in Yochai Benkler's Network Propaganda, and you can track it over successive iterations of the Ad Fontes chart. You can also see it in specific events such as the departure of Shep Smith. It used to be that Fox talk shows were junk, and Fox news broadcasts and websites were OK. Not so any more. Example: "the amount of coverage Fox News devotes to [Antifa] is preposterous. A search for “antifa” on Fox News’ website from November 2016 to the present returns 668 results, while “homelessness” returns 587, and “OxyContin,” 140. “Permafrost” returns 69. A decentralized, leaderless activist group with no record of lethal violence in this country, antifa has been skilfully transmogrified by the conservative media into one of the gravest threats facing Americans in 2019" [23]. The wall of separation between reporting and opinion has long since been blown away, and Fox is now the media arm of the administration. On CO|VID-19 it has published outright misinformation "Tara Setmayer, a spring 2020 Resident Fellow at the Institute of Politics and former Republican Party communications director, said what’s coming from Fox News and other pro-Trump media goes well beyond misinformation. Whether downplaying the views of government experts on COVID-19’s lethality, blaming China or philanthropist Bill Gates for its spread, or cheering shutdown protests funded by Republican political groups, it’s all part of “an active disinformation campaign,” she said, aimed at deflecting the president’s responsibility as he wages a reelection campaign." [24] I could go on. Fox has changed over the last three to four years, in a meaningful way, and we should recognise that. Guy (help!) 20:56, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  I do not know the reliablity of Yochai Benkler's "Network Propaganda", not listed at RSP so I cannot determine its usefulness in this discussion. The opinion of a Buzzfeed News journalist on how much coverage Fox News should give to Antifa compared to homelessness is irrelavent. We need to know whether these articles produced by Fox are reliable and fact checked (which as I explained above I believe they are) not what topics they do and do not cover. I cannot speak for the latter half of your comment since it is an offhand quote from Tara Setmaye as opposed to a multitude of RSs. It is possible Setmayer is true but was referring to the talk shows like Tucker Carlson Tonight which is more likely to be true as opposed to the website. Regards  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 21:24, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  • Benkler et al.'s Network Propaganda is a peer-reviewed Oxford University Press book.[25] Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:17, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  It doesn't matter for our purposes whether Fox covers various news events proportionally. What matters is whether specific news articles produced by Fox News are reliably accurate. If we were using Fox News coverage as an integrated whole to tell what current events are important based on their coverage, yes, that would be a problem, because they often selectively choose what topics to cover most heavily. But Fox's lack of coverage of the opioid crisis, for example, has no bearing on whether an individual Fox News article on homelessness, for example, is accurate. −−− Cactus Jack 🌵 21:29, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  I'll just add a bit of clarity per an NPR interview with Benkler: INSKEEP: Benkler was drawing a picture of something we can't really see, how millions of people find and pass on information. He's a Harvard professor. He also works with the Open Society Foundations. Those are the pro-democracy groups funded by George Soros, the financier who has commonly backed Democrats in the United States. Does anyone have a link to the "peer review" so we can see who was on that panel? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 16:16, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

• Comment I agree with other commenters that the reliability of their cable pundits are separate from their news operation (I would consider the pundits to be generally unreliable considering their recent role in downplaying the Pandemic and for many other misleading and false statements made throughout the years). However their publication of a false story about Seth Rich working with Wikileaks was an egrigious error of judgement, which they (thankfully) subsequently retracted, which makes them much better than some sources (cough, OpIndia, cough). However, their decision to publish the story in the first place makes me question their editorial judgement. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:48, 7 June 2020 UTC)
• Concerns have been raised about other articles in Fox News by Malia Zimmerman, the author of the Seth Rich report, see The New Republic and Quartz

  That was Hannity - a pundit. Maddow does the same stuff only different topics. We've also endured 2 or 3 years of a Russian collusion nothingburger by left leaning sources. Our job is to bypass the speculation, conspiracy theories and biased opinion journalism regardless of who is publishing it - they all do. Stick to WP:RECENTISM, WP:NOTNEWS, WP:NEWSORG - the latter of which are now conglomerates. Wait for the historians and academics to give their retrospective accountings. There is no argument here that I've read that is not based in political opinion, and that is not a valid reason to declare the most watched cable news show unreliable. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:57, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Atsme:, While Hannity also spread the conspiracy theory, it was also reported on at foxnews.com, see this archive. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:01, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  That archived report was simply a news report - the big 3 also reported the incident. ABC reported it and criticized Fox "commentators", not Fox newscasters. Please state the facts accurately. Fox has criticized the networks as well for their misreporting of events. It goes back and forth. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 22:09, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  Atsme, MSNBC is not reliable for factual reporting. Even though Maddow, unlike Hannity, does cite her sources. Guy (help!) 23:03, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  Guy, do you frequently watch Hannity or Maddow? If my memory serves, they're on at the same time? From what I understand, Hannity actually interviews the sources on his show (radio talk-show, too). I can quickly recall Maddow's "self-defeating spectacle" per Slate over Trump's tax returns, and there are several such spectacles, not unlike Hannity's but guess who leads in the ratings for whatever reason? And what exactly determines "mainstream" - one's POV, or the ratings? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:24, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3 I would not trust anything I read on Wikipedia that was cited to Fox News content alone. They purposefully manipulate their content for political attention and have an obvious bias that should disqualify them from any use as a reference for even the most basic facts, especially when it comes to America and/or the rest of the world. GPinkerton (talk) 21:50, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3, Fox News is politically biased to the extent that it affects their supposedly factual reporting. Take this article, front page of their website right now, about the New York Times, which is titled: Liberal paper's editorial page editor steps down amid fury over Cotton op-ed note that the actual article once you click on it is titled differently, meaning that they specifically had this title on their home page in order to drive up rage in place of actually reporting. This is just one example of many, Fox News is a right-wing propaganda outlet that is most certainly not reliable. I would not go so far as to call them unreliable, since as far as I know they have not published downright false information systematically, but I am changing my vote per comments below, any source which publishes climate change denial and Seth Rich conspiracy theories is not reliable. Having that green next to their name is a display in bothsidesism that is not reflected in reality. Devonian Wombat (talk) 22:18, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
  • Which part of the headline was inaccurate? The NYT itself reported that its editorial page editor had resigned and that his resignation was connected to negative response to the publication of Tom Cotton's op-ed. [26] --Metropolitan90 (talk) 04:14, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3, or, failing that, 2. No one, I hope, disputes that Fox is extremely WP:BIASED on anything to do with American politics (and I'll note that cites to it are often careless about the requirement for in-text attribution that that generally requires.) While such biased sources can be used provided their bias doesn't interfere with their fact-checking or accuracy, the issue with Fox is that the ideological mission it was founded for takes absolute priority over these things. ([27][28]) It has been covered as a case-study in propaganda ([29][30]) and as a leader in the shift towards market-driven sensationalism at the expense of accuracy. ([31][32]) More importantly for our purposes, these things have led to misleading or outright inaccurate coverage of many disparate topics, especially, though not limited to, climate change. ([33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42]) Most recently (and perhaps most dangerously), Fox News' COVID-19 coverage has been notably inaccurate in a way that may have contributed to the severity of the epidemic in the US ([43][44][45]); this, I think, is the main reason to categorize it as a 3. It is true that the network is extremely popular and has high viewership, and it is true that a lot of what they cover is merely biased rather than misleading; additionally, it could be tempting to say that the network is only grossly, constantly misleading and inaccurate in a few specific contexts (eg. climate change), and that it's therefore unusable for those topics but still usable elsewhere. But I feel the recent wave of COVID-19 misinformation from the network provides clear evidence that Fox will freely publish inaccurate or misleading stories without warning, on any topic, the moment the people in charge decide that doing so is important to their core ideological mission and hand it down as part of the daily memo, even in situations where doing so is extremely dangerous. Trying to carve out only a few "unsafe" uses for it as a source is a bad idea because the underlying problem is systematic - while they are not incapable of fact-checking and accuracy, their ability to meet that standard is fatally compromised by a structure that places it completely subordinate to their ideological goals, and by ownership and leadership that have shown themselves to be entirely willing to disregard fact-checking and accuracy, even for extremely important topics, when they find it ideologically convenient to do so. --Aquillion (talk) 22:28, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  Aquillion, please delete the sources that refer to the political commentary on Fox News Channel and not Fox News newcasts. This RfC is focused on the newscast, not the political commentary talk-shows. I went through several of your sources and they refer to the commentary, not the news. Thanks! ^Atsme _Talk 📧 15:44, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 for most purposes, option 3 for political and racial issues, based largely on the fact that the reputation of the network for bias would taint the reliability of Wikipedia articles citing it for those purposes. Fox just drew controversy for an issue where it posted a graphic of stock market gains tied to prominent murders of African-Americans. Moreover—and this is an aspect I really haven't seen raised before—option 2, at least, because some of their content appears to be undisclosed paid advertising. For example, in one period I saw numerous articles on Fox touting a "Black Rifle Coffee" company, so much so that I even started a draft article on the company. However, I quickly ran into a roadblock in finding that all other news reporting of any substance on the company was in pay-for-play churnalism venues. Upon further examination, it became apparent to me that the Fox pieces were written more like paid advertisements than objective news pieces, and contained objectively false characterizations of the notoriety of the company. There was no disclosure of any payment, so Fox is either in the pay-for-play reporting business, or they are allowing articles to be published that readily appear to be pay-for-play reporting. Either option is problematic for any news coverage that could potentially benefit a party with a pecuniary interest in how an article is presented, from a perspective of either financial or political gain. BD2412 T 22:41, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  BD2412, do you have a link to that controversy? I'm on island time and pretty much out of the loop in real-time. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 00:56, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Sure, covered here. Of course, Fox is hardly the first network to have to apologize for tone deaf coverage. BD2412 T 01:09, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Thank you. You're right about apologies - back in January, CNN went silent when Andrew McCabe apologized for lying to investigators. Most recently, this apology by Brian Stelter with CNN who lied about ‘no sign of smoke or fire’. Do we downgrade CNN? I can provide numerous errors and ommissions for that network, as well as MSNBC, ABC, CBS & NBC. Did any other network besides Fox News report these things? We've already seen how the left-leaning stations & networks handled Reade-Biden sexual assault allegation vs how they handled Kavanaugh. WP garnered negative media attention over the left-leaning handling of it - don't you find that concerning? Being a biased source is not a valid reason to downgrade the most-watched news source (with right & left viewers) - to do so is strictly POV rather than being based on an equivalent analysis with other networks. WP policy requires NPOV - it's one of our core content policies - downgrading RS because we disagree with their POV is noncompliant with NPOV when choosing sources. Is the plan to downgrade all political news because it's all biased? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 01:36, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  I am actually somewhat more concerned that they may be promoting paid advertising as news. In retrospect, the thing that first struck me as suspicious about the "Black Rifle Coffee" story is that it appeared on the Fox website, then disappeared for a time, and then reappeared at intervals, a pattern more characteristic of an advertising campaign than a news story. BD2412 T 02:04, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  I don't see any paid advertising scheme there, but I do see insensitivity, and they apologized for taking it out of context, as well they should - somebody obviously wasn't thinking straight. There is no mention in that report about "Black Rifle Coffee" that I could find, so it seems to me that mentioning it with the S&P issue would be SYNTH with a splash of OR, wouldn't it? Newsrooms can be hectic, and you can rest assured it's a ripe environment for mistakes. The latter is why I have always stressed "exercise caution" when citing news sources today. The same FCC regulations that apply to broadcast news don't apply in the same manner to cable/internet news - they enjoy much more freedom because they're not using public airwaves, although none of them are totally immune from political pressure. If you haven't read my op-ed in The Signpost this month, please do.<— shameless advertising, not paid advertising. 😉 ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:34, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  SYNTH and OR are not really applicable, as we are not discussing whether to include such assertions in an article. Whether we are dealing with shameless advertising or paid advertising, the ultimate effect is that they published claims about the subject that led me to believe that it was a notable subject, and those claims turned out to be inaccurate. BD2412 T 18:21, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3 they call Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, and Laura Ingraham news. Shows that they don't separate factual reporting from opinions. They promote conspiracy theories with no basis and call it news. Smith0124 (talk) 00:14, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Smith0124, there's a difference between opinion & talk shows and straight news reporting. Fox's talk shows are as much of a crapshoot, w.r.t. political affairs, as all other mainstream media. ProcrasinatingReader (talk) 00:20, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 per Atsme with a bit of the Option 2 caution suggested by Cactus Jack. I personally think this RfC should be closed since the intent seems to be to ask the same question over and over again until finally someone will close with the answer a group of editors has been hunting for. Springee (talk) 01:01, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 While Fox News Channel was founded to provide a forum for U.S. conservative opinion, it has always provided a professional news service. I don't see that the fact they provide right wing commentary detracts from that. Many of their talk show hosts came from other cable news networks: Glenn Beck, Geraldo Rivera, Lou Dobbs, while Megyn Kelly moved from Fox to NBC. All news by the way is biased since editorial discretion is required in choosing stories to present. For example, Fox News covered the sexual assault allegations against Joe Biden long before other legacy media did. But that has nothing to do with the accuracy of their reporting, merely that their emphasis is different. TFD (talk) 02:39, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3. The following text is in regards to the news reporting division at Fox News (not its prime talk shows and commentators). Academic sources widely consider Fox News as a propaganda outlet, including in its straight news reporting which is often misleading, hypes up non-stories and gets things egregiously wrong all the time. I'll keep the focus primarily on two issues rather than to just list every egregiously wrong thing that Fox News has done: (i) Fox News' climate change denial propaganda and (ii) the intentional promotion of Seth Rich conspiracy theories to divert attention from a negative news cycle for Trump.

  (I) Climate change. Peer-reviewed research has widely described Fox News as a major platform for climate change denial. According to the fact-checking website Climate Feedback, Fox News is part of "a network of unreliable outlets for climate news."

  • Bill Sammon, the Fox News Washington managing editor, instructed Fox News journalists to dispute the scientific consensus on climate change: "A leaked email from the managing editor of Fox News Washington, Bill Sammon, during the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009 reveals Fox’s sceptical policy towards climate change. Sammon advised Fox journalists to “refrain from asserting that the planet has warmed (or cooled) in any given period without IMMEDIATELY pointing out that such theories are based upon data that critics have called into question”." Page 174 of Marisol Sandoval. "From Corporate to Social Media: Critical Perspectives on Corporate Social Responsibility in Media and Communication Industries". Routledge.
  • Bret Baier, a straight-news anchor pushing climate denial propaganda -“In February 2010, a paper on sea level rise that had previously been published in Nature Geosciences was formally withdrawn by the authors because of an error they had identified subsequently in their calculations. Fox News announced the development in this vein: “More Questions About Validity of Global Warming Theory.” In fact, the error in the calculations had led the authors to projections of future sea level rise that were too low!" Page 223 of Michael E. Mann. “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From the Front Lines.”
  • Bill Hemmer, a straight-news anchor: Promotion of Climategate falsehoods: "“This particular falsehood had been promoted recently by venues such as Fox News , e.g., Bill Hemmer on Fox’s America’s Newsroom, December 3, 2009: “Recently leaked emails reveal that scientists use, quote, ‘tricks’ to hide evidence of a decline in global temperatures over the past, say, few decades." Page 353 of Michael E. Mann. “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From the Front Lines.”

  (II) Murder of Seth Rich conspiracy (i.e. "Russia didn't hack the DNC"). On May 16, 2017, a day when other news organizations were extensively covering Donald Trump's revelation of classified information to Russia, Fox News ran a lead story about a private investigator's uncorroborated claims about the murder of Seth Rich, a DNC staffer. The Fox News story reported that the private investigator had uncovered evidence that Rich was in contact with Wikileaks and that law enforcement were covering it up. The story was in the context of right-wing conspiracy theories that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party had Seth Rich killed because he was the source of the DNC leaks. U.S. intelligence agencies determined Russia was the source of the leaks. In reporting the investigator's claims, the Fox News report reignited right-wing conspiracy theories about the killing. The Fox News story fell apart within hours because other news organizations did the basic journalistic legwork to confirm aspects of the story that Fox News intentionally opted not to do. Furthermore, other news organizations quickly revealed the investigator was a Donald Trump supporter and had according to NBC News "developed a reputation for making outlandish claims, such as one appearance on Fox News in 2007 in which he warned that underground networks of pink pistol-toting lesbian gangs were raping young women." Later that same day, the private investigator said he had no evidence that Rich had contacted Wikileaks. The investigator claimed he only learned about the possible existence of the evidence from the Fox News reporter herself. Even though other news organizations had quickly found the story to be erroneous and the story had complete fallen apart within hours, Fox News chose merely to alter the contents of its story and its headline, but did not issue corrections.  It took Fox News a week to retract the story. Unlike normal news organizations, Fox News did not bother to publicly explain what went wrong in its reporting. The reporter behind the fabricated story, Malia Zimmermann, may still be working at Fox News (that's at least what her Twitter bio says) despite having egregiously fabricated a story – Fox News can't show the basic transparency of clarifying whether she is still working behind the scenes on Fox News stories.

  Note that as soon as the Fox News story appeared, editors on the Murder of Seth Rich page fought hard to include it in the article. Editors on the talk page argued that Fox News was considered "generally reliable" (this includes one editor who is voting for Option 1 in this very RfC). This is precisely why Option 1 is unacceptable. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:00, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  • And note that I argued against inclusion on the basis that the story had not been widely reported. Also note that you argued vociferously to include a misleading story about Rep. Tulsi Gabbard that had only been reported in one news source (NBC) and I argued against inclusion for the same reason. But that is the nature of investigative reporting. One news source presents something that a source told them and the rest of the media either pick up the story or they don't. Are we going to ban NBC News too on the basis that they are biased in favor of establishment Democrats? TFD (talk) 03:16, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
    • As soon as one other RS reported "According to Fox News...", you said "Fantastic! Let's include this batshit insane conspiracy theory in the article."[46] I have no idea what your Gabbard commentary is about. On the Murder of Seth Rich article, I had to spend hours re-writing and fixing the article, and preventing editors such as yourself from lending credibility to a deranged conspiracy theory on one of the most read websites in the world and preventing editors such as yourself from imposing more harm on a murder victim's family. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:32, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
  • Your climate change points are not any proof against RS. Point 1 doesn't mean anything because that isn't reflected in any actual stories we can point to, nor is it a requirement for WP in reporting on CC stories that the news source has assert climate change is real in every story about climate change. Unless the source is spinning every climate change story in full outright denial mode, that doesn't make them unreliable (At worst, judging the latest CC stories they have run [47], [48], [49] they play just a bit into "skeptic" but they do not let that taint how they report the basic facts of these climate change reports, only just throwing in a para "skeptics say these there may be no climate change" langauge" somewhere. That's not wrong nor touches anything about their RSness. Your point two is using the headline of a story which is never considered reliable so we ignore that. On 3, its clearly misunderstanding the language of the emails as applied to the data per [50] (eg even that book gets the context wrong). So no, none of that proves Fox is not an RS. I wouldn't use them for CC news data only because I don't believe their bias would be helpful and other sources are tons better in terms of the basic science that is involved like NYTimes, but that doesn't rule it out.
  • On the whole thing with Rich, the "news" part of Fox that reported on the conspiracy was simply reporting it existed (that the Fox opinion desk side were going all crazy over it) and gave insight from the other side's denial nothing happened like that. Did they chase it down as well as the NYTimes or others? No. Is that a requirement for an RS? No (like the answer to the CC #1 above). All we are looking for is editorial control and fact-checking, which they did some. Not as extensive, and likely they were rushing to print (again, they have a bias) . And key to all that: They Redacted the story within the week [51] . Editorial control. That's all that matters for the RS factor. Now, that editors rushed to want to add it, that's a problem that we are not enforcing BLP, NOTNEWS, and RECENTISM especially with controversial claims from biased RSes. --Masem (t) 03:24, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
    • It was the news division that was behind the Seth Rich story! It was a Fox News scoop – not commentary by Sean Hannity. There would have been nothing for the opinion desk side of Fox News to get crazy over if not for the fabricated story by the straight news division. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:40, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 as long as we are clear we are not talking about their opinion or talk shows, but only their news programs or news portions of their websites which have been repeated shown to follow the expected editorial control we expect of RSes, biases notwithstanding. Bias does not discount a reliable source, though it is fair to raise the question (like this) if a bias has affected the reliability of a source. Their talk shows should be treated only as RSOPINION and used only when DUE is appropriate. I also point out as noted below this has been asked at least 3-4 times in a non-formal RFC (which is NOT required to include on RS/P) and the weight of those discussions be considered in this. --Masem (t) 03:02, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
  • How can the news division of Fox News be considered reliable when its reporters are instructed to promote climate change denial and when said straight-news reporters act upon these instructions and tell brazen falsehoods about climate change? Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:10, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
    • Their reporters don't lie about climate change, but they give too much time to climate change deniers. Similarly, ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and the broadsheets gave way too much coverage to misleading pundits falsely claiming that Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction, in fact manipulating public opinion in favor of what would be a devastating military adventure. TFD (talk) 03:23, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
    • Do you have any examples of this that aren't over a decade old? If so, please provide them. Ten years is a long time in the politics and media world. 10 years ago Mitt Romney was the Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting; today he's one of the most vocal critics of the Republican president. 10 years ago Breitbart News was a generic conservative commentary site; nowadays it's a hard-right propaganda outlet. The layman's consensus in the US around climate change is much, much stronger than it was a decade ago. −−− Cactus Jack 🌵 03:48, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
      • Fox News, Nov 2018[52]: "NASA warns long cold winter could hit space in months bringing record low temperatures" – A complete misrepresentation of the science in order to promote a global cooling narrative.[53]
      • Fox News, Oct 2019[54]: "Explosion in Antarctic sea ice levels may cause another ice age" – A complete misrepresentation of the science in order to promote a global cooling narrative.[55].
      • Fox News, Feb 2017[56]: "Federal scientist cooked climate change books ahead of Obama presentation, whistle blower charges" – Giving credence to the dumb ravings of a climate change denier[57]. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 04:11, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
        • The Nov 2018 was a mistake several outlets made per Poynter and per Poyner "Like Metro, Fox and The Sun have also since corrected their stories." Editorial control. So not proof.
        • Oct 2019 story: As per Climate Feedback: "The Fox News article has been corrected..." Editorial control. though the fact they don't check with scientists of the work behind a paper before publishing the results of a paper is not great journalism but that's not a requirement under RS.
        • Feb 2017, this one is a bit different. If you read Fox's article, all claims of it are directly attributed to other sources and none to their own; the slowdown claim is from the whistleblower, and of course Daily Mail and Washington Times are used as other sources of information. Now, red flags go up in that I would not touch this story for use in any CC related article, but I stress that in terms of an RS, its not wrong. It doesn't go out of its way to say "this is bad understanding of a graph" but thats again, not a requirement of an RS, and in terms of discussion if someone said "We need to use this article", I would suspect that UNDUE factors from other less biased sources would be there. But again, nothing about that article says anything against being an RS. Just a biased source for CC claims. --Masem (t) 04:38, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
          • All the sources that also happened to make Fox News's "mistake" were sources which are considered generally unreliable or which have been deprecated (does the fact that The Sun sometimes runs corrections make it a reliable source with thorough editorial control? No, of course not). That's a clue as to what company Fox News belongs in. And it's entirely consistent with the existing academic literature on the broader network of right-wing disinformation that Fox News sits smack in the middle of. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 05:22, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Just like CNN and MSNBC and all the other cable news channels, they have a news show and a talking head show. Their news is reliable, just as most of the other RS, even if they don't share the same bias as CNN or MSNBC. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 03:42, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
  • Baloney, this is the old false equivalence claim. Fox doesn't even try to be neutral, their biases are displayed on their sleeves for anyone to see. CNN and MSNBC keep their news operations separate from the opinion operations, but at Fox, it's all one bag -- that's precisely and entirely what Roger Ailes intended to create. You could see it in his programming on the pre-Fox "America's Talking" channel (that became MSNBC after they kicked Ailes out). His purpose has always been to create a conservative-leaning "news" channel which would counter the bias he perceived in CNN. He wasn't shy about declaring this, and the result is the biased, unreliable Fox News we have today. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:58, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Not really commenting in the poll, but it’s worth pointing out that there is a substantial difference between Fox News TV and foxnews.com. The former can have some decent reporting depending on the reporter and anchor (also some real crap as has already been pointed out.) Foxnews.com makes the Daily Mail look like the New York Times, though. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:25, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 for the most part. Fox News is reliable enough for run-of-the-mill news, but not for news regarding politics or anything connected to politics. They do not maintain a Chinese wall between their news operation and their opinion operations, and are blatantly biased in favor of Trump and the Republican Party, and against anything perceived to be liberal or (God forbid!) socialist. I have no opinion about the local stations, but would suggest that the owned-and-operated stations are more likely to hew to the Murdoch/Ailes model, while the affiliates would be independent operations. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:58, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 for the core news reporting (though there can always be exceptions), and option 4 for the pundits, talk shows, and opinion pieces. I fully agree with GPinkerton's and BD2412's assessments of Fox's lack of editorial diligence, and Aquillion has highlighted only a fraction of their misinformation campaign. Even setting my political bias aside, I do not trust their capability to report statements of fact. —⁠烏⁠Γ ^(kaw) │ 06:14, 08 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 per JzG. Having read Network Propaganda, this is conclusively proven. Because you cannot rely on self-correction of mistakes, every piece from Fox News needs to be independently verified by the user and therefore citing Fox News ends up being an act of original research. There will be still things one can source to Fox News, for instance "Fox News thinks" or "Murdoch told on Fox News that". For right-wing perspectives one can always cite other prolific media like The Hill which, while clearly politically tinted, tends to be more matter-of-fact (for now). Nemo 08:31, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Standard WP:NEWSORG with oversight. Yes it may have political leanings, but so does The Guardian, CNN and the majority of other media outlets. Yet I don't see them getting the same treatment as this. The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 09:39, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 I'd normally try to stay away from US politics as toxic but feel obliged to respond to RfC's listed at WP:CENT. I nominated the two most recent stories listed as blurbs at WP:ITN and so am familiar with their details. Looking at the coverage of these on Fox News ([58], [59]), this seems shallow but accurate and generally unexceptional. Andrew🐉(talk) 10:37, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 meets WP:NEWSORG with oversight just like CNN and MSNBC.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 11:03, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 mostly, Option 2 at best for core news reporting. Fox News has consistently peddled inaccurate/fake news, whether an hierarchical structure of a news organisation exists is irrelevant. Fox News also lacks the journalistic tradition of correcting their mistakes publicly in most cases - to state how widespread it is, I found an example in the last one day alone, WTVQ. For pundits and opinion pieces (Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity, et al.) it should strictly be Option 4 due their nature of sensationalizing news reporting and often making biased and inaccurate reporting. --qedk (t 愛 c) 14:55, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 - It either meets RS standards or not. Their core news department does meet WP:NEWSORG from what I can tell. Pundits and opinions should be handled by WP:NEWSBLOG. I think it is important for people to realize the distinction here and I think that is what is being missed by some. PackMecEng (talk) 15:25, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 One of the only major conservative news outlets, it is a source for reliable news. Just like CNN is considered reliable even though both news sites have a bias and tend to lead towards their political standing. It would be a shame to not count Fox news as reliable. Csar00 (talk) 15:50, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 It meets WP:NEWSORG. Fox News being a WP:BIASED does not severely affect it's reliability; it is not WP:QUESTIONABLE since it's not an "extremist". Now in the COVID-19 pandemic, eh a small difference in its reliability. Taking hydroxychloriquine is not recommended, warned Neil Cavuto to Fox News Viewers. Well then.
  .@FoxNews is no longer the same. We miss the great Roger Ailes. You have more anti-Trump people, by far, than ever before. Looking for a new outlet! Donald J. Trump 4:59, 19 May 2020 (UTC).
  That is enough to show that Fox News doesn't have bias that affects it's reliability. {{reply to|Can I Log In}}'s talk page! 16:40, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 for the news programming, Option 2 or 3 for the pundit programming. Nothing has really changed since the last RFC on this. Note- I would have the same opinion if we were discussing CNN or MSNBC. The problem is that too many of our editors have difficulty differentiating between news reporting, news analysis, and news commentary/opinion. Each needs to be handled differently. Blueboar (talk) 17:40, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 or Option 2. I think everyone here acknowledges Fox has a conservative bias. That alone is not enough to deem the network unreliable or to deprecate it, unless we also take a hard look at MSNBC. Calidum 18:10, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Comment A lot of responses in this thread so far are simply "reliable per NEWSORG" without any justification. I would like to present another story, the false claim that Omar Mateen had been radicalised by Marcus Dwayne Robertson. From The New Republic:

  Since [Malia] Zimmerman joined Fox News in 2015, Fox News has repeatedly picked up her reporting and used it to legitimize the larger counter-narratives that form Fox News’s fevered worldview. These stories touched on alleged issues like voter fraud, gun confiscation, the Benghazi terrorist attack, the unmasking of Trump transition officials in confidential documents, and the murder of Seth Rich. Fox News has repeatedly picked up Zimmerman’s reporting and used it to legitimize the larger counter-narratives that form Fox News’s fevered worldview. In June 2016, shortly after the attack on the gay nightclub Pulse in Orlando that killed 49 people, Zimmerman reported that the shooter, Omar Mateen, had been radicalized by an imam and ex-con named Marcus Dwayne Robertson.

Citing anonymous law enforcement sources, Zimmerman alleged that Robertson had been “rounded up” in the wake of the attack and that Mateen had been radicalized while attending an online seminary run by Robertson. But Robertson and Mateen had never met. Furthermore, Robertson had never been “rounded up” by anyone. That didn’t stop Fox News from running with the story—or other outlets, including The Daily Beast, from picking it up—until it was finally debunked. Robertson was forced to defend himself on Greta Van Susteren’s Fox News show On the Record. As reporter David Gauvey Herbert wrote in Quartz his explanation satisfied Susteren. But the damage was done. Zimmerman’s shadowy unnamed sources—whom Herbert and others have been unable to identify—fingered a man who had nothing to do with the terror attack and upended his life. Robertson lost his job and faced a barrage of death threats, despite having no connection to Mateen.

The story, which is still online has not been corrected or retracted. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:26, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Why should it be retracted? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:40, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Maybe retracted is the wrong word, but there's no update on the story to indicate that the claims are no longer considered true. The only update on the story was adding Omar Mateen to the death count. Hemiauchenia (talk)

What claims? Please provide a link to the source that supports what you're saying because I don't know what you're talking about. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 19:40, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

"or other outlets, including The Daily Beast, from picking it up" Would you argue that the other sources should be downgraded as well as Fox? I note that The Daily Beast was this year upgraded to a green source on PERENNIAL, should we reverse that? NPalgan2 (talk) 19:49, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

The problem with bad news stories is that they are like anecdotes, they don't tell you the hit rate. I don't think having reported a news story that later turns out to be incorrect is necessarily an issue of reliability, I mean look at the whole Covington thing. As the Perennial sources entry indicates, "Most editors consider The Daily Beast a biased or opinionated source. Some editors advise caution when using this source for controversial statements of fact related to living persons" Which is inline with them covering this story, as it involves BLPs. I would consider the Daily Beast a significantly lower quality source than something like the NYT or WashPo, and if something is being covered in the Daily Beast but not those would have to make a judgement if its use was appropriate. I called this RfC simply to get a new concensus on how reliable Fox News is, not because I have a vendetta against Fox News or conservatives. I would be happy to see Fox News retain its generally reliable rating at the end of this. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:02, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 There is clear bias in how they report certain things, and which things they report and which they don't. For instance, I believe they're the only news organization anyone would consider legitimate at all that tried to discuss the Michael Flynn "unmasking" issue as anything other than a right-wing conspiracy theory. They are okay on some factual matters, but we should use caution when citing Fox News. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:39, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Limited option 2 - Option 2 is very broad, so I'm going to say that Fox News is problematic on a significant amount of US political reporting. Outside of that, their flaw rate certainly is no worse that others that sources we consider generally reliable (which certainly doesn't require perfection by any means). That political reporting (reasonably construed) is not always flawed, but an appreciable amount is. As noted above, this is often on what is notreported (or not covered in depth) - this can make their reporting lack context, but may, or may not, mitigate on accuracy concerns about what is present. Nosebagbear (talk) 18:57, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3, certainly for anything related to science, politics, or COVID per Snoogans and also concerned about native advertising per BD2412. buidhe 19:16, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 on news reporting. I note that they use a considerable amount of AP content. Obviously does not apply to commentary.--Wehwalt (talk) 19:44, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Somewhere between Option 1 and Option 2 for their straight reporting with the usual sanity checks - newsorgs are only the first draft of history, but is the news side of Fox really so much worse than its peers? Certainly the Seth Rich article (three years ago) was a grotesque lapse of judgment, what of CNN letting Chris Cuomo lob softballs at his brother rather than press him on his atrocious response to the coronavirus? NPalgan2 (talk) 19:50, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  NPalgan2, please avoid the whataboutism and keep an eye on your own POV. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:53, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Muboshgu, the whataboutism link you provided is to a WP article, not WP:PAG. On WP, the closest PAG I could find is the essay Wikipedia:Other stuff exists, which is both useful and useless, depending on context. The essay states: When used correctly, these comparisons are important as the encyclopedia should be consistent in the content that it provides or excludes. I'm of the mind that this is one of those instances where consistency is important. Some of the comments in this discussion remind me of The Atlantic article. I'm of the mind that when either side of an argument is silenced or intimidated into silence, it leads to a homogenous community that is incompatible with NPOV. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 13:57, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

  A "whataboutism" is nevertheless an argument that should not be used and should be called out for what it is. I don't think we're using Cuomo on Cuomo interviews as anything other than an occasional source of amusement. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:51, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 and Comment. FOX News has had a front-row seat at the White House Press Briefing Room along with NBC, CBS, ABC and CNN for a very long time reporting on the activities of multiple presidencies, both Democrat and Republican. I believe that FOX News should be treated *the same way* as NBC, CBS, ABC and CNN. Also, to the OP User:Hemiauchenia, in the interest of transparency, could you please fill out your User Page with some information about yourself? Thank you. History DMZ ^{(talk)+(ping)} 20:13, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  History DMZ, Please do not ask editors to post personal information. It is not required to post political opinions either. Please respect WP:PRIVACY. buidhe 20:27, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Buidhe, I never asked for *personal* information. I asked for *some* information. That can be userboxes, a short introduction, etc. Please don't put words in my mouth that I didn't speak. But to be clear, NO personal information was asked of the OP. Cordially, History DMZ ^{(talk)+(ping)} 20:34, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  History DMZ, I can tell you that I don't really care for Hemiauchenia, despite the fact my account is named after it, having never edited the article. I do think the article (alongside that of Paleolama) are in need of serious work though. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:41, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Hemiauchenia, thank you for your cordial and humorous reply. Perhaps what you just shared is TMI for some lol. But seriously, it wouldn't hurt if you introduced yourself a little to the community through your user page. It's *optional* of course. Cheers, History DMZ ^{(talk)+(ping)} 20:52, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  History DMZ, The White House gave press passes to Infowars and OANN. That means literally nothing. Guy (help!) 12:19, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  JzG, The Obama White House (2009-2017), whom I voted into office and hold no bias for or against, gave *front-row* press passes to FOX News and sat them next to NBC, CBS, ABC and CNN. That means a lot. Cordially, History DMZ ^{(talk)+(ping)} 18:02, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  @History DMZ: that was then. They have totally changed because of Trump. It's a symbiotic relationship made in hell. They have moved from ordinary right-wing RS, to extreme right-wing allies of Russian propaganda defending Trump, no matter what, and we know he lies constantly. -- Valjean (talk) 05:42, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 Far more reliable than its cable competitors such as the pathetic CNN or MSNBC that are little more than 24/7 coverage of "we hate Trump". Considering all the poorly worded tones of once reliable sources such as the NYTimes, the WaPo, BBC and simliar mostly print based news entities, FoxNews appears as reliable as as them overall. Since we shy away from posting news opinion pieces in most BLPs we also do so with cable based pundit commentary, or at least we should.--MONGO (talk) 20:43, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2, with Option 3 for political content. Speaking as a journalist, Fox News's news coverage, while better than its opinions commentary, still flouts the professional standards of the industry, and this has worsened since the prior RfC. The Seth Rich example (Poynter headline: "Fox News’s retraction is a woefully inadequate response to its colossal mistake") is just one of many. While it does often publish decent enough content, I agree with Nemo that anything we cite to it would have to be confirmed somewhere else more reliable, at which point it is no longer functioning as a source. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 20:46, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 - Opinion, punditry, and headlines aside, their straight news stuff is fine. Like SJ says, on par with CNN, MSNBC, or any other cable news. (Well, better actually than some cable news, like OANN and Newsmax.) I agree with Masem's comments above that making mistakes and correcting them later is not a sign of unreliability. I think it's quite the opposite in fact. Fox News is not a top-tier source and can usually be replaced by a better source, but it's an RS, when used properly. By the way, we just did this last year. [60] Levivich ^{[dubious – discuss]} 20:48, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1- How many more of these discussions do we need to have. Sure I understand that consensus can change, but having the same exact discussion every other month just because there is a group of people who hate Fox News is a massive waste of time. It is at least as reliable as its competitor CNN and we haven't banned that as a source yet.--Rusf10 (talk) 23:20, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Reliable. Elizium23 (talk) 23:27, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Per Atsme. Shinealittlelight (talk) 00:05, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 As far as actual factual reporting they seem to do about as well as most NewsOrgs. They post their corrections which are easy to call out. Not a huge fan of what they choose to write about but that doesn't make it unreliable. The Punditry is hot garbage but then most punditry isn't reliable anyway.AlmostFrancis (talk) 00:13, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Options 1 to 4. The news department will generally get "sky is blue" type facts right. They still get all the way over into reporting debunked information, which is sometimes called out by other members of the team, but not always.

Are they "reliable for US Politics"? Hell no. Ask yourself if their reporting deviates from what all other mainstream news sources report. If someone can't see that there is a huge difference between their reporting and the reporting from the rest of mainstream media, they are blind. If they do see the difference, and still consider Fox News generally reliable for US politics, they don't know what's really happening, are buying the GOP party line without thinking, and don't know how to vet sources for reliability. Note that such people consistently hate fact-checking sources.

Keep in mind that research shows that Watching Only Fox News Makes You Less Informed Than Watching No News At All

Fox News was created by Roger Ailes to be a voice for the GOP, not a real "news" station. It's their propaganda channel. With the arrival of Trump, they have gone from normal right-wing (which can be opinionated, but still reliable) to extreme right-wing (which, like extreme left-wing, are not reliable) and often repeat Russian talking points, the exact same ones being pushed by RT and Sputnik, which are Russian propaganda channels. That is very worrying.-- Valjean (talk) 00:18, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Valjean, for the sake of academic clarity - two FDU professors that were involved in the original New Jersey and later international polling (your link above), Peter J. Woolley and Dan Cassino, explained the misleading results by the news media as follows: "Does Fox News make you dumb? No, but that was the headline generated by news aggregators re-reporting research by Fairleigh Dickinson University‘s PublicMind." They closed with the following statement: We never said, nor meant to say, that Fox viewers are dumb — or MSNBC viewers for that matter. They’re no better or worse than the average respondents. Clearly, anyone who is dumb and watching TV was dumb when he or she sat down in front of the tube. Some news sources just don’t help matters any. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 17:55, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

To ^Atsme - Results from the 2012 Fairleigh Dickinson University (FDU) survey that Valjean reported on (above) found that "Fox News viewers were less informed about current events than people who didn't follow the news at all." [61] That's the result of their study. So it's best to avoid getting hung-up on a headline & instead focus on the results of the study. BetsyRMadison (talk) 20:19, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2. Great to be here. Lots of folks out there are saying Option 1 and many are saying Option 3, but I like Option 2. In my experience, the reliability of the "News Division" of Fox News has gone down over recent years. I don't think enough people here are talking about that. For me, since Shepard Smith left,^[62] their standards have started to lax. According to Brian Stelter, Smith wasn't the only person in the News Division to leave, and he reported that Fox News executives are mainly trying to head the company away from prioritizing actual journalism in their coverage.^[63] Regardless, it is certainly clear that they have changed in some way over time.^[64]
  While writing this comment, I did some digging. I wanted a reliable source to tell me how other reliable sources think things are. It's easy to get caught up in your own perceptions of things, so I wanted something outside my own biases. What I found was this article. It's answer: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  It's not clear, and no one knows for sure. We can debate it all we want, but we're never going to get a satisfactory answer out of this question besides (to me) Option 2. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 02:21, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• It keeps coming up, because it's such a hard case. Ultimately, I land [close enough to] Option 2 for the news. Certainly the pundits/talk shows can range anywhere from option 2-4, depending, but the news content is ok for a lot of subjects. I think where it's hardest is when it comes to story selection and word choice. Fox doesn't regularly simply get it wrong and doesn't often contradict other sources on the basic facts, but will cover some things that don't get any traction elsewhere and is more likely to use particular kinds of language to cover those stories (like one they've gotten some flack for in the past is "thug" -- for which they're certainly not the only one, of course). Not sure if that should factor in to RSP -- just seemed worth mentioning — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 04:18, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2, generally. Mostly per all of the above. I'd also add that Fox tends to be a good source in terms of determining what the Republican Party's stance on an issue is. This is roughly in line with my opinion on the merits of including Xinhua or CGTN as a barometer of the "official stance" of the CCP. OhKayeSierra (talk) 04:40, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2: The arguments that Fox News is generally reliable because of WP:NEWSORG aren't convincing. This specific part of the RS content guideline reflects general consensus for the entire class of sources that are news organizations, and the following are not the same:
  • generally considered to be reliable (from WP:NEWSORG, bolding mine)
  • considered to be generally reliable (an apparently common interpretation here)
  When it comes to an RfC to determine the consensus on the individual reliability of a particular news organization, it's a very weak argument to just say that Fox News is a news organization and then point to the massively general group of news organizations. We need to identify whether the particular news organization engages in fact-checking and has a reputation for accuracy
  There is problematic journalism by Fox News, which is elaborated by (among others): JzG and Aquillion regarding misinformation and inaccuracies, Snooganssnoogans and Aquillion regarding climate change and conspiracy theories, Aquillion regarding academic studies on the priority given to ideology, and Sdkb and MJL regarding general journalistic standards.
  Fox News does have editorial oversight, yes, but the existence of an editorial team doesn't guarantee reliability. The quality and standards of that editorial process is not at the same level expected of a generally reliable source (bolding mine):

  The source has a reputation for fact-checking, accuracy, and error-correction, often in the form of a strong editorial team.

  The historical level of journalism over the past decade requires editors to pay significant attention to individual articles, in many contexts, before they can be used as references. — MarkH₂₁^talk 05:05, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) (Standard disclaimer of I'mabout their opinion/commentary, which is a solid "4", but just the actual news...) Either 3 or 4 overall, and its questionable assessment of appropriate weight means it absolutely should not be used in assessing WP:DUE; probably 2 for the basic facts themselves. I don't think it's the worst offender in regular use on ENWP; it tends to get basic facts right more than it gets them wrong (admittedly a shamefully low bar to set); it strikes me as only a dull roar of awfulness surrounded by a sea of utter journalistic tripe. I'd rank it substantially below "real" reporting — Reuters, AP, NYT — but a bit above all the tabloid-y rags like Huffington Post, Daily Beast, Washington Examiner, Complex, etc. By all means let's ditch Fox, but let's also take care of the tabloid infestation while we're at it! —{{u|Goldenshimmer}} (they/them)｜Talk｜Contributions 06:01, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 per JzG, Devonian Wombat, Aquillion, Snooganssnoogans, etc. Gamaliel (talk) 12:13, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 1/2 My feelings mirror that of BD2412 for national programming fairly closely. I live in a very small television market, but I would have to say Option 1 for local affiliate news programming. My local station, WEUX contracts with the NBC affiliate for news programming. -- Dolotta (talk) 15:12, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1: Respectable WP:NEWSORG with editorial control no different then NYT --Shrike (talk) 17:03, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  Shrike, oh, I can think of some differences :-) Levivich ^{[dubious – discuss]} 18:12, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• I haven't done any investigation of the issue myself, but just looking at this thread, the points put forward by User:Masem are a lot more convincing than any of the points set out by those arguing against (many of which bring up things which aren't relevant to reliability). --Yair rand (talk) 21:02, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2/3. I think by now it is clear that the pundit shows are not included in this analysis. That said, Fox has shown a top-to-bottom willingness to slant coverage, to use misleading headlines, chyrons, tickers, etc., to give mouthpieces for despicable views a platform, to present conspiracy theories as facts, etc. WP:NEWSORG does not apply when a source has a well-established pattern and editorial direction that allows rumors and untruths (NB:untruths are different from usual journalistic mistruths) to be reported as facts. This is not merely bias. Unfortunately, a blanket statement about which of those options applies is impossible because the reliability varies depending on context, story subject, and even time slot. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 22:31, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 Per Aquillion, Snooganssnoogans, and Guy. Everyday non-political/scientific event reporting is fine, but their record in fact-checking and explicit error correction is unacceptable. JoelleJay (talk) 23:49, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1. treat the same as CNN, NYT, etc. As with any source, my first check is whether or not they have a corrections process and/or policy. They do. [65] Sure, they have gotten stories wrong, and corrected themselves, but then again they didn't treat us to 2 years of Russia Hoax, either. Their bias seems to be less of an issue than with, for example, CNN, which has broadcast 10 interviews of Andrew Cuomo by Chris Cuomo [66]. Additionally, the inclusion of Fox as a "gold-standard" source would give Wikipedia some sorely-needed political diversity in its "gold standard" sourcing on US politics, something we lack if we treat it any less than CNN, NYT, etc. Adoring nanny (talk) 01:55, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
  • @Adoring nanny: "they didn't treat us to 2 years of Russia Hoax, either". Therein lies the rub. Editors who think that Fox News constant pushing of the completely false conspiracy theory that the proven fact that Russia interfered in the election to help Trump win (that is the narrative from all RS) is a "Russia hoax" have swallowed the kool-aid served daily by Fox News. No wonder the votes for Option 1. They actually see that there is a huge difference between the counterfactual narrative pushed by Fox News, RT, Sputnik, Breitbart, Bongino, and all other fringe sources, and the factual narrative documented by all mainstream sources (IOW the ones we consider RS), and seeing that difference, they still believe the false conspiracy theories because they have been deceived into believing Trump's lie that mainstream media are fake news. No wonder we have this problem. They don't know how to vet sources. Fox Fake News is treated by them as equal to CNN, ABC, BBC, etc. No, there is a world of difference. -- Valjean (talk) 05:35, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
    • The hoax is the assertion that Trump colluded with the Russians. Adoring nanny (talk) 11:13, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
      • @Adoring nanny: that's not the only part denied by Fox News, but, just to keep the terminology correct, the Mueller Report was not able to collect enough evidence (because of Trump's proven obstruction of the investigation) to prove "conspiracy"/"coordination", but did describe numerous examples of what could be considered collusion/co-operation/invitation/facilitation, which is not a crime, just disloyal to the interests of the United States. Trump and Fox News still attempt to deny/downplay that Russia interfered, and the term "Russia hoax" includes that, not just the part about collusion/no collusion. Trump has still not done anything to prevent the current disruption of the elections and has stated he would accept foreign interference to help him, and that he might not even notify the FBI, which would make him vulnerable to blackmail by foreign bad actors like Russia. -- Valjean (talk) 16:35, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
        • MR. CLAPPER: Well, no, it's not. I never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign or someone in it was plotting/conspiring with the Russians to meddle with the election [67]. So Fox was right about that all along. A fine example of why we need them as a first-class source. Adoring nanny (talk) 21:32, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
          • You seem to be ignoring the difference between "conspiracy" and co-operation/collusion. Mueller describes the Trump campaign's actions quite well as "the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests." The Trump campaign did take myriad proven "actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests", but without evidence of a formal written or spoken agreement, conspiracy could not be proven, even if everything done, and the results of those actions, indicated that such an understanding existed, regardless of whether a formal "agreement" existed. Conspirators usually avoid leaving such evidence.

Starting in 2015, EIGHT foreign allied intelligence agencies reported to the FBI that numerous Trump campaign members and associates were secretly meeting with known Russian intelligence agents (who were being monitored). The campaign lied about all these contacts. Their conversations were so worrying and a threat to American democracy that those intelligence agencies reported their findings to the FBI (and maybe CIA). The Trump campaign was deeply involved with Russian intelligence, and we saw the results. That's collusion (or unproven conspiracy), no matter how it's defined. Fox News will not tell you any of that, but RS do, and our articles here do.

There is a huge difference in the coverage by Fox News and mainstream news. Fox News paints Trump and his campaign as innocent victims of a witch hunt, when all the suspicion was actually justified and a result of the campaign's own actions. Trump's continued refusals to condemn the interference and constant cozying up to Putin doesn't help. Now he's threatening to withdraw American troops from Germany, which is a nice gift to Putin.

The Steele Dossier alleged “a well-developed conspiracy of co-operation". Well guess what. Even though the "conspiracy" was not proven, what actually happened was loads of proven "co-operation". Fox News ignores what actually happened and focuses on what was not proven. How convenient. Trump is still "co-operating" with Putin, and that's very wrong. -- Valjean (talk) 00:35, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

There is zero requirement that a RS tell a complete story. Obviously we give more credibility to the sources that have routinely shown commitment to tell the full story and follow up as needed (NYTimes) but plenty of other high-quality RSes will go to press with 3/4ths of the story and may update as the go along or the like (like CNN). Omission by choice of part of the story is also acceptable but of course this might depends on what's omitted and why. If a story involves a rumor about X and the publication doesn't even attempt to reach X to ask about it, that's iffy, while when a source does try to reach out to X and gets no response, they'll say that. Fox will omit parts of stories, this is not in doubt, and this leads to their bias, but it doesn't change their reliability in a big-picture sense. I would say that if a source is making so many omissions in a story to make it swiss cheese and or to actually make it swing a totally different way by omission of essential details, then we'd have a problem but that's not what Fox does. --Masem (t) 00:50, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Masem, I agree with everything except the last part. Fox News consistently ignores or downplays anything that is negative about Trump. That's classic pseudoscientific "journalism", because it's agenda-driven reporting. It's not real journalism. It's propaganda. They paint a totally different picture than the picture painted by all the mainstream sources, and that is not by accident. It's not a bug that they ignore "essential details" and end up pushing counterfactual narratives. They do it so egregiously that Shep Smith and Wallace were constantly having to call out the others. That's problematic. -- Valjean (talk) 00:57, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Ahem, on their front page as of right now we have Pence criticized after meeting with packed room of trump campaign staff ignoring social distancing guidelines, with a big photo on their main page. Adoring nanny (talk) 22:31, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes, they actually document how Democrats criticize Pence. Nothing new about that. Now find examples of them criticizing Trump and you'll have examples of the exception that proves the rule, IOW proof that they rarely do it themselves. Such examples do exist, and they are remarkable, showing that they exceptionally rise to the standards of proper journalism they routinely violate. -- Valjean (talk) 02:03, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

From what I've read throughout this RfC, the opposition to FN is not convincing. Journalistic opinion in the media has become the norm as I've already demonstrated in this month's Signpost Op-Ed. Fox News has covered stories that others in MSM have refused to cover...at least until they basically had no choice but to cover it...Tara Reade comes to mind. As editors, we are responsible for encyclopedic content - not political rhetoric and speculation. Going back and forth over a RS not publishing what we expect per our POV vs another RS publishing what aligns with our POV - despite it being pure speculation in many cases (such as the Steele dossier and the Russian collusion conspiracy theory) - is what RECENTISM actually prevents from being included in our encyclopedia, and helps avoid the criticism we've been seeing in the media regarding WP having a leftist slant when our articles should be touted as being neutral. This problem is growing and it needs resolution for the sake of the project. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 22:56, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

WP:Recentism doesn't prevent the inclusion of that content, although I have repeatedly seen it invoked in that context with the meaning that "we will prevent anything negative about Trump from being included until we see RS reporting only positive content about him, and only then will we allow it." That version of "recentism" is not according to policy. No, we use RS as they appear en masse (IOW when multiple RS report something), and we don't wait until our preferred version appears in RS. What we do is document what RS say now (sometimes waiting a few days to avoid violating "recentism"), and we update and revise content if the narrative and details in RS change, and that is what has been happening with that content you mention. The multiple attempts to completely delete the Steele dossier article have always been against multiple existing policies and have revealed a politically-driven agenda, not a policy-based agenda. -- Valjean (talk) 00:25, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

While we arguably can use the present attitudes of the press en masse and change as time goes along, as you suggest, this is what leads to at least 50% of the problems in the AP2 ArbCom discretionary area because editors are rushing to include the latest commentary about a topic. We'd have a lot smoother editing process overall if NOT#NEWS and RECENTISM were considered to avoid the rush to include media commentary until we have a better idea of how to frame everything about it and the long-term picture. Yes, ultimately we'd get to the same place but one is far less strive-ridden, and deals with things like the issues around Fox's bias, for example. We are writing for the long-term , not the short term (that's Wikinews if you really want that). and that means avoiding certain material that may be readily available in the press "now" until we now how best to write about it "later" from more academic more distant sources. --Masem (t) 22:08, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

• Treat the same as The New York Times? This is not a serious !vote and should not be afforded any weight. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 00:01, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Political diversity is not a factor for reliability. Using extreme neo-Nazi and anarchist blogs would also be politically diverse, but that's irrelevant to their (un-)reliability. — MarkH₂₁^talk 06:40, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

• No, but it does show how treating Fox as somehow more biased than (for example) CNN, we harm Wikipedia. Adoring nanny (talk) 11:20, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 as a standard American news org. Obviously they have pundits and talkshows, and common sense must be used just like with any source. In his 2014 book Partisan Journalism: A History of Media Bias in the United States, Virginia Tech media professor Jim A. Kuypers wrote that partisan journalism is a very widespread and old phenomenon in the mainstream US news. I would not muddy the waters between reliable and opinionated sources further, and strongly oppose popularity contests of singling out news orgs from a partisan media field for this reason. --Pudeo (talk) 08:50, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2: This is my first time participating in something like this, so weight it accordingly, but I found more persuasive arguments in favour of anything less than Option 1 which is mainly citing WP:NEWSORG or bothsideism, among other flawed rationales (see the Russia hoax claim or the argument that, along with other news outlets, Fox had the front-row seat at the White House Press Briefing Room; InfoWars and other unreliable news outlets have been invited too). Certainly, I disagree with the current wording of Some editors perceive FOX News to be a biased source whereas others do not; neither affects reliability of the source which should probably reflect the change in recent years to Most editors consider Fox a biased or opinionated source. Some editors advise caution when using this source for controversial statements of fact related to living persons like The Daily Beast (I do not have any opinion yet on whether it should be demoted, I trust the consensus; and I do not think that we should demote it just to compensate for a possible demotion of Fox as a bothsideism). The difference between the two is that, as MarkH21 put it, Fox may now considered to be generally reliable which is different from generally considered to be reliable for the green box and the overcited NEWSORG. I also agree with Goldenshimmer assessment that Fox is closer to the Huffington Post (which is currently yellow) and others mentioned than the AP, The New York Times and Reuters which, if anything and like Wikipedia (for those who claim Wikipedia to have a left bias), have a centrist bias rather than left bias, at best centre-left and mainly on socio-cultural issues. Finally, if we are going to prefer those sources over Fox anyway and we need those sources to confirm whether Fox was reliable or not on a case-by-case analysis, we are already following Option 2.--Davide King (talk) 11:13, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 as generally reliable per WP:NEWSORG for factual reporting. Talking head punditry stuff is rarely used in articles and where used is attributed as it should be. an important news source which expands into subject areas other NEWSORGs may not. -- Netoholic @ 16:42, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 - the discussion here is convincing me that this is a terrible source even for news. Option 2 as second choice. If a local affiliate has a news story that's worth noting, it'll be in less tainted sources - David Gerard (talk) 19:55, 10 June 2020 (UTC) Changing this to Option 4, given the deliberate fabrication of news story photos - deliberate fabrication is deprecation material - David Gerard (talk) 10:44, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 I would be fine with option 1 also, but from the discussion it seems that there are "additional considerations" as to the division between reporting and editorials. I prefer option 2 because it allows us to make that distinction clear since unlike many other news organizations brought up, their editorials are generally not reliable for information. — Wug·a·po·des​ 00:04, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3: better sources are available w/o the risk of running into misinformation or conspiracy theories. If Fox is the only media org covering a certain issue, then it's probably undue anyway. --K.e.coffman (talk) 02:37, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2: Local affiliate stations are generally reliable, but the Fox News Network has reliability problems when it comes to certain topics such as climate change[68] and the Trump Administration[69]. I would favor deprecating it as a reliable source for topics on which it has demonstrated a history of misleading coverage. Kaldari (talk) 03:33, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 generally reliable as a news org. Yes, they have pundits with a bias that most Wikipedians don't share, but this isn't about that. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 13:30, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4 FACT: Ofcom in the UK are unlikely to award a licence to Fox News as they are not impartial: "British media regulator Ofcom has concluded that Fox News programs featuring Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson violated the U.K.’s broadcasting code by breaching impartiality rules...Sky dropped Fox News from its UK lineup in August, but Ofcom has continued to investigate complaints about shows that aired before the channel went dark. The regulator said Monday that both “Tucker Carlson Tonight” and “Hannity” broke the rules on the “due impartiality” expected of news coverage in Britain. SethWhales ^talk 20:42, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

@Seth Whales: The RfC specifically mentions "as separate from their cable pundits" to avoid confusion and to solely focus on Fox News general reporting. Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity both fall under the "Cable pundit" classification, and there's no way that anything from their programmes should be cited in wikivoice to begin with, only as attributed opinion under specific circumstances where the comments were found to be independently notable. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:18, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

• The "pundits" and any "news coverage" are inseparable. They may show the same television pictures, but it is the commentary that is all important that goes with it. I remain Option 4 SethWhales ^talk 20:42, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1. We're beating a dead horse at this point, and I think it's time to drop the stick. Yes, Fox is biased. So is almost every other major US news outlet, like NYT, NBC, and CNN. Fox is a standard WP:NEWSORG. JOEBRO64 21:28, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Fox has its biases, as do all of the networks and the NY Times and WaPo etc. But it is a generally reliable source when reporting factual stories. I realize that Fox's editorial biases are unpopular around here but this never ending attempt to blacklist Fox is getting old. It reminds me of the old expression "the voting shall continue until the correct result is returned." And I for one am concerned about what appears to be an insidious drift towards creating an ideological bubble into which all sources to be considered RS must fall. There is already widespread suspicion among conservatives of a leftwing bias on the project. These endless attacks on Fox News only add fuel to that fire. -Ad Orientem (talk) 22:46, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 per numerous arguments showing that Fox News meets all WP:RS criteria for editorial oversight. All news sources have bias, and as long as we distinguish opinion from reporting, Fox is no different from CNN. — JFG ^talk 22:53, 11 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 I think that Masem is correct. As far as the news programs go, they are perfectly comparable to CNN, MSNBC, BBC, CBC and other news sources that Wikipedia already uses all the time. Talrolande (talk) 01:18, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 per Ad Orientem. This sort of partisanship is disgusting. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:26, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 FoxNews definitely meets WP:NEWSORG; and while biased so too are CNN, The Guardian, NYT, MSNBC, etc. but they are allowed. I fear this RfC would be used to get around WP:NPOV. The solution to bias in reporting by a right leaning source is to simply add text sourced to a left leaning source and vice versa. If we go down the slippery slope of banning major right leaning news sources then we will bias our content and gain a reputation of censorship and partisanship and then our article quality will deteriorate and we will be seen to be a biased source that fewer people take seriously. Finally, FoxNews does an enormous amount of reporting on neutral non political matters. Conclusion: right leaning sources are just as welcome as left leaning sources on the NPOV encyclopedia that anyone can edit.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 01:48, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: Yes, every other news outlets may have a bias (certainly more centrist bias than the often overused left bias; The Canary and Occupy Democrats are red) but not all biases are the same and they do not affect factual reporting, whether Fox's bias seems to be stronger that it affects its reporting more often that all those news outlets mentioned and this is something to consider. So clearly, if bothsideism is the best rationale one can offer for Option 1 as it is the most cited along with WP:NEWSORG, I am not impressed. There are better more right-leaning sources anyway. A change from Some editors perceive FOX News to be a biased source whereas others do not; neither affects reliability of the source to Most editors consider Fox a biased or opinionated source. Some editors advise caution when using this source for controversial statements of fact related to living persons (even while remaining green) seems to be at least warranted.--Davide King (talk) 08:02, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Either Option 1 or Option 4 - Every single thing said above in terms of Fox being a WP:NEWSORG is also true of the Daily Mail, the Daily Mail also has an editorial team, it also covers actual news stories, it also has a front-row seat at various events. It also shares all of the DM's vices in terms of tabloidism. The DM ban (let's not try to pretend that it is anything but a ban) was an example of primarily US-based editors finding it easy to deprecate the media of another country, this RFC shows that many of them are not capable of applying the same standards to a source closer to home. Therefore, either Fox is generally reliable as a WP:NEWSORG (but so, within the limits of tabloidism, is the DM) or Fox should be deprecated along with the DM. Personally, I deplore these RFCs on general reliability of WP:NEWSORGs in countries where media can generally operate freely, and think them no better than popularity contests pillorying "bad" media, completely detached from the actual contexts in which editors actually wish to use these sources. FOARP (talk) 09:38, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1, with a little bit of 2 for US politics. Yes, they have editorial bias, so does pretty much every news outlet. I'm aware that elements of the "woke brigade" want to rule them out of existence. That's not Wikipedia's role. Stifle (talk) 10:57, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Question: why isn't this decision based on existing academic research instead of opinion Rather than base this decision on opinion it would be helpful to bring in academic studies of media reliability, many professional researchers have spent years collecting evidence on this question. That would give us something to work from and also provide information on if Wikipedia should separate reliability of the website and the TV channel or by subject, e.g Fox News is currently being sued for “knowingly disseminated false, erroneous, and incomplete information”. Wikipedia is based on reliable sources, I suggest it makes sense to decide what reliable sources are through in depth analysis which many people have already done. John Cummings (talk) 12:31, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
  • FWIW, that lawsuit has been summarily dismissed, and Fox's side was baced by a trade org that includes CNN and MSNBC in supporting First Amendment speech. --Masem (t) 12:43, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2: I see a lot of good pieces of evidence above, including the Business Insider report, the Ofcom finding and MJL's comment. I would like to add to the discussion the fact that we are a global encyclopedia and America's "left-wing" and "right-wing" are not that of the world. We here in Europe might find some things said on CNN to be right-wing-only talking points. Those afraid that we may have listed too many left-wing sources as reliable and too many right-wing sources as unreliable might do well to remember that this is a nationality-specific claim. I'd like to suggest some general principles: biased for international reporting, where Fox's Overton window may be wildly off; biased for U.S. politics (including reports on protests and human rights movements); generally factually accurate for events that are not capital P political; use only with care for business-related content (per BD2412's very worrying comment); treat pundits as WP:SPS. Some are discussing Fox's climate change denial but no news media is suitable for scientific content in this way anyway; it is, however, something to bear in mind for e.g. climate change protest coverage, or coverage of a person's views on a scientific issue. — Bilorv (Black Lives Matter) 12:45, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 This is the type of thing that needs to be decided on a case by case basis. If, for example, someone was writing/editing an article about say, a plane crash for example, and a Fox News segment about that crash stated the names of the pilots, there would be no reason to assume that that information is made up. This is true of any news station. Empirical claims about objective facts made by a prominent news station are unlikely to have been fabricated. As far as other kinds of claims are concerned, any news station, not just Fox, should be taken with a grain of salt, and only be used as a source if the individual editor makes a judgement call to include it. A Google Scholar search for 'Fox News bias' brings a number of studies, but so does the same search for CNN. Media outlets in general are designed to appeal to a target audience, and are not designed to be entirely factual. According to mediabiasfactcheck.com, Fox and CNN are equally biased. It's not a question of which station is being used as a source, it's just about whether or not a better source can be found. Peer reviewed journals will always take precedence over news stations, regardless of the station. --Puzzledvegetable^{Is it teatime already?} 15:27, 12 June 2020 (UTC) + strikethrough in response to following comment ​ --Puzzledvegetable^{Is it teatime already?} 02:55, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

  Puzzledvegetable, WP:MBFC is rated generally unreliable and self-published. It's not a good source for the reliability of other sources. buidhe 17:54, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 The news programs on Fox News are as reliable as the news programs on other cable news channels, such as CNN and MSNBC. I'm going to be very blunt and just state the obvious: Fox News is not much liked around here (on Wikipedia) because of the political slant of the commentary in its opinion shows. That does not render the factual reporting on its news programs any more unreliable than the news reporting on CNN or MSNBC (which, I note, also have a very heavy slant in their opinion programs, albeit a slant that many more Wikipedians feel comfortable with). The commentary programs on Fox News are obviously unreliable for statements of fact, just like the commentary from any opinion column is unreliable for statements of fact. The factual reporting in news articles on foxnews.com is generally reliable. There are political biases in which stories Fox News chooses to cover, just as there are political biases in which stories CNN and MSNBC choose to cover. And for certain categories of information, I would consider all three generally unreliable (e.g., WP:MEDRS content). Why am I comparing Fox News to CNN and MSNBC? Because those two channels are very comparable to Fox News - they're cable news channels with strong political biases and a clear partisan affiliation. Yet I don't think we'll see many calls for them to be considered unreliable, because their political biases better align with the views of most Wikipedians. -Thucydides411 (talk) 19:09, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Like -Ad Orientem (talk) 19:14, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Like - ^Atsme _Talk 📧 23:23, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4. I'd like everyone to see this article from The Seattle Times that shows Fox News digitally altering images to misrepresent the current situation in Seattle. This is not their first act of news manipulation and far from the last. SounderBruce 05:26, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
  • As noted below: photos like headlines and other material around an article should not be taken as the work of the reporters or editorial desk and should not be used to judge the reliability of the content. Bias, absolutely. --Masem (t) 05:43, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

  Interesting. Now before FOX news gets deprecated, Jan 2019, Seattle FOX affiliate KCPQ (Q13 FOX) altered a video of Trump. One of the additional questions to this RfC is Do local affiliate stations have a separate reliability to the main Fox News operation? Possibly not, but most likely not when reporting national news since affiliates use their national news affiliation. {{reply to|Can I Log In}}'s talk page! 18:06, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3: A 2015 fact-check of Fox News pundits by punditfact found that "about 60 percent of the claims checked have been rated Mostly False or worse". In terms of international affairs, Fox News always restates the American government positions uncritically, presenting the administrations' propaganda as facts. An example of this is its coverage of the assassination of Qassem Soleimani in January 2020. [70] [71]. Mottezen (talk) 07:49, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Comment Comparing Fox News to CNN or MSNBC is not an argument. Only Fox News is being discussed here. Mottezen (talk) 07:49, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 34 FFS, if they are doing a daily mirror and faking photos that should be a no there and then. That was not "The Colin the Conservative show" that was Fox news (you know the people who fought for lies to be counted as free speech). Sorry that pushes them over into 3 for me, and its borderline 4.Slatersteven (talk) 09:29, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 We can't honestly separate out the propagandistic tactics like digitially faking images just because the reporters might not be involved. Whoever makes the decision, whoever implements the dirty work, that's the content they choose to show the world. By their fruits shall ye know them. XOR'easter (talk) 16:11, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 at least and preferably Option 4 Reporting rumor as fact and not even bothering to delinieate between the two as well as faking pics and editing other videos to distort what happned is beyond the pale. MarnetteD|Talk 17:58, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 a news organisation that recieves talking points from a Republican adminstration that pedals in conspiracy theories an obsfucation. Acousmana (talk) 18:54, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1. It's my understanding that the news stories reported by Fox News can normally also be confirmed by reporting in other sources whose reliability is less controversial. For example, the lead story currently on FoxNews.com is "Seattle police chief and mayor at loggerheads over handling of George Floyd protests, autonomous area". For comparison, see the article on KOMO-TV's website (the Seattle ABC network affiliate), "Mayor Durkan, SPD Chief Best put on united front in public, but tensions remain". The Fox News article may emphasize certain aspects of the story more than other news sources might, but that does not make it inaccurate. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 20:59, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

  That's pretty much the opposite of how it goes with a site given to fabrication, like Fox News - the non-fabricated stories also being findable in non-fabricating news sites was part of the justification to deprecate the WP:DAILYMAIL - David Gerard (talk) 21:35, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

  No evidence has been presented of Fox News fabricating the news parts of stories from the news desk. Reporting that has been fixed via errate, yes (but that's eexpect), and tclear evidence of bias due to which angle they take in cover but which does not eliminate a source from being an RS. But intentional fabrication that has never been corrected or addressed , like there was with the DM and Brietbart cases, has yet to be shown. --Masem (t) 21:47, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Masem: Fox News fabricated quotes of John Kerry in 2004, see these stories in The Guardian and The New York Times Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:52, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Which, as your ref points out, Fox apologized and corrected, expected of RSes when mistakes are made. We're talking cases where , in the situation of DM, they falsified quotes and when challenged, said nothing, and didn't change anything. It was obvious DM wanted to keep the fabrication. Now, we can play the hypothetical thought game if Fox "intentionally" used the misattributed quotes with plans to revoke later if they were challenged, but we can't make that presumption without further evidence of this. There's nothing to objectively doubt their rational of "fatique" that lead to the misuse of those quotes. --Masem (t) 22:00, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

There was also that ridiculous case in which the Daily Mail had two articles prepared for the Amanda Knox verdict before the verdict was even announced and accidentally published the wrong one, complete with fabricated quotes, events, and everything. I don't think Fox can even get close to that. JOEBRO64 22:27, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1. Photos and headlines should not be relied upon regardless of the source. Furthermore Fox's talk shows/opinion pieces are already treated differently than its core news reporting, which is generally reliable.--Tdl1060 (talk) 22:30, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 generally but Option 3 for all politics and science subjects Fox News pundits/opinion pieces should not be considered reliable and should be deprecated across the board (they don't appear to be used all that much), but given the deterioration of the reliability of Fox News over the last ten years and the linked examples of editorial direction to downplay science and support Trump's lies, all Fox News citations about science or politics should be attributed in-text at a minimum ie "According to Fox News,...". Based on their demonstrated bias, the weight given to Fox News news reports should be significantly reduced. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:20, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 4 FOX News's coverage of the Seattle protests has been fake news at best. Their article of armed gunmen in the Autonomous Zone had Photoshopped images, as exposed in a CNN Business expose . While it is photos, the photoshopped headline was significant enough to be outed in another media outlet, and therefore should be taken into consideration for being fully deprecated. BrythonLexi (talk) 13:16, 14 June 2020 (UTC) — BrythonLexi (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• Option 3: Per Aquillion, Snooganssnoogans, and Guy and others. The is media bias and then the is fake news and clearly unreliable for factual reporting such as the seattle protests, covid-19 and the riduclous reporting that turned the Birmingham, the UKs second largest city into muslim controlled no-go area . The news service needs to clean up its act if we are going to treat with confidence as a reliable source. ~ BOD ~ ^TALK 16:01, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 5: If inclusion in WP hinges on whether reporting by a single NEWSORG is reliable then you've already failed. Remove and replace where acadmeic sources are more appropriate, cede AP2 to the POV pushers—readers can't trust that content anyway—and wait until editors start listening to Masem. fiveby(zero) 17:02, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 for news, Option 2/3 for commentary depending on which pundit is involved. The weight/focus given to certain topics is perhaps not agreeable; but looking at articles individually, nothing suggests a lack of editorial control which would jeopardize editorial control, as Masem points out. When readers look at citations to Fox News articles, they are looking at individual news articles, not the network/website as a whole. feminist | freedom isn't free 02:30, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 for news and politics, Option 3 for science-related matters. Ten years ago, I would have selected Option 3 for the entire news organization, but the last decade has witnessed a slow but steady decline in reporting standards across the Western world, so in that sense, Fox is no longer any better or worse than other major networks such as CNN or MSNBC in terms of reliability and impartiality. That being said, I don't think Fox should generally be considered a WP:RS when it comes to science-related matters, given that it has consistently provided a platform to climate change deniers and often runs stories suggesting that climate change is not caused by human activity. Amanuensis Balkanicus (talk) 05:13, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 for news and politics. They were the only major media to cover the Tara Reid situation while the others tried to bury it. Fox has a clear conservative bias, but as mentioned above, there is no such thing as bias-free political reporting. It needs to be handled on a case-by-case basis.Jacona (talk) 15:50, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Odd, as we do not even use Fox news in her bio, so what is this "situation" that is so important we do not mention in?Slatersteven (talk) 16:02, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Their Tara Reade reporting is actually a reason to NOT use Fox News. They immediately jumped on the situation (a BLP and NOTNEWS violation here), without getting more clarity on the subject, because they will immediately grab and exaggerate anything that smears Biden and helps Trump. That's their reflex and job, to smear, not report news accurately. That's why they were the first to write much about it.

Other RS were more circumspect and cautious, waiting for more clarity and evidence. Fox News was acting like the National Enquirer, and lots of what they originally wrote is now seen to be outdated and wrong. Of all sources, Fox News and the National Enquirer are the types we should wait a long time with before using. Fox News should be deprecated, just like the Enquirer.

In fact, try comparing how Fox News ignored and downplayed Trump's boasting/confession of his habit and methodology of non-consensually sexually assaulting women, and their ignoring and downplaying of all the credible allegations by numerous women who experienced that and did not want it, and then compare their reporting on Tara Reade. That comparison shows they are not "news" but "propaganda". -- Valjean (talk) 16:17, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Ohh, Tara Reade Mmmmmm, the story that was being " not ignored" as early as 2019 by "not Fox news".Slatersteven (talk) 16:24, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Valjean, what Tara Reade reporting from Fox is now seen to be outdated and wrong? petrarchan47คุก 22:41, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

• Option 1 for news; any punditry should be Didn't mean to hit publish; waiting on response from Valjean above... petrarchan47คุก 19:41, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• 3.7 -- It is a propaganda outlet which occasionally broadcasts news. EllenCT (talk) 20:54, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3: In 2015, President Reagan's former domestic policy advisor, Bruce Bartlett, published his detailed analysis of Fox News wherein Bartlett concludes Fox News is a "Propaganda Machine." [72]. In his analysis, Barlett reports on several studies that found "Fox viewers are misinformed" and are "more likely to have factually untrue beliefs than those who receive their news from mainstream sources." In my view, even if you look only at their alleged 'news shows," Fox is a propaganda outlet. For example, on their alleged 'news shows:'
  

• Just last week Fox News finally removed their "digitally altered video" of their coverage of the protests in Seattle after they admitted the cities in their video were not of Seattle at all. [73] [74] [75]. Fox News' "deceitful tactic was called out by The Seattle Times. The local newspaper reported that when it asked Fox News about the images, the network removed them. Fox News' depiction of the demonstration mirrors much of right-wing media's attempt to portray it as menacing." [76]
  
• On Fox News Special Report w/Bret Baier: Bret Baier displayed a racist graphic alleging that the Stock Market gets a big boost when black men are murdered or beaten to near death. After criticism, Bret Baier actually had the racist-nerve to justify producing his racist graphic but did apologize for airing his racist graphic “It was used to illustrate market reactions to historic periods of civil unrest and should have never aired." [77] [78]
  
• Fox News' Martha MacCallum: On the rapidly spreading, deadly coronavirus, Martha MacCallum told her Fox viewers that re-opening the U.S. economy is more important than mitigating the spread of coronavirus, [79]  Recently Marth MacCallum told her viewers that the May job's report is vindication for all of Trump supporters who protested with their assault weapons against state's that shut-down to mitigate the spread of coronavirus. [80] In mid-May, Martha MacCallum cut away from coronavirus coverage to pushTrump's Obamagate conspiracy onto her Fox viewers. 
  
• Fox News' Bill Hemmer: On the 2018 midterms, to his Fox viewers, Bill Hemmer equated Democrat voters to Saddam Hussein supporters when Hemmer compared Democratic voter turnout in the midterm elections to “Saddam Hussein numbers.” [81] In a March 25, 2020 interview, Bill Hemmer did not challenge Trump and did not correct Trump's lies for Fox viewers when Trump as on Hemmer's show lying and misrepresenting facts about the coronavirus. [82].
  ***
• Fox News' Ed Henry: When the public learned of the whistleblower report against Trump, Ed Henry told his Fox viewers that the whistleblower was acting with “political bias” against Trump. [83] Ed Henry recently told his Fox viewers that other media were spreading lies about Trump tear-gassing peaceful protesters in DC for a photo-op. Ed Henry said, “We should also point out though that some of the reporting from a couple nights ago was false, which is that there was all of this talk that really spun this up into a controversy, that pepper spray and whatnot was used,” [84]
  
• Fox News' Shannon Bream pushed anti-Transgender propaganda to her Fox viewers and did not challenge two of her guests when they  "made false and dangerous claims that protections for transgender people put other Americans at risk." [85] Other times, Shannon Bream 'misgenders' and stigmatizes transgender athletes to her Fox viewers and described JayCee Cooper as a  “biological male, now identifying as female”  and described NCAA track & field runner CeeCee Telfer as “a biological male who now identifies as a woman.”  
  
• Fox News' Sandra Smith:  During Sandra Smith's interview of K.T. McFarland, McFarland equated Rep. Adam Schiff to Hitler's propagandist, Joseph Goebbles.  Instead of telling her Fox viewers to ignore McFarland for equating a Jewish man to Hitler's propagandist, Sandra Smith simply said, "K.T McFarland, great to have you on this morning, thanks so much." [86] Sandra Smith lied to her Fox viewers and falsely claimed that Trump wants key witnesses like Mick Mulvaney and John Bolton to testify in the Impeachment hearings even though Trump blocked them and all witnesses from testifying during the entire impeachment process. [87]

Based off these examples, and more that I did not put here, Option 3 is my choice BetsyRMadison (talk) 17:59, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Your list of critical opinions above that you used as the reason to demote a generally RS needs to be cited to generally reliable sources or better, not biased opinions published in questionable or biased sources like HuffPo, Mediaite, Glaad, Daily Caller, Media Matters, and a few competitor sources. Also, the criticism and commentary you added about the photo illlustration and photoshopped images is noncompliant with WP:RECENTISM and WP:BREAKING, especially considering the images were retracted by Fox which is a sign of credibility. The same applies to the graph that was used without context - apologies were made by two Fox news anchors including Bret Baier. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 01:02, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

• Options 2, 3 and 4. At the very least Fox News news needs to be marked as a biased source and all content needs to be carefully considered through this lens, so option 2 should apply across the board. They should be regarded as deprecated for US political content (fairly broadly interpeted) including climate change, race relations in the United States and gun control in the United States, except for WP:ABOUTSELF references. Option 3 should apply for content that is peripherally or indirectly related to US politics, including UK politics. Thryduulf (talk) 18:15, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1 Fox News is about as reliable as the New York Times or CNN. It is important to distinguish their talk shows and general reporting. The general reporting is much more reliable than the opinion pieces and the talk shows. The talk shows and opinion pieces are about as reliable as the New York Times opinion pieces. Scorpions13256 (talk) 18:57, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4. As the history of Fox News as an organization demonstrates, it was invented, designed, developed, and produced with the sole purpose of undermining the practice of journalism due to its fundamental belief that reality has a liberal bias. You can read this for yourself in any number of historical works about the organization. The idea for Fox News came out of the conservative right-wing’s disgust with how Nixon was treated by the press. Vowing that they would never allow facts and evidence to interfere with reality ever again, Fox was created as a parallel world, where conservative facts replaced “liberal” ones, mostly by engaging in open distortion, fabrication, and wholesale lying. The fact that they sometimes regurgitate Associated Press stories does not save them from their fate or wipe the slate clean. Fox is not a news organization. It has never been fair and balanced. It has never been the slightest bit interested in reporting and letting the audience decide. It is a giant lie, and has operated as a liar, from the day it opened its doors. It exists solely to undermine truth, to impede the rule of law based on the body of observable facts, data, and evidence, and to constrain the democratic impulse of informing the electorate for which journalism as a practice and a discipline takes its role as a function of a responsible citizen. There is no other option than option 4. Viriditas (talk) 22:31, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 4, or failing that Option 3. At best, Fox is a highly partisan source which misrepresents through distortion and selectivity. At worst, it publishes outright falsehoods. The problem here is not that Fox is right-leaning, but that is a purveyor of bad journalism. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:00, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 for straight "sky is blue" reporting, Option 3 for most pundits, Option 4 for certain folks including but not limited to Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity. In other words, it's a case by case basis. We can't apply a one-size fits all. Heck, for straight sports reporting without editorial commentary (their horse racing is decent), they are almost to Option 1 (much as I really hate to admit it). And I say all of the above as a known US liberal Democrat. JMO. But the thing I'm seeing here is a lot of people starting to personalize this discussion, and that's inappropriate Montanabw^(talk) 16:44, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion (Fox News)

• US media landscape has changed a lot since 2010, and not to the better. That being said, I am interested to see what concrete examples of inaccuracies on Fox's part that can be found. Talk shows on any network should never be cited for facts imo. buidhe 20:08, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
  • I don't think lack of factual falsehoods makes a source reliable. Remember that the coverage of something in RS is also used for determining WP:WEIGHT in Wikipedia so if a fact collection is sufficiently biased or omits relevant info due to agenda pushing, it can end up tilting what we call the NPOV if we treat the fact selection as neutral. Facts themselves can also be distorted without being stated falsely outright, and the nature of agenda pushing is to do that. This is goes beyond Fox News. 2602:24A:DE47:BB20:50DE:F402:42A6:A17D (talk) 21:26, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

If factual accuracy is not the metric, then what is? If WP:RS is not about reliability, there's a danger that the policy will end up being used to remove sources simply because they cover issues that editors don't want to be included on Wikipedia. -Thucydides411 (talk) 19:14, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• The local affiliates will make this a really tricky one - David Gerard (talk) 20:11, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• I agree with Buidhe, my opinion is that the RfC from 2010 was outdated, as I agree that the US media landscape has changed greatly since 2010. Fox News tends to discussed a lot, so I thought it was worth opening a proper RfC to settle the issue. One of the main controversies about the factual accuracy of Fox News since 2010 revolves around the now retracted false claims that Seth Rich was in contact with Wikileaks back in 2017, see this archive of the original Fox News article and these Politifact and Snopes articles, there are allergations that some of the quotes for the story were fabricated. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:25, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• Newslinger, please remind me again - wasn't the purpose of WP:RS/Perennial sources to avoid multiple time-sink RfCs? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:05, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  The purpose of the perennial sources list is to index past discussions on this noticeboard. The previous uninterrupted RfC on Fox News is from 2010, a decade ago. As noted in the "Controversially classified sources" notice at the top of WT:RSP, Fox News and the Southern Poverty Law Center (RSP entry) are the only sources whose entries were subjected to edit warring since the list was created, and based on that, I had been expecting RfCs on these sources for some time. — Newslinger talk 22:58, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  Well, if this is a "real" RfC, the projects and wider community need to be informed. Who is in charge of doing that? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 01:00, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  adding - Newslinger - this RfC is malformed because it doesn't separate the pundit shows from the actual news, and it doesn't say anything about it being Fox cable or Fox broadcast. 01:05, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  This RfC is not malformed. The RfC statement includes the text "(as separate from their cable pundits)", which clarifies that it refers to the Fox News (news and website) entry. (If the statement didn't include the text, the RfC would cover both the Fox News (news and website) and the Fox News (talk shows) entries.) In my experience, notifying WikiProjects of discussions on this noticeboard about mainstream American news sources tends not to make a difference in participation, but you or anyone else can notify related projects if you wish to do so. — Newslinger talk 01:18, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Newslinger - it doesn't specifically state FoxNews (cable/satellite) vs FoxNews network affiliate broadcast stations. The latter are subject to FCC regulations that are different from networks and satellite transmitted news. I see David Gerard also mentioned it above. Oh, and thank you for adding this RfC to WP:CENT. My concern is the continuous partisan push (for years now) to downgrade this RS because of its conservative bias while keeping only center-left and left leaning biased sources. It appears the arguments are based primarily on POV opposition rather than factual news reporting. A network like Fox News doesn't become a most watched political news station whose viewership is bipartisan by being unreliably biased. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 15:07, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  No problem. It looks like Hemiauchenia has inserted an additional question into the RfC statement that specifically asks about affiliate stations. As a general rule of thumb, RSP entries for television channels only refer to the main channel, and not to any affiliate stations of the parent company's television network. For Fox, the Fox News entry is scoped to Fox News, and the stations listed in List of Fox television affiliates (by U.S. state) are out of scope. If an affiliate station becomes controversial enough to meet the inclusion criteria on its own, it would receive a separate entry on RSP. I trust the community and the closers (preferably a panel of closers) to reach the right decision. — Newslinger talk 05:35, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  Actually, the most effective way to publicize this RfC is to list it on the centralized discussion template, which would put this RfC on the same level of vetting as the ones for the Daily Mail (RSP entry) and Quackwatch (RSP entry). I've added this RfC to the template. — Newslinger talk 05:14, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Atsme: I'm not sure what your point is, the last RfC on Fox News really was in 2010. Fox News is also listed at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources as one of the most controversial sources on the list (alongside SPLC, which has never had a RfC) and recommends opening a new one. There have not been any recent-discussion on the general reliability of Fox News, so I thought it was worth having this discussion as a reference for subsequent discussions about Fox News's reliability, a lot has changed since 2010, especially with the election of Donald Trump, so I think it is worth doing. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:16, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  • Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 237#Is Fox News a WP:RS 2018 RfC ^{update per below: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_238#Fox_News_reliability_RfC 15:07, 8 June 2020 (UTC)}
  • Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 257#Fox News 2019 Discussion
  • Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 276#Reboot to specifically address Fox News (talk shows) Oct 2019
  • Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 287#Fox News, 9/11 topic March 2020
  • And there were several other discussions in 2020 that point editors back to eariler discussions. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:48, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

    Atsme, WP:CCC. We're likely to see the Mail off the list at some point if the new editor continues to make progress. In the same way, Fox has changed over time and the March discussion was narrowly focused. Guy (help!) 22:04, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

    @Atsme: I don’t see an RfC in the 2018 post in Archive 237? — MarkH₂₁^talk 05:02, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

    I think it might be Archive 238 Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_238#Fox_News_reliability_RfC. PackMecEng (talk) 05:09, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

    Thank you for finding that, PackMecEng. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 15:07, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

    Ah, thanks! It seems to have been limited in scope and then withdrawn, so there really hasn’t been a full RS RfC since 2010. — MarkH₂₁^talk 05:14, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

    Looks like, though the discussion that spawned that 2018 RFC had quite the participation. PackMecEng (talk) 05:17, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

@Atsme: Fair enough, the issue is that none of these were actually properly formatted as a RfC, though the 237 and 257 Archive discussions are substantial, I apologise for not checking thoroughly. By formatting this as a proper RfC, hopefully we can end the endless cyclical discussions about Fox News. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:57, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

• Also, even the Daily Mail being depreciated has not stopped endless discussions about it. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:58, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

  Apples and oranges. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 22:02, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

• I think we need to keep in mind that the Wikipedia policy of reliable sources is editorial oversight. Fox News does fact checking like any other major news organization, but the end result is always disputable on significance and implications (just like CNNs or MSNBC's reporting). News organisations create narratives that often times are not real or are exaggerated (for example ideas like government collision or broad racism or social justice are not perceived in the same way by these organizations). But keep in mind that "truth" and "facts" on events that come out of any news organization will carry bias since they tend to interpret little facts like a case of police brutality and then extrapolate it to abstractions like racism or harassment and so on. When it comes to these mega interpretations, there is very little truth since there is no such thing as an organization that determines the truth of an interpretation. If Fox News has been discussed multiple times back to back recently then this is a closed debate.Ramos1990 (talk) 22:44, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
• There is always a comment that we are talking about Fox news anchors “as separate from their cable pundits”. Firstly, the latter is what everyone watches and thinks of as Fox News. But there is another point we keep avoiding (at least as far as I’ve seen); and that is Fox broadcast versus the Fox website. The Fox website is cited heavily in WP. But, the site is embarrassing to read. The main stories are nearly always political attacks. If there is no news, they will go back and run stories about Benghazi and Lewinsky. O3000 (talk) 01:30, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Let's not make this about one topic, and whether a RS believes it 100% or not, or whether or not they choose to publish opposing views. That does not make them unreliable - it makes them opposition to one POV. We need diversity - not a single POV - and attempting to eliminate all opposition to a single scientific belief when there are others is censorship. This isn't a case of the world is round, not yet, anyway, so we give DUE to prevailing science theory and also include what the opposition believes (if it is also based on scientific theory). Science can factually and steadfastly state a lot of things as fact, just not questionable predictions which deserve mention. As long as there is scientific controversy, we include it - we don't have to believe it. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 14:42, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

• The references here have been moved to #References (Fox News), as the {{reflist-talk}} template captures all references above the template, including ones added in newer comments. Atsme's comment below was made when the references template looked like this: Special:Diff/961474909 § Discussion (Fox News). The {{reflist-talk}} template was originally in the bottom of the Responses section, then moved to the bottom of this Discussion section, and now finally to its own References section. — Newslinger talk 05:21, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  The references above are either not reliable or not up-to-date (WP:RECENTISM) if they say Fox didn't retract the Seth Rich story - (and that is part of the reason this RfC needs an experienced closer who is not politically biased). See the NYTimes article which states: Fox News on Tuesday retracted a story linking the murder of a Democratic National Committee staff member with the email hacks that aided President Trump’s campaign, effectively quashing a conspiracy theory that had taken hold across the right-wing news media. It goes on to say (most importantly) that: "it also underscored a schism between the network’s news-gathering operation and one of its biggest stars: the conservative commentator Sean Hannity". Again, the news portion of FOX is a reliable source but like other cable news, the pundits are opinion. Oh, and The Washington Times did apologize and retract per this Vox article. I find the allegations that Fox News did something irreversibly wrong to be very disconcerting, and I do hope the closer of this RfC takes those misrepresentations into consideration. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 17:58, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

• The elephant in the room is that we always are coming back to Fox NEws because editors on all sides willing ignore NOT#NEWS and RECENTISM, rushing to put in breaking stories and commentary, or what I've seen called "hyperjournalism" (its gotten worse with how we've covered COVID) We can be up to date, but our up to the minute coverage should stick to bare facts and have nearly no coverage of anything controversial until that story has had a chance to go through the news cycle a few times (eg like the Rich story, or as an opposite example, the Covington MAGA hat kid from last year which has ended with egg on the WaPost and others' faces) We shouldn't be including any commentary from journalists or experts unless its actually part of the story (eg Trump's comments on mail-in ballots leading to Twitter's fact check leading to Trumps EO on Section 230 fully qualifies in the article on Section 230). But we have both new and experienced editors going around rushing to fill these in as soon as they happen. Now, I agree that short term, if I was pulling info from NYTimes in the short term compared to Fox News, I'd have less a concern, but if we were properly waiting until the "long term" (a few news cycles out), it is much much easier to realize that we can treat Fox News (the news desk, not the pundits) as an RS, but that with information from the multiple news cycles, we have a way to apply UNDUE appropriate to know if actually need to include them. Most of that time, that is "no", as they are usually repeating the same basic story from other good sources. This is in contrast to Daily Mail or Breitbart that under the same conditions, we'd have NOTHING usable because we simply outright cannot trust their material. This is how we can justify Fox as an RS but still respect that it's probably not going to be used often due to UNDUE, but we need more editors aware that respecting the principles of NOT#NEWS and RECENTISM will avoid having Fox being pushed as hard as a source (since ideally, we won't be seeing as much liberal opinion as quickly as possible either). --Masem (t) 19:21, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Masem, that's a very good point. Guy (help!) 12:22, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  With all due respect to Masem, I would have equal concern over the coverage by the NYTimes considering their spin, mistakes and bad judgment calls when publishing material from anonymous sources that turned out to not be accurate throughout the left's Russian collusion conspiracy theory that was promoted by MSM based on the Steele dossier and false information provided to the FISA court. We should have waited per WP:RECENTISM. We cannot put 100% of our trust in online headlines and the instant news that follows those headlines, regardless of who is publishing it. The NYTimes' own executive editor brought to light the "unmistakeable anti-Trump" coverage. Perhaps WP editors who are anti-Trump themselves do not see anything wrong with the NYTimes being anti-Trump, and therein the problem lies. It is unequivocal bias, the same as it was when the right disliked Obama because it is politically motivated partisanship. In my Signpost Op-Ed this month, I added a link to the discussion with Ted Koppel who did an excellent job explaining the problem. It is real, and it does exist in internet, cable, broadcast and print political news media because we are dealing with a different era in journalism. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:58, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  Oh, I don't disagree that RECENTISM should apply equally to all sources and better to wait to add to judge when we have a better concept of the full picture, have most corrections in place, etc. For example, apparently the NYTimes took the analysis of Bolivia's elections possible fraud at face value that lead to Morales' loss (NYTimes was not the only thing going on). Now obviously, WP wasn't a part of that, but I mean, that situation or the MAGA Hat cases are examples that our most trusted sources can still be wrong in the short term. But were I to bet on which source would be less wrong in the short term, between the NYTimes and Fox? My money is on NYTimes. --Masem (t) 22:07, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• @Hemiauchenia: This edit has had this effect because it has taken the RfC statement beyond the bounds of brevity. Please amend the statement (not necessarily that line) to be less verbose, so that it will once again be listed on the RfC boards. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:05, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Redrose64: Sorry about that, is the amended version better below the word limit? Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:10, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Thank you Yes, it's displaying properly now. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 09:43, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• An additional comment: some of the views expressed in the discussion seem to equate finding Fox unreliable with having a liberal bias. I would point out that there are many much more serious and factually reliable conservative news sources, such as National Review, The Federalist, The Bulwark, The American Conservative, and Reason, to name a few. None of these will exhibit characteristics such as the tabloid tone and shock headline attributes of Fox. BD2412 T 04:45, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

  Please don't call Reason conservative. They favor legalization of all drugs (including crystal meth and heroin) legalization of prostitution, zero restrictions on immigration -- 100% open borders with no border patrol or DEA -- immediate closure of every US military base outside the US, no tariffs or trade restrictions, and equal marriage rights for gays. Those are not positions conservatives support. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:59, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

  Whether you consider Reason conservative is entirely based on whether you consider American Libertarianism a branch of conservatism. Personally, I would say so. Being within the loosely defined blocs of Liberal and Conservative certainly does not imply universal agreement. Devonian Wombat (talk) 07:21, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Guy Macon: Reason is unquestionably conservative with respect to fiscal and economic policy, and minimizing government intervention. There is, of course, variation within conservatism that deviates from those principles in the service of empowering government to maintain notions of traditionalism, but the specific positions taken are highly liquid. Incidentally, opposition to gay marriage is no longer really a conservative position. Republicans are now just as likely to support gay marriage as to oppose it (including President Trump, an unwavering gay marriage supporter, for which he has been given little credit). Fox News itself has been called out by activists for becoming too pro-gay marriage. BD2412 T 15:13, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Slightly off-topic, but the American Tea Party movement is a good example of strong fiscal conservatism with neutrality on social conservatism. There's a bit of detail on this at Social conservatism in the United States#Electoral politics. Here in the United Kingdom, the Conservative Premiership of David Cameron legalised same-sex marriage, amongst other non-socially-conservative things. Capewearer (talk) 16:36, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• While they overlap in some areas, no reasonable person considers US Libertarianism to be a branch of US conservatism. Again, legalizing heroin, opening up the borders, defunding the police, and solving the problem of prayer in government schools by getting rid of the government schools are not positions that are widely popular among any branch of US conservatism. I could also argue that abolishing the income tax, removing all restrictions on firearms, and closing down the FDA and FCC are not positions that are widely popular among any branch of US liberalism.

Related: World's Smallest Political Quiz.

Please note that I hold US Libertarians in the same low regard as I hold US Democrats, US Republicans, and US Greens. The greens and libertarians just haven't had the opportunity to disappoint us yet. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:44, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Hmmm...so basically, you don't like US politics. Here on Bonaire, my needs align more with the Blue party. In the US, I'm up and down... and still cling (does that make me a Klingon?) to the values of JFK, as best I can recall. I'm just not that into it. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 23:45, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• BD2412, Oops. The Federalist just got banned from Google's ad platform due to publishing disinformation about BLM. [88] Guy (help!) 20:19, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

  • That is actually not what that article says (ZeroHedge was banned, while The Federalist was merely warned, apparently over "comments"), but even so, The Federalist remains some number of levels more reliable than Fox News. BD2412 T 20:25, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

    BD2412, a low bar indeed... Guy (help!) 21:09, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

    Guy, Zero Hedge is unreliable, we already know that - they said the protests were fake, and had already demonetized that part of their site (probably a video). The Federalist case was different - they were simply warned about monetizing race-related content which Google deems a violation of their monetization policy. NBC News stated: "The Federalist published an article claiming the media had been lying about looting and violence during the protests. All Google is doing is appeasing a British nonprofit group and preventing Google customers from earning clickbait revenue from Google placed ads. Look at the NBC misleading headline: Google bans two websites from its ad platform over protest articles - so what does it all actually mean? Google told The Federalist to demonitize (probably page ads and video) which means no clickbait ad revenue from Google for that content. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 23:04, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

    Atsme, that's a very idiosyncratic presentation. No, they are not "appeasing" anybody. They have policies, a pressure group noted that the Federalist was violating those policies, and that Zero Hedge was publishing fake news while violating those polices. Google checked, agreed, and took action.

    Early reports conflated the two. Most have now been updated to correctly reflect the different actions taken. Guy (help!) 23:34, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Exactly - "Early reports conflated..." - that's why we have WP:RECENTISM & NOTNEWS, and why this RfC and the comments that conflate politcal commentary with Fox News are just plain wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Atsme (talk • contribs) 08:32, June 17, 2020 (UTC)

• Comment - It's an example of a massive double-standard on here that the UK-based Daily Mail was effectively banned but primarily US-based editors on here feel unable to apply the same logic to Fox News, which shares all of the DM's vices and virtues. FOARP (talk) 09:29, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
  • DM - and to be fair on the US - Breitbart - has been shown to actually falsify information to get the story they want. Fox News (the news side) may bias and swing a story's details to tell a specific angle to a story but we don't have yet anywhere close to the massive scale of falsification. (Misreporting with later redactions do not count because that we expect out of an RS). --Masem (t) 12:46, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
    • And it turns out that Fox has been fabricating too - David Gerard (talk) 15:37, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

• They all do it, David. ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, NYTimes, WaPo - left-leaning media are not unlike the right because they are all spewing political commentary right on their front pages. CNN chooses to call their pundits "news journalists". The first sentence in the Don Lemon lead tells our readers that he is "an American television journalist" whereas Sean Hannity is "an American talk show host and conservative political commentator." Now look at Rachel Maddow - "an American television news program host and liberal political commentator." Wolf Blitzer, another inaccurate description of a political commentator vs journalist or newscaster/news anchor. Politico's Jack Shafer was on target when he wrote: "Singling out Blitzer for a thrashing does not exonerate the other cable news anchors—their crimes remain under investigation. The Situation Room and other less-bad CNN prime-time programs—Erin Burnett Outfront, Anderson Cooper 360° and CNN Tonight With Don Lemon—churn through their time slots lighting news fuses that promise fireworks but often deliver duds. Once you start viewing these CNN programs as talk shows about the news in which hosts interview reporters, “specialists” and newsmakers, and not as news programs, per se, your journalistic expectations recede." Fox News Channel defines their political commentators correctly and keep those shows separate from the news, but based on some of the comments above, several editors are still conflating the two, perhaps because they are not well-versed in the operations of television networks. I think PEW nailed it with their June 2018 survey, Between Factual and Opinion Statements in the News. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 02:54, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• As you've been told several times, WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is not a convincing argument at Wikipedia. We're talking about this thing, not other things - David Gerard (talk) 08:19, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
• As you've been told several times... - wow, David, that sounds awfully bullyish. I'm not some child who has to be told anything. I welcome reminders - none of us are perfect - and you can certainly disagree with my position, but unless you can quote a policy that forbids such use of comparisons, you're just stating opinion, and I will continue to use comparisons to demonstrate the need for consistency in support of NPOV when making decisions as important as this one, and to overcome political bias in the decision-making process, perceived or otherwise. Happy editing! ^Atsme _Talk 📧 19:08, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is about article notability, content, etc. We're discussing something much more general here - whether a major news source should be excluded. It is very important for decisions on which sources are considered reliable to be consistent. What appears to me to be happening is that people are trying to exclude Fox News for its failings, while ignoring the failings of equivalent news sources (CNN & MSNBC) that have very similar failings. The inconsistency appears to me to be politically motivated. I'm no fan of any of the cable news channels - they are all guilty of the same sorts of sensationalism and partisanship. However, if we're going to declare Fox News unreliable, we really have to declare CNN and MSNBC to also be unreliable. If we aren't consistent, then it looks very much like WP:RS is being applied only when it's politically convenient. -Thucydides411 (talk) 14:34, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

The statement above ignores a fundamental difference: "... trying to exclude Fox News for its failings, while ignoring the failings of equivalent news sources (CNN & MSNBC) that have very similar failings."

For CNN & MSNBC, such "failings" are a "bug", IOW exceptional errors they immediately correct. For Fox News, such "failings" are a "feature" of their modus operandi. Unless called out on a large scale by myriad other major sources, they will not correct the error, and other extreme right-wing media do the same. That is a major difference between left-wing media and right-wing media. The left uses fact-checkers and corrects errors, whereas the right ignores fact-checkers, attacks fact-checkers (Trump told his supporters to not believe fact-checkers), and persistently uses propaganda as a tool, even when it has been proven to be false/fake.

Fox News is no longer just a right-wing RS we can use. It has slid to the far-right (CNN is considered slightly right-wing by the rest of the world) and is focused as a tool of Trump, with a "Trump-Fox News feedback loop" (search that term) that is documented as a phenomenon. Here is just one article. There are many. -- Valjean (talk) 18:58, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Your argument is similar to others, all of which have been successfully disputed throughout this discussion. The oppose iVotes appear to be very partisan in nature, and have failed to produce any evidence that supports downgrading Fox News as a generally RS. Our own WP article describes our left bias, Ideological bias on Wikipedia#Bias in Wikipedia content in relation to US politics, and that is what we need to fix and what I believe we are doing now to preserve and maintain a NPOV for the benefit of the project overall. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 19:26, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• Atsme, no, they do not fabricate stuff. They may spin, and they may make mistakes. Fox News has been literally photoshopping a guy with a gun into images of otherwise peaceful protests. That is fake news. Guy (help!) 20:21, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• JzG, they actually do, including the New York Times and Pulitzer Prize winning stories. Remember Janet Cooke and The Washington Post who returned their Pulitzer? Do the research, Guy. You once told me I was naive - uhm, no. It's not me. After over 35 years in & out of newsrooms, tv studios, post production, artwork & layouts, typesetting - I am not the least bit hesitant in telling it like it is while backing it up with RS to support my position which I just did. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 20:55, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

  Atsme, this is exactly the problem. A reporter at NYT faked reports (quite common). This was detected by the Times and he was pushed out. With the Fox pictures, they are still defending them and there has been no action, that we know of, against those responsible.

  And then there's the false and misleading stories on COVID-19, and climate change, and the many other instances.

  You can excuse thema ll away one by one if you like, but in the end the pattern is clear and systemic and entirely in line with the academic research that shows Fox News to have joined FNC in using an agenda-driven, not fact-driven, model. Guy (help!) 21:18, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Guy, my views align more closely with Masem. I'm not making any excuses - I'm simply stating facts. After reading your essay, I'm of the mind that we will probably find ourselves in disagreement more often than not so I'm going to leave it there. I've got plenty of work to do helping to reduce the AfC/NPP backlog which keeps growing. Happy editing! ^Atsme _Talk 📧 13:31, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

There's no evidence yet - and I'd love to be proven wrong - of the news content (not headlines, not photos) coming from the reporters and checked by the editors out of the Fox news side of intentional/malicious fabrication as was clearly shown on the DM/Brietbart cases. That would be a slam dunk in closing this against the use of Fox News. But everything listed above that is claim of Fox fabrication is either being due to Fox's bias (not fabrication but presenting in a specific angle which RS does not judge but cautions about when NPOV comes along), corrected stories (of which we can play mind games of whether these were intentional or not until pointed out), or simply outside of the news-desk editorial content, like the Seattle picture stuff. I'm trying to be the devil's advocate (literally, almost) here - There's a lot of personal and other reasons that people want to see Fox News demoted from reliable, and I would tend to agree that net result, but we need to prove the case out on this, otherwise, any weak rational can come back to bite us in the future ("You demote Fox for fake headlines, CNN has done fake headlines..." type logic). And that's why I'm point out that even with Fox news still considered reliable, UNDUE drives away from its use as a source when other sources covering the same event exist. --Masem (t) 13:38, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• I am of the same opinion as Jimmy Wales on this..."You shouldn't really use Wikipedia as the sole source for anything, ever. You shouldn't use anything as the sole source for anything, in my view." Wikipedia is an Anglo-American encyclopedia, and so it values western opinions/references/sources and denounces other news agencies as "government controlled/funded", when it is clear that American and British journalists either toe the line and use government press releases as fact, or they are ostracised. What I am saying is that every editor must be careful, what they are publishing, for instance, Bolivian coup. Every western news organisation shouted out "election fraud", only for MIT to state (months later) "There is not any statistical evidence of fraud that we can find,” wrote John Curiel and Jack R Williams, both from MIT, adding that the conclusions of an audit by the Organization of American States “would appear deeply flawed”.. My message, be very sceptical of western news agents (BBC, CNN, Fox), as much as eastern news agents from China or Russia.SethWhales ^talk 15:35, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

  +1 - I'm on the same page, Seth Whales. As several of us have repeated over and over again, comply with WP:RECENTISM, WP:NOTNEWS and exercise caution toward all news sources in today's clickbait environment, especially political news which in and of itself is subject to the biases of the authors/journalists/publishers. If we had been adhering to our PAGs, this issue never would have been brought up, much less noticed - it would have disappeared in the anus of internet history. Correction was made/published by the news source - end of story. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:40, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate Fox News for AMPol2. We don't save a source because only two out of a dozen+ of its hosts are good. When it's accurate, other sources should be used. Speaking only of Fox News, not its talking heads, with the exception of Shep Smith (consistently good, but no longer at Fox) and Chris Wallace (he occasionally dares to do the right thing), Fox News should be deprecated for politics. Those two hosts are the rare exception that proves the rule. The other hosts in the newsroom are generally unreliable.

Fox employees leaving the company have described the "newsroom" (not just any room) as "an extension of the Trump White House."[89] The situation is worse now, to the point where the influence of Fox News and Fox & Friends on Trump and the GOP cannot be ignored. The tail is wagging the dog:

"Fox News is no longer the propaganda arm of the Republican Party. The Republican Party is the legislative arm of Fox News." -- David Atkins, Washington Monthly

Deprecate it for AMPol2, which is not a total ban. When Wallace and others are accurate, they can still be used for politics, but we only know that by comparing them with other sources, so we should generally use those sources. (The rest of the hosts should be blacklisted for politics.) -- Valjean (talk) 15:37, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Picture manipulation by Fox?

Just saw this tweet, claiming blatant photo manipulation by the Fox News site. It's 2am here - is anyone here familiar with the originals? If true, this sort of practice would rule out Option 1 - David Gerard (talk) 00:58, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

@David Gerard and David Gerard: here's another source:

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/fox-news-runs-digitally-altered-images-in-coverage-of-seattles-protests-capitol-hill-autonomous-zone/

BTW, your comment ended up in the wrong section, so I moved it here. I hope you don't mind. -- Valjean (talk) 03:50, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

David Gerard, there have been several examples of this in the past, a few of which can be found in the article Fox News controversies, though there are a few others that didn’t get enough coverage to be due there. I sort of agree that this should preclude Option 1 to some extent, as this isn’t a regular occurrence from other outlets, but it happens periodically with some degree of regularity with Fox. I would presume a lot of people are !voting “Option 1“ based on the Fox News of a decade ago, or are simply unaware of these kinds of things. Symmachus Auxiliarus (talk) 04:04, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I mean, pictures shouldn't be considered as part of the story written by the byline of the author of the article. That's some guy trying to illustrate the paper, and just like headlines and anything else outside the article should not be taken as representative of what passes the editorial desk. It is clear example of the bias that Fox will try to do which, as I've commented below, usually makes their covers just unnecessary to include when other more RSes are covering the same thing if we are taking cautious steps in applying NOT#NEWS and RECENTISM. --Masem (t) 04:28, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I don't buy this excuse. Making stuff up is making stuff up. OK, headlines should be disregarded and not cited—for example, I have seen a false headline in a very reliable paper (Times of Israel), albeit it was quickly fixed. Deliberately falsifying images, however, is falsification and my standard for deprecation is "deliberately and consistently reports falsehoods." buidhe 06:04, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

It was a montage - most people familiar with images can see that...but it appears Fox competitors are scraping the barrel to find fault. Life goes on. It's not half as bad as publishing images of children in cages and falsely claiming it was Trump when the photos were from the Obama administration, and worse, promoting a presidential nominee who lied about it. Again, as I've stated above - exercise caution, comply with WP:RECENTISM and wait for the retrospective from historians and academics. We need to stop with the Twitter feed - it's unreliable - and stop breaking news - WP:NOTNEWS. Follow our PAGs and we'll be fine. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 15:25, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Come off it. They're blatantly and intentionally lying. This is beyond the pale. Stop apologizing for liars. oknazevad (talk) 15:36, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

A “montage”? Is any other reliable source characterizing it this way except Fox News itself? Symmachus Auxiliarus (talk) 15:42, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

The desk jockies that write headlines for CNN and other sites are just as bad in terms of writing clickbait titles (there's a whole case around Lawrence Lessig and the NYTimes just over a bad headline, despite the article content being legit). [90]. (Whether that suit will develop into anything we don't know, just the point that headlines are written without the care of the body of the articles). This happens across the board, but since we don't use headlines or pictures or picture captures as "reliable" because of the fact they are written outside the editorial process, this type of manipulation should not be counted against the reliability of the reporters and editors above the Fox News desk. Bias of the overall work, heck yes. --Masem (t) 17:19, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

The more respectable and reliable conservative sources that I mentioned in the previous section—e.g., National Review, The The Federalist, The Bulwark, The American Conservative, and you can throw in The Wall Street Journal—wouldn't be caught dead engaging in tabloid practices like this. Considering the fact that Fox's prominent posting of this panic-inducing image coincided with one of the worst stock market drops of the year, I would think that Wikipedia should definitely avoid linking to such content. Perhaps the best solution would be some means of examining potential uses of Fox as a source on a case by case basis, with a consensus-based process to vet individual news articles for propriety before using them. BD2412 T 17:37, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree those sources would not manipulate photos like that, but again, we're looking to what is usable by WP, the article content, not the photos or headlines. That they do that type of manipulation should put up a big caution that they are biased outside the newsdesk and thus when applying UNDUE for inclusion, that weighs heavily against them. That's how you apply consensus on a case-by-case basis without eliminating the use of Fox for most other topics where there are few issues with their reporting, and without applying "not reliable for X topics" which always get plagued with debate if that's used. I know it seems earlier just to say Fox is not an RS, but the evidence is not there for that... But we have ways to work around the problems of its bias as long as consensus-based processes build on NPOV are used on case-by-case. --Masem (t) 17:45, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

- Please...see our WP article Photo manipulation##Use_in_journalism. I would think the montage was used to depict different events in one image, such as the protestors in the images published by The Detroit News which shows armed protestors. Armed - with guns. First of all, Tucker Carlson, the subject of the tweet in this particular discussion, is not a newscaster, rather he is a pundit so why are we having this discussion at all, David Gerard? Hannity is also a pundit and he also addressed the gun toting protestors. There are pictures in the article I linked to with the caption Armed men weapons in the Senate gallery on Thursday, April 30. (Photo: Craig Mauger, The Detroit News) but there are also other images with gun toting protestors. Are you saying there were no guns, and the image is a false depiction of the protest? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 17:46, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Please...see our WP article Photo manipulation##Use_in_journalism which is a subsection of the section "Political and ethical issues", and links to Photojournalism#Ethical,_legal,_and_social_considerations. You're providing evidence against your own position here. Photomanipulation in this manner is a deprecation offense - David Gerard (talk) 17:57, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

What newscast used the image? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:02, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Nevermind, I found the retraction which states: Editor’s Note: A FoxNews.com home page photo collage which originally accompanied this story included multiple scenes from Seattle’s “Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone” and of wreckage following recent riots. The collage did not clearly delineate between these images, and has since been replaced. In addition, a recent slideshow depicting scenes from Seattle mistakenly included a picture from St. Paul, Minnesota. Fox News regrets these errors. If you're talking about deprecating based on that, then a whole lot of once considered RS are going down with it, including the AP, [91], and so is LA Times, National Archives, well...here's a short list. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:33, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Even their "correction" was false. It was not a collage. It was a photo-shopped image inserting a weapon carrying person into the image to push a false narrative that the POTUS is pushing. O3000 (talk) 19:22, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

The correction was not false - and what "false narrative" is POTUS pushing? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:08, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

• All of them - of all major networks, despite claims to the contrary by others, FOX is the only one whose main network coverage is specifically regularly factually inaccurate. While MSNBC or CNN may have programs that are informed by a Talking Head, or their news and op-ed can become amalgamated because modern reporting has become that way inclined (with US media in particular), FOX is the only news source that openly leads with journalists that aren't journalists, repeating conspiracy theories from the internet in live bulletin and stories that are not listed as opinion. This isn't a Tucked Carlson issue, this is objectively bad journalism across the board with terrible editorial decisions being made - the kind of decisions that lead to Piers Morgan losing his job in the UK, but lead to very little in the US other than defence of the behaviour because of WHATABOUTISM because of the perception that the largely centrist position of reality is to the left of the general perception of the average conservative American. As Colbert once said, "reality has a well known liberal bias". FOX is the only mainstream network where it is clear that entire topics are handled by partisan groups that are different to the core journalists that they actually have in their employ. It's why they can challenge the president for factual inaccuracies on Monday and appear legitimate, but still be publishing their own factual inaccuracies for days after until surreptitiously changing their articles without indicating what has been later altered. Most reliable networks publish their "corrections" openly. FOX is well documented for failing to do so, and often allowing their affiliates to continue using the incorrect versions of events in their broadcasts even while amending their incorrect news articles. Koncorde (talk) 05:22, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• This isn't necessarily an issue that's exclusive to Fox. MSNBC, for instance, has been caught deceptively editing recordings to portray figures in an unflattering light. Take this, when they deliberately presented Mitt Romney comments out of context, or this, when they spliced together George Zimmerman's 911 call to make it sound like he was racist. JOEBRO64 12:01, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
  • Two wrongs do not make a right, and this is a rather more incendiary situation than Zimmerman's.Slatersteven (talk) 12:05, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
    • ...what? Why should we treat Fox differently than other outlets that are guilty of similar manipulation? MSNBC was just caught last month doing it again with William Barr; it's been a recurring issue with that network for years. As some users, like Ad Orientem, Atsme, and Thucydides411, said above, I think some editors are treating Fox differently because it has a political slant they don't agree with. JOEBRO64 14:54, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
      • I can only speak to my perspective on this, but I think part of the issue here is the frequency with which both this issue arises, and the frequency with which there are multiple factual errors in their reporting, and how skewed the presentation is, including “news” programs such as Bret Baier. As well as the general reluctancy to highlight omissions and errors. It happens more often with Fox than with most other mainstream sources. Symmachus Auxiliarus (talk) 15:01, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
      • Because faking pictures of people carrying guns at a time when there are troops (even if they are Saturday afternoon ones) paroling the streets of some cities and the president calling for the army to intervene is rather more serious in its potential repercussions and thus should have been dealt with with far more care. Also Otherstuffdoesnotesxist is an invalid an argument as wp:otherstuff. As well as (as I already said) just because wee do not prohibit X does not mean we should not prohibit Y (rather its an argument for also prohibiting X). And to add, this is fox news, not commentary or chat shows. One of the argument is has always been "But its not Fox news that does it", guess what...it does. Moreover No its not because they are right wing, its because this had the potential to inflame a very very dangerous situation (and , by the way, the Daily Mirror is not right wing).Slatersteven (talk) 15:02, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

      TheJoebro64, MSNBC is an opinion broadcaster. We've long recognised the difference between Fox News and FNC; in the same way, we recognise the difference between NBC and MSNBC. The difference here is that there are multiple images, and they were used by Fox News, not FNC, to promote a false narrative around the Seattle protests. If Fox had put their hands up, we might be able to have a conversation aboutt hat, but their apology amounts to "sorry we got caught". They have not acknowledged the underlying problem, still less undertaken to do anything about it. Guy (help!) 09:06, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

  TheJoebro64, If there's a pattern of MSNBC doing this I would also support it being rated generally unreliable at an RFC. buidhe 16:56, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Speaking as a journalist, the manipulation is an egregious violation of photojournalism ethics, and the lack of a proper retraction that acknowledges that the original images were manipulated makes the issue massively worse. This is a perfect example of why option 1 is unacceptable. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 19:21, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Apparently not just one image, and not just run in one segment, and so obvious they had to know [[92]].Slatersteven (talk) 17:55, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Slatersteven, this is an absolute slam dunk. Literal fake news. Guy (help!) 09:00, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Here [[93]] is the edited report where they have removed the image, note they do not actually admit it was faked. So no they are not owning up to it.Slatersteven (talk) 18:08, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Retraction statement: Fox News in a statement said it "regrets these errors," specifically for not clearly delineating between the images. Can we move on? ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:14, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

That is not a retraction, they do not say "we used fake imagery" do they?Slatersteven (talk) 18:16, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

IN fact I would go further, by not admitting the picture was fake they are (in effect) saying it was genuine.Slatersteven (talk) 18:19, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Well, don't go too far - see my comment above. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:37, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I would, the image was a cut and paste job, and they stand by its authenticity by not admitting it was faked.Slatersteven (talk) 19:12, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

That "retraction" does not acknowledge that the original imagery was manipulated. This makes the error far worse, not better. So no, we should absolutely not "move on" — this is a clear current example of the kinds of problems Fox News has. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 19:14, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

There is little question that the final image - the armed person in front of the Seattle shot - was designed to manipulate the reader to think that the SAZ was being patrolled by armed militia-like people. But is the image itself "manipulated" ? Adding a clearly second image atop a first ("count the pixels" may seem trite but the cut-off elbow is an obvious sign this wasn't anywhere close to trying to be a pixel-perfect digital manipulation) I will agree with what is said from the NPPA in Seattle Times' report [94] that they needed to have marked that from an ethical standpoint, which is the key problem here when we talk about bias; even if they had that statement, that's still a very biased combination of elements designed to manipulation the average reader's thinking. Other sources have done this before: File:OJ_Simpson_Newsweek_TIME.png the infamous case of Time darkening the photo of OJ for example. This is why we ignore headlines, section titles, photos, and other incidental materials as part of what we consider "reliable" for any reliable source, because that's a whole different editorial team from the people writing and editing the news, all designed to draw the reader's eye, for any work. I will still argue that this bias from Fox can be used in most problematic cases to eliminate it as a source when UNDUE is taken into account, but no need to touch it as an RS source (from its news desk, obviously not from its opinion side) --Masem (t) 19:54, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) WaPo stated: "The misleading material spliced a June 10 photograph of an armed man at the Seattle protests with different photographs — one also from June 10, of a sign reading, “You Are Now Entering Free Cap Hill,” and others from images captured May 30 of a shattered storefront and other unrest downtown." The retraction is self-explanatory but WaPo further stated that Fox News explained there is an "editor’s note appended to three online articles" which I've already provided. In this case, the man with the gun was standing in front of a car at CHAZ on June 10th during the Seattle protests (the David Ryder image). His image was digitally copied, and photoshopped into the Fox montage and into another image to show him standing beside the CHAZ sign. That is typically handled by a separate dept. such as artwork & layout for the website. That's where online publications can get in trouble unlike newsprint which afforded the publishers more time to prep and check, and even then it wasn't 100% foolproof. The image of the man with the gun is real per the Seattle Times: The June 10 photo of an unidentified man with a gun standing in front of a car in CHAZ was taken by Seattle freelance photographer David Ryder, who distributed the photo through Getty Images. Fox News retracted it as responsible news networks are expected to do. It's a done deal. Somebody is probably going to be fired or moved to another dept., which is typically what happens in such cases. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 20:28, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

And what about the image of him also standing in front of a smashed shop, how did they explain that? Or the one oh the same bloke, in the same stance standing next to a free zone sigh?Slatersteven (talk) 10:23, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

You keep repeating the same thinig over and over - look at the Seattle Times article - it is explained in detail with the photos. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 17:32, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

[[95]] "Fox News is one such media outlet that published a series of articles on how the Seattle 'autonomous zone' has armed guards and local businesses are being threatened with extortion, and how the Seattle Police has been urged to take back control from "brazen, anti-cop anarchists." "One image shows the armed man standing in front of what appears to be a smashed retail store".Slatersteven (talk) 17:36, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

However, social media users were quick to notice that the images in all the Fox News articles had one thing in common – they all featured the same armed white individual wearing a bulletproof vest and holding an assault weapon. After some digging, users discovered that Fox News had photoshopped the image of the armed guard into all of its images to portray a more "dangerous" situation in the self-declared autonomous zone."

• Seems to me this is rather serious. We have the POTUS claiming that antifa is involved with the demonstrations and declaring that antifa is a terrorist group. We have the Seattle police saying this might spread to other cities. Then, Fox publishes a fake photo seemingly supporting Trump’s claims. All of this together pushes an image of the country under siege by armed terrorists starting a violent revolution. This is in a heated atmosphere, in a country with guys with AK47s waiting for a race war. O3000 (talk) 20:14, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Photos are ALREADY considered unreliable for use as a source. Blueboar (talk) 20:29, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Well, yes (although I can't actually find a guideline to that effect). But, suppose a source fakes a photo of Trump starting the fire behind the church that he held a bible in front of. Would you continue to support such a source as reliable? Headlines are often exaggerated. But, actually faking a photo to push a conspiracy theory favorable to the POTUS that a "news" source has consistently supported is beyond the pale. We have to draw a line somewhere. O3000 (talk) 00:19, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Its not about using the photograph(S)it is the fact that it was a lie broadcast on fox news (and other parts of the Fox empire). Its the fact it shows they make shit up.Slatersteven (talk) 10:26, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

I just read this entire thread and carefully looked at the webpages/images referenced. The obvious "lying by Photoshop" and the weaselly retraction that failed to acknowledge that they lied by Photoshop made me change my opinion of Fox News from "Use with care" to "Generally unreliable for facts, events, interviews and quotes." Those images shown at [96] raise the question: if Fox News is willing to mislead me about where a particular person carrying a gun and wearing a green mask was standing, how can I trust anything else they present to me? --Guy Macon (talk) 12:47, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

So let's now declare that all RSes that uses clickbait and misleading headlines be also "generally unreliable" which is all of them including the NYTimes, if you go that direction. Pictures, like headlines, are not part of the reliable content we are judging or can use in WP. This is why we have that line being drawn. --Masem (t) 13:17, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

This was not a headline, click bait or otherwise, it was included in multiple programs across Fox.Slatersteven (talk) 13:45, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

It is still part of the content outside of control of the actual editorial control of the news desk. Its stuff we as editors can't use as part of a topic. If we want to make reliable sources be responsible and reliable for all content they publish - headlines, photos, etc. - so be it, but that would affect many "normally RS" sources which I don't think is the goal here. --Masem (t) 13:55, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

What Fox news has no control over what photos they include in a news broadcast? Christ I could not view the Seattle time article and so assumed the picture I could see was a mock up by the Seattle times because it was such an obvious fake. When I saw in fact what I assumed was a joke at foxes expense was actually what they had tried to use (not once but multiple times) I had no choice but to change my choice. Sorry but "no one even thought "this looks a bit off" better not use it" becasue "well its not MY job to think" is not a defence.Slatersteven (talk) 14:01, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Consider what parts of a Fox News broadcast we'd use within articles presuming they were reliable - we can only use what is said by the anchors and any quoted text from video interviews or news clips. What's said by the anchors is copyproofed text from the news department, which is what we're looking at here, and nothing implies that the clips and interviews are being tampered with (outside of cutting them to show Fox's bias). Now, if Fox News was playing with splicing or deepfake game with interviews during those segments, that the equivalent of the DM falsification that we can work from to deprecate Fox. --Masem (t) 14:09, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

"President thingywobble was not seen at a press interview" cue fake picture of President thingywobble shaking hands with a child rapist "and the white house has not answered our request for clarification of where he it", yes a picture can be used to mislead whilst the words do not, its called a dog whistle. This is my last word here, we should not use news organisations that actually fake content, not even dishonestly edit, actually fake it.Slatersteven (talk) 14:21, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Masem, that might carry some weight if the news desk had issued a statement and demanded disciplinary action against the person responsible. Not seeing any evidence of that.

This lends credence to the theory that Shep Smith was the canary in the mine. Guy (help!) 21:22, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Again, devils advocate here: when other RSes have screws up like this like Time's OJ picture/etc. have we expected them to call out the person responsible? RS demands editorial control which, even as a stretch here because the photo side is outside the news department, still happened, but does it require appropriate disciplinary action? There's clearly a huge weight of bias to want to tip Fox news into deprecation, and certainly enough of these things that it would seem easiest to be done with it by doing so, but we're going to have people come back to this case and use arguments we're setting here against other RSes to argument for their deprecation over and over and over again, so lets make sure that we are doing it.

The other route, which is circular but would be a lot easier to say why Fox needs to be deprecated, is to modify RS to not only talk about editorial control, but where appropriate, particularly for a mainstream source, adherence for journalistic ethics. Of which the list of misdeeds by Fox (from its news team) starts to grow incredibly long, while leaving little of our main RS untouched. It might take a way a few other sources that are biased that don't show ethics (which I would sort of demand/expect in the AP2 field if we went that way) but I would guess at the benefit of putting Fox into the deprecated category this would be an acceptable loss, to speak --Masem (t) 21:37, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

On the question of where we talk about headlines not being an RS, Wikipedia:A headline is not a reliable source this essay came out of discussion last month [97] that we all agreed headlines were not RSes from past discussions we never really codified that. --Masem (t) 13:29, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• Rushing to judgment on the basis of one recent incident (in which Fox News issued corrections) would be very unwise. Letting momentary outrage drive long-term decisions on which sources are reliable would be very short-sighted. Based on this rationale, we could have banned any number of reliable sources. In December 2016, the Washington Post ran a false story about Russia supposedly hacking into a utility grid in Vermont. The story was widely reprinted and caused a good deal of panic before it turned out to be completely false - one laptop that was not connected to the utility's control systems had malware that's widely available to hackers online. The Washington Post issued a half-way correction to the story (mentioning that the computer wasn't attached to the utility's control systems, but not mentioning that the malware isn't connected to Russia), but kept the misleading title in place. The Washington Post acted irresponsibly by running a dubious story that aligns with their political outlook, but which a bit of research would have shown to be completely unsupported, and then failed to fully correct the story. Yet it would be really short-sighted to use this one instance to rule that the Washington Post is not a reliable source. I'm sure that there wouldn't be a widespread call by Wikipedians to rule out the Washington Post anyways, because the Washington Post's editorial slant aligns much better with the views of most Wikipedians than that of Fox News does. -Thucydides411 (talk) 14:25, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

You could always nominate it and see.Slatersteven (talk) 14:29, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Actually, I don't see how that WaPo story was "false". They correctly reported what officials said. I don't see how WaPo faked anything and they made no claims in their own voice. A far cry from digitally altering a photo, and claiming another was from a different city. And let us not pretend this was "one recent incident". Fox is on this page on a regular basis. O3000 (talk) 14:34, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

That's a bit like when Fox News makes absurd statements, phrased as a question. The Washington Post's article repeatedly says that Russia hacked the utility, but appends some version of "officials say." In fact, I recall arguing with editors at Russian interference in the 2016 United States election (including some of those who have responded to me here) back around that time about these very sorts of claims. There were many editors were insisting that these sorts of claims had to be stated in Wikivoice, because the US intelligence agencies are reliable, and also arguing against interpreting many of these statements as claims made by officials - but rather as claims made by the Washington Post and other newspapers. For example, take this sentence in the Washington Post article:

The penetration may have been designed to disrupt the utility’s operations or as a test by the Russians to see whether they could penetrate a portion of the grid.

That sentence appears to state, as a fact, that the penetration occurred, and back then, I'm sure those generally arguing for inclusion of as much Russiagate material as possible would have argued that that statement should be interpreted factually (for an example, take a look at this discussion).

The Washington Post's article spawned a whole spate of articles in other news sources, with titles directly stating that Russia had hacked the utility. BBC: "'Russia hacking code' found on Vermont utility computer". Reuters: "Russian hackers penetrated Vermont electric utility - Washington Post". Politico: "Vermont utility confirms system breach by Russians". NBC News: "Vermont Electricity Department Finds Malware Linked to Russian Hackers". Boston Globe: "Vermont utility finds malware code attributed to Russians". The Washington Post did not do basic due diligence on the claims made by the officials, and those claims were debunked by others within days, leading to the Washington Post to correct some - but not all - of the false claims made in the article. If you were only to read that one Washington Post article and the editor's note at the top, you would not know that the malware involved is widely available to hackers - not just Russian state hackers.

In other words, the Washington Post uncritically presented the claims of government officials, and appeared to repeat their claims in its own voice in places. That led to widespread coverage claiming - as a fact - that Russia had hacked the utility. The story then fell apart after basic inspection, which the Washington Post had failed to do before running the article, and the Washington Post never fully corrected the article. But that one incident (and it's not the only from that time involving the Washington Post, including the infamous "PropOrNot" article) should not lead the Washington Post to be listed as unreliable. Making decisions based on individual stories like this - especially in the heat of the moment - is bad practice. -Thucydides411 (talk) 19:38, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Surely WaPo is not responsible for what is published in other sources. The WaPo article appears to be correct as it repeatedly attributes, as they should. O3000 (talk) 20:18, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

In the sentence I quoted above, they did not clearly attribute the statement. But more than that, the Washington Post failed to do even basic verification of what the government officials were telling it, and the story collapsed within days, once other news agencies approached the story with greater rigor. Yet the Washington Post never fully corrected the article. I don't see how you can view this as anything other than a failure to live up to basic journalistic practices. -Thucydides411 (talk) 13:36, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides, that argument is an example of the kind of dumbfoundingly vacuous cherrypicking that is at the core of this RfC. Are we ready to have editors falsely and routinely hold WaPo's 150+ year record on a par with Fox? Just about every website posts at least a sizable percentage of fact. Today it is Sunday. It may rain next week. If that's your best shot, we are never going to reach consensus above option 3. Please try to make comments that do not deny the central issue. SPECIFICO talk 15:53, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

@Thucydides411: That's a great demonstration of a particularly egregious failure on the part of the Washington Post. On the other hand @SPECIFICO:, your reply is, to use your own words, "an example of the kind of dumbfoundingly vacuous" approaches some editors take towards civility, which is not only required by policy here but also useful in life. Surely there's no need to scrape the bottom of the barrel. -Darouet (talk) 03:17, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

• Correct me if I'm wrong, but it is getting closer to election time in the US, right? I'm of the mind that the upcoming election might be part of the reason for the repeated attempts to eliminate Fox News as a generally RS, and with such vengeance vehemence in a try-and-try again effort to reach what has been an elusive result. I have provided the following quote as an aside to the fact that Fox News has been the #1 rated cable news channel for 18 consecutive years, much to the dismay of their competitors and political opposition; many of whom continue to throw stones at Fox News from glass houses. I would have cited the NYTimes or WaPo instead of Forbes for Fox's rating but lo and behold they did not publish even a blurb about it, which speaks volumes as to why we should not eliminate or downgrade all of our RS, like Forbes and the Washington Times, based purely on political bias. Anyway, the following is quoted from a literature review in the International Journal on Digital Libraries. It made me go "Hmmm..." so I thought it was important to share it as part of this discussion in the event political bias might be a factor in this RfC, unknowing or otherwise, and if it is, then at least now we are better able to understand why:

"Not all frame analyses focus on the text of news articles. For instance, DellaVigna and Kaplan analyzed the gradual adoption of cable TV of Fox News between 1996 and 2000 to show that Fox News had a “significant impact” on the presidential elections. Essentially, the study analyzed whether a district had already adopted the Fox News channel, and what the election result was. The results revealed that the Republican party had an increased vote share in those towns that had adopted Fox News."

^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:25, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Atsme, this is an odd edit. The study you linked to does indeed say that Fox has had an undue effect on elections. It also stated that Fox was significantly slanted and that Fox viewers were the most uninformed about the Iraq War. So yes, we are trying to reduce dependence on an unreliable source as per guidelines. So yes, it is getting closer to election time in the US, right? But, your claim that those efforts to stop using a bad source is based upon “vengeance“ is a violation of AGF and CIV and completely ignores that they simply don’t like usage of bad sources, while you think you are on the side of goodness to continue usage of a source your own citation criticizes so heavily. O3000 (talk) 00:44, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing that to my attention. I corrected it - that was not the word I originally intended to use. I'm actually done here. Happy editing. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 03:29, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Lately I've noticed a tendency to appeal to dictionaries in cases like these. O3000 you might like to look at the definition of "with a vengeance" to understand how (at least in modern English) this is an impersonal expression. A lot of people are having trouble identifying what is and isn't civil these days. I've noticed it seems to depend a lot more on status than on fact. Not sure if that's what happened here, but I thought it was worth providing some expert testimony from a trusted source. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 05:48, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Atsme already changed the wording. O3000 (talk) 14:48, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

OK how about this [[98]]?Slatersteven (talk) 18:25, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Or [[99]] "Fox altering the images without any disclaimer was “terribly misleading.”".Slatersteven (talk) 11:38, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Further evidence of recent malign behaviour by Fox News

Comment I came here to point out the self-same doctored fake news story as the one discussed above after having voted (above, option 3) some time ago. The Fox News fake-photo debacle is one of a long line of disgraceful truth-evasion on behalf of Fox's editorial standards. They are the American Sputnik, and I have great difficulty understanding why so many people disagree with/are blind to/ignorant of/overlook this. (Delete as appropriate.) Here, though, is yet another instance of Fox`s child catcher level of nefariousness: described by this article In short, the now-famous recent incident of CNN journalists arrested live on air is twisted by Fox into an attack article on its less far-right competitor by: seeking to bury the wholly self-explanatory video of the incident; using the anchor's script smarmily and baselessly to malign CNN journalists; and, to finish: a heavy dusting of their standard line that "the liberal [non-Fox] media is disobedient/disingenuous/violent/non-white/guilty of unAmerican activities". It is unthinkable that such an organization can be considered a reliable source for anything related to news, politics, America, or anything else important or potentially controversial. And I don't for a minute buy this alleged firewall between their newsroom and their pundits. They choose the pundits, they pay them, broadcast them, and embed their opinions in videos on their news articles of FoxNews.com GPinkerton (talk) 13:09, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

References (Fox News)

Sources

Collapsed because these are references primarily to political pundits, like Sean Hannity on Fox News Channel, not Fox News. GQ headline reads Fox News Was Duped by a Seth Rich Conspiracy Pushed by Russian Intelligence. Fox News retracted the story from their news section but pundit Hannity continued. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:42, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

What's the point of viewing Fox News in isolation? They are the ones who provide the platform to people like Sean Hannity and hence they should be treated as the same entity, or atleast related. "Not Fox News" is an incorrect conclusion. --qedk (t 愛 c) 16:36, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Well, probably because this RfC is about Fox News which is separate from the Fox News Channel's talk-show commentary: Which of the following best describes the reliability of the reporting of Fox News? (as separate from their cable pundits) foxnews.com. It appears this RfC may have wasted a significant amount of our valuable time arguing with those editors who conflated the two and did not distinguish between factual newscasts by Fox News anchors and the channel's political talk-shows. I was concerned about that issue from the very beginning, and mentioned it to Newslinger. I'm afraid you may have just validated the reason for my concern. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 20:12, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

It was a drawn implication, hence I clarified my vote in each aspect of reliability, my point is simply to correct the notion of Fox News and pundits being separate entities when they function in conjunction. --qedk (t 愛 c) 20:48, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Atsme How are they separate? What other news organizations are only reliable at certain times of day? Do we have to specifically disbar "pundits" (regular employees, not mere guests) with other news outlets? Where do we disqualify such content under the BBC's head? GPinkerton (talk) 22:48, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi, GPinkerton - please see my sidebar note which follows my iVote in the RfC iVoting segment above. The scope of this RfC is strictly the newscasts, not the talk show entertainment on the Fox News Channel - two entirely different things. Think of it as you would an ABC broadcast on channel 8A which includes daytime & primetime talk shows, movies, series, and then there is "the news". Also, a few questions were added below the original RfC a day later, and should not be considered part of the actual RfC. I do hope editors have not been confused by it. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 23:08, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Also... (not Atsme’s point, but worth noting)... there is an analogy to print journalism, where we draw a distinction between the “op-Ed” (opinion) pages and other (news) sections of the paper. We can equate stuff like Hannity’s show to the op-Ed page. Blueboar (talk) 21:57, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Just to clarify, the {{sources-talk}} template above captures citations in everyone's comments from this RfC, including comments posted after the ones above. — Newslinger talk 10:27, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Studies on the reliability of Fox News

General (Fox News)

• The Fox “News” Lie: Fox's “news” side pushed misinformation every day for four months straight, Media Matters.
• Fairleigh Dickinson University: What you know depends on whatyou watch:Current events knowledgeacross popular news sources. Found that study participants who watched Fox News we less informed than people who watched no news [100].
• Nelson, Jacob L. (January 23, 2019). "What is Fox News? Researchers want to know". Columbia Journalism Review.

Climate change (Fox News)

• Science or Spin?: Assessing the Accuracy of Cable News Coverage of Climate Science, Union of Concerned Scientistis 93% of global warming coverage by the Fox News Channel was misleading
• Climate-Challenged Society, Oxford University Press. popular media outlets in the US that make no pretense of balance objectivity in their attempts to advance denial, such as Fox News
• https://www.citizen.org/article/foxic-fox-news-networks-dangerous-climate-denial-2019/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=52dbcd4f-2756-4284-973a-7fe06c039cd5 Public Citizen: Fox News Network’s Dangerous Climate Denial 2019] Of the 247 segments, 212 or 86% were dismissive of the climate crisis, cast warming and its consequences in doubt or employed fear mongering when discussing climate solutions. and “Tucker Carlson Tonight” ran the most climate denial segments with 41 or approximately seven per month, followed by “Hannity” with 32 and “The Five” with 29

COVID-19 (Fox News)

• How Right-Leaning Media Coverage of COVID-19 Facilitated the Spread of Misinformation in the Early Stages of the Pandemic, Oklahoma State University, University of Pennsylvania, Carleton College In this paper, we report the results of an automated content analysis showing that right-leaning news outlets (e.g., Fox News, Breitbart) were more than 2.5 times more likely than mainstream outlets to discuss COVID-19 misinformation during the early stages of the U.S. pandemic response.

No Go Zone anti-Muslim conspiracy theory (Fox News)

• No-Go Zone Conspiracy Theory, Georgetown University Bridge “there are actual cities like Birmingham that are totally Muslim where non-Muslims just simply don’t go in;” (at the time of the interview, Birmingham’s population was 80% non-Muslim). — Preceding unsigned comment added by John Cummings (talk • contribs) 10:07, June 14, 2020 (UTC)

Discussion 2 (Fox News)

• Comment - I previously hatted this discussion and it was reverted. The reason for my action was because this entire section is irrelevant to the scope of the RfC, and a waste of editors' valuable time. The first source, which is a biased progressive opinion source, briefly mentions the Fox newscast bias, and goes on and on about the Fox News Channel's talk-shows and political commentary that has nothing at all to do with the Fox News Channel's newscasts. Every other source/analysis/poll included after that first source are irrelevant to the RfC because the scope encompasses only the Fox News Channel's political commentary and talk-show pundits, not the newscasts. Hopefully this explanation will save editors from wasting any of their valuable time on off-topic opinions that have no relevance to the RfC. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 03:05, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
  • Given that you've started literally positing a conspiracy against "conservative" sources operating on this page, at this stage you're WP:RIGHTINGGREATWRONGS and probably aren't someone who should be telling anyone else what to post - David Gerard (talk) 15:33, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
    • @David Gerard: I agree. The constant accusations of editorial bias is a personal attack and must be stopped (for some reason the accuser(s) don't realize their own bias can be seen as the reason they are defending Fox News.... How odd! They shouldn't cast stones.):

"Using someone's political affiliations as an ad hominem means of dismissing or discrediting their views, such as accusing them of being left-wing or right-wing, is also forbidden. Editors are allowed to have personal political POV, as long as it does not negatively affect their editing and discussions."

It is the lack of accuracy and pushing of political and scientific pseudoscience, IOW pushing counterfactual content and narratives, that is the reason we don't like Fox News. Hey, someone in the news media has to do this propaganda job (that's the nature of the beast), and instead of leaving this job to the most extreme right-wing sources, Fox News has joined the fray after Trump's rise to power (which happened largely because of them as his propaganda voice). Editorial bias has nothing to do with our opposition to Fox News's inaccuracy. That is their own doing. -- Valjean (talk) 15:48, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

I've stated several times now that I do not consider any of the cable news channels particularly reliable, and though it's completely irrelevant, I'll just mention that my political biases are extremely different from those of Fox News. However, it does appear clear to me that the reason why there is a push to exclude Fox News specifically as a source - as opposed to CNN and MSNBC, which are on a very comparable level of overall reliability and political bias/partisanship - is because the bias that Fox News exhibits does not align with the views of most Wikipedians. Wikipedia should have a consistent policy on reliable sources, which means that either all three major American cable news channels are reliable, or all three are unreliable. Taking an inconsistent, politically biased approach to WP:RS will just serve to tilt articles. -Thucydides411 (talk) 09:34, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Since you clearly missed the nuance, let me spell it out for you, Fox News has been inaccurate on multiple occasions. They made their platform available to pundits who have been wrong on multiple occasions. I recommend either you read the comments carefully to avoid making blatantly pointless accusations or just not say anything that might be viewed as accusatory. --qedk (t 愛 c) 09:56, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

You have to distinguish between opinion (e.g., pundits) and news articles. Politically motivated reporting is not a peculiarity of Fox News, however - CNN recently ran an interview with Susan Rice in which she claimed the violence at protests over the killing of George Floyd might be instigated by Russia: [101]. All three major American cable news channels (Fox News, CNN and MSNBC) are questionable, and should be handled similarly. Treating the news articles on their websites as reliable is a reasonable policy. Opinion articles and opinion shows are definitely not reliable. It would be reasonable to class broadcast news reports on all three channels are unreliable (as opposed to articles on their websites), in my opinion. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411, have a quick look at the Ad Fontes chart. https://www.adfontesmedia.com/ - notice that it distinguishes CNN.com from CNN Cable, and Fox News from FNC. We also make this distinction. We distinguish NBC from MSNBC, because, yes, we all know that cable infotainment is not the same as real news.

Fox News (as opposed to FNC) has been considered reliable up to now. What's changed is not us, it's Fox News. It's now rated less reliable and more biased than the Daily Mail.

Fox now blurs the line between its editorial agenda and its news reporting. The canary in the mine was Shep Smith. The doctored images of Seattle were on Fox News, not FNC. Fox has changed. Guy (help!) 16:07, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

What makes Ad Fontes reliable? The doctored images of Seattle were on Fox News. Fox News issued a correction, which is one of the things we look for in reliable sources. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:51, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411: You've several times repeated your assertion, All three major American cable news channels (Fox News, CNN and MSNBC) are questionable, and should be handled similarly. without giving any reasons or explaining why they should not be differentiated based on the evidence under discussion. Can you give us several examples, instances of Fox making an error biased against Trump and the Right and then issuing a correction? Or is it all the other way -- Right-leaning bias in prime time and then a correction buried elsewhere? Thank you. SPECIFICO talk 18:27, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411, no they did not. They mumbled something about the home-page photos “did not clearly delineate” the splicing together of multiple images from different locations. That's a "sorry we got caught". In a responsible news org, the editor would have been fired or at least disciplined. Guy (help!) 20:26, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I don't know what you mean by "mumbled." They posted written corrections at the top of the articles and changed the images. -Thucydides411 (talk) 21:05, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Lets all lay of the PA's, and assume good faith.Slatersteven (talk) 09:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree, Slatersteven. Let's stick to the facts as follows: WaPo returned a Pulitzer because of a fabricated story they published, and so did the NYTimes. See this diff for the links to the stories. Why haven't we demoted or even deprecated those 2 sources considering they were actually reporting the news, and not opinion or political analysis? For news & statements of fact, they cannot be trusted after those two major screw-ups. How can we ever trust them again, especially after the past 3 years of them pushing a Russian collusion story - using anonymous sources and unverified material - misleading their readers/audiences - and winning more Pulitizers for getting it wrong? Fox News Channel was one of few who did not promote the Russian collusion story - the talk-shows (political commentary) investigated it and found zero collusion. They got it right and everybody got it wrong. They also got the 2016 election right - but that was analysis/opinion/commentary not news. Shepard Smith was a Fox news anchor and he stated: “The Fox News poll did have President Trump losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton and the Fox News poll was accurate,” he said. Of course, factually he was accurate because that is what the poll stated, but the polling prediction was wrong. We may not agree with what they're reporting, or their POV, but that doesn't make them unreliable. And yes, they're biased - so are all the others. A Fox News Channel employee recently made a bad decision in art & layout when they used photoshopped images as artwork to depict a scene and enhance a story, and for that you want to demote the entire Fox News Channel as unreliable? How often has ABC screwed up and aired [https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/2019/10/15/abc-news-airs-knob-creek-kentucky-gun-range-video-as-syria-bombing/3976328002/ fake photos? And CBS, and on and on. What the broadcast did was actually news. What Fox did was garnishments - art depictions on their website. Deadlines cause mistakes and that is why we should closely adhere to RECENTISM & NOTNEWS. If we had, this would not be an issue because it was quickly removed. No...Fox News is not anymore unreliable than any of the other news channels. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:50, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Your point is fifty long comments now. Many are the same thing rephrased (like propping up instances of center-left journalists who've been wrong, like it's a 1:1 exchange of "bad Cillizza tweet" to "X claims Hillary killed Seth Rich" articles.) There's no reason be so passive aggressive and smarmy. As the OP mentioned, the vote favors Fox News and my understanding is nothing will change. Your criteria is a blank check that performs terribly as a discriminator function, which is part of why others were criticizing you. Thanks to User:Snooganssnoogans for the janitorial work, it's appreciated. Wunderkiwi (talk) 02:28, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

^^^Note to closer: This user has 13 total edits.^^^ ^Atsme _Talk 📧 12:05, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Good work on the And you are lynching Negroes argument. This RfC is about Fox News so all you could really do was to prove how other journalistic institutions got it wrong in some instances instead of proving the arguments wrong about how Fox News has diminished in their role as a source of reliable journalism. --qedk (t 愛 c) 09:53, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

QEDK, please explain your comment and to whom you've directed it. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 12:05, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

@Atsme: It's very clearly directed at your arguments in the wall of text (which is something you already knew given your talk page posting, so let's not be ingenuine here). There's nothing to explain, I recommend you read the wikilinked page and understand what I was saying, if you still don't, the second sentence of my paragraph is simple enough to explain that kind of argument. --qedk (t 愛 c) 12:38, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

I am offended by your comment, or that you would even use such a racist analogy. Fox News Channel is currently rated as a generally reliable source - and until proven otherwise, that is how it stands, and from what I'm seeing in the iVotes, it will remain a generally reliable source whether we like it or not. Your insult and use of lynching is unbecomming an administrator. You should be desysopped for making such a comment on this noticeboard. The sentiment that has been displayed here about conservatives and racist comments like yours do not belong here. I advise you to strike your racist comment. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 12:52, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

I don't think you understand what's racist and what's not, and unfortunately I don't have the time or effort explaining the multitude of levels you're wrong on. I was not the one who came up with this analogy so perhaps you should take it up with Soviet propagandists who did and while you're at it, also understand why I said your argument was fallacious and calling people racist without a) any knowledge of their race or personal life, b) any evidentiary proof that they are racist, is the most offensive aspect about all of this. I'm going to leave this here and you can resume your name-calling if you please. --qedk (t 愛 c) 13:01, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

QEDK, I'm not following why you chose to say "Good work on the And you are lynching Negroes argument." "Good work on the Whataboutism argument" would have been less inflammatory. You're saying Atsme made a comment referencing racism on this page? I see references to racism in others' comments but I don't see references in Atsme's. Actually it's inflammatory to reference an article about Russian arguments; no need for denegrating Russians. I think this boils down to an "WP:OTHERSTUFF" argument. wbm1058 (talk) 15:44, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Answering because you pinged me, @Wbm1058:, I chose to say it because that was the basis of Atsme's argument. Maybe it would have been less colourful (commenting on arguments is not inflammatory) but it would also have been inaccurate, since Atsme's point was a variation of the tu quoque fallacy and borderline whataboutism. Similar to how the Soviets used the terminology to deflect criticism of their own wrongs, Atsme is using the wrongs of other journalistic institutions to deflect criticism of Fox News (which very ironically gives platform to racist pundits) — so no, it was not denigrating Russians either (that is how the catchphrase is used). I never said that Atsme made racist comments, I said that they (implicitly) labeled me a racist, racist comments like yours..., ...advise you to strike your racist comment..., which is again very ironic given my predisposition. I have always tried to comment on the content and not the contributor and in this case, I've also done the same. So to hear that I'm a racist and I made personal attacks, I'm baffled. In any case, Atsme is free to attack me in any way they deem necessary, I don't mind. Good day. --qedk (t 愛 c) 17:12, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Fox News: reliability in context

In the RfC responses above, the New York Times was invoked several times as something of a 'gold standard' RS. With that in mind, I ask editors to consider a comparison of Fox News with the following:

• New York Times: we were wrong on Iraq
• The NYT printed a false claim and has not corrected it after 10 months. Per Newslinger "Following up on my correction submission to The New York Times, I have not yet received a response from the NYT, and "Trump Shares Unfounded Fringe Theory About Epstein and Clintons" has not yet been amended". The claim serves to exonerate Clinton from ties to Epstein's island, and in so doing, smears victim Virginia Giuffre as a liar. (And since the recent Netflix special, Giuffre is no longer alone in her allegation.)
• The NYT printed an inaccurate statement from Joseph Backholm, one of Tara Reade's corroborators, and did not respond to a request for correction. So, if Backholm is interviewed again he can potentially be discredited for having changed his story. The Times (May 31) article has: Joseph Backholm, who said she had told him about an assault by an unnamed senator when they were students together. However, "Backholm says that Times inaccurately reported details he told them ("She didn’t provide any details and didn’t say it was a senator") Backholm texted back to Lerer."*. In a tweet dated May 26, Backholm stated she told me that while working in DC she had been sexually assaulted by "someone you would know."*
• The NYT stealth edited their investigative piece on the Tara Reade allegation against Joe Biden on behalf of the Biden campaign, removing a caveat from their summary.* According to Fox News, The Times originally reported: "No other allegation about sexual assault surfaced in the course of reporting, nor did any former Biden staff members corroborate any details of Ms. Reade’s allegation. The Times found no pattern of sexual misconduct by Mr. Biden, beyond the hugs, kisses and touching that women previously said made them uncomfortable. The final sentence was removed because the Biden camp "thought the phrasing was awkward", per Ben Smith.*

I have yet to see anything comparable to these examples from Fox News. What am I missing? petrarchan47คุก 22:49, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Studies_on_the_reliability_of_Fox_News? --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 23:15, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

From what I've observed, editors are saying that Fox corrects their mistakes. Is this not true?

In your list, nothing even remotely compares with fake news that led to a deadly war.petrarchan47คุก 23:32, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Petrarchan, your emphasis on the WMD and the New York Times seems besides the point. The vast majority of US news outlets, including Fox News, posted uncritical WMD coverage both before and after the invasion of Iraq. What sets the Times apart is that it issued a retraction, not the error itself which was also made by most of its peers. Newimpartial (talk) 23:43, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Petrarchan47, they have a correction system in place, but it's used woefully inadequately (see e.g. [102][103][104]) {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 16:40, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Read WP:Other stuff exists and drop this. This RfC is about Fox News, not the NYT. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 16:36, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Clarification requested (Fox News)

This has been raised in passing above, but not clearly answered - what is the scope of this RFC? When we say “Fox News”, what are we referring to? Does it include the news programming of local Fox affiliates (such as WNEW in New York City)? Does it include the Fox Business cable channel (FBN)? What about Fox’s talk radio broadcasting? Or is the RFC limited to just the main cable news station and its associated website? Blueboar (talk) 15:25, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Local affiliates have separately operated newsrooms, so they're not under this discussion. This is about whether or not the cable news channel's news operations have let their bias undermine the reliability of their news coverage. (I say yes.) oknazevad (talk) 15:43, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Problem is... it isn’t as clear cut as that. The cable channel will often go to local affiliates for coverage of news events, since the locals have camera crews and reporters on scene. So would that reporting be ok or not? It’s on both local AND cable. Blueboar (talk) 18:17, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

@Blueboar: My main focus when calling the RfC was the parts of the Fox News operation that are citable on Wikipedia, i.e. primarily the website and the main cable channel. I added the affiliate question as a response to quieries, but as Newslinger pointed out above, affiliate stations generally are considered to have a separate reliability to the main news operation, and so I don't consider the RfC a vertict on the reliability of affiliate stations. Hemiauchenia (talk) 15:58, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I also wish to address here why I opened the RfC in the first place. Ultimately including option 4 was not because I was intent on depreciating Fox News, but that the language I chose was a standard boilerplate that has been used in other RfCs. Generally reliable, unclear / additional considerations apply and generally unreliable is a useful standard for RfC, and provides some nuance in the discussion. It is far better than "should Fox News be depreciated" that had previously been proposed. There is overwhelming concensus in the RfC that Fox News shouldn't be depreciated, which I agree with. I should note that I generally don't edit the American politics area at all (check my edit history), and this wasn't an attempt to attack Fox News, I would be happy to see it retain its generally reliable status. The RfC is about arguments not simply a straight vote, so when the RfC is closed it will be decided based on the strength of arguments, so if the arguments against Fox News are bad (which I agree that some arguments in this RfC against Fox News are), then they will simply be discounted by the panel of closers. I think that this article in the Columbia Journalism Review "What is Fox News? Researchers want to know" in probably the most relevant piece to this RfC. It discusses many issues that have come up in this discussion, including the lack of research on the reporting of Fox News itself as opposed to the pundits. Calling this RfC has been a huge learning experience for me, and maybe doing some kind of pre-RfC that was done for Quackwatch would've been better in hindsight. Thanks for your understanding. Hemiauchenia (talk) 15:58, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Request please could someone list the different 'parts' of Fox News, this would be helpful in differentiating different comments. John Cummings (talk) 14:08, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

  John Cummings, I see it as:

  • Fox News;
  • Fox News Channel (FNC), the opinion broadcaster which accounts for most of what people think of as "Fox News" (Hannity etc);
  • Fox local affiliates

  Others may have different definitions. Guy (help!) 14:24, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

  I see no evidance that "fox news" is a separate entity from Fox News.Slatersteven (talk) 14:28, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

I would break it down with;

1. FNC (the main cable news channel)
2. FBN (Fox Business Network - business news and commentary)
3. Local affiliates (each with a news division)
4. foxnews.com

These are all interconnected... for example: when a story is breaking, FNC may use local affiliate film crews and reporters to cover it (as they are on scene). That coverage may then get a synopsis posted to foxnews.com. Usually, it is the synopsis on foxnews.com that gets cited on Wikipedia, and not the broadcasted footage. Blueboar (talk) 15:10, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

thediplomat.com

Over at Talk:Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 a user has challenged thediplomat.com as "a bucket full of the American propaganda bullshit" [[105]] so is this [[106]] an RS for "A deleted tweet by the Donetsk People’s Republic showed a BUK-M1 system in the group’s possession".?Slatersteven (talk) 12:46, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable The Diplomat is a reputable current affairs magazine. The user is banned from the article in question for disruptive editing. The deleted tweet has been covered in other outlets, see. this story in the Straits Times. Hemiauchenia (talk) 13:18, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

@Hemiauchenia: and why quotation marks are used here by ABC Online if it is an official twitter account of the Donetsk People's Republic?? (:

On Thursday a Twitter account for the "Donetsk People's Republic" issued several posts claiming to have seized a missile system from the Ukrainian army.

The official Twitter account has a special mark. And I don't see one. So everyone could create this account, right? That is why I would like to see a proof of the ownership but not these propagandist publications on the media and a picture of the "seized Buk launcher on 29 June 2014" which was posted in 2011 [107]. --Александр Мотин (talk) 15:41, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Worth noting that The Diplomat has come up before, see Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_193#The_Diplomat Hemiauchenia (talk) 15:56, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

@Hemiauchenia: Well, let's just consider this publication of the Diplomat to lack reliability? --Александр Мотин (talk) 16:01, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable Seems to meet our usual standards, remember bias is not a criteria (assuming they are). Nor am I seeing any evidence they are not reliable.Slatersteven (talk) 16:04, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable, they also walk pretty far from the traditional line of "American propaganda bullshit” if thats the concern, I have found them to be one of the most if not the most even handed english language publication covering the indo-pacific. Ownership is Japanese and the majority of staff is non-American. Just a note that anything from the section “The Debate” is either comment or opinion and should be treated thusly although that should be pretty obvious. There are three internal degrees of quality but given that all are over Wikipedia’s bar for reliability I don’t think there is much to be gained from delving into that as it isn’t relevant to the problem at hand. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 16:19, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Also the author of that piece, Ankit Panda, is one of the most respected security analysts of his generation (pretty much everyone has published him) as well as an editor at The Diplomat. I don’t think there is a legitimate objection being made here. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 16:24, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable, but the editor has been topic banned anyway. Guy (help!) 23:38, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
• Probably reliable however as I noted on the talk page, I don't think we should be using that particular article if possible. It seems to be a late breaking news piece since it notes it may be updated. I assume that is no longer the case, however such pieces should always be used with care since the level of fact checking can be more limited. And there is a particular issue with this piece which raises concern. It mentions a tweet and links to a screenshot of that tweet on Twitter. There is no doubt that the tweet is real, and the screenshot very likely is as well. However there's strong indications the screenshot is a machine translation of the original tweet in Russian. While machine translations have their uses, they need to be used with care. It's unclear why the article linked to a machine translation of the tweet and yet gave no indication that it was a machine translation (and nor does the tweet they linked to). Does this mean the source relied exclusively machine translation? Did they even know it was a machine translation? Given they didn't mention the machine translation issue at all, we don't know. While it may be acceptable for a source to rely on a machine translation, it seems quite questionable for a source to rely solely on a machine translation and not mention that is what they were going by. IMO this is likely a good example where we need to remember that just because a source is generally reliable, doesn't mean it always is. If there is ample evidence for problems with a particular article, we have to carefully consider whether we should use it or instead rely on other sources for which don't have that problem. It's not clear to me there's anything that the source claims which isn't backed up by other sources, so there is probably no reason to use that particular article. Nil Einne (talk) 14:53, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Shouldn’t we “if possible” always be looking to upgrade dated journalistic sources to more current academic ones? Like you said I can’t imagine its too hard to find this piece of information in the ocean of scholarly work published about the incident in the last six years. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 14:58, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable for what it is reliable for - The diplomat carries both opinion and analytical pieces, it has an editorial team, its opinion pieces should be treated as opinion, its analysis (assuming it comes from an expert) should be treated as expert analysis. FOARP (talk) 09:47, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Reliable but also includes opinion/analysis that may need to be attributed in some cases. FOARP is correct that the site carries a lot of opinion/analytical pieces and those should be treated accordingly. Neutrality^talk 18:37, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

HIV & AIDS In Africa

At Catholic Church and HIV/AIDS, WhatamIdoing suggested four books that he thought were relevant and helpful. One was Jacquineau, Azetsop (2016-09-15). HIV & AIDS In Africa: Christian Reflection, Public Health, Social Transformation. Orbis Books. ISBN 978-1-60833-671-5.. AlmostFrancis disputes its reliability because Orbis Books is "unabashedly religious and Marxist," and because several of the chapters are written by Catholic priests. He has removed all content attributed to it, including secondary citations to pre-existing content. In general, is this book reliable for this article? Are chapters written by expert priests reliable? Thank you. --Slugger O'Toole (talk) 13:43, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

I can see wp:undue issues with this, and it can be argued to not exactly be third party.Slatersteven (talk) 13:47, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Slatersteven, Could you elaborate on the undue issue, please? -- Slugger O'Toole (talk) 13:52, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

As I said its not exactly third party, thus one can argue it represents a very narrow and biased viewpoint. One can go as far as to say self serving and promotional.Slatersteven (talk) 13:57, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Or not. I assume you haven't read it? One of the sentences blanked from the article is this: In early days of AIDS, discriminatory views of political leaders were supported by religious leaders, including Catholic clergy, hampering the response and worsening the pandemic in some parts of Africa. That's cited to the director of the African Jesuit Historical Institute, who has a PhD in African political history from Oxford. I would not consider that a self-serving statement, and I bet nobody else would, either.

Given that this article is "Named organization and subject", it would be WP:UNDUE to omit everything published by anyone related to that organization, but that is a subject for a different noticeboard. The question for RSN is whether this source is reliable enough to support this statement. What do you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:49, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Self serving and "serving that version of my organisation" are not the same thing. It promotes a specific opinion, one that may not be independent of the publishers agenda, hence why I said this is more a case of undue.Slatersteven (talk) 15:53, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

The same claim could be made with greater justice of basically any newspaper. I assume that you don't think that major newspapers regularly publish things that their publishers disagree with? Hearst would be rolling in his grave. WP:UNDUE has nothing to do with whether publishers choose to publish authors whose views are congenial to their own. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:03, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

No, but it does if those views are only represented by that one source (it is after all what it means, an undue opinion). Yes (by the way) I would and have said that if an opinion only appears in one newspaper then it might well be undue to mention it).Slatersteven (talk) 19:10, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Before we get to in the weeds on that quote, which is why this should all be on the talk page, it was also going to be a two sentence section where the second one was promotional. The bigger issue was that the page cited doesn't seem to be in the source, page 522 out of 424.AlmostFrancis (talk) 20:09, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Thats wp:v, not RS. But its a valid point.Slatersteven (talk) 20:12, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Hey, I didn't bring it here :) AlmostFrancis (talk) 21:49, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

AlmostFrancis, I cited "location" 522, not "page" 522, because I cited the Kindle version of the book. I also said I'm not sure how to cite a Kindle, so if you have some advice I would be obliged. -- Slugger O'Toole (talk) 20:43, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Add a bookmark on the kindle which you can then view the page number. Alternatively you can search for the quote you are using on the google books page, which will return the page number, though you may not be able to view the page itself. I recommend the search because no one wants to be forced to use the kindle.AlmostFrancis (talk) 21:49, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Slatersteven, The source was also used as a secondary source to further support existing content. While admittedly I only skimmed the chapters that didn't seem directly relevant, and while I haven't worked my way through the entire book yet, I haven't seen anything that looked like a fringe position. -- Slugger O'Toole (talk) 20:47, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

I would still consider it possibly undue,. It doers not have to be fringe. If there are other sources just use those. My concearn would be this on its own.Slatersteven (talk) 20:52, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Slatersteven, I agree. Exactly the kind of source we should steer clear of in a controversial area like this. Guy (help!) 23:37, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Not sure what RS has to do with this as it is mostly a Due Weight issue. It is a weak source for two reasons. One the publisher follows liberation theology and is an imprint of a Catholic order which has a missionary focus. The Chapters added so far were not written by experts but by Catholic priests, Jesuits I believe. I am not sure where the "expert" part came for the priests, though?AlmostFrancis (talk) 15:47, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Probably when they get PhDs from Oxford, is my guess. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:56, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Being a priest or a Jesuit does not preclude being an expert... I agree that this is more a due weight issue though. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 16:51, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

That's what I get for trying to be brief. One priest was a director of a what looks like a Jesuit archival institute, which does produce a journal, who does not seem to produce much if any scholarship. Unless everyone with a DPhil is an expert then he would not be. The other priest "taught" at a number of schools but mostly just seems to contribute to various church magazines, though again he does have a Ph.D. Too be fair some of the other priests in the book do publish, seem to have actual academic jobs, and might fit under expert. But this should be decided on a DUE basis at the actual talk page. For all I know I just missed where these two priests have shown expertise. AlmostFrancis (talk) 17:56, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

WP:V's only definition of expert is anyone "whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications". The PhDs are optional under our rules. Mkenda certainly qualifies, as Routledge (as in, "the largest global academic publisher within humanities and social sciences") tapped him to write a chapter in ISBN 9781134505777.

Your edit summary, when you blanked this, said that you thought the source was WP:QUESTIONABLE, not that you thought it was UNDUE. UNDUE would mean that you thought there was too much in the article from priests writing that their organizations were discriminating against PWA. If you're no longer concerned that the source is unreliable for the stated claim, and you don't believe that there is too much criticism about discrimination against PWA, then maybe you'd like to go restore that sentence and its citation. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:59, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

It is dishonest to say that I said it was WP:QUESTIONABLE when I in no way tied myself to that wikilink. Unless you are arguing that "questionable" doesn't have a understood English meaning, I ask you too strike your comment and not misquote me again. The rest of your comment is a strawman argument and belongs on the talk page anyway.AlmostFrancis (talk) 19:56, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

You have made more than 500 edits at this point. If you use jargon, we're going to assume that you're doing it on purpose. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:20, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Dishonesty is its own punishment. Everyone can look at the diffs if they want and see that you did not accurately portray what I wrote. So I guess you are arguing that questionable does not have English meaning and can only be understood as jargon.AlmostFrancis (talk) 04:01, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

AlmostFrancis, You said "this source seems questionable", which is why I brought it here. You didn't say anything about due weight. -- Slugger O'Toole (talk) 20:40, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Comment Oxford University does not award PhDs and never has. Anyone claiming to "get PhDs from Oxford" should be treated with the utmost derision. I also agree that any self-published book by a POV source connected with the book's and the article's subject should not be considered reliable, nor consideration of it due. Having purportedly got a (probably theological) doctorate does not make a priest an impartial expert on the failings of the church to which he belongs. GPinkerton (talk) 05:32, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

The difference between a PhD and a DPhil is purely semantic --Guerillero | Parlez Moi 16:20, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Guerillero. The "DPhil" is in history, not theology. And Wikipedia does not require sources to be impartial; see WP:BIASED. Excluding everything written by historians who also happen to be Catholic priests is its own kind of WP:DUE (and surely we'd rather use a book written by an African historian–priest than a newsletter written by a journalist for a local diocese?). WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:18, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Guerillero, Though Dr. Phil not so much... Guy (help!) 15:51, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

The DPhil was for history. Thesis was on the effects of state policy in Tanzania on the Chaggas(sp?) people. Of course it was from the Jesuit private hall :) , still oxford is oxford so pretty sure we can trust them AlmostFrancis (talk) 04:01, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

ettoday.net

• ettoday.net  

This site was linked in a couple of articles as Epoch Times, but it's not an Epoch Times domain (maybe it was syndicated). Looking at the site through Google Translate, it appears to be the Higashimori New Media Holding Co., Ltd - new media being in my experience largely a synonym for ad-riddled clickbait, which certainly looks to be the case here.

Is it just designed for a completely different audience, or is it as crappy as it looks? Guy (help!) 08:08, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• From a quick look, the site seems not to be affiliated with Epoch Times, even if the names are similar. The articles on ETtoday are still not very reliable though, most are poorly sourced and have clickbait headlines like "Nine Children Born! 29-Year-Old Man Complained That his Wife Was Sick and Could Not Give Birth. A Second Later, She Was Pregnant Again". The political reporting on ETtoday is not nearly as partisan as what I would expect from Epoch Times, which is somewhat good I suppose. For their political stories, ETtoday mostly focuses on politics in Taiwan, with fewer conspiracy theories and self-supporting "exposés" than Epoch Times has.

(I suppose there is a chance that the site could be a minor Epoch Times offshoot, and if proof could be found supporting that, I would be glad to change my assessment) K^{ʜᴜ'ʜᴀᴍɢᴀʙᴀ} K^{ɪᴛᴀᴘ (parlez ici)} 12:54, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Just wanted to point out that Higashimori is a Japanese word and the news title translation is horribly wrong. Goes on to say how we shouldn't rely on Google Translate too much. ◢   Ganbaruby!   (Say hi!) 17:55, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Generally reliable. ETToday is a subsidiary of the Eastern Broadcasting Company (zh:東森電視), one of the largest cable television networks in Taiwan. It is a "well-established news outlet" per WP:NEWSORG. It is in no way affiliated with the Epoch Times. If some articles link it as "Epoch Times", these citations should be edited to fix the mistake. feminist | freedom isn't free 02:44, 15 June 2020 (UTC) Addendum: "new media" (Chinese: 新媒體) in the Chinese-language context commonly refers simply to online-focused news media rather than newspapers or TV. It suggests nothing about the quality of articles. feminist | freedom isn't free 17:49, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

  Feminist, thanks, very helpful. Guy (help!) 15:50, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Generally reliable. The situation is more complicated than it initially looks, although I don't think it affects reliability. ETToday was indeed owned and operated by the Eastern Broadcasting Company, but according to Who Owns the World's Media?: Media Concentration and Ownership Around the World (2016) published by Oxford University Press and edited by Eli Noam, the Eastern Broadcasting Company's ETToday had been renamed to NOWnews and was sold to Chunghwa Telecom's parent company in 2008. NOWnews appears to be located at nownews.com. The ETtoday (with a lowercase second "t") that is currently located at ettoday.net was established in 2011 (according to Chinese Wikipedia) by a subsidiary of Eastern Media International, a conglomerate that partially owns the Eastern Broadcasting Company. From this, it looks like Eastern Media International and its related companies sold the original ETToday, but retained the trademark to use for the new ETtoday. Unless someone provides evidence against ETtoday's reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, it should be considered generally reliable under the news organizations guideline. — Newslinger talk 01:21, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

RfC: The Red Pill Movie

Is The Red Pill (2016), directed by Cassie Jaye, a reliable source for subjects related to the manosphere or the men's rights movement? — Newslinger talk 00:19, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

There's a discussion going on about this film, The Red Pill at the Manosphere article. I think the film is one sided, dishonest and begging the question. Having shared my opinion of the film, I'd like to know what other editors think, is this a reliable source for the manosphere or men's rights movement articles? Official site here: [108] Reviews here: [109] Cheers Bacondrum (talk) 23:55, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Absolutely not except for attributed opinion of people who are filmed. We should avoid citing films anyway as they are difficult to verify. buidhe 00:16, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

• Not reliable per my comments at the manosphere talk page. To repeat them here, the film been criticized for lack of accuracy: From the outset, Jaye’s film is tilted in favor of the MRAs she interviews and lacks a coherent argument, not due to her own internal conflict but because the film is built on a fundamental misunderstanding of the relevant terms, including “rights,” “patriarchy” and “feminism.” ([110]), and there is no indication it meets requirements at WP:RS that it be recorded then broadcast, distributed, or archived by a reputable party. GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:45, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

  Well I don't think that's a fair counter argument to say the doc 'misunderstand the terms'...it presents a challenge to the meaning of those terms, yes, but a debate cant really be dismissed as misunderstanding if the arguments are coherent enough. I'd say enough factual basis supports the doc to say it has merit — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.109.150.142 (talk) 02:06, 11 June 2020 (UTC)— Note: An editor has expressed a concern that 76.109.150.142 (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. (diff)

  I am simply presenting one (of quite a few) sources that have taken issue with the accuracy of the film; it is not my criticism. GorillaWarfare (talk) 02:10, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

  Thae LA Times article is a film review not an academic critique. Moreover the author doesn't seem to understand the issues from a factual view. In any case if it's a contest about what sources are reliable we certainly cannot rely on this opinion piece. Tony999 (talk) 07:42, 13 June 2020 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that Tony999 (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion.

  I've presented it as just one example of many criticisms of this film's lack of factual accuracy (others found at The Red Pill#Critical response or a quick Google search). However I'm not sure I understand your objection—the film is certainly not an academic work, so why may only academic sources criticize it? GorillaWarfare (talk) 16:17, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

• Not reliable I'm familiar with the documentary mostly due to the author's TED talk. I suspect there is a lot of good information in it. However, I think it counts as basically self published. As such it can't be treated as a RS. A third party RS can reference it if it makes an important point and that would possibly make it DUE for inclusion but by itself, not a RS. Springee (talk) 00:58, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
• reliable The film interviews multiple feminists and doesn't treat them any differently to the MRAs, so it's hard to say it's biased. If anything, she started off being very biased against the MRAs by her own admission. We should not trust sources attacking the film for biased reasons. For example, The LA Times is known to be a very feminist outlet - so of course it would object to feminism being criticised. The point of the film is to actually investigate the movement - something very few people seem to do. If we are going to discard the film, then we also need to discard all other opinion pieces about the movement. TiggyTheTerrible (talk) 14:48, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

  Can you expand on how the film actually meets the policy requirements at WP:RS? GorillaWarfare (talk) 15:34, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

  Certainly. The film is published by a reputable mass-media cohttps://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard&action=edit&section=42mpany known as Gravitas Ventures, which is a part of Red Arrow Studios. It has also been vouched for by The Daily Telegraph, and Heat Street; the latter of which wrote an interesting piece on the reaction to the film. It may challenge the ideology of some commentators, but it is a valid and valuable source regarding what MRAs believe; it should be treated as a character study on the movement, at the very least. Especially since we now know that several of its most famous detractors didn't actually watch it before attacking it. TiggyTheTerrible (talk) 16:54, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

We have no evidence that documentaries from Gravitas should be regarded as reliable sources. This film appears to be more entertainment than journalism, and certainly not scholarly in any way. --Orange Mike | Talk 16:56, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Reliable sources on these men's movements seem sparse, if I'm honest. Major news outlets seem to conflate the names of entirely different groups - as if they were basically factions of the same thing, or all in it together. As far as sources go, this is actually the most accurate one I've ever seen outside of that article I linked above. TiggyTheTerrible (talk) 18:31, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Agreed with Orangemike on the lack of support for Gravitas being a publisher that make its documentaries RSes. As for the sparsity of sourcing that you're claiming, that's absolutely not the case. I just listed off for you eight separate, peer-reviewed papers that are currently in use at the manosphere article, and that's not even counting the book sources. I added most of those myself, and I only have access to two academic databases; there are far more out there that others who have broader access could add. We absolutely do not need to resort to poor quality documentaries due to lack of other quality sourcing; there is plenty. You have claimed that this is "actually the most accurate [source] you've seen", which seems to mean it fits your own opinions on the MRM, not that it in any way meets the requirements of WP:RS. You have also just discounted one of the academic sources as "biased" because it does not match your own definition of the MRM, despite it being a peer-reviewed paper by a professor of sociology. I'm not sure you are in a good position to be determining the reliability of sources in this topic area at all. GorillaWarfare (talk) 19:28, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

GorillaWarfare, of your eight peer-reviewed papers only two are relevant and the only one I was able to read featured multiple misconceptions and ideological statements about men's rights groups and what they want. This should not be surprising as these are Gender Studies journals you linked to - which are absolutely notorious for the poor quality of their work. The whole field has been disenfranchised in at least one country because of it. There was a prank a little while ago where some academics managed to get prominent Gender Studies journals to print Mein Kamph by changing 'Jews' to 'men' and 'Aryans' to 'women'. TiggyTheTerrible (talk) 22:23, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

You wrote on the manosphere talk page that "Only two of those even mention the men's rights movement", which I assume is what you're referring to here when you mention only two of the journals being relevant. I'll copy what I said there: Well, this article is about the manosphere, not just the men's rights movement. Some of these sources focus on the MRM, some on other manosphere groups, and some on the manosphere as a whole. I'm not sure where your claim that only two of these sources mention the MRM is coming from, unless you're only reading the titles—I'm pretty sure that every single one of these papers discusses the MRM in some capacity.

If you really want to start a discussion that gender studies journals are wholly unreliable, you can start another discussion here at WP:RSN; I look forward to replying there to that absurd claim. Otherwise we will continue to follow WP:SCHOLARSHIP. I will note that the journal you're referring to with your mention of the Grievance studies affair is not among the academic sources used in this article. GorillaWarfare (talk) 22:58, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

• Comment Could you please list what information that is being considered for inclusion if this is accepted as an RS in this situation? Arkon (talk) 19:51, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

  Information included is: who the men's rights movement are, the issues they are campaigning about, and the opposition they face. It's a good basic intro to what they say. TiggyTheTerrible (talk) 22:23, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

  Too vague for me to give a good opinion. Arkon (talk) 23:58, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

• I think the film is fine for attributed opinions and views of the films subjects, per WP:RSSELF and WP:ABOUTSELF, as long as those claims are not contentious. As far as I can see from the talkpage, the usage seems to be hypothetical. Can specific examples of sentences of where you would like to use the source be given? Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:42, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

  As TiggyTheTerrible has said above, I believe they wish to reframe the entire article and the definitions of the "manosphere", "men's rights movement", etc. based on that documentary (which would contravene every other source in the article). This is what they did in their first edit to the page: [111]. As of yet TiggyTheTerrible has not been able to find a reliable source supporting their point of view, and so is trying to get this documentary accepted as a reliable source to rebut the much higher-quality sources used in the article's current form. GorillaWarfare (talk) 23:05, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

  Not in Wikivoice, no. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:24, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

  (Conversation about the scholarly sources moved to Talk:Manosphere#Scholarly sources. GorillaWarfare (talk) 01:36, 11 June 2020 (UTC))

• Reliable Personally I think the documentary is rather surprisingly well done; it DID make me see the men's rights sphere in a different light- I still do think there are many flaws to be said, but I think the arguments were decent enough and well enough sourced. I watched it about a year ago, I remember jumping on google (lol and wiki) to fact check some of the things presented, and was surprised to see how much was true. I don't think it's all that one sided, nor dishonest. As for 'begging the question, I wouldn't agree...it used a lot of statistics and references to laws/government programs...one might disagree with the interpretation, but that's hardly assuming the truth of the conclusion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.109.150.142 (talk) 01:53, 11 June 2020 (UTC)— Note: An editor has expressed a concern that 76.109.150.142 (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. (diff)
• Attribute, do not use as proposed. It is certainly not more reliable than scholarly sources, and should 100% not be used for what TiggyTheTerrible is proposing, but it’s not plain wrong to the degree that it can not be used at all. Devonian Wombat (talk) 04:37, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable I don't understand why this is even up for debate? The documentary may present points of view that you and I may disagree with but it does not misrepresent anything. We may also both disagree with many Trans-Exclusive Radfems but we won't say that their documentaries are "unreliable" for citation in articles about Radical Feminism. hendrixski (talk) 04:45, 11 June 2020 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that hendrixski (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. (diff)

• Comment Is there canvassing happening here? It's pretty odd for an IP with no other edits (76.109.150.142) and an editor who's not edited in a year (and only edited six times in the past decade) and never previously commented at RSN or at Talk:Manosphere (Hendrixski) to suddenly show up here and argue that the documentary is a reliable source. GorillaWarfare (talk) 15:05, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

  Update: just found that a canvassing request was posted on Reddit: "The Red Pill Movie is up for review as a source. Is it reliable? Why don't you tell them (politely)" GorillaWarfare (talk) 15:16, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

  I've upgraded this discussion to an RfC to request opinions from a broader section of the community. — Newslinger talk 00:19, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Not reliable except for quotes: It's a documentary that interviews many people relevant to the topic, and so it's reliable as a source for the views of the people in it. However, it's also a documentary by one person who we have no reason to expect any particular editorial rigor from. She directed it, she's the presenter, she appears to own the production company, and it was funded on Kickstarter so she doesn't even really have any pressure to fact-check it from funders. Regardless of any slant, that alone makes it not a reliable source: it's about as reliable as any YouTube video. Loki (talk) 03:48, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Not reliable except for quotes, as above. This is basically a self published source - 'Gravitas Ventures' is a film distributor, not a publisher, and would not have filled any kind of fact checking or editing role. - MrOllie (talk) 12:24, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Not reliable - The existence of the film is significant, barely, but this isn't the same thing as being reliable. Anything the movie says which is important, quote or not, can be better supported by more reliable sources. Grayfell (talk) 01:36, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

• Not reliable - laughably unreliable, I wouldn't even use it for statements about its own content unless that particular content was noteworthy by inclusion in an RS, in which case use that. AsLokiTheLiar says, this is on the level of a self-published YouTube video with production values - David Gerard (talk) 16:44, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Not reliable as a self-published source by someone who is not recognized as a subject-matter expert. Quotes from the film can be usable as opinion if covered by a third-party RS – basically per Springee. (Ironically, watching the film pushed me more towards feminism than vice versa, but that's beside the point.) feminist | freedom isn't free 17:46, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• Not reliable of course not, there are much better available sources including scholarly ones. If an independent source considered more reliable mentions it in a particular context, it could be used to mention it. —PaleoNeonate – 07:14, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Not reliable - can use more reliable sources that talk about the film to the extent including mention of the film makes sense. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 14:30, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Not reliable seems about right here. Quite aside from issues of accuracy, there is an inherent tension between narrative pace and factual nuance. I hope we don't cite Michael Moore films either. Guy (help!) 15:46, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Use of extended quotation solely from Daily Mail on Death of Keith Blakelock

Death of Keith Blakelock (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Please see Talk:Death of Keith Blakelock for discussion of deleting or keeping an extended quotation sourced solely to the DM, including a claim that noting the DM's habit of fabricating quotes is a serious BLP violation, It's a BLP violation because you're alleging of the reporter with the byline that he makes things up. - so, more eyes would be welcomed - David Gerard (talk) 12:15, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

The discussion there has become a relitigation of WP:DAILYMAIL, to the point of pinging the RFC closers to this end. As such, I've moved the discussion here from there, pasted in below - David Gerard (talk) 11:13, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• This is, of course, not the board to discuss BLP violations - that's WP:BLPN. If this claim of a serious BLP violation is in fact a serious claim, and not just a spurious justification thrown into an argument in support of keeping the Daily Mail, I am sure it will be brought to BLPN properly. Else withdrawn - David Gerard (talk) 11:48, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• I think that the quote is overly long anyway, and I don't think its removal seriously detracts from the article. The question is whether the quote is WP:DUE. Usage of the Daily Mail was "generally prohibited" for good reason. As for the editors who are upset with the Daily Mail's removal, we saw similar drama with portals where a handful of holdout editors were strongly opposed to their removal. Can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. Hemiauchenia (talk) 12:19, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Dacre-era Daily Mail plus the context suggests that we shouldn't trust it - they have been known to fabricate quotes. Guy (help!) 13:21, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Worth noting that some of these claims seem to be almost intentionally vague and or faintly ridiculous precisely to avoid legal action. Others seem deliberately crafted to have two quite different meanings, for the same purpose. You'll never go wrong with a specific claim, as long as you're not lying, or even if you had reasonable grounds to believe it was true (thereby excluding "I read it on Wikipedia" of course). Specificity. Accuracy. Umabiguity. Should all come naturally to encyclopedia editors, or so you would have thought. Brian K Horton (talk) 05:28, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Murderpedia

This came off BLP/N, where murderpedia.org - what appears to be a site managed by one person - is used about 300 times presently on WP. [112]

For living persons, this immediately fails WP:BLPSPS. Furthermore, looking at any specific entry page, it is similar reposting key published articles about the killer/suspect from major sources, which also presents a copyvio problem when linking to them. BUT that does provide the benefit that we can replace these with the works that source cites directly. eg pulling up a random entry like [113] includes Wikipedia's entry and then a number of Times of India articles in full, which are the RIGHT sources to use instead.

So I would suggest this be a blacklisted source, and that we have these methodically removed in favor of the sources given on these pages. If this means tagging them as "deprecated" or with a tag to indicate they should be replaced and identifying the ease which they can be, so be it. --Masem (t) 15:50, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Yep, pretty much looks like an SPS, and a rather iffy one (Wikipedia as a source?). Yep, blacklist it.Slatersteven (talk) 15:52, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Support blacklisting per Masem's rationale. We should avoid linking to this site per WP:ELNEVER. buidhe 15:55, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree with blacklisting this source, anything to do with murder and BLP's is extremely sensitive and needs far better sourcing than this. Also the COPYVIO is a serious issue. Hemiauchenia (talk) 15:58, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Deprecate and blacklist - David Gerard (talk) 16:23, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Ditto everyone, thanks Masem for starting this here. --JBL (talk) 16:35, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

By the way: I guess it won't surprise anyone that the use of Murderpedia is often accompanied by the use of FindAGrave. I've been removing both when I see them. --JBL (talk) 21:09, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

For those of you who are into this kind of thing, Stephen Akinmurele has only two references: the multiple-copyright-violating Murderpedia, and the Daily Mail. --JBL (talk) 22:46, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Charming headline that Mail article ... GPinkerton (talk) 03:09, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Fortunately as I've hopefully explained, at least we know of 5 BBC articles that that specific article can at least be expanded with at minimum. But they do need to be added and sourced individually. --Masem (t) 03:42, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Blacklist. The site hosts copyright violations and its use frequently violates WP:BLPSPS. — Newslinger talk 03:50, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

  Newslinger, any examples on WP? I am completely up for this. Guy (help!) 13:13, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Murderpedia is okay for research, but we shouldn't be sourcing articles to it. FindAGrave is okay, but shoud be moved to WikiData when found.--Auric talk 21:59, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

thisismoney: just Daily Mail reprints?

I added thisismoney.co.uk as an additional URL under Daily Mail on WP:RSPDM. It self-describes as the "money section of the MailOnline" in its about page.

I just thought I should double-check here: is anything on thisismoney not just DM/MoS reprints?

(Though I'd think the "money section of the MailOnline" was sufficient to be covered by WP:DAILYMAIL.) - David Gerard (talk) 16:26, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

I would say yes, being part of something means they are covered by the rules pertaining to it.Slatersteven (talk) 16:31, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Is it not self evident that if it reprints stories from the entirely separate Mail and MoS, then it is simply untrue to say, for editorial purposes, it is governed by the same rules as MailOnline. It stands to reason that the entire point of choosing a separate brand name and domain, is to draw a distinction from MailOnline, reflecting what is, as anyone would know if they had ever picked up a copy, the fact that "This Is Money" originates from the name of the financial section of the print editions. Being part of the MailOnline would appear to only refer to the fact the MailOnline is the digital platform, and if all thisismoney.co.uk do is reprints of the print editions, it stands to reason the only involvement of MailOnline is technical support or other related activities not directly pertinent to editorial control, which presumably has to be quite strict in any financial newsroom. The City Editor of the Mail has been in post for twenty years, and for ten years before that was Financial Eitor of The Guardian. This surely contradicts everything we have been told about the reputation, culture and environment of the MailOnline by the more overtly biased sources out there, and as I have noted above, there is a notable absence from Wikipedia itself of anyone except Wikipedia being prepared to declare even the MailOnline generally unreliable. Brian K Horton (talk) 03:48, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Ad Fontes Media Bias Chart

Ad Fontes Media is an organisation founded by former patent attorney Vanessa Otero, which publishes a Media Bias chart and gives ratings to to sources similar to Media Bias/Fact Check. It has been invoked in recent discussions on this noticeboard notably Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Some_sources_should_be_promoted_for_the_sake_of_neutrality and the Fox News RfC. Their methodology can be found here, which apparently involved the rating of around 1800 individual articles and TV shows. My question is why is this source being invoked as an authority on source reliability when MB/FC is considered unreliable, as both are self published sources and as pointed out by NatGertler in the neutrality discussion above and in the Columbia Journalism Review:

Both efforts [Media Bias Fact Check and Ad Fontes] suffer from the very problem they’re trying to address: Their subjective assessments leave room for human biases, or even simple inconsistencies, to creep in. Compared to Gentzkow and Shapiro, the five to 20 stories typically judged on these sites represent but a drop of mainstream news outlets’ production.

I would like to know what other users think of this source and other self published media bias authorities. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:03, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Apparently Ad Fontes has come up before, see Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_290#Ad_Fontes_Media_and_AllSides, but that was for its use as an authority of the political position of a news outlet in article space, not to justify discussions on this noticeboard. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:10, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• Generally unreliable for the same reason as MBFC. I don't see any major differences between these two publications in terms of their reliability. buidhe 22:52, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
• Generally reliable as it's a professionally controlled project with multiple trained people on their team. They have a scientific approach and training. They are the best such site in existence. -- Valjean (talk) 00:32, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
• Generally unreliable. As with MBFC, this is an armchair analysis of media bias by amateurs and non-experts. The people who put these ratings together are random volunteers who get $100, a mug and a t-shirt.[114] Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:23, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
• Usable with attribution (as no such assessments can be an exact science): I don't personally treat it as an authority but as a good reference/guide. The project also initially started small but funding was a success and it has a team, became notable, etc. —PaleoNeonate – 07:04, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• I would not cite it on the encyclopaedia, it is a useful guide for us here to be factored in holistic assessment of a source based on multiple perspectives on its reliability. Guy (help!) 10:37, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Attribute (encyclopedia) / Minimal Weight (debates). "but a drop of mainstream news outlets’ production." resonates. Certainly doesn't imply a scientific approach, accepting the irony that "but a drop" is a very unscientific phraseology. Brian K Horton (talk) 04:30, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

deaddeath.com

deaddeath.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com

I want to ask about whitelisting a citation for the death of Mr. Wrestling II, but I can't find any mention of it in the archive for the blacklist. I want to know it's reliable, and/or why it was blocked. --Auric talk 21:55, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

• No editorial oversight and simply reprints material from elsewhere on the web, including rumours from social media. It may also copy from reliable sources, but the social media thing is clearly a no-no. Black Kite (talk) 12:55, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• Oh, and the entry for the wrestler is indeed, just copies of social media posts and a summary of his life stolen from elsewhere on the web. Black Kite (talk) 12:57, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. I decided to go with another ref.--Auric talk 13:05, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• I found this by accident yesterday. It aggregates other reports, of distinctly variable reliability, including what appears to be speculation. Basically clickbait, not a usable source. Guy (help!) 10:39, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Court sentence being used in an article on archaeology

At Iruña-Veleia an editor has twice made this edit.[115] "Despite this assertion held by the accusation, the two UPV-EHU experts committed an appreciation error, since the lines carved in the pieces are not actually letters, and no "RIP" can be inferred from them, as concluded in the June 2020 sentence.

I'm also unsure about this source (which in any case is being misused): In May 2009, prominent archaeologist Edward Harris published the conclusions of a detailed assessment of the findings in Iruña-Veleia, according to the copies submitted to him by the excavations team in charge, with the scholar examining the excavation method, recording of plan and section data, as well as the compilation and illustration of stratigraphic sequences. He concluded that the findings held true, according to the evidence provided. As you can tell by the title, it's something written "To Whom It May Concern" on a blog.[116] The author is an expert on stratigraphy (which isn't really an issue for the apparent hoax), but on a blog? In any case the blog is since a court case last week directing people to a new website[117] arguing the issue, so it looks as though both sites are not neutral about the artefacts in question. Doug Weller talk 14:26, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

The Guardian source is obviously usable, but I'm not sure for the others, especially if they're both primary and transient... —PaleoNeonate – 03:31, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

References

Gazelle - The Palestinian Biological Bulletin

Hosted either here: https://jaffacity.wixsite.com/gazellebulletin/ - or here - http://www.gazelle.8m.net/index.html - unclear which of these is supposed to be the "official" address.

This appears to be the homegrown, self-hosted, non-peer-reviewed journal of a single author (this guy). We got a heads-up from deWP about the possibly fishy status of several taxonomic descriptions (see current AfD here: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chilean blue whale) and that publication in particular [118]; unlike them we seem to have escaped getting an English article about this masterpiece, also published in the "journal". Following that, I have removed the dozen or so citations to this source that the author has inserted on enWP over the last few years.

I wouldn't have thought that there's much room for disagreement here, but since Tisquesusa just reverted me here, it appears we need to have this discussion. What bearing being hosted on Researchgate and having an ISSN number has on reliability is a bit of a mystery to me, however. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 20:01, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree. Tisquesua I'm not sure what your thinking here is. Researchgate is considered an unreliable source per WP:RSP

ResearchGate is a social network that hosts a repository of user-generated publications, including preprints. ResearchGate does not perform fact checking or peer reviewing, and is considered a self-published source. Verify whether a paper on ResearchGate is also published in a peer-reviewed academic journal; in these cases, cite the more reliable journal and provide an open access link to the paper (which may be hosted on ResearchGate).

Also the paper itself "Ornithomimid Dinosaur Tracks from Beit Zeit, West of Jerusalem, Palestine" is not relevant to the Tendaguru Formation article itself, which is in Tanzania. As far as I can tell the article is not cited in the text. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:08, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Tisquesusa has since reverted his re-adding the publication, so there's no longer an issue. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:27, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I saw; it is appreciated :) However, if a couple more people wanted to add their assessment, that would be useful. I can see this coming up again - the author is currently busy decorating lots of other language WPs, and sooner or later that journal is going to rear its head again here. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 22:31, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

@Elmidae: If it is being spammed with the intent to promote the "journal" then it should be added to the Spam blacklist, as as a publication with no effective peer review it is no better than something published in OMICS. @Headbomb: do you think that this is worth adding to your unreliable script? Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:47, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

@Hemiauchenia: Re Headbomb's ref highlighter, that already is picking it up; sole red standout on several of the pages where I removed it. Works as advertised! --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 00:01, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Photos

Wikipedians fighting over a flag on a hill none of them are prepared to die on. Actual verité, not posed at all.

It seems there is not policy (as far as I know) that forbids the use of photos published by news organisations. As plenty of people seem to think they are not RS maybe we need to write this into policy.

Should we forbid the use of photos published without accompanying text?Slatersteven (talk) 15:42, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• A photograph should never be used as a source for information on Wikipedia... however, a photograph can be used to illustrate information that is otherwise reliably sourced. Blueboar (talk) 15:48, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
  • But do we say that anywhere?Slatersteven (talk) 15:52, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
    • I do know that we have discussed the issue of images from an original research perspective (saying that an analysis of a photo by an editor would constitute OR)... and we do have WP:OI (but that talks about images created by Wikipedians, not images created by news orgs.) we may also have discussed them from a WP:COPYRIGHT perspective. I would agree that we should say something about them from an WP:V and WP:RS perspective. Blueboar (talk) 16:14, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
• As a note, using photos from media organizations on WP is prevented by WP:NFCC#2 - we do not allow photos which are meant to be purchased from press corps like Gettys to be used as they have commercial value, unless they are the subject of discussion themselves (like the flag raising on Iwo Jima). --Masem (t) 16:27, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

That is using them not citing them.Slatersteven (talk) 16:29, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Consider what if we were using graph data from a news article...We're allowed to cite graph information but in such a case I would expect that we know the source of the graph data is reliable - which might be the actual work that published it but more often is a third-party source. But in this case, we can't make any further interpretations beyond WP:CALC of graph data in the articles. (eg trying to interprete climate change data for ourselves, that would need the expert statements of what it means, but dropping a 100-yr graph of average temps going up, we can say this shows the average rising temperature over the past 100 years). Photos become more fuzzy because nearly everything about that is not hard data but interpretation that CALC doesn't apply to, and thus we have never considered them as reliable sources in discussions, but never iterated in policy. --Masem (t) 16:42, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Which is why I am asking if we should.Slatersteven (talk) 16:47, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

We should, but I think its more an NOR issue than an RS, though the source of the photo/graph/image needs to be taken into account as a first step (sourcing graph data from a questionable source isn't going to work either). --Masem (t) 17:00, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

If a picture show X its not OR to say it shows X. Thus the only issue would be its its depiction of X an RS.Slatersteven (talk) 17:38, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes, but we have to be careful because a photo can't show other things like intent or action or the like. I've seen editors try to show a photo of X and Y together (X and Y being BLP) and then assert some type of connection between X and Y that may or may not exist. And unless the origin of the photo is clearly know, other factors, like identifying a location based on landmarks, as well as potentially identifying specific persons if the image is not clear. There's almost no case I can see using an image (outside graphs) solely as a reliable point of information. --Masem (t) 18:09, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Over at millhist it crops up every so often for issues such as military decorations (well this picture shows it on his uniform (but that is usually OR anyway)) for example.Slatersteven (talk) 18:14, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Regarding the OP (which seems to be sort talking about a photo being a source) this policy creates a sourcing requirement for the presence of material, not a requirement that restricts the inclusion of sources. North8000 (talk) 16:35, 14 June 2020 (UTC) I think that Blueboar is addressing a different issue, which is that the caption of an image or sometimes the mere presence of an image in context is itself a statement which may need to be sourced. An example is that putting an image of John Smith into an article on Australians may be an implied statement that John Smith is an Australian. North8000 (talk) 16:40, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes that is what I am talking about, a lot of users seem to be under then impression that A: Photographs are not RS (like headlines) and that B: you cannot judge the RS by the quality of pictures it uses (because of A, we cannot use the picture). But this does not appear to be the case. So therefore as some users seem to think (and from their tone agree) that they should not be regarded as reliable I am asking the community should that in fact be the case.Slatersteven (talk) 16:45, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

This is just a category error. My sandwich from lunch can't be used as a reliable source, because it lacks the relevant kind of information. The same is true of photographs. People who say "in the photo one can easily see ..." are committing original research, just as if I tried to add "anyone who has a bite of my sandwich can easily tell it contains tomatoes, and is delicious". --JBL (talk) 19:49, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Online photographs are basically digital art. The art and layout departments in today's clickbait environment may not always consider potential ethical implications when using a manipulated photograph to accompany an article headline, especially when working under time restrictions in the race to beat competitors to the punch. You can also liken it to artistic license - the artists often see nothing wrong with combining elements from different digital images that took place at the same time in basically the same location. The editor-in-chief and copy editors may not even know an image was manipulated until after they go online. I retired quite early from a 30+ year career in media, but have maintained an expert level in photography, digital image enhancement and photoshopping, field & post production for online video and television, and there are times when I can't even tell the difference when the job is done well; therefore, I have no reservations in saying that images are/can be changed without us ever knowing it. I agree with Masem in that images are not a RS. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 01:11, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

There is Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Images. Images can be taken from any source, provided copyright is respected. But, "Images should look like what the are meant to illustrate." I don't know how specific the guideline needs to be. Editors should not use images to provide misleading information because of a perceived loophole in policy or guidelines, but should adhere to the spirit of the project.

I remember a case where an editor created an image of Hitler and Stalin. In fact they had never met and the photo was deleted.

TFD (talk) 01:22, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

And what if the are from an RS? How do we know an image is of what it claims to be?Slatersteven (talk) 09:28, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

If it is from a generally accepted RS we accept the image is what it is claimed to be in the RS. Anything else is OR unless its clearly and obviously a mistake (source says dress is white, dress is red in photo etc) We would not use the photo *as* a source for articles in most cases because our rules around inclusion of non-free media start to come into play. The exceptions are specifically where the photo itself is the subject of the article. This seems to be a rather specific query however, is there an example that has prompted this? If you look at the very top of this board in quite clear writing, it says in order to get an answer we need the source, the article, and the content the source is to support. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:38, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

I think this is more a meta issue than one with a specific example in mind. The question probably should have been asked at the talk page of WP:RS itself - as a preliminary to (potentially) amending the guideline - rather than here at RS/N. That said, since it HAS been asked here, I don’t see any harm in continuing to discuss it.

As I see it, the underlying question is: in terms of reliability, do we consider photos appearing in news sources as being SEPARATE from the news reporting (as we do with headlines), or are they PART of the news reporting? Blueboar (talk) 14:52, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Pictures being an instant snapshot of a situation lack context without a written description. You cant use a picture as a source for anything except the basic facts of what the picture is showing. Take Eddie Adams most famous picture. Its a man pointing a gun at another man. There are plenty of factual things about the photo you can state, but anything actually useful (where it is, why, context, who, that one of the subjects was in the midst of being executed) cannot be sourced without accompanying text. Taken in isolation you cant even say its not a still from a war movie. As a primary source a photo is reliable for the basic details of what the photo shows. In much the same way any other visual media is a primary source for its own content. So I would say they cannot be considered except as part of the reporting (except in the cases like the above where the picture is the subject itself). Only in death does duty end (talk) 07:49, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Mustang

There is currently a discussion over at the talk page for the Mustang article over whether the following footnote should be included in the article.

According to Claire Henderson, an ethnohistorian at Laval Univeristy Lakota Sioux oral history and the reports of early European explorers of the Upper Missouri River, there is a hypothesis that Equus was not completely extirpated from North America, but that the northern Plains Indians had domesticated and preserved a Tarpan (Equus ferus ferus) like horse prior to the arrival of the Europeans. (Yvette Running Horse Collin pursued this idea further in her 2017 PhD thesis The Relationship Between the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas and the Horse: Deconstructing a Eurocentric Myth). However, no physical evidence such as bones dating after 8000 B.C.E. and prior to 1500 A.D.E. have been found.

This relates to the "horse continuity theory" in the americas, the (fringe) idea that horses in Pleistocene North America are the ancestors of living mustangs, despite the lack of genetic or archaeological evidence. This theory is often found on self published pro-mustang websites and blogs. The first source is "The Aboriginal North American Horse" (which is also cited in the Horses in the United States article) a statement given in 1991 by Claire Henderson, an ethno-historian at Laval University (I have been unable to find any other information on her other than this story relating to the statement in the Chicago Tribune) the second is "The Relationship Between the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas and the Horse: Deconstructing a Eurocentric Myth" a 2017 PhD thesis by Yvette Running Horse Collin in Indigenous Studies at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Both studies have the same issues, both are arguably WP:SPS, don't have any evidence backing up their claims, only reasons to cast doubt, and rely on the oral tradition of various elders, and oral history is notoriously unreliable for long timescales. The latter paper also includes these wild quotes, among others

In keeping with the traditions of my Plains Indian ancestors, my education began with a spiritual experience I had involving a gift from an Indigenous “medicine man and woman” who lived on a New Mexico Pueblo. During a time when I was in desperate need of healing, they gifted me with two horses - a red roan mare that had been trained (according to their People’s traditions) to protect others during spiritual battle - and her four-day-old paint foal. My education continued with a vision that I experienced from my Ancestors. I gained this initial knowledge through firsthand observation, the utilization of all of my senses, and other experiential learning methods. Thus, began my role as a participant-researcher.

Scientists have discovered that horses emit “alpha waves” – the same waves emitted by humans during prayer - and they are beginning to recognize that the emission of such waves can be beneficial in treating brain injuries

I honestly was at a bit of a loss which noticeboard to post this to. I think much of the oral history (as I mentioned on the talk page) stems from the fact that horses spread much earlier into the American interior than colonists, and considering the hundreds of years that have passed this could lead to the impression that they always had horses. My own view is that neither of these sources are reliable enough to cite as an authority, even for a minority view and that the footnote should be removed entirely. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:35, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

• Absolutely not These sources are reliable for oral history saying that it is true, but the WP:WEIGHT of such claims is nothing compared to actual scientific evidence. The content should be moved to an article dealing with oral history. buidhe 20:05, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
• No horses in America before Columbus. Definitely not. Oral history and visions of the ancestors emitting equine alpha waves is exactly what it sounds like. Plains Indians had horses before Europeans reached the upper Missouri, but that was centuries after 1492 and as everyone knows horses are faster than people. GPinkerton (talk) 00:29, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• Comment this out of context discussion by an editor who is creating some drama over at the article misses the point that the existing consensus of the long-standing editors of this article agree that is it a fringe theory. However, we put it in a small end footnote because it is something that occasionally keeps being added back in. We tossed it out for some time, but it was recently put back in again, in part because of the actions of the above editor who initially appeared at the article, apparently supporting the “non-extirpation” position. In other words, the note was added to debunk thentheory, not support it. Montanabw^(talk) 06:29, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Let's just wrap this up. As MBW said, the sources were not meant to validate the fringe theory, but to acknowledge the existence of it. I've revised the section to do what I think is better job of both acknowledging and de-bunking it.Lynn (SLW) (talk) 12:31, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

• Probably not - like any fringe theory (and in fact ALL content on ENWP) in order to be included in an article it requires a reliable source to discuss/acknowledge it. If there are no reliable sources that discuss it, then it doesnt go in an article. This is how all fringe theories are dealt with. If there are reliable sources that discuss it (and usually for fringe nonsense, dismiss it) then its acceptable to include it and what those realiable sources say about it. As there doesnt appear to be any argument about the reliability of the sources used, the fringe noticeboard is probably a better place to gain consensus on if it should be in the article or not. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:49, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• This is mythology not fact, on the face of it. Guy (help!) 10:15, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
  • Precisely. But thus a mention is in order, in context, which we are trying to do. There really isn't an editing dispute here. Montanabw^(talk) 18:18, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

    Montanabw, sure. Either way, not an RS question, but a content (WP:UNDUE) question, right? Guy (help!) 18:38, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Usage of opinion articles on Epoch Times

I recently reverted a section on The Epoch Times (which itself is a deprecated source on WP) which cited three opinion articles on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's coverage of ET's peddling of conspiracy theories on COVID-19, which the editor has misrepresented as reports from Toronto Sun. Does these opinion articles constitute due weight on The Epoch Times article? [119][120][121]--PatCheng (talk) 09:02, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

You removed more than that. In the same edit you removed all of this, saying "Removed per WP:UNDUE. You cited several opinion columnists which fails WP:RS":

"On April 29, 2020 CBC reported that some Canadians was upset with Epoch Times's claim that China was behind the COVID-19. It described that the Epoch Times polarized people and advanced a conspiracy theory about the origin of the corona virus. The report noted an earlier version of the headline incorrectly stated "the Epoch Times claimed China made the virus as a bio-weapon". Since its publication, the CBC report's headline had been changed for three times. At the beginning, the headline included words 'racist and inflammatory', which was removed in the later versions of the headline.

"On May 1, 2020, an article on National Post defended the Epoch Times and argued that the corona virus did originate in China and reputable mainstream media outlets had reported the virus possibly escaped from a viral research lab in Wuhan. The article was titled with "Canada Need a better CBC". It commented that Epoch Times' suggestion that the virus could be accidentally released from a Wuhan lab does not justify CBC's hit piece and urged that Canada government should appoint serious leaders for CBC. The report said due to its extensive contacts in China, the Epoch Times has often led Western media in matters the China's Communist Party regime has tried to suppress, including the effort to cover up information about the coronavirus. The article also commented that China's Communist government quarantined Wuhan city but didn't inform WHO about the danger of COVID-19, which caused the world-wide pandemic later. Many governments in the world shared the same view with The Epoch Times that Chinese government was of "irresponsibility and dishonesty".

What's wrong with this source for instance?

And although this isn't NPOVN, I don't understand what was "undue". Doug Weller talk 09:20, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Doug Weller talk 09:20, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

You don't understand how an article section detailing three opinion pieces is undue? The series of edits looks to be an improvement to the article. There is summary text in the COVID section for Some Canadians... CBC news piece. I'd argue PatCheng did not go far enough and Some columnists defended Epoch Times' coverage of COVID-19 and noted that criticism... citing the three columns is undue and should be removed. fiveby(zero) 15:38, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

References

Now the section has "It [i.e. Epoch Times] has promoted anti-China rhetoric and conspiracy theories around the coronavirus outbreak, for example through an 8-page special edition called "How the Chinese Communist Party Endangered the World", which was distributed unsolicited in April 2020 to mail customers in areas of USA, Canada, and Australia. [cite to CBC.ca][cite to msn.com]" The msn.com cite is worthless, it doesn't say that anyone received that particular edition. The cbc.ca cite is dubious for saying "anti-China rhetoric" because, as the opinion articles point out, the opinion of a woman in Kelowna plus an anonymous postal employee isn't the same as a fact. The cbc.ca cite is also poor support for saying "conspiracy theories" because it was apparently influenced by their headline (PatCheng removed "The earlier headline also incorrectly stated the Epoch Times claimed China made the virus as a bioweapon." and later removed the cite which showed the headline). I think therefore that the stuff which cites the CBC story doesn't belong in the article, but it is also workable to point out what others think of the CBC story. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 15:14, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Peter Gulutzan, plenty of sources for this (and it happened in the UK and Ireland, too): [122], [123], [124]. What are you challenging? The fact of it being distributed or the fact of it being anti-Chinese conspiracist claptrap? Guy (help!) 10:07, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy, I do not see a way that I could make it more clear without repeating. We'll see whether other people bother to read. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 13:40, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

The /opinion/ ones can probably be left-out, but the CBC April 29 article is a good source. Normally we don't need to include undue ET responses if independent sources don't also mention them. —PaleoNeonate – 06:46, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes - we don't need WP:MANDY-level denials not covered in third party sources. Guy (help!) 10:13, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Hello , I'd like share some view

1. There are also a lot of third-party media defending Epoch Times. Different views from reliable sources should be allowed in Wikipedia per WP:NPOV.-------Here are 3 examples: 1.True North: CBC article echoes Chinese Communist Party talking points、　2. CBC targets independent news outlet for 'racism' after it reports accurately on China、3. Exposing CBC's disgraceful story attacking anti-Communist China Epoch Times
2. "Weather Virus came/leak from Laboratory?" That's not "anti-Chinese conspiracy theory" but possibilityies for truth-finding. Chinese Communist Party CCP not equal to China. CCP is a Totalitarian regime , bad records on abusing biotech and genetic Engineering, persecute Chinese people, forcely harvests organs from living Chinese Prisoner of conscience for money.

1. Epochtimes's report did not say Covid-19 "a Chinese made bioweapon".' but maybe possibilities like leaking from China laboratory. and indeed, many mainstream media international or of Taiwan, even Hong Kong(also Pro-Beijing Madia) , also reported several possibilities. Taiwanese and Hongkongner are also Chinese people, That's irrelevant to anti-Chinese conspiracy.
2. Besides many mainstream media reported about Covid-19 and Wuhan laboratory, and wheather CCP have military biotech project.for example:
   1. 2020-6-14 Canadian scientist sent deadly viruses to Wuhan lab months before RCMP asked to investigate:Amir Attaran, a law professor and epidemiologist at the University of Ottawa said "It is suspicious. It is alarming. It is potentially life-threatening," said "We have a researcher who was removed by the RCMP from the highest security laboratory that Canada has for reasons that government is unwilling to disclose. The intelligence remains secret. But what we know is that before she was removed, she sent one of the deadliest viruses on Earth, and multiple varieties of it to maximize the genetic diversity and maximize what experimenters in China could do with it, to a laboratory in China that does dangerous gain of function experiments. And that has links to the Chinese military."
   2. 2020-06-04_Ex-head of MI6 Sir Richard Dearlove says coronavirus 'is man-made' and was 'released by accident' - after seeing 'important' scientific report
   3. Taiwan's mainstream Central News Agency(a public Media owned by all people):2020-04-25_俄專家支持病毒人造論 稱中國科學家做了瘋狂事Russian experts support the theory of virus artificiality, claiming that Chinese scientists did crazy things
   4. Hong Kong's mainstream pro-Beijing Media report:2020-06-09_挪威研究稱新冠病毒部分人工製造 獲前英情報主管撐Norwegian research says part of Covid-19virus artificially , this view supported by former British intelligence director
   5. more example can be listed, also many chinese-language media reported, even pro-Beijing media in Taiwan and Hong Kong also reported some. Many expert keep the possibilities,also the USA and UK Government, and ex-vicehead(lead fight 2003 SARS) of Taiwan's DOH(Department of Health).
   6. Some media reported that France expert or China ex-officer concerned about wheather ChineseCommunistParty use the P4-laboratory for what? for risky research? for bioweapon? Many assumptions and doubts comes form--- CCP's opaque and deny international and WHO expert a field investigation in china. Wetrace (talk) 05:03, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

      IDK about the others but WP:DAILYMAIL is not an acceptable source. buidhe 06:45, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

1. 1. Thank you. Sources above not including DailyMail. In fact, many Taiwan Mainstream reported about Virus possibilities with laboratory. Wetrace (talk) 11:31, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Wetrace, those don't come across as anything close to the quality of sources that criticise Epoch Times. It's also pretty clear why a popular Taiwanese site would support the Epoch Times' anti-CPC agenda. Guy (help!) 15:25, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

The Week ( theweek.co.uk / theweek.com )

The Week is cited a couple of hundred times on Wikipedia. Is it reliable? --Guy Macon (talk) 13:07, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Falls into the same ballpark of works like The Nation; weekly politically-oriented news magazine. Typically editorial practices for such a work, and have not seen anything to suggest that they engaging in any fabrication or the like (in searching for any incidents on the web). May not be the Old Grey Mare but nothing to blemish editorial practices that I can see and when I've used them, nothing that stands out. Only small bit to note being a more central (but still left-leaning) magazine. So reliable. --Masem (t) 13:45, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

And just to note, there is a UK version and a US version, same ownership (like Wired US and Wired UK). Same rational applies to both. --Masem (t) 13:52, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

The Week isn't so much a publisher as a re-publisher.

Pieces which are "original" to The Week are composites of pieces from elsewhere. For example, a piece on Covid Lockdown in the UK is peppered with attributions:

• Britons feel betrayed, said Andrew Rawnsley in The Observer.
• This escapade has unleashed "public rage," said Rachel Shabi in Independent.co.uk.
• Johnson has sabotaged public trust, a crucial weapon in the fight against Covid-19, said Janice Turner in The Times.
• The Left wants Cummings fired because he knows how to win, said Nick Ferrari in the Daily Express.
• That’s why the prime minister won’t get rid of him, said Marina Hyde in The Guardian.

Other pieces are covered by the small print disclaimer at the foot of the final page:

Sources: A complete list of publications cited in The Week can be found at theweek.com/sources.

which leads to a list of publications and their websites with no way of linking fact to source.

In short, it's reliable, but citing The Week denies credit to the original source of the material, and falls shy of being truly verifiable. Cabayi (talk) 14:34, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

• I looked up some of the uses on obvious hot button topics. What I found was not encouraging. Articles with no bylines, listicles and the like, but also attributed comment to (e.g.) Francis Wilkinson (who he? -- ed.), whose qualification as a valid opinion appears to be that he writes opinion pieces, mainly in The Week, where he was at the time Executive Editor. Opinions are like arseholes: everybody has one. I don't see any valid reason for citing opinions form people known only for having opinions, in publications that only really publish opinions. We should strive for a more grounded approach to fact. I don't see any indicators that this is a generally unreliable source, i.e. that it makes stuff up, but I owuld say that any of the current uses I have seen should not, and probably would not, survive any challenge to removal. Guy (help!) 09:34, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Catholic News Agency

• Article: David Haas
• URL: [125] (general), [126] (article in question)

Hi folks, I don't see much discussion of Catholic News Agency on this board (it only comes up once in the archives with a tangential mention) so I'm looking for opinions on its reliability. Right now, the second link above is being used to support a claim that a BLP was accused of sexual misconduct, which is obviously an area where we want high-quality sourcing. In this case, I've looked at the primary sources they're referring to, and I believe that the article is accurately reporting that the accusations exist. I've modified the article to attribute the report to Catholic News Agency, but I'm interested in wider input on the reliability of the source, both in this case and in general. My initial read is that it's not the best source (though it does at least claim to have editorial oversight), but in this case I think using it with attribution is reasonable. creffett (talk) 13:39, 15 June 2020 (UTC) (please ping in replies)

• I think this falls into the “best used with in text attribution” category. Reporting won’t be inaccurate, but it may be one sided. Blueboar (talk) 14:14, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• According to its about page, "Catholic News Agency was founded in 2004, in response to Pope St. John Paul II’s call for a “New Evangelization." It is one of the fastest-growing Catholic news providers in the world."[127] I would say it is probably reliable for facts but obviously expresses a Catholic POV and should be combined with other sources for NPOV. When in doubt, attribute. In the case where a Catholic person is accused of misconduct I would say it's entirely usable as admission against interest. But in that case it doesn't hurt to attribute. buidhe 18:20, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
  • That doesn't sound like something that can be used as evidence of notability, though, for instance. It sounds like they haven't been caught lying - which is good, but then I think about the deprecated LifeSiteNews, which is used as an opinion outlet by Catholic hierarchy. To what extent are they hooked into that media sphere? - David Gerard (talk) 22:11, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
    • Hmm, you may be right about that. I randomly clicked on their front page and CNA describes Czechia as "a largely atheistic country", but Pew says only 25% of Czechs identify as atheists[128] ("largely secular country" would be accurate). However, CNA is probably reliable for reporting what Pell says [129] (just not WP:DUE). buidhe 23:30, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
    • It's widely cited in RS books, but mostly for quoting Catholic Church figures. buidhe 23:32, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• I would say reliable with attribution for statements by Catholic figures, handle with care for anything else, does not establish notability. Its mission is to evangelise, not to publish fact, so we should not treat it as an authority for fact. Guy (help!) 09:21, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Reliability of sources on religious texts

There is a somewhat unusual situation at Homosexuality in India and Hinduism and LGBT topics concerning the inclusion of the following text (and variants thereof):

but Rigveda says regarding Samsara that Vikruti Evam Prakriti (perversity/diversity is what nature is all about, or, what seems unnatural is also natural), which some scholars believe recognizes the cyclical constancy of homosexual/transsexual dimensions of human life, like all forms of universal diversities.

As well as the following challenging text, which is not currently present in the article:

Hindus have many sacred texts and different communities give special importance to different texts. Even more so than in other religions, Hindus also foster disparate interpretations of the meaning of various texts. The Vedas, which form the foundation of Hinduism for many, do not refer explicitly to homosexuality, but some authors claim that the Rigveda says regarding Samsara that Vikruti Evam Prakriti (perversity/diversity is what nature is all about, or, what seems unnatural is also natural), although Monier-Williams does not attest either vikriti or prakriti in the text of the Rig Veda. Some writers believe this phrase recognizes the cyclical constancy of homosexual/transsexual dimensions of human life, like all forms of universal diversities, although academic Sanskritists like Jamison & Brereton do not accept the existence of the phrase in the text, as with Sastri in the revised Vedic concordance.

In summary, in the present version of the articles, there is text asserting that the Rig Veda, an ancient compendium of Sanskrit religious poetry, contains the line "vikruti evam prakriti", which is claimed to mean "what seems unnatural is also natural", which is alleged to be a statement about homosexuality. These statements are currently sourced to this article in a popular publication , and this academic source on religion and sexuality. This text is currently being challenged on the grounds that the line "vikruti evam prakriti" does not actually occur in the Rig Veda, in support of which a number of authoritative sources on Sanskrit and the Rig Veda, which do not accept the attestation of the line in the Rig Veda, are cited, as well as searchable databases of the raw text itself. Exclusion of the challenged line and/or inclusion of text suggesting that the challenged line does not exist in the Rig Veda are both currently being rejected on the grounds that the academic sources on Sanskrit and Rig Veda are "irrelevant" because they do not specifically deal with homosexuality.

So the questions are:

1. Are the sources cited in support of the existence of the phrase (a popular publication, and an academic work on religion and sexuality) reliable in the context of making a specific claim about the existence of a phrase in a specific religious text in a specific language, where the authors are not specialists on any of the religion, the language, or the work, and where no further citations are present in those sources attributing the claim to specialist works on Sanskrit or the Rig Veda?

1. Are the sources cited in opposition to the existence of the phrase (all academic works on Sanskrit and the Rig Veda, of which several of the most salient ones are cited, which document the entirety of the Vedic corpus, according to which not only the challenged line, but even the individual words within it, are not attested in the Rig Veda) unreliable and/or irrelevant in the context of the articles in question?

Hölderlin2019 (talk) 00:55, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

References

• The text is poorly written and looks very much like a novel synthesis. Guy (help!) 09:23, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• It is WP:OR, unless the reliable sources entirely support the text. D4iNa4 (talk) 08:37, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

RfC: Crowdfunders

Should crowdfunding platforms be blacklisted, as petition sites are, with specific links whitelisted as needed? Guy (help!) 08:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Background

Petition sites are blacklisted, with specific links handled by whitelisting. This is due to widespread use of Wikipedia to promote petitions, often but certainly not always in good faith. Most uses of petition sites were of the form In (year), a petition was launched for (cause). Source: Link to the petition.

The same applies to crowdfunders, with the additional problem that they are not just asking for signatures, but actual money. Many of the links are (inevitably) to campaigns that have now ended, but even here, they are primary. Example:

On April 24th 2013 Braff started a Kickstarter campaign to finance "Wish I Was Here" which based on a script he wrote with his brother Adam Braff.

References

This was added on the day the kickstarter launched.

The scale of the problem is not small.

• gofundme.com   (123 references)
• indiegogo.com   (876 references)
• kickstarter.com   (2,973 references)

Opinions (Crowdfunders)

• Support as proposer. Guy (help!) 08:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support per Guy - David Gerard (talk) 09:10, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support – If the crowdfund is notable, then it should not be hard to find a secondary source as a reference. If there is no secondary source, then it is not notable and should not be mentioned. I also have a hard time imagining a situation in which these websites are necessary as a source for notable facts. (Perhaps as a source for self-published birth date on a BLP, but a request to whitelist will suffice in that situation.) --- C&C (Coffeeandcrumbs) 09:43, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support if crowdfund is not covered in secondary RS, we should not cover it either. buidhe 12:00, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support - We can mention the existence of a crowdfund if it is mentioned by independent reliable sources... but we should not link to it. Blueboar (talk) 12:45, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support I agree, these funding requests can become very political, very quickly. --- FULBERT (talk) 12:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support Agreed, a crowdfunding campaign on its own without secondary coverage does not establish notability. Hemiauchenia (talk) 13:12, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support seems obvious to me. Springee (talk) 14:09, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support I agree crowdfunding sites should be blocked. They are like fundraising links. You would not allow PayPal pages or links to someone's ebay page. --Althecomputergal (talk) 15:42, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support: no brainer. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:12, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose as explained below. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:52, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose But I'll explain more below - we should not be using these sites for anything notability related or similar, but once a notability threshold is reached they are fair game as equivalent to primary sources for the projects backed. --Masem (t) 20:34, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Allow in external links for crowdfunding in relation to notable subjects, per Masem. BLPs who are supported by Patreon subscriptions, for example, ought to have their crowdfunding linked. EllenCT (talk) 20:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

  EllenCT, What? Why? Why on earth would we include a link that basically says "give this person money here"? We can link the official website, and leave them to do thier own panhandling. My monthly Patreon bill for subscribed content is in excess of $100, I'm not opposed to crowdfunding, but it's not our job to drive donations to the article subject. Guy (help!) 09:06, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose for closed campaigns as per Masem's rationale but deprecate links to live campaigns, imv Atlantic306 (talk) 22:18, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

• If there is no secondary source for a crowdfunder, then it is not significant. If there is a secondary source then use it and don't link the crowdfunder. This seems obvious to me. It's the approach we take for petitions, and it is working well for that. An edit filter or revert list will not work I think: revert lists can be overridden trivially by simply reinserting the link, an edit filter set to warn will be ignored, as is the case for blogs and self-published sources (e.g. filter 894, 1045), and if set to enforce, whitelisting of individual links is obscure. The blacklist / whitelist process is well suited to handling this issue. Guy (help!) 08:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
  • This seems pretty obvious and clear - David Gerard (talk) 09:10, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• AngelList (but see discussion below)
• ArtistShare
• Community Funded
• Crowd Supply
• DonorsChoose
• Experiment
• Fundable
• Fundly
• FundRazr
• GoFundMe
• Groundfloor
• Indiegogo
• InvestedIn
• JustGiving
• Kickstarter
• LaunchGood
• Lending Club
• MicroVentures
• Patreon
• Piggybackr
• RocketHub
• Seed&Spark
• Wefunder

I think I want to create CrowdFunderFunder, a crowdfunding site to collect donations for creating new crowdfunding sites. If it works out, CrowdFunderFunderFunder... --Guy Macon (talk) 14:10, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, but how will you fund that? Guy (help!) 15:36, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps the WMF will create wikifunding. They seem to be pretty good at that sort of thing... --Guy Macon (talk) 17:10, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• @Guy Macon: AngelList is not a crowdfunding site, it has information similar to Crunchbase and is more like Linkedin. --qedk (t 愛 c) 09:57, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable. Would you be so kind as to look at Template:Crowdfunding platforms and remove any non-crowdfunding platforms you see??

{{Crowdfunding platforms}}--Guy Macon (talk) 12:24, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

for some reason, having this template expanded at the indent level was screwing up indents down the rest of the entire talk page, I've "nulled" out the expansion from above as a note. --Masem (t) 13:22, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

• I disagree with the rapid sense to treat these like change.org (which I fully agree should be blacklisted) but I do agree with waving the huge flag on their frivolous use. Hundreds of projects attempt crowdfunding, few met their goal, and fewer still of those are WP:N-notable before they get completed. But there are more than a few exceptions of projects that have been announced first through things like Kickstarter that get attention through secondary sources that we have had articles on. And where I have found the crowdfunding sites sometimes useful is in that they serve as a primary source for some information not always captured by the secondary sources but needed to properly flesh out an article. (but not documenting EVERYTHING said on the funding page). This is no different from using a development blog hosted anywhere else for some of the finer details, as long as notability has clearly been shown and we're talking filling in some of the holes rather than building the entire page off that primary source. But again, this is under limited cases, and not the common situation that these links are used for which is the promotional spam without any sense of notability. --Masem (t) 20:34, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Masem. I took the time to look through a few dozen pages with these links to get a sense of how they're used. I removed a few clearly egregious cases, but in a reasonable minority of cases I see this pattern: a secondary source describes an event/item that underwent crowdfunding, and the crowdfunding reference is placed after the secondary reference. I can see from a user's perspective why this would be useful. Jlevi (talk) 22:32, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I think Masem has a good point. Look at Ogre (board game)#Kickstarter project as one example of a legitimate citation. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:50, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

If we have to spamlist it as opposed to blacklist (so that I have to press "accept my edit" twice to reduce the "change.org"-type additions, that's fine. I understand the clear concern of when these are being added as inappropriate promotional links and this is definitely a goal I back. And I would certainly make it a RS/P item as very situational as a primary source, not for notability, only to be used in moderation when trying to be comprehensive but not "complete". (I am speaker here as having backed video and board games through KS and others, and have once in a while used those sources here to add the odd missing detail, but not to do anything close to WP:NOT#GAMEGUIDE regurgitation which is the other side of caution when allowing these.) And of course, when talking about crowdfunding, the non-funding parts of these sites are authoritative, such as KS listing out its top projects by $ amount. --Masem (t) 23:48, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Masem, OK, but look at filter 1045 (blog) or filter 869 (deprecated source). Most editors are clicking through and making the edit anyway. And a mainspace filter will not prevent people spamming crowdfunders on talk pages. Guy (help!) 09:04, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, I looked at Ogre. I tried to find a secondary source for the content currently cited to Kickstarter. Turns out to be remarkably difficult. Which is kind of my point: the two main uses are (a) active campaigns added by obvious fans and (b) primary sources for trivia. Neither passes WP:RS.

Of course most kickstarter projects ship late, some never ship at all - we both agree I think that live campaigns should not be included. How do we police that? How do we stop it on Talk pages?

With petition sites, we do link (via whitelist) a few closed petitions that have received external coverage and where the content of the petition page is of specific interest. That is exactly what I am proposing here, in fact. But for the most part the primary source is either excessive detail or an active solicitation for support, which is inappropriate IMO. Guy (help!) 09:15, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

There is a factor here that not all crowdfunding sites are the same. Whereas I trying to make sure that Kickstarter or IndieGoGo pages are still open - because a key feature of most projects there is their running devblog/progress which is the information value we want - a site like Patreon or GoFundMe is all about getting you donation and rarely provides useful info or is about anything notable in the long run. (And as this question started, if any of those types of campaigns are actually of note, they will get secondary coverage). The Kickstarter/IndieGogo pages (and I think there's a few others like this) are the ones that are the basis typically for notable commercial products, which is a key difference here, and usually that's not going to be something "personal" that will get started. You still might have people spamming links during their open campaigns to get others to help support that, which is an issue but because these usually can't be started "on a whim" like a Patreon, GoFundMe, or change.org petition, they aren't as frequent or common. That might be a key distinction to think about here. --Masem (t) 13:43, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

• Masem, crowdfunding is indeed a notable thing. We should certainly include it when mentioned by secondary sources. What we should not do is include links to crowdfunding projects, for exactly the same reason that we don't link to petitions. When I have gone through and found the original addition, almost all appear to have been added while the campaign was active. This seems to me to be a serious problem. Guy (help!) 09:00, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

  Some crowdfunding projects gain notability while they are active in the month or so (And then you have something of the situation like Star Citizen which has been in a perpetual crowdfunding situation since 2013, but let's call that one the outlier). In some cases (and these are cases I've edited on so I can speak to it), these are easily tied to existing topics - the Mystery Science Theater 3000 revival passed its goal quickly but that was easy to already tie to a notable topic (the original show). Surprisingly at the end of the day, the only time I ended up linking to the kickstarter was to provide a snippet of information about the ORIGINAL show that we didn't have before that came during the project updates during the campaign period from the show's creator. A separate case would be the example of Broken Age which when it launched as a KS in Feb 2012 was just known as Double Fine Adventure, and at the time because one of the highest-funded projects and gained significant attention to a point that it was clearly notable whether or not it ended up being made (in part because the team behind it was already a known factor ( eg state of the article about 2 weeks after the start of funding) Now, at this point, we hadn't had to link to KS, the only link being the one in the External Link, because the secondary sources were covering it well, but my point is that can be crowdfunded projects that are notable or tied to notable topics that we may need to touch on the updated and informational pages that most crowdfunding sites use for keeping the crowdfunding supporters up-to-date on the project as primary sources. Additions where they are used to build out details that we would expect for contemporary works like development (conception, influences, behind-the-scenes, etc.) are useful, and this is where I'm worried the action here is potentially cutting those off. But in both cases, and in general, these were only included until after secondary sources established that crowdfunding was going on (and in the latter case, enough to establish independent notability). I fully agree that if first mention of any project is by the inclusion of the crowdfunding link, particularly while it is actively, is more an attempt to draw people to participate in it, not to use for informational purposes, but that's not the only use of crowdfunding sites for WP's purposes. --Masem (t) 13:18, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

  To add and stress: the cases I only started adding significant information on the crowdfunding efforts in these examples and others was after the project was clearly past its target goal well before the end of the project (these two examples were within days of the start of the campaign) Obviously, this is a key factor for notability. --Masem (t) 13:32, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

  Masem, I do not disagree at all. I just don't think we should be using the primary source, or indeed allowing users to publish links to crowdfunders on talk pages. The crowdfunder pages are SPS and primary and almost by definition promotional. Guy (help!) 14:13, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

  SPS nor primary sources are not immediately disallowed by any policy (though obviously can't be used in some situations like BLP), and whether the links are used in a promotional fashion or not all depends on context where it is being used. There are some of the crowdfunding sites that you listed like Patreon that I cannot see any other use but promotional in any article because of how that is setup, whereas a Kickstarter project's use is going to depend how its incorporated - just dropping a link off on talk and saying you should back this is clearly promotion, while dropping the link off and saying there's some details on the project's inspiration that can be added is a good use, and something we'd not want to block. Now I fully agree that I'd rather pull that info from a secondary/third-party source repeating the information from the crowdfunding page, but that's not always possible. --Masem (t) 14:42, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

• I have no problem with MENTIONING a crowdfunding campaign in an article. The concern is with LINKING to it. Linking seems promotional in nature rather than informational. Blueboar (talk) 12:48, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

It seems to me that linking to a crowdfunding campaign that...

• is closed and no longer accepts money, and
• is the origin of a product or service notable enough to have a Wikipedia article

...is not automatically promotional. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:49, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, well, it's primary and self-published, but it's also a marketing communication, isn't it? Guy (help!) 14:15, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Some certainly are. But the story in Ogre (board game)#Kickstarter project documenting how the game morphed from a tiny game in a zip lock bag that fits in your pocket to a massive box -- far larger than any board game I have ever seen -- because so many people donated is an interesting story, and the huge size (but not necessarily how it got that way) has been noted in multiple reviews of the game. Seeing as how they sold out of them and have no plans for making any more, it is hard to see how at this point that particular kickstarter page is promotional. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:55, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon, yes, it's an interesting story. Is it covered in any secondary sources that make this point? Guy (help!) 15:21, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Owler

Does anyone have views on the reliability of Owler? Our article about the site explains that the content is crowdsourced, and I wonder whether it fails WP:USERGENERATED, which was also my concern when looked at the site itself. My query is prompted by this edit by Steinythefirst. Cordless Larry (talk) 12:41, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I noticed this too, as the user has been using it as a (naked) ref for company stats on a lot of pages. I don't think that it meets guidelines for a reliable source; there's no provenance or verifiability of the data. I'm going to ask the user to stop adding it to pages until we work this out and decide if it should be removed from all pages. tedder (talk) 15:56, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• Doesn't look as if it meets RS. Guy (help!) 16:15, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• In general offering “competitive insights” doesn't mesh well with good journalistic practices, the crowdsourced part is just the icing on the cake and due to that I would consider them even less reliable than a normal business information service. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 17:17, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Is it a problem that Wikipedia's own article on the Mail doesn't seem to justify depreciation as a source?

WP:NOTFORUM

Is it a problem for Wikipedia's editors that the Wikipedia article on the Daily Mail doesn't seem to support a claim that they are generally unreliable (without having to synthesise a conclusion from the disparate examples offered)? And worse, the claim that the Mail has been "widely criticized for its unreliability", appears to be misrepresentation at best, fabrication at worst, once you actually examine the sources given to support it (accepting one is an offline source that I cannot check right now. Brian K Horton (talk) 17:29, 16 June 2020 (UTC) If you have complaints about the Daily Mail article the best place to take them is Talk:Daily Mail. One of the reasons that the Daily Mail was depreciated was that it its use in Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons articles, which require high quality sourcing was unacceptable due to its sensationalism, and history of falsehoods. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:36, 16 June 2020 (UTC) This isn't a complaint about the article, nor was I seeking a reason for the depreciation, only an opinion on the dissonance between the article and "history of falsehoods", if indeed you even see one in this context. Do you see one? Brian K Horton (talk) 20:46, 16 June 2020 (UTC) NO as we are not an RS.Slatersteven (talk) 17:37, 16 June 2020 (UTC) Interesting way to look at it. Doesn't really excuse deliberate acts however, only accidental or excusable failures to ensure Wikipedia is as reliable and neutral as it can be, in both its content and decision making, within the limitations of a volunteer workforce.Brian K Horton (talk) 20:46, 16 June 2020 (UTC) Its also not a question of the DM reliability so much as how an article is written. Remember Wikipedia is user written, so at any given time any given page may not be an accurate reflection of the subject. Nor can we police every article for accuracy, we rely on the competence of our fellow editors. All this shows is the DM article needs work.Slatersteven (talk) 09:03, 17 June 2020 (UTC) Also (unless the article has been significantly altered in the last 24 hours) there is plenty about its "unreliability, as well as printing of sensationalist and inaccurate scare stories of science and medical research, and for copyright violations".Slatersteven (talk) 09:06, 17 June 2020 (UTC) As the others have said, it is not our place to go into the evidence behind the scenes (that no RS I've seen discuss directly) of why WP decided to depreciate DM, but that did lead me to find and add Jimbo's support for this move [130]. But back to the key point, if you can find a RS that discusses specific points of the 2017 debate on the DM deprecation discussion , we can include those highlights, but most stories just said "WP deemes DM unusable" and that's how we have to present it to the mainspace. --Masem (t) 20:55, 16 June 2020 (UTC) You got the wrong end of the stick entirely. This is not about how the article covers the debate that led to depreciation, it is about the surprising lack of any other support of the claim in the article, and what this might say about the methodology and the people behind it. Brian K Horton (talk) 02:37, 17 June 2020 (UTC) No, I understand you want to have discussion of what sources and information that led the internal discussion to deprecate DM, but as I said, there's no external reliable sources that cover those deals, and we don't use WP as its own source here. The process is there if anyone wants to go review the history itself, it's not like it was conducted behind closed doors, we're just not going to incorporate it as an unreliable source into our article. --Masem (t) 03:10, 17 June 2020 (UTC) You haven't understood me at all. Not even a little bit. And I think I should know, it was me who asked the question after all. Brian K Horton (talk) 04:19, 17 June 2020 (UTC) If you’re not satisfied that the article Daily Mail covers its controversies and RS assessments of its journalistic standards, that’s an issue to raise at Talk:Daily Mail. If you believe that Daily Mail shouldn’t have been deprecated, that’s an entirely different matter. If neither apply and you just want to opine about its deprecation, then this discussion isn’t appropriate for WP. — MarkH21talk 04:31, 17 June 2020 (UTC) When assessing a publication's reliability on this noticeboard, editors are not limited to using content that is cited in the Wikipedia article on the publication. — Newslinger talk 01:33, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

The Siberian Times

The Siberian Times is an english language web news site founded in 2012, dedicated to the Siberian region. It has been cited around 120 times on wikipedia according to siberiantimes.com  . Mashable describes their reporting as: "These stories are allegedly real with a bit of hyperbole/Siberian fan fiction thrown in. According to Meduza, despite being edited by a Russian woman, the site is the brainchild of Will Stewart, who, as proprietor of East2West Limited, is responsible for the vast majority of the sensationalist and often false stories about Russia in the British tabloid press, including the Mail, Express etc. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:48, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Not an RS.Slatersteven (talk) 17:50, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

HowStuffWorks

HowStuffWorks (not to be confused with the excellent The Way Things Work) is a website that describes itself as a "...source of unbiased, reliable, easy-to-understand answers and explanations of how the world actually works." It has been cited on Wikipedia over 3,000 times according to howstuffworks.com   The site has been around since 1997, it has only been briefly discussed on this noticeboard twice before in 2009 and 2011, alongside some other tangential discussions. I can find few secondary sources on the site other than a discussion of its editorial policy from 2008. In my opinion the HowStuffWorks is a mid quality tertiary source, it's not a terrible low quality clickbait site, but that it is a lower quality source than Britannica, similar to the stories on history.com, and its medical content should not be cited at all per WP:RSMED. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:18, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I glanced through a dozen or so of their articles. My impression is that their article quality varies widely, and seems to be mostly due to the freelance contributions. When one of their articles identifies sources, it may be better to use the sources instead. --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 22:06, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree, I've seen much worse sites but it isn't great either. There isn't really a good reason to cite it in most cases. Wikipedia should generally not cite tertiary sources unless they have a good reputation for accuracy (like Britannica), but even then sparingly. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:14, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

• If HowStuffWorks is the only source for a statement I am highly doubtful of it. Therefore, uses should be replaced by more reliable sources. buidhe 22:24, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

U.S. News

Is this news agency, U.S. News & World Report, a reliable source? A recent article piece this by U.S.News claims "Indian government sources speaking on the condition of anonymity told The Times of India that 20 Indian army personnel had died in the fighting", where as in reality there is anonymous source, Army itself released statement of 20 personnel KIA which all medias have covered. It seems presenting the article as investigative journalism success. Again it claims, "American intelligence believes 35 Chinese troops died, including one senior officer, a source familiar with that assessment tells U.S. News" where as for such casualty report there is no need to hide anything, US House of Foreign Affairs/Pentagon/CIA never support such claim, above that which assessment, who are doing this, nothing is mentioned neither Indian Govt./Army support such claim. No other US sources like of NYT, WP, CNN which will be the first to receive such infomration do not claim such. So, again is this particular article a reliable source? Drat8sub (talk) 15:54, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Can't find anything in archives which would indicate that this is not a reliable source. There is no need for sources to reveal their actual identity as long as the news has been published by a WP:RS and US news meets definition of WP:RS. --Yoonadue (talk) 16:16, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

No this was not the case here. The first claim is manupulating the veracity of the second claim. They have written "anonymous source from Indian Govt. that 20 personnel KIA", ofcourse no need of revealing identity. But when someone read more online they will find out that this claim is true because Army has revealed the same, thus this gives a notion for the readers that as the first claim by anonymous source comes out to be true then the second claim by anonymous is also true, does not matters if any Govt./Army source provide such or not. the problem lies there. Drat8sub (talk) 16:31, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

It may be simply a time factor; it's hard to check exact when who knew what, when things were published, etc. It would not be surprising if USN&WR got their information and published first, then the Army got theirs and other RSes published that. In such a case, where we have information via way of an intermediary source as in these cases, it can be preferable to use the more "reliable" intermediary source (a named official over an anonymous one) and the reliable source that backs that, but that does not impact the reliability of the source using the weaker intermediary source overall. US News remains a high quality source for such things. --Masem (t) 16:45, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Agree with Masem... there may be sources that are MORE reliable for a given bit of information, but that does not make US News UNreliable. As is always the case when covering recent events, as updated information comes in we need to update our article. And that may mean we need to switch the sources we cite. That does not make the old source “bad”... just the new source “better”. Blueboar (talk) 17:06, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

• One of the better and less partisan US news sources imo. buidhe 21:57, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
• As far as I am aware, this is one of the few news sources that just quietly gets on with doing its job without really getting involved in the punditry business. Guy (help!) 12:10, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Clinical practice guidelines or not? (Medicine)

http://www.indianjpsychiatry.org/article.asp?issn=0019-5545;year=2020;volume=62;issue=8;spage=280;epage=289;aulast=Subramanyam Subramanyam 2020] states "clinical practice guideline" at the top. I would like to be sure on the reliability for WP:MEDRS which states clinical practice guidelines as one of the best sources. It is in broadly in keeping with what I found found elsewhere although I am not familiar with the authors or journal. There is only one other practice guideline I am aware of on this topic. Amousey (they/them pronouns) (talk) 20:59, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Amousey, this is a MEDRS question, please ask at the medicine wikiproject. Guy (help!) 17:01, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Taiwan News Online

Is Taiwan News reliable? I hear that it is very biased against the CCP but I want to gather insight from more Wikipedia editors. Website: [131] ɴᴋᴏɴ21 ❯❯❯ talk 21:55, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

It would be striking if it were not opposed to the CCP. The layout seems to be normal for Asian news websites, and Google shows some citations by other sites but none by what I would accept as gold standard sources. So: a definite maybe from me ;-) Guy (help!) 12:08, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Generally reliable, Taiwan News is generally reliable with the exception of coverage of companies within the same corporate group as them (primarily an issue with I-Mei Foods which tends to be overly fawning), I would always defer to independent sources in that situation if there is a conflict. I would also take care with pulling words/language directly from them without attribution, its often a bit verbose and Taiwanese english is a bit heterodox at times (they also have a habit of going with the most provocative yet accurate translation of mandarin to english, they stay within the bounds of accuracy unlike say MEMRI but its definitely skewed towards the provocative). This is not an issue unique to them though, we see the same thing in Indian WP:RS regulary and we see the opposite in Japanese WP:RS (they choose the least provocative translation). I also think we need context for why this is being discussed here, you hearing that they’re biased against the CCP doesn’t necessitate a RSN discussion and even if true bias (especially against a group as objectively evil as the CCP) is ok in reliable sources on wikipedia. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 19:10, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Steven Tibble

I would like to refer to Steven Tibble's following books in articles about the crusades:

• Tibble, Steven (2011) [1989]. Monarchy and Lordships in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, 1099-1291. Clarendon Press. ISBN 978-0-19-822731-1.
• Tibble, Steven (2018). The Crusader Armies: 1099-1187. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-21814-5.

His first work (Monarchy and Lordships in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, 1099-1291) is cited, for instance, in the following works:

• Hamilton, Bernard (2005) [2000]. The Leper King and His Heirs: Baldwin IV and the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-64187-6. - he thanks Tibble for drawing his attention to certain events, but also emphasizes that he does not share Tibble's all conclusions (p162)
• Jotischky, Andrew (2017) [2004]. Crusading and the Crusader States. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-138-80806-5. - he mentions that Tibble "extensively" analyzed "the lack of continuity among baronial families" during the first decades of the Kingdom of Jerusalem (p69)
• Barber, Malcolm (2012). The Crusader States. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-11312-9.

His second work (The Crusader Armies: 1099-1187) is cited by Nicholas Morton - a lecturer in History at Nottingham Trent University. Morton writes that Tibble's work contains "many thought-provoking arguments" (Morton, Nicholas (2020). The Crusader States and Their Neighbours: A Military History, 1099-1187. Oxford University Press. p. 4. ISBN 978-0-19-882454-1.). I must emphasize that Morton's book was published by the Oxford University Press. As Iridescent made it clear twice, this publishing house also published books like Emil's Clever Pig and Slayer Slang: A Buffy the Vampire Slayer Lexicon - so I may make a new mistake when referring to his work to verify the use of Tibble's book.

I seek your advice on Tibble's books, because he "is not an historian but works in PR and communications" as Norfolkbigfish emphasized when I wanted to refer to Tibble's first book (Monarchy and Lordships in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, 1099-1291) in an article. I do not want to begin an edit war on the use of these two books of possibly low scholarship. Thank you for sharing your thoughts on the reliability of Tibble's books. Borsoka (talk) 05:26, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

(responding to ping) I have no opinion on this particular author as I know nothing about the author other than what's on his website; my concern (explained at greater length here) is with the apparent misconception that publication by the Oxford University Press confers notability. OUP is a commercial publisher owned by Oxford University as opposed to the publishing arm of Oxford University, and as such publishes everything from sheet music to picture books for toddlers; books published by OUP have to be evaluated on the basis of their individual merits, the same as we would with a book from Penguin, Macmillan etc. ‑ Iridescent 09:14, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Which Steven Tibble is it? Because if its Dr Steve Tibble, he maybe but with attribution. I am seeing a lot of good reviews.Slatersteven (talk) 09:22, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

This one. ‑ Iridescent 09:27, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

According to my experiences, editors who have actually read academic books about the crusades have no doubts about the reliability of Tibble's works. However, my experiences are limited. Two editors who are obviously more experienced than myself, Norfolkbigfish and Iridescent, challenged Tibble's reliability. Borsoka (talk) 10:05, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Editors are not RS. I see nothing to say these are not perfectly respectable book on the subject.Slatersteven (talk) 10:15, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

• Short of delving into academic debates on which I am certainly not qualified to comment, those books appear to me to meet RS handily. Reputable publishers, cited by others. As to how much to rely on them, that's a due weight question. Guy (help!) 12:04, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

There are multiple reviews of Tibble's first book on JSTOR, which in summary comment that there is some good work but also some significant weaknesses. Probably to be expected of what was effectively Tibble's PhD thesis. PW Edbury writes This book contains rather too many trivial errors : for example, Tibbie ought to have known that RRH no. 276 is a forgery (p. 86) ; that Walter of Caesarea does not appear as constable of Cyprus in 1206-we have to wait until 1210 (p. 127); and that it was Hugh and not "Henry" of Antioch Lusignan who contested the alienation of Sidon (p. 174). The form "Ch?teau P?lerin" is more bizarre. Furthermore in his statistical analysis of land-holding in the lordship of Caesarea and in some of his ex nihilo arguments, Tibbie lays his methodology wide open to criticism. The point, however, is this. Despite all the detailed shortcomings in his argumentation, the conclusions he reaches are, I believe, essentially valid. Many previously accepted opinions must now be jettisoned; our understanding of the history of the kingdom has advanced considerably. Also Tibbie is strongest on the pre-1187 period. He gives little attention to the question of how the loss of territory and the partial reoccupation after 1187 affected the pattern of land-tenure and seigneurial authority. Nor does he consider the two major thirteenth-century creations, the reconstituted county of Jaffa as held by a branch of the Ibelin family from the mid-1240s and the de Montfort lordship in Tyre, and these omissions may mean that the impression he gives of the situation in the closing period of the kingdom's history is seriously distorted.

Peter Jackson writes At times the perspective appears a trifle narrow, as during the discussion of a grant to Balian of Beirut of an estate in the royal domain at Acre by King Henry I of Cyprus, in his capacity as regent (1246/7). To say that 'there is no reason to suppose that Henry's motives ... were anything other than a desire to offer financial support to a hard-pressed vassal' (p. 79) is to ignore Henry's precarious claim to the regency and his own need for support. The suggestion that John of Ibelin was given Beirut by his step-sister Queen Isabella on its recapture in I197 (p. 90), moreover, is actually contradicted by the charters, in none of which is John entitled dominus Beriti prior to 1206, when Isabella was dead. Such minor quibbles apart, however, this is an important work which makes a valuable contribution to the history of the Latin East.

James Powell writes in his reading am concerned that the book's view is so limited that it will require considerable tion as a result of additional research. First of all, the author has been overly his predecessors in his approach to the institutions of the Latin Kingdom. He talizes feudal lordship in a way that excludes numerous other elements, most Italian maritime communes, from consideration as factors in the equation he establish. While he includes the military orders, his discussion of the role of pears to lack coherence. Certainly, relations between church and monarchy shape relations between the kings and the nobles. Even the question of economic is more elusive than the author seems to suggest. The assumption that, if the poor, the crown was wealthier and able to control them, is weakened not merely dence presented so convincingly concerning the growth of the power and military orders, but also by questions regarding the overall economic strength Kingdom. We need to know whether it was a viable economic entity, able to sustain a sub- stantial local military organization. If lordships were weak, was the monarchy in a position to gain significant advantage or did it too have problems?

As far as I can tell the second work hasn't been accademically reviewed. Tibble has been working in Public Relations since completing his PhD at Royal Holloway in 1982. His approach is indebted to the pioneering work of John LaMonte (Feudal Monarchy in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem) who argued that "a vigorous nobility exercised effective control over an emaciated monarchy." Recognizing that this picture has been substantially modified in the work of Joshua Prawer, Jean Richard, and Jonathan Riley-Smith.... As he has been outside academia he doesn't seem to have published any peer reviewed articles. His works would seem to be interesting, informative and useful but open to challenge on both fact and analysis by academic historians, particularly those who specialise in the field. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 15:42, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Norfolkbigfish, which is an undue weight question. Guy (help!) 16:58, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

JzG, 100% agree Norfolkbigfish (talk) 17:44, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

RfC: An Phoblacht

Is anphoblacht.com   (369 uses—party organ of Sinn Féin) reliable? It is used as the only source to support content such as "In late May, a physical altercation between protestors and the police, involving more than 8,000 coal miners, involved demonstrations on a march to the federal capital, Madrid." (Anti-austerity movement in Spain) and "The bombing killed 12 bystanders and severely injured many more. Barrett was arrested with several others in a wide ranging sweep of sympathisers with the Irish Republican cause and was the only one found guilty." (in Michael Barrett (Fenian)) buidhe 09:31, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Responses (An Phoblacht)

• My personal opinion is that it's a republican propaganda outlet and should be: deprecated for anything related to the Troubles, generally unreliable for facts, attributed opinion is undue unless discussed by third party sources. buidhe 09:31, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Not an RS, as this is not an independent source but an actual party political publication.Slatersteven (talk) 09:37, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

• It's reliable as to the politics and strategy of the RM at that point in time, and for their own self-analysis, but not for external reporting. Certainly wrt the examples above, it seems unlikely that the information cited wouldn't be found in another reliable source. ——Serial ^# 09:41, 18 June 2020 (UTC)
• Reliable as a source for official statements from Sinn Fein and for de facto official statements from the IRA (yes, I know they deny the connection, but they'd never have printed anything claiming to be an IRA statement without clearing it with the Army Council), but not as a source for news reporting in general. ‑ Iridescent 09:54, 18 June 2020 (UTC)
  • I disagree with the last part, if they deny any connection we cannot claim there is.Slatersteven (talk) 10:00, 18 June 2020 (UTC)
• Looks to be basically a SPS, reliable for attributed statements of the party but otherwise not so much. Guy (help!) 12:01, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Muraselon

Is Muraselon.com a reliable source? It is used for articles about the Syrian Civil War, such as Northwestern Syria offensive (April–August 2019),2017 Mayadin offensive, 2018 Syrian-Turkish border clashes, Afrin offensive (January–March 2018). My personal view is that it is a pro-government blog and not a reputable news source. I think its use is because details of day to day advances and retreats in various Syrian battles are not reported in many reliable sources - but to me this suggests the details are not noteworthy and if Muraselon is the only source it's not worth including. I would welcome other views. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:10, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

This reads more like wp:undue than an RS question. Bias is not an issue, accuracy is.Slatersteven (talk) 11:11, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

We mostly determine weight from coverage in RS though. Alpha3031 (t • c) 12:53, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, to be clear my main question is: is this source reliable? I only mentioned noteworthiness as sometimes I see a defence of such self-published sources that reliable sources don't cover the same level of detail. Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned that as muddies the water. Thanks. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:57, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

As I said bias is not an RS issue, so any evidence they fake stuff?Slatersteven (talk) 13:41, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Electrek, one more time

Apologies for reviving discussion of Electrek again, but contrary to Lklundin's point that Electrek's staff are divested from Tesla in terms of investing, it was brought to my attention that Fred Lambert yesterday admitted some 30% of his stock portfolio is in Tesla: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EawUtBGXgAAZ0FJ?format=png&name=900x900. If the editor-in-chief of a publication is heavily invested in a company that his website is "reporting" about, that certainly calls into question whether the publication should be allow to be considered a reliable source on Wikipedia. QRep2020 (talk) 17:37, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes I would say that is a COI.Slatersteven (talk) 17:39, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

As the one who noted Lambert's comment I would agree that Electrek has a serious COI issue with respect to Tesla reporting. This COI has been noted by other automotive sources. If we look at the Tesla page there are 37 citations to Lambert alone, 49 to Electrek. I suspect most are rather innocuous facts or announcements from Tesla (Tesla says they will do X). However, it is clear that Tesla has used sympathetic newsish sites like Electrek to make sure Tesla's preferred narrative goes out to the public. In the worst cases there have been accusations that "leaked" emails were deliberately feed to Electrek or others to bypass SEC laws relating to corporate dissemination of information. With such a COI it's hard to say if some news story is DUE because it was covered by Electrek or not (Tesla "paid" for their preferred story to run). Electreck hasn't been 100% on Tesla's side. They recently ran an article a critical article relating to Tesla quality. Also, Electrek is often quoted by non-critical news stories. As such I'm not sure how best to handle it. Clear COI but cited by others. Personally I would suggest going with a bit of a custom approach. I would trust it for basic statements of fact/quotes. I would assume their editorial judgement is effectively purchased thus treat the site more like a notable blog. As such reporting by Electrek shouldn't establish WEIGHT and the site shouldn't be used as a source of reliable commentary etc. Springee (talk) 18:47, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Here's my outsider opinion, from someeone who is pretty familiar with Electrek and has been semi-closely following Tesla news for years now. Even if Electrek didn't have any COI with Tesla, they shouldn't be treated as an RS regardless. It's true that Electrek sometimes publishes articles critical of Tesla. However, I'm sure that when they do so, lots of other more reputable sources are reporting on similar things. IMO Electrek should only be used for truly basic information (on XX/YY/ZZZZ Tesla/Musk said ABC). Aside from that it should be attribution-only - no "Wikipedia voice".

• I feel Springee’s “custom approach” is pretty brilliant and appropriate given the atypical circumstances. I think the publication at its core is a good one and the Tesla bias is their only real stumbling block (reliable sources describe them as a "notably pro-Tesla publication”[132]). Its also an issue that should be less problematic in the future when the electric car market is more diversified, this is such a big deal right now in COI terms because at the moment most electric car coverage can be summed up as “Tesla and the rest." Horse Eye Jack (talk) 18:57, 18 June 2020 (UTC)