Talk:Battle of Idlib (2015)

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Twitter as source[edit]

I want to query this edit which says that "Peto Lucem" on Twitter and Hassan Ridha on Twitter are reliable sources, as well as the general issue of using Twitter as a source. I don't think Lucem is particularly reliable; he's obviously extremely partisan. Ridha might be better. But both of them are essentially random people who tweet, just like I am. They don't work for a news organisation or research institution of any sort. They may be accurate, but as encyclopedia we can't rely on them. If what they mention is noteworthy, then it should be picked up and reported by reliable sources. A tweet by, say, Elijah J. Magnier, is more robust, because he is accountable as a non-anonymous individual who works for a news organisation. But even this is questionable, as if what he mentions on Twitter is reliable he would write it up in an article, following his publication's editorial guidelines around his sources. The tweet has the status of a primary source. I'm not saying what these tweets report is false, just that we can't accept it as true in our own voice. We need to seek corroboration from secondary sources. I think it is appropriate, therefore, to include this material in the article, but with a better source tag so we know it needs additional sources to be confident. BobFromBrockley (talk) 13:46, 9 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]