Wikipedia:Content noticeboard/Archive1

Purpose of this forum

Perhaps we should start by stating the purpose of this forum and what will not be accomplished here.

It is my understanding that it would be a good idea to have a central location for FA, GA, and article content editors to have a place for discussing their issues with writing, copy editing, sources, and the various nomination and promotion procedures.

I don't think it would be a good place to ask for copy edits if articles are poorly constructed or clearly need substantial assistance that goes beyond grammar and spelling tweaks. Nor do I think this is the place to solve content disputes in contentious topics. However, occasionally editors ask for changes in articles of high quality that go against the GA or FA criteria. This may be the place to clarify such protests.

Thoughts? --Moni3 (talk) 19:14, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 19:18, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

This seems like an excellent idea!  iMatthew :  Chat  19:15, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

This seems like an interesting idea, but I'm not clear on what the scope of this is intended to be, and the interaction with other notice boards such as WP:RS/N and WP:OR/N and the talk pages of various content policies/guidelines. From the description above, it sounds like it's basically about style issues? Anomie⚔ 21:05, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

I was thinking it would be more for actual content building rather than cosmetic issues. As far as I know we don't yet have a noticeboard where you could ask, "Is this article well-written", or "Where can I find info on X?". –Juliancolton | ^Talk 21:15, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Please keep in mind that it's so new that the only thing dictating what this forum is for is basically right here. Style issues, copy editing, where and how to find sources, the GA and FA and other article assessment processes, general assistance about the quality of content, non-free image violations, plagiarism and copyvio problems, are all within a reasonable scope for this noticeboard. Outside of this noticeboard's scope would be topics better covered by other noticeboards or issues needing admin attention. --Moni3 (talk) 21:18, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I was confused by the statement above that it wasn't for copy editing or content disputes, which didn't seem to leave much left. So, for example, asking for help figuring out a FUR to prevent a non-free image from being deleted (when there obviously is a rationale, but I just can't figure out how to word it) would be a good use of this board? BTW, plagiarism and copyvio problems are covered by Wikipedia:Copyright problems. Anomie⚔ 21:35, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

There may be overlap to be worked on as the board progresses. There is a non-free content board, a peer review process, and a plagiarism board. A use for this board as opposed to others is if I come here with an article I am writing from the ground up and have a question about a passage I'd like to have in the article (as opposed to an entire article that may be copied from another source), your example about how to word a fair use rational or be urged not to use the image, or very general comments on how to improve an article from editors who may be momentarily stuck. I've asked a few places how to use sound snippets and have not yet gotten a response I can use. I am having a particular difficulty finding contemporary criticism on popular music in 1959 and 1963, and I'm beginning to think it doesn't exist. I'd like to find a source that says that, though. I could ask here when the board gets more active, hoping someone can point me in the right direction. I have access to a ginormous library, but have taught myself how to use it. --Moni3 (talk) 22:03, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Frankly, I don't know that this board will work, Moni. I usually don't fight Occam's Razor, and so far you got Barack Obama, conspiracy, and a minor but highly factional linguistic fight. Wishing all good for you, naturally. JJB 23:40, 13 Jun 2009 (UTC)

Kinks get worked out all the time on Wikipedia, hence all the noticeboards. Sometimes painfully and sometimes not. Hoping the initiation of this noticeboard will not be painful. --Moni3 (talk) 23:42, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

When is a fact a fact?

Recently I have been faced with the question how the following line When using sources written by authors who are a reliable experts in the field in which they are writing, consider using the facts mentioned by them rather than making direct attributions of their opinions. Facts do not require in-text attribution since they are not solely the opinions of people. from Wikipedia:Fringe_theories#Particular_attribution is to applied in relation to When establishing events or actions, reference should be made to a reliable source. as dictated by Wikipedia:CONTROVERSY#Attribute_facts as well as the quote of Jimbo: If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts; given in Wikipedia:NPOV#Undue_weight. This has come up in a controversial article and I am not quite sure what the appropriate synthesis of the above mix of guidelines and policy would be. Unomi (talk) 19:14, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps I have asked this question the wrong place? Unomi (talk) 19:19, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Don't know about wrong place, but certainly a new place that anyone who has not been paying attention to MfD or various other forums may not yet know about. No expert on hand surgery should have to be cited to say that it's his opinion that humans have five fingers on each hand. No mathematician should have to be consulted to affirm that there are seven days in a week. I think you might have to give an example here to illustrate your point. --Moni3 (talk) 19:41, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

As it is not easy to compare apples and pears, I should probably just link to the argument in question.

Even linking to the discussion at 9/11_conspiracy_theories makes me think that the WP:Fringe/Noticeboard is a better venue for this question. It will be difficult to determine what is within the scope of this board regarding tendentious articles such as this one. --Moni3 (talk) 21:23, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

You are probably right, I must admit that my initial impression of the fringe board has made me less than confident of the neutrality of many that frequent it. I think that this is not different than so many other discussions on how to apply policy. Unomi (talk) 21:50, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Hey, let's try this out

About six to nine months ago, discussions and an RfC were held to determine if the article on Gadsby: Champion of Youth should stay a lipogram. Consensus determined that it should not, so parts were rewritten so that they were actually clear (although it still has many problems with odd words because no "e"'s were allowed before). Now, an editor has brought the subject back up on the article's talk page. I'd appreciate it if anyone could comment. Cheers, —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 23:02, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

I read some of the talk pages and the article to try to understand what you are asking. Editors are attempting to write the article omitting any words with the letter E, or deliberately misspelling words to avoid the use of the letter E? Is this correct? If that is indeed what your question is, then it is my opinion that the article, as all articles, should simply explain what the topic is about in the most forthright language possible, and specifically for this one, provide examples of the language used by the author with reliable sources pointing out the eccentricities of the writing. Similar to the language discussions in an article on Damon Runyon (which should be improved). If I didn't get it right, apologies, and perhaps you can explain with more detail what the issue is. --Moni3 (talk) 23:16, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Favor lipogram: (conflict) Actually, it was a lipogram going back to 2004, upon its initiation by a good admin with full approval. Following much discussion from both camps, only six months ago an anti-lipogram group put up a poll and said it was WP:CON. But both camps still do not concur, and hardly any improving is going on now. I thought I saw both factions compromising, in that significant portions could stay as lipograms and a handful would not; but this, though it was actual compromising and not coup, did not stand for long. Accordingly, I favor sticking with that solution. JJB 23:25, 13 Jun 2009 (UTC) Moni, thank you, but all camps stand in favor of forthright wording and straightforward layout. Many contributors (probably a majority) think this can occur lipogrammatically, but many do not, and point-by-point discussion is notably light. JJB 23:30, 13 Jun 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the 'consensus' going back to 2004. Please see Wikipedia:Consensus#Exceptions, bullet number three. "Consensus decisions in specific cases do not automatically override consensus on a wider scale." Note that once outside comment was invited, this so-called "consensus" for the lipogram was overturned. Also, yes, words were purposefully misspelled to maintain the lipogram, including the author's name. —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 23:40, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

I was one of the few editors who came to the page as a result of the RfC. There were, in my opinion, many lipogrammatical excesses (as described above) in the article at that time but I assisted in negotiating a consensus to remove these so that only the main body text was a lipogram. There was a clear consensus, recorded in the talk page and as a hidden comment within the article, that the article should remain like this. Martin Hogbin (talk)

If the point of the lipogram construction of the article is for curiosity's sake alone, it would not be something I would support. Unless, hint, this is for April 1's main page FA. --Moni3 (talk) 23:40, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Moni, good thinking as to April Fool's. A lot of folks did support this lipogram, and many did so for many months prior to this nominator finding it. So his thought that it was a shift in WP:CON and not actually a coup is a bit autonomous, I think. And a short form for Gadsby's author is not stylistically or morally wrong, contradicting his implications. But I'm also busy. JJB 23:52, 13 Jun 2009 (UTC)

I would say that if contributors can work within limitations of lipogram form and add information, why not? Finishing WP will not happen tomorrow anyway. It is hardly WP:OWN to work on additions via discussion and word-smithing. Curiosity should count for a bit. Unomi (talk) 23:55, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

If they could do that, I'm not sure we would be here. The problem is they can't. When the article was in a lipogrammatic form, it was utterly convoluted and painful to read, and anyone trying to clean it up was reverted unless they somehow managed to think up a way to re-write it without using the letter E. If it could be written in that form and still be easy to read, I would not be against it. I believe that it has already been demonstrated that it cannot be done, that the result is awkward and confusing, that it requires more clicking on wikilinks to understand the topic than should be necessary (as creating links was a common way of getting around required words with Es in them, like the authors name) and that it's prohibitive to people coming along and improving the article who are not a member of the word puzzle club. Rnb (talk) 00:26, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Fair 'nuff Unomi (talk) 00:43, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

• It strikes me that a novel way to illustrate this concept would be to have two versions of the articles (one after the other, or just interlinked) - as close to eachother in actual "spirit" as possible but one without the "lttr". –xeno^talk 09:03, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

If someone's editing style is to avoid a letter, that's fine for that editor as long as the article delivers the necessary information. If new information is added, editors can change the style if they wish. I think the article should not require editors to follow this peculiar style. Editors who want to play this word game should view new edits as additional puzzle pieces to play with. -- SEWilco (talk) 18:14, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

A question for this forum.

I have a simple question:

If this board's purpose is to deal with content issues that cannot or should not be covered in the other boards, what happens if someone comes here to push their POV?

In a variety of political and fringe articles (Yes even Barack Obama's article) editors sometimes have a problem of separating their political bias when editing these articles. (Also, that in itself also becomes a rather common accusation during these types of debates.) When these editors try to add something that is against current consensus, may not have reliable sourcing, is mainly of a scandalous nature and incendiary, or is blatantly a POV, they come to logger heads with other editors who do not see their point. These same editors will try having long conversations to prove their side, bring the subject up again and again, call for an RFC, bring it to AN/I, etc, but in the end consensus has not changed. My worry would be if these types of disputes will spill over into this forum. So my question is what power does the forum have? If say, this forum decided against the editor in question, what would/can happen?

I ask this because soon or later it will happen. Brothejr (talk) 23:20, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

This forum has no power as yet, and I anticipate any references to contentious topics, and certainly ones covered by ArbCom sanctions such as Obama and Scientology articles should be dealt with elsewhere. This is merely an arena for editors who are interested in constructing the best quality articles to get tips and trade ideas and concerns. The power that this forum may eventually have is keeping track of trends to diminish article quality. Where discussions about such concerns may not have been centralized, this forum may be able to clarify concerns for content editors. I have recently dealt with editors urging me to cut the length of at least one of my articles despite the fact that it passed FAC, is far shorter than other FAs, and represents the body of literature on the subject. Similar attempts to compromise quality should be shared. --Moni3 (talk) 23:37, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

no forum has power, except to the extent that it is a place for trying to establish some degree of consensus on issues. This will have as power in that sense as the results justify. But as for matters that fit into the other established noticeboards, I would say to use them, because they have a large regular group of people who respond. DGG (talk) 01:17, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I expect anyone trying to push a POV here will be sent to WP:NPOV/N or WP:FRINGE/N, as appropriate. --Hans Adler (talk) 01:20, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Project tags

Maybe I'm posting this in the wrong place, but I'm wondering if article creators and new page patrollers working to improve content find the arbitrary deviations in WikiProject tags daunting. Some are WPBiography, others are WikiProject Food and Drink, and then there's Visual arts (no WP or WikiProject at all, plural, and a lowercase a in arts) etc. Is it worth trying to get them standardized? I know I spend quite a bit of time playing hit or miss and trying to guess how different ones are named, often giving up. Hit me with a trout if this is better on Village Pump or somewhere else, but I'm posting it here for the article builders to weigh in... Gulp. ChildofMidnight (talk) 03:18, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

It seems there's a de facto standard for having at least a redirect to the banner at "WikiProject Foo" (matching the name of the project, however capitalized). I don't know whether a proposal to get every banner moved to that name would fly, but creating the "standard" redirect for projects that don't have one should be uncontroversial. Anything "official" would probably have to end up at WP:VPR and/or WT:WikiProject Council eventually for more widespread discussion. Anomie⚔ 03:50, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I think you're talking about the project tags on talkpages – if they're confusing you, just create "standard" tags and redirect them to the template currently in use (e.g., {{WPLT}} and {{WP London Transport}} are both redirects to {{WikiProject London Transport}}. For most projects, this is already the case. – iridescent 03:51, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I can do redirects for project tags? That's freaking brilliant. Thanks very much. I always prefer simple shortcuts to resolve problems over the herding cats approach. So if I want them all to be {{WP NameofprojectthatIthinkislogical}} then, for example, I make {{WP Art}} redirect to {{Visual arts}}, and {{WP Food}} redirect to {{WikiProject Food and Drink}}? ChildofMidnight (talk) 04:43, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, why not? I don't think it would hurt anyone... :) —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 04:47, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

One caveat to the above; be careful if you're creating what seem to be "obvious" acronyms and abbreviations (such as the {{WPLT}} I mention above), as they may clash with something else. Those with very long memories will remember a tug of war between WikiProject UK Railways and WikiProject Ukraine about the ownership of the WP:UKR redirect. (In true Wikipedia fashion, it ended up pointing to Wikipedia:Romanization of Ukrainian, a page I strongly suspect nobody using it is trying to reach.) – iridescent 16:33, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I'd recommend not creating these shortcut redirects at all; just use the full "WikiProject Foo" form, creating it if necessary, so everyone knows what you're trying to refer to. It's really not that much extra typing, and it makes the wikitext more clear for anyone coming along behind you to edit it. Anomie⚔ 17:40, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Established editors

Thanks to those of you who commented on the idea. I have put it on the back burner after the intense hostility. I would be happy to drop the idea of a membership elected from the membership, and not from the 'community', but for one thing, which is that many advocates of fringe and crackpot views are also 'established editors' in the sense of having edited here a long time. It is important to weed this group out of any group of people who are genuinely committed to the core neutrality principles of Wikipedia. So that's the problem - how do you define a group that was genuinely committed to neutrality, and who could in principle advise and help on WP:NPOV related issues, without some form of elective process? It is very hard to spot culprits without a detailed knowledge of the articles they work on, the style they use, their whole method of operation. Election is the only method I can think of. Suggestions welcome. Peter Damian (talk) 18:10, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Peter, what did you envision this membership would do? Would they have leverage is content disputes? Would their voices have more emphasis than newer editors or ones who are pushing conspiracies or fringe ideas? What was your ideal with the plan? I think the reaction we saw in the MfD was a genuine protest, just as the development of Established Editors is a protest. I think anyone who has written an article knows the frustration of editors who are not familiar with the sources insisting something be paced in the article that goes against good judgment, and it is very frustrating to face this over and over. I recognize the fatigue in dealing with this that leads to incivility, which leads to blocks. What is the bridge between anarchy where anyone can tell anyone to fuck off for being a stupid git, and the suppression of genuine frustration and criticism? --Moni3 (talk) 18:22, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I think there is a need for a group that can advise and help in content disputes. A sort of neutrality arbitration committee. Arbcom is currently stepping into these waters (e.g. with Scientology) which is in my view a mistake, since Arbcom (and administration in general) is about behaviour. There needs to be a group or arbitration committee which exasperated editors can go to when things of the sort you describe happen. This process informally already happens - there are admins I know I can go to and who use good sense to resolve these situations. But it is an example of an informal practice that needs to be formalised. And also the job of policing Wikipedia should be divorced from the job of resolving disputes. Peter Damian (talk) 19:13, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

• I see nothing wrong with forming a club like this. Detractors like to throw around phraseology like “cabals” and “meatpuppetry” and all sorts of hot-button language intended to elicit fear, doubt, and uncertainty. Whenever that happens, it is borne of fear. I won’t openly conjecture about just what these detractors fear as I would no-doubt be accused of “failure to assume good faith” by those who like to wikilawyer and seize the moral high ground. Yet that is precisely what his detractors were engaging in when they dumped all over Peter and his plan by trying to delete his advocacy page: failure to assume good faith, and that lead to mob action designed to silence the threatening speech. It was disgraceful.

  What does any club or association do? Peter had outlined that rather clearly and there was nothing wrong with that since what was being articulated was to promote adherence to Wikipedia’s principles.

  I encourage Peter to restore his Established Editors page to its full content and not wimp out; he caved to fear mongerers. A lot of editors went to bat for him in the MfD to support his right to have that page. I think he should honor that effort by restoring the page. A proper discussion can not occur and a proper consensus on the details arrived at until what is being contemplated is out in the open where the details can be sanitized by the sunshine of vigorous debate.

  This reminds me of a picture in my local paper. It showed some women burning an American flag in a local park. I thought “OMG, they’re doing that out in the open?” Then I read the caption. They were Daughters of the American Revolution. They were properly disposing of a tattered and worn flag. “Of course!” I thought. All was in order: The flag was folded while it was being consumed with flame; they had their hands over their hearts; solemn expression on their faces. That’s OK. Just fiiiiine. What is looked upon with great disfavor is to burn the American flag when one has a fist thrust in the air and a furrowed brow. Republican elected officials during an election year periodically try to pass legislation outlawing “desecration” of the American flag (read: burn the flag with a “frowny face”). This is precisely what Peter’s detractors did: they assumed he was forming a club for the purpose of engaging in activities “with a frowny face.” How about they assume he was really out to do what he said he was out to do: form a club “genuinely committed to the core neutrality principles of Wikipedia”?

  How about we assume he might be trying to do some good instead of forming a mob in the village square and march down to burn his hut down? Greg L (talk) 19:58, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

---

Thank you for these comments. I have modified the contents page to reflect the minimum conditions for such an assocation, namely the election process, the commitment to the core neutrality policies, and the principle that all other policies are subordinated to neutrality. Those who accept nomination (which includes Greg and Dunc, who have been nominated) can agree on what the purposes of such an association should be. Fair? Peter Damian (talk) 20:10, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

(ec, re to Greg) Agree with pretty much everything you say, although you might want to explain the whole "flag" thing – I'm not aware of anywhere except the US and a couple of Islamic countries with Koranic verses on their flags, where that would be understood. (Is there an American equivalent to the Union Jack Toilet?) For reasons already given I think this is an idea that won't work, but trying to stop people discussing it is a disgrace. – iridescent 20:15, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. But for this to work, nominees must accept nomination. The core principles of the assocation are only two, namely commitment to the core neutrality policies of Wikipedia above all else, and 'election from within' rather from the dysfunctional 'community'. I now have a feeling this may work. Peter Damian (talk) 20:25, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

[To Iridescent] - since voting cannot begin until 20 people have accepted nomination, your condition is met. On the block voting issue, you will notice that is not mentioned in the articles, and never was! Thanks. Peter Damian (talk) 20:39, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

• Iridescent: For non-Americans and for Americans under the age of 20: Two pictures are worth 2000 words. Burning a flag in an approved fashion. Note the ceremony. He might have a tear in his eye as he places a properly folded flag into the fire. This is all good. Very good. This is “bad” flag burning. Note hippie. Probably stinks. No-doubt smokes pot and wants to have sex with under-age girls. Maybe sex with animals too—who knows? Clearly godless. Commie. Note the lack of ceremony and the “frowny faces”.

  America’s conservative politicians (Republicans, which I generally count myself as a member of) try to keep themselves in power by pandering to their core constituency by periodically trying to pass laws outlawing the latter. They declare that it is “flag desecration” and isn’t an issue of “speech”, which of course it is. The flag is ashes in both cases. The only difference is the message during the burning. The message in the latter brings out righteous indignation and mob rule. Ugly behavior.

  More to my point, the basis of the opponents arguments in the MfD all assumed Peter was trying to engage in subversive activities, like picture #2 of “bad” flag burning. They couldn’t even assume good faith. Greg L (talk) 20:41, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

So Greg, are you going to accept nomination or not? Peter Damian (talk) 20:46, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

• Thank you for the “atta boy.” But you wouldn’t want me. I just got being whacked by an ArbCom for being mean to some other kids in the sandbox over a not linking dates. The dispute was a subset of over-linking. See Sewer cover in front of Greg L’s house. I’m restricted for an indefinite period from having anything to do with WP:MOSNUM or WT:MOSNUM.

  I will keep you bookmarked and will check in on your progress. I hope you keep me apprised of major developments in your progress towards forming a club of like-minded individuals. Something to consider: You might put a preamble at the top of your page designed to assuage the concerns of editors who might harbor suspicions over your intentions. That might avoid another MfD. ;-) Greg L (talk) 21:27, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Spam at GA

Just a note that Zithan (talk · contribs), sockpuppet of crat/admin/OS Nichalp (talk · contribs) (now impeached by arbcom) nominated four articles that he wrote for business clients for GAN in return for money, and two passed. His most recent article is currently up at AFD as a whitewash/spam YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) 04:48, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

FA/GA Boycott

Having been a significant contributor to several FAs and even more GAs, and also having been a GA reviewer in the past, I decided awhile ago to remove myself from activity in either the FA or GA process. I've waited several months on this just to make sure I'm serious about it and not just reacting emotionally. I haven't changed my mind in all that time, and I suppose this is as good a place as any to state my reasons for my personal boycott.

Both processes are overstepping their bounds. They have begun to make subjective judgements about whether an article should be promoted or not. Mainly when it comes to short articles, I feel that many in the GA and FA process are, knowingly or unknowingly, pushing the limits of their power over a system that rewards content editors with community prestige in order to further an agenda the relegates short articles to a second-class state. A state in which they cannot be GAs or FAs no matter how good they are. Since many of the articles I write are shorter articles, I don't want to be part of a process where I constantly have to defend my work against a non-existent "It's too short" criteria. One article I helped write was nominated for deletion during a GA review because some editors thought it was too short or not notable enough, although they admitted that it was well-written and well researched. I respect the editors of the GA and FA processes, but when they use these processes to push some idea they have about short articles in general, they are stepping outside the bounds of what GA and FA are meant to do. They are moving outside the GA and FA criteria into places where they shouldn't.

If this was the only thing wrong with the GA and FA processes, I would not boycott either process. I believe most editors mean well and we could figure out a solution to the above problem. However, I have continuously had problems with the GA process, because its review system is erratic and you never know if you're going to a star-class review or a review from a guy on his first day of editing who makes poor judgements and is difficult to deal with. With the FA process, although most reviewers are wonderful, I have been frequently hounded by editors pushing petty arguments. It gets repetitive and it takes its toll on you.

I also don't like the general idea of Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by featured article nominations and the attitudes it promotes. I'm tired of the hierarchy that seems to surround how many FAs or GAs an editor has. FA and GA status really doesn't mean anything. It's artificial. It too often gives people a false idea that their article is somehow "finished" or that they "own" it. It is a sneaky and pervasive feeling and I believe that it hurts wikipedia.

I will remain a content editor and will continue to improve articles the best I can, but GA and FA just aren't worth it anymore. All the time I spend fighting for a good GA review or dealing with pettiness at FA could be better spent adding content, I feel. And that's the whole problem. I'm a content editor at heart, and I feel sometimes that GA and FA hurt content growth more than they should. They motivate editors to add content, sure, but I would rather be motivated by the opportunity to learn and serve others, not by prestige and competition. FA and GA gradually sucked all the fun out of wikipedia for me, so I'm trying to get back to what made it fun. Wrad (talk) 02:10, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I must admit that I have considered nominating the list for deletion many times, but decided not to since it would only be swamped with people who hang out on FAC, thus making deletion impossible. It's simply an ego booster and serves no good purpose whatsoever. It's no better than listing people by their edit count, or by how many barnstars they have. Nobody really cares. Majorly talk 02:15, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The scary thing, though, is that people really do care. It does matter to people, even if they just joke about it. I think that list is awful. It makes people less likely to collaborate on articles, because they want all the credit for themselves. That in turn causes less important articles to take precedent in editors minds--articles which are easier to write solo. This in turn hurts wikipedia, because when people look things up on this site that are in a real encyclopedia--articles on basic subjects--too often they find poorly written articles. Everyone knows that it's virtually impossible to get articles covering broad subjects through FA, so why should they bother, really, if FA status is all that motivates them? Wrad (talk) 02:21, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Well, I meant nobody other than those on the list. But yes, I know exactly what you mean. Making an article an FA should be for the enjoyment of writing, making the article as good as it can possibly be, and perhaps seeing your work on the front page, rather than the shiny gold star and rising in the ranks on the list. Majorly talk 02:31, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I loathe WP:WBFAN and what it stands for and would happily see it deleted, but see Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by number of edits (fourth nomination) (and the three preceding MFDs) for a taste of the hostility any attempt to MFD it would raise. As I may have remarked once or twice, I disagree with FAC and think it promotes compliance to arbitrary guidelines over usefulness to the reader; all WBFAN is ranking is "ability to write articles complying to a particular set of guidelines". I disagree with the "basic articles are more important" premise though (there was a long discussion a couple of months ago on this matter); there are any number of places someone can find information about London, but nowhere else (print or online) where people can find equally in-depth coverage of Noel Park, for example. – iridescent 02:43, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I think that assumes that Wikipedia has little or nothing to offer on basic topics when compared to other mediums. I disagree. I guarantee you that the article on Green has a lot more to say about its broad subject than any other source out there. How about "basic articles are just as important"? The only reason I highlight them is that they are harpooned so badly at FAC again and again. Wrad (talk) 04:05, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I tend to agree that WBFAN is unnecessary, and at times harmful. I know of several editors who have produced featured articles for the purpose of raising their position on that list (which may or may not be a good thing...) –Juliancolton | ^Talk 02:55, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I did the FA thing once, and decided not to bother again: too much crap for what's really just bragging rights. Anomie⚔ 03:52, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Maybe we who aren't part of either the GA or FA superpowers of the Wiki should call ourselves Third World Editors. :) Wrad (talk) 04:17, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Thought provoking statement, Wrad. Do you really feel that there are superpowers that make exclusive decisions at FAC? I see FAC like any other forum on Wiki that is often influenced by movements that wax and wane depending on whoever is hanging out at FAC at the time. There are different motivations for editors at FAC that run between those who write formulaic articles on the same topics and count their stars from WP:WBFAN as proof of excellence, and those who write simply because they enjoy writing and use the article as proof of excellence. Do you think a system devised to exclude editors from churning out factory-like articles would be any better than one that excluded short articles? --Moni3 (talk) 18:11, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I am not speaking of individual editors in this. I think that the GA and FA processes have become superpower behemoths which, almost unconsciously, influence wiki-culture in a harmful way more than they should. I think we need to talk more about how these processes are affecting the site without automatically accepting them. Wrad (talk) 18:20, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Ok. Where would you start? I'm interested in understanding what you mean by GA and FA are influencing Wiki-culture as a whole. --Moni3 (talk) 18:26, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Well, one thing I mentioned it that it tends to motivate editors to go solo, taking on smaller articles which are easier to make FA or GA quality, often ignoring a major strength of wikipedia, its collaboration. It tends to make many people more concerned with numbers than with quality. It takes the same amount of work to write six or seven short FAs on small topics as it does to write one long one... Which am I likely to choose? Wrad (talk) 18:31, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Another thing I've noticed is that wikipedia editors long for connection. It's in their blood. They are constantly making more and more new projects or programs or discussion forums or systems as soon as the old systems no longer provide them with that connection. What happens is that some editor feels that there is a need that isn't being met, and his views/concerns for the wiki aren't being heard, so he makes a new forum out of his need for connection and change. If things work out, the new forum is a success for a while, until it gets so large that the editor again feels a lack of connection, and starts a new forum, project, or system. Perhaps the FA and GA processes have grown so large that editors are feeling a lack of connection, and that's why we have dissenters springing up... Wrad (talk) 18:37, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Wrad I have recently felt the same way about the whole GA/FA process. My beef with the process is that editors come to an article they know nothing about and ask, or more likely demand, changes for no reason other than cosmetic reasons or their own personal belief of what should be in a Wikipedia article, but their suggestions dont help the article and arent required by the guidelines. I was once told by editors to "calm down" when I told an editor who had made, what were in my opinion unneeded suggestions at an FL nomination that "I dont agree with your suggestions, wont do them, and I am fine with failing this nomination". Because I was willing to fail a nomination I mustve been "upset", no I am just being realistic, a fancy title of FA is not important to me so I dont care about making changes that dont matter. It is common that if you dont agree or refuse to do a "suggestion" that you are accused of being "uncooperative". On the flip side there are MANY GA and FA articles out there by "respected" editors who are "liked" and have lots of "wiki-friends" that are crap. It is all about who you have worked with and who has your back. Some reviewers do a minimum checklist of what pretty much boils down to "your article is well-written with no spelling or grammar issues" and do not look to see if the information is 1-correct, 2-comprehensive and complete on the topic. You have enough supporters and you can get away with incomplete articles and up your "count" of GA and FA articles because you want to look like a big shot, even though the articles are not finished, move on do the same to another article and so on, and there are a bunch of FA and GA articles left sitting there incomplete with gaps of information, its like they are on a time-restraint on wanting to go on to the next article. I see the same editors constantly putting article after article up for FA status, sometimes the same article a second time in a month after "working really hard to fix the problems". Maybe if you lose an FA promotion on an article you should have to wait 6 months before you nominate ANY article for FA again. Slowing these types of editors down might discourage this rush that goes on.Camelbinky (talk) 19:16, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Another way in which FA influencing Wiki culture is the insistence by some RfA voters that editors nominated for adminship must have worked on a (or multiple) featured articles before getting their vote. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 18:55, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

@ Wrad re: collaboration: I have to speak for myself here. Not everyone who works alone does it for the recognition. I work alone because I'm starting to realize I'm a control freak about certain things. The most help I had was constructing Museum of Bad Art for April 1, and it was a shock to see so many editors milling about in and rearranging my sandbox. After working alone so often, I come to trust my own judgment about the way things should be. Call it being stubborn, or call it being confident. It's probably both. I've offered to give co-nominations for copy edits or such because such a thing appears to be a commodity. Some editors have accepted and some have turned me down. The support I received for the suite of articles I wrote about the Everglades was overwhelmingly positive, and I wish there was something I could do to recognize the efforts of the many editors who assisted me with these beyond the barnstar I created for them.

@ Wrad re: connections: I find what you describe the same thing that happens in any large company or organization when new people come in. They get excited about exacting some change, and when it doesn't happen, it's abandoned and people leave, only to be replaced by the next new idea. The purpose of committees and all: the committee met to decide further discussion was necessary.

@Who then was a gentleman: I see the validity in such experience. Admins participate in functions where article quality is at stake, and they should understand what it is like to construct an article from the ground up, the kind of work that goes into it. --Moni3 (talk) 19:24, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for Museum of Bad Art, wonderful. Peter Damian (talk) 20:14, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm not even clear that vast tiers of article quality assessments, and the tens of thousands of hours people spend editing and debating those instead of working on articles, really improves Wikipedia. I follow media coverage of Wikipedia somewhat closely, and I've never seen the article assessment process touted as a meaningful thing that assures readers of quality. Based on observations of people talking about Wikipedia, I'd wager the average visitor to WP believes the main page FA is chosen arbitrarily at the whim of Jimbo or some higher-up a few days or even minutes before it appears on the main page. Most people seem to think it's just an article selected to be interesting, not because it's been so excruciatingly vetted.

All of this meta-work, while giving some Wikipedians bragging rights, and others the ability to make objections and make other people do work on command, doesn't seem to clearly improve Wikipedia or its reputation with readers and critics more than just a simple peer review process could. It's vaguely against the idea of an encyclopedia that anyone can edit - the process seems to encourage edits from only the person wanting to make it a GA/FA, and other people cast themselves purely as critics, assessors, sweeps reviewers, etc. and don't typically improve the article. The way the typical FA/GA goes seems to be the opposite of a community article anyone can edit.

Since I don't see the assessment levels alone really improving Wikipedia one bit, I think the best of GA/FA is that you can usually get productive feedback on what is often a quite obscure article and improve it more than you could just plugging away unnoticed on your own. And that's a considerable asset for the community to have. But the cost is that it creates an adversarial system where both article writers and reviewers tend to see the work they do more as collecting personal trophies rather than helping write good articles for the community. I guess my question is whether the FA/GA process ocean is the only way to get meaningful outside feedback and editors for articles needing it, and if there are other ways (like purely peer review), is keeping GA/FA around worth the drama and thousands of hours people spend purely doing the meta work. --Chiliad22 (talk) 20:42, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I can only point interested editors to my essay "Situation Normal: All FACked up". Things have got worse, not better, in the four months since I wrote that piece. Physchim62 (talk) 21:12, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I also think WP:WBFAN is harmful (I have refused my name being added for an article I worked on: vote with your feet). I strongly discourage connections between the reward culture and content review. My limited contributions at GA aim to encourage a focus on improving the encyclopedia, not awarding medals. Short articles are and have always been welcome at GAN, individual incidents notwithstanding. That doesn't mean that short articles are immune from scrutiny. For every case where a short article has been given a hard time at GA, I'm pretty sure I can find 10 which have been listed. Geometry guy 21:43, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

My problem with GA has mainly been dealing with reviewers who have no clue what they're doing. Wrad (talk) 21:56, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Yup, it is a problem: there are some excellent reviewers, and there are some inexperienced ones. It is like going to the casualty department with a serious medical condition and having to deal with the receptionist, or with a nurse or junior doctor who doesn't understand the problem, rather than the registrar who can provide the diagnosis and care you need. It can be a nightmare. Unfortunately, there aren't many registrars, and they have to sleep some of the time. However, I would not condemn or abolish freely available healthcare, despite its inadequacies. Those who wish to boycott it can go private. And at GA, any failed GAN can be renominated and any inadequate review can be reassessed. Geometry guy 22:18, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

It's inevitable that the worth of FAC is relative to every individual who has participated in it. I recognize its shortcomings and believe they can be overcome with enough assistance and attention on the most serious problems. In short, FAC is what an editor puts into it. While its true that most readers have no idea about the assessment processes, well-written articles (regardless of status) can only improve Wikipedia's reputation that has been marred by scandals and vandalism. I will be clear on this, however: FAC itself does not create an adversarial system. Individual editors come into the process with these issues and the egalitarian and youth-driven culture of the entire website allows it to foster.

I hope in some way that FAs are models for stubs and start class articles. I also know that many articles will remain in poor shape until one person gets the motivation to overhaul it. That's also human nature. It seems to me that the real criticism is for the patterns people and groups get into. I don't think they're only in GA and FA processes. --Moni3 (talk) 21:53, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

View from the ivory tower

I'm sure the fact that pretty much as soon as this noticeboard was created its first real action was to provide a venue for teh dramaz says something, I'm just not sure what. As the longtime number 3/4 editor on the evil we shall not name (YellowMonkey and me have been trading spots for some time), I fully understand there are valid criticisms about the list, FAs in general, and audited content quality in particular. I'm also that guy at RfA who is opposing candidates for not having substantial experience in those areas, and I'm a committed GA reviewer, so you couldn't pick a better strawman than me to analyze.

I should start off by saying I like the list, and yes, I do consider it a sort of friendly competition (of course I concede I will never be able to beat the behemoth that is HurricaneHink.) It is a motivator for me, but it's hardly the only reason I edit. I produce FA/GA because I think it's a valuable asset not only to me (improving my knowledge of the subject, making shiny, interesting and proper articles out of fancruft turds, as it were) but also to readers. FA should never stand as the pinnacle of articles on Wikipedia (but I fully admit it's often perceived that way), but it's the best we've got. I would love to hear from Wrad and Physch about what we would replace FA/GA with if we swept it away tomorrow. I feel it's necessary to give readers an indication of what has been vetted as our best material, even if best is often subjective and based on who shows up at FAC. Is that a problem? Hell yes. But it's no different from any other part of the wiki.

Finally, on the WP:OWN/collaboration issue, which I feel are often talked about separately but go together; is there any indication this is so, or just notions? I would say I am something of a lone-wolf editor (the only project I really work in is WP:VG) so I guess you could type-cast me as the star-hungry editor. But it has never been my experience that this is the norm, or such actions are par for the course. WP:WBFAN lists as many people who want to list themselves as nominators: look at the FAC for History of timekeeping devices, for example. No one gets cheated out of recognition for their work. Bronze stars and WBFAN are the exact same function as barnstars; sure, some people will be motivated to get them and become a detriment to the 'pedia overall, but that's generally not what happens.

So this is probably a tad ramblin' as I was just typing as I was thinking, but that's where I stand. FA/GA are the best we have in filling an important role on wiki. There's little evidence that the dozens to hundreds of editors tied up in reviewing and running the show would be creating more content, and that finding that content would be easy without the current mechanisms. In short: reform FAR rules, make some changes, and actually dig in and contribute—that's the only way I see you can change the "culture" editors are alleging. Otherwise, ignore it entirely; but I'm not sure that's helping Wikipedia either. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 21:53, 14 June 2009 (UTC) (The TL,DR version of this: read what Gguy and Moni have said above. It is what you put into it.) -21:54, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Well, my plan is to remove my name from that list, which I've already done, and then continue to write quality articles that could probably make GA or FA, but just not worry about taking that last step of nominating them, because it's a waste of time. I've removed all references to the FA or GA status of any article I've ever written from my user page. I just refuse to be part of it anymore because it just isn't any fun. Wrad (talk) 22:02, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I think that's a reasonable summary or essay. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 22:21, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

You can craft the CliffNotes version, then :P --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 22:27, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

For another view on the issue of linking content review processes with reward culture, see this archive. Geometry guy 22:30, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs forgets that there is already a proposal to replace FAC, albeit one which has not advanced much in the last couple of months. He also forgets that Wikipedia would not end tomorrow is there were no replacement at all – to suggest otherwise is to pretend that Wikipedia exists for the benefit of FAC (or, perhaps more accurately, "FAC editors") and not the other way round. Physchim62 (talk) 23:19, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I was not aware of the proposal, although on a cursory glance it seems more like TFA reform and in my opinion is worse than the FAC process (it could create walled garden mentalities and standards across projects, as well as turf wars between child/sister projects). --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 00:23, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Forgive my naivety and rudeness, I am a newcomer here. As I understand, FA/GA is a part of WP system (break it and build new one, it will be same thing after all), it should be run and it is run, but it is desperately lacking reviewers, especially qualified ones. Thus I am surprised to see that these kind of forums immediately attract dozens of contributions, but the FA/GA nominations not. IMHO this thread would not exists if all those respected and experienced editors would just do decent job and contribute (as professionals) at the GA/FA reviews, rather than here. Most GA/FA reviews are so silly just because nobody wants to review, and somebody (who should be thanked for their courtesy) picks it up. It takes (for me, in my fields) equal time to review a paper as read and reply to this thread. Materialscientist (talk) 03:47, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

• I think that the FA issue arises from the lack of community input into who gets to act as FA staff, and have proposed at WT:FAC (for want of a better place) that this be amended. Stifle (talk) 11:33, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
  • The fact that we need "FA staff" at all is a sign that something is wrong with the system. Wikipedia doesn't exist to create FAs: we welcome and recognise good writing, yes, but that is not our fundamental aim. Every suggestion that comes from the FA-addicts is along the lines of "the system is fine, it just needs lots more resources from the rest of the project". I say NO, the system is FACked up, that it drains resources from the rest of the project for minimal benefit to are key goal of writing an encyclopedia. It should be scrapped, as per the WP:ESPERANZA precedent. Physchim62 (talk) 11:58, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Voting at RfA

The issue of voting is clearly contentious, but content contributors should perhaps spend more time at RfA's. And if they do, what questions should they pose? What criteria should they use for support or oppose? Should admins have a good track record of content contribution? Most assume they should, but if you think that their should be 'segregation of duties' between those who fight vandals and protect the encyclopedia from harm, and those who do the main work, then perhaps they shouldn't. It's a conflict of interest for those who have the power to ban, also to decide what should go into articles. What do you think? Peter Damian (talk) 20:45, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Anyone who's watched RFA for any length of time knows my cut-and-paste oppose, which is suitably modified as appropriate – While I don't subscribe to the "must have 10 FAs" school at RFA, I don't think editors who haven't had the experience of putting large amounts of work into an article, and/or defending their work against well-intentioned but wrong "improvements" or especially AFD, are in a position to empathise with quite why editors get so angry when their work's deleted and/or The Wrong Version gets protected, and I don't support users who don't add content to the mainspace being given powers to overrule those who do. I stand by it; admins like Keeper76, who've worked on a bunch of stubby articles rather than a few long ones, I have no problem with; what I object to are people with little or no experience of just how hard it is to follow Wikipedia's myriad policies, being in a position to rule over breaches of said policies. (Work on an article for a week and then see someone nominate it for deletion because "there's no book on it in my local library", and then you're in a position to make valid comments about "always remaining civil".) – iridescent 21:22, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I have a very simple rule, well two actually. Oppose anyone who spends way more time chatting on user talk pages than article/project talk pages/editing articles, and anyone who supports the civility policy. --Malleus Fatuorum 21:42, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Almost forgot; and anyone under the age of 18. --Malleus Fatuorum 21:44, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

• For what it's worth, this thread isn't really within the scope of this noticeboard IMO. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 21:48, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Why not? Wouldn't it be a good idea if administrators were more likely to be chosen on the basis of their understanding of the daily frustrations faced by regular editors? --Malleus Fatuorum 21:58, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm not disputing the basis for this thread, but ideally I'd like to keep this noticeboard free of drama/POV-pushing (not suggesting that Peter is doing either). The last thing we need is another forum to discuss RFA. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 22:20, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

It's not a discussion of RfA, it's a discussion of how candidates at RfA might be more effectively vetted. --Malleus Fatuorum 23:09, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

It isn't the idea of content editors !voting at RFA that's contentious. It was the suggestion of block voting that raised wp:canvass concerns. I think RFA would benefit from having more editors checking candidates contributions especially for neutrality, plagiarism and being of an encyclopaedic nature; and our experienced writers are likely to be good judges of that sort of thing. Also it would help give a fair wind to some RFA candidates who are themselves article contributors if editors with FAs under their belt were reviewing candidates article contributions and giving their assessment. At present an RFA candidate whose been reporting vandals at AIV or tagging articles for speedy deletion can expect RFA regulars to either endorse them as good vandalfighters or New page patrollers, or if their work isn't up to scratch to say so. Unless they have GAs/FAs, article contributors can be at a disadvantage at RFA, I've even seen contributors with thousands of manual edits to mainspace be opposed because they also use automated tools! ϢereSpielChequers 15:05, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

OK, let's see if this works

OK, here's a "high end content question" of the sort I had in mind when I suggested this board:

At some point in the next couple of months, I plan to do a top-to-bottom strip down and rewrite from basics of the (currently horribly messy and rather dubiously 'sourced') Hampstead Heath – as a fairly high-traffic article (about 15k–20k hits per month) the state of this one has irritated me for some time. Should the rewritten version keep the Gallery section? It's an impressive bit of wiki-coding (each caption is a clickable link to the article on the relevant building) and must have taken someone a very long time to set up – but it a) must breach just about every bit of the MOS there is, and b) doesn't actually illustrate Hampstead Heath at all, but is an index of buildings visible from Hampstead Heath (well, buildings that would be visible if there weren't trees in the way). There's also a third "coward's way out" option of booting it across to the separate Parliament Hill article. Any thoughts? – iridescent 16:25, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I have no problem with galleries, but I know it's frowned on in FAC if you go that far with it. That clickable bit is kinda sick, it would be a shame to lose it. My one pet peeve with galleries is presentation -- I like when all the rows are full. rootology (C)(T) 16:49, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

What actually is wrong with the article? It says the right sorts of things in the right order. The ending sections are rather scrappy, to be sure. (On the other hand, I know from experience that a superficially nice-looking article can grow zits and things on closer inspection). Interested that you cover both Chelsea Bridge and Hampstead Heath. Peter Damian (talk) 17:23, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

The faults with the text are mainly that it's very choppy; a lot of it is sourced to rather dubious sources that need thorough re-checking; there are glaring gaps in the history (the current article doesn't even mention Jack Straw, for example). I'm not suggesting a complete tabula rasa scorched-earth rebuild as I did with Battersea Bridge, but rewriting it with a more coherent structure – and a chronological ordering, rather than the current "list of places on Hampstead Heath" format – and then re-importing those parts of the original article that are legitimately sourced and worth salvaging.

My geographic articles follow the rivers, as they make natural "mini-topics", so you have a broad swathe along the River Moselle (Noel Park, Broadwater Farm, Bruce Castle etc), and a whole batch along the Thames. Hampstead Heath and Lea Valley Park will probably be the first ones I do on the Fleet and Lea respectively. – iridescent 18:33, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I have all 8 volumes of Hughson's London (1807) which has some very quaint illustrations - I think it's online but if not I can digitise them. Let me know. I do like Battersea Bridge. Peter Damian (talk) 18:50, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Hmm some of it appears to be online, but not all of it, apparently. Peter Damian (talk) 18:56, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

For Battersea, I intentionally used Greaves's, Grimshaw's and Whistler's paintings to illustrate the old bridge; they neatly served a dual purpose in illustrating both what the old bridge looked like, and how/why there was such controversy about Whistler's intentionally unrealistic depictions of it in the Nocturne series (the first time a court had ever ruled on the quality of an art work). For most of the bridges, I find the Illustrated London News archive – already mostly online – to be the best source for early images, backed up with a couple of scans of old maps to give a historical context. – iridescent 19:07, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Not fond of the Gallery in its current form on the Hampstead Heath article I must say. Looking over the article, I reckon there'll be a sizeable increase in size (needs ecology ++) so there might be some more text to slot stuff in against. Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:09, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Believe me, it'll be huge; don't expect it any time soon. I dislike galleries – AFAIK I've only ever used one once (Hammerton's Ferry, and that was under unusual circumstances where most of the images really needed to be there) but the amount of time someone put into that cool absolute-positioned coding makes me a bit reluctant to delete the Hampstead one if-and-when the time comes. – iridescent 16:57, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

There are FAs with galleries, but they are mainly art and architecture articles. I don't see a reason why a gallery would be a bad thing, unless there are more gallery images than text. --Moni3 (talk) 12:54, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

My rule of thumb on galleries chimes with what Moni says above. Where the subject is a visual one a small gallery can be acceptable. But for a regular subject like Hampstead Heath I'd likely be objecting to the presence of a gallery. Galleries, IMO, are too often excuses for editors not to to be selective about the images that will best illustrate the subject. I generally recommend moving the gallery pictures to Commons and adding a link from the article. --Malleus Fatuorum 13:00, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Butting in here, I'm of the opinion that galleries should be used sparingly, and only when absolutely necessary to retain an article's comprehensiveness. We have Commons for a reason. Although, I've found {{double image}} to be useful. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 17:03, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Theory & policy question, good content by a later banned user? Prostitution in South Korea.

Echoed from this discussion. Yes, this was seen on Wikipedia Review, but it's a good question and discussion point, focusing on Prostitution in South Korea. I have no overall opinion (yet) on the content, and want to get a discussion going.

• Article on November 8, 2008. 1046 words readable prose, 13 sources.
• Article on November 20, 2008. 4375 words readable prose, 117 sources. Quick glances seem to show valid sourcing and content.

The 12 days' expansion was by Occidentalist (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) was is apparently a sock of Lucyintheskywithdada (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log). These users are blocked, but looking at the entire history of the article[1] I don't see an obvious clue about them having targeted it before. This page was dramatically expanded (4.18x) by a now "banned" user. Future Perfect at Sunrise (talk · contribs) reverted it all here, citing "rv all edits by banned user, back to 9 November".

Here's my question, which seems to come up perennially: is this new content considered by anyone to be invalid since it was introduced by a "banned" user? Would it be against any policy violation if I, hypothetically, edited on this last Occidentalist version and hit save? I'm never sure where people stand on this sort of thing. The longer version of the article on the surface appears to be a much better article. rootology (C)(T) 16:46, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Policy actually is clear on this. Despite what some of our more trigger-happy editors think, there's no obligation to revert edits by a banned user – but if you knowingly allow them to stay knowing a potentially compromised source, then you take responsibility for verification. This used to come up with Peter Damian's edits quite often (i.e., people would revert his valid edits because he was zOMGbanned!!!). – iridescent 16:51, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

We have a reason we don't reinstate content from banned users: no other user should be brought into the situation where they have to waste time and energy debating them, if only indirectly through their proxies. I am personally by no means convinced this was good content. It seemed pretty tendentious, sensationalist and POV-pushy. But the nature of the abuse by that banned user means that I have no longer the slightest wish to get involved with the cesspool of that article, and would be surprised if anybody else who might oppose that material would want to. Which means that if you reinstate it now, you will have not only rewarded the banned user, but made their material de-facto unassailable, by rewaring the abusive behaviour. Personally, I would consider any such reinstatement of content in such a case a classical case of illegitimate "proxy editing". Just my personal opinion, and I will not comment further. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:04, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Perfectly fine, well sourced and verifiable content should not be removed, period. There is no basis outside of your personal opinion that you engaged in edit warring with multiple users, indefinitely semi-protected a page (which I just had undone), and wholesale wiped content because you feel that everyone that engages you is now a "proxy." I'm not a proxy, yet I feel that you have abused your administrative powers in edit warring on this page and then protecting the "right" version, and others have felt the same in regards.

I highly suggest that you open up a line of dialogue instead of throwing out veiled threats. You were recently admonished and stripped of your administrative privileges for similar actions. seicer | talk | contribs 17:08, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

The only edits I ever made on that page were reverts of obvious socks of banned users. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:15, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

This is similar to work contributed about prostitution in the Philippines a year or two ago. Appears well-sourced, but blatant propaganda. First question: where are the good sources? Second, if they are good, is there any evidence of WP:SYNTH and all that kind of stuff? Peter Damian (talk) 17:27, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Having read the the reverted material more carefully, I tend to agree that it is sensationalist and pushy and dubious original research. The sources are probably good, but they are stuck together in an outlandish and hard-to-verify way. I would have reverted if it were not a banned user (which is the real test). Peter Damian (talk) 17:33, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Paid editing

Once the Olympics kept their ideals of amateur competition so stringent that athletes who had ever taken money for performing were stripped of medal (see Jim Thorpe), and even athletes who paid for professional coaching were regarded with some skepticism as if doing such a thing was one step toward cheating. Now professional athletes perform in the Olympics regularly; whether the Olympics is better off is a good argument to be had.

FA writer User:Nichalp has been editing under another user name and getting paid for it. See the Signpost missive about it. There's an RfC about paid editing here. It might be a more cut and dry situation with Nichalp that a company has hired him to see after their interests on Wikipedia.

So, you who eats cardboard and whey, what if a private grant offered you money akin to a year's salary to write anything you wanted as long as you produced a certain number of GAs and FAs? What if the parameters were narrower? What if you had to produce all your articles in the realm of chemistry, French literature, or Baroque composers? What if the Wikimedia Foundation started to offer monetary rewards for well-written articles? How would money change the culture of Wikipedia? --Moni3 (talk) 13:05, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

My opinion's no secret; whatever the Great Helmsman might say to the contrary, I don't see how "motivated by financial gain" is morally any worse than "motivated by an interest in the subject". Particularly if you're talking about FA level, enough people will pore over it to strip out any bias. Anyway, "you can't write about something you're being paid on because you then won't have a balanced view" is a bullshit argument; almost every music, literature and sports bio is written by fans, and presumably most contributors to Roman Catholic Church, Obama, Lesbian etc all have particular biases for or against. Wikipedia's critics have a valid point in that we're so big that the self-correcting mechanism breaks down on smaller low-traffic articles, but at the GA/FA level there are always going to be at least a few eyes on everything. – iridescent 17:06, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Agree with Iridescent, for the most part. It's nice money if you can get it, but I wouldn't automatically say that GA/FA will strip out bias. As long as such COI are plainly stated, I'm generally sure the regular policing can take care of it. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 18:21, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

I enjoy writing articles quite a bit, and clearly don't get paid to do it. I wonder sometimes if someone offered me money if I would be as productive as I am. Surely one of the first things to keep me from doing something is to order me to do it. I magically lose all interest. --Moni3 (talk) 18:58, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, but nobody's talking about a Citizendium-style "get accredited or get out"; you'd write Torchlight to Valhalla because you were interested in it, and Air Products & Chemicals to pay the mortgage. This is the model plenty of print sources have used for decades; it's also the system that keeps most theaters and orchestras in business. – iridescent 19:11, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

I've written an FA about a company. I didn't know the owner beforehand (even though several people accused me of being a operative for the company) but I did get to know him after I asked for free images and we started corresponding. I often think about how my attitude toward the article might have changed if he had said, "How about a lifetime 50% discount for writing the article?" or similar. He never offered me anything, nor would I have accepted it; I wrote it because I always liked the place. The article was more or less finished before I got to know him; now, I won't even edit the article because I feel uncomfortable doing so. My point is that even though we might tell ourselves we're not affected by the relationship, we can't be sure. --Laser brain (talk) 19:44, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

I'd love to get paid by the U.S. Navy to write articles about their old battleships. Having said that, I think that writing about old ships is different than writing about current CEOs or companies. What I am trying to say is that I echo Laaser Brain above with the caveat that I think it depends on the topic. —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 00:04, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

The core issue is conflict of interest. And getting paid to edit something certainly creates a problem in that respect. What are the chances of it being NPOV and including alternate perspectives when it's being done under contract? Just look at the puffery that passes for polical articles when they're edited by partisan supporters and compare it to the hit pieces for figures that aren't popular with the Wikipedia set. NPOV is a core policy and it should always be encouraged. Paid editing is not consistent with the values espoused in this policy. ChildofMidnight (talk) 05:31, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

The same could be said about "editing by fans of the topic", "editing by opponents of the topic", and so on. Just as a fan, opponent, etc can write an NPOV article if they are careful, a paid editor could do the same. Which is why WP:COI doesn't forbid COI edits, it just strongly warns about NPOV and gives advice on how to avoid problems. Anomie⚔ 17:01, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Internal links in footnoted references

Looking through FAs, there doesn't seem to be any common way to handle internal linking in footnotes, the most part are publishers and authors. Most articles are incoherent, with certain publishers linked, others not, and authors most often unlinked; while some at every instance. The general guideline on linking, Wikipedia:Linking, doesn't discuss this case, I suppose there aren't any guideline on this ? So how do you feel about this ? My preference would be to link any relevant link (of any type, not only publishers and authors) for the first time they appear in a footnoted reference. As it's a different part of the article, not the main body, the existence of the same link in the body shouldn't have impact, but for similar reasons to the article body, linking repeatedly the same item isn't necessary. Cenarium (talk) 02:48, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

SandyGeorgia (talk · contribs) would probably be able to explain that. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 05:11, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

As a general rule, I only link authors in the references. I haven't yet seen that linking publishers adds much to the understanding of the reader, but if someone links publishers on an article I've got watchlisted, I won't unlink either. As for linking terms in other things, my understanding is that, just like we should avoid linking terms in direct quotations, I avoid linking terms in the titles of books/articles/etc. But this is just my practice, others do differently. --Ealdgyth - Talk 15:35, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

I wouldn't link terms in a title too, I meant for example locations (Geographical place of publication), they appear from time to time, and when it's part of a larger work, that work. As for publishers, some are often very topical to the subject, and would provide relevant information to the reader. On the other hand, some are very general, but which are relevant or less may be difficult to decide in certain cases, so the easiest way is to link them all at the first instance in footnotes. Cenarium (talk) 16:19, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

I usually link journal titles when we have an article for the journal, authors as well (but less often). I think redlinks are a big no-no in reference sections. But I agree with all the above that practice varies. Physchim62 (talk) 16:02, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

I would think that internal linking of publishers would only make it more confusing for the reader to click on the hyperlink to the article or book. If there is no url, I don't think it would do any harm to link it, but then you run into a consistency issue. So, I'd say, don't link publisher names in footnotes. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:36, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

I pretty much always link publications in {{cite web}}, mostly because with web sites I think it's best to have a page that allows readers to garner a more informed opinion about the site. Web doesn't have the prestige of print, after all. I do the same in {{cite news}} for plain consistency. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 21:18, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

As I'm involved with WP:JOURNALS I try to link journals every time I see them. Proc. Roy. Soc. London A vs. Proc. Roy. Soc. London A, or PRL vs Physical Review Letters (possibly piped as PRL or Phys. Rev. Lett.). This way, you don't have to figure out what the abbreviation means, and resolves ambiguities such as Phys. Rev. Lett. meaning Physics Review Letters or Physical Review Letters. It's also a fantastic way to get people to write articles about these journals, and helps to establish if the cited work meets WP:RS. I do the same for publishers. Some discretion is applied when linking truely non-notable organizations or journals. Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 22:07, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Headbomb, are you saying that if an article has 5 refs to PRSA, you would link it in every individual one of them? My own feeling is that it should be linked only if the journal name is written in the text, not merely the footnote? DGG (talk) 04:31, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

It's what I'm currently doing. I don't ever recall meeting resistance on bluelinks (although redlinks made some people twitch). The idea behind it (well at least behind my actions, can't speak for others) is that when I'm reading something, and click on say ref#73, I want the link there. If it's also linked at ref#24, it's of no use to me (or at least its a hassle to check if the link is present in one of the 72 refs that comes before ref#73).Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 04:42, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I strongly support adding links to all journal titles. Where this would introduce redlinks to featured content, we could add a subpage to WP:JOURNALS where FA editors give the name of the Wikipedia article and name of the journal, and WP:JOURNALS collaborates to create the stubs and add the blue link.

I think each footnote should stand on its own while the article is being brought up to FA level, but after that point the overlinking should be trimmed. My rationale is that prior to FA, cites are moving around a lot, and it is easier if citations are self-contained. I guess bots could help manage the journal title linkage to reduce overlinking, but we could also update {{cite}} so that links within the citation are linked but don't exhibit the visible properties of a link, such as underscore and blue. That way the link is there for editors, but not distracting for readers. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 04:59, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

There a bot compilation coming up (although it is not centered on FAs, it will allow the identification of the most popular missing journal articles). Also that "solution" is way to complex to be implemented or enforced. Bluelinks/redlinks are not that evil, especially in footnotes. No one reads footnotes for their litterary value. Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 05:29, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I think external links are sufficiently visible over internal links, with the font difference and the arrows, so it's not a problem imo. I'd argue that journals can be very relevant to the topic at hand, when they are speciailized in the subject matter or made substantial contributions to it, it's important to link them. It's also a form of credit, and same goes for authors of course. Many authors are scarcely linked, their articles would probably benefit in being linked in references. And as pointed out, if one reads a reference, it's that you're interested in the source, thus in the authors, journals, and publishers to a lesser extent as well. Cenarium (talk) 15:23, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

For hand-coded references which don't use any template formatting, I don't see the value of linking more than once to any single term in the footnotes/references section. Articles from The New York Times, for instance, need not be linked to that newspaper a dozen times in the same article. It can steal focus from the reference URL, if present. In many cases, clicking on the main URL will take the reader to a page that lists publisher or author.

Unlike Ealdgyth, I'll link terms in a quote if their meaning in context is not entirely clear to a reader unfamiliar with the topic. For instance, I linked the word "exec" in a direct quote, so people with no military knowledge can follow along. Binksternet (talk) 15:35, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Lucy (elephant)

This article is a POV disaster and a battleground. It needs work or deletion. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 07:22, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Non-notable elephant in my books. Physchim62 (talk) 13:10, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Agree with redirect. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 21:42, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

American Dream

There's been some work in the last five weeks on American Dream where a couple of versions of a lead section have been put forward, each a synthesis of received wisdom, with slim reliance on sources. There was even a bit of original research with the addition of the phrase "ethos of prosperity" which doesn't appear anywhere in the literature.

I could use some help in whipping together two or three good lead paragraphs using the ten or so sources listed at Talk:American Dream, or other expert materials. I made a small start today, but expansion and adjustment is still needed. Thanks in advance! Binksternet (talk) 18:21, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Might I suggest you write the rest of the article first, the work on the lead? I find it's easier to figure out what should belong above the fold once you've sketched out all the rest of the content. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 20:47, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Good idea. Sometimes, when I'm writing a completely new article, the lead section initiates the article, catalyzing the search for content, then the content rebounds on me and demands its own shape, which of course requires changes to the lede. It's iterative; a bootstrapping process. Binksternet (talk) 20:55, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

HH Bhakti Svarupa Damodar Swami

Who is in charge of swamijis? Should I prod? AfD? Leave it for someone else? Suggestions welcome. Cheers. ChildofMidnight (talk) 21:16, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I would ask at WP:RELIGION or WP:INDIA. Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 02:09, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Theology

Most of my contributions are in the area of philosophy and medievalism. I wrote all of Medieval_philosophy from scratch. I never finished it and never bothered to submit to GA or FA because it seems an awful destructive process. I get even more depressed when I see Theology. What a mess. How could any work that pretends to be an encyclopedia have such an abomination? Tags everywhere, the footnotes are actually longer than the article. Half the paragraphs are just lists. Peter Damian (talk) 21:02, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

There have been lots of discussions about how some of the top-level articles (and indeed top importance) go neglected while people work on sub articles. The problem is that it's a Herculean effort to work on these major articles and many of them would take weeks of research by a collaboration of editors. It's difficult to wrangle all those people into a concerted effort. When and if they get to the GA or FA processes, they are given extra scrutiny because of how broad the topic is. I'm sorry that your opinion of the FA process is that it's destructive. It's not supposed to be! I'd love to see some philosophy and medievalism articles there. If you want to put together a collaboration to work on Theology, feel free to call on me for editing or whatever I can do. --Laser brain (talk) 21:11, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the offer. More generally, I would like to see some guidelines developed about approaching 'big' subjects (sample list below). One guide I always use is that the Wikipedia introduction to any such subject should not be a million miles different from how any other standard recognised secondary or tertiary source approaches the same subject. I.e. if I were to list the introductions of 10 reference works, including Wikipedia, it should not be possible to discern the Wikipedia one. Currently this is far from the case, and it is amazing how much resistance you meet when you suggest it. Mostly because the 'characters' that inhabit these pages have some very fixed and idiosyncratic and usually personal views about what these subjects really are, and they feel that Britannica or Columbia or other common reference source has got it wrong, and this is their chance to put it right. If there were a policy page one could point to, that would be a great help.

WP:LEAD is slightly helpful, but more work needs to be done for the 'big' topics. The problem with these topics is that they are, well, generally very large and have a lot of history attached and have to be approached with generality, which is difficult. E.g. Space for example, goes straight in to the Islamic view of space, without even mention the considerable work done by the Greeks. The introductory definition 'Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent in which objects and events occur and have relative position and direction.' is also quite strange.

• History
• Geography
• Mathematics
• Physics
• Chemistry
• Time
• Life
• Existence
• Space
• Philosophy
• Theology
• Law

Peter Damian (talk) 09:39, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

To some degree, we might point to Wikipedia:Summary style, which specifies that any article should essentially be a summary of its subtopics. One benefit we would have with these broad topics is that if their subtopics are reasonably referenced, we need not duplicate those references in the main article. I can see writing all those above as broad overviews and introductions only, giving enough information so readers can discover which subtopics they wish to explore. I concur that they should be similar in scope to other encyclopedias. --Laser brain (talk) 14:15, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I think one problem with these articles is that everyone thinks they have an opinion on the definition of each of these topics! I could give you several of my definitions of "chemistry", which are (quite rightly) not included in the article! I can also point you the the FAC for chemistry. Most of the articles you cite have free standing WikiProjects devoted to the subject area, which would indicate that we have editors who know the main arguments. The GA/FA route seems a bad way to improve them, as that would leave the judgment in the hands of editors who (for the most part) don't have a clue what they're talking about, other than their vague memories from high school. Perhaps you should team up with WP:VITAL to see if we can get a general community push to improve these wide-ranging articles (there are many more than you cite). Physchim62 (talk) 15:06, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

And if you left these articles solely in the hands of subject matter experts, you would end up with a quite interesting article, I'm sure, that no one save experts can read. It's important to get feedback from people with all kinds of backgrounds in order to make sure the article works on multiple levels, rather than risk creating walled gardens. That doesn't mean they have to go through GA/FAC, but at least they are a venue for attracting uninvolved editors on "neutral ground", so to speak. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 15:20, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Subject matter experts can often write in a way that is difficult to understand. That does not mean that non-SME's are automatically able to write in a way that is crystal clear.

Take e.g. the opening to Space. "Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent ...". But extension is space, so the definition is entirely circular (as someone else has already commented on the talk page). It continues "The concept of space is considered to be of fundamental importance to an understanding of the universe although disagreement continues between philosophers over whether it is itself an entity, a relationship between entities, or part of a conceptual framework." This was clearly not written by an SME, who would have been careful not to put this word-salad into an introduction for beginners. Entity? Conceptual framework? What? The rest of the introduction is gobbledygook, plus a few straightforward grammatical errors to boot. And this is not because a non-expert wrote it. Peter Damian (talk) 17:18, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Or another example: We have an atrocious article Boolean logic, full of bullshit, written by a non-SME who believes he is an expert because he has taught the material in a school. Vaughan Pratt has three times rewritten the article as something that makes sense but is not sufficiently accessible. His attempts got better over time, but each time the owner of the atrocious article came back after a while and resurrected it as a POV fork. Vaughan Pratt's articles are at Boolean algebras canonically defined, Boolean algebra (logic) and Boolean algebra (introduction). This is the reason for the absurd disambiguation page Boolean algebra. Hans Adler 17:32, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

That's interesting. I note immediately that it satisfies Damian's law. This is the principle that people who don't know what they are talking about generally express themselves in unclear and clumsy ways and generally write badly in ways that are detectable to someone who is not an expert in the subject in question. The giveaway is the opening sentences "Boolean logic is a complete system for logical operations. It is used in countless systems.". I don't know anything about Boolean logic but the phrasing alone suggests that something is badly wrong. By contrast, the opening of Boolean algebras canonically defined seems perfectly well-written. The rule is not infallible, but is rarely wrong. Boolean algebra (logic) is quite well done also. Why am I saying this? Well, it is to prove that issues of content can be decided by non-experts. Peter Damian (talk) 18:33, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

My point wasn't to smack experts or the writing of said experts, I'm just saying that a couple fresh eyes almost always helps improve the article. It's the reason why WikiProject Video Games partners with WikiProject Military History for partnered peer reviews. I've often found MILHIST article leads rather confusing, and the MILHIST chaps are able to pinpoint parts of gameplay in video games that non-players would get mired in. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 18:44, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I totally agree. So long as the non-experts don't insist, for instance, that loads of unrelated stuff must absolutely be treated in the article because they feel it's somehow the same thing, their help is vital for improving our more technical articles. In most cases only silly non-experts are a problem. --Hans Adler 19:31, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. I was once involved with the initial effort to write top level articles for a competitive encyclopedia. My experience there was that experts are generally not good people to write articles of this nature & the experience in dealing with their attempts was so unpleasant I have rarely revisited that project. True, experts sometimes "write" good textbooks--but this is because of the extensive work done on them by professional editors in the true sense of the word, generalists with subject literacy who know how to express things clearly. There have been a few people in history who can do both. We would be extraordinarily lucky if there were such a person here, though perhaps one or two such people have sometimes edited inconspicuously. DGG (talk) 04:27, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I had also noted this tendency, that articles on general or broad subjects are often neglected. They have different aspects, so knowledge in various fields is needed, which requires more collaborative efforts, and it's particularly difficult to find the proper balance in the description of those aspects. A high level of summary style is needed, and what is to be included is often difficult to determine. Thus many such articles are small or little-developed, for example Politics, Sport and Country. They have been longer at some points, but were reduced because the content was too specific, for balance reasons and similar. There are also some subjects, that are very close to us, but on which we can't find anything to say, for example forehead and chin. Some other broad topics of low quality are Song and Health, as well as more specific but important subjects like Night or Shadow. We also have difficulties to make articles on very general subjects with variety of meanings. So we have some UFOs like Title, is it an article, a dab, a list ? Some would-like-to-be-an-article dabs like Mission or Growth. As a final example, there is the amazing contrast in quality between Medieval cuisine and Cuisine. Actually, I had planned to bring this matter somewhere for some time, and this place could be the one; I'll try to make some findings on this subject in the coming weeks, and bring this up again to see if we can work something out. It also come under light recently, when Wind has been nominated for FA. Cenarium (talk) 01:43, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

1953 Iranian coup d'état ‎

Major dispute at this article over appropriateness of the lead section. Unfortunately seems likely to turn into an edit war, so we could use some second opinions here. Since Iran is in the news recently, it is important that Wikipedia have a good article ready to go- but the article has been massively overhauled in the past two weeks, and at least in the lede section is now much much worse.

I previously posted a request at the Neutrality noticeboard, to which an editor thankfully responded. The lede is now better following that editor's input (no longer a series of long quotes and accusations of Nazism without mentioning the historical context), but now is incredibly small. The lede currently doesn't even mention the Shah or that the coup restored the monarchy, instead inexplicably focusing on oil companies changing their name. I've been reverted several times.

Details are at Talk:1953 Iranian coup d'état#Lede paragraph . Bear in mind that the first posts there are in reference to a much worse lede section than the current (still flawed) one, as noted above. SnowFire (talk) 03:44, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Can you point out a historic version of the lede that is closest to what you want to see now? Binksternet (talk) 15:17, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it's on the talk page. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat&diff=297419002&oldid=297402739 is an old version that I originally reverted to (not written by me). Talk:1953_Iranian_coup_d'état#Moving_forward:_Proposed_new_lede is where I workshopped a proposed new lede, asked Skywriter for comment, got only a complaint about a single reference, and edited it in at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat&oldid=297658605 . Which was promptly reverted as "vandalism" and against the "consensus" of, um, Skywriter and one other editor, who'd previously clashed a bunch with others on the talk page anyway.

Thanks for your input; the current problem is that the new lede devotes literally all the attention to the oil company issue. This is a major issue, and arguably the biggest cause of the coup (I'd personally disagree, but it's close), but it'd be like having the lede on the American Civil war article spend all the time talking about slavery and none about state's rights or Lincoln. I'm not an expert on the coup, so I wish others would take the lead here, but I know enough to know a really unbalanced lede when I see one. SnowFire (talk) 20:58, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

The coup was also a military operation, and a sentence or two should be devoted to the most important points of how political authority was overtaken by the military. Binksternet (talk) 01:13, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Joseph Campbell

I am involved in a revertwar on the article about Joseph campbell with an anon user who blanks the in my opinion very notable, well sourced and well balanced section on post-humous controversy. At first I thought it was just a case of reverting a trolling vandal so I didn't pay attention to 3RR, but he is persistent and is resorting to different tactics to justify his blanking - among others he called me a "Jehovah's witness fundamentalist" apparently he has checked my edit history and seen I have been engaged in dispute resolution on that page. I need some third party to see what's going on on the page and decide whether to protect, block, or what ever. I won't revert him again.·Maunus·ƛ· 18:20, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

That whole section is a valid part of the study of Campbell's life. You're right; it should stay. Binksternet (talk) 18:45, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Human rights in the United States

This question concerns content that has issues with plagiarism, copyright infringement, and NPOV. It also concerns the placement of said content in the lead section, as it does not currently summarize anything in the article. The full discussion can be found here and anyone is welcome to contribute to it. To recap, in the past few days, the following content was added to the lead section:

Throughout the Cold War and since that time, few nations placed more emphasis in their foreign policy on the promotion of human rights, including tying foreign aid to human rights progress and annually assessing the human rights records of government around the world.[2]

Having been here for just under five years, I am very familiar with spotting plagiarism and copyright infringement. Even though the content above was cited appropriately to a book by Michael Ignatieff, the authors opinion on the value of the U.S. role in human rights and foreign policy was unattributed and copied directly without quotation or paraphrasing.

I believe the above passage can be considered plagiarism and copyright infringement of the original source, of which at least 28 of the 43 words in the passage above were copied and pasted from exact phrases in Ignatieff's book. For example, the exact phrases "Throughout the Cold War", "few nations placed more emphasis in their foreign policy on the promotion of human rights" and "the human rights records of government around the world" are copied from Ignatieff's book verbatim. Here is the original material by the author with a URL to the book page:

Throughout the Cold War and afterward, few nations placed more emphasis in their foreign policy on the promotion of human rights, market freedom, and political democracy. Since the 1970s, U.S. legislation has tied foreign aid to progress in human rights; the State Department annually assesses the human rights records of governments around the world. Outside government, the United States can boast some of the most effective and influential human rights organizations in the world.[3]

Per Turabian 2007, pp.77-80, this meets at least one (or more) of the three indicators of inadvertent plagiarism:

- You cited a source but used its exact words without putting them in quotation marks or in a block quotation
- You paraphrased a source and cited it, but in words so similar to those of your source that they are almost a quotation: anyone could see that you were following the source word-by-word as you paraphrased it.
- You used ideas or methods from a source but failed to cite it

Additionally, this violates the NPOV policy, in that we need to "assert facts, including facts about opinions—but do not assert the opinions themselves...When we discuss an opinion, we attribute the opinion to someone and discuss the fact that they have this opinion." These words and ideas belong to Michael Ignatieff and according to the rules about plagiarism and NPOV, they need to be attributed appropriately. Unfortunately, the original author continues to claim that this is a statement of fact, not opinion, and is paraphrased, not plagiarized. Obviously, any person familiar with Wikipedia policies and guidelines and academic style sourcing guidelines like Turabian/Chicago Style, understands that this is not an acceptable form of paraphrasing. Since my original complaint was made, the material continues to get added back into the article. Here is its latest incarnation:

During and after the Cold War, few countries emphasized in foreign policy the furtherance of human rights as vigorously as the United States, which also ties foreign aid to human rights progress and annually assesses the human rights records of numerous governments.

This is still considered plagiarism if we observe Turabian's indicators of inadvertent plagiarism. And, according to the NPOV policy, we must attribute opinions: "It is also important to make it clear who holds these opinions. It is often best to cite a prominent representative of the view." The sentence itself is somewhat complex, so it is understandable that a fairly new editor might miss the subtlety of the distinction between the statement of Ignatieff's opinion in the first part ("few countries emphasized in foreign policy the furtherance of human rights as vigorously as the United States") while the second part is a clear statement of fact ("ties foreign aid to human rights progress and annually assesses the human rights records").

Is there any reason why this opinion should not be attributed to Michael Ignatieff as it both represents his opinion on the subject of the history of U.S. human rights and foreign policy as well as closely resembling his exact words and phrasing? And should it appear as a blockquote to avoid the problems of plagiarism and poor paraphrasing? Finally, should it even appear in the lead section when it does not summarize anything in the article? Viriditas (talk) 09:54, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Observations:

• If it's not in the body, it doesn't need to be in the lede.
• If it's paraphrased sufficiently, it isn't plagiarism.
• It is paraphrased sufficiently.
• The article is about human rights in the United States, not about the issue of human rights used as a carrot and stick by the U.S. as part of its foreign policy.
• The opening sentence of that article strikes me as being the second sentence, following a brief definition which isn't present.
• The absence in the lede of human rights abuses relative to race, justice and imprisonment is an appalling omission. Binksternet (talk) 12:05, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Understood, but for clarification, the version you say is "paraphrased sufficiently" is the latter, not the former, correct? That version was just added into the article recently. I'm assuming you are not referring to the former example, as that version is almost completely derived from the original book source (28 of 43 words in complete phrases) and lacks quotation marks and attribution and is a clear copyright violation. Viriditas (talk) 13:21, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

I took another look at that mess of a talk page and I have to decline involvement in the article. My plate is full! It's a real cat fight over there, but the biggest issue is the scope of the article. Worrying about copyvio text in the lede is less important than determining whether the article will cover human rights AND the USA or human rights IN the USA. If the article is determined to cover only domestic issues, then that plagiarized text would go over to some article such as Human rights and United States foreign policy where it would have to be completely rewritten or put into quotes attributed to the source. Basically, the article must be split and rewritten, in my opinion. Binksternet (talk) 23:25, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Mostly agree, but whenever I see copyvio, it gets deleted. And per Turabian/Chicago Style, Wikipedia:Plagiarism and WP:NPOV, statements of ideas and opinions belonging to an author should be properly attributed. I think you're right though, in that a split and rewrite is a foregone conclusion, and I was actually mulling it over before you replied. Viriditas (talk) 23:32, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Bot creating countless redirects from alternate capitalization

Comments invited at Wikipedia talk:Bots/Requests for approval#Why do we have a bot creating redirects that are handled by case insensitivity in the search box? –xeno^talk 21:28, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Wow, phenomenally dumb bot activity. At any rate, this venue is for content, not redirects. We're about the meat, not the skeleton. Binksternet (talk) 22:57, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

I think it's fine at this board, personally. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 04:39, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Derogatory Nicknames

Talk:Rachel_Corrie#Request_for_Comments_on_the_inclusion_of_Saint_Pancake has ended, without a lot of progress. Much was written, no particular positions have been modified, but a few things have been clarified. "Saint Pancake" was an epithet posthumously applied to Rachel Corrie, which all parties are agreed is negative. In the past six months or so, three completely separate reliable sources have discussed the use of the epithet, including Salon. A majority of editors believe that the epithet should be excluded from the article, for reasons that I find unsupported in policy. Boiling it down, there are a series assertions that I don't find supported in policy, and here are the resulting questions:

• Can an insulting nickname be political speech, and hence a "viewpoint", or is the usage of a nickname simply a documentable fact?
• If it's a fact, is there some Wikipedia content policy against reporting such overtly insulting facts, even if they're reliably sourced?
• If it's an opinion, does WP:FRINGE apply? The way I read it, that guideline is about scientific and conspiracy theories, rather than about nicknames.
• If WP:FRINGE applies, what does it take to label a fact a "tiny minority" viewpoint? Does a reliably sourced bit of information ever become so much of a minority, that even a single descriptive mention violates WP:UNDUE? If so, how does WP:YESPOV apply to such a situation?

In the RfC, one editor argued by analogy that the derogatory "Martin Luther Coon" applied to Martin Luther King, Jr. is a similar situation, an assertion on which I declined to take a stand. Do we--should we--would we ever cover notable nicknames applied to historically significant figures? List of U.S. Presidential nicknames has some not particularly nice names, but none of the particularly nasty ones. Is there an unstated encyclopedic content line in that or similar articles that governs what is or is not included? Jclemens (talk) 04:30, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Theology

Most of my contributions are in the area of philosophy and medievalism. I wrote all of Medieval_philosophy from scratch. I never finished it and never bothered to submit to GA or FA because it seems an awful destructive process. I get even more depressed when I see Theology. What a mess. How could any work that pretends to be an encyclopedia have such an abomination? Tags everywhere, the footnotes are actually longer than the article. Half the paragraphs are just lists. Peter Damian (talk) 21:02, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

There have been lots of discussions about how some of the top-level articles (and indeed top importance) go neglected while people work on sub articles. The problem is that it's a Herculean effort to work on these major articles and many of them would take weeks of research by a collaboration of editors. It's difficult to wrangle all those people into a concerted effort. When and if they get to the GA or FA processes, they are given extra scrutiny because of how broad the topic is. I'm sorry that your opinion of the FA process is that it's destructive. It's not supposed to be! I'd love to see some philosophy and medievalism articles there. If you want to put together a collaboration to work on Theology, feel free to call on me for editing or whatever I can do. --Laser brain (talk) 21:11, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the offer. More generally, I would like to see some guidelines developed about approaching 'big' subjects (sample list below). One guide I always use is that the Wikipedia introduction to any such subject should not be a million miles different from how any other standard recognised secondary or tertiary source approaches the same subject. I.e. if I were to list the introductions of 10 reference works, including Wikipedia, it should not be possible to discern the Wikipedia one. Currently this is far from the case, and it is amazing how much resistance you meet when you suggest it. Mostly because the 'characters' that inhabit these pages have some very fixed and idiosyncratic and usually personal views about what these subjects really are, and they feel that Britannica or Columbia or other common reference source has got it wrong, and this is their chance to put it right. If there were a policy page one could point to, that would be a great help.

WP:LEAD is slightly helpful, but more work needs to be done for the 'big' topics. The problem with these topics is that they are, well, generally very large and have a lot of history attached and have to be approached with generality, which is difficult. E.g. Space for example, goes straight in to the Islamic view of space, without even mention the considerable work done by the Greeks. The introductory definition 'Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent in which objects and events occur and have relative position and direction.' is also quite strange.

• History
• Geography
• Mathematics
• Physics
• Chemistry
• Time
• Life
• Existence
• Space
• Philosophy
• Theology
• Law

Peter Damian (talk) 09:39, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

To some degree, we might point to Wikipedia:Summary style, which specifies that any article should essentially be a summary of its subtopics. One benefit we would have with these broad topics is that if their subtopics are reasonably referenced, we need not duplicate those references in the main article. I can see writing all those above as broad overviews and introductions only, giving enough information so readers can discover which subtopics they wish to explore. I concur that they should be similar in scope to other encyclopedias. --Laser brain (talk) 14:15, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I think one problem with these articles is that everyone thinks they have an opinion on the definition of each of these topics! I could give you several of my definitions of "chemistry", which are (quite rightly) not included in the article! I can also point you the the FAC for chemistry. Most of the articles you cite have free standing WikiProjects devoted to the subject area, which would indicate that we have editors who know the main arguments. The GA/FA route seems a bad way to improve them, as that would leave the judgment in the hands of editors who (for the most part) don't have a clue what they're talking about, other than their vague memories from high school. Perhaps you should team up with WP:VITAL to see if we can get a general community push to improve these wide-ranging articles (there are many more than you cite). Physchim62 (talk) 15:06, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

And if you left these articles solely in the hands of subject matter experts, you would end up with a quite interesting article, I'm sure, that no one save experts can read. It's important to get feedback from people with all kinds of backgrounds in order to make sure the article works on multiple levels, rather than risk creating walled gardens. That doesn't mean they have to go through GA/FAC, but at least they are a venue for attracting uninvolved editors on "neutral ground", so to speak. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 15:20, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Subject matter experts can often write in a way that is difficult to understand. That does not mean that non-SME's are automatically able to write in a way that is crystal clear.

Take e.g. the opening to Space. "Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent ...". But extension is space, so the definition is entirely circular (as someone else has already commented on the talk page). It continues "The concept of space is considered to be of fundamental importance to an understanding of the universe although disagreement continues between philosophers over whether it is itself an entity, a relationship between entities, or part of a conceptual framework." This was clearly not written by an SME, who would have been careful not to put this word-salad into an introduction for beginners. Entity? Conceptual framework? What? The rest of the introduction is gobbledygook, plus a few straightforward grammatical errors to boot. And this is not because a non-expert wrote it. Peter Damian (talk) 17:18, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Or another example: We have an atrocious article Boolean logic, full of bullshit, written by a non-SME who believes he is an expert because he has taught the material in a school. Vaughan Pratt has three times rewritten the article as something that makes sense but is not sufficiently accessible. His attempts got better over time, but each time the owner of the atrocious article came back after a while and resurrected it as a POV fork. Vaughan Pratt's articles are at Boolean algebras canonically defined, Boolean algebra (logic) and Boolean algebra (introduction). This is the reason for the absurd disambiguation page Boolean algebra. Hans Adler 17:32, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

That's interesting. I note immediately that it satisfies Damian's law. This is the principle that people who don't know what they are talking about generally express themselves in unclear and clumsy ways and generally write badly in ways that are detectable to someone who is not an expert in the subject in question. The giveaway is the opening sentences "Boolean logic is a complete system for logical operations. It is used in countless systems.". I don't know anything about Boolean logic but the phrasing alone suggests that something is badly wrong. By contrast, the opening of Boolean algebras canonically defined seems perfectly well-written. The rule is not infallible, but is rarely wrong. Boolean algebra (logic) is quite well done also. Why am I saying this? Well, it is to prove that issues of content can be decided by non-experts. Peter Damian (talk) 18:33, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

My point wasn't to smack experts or the writing of said experts, I'm just saying that a couple fresh eyes almost always helps improve the article. It's the reason why WikiProject Video Games partners with WikiProject Military History for partnered peer reviews. I've often found MILHIST article leads rather confusing, and the MILHIST chaps are able to pinpoint parts of gameplay in video games that non-players would get mired in. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 18:44, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I totally agree. So long as the non-experts don't insist, for instance, that loads of unrelated stuff must absolutely be treated in the article because they feel it's somehow the same thing, their help is vital for improving our more technical articles. In most cases only silly non-experts are a problem. --Hans Adler 19:31, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. I was once involved with the initial effort to write top level articles for a competitive encyclopedia. My experience there was that experts are generally not good people to write articles of this nature & the experience in dealing with their attempts was so unpleasant I have rarely revisited that project. True, experts sometimes "write" good textbooks--but this is because of the extensive work done on them by professional editors in the true sense of the word, generalists with subject literacy who know how to express things clearly. There have been a few people in history who can do both. We would be extraordinarily lucky if there were such a person here, though perhaps one or two such people have sometimes edited inconspicuously. DGG (talk) 04:27, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I had also noted this tendency, that articles on general or broad subjects are often neglected. They have different aspects, so knowledge in various fields is needed, which requires more collaborative efforts, and it's particularly difficult to find the proper balance in the description of those aspects. A high level of summary style is needed, and what is to be included is often difficult to determine. Thus many such articles are small or little-developed, for example Politics, Sport and Country. They have been longer at some points, but were reduced because the content was too specific, for balance reasons and similar. There are also some subjects, that are very close to us, but on which we can't find anything to say, for example forehead and chin. Some other broad topics of low quality are Song and Health, as well as more specific but important subjects like Night or Shadow. We also have difficulties to make articles on very general subjects with variety of meanings. So we have some UFOs like Title, is it an article, a dab, a list ? Some would-like-to-be-an-article dabs like Mission or Growth. As a final example, there is the amazing contrast in quality between Medieval cuisine and Cuisine. Actually, I had planned to bring this matter somewhere for some time, and this place could be the one; I'll try to make some findings on this subject in the coming weeks, and bring this up again to see if we can work something out. It also come under light recently, when Wind has been nominated for FA. Cenarium (talk) 01:43, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Four points:

• Everyone knows that any encyclopaedia worth the money starts off its article on space as "Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is." ☺
• Part of the problem with the articles "close to us" is that they are often written cargo cult style. A loose collection of random factoids, usually mentions in films and television programmes, is collected, in the hope that magically an article will arise. I've Kerrzappp!ed a few cargo cult articles in my time, but I know that there are many that have never crossed my path.
• One of the problems with articles on seemingly simple subjects is that they involve non-trivial effort to write properly. See what I wrote at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cliché. Another problem is revealed by Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Greatness. A third problem is exemplified by the fact that I, for one, have spent so much time fire-fighting elsewhere that I've not yet had time to get back to either. I'm far from the only one that has such problems. There's more on this at User talk:Uncle G/Archive/2009-02-19#WP:Articles for deletion/Asynchronous error reporting.
• There really, truly, is a discipline of encyclopaedist. The skill set that one requires in order to write and build an encyclopaedia such as Wikipedia is an identifiable, distinct, thing in its own right. One of these days I'll have enough time in between the fire-fighting to write User:Uncle G/Encyclopaedist, too.

Uncle G (talk) 07:32, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

A problem with leaving articles to locals arises in controversial areas like religion & politics. You get either biased articles, or unsatisfactory ones haggled out between people with different biases. Sometimes both. If anyone can think of a way to get the community to join in effectively I'd be interested. Peter jackson (talk) 09:45, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Medi, India

I have just redirected a whole bunch of identical pages to Medi, India, a title which apparently eluded the creator of these pages. I am not sure that they are all appropriate as redirects, though, even if most of them are. Could someone check that out? -- Blanchardb -^{Me•MyEars•MyMouth}- timed 13:29, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

What to do with Iranian stand-up comedy

My inaugrual 'see if this noticeboard is any use' posting.

This article found in this state, has me stumped. It is neither a list of Iranian nationality comics, or an article on Iranian stand-up comedy. My first thought was to just sectionalise the entries based on actual nationality and rename it to List of xyz, but I can't determine the nationality for some of them, and I'm not even sure if that is a usefull list. So, what should be done with it? Add to/Rewrite/Move/Merge/Tag/Delete?

MickMacNee (talk) 13:43, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

• It's difficult to find any evidence of a genuine subject here. I can find sources on Iranian comedy in general, but no source as specific as this, or that propounds the concept as defined here.This seems to fit the old "idiosyncratic non-topic" concept that we used to have in deletion policy. It's an inference, by Wikipedia editors, that since some satirists are in Iran, and since some stand-up comedians in other countries use their own backgrounds in their acts (as comedians are wont to do), that there's a subject of "Iranian stand-up comedy". Wikipedia editors group British-born, U.K.-resident, English-speaking Omid Djalili with Iran-born, Persian-speaking, Belgium-resident Ebrahim Nabavi, expecting that somehow, magically, an article will arise connecting these completely unconnected people. ☺

  An article on Iranian comedy would probably link comic actors Nosratollâh Vahdat and Esmâ`il Arhâm Sadr, by the way, and would mention "lâhlezâri". An article on Persian comedy would similarly mention ruhozi (over the pool) and Bâqqal bazi (the play of the grocer).

  So … You have some red links, and a largely useless page on a non-subject by a title that would be better as a redirect. Put the twain together, and what do you get? ☺ Uncle G (talk) 05:50, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

• Not useful in this state, recommend AfD or PROD. The author probably meant to write List of Iranian stand-up comedians, but overlooked that many of the people included do not seem to be actual Iranians, but rather people with Iranian heritage, making this a rather useless list.  Sandstein  22:05, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Joint Commission

Joint Commission (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) needs a large amount of cleanup. Most sections are clearly edited with a positive or negative point of view, and it would greatly benefit from a neutral rewrite. As I work for a JC-accredited health center, I don't think I can bring sufficient neutrality to the table.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 15:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I would say the overall structure of the article is the problem. Things like "alternatives" and "how the commission" works are POV funnelers. Scrapping these sections might help. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 03:02, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Google spreadsheet as a reference?

A user, keeps adding what I think is an WP:OR Google spreadsheet[4] to the List of countries by military expenditures article as a reference. I am not even sure it is WP:OR because the spread sheet was made using data from Wikipedia itself, (although I am not sure how the data was collected and put into the spreadsheet).
As there is clearly a disagreement between myself and the editor I was wondering if someone else could give me their opinion. Is that a relevant reference and can this spreadsheet be used at all? FFMG (talk) 11:41, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Burn it with fire, simple as that. No way it meets WP:RS, and no way that isn't OR. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 12:47, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't look like the Google spreadsheet is being used as a reference in the latest version of the article, just as a misplaced external link. But linking to a Google spreadsheet here is just stupid, if the information is useful enough to include then just make an article or add the column to the existing table.

Applying basic mathematics is not OR, otherwise we'd have to have a source for every use of {{convert}}; see WP:NOTOR (particularly WP:NOTOR#Simple or direct deductions) for more. The source numbers do of course have to be reliably sourced, but I hope our existing articles with those source numbers already have refs we can copy. Anomie⚔ 14:34, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, as I said originally, I was not 100% sure it is OR or not because the data comes from wikipedia itself. But having said that I am not sure how the link between List of countries by military expenditures and List of countries by population was reached, (I cannot see the spreadsheet any more, maybe it is/was a temporary link).

Either way it does not make sense to gather the data from wikipedia, put it onto a Google speadsheet and then link it back as a 'see also' in wikipedia.

The contents of the speadsheet are probably properly sourced as they come from wikipedia itself, but I don't see the point of having that spreadsheet there at all.

I agree with Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs here, I think it should go. What do others think? FFMG (talk) 07:50, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for your opinions, I had asked FFMG for a third opinion in the edit summary, I'm not very wiki savy. Concerning the comments, I think FFMG and Fuchs are attacking a fundamental principle in Wikipedia. That is assume good faith. In 2006 in a discussion in the university we were wondering about the military expenditures per capita. We could not find any source about it. So I put in my blog making a x/y=z table, using wikipedia data, and as Anomie says in his comments this is reliable data and it's not OR. Can we only put CIA "facts" book, in Wikipedia or what?. I put in my blog in my native language Spanish, just google it [5] and you will find it. Since 2006 I have received daily visits to this post. Therefore I find it is relevant also for the English speaking people. I did not put a link to my blog as an External Link (I wonder if I should have done that) to seek publicity, I put it in a google spreadsheet so anyone could see the methodology and/or improve it. You can see in the methodology tab, the pasted information from cited articles. [[6]] I apologize if I have broken any rules that I do not know. I then I would ask to please someone open an article following this comment Anomie has said if the information is useful enough to include then just make an article. It is useful and I know people are interested about it, so I propose to open a new article about it. For now I will change it to external links. It seems 2 users say its OR (FFMG and Fuchs) and 2 users say it's not OR (Anomie and me). Let's have 2 or 3 more people to untie. If they say it's OR then I will delete it. --Qwarto (talk) 10:51, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Not sure why you changed the title of this section so I reverted it if is all the same with you. I also see that you changed the article as well to move your spreadsheet to a external link section.

I find it very strange that you are forcing a change to the article and _then_ demanding for a third opinion, why not do it the other way?

Anyway, the question is not just about OR or not, this page is about content discussion, is a Google spreadsheet you created using Wikipedia improving the article(s)?

Is your spreadsheet not quickly going to be out of date and meaningless? Who will maintain the data in your spreadsheet?

Will you update the data on a regular basis, (as often as the pages are)?

Will you also follow the various rules regarding crediting Wikipedia? FFMG (talk) 13:49, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

FFMG, I put it in the external link because it has been sugested that it was misplaced. Anyways, I propose we should do what Anomie and I are suggesting now, that is create a new article called "List of countries by military expenditure per capita", this is interesting for people and relevant, and the data is ready. I could create myself if I would know how to make tables on wiki. Again I apologize if I have irritated you, but I was behaving in good faith. --Qwarto (talk) 15:14, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry where does Anomie say you should create an article? You are more than welcome to create a new article if you wish.

BTW, I never said I was irritated, I just don't think that the spreadsheet you created should be there at all, it does not help the articles and it will very soon be out of date.

Will you also be editing it to give credit to Wikipedia? After all, your entire spreadsheet was created using data from wikipedia, (albeit to be used in wikipedia). FFMG (talk) 09:00, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

For the record: I said "if the information is useful enough to include then just make an article or add the column to the existing table" (missed context in italics). Whether such an article or table column is created, I don't care. Anomie⚔ 11:05, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Why I also don't understand is why you, (Qwarto), accepted when your spreadsheet was removed from List of countries by population[7] as an unrelated link, yet you keep on wanting the same spreadsheet to be included in List of countries by military expenditures, what does it add to the article?

As this is the content noticeboard I am still curious to hear if this home-made spreadsheet will actually add anything to the article, (and who will maintain it when either article will change)? FFMG (talk) 12:00, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

The user Anomie, suggested that creating a new article could be a feasable possibility, a possibility that I liked. That was my intended point. In the spreadsheet I already said all the info comes from wikipedia. I put in the spreadsheet it was done in late June 2009. The idea is to have an approximation. I will updated in 1 year or so, if nobody does it before. Anyways, perhaps people [[WP:DGAF|don't really care]. --Qwarto (talk) 14:58, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Is summarizing per MOS:INTRO WP:SYNTH?

Two editors User:Offliner and User:PasswordUsername are refusing to add a summary of the the criticism section within the body of the content in the lede per MOS:INTRO in the article Nashi (youth movement), claiming that providing any summary violates WP:SYNTH, see Talk:Nashi (youth movement). I even suggest that they come up with their own wording, by they respond with reversion. Could we have some input please. --Martintg (talk) 21:25, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

SYNTH is a rather poorly written section of WP:NOR and in my opinion should be axed. Synthesis (pooling of information and sources) is required for comprehensible writing. As long as you're not linking items in a suspect way (to advance a position, as WP:SYNTH says), you're find. WP:LEAD makes it clear that Offliner and Password are wrong. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 21:40, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree with DF 100%. The only thing I can add regarding SYNTH is that it is most certainly required for comprehensive articles; one source that deals exclusively with the Design 1047 battlecruisers may say that they were similar to the Scharnhorst class, but as that gives no specifics, you have to go to a different source—one that only discusses the Scharnhorst's—for that class' specifications. I don't believe this violates SYNTH. —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 22:13, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

By definition, the two should not be in conflict. It is, possible to write a lead summary in a non-neutral or SYNTH violating way, but "any summary" is not off limits, just unfairly slanted ones, ones that assert novel conclusions, etc. In general, every part of a lead should be directly attributable to a specific cited body text paragraph or sentence. Summarizing those appropriately is not synthesis. Jclemens (talk) 03:39, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Summarizing is not synonymous with synthesis. In this case the lede can and should have a sentence summarizing the criticism; something like, "Critics have accused the organization of spying upon and harassing opponents and compared it to the Soviet Komsomol and Hitler Youth." or, if you prefer passive voice, "The organization has been accused of ...". Abecedare (talk) 04:06, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Martintg is battling against a strawman. Nobody suggested that any summary is synthesis. However, combining bits of criticism from different critics into one critical claim (for instance, using the words of one critic to "elucidate" a completely unrelated critic) is inadmissible. One the other hand, if Marting wants to write a proper lede instead, he is not precluded from doing so. PasswordUsername (talk) 20:04, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I've added Abecedare suggested text to the article. --Martintg (talk) 23:57, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

The text I added as suggested by Abecedare has just been partially reverted by LokiiT (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) here. --Martintg (talk) 02:51, 8 July 2009 (UTC)