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Problem behaviours and rudeness

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Some editors are distressed by the aggressive behaviour and rudeness of others, and/or believe that many good editors are being driven away by it. I made some observations and proposals on managing the problem at Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)#Best practice, several of which affect our policies. I now think it worth exploring them in more detail and widening the conversation. Would it be best to create a new thread here, create it somewhere else, or just ask folks here to follow the above link? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:28, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

I'll post them again here, then. I have some experience of civility codes in both commercial and public organisations, all in the UK. Here are some of my observations about current best practice and how they might be implemented on Wikipedia:

It is becoming increasingly accepted that rudeness and disrespect are in the mind of the recipient; if they feel insulted by you then you have insulted them, whether you intended to or not. WP:IUC needs updating accordingly.
Rudeness is about more than just words. Aggressive behaviours can be equally rude, not only in active aggression such as reversions but also in passive aggression such as refusal to acknowledge or discuss an issue or to admit any personal failing. WP:IUC could make this clearer.
Overly-detailed prescriptive guidelines are the wrong way to implement policy. An enlightened moderator is absolutely essential in dealing with incidents that escalate. As it stands today, WP:IUC is a classic example of how not to do it and does nothing but provide ammunition for logic-chopping excuses and "I have nothing to apologise for" attitudes. If it is simplified and refocused on perceived intent, that should help the moderating Admins to make better decisions.
Apologising for unintended harm, such as a perceived insult, is increasingly becoming mandatory. It is in this respect analogous to a fine for a parking offence, where the parking itself is only a civil offence but failing to pay the fine is a criminal one. Such a forced apology may well be mealy-mouthed and insincere, but it has been seen to be made and that is the crucial thing. Once somebody has been forced to cough up several such, they will begin to get the message. WP:CIVIL is grossly behind the times in this respect. It also needs a shortcut such as WP:APOLOGY (which currently redirects to an essay) to help raise awareness of its critical importance.
To be effective and deal with expert wrigglers, moderators also need a generic getout clause allowing, "we just find it unacceptably disrespectful overall" judgement even though specifics may be vague. An example would be an unjustified demand for an apology, where the demand is really just a cynical revenge manoeuvre. I don't know to what extent our Admins have this already.
Logging and tracking of escalated incidents is the norm. "You have been called here on three separate occasions already this year" type information should be available to moderators at the click of a button. Typically, the data is time-limited to prevent lifelong black marks. I don't know of our Admins have such tools, but they should.

— Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 03:17, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Without addressing the general validity of these principles there are two issues right off the top which I see with applying them: First; we have no baseline of acceptable behavior. Likely the organizations all had either a basic code of conduct against which transgressions could be measured and addressed or a set of common norms based on shared culture. Here the best we can come up with is "fuck off" is generally OK while "fuck you" almost never is. Second; We have no moderators. Rather there is a self selecting and varying population of editors who opine at AN and ANI. There is only a verybasic consensus of what is OK or not and both outcomes and sanctions vary extensively from case to case.

The very concept of rudeness depends on a set of commonly held norms, or at least a recognition of whose norms should be applied to interprete proper behavior. (e.g. 'When in Rome. Do as the Romans) There are many ways our various editors may intend or take offense because our editors each have differing cultural and personal social capital i.e. the knowledge and social graces one gains when growing up e.g. 'ladies first', what one can and can not eat with one's fingers, and all the bits of knowledge and values one equates with being 'proper' or holds as valuable. Without some common ground it is not possible to even identify transgressive behaviors. (Unfortunately there is no Wikipedia equivalent to Emily Post's Book of Etiquette.)

I am tempted to say the solution is to focus on graciousness rather than rudeness. A gracious host neither takes offense nor gives unintended offense. The problem is graciousness is not a common value either. It does, however, have the advantage of being easily described, whereas rudeness is not. Even the gracious host must address the puppy who keeps pissing on the floor though. </pontificate> Jbh ^Talk 03:58, 6 June 2018 (UTC) Last edited:Added wikilinks for those interested. 15:07, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

"fuck off" is generally OK And here we see the problem... the puppy who keeps pissing on the floor Ah, the ol' WP:CIR defense. The vast majority of rudeness I've witnessed on Wikipedia has nothing to do with competency and everything to do with WP:OWN, an editor who doesn't want anybody to interfere with their preferred version or outright tries to silence another editor through deleting their on-topic comments. Wikipedia really doesn't need any further rules to deal with this behavior; it's purely an enforcement issue where "well-known" editors are hardly ever held up to the rules, allowing them to violate WP:DE with impunity. "The puppy who keeps pissing on the floor" is blocked almost immediately. The "gracious host" who pisses on the rug after the puppy shampooed it and dusted it, that's the problem. Bright☀ 10:56, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Let me just say I disagree totally with the first point. I oppose making the alleged offended party the sole arbiter of whether something was rude or not. There will be no modifying WP:IUC to this effect. No way. The reason is that there are plenty of people around here who like to feign outrage and insult as a means of "winning" disputes. Reyk _YO! 10:57, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Like many others, the problem is rooted in the way we make decisions. You have five different viewpoints and 20 variations on those viewpoints, and people rarely change their minds as a result of discussion. You also have grudges, axes to grind, and agendas that determine many editors' contributions to decision-making. All of this is human nature and it is not going to change in the time scales that concern us. Thus it's impossible to get anywhere near the clear consensus required to make significant changes for the better.
In the area of editor behavior, self-selected self-governance is a failed social experiment. Such a thing has never succeeded in the history of civilization, to my knowledge, at least not in communities as diverse as this one. To have any hope of addressing these problems, you would have to change the system of government, and that would require WMF to assume control without asking our permission, which would not be without its own problems. ―Mandruss ☎ 11:10, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Not going to happen. Pointless debate, as have been all of its predecessors. If people don't want to be faced with what they perceive as rudeness then they need to adopt the lifestyle of a hermit. It is the way of the world, perceptions differ and all the WMF blarney about "safe spaces" etc will not change that. As was once said, we're not here to sing Kumbaya. - Sitush (talk) 11:20, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you all for your comments. In response I should perhaps point out that I made a number of suggestions, not all linked directly to each other, so any simplistic "it won't work" type comment begs the question as to which "it" is being criticised and whether any of the others might be worth pursuing. There can never be a "baseline of acceptable behaviour", as what is acceptable in one context may not be in another. That is why it is important for moderators to be free to exercise their discretion. Someone pointed out that we have no formal Moderators but that Admins are frequently called on to perform in this role: yes, that is indeed who I mean when I talk about a moderator with a small "m". For example I already pointed out the example of someone falsely claiming to be offended and admins need discretion to make judgements about that, there can never be the total "one offended party one judgement" rule that someone misread into one bullet point. It is worth repeating that Wikipedia has a problem with so many editors walking away and I am among those who believe that our excessively abrasive environment must hold some responsibility. The suggestion that our current policies and guidelines cannot be improved is frankly ridiculous. Some degree of incremental change is needed and that is what many of my suggestions are aimed at. Somebody also pointed out that the problem is endemic within the Admin community - yes of course it is and that is precisely why I suggested some changes that might help guide such Admins towards a more considerate attitude. These suggestions do not come from nowhere, I have seen them working elsewhere and if Wikipedia will only blindly reject them wholesale then perhaps Wikipedians need to sit back and consider just why they wish to differ from the way the world is moving. Is it really my suggestions that are out of touch with reality, or is it actually the Wikipedians who are driving their ex-colleagues away? This is what I have come here to try and start a reasoned debate about, not just snap soundbites. I would respectfully suggest that, while we are indeed not here to sing Kumbaya, we are not here to piss in each other's pockets for the sake of it, either. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 21:42, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Those will all make me glad not to be in the UK! Damn. "Rudeness and disrespect are in the mind of the recipient?" Um, no. We're not mind readers. The standard should be "knew or should have known", and whether offense would be caused to a reasonable person. If you call someone a fucking moron, you should know most reasonable people will be offended by that. If I'm offended by words containing the letter "z", you can't know that would offend me, nor is it reasonable for me to take offense to you discussing The Legend of Zelda. Far as "refusal to admit personal failings", well, if someone says you have a personal failing and you disagree, they can think what they think and you can think what you think. We already consider guidelines descriptive rather than prescriptive, and lawyering doesn't work. If someone finds a way to misbehave that isn't "technically" covered by a policy yet, they can still be sanctioned for being disruptive in general. And reverts happen, it's part of editing. If someone is too thin-skinned to get reverted sometimes, this probably isn't the right place for them to be. I will tell you right now that I will resign the bit before I use it to force someone to apologize. Absolutely not. I want people to apologize if they are actually sorry. If people are routinely forced to apologize, apologies mean nothing at all to the recipient either! If someone right now says to me "I'm sorry, I was having a bad day and I shouldn't have reacted that way", that actually means something to me. But if I knew they were going to be made to say it anyway...do they mean that, or are they just getting it out of the way since they'll have to anyway? As above, we already do have that "wiggle room"—if someone's clearly being disruptive, they can be told they need to knock it off, regardless of exactly what it is they're doing. And with "logging and tracking", blocks and sanctions are logged, and noticeboards are all searchable. But the number of times someone's been to a drama board isn't the crucial bit, you need to go read the context. Did they actually do something wrong and receive a warning for it? Was the complaint generally considered to be baseless? That rather does matter. If someone is drug to ANI ten times, and all ten reports are baseless, we shouldn't sanction them anyway on some kind of "where there's smoke there's fire" stupidity. So a couple of these are already the case, and the rest should absolutely never be. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 22:03, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

As Sitush said, we're not here to sing Kumbaya. We're here to build an encyclopedia using certain policies and guidelines. If I tell an editor, "no, you can't factually state that your caste is literally descended from the gods and I'll block you if you continue" I'm aware that I might be insulting them but I'm not going to apologize for upholding Wikipedia policies. Similarly, spammers told to stop spamming have offended me by trying to use Wikipedia for their personal financial gain. I respectfully suggest you need more experience with civility codes in both commercial and public organizations because "if they feel insulted by you then you have insulted them, whether you intended to or not" is certainly not the case when the rubber meets the road (performance reviews, code quality reviews, contractor objective fulfillment reviews, promotion reviews, etc.). I use these specific examples because we are essentially reviewing each other's contributions here. We can do so politely but we will give offense to people not here to build an encyclopedia according to our standards and we shouldn't have to apologize for that. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 22:35, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict × 2) Well, I must submit that the belief – "There can never be a "baseline of acceptable behaviour", as what is acceptable in one context may not be in another" is why there is not going to be a solution. If there is no consistent behavioral model to judge and be judged against then anything can be either a transgression or acceptable. Simply saying "what is acceptable in one context may not be in another" is pretty much a throw away statement. Of course that is true but, in this instance, the context is editing Wikipedia. The only contexts that arise are subsets of that one, for instance: interactions at articles, interactions in dispute resolution, interactions with new editors, interactions with the public e.g. BLP subjects, informal interactions among peers, etc. All of those are simply more or less strict application of the baseline. This is no different that how office/professional interactions differ from a baseline.

The issue here is that there is no general agreement on what to model the baseline off of. Some want 'professional' while others feel 'mates hanging out at a pub' is more proper. Add to that the ones who think the world should be wrapped in cotton candy and no offense should ever darken their world and you get conflict and grief from a universe of un-managed expectations.

To create manageable expectations; First define the type on online environment is desired; Then examine the values which must be held dear for such an environment to arise and be sustained; Finally identify the type of behavior which expresses and enforces those values. You talk of processes but what are they meant to achieve? How will they identify who is 'right' an who is 'wrong' if no 'right' or 'wrong' behavior prescribed? Who will administer those processes, if they are to provide coercive relief under what authority can they act?

Simply asking people not to be rude is pointless because it requires knowing not only what one considers polite/rude oneself but what each individual one interacts with does as well. Even if that is known how does one judge which set of mores should be observed? In the 'real world' the senior or dominant individual decides c.f. one's boss, one's elder or one's contextual social superior. On Wikipedia though we have no way of negotiating by whose values an interaction should be judged.

There was a long running and very divisive dispute about whether the severity of an editors transgression by the use of a certain "c-word" should be judged based on the American view of the use of that word (very, very, very bad) or the view of the rest of the English speaking world (meh, its even used on the BBC). In that case the editor, who is British, was sanctioned based on how offended Americans were. There was a bit more to it but the situation is illustrative of what happens when there is no common baseline. Jbh ^Talk 22:45, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Well, yes, as @NeilN: suggests, I offend people every day, often every hour, of my editing here. A lot of that offence is very severe in nature even on those occasions where I do not name-call nor use words that some people consider to be naughty in some contexts. It frequently invokes serious reactions - legal threats, corresponding attempts at offence, occasionally death threats and in one long-running series of events, things that were so disruptive to my personal life that I had to relocate and get the WMF and police involved. Under the sort of schemes being mooted here, I would have been booted off Wikipedia many years ago and I absolutely guarantee you that the project would have been much worse for it. The same applies to a lot of other people, some of whom have indeed been forced out for Doing The Right Thing. That said, if any sort of snowflake organised monitoring of civility begins, I'll just go anyway: things have to be considered on their own merits and there neither is nor can be any bright line. We are primarily an encyclopaedia, not a social experiment. - Sitush (talk) 03:55, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

These pointless discussions founder because they are not based on any practical examples of how being nice would assist the development of a neutral encyclopedia built on reliable sources. People who are offended by assertions that evolution-is-real-get-over-it or similar in many fields need to use another website. People who civil POV push until good editors are provoked to rudeness need to use another website. The aim is to develop a neutral encyclopedia built on reliable sources, not provide a place for every nitwit to have their say. Johnuniq (talk) 23:48, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes, being on the wrong end of the civil pov pushing thing earned me one of my blocks. Then, soon after, the person was globally banned or something similar by WMF but the block stays on the record. I still maintain that even my response to them was misinterpreted (deliberately) by their supporters and by an admin (also no gone) who didn't understand the context or the idiom. - Sitush (talk) 01:08, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Indeed, this is a very tricky area so far as definitions and enforcement are concerned. I made a concerted effort to get some clarity in 2013, it accomplished exactly nothing. See Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Civility enforcement. Beeblebrox (talk) 00:20, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

As I opined above, the issue is intractable under our current system of governance. Unless someone can show that the many years of repetitive debate have changed something in this area, an entry should be added at WP:PERENNIAL. That would at least have the benefit of reducing further repetitive debate, if not eliminating it completely. Easy access to the major past discussions should be provided via PERENNIAL so that editors can see that their ideas are anything but new and that many before them have tried and failed. We could create a page devoted to compilation/summary of the relevant policy, guideline, essay, and discussion, if such a thing does not already exist, and that could be linked from PERENNIAL.
Discussion is good. Time-consuming repetitive unproductive discussion is bad. Realism is good. ―Mandruss ☎ 10:19, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Whether or not civility codes can work among employees within a particular geography, here we are volunteers on a global project. Simply implementing something that is "best practice", trendy and possibly workable in California, London, Moonee Ponds or Saudi Arabia will only give you a reminder as to how different the world is. That isn't to say we can't or shouldn't have changes here, and yes we could make the place less bitey to newcomers and regulars alike. But any successful change to a complex system like this needs to be very specific, nuanced and researched against what has been tried before. As a rough guide allow for more work in the design stage than the coding stage. We are currently at a stage analogous to surgery in the Victorian era before gentleman surgeons had been persuaded of the need to wash their hands before operating on patients. Hence the widespread myth that editors biting each other is entirely a behavioural issue. If you do outreach and talk to newbies you soon realise that sometimes it is a software issue and that making a few software changes to reduce edit conflicts would do quite a bit to make this place, and especially newpage patrol, less bitey. But good luck persuading the WMF and especially the developers that when people talk of being bitten by the regulars on Wikipedia sometimes they really mean being on the losing end of an edit conflict. Ϣere SpielChequers 11:51, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

@BrightR: I believe your comments hit the nail squarely on the head. That is a major issue. Our one guideline--don't bite newcomers--is clever and colorful but mostly unusable as an actual guide.

Discussion here is going back and forth between "ethics" and "morality". A general humanistic ethic is not difficult to determine. Jonathon Haidt has done so cross-culturally. He has established at least 5 cross cultural ethical principles, and since Jbhunley is right in saying our context is limited to and defined as Wikipedia, that means there is only really one principle of concern to worry about applying here: be considerate of others, make the effort not to do harm. In many ways those are already advocated and should be advocated. If a stronger support of that ethic is the best we can do, then at least that is something.

As for specific rules of practice, first, those who take disagreements over content personally is not the concern here. Set that aside. Disagreements over content already have multiple methods for resolution that work reasonably well. The fact there are no such methods for resolving personal attacks is the issue.

The bottom line here is whether or not editors believe--or don't--that what has been termed "the abrasive environment" of Wikipedia does harm to Wikipedia. That's our only concern defined by our limited environment and limited interaction. Some people are nice. Some people aren't. That too is beside the point. Does the absence of better more specific guidelines concerning personal attacks harm Wikipedia? If you as an editor think possibly yes, or definitely yes, then we should agree to do something about it.Jenhawk777 (talk) 17:08, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Discussion here is going back and forth between "ethics" and "morality". I read the sentences after that and still have no idea how you came up with that. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 18:17, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Ethics is the big picture issue, morality is its rule based applications. Sorry--jargon. I apologize. Jenhawk777 (talk) 19:29, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

You're arguing from a predetermined position, hence the use of the word "better". An alternative to your questions could be "would the addition of more specific guidelines concerning personal attacks harm Wikipedia ..." But, either way, I refer you to my first response in this thread: it is not going to happen. If you want it to happen then feel free to fork. - Sitush (talk) 17:00, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

we should agree to do something about it The obvious thing which has been raised time and again is abolishing the selective enforcement of rules. The top is definitely not interested in equal and fair enforcement of rules and as has been noted time and again, the hardcore Wikipedia contributors are not interested in equal and fair enforcement either. The only way I see things changing is if the Wikimedia Foundation decides enough is enough and replaces the admins with an army of hired, uninvolved, non-editors who take WP:DISRUPTSIGNS at face value and block anyone who is disruptive. You'll see attitudes being adjusted overnight. Bright☀ 18:15, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

BrightR, what you suggest would indeed cause a very, very rapid shift in attitude. It would be a shift from "This volunteer project I contribute to has its problems, but it's ours, and I'll happily volunteer my time for it", to "Well, that's the last second of my time I ever volunteer for Wikipedia. I guess I'd better help out the people who are forking it to an actual community-based project instead." Wikipedia is run by its volunteer community, not by fiat. That's a feature, not a bug, even when one occasionally does not like the outcome. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 00:29, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

You say you will leave if things change and everyone of us here knows people who have already left because things don't change. I am indeed arguing from a predetermined position that civility is preferable to incivility. Since it is already a general principle of Wikipedia's, it doesn't seem necessary to remake the wheel here. Do personal attacks--genuine personal attacks--harm the bigger picture, interfere with quality product, prevent Wikipedia from achieving its goals in any way--however you want to phrase it--does working in a peaceful environment tend to accomplish more? How hard is it to ask people to please simply say, 'I disagree', instead of 'I disagree you stupid ignorant fuckhead?' Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:38, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

A community-run project can still have equal and fair enforcement of its rules. There are already many forks of Wikipedia, how's that working out for them? Bright☀ 10:31, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

Revised suggestions

For all I know this may be just a rehash of previous discussions, but I have certainly learned something useful, notably from Sitush who tackles some of the PoV communities that infest certain areas of life and Wikipedia. Also, it is clear that mandating an apology is never going to happen outside of specific Admin decisions (where I have seen it demanded). I guess my original thought needs some re-orientation: given the concerns over driving valuable editors away, can we strike a better balance between abrasiveness and civility?, so here is a modified set of proposals with greater focus on practical changes to policy and/or toolsets:

Rudeness is about more than just words. Aggressive behaviours can be equally rude, not only in active aggression such as reversions but also in passive aggression such as refusal to acknowledge or discuss an issue or to admit any personal failing. WP:IUC could make this clearer.
Overly-detailed prescriptive guidelines are the wrong way to implement policy. An enlightened and empowered moderator (i.e. the Admin coimmunity) is absolutely essential in dealing with incidents that escalate. As it stands today, WP:IUC is a classic example of how not to do it and does nothing but provide ammunition for logic-chopping excuses and wikilawyering. If it is simplified and refocused on perceived intent, that should help the moderating Admins to make better decisions.
Apologising for unintended harm, such as a perceived insult, can often yield a positive outcome. Such an apology may make no sense to the person apologising, but it has been seen to be made and that is the crucial thing. Once somebody has been asked to deliver several such, they will begin to get the message. WP:CIVIL is grossly behind the times in this respect. It also needs a shortcut such as WP:APOLOGY (which currently redirects to an essay against apologising) to help raise awareness of its value.
To be effective and deal with expert wrigglers, moderators (i.e the Admin community) also need a generic getout clause allowing, "we just find it unacceptably destructive overall" judgement even though specifics may be vague. An example would be an unjustified demand for an apology, where the demand is really just a cynical revenge manoeuvre. I don't know to what extent our Admins have this already.
Logging and tracking of escalated incidents can help identify destructive individuals, but also raises concerns about retaining such information for too long. "You have been called here on three separate occasions already" type information should be available to moderators (i.e the Admin community) at the click of a button. The data needs to be strictly time-limited to prevent lifelong black marks. Perhaps one calendar year would be about right, perhaps a few months? I don't know if our Admins have such tools, but I would suggest that they should.

— Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 20:16, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Any plan to force civility on a diverse community needs to first determine how to handle civil POV pushers, unemotional SPAs, paid advocates, and those lacking competence. Here is something that might work: in each month, an admin who does any civility blocks must also block a roughly equal number of unhelpful contributors who cause trouble and waste time. Johnuniq (talk) 23:24, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Any plan to force civility on a diverse community needs to first determine how to handle civil POV pushers, unemotional SPAs, paid advocates, and those lacking competence. Why, may I ask? It seems to me that these two issues are quite orthogonal. They saying "it doesn't cost anything to be nice" comes to mind.... CapitalSasha ~ talk 23:30, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

There is no problem with genuinely uncivil contributors because they are easily blocked. Anyone disagreeing should post a couple of examples. The problem occurs when a good editor gets frustrated with a POV pusher. Blocking the good editor because the POV pusher was civil will damage the encyclopedia. All "normal" editors who build content will eventually be removed as they become overwhelmed by the clueless who have learned to tick all the CIVIL boxes. Johnuniq (talk) 23:36, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

I understand your point but I feel that it is a bit absurd. Surely most "normal" editors can figure out how to not personally attack the POV-pushers? It's not that hard.... CapitalSasha ~ talk 23:39, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Steelpillow, you reflect the exact problem that Johnuniq raises. You carry on with essentially the same thing as though you didn't even read the answer. That answer, in large, flashing, bold, letters, is NO. It is not "ask again until you get a different answer", it is not "tweak your proposal a little", it is "We read your proposal and we reject it." That is why we have pages like the one about dropping the stick, and when someone gets that showed to them, sometimes their feelings get bruised. Too bad. Wikipedia, as was once stated, is not an ivory tower, it is a shop floor. To get anything at all done, we need to be direct and honest with one another. We shouldn't be needlessly uncivil or abrasive, but some people take bluntness as meanness. The answer to your proposal is NO. I'm sorry if such bluntness strikes you as mean, but some people refuse to see something until it's put in their face, and when that happens, we need to put it in their face so they stop wasting time. Sometimes, that needs to be "Quit asking that question, it's already been answered." Sometimes, that needs to be "If you do that again, I'm going to block you." Sorry if that bruises someone's feelings sometimes, but we're undertaking a very large project here, and we really don't have time to cater to the thin-skinned. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 00:43, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Seraphimblade, that doesn't seem to me to be the clear conclusion from the above discussion. CapitalSasha ~ talk 00:57, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

To add two more substantive points, (1) why on earth should the "thin-skinned" (i.e. those who don't enjoy being told to fuck off all the time) be excluded from editing Wikipedia, when surely they could make many valuable contributions in a less hostile environment, and (2) it doesn't take any additional time to be civil. CapitalSasha ~ talk 01:02, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Experience tells me that the thin-skinned see offence where the consensus of the community is that none existed. That has wasted a lot of the time of a lot of people over the years. - Sitush (talk) 01:18, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

I believe it's very well-established that the Wikipedia community is not at all representative of the wider population, which is a problem in my view. I think there is a compelling argument for Wikipedians coming to a consensus that we should put aside our consensus of personal opinions about what should be acceptable in favor of a consensus of wiser opinions about what is good for the project in the long run. CapitalSasha ~ talk 01:36, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

If we listened to the "consensus of wiser opinions" (and by the way, whose wiser opinions?), we'd never have started this project, because clearly the idea of an encyclopedia that the whole world can edit is laughable and ludicrous. Here we are, coming on twenty years later, and flying in the face of those "wiser opinions", we made the damn thing work. With a community-based, consensus-driven model, not a top-down "wise lawgiver" model. Sorry, that ain't changing, and it had certainly better not. It made this whole crazy experiment work to being with. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 02:09, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

By wiser opinions I only meant our own opinions with cooler heads than might prevail in the face of a frustrating situation. I'm definitely not proposing to scrap the community-based model!! As I said, I think it's well-established that Wikipedia's community is highly skewed demographically, and I'm not sure that that's sustainable. But I only seek to advocate within the community structure, obviously. CapitalSasha ~ talk 02:21, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

The community will always be highly skewed demographically. For example, most of my friends would prefer to spend their time in the pub and at the gym than researching and writing. The vast majority of people have no interest in disseminating knowledge and a surprisingly high number have little interest in assimilating it in the pseudo-academic context that Wikipedia presents. - Sitush (talk) 02:27, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

And of the people who are interested in disseminating knowledge in the pseudo-academic context that Wikipedia presents, 90% of them are male? Surprising.... CapitalSasha ~ talk 02:30, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes, that's where I thought you would be going with this. I am not engaging on the female Wikipedian issue: it is mostly bollocks to connect that to perceived civility and I really do not care what surveys may say. I could list a whole load of civil pov-pushers to prove the point and I could list a whole load of women I know in real life who have mouths like gutters. - Sitush (talk) 02:43, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

I don't know that the claim is that women are less happy with incivility; I certainly don't want to make that claim now. Another possible claim could be that rudeness discourages newcomers and members of outgroups in general, and allowing people to be nasty to each other tends to further bias the site towards the people who are already here, who are demographically skewed. I'm not sure. I'm a bit surprised though by your lack of curiosity/interest, and I'm not sure why you value your anecdotes over "what surveys may say." CapitalSasha ~ talk 02:53, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

The claim has been made repeatedly but the surveys are themselves skewed. For example, I edited an article last week about a village in India where the 2011 census reported literacy (this is very basic literacy) among its women was 30-odd percent and that for men was 70-odd per cent. Yes, it is quite probable that the village also has poor internet connectivity but I think there is a systemic issue that goes way beyond Wikipedia when things like that come to light. Similarly, a recent piece I read in, I think, The Signpost reported that many women do not realise anyone can edit this thing. God knows why the literate amongst them can't read the blurb (or choose not to read it), but clearly if correct then that impacts on the skewedness. Perhaps we should be doing more outreach with mumsnet etc. In any event, the world is a rough place and keeping things compliant with our policies etc here means we cannot always treat people with kid gloves. I think Steelpillow has realised that now. - Sitush (talk) 02:58, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

User:CapitalSasha Another possible claim could be that rudeness discourages newcomers and members of outgroups in general, and allowing people to be nasty to each other tends to further bias the site towards the people who are already here, who are demographically skewed. Amen sister. Seems irrefutable to me. bias

User:Sitush Isn't there some middle ground for you between the rough world and kid gloves? Can't keeping things compliant with our policies here be done in a civil fashion? Instead of focusing on the tiny percentage of those thin skinned you abhor how about the rest of the world of Wikipedia? Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:38, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

See, you are doing it again with your presumptions. Abhor? Who said anything about abhorrence? - Sitush (talk) 04:40, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

@Seraphimblade: Which of my five remaining suggestions are you saying "no" to? And what "consensus" are you referring to? I see none here yet. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:53, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

A possibly wise person once said "These pointless discussions founder because they are not based on any practical examples of how being nice would assist the development of a neutral encyclopedia built on reliable sources" so let's get started. Does this comment violate CIVIL? Should the author have been blocked? Would it be desirable to investigate the background first? Johnuniq (talk) 06:10, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

I would say that technically, yes it does breach CIVIL, but that also, yes the background needs to be understood before the scale of the offence can be judged. I have seen rudeness used as a tactic to drive tenacious PoV timewasters away before now, and it always distresses me. Straight bluntness and topic bans are always to be preferred. But we are all only human and exasperation does sometimes win out. I have suffered the odd block on that account myself (exasperated rudeness, not timewasting, in case you are wondering seraphimblade.

). The example here appears trivial, perhaps deserving at most a "could have been more polite without losing impact", I doubt that it should have earned a block unless the back story is exceptional, e.g. the poster had already been censured and told to desist, hence the suggested utility of a short-term tracking tool. I also believe that WP:IUC is over-prescriptive in such cases, because the more it says, the more it opens the way to endless wikilawyering. The Admin community should be given a little more air to moderate such individual cases as they see fit. But I also believe that other aspects of the policy could be clarified. Hence my suggestions here. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 09:32, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

User:Johnuniq I appreciate the specific example. That's excellent. While I would say this person is not exactly civil, in my opinion this example does not fall into the category of personal attack. There is disagreement over content. He denigrates the case you make, relevancy, claims there is misunderstanding on your part, references policy, attempts to focus the argument on the issue, and actually compliments you on the rest of your work. He is clearly exasperated, but at no time does he actually make a personal attack. Someone can comment on your writing, your logic, your references, and anything else without it actually being an ad hominem attack. He never says you are stupid. He never actually says anything about you individually at all. His manner and language are in that grey area of incivility in real life, but in the Wiki-world, it does not cross that line. If there was an enforceable rule about "no personal attacks" and the specific example had to be included--there is no example here to give.

So that's a good example of something that might upset someone that is not actually a personal attack. If there was a policy, an admin would suss that out right away I expect. Jenhawk777 (talk) 18:13, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

I gave two examples of rude behavior directly harming the encyclopedia (undoing corrections, deleting a talk page comment that pointed out a mistake). The problem is that there is no enforcement against this behavior. Instead of dealing with hypothetical "does this harm the encyclopedia" you can just put your foot down and block editors who outright harm the encyclopedia and use incivility to get their way. Johnuniq's example may show no immediate damage to the encyclopedia, but at this level of discourse ("FUCK OFF") is counter-productive to consensus building and editors who engage in such behavior should be warned that when it crosses into WP:OWN they will be blocked. Bright☀ 10:40, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

You're right. And you're right again. I had no idea I had the ability to block someone here. (Holy crap Batman!) And then you're right again. Jenhawk777 (talk) 00:02, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you all for your general comments. Although focused comment on my bullet points has been sparse, there is clearly sufficient interest to develop more specific policy wordings for my three suggested changes and take them to the associated talk pages. Can anybody answer my two specific queries about Admin powers: a) to what extent are Admins expected to exercise their discretion in dealing with wrigglers and wikilawyers, and b) what kind of tracking facilities do they have, if any, to summarise a given user's misedmeanours in the recent past? Would I be better raising these on an Admin-specific discussion page such as WP:AN? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 02:47, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

As the OP, I think this discussion has reached its end. For anybody interested, I hope to flesh out some specific policy/guideline/essay changes to propose on the appropriate local discussion pages and I have started a working draft of them in my sandbox at User:Steelpillow/sandbox. Thanks again, all. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 14:23, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

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

MOS:JOBTITLES tweak

FYI

– pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography#Proposed MOS:JOBTITLES tweak

Gist: Proposal to not make it mandatory to capitalize commercial and informal titles when used in front of names, to better reflect contemporary usage and for easier readability (e.g., allow XYZCorp senior vice-president Xiao-ting Chen, and team co-captain Pat O'Brien ...; will have no effect on things like President Sebastián Piñera of Chile). — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 01:06, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

MOS:POSTNOM tweak

FYI

– pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography#MOS:POSTNOM limit proposal

Gist: Three-question RfC on 1) limiting the number of post-nominal abbreviations after names (see, e.g., lead sentence at Archibald Montgomery-Massingberd); 2) to what number; 3) and whether, in the case of a lot of them, to permit some in the lead or move all honors into the body of the article. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 01:17, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

Trademark mis-use

Do we have any policy about when we will use someone's registered trademark as a generic term, even while they're actively trying to prevent that? E.g. Velcro; see Talk:Hook and loop fastener. Dicklyon (talk) 03:53, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

@Dicklyon: You mean besides MOS:TM? ―Mandruss ☎ 04:11, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

MOS:TM actually doesn't cover this. Unless we know a term has become a generic trademark, we should avoid using the trademark term to refer to general usage. A list of such cases are at List of generic and genericized trademarks in the third section. It offers good advice from the AP Manual of Style "use a generic equivalent unless the trademark is essential to the story". As to what are and are not generic trademarks, I haven't been able to find an authoritative list for the US PTO, but we'd should follow US regulations here to determine it in main space. --Masem (t) 04:15, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Right, not really a style issue. Thanks for that link. The "Velcro" under discussion shows up in the section List of generic and genericized trademarks#List of protected trademarks frequently used as generic terms. So what is our policy for such things that are "actively protected" and also "frequently used as generic terms"? Dicklyon (talk) 04:19, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Style is the major driver since its a difference of wording choices, but its not the full picture. But we otherwise have no hard advice here. It makes sense to avoid the use of non-generic trademark when not referring to the product specifically. I do note we ignore "(R)" or "TM" symbols with any other trademark, so the request to call "Velcro" as "Velcro (R)" won't happen, but we should seemingly (in the "do the least harm" view), respect the non-generic trademark state, even if the RSes routinely ignore it. --Masem (t) 04:26, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

I tend to agree in the Velcro case, but would feel better if we had more clear guidelines some place about when to respect a trademark and when to treat it as generic. How do we draw the line? Dicklyon (talk) 04:38, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

I've been trying to find an "official" comprehensive list, but cannot find one. (Even searching on marks at USPTO do not easily reveal generic from non-generic). We need a source/list like this to draw that line, and haven't found something of sufficient authority here, yes. --Masem (t) 04:50, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Bearing in mind that list of genericized trademarks is in the article namespace and not a reliable source, it's of no help IMO. It would be good to have a consensus-supported project namespace listing of trademarks that it's OK to use generically. (And in my opinion we should mark the non-generic use with capitalisation, and the generic use by lack of capitalisation, but that again is probably a minority view.) Or, an external link to an authority (perhaps and preferably even one we think that US courts would accept) would be an alternative, if one can be found. Andrewa (talk) 16:21, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

It seems like Wikipedia should not be able to do wrong here. If, in the opinions of a majority of editors, the trademarked term is the common name of a type of product, then it is genericized by definition. Any office that keeps a list of such terms should be asking us, not the other way around. Wnt (talk) 21:47, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm fairly certain that that would fall foul of WP:OR. The opinions of editors counts for very little around here. Having said that, if a variety of reliable sources either claim that Velcro is a genericized trademark, or they simply use it as such, then it would surely be genericized by definition, and if Velcro Companies wants to stop that from being the case then it's up to them to tackle the sources themselves, not us. As an aside, the next time an IP user vehemently defends VC's claim over the trademark could somebody please steer them towards WP:COI. nagualdesign 03:13, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

@Nagualdesign: To be clear, when I said "in the opinion of a majority of editors that the trademark is the common name of a type of product", I meant per their responsible editing given a reading of WP:COMMONNAME and the relevant source literature, not in their own personal day-to-day usage in conversation. If the editors honestly believe the trademark is being used generically in the sources as a whole, then I would suggest it is in all probability being used that way. Wnt (talk) 21:14, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Velcro has been a dictionary word for a long time, but in recent years the Velcro Brand (as labelled on Velcro(R) products in major stores) has been trying to wind back time. Do some searches for the words "velcroed" and "velcroing". The trademark is long since genericized. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:26, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) How dare you write it like that! Don't you know that you're supposed to write "VELCRO® brand products"?!?

Joking aside, it seems rather odd that they would insist that people use all caps, thereby being drawn into their legal web. If people just use Velcro (or even velcro) would their supposed claim evaporate? And yes, it doesn't take much searching to demonstrate that it's a genericized trademark. It is indeed in the OED. nagualdesign 03:40, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Their position is untenable for us. Even when talking about VELCRO® Brand fasteners, proper name trademark, talking about that companies products, we will not use thier allcaps choice of styling. And that's a far cry from when we talk about competitor's velco products, let along the old concept of using velcro for velcroing velroed things to other things. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:25, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

We should use their all-caps styling in direct quotations where applicable, and not otherwise. The initial capital is IMO a different issue, see my comments elsewhere. Andrewa (talk) 16:25, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Keep in mind that a generic trademark only applies to the type of product, and does not prevent it from being non-generic in other areas. The ur-example here seems to be thermos - its generic in describing the type of container, but the Thermos Company retains its trademark on Thermos as a manufacturing firm.

And here's the thing, a trademark can only become generic if a court decides this (and even then, I've not found a list for that), but a trading that is in the process of being genericized is much more difficult to determine. Eg, Google and Xerox actively are fighting the genericized of these words, even if the press routinely uses them that way. I personally think that in cases where we know the trademark owner is actively discouraging the genericized trademark, we should respect that (and thus create a list we know of these cases), but if we cannot find any evidence that a genericized trademark is being actively fought against, while the media uses the trademark in a generic fashion, then we might be able to.

But again, we absolutely need a list here, something we know is reliable. We can't enforce this if we have vague ideas of what is generic and what is not. --Masem (t) 03:35, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

We're not going to get a reliable and authoritative list, because it doesn't exist, because company lawyers are running rear guard actions against the blowing of the sands, and for velcro, there is no reasonable alternative. People do not ask for hook-and-loop fastened shoes for their kids who can't tie shoelaces. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:25, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

"Generic trademarks" are ones that a court of law have determined can no longer be used as trademarks for that field (typically when the company owning it goes to court to try to protect it and loses, like with "aspirin"). There should be an authoritative list of these. "Genericized trademarks" are those on the verge, but have not been yet ruled by a court to have become generic ("google" falls into that). That's going to be the one that's more iffy for an authoritative list outside of language experts and legal interests. --Masem (t) 06:23, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

People do not ask for hook-and-loop fastened shoes for their kids who can't tie shoelaces - Exactly. Andrewa (talk) 06:33, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

In fact if I were to ask in my local hardware store for a "hook and loop fastener" I'd probably be shown a cabin hook. (And they do sell velcro too... whether it's real or bootleg I have no idea, but I've bought it there. And I asked for "velcro" and was instantly understood.) Andrewa (talk) 06:57, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Actually, I've made several websites for curtain manufacturers and related industries and they do tend to use the phrase "hook-and-loop tape" because both "hook tape" and "loop tape" are sold separately. Of course, if you asked them for Velcro they'd ask you if you wanted hook tape, loop tape or both. Anecdotal, I know, but there it is. nagualdesign 15:20, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Well... There is a distinction between use within “industry sources” (who are careful not to violate trademark laws, because they don’t want to get sued), and use by non-industry sources (who are less concerned about being sued). Non-industry sources routinely use some trademarked names as a generic... indeed such names are sometimes listed in dictionaries as a generic. Perhaps one way to draw the line is to see if the brand name has been turned into a verb (to velcro, to hoover, to xerox, etc.) Blueboar (talk) 15:48, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I'm aware of that distinction. I assumed we all were. Sorry if that wasn't clear. My point was that you could walk into almost any hardware store and ask for hook-and-loop tape and they probably would know what you meant. And if you went into a haberdashery store and asked for loop tape they'd probably know what you meant. But let's not digress. nagualdesign 16:58, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Any particular reason not to just follow the sources? If the majority of the RS about the topic call it Velcro, call it Velcr. If the majority call it hook-and-loop fastener, call it a hook and loop fastener. WP:COMMONNAME may apply.Tazerdadog (talk) 04:39, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

That's always been the principle. Some care is needed to deal with non-independent efforts in the branding war by the Velcro Brand Company. I suggest looking at dictionaries, and google ngrams for words such as "velcroed". --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:25, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

While if we follow the sources and use what most other sources use (eg if they all use "xeroxing" for "photocopying"), it is very very unlikely that the company will come after WP only for that, so that's at least something reasonable. But if we're dealing with a term that doesn't have that wide use but is out there. (something like "googling" might fall into this, I have not done any investigative check), we should be very careful - even if some sources uses, if it is not near universal, we should avoid it ourselves. --Masem (t) 06:12, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

There's been a lot of discussion on this, I've linked to what I have found so far here. But none of it seems terribly conclusive.

I've also raised it on the Meta here to see whether there are any Wikimedia-wide guidelines, but nothing so far. I think there should be, personally, but IANAL and some have suggested that we would actually compromise our legal position by having such guidelines. So it's no wonder it's in the too-hard basket. Andrewa (talk) 06:26, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Some people try way too hard to get Wikipedia to "respect" trademarks. Since we are not selling anything, that's not our concern. I'm no lawyer, but my understanding is that the law eggs on companies to do "whatever they reasonably can" to sabotage generic use of trademarks, which means that we will find that however large we manage to stretch our anus, the next fist we encounter will always be just a little bigger... Wnt (talk) 21:21, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Agree. We have several comments at Talk:hook and loop fastener that suggest that, for legal reasons, we should avoid using velcro as a generic term. But AFAIK we have no legal advice to that effect, despite much prior discussion. That's what I'm trying to clarify, as the necessary first step. If we do have reason for thinking that it would be illegal for us to name the article velcro, that's one thing. But all we have is an entertaining youtube from the company itself, which is of course a primary source. To regard that as a show-stopper is a dangerous precedent, to say the least. Andrewa (talk) 05:58, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I do think sources do matter, and if everyone else and their dog uses "velcro" uses that to mean hoop and loop, then we're fine. That's no so much an issue to as the case where there is not clear-cut evidence that a trademark is on its way to genericizing, but editors want to push it with a smattering of sources but clearly not universal across sources. We do not want WP to lead in this - we should follow - and there we should outright avoid the generic terms. --Masem (t) 06:10, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm with you on this, Masem. Respecting the law, and the idea that WP should follow not lead, is not at all the same as stretching ones anus for a good fisting. Having said that, the whole idea of trademarks is for companies to differentiate themselves from other companies that provide similar products or services. That doesn't stop you from opening a sandwich shop called Velcro though. The only sticking point might be trademark dilution, but since Wikipedia does not manufacture hook-and-loop tape (or sell sandwiches) this is pretty much a non-issue. Do people (not just businesses) use Velcro in everyday language? Yes they do. Is it okay for Wikipedia to reflect that fact (per COMMONNAME)? Of course. But it would certainly be nice to have all of this confirmed so we can finally put it to bed, and I for one appreciate your efforts. nagualdesign 15:20, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Agree with one proviso... I think we should distinguish Velcro (the proper name referring to the company and its product, and hypothetically also to the sandwich shop) from velcro (the common noun that has generic usage, and very probably the verb too). This is not a matter of usage but of grammar... it's the same spoken word, but in written English there's a marking on proper nouns (and very occasionally on their verb derivatives too). But (in en:Wikipedia at least) my opinions on capitalisation generally do not have consensus support, so that may not be a helpful distinction here. Andrewa (talk) 16:11, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

This is true, most of the time a trademark as applied to a specific brand/area becomes generic, its common use drops capitalization. (We use "aspirin", not "Aspirin"). So when the company name is still trademarked, we should avoid using the capitalized form for the generic term, as you suggest. --Masem (t) 16:16, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

That's half of it... we should avoid using the capitalized form for the generic term. And I think we should do that regardless of sources for particular cases, as a matter of grammar as attested by general English usage. But I think we should also avoid using the uncapitalised form non-generically, for exactly the same reason that we avoid the allcaps form - It's promotional styling, and therefore not encyclopedic. Andrewa (talk) 16:36, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Good point about the capitalization. I often make the mistake of capitalizing verbs like google, but I'm aware that that's not proper English. nagualdesign 16:58, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Ah, but what is proper English? This is exactly the point I have tried (and failed) to make in other discussions regarding capitalisation and proper nouns. We in Wikipedia, following the trend of linguists generally for the last hundred years or so, have rejected linguistic prescription in favour of descriptive linguistics. We regard whatever speakers do (some say only native speakers but even that is not agreed) as ipso facto correct. That's why we are interested in reliable secondary sources not just for referencing information, but also in deciding article titles. Now, in written English (and Wikipedia is written English) there is a marking of a proper noun by a capital letter... that is the common practice, and has been supported by rules from time to time but it's the practice that interests us (and that is one of the key points for which I have failed to gain consensus, or perhaps just understanding). Readers generally understand the difference between Velcro and velcro (but perhaps subliminally, and that's part of the problem - we are not all linguists!). This gives us the opportunity to distinguish between velcro and Velcro, and I think we should take it. Andrewa (talk) 01:26, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Umm... yes and no. If we start using 'words' like alot, using literally improperly, or ending sentences with "right now" for no good reason I'm going to stop using Wikipedia. Neologisms and poor spelling/grammar are not the same thing. Proper nouns are capitalized, verbs are not, and if that makes me a 'grammar Nazi' then Sieg Heil!

nagualdesign 01:56, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

We write in an encyclopedic tone (can't put my hand on the policy/guideline but it's there somewhere I think, and is IMO commonsense anyway) and nobody is suggesting otherwise I hope! But verbs can be similarly capitalised... If I say I'm ritzing tonight that could mean at any "ritzy" establishment, but if I say I'm Ritzing tonight that means at the Ritz. Andrewa (talk) 16:33, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

PS you lose. (;-> Andrewa (talk) 16:40, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

PPS I've finally started User talk:Andrewa/Prescriptive linguistics think tank which has been in the pipeline for ages. You might like to comment there. Andrewa (talk) 18:22, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

If the reliable sources start using "alot", then we'll start using it also. It is inevitable. The question is, is lower-case "velcro" used as the generic term in reliable sources? I looked at two and saw upper-case ... but I have no idea if NASA literally uses the brand, though. Wnt (talk) 11:40, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

Agree that sources do matter (I hope nobody thinks I am questioning this!) and that We do not want WP to lead in this, but does the conclusion and there we should outright avoid the generic terms (my emphasis, and should that be therefore?) follow? It seems rather sweeping to me. Andrewa (talk) 16:11, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Category:Indefinitely blocked IP addresses

A thread at ANI about an IP block length got me searching and I found this category, which contains quite a number of addresses. Is this intentional and typical? I didn't think IPs should be left blocked indefinitely. Home Lander (talk) 16:20, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

I've been meaning to look into some of the more recent, seemingly accidental ones. The old(er|est) ones are generally requests by the school or ISP admins, open proxy, etc. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 16:57, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

I sampled three and two were IPs at ISPs that presumably should have been reused by now: User:125.60.195.230 and User:59.10.64.43. Both were blocked in 2015. The second was blocked as a "vandalism-only account" after four edits, which makes it look like a mistake; but it was also labelled "probably open proxy" suggesting the IP was targeted on purpose. Though how an account with four edits can be identified as an open proxy... somebody have NSA connections around here? (I assume so, but I didn't think they'd run both ways!) Wnt (talk) 23:17, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

If a proxy is wide "open" it is very easy to test, just try to use it. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:32, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Does Copyright Violation extend to sandboxes?

This may be a tricky copyright question that I would prefer to discuss here at VPP rather than at a drama board. An experienced and productive editor, User:btphelps, had several old drafts that consisted of material that had been copied from copyrighted sources, in their user space. They had been sitting in user space as copyvio for between one and four years. A reviewer, User:Shadowowl, moved the drafts from user space to draft space. Somehow the drafts were tagged for AFC review. (Since the drafts have been deleted, I no longer have their history, and I assume that Shadowowl tagged/submitted them.) I reviewed the first one, Draft:Charley Smith (Cowboy), and thought that it read like it had been copied, and found using Earwig’s copyvio detector that it had been copied from two sources, and tagged it for G12. At this point I read an exchange between Btphelps and Shadowowl, in which Btphelps said that the pages should not have been moved out of their “private sandbox” because they would almost certainly then be deleted for copyright violation, and that they were still works in progress. I found that the second one, User:Btphelps/51st Engineer Combat Battalion, was also copyright violation. These pages and a third page have now been deleted as copyright violation.

Okay, here is the issue. Btphelps says that they are not aware of a policy that prohibits works in progress from containing copyrighted material while they are still in progress (whether for one day or one year or more), and that they think that copyright enforcement applies to submitted or published articles. On reading the copyright policies twice, I don’t see any limitation that says that copyright policy only applies in some parts of Wikipedia and not everywhere. Btphelps says that we should have assumed good faith. I agree that good faith is a good policy, but I am asking whether copyright is absolute and overrides good faith.

My own reading of the policies is that we have had a good-faith error by a productive good-faith editor. I don’t know why Shadowowl moved the drafts, although it likely had to do with recent concerns about stale drafts in user space and in draft space, and these drafts did seem to have been abandoned.

Comments? Robert McClenon (talk) 00:45, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Any edit on Wikipedia in any namespace must abide by the copyright rules. Killiondude (talk) 00:52, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm no lawyer, but it seems to me that anything on Wikipedia which is visible to the public at large is subject to copyright law. I don't think the law would care about our internal page classifications. Zero^talk 00:55, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes it does, unequivocally. Text everywhere must abide by the copyright policy. If you want a link, see Wikipedia:Copying_text_from_other_sources#Can_I_copy_text_into_a_user_page_or_talk_page_in_order_to_work_on_it? ~ Amory (u • t • c) 00:56, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

User:Amorymeltzer - That answers that. So the editor made a good-faith error, and shouldn't do it again. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:42, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes, copyright policy (and copyright law) applies to user- and talk- namespaces. That said, context matters; it might be acceptable to copy a few paragraphs from an outside source onto a talk page for discussion and article development purposes, but not appropriate to drop the same block of text into the body of an article.

In this instance the draft text was just a straight dump of the external site(s). That's not kosher, under pretty much any circumstance, in any namespace. It's also a really bad habit for any sort of writing. Copying an external text and then trying to tweak the wording until it looks 'different enough' is a really easy route to inadvertent copyright infringement and plagiarism. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:28, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

I agree that we don’t want copyvios in any space... but it is the second part of this ... where shadowowl took the material from another editor’s user space and moved it to draft space (without asking)... that compounded the problem. Very bad practice that we should discourage. Blueboar (talk) 18:53, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
Yes.. You are not allowed to host copyvios in userspace or draftspace. This has never been in question. A copy is a copy. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 19:41, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
Yes, but... there can be confusion between actual copyright violation, a legal issue, and plagiarism, which is a matter of academic integrity. To be considered a true copyright violation, the page has to have a lot of text from some other source, not just a snippet. The context of the work (i.e. a draft being rewritten rather than a competing online publication) would also matter and so on; I'm not sure if there really is a dividing line or just a weigh-off of the lawyers' wallets. There are a lot of things that editors can and have been keelhauled for here though which is just plagiarism -- like using seven sentences word for word, in one case I remember. That kind of plagiarism is not reputable for Wikipedia, but it's also not illegal; hence it should be tolerated when it is in a user draft being worked on. That said... while we should tolerate it, it's never actually a good idea. If you make a habit of copying and pasting paragraphs to the edit page to look at while you work on your own text, eventually something embarrassing is going to happen. Best not to do it in the first place. Wnt (talk) 21:29, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

I have been a professional writer for much longer than there has been a Wikipedia. (In fact, I recently learned that I am a source for a few articles.) In pre-computer days, I would often go to a library to do research. Sometimes I would photocopy pages from a book to refer to when I returned to my typewriter. Admittedly this is violating copyright, but it is essentially "no harm, no foul". The information was always put into my own words (or into quotation marks), with full credit given to the source. How is copying-and-pasting reference material into a draft article any different, knowing that the information will eventually be re-worded and given proper credit? → Michael J Ⓣ Ⓒ Ⓜ 22:14, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Any copyrighted material (even if being used under fair-use) can only exist in article space - the relevant policy here is WP:NFCC#9. Black Kite (talk) 22:22, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
- A point: NFC does not cover text-based copyrighted material. Only for separate media that has to be stored under the File: area. Text-based content falls under the limitations of fair use that would be allowed via CC-BY-SA/GFDL, which we generally do not allow a lot of, and definitely required attribution. --Masem (t) 15:00, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
The *reason* for this is because even if the copied material is re-written, it still exists and is viewable in the revision history. Which qualifies as 'published'. If it only exists for a short time, or is only a small amount of material, it can be rev-del back to the point where its not a copyright violation. If its extensive and there from the start, it needs to be nuked. Only in death does duty end (talk) 22:26, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
Because there is a massive difference between "your paper notes at home which no one ever sees" and "your electronic notes on a top-10 website that can be searched for and linked to." Chance for real financial harm to the copyright owner. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:05, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
It doesn't even have to be copyright "material". Just providing a link to material that may be in breach of copyright at, say, YouTube, is seen as "encouraging others to infringe copyright", and can get you an indefinite block, can't it? Martinevans123 (talk) 15:07, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
- Should not be linked (WP:COPYVIOEL), but no explicit word on blocking policy. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:15, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
  - It would be a behavioral problem to review should one continue to insert such links into articles, barring obvious cases (eg linking to Pirate Bay with the intent to point to the copyvios there). Someone inserting a YT link thinking it might help discussion or improvement should only be warned, not lambasted. --Masem (t) 15:30, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
    - Whether such a "behavioural problem" is treated better with re-education or punishment, the salient point being that no particular space, including user talk page chat, can be considered a "safe place" for such links. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:02, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

Discussion notice: Auto-deliver the required DS "awareness" notices

FYI

– Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: WP:Village pump (proposals)#Bot to deliver Template:Ds/alert
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 18:03, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

I support this. Jenhawk777 (talk) 19:04, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

@Jenhawk777: This isn't the discussion, it's a pointer to the discussion. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 20:29, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

I went and read the discussion before coming back here and posting this. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:20, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

The place to support, oppose or comment on a discussion is at the discussion, not at the notice. · · · Peter (Southwood) ^(talk): 06:00, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

RfC: Ease switching of citations between citation templates or no citation templates

Please see Wikipedia talk:Citing sources#RfC: Remove the bullet point that starts "adding citation templates..." Jc3s5h (talk) 14:48, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Guidelines regarding birth names of trans individuals

The guidelines regarding birth names of trans individuals were introduced here, justified with reference to this discussion regarding how to refer to trans individuals who were previously known by another name. It is currently:

In the case of transgender and non-binary people, birth names should be included in the lead sentence only when the person was notable under that name.

However, the aforementioned discussion regards those who were notable under a prior name; I can find no discussion regarding individuals who were not notable under their birth name. It appears the assumption that birth names should not be included was made by a single editor - without debate - in the aforementioned discussion. (This discussion was related to discussions here and here.)

This assumption-turned-guideline was justified via links to GLAAD and NPR. However, those links do not support the premise. The NPR link states, "We respect their wishes if they change their names," i.e., that people will be referred to by their chosen names, with nothing about censoring birth names. Similarly, the GLAAD link states, "They should be afforded the same respect for their chosen name as anyone else who uses a name other than their birth name (e.g., celebrities)." But that's not what we're doing here; the guideline explicitly rejects this in having cis celebrities treated differently. See, for example, Elton John or Portia de Rossi, both of whom have their given names in the lead sentence, while the page for Laverne Cox - the example given here - includes no reference to birth name, not even under "early life." (In fact, that goes well beyond what is proscribed even here.) WP:HARM is mentioned with reference to the aforementioned links, but those links cite no specific harm in revealing a trans individual's birth name, only general harm in refusing to use the individual's chosen name.

In summary, there was no discussion in making the guideline - only related topics - and it was made based on sources that don't support the de facto change. Indeed, the guideline is more extreme than that of the advocacy organization cited! Wikipedia is not censored, so, just as GLAAD advises, Wikipedia should have a single standard regarding birth name regardless of trans/cis status. That would entail removing the specific instruction for trans individuals, possibly reconsidering the one for all individuals in light of this change. Calbaer (talk) 02:24, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

It's a guideline so won't be consistently applied. Guidelines represent a weak form of consensus on how things are generally done. They aren't rules or policies or even instructions - only a guideline. This guideline represents how it's typically done for multiple names. There might be a reason to include it, in which case go ahead, leave a talk page post explaining why. By default it's probably best to leave it out per WP:LEAD: "the most important points". -- GreenC 03:00, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

It makes sense to have the same standard for trans people as for anyone else who changes their name. Just at a glance at a number of articles, it seems that biographies about authors, actors, musicians, politicians etc generally include their birth name in the first line or paragraph regardless of whether that subject ever did anything notable under that name. This makes sense from the perspective of providing information to the reader while still respecting the subject's choice in how they are addressed by using their chosen name as the article title, and throughout the article to refer to them. That GLAAD piece seems to agree with this. I don't know if it's always necessary to include a person's birth name in the lead—perhaps in some cases it'd be better to place it in the body of the article under personal history, or just to leave it out entirely—but it definitely shouldn't be forbidden in the MOS, and that line should be removed from the guideline. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 03:04, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Well looking more closely at MOS:MULTINAMES I see your point, transgender are not only singled out but treated exactly opposite as every other case, why? -- GreenC 04:19, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

I don't see how one can have a complete article about someone if they were once known by another name and gender and ummm, we can't mention that. That does strike me as the sort of thing one would mention right away in any reputable biography. This is starting to veer into silliness. -Ad Orientem (talk) 03:56, 27 June 2018 (UTC)
- The problem is that it often becomes a matter of sourcing. If we have to turn to forum posts or the like that claim Jane Smith was originally born as John Smith but had done nothing notable under that name, there's no reason to mention that. And this is a view I generally see taken by mainstream media as well. It's why we should be guiding by what sourcing does exist, and make sure it is the expected high-quality sources that justifies inclusion of their previous background. --Masem (t) 04:11, 27 June 2018 (UTC)
- The OP is about MOS:MULTINAMES ie. placement of name in lead vs. body -- GreenC 04:19, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Notability before a name change has never been our guideline for the inclusion of a birth name. I agree that we should not treat this any different than any other name change - if reliable sources cover their birth name and circumstances significantly, then we do too. Singling out one group is the antithesis of equal treatment. A gender change is a major event in the life of someone, and if sources document it, we don't shy away from covering it. Maybe someday sources will stop caring about and stop covering this, and when that happens, then we may never know who was born one way or another and so would not need this exception in that case either. Let's remove it. -- Netoholic @ 07:11, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

As long as it can be reliably sourced, this should be fine, but we need to stress that is equivalent for all people, and stress that "reliably" is very important here. We can't use things like court documents, we definitely can't use things like forum posts or the type of information that the seedier side of the Internet can drag up. If there are a lot of good RS articles about the person that are very detailed, and only a small-town newspaper happens to mention their former name, there's probably a reason not to include it. This logic applies across the board. --Masem (t) 13:21, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

In principle, I agree with you that reliability should be stressed, but I also know that, in practice, sometimes editors consider it like a sport to dig through some pretty obscure references to fill in the early-life biographic details. -- Netoholic @ 14:52, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

If you have to go through obscure though reliable sources (particularly if they aren't as current as where their notability lies) we probably shouldn't be adding it, particularly if the individual makes no mention or even actively seeks to not have attention draw to that. BLP does come down to "do no harm", and that should be taken into effect. Especially for trans-persons, this can lead to off-site harassment and other problems. --Masem (t) 15:45, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Contesting a close three years after the fact is not going to lead to a productive discussion. The view that we should always include birth names was represented by several editors, but did not gain consensus. A substantial change to the guideline should be brought as a fresh RFC.--Trystan (talk) 13:56, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

This is an encyclopedia. We include all sorts of information that the subject may not wish to promote, but that doesn't make it less encyclopedic. Natureium (talk) 13:58, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Despite claims here, the change of name for a trans person is different than the typical change of name. Most changes of name are not a denial of an identity; Hillary Clinton is not claiming not to be Hillary Rodham. Stan Lee had his name legally changed not to deny having been Stanley Lieber, but to better associate himself with the work he did under his popular pseudonym. The trans renaming is not utterly sui generis (the shedding of a "slave name" has some similar effect), but it is far from the default. And the birth name gets wielded by folks looking to do psychological harm to the individual in purposeful deadnaming. So, as with various other personal details, we should avoid it unless we can show it being relevant.... such as in the case where they were notable under their prior name. --Nat Gertler (talk) 14:33, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Sure. Which explains the no lead sentence guideline (which probably actually means in practice not in the lead). The guide does not say don't put it in the article, where it makes sense. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:42, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Even the separate guideline for the lead sentence - as well as omitting it all together - is a different standard of relevance for cis individuals than for trans individuals. Portia de Rossi's birth name is not any more relevant to her article than Laverne Cox's. As for the assertion of harm, two points: One is that citations such as the GLAAD guideline state that the harm is in insisting on only using the birth name, not in mentioning it at all, or even in mentioning it initially to get it out of the way. More extreme assertions have just been editor opinion, unsupported by evidence or even outside opinion. Two is, as stated in WP:CENSOR, "Wikipedia may contain content that some readers consider objectionable or offensive‍—‌even exceedingly so. Attempting to ensure that articles and images will be acceptable to all readers, or will adhere to general social or religious norms, is incompatible with the purposes of an encyclopedia." I understand that this is offensive to those editors who take a position more extreme than that of mainstream advocacy organizations such as GLAAD. However, it is not the job of Wikipedia to avoid such offense by censoring - or even moving - relevant information. Calbaer (talk) 14:49, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Not all personal details are "relevant", even if we know them. We typically will not list a person's street address, say, or their weight (with the exception there being where it's clearly relevant, as with a boxer.) If a person was famous under some prior name, sure, then it's relevant. But giving information that does not give real further insight into the individual and can be weaponized against them? That would seem to fall under things that we would more likely avoid. --Nat Gertler (talk) 15:25, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

That's because not all information is encyclopedic, but a name is. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 15:34, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

In addition, claims of harm or weaponization are made without either logical argument or external support. The example, Laverne Cox, is openly trans and identified as such in the second sentence of the article, so it's not like this is a big secret. Those who want to use a gendered identifier already have pronouns (he/she) and honorifics (Mr./Ms.) at their disposal, and need not use either birth or subsequent first names. No one has yet offered any reasoning behind the alleged harm of using the same guidelines we use for everyone else covered here.

And, once again, censorship is going beyond even the guideline, which says nothing about excluding the name all together, but has been nonetheless cited as a justification in doing so. Calbaer (talk) 19:28, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

This is a special case of Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons#Presumption in favor of privacy. We are presuming that the prior-to-transition name is something the subject wants to keep private, so are leaving it out unless it is widely documented. The presumption is not always true, so if you can find evidence the subject has no objection to the prior name being published, we can publish it. For example, Daniel Mallory Ortberg has no objections - and, of course, had a widely publicized prior name. But in general, the presumption that the subject does not want to be associated with their prior name is true. --GRuban (talk) 20:03, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

That article is failing badly as an encyclopedic article. It took me reading until the last paragraph of the page to find any information about the basic fact of the subject's gender, and even now, I'm not sure what the answer is. Natureium (talk) 20:07, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

The "claims of harm or weaponization" are indeed true — refusing to use a trans person's preferred name, but instead continuing to refer to them by their deadnamed birth name instead, is quite verifiably documentable in reliable sources as one of the most common tactics for denying the legitimacy of transgender identities that exists at all (right up there with refusing to use the trans person's correct pronouns.) So our principles of privacy and "do no harm" do apply to transgender people's pre-transition names: there needs to be a much higher burden of importance on the information (such as preexisting notability under that name prior to transition) before it's appropriate to include it in Wikipedia, and "people might want to know" is not enough in and of itself. (People might want to know if a transgender woman still has her penis or not, too, but that doesn't mean they have a right to know.) As for Laverne Cox, one of the issues with her is that no reliable sources exist for her birth name at all — so we don't even need to debate whether it's important information for her article to include or not, as no valid sources even exist by which we could ever add it to her article in the first place. I've certainly seen unreliable sources make unverified claims about what her birth name was — but her birth name has never been published in any source that would ever be an acceptable one for the purposes of getting the information included in a Wikipedia article. Bearcat (talk) 20:41, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Listing their birth name in an encyclopedic article is in no way the same as refusing to use their preferred name. No one is trying to argue that the title of the page should be their birth name or that it shouldn't include their preferred name. The argument is that it is encyclopedic to include the person's birth name, and as of yet, no one has provided a valid reason not to. Natureium (talk) 21:21, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Understanding that trans-people may come under harassment and ridicule if their transition is widely known (it's an unfortunate part of the current Internet culture), if by including a birth name we can clearly tell there was a gender transition, even if we don't call it out, that's going to cause those individuals harm. --Masem (t) 22:03, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

The distinction between "listing their birth name in an encylopedia article" and "refusing to use their preferred name" is not as clearcut as you seem to think it is. Keep in mind, for instance, that people cannot insist on using a trans person's dead name instead of their current name if they don't know what the dead name is — which is precisely why any person or organization, media or otherwise, that wants to be seen as being in any way respectful of trans issues has an inviolable responsibility not to participate in being a vector of the dead name's dissemination. Bearcat (talk) 23:37, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

The OP has presented what I think is quite a good source for this topic (the GLAAD transgender media reference guide) that explicitly states that media should afford transgender people the same courtesy they do other people who've changed their names. Many transgender people are able to obtain a legal name change from a court. However, some transgender people cannot afford a legal name change or are not yet old enough to legally change their name. They should be afforded the same respect for their chosen name as anyone else who uses a name other than their birth name (e.g., celebrities). I think that's a pretty good starting place for a guideline on this topic. While I absolutely agree that insisting on referring to someone by their birth name can be inconsiderate or downright cruel, that's not what we're talking about here. The proposal is simply to remove the guideline that forbids mention of a person's birth name in the lead of an article on them. Obviously it makes no sense to include a person birth name if there aren't good sources backing it up—we should use the same standards that we do for any information in a BLP. But the specific requirement that the person have done something notable under their birth name is much different than the guidelines we use for any other person who changed their name. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 21:25, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

It seems to me better to take a step back from the views Natureium and Red Rock Canyon have expressed. Why would it be encyclopaedic to include the birth name for individuals who were not notable under that name? In such cases, there is an entirely reasonable presumption that these trans people would not wish to be deadnamed and would not wish their birth names circulated. What version of encyclopaedicity would outweigh this? Formal consistency or OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is not a good candidate IMO. Newimpartial (talk)

I would request that we avoid using the term "deadnaming," as it is an emotionally charged term, and - even more than that - an imprecise one. Sources seem divided on whether it means calling someone by their birth name (arguably the most popular definition) or mentioning their birth name in any context. Using it to refer to the latter in this discussion is imprecise; if you wish to state the effect of either the former or the latter, state it rather than relying on an imprecise neologism which clouds the argument with imprecision and/or emotion.

Similarly, I would request those claiming that reliable source exist for their arguments to cite these reliable sources rather than just stating that they exist.

If no reliable source exists for a person's name - cis or trans - than we won't use unreliable sources. Similarly, if we decide that it's not encyclopedic to include a trans person's birth name, the same should be true of a cis person's. WP:RS can still be used to remove unreliable information, but the need for a separate guideline still seems to be both unnecessary and unsubstantiated. Calbaer (talk) 21:55, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

The harm done by deadnaming (in the broader not the more restrictive sense) is discussed e.g. here <https://splinternews.com/what-deadnaming-means-and-why-you-shouldn-t-do-it-to-1793848137> and here <https://www.healthline.com/health/transgender/deadnaming>, among a very wide range of sources. This is certainly not a SOURCESEXIST situation, and I am beginning to sense the civil POV pushing that is so often found on trans topics. The argument that Trans and Cis birthnames should be treated identically completely ignores the dangers and aggressions that are part of everyday life for most trans people and seems willfully blind to actual social reality. Newimpartial (talk) 22:11, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm not proposing that we go out of our way to dig up people's birth names. The normal policies of RS and weight and BLP make that determination. I'm talking about a single line in MOS:MULTINAMES that says that a trans person's birth name should not be in the lead unless they did something notable under that name. If you think that the use of someone's birth name is so inherently harmful that we should never even mention it, then you should probably try to get policy in place that forbids that. All I'm saying is that once editors decide to include a person's birth name in their article, they should also be permitted to decide where in the article to include it. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 22:52, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Asking for a reliable source when someone claims one exists is not being "willfully blind." In fact, Newimpartial's sources run contrary to Newimpartial's argument. "Deadnaming occurs when someone, intentionally or not, refers to a person who’s transgender by the name they used before they transitioned" (emphasis added). That is the definition of deadnaming that does not apply here, the use of it to refer to the person rather than to provide information about them. Newimpartial's other source defines it as "the term used in the trans community for calling a trans person by our assigned name at birth." These sources reveal that, as I said, it is an inappropriate term for what is being discussed here.

I am not advocating for calling or referring to trans people by their birth name any more than I would say that it was proper to refer to Elton John as "Mr. Dwight." Newimpartial claims that to even make such comparisons is to ignore the differences, but my point is that those most invested in the well-being of trans individuals take a similar stance. It is Wikipedia that is being out of step if we treat trans people differently; advocacy groups - in spite of the alluded-to differences in circumstances - appear to want them treated just like anyone else.

I will also note that, of the two sources, only one makes a glancing mention that "many trans people would prefer to not have their dead name used at all," but it does not assert any harm from doing so. In addition, both refer to news reporting, which is slightly different from what is referred to here. For example, few media reports include the birth name of celebrities not using those names. Encyclopedias, however, generally do. Nonetheless, even ignoring all this, the sources not support a guideline that omits any reference to the name entirely; they just advise avoiding using the name to refer to the person in question. Calbaer (talk) 23:25, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

Q.v. my previous comments on "willful blindness" and "civil POV pushing". First, a point on the "advocacy groups" - they certainly are not arguing that the birth names of Trans individuals should be treated the same way as the birth names of Cis indicuduals in every respect. Rather, they are arguing that, like Cis individuals, they should generally be referred to by their chosen name as a gesture of respect. They are certainly not arguing that deadnaming a Trans person is equivalent to using the birth name of a Cis person, or that the personal consequences of both are likely to be the same. Calbaer has nearly sidestepped the discussion of the consequences of deadnaming in the two sources I cited in favor of a kind of WIKILAWYERING, whereas this was the main point I was documenting through the citations. Finally, Calbaer is making an absurd distinction in maintaining that a reference to the subject by their birth name in the lede, for someone who was not notable under the birth name, is different from "referring to" them and could ever be DUE. As far as I am concerned, the provision under discussion here is simply a specification of UNDUE and should be uncontroversial; reliably sourced birth names can still appear in the body of the article per UNCENSORED. Newimpartial (talk) 23:36, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

The portion of the Healthline reference that I quoted makes that distinction between referring to someone by their given name and using that given name at all, so I'm fairly certainly it's not "absurd." It's not "wikilawyering" to point out that sources you've presented as defending your viewpoint fail to support it. Calbaer (talk) 23:43, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

And I would request that we don't get into dictating what terms trans people are or aren't allowed to use to describe their own uniquely trans-specific issues. It's kind of like how straight people don't get to take the definition of homophobia away from gay and lesbian people — non-trans people don't get to define the terms of debate around a trans-related issue either. LGBT people get to name our experiences as we see and experience them — you're free to decide that you don't care if somebody's basic dignity is being affected by the issue, but you're not free to dictate that LGBT folks aren't even allowed to describe the issue in words whose definitions belong to LGBT folks in the first place. Bearcat (talk) 23:56, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

The guidance from the New York Times Manual of Style and Usage is: "Cite a person's transgender status only when it is pertinent and its pertinence is clear to the reader. Unless a former name is newsworthy or pertinent, use the name and pronouns preferred by the transgender person." In general, good advice, and generally aligned with our current guideline, allowing for the differences between a newspaper and an encyclopedia. If a trans person's birth name is one under which they attained notability, it will be mentioned in the lead. If not, it will generally be mentioned in the body of the article in a section on their early life, where it is pertinent.

Because names are usually gendered, giving a trans person's birth name very often conveys that the person is trans. Including a non-notable birth name in the lead sentence conveys that the first and most important thing we need convey about the person is that they are trans, which is entirely undue (and much more problematic than conveying that the most important thing about Elton John is that he was born Reginald Dwight, which is merely inexplicable.)--Trystan (talk) 02:22, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

There's a WikiProject LGBT Studies-specific standard at WP:TRANSNAME, and a related standard at WP:GENDERID. If we have to have the discussion again, deadnaming is an invasion of privacy. To put things bluntly, there is no public right to know whether someone's genitals at birth match their current public identity. Maybe putting it that way will convey some of the gravity of this issue to people who are unfamiliar with the impact. (For what it's worth, here's an inconclusive discussion of the issue regarding a particular trans performer.)--Carwil (talk) 05:19, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

@Carwil: Your "an inconclusive discussion" link is broken. Feel free to just remove this comment when you fix it. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 19:44, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

That's nice, but wikiprojects can't overrule community consensus. A majority of things in biographies would probably be considered an invasion of privacy. We only cite reliable sources, and there are no wiki-spies outside people's homes trying to note private information that isn't already published. Natureium (talk) 13:48, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

There's a more subtle question of even if a piece of data is published by multiple RSes, is it appropriate for us to include it? Again, I refer to the case of the Star Wars Kid where, until the person actually stated his identity, we opted to not include his name, despite being published in a few mainstream, reliable press sources. We are not bound to publish every bit of factual information about a person, and should use care in cases where there is potential harm to privacy and/or their well-being. --Masem (t) 13:57, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

The fact that we can have articles on (presumably) cis people who do not have their birth name given indicates to me that an explicit guideline just for trans people is not necessary and in fact may not be sufficient. In any case, most articles on trans people I've seen do mention their status, most in obvious places like the first paragraph and/or the categories.

Regarding the more general issue of giving birth name in the first sentence, that guideline makes sense for an encyclopedia; it does not mean that it's the "most important thing" about, say, Elton John. Encyclopedias are generally not written in inverted pyramid style. (It makes more sense for John - who had an album entitled Reg Strikes Back - than for de Rossi, but a consistent guideline makes more sense than an article-by-article judgment of the importance of birth name.) Calbaer (talk) 22:52, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

* Comment there should be an award for the purest, most unadulterated WP:IDHT. Newimpartial (talk) 23:16, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

I find it interesting that your links generally contain the opposite points from those you've intended to make, whether it be the definition of "deadnaming" or the following, from WP:IDHT: "Do not confuse 'hearing' with 'agreeing with'." Please stop accusing other editors of bad faith, not getting the point, and wikilawyering just because they don't come around to your way of thinking. As WP:IDHT also states, "Believing that you have a valid point does not confer upon you the right to act as though your point must be accepted by the community." My original point is that there was never community consensus for this to begin with, because it was never put up for open discussion. That discussion is long overdue, and insults are not productive additions to it. Calbaer (talk) 18:14, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

Your non-recognition of the ironies of your own posts is consistently amusing. For example, you wrote "No one has yet offered any reasoning behind the alleged harm of using the same guidelines we use for everyone else covered here." When at least three of us offered sources and/or arguments for harm, you simply continue as if no evidence had been offered, and instead shift goalposts or wikilawyer the wording of the sources (what does "refer" mean) without recognizing or acknowledging that your main point had actualy been addressed. Your preferred approach, of looking for a phrase or passage in a source that acknowledges a boundary or a contrary view, and presenting that out of context as if it refutes your opponent's argument, is very difficult to square with AGF AFAICT.

It's not that you deserve an IDHT award because you haven't come around to the consensus view. You deserve an IDHT award because you show no sign of reading with comprehension the posts that disagree with yours. E.g., I understand that you see no good reason why the birth names of Trans folks should be treated differently from the birth names of Cis folks. I, along with the widely-participared consensus in the discussion that gave us MOS:GENDERID, see good reasons why they should be treated differently. You don't have to agree with the majority, but as long as you don't recognize or understand our arguments, well, that's IDHT. Newimpartial (talk) 19:57, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

I don't really see what MOS:GENDERID has to do with this discussion. As far as I can tell, nobody here is advocating changing that policy (ie we all agree transgender people should be referred to by their pronoun and name of choice). But in any case, regardless of my own personal opinions, it seems obvious that a policy that has stood for 3 years, like that in MOS:MULTINAMES, has presumptive consensus, and shouldn't be changed without a new consensus. Given the disagreement in this thread, I think the only way to do that would be to introduce an RFC. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 22:56, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

Is there are policy of presumptive consensus where an unchallenged unilateral guideline change is considered consensus, or is that just what you figure is the case? I'm not challenging anything you're saying, especially what you're saying about an RfC; I'm just curious whether the comment about consensus is a statement of policy or opinion. Calbaer (talk) 23:21, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

It's my interpretation of WP:EDITCONSENSUS. If, after you had started this thread, the vast majority of responses were supportive of your position, then maybe we could've assumed that the consensus in favor of that original change was weak (but maybe not, it's been unchallenged for 3 years after all). However, there's been substantial support for keeping the policy as-is, indicating that any change would be controversial. I'm not sure if there's any policy that explicitly defines this kind of consensus, but I think in this case only the explicit consensus of a formal procedure would suffice for supporting a change. In general, the person proposing to change the long-standing text is the one who has the burden to demonstrate consensus for their changes. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 23:47, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

It's not that I don't recognize your arguments. It's just that they're unsupported by the evidence that you give, and, in fact, countered by some of that evidence. If I understand your accusations of "wikilawyering" as anything other than insults, you mean to say that you feel that the spirit of the articles you share would support your position, even if their content does not. That not everyone agrees with such (re)interpretations is no doubt frustrating, but your strategy here brings to mind an old saying, "When the facts are on your side, pound the facts. When the rules are on your side, pound the rules. When neither is on your side, pound the table." If you have a relevant counterpoint to make, it would be far more constructive to make it rather venting your frustration through ad hominem attacks. Calbaer (talk) 23:21, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

Dude, I am not the one here pounding the table. I challenge anyone to read the two citations I have above, about deadnaming, and come away with any conclusion other than that "these sources maintain that deadnaming is harmful". Yet the only reaction to these articles that you have shared with us is to quibble over whether referring to the subject of a WP article by their birth name in the lede section constitutes deadnaming. No recognition or critical awareness that your question, "what harm does the use of birth names do", is answered in these among many other RS. No acknowledgement that the connection between giving the name in the lede and actual harm to Trans people was spelled out repeatedly in this discussion. Just continuous wikilawyering based on the presumed universal encyclopaedicity of birth names and constantly moving goalposts around what terms such as "refer" and "deadnaming" mean. The fact is, there is exactly one person in this discussion who has denied the import of these sources or the relevance of the harm done to Trans people on the appropriate content of the lede of articles about them. Those are facts, not insults, BTW. Newimpartial (talk) 04:06, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Comment. As someone wise once said, Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. We routinely exercise editorial judgment, choosing not to include information for various reasons. ISNOT, which dates to 2001 and has carried policy weight since 2005, says: Information should not be included in this encyclopedia solely because it is true or useful. A Wikipedia article should not be a complete exposition of all possible details, but a summary of accepted knowledge regarding its subject. Verifiable and sourced statements should be treated with appropriate weight and also merely being true, or even verifiable, does not automatically make something suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia. Per BLP, when writing about a person noteworthy only for one or two events, including every detail can lead to problems—even when the material is well sourced and when the name of a private individual has not been widely disseminated or has been intentionally concealed, such as in certain court cases or occupations, it is often preferable to omit it, especially when doing so does not result in a significant loss of context. (That last bit was more about non-notable people, but the spirit, if not the letter, should apply.) The claim offered above that publishing a trans person's former name is somehow equivalent to publishing a pseudonymous entertainer's birth name is frankly absurd. The guideline is fine, and no coherent, let alone compelling, argument has been offered for changing it. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 03:39, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

This might not be convincing to you, but it is to me: they're not called BLPs for nothing. It has "biography" in the name for a reason. No halfway decent biography of a public figure would leave out their birth name. Every biography I've read has to some degree discussed the circumstances of the subject's birth. Obviously we're not writing entire books on people, but I think for the people who do have fairly large articles about them, it might make sense to include basic information such as their birth name. The policy you quote above applies to people who aren't majorly notable, who have small articles written about them. And that's for good reason. The same arguments about how noting someone's birth name could harm them also apply to discussions about how noting an actress's birth date could harm her career. And yet we generally consider year of birth worth including in any BLP of considerable length (so long as it's published in reliable sources, of course). I'm not saying every article needs the subject's birth name, just that it should be up to editors working on that article to decide whether to include it and where to include it. This specific guideline is an unnecessary restriction, since existing policy already discusses privacy for BLPs. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 07:55, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

The thing is, RRC, current policy and practice does allow reliably sourced birth names of Trans individuals to be included in articles, and even in the lede if the subject was notable under the former name. Contra Calbaer, this is actually a fairly moderate position that maintains UNCENSORED while avoiding the worst harm that can result from deadnaming in articles (i.e. encouraging deadnaming off-wiki by essentially trolling readers with the birth name in the lede). I hope you might recognize that leaving the issue to local consensus is likely to produce more conflict on BLP pages, rather than less, which should not be a goal. Newimpartial (talk) 13:29, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

A ping would have been appreciated, @Calbaer: EvergreenFir (talk) 08:02, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

As Drmies noted in the close so many years ago, GLAAD does indeed recommend against dead naming ( see now [3]). Not sure why this horse has been exhumed. Rivertorch pointed out many of the issues here: BLPPRIVACY, HARM, ISNOT, etc. As was discussed to death last time, this is not parallel to married names or stage names. There is a deeper, and more harmful, history to how trans people's names are presented. EvergreenFir (talk) 08:16, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

The GLAAD literature multiply cited says that the way publications treat celebrity birth names is the way they should treat birth names of trans individuals. It is bizarre this literature is cited as justification for the guideline by the same people calling the comparison made therein "absurd." I understand that perception is important and it's not a perfect parallel. I never said it was "the same." But when a leading trans rights group - the one cited for this issue - states that they should be treated similarly - even though they aren't identical - I'd say that's fairly compelling evidence that a separate guideline is overkill.

If your viewpoint is that a trans person's birth name should be mentioned - as a fact, mind you, not a reference - then the guideline goes too far. If your viewpoint is that a trans person's birth name shouldn't be in the article, then merely saying that it shouldn't be in beginning doesn't go far enough (although, again, I see this viewpoint as one not reflected in even the trans rights literature). I suppose this is what leads one editor to call the status quo "moderate," but really it makes the status quo nonsensical.

The mention of BLP leads to two questions: If we already have a policy covering details such as omitting birth names, isn't the additional guideline unnecessary? And, since editors keep citing the HARM essay, under what conditions is it harmful to include someone's birth name in the lead paragraph but not harmful to include it further down in the same article? Again, the guideline as it currently stands does not appear to do anything useful, which is why I'm questioning it. Calbaer (talk) 16:14, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Well, Calbaer, if your goal in beginning this discussion were to push WP policy in the direction of favoring HARM over UNCENSORED, I would say you were well on your way to achieving that goal.

As far as the advocacy literature is concerned, these sources are arguing that just as journalists and others would use the new name for a Cis subject, so too they should use the new name for a Trans subject. None of these sources are arguing that just as one might include the birth name of an encyclopedic subject in the lede for a Cis person, so too one should do so for a Trans person, and it is blatant False Parallelism to infer that they do, a claim you have repeatedly made in this discussion.

Finally, if you can't see the difference in impact between including the reliably sourced birth name of a Trans person "below the fold" in the body of a WP article vs. trolling less-interested readers with it in the lead sentence, then your acuity about internet communication is much less than I believe it to actually be. Newimpartial (talk) 16:36, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Since you keep addressing it, here's what GLAAD actually says:

Disclosing birth names. When a transgender person's birth name is used in a story, the implication is almost always that this is the person's "real name." But in fact, a transgender person's chosen name is their real name, whether or not they are able to obtain a court-ordered name change. Many people use names they have chosen for themselves, and the media does not mention their birth name when writing about them, (e.g., Lady Gaga, Demi Moore, Whoopi Goldberg). Transgender people should be accorded the same respect. When writing about a transgender person's chosen name, do not say "she wants to be called," "she calls herself," "she goes by Susan," or other phrases that cast doubt on a transgender person's identity. Do not reveal a transgender person's birth name without explicit permission from them. If the person is not able to answer questions about their birth name, err on the side of caution and do not reveal it.

EvergreenFir (talk) 06:11, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

So, as I read this discussion, we have a 'rule' that we advise not, under defined circumstances, including the name in the first sentence. Most discussants seem ok with that rule for various reasons. It's also important to note, as it has been noted several times, that the 'rule' is not about the rest of the article, so at present, changing that 'rule' has failed to gain traction, here. What more is there to discuss that will bring light, instead of heat? Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:47, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Agreed. Using uncommon names in the lede sentence isn't right, but going beyond that limited case to any suppression of known information in the article as a whole would not possibly be acceptable. For example, you can say in the text that Adolf Hitler would have been Schicklgruber if he had not been legitimized by his non-biological father, but saying "Adolf Hitler, also known as Adolf Schicklgruber..." in the first sentence would give readers an entirely erroneous idea that this was a name people know and use often. As far as "deadnaming" is concerned? A person is free to make any assertions he/she/they want about their gender, and if those catch on in the reliable sources, Wikipedia is bound to copy them; but Wikipedia does not suppress information simply to indulge someone's fantasy that he/she/they never had a birth sex. I mean, if we were to give up on telling readers there was ever a Bradley Manning, should we give up saying that she was ever on a boy's sports team? Should we then go a step further, make up a lie and say she was actually on the girl's team, maybe some fake awards and statistics to go with it? No. We hold the line at including what we know is true, because it's the only sane place to draw a line. But putting it in the lede can sometimes give an untruthful impression. Wnt (talk) 21:40, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

The sad thing is that MOS:GENDERID encourages that we avoid specifying the team was a boy's team, which in combination with its encouragement to avoid ever mentioning the way the person publicly presented at the time leaves readers to assume the team was for girls or was co-ed. Specifically, it says Avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent).

Unfortunately all discussions about this sort of thing get bogged down by those pushing for extreme "progressive" positions on the issue (to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS). Anomie ⚔ 21:23, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Oh my. What will those pesky progressives do next? Maybe we could build some kind of a cyber wall and deport them to some Third World wiki. Fact: no one arguing against the proposal in this thread has said a damn thing that even implies using Wikipedia articles to right wrongs. @Wnt: While you're entitled to hold any opinion you like about transgender people, making derisive comments about them in a VP discussion is unproductive at best, and potentially quite disruptive. That bit about fantasies and birth sex was gratuitous, uninformed, and frankly beneath you. I hope you'll consider striking it. Perhaps either you or Anomie would care to address what's actually at issue here by answering this question: is there generally a sound encyclopedic reason for publishing the birth name of a trans person who was not notable before changing that name? Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 04:16, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

If that's your argument, why do we publish anything that happened before a person was a public figure. Articles usually include when/where someone was born, who the subject's parents are, alma mater, etc. This almost always is written about something that happened before the subject was notable. Very few people are notable from birth. Natureium (talk) 15:51, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

Such information speaks to a formative aspect about the person's life; their former name does not. For instance, being born and raised in rural Manitoba, then moving to Montreal and studying classics at McGill is quite different from being born and raised in San Diego and working at Taco Bell there while working as an apprentice mortician; in either case, it tells us something meaningful about the person's life. Being named George or Theodore or Christopher as opposed to Paul or Adam or Benjamin? That tells us nothing meaningful at all. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 19:34, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

Waaat? You're telling me there's nothing "formative" about a trans person being trans? This is getting into absurdity. I mean, the reality is that pre-transsexual lives are often very formative and meaningful. A lot of folks admired Bradley Manning as a gay soldier striking back against an oppressive national military administration. Now you're saying get out the eraser, that never happened, or at least, don't talk about it, because it doesn't fit with the image she is currently seeking to cultivate? It's always like that -- transsexuals don't spring from Jove's forehead in full armor; transsexuals are made. And we of Wikipedia look into any detail we can get our hands on. You don't have to take it personally, but you should recognize we are not interested in coming here to discard information that is available to the scholar. Wnt (talk) 00:03, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Huh? You don't appear to have understood Rivertorch's comment, or the guideline under discussion, which doesn't prevent (or have anything to do with) nothing that a person is trans. It's only the WP:TRIVIA that someone was non-notably named John as opposed to James as a baby which isn't encyclopedic. -sche (talk) 01:21, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

That's correct. I said nothing at all about our not mentioning a trans person being trans. I'm more than a little confused by Wnt's reply, though, because I also said nothing about "transsexuals". My understanding is that transgender status is indeed innate—or at least determined very early in life. If that is so, then I can't help thinking that your comments here, Wnt, are needlessly inflammatory and may come across as quite contemptuous of any trans readers who happen onto this discussion. In my experience it's quite possible to hold various beliefs that are at odds with prevailing opinion or scientific findings and still be respectful, but I won't try to impose my values on you. I will say that I am not taking anything "personally"; I'm not transgender and am not active in transgender rights advocacy off-wiki, but I do often feel the need to call out cruelty and injustice when I see it applied toward any minority group. This is not the first time that a Wikipedia discussion on a transgender-related topic has veered into something that seems, from my perspective, ugly and mean-spirited. I hope it's the last time. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 03:41, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

The difference between wikt:transsexual and wikt:transgender is subtle at best, and I may have confused things by using the wrong term and idea, but it may be at the core of the argument here. If a kid from a young age actually identifies with a certain sex and uses a name to reflect that, then the "deadname" may be rather trivial since there may be no point to giving it except to give it. (I mean, if the child actually did play on the opposite-from-birth-sex sports team) However, when an adult becomes transsexual - i.e. stops signing "Bradley" and starts signing "Chelsea" - then knowing both names is vital to the article. Generally speaking, a biography should have an early life section - based on sources. If the sources describe the early life of someone who had another name and gender at that time, then that early life should be covered with that information. Indeed, you can say that even the person's early life, though it was not "notable" then, has become notable by virtue of association with the late life, which would be an argument even for using it in the lede. I don't want to support using it there every time since it could be misleading, but we should not apologize for causing "distress" by having complete, accurate biographies. Ultimately, the "distress" surely does not originate from those who track freely published media about birth sex, but from those who would somehow harass transgender people using some snippet of information they found on the internet, which they could find many places, and which in any case they surely don't need to have in order to do something obnoxious. Wnt (talk) 15:05, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Well, that's an argument that routinely gets knocked down in discussions over BLP (and I've sometimes been on the side of inclusion—it really depends on what the snippet is and the type of other sites where it can be found). We do routinely revert edits that add personal information to articles even when such information has been extensively reported by reliable sources when we deem that the benefits of including it are outweighed by the harm it likely would cause. Potential harm aside, we also routinely omit information that we deem trivial or irrelevant. It's all about exercising editorial judgment, and we're talking about a best practice, something with guideline status that can be ignored if there's ever a good reason. But the Manning example isn't a useful one because no one is arguing that we shouldn't mention both names; before she came out and changed her name, she definitely was notable as Bradley. What's at issue here are those we would not have considered notable before they changed their name. Omitting their birth names is best practice because that information has no bearing on their notability and may well cause harm. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 16:25, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

@Rivertorch: Why do we typically include the birth name in the lead of any biography? Personally I don't have an opinion on that question. What strikes me as off is having one practice for most biographies and an opposite practice for one special group, and even more so when the rhetoric used to push the special practice leans heavily towards advocacy. Why not push for removing birth names from the leads of all biographies instead of a special exemption for one group, if you think there's no encyclopedic reason for it? Anomie ⚔ 01:57, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

@Anomie: The word "special" strikes me as rather loaded in this context (e.g., "special rights"). If one sees the question as being fraught with great significance in terms of politics or social change, then perhaps you have a point. I tend to think of it more in terms of trying to be kind to people we're writing articles about. There's one group of people—who happen to be a despised minority—who have good reason to want not to be known by their former names. If some other group (e.g., authors with pen names, actors with stage names, people who changed their names upon marrying) also had a good reason for wanting the same, I expect we should try to accommodate them. But they don't, so we don't. To answer your second question, I think that one reason is that the birth names of many, perhaps most, notable people are readily available from various sources. That's in stark contrast to the birth names of notable trans people: except for those people who were notable before changing their name, reputable sources generally don't publish them. Those sources that do publish them do so for one of three reasons: (1) because they're ignorant that the practice of deadnaming is distressing, (2) because they intend to cause such distress, (3) because they're reckless and don't really care whether they cause distress or not. We appear to be contemplating adding a fourth reason, perhaps unique to our project: (4) because we think that trivial factoids are so critical to the comprehensiveness of our encyclopedia that we're willing to risk causing distress. I find that troubling. I certainly am not here to advocate for anything in particular, except perhaps clearly written articles, but I will come to the defense of a minority group if I think something that Wikipedia is doing may unnecessarily cause them harm. I don't check my humanity hat at the door when I log in here. If that constitutes advocacy, I guess I'm guilty as charged. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 05:54, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

I agree with Rivertorch. And it is not as if Wikipedia is somehow ahead of the curve on this. Many major media outlets follow similar guidelines, if not more restrictive ones. EvergreenFir (talk) 06:14, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

There is an ideological apocalypse going on in the world between the ilk of Milton and Jefferson and the builders of the Great Firewall of China. The question is, can ordinary people be allowed to read, track, remember, and process the news and other publicly available data they encounter, and use it to think for themselves, or do they need guards to defend them from any possible information about anything getting to anyone who doesn't have a valid occupational reason, as evaluated by the government, to have it? And we have been seeing this battle lost in the right to be forgotten, the present EU effort to force censorware on news aggregators, the systematic keelhauling of hundreds of celebrities for some one stupid comment they once made, and many other situations. Now we have a choice between saying "collecting information is wrong, writing articles is wrong", or saying "harassing is wrong, discriminating is wrong". Which is it? Wnt (talk) 15:18, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

I have no idea what you're even taking about let alone asking me. How are China and the EU germane to this discuss about deadnames? EvergreenFir (talk) 19:50, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Many authors with pen names and actors with stage names did have good reason to want not to be known by their former names, usually due to descrimination against their ethnicity, or, in the case of authors, women who wanted to write about subjects seen as "unladylike". The name that a notable person went by for decades, even if at their core they believed it to be inappropriate, is hardly a "trivial factoid". --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 15:29, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Birth names - not sure what we are discussing

There are two distinct issues here:

Mentioning a birth name in the lead sentence of an article.
Mentioning a birth name somewhere else in an article.

I am not sure which of these is being discussed in this thread. Could someone please clarify? Blueboar (talk) 13:09, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

The guideline I'm questioning only regards the lead sentence. If others want to argue the second, I consider that muddying the waters, though I do believe people use the guideline to justify excluding the birth name elsewhere as well, even though it clearly only regards the lead sentence. I feel that a more appropriate guideline would just leave this out all together or broaden it to not be about gender specifically, e.g., "An exception is a case where it wouldn't be appropriate to reveal birth name within the article."

Regarding the second, I'll note that part of MOS:MULTINAMES is de facto pro-deadnaming in both definitions of the word (mentioning the name and referring to someone by the name). "If a person is named in an article in which they are not the subject, they should be referred to by the name they were using at the time of the mention rather than a name they may have used before or after the mention." I'd think that a good compromise would be to allow mention of the birth name in the lead but specify that it should be avoided Calbaer (talk) 14:58, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

In light of this, for the lede sentence, I think that we should that name, save for two specific situations:

If that person was notable under the original name (That is, as a test, remove all the parts of a person's bio that are related to the transition or post-transition, and ask if there's clear standalone notability. If so, the lede should have that name. Aka this is the Caitlyn Jenner case)
If failing the first, the original name is clearly and obviously used in routine coverage in reliable sources about the person. I can't name any trans individuals that fit this immediately, but this would be how we handle a person like Stan Lee. Key is the "clearly and obviously" part; you can't just point to one source and say that justifies the name. You need to show that when there are reasonable indepth biographical material written about the person in multiple sources, they make mention of the birth name.

Standards for the body can be a bit less relaxed, but the lede should be more objective and stricter. --Masem (t) 16:11, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

I agree with Masem here (pleasantly surprisingly). The lead is for only the most pertinent summary information. The non notable birth name of any individual where the use of that birth name is contentious doesn't belong in the lead.

That said, we also don't include the birth name of transgender people in some cases. For example, Jazz Jennings. BLPPRIVACY, HARM, TRIVIA, etc. all come into play, especially in my opinion when discussing the biographies of transgender minors or people who came out as transgender while a minor. EvergreenFir (talk) 06:10, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

While I'm all for consistency, I think it would be a step backwards to censor or bury the birth name of, say, Portia de Rossi, whose birth name I've never seen outside of Wikipedia. Where appropriate, we have birth information in the first paragraph. A lot of people complain that their age is now not only available but the first thing that shows up in an article. It likely does real harm to the career of actors and actresses who face age discrimination. ("Harm" has been mentioned a lot here without mentioning what that harm means; that's what it could mean in the case of birth date.) But we still have that information there because we're an encyclopedia, and that's appropriate. If inclusion of information violated actual policies, e.g., BLP, that would be another matter, but then the information wouldn't be in the article at all. A guideline which rejects the information from the lead sentence specifically seems an unnecessary addition by a editor trying to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS and get ahead of the way that even advocacy groups recommend such material be covered.

(When I say that "harm" is mentioned here a lot without any meaning attached, I mean precisely that. Do people mean the real harm that could come from the name of a pseudonymous person - e.g., Jazz Jennings - being revealed to make it easier for those who might want to harm them? Obviously then, we'd leave that information off the article all together, per WP:BLPPRIVACY. However, it seems as though some are talking about the "harm" in making obvious via name in the first sentence what's already obvious via the use of the word "trans" in the first paragraph - that the subject's assigned gender and identity differ. Calling that "harm" seems wrong; like the use of "deadnaming" for stating birth name - as opposed to using it to refer to a person - it seems like this is using deceptive and loaded word for emotional impact in order to avoid the actual details of what's under discussion here.) Calbaer (talk) 15:19, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

The harm that has been mentioned here is called deadnaming, and earlier in this discussion are links to pages that describe the phenomenon. Did you miss that or are you just being dismissive of it? If it is a "loaded word", who loaded it—the people who are simply asking others not to use their birth names (a reasonable request, surely!) or those who insist on using them anyway because the existence of openly transgender people doesn't mesh well with their worldview? To answer your question, yes, in some cases there might be the potential of physical harm attached to the use of deadnaming; transgender people are at grave risk for violence even in the jurisdictions where they have civil rights, and I certainly can imagine a scenario where an incident that begins with taunts about a birth name goes south in a hurry and someone winds up getting hurt. But physical assaults only one kind of harm. Bullying is a huge problem that the Internet has made much worse, and the transgender population is particularly at risk. Anyway, be it murder or suicide, shall we wait for the first death of a subject needlessly deadnamed in a Wikipedia article? I think it would be better to pursue a course that wouldn't contribute to such a death, but maybe that's just me. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 16:57, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

RE: "asking others not to use their birth names (a reasonable request, surely!)"... actually no. It isn't always a reasonable request. A LOT depends on the specific situation, but there are certainly times when asking us to ignore a previous name is actually an unreasonable request. Certainly we should never "out" a previous name. And, sure, in many cases the existence of a previous name is essentially nothing but biographical trivia (and in such cases we can certainly accommodate a request to not mention it). But... there are plenty of situation where mentioning a previous name rises above the level of trivia. We take our cue on this by reviewing the reliable independent sources. If they (in the aggregate) think it important to use a person's previous name when discussing some aspect of of that person's life, then we should follow that. If they ignore the previous name, so should we. Blueboar (talk) 17:39, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Again, we're talking about a guideline here. If there's good reason at a given article, we can ignore it, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't have the guideline or that it isn't best practice in most cases. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 04:42, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

And only to add: we should stress this should be high quality independent RS. While we don't restrict TMZ for example, if a birth name is only being regurgitated by TMZ, celebrity rags, and tabloids, and not by the more quality publications , that's a reason to avoid inclusion. --Masem (t) 17:56, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

@Rivertorch: A problem with the term "deadnaming" is that it seems to have two very different definitions that are conflated in discussions like this: (1) To call a person by the old name in preference to the new name, particularly as a way to reject their self-identification, and (2) to ever mention, even in passing as historical background, that the old name existed. The conflation allows activists to claim that the second sense leads to all the harm of the first sense. Anomie ⚔ 21:48, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

I agree with you that conflating the two definitions isn't helpful, but the difference seems to be based on intent, which can be difficult to determine. And might not deadnaming by the second definition enable it by the first definition? In either case, the effect could be harmful. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 04:51, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Intent is unnecessary to see the difference here. One is calling someone by a name, The other is stating the fact that the person had, at a certain point in time, been known by the name. For example, to take this out of the current context, let's say I wrote: "While in Indonesia, President Obama was known as 'Barry Soetoro' to his many friends," that's a statement of fact (assuming it is reliably sourced). I'm clearly using "Obama" to refer to him. However, if I say, "In Indonesia, Barry Soetoro made many friends," then I'm "deadnaming" him, in the sense of using a name he long since stopped using. (I've seen political critics use it the latter way to imply that his African and African-American identities were not reflective of his upbringing, in which his guardians were either white Americans or native Indonesians, so this can be contentious and insulting even in the case of cis individuals.) While I suppose there might be an artificial case that doesn't neatly fall into one of those two categories, but saying "born X" is clearly the former. And this form of "deadnaming" is the recommendation of the current guideline for those who achieved notability under their prior name. So "deadnaming" does indeed seem like an unhelpful way to refer to it. Calbaer (talk) 00:35, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

WP:DESIST

In doing category cleanup, I found Wikipedia:Desist categorized in Category:Wikipedia behavioral guidelines. I've put {{Essay}} on it and moved it to Category:Wikipedia behavioral essays. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 03:30, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

Good move. Beeblebrox (talk) 06:58, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

Use of copyrighted material undergoing active license negotiation

What does Wikipedia policy say with regards to publishing verbatim government documents whose copyright is under active negotiation? The article Towrang Convict Stockade makes use of Australian government documents, one of which was published under a copyright held by the Roads and Traffic Authority of New South Wales. That agency was covered by an agreement with the Copyright Agency for the use of content in reliance on the government statutory licence until 30 June 2012. However, an agreement with NSW government agencies is currently under negotiation. That would seem to preclude the usage of copyrighted material published by the Roads and Traffic Authority of NSW, under which the document in question was published. Any input on this question would be greatly appreciated.
References

Berger, Ian (2005). "Statement of Heritage Impact". Widening and intersection improvements on the Hume Highway at Towrang & Carrick Roads: review of environmental factors. RTA Southern Region Client Services. p. 161.
Kaplan, Anna. "NSW Government Licensees - Copyright Agency". Copyright Agency.

spintendo 08:27, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

@Spintendo: You seem to be a bit confused. This article uses CC-BY licensed material from the New South Wales Office of Environment and Heritage. The Berger document is a referenced source, not something whose text is actually used in this article. No copyrighted material from the Roads and Traffic Authority is used in this article. The copyright status of a referenced source is completely irrelevant - one would expect that it, like most other sources, would be copyrighted. The Office of Environment and Heritage material is released under CC-BY 4.0. A private business claiming that they have been "in negotiation" to manage copyright for government organisations since 2012 doesn't change the fact that many, many government departments have decided to instead release material under free licenses during that time. The Drover's Wife (talk) 08:37, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

@The Drover's Wife:"The Berger document is a referenced source, not something whose text is actually used in this article." If saying it only made it so. Unfortunately, I believe you may be the one that is confused, as large amounts of text from the Berger document are used in the article, as shown below:

Comparison of texts
Text as it appears in the Wikipedia article Towrang Convict Stockade	Text as it appears in the Berger Source Material
It is certainly believed to have had the largest concentration of convicts in southern NSW during the period of its operation. The convicts were guarded by soldiers of various British regiments, including the 28th, 31st, 51st and 80th. The first commander of the stockade was Captain J. Darley (1833 to 1836), followed by Lieutenant R. Waddy (1836-39), Lieutenant R. Sherberras (1839), Captain W. Houghton Tyssen (1841), Lieutenant W. Cookson (1842) and in 1843, the last year of the stockade's operation, Lieutenant Owen Gorman. The stockade is believed to have consisted of a small cottage and a number of huts for the soldiers and their families, together with a garden tended by the military, and huts and boxes or timber cells about 4m square for the convicts further down the Wollondilly River.	Towrang was the largest concentration of convicts in southern New South Wales at this time. The convicts were guarded by soldiers of various British regiments, including the 28th, 31st, 51st and 80th. The first commander of the stockade was Captain J. Darley (1833 to 1836), followed by Lieutenant R. Waddy (1836-39), Lieutenant R. Sherberras (1839), Captain W. Houghton Tyssen (1841), Lieutenant W. Cookson (1842) and in 1843, the last year of the stockade's operation, Lieutenant Owen Gorman. The stockade consisted of a small cottage and a number of huts for the soldiers and their families, together with a garden tended by the military, and huts and boxes or timber cells about 4m square for the convicts.

You've just stated that text from the Berger document has not been used in the article. If that is the case, can you explain how the text above was placed exactly where you said it wasn't? spintendo 22:14, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

@Spintendo: I should point out that the Berger source is also CC-BY-3.0 licensed. As I said above: a private business claiming that they have been "in negotiation" to manage copyright for government organisations since 2012 doesn't change the fact that many, many government departments have decided to instead release material under free licenses during that time. The Copyright Agency is a business - it has no special standing, and its desire to get back the cushy government contracts it had prior to 2012 has no legal bearing on the decisions of government departments in New South Wales and around the country to not assign management of their material to them, and instead release their material under free licenses. The Drover's Wife (talk) 22:27, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

"Many government departments have decided." You must have copy then of exactly which govt departments those are, and the one specifically from RTA which states its texts are available under that license. And if that is the case, would you like to redact your earlier statement, or is it still your assertion that there is no Berger text used in the article? spintendo 22:39, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

@Spintendo:, your own link tells you that the Berger document is CC-BY-SA 3.0 licensed. I previously pointed out the Office of Environment and Heritage material is released under CC-BY 4.0. The Drover's Wife (talk) 22:44, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Spintendo, The Drover's Wife, you might get more input on this if you moved it to WT:CP. But just quickly: if the Berger source is compatibly licenced and the article includes content copied from it, then attribution is required, similar to that already in place for the Office of Environment and Heritage content. That's easily provided, and perhaps is all that's needed (please note, I haven't looked in detail). Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 22:59, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

Correct. I was not aware that one freely-licensed source had closely paraphrased another freely-licensed source - that is easily remedied. But this stuff about The Copyright Agency is rubbish. The Drover's Wife (talk) 23:03, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

MOS:WTW addition RfC Terms that can introduce bias

FYI

– pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Words to watch#RfC Terms that can introduce bias

Gist: Should we add a class of "Terms that can introduce bias", listing incorrect use of Arab and Arabic as an examplar? Batternut (talk) 10:44, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Unblock people using VPNs from editing

I have a serious concern about blocking people from editing who are using VPNs – as, for example, this has totally silenced anyone in Turkey.

I know this is a complex issue and I'm not suggesting this decision was taken lightly – however surely one resolution would be to simply ‘grade’ edits and if they are done via a VPN they are flagged for more urgent attention.

For what it’s worth, I live in Australia and use a VPN constantly, as all ISPs are now legally allowed to track every site I visit, so I use one as a matter of privacy – and I’m sure I’m not alone.

I’m writing to ask advice about the best next step as I feel this is a very serious issue affecting freedom of speech and I’m not sure how to proceed.

At the very least I'm convinced a blanket ban on VPNs and TORs in principal sets a dangerous precedent and there must be some technical compromise that doesn't effectively silence those in places where Wikipedia is blocked.

I’m on the Editorial Board for the WikiJournal Science and keen to discuss this further - forgive me if this was not the correct place/tone to post here - it's my first time getting involved in this forum.

Jack Nunn 05:23, 26 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jacknunn (talk • contribs)

Per Wikipedia:Blocking policy#Common blocks imposed, it says this:

A hard IP address block (account creation blocked, prevent logged-in users from editing from this IP address) disables all editing and account creation from behind the blocked the IP address, whether or not from logged in users (except accounts that are IP-block exempt - these users can edit while behind the blocked IP, but cannot create accounts). This is typically used when the level of vandalism or disruption via creation of "throwaway" accounts is such that all editing from the IP address is to be prevented except after individual checking of requests. Open proxies are hard-blocked on detection, and Tor IP addresses are automatically blocked by the Tor block extension.

VPNs are considered to be like open proxies. — MRD2014 ^Talk 12:52, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Hi Jacknunn. How do you propose we stop people from using VPNs/proxies to easily evade blocks? --NeilN ^{talk to me} 12:53, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

@Jacknunn: There's no blanket ban on VPN that would be impossible to know all the IPs there are 100s if not 1000s of VPN services who are constantly changing IPs. Try others that are less well known, smaller, more expensive etc.. get away from the crowd greater chance the IPs will be clean. -- GreenC 13:39, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I have to second GreenC's point: I edited via VPN all the time when I was in China while logged in to this IP block exempt account. Really the only thing that needs to be done is provide a process for folks in Turkey (or countries with similar problems with editing) to apply for an IP block exempt account from the get-go. We have other mechanisms to block such accounts. This doesn't help IP editors, but registering puts one more step between an unsafe editor and a malicious government anyway. Ian.thomson (talk) 15:29, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

In my experience, applying for an IP block exemption is not easy, nor are you very likely to meet with success, despite legitimate uses for one. I don't think a majority of IP users, or newly registered users will have much of a chance with that process, unless we change policy to cover those cases. I still think a soft block would be a better option, since that increases accountability and makes for easier management of the incoming edits from newly registered users. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 15:35, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Many users will not look for lesser-used services, or even have the technical competence to know how to, past the basic guides one finds with a simple search. This is a legitimate issue that affects potential editors in countries with more restricted policies than what a majority of users here currently enjoy. Wikipedia strives to be the "encyclopedia that anyone can edit" but imposing restrictions that can cut off an entire region or demographic due to their (legitimate) use of a VPN or proxy is akin to throwing the baby out with the bath water. I know we need to cut down the vandalism, but a lot of our automated (and semi-automated) anti-vandalism tools have come a long way since this blocking policy was created. As mentioned above, the edits could even be flagged automatically for review, like we currently do for other potentially damaging edits. Are we sure that the continued blocking of all of these anonymizing solutions is really necessary? I would very much like to see statistics on number of vandalism edits previously encountered from anonymized users (and any other related data that may be relevant), so that we can properly assess the potential impact of this issue.

I know we need to cut down the vandalism, but a lot of our automated (and semi-automated) anti-vandalism tools have come a long way since this blocking policy was created. As mentioned above, the edits could even be flagged automatically for review, like we currently do for other potentially damaging edits. Are we sure that the continued blocking of all of these anonymizing solutions is really necessary? I would very much like to see statistics on number of vandalism edits previously encountered from anonymized users (and any other related data that may be relevant), so that we can properly assess the potential impact of this issue. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 15:33, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Of course it is necessary to slow down long-term abusers and general trolls. The automated anti-vandal tools are great but they don't work for long-term abusers, trolls and socks. Allowing anyone to edit is one side of the balance. The other side is providing support for those who do build the encyclopedia by not allowing waves of disruption. Johnuniq (talk) 23:08, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I agree. The primary reasons for VPN blocks is long term abuse, not casual vandalism. — BillHPike (talk, contribs) 03:39, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Evidence-based policy?

I just saw this tweet from WikiResearch which I think is relevant and challenges some of the assumptions underlying the VPN policy. Thoughts?

'"most vandalisms [on Wikipedia] were reverted within five minutes" on average' https://web.archive.org/web/20180710063433/https://twitter.com/WikiResearch/status/1016555362575474688

Jack Nunn 06:36, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Experienced editors are not concerned about poop vandals or others who make nonsense edits because they are easily handled. The corrosive force that drives away good editors is the wave of POV pushers who arrive with brand new accounts to repeat the same arguments that were settled last week and the week before. Open proxies provide haven for such troublemakers. Please ask at WP:HELPDESK about fixing your signature so it complies with WP:SIG. Johnuniq (talk) 11:02, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

VPN blocking discussion summary

Thank you everyone for your input on this so far - it's an important issue and I appreciate the enlightened discussion. For me I would summarise the issue as a matter of one of balance. If the balance at any point tips and means any one person is silenced from sharing, say, a human rights abuse or environmental catastrophe - then the balance has failed. At the moment, I feel the balance is failing. As mentioned, I don't have the expertise to suggest anything more than vague sketches of ideas. As others have suggested, some kind of flagging/rating/grading system could exist. Maybe a subject for a hackathon - which could redress the balance in a week. It will always be a game of cat and mouse but at the moment it feels like we've let the cat give up. Or are we the mouse? ha ha. Anyway - I had this helpful response from a Wikipedia email address (edited to remove identifying information as I didn't ask if I could share it):

'"We appreciate your email, and I have to say we are very sympathetic to your concerns XXXX we strongly advocate for anonymity and security measures for users wherever possible.

'Our policy against open proxies exists out of sheer necessity. It's unfortunate and we regret it, but the sheer quantity of abuse we receive through these sources is too large to handle. It's not that 'grading' Italic textwouldn't work theoretically, it's that we can barely keep vandalism and long-term abuse off our platform as it is, and we would not be able to do so without the blocks that are currently in-place.

'We do not have a blanket policy against closed proxies, and we evaluate these on a case-by-case basis.

'Experienced editors caught behind a block are encouraged to apply for an IP block exemption, and newer editors are encouraged to spend a few weeks polishing a proposed article to include as part of their application. Italic 'My understanding is we are reasonable with granting these, provided we can establish a level of trust."''

This was a helpful response but I have to agree with other comments above (AfroThundr3007730) - 99% of casual editors (like me) would have no idea how to get around a block, and frankly, shouldn't need to. The whole point of Wikipedia is it's 'quick' and easy to edit - say, in an emergency. I live in Australia and have to turn my VPN off for every edit - that's annoying enough - but it raises enormous alarm bells and I think something needs to change.

Sidetopic - but even this method of having a discussion about something this important feels like something built in the 1980s! Look to Loomio for discussion/decision platforms.

Thank you again for this discussion. Jack Nunn 12:37, 27 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jacknunn (talk • contribs)

Sorry, you don’t qualify for local IPBE on the English Wikipedia. Any discussions about loosening IPBE all have assumed the loosening would apply to users with significantly more experience on-wiki than you have. Editors who have less than 500 edits are extremely unlikely to be granted it without significant experience on other Wikimedia projects. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:50, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
If the balance at any point tips and means any one person is silenced from sharing, say, a human rights abuse or environmental catastrophe - then the balance has failed. Wikipedia is WP:NOTNEWS and should not contain original reporting. If the abuses or catastrophes are not published in reliable sources, they shouldn't be on Wikipedia. If they are in reliable sources, anyone anywhere in the world can add it to the appropriate article. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 05:23, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Search Box Filtering?

Wikipedia is one of the most useful sites on the Internet. Even so, if it is going to be used everywhere, it needs to apply some filtering to the search box, so topics that are widely viewed as offensive do not inadvertently appear because they contain the same first two or three letters as the search target. Specifically, while using the big screen where displaying pornography is inappropriate, a search for "Alternator" caused an inappropriate image describing "Alt Porn" to appear. It would be seem to be more sensible remove pornography from the look-ahead function so only a deliberate search will find and display it, and to do likewise with other widely-offensive topics. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.208.47.94 (talk) 19:04, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

Hi 198.208.47.94. The kind of people who volunteer as unpaid encyclopedia-writers tend to have a strong ethos in favor of freely and openly sharing information. We are also have a primary mission of writing articles as neutrally and impartially as we can. As an open project, we have diverse people from every corner of the planet, with diverse views on controversial topics. We have by necessity developed a rather strong taboo against subjectively imposing individual opinions and passing judgement on anything controversial or culturally-subjective. We have a policy that Wikipedia is not censored. We write educational content, and we firmly decline to pass judgement on which articles or which images some people might consider "offensive". No two people will ever agree on what should or shouldn't be filtered, especially when we serve every country on earth. Some people find images of Muhammad offensive, some people want images in the breast cancer article filtered, some people want bikinis&speedos filtered, someone wanted to filter any image of a woman not wearing a burka, as well as of a million other topics and social-standards. We do not frivolously include potentially offensive content, but we do not apply culturally subjective standards to exclude or hide educational content which some people might find offensive.

The only way that we will avoid displaying "offensive" search images is if we shut off all images from search results. In fact when images were first being added to the search results, I personally raised the concern that maybe we shouldn't do it at all. I foresaw exactly your objection, that you saw images from some random article you weren't looking for. However it was decided that having images in search results was a valuable feature, that it was worth having those images even if it meant some people would occasionally come across something they dislike.

I hope you can at least partially understand and respect that we deliberately-avoid imposing a subjective and cultural judgment on what kind of educational content you can find on Wikipedia. We hope that our dedication to broad and uncensored topic coverage makes up for any unwanted content you accidentally come across. Alsee (talk) 21:37, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

Help:Options to hide an image may be of some use. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:53, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Question about templates and categories re: user essays

See here. Reason I'm posting here is that it wasn't until after I saved the page that I noticed no one had posted anything on the page except an edit request (which automatically solicited a response) in eight years, and figured a random message left on the talk page would never be noticed. Sorry if this is forum-shopping: feel free to just copy my message there over here and blank it there if so. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 00:08, 11 July 2018 (UTC)

RfC on Spanish/Catalan/Basque regional identites

There is a an RfC at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography #RfC on use of Spanish regional identity in biography leads that may be of interest to editors here. --RexxS (talk) 00:23, 11 July 2018 (UTC)

Gender-neutral language

Although I support GNL, it looks (to a greater extent than ever before) that many Wikipedians prefer generic male language should be kept. Look at the GNL section of the WP:MOS. It appears that there are now more Wikipedians than ever (according to a current discussion in the middle of the talk page) who appear to support a rule that's closer to the following:

Either gender-neutral language or gender-specific language is acceptable, the preferred term depends on what is most commonly used in practice; please do not change from the version used in the first nonstub version of an article without consensus.

Any thoughts on the best words are?? The "Use gender-neutral language when..." rule appears to be something most Wikipedians disagree with now. Georgia guy (talk) 14:57, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Georgia guy: Where is that quote from? It's not from MOS:GNL, the relevant guideline. — MShabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 21:06, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

It's from the WP:MOS. Please scroll that page to the GNL section. Georgia guy (talk) 21:10, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

No it isn't. — MShabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 21:18, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

For the record, the MOS says:

Use gender-neutral language where this can be done with clarity and precision. For example, avoid the generic he. This does not apply to direct quotations or the titles of works (The Ascent of Man), which should not be altered, or to wording about one-gender contexts, such as an all-female school (When any student breaks that rule, she loses privileges).

It would be most useful to clarify what we mean by "gender-neutral". In today's dispute, an editor mass-changed the word "mankind" in about 170 articles because one of its two definitions is not gender-neutral. (Actually there was no indication they even consulted a dictionary; apparently they simply saw the word "man" and felt that automatically made the word non-GNL.) In such cases, the existence of one non-GNL sense should not preclude Wikipedia's use of the other(s). If a word is ambiguous in the context, it should be changed, but that's an issue of clear language that has nothing to do with GNL. ―Mandruss ☎ 16:22, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Reminds me of the person running around a few months ago with things like Talk:Misuse of statistics#Requested move 20 April 2018 and Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 114#Rename "View history". Anomie ⚔ 21:42, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

As an editor, I actually see no reason whatsoever to use "mankind" (except if it is in a quote), see, [4] [5] but it may be different for different words. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:35, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
While I do think we should encourage editors to use gender neutral language (where appropriate)... I don’t want a situation where editors are going around disrupting the project to “enforce” it. Encourage, don’t mandate. Blueboar (talk) 17:28, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
I strongly agree with Blueboar. I try to use gender-neutral language, and I think our policies and guidelines should encourage it, but I don't think it's a good idea to seek instances of non-neutral language to fix. To me, it reeks a little too much of WP:RGW. — MShabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 18:15, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
The problem is the phrase "what is most commonly used in practice" - how is that to be determined? Google hits can be a start but they, all too often, are affected by variables that skew the "in practice" idea. I have seen plenty of discussions where each side was convinced that their version was the commonly used one. It should also be noted that many of the "gender specific v gender neutral" terms are as in flux at this time as they ever have been. Thus we have the question of when is the tipping point reached where the 'pedia should shift from one to the other. As I read the proposed phrasing I don't see it solving anything in the current situation. MarnetteD|Talk 18:26, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
To see what's going on, please go to the Wikipedia talk:Manual of style, specifically the section that's currently #8 (its number may change as earlier sections are archived.) Georgia guy (talk) 18:33, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
I've seen that discussion. It is about one specific term. This proposal is about gender neutral language in general and addresses none of the concerns I've raised. MarnetteD|Talk 18:38, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
And I want to know people's opinions on when GNL should not apply besides trivial situations like direct quotations. Georgia guy (talk) 18:40, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
I suggest: history articles when all the people under consideration were known to be men. Rjensen (talk) 19:24, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
Although GNL is a goal, as has been said we are not here WP:RGW and should still follow common usage rather than use wikipedia as a vehicle for change. This doesnt mean we should not have guidance to educate, but the world moves slowly and it is not our job to force the use of GNL. MilborneOne (talk) 19:25, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
Force? For goodness sake? No one forced Oxford to refer to 'mankind' not neutral in the cite I included above[6]. Alanscottwalker (talk) 21:43, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
We should use inclusive language in our articles, except for quotes and official titles, as appropriate. --Enos733 (talk) 19:47, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
Of course we should use gender-neutral language. I don't see anyone arguing against that. The problem is that some people think that "mankind" isn't gender neutral, when it's been clearly defined as such. Natureium (talk) 19:56, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
Some people? No, unless what you mean is RS are people. Here's Oxford: [7]. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 21:43, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
What is your point? You have cited one source yes, but it doesn't weigh any more than another dictionary or related WP:RS would. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 21:48, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

The source from Merriam-Webster that makes no mention of a neutral alternative. [8]. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 21:53, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
What is your point? It's already been established that Webster notes the gender issue in its 'mankind', entry. Webster noted gender in it's 'mankind' entry because it exists, unlike in other words it notes. Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:17, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
In the case of "mankind", all of the reputable style guides recommend against its use for reasons of gender, and have moved to this position over a 30 year period. I don't know any native speakers who use "mankind" without making a POINT by doing so; certainly none under the age of 50. This is a case where the language has already moved on. Newimpartial (talk) 13:49, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

As the whole "mankind" argument demonstrates, gender neutral language is already more common, at least in the style of contemporary written English that Wikipedia is composed in. Editors might benefit from using a more nuanced approach rather than changing article en-masse, but contra MilborneOne preserving gendered language seems Wikipedia is attempting to "stand athwart of history yelling 'stop'", which isn't the mission. Nblund^talk 20:50, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
- Just to point out that I dont have a problem with NGL when appropriate but rather see education rather then forcing the issue like the mass change of mankind against common and seemingly correct usage. MilborneOne (talk) 21:12, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
I am in favor of just keeping this to LGBT related articles. If the article is about a guy who self identifies as a guy then we use him/his/he, this should be done per WP:RGW. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 21:44, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
A question: outside of use in direct quotes, how often is a WPian going to use "mankind/humankind" , and in a context where it can't be replaced with "humanity" or the like? I easily see issues whether we chose mankind or humankind, but switching off to a synonymous word that has no such gender implications at all seems better... --Masem (t) 15:11, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
Well, that's weird. So Neil Armstrong has now been retroactively given credit for claiming the Moon for men only? Who the hell interprets 'mankind' as excluding women? sigh. It's this kind of crap that got Trump elected... Wnt (talk) 15:24, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
What is missing from our MOS guidance is a nod to WP:RGW... it is fine (and even beneficial) to change individual instances of gender specific language (to gender neutral language)... but making indescriminant mass changes is considered disruptive. Go slowly, and take it one article at a time. Don’t make a crusade of it. Blueboar (talk) 16:31, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
If we add something about that, it should also cite Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Magioladitis 2#High-speed_editing, which is a generally enforceable ArbCom sanction, as someone pointed out recently at ANI, about the "U.S." → "US" AWB spree: "Where editors have made a number of similar edits in a short time space and other editors have raised concerns about those edits, the editor is to stop making the edits and engage in discussion.". I would support doing so, but it should be in a footnote for the most part, off the MoS lead's bits about editwarring over style. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 21:22, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
We already have support for gender-neutral languag at MOS:GNL. The current dispute is about the linguistically ignorant idea that "mankind" means "dudes only", a view not supported by any dictionary or by linguistic history, or by actual usage in reliable sources or in our own pages. In rare instances it has been used that way when paired with "womankind" in the same construction, but this is a poetic artifice and isn't going to be found in encyclopedic prose. A handful of usage dictionaries concede that some people think of "mankind" as gender non-neutral (unaware that the word dates with its generic meaning to before "man" by itself picked up a meaning [sometimes] of "male adult human", though loss of a prefix we now see only in "werewolf" and "weregild").
The idea that "mankind" is sexist is a legitimate reader-perception issue, but it's a minor, niche one.^{[citation needed]} (Most of our readers seem educated and experienced enough with the language to not go on a misguided language-policing spree about it, as do most of our editors.) Ergo, we should not have a rule against the word, but it's marginally preferable to change it in many cases to "humanity", "people", "peoples", "the world population", "the human species", "modern humans", or some other construction that fits the social, historical, cultural, statistical, human-geographical, evolutionary, or physical-anthropology context in question. We do not need an AWB rampage to politically-correct every instance of "mankind", especially since the word is emphatically not wrong, just not everyone's favorite. Nor do we need an AWB blitz to revert to "mankind"; the entire basis of MOS:RETAIN is if that any given usage is permissible under MoS, leave it alone. Mass revert-warring is just as WP:POINTy (and just as much a grounds for sanction) as doing a mass undiscussed change. They're both futzing with thousands of pages for reasons not sanctions by any policy or guideline.
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 21:10, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Just a brief correction to the above: it is not "a handful of usage dictionaries" that mitigate against "mankind", it is basically all authorities over the last 30 years that have moved in this direction. When all recent, reliable sources agree about something, I wouldn't call that finding "niche". Still, no rampaging is mandated.

I would also like to point out the fallacy that has frequently been repeated in these discussions, that because "man" and "mankind" have a gender-neutral etymology that therefore they don't have ( or shouldn't be considered to have) gendered connotations. Bollocks. The inclusion or exclusion of women from "mankind" was part of the broader question of gender organization of early modern society, and I dare say that "mankind" was a good deal more ambiguous and possibly gendered in its meaning in 1800 than in 1500. Which then makes sense of the proliferation of more clearly neutral alternatives, which began not in the feminist cultural revolution of the 1960s and 70s but rather back in the 17th century. Newimpartial (talk) 11:09, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Same thing I said at the "mankind" discussion: mankind is indeed gender-neutral, but dated—its use has declined steadily since the 18th century and has been significantly less common than "humanity" since the 1970s. Its removal should not be mandated, but neither should it be granted WP:RETAIN-like protection, as replacing it with "humanity" or another clearly neutral equivalent causes no concrete problems (only ideological ones). Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:07, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

I agree with the Gobbler. ;-) As I wrote in the MOS discussion, there is no reason for Wikipedia to move in the opposite direction of every major style guide; news organization guides; and our own manual of style. ... I take that back. There is one reason: To make a political statement. - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) 05:16, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

I propose that the "Manual of Style" be renamed as "Perdaughterual of Style." Jack N. Stock (talk) 05:29, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Thankfully "troll" is gender neutral. EvergreenFir (talk) 06:27, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

This whole debate begs the question: Wikipedia editors literally to dumb to see that etymology doesn't dictate contemporary usage? Nblund^talk 16:05, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Proposed MoS footnote to discourage mass changes

FYI

– Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see WT:Manual of Style#Proposed footnote to discourage mass changes
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 21:51, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Article that explains the etymology of mankind and its controversy

The Gizmodo article "Think twice before using 'mankind' to mean 'all humanity,' say scholars" explains very well where the word came from and why its use is controversial. (Thanks to user:Clean Copy for the link.) Thinker78 (talk) 04:07, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

That article is rather remarkable. They say that (a) "mankind" is from Old English "mann" that could refer to either sex and could be specified to "waeponmann" or "wifmann" if one sex is desired, (b) the combination generally could refer to both sexes, (c) for the past two centuries it has pretty much always been taken to refer to both sexes, hence (d) one should "think twice" before using it and prefer "humanity". Seldom have I seen the conclusion so not follow from the premise. Wnt (talk) 09:31, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

So, you agree, 'man is man' and 'woman is a kind of man'? Or would you prefer, 'women is a subset of man'? - Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:46, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Basically, there are 50% chances "mankind" had chauvinistic origins, so although in the general definition "mankind" can be considered gender-neutral, the origins of the world might not have been gender-neutral. To avoid the centuries-old possible use of a man-centric worldview, as is very well possible, and more important, to avoid the looks of gender-bias (MANkind), it is preferred the use of other words to denote all humans, like humanity, which sounds less gender-oriented, or people, who doesn't have the controversial etymological "man" in it. In Spanish there is a similar issue because often it is said "los hombres" (men) or "el hombre" (man) to refer to all humans, so it brings to question the claim that the use of "man" originated purely as designation of more than one gender, as Spanish society has been historically very chauvinistic. Thinker78 (talk) 18:32, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Yah, but that's huMANity, not huWOMANity, so obviously....... ;) Wnt (talk) 00:44, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

What a lame, reactionary attempt at humour. 'Human' ≠ 'man', anymore than 'woman' just because all of 'man' happens to be in 'human' and only part of 'woman' is. The use of "humanity" does not carry with it the same perceived gender implications as "mankind"--not for most speakers anyway--and your little quip, based in awkward, half-thought-out folk etymology / morphemics as a justification for "analytical/rational" resistance to the emerging norm comes off as, frankly, chauvinistically antagonistic to the larger trend towards gender neutral language. Snow ^{let's rap} 23:02, 11 July 2018 (UTC)

Lame? The derogatory term comparing to one with physical impairments? Killiondude (talk) 00:44, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

I've never known the word to be considered derogatory. It's either a clinical term for actual lameness, or it's an idiomatic usage implying an unimpressive effort. I would not be surprised to learn that some communities have decided it is "ableist", but despite having seen a lot or prejudicial language of every sort over the course of my life, I've never heard that word used to derogatorily insult or cast aspersion on a disabled person. The usage, as far as I can tell, is almost always metaphorical, not literal. But rest assured, if it gained enough cultural currency as something directed offensively at others, I would quickly reconsider my own use of the term. I would probably even consider doing so if it had no such literal offensive usage but simply came to be regarded as highly insensitive. Because at some point, even if you disagree with the logic under which a term has been branded as insensitive, and find the objections to be puzzling, you still have to recognize that, at that point, the word has become so charged by social context that your usage runs the risk of imparting additional subtext which you never intended. As far as I can tell though, most people still consider "lame" to be a synonym for "sad, underwhelming" and I'm quite happy to use it in that fashion to describe that "joke". Snow ^{let's rap} 03:06, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

More to the point, the Gizmodo article isn't a reliable source but is clickbait junk written by a web content churner with no apparent (much less demonstrated) reputable background in English linguistics, and who is clearly confused in trying (quite poorly) to provide a basis for a language-change activism viewpoint. I've said elsewhere that the fact that some people misinterpret "mankind" as sexist is reason enough to avoid its usage; we don't need to make up, or go along with made up, fake reasons. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 00:28, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: I agree with your conclusions, although personally, as someone who does have a background in linguistics, I would put it slightly differently: most people engage in a kind of subjective folk etymology when they are parsing the a word based on morphemes which they recognize within it; this is an ordinary, useful, and unavoidable feature of cognitive semantics and it is a part of how words evolve in "actual meaning". Most people haven't the first clue about the history of their language, let alone the province of particular words, so engaging in pedantic discussions about word roots and comparative syntax is a massive exercise in missing the forest for the trees (and often conducted by people clearly not trained in the relevant fields who simply wish to try to preserve their preferred interpretation of the meaning of the word and its social consequences, for whatever psychological reasons, typically blundering from one nonsensical linguistic argument to another; actual linguists tend to be rather unbothered by change, given they understand that it is an unavoidable part of the natural phenomena they study).

As a basic tautological matter, a word means what it is received to mean by living speakers, and if a given term is perceived as offensive (or perhaps it is better in this instance to say "inclined to cause irritation in half of us English speakers living on planet Earth today") then that is the reality, and it's pointless to say "well no one felt that way about it when I was young, where I lived!" (which, btw, is almost certainly false; if you (generic/hypothetical 'you', not talking to SMcCandlish here) think women haven't been intuitively reflecting on being discluded by the term for a long, long time, you are probably a man one who hasn't stopped to think for very long about all of the ways language has traditionally put men forward as the default representatives of our species--of which there are many that I assure you do not go unnoticed by women). Snow ^{let's rap} 22:44, 11 July 2018 (UTC)

Which is a long way of saying, as I did, that we have reason enough to avoid "mankind" without fake reasons to do so. I have a linguistics minor myself, and understand all of this; I've been trying to keep the discussion from being mired in it, because it's basically immaterial. Even your "a word means what people take it to mean" point doesn't really have much bearing on this, because the word isn't ever taken to mean "men as a class, exclusive of women", except in a rare poetical construct contrasting "womankind" with "mankind"; dictionaries continue to provide the broad definition as the sole or primary one, and RS continue to use it this way. While there's a language-change movement to stamp out use of "mankind", it has not been successful in doing so, or in changing the definition, only in helping a little to shift perception of the appropriateness of the word, a shift that (as you observe) has long been underway without their input. That's what WP cares about, the effect on readers; that is the reason the word should be discouraged here, not for any of these academical and (viz. the Gizmodo article) pseudo-academical ones. WP is making a mistake when it uses wording that causes the reader to mentally rebel, to stop absorbing our material, and to start questioning the project's motives or neutrality. This requires no etymology, and no philosophical or interdisciplinary arguments, just common sense. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 23:06, 11 July 2018 (UTC)

I don't disagree, except for the caveat that the linguistic discussion invariably become part and parcel of the debate whether we'd like it or not, because the utilitarian argument you lay out above eventually always gets met by someone saying "Well, that's just how you perceive it (in your hand-wringing, overly-emotional way), but here's what it really means, because of [X, Y, and Z non-sequitor folk linguistic arguments]" As if a word's semantic effect were in some way a consistent, concrete thing that could be empirically verified by such slap-dash methodology and that such anacrhonisms should prevail over how people actually use and perceive the word in contemporary parlance.

People have been staking out ideological turf surrounding words in that way since forever, and the average Wikipedian is not any more (or in any event, not significantly more) well-versed in the relevant linguistic, semiotic, or empirical analysis such that we cannot expect the same here; indeed, our editors on average are probably closer to the class of people who (for those who have an ideological imperative do so) know just enough about linguistics to feel comfortable constructing a personal theory, but not enough to do so without producing nonsense as a result. I know I see something in that vein virtually every time we have to debate a controversial use of a term that isn't just patently offensive. And incidentally, it comes both ways along the cultural divide surrounding inclusive language; I've had quite the challenge more than once trying to convince editors who wanted to word an article using some obscure/personal gender pronoun (that a subject of a BLP has chosen for themselves) that such an approach is not advisable, using a variation of your "it's about the reader" argument from above. Snow ^{let's rap} 00:29, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

Reference in headers

Hi folks.
Is there any policy that prohibit usage of references ^[1] in the headers (e.g. Header^[1]) of sections and tables (columns)?
Can't find it. I searched the archives for that but to no avail. Thanks.
DAVRONOVA.A. ✉ ⚑ 12:47, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

WP:CITEFOOT which contains: "Citations should not be placed within, or on the same line as, section headings." It would appear that the subsequent clause beginning "For exceptions, see ..." referred to WP:REFPUNCT which says nothing about references in headings.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:00, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Thanks. DAVRONOVA.A. ✉ ⚑ 13:54, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

ArbCom wants the community to come up with infobox inclusion criteria

FYI

– Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Infoboxes § ArbCom wants there to be an RfC and the drafting of infobox inclusion criteria

Short version: In two RFARBs, the Arbitration Committee has said that it can't/won't resolve the perpetual "infobox warring" problem, because this is a content and policy decision that the community has to make. We've been asked repeatedly by ArbCom to develop inclusion criteria for infoboxes so that "The use of infoboxes is neither required nor prohibited for any article" does more than resolve (or devolve) to "fight about it endlessly article by article and category by category". But this has yet to happen, and it won't be easy.

The discussion now open isn't an RfC for !voting, but a place to discuss drafting such criteria for eventual RfCing at Village Pump. SMcCandlish (talk-contribs) 02:32, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

This discussion has been a long time coming and, though it is going to see some vigorous debate no matter what we do (due to this being the perennial battleground between two highly entrenched groups of editors who have litigated the matter repeatedly across numerous articles and tend to show up together en masse) I think we can nevertheless mitigate the tension somewhat by organizing a shortlist of options here. I agree with SMcCandlish that the status quo is not working, and hasn't ever since the inception of the "Infobox wars", if we're to use the somewhat (but not completely) hyperbolic term for this roving battle of wills. So, while I don't favour a one-size-fits-all approach here, I do think that we need a shift towards presumptive inclusion of presumptive disclusion, even if the ultimate guideline ends up being quasi-precatory. That could either be a blanket presumption or inclusion or disclusion for all non-list and non-disambig pages in mainspace, or else a set of presumptions that vary across a selection of articles types (BLPs, historical biographies, geographical entries, taxonomical articles, abstract concepts, works of music, works of literature, ect, ect.).

I know I am going to make myself the least favourite person of one of the afore-mentioned groups either way here, so I am just going to make a call here as to what I expect the general opinion to be amongst the editing corps broadly: I think that most editors are going to err on the side of inclusion either as a general rule or at least for most particular categories. I think the anti-infobox stalwarts, while represented by an active, vocal, and well-organized (by which I mean both their arguments and their propensity for moving together) group of editors, are a minority in the larger Wikipedia population. I think that the utility of infoboxes is largely presumed by the average editor; I won't belabour the reasons in detail, but will try to summarize the arguments I have most often seen asserted in the past by the pro-infobox camp (augmented by my own perspectives):

1) The utilitarian-for-the-reader argument that an infobox serves as a useful encapsulation of vital information which the reader can access at a glance, which (if wisely considered) may actually address the needs which brought a significant number of readers to the article in the first place and which, in all other cases, helps summarize and frame the rest of the article.
2) The utilitarian-for-the-project argument that infoboxes, owing to their consistent and constrained syntax, are incredibly useful to the encyclopedia, to the project, to other Wikimedia movement projects, to analytics researchers, and to other individuals and entities looking to leverage our information for pragmatic purposes. This owing to the fact that the inofbox allows for bot activity and other machine processing and learning mechanisms to extract data in an organized fashion and to analyze, relate, and index both the data itself and the articles they are found on, in a myriad of useful ways. These technical applications are so varied and complex that they go well beyond my ability to effectively summarize here, so I will leave that exhausting task to those who work in these areas (both on project and off, and as part of the broader Wikimedia movement and external to it). But I can say as much as this with confidence and without exaggeration: the applications are myriad and substantial for both research and practical purposes.
3) The style and consistency argument, which has various iterations but which I believe can be boiled down to two inter-related points: A) There is a value in preserving a default approach across Wikipedia's articles (or at least articles within a given vein) and that since most Wikipedia articles already employ an infobox, it is easier to default to this approach, and B) The infobox has become a staple of Wikipedia style and their absence in most categories of article is noticed and disliked by most readers. Needless to say, I think that (even if we assume these assumptions to be true, which is a bit of an if) this third category of argument is by the far the weakest of the three which advocate for a default inclusion approach. But not entirely irrelevant.

Now, having detailed those pro arguments, I don't want to give short-shrift to the anti-infobox perspective, but I fear I have to, for one simple reason: I've never (despite getting RfC'd to a contentious infobox discussion a few times a year since forever) entirely understood the deeply held conviction of a minority of editors that the "Idiot box" is unnecessary and ungainly. While I can't say for a certainty that the trend always holds, my experience has been that the objection to Infoboxes usually boils down to aesthetics--the infobox is said to not look very much like what you would find in a traditional encyclopedia. I don't know if that's necessarily true (I certainly saw very similar templates in some encylopdias when growing up before electronic versions were a reality) and more importantly, I'm not sure if that is a compelling argument anyway: Wikipedia is WP:NOTPAPER after-all. It is worth noting that not every anti-infobox advocate is an absolutist: some simply want the parameters utilized in a box kept to a minimum, and in this respect, I can definitely agree: most IBs to tend to contain excessive detail, and the fields chosen for inclusion can be arbitrary and perplexing at times. If am doing a disservice to the anti-infobox/default-to-non-inclusion advocates and/or have forgotten any obvious pragmatic arguments for their preferred approach, I am sure they will provide a detailed rebuttal, but those are the major categories of argument which I can recall from both sides, in any event.

I think (and I suppose this central discussion will either confirm or refute) that most editors fall somewhere on the inclusion/lean-towards-inclusion spectrum for one of the above three general reasons. But I do think we need to be careful about locking ourselves into binary thinking: there may be alternative, more nuanced, and/or middle-ground approaches out there that have not been widely considered in the past. I personally lean towards a hybrid of the two possibilities I discussed at the opening of my comments here: 1) create a general guideline that presumes inclusion for most articles, but allow it to be rebuttable, and 2) create a more nuanced set of topic-specific guidelines that discuss the policy calculus for each--though I expect most of these, reflecting community consensus, will err towards inclusion too, though probably not all. I do think its important that, even if we do diversify the analysis some, the guidelines should probably be kept in one centralized policy or MoS space. That's about all I can think to say by way of introduction. Except maybe, I recommend buckling your metaphorical seatbelts on this one. Strong (but hopefully fully civil) opinions most certainly incoming. Snow ^{let's rap} 12:50, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

Chains (unit of measure) RFC

FYI

– Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK Railways#Chains RFC

This is a four-way proposal for a possible variance from WP:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers on the handling of a unit, the chain, in articles on British railways in particular. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 03:42, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

Incident thread RE: Usage of AWB (continued)

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

This is following on from the above linked incident thread, in which I was informed that I had incorrectly used AWB when I updated "U.S." to "US" in usages of {{Episode table}} following a discussion at the WikiProject Television (Special:PermaLink/848355963#MOS:US); specific details available at the incident thread.

The result was that I would have my AWB permission removed, but now that I have successfully reapplied for it (Special:PermaLink/850161648#User:AlexTheWhovian), I wanted to post here to basically ask permission to revert my edits using AWB (i.e. change "US" back to "U.S." in usages of {{Episode table}}), to restore the pages to how they were previously before my AWB edits, as suggested in both the initial incident thread and the PERM thread. Thought that it might be best to ask here first instead of going straight for it, lest there be another incident thread raised.

@Amaury, AussieLegend, Davey2010, Esuka323, HandThatFeeds, IJBall, Iridescent, JJMC89, John, Netoholic, Nyttend, Only in death, Power~enwiki, Primefac, Pyxis Solitary, Schwede66, SMcCandlish, Snow Rise, Swarm, and The Optimistic One: Pinging every editor that contributed to the initial incident thread and the PERM thread. Cheers. -- Alex^TW 02:55, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

You know, I think it's best to not use AWB to "undo" this – let's just let individual editors take care of this on their own... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 03:10, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

One of the concerns with the original run was whether due care could ever be given to keeping the articles consistent in their usage of US/U.S. and other dotted/undotted acronyms both inside and outside the Episode table. This is something which is very hard to guarantee on any sort of semi-automated run. That concern is present both in the original run and in any run to restore the old usage. Like IJBall, I think this is something that is best done manually. -- Netoholic @ 03:42, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Okay, all good. So, there's no issue with keeping US, and we should leave the initial case that raised the issue. Thanks for that, I'll need to remember that for the eventual RFC I was planning. I only raise this based on the previous suggestions of other editors, including administrators, that it should be reverted thusly. Cheers. -- Alex^TW 03:59, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

"there's no issue with keeping US" - no.... I didn't say that. I said it should be fixed manually, which involves checking the article for consistent use. As in, you should fix it, but don't use AWB. That you so radically misunderstand (or just hear what you want to hear) is the root cause of this whole thing. I can see no good from you regaining access to these tools when the effects of misunderstanding can be so profound. You want to fix this, open your contribs list, and start fixing. Frankly, I wouldn't have given you back the tool until you'd completed this, as a minimum. -- Netoholic @ 07:14, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Unless I have an admin state that I have to manually check 2,000+ articles, that won't be going on. What you would or would not have done really has no standing here, as you are not the one who reviewed the application, nor are you the admin who stated in the incident discussion that I could/should reapply. Cheers. -- Alex^TW 10:19, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

"Okay, all good. So, there's no issue with keeping US, and we should leave the initial case that raised the issue." Don't jump to conclusions based on the responses from TWO editors.
I don't accept that the massive edit should stay as-is until an individual editor changes US back to U.S. on an individual article — because 99.5% of editors who work on TV articles probably don't know that MOS has not been changed, don't know what was behind the edit and that it was not based on a legitimate decision.
I don't care how you play with your toy as long as how you use it wiki-wide is based on a substantial consensus of editors.
My suggestion for undoing what you did: why don't you create a talk page message similar to those of bot messages, use AWB to post it on the articles you affected, and through it inform editors of those articles that the US can be changed back to U.S. on American and Canadian articles. In whichever manner the rollback is accomplished ... it should be done. Pyxis Solitary 06:53, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Your personal suggestion has been noted and may be looked into. I'll wait for some administration comments as well (as I can't jump to conclusions based on the responses from four editors), as it was an administrator who recommended I use AWB to revert the edits. Cheers. -- Alex^TW 10:19, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I strongly suggest that you listen to whatever consensus this thread comes up with regardless of the advanced permission status of those commenting. The dismissive attitude you are expressing towards your fellow editors in this thread is extremely inappropriate and is, in my experience and opinion, one of the behaviors which signals an editor heading for a long IDHT block. I believe that would be a loss to the project should that come to pass.

On the issue raised here my suggestion would be for you to start checking the articles you changed for internal consistency - that means doing it manually unless/until you can get consensus for an AWB run not doing nothing while lobbying for an AWB run. You made the mess so it is your responsibility to work to clean it up. Jbh ^Talk 11:29, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Cheers. I'm sure that I'll get around to cleaning it up. -- Alex^TW 13:51, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

I wasn't fully aware of the U.S. to US changes until I saw people reverting the edits made by Alex and linking to the admin board discussion in their edit summaries as their justification. I had little choice but to read the entire discussion as I wasn't sure if their reversions were justified or not and I just wanted to make sure. But if you want to change back to U.S. go for it, I don't mind either way. Esuka323 (talk) 11:15, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

@AlexTheWhovian: I appreciate your caution, but part of the reason your AWB access has been reinstated was so that you can revert the mass changes you initially performed. The issue was not that you used AWB incorrectly, but that you made a mass style change to a huge number of articles without a formal community discussion. The local consensus on the talk page was not sufficient to override an MOS guideline to the contrary. That's a fairly minor "offense" that was blown out of proportion, IMO, and it's even possible that the community might end up supporting the change. But your AWB was correctly revoked, and you are still expected to revert the changes. You should now understand why AWB is a privilege, and how it can become controversial even with seemingly minor improvements. You do not need to ask permission to use AWB in accordance with the rules, and reverting a controversial change you made is not something you need to ask permission for. What you need to ask permission for is the change itself, via RfC or on a community noticeboard and listed at WP:CD. Swarm ♠ 12:07, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

So, if I've got this right... I should have filed an RFC for the initial change, but in my oversight I didn't, and now in an attempt to rectify my apparent transgressions, I need to leave the mistake on a great number of articles for weeks while I file and wait for an RFC to gain permission to undo my mistake? I would have thought Wikipedia would be all against faulty articles. But, anyways, thank you for clearing it up; it does actually help. -- Alex^TW 13:51, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

No, it seems you've misread. You don't need permission to undo your mistake. This thread is unnecessary; you're already expected to just do it without further ado. You need permission for the original change you tried to make. Swarm ♠ 16:12, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

I agree with both IJBall and Netoholic, up top; if editors have a strong argument to make in favor of "U.S." at a particular article, they can make it; the accuracy and presentability of the article isn't affected for readers either way, and in probably 99% of cases it's going to be a WP:DGAF matter. I would add three additional reasons:
1) The current and immediately previous MOS:US (which one to use is still under discussion in an RfC) both actually favor "US" as a default, either implicitly or explicitly. Even the decade-old wording led to "US" dominating in the long run at WP because of the rule to not use "U.S." then "UK" in the same material. Ergo, a mass-revert to "U.S." would have a WP:POINTy effect if not intent, and would be a WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY failure. We don't do an unhelpful thing "just because", only to have it slowly be undone again later. That segues into ...
2) Two wrongs don't make a right. If it was disruptive to mass-change articles to one spelling, it would be disruptive to mass-change them back to the other. We have a whole MOS:STYLEVAR about this, and it's also covered in more general terms at WP:MEATBOT. Mass "twiddles" of this sort are disruptive primarily because they trigger thousands of editors' watchlists for near-pointless trivia that virtually on one cares about and which doesn't noticeably improve the encyclopedia one way or the other for readers.
3) This mass case in particular is about tabular data, which is a circumstance in which concision is valued. Given the overall meaning and intent of MOS:ABBR, the fact that a "U.S." exception is sometimes permissible cannot be interpreted as if a requirement to use the longer version for subjective reason; here we have an affirmative objective one to prefer the short style.
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 16:57, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

AlexTheWhovian, I agree with SMcCandlish on this. A second AWB run would make sense to undo actual damage to an article, and would (IMHO) be uncontroversial and expected. But in this case, the edit was trivial, and a second run would be more disruptive than useful. If this discussion results in consensus for a mass-revert, then cool beans, but it doesn't look that way right now. I also don't think anyone can honestly expect an editor to manually fix several thousand changes either. Perhaps the best course of action would be to let these edits be dealt with organically by the individual editors watching the articles, with a message on your talk page (per Pyxis Solitary) to let editors know it's okay to revert your changes. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 17:08, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

That sounds entirely reasonable. Though the message should probably point to this thread and the larger discussion about why not to revert them with AWB. >;-) — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 17:22, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

It may be helpful to disassociate this discussion from the current US vs U.S. debate (above)... the issue is how best to correct a disruptive automated mass edit. Imagine that Alex had run a script to mass capitalize the word “farm” where ever that word appeared... and now realized that this was an error... What would we tell him to do? Blueboar (talk) 17:35, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Couldn't he run a script that goes through his contributions, hits "undo" on AWB edits from the period in question, saves the edits that can be undone, and logs the ones that can't? This should avoid false positives, and if he's determined to decapitalise "farm" correctly, it should reduce the manual workload significantly. Nyttend (talk) 22:34, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

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

Invitation of newly graduated PhDs to edit articles in their domain

Dear all

In order to improve the contents of the wiki articles and expand the coverage of relevant topics, I'd like to propose tracking and invitation of newly graduated PhDs and specialists to edit articles in their relevant domains. It would be wonderful if new specialists got invitations with a list of Wikipedia topics they might be interested in editing

Regards, TZ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tany Zyu (talk • contribs) 17:42, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

A nice idea, but per WP:EXPERT not a great idea. I also find it unlikely that recent recipients of PHDs are setting as their first task a place to work that offers no pay and no benefits. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:01, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

We'd be asking them to walk into an editing situation entirely alien to them - they are trained to do original research and synthesis. Which of course is just endorsing what Beeblebrox has linked to. Doug Weller talk 18:42, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

To be fair, Wikipedia offers the same benefits as most post-doc and sessional instructor positions. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 05:55, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

I've been involved in quite a bit of outreach over the years, and one of the most basic lessons that I have learned is that our target for new editors is intelligent altruists with spare time on their hands and an interest in Wikipedia. New PhDs certainly meet one of those criteria...... Ϣere SpielChequers 22:15, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Indeed. And we do very well out of not-yet-graduated doctoral students looking for a distraction or excuse not to get on with their thesis. WP:EXPERT certainly does not mean we discourage expertise - a wierd idea. Johnbod (talk) 22:24, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

WereSpielChequers, the altruistic part? --Izno (talk) 23:28, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

I don't know if PhDs are more or less altruistic than society in general. Does anyone have data on that? Ϣere SpielChequers 05:37, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Without repeating what our many essays on expert engagement already say (which I agree with to varying extents), and having worked on this a bit, including Wikipedia:Wikipedia Fellows (although I'm only commenting as a volunteer in this thread), the impression I have is that the ease with which we can get new PhDs to contribute (or academics in general, but especially early career academics) varies significantly by field. That's not to say academics in some fields are more capable of editing, have an easier time adapting to the Wiki Way, or are more interested to edit, but that the activity of contributing to Wikipedia can more easily be considered relevant to one's academic career in some fields rather than others. If you're encouraged to do so professionally, you're more motivated to put in the effort to learn the policies and guidelines and persist when ol' Randy comes by. One good example is sociology, and in particular the emphasis on public sociology. Contributing to Wikipedia is easy to justify as doing public sociology, and the American Sociological Association was among the first participants in the Wikipedia Fellows program. It fits in well with any department that sees as a priority dissemination of knowledge to the general public and/or engaging in collaborative communication of the discipline beyond traditional publishing. Doing public sociology on Wikipedia means engaging with the discipline in a novel way -- that's something people get excited about, and something that makes for an easy conference proposal. There's a similar way in to many humanities and social science fields, but it's a harder sell with others. Generally speaking, academics/professionals in fields like chemistry, electrical engineering, mathematics, physics, business administration, biology, etc. are simply expected to have other priorities. Yes, there are aspects of these (science communication, for example), but it's more often a niche/specialty. $0.02 — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 03:02, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Merge proposed: WP:NCCOMICS to MOS:COMICS (which is already ~50% NC material)

FYI

– Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Comics#Merge in WP:NCCOMICS

We have WP:Manual of Style/Comics, the top half of which is naming-conventions material. Then we have WP:Naming conventions (comics), a competing comics naming convention. This is a silly WP:POLICYFORK. Having a combined guideline is thus proposed, based on successfully combined MoS/NC pages in other topics. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 08:43, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Merge the Cyrillic advice to one guideline

FYI

– Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Merge the Cyrillic advice to one guideline

Gist: merge overlapping WP:Naming conventions (Cyrillic), WP:Romanization of Russian, WP:Romanization of Ukrainian into one page, to resolve the WP:POLICYFORK. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 12:44, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Youtube's wikipedia blurb inclusion on "fake news" terms now appears to be live

YouTube announced it was going to do this a while ago [9], but it now appears to be live: if you search for "global warming" on YouTube now, you are first going to get a hit for the Wikipedia entry for global warming. Further, any video that appears to be named with "global warming" has this blurb box just under the video before other details. This is regardless of the nature of the video, so it's on both those that support/recognize that GW exists as well as those that deny it.

I cannot immediately find any other search term that immediately triggers this, but I'm sure they are there or will be added soon.

We may want to 1) compile that list as we learn of the terms that are listed, and 2) establish semi-protection or be prepared to do so on these pages since I can see this is only going to draw a large amount of traffic including those that are going to be very disagreeable. A further point may be to review those lede sentences that YT is using for all found articles just to make sure that they are presented as neutrally as possible but within the bounds of UNDUE and FRINGE. (The borrowed text from our Global warming article seems fine). --Masem (t) 16:01, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

Found a few more "triggers": "Holocaust" and "Moon landing". --Masem (t) 16:05, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:YouTube links to Wikipedia was started for this - it's a little thin, but it exists. Chris857 (talk) 16:06, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

They have clearly added more since July 9th, the ones I've found, I added. --Masem (t) 16:13, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

And on double check, those are EB links, not Wikipedia (when they come up on YT). --Masem (t) 16:15, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

I've just looked at YouTube, entered "global warming" as a search term and run the search. The first two entries (after ignoring the ad) are from National Geographic, then others from a variety of sources. Nowhere in the first 100 entries is Wiki shown. [10] According to the logo I'm looking at YouTubeGB, so is this possibly a US-only thing? Martin of Sheffield (talk) 16:24, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

Nope...I get the same here in the US... Nat Geo... then other vids... nothing from Wikipedia. Mobile vs desktop? (I searched via mobile). Blueboar (talk) 17:25, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

Searching from the UK, no entries on Chrome (Desktop) for Wikipedia Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 08:49, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

It is very likely that Youtube does a gradual rollout for things like this. I wouldn't be surprised about differences in behavior between various users for several weeks. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:28, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

A/B testing seems a likely scenario for rolling out a feature like this. Screenshot here, for those who can't seen it yet. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 01:44, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

It looks like the state-sponsored media tags now also link to Wikipedia. When watching videos from CBC News, I am now seeing "CBC is a Canadian public broadcast service Wikipedia" or "SBS is an Australian public broadcast service Wikipedia". The notices have been around since February, but the Wikipedia link is new. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 21:00, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Strange, when I ran "The Holocaust" through YouTube search, it came up with Encyclopaedia Britannica... I suppose it's a phased roll-out, with Wikipedia used for particular topics only. —Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 22:30, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

That was my bad, actually. I was updating the link by Chris857 above, and realized Holocaust and Moon Landing pointed to EB, not WP. Since per that same link that the WMF appeared to agree to a trial of a limited number of pages, this might just be seeing how trying several similar sites works out for them. --Masem (t) 22:34, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

All good, Masem. Hope you're doing well. I'll be keeping an eye on the page, if nothing else. —Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 22:37, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Searching for global warming on youtube gives me a wikipedia blurb but that's the only one I've seen. Natureium (talk) 22:40, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

In the other direction, Wikipedia links to about 22,000 unique YouTube URLs (for the top-10 wikipedia languages) - not many considering YouTube is among the top 5 websites. I guess we don't consider YouTube as much as YouTube considers Wikipedia. Sort of like a trade gap. -- GreenC 22:56, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Not a democracy?

As a direct result of 17 years under the current model, content policy and guideline have become so complex, watered down, and self-contradictory as to be all but useless in governing content. For most disputed content, equally convincing policy arguments can be made for and against, and routinely are. Supporters make policy arguments A and X, opposers make policy arguments B and Y, and the closer (if any) is not allowed to decide which side has the weightier arguments because that would be a supervote. The only requirement, even when it's enforced, is that we make some kind of cogent connection to some policy, which is fairly easy for any editor well-versed in policy. Even if all participants are acting in good faith, which is rare, this leaves content arguments heavily dependent on editorial discretion and judgment, which are extremely susceptible to natural human bias. Looked at with stark clarity and objectivity, consensus comes down to the POVs of the editors present, and Wikipedia editing has become the democracy that it claims not to be.

For this reason, I sit out a majority of the content discussions that I see in the AP2 area. I have strong feelings in that area, and I'm not comfortable being (much) a part of what I see as a fundamentally broken system. I participate when I feel that policy clearly points us in one direction, and that's rare.

I'm posting this because I think it's a worthwhile discussion and not inappropriate for this page—even if there is no viable solution—and in the hope that I can be persuaded that my thinking is flawed. This is very different from the recurring "Wikipedia has a [liberal or conservative] bias" discussion, one of which was recently closed after 56 hours as a waste of time. Perhaps it can be received as something other than pointless heresy worthy of a speedy close. That said, I know these things usually degenerate into pointless bickering, and it would need to be closed at that time.

Comments? ―Mandruss ☎ 18:24, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

I would say that a lot of issues would be eliminated related to AP2 and many other ongoing controversial areas if we kept WP:NOT#NEWS and recentism in mind, in addition to how much information there is in a 24/7 news cycle and how much this has to be included in our encyclopedic articles. Facts can be updated when they come down the road, but opinions and analysis should be held off or very carefully discussed before addition. Too much of what I see at ANI/AE is because editors want to rush to add in non-facts (even if they are detailed analysis from well-established experts) that are critical of the topic, because it is human nature to focus on the negative, and editors challenging that. We don't need to be that up-to-date if it causes these behavioral conflicts. --Masem (t) 21:45, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

AP2? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:11, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Post-1932 American politics, most commonly present-day American politics. Refers to ArbCom remedies in that area. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:14, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

WP:ARBAP2 PackMecEng (talk) 22:17, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

I very much agree with Masem’s comment on this. We have a serious problem with not enforcing recentism and NOTNEWS. And it does tend to manifest in the form of giving UNDUE coverage to negative analysis and opinion regarding current events. Blueboar (talk) 22:44, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

I didn't intend for this to be a discussion about AP2 specifically, and I see similar problems in other areas. If it's more useful to narrow scope, so be it, but I suspect narrowing to AP2 will quickly devolve into a Wikipedia-bias discussion like the recently-closed one. ―Mandruss ☎ 23:12, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Can you give us some examples from non-politics articles? Blueboar (talk) 00:58, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I could, and I understand the benefit of illustration, but then we would tunnel-vision on those examples and miss the larger picture. The point is that we have one set of PAGs for everything; if the problem I have described exists at all, it exists for all topic areas. ―Mandruss ☎ 01:27, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

OK... Unfortunately, I can not comment on (or address) your concerns without a clearer understanding of what those concerns actually are... and to gain that clearer understanding, I would need some examples. So I guess I am done. Blueboar (talk) 01:50, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

That's fine. Ultimately, what I've said rings true with other editors based on their experience, or it doesn't. ―Mandruss ☎ 01:58, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Keeping in mind my comment about 24/7 news cycles and their impact on lack of NOT#NEWS/recentism considerations, the next biggest area that this behavior manifests itself is any persons or groups involved in the current culture war over identity politics (which, unless they are a politician or directly connected to one, are not covered by AP2), which this often comes down to those called out as alt-right or far-right. This is not to say that we should whitewash away any valid criticism of these people, but their articles tend to be extremely slanted to paint them in as negative a light as possible, adding in any sourced opinion that make them seem worse, and attempts that I've seen to at least achieve a reasonable mid-point are refuted because "we have to follow UNDUE". I've argued elsewhere that UNDUE really needs aspects of recentism thrown in; UNDUE is great when looking at coverage of a topic 5 to 20 years after its left the spotlight to judge what the sources are, but fails in the immediate present in light of 24/7 news cycles. --Masem (t) 13:29, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I think this highlights a problem with UNDUE. A plethora of low quality, though still reliable, sources can, and do force us to have highly biased and partisan articles. This could be mitigated if source quality could be weighted, but the way UNDUE is written now it's just a numbers game. --Kyohyi (talk) 13:49, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps the next step then would be to propose modifications to WP:UNDUE with an RfC? I imagine we could get broad support for this if done properly. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 15:06, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

It's not usually "low-quality" sources, though. It's mid-to-upper tier sources where these opinions/analysis are coming from (mid tier being things like the Daily Beast or Vox, at a mid-tier, up to things like the Washington Post and New York Times). And while writers for some of the upper tier works should be respected as experts or key people in certain fields, doesn't meant we need to include their immediate opinion if we've already layered on a lot of negative information already.

I've argued both on the lack of recentism concerns in UNDUE, as well as the fact that editors review UNDUE weighting of sources limiting themselves only those sources we have deemed RS, while we really should be looking at the broader pictures, and then decide what material from RSes may make sense to include. It is very short-sighted of editors to only look at a subset of sources and in the here-and-now to say that this is how a subject should be covered, when we really should been considering a much higher level, broader view (in both sourcing and time) to make sounder judgments of what to cover. That immediate action that some editors want to use is what fuels the endless debates and combative nature in AP2 and other topic areas. --Masem (t) 15:33, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree with you on tiering. To me, upper tier is reserved for academic sources with good peer review. Mid-tier are academic style journals that pose new ideas, but not necessarily extensively peer reviewed. Also mid-tier are high quality publications that fall in NEWSORG. Finally, Editorial commentary, analysis, and opinion pieces in NEWSORG type publications are low tier or even should not be considered reliable at all. --Kyohyi (talk) 15:54, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

That's fair, but when I see debates on this articles, there's usually very little consideration of academic sources, and newspapers like NYTimes and others are held as high-tier sources for these. Given that good academic sourcing takes time to develop, we do have to consider how newspapers and other similar sources are used in the "short term" to develop these articles. --Masem (t) 16:05, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

I agree entirely with what you've posted here, Masem. The implications result in articles that are far too focused on history of the subjects post-2000s (where online news articles are more frequently found) and provide what is essentially trivia rather than a comprehensive overview of the topic. Killiondude (talk) 01:00, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Our main problem is a new generation of editors that thinks everything is bias and use clickbait news spam as sources.....even seen people fight to keep one paragraph headline spam from Buzz feed. We need to update our policies about clickbait and news spam. No longer an academic environment and we need to make things more clear for the Next Generation.... like the difference between news reporting vs journalism....just look at the play by play daily news coverage at Scott Pruitt#Controversies .--Moxy (talk) 01:13, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

On the matter of Wikipedia becoming more democratic, or otherwise functioning as a de facto democracy, is that even a bad thing? More fundamentally, Mandruss, was there ever a worthwhile alternative? Regarding the concern that "consensus comes down to the POVs of the editors present", was that ever not the case? Sure, Wikipedia policy proclaims otherwise, but that is just another mute referral to scripture whose antiquites have become rather quaint. Given you consider this to be a "fundamentally broken system", what can replace it? Alternatively, why replace it? What objections do you have to the conditions you described?

I am genuinely interested in your thoughts on these matters and since nobody has asked those broader questions yet, I might as well. Hopefully, they are not too far beyond your intended scope. —Nøkkenbuer (talk • contribs) 22:51, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

@Nøkkenbuer: is that even a bad thing? Yes it is, unless Wikipedia content is to reflect the POV of the side who can mobilize the most editors. I think that's a bad idea.
I've been around for only 5 years, so I don't know whether things were ever any different. I do know the following two things. 1. If policy were less complex, watered down, and self-contradictory, it would tend to point everybody toward the same answer. It would be harder to misinterpret policy, and it would be harder to deliberately misuse it. The inherently biased editorial judgment would play a far smaller role. 2. Policy wasn't born that way, it took 17 years under the current model to get here. I postulate that that is an inevitable result of the way we have developed PAGs. Too many cooks in the kitchen, with no requirement for any particular cooking talent or experience. A different model would be needed, one in which policy is decided and written by a smaller group of individuals who have very extensive experience and policy knowledge, and who have an instinctive understanding of the problem and are prepared to say no, the policy doesn't really need that new wrinkle. The wide-open egalitarian self-governance model is a novel and interesting idea, but it's novel because civilization long ago figured out that it doesn't work. All societies need "wise men" (and wise women) in some form.
I reiterate what I said in the OP, "even if there is no viable solution". While there may be a theoretical solution, it is unlikely to be viable because the change would be too dramatic. It would require WMF to take action without asking for our permission, and that is unlikely in the extreme. I simply feel it's important to recognize and understand the problem for what it is—a problem with the system, not the people using it. ―Mandruss ☎ 04:53, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Its worth noting that we do have a (very) weak form of the kind of central authority here that you are talking about, in ArbCom. Mostly ArbCom restrains itself to parsing disputes and establishing sanctions, but once in a blue moon it codifies a previously only presumed policy interpretation or even unilaterally extends the meaning of a policy. I'm not sure I wholly accept your basic premise that these ills are best described in terms of their being a consequence from the openness of our democratic model. That's a very wide-ranging suggestion and I'd have to choose the words of a response to that carefully, since I believe this project is unique in human endeavour and that the decentralization/plurality elements you are concerned about may not just be virtues, but indeed necessities--and yet, at the same time, I can hardl deny awareness of the difficulty in establishing primacy of different editorial considerations. I think that in 97% of content disputes, the consensus model works just fine in enabling groups of local editors hammer out a pragmatic solution. But that remaining 3% (mostly at BLPs) consume inordinate amounts of community effort and lead to reliability issues with some of our highest traffic articles.

Honestly, I think maybe community consensus is still the solution, but would involve a concerted and extended effort to form a kind of hierarchy of policy. To take just one of many possible examples, I'd love some "connective tissue" policy that makes it clear that BLP cannot trump WP:NPOV, which is, afterall, a pillar policy. Some editors wield it like a pure WP:BLUDGEON to keep anything remotely controversial out of articles about manifestly controversial figures, up to and including convicted perpetrators of mass atrocity crimes. BLP is meant to supplement/nuance NPOV, not override it, and it's damaging to our accuracy than some wave the those three letters around as if the term works like a magic talisman, making all unwanted claims disappear, no matter what the WP:WEIGHT of what the sources says. Recently we have developed the "explanatory supplement" tier of policy pages, but its clear that these are meant to be the weakest and least binding (with the exception of MoS guidelines) of all pages which nevertheless conform to WP:PROPOSAL and are thus "policy". Perhaps what we need instead are a super-ordinate level of policies just below the 5P which would allows us to somewhat more precisely and consistently coordinate the exact protocol/priority of policies when they clash. I'm not sure that this makes the policy scheme any less complicated, but if I am to be honest, that suggested priority of your recommendations may be at odds with the others; its probably impossible to make policy more concrete and less watered down while at the same time substantially reducing the actual volume of policy.

A massive effort to reorganize policy in such a way--and let's be honest, this would be one of the most onerous, complicated, difficult and drawn out community discussions ever--could theoretically proceed through our historically (mostly) successful community discussion processes. Or it could proceed with a nod to your "wise women" strategy. But that would be a sea change in itself. But I can't say the idea is entirely without merit. If we were to have a tier of editors who, like arbcom, had a position respected as capable of creating at least some binding analysis on policy, but were more numerous and did not need to be admins, because they would not be involved in conduct disputes (or even directly engaged in individual content disputes) and thus have no need for the tools, I wouldn't discount the possibility that, if approached carefully, it could improve consistency and reduce the territory for disputes. Speaking by analogy, if the larger editor community (or at least those who are interested in getting involved in policy areas) are Wikipedia's legislators, creating our "statutory" policies, your prospective group of wise men would function as a judiciary of sorts, ironing out the wrinkles through "common" policy. Of course, the metaphor is not perfect, since a policy is amenable to change (whether by the same or different parties that originated it) on the fly, which is arguably closer to common law than statutory law, but I'm sure you get the general thrust of the comparison. Again, I don't know I can commit to the idea that such a tiering-up of our user base is necessary or advisable, but that is roughly how I think it would have to work if the community ever moved in that direction. Snow ^{let's rap} 12:18, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

Bullet list of key misinterpretations of current sourcing policy

Moved to Wikipedia:Frequently misinterpreted sourcing policy

Some related points badly need to be reinforced, perhaps in multiple places (though in much more compact wording – I'm trying to explain the issues, not wordsmith them into rule rewrites):

Original draft:

What a writer/organization is an expert in actually matters. A lawyer is not a linguist, and punditry from one about English-language dialects is not reliably sourced just because it got published (especially if perpetuation of incorrect beliefs about dialectal matters is what drives his book sales). The central principles behind WP:MEDRS really apply to all topics. It doesn't matter if an author is a world-class expert on quantum mechanics, if what they're writing about is a professional digression into human psychology or the history of Cyprus. We're suicidally over-focused on publisher reputability [based mostly on pre-Internet reputation] instead of author reputability, in an era when publishers are buying each other, selling off divisions (without changing the names) to whoever has the most money, getting entirely bought out by international infotainment conglomerates, and also going more and more toward where the money is into nonsense populist works full out outlandish claims. Being from a major publisher is not proof that a source is reliable, it's just an indicating that it is more likely to be reliable than self-published blogging or e-books because at least one professional editor acted as a filter.
- Journalism news reporting about or touching on technical topics cannot be used as a reliable source for technical claims. Journalism (in either sense) simplifies both concepts and wording in such topics. Nor is it reliable for statistics; journalists get statistics from somewhere else (the reliable sources for them) and then often misinterpret and misrepresent the data.
Blogs and advice/review/op-ed columns are primary sources and most of them are not high-quality primary sources. When they have not been written by notable individuals or those acting as official spokespersons of notable organizations, either with their own sources cited or at least a very clear indication where the information is ultimately coming from, they're just noise.
- Even when editorial materials have been written by such ostensibly reputable parties, they are viewpoint not fact. Many columnists are wrong about many things, and the entire point of an op-ed (opinion editorial) is to press an opinion or view, just like a press release.
- Even MEDRS has an error in it in this regard which I've been trying to fix for several years in the face of WP:STONEWALL behavior: "Ideal sources for biomedical information include ... position statements from national or international expert bodies". Position statements are press releases (though often citing their own sources for background facts, as do high-end op-eds), and the guideline even used to say "press releases" there. That term was removed to sweep under the rug the fact that MEDRS is saying, e.g., the British Medical Association or FDA organizational stance on e-cigarettes is "ideal" secondary sourcing when it is actually highly politicized primary material.
- When usable at all (per WP:UNDUE), opinion material must be attributed inline and often should be directly quoted. We don't repeat what they say in Wikipedia's own voice. Reviews (in the book, film, etc. sense; I don't mean academic literature reviews) are by nature subjective; a work cannot be said by WP to be derivative, thrilling, etc. based on them; we can just quote/paraphrase reviewers in a due and balanced manner. (However, in-depth reviews can sometimes be secondary RS for particular facts, when they are based on research and are stating a simple objective claim, e.g. that so-and-so scene was filmed in Botswana. An FDA statement can likewise be a secondary source for factual not stance material when its own sources for the claim are clear.)
News reporting and journalism proper are not the same (though the profession of journalism covers both). But neither are guaranteed reliable secondary sources. Plenty of investigative journalism is primary, especially where it hides sources and comes to a conclusion reached by the writer as if that individual had the fact-finding and deductive powers of a huge agency. Some careful news reporting is secondary (based on interviewing multiple experts, agencies, etc., not on repeating what eyewitnesses said), when it's not regurgitation and conclusion-leaping; even then it has to be treated more and more like primary sourcing the closer it is to the events it's reporting on, and the further those events recede in time.
- Learn this, know it, live it: Publication in a major newspaper, news site, academic journal, non-fiction TV show, etc. doesn't magically make it secondary. Secondary is a quality of the writing and the editorial process that led to publication, not of the publishing company or publication itself. Various publications that focus on secondary material also include lots of primary material. "It was in a newspaper so it must be secondary" is nonsense, a misunderstanding of the concept. (Do you think the advertisements in the newspaper are secondary sources? What about the "situation wanted" classifieds?)
- Headlines and similar news blurbs ("kickers" and "deks" – see News style) are not sources; they're metadata and advertising: summaries and attention-getting teasers that not only are not the actual substance of the piece but often misrepresent it, either as to material facts or as to balance.
Not all tertiary sources are created equal. Reputable encyclopedias and dictionaries, both general and field-specific, are reasonable sources (at least temporarily) for basic and uncontroversial information, as long as we understand that more in-depth and current secondary sourcing trumps them. Coffee table books are not in the same class and verge on categorically unreliable. Being a compilation of previously-published claims doesn't automagically make a work reliable.
- Dictionaries are generally not reliable except for what a term means in everyday casual speech and writing (which is usually not what we're writing about except in an article about a slang expression). They cannot be used to trump more in-depth sources. If we have an article about a term, the most notable and encyclopedic information is how the term is used in one or more professional fields; we should note the broadened everyday-banter definition in passing only, and focus otherwise entirely on what RS in the field(s) say about the term and the concept(s) it describes. A dictionary's definition that doesn't including that meaning cannot be used to suppress it. Similarly, if a dictionary (a highly tertiary source) gives a concise definition of how the term is used in a specific field, this cannot be used to constrain the scope or content relating to that field either; we should use the same sorts of secondary sources to provide encyclopedic coverage that the dictionary writers used [we hope] to arrive at their over-simplified topical dicdef (which may also be decades out of date); we should do a better job of it.
And that's just touching on some basic sourcing issues. Community understanding of WP:NOR seems to be an an all-time low. That policy needs to be rewritten with greatly enhanced clarity, both as to what various classes of sources are for what kind of info in what contexts, and as to what does and doesn't constitute original research at all. At this point, I now regret having opposed the merger plan of WP:NOR, WP:V, and WP:RS into a single attribution policy, back in the 2000s. While it would have produced a very long policy, at least it would've been in one place, and interpretational issues could actually be managed and resolved.
- Every day I see farcical antics at both extremes of NOR misinterpretation. On one day, it's someone taking multiple sources about event X that suggest correlations with entity Y and perhaps outcome Z, none of them in agreement about exactly what happened, and turning this into a WP statement that Z is a result of Y doing X. The next day, it's someone denying that we're able (instructed, in fact) to use multiple sources that are in agreement to summarize the RS consensus in our own words, just because they didn't all use exactly the same phrasing.
- This stuff is intensely disruptive, in a far worse way than chest-beating contests on talk pages, since it results in skewed edits in the articles, and thus direct misinformation or misleadingly cagey and incomplete information being sent to our readers.
WP:DE and related provisions (WP:NPA, WP:NOT#FORUM / WP:NOT#BATTLEGROUND, etc.) need to be enforced more swiftly and with less drama, especially when discretionary sanctions already apply to a topic.
- The way to do this is to issue short-term topic bans and blocks with less hesitation, either on the part of DS-using admins or by the community at WP:ANI. If someone's being an asshat, remove them from the topic area and let the rest of us get back to work. If the sanctions are short-term, they will either a) have the desired effect and shift the editor's behavior, or b) demonstrate the editor has some kind of WP:CIR / WP:NOTHERE problem if they keep doing it again and again despite escalating sanctions each time.
- Our current process typically involves a too-lengthy litigation and too-high standards of proof because the typical sanction imposed is too long and dramatic. Stop making it about a one-year sanction, and instead about a two-day sanction with the next one being a week, then a month, then three. Analogy: Our criminal justice system would be unworkable if every traffic ticket could lead to a life sentence. It would be hard to secure a conviction and no one would be willing to do their time but exhaust every avenue of appeal.

If a lot of this was resolved through better-written policies, then it wouldn't matter so much if screaming obsessives on either side showed up to rant about Trump. If they tried to use sources incorrectly we'd just revert them, and if they unreverted, someone else would revert them again because we'd all be on the same page about sourcing. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 12:33, 29 June 2018 (UTC); collapsed in favor of new version, 04:47, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

User:SMcCandlish......make this into an essay !!! I would link the essay.--Moxy (talk) 00:42, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Really comprehensive and well thought out wall of text. I agree with pretty much all of this. Now if only we could get some of those changes pushed into actual policy... — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 02:11, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Working on essay-izing. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 02:15, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Done, at WP:FMSP, with some revision and substantial reformatting, plus some additional points. Pings: Moxy, AfroThundr3007730. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 04:47, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Problem behaviours and rudeness

Revised suggestions

See Also

MOS:JOBTITLES tweak

MOS:POSTNOM tweak

Trademark mis-use

Category:Indefinitely blocked IP addresses

Does Copyright Violation extend to sandboxes?

Discussion notice: Auto-deliver the required DS "awareness" notices

RfC: Ease switching of citations between citation templates or no citation templates

Guidelines regarding birth names of trans individuals

Birth names - not sure what we are discussing

WP:DESIST

Use of copyrighted material undergoing active license negotiation

MOS:WTW addition RfC Terms that can introduce bias

Unblock people using VPNs from editing

Evidence-based policy?

VPN blocking discussion summary

Search Box Filtering?

Question about templates and categories re: user essays

RfC on Spanish/Catalan/Basque regional identites

Gender-neutral language

Proposed MoS footnote to discourage mass changes

Article that explains the etymology of mankind and its controversy

Reference in headers

ArbCom wants the community to come up with infobox inclusion criteria

Chains (unit of measure) RFC

Incident thread RE: Usage of AWB (continued)

Invitation of newly graduated PhDs to edit articles in their domain

Merge proposed: WP:NCCOMICS to MOS:COMICS (which is already ~50% NC material)

Merge the Cyrillic advice to one guideline

Youtube's wikipedia blurb inclusion on "fake news" terms now appears to be live

Not a democracy?

Bullet list of key misinterpretations of current sourcing policy