Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

"WP:VPP" redirects here. For proposals, see Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals).

 Policy Technical Proposals Idea lab WMF Miscellaneous 

• Table of contents
• First discussion
• End of page
• New post

The policy section of the village pump is used to discuss proposed policies and guidelines and changes to existing policies and guidelines.
If you want to propose something new that is not a policy or guideline, use the proposals section.
If you have a question about how to apply an existing policy or guideline, try the one of the many Wikipedia:Noticeboards.

Please see this FAQ page for a list of frequent proposals and the responses to them.

« Archives, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198

Dating articles, use of the word "currently" without a date provided

Too many articles use the word "currently" without any reference to when the "current" date applies. The problem would be eliminated if Wikipedia automatically included the original date of publication of articles near the header/title of all articles, along with the date of the most recent edit. If authors would include a date similar to "currently, as of xxxx," the problem would be alleviated.

Perhaps Wikipedia could generate an automatic super-script following the word "currently" when no date is provided, like the ^{[citation needed]} seen so often? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mach37 (talk • contribs) 19:24, 22 June 2014 (UTC)

(A) checking your contribs (a whopping 6 over 7 years) it's hard to get very excited, but thinking about it...

(B) brainless date stamping would likely be rife with unintended consequences and less effective compared to judicious manual editing, e.g., "As of June 22, 2014, this editor is opposed to this idea." NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 20:45, 22 June 2014 (UTC)

You are quite correct N. On the other hand I have seen articles where events added years ago are labeled as "current" - I sometimes wish we had a bot that would remove the word as soon as it shows up in an article because "current" so soon isn't :-) I am kidding (for the most part) I know we mention this situation in the MOS somewhere. Cheers. MarnetteD|Talk 21:42, 22 June 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it's in WP:RELTIME. You can mark up these statements with {{when}}. AutoWikiBrowser could probably be used to effect this change without the use of a bot. Since AWB is generally subject to human overview, this would probably be a better solution than a bot. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 22:12, 22 June 2014 (UTC)

As an AWB editor, I would just like to point out that there is a problem with this solution, in that an AWB editor has no idea when a "currently" statement might have been added to the article. Since the largest AWB runs (like the current 70,000 article typo list) involve editors without necessarily any expertise in most article subjects, it's going to be hard for an AWB option to be productive, and is likely to generate a lot of invisible errors. VanIsaac_WS^cont 05:07, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

It would be better as a manual AWB task which is what I think was meant. As an option it would create the difficulties you describe. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 18:48, 23 June 2014 (UTC).

I'm wondering if it wouldn't be worth it to program {{as of}} to output a maintenance category when it contains no date parameters, then have AWB or a bot task add {{as of}} to any instances of "currently" that don't already have it. It would help keep Category:All articles containing potentially dated statements complete (by adding the {{as of}} template to statements that have a plain text "as of" indication) and also give a good working category for finding instances of "currently" that aren't more specific. VanIsaac_WS^cont 20:58, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

The phrase "as of X date" is better than currently. But it's better to write "since X date". --NaBUru38 (talk) 01:40, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

"As of 2013" and "Since 2013" do not mean the same thing. Consider this data:

Year	Amount
2011	15
2012	17
2013	17

The amount is 17 as of 2013, but it has been 17 since 2012. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:38, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

Well, if one wanted to get overly-technical about it, it has been 17 since 2013. That's just not the whole story, since it was also 17 in 2012. While "since" implies a time of origination, that's all it really is, an implication. All that said, I'm probably nit-picking. DonIago (talk) 13:29, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

irony alert The overly technical would observe that based on this data, the status subsequent to 2013 is a mystery.NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 17:33, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

"The amount is 17 as of 2013, but it has been 17 since 2012" - Yes, that's why I said that "since" is better: it includes more information. --NaBUru38 (talk) 02:07, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

But it also implies erroneous information, specifically that it is still 17, even though we have no data for 2014. It suffers from exactly the same problem as "currently" does - it conveys false certainty about an unknown current state. VanIsaac_WS^cont 02:23, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Since what I was thinking of was a "number of times X happened in the year", the status of 2014 is unknowable. "There have been 17 cell phone thefts each year since 2012" is completely accurate; "As of 2012, there were 17 cell phone thefts" is suboptimal. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:14, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, my experience is with things like populations - a count not of frequency, but of physical objects - where "since" is unambiguously bad if the number is changeable. But you're still working with a dated usage unless your 17 cell-phone thefts gets updated on January 1st. The unambiguous wording for a "17 cell-phone thefts per year" would be "in year_x and year_x+1" or "from year_x to year_y", not "since year_x". VanIsaac_WS^cont 07:07, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

• Anyway you look at it "currently" or "as of" both read badly and smack of non-encyclopedic recentism. I cringe everytime I see something like that in an article. Spartaz ^Humbug! 05:57, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

See WP:DATED. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 06:36, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

• Almost the only time I encounter DATED is when someone's abusing it, by tagging paragraphs that say things like "In the 18th century, few people ever traveled more than 20 miles from their birthplaces, but now it is not unusual for people to travel 20 miles in a single day." Because, you know, "now" is ambiguous and next year, people might suddenly stop working more than a 10-minute walk from their homes. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:14, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

  • Yeah, I don't like the "as of" in the article text either. I would much prefer for a template that makes a hovertext-style note with as-of information. VanIsaac_WS^cont 07:11, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

One thing possible is simply to point out more vigorously to article authors the disadvantages of present-tense writing. I see too many articles where it's obvious no one has thought of it at all. A present tense article is foredoomed in too many cases; it's not neccesary. Also my impression is that writers promoting products and using Wikipedia space to do so have this habit. Or it appears so to me. Mydogtrouble (talk) 01:37, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

Stop the "citation needed" nerds

I'm a well-educated, occasional editor of Wikipedia articles. I'm also a constant reader of Wikipedia, and appreciate greatly the vast areas of knowledge available easily and in depth.

Now for my complaint and policy suggestion: it appears that there are a number of editors who liberally sprinkle "citation needed" entries generously in serious articles, written by serious people. I have read many of these articles, where the author is clearly knowledgeable and authoritative on the subject matter - only to have the article put in question by all these "citation needed" entries. Enough. First of all, not all knowledge can be cited. In law, everything depends on precedent - but not for all knowledge.

When a fact is stated, a citation is not always needed. The nerds that go around devaluing others' work by entering "citation needed" everywhere do no one a service. They should be limited in this exercise by a change of Wikipedia policy. My suggestion: if they feel one is needed, then a comment should be made to the article's author or to an appointed editor.

My firm belief: these "citation needed" entries cast discredit on Wikipedia itself, and unnecessarily so. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Oleh77 (talk • contribs) 17:15, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

Almost all Wikipedia articles of any significant length are the work of multiple contributors - there is no "article's author" or "appointed editor". Your proposal is entirely impractical, regardless of the merits or otherwise of your arguments. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:20, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

Verifiability is one of this encyclopedia's foundational principles. That doesn't mean every sentence requires a blue number after it, but all articles must be clearly based on mainstream secondary sources, not on any one person's ostensible expertise. Articles don't have an "author" here, and we don't judge an article by whether its contributors are "serious people". —Designate (talk) 17:25, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

Oleh77, some of those tags are appropriate, and some are not. If you see some that aren't appropriate (someone once fact-tagged a sentence that said humans normally have four fingers and a thumb, and even among the well-intentioned, people will sometimes add fact-tags when the citation is right there at the end of the passage), then you can remove them. Similarly, if you see something (like a direct quotation, statistic, or anything at WP:MINREF) that should have a citation and doesn't, then you can add one. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:56, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

@Oleh77: Please wrap the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Stop the "citation needed" nerds (or this one, doesn't really matter) in {{discussion top}}/{{discussion bottom}} - per WP:MULTI the same discussion shouldn't occur in more than one place. --Redrose64 (talk) 10:34, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Stop the "unsourced claims" fools

I'm a well-educated, regular editor of Wikipedia articles (even an author of several, such as Debtera and Magical Treatise of Solomon). I just about consider this project to be a divine mission.

Now for my complaint and policy suggestion: I know from experience that there are a number of editors who liberally sprinkle unsourced statements generously in serious articles, sourced and verified by serious people. I read many of these additions, where the editor has at least convinced themselves that they are knowledgeable and authoritative on the subject matter - only for them to be completely ignorant that books often exist on the subject they're writing on and that their additions will look far less spurious if they add a small reference tag listing a book title, author, publisher, and page number. Enough. While not all knowledge can be cited, such subjective knowledge is out of place in the objective and verifiable site we aim to be -- See WP:Verifiability, a cornerstone of this site.

If something is stated as a fact (or even attributed as a notable opinion), a citation should exist for it. The fools who go around devaluing others' work by adding unsourced statements do no one a service. They should be limited in this exercise by following Wikipedia policy, or going further. My suggestion: if a statement remains unsourced, anyone is free to remove it.

My firm belief: Unsourced statements that need citations cast discredit on Wikipedia itself, and unnecessarily so. Ian.thomson (talk) 17:38, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

There's often a gap between what Editor #1 believes "needs citations" and what Editor #2 believes, with equal sincerity, does not need citations. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:56, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

If there's a citation later down the line, a CN tag is inappropriate, but the OP spoke plenty about "authority". Ian.thomson (talk) 22:23, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

Oleh77, you started your argument by calling those who disagree with you "nerds" and "fools". That is unacceptable behavior here on Wikipedia, but I am willing to make an exception in your case. May I have your permission to use similar terms to describe you? --Guy Macon (talk) 22:46, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Is citing only one author for an article a copyvio?

My new article Nossa Senhora da Graça incident was blanked with a copyvio notice for being sourced from one author only. The article cites three sources, all from the same author (C. R. Boxer, an authority on the Portuguese and Dutch maritime empires). The concern, as commented by the editor who put up the notice, is apparently "basing such a detailed article so closely on the work of one author carries a great risk of copyvio, even if only by close paraphrasing." So my question is, can citing one author only really be considered a copyvio? Also, I don't believe that it is appropriate to put up a copyvio notice that effectively blanks the article when the editor in question is not even sure if this is a copyvio. I sincerely hope that someone with authority can see the sense in my arguments (that this is not proper procedure) and unblank my article. (Also see Template:Did you know nominations/Nossa Senhora da Graça incident and Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2014 June 27 for supplementary arguments pertaining to the article itself.) _dk (talk) 02:55, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

I did not want to blank the article; but the copyvio notice I used seemed the best fit for the problem I had encountered when reviewing the article at Template:Did you know nominations/Nossa Senhora da Graça incident. It is a pity that it blanks the page, and if anyone can identify a tag which notes the problem without blanking the page, that would be useful.

The substantive issue here is is whether it is appropriate for Wikipedia to carry such a detailed article based solely on the works of one author. Even if the article has been written without any close paraphrasing, it seems to me to be very hard to avoid getting at least into grey territory with regard to copyright.

I think that this question does need examination, particularly since the article has been nominated to be be linked from the main page. We do need some sort of guidance here on how this sort of usage fits within copyright obligation, and within Wikipedia's sourcing guidelines. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:24, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Under Wikipedia:CP#Instructions_for_special_cases, you'll see "If you suspect that a page contains a copyright violation, but you cannot find a source for the violation (so you can't be sure that it's a violation), do not list it here. Instead, place {{cv-unsure|FULL_URL}} on the page's talk page, but replace FULL_URL with the full URL of the page version that you believe contains a violation. (To determine the URL, click on "Permanent link" in the toolbox area, and copy the URL.)" That is the template you're looking for. It's hard to AGF when your page is blanked. _dk (talk) 03:40, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

The tag for a single source (multiple publications by a single author may be construed as a single source) is {{one source}}. It is very easy to write an article with zero copyvio and only one source, just like it is very easy to write an article filled with copyvios and use a dozen sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:05, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing: As a general principle, yes it is possible to use a single source without copyvio. But this case is an usual one, because there is such extensive use of a single source. Is there any policy or guideline on this situation? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 04:16, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Not specifically. If the one author is the only possible source, then it fails notability and other requirements to base articles on "multiple" sources, but that's about it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:00, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

I could argue that there is the case where the author is the noted expert in the topic and thus sourcing everything to that author makes the most sense, but in such a case, I would expect that searching of other references to the topic will pull out more details. Eg, could we source the entire Civil War to Ken Burns? Perhaps, but clearly there's sources beyond Burns about the Civil War. And in fact we'd strongly discourage this type of approach, wanting to see the large variety of sources available to be more useful to our readership. But this is unlikely going to be the case in the scenario this thread is describing, where the number of sources is about a topic is small and possibly only attributable to a single author. --MASEM (t) 02:38, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

(ec) @Underbar dk: Sigh. The sources are those cited in the article.

If the consensus is that this sort of use of sources is acceptable, then the page can be easily and quickly unblankked. Until then, please try to focus on the substance of the issue. Continued wikilawyering simply clogs up the discussion and reduces the likelihood of third-party input to to rsolve the situation. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 04:10, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

• As an independent and neutral reviewer, I am going to remove that copyvio notice. Using a single book as a source is not a copyvio; it may not be great sourcing, but it's not copyvio. I'll put the one-source tag on in its place. Risker (talk) 04:24, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Absolutely not a copyright infringement (if no close paraphrasing is present) and I have no idea how it could be thought of one. High quality magazines such as The Atlantic regularly contain long form pieces summarizing at length one written work (usually a book) with no copyright concerns whatsoever. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 04:26, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

If you wrote the article in your own words its never a copyviolation, as for the facts about the captain and the ship that they are single sourced, that maybe the case on first sight, but they are not to hard to verify, as the incident happened in the area where the VOC captains where sailing it is prob mentioned here [1], VOC archive 1600-1800. The portugese archive contains similar captains letters and log books, the mentioned books are a long time time around and if the writer had stated wrong facts about the ship another naval historian would have that published in an article, these archives are pretty well researched.Mion (talk) 07:01, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

I think the policy sought out here is WP:AGF. Unless you have the source to verify a copyvio as the case, or someone has made a complaint, the article should be assumed - in good faith - to be free of copyright violations. - Floydian ^τ _¢ 03:08, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

• For an obscure incident that took place in the middle of the sea off East Asia some centuries ago, and involved no English-speaking people, it is far from surprizing if all the best sources in English are by one historian. To deflect suspicious reviewers it might have been politic to reference some reviews of Burns' work that more or less endorse him, or just another tertiary reference, even if it does nothing but cite him. Johnbod (talk) 16:16, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

More Leniency on Notability Requirements?

After having some in depth discussion on notability, particularly regarding notability in music but this can also apply to notability in general, I thought a discussion could be brought up regarding the current notability guidelines in that perhaps they are a bit too strict. I am of the opinion that if there is at least one good source out there, then we should be able to cover that subject. I will quote some of the discussion that I had in the Notability in Music talk page. I will note that I am only quoting my own statements in the discussion as I didn't want to carry over everyone's comments without asking their permission first.

"I would simply like to bring up a discussion about why there is so much emphasis on the need for musicians, artists, bands, and albums to have a certain amount of notability in order to have articles? Throughout the years, I have used Wikipedia as a valuable source in researching about various bands and their music that I would not have otherwise discovered had the information not been here, notable or not. It seems to me to kind of defeat the purpose if we're all the sudden only interested in music that's 'important enough' only. Why limit what could be valuable information for people? Some information is better than none."

"Exactly. Album information is very useful. It would be a shame to see a lot of valuable information be erased because the albums were not notable enough and the information could not be properly merged into the artist article."

At this point, somebody replied to me with the argument that if we did that, it would be like covering every non-notable product any significant company released, or covering all non-notable films any significant actor was in. I replied with the following.

"Actually, believe it or not, I wouldn't mind if we had more in depth information about more obscure products or films and other things that are made by otherwise notable people, companies, etc. I like to read Wikipedia to discover things. That's what an encyclopedia is for. Information on subjects. If we become so limiting in the information provided due to lack of notability, then we limit the amount of knowledge that can be discovered. I'm not saying we should treat Wikipedia like a directory or anything like that, just that maybe the current notability guidelines seem a little too tight."

"As for the notability guidelines, maybe tight isn't the best word. When I said the guidelines were too tight, I mean they were too strict. More clarity could actually be a good thing. I agree with you there. But I think requiring three to four external reviews is too much. I think if it gets at least one external review, that should be enough. Again, that's just my opinion. But I wanted to bring up the point to see if anyone else agrees."

Essentially, I believe that with the current guidelines, we are limiting the amount of legitimate encyclopedic information that we could be providing due to our current notability requirements, and I wanted to bring up this discussion to propose that we change the notability guidelines to make them a bit less strict. I am not suggesting that we forget citing sources, as citing sources is very important, nor am I suggesting that we turn Wikipedia into a directory. I would love to discuss this to see what others' opinions on the matter are. Jair Crawford (talk) 17:08, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

I lack experience in the music pages so take w/ grain of salt..... this sounds like a proposal to create a directory that would include pretty much any album, which something different than an encyclopedia. It would help a lot if you illustrate your general remarks with the proposed new language

NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 17:33, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply and input. I'm not by any means suggesting that we include any album. I'm simply suggesting that albums should not be deleted when they've been reviewed and they are by a significant artist. One review should be enough for notability, in my opinion. Especially if it is by an already notable artist. I do realize notability is not inherited. If an album by a notable artist does not have any sources or reviews, then obviously it should not be included.

I am not sure what you mean by 'the proposed new language'. I am relatively new to editing. Could you explain what you mean by that?

Also, while this discussion started initially on the subject of music albums, I think it can easily apply to other things as well. Hence why I decided to keep the subject more broad in the description.Jair Crawford (talk) 17:39, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Great minds bring up new ideas to make things better here all the time, and that starts with making a proposal. You have told us the goal (loosen N standards). Well, look up the current text that tells us how Notability works, and figure out how that text would have to be changed to accomplish your goal. That is the basis for a meaningful proposal.... not just the goal, but the mechanism that will achieve it. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 17:54, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Ah, thanks for the clarification. Ok, so I went ahead and looked up the text for general notability, and since this discussion originated on the topic of album notability, I looked up the text for albums. I was actually surprised that the current text is rather general.

Currently it reads, "An album requires its own notability, and that notability is not inherited and requires independent evidence. That an album is an officially released recording by a notable musician or ensemble is not by itself reason for a standalone article. Conversely, an album does not need to be by a notable artist or ensemble to merit a standalone article if it meets the general notability guideline. Album articles with little more than a track listing may be more appropriately merged into the artist's main article or discography article, space permitting."

Now based on recent discussions I've had on some album pages that have recently been nominated for AfD, it seems like an unwritten-rule has been in circulation for a while. This unwritten rule is essentially 'An album should have at least 3 to 4 sources or reviews to be considered notable'. I think that is too strict. And there is nothing to suggest that in the text. So perhaps if a line such as "An album should have at least one review." should be added to the text? The albums I've been recently discussing not only have Allmusic reviews, but reviews from Cross Rhythms as well, yet the consensus seems to be that they are not notable since that's only one source in addition to Allmusic. Again, this seems to be an unwritten rule of some sort. Jair Crawford (talk) 18:16, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

In my experience, if an album is reviewed in at least two reliable sources (particularly if they come from this list of recommended sites/publications), that is good enough to meet WP:NALBUMS. Could you point me to an AfD where the album in question has been reviewed by both Allmusic and Cross Rhythms?  Gongshow   talk 19:29, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Yes.  Gongshow   talk I will link the article and the AfD page. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Power_of_Your_Love https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/The_Power_of_Your_Love Forgive me if my links aren't in proper syntax. I'm very new to editing. That's one out of about five early albums by that artist that have both the Allmusic and Cross Rhythms reviews that are currently AfD'd. Amendment: the albums were actually reviewed by ACMusic and Cross Rhythms, not AllMusic. A bit of an oversight there on my part, but I feel my point still stands. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friends_in_High_Places_%28Hillsong_album%29 This article does have an AllMusic listing as well as a Cross Rhythms review. All of the albums in this particular case have a review with Cross Rhythms. So that is one solid review for each of them. Now under the current guidelines, that should be enough. There seems to be an unwritten rule about the amount of reviews needed though.Jair Crawford (talk) 22:32, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

We require significant coverage by multiple sources, so one in-depth review, while good, is not sufficient to keep an article. Note that while having two such reviews is consider a reasonable baseline, the more you can show, the less likely the notability will be challenged later. --MASEM (t) 06:27, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

I just looked it up on the general notability guidelines, since I couldn't find anything on the number of sources in album notability. It does say that multiple sources are generally expected, but it also says that there is no set number of required sources. So as the wording currently stands, it can be left open to interpretation. The wording probably should be a bit more clear there. I'm of the opinion that as long as there is one good reliable source, then that should be enough. But that's what I originally posted on here to propose, so we've come full circle. Now that I'm considerably more in-the-loop (thanks for the clarifications) I'd like to hear people's opinions on this. Jair Crawford (talk) 06:44, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

True, there are interpretations on how many sources one needs, and sometimes one can get away with a single source, but that's extremely rain and where the source is an authoritative one that other sources could likely be found through it. A single review from a cite that aims to review all music releases is not that - it's good as a starting source, but not alone. This is why universally we ask for two or more in-depth sources (in this case, reviews). The thing to remember that the GNG is not an end point but a means to an end, the presumption that with what is given by the GNG type sources, we can ultimately find more and build out a better encyclopedic article. One review for an album is not going to show that. --MASEM (t) 13:27, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

Fair point. I guess I'm just one who tends to lean towards preserving as much information possible over removing articles. Now, I do agree that some articles do need to be deleted. But for me, those are articles which have absolutely no sources, which there are quite a few of on Wikipedia. Jair Crawford (talk) 17:15, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

• We already permit articles on almost anything connected with music, way below the notability standards for many other subjects. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:59, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

It seems as though people are trying to tighten up the notability for music though (see my above reply). I believe instead of making notability for music stricter, that we should make notability for other topics more lenient. Now, I did look up the text for general notability, and again I was surprised that the text was once again, rather general. Jair Crawford (talk) 18:16, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

@Jair Crawford: I fear this is due to the influx of social media ie. YouTube where anyone can post their wares and have a significant response, which does not provide nobility. Mlpearc (open channel) 18:27, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

That's a good point. The articles that brought this to my attention though are by a very notable artist and they have at least two (turns out it's actually one review. The other source is a listing) reviews as sources. I provided links in one of my replies above. They are actually older albums that came out long before youtube even existed, and they had some coverage. Jair Crawford (talk) 22:32, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Actually, I would say the "notability standards" are the same for music as those other subjects. The difference is that music is a topic covered with far greater prominence in the real world. That inherently creates more coverage and a greater chance of passing WP:GNG. Resolute 19:07, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

WP's goal is to write encyclopedic quality articles, not just to document the existence of verified information. We want to have articles provide enough context for readers to understand the weight of topic to the real world, and hence why we ask for articles that have good secondary sourcing in addition to primary and tertiary, so that context is provided. Our notability guidelines provide for presumptions when those likely will exist, if they aren't already clear already, and hence why they seem strict, so that we can be sure in the future we can develop a useful article. If in the case of a non-notable album by a notable band that information can be discussed in the notable band's article page, and redirects/disamb provided since these pages are cheap. --MASEM (t) 19:15, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

• Thanks to everyone for their input so far. I'd like to hear what more opinions anyone may have on the subject. Again, to clarify after the discussion we've had above, my proposal is to make the notability guidelines a little bit more lenient in allowing an article with at least one good source to be considered acceptable criteria to be kept. Jair Crawford (talk) 17:15, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
• I am opposed to any reduction in the strength of the notability policy and indeed believe that a much better case is made for significantly strengthening it. BLP violations abound in little-seen, marginally notable articles. They often become part of walled gardens. The main reason we have a "paid editor problem" is the extremely low bar of notability. No, I'd say that "increased leniency" in notability is precisely the opposite of what is good for the encyclopedia. It might be cool for the garage bands trying to sell their music, but that's not our purpose. Risker (talk) 23:11, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
• I'm much of Risker's mind. Rather than "anything with one good source is okay", I'd support something more like "anything with less than two good sources is never okay" (keeping in mind that what matters is the number of sources published in the real world, not the number of sources someone typed into the current version of the article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:10, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
• As I've said before, I think the notability policy , or at least a notability policy based on the GNG, is nonsense. It prejudices the encyclopedia towards all subjects that are covered y the sort of media easily encountered on the internet. The bias noticed above in favor of popular music articles is not because there is more written about them, but because there is more written about them in the sort of sources WPedians are comfortable with and can easily access--and the same goes for popular sports. DGG ( talk ) 22:39, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

• If anything, I am rather strongly in favor of making making the notability guidelines more restrictive, so that 3-4 in-depth sources are required. In this age of 24/7 drive-by media saturation, it is bordering on trivial for an event or a person or whatnot to be picked up by a couple of media outlets. Tarc (talk) 22:46, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
  • That would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I've been working on a number of articles on notable subjects lacking citations (governors of Roman Britain) & using a single standard reference to fix the problem. Yes, I could add more sources to each article -- although that would reduce my already small efforts to a negligible flow. There are simply some notable subjects where a single reliable source is satisfactory for creating a Start class article. (And in the category I'm working on, there just isn't much more to be said about the subject than would meet Start class standards.) -- llywrch (talk) 16:38, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
• I believe we are too lax with notability requirements as it is. We already have different notability standards so a football player who is on the pitch for 5 seconds in a certain type of match without even touching the ball gets an article, as does a minor celeb (and almost all are minor) where a an academic who is renowned in their field has to leap over a sensibly high bar to qualify. Raise the bar for the rest to the standards for an academic at least. Fiddle Faddle 22:54, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

After marking for notability - what next?

I encountered an article that has notability problems - Bob_Mayer - and marked it as such. Is there a formal review of articles that have been marked? What happens next - should I wait a while and mark it for deletion if it isn't improved? How long should I wait? etc. Thanks, LaMona (talk) 16:03, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

Generally you should give time for editors to see the tag and try to fix it. Generally about a month or so is the minimal amount of time. If after that there's been no improvements and you can't find sources yourself, then the next step would be to nominate it for deletion at WP:AFD, though the steps listed at WP:BEFORE should be taken first. --MASEM (t) 16:06, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. That's the kind of info I needed.LaMona (talk) 00:03, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Showing logos for Wikipedia Library partners on a WP: page

Hey folks, We have great partners in the Wikipedia Library who have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of individual accounts. For purposes of acknowledgement as well as easy identification, I'd like to use their logos (Intended Logos) on a single WP-namespace Wikipedia Library page that lists the journals, and on the individual WP-space signup pages for the free accounts. The image would look something like the above. What do you think? Cheers, Jake Ocaasi ^{t | c} 13:34, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

If the logo is free, there's no issue, but for non-free logos like JSTOR, we do not allow non-free to be used off mainspace. This was actually asked for an exception a few months back at WT:NFC , some editors wanting to make an exception for logo for entities that were in partnership with wikiprojects; this did not gain consensus. --MASEM (t) 14:01, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

The discussion was here. Thincat (talk) 07:45, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

Notability of academic journals

From time to time, an article on an academic journal is taken to AFD for lack of notability. More and more frequently, I am faced with arguments (explicitly or implicitly) calling for ignoring all rules, even if an article on a particular journal does not meet WP:GNG or WP:NJournals. The justification usually comes down to "Articles on scholarly journals should be presumed notable; we owe it to our readers to allow them to investigate the sources we are citing to document other WP articles." (Carrite at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Journal of Bengali Studies). This argument is also given by non-peer-reviewed magazines (for example, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Technologist (magazine)). I have given my opinion to the contrary at length at the AFD for the Journal of Bengali Studies, so I refrain from copying all that stuff here, but can do so if people think it is preferable. I would like to know whether the community at large here feels similar: should we include articles on all academic journals without exception? Should I stop wasting my time with lengthy (and repetitive) arguments about notability for journals? For years we have used WP:NJournals to good effect, but if we're going to go for IAR in these cases, that doesn't count for much. Opinions welcome! --Randykitty (talk) 17:38, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

No we shouldn't. There are some journals that are reliable sources for our articles, but the source is a non-notable publication. That said, merging non-notable journals to the publisher of the journal (who is more likely going to be notable if they have many publications under their name) is a good solution. --MASEM (t) 17:40, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

Journals lacking the most slender reed of notability should not be considered as having sufficient WP:WEIGHT to count as an RS NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 17:44, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

Notability and reliability are two different things. Academic journals are rarely noted by mainstream press, and the journal systems lacks any significant amount of navel gazing to write about themselves. But being peer-reviewed journals with experts in their respective fields meet the basic fundamentals of WP:RS. --MASEM (t) 17:54, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

At WP:NJournals, some criteria have been developed that are less dependent on "navel gazing". I sympathize with Masem's point of view: if a journal does not even meet NJournals, I think it is quite likely not an RS either. --Randykitty (talk) 18:28, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

You may have misread my point. The notability and the reliability of an academic journal are two , unconnected factors. A reliable journal can be non-notable, as long as it meets the basics of what we need for an RS: editorial control, and a history of fact-checking (in most cases for journals, peer-reviewing). Notability might help to identify how well the source may meet these elements if they are not spelled out by the source, but any self-respecting journal is going to make clear of its publishing guidelines. We do not require the source work to have an article on WP. --MASEM (t) 18:33, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

• I am 100% fine with the existence of stub articles on academic or quasi-academic journals sourced to nothing more than themselves, per WP:IAR. You have the right to nominate, I have the right to defend. Carrite (talk) 18:02, 3 July 2014 (UTC) Last edit: Carrite (talk) 18:03, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

• I'm absolutely not proposing to restrict your right to an opinion. I just want to have some clarification on what policy to apply. I have been spending a lot of time recently on AFDs where I was faced with a lot of opposition (and, frankly, also some abuse, but that is not the point here and I'm certainly not implying the abuse came from you; see for example Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Democracy & Nature) based on what I regard as non-policy based arguments. I'm getting tired of that, so I'd like to have this settled at least for the coming year or so. --Randykitty (talk) 18:26, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

• "Proposal: WP:NJournals is modified to require that otherwise non-notable journals be cited 3 times in Wikipedia to establish notability." If increasing bureaucracy would make things more clear, then if all other tools for determining notability fail, we could push people who wish for there to be journal articles to at least prove that the journal is publishing content of use to the Wikimedia community. If any otherwise non-notable journal cannot meet this very low bar, then it is unlikely to be of use to this community.

Would a proposal like this resolve the problematic cases? I am presuming that bad journals and disinterested promotional editors would have trouble inserting facts from three journal articles in three Wikipedia articles. Like others have said, if some publication is good enough to regularly cite on Wikipedia, then it is useful for Wikipedia readers to have some information on the source. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:30, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

Not sure that changing NJournals matters in any official sense, in that it is only an essay. Likewise I don't see any need for VPP discussion on changing it. Playing along, however, it seems to be largely consistent with the practices of wp:WikiProject Academic Journals. I'd suggest that inability to find any bibliographic cataloguing data should be treated as a clear indication of both non-notability and non-reliability. We can't expect readers to find sources that we can't locate ourselves. A request on wp:RX that comes up dry after three months can be assumed to be unreasonably difficult for readers to find. LeadSongDog come howl! 20:34, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

I have always been opposed to IAR and Carrite's exposition is a great example of why. There are plenty of independent "newspapers" and other periodicals looking to give their screed the veneer of respectability. Bluerasberry's proposal would incentivize bad actors to plunk "facts" into various entries with an eye towards the springboard to their own article. Since notability is not temporary, the proposal is dead on arrival. I agree with NJournals as it currently reads and voted to delete Journal of Bengali Studies for that reason. While I like using Wikipedia to evaluate various periodicals as reliable sources, a dearth of reliable sources about a periodical render any article about same pretty worthless. I wholeheartedly agree with Masem in that an academic journal may itself be considered a reliable source although not notable. I get RandyKitty's point that an un-notable journal might not be reliable, but I would counter that unless a consensus at RSN says a particular book or author isn't reliable, it is often considered reliable even if it clearly fails WP:NBOOK. Chris Troutman (talk) 20:55, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

I wonder why this discussion has been conflating the isue of a journal's reliability as a source with that of its notability as an article subject at all. The two have absolutely nothing to do with each other; why would anybody think they do? The huge majority of perfectly fine academic quality publications are not notable in the sense of being potential article subjects (or else why stop at journals; is somebody planning to write an article on every scholarly monograph or Ph.D. dissertation that has been out in print with a decent publisher somewhere?). On the other hand, a journal might conceivably be highly "notable" (in Wikipedia terms) for being a notorious pseudo-scientific scam or something. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:10, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

• I've participated in a number of academic journal discussions at AFD and agree that WP:GNG or WP:NJournals have been invaluable in helping to decide notability. In fact, I tend to ignore the rules and treat WP:NJournals as a sensible guideline rather than just a mere essay. I've never closed an AFD, but if I did, sensible arguments based on these would carry a lot of weight. But I also recognize there may be cases in which these may not apply and invoking IAR is warranted. For instance, major selective indices could have a systemic bias against non-English journals or those from the developing regions. Otherwise serious open access journals may be happy to be indexed in indices that some consider insufficiently selective. Sometimes dubious journals manage to get indexed in good indices for a time. In such cases, editors may invoke IAR and try to present an alternative argument for keep or delete, How well that flies depends on context and the strength of the argument. From what I have seen, IAR rarely works, but it can work and is a useful way to deal with exceptional cases. Unless AFD closers suddenly start consistently putting a lot more weight on IAR than WP:GNG or WP:NJournals based arguments, I cannot see how IAR is a threat to rational decision making about journals at AFD. --Mark viking (talk) 22:26, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
• Notability is a guideline not a hard policy and so there is plenty of wiggle-room to include topics such as journals. Readers may reasonably expect us to have an entry for any journal which is used as a source. If there isn't a lot to say about it that's fine. There is no requirement for our pages to be of any great length and so a perfunctory entry which provides the essential facts about such a journal is fine. Andrew (talk) 22:32, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

• @Andrew Davidson:, this is exactly the kind of attitude that I am having problems with. The position seems reasonable, why not include every academic journal? In principle, I even agree with that. But in practice, I don't. Regrettably, there are journals that we really don't want to include, such as for example predatory journals. Unless these cause scandal that is covered in reliable sources, we would not be able to include a warning to readers that such a publication is a shady journal, because if there is no coverage, all that we can list in an article, as you say, are only the "essential facts" that the journal presents about itself on its own website. Unless you are proposing that WP editors start evaluating journals themselves to decide which new journals are predatory, and then delete articles on those journals based on their own opinion, I see no way around this problem but to have at least a minimum of requirements to establish notability of a journal. By necessity, we need third party sources for that, there is no escaping that fact. BTW, the problem is by no way limited to predatory journals. Each year dozens of journals get started online, now that it has become very easy for anybody to do so. Even when legitimate, many of those don't make it past a few issues, at most. Unless they are supported by a major publisher or academic institution, such journals often disappear without leaving a trace. If we would include articles on them the moment they produce an issue, we are later left with an article that cannot even be verified any more. How would you handle that? We simply must have objective criteria, independent of our own opinions. NJournals uses listing in selective databases for that. That does not, of course, constitute "in depth coverage" in the sense of GNG, but is a seal of approval from a professional organization/company. In practice, listing in just one selective database (not DOAJ or Google Scholar, for example) is taken as meeting NJournals. Everything that we subsequently write in the article, is based on information provided by the journal, which we trust because of that seal of approval by the database. So our current practice is already to have a low threshold for academic journals. I think it would be a very bad idea to completely do away with that threshold or replace it by our own, subjective, opinions. --Randykitty (talk) 10:29, 4 July 2014 (UTC)

Let's talk a bit about those "essential facts". Most of those go into {{infobox journal}} parameters as simple factual data, about which even unscrupulous publishers have no reason to mislead readers. One fudgeworthy thing I see there is |impact=, and to mess with that is just foolish: it would be caught, and their advertisers would be pissed to find they'd been mislead. The other is |peer-reviewed=, which is usually omitted anyhow. It's the more elaborate text where primary content becomes a potential problem, particularly in describing scope or editorial policies. There are many reasons why users might come to an article about a journal, but I suggest that first and foremost among the reasons is that the user wants to locate a journal article they've seen cited (whether that be on or off-wiki). Although providing directory services is not strictly the purpose of wp, in the case of articles about journals doing so supports users in the verification of cited statements and in the long run supports the mission of the encyclopedia. For this reason we should prefer to have a minimalist data-only article over having no article at all. Note too that this is irrespective of the reliability of the journal. It is intrinsic to the way WP works that we enable readers to assess sources for themselves. Helping them find those sources is a key part of making WP useful, not to mention that it helps editors grow content and correct errors. LeadSongDog come howl! 15:14, 4 July 2014 (UTC)

Are you guys seriously proposing carving out "academic journals" as a new topic fiefdom of alleged "inherent notability", i.e. blanket allowance of articles for any journal independent of outside coverage (like schools or villages)? I thought we've all had enough of those. And I don't buy the argument about it serving the information needs of our readers related to citations in other articles. Why stop at journals? Using the same argument, you could propose having an article about any book that has ever been cited anywhere on the wiki. Or about any individual academic who ever authored one. Or, why not any website that's ever been used as a source? Of course, such a proposal would run directly counter against the well-established consensus of WP:PROF, WP:NBOOK, and WP:NWEB. So what's different about journals? Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:33, 4 July 2014 (UTC)

(ec) A reasonable solution I would think would be to have the publisher of such journals have pages (the journal might not be notable, but the publisher should be, otherwise we are getting into SPS territory here), and redirects for those non-notable journals to the publisher and a list of journals there, with even a table to support the datum proposed above. If a non-notable journal has a non-notable publisher, that starts to beg the question of the reliability - not completely, but it does start to raise questions if we can't connect anyone involved with the work or publisher to a known entity that we can even validate with reputation. But I do want it clear that there are hundreds of non-notable journals published by notable publishers (my experience from the more fundamental science/engineering works) and these are certainly fine as reliable sources. Note that I agree with FP that we don't want to have inherit notability for journals, because that would be a slippery slope across the board for any site that publishes information. --MASEM (t) 15:39, 4 July 2014 (UTC)

If you go that route, the publisher articles will become dominated by a long string of thousands of journal infoboxes - something that nobody wants - leading to outright deletion of that data. Outside of WP editors, nobody cares the least bit about our policy on the WP:N of articles, but every critical reader cares or should care about the sources they can use to WP:V statements. How can I make this clear? We don't need these articles to have N subjects, what we need is a place to put the data about the cited sources. Since even after all this time WP can't seem to get it's act together on doing that simple thing well, (don't get me started on our cacophony of citation 'standards') instead we need to cobble together a workable endrun. I would certainly have preferred that this be done properly on wikidata or a dedicated citation space, but for now, wp articlespace is what we have. It sucks, but for now it is the least-worst answer that serves the purpose. Show me a better alternative, and I'll happily say "move that crap outta here", but please don't try to tell me that N trumps V, 'cause that just doesn't cut it. These stub articles may not be pretty, but they serve a useful purpose.

As an aside, consider too that we have many articles citing sources with variant journal titles such as PNAS, Proc Natl Acad Sci, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. We even have a rule saying we have to support the use of all the variant forms, depending on which was used first in an article. Without a target, the redirects are orphaned and deleted. Not that PNAS will suffer that fate, but that the stubby articles we're discussing will. LeadSongDog come howl! 16:50, 4 July 2014 (UTC)

It doesn't have to be a string of infoboxes, it can be a single table, duplicating the primary fields of the infobox (of course, not publisher, you're on the article about them). And realistically, a person who is reading an article that is primarily sourced to journal articles (as those of our technical nature will be), they are going to know how to figure out the reputation of a journal if they need to know that information for their research. And these publisher articles can also serve to be targets for the redirects that you talk about, even using anchors to have the readers land on the right line. So these concerns are simply not there or are addressable as to make the "need" to have journals be inheriently notable unnecessary. --MASEM (t) 06:08, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

Just a note... in the case of the article on Journal of Bengali Studies, there is a serious case of COI that needs to be taken into account... the article was created (User:Tamalmou. It turns out that he is the founder of the Journal. Thus, there is an element of self-promotion behind the journal article. I will also draw your attention to the fact that the only other article to link to Journal of Bengali Studies article is the article on Bengali Studies (which was also created by User:Tamalmou)... where it is mentioned in order to support a claim, that Bengali Studies is itself a notable academic discipline (to quote from that article: "This field is considered to have been formally recognised within academia in recent times with the launch of the Journal of Bengali Studies in the year 2012 by Tamal Dasgupta who teaches at University of Delhi"). I will mention all of this at the AfD... it may make a difference. Blueboar (talk) 12:43, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

Coi and a possible intention to influence Wikipeda in a pov fashion. Hopefully I'm wrong, but as they say they intend to settle one very controversial issue involving the birthplace of someon (Odisha vs bENGAL) I'm concerned. Dougweller (talk) 15:35, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

No more job postings on Wikipedia

Hi, i would like to ask the community how it sees an expansion of the current policy Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not#Wikipedia_is_not_a_soapbox_or_means_of_promotion to prohibit recruitment from the WMF or a Wikimedia Chapter on the Wikipedia as seen on Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)/Archive_127#I_need_some_good_devs and Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions#Interesting_job_opening.

I dont think it would effect the recruitment for the WMF [2] or Chapter much as both have websites with place for job specifics and there is META, next to that, if people are very active on a subject they are already in touch with the people from WMF or the chapter in solving or managing the issue.

The reason for not allowing it from Wikipedia's side is that we have from the beginning a non-paid volunteer community and its a bit depressing if people drop in from time to time to declare that we are in the wrong place, better move to the parallel structure and get paid for what you are doing now.

What would change ? Wikipedia pages may not be used for advocacy unrelated to Wikipedia, WMF and Wikimedia Chapter recruitment, but pages in the Wikipedia namespace (also known as "project namespace") may be used to advocate for specific viewpoints regarding the improvement or organization of Wikipedia itself. So essays, portals, project pages, etc. are part of what Wikipedia is.

• WMF and Wikimedia Chapter recruitment, was added to this text as an example on [2] notes on Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not#Wikipedia_is_not_a_soapbox_or_means_of_promotion.

So, is there support for the addition , or maybe totally not :)? Did i miss a relevant viewpoint ? Mion (talk) 17:03, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

These are the WMF's servers so if they want to offer a job that is targetted towards editors of WP, I see no reason why not (in fact, they're had site headers that have been more obnoxious from some users' standpoints before without asking us). Any other third party, no way, but that's sorta of appropriate for the WMF to do so. --MASEM (t) 17:20, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

At the moment of the creation of the Chapters and the WMF it was explicit mentioned that the Wikipedia project makes her own decisions, now its not about who runs the hardware, but about the question do the job postings result in less motivated volunteers and people leaving and if so should we ask WMF and the chapters to stop it, as less volunteers is not in their interest too.Mion (talk) 17:52, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

(Posted both here and the Signpost talkpage.) I'm really not seeing the problem here. These are jobs supporting the community, and both the community and WMF would presumably quite like the people doing them to have community experience. Indeed, one of the biggest causes of friction between the community and the Foundation has been WMF hiring people who don't come from within the community and find it difficult to understand. Remember, these are postings in the Signpost - not banner ads or notes in articles, which probably would be inappropriate.

Secondly, I think that policy has to be read with some common sense. It also prohibits "opinion pieces", and it would obviously be silly to apply this to a community newsletter! We've been including chapter/Foundation/WiR/etc job openings in the Signpost on and off for a few years, and it's generally been seen as a positive thing; I don't think an overly-strict reading of this policy should be taken to prevent it, for no real benefit to anyne. Andrew Gray (talk) 17:44, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

WP:QUOTE

Could the community please look into the situation where we have a unregistered IP deleting quotes from well over 250 articles, whilst having no intention whatsoever of transferring to Wikiquote. I personally believe that these mass actions are disruptive and not in the interests of the Encyclopedia. As I see it WP:QUOTE is not a policy, but a guideline and some quotes are relevant to the article. There is some discussion of this on Dennis Brown's Talk page. The attempted discussion on the IP's Talk page have been deleted almost as soon as they have been posted.

Community advice is appreciated. With thanks, David J Johnson (talk) 10:16, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

• Actually, it isn't even a guideline, it is an essay (I missed that at first). I would disagree with the premise of it, that you can't ever use "Quotes" sections in articles. There are a number of times when it would be totally appropriate and beneficial. Not all, but many, thus wholesale deletion of these sections should never be done simply out of the fact that an essay say so. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 10:24, 7 July 2014 (UTC)
  • Link to the IP's edits please? Can't find one either here or in Dennis's page. Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:29, 7 July 2014 (UTC)
    • Link here: User talk:64.4.93.100
    • Ah, thanks, found it too in the meantime. Well, all I can say is, in the half-dozen or so random cases I briefly looked at, the removals seemed to be proper. Actually, pace Dennis, I personally find it quite hard to imagine any situation in which a bare list of quotations, not embedded in context and discussion and without a clearly documented policy of selection, would be beneficial to an encyclopedia article, so I'd say that as a general rule of thumb their removal is likely to be beneficial. If anybody thinks a specific quote or group of quotes is useful, by all means reinsert it, or better: integrate it in the text where it makes sense.
      I also don't buy the claim that this should not be done without transferring them to Wikiquote. I can't speak for the anon, but I personally happen to think that Wikiquote is a crap project with 90% crap content and negligible educational value, so if it was me, I would certainly never add anything there. You can't demand that somebody should volunteer to add crap to a heap of crap as a precondition to be allowed to remove crap elsewhere. Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:44, 7 July 2014 (UTC)
      • Agreed. I often come across quote being added out of context to biographies and articles that are vulnerable to nationalistic editing. Dougweller (talk) 10:50, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

While many of the deletions may detract very little from Wikipedia, some are of value and in some cases simply need moving around the article to provide better context. One of the issues here (and I raised the point at ANI before becoming aware of the discussion here) was that there is no way of knowing what of value is being deleted and what is worthless that deserves deletion. The editor appears to be simply deleting anything under the heading ==Quotations== without any thought. The edit summaries are useless and repetitive. I suspect that this might better be resolved at ANI rather than as a policy issue. The policy works reasonably well provided editors are thoughtful, considerate and have the greater value of Wikipedia in mind.  Velella  ^{Velella Talk}   11:13, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

I am not. As I already said I leave sections that provide value like at Yogi Berra. But most of these sections do not provide value here. 64.4.93.100 (talk) 13:10, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

• Quotations sections including randomly listed quotations are not all “heaps of crap.” There are as many articles offering valuable quotations in an informative manner at Wikipedia as there are articles with useless ones. One can loathe Wikiquote but it nonetheless exists and the same observation applies there as well. I think it’s wrong to defend any mass deletion policy based on an overzealous application of the rules that borders on thoughtlessness. IP 64.4.93.100 has interpreted the rules and carried out edits accordingly. The question is whether his interpretations and actions are correct. If consensus agrees, so be it. But the bigger question should be, as Velella has wisely pointed out, whether or not edits are “thoughtful, considerate and have the greater value of Wikipedia in mind.” At present, IP 64.4.93.100’s edits are more disruptive than constructive. A reasonable proposal would be that he stop this disruption and await consensus first. The fact that he’s still bulldozing his way through swathes of Wiki forest proves he’s not interested in discussing the matter (the reason why several editors consider his edits as “sophisticated vandalism”). One should also note that IP 64.4.93.100 is deleting entire sections of pertinent and captioned photos using WP:NOT and the statement at Wikipedia:NOTGALLERY: "Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files" to justify the deletions. But what exactly does that statement mean: that valuable captioned photos must be integrated within the article and not arranged within a section? And where it does it say that one has the right to delete entire sections without the minimum of debate first? I agree, finally, with the fact that "there is no way of knowing what of value is being deleted and what is worthless that deserves deletion." So cut the excès de zèle and discuss first. --Jumbolino (talk) 12:47, 7 July 2014 (UTC)