Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 63

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nested sources?

I'm looking at a journal article researching info to use here. The article gives citations for a lot of the information the authors talk about (mostly magazines and newspapers). My question is, when should I cite this article (below), and when should I cite the work they cite in the article? If they say "this magazine said this", who gets cited? —Sebquantic (talk) 01:53, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Bayus, Barry L.,Jain, Sanjay,Rao, Ambar G. Truth or consequences: An analysis of vaporware and new product announcements. Journal of Marketing Research, Vol 38(1), Feb, 2001. pp. 3-13. US: American Marketing Association.ISSN: 0022-2437

You should always cite the place where you get the infomration from, even if it didn't originate there. If they cite an article indexed as Smith (1998, p24) in their article, you would phrase that as: Smith (1998, p24) cited in Bayus, Barry L.,Jain, Sanjay,Rao, Ambar G. Truth or consequences: An analysis of vaporware and new product announcements. Journal of Marketing Research, Vol 38(1), Feb, 2001. pp. 3-13. US: American Marketing Association.ISSN: 0022-2437 Betty Logan (talk) 02:31, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks—Sebquantic (talk) 03:23, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Agreed but, if you can go to the original source why wouldn't you? Each iteration increases the possibility of error. Can you find the original and quote from it? JodyB_talk 13:47, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I doubt I would be able to get ahold of most of the originals. They are decade-old issues of things like Computerworld, The Wall Street Journal, etc —Sebquantic (talk) 14:02, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT answers these questions. Blueboar (talk) 14:12, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

The original source might be a primary source, or an unreliable source. In such a case the source citing it would be the one to cite. Peter jackson (talk) 16:57, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

islam.thetruecall.com

Is [1] a reliable source for the quotes in Islamic view of Moses - a pretty bad article in any case. I removed a couple of other broken/dubious sources Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 12:20, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Wow, that article is horrible. I can't see anything on islam.thetruecall.com to indicate that it's reliable for anything and it seems to be used in a number of articles. I assume quotes from the Qur'an can be sourced from wikisource (e.g. 'Has the story of Moses reached thee?' etc) but quotes from the Qur'an seems like the last thing that article needs. It's in desperate need of a pruning and secondary sources about the topic. Sean.hoyland - talk 13:25, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree completely. Zero^talk 06:21, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Kelly O'Donnell

An IP user has been adding some controversial info to this article (diff), citing newsbusters blog.

I do not believe that this is an acceptable reliable source.

Fortunately, following some warnings, the user has taken the discussion to the talk page.

I would greatly appreciate it if others could comment, in Talk:Kelly O'Donnell#Controversy.

I have posted here specifically as it is a source reliability issue, so I hope that I will not be accused of board shopping if I cross-post to the BLP noticeboard; I am not involved with the issue, but am a neutral third-party trying to keep the discussion on-track.

To keep the thread clear, please comment on the article talk. Many thanks, Chzz ► 20:39, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Is Dollywood.com a reliable source for the article about Dollywood?

This may sound like a stupid question, but is it? I ask because on Dollywood.com, things are geared more towards promotional stuff, rather than neutral information. Regardless, all the articles on Dollywood need citations, for example there is only one on that page. So if Dollywood.com does turn out to be a non-reliable source, would it be okay to use it temporarily until more reliable sources can be found? Thanks, Donatrip (talk) 03:40, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Only for uncontroversial facts. Obviously you could not cite it as a source for, say, it's own awesomeness. Guy (Help!) 19:20, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Haha yeah I see what you mean. This helped; thanks Guy! :) --Donatrip (talk) 02:55, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Mulberry Harbour

I served with the Royal Navy in WWll on Deep Sea Rescue Tugs. While serving aboard HMS Jaunty we towed the Mulberry Harbour Blocks, in tandem with HMS Stormking from East India Docks in London where they were built, to Beachy Head. This meant we towed them through the narrow strauts that are between Dover and calais and known as E-Boat Alley. These blocks wer submerged and floated for towing to Arromanches following D-Day. Our ship was not involved in towing them as we were part of the group on the eve of the D-Day landings who went over to tow any hazards that would impact on the Troop landings. We were also there when the storm wrecked much of the Harboir at Arromanches and totally dismantled the Harbour at the American Omaha Beach. The US Deep Sea Tug USS Partridge and the Royal Navy Tug HMS Sesame were torpedoed on June 10 towing parts for th Mulberry Harbour off Arromanches. Harry Greenwood <email address redacted> —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.86.16.170 (talk) (talk • contribs) 05:50, 16 April 2010

I assume you are asking whether "you being there and seeing it" can be considered a reliable source for an article. The short answer is: No. You would have to write up your account and published it before we could use it... but we can not include material that is not published. The objection to your adding material to Wikipedia from your memory of events has less to do with WP:RS as it does with our policy of WP:No original research. Blueboar (talk) 12:42, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Harry, is this covered in, for example, Pawle's Most Secret War or some other source? Guy (Help!) 19:19, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Harry: As mentioned above, statements from editors are not suitable in articles. While that policy unfortunately excludes many useful contributions, you may appreciate that the policy is essential if you contemplate the many thousands of "unusual" people that populate the Internet and who would claim anything if the policy was relaxed. Johnuniq (talk) 23:41, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Three questionable sources in a WP:BLP

Continuing problems on Gilad Atzmon as editor adds these three sources for a claim that some anti-Zionists criticize Atzmon.

http://www.marxists.de/racism/antisemitism/counterpunch.htm Long rant by a political opponent on a self-published advocacy site.
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2009/01/friends-we-dont-need.html A throw-a-way accusation by a professor who does not identify self in the self-published blog posting.
http://www.labournet.net/antiracism/0507/ongilad1.html Long rant by political opponent on a self-published advocacy site.

These were deleted before but now are used to prop up a sentence in the lead that infers that only Anti-zionists criticize Atzmon, which obviously isn't even true, as even rest of article shows. CarolMooreDC (talk) 13:56, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree, they're all unreliable, especially the second one, as blogs aren't considered reliable sources. As for the rest, they don't look like secondary sources to me. In this case it's the quality of the sources rather than the quantity of the sources.

Update: I removed the second reference, and marked the rest with {{Vc}}. Minima c (talk) 14:08, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Anybody else want to call for deleting the refs? CarolMooreDC (talk) 23:12, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

In my view these are polemical, and therefore unsuitable for use in supporting controversial material in a WP:BLP. Guy (Help!) 19:29, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Guy. Note there are a number of sources like that in the article and any attempt to include an Atzmon defense usually is deleted. Last spring an Admin deleted most of them, but they and new ones are back worse than ever. Should I bring the examples to [[WP:BLPN}}? CarolMooreDC (talk) 13:55, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

KMFDM FAQ

http://www.kmfdmfaq.com/faq.htm I don't think this is a reliable source (for information on KMFDM, in this specific case adding information on a single from the album Xtort here), it seems to be a fan-made site, and I don't think it has enough external control for accuracy to be reliable (whether the information is true or not). However, User:Torchiest contends that "That FAQ has been listed as a source on the main KMFDM page for four years, and it's been linked to from KMFDM.net as an official band-endorsed source of information for years as well."[2] So instead of engaging in an edit war I felt some objective viewpoints would help solve this dilemma one way or the other. Thanks! MrMoustacheMM (talk) 21:26, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

This does appear to be a fan site (and one that hasn't been updated in 4 years). There's no indication that it satisfies Wikipedia's reliable sourcing requirements. Jayjg ^(talk) 21:37, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

{ec} Looks like a fansite to me. Unless the authors are music journalists or something, (I didn't research the site's authors) I would say that it's not a reliable source. The fact it's used as a source for years simply means that it's been wrong for all that time. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:42, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

At the bottom of the page it says "The information found herein is © KMFDM Inc." Does that make a difference? Torchiest (talk | contribs) 23:40, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

I think that's because part of the FAQ was taken from kfmdm.net, as per http://www.kmfdmfaq.com/faq.htm#VIII:2. By the way, the link from kfmdm.net doesn't seem to be an endorsement, since that page also links to kfmdmsucks.net, and even our Wikipedia page. --GRuban (talk) 14:18, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

While it's proper to debate whether being linked from an official site constitutes an endorsement, linking to a site called "KMFDM Sucks" doesn't invalidate it either. Let me explain that band has a history of self-deprecating humor, and even released a single called "KMFDM Sucks". Squidfryerchef (talk) 14:40, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

If this is the same KMFDM FAQ that's been regularly posted to USENET for over 15 years, that might be worth considering as an expert SPS, though it would be more appropriate as a WP:EL. For a bona fide FAQ, I'd want to see if the regular editors of the page would want to IAR on this one. I'd suggest using an inline tag like refimprove instead of deleting the content outright, except if it's a BLP problem. Squidfryerchef (talk) 14:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Reliable source from youtube

Hi,

The best reference I have found in support of statement was made by notable person is link to youtube video. The video include an interview with him in which he made this statement (In an Israeli TV show, at Israeli Channel 1, which is a reliable source), however-the Hebrew title that the one who uploaded the video to youtube choosed is hatred toward the speaker. I can't find other online version of this video. Can I still cite it as a sole source?--Gilisa (talk) 10:19, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

No. Anyone can upload stuff to youtube, possibly after modifying it. Also, if the information being verified is worthwhile, it will appear in other sources that are actually reliable. Further, it is original research for an editor to select specific comments made by some person from a primary source, and then present those comments in an article (a reliable source may point out that the quotes were later withdrawn or were made as a joke, and so on. Johnuniq (talk) 11:06, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Johnuniq, it's an interview, it's not edited and if you can refer me to the specific policy that support all of what you assert (original resaerch and so forth) apply to an interview in You Tube automatically-do it. If you can't, then let others to answer my question. My question refered more to the title of the video than to its content.--Gilisa (talk) 11:14, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

A link would be helpful? What is the content that you want to include and the citation? Uploads of programs to utube also have possible copyright violations.Off2riorob (talk) 11:18, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Here it is, ( the one who's speaking is Azmi Bishara-he said there that he historically see Israel as part of south Syria and that there is no Palestinian nation, but an Arab nation. It's all in Hebrew, so I don't know how helpful it can be for you.--Gilisa (talk) 11:32, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Youtube videos would be reliable sources if both the original publisher and the uploader are reliable sources. If the title of the work is obscene that is unfortunate, but ultimately has no bearing on the issue. Betty Logan (talk) 11:37, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

How can it be verified that the video on youtube is the same as what was broadcast on TV? Modification of videos without leaving a clear trace is easy, anyone with a computer can do it. There is a good reason why youtube is not by default considered a reliable source. Zero^talk 11:47, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Zero, it's not edited as can be easily understood from the video in which the frames are continuous as well as the language. Betty Logan summarized the main points for consideration pretty well-if both the original publisher and the uploader are reliable sources-then it's a RS.--Gilisa (talk) 12:10, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

The uploader is not a reliable source in this case, is he? nov424? As I know utube links to support content are generally considered to be a bad idea, if the issue was notable a citation would have reported about it elsewhere anyway. Off2riorob (talk) 12:22, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Off2riorob, the uploader in this case is indeed not a RS. However, as for noteability, it was reported in many other places. What is valueable in the youtube link is that it's a direct citation--Gilisa (talk) 12:48, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation, imo it doesn't appear usable in this case, at least you have the other reliable reports of the incident. Off2riorob (talk) 12:56, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Well, how about this? It comes from Arutz 7, which is a constant visitor on this noticeboard-and many times considered as RS.--Gilisa (talk) 13:13, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Arutz Sheva was discussed here. To me it does not look as if "outsiders" found it a RS. And then to use it as a source in a WP:BLP? -Seriously. No. Huldra (talk) 14:41, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

(ec) Anyway, surely if its a notable statement then it will be widely reported elsewhere. Otherwise there is a severe dash of UNDUE if this is the only place you can source it to. Spartaz ^Humbug! 15:33, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

In general, youtube videos are not considered reliable. Often there are WP:copyright issues as well. The exceptions are videos created by and posted by mainstream news sources on their own dedicated youtube channels. Blueboar (talk) 15:32, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Query

Is it alright to use some tabloid sources for non-controversial facts in a biography? I've done-up Ben Thompson (actor), but was wondering if this is an alright practice for facts not covered in any other sources. Regards, Pyrrhus16 00:14, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Depends what is meant by a "tabloid". Which sources? Squidfryerchef (talk) 15:01, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

The current refs 2 (Western Daily Press), 8 (Daily Record), 9 (Western Daily Press), 12 (Daily Mirror), 13 (Metro) and 14 (Daily Mail) are the ones I am wondering about. Pyrrhus16 22:42, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Use of an interview as a reliable secondary source

In the Southern Poverty Law Center article, an editor is using an interview from the WNYC radio program "On the Media". He/she summarizes this interview as follows:

"In the last year the SPLC has also expressed concern that hot rhetoric and disinformation is causing a dangerous increase in paranoia and confrontation within the political landscape. There is the concern that overheated speech of pundits and politicians is inflaming hate groups that may pose a viable threat. The SPLC specifically singled out Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann, Congressman Steve King, and commentators Glenn Beck and Lou Dobbs as failing their moral responsibility for the inflammatory effects of their rhetoric on hate group violence."

1. Is a straight interview like this (it is not clips of an interview that is in the context of a news story) a primary source, or is it a reliable secondary source?

2. If the source is a primary source, does the above summary violate the following policy on primary sources:

"A primary source can be used only to make descriptive statements that can be verified by any educated person without specialist knowledge...Do not make analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims about material found in a primary source."

--Drrll (talk) 01:07, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Interviews are considered primary sources and can only be used to represent the opinion of the subject. There are certain cases where they are valuable (see #LGBTQ above) but generally you would use them for "In an interview, the SPLC said..." statements. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 10:23, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

You're talking about using only direct quotes or very close paraphrased approximations, right?--Drrll (talk) 10:36, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

That would be my interpretation of PSTS, and I would much rather use their own website. I would actually favour using a shorter, less detailed summary, not including the names, stating clearly that it was an interview, and if possible attribute it directly to a person at the SPLC rather than the whole organization. Also, I wouldn't use it at all if it's a lengthy article - that's stub-type stuff and I would expect it to change as more information about the SPLC arises to flesh out the article. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 13:44, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

I would classify the material quoted above as ephemera that really isn't encyclopedic. I wouldn't call it "stub-stuff" as stubs are held to the same standards as full articles. I agree that interview are primary sources, even when embedded within news stories. The exterior news story may be secondary if it synthesizes or brings some objectivity to the topic, however if it just is reportage, it also is a primary source as an eye-witness to the interview. --Bejnar (talk) 16:33, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Who is the publisher in this instance? The publisher is WNYC. Is WNYC a reliable source? Yes. Is WNYC secondary to the SPLC? Yes. Therefore, the interview in question is "published by a reliable secondary source". Indeed, this noticeboard is for discussion of "reliable sources", and the question Drrll has asked is a question about primary sources, which doesn't even pertain to the scope of this noticeboard. I have asked this question over at the NOR noticeboard[3]. SaltyBoatr (talk) 16:27, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with the Salty on this one -- an interview conducted and published by a reliable source (in this case, WNYC) is an acceptable source. //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 17:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree that WNYC is a reliable source--the question is whether a transcript of a straight interview is primary or secondary. This noticeboard doesn't seem ideal for answering this question, but it seemed closest to the noticeboard choices available.

GamesRadar piece

Last week, Scapler (talk · contribs) added a reception section to Pokémon Black and White (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) that cited this article from GamesRadar. Since then, there has been discussion on the talk page as to whether or not this is actually an editorial piece and is not a reliable source for the content being cited. Another user who agrees with me MelicansMatkin (talk · contribs) also brought up that "the WikiProject (WP:POKE) seems to have developed a warped perception of reception as of late. Anything that even briefly mentions the subject is instantly seized and used for the article, even if it's almost completely irrelevant to the article". This is most certainly the case for the GamesRadar article. So is this 14 sentence editorial a reliable source when it comes to being a "reception" of a game that's six months from being released?—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 00:05, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Here are my initial thoughts...Generally speaking, GamesRadar is considered a reliable source for video games. I'm not a Pokemon fan, but it looks like a reliable source for this article. However, I'm not sure the article expresses "disappointment". The article says "surprised", not "disappointed". Also, it makes no mention of the GameBoy being obsolete. (Yes, the GameBoy is old but Wikipedia has rules about WP:SYN). I think a better phrasing would be:

Justin Towell of GamesRadar UK expressed surprise that the games were not announced for the planned Nintendo 3DS handheld, and that the titles "Black" and "White" evoked an image of the Game Boy.

This is beyond the scope of this noticeboard, but IMHO, the second point about evoking an image of the GameBoy seems fairly unimportant, so I would drop it from the article. I think what our readers would really like to know is whether the game will be available for Nintendo's new system. So I would change it to:

There has been no announcement whether the games will be released for the planned Nintendo 3DS handheld, according to Justin Towell of GamesRadar UK.

And I would drop the reception section of the article and work the above sentence into somewhere else in the article text.

A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:00, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I've incorporated your suggestions into the article as it stands as such. However, I believe that the author of the content will revert me fairly quickly, because the piece is purportedly a "reception" of the titles of the games being "Black" and "White" as opposed to something more "imaginative" in Justin Towell's opinion.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 02:40, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Uexpress

Uexpress appears to be a syndication service.[4][5][6] They mostly carry word games, puzzles, cartoon, features, and some columnists. I don't see any indication that they exert editorial control over the material they offer. For columns that haven't been published by any conventional newspaper or similar publication are they the equivalent of a self-published source? Will Beback talk 23:59, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

It depends what one is trying to use it for. Are we talking about something like "Pet Connection" or "Supermarket Sampler", which I would expect to be noncontroversial, or the columns of Ted Rall or Ann Coulter, for whom many readers take at least one of those columnists with ~~a grain of salt~~ the Bonneville Salt Flats? --Metropolitan90 (talk) 15:47, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
- Uexpress is being used as a source for an opinion of a controversial group, based specifically on a column which does not appear to have been printed in any secondary source. Will Beback talk 23:01, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
  - It would still be helpful to know which group, what opinion, which column, and which Wikipedia article this relates to. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 23:00, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

This concerns an opinion of Federation for American Immigration Reform given by Georgie Anne Geyer. The cited article is here: [7]. As mentioned above, I haven't been able to find any version of it that's been published by a newspaper. The editor who added it has complained that an opposing view, added as balance, represents undue weight. Talk:Federation for American Immigration Reform#Undue weight While investigating further I realized that the Geyer cite might be problematic. FWIW, Geyer is not an impartial journalist on this issue but rather has written advocacy material.[8] If the Geyer cite is removed it'd legitimate to move the balancing quote to a less prominent location. Will Beback talk 22:46, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Edward Stone (clergman)

In the article on Edward Stone (clergyman) a user has advanced the theory that Edward was actually known as Edmund:

However, it is also possible that the Reverend was formally known as Edward, but was referred to as Edmund by his close friends and family. Wills of other members of the same Princes Risborough family support this theory[2] and it is common for people to use "pet" names this way.

The citation given is "Buckinghamshire Records Office" No reference number is given to identify the family wills, but it is my understanding that even with full document references this would not be acceptable as it is not a printed source. Opinions appreciated.

Speculation based on primary sources - absolutely doesn't belong here, per WP:PRIMARY. (Barnabypage (talk) 19:58, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Ditto. Unless there is a secondary source for the speculation it is WP:OR and should not be included. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:12, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

TorrentFreak

Is TORRENTFREAK.COM a reliable source for technology news, specifically in relation to file-sharing and to establish the notability of computer software? [9] It appears to be a small advocacy outfit, promoting copyright infringement, with no oversight or fact checking department. The Guardian and a host of reputable technology websites such as Wired News and CNET cover the same topics, including lawsuits, with greater impartiality. Wikispan (talk) 15:14, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

TorrentFreak falls in the area between an expert selfpub and a true secondary source. It certainly has a reputation for reporting on the details of torrent-based technology. According to our own articles, it apparently broke an important story on ISPs throttling peer-to-peer connections. A quick Google Books search showns that it's cited fairly often, and Google News indexes it as a news source. It's come up before [10] on WP:RSN and much the same things were said.

You can always feel free to upgrade citations to a more reliable/more widely available/more original/or more background information source, but that's if they provide the same information. I would expect the Guardian or Wired to work in broad strokes, and more specialized sources such as TorrentFreak, Ars Technica, The Register, or Freedom To Tinker to provide the details.

Also, do you have a source that says they "promote" copyright infringement? There's many legal uses for torrents. I believe Wikipedia can be downloaded via torrent.

It should be fine for facts about torrent file-sharing technology. But it's probably too specialized to establish notability for a software package. Squidfryerchef (talk) 14:32, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Several other sites have a reputation for reporting on the finery of torrent-based technology, most importantly, with objectivity. TorrentFreak bloggers habitually defend the practice of downloading protected works and they encourage readers to vote Pirate Party. I am struggling to understand how they are reliable for anything other than news stories about themselves and what the most Pirated movies on BitTorrent each month are. Google News also indexes Alex Jones' PRISONPLANET.COM and countless other unreliable sources, casting doubt on its usefulness as a barometer. (talk) 16:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

As Wikispan says, the real issue here is no evidence of editorial oversight or fact checking by anyone with published credentials in a relevant subject area. That alone disqualifies it as a reliable source. --Rlandmann (talk) 20:32, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

A source does not become unreliable just by publishing opinions favorable to a political party which one Wikipedian does not like.

Squidfryerchef has said it well: The numerous citations of Torrentfreak in publications which are uncontroversially regarded as reliable sources (see also Google Scholar) show that the site has a reputation of being citeable with regard to its (limited) area of expertise. Given this reputation outside Wikipedia, it is irrelevant whether a Wikipedian is "struggling" to understand why all these scholarly articles, reputable newspapers etc. chose to cite TorrentFreak. Speculating about their editorial process also doesn't override this evidence.

Summarily, I think Torrentfreak can be considered a reasonably reliable source for factual statements in the area of filesharing and copyright infringement. In a case where its information is conflicting with that of other sources, or when citing it for opinions, extra caution should apply.

Regards, HaeB (talk) 23:08, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

TorrentFreak bloggers do offer a unique perspective in some regards. I do acknowledge that much. They are often first to publicly announce the arrest of individuals connected to the Warez scene and the closure of unlawful online file-sharing websites. They frequently share tips on encryption, as well as private trackers, helping visitors to stay two steps ahead of the law. A close examination of Google Scholar shows that many people find them useful for statistics on which games and films are most downloaded. However, they are not cited nearly as often as CNET, The Register or Ars Technica (or any other reputable source with editorial oversight) which have tens of thousands of hits between them, compared to just 128 for TorrentFreak. Wikispan (talk) 19:14, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

The difference in the number of hits surely has something to do with the fact that CNET etc. cover a vastly larger area than TorrentFreak, which (as noted above) focuses on the rather narrow topic of filesharing. Regards, HaeB (talk) 04:16, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Interview in Independentpoliticalreport.com for BLP?

This interview in Independent Political Report for Wayne Allen Root BLP. Reliable?? Not mentioned in WP:RSN search. Thanks. CarolMooreDC (talk) 22:35, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Unless there are doubts about its legitimacy, I don't see why not. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:09, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Just to clarify, this article is an interview, which is different from a news story. In an interview, all the source needs to do is to accurately write down what the interviewee says. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:08, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Bloody-Disgusting

why is someone saying bloody-disgusting.com is a "questionable source"? its been cited 2000 times on wikipedia, also i think you should know the user has previously been banned from editing on wiki. :) thanks

This probably has something to do with this thread on the WP:IRS talk page. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:58, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Not as obvious an answer as it first appears from the name. (By the way, we have an article on them: Bloody Disgusting.) It's a relatively new website, and has a horrible name, but is starting to be cited by more reliable sources: The Scotsman; Time Magazine; Canadian Broadcasting Corporation; MSNBC; again MSNBC. That's how sources become considered reliable, more reliable sources rely on them... but it's just starting that process. I'd say depends on the item to be cited. What is the item to be cited? --GRuban (talk) 23:20, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Its basically some information on the biographical article on Ali Larter, someone with the ip address 207.69.137.40 is citing the site as a questionable source. If someone could let them know it is a source because others also undid their revisions but he redid them. Very annoying. Thanks!

The Progress Report & LewRockwell.com

Current argument happening at Talk:Libertarianism over the validity of a number of sources. One is The Progress Report. I'm not sure exactly what the site would be considered. Another is Lew Rockwell, which is a libertarian site. This is the WP article for it. Would these count as blogs, or opinion sites, or news sites, or maybe they can be used for some but not all types of sourcing? Torchiest (talk | contribs) 18:29, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

source #3 links a search engine Darkstar1st (talk) 19:26, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Blatantly false. It links to the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, not a search engine. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 19:34, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

We should keep the main discussion on the talk page itself. I removed the IEP source, as it doesn't say anything specifically about the statement it is cited with. But I'm still curious about the other two sources I originally asked about. Torchiest (talk | contribs) 19:36, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

No they are not reliable sources except for statements about themselves. Note however that some articles they publish were originally published elsewhere and can be evaluated independently. TFD (talk) 19:49, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

No, source 69 "^ Foldvary, Fred E., Geoism and Libertarianism. The Progress Report." is a link to an editorial blog from a lecturer at the same private Santa Clara Jesuit university as this disputed source http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/submitted/sundstrom/Sundstrommanifesto.pdf used as the primary source on left-libertarianism page.Darkstar1st (talk) 20:37, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Neither of these are reliable. The first is very very FRINGEy, the second provides no information about it's editorial control or expertise. Hipocrite (talk) 20:38, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Source 10 of the left-libertarian page list the following self-published blog from an anarchist site: http://flag.blackened.net/liberty/tals.html I suggest we include an expert as several of the sources related to libertarianism appear to be manufactured in the last few years.Darkstar1st (talk) 02:36, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Evelyn Evelyn

There's been an ongoing dispute for some time now on Evelyn Evelyn about whether some fandom controversy about the band has sufficiently reliable sources to be mentioned in the article. Sources that have been proposed include this and this. More input about whether these are reliable sources would be welcome; it would probably be better to contribute on the talk page than here, since that way the other editors of the article are more likely to see it too. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:42, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Bostonist.com (your second link) is, by its own description, a blog site - so not a reliable source unless Kerry Skemp, the author of this article, is a noted expert on the subject. The reliability or otherwise of About.com must have been discussed before - I don't know if any conclusion has been reached but the general tone here is dubious: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:About.com#Blocking_about.com Barnabypage (talk) 17:16, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

There have also been suggestions that the personal blogs of the members of the band Amanda Palmer and Jason Webley would be usable as primary sources for the existence of the controversy. Again, comments on the article's talk page would be helpful. Dr Marcus Hill (talk) 09:59, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Flag

Flag appears to be willing to publish anything written by anarchy-sympathetic writers, and does not appear to have any real editorial oversight or review process. The about page says: "Located in Chico, California; run by individuals committed to the expression of free ideas; flag has provided free web space for anarchist thinkers since 1997. The content and views expressed on this server are in no way related to or endorsed by the owners of this domain or any of its upstream providers." The particular piece being disputed is here. Torchiest (talk | contribs) 13:59, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Looks like Flag is basically a hosting service for a wide variety of projects related to anarchism, so it confers no reliability on the piece. Having said that - a bit of Googling suggests that the author, Chris Faatz, may be a recognised authority on aspects of radical politics. Someone would have to dig deeper to establish this, but if so, his piece might qualify as a RS at least for some statements. Still far from ideal, though. Barnabypage (talk) 15:21, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

You may be right. Looks like he's done work for The Nation, which would help establish reliability. Torchiest (talk | contribs) 15:33, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Sources used in new edit to Platine War article

An editor in the Platine War article has made edits here citing works by Pacho O'Donnell and Diego Abad de Santillán. The most troubling to me is the use of the former to justify a lowering of the number killed by the dictator Juan Manuel de Rosas from a figure of between 2,000 and 20,000 to "80". As this seems to be quite a radical departure from the sources I've read, I'm wondering if this author/source is pushing a fringe view?

I've not come across materials from either author touching on this period, so guidance would be appreciated as to whether they are RS for the statements in this edit. There is some back and forth on Talk:Platine War that may or may not be enlightening. • Astynax ^talk 03:24, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I would agree that a drop from 20,000 to 80 is worth a challenge. If need be, directly attribute the numbers (suggest something like: "There is debate as to how many were killed. At the high end, noted historians X, Y and Z, estimate 20,000<ref>; Noted historians A, B and C puts the number closer to 2,000<ref>, while Pacho O'Donnell and Diego Abad de Santillán state it was only 80<ref>.") Blueboar (talk) 15:28, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

If you want to know whenever O'Donnel is a reliable author or an unknown man making some weird story to draw atteintion to himself, I must point that he was Secretary of Culture of the city of Buenos Aires and Argentina itself, Senator, Deputy, ambassador in Panama and Bolivia. And his specific work as historian is recognized as well: he received the "Isabel la Católica" ("Isabella the Catholic") order from the Spanish King Juan Carlos I of Spain, and the "Palmas Académicas" ("Academic palms") in France (See here, the page belongs to the government of the province of Misiones). The legislature of Buenos Aires honoured him as illustrious citizen (see here, news article at "Clarín" newspaper). I have to note that the pages are in Spanish, but it's an Spanish author the one we talk about here. Suffice to say that the pages are reliable and unrelated with him: not reliable in the sense of talking about history, but reliable in the sense that we can take for sure that they are not "spamming" or lying. MBelgrano (talk) 01:16, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Fallingrain.com

Hi please join in the thread at here. Falling rain was compiled in 1995-1996 and lists false population estimated within a 7 km radius and altitude data which reliable government sources and google earth and consistently proved wrong, often dramatically so and oftne lists settlements or draws railway lines which no longer exist. Unfortunately many editors believe this data to be reliable and have used it or linked to it in over 9000 of our encyclopedia articles, presenting the read with false information or directing them to false information through external links. This site has recently been used as a source for the mass creating of generic stubs about Kenyan village. The creator is now aware of the problem and thanks to a Xenobot has now been dealt with but we still have 9000 articles using this as a source/link. I and other well trsuted experienced editors/admins such as User:Darwinek, User:Orderinchaos and User:Satusuro have called for this to be blacklisted asap and did so back in December. Four months later we are still stuck with 9000 links in articles and a lot of data which we know are false. It seems however this is not adequate enough for deletion and that a wider consensus is needed. Please can you comment on the black list page in the link given and offer your views on this situation. Thankyou. Dr. Blofeld ^{White cat} 22:18, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

matzav.com

Is http://matzav.com/ a reliable source? Jayjg ^(talk) 00:48, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Reliable for what Jayjg? Book reviews, restaurant reviews, news of community events, I would say yes. News more generally, probably not. Itsmejudith (talk) 10:14, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Reliable for this claim:

In April 2010, Orthodox rabbi Ephraim Kestenbaum was quoted as recounting that his father, David Kestenbaum, a rabbi who had worked to save European Jews during the Holocaust, had been urged by Wise through him (Ephraim) to reduce his pressure on the American government, and that Wise had told him " Tell your father that he has to be an American and not to fight hard for Jews in Europe. You have to be an American first." Kestenbaum stated his belief that, but for Wise’s actions, President Roosevelt would have done more to save Jews in Europe.<ref>Yair Alpert, [http://matzav.com/rabbi-kestenbaum-speaks-of-astounding-misdeeds-of-reform-rabbi-stephen-wise-during-holocaust "Rabbi Kestenbaum: Jews Died During Holocaust Because of Reform Rabbi Stephen Wise"], Matsav.com, April 14, 2010.</ref>

--Jayjg ^(talk) 12:42, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

This seems like a quote from an interview and probably not an interview directly with matzav.com. It needs to be traced back because otherwise this becomes info at 4th or 5th hand: matzav says that E. Kestenbaum says that D. Kestenbaum says that Wise influenced Roosevelt. But perhaps Yair Alpert is the author of the piece and can be seen as the source? Itsmejudith (talk) 13:12, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I have no idea what the origins of the quote are, I just wanted to know if the website was a reliable source for the claims being made. Jayjg ^(talk) 12:27, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Sorry. I see now that it's not a quote from an interview but the report of a speech. Not reliable. We can only use academic secondary sources for anything related to the history of the Holocaust. If Rabbi Kestenbaum's speech is indeed important then it will be more widely reported and eventually discussed by historians. I see that the Stephen Wise article already contains similar information, sourced to academic historians, so this can safely be left out. Itsmejudith (talk) 12:49, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Racerhistory.com

Would http://racerhistory.com be considered a reliable source? ~EDDY ^{(talk/contribs/editor review)}~ 00:52, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

No. How are you, formerly active with African articles wikipedian? Dr. Blofeld ^{White cat} 17:33, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it looks like basically a fansite.[11] A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:14, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Opinion Sources in "2010 Itawamba County School District prom controversy"

For example, is the following reliable?

http://www.inquisitr.com/69069/constance-mcmillen-fake-prom-confirmed/

And:

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/features/view/feature/Lesbian-Couple-Sent-to-Fake-Prom-1015

The source cited above is a link to opinion pages hosted by The Atlantic Wire. The article citation refers to it, incorrectly, as The Atlantic. The article is a personal commentary piece that cites other commentators and an interview.

I think the BLP source standards apply to this article, at least in the context that these sources are used, since there seems to be a tendency to these sources to vilify one group of identifiable living people (students of a particular high school), and in some cases to stigmatize the general population of an identifiable geographical area. Geogene (talk) 23:53, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I've changed the Atlantic Wire citation to link into its section of the Atlantic article, which describes TAW as "a website associated with The Atlantic that aggregates opinion from across the media spectrum and summarizes significant positions in each debate." TAW's own About Us page further describes TAW as a "portal for opinion news" that "systematically tracks hundreds of opinion-makers from newspapers, web sites, television, radio, and magazines", "synthesizing and analyzing what’s out there, summarizing the significant positions in each debate", and "fram[ing] the key questions and disputes of the day and offer[ing] clear links to our sources."

The 2010 ICSDPC article plainly references facts from this source (rather than opinion, which I believe would also be valid as long as it was labeled as commentary.) AV3000 (talk) 02:55, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Hi AV3000. I agree with your description of the source, that it catalogs what it calls "opinion news" from "opinion makers". I also agree that the article is sourcing issues of fact from this aggregate of opinion pieces, facts that deal with the actions of living people. For example, that AW piece cites an Arianna Huffington op-ed condemning the recent preliminary court ruling, among other things. I don't think this material is RS as a source of facts. I continue to insist that it should not be used as such. Perhaps the original HuffPo op-ed it cites could be used, carefully, as a source of quotes from notable commentators (Huffington may be notable enough) condemning what happened, with those quotes identified as such in the article and attributed to the pundits behind them. That would be simply using an opinion piece to cite the opinion of the author, which I agree is probably an acceptable use as long as it is kept notable and there isn't enough to turn the article into an attack piece. Using such a source for facts is another matter, unless we're citing an expert on a non-controversial, non-BLP topic. Thanks for modifying the citation. Geogene (talk) 15:10, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

East+West Review, Institute of Law and Culture (country unknown)

[ http://www.eastwest-review.com ]

Can anyone comment on the reliability of this source? It appears to have been added this month as a source to numerous articles but I can't find out much about it. On their site it says

"East+West International Review represents a special new analysis and information project of the Institute of Law and Culture and its structural subdivision - Center for European Cultural Identity Studies."

but there is no real information about where this Institute is supposed to be or who is behind it. I can't even see what country it is supposed to be in. Some of the articles seem to be opinion pieces that are being used to support statements of fact.

I have found it here:

--Boson (talk) 22:31, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't see anything that would tell me it would qualify as reliable... no physical address, no listing of editorial staff or editorial policy. Essentially it is just an opinion blog. Blueboar (talk) 13:40, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Two commercial competitors; one gives data about the other

There are two major commercial dating websites which are direct competitors; one is called eHarmony and the other is OkCupid. The founder of OkCupid derived unpublished numerical data about his competitor based on his competitor's published data; he posted his methodology on his site's official blog, and that what I am considering citing.

Here is the statement I am considering adding to the article about eHarmony:

While eHarmony themselves do not publish statistics comparing the number of people who join the site to the number of people who marry as a result, industry competitor Christian Rudder has calculated that of eHarmony's 20 million user accounts, 96.25% are dead in the sense that the user cannot send a reply to messages due to not having a current paid subscription. Of the 3.75% of accounts which are active, 93.8% discontinue paying for eHarmony without declaring a marriage match after an average of six months.

I feel that this statement is as objective as any other numerical statement, and that it is fundamental enough to exist in the article without interpretation. However, I feel that almost all readers would themselves interpret this statement as being an unflattering fact.

If this statement were coming from multiple neutral third parties, I definitely would say that it belongs in the article. What I cannot say is that I am sure an entrepreneur can give data about a competitor. The source, Christian Rudder, is himself an industry leader and ought to be considered a reliable source to speak on the industry, and in the page I source he is speaking in that capacity. I feel that the numbers are not an opinion, so this is not a NPOV issue. But in this context, is he a reliable source?

Please answer on the eHarmony talk page in the section for this. Blue Rasberry 00:50, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Nature Precedings

Should Nature Precedings be considered a reliable source for inclusion in an edit [12] for Intelligence Quotient? They are put in as preprints for others to look at and comment on. Dmcq (talk) 22:29, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

In general, no. "Documents on Nature Precedings are not peer-reviewed and, as such, should not be considered "published" works." So (like other preprint servers such as arxiv) it falls under WP:RS#Self-published sources (online and paper): it can only be used as a source if its author is a well-established expert in the specific subject that it is being used to source. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:05, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I've noted it looks okay for iinclusion on the talk page as I've found an article here on the author and it is one of his areas. I have misgivings about the contents of the article but then I'm not qualified to judge. Dmcq (talk) 14:12, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

BlackJack's site

In respect of this site www.jl.sl.btinternet.co.uk/stampsite/cricket which has been used extensively by user blackjack I would point out that as regard copyright there can be no real issue because the cricket content is in two parts. Firstly scorecards copied from a variety of secondary sources. No issue on reliability here as the cards are available in several books, some dating back 100 years or more. There is no primary source here ie: BLACKJACK has discovered nothing new. Part two is his own opinions expressed as comments and annotations. Some of this is risible and utterly unreliable. The Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians which is accepted by MCC and ICC as the main source in this area(ICC co-ordinator D.Kendrick is ACS chairman) saw these comments to BJ's work in the terms I express and have written about them as such. Given the BJ attacks violently anyone questioning his work I believe this should be looked at. Though the scorecards are reliable, the opinions are actually new and held only by BJ and thus utterly unreliable. Distinguished historians Peter Griffiths(Cricketarchive), Peter Wynne Thomas, Keith Warsop, John Goulstone and others would support this view. Incidentally Mr Warsop published an almost identical list of scorecards to the one on www.jl.sl.btinternet.co.uk/stampsite/cricket twenty years ago and a booklet detailing such scores was published by ACS six years ago. As for using names to sign posts - who is Blackjack or Moondyne?88.108.2.72 (talk) 08:07, 15 April 2010 (UTC) DR A Tillmann

We have already stated (above) that this issue revolves around the question of whether BlackJack (in his real life persona) should be considered a reliable expert on Cricket due to his stated work experience. If so then his opinion would be note worthy and can be included, and his website would be considered reliable and can be cited. Those of us who respond to questions on this notice board are not in a position to judge whether a particular person should be considered an expert in a specific field. That is a question that is better answered by the editors at the relevant project page (in this case Wikipedia:WikiProject Cricket) who will be more familiar with the reputation of sources relating to the topic.

If you feel that BlackJack is "attacking" people, or violating another of our behavior guidelines, the place to complain is WP:ANI not here. Blueboar (talk) 15:22, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, Blueboar. Dr Tillmann is none other than Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Richard Daft. He has already made several posts at WT:CRIC which annoyed the members there but he still persists in his petty vendetta which, as you can see, is because I do not always agree with some of his chums in the ACS. You will note, however, that though he doesn't like my theories, he does agree that the site is reliable for its match reference information and that is what really matters. The site is designed to present a consolidated list of match references and it is on this that its reliability must be judged. I'm happy to discuss it at WT:CRIC as long as the contributors are all bona fide members of this site.

By the way, the ACS has no official status whatsoever. It has, however, used my matchlist as the essential basis of its online "Early Cricket Project" and has designated me as the main contributor. CricketArchive (also mentioned above) has published match references and full match scorecards for the 18th century which were provided by me and, again, they have acknowledged my contribution (I reckon I supplied some 95% of their 18th century material).

I'm rather busy in real life now and can only spare limited time for WP. But I have been sorting out site licensing with Moonriddengirl as above and I said to her that I will instigate a discussion on CRIC when time permits, unless one of the genuine members wants to kick it off first. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 15:50, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

ACS is the official ICC provider of List A statistics and is used by ICC for all its' official records.88.108.10.67 (talk) 20:29, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

List A cricket started in 1963. The site in question deals with the 18th century. Please keep things in context. ---- No it's used for all records and list A started in 1962Jack | ^{talk page} 20:35, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Get a clue please... both of you... complaining about each other here on this page will not help. For resolution on the "expert/not expert issue, go to WP:WikiProject Cricket... for resolution on sock puppetry, personal attacks or other behavior issues, go to WP:ANI. Please to not continue your conflict here on this page. Do not respond to each other on this page (we understand both sides of the issue, so there is no need)... take it elsewhere. Thanks. Blueboar (talk) 00:19, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Please don't send this back to WT:CRIC, that is where it just goes round and round. A neutral area where reliable sources are debated (i.e. here) is a much better venue. At WT:CRIC, that is where Blackjack and his supporters (including me) all interact, and a fair and neutral assessment of the source will never take place there. You can ask Blackjack and the IP to not comment on the source themselves and leave it to a neutral user, but please take a look at the issue and don't bounce it back to WT:CRIC :) --SGGH ^ping! 13:45, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes - so let's get to the crux of it - why should this site be considered reliable according to our normal policies on RS? I don't want any "he said, she said", let's stick to the site. --Cameron Scott (talk) 13:48, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

I completely agree. But I am going to have to explain why the site is reliable and also explain to people who do not follow cricket that I am a subject expert. But, I don't know the process here. Please post some questions and I will answer them, if you want to do it that way. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 17:23, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok, let's start with that - which reliable sources note that you are an subject expert? Newspapers, specialist cricket publications etc. --Cameron Scott (talk) 17:31, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Just noting in passing that IMO this is the proper venue for this discussion, not the cricket project. Cameron Scott's quesiton above is precisely the one I'd have asked, and is the most relevant here. Guy (Help!) 19:22, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Also, here is a slightly easier question that may be helpful: What reliable sources have attributed information to the site? That is, it is not suitable for Wikipedia to use information from a site if no relevant authorities regard the site as reliable. Johnuniq (talk) 23:48, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

The essential sources which may be considered reliable are CricketArchive (CA) and the Association of Cricket Statisticians (ACS), both of which qualify as "specialist cricket publications". CA is an online source only while the ACS mainly produces printed material in the form of handbooks, although it does have a website which includes its Early Cricket Project. CA is widely quoted for its statistical content but note that it contains very little in the way of narrative or historical content. The ACS is less well known but, as its article shows, it does attract recognition.

If we accept that these are reliable sources then the next thing is to ascertain where they got their 18th century coverage from and, although my contributions were not exclusive, they were extensive and the bulk of the 18th century material published online by both these sources is derived directly from the match references that form the fundamental part of From Lads to Lord's (LTL). The acceptance of this information by CA and the ACS effectively confirms their view of myself as an expert in this area of cricket history.

If you look at CricketArchive contributors you will see that John Leach is one of many people who contributed the thousands of scorecards and match references to the site. The page is not specific re contributions given but I can guarantee that these people did not merely write in with a question or two. For example, I believe that Peter Wynne-Thomas, who has an article on here, contributed massive amounts of information about Nottinghamshire CCC. My contribution amounted to about 95% of the site's 18th century coverage including nearly all the detailed scorecards.

Contributions to the ACS Early Cricket Project are recognised in detail. If you look at the list of contributors you will see my name and if you follow the matchlists (one per year) you will see that I contributed the vast majority of references given. Taking one page at random, you can see that the Matches in 1730 were contributed exclusively by me.

The information I gave to CA and ACS was based on the list of match references that forms the fundamental core of LTL but admittedly it is me personally rather than the site which is acknowledged as the source by CA and ACS.

I have been extensively published by the ACS both online and in their printed material: e.g., their main publication is the Cricket Statistician which is a quarterly journal. Examples of my ACS online work are this and this. I was also published by The Cricket Society whose secretary Mr Hignell personally invited me to contribute historical material based on my work in the ACS publications. I resigned from the ACS in 2007 due to differences with the committee about its policy towards cricket history and I decided not to remain in the Cricket Society because I have limited time for writing and I wanted to concentrate on the internet.

(addition) I've been reminded that my article The Monster Bat Controversy of 1771 was published in the Autumn 2006 edition of The Journal of the Cricket Society. Various articles about cricket in the 18th and early 19th centuries were published in the ACS Cricket Statistician from c.2004 to 2007 when I resigned from the ACS. I'm afraid I don't have those journals any longer so can't check the precise details. Since spring 2007, my writing has been confined to the internet.

Re Peter Wynne-Thomas who I mentioned above, he performed a review of LTL in its initial form although I should point out that he got someone to print it for him instead of viewing it on the internet. As a result, he took it out of its "comfort zone" and lost all sense of layout and presentation. However, it is the content that is important. His review is in the Cricket Statistician in either the 2007 autumn or 2008 winter edition. This was after I resigned from the ACS and the editor added a little note to the review which rather unnecessarily mentioned my resignation. Mr Wynne-Thomas recognised that the fundamental aspect of the work is the consolidated match references and he praised my industry in completing this and commented upon its usefulness (at that time a consolidated set of 18th century match references did not exist with references distributed across a number of not easily obtainable books). ACS reviewers tend to be very strict and do not hesitate to cite errors when they see them. Mr Wynne-Thomas did not cite any match references that were incorrect and I am sure that he did check them, or at least a substantial sample of them. Given that he is acknowledged to be an expert in the field, this finding says a great deal about the site's reliability. I have to admit that he did have some criticisms in other areas but they do not imply a lack of reliability and are effectively his opinion versus mine. He suggested a couple of extra sources (one of which I found useful, the other less so). He complained somewhat testily about the lack of original research (which must suit WP) but, as my preface clearly points out, the key purpose of the work is to consolidate existing match references. He disagreed with some of my opinions such as my view that Neville Cardus was the "wisest of all cricket writers", which is hardly significant. And he objected quite strongly to the geopolitical and general history coverage which he sees as irrelevant, whereas I would point out that the scope and theme of the work are clearly outlined in the preface and it does say that I consider the geopolitical and cultural background to be of great importance, so that is a matter of whether to present precise detail only or provide a big picture too.

LTL has received mentions in other media although I can't be specific about dates. The mentions were not unfavourable and were included in pieces about cricket or sporting websites in general. For example, the Daily Mail in c.2008 had an article about sporting websites and said that LTL carries a compendium of early cricket match references, or words to that effect, but made no comment about its quality. There was something in a similar vein last year in one of the Sunday papers, The Observer I think. The Wisden Cricketer had a piece sometime in the last couple of years which mentioned LTL among sites that cover cricket history but said nothing specific. I don't buy papers or magazines so I only know of these mentions after being shown or told about them by other people. The site is still quite new and early cricket has only a limited market, even among cricket fans, so I would not have expected even that much "media coverage". These mentions are only worth noting in passing: it is the CA and ACS connections that are key to this discussion.

I might add that Wikipedia itself has given credence to the site because, although I am biased, the core members of WP:CRIC are subject experts although most have only a passing interest in the sport's early history. However, none of these people have challenged the reliability of LTL apart from an interested question or two. I think this post by one of the most respected cricket contributors is an excellent summary of the overall CRIC position.

In addition, in his latest missive to WT:CRIC, my opponent actually states: Firstly scorecards copied from a variety of secondary sources. No issue on reliability here as the cards are available in several books, some dating back 100 years or more. Precisely. And, as I have said all along, it is the key purpose of the site to consolidate match references from all these old books (by the way, I don't use detailed scorecards there as they are out of scope and I have uploaded them to CA where they are appropriate). In another place, he complains that "There is no primary source here: i.e., he has discovered nothing new". As I have said, OR is out of scope and, given that the existing match references have been reliably sourced and reliably presented by someone who was indispensible to the CA and ACS sites re their early cricket coverage, the LTL site must itself be considered reliable.

Thanks for taking time to read this. I'll be happy to answer more questions but do please note that I don't have as much WP availability now as formerly. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 06:01, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

The desire has never been to question Blackjack's industry but he has raised three points:

1) The review of his web book and his article (which I accepted) in the ACS magazine was unfavourable.

2) It did not question the scorecards which were copied from other sources and sent to the ACS early cricket group where his contribution was noted. He sent the same cards to Cricketarchive which actually already had them.

3) The crux. BJ has undertaken no original research. His work is second hand. He is not an expert but an informed amateur. All the sources were research by others years ago. As a result:

4) He shows ignorance of context when adding comments and making observations about pre 18th Century Cricket. It is this that is at question. Thus he has a list of pre 18th Century County Champions. No one else has this list because it is his own little piece of fantasy. No one recognises it. His analysis of early cricket is so badly flawed as to require several pages to illustrae. The names he has mentioned, including Mr Wynne-Thomas concur with this view as do the ACS Early cricket group.

5) Upon being criticised by ACS he engaged in a series of aggressive emails to myself, Mr Wynne Thomas and others. He did not fall out with the committee.

6) Blackjack was not indespensible to the ACS or CA coverage. Mr Griffiths(proprietor of CA) has all the cards submitted by BJ to hand anyway. BJ was kind enough to transcribe them. The ACS ECP has all the cards and more. Again BJ transcribed them after which they were check for the inevitable typos and errors.

7) In summary BJ knows a lot about C18th matches but very little about the context, histography, research, primary souces(A point he is keen to make) or the methodology of interrogating such sources.

LTL is a reliable source of scorecards but the use he has made of his conclusions is simply so lacking in the items listed, as to be untenable for school homework. 88.108.10.117 (talk) 14:10, 17 April 2010 (UTC)(On behalf of MA, PWT, KW, JG)

Let's have a few truths here. The writer of the above is called Mark Asquith (I am not "outing" him: he has admitted in his Richard Daft guise who he is) and he was briefly the editor of the Cricket Statistician. He was then dismissed by the committee for whatever reasons and he promptly resigned his ACS membership. This happened a year or more before my dispute with the ACS committee which was about their procrastination in moving the Early Cricket Project forward. None of that has anything to do with the reliability of my website and the thing you have to watch with Mr Asquith is random comments going off at tangents. So you can ignore his point (5) which is a complete fabrication.

The review by Mr Wynne-Thomas was as I have said above and was only unfavourable in terms of his views about no OR, the use of geopolitical and cultural background and a few minor differences of opinion. As far as the fundamental match references are concerned, Mr Wynne-Thomas did not find any faults at all and this is what matters in terms of site reliability.

CricketArchive may already have had 18th century match references but they did not publish them until I provided the definitive list which is why I am on their list of contributors.

Again with his point 3, he has completely missed the point that the intention of the site was NOT to do OR but to consolidate the existing references which were distributed across several old books. Why he cannot get into his head that you can write a book without doing OR, I do not know. He has previously complained about articles on WP because no primary sources are quoted even though he knows full well that we do not allow them.

Re point 4, no one else but him has questioned the context of the site and he is hardly one to question that. His own work on this site has shown a complete lack of context, especially Golden Age of cricket when he was using his User:Fieldgoalunit alias. That article had to be dismantled and restarted. Similar comments were made by the then ACS chairman about his editorship. And you will note how I have had to edit his above post to make it readable. In Mr Wynne-Thomas' review, nothing was said about context and, if the ACS Early Cricket Project shares his view, why did they acknowledge me as their main contributor? The assertion that a proposed list of champions is a fantasy must apply equally to the people who were involved in the production of a similar list for the 19th century, which is where I got the idea from. In fact, the official championship began in 1890 and any and all prior lists are merely mild speculation with the benefit of showing who the most competitive teams were over a given period.

Re point 6, the facts are as I stated them in my previous post and the evidence is in the online links.

Point 7 is just speculative rubbish about someone he doesn't even know.

And his final line is typical of the childish taunts he so readily adopts as in this post where he resorts to describing a good WP:CRIC member as "mental". His allusion to school is appropriate for someone who acts like something in a school playground.

I did hope that this discussion would be reasonable and mature and would involve genuine members of the site, but here we are dealing with a troll yet again. Where are the ground rules for WP:RS which will ensure reasonable and objective discussion? ----Jack | ^{talk page} 15:16, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I resigned in fact(See the appropriate Journal). The 19th century list was arrived at over several years from contributions of distinguished experts. I didn't call anybody mental as the post shows. In fact in all these dealings have been temperate.

The 19th century list is pure speculation based on looking at known match results, exactly like the 18th century list. However, they both have the merit of highlighting who were the most competitive teams at the time. And, I'm sorry, but if you think your comment to AssociateAffiliate was not a childish insult then you have a problem. If you think you can ask someone if they are ill and then suggest they are showing signs of mental instability, then you have a problem that goes beyond being rude. That sort of cheap taunt is right out of order and we have had it on this site ever since you first came on. If you recall, the first admin who blocked you, User:Orderinchaos, did so inter alia because you threatened someone. But of course you are always so "temperate", aren't you?

Can we have an admin here to sort this character out, please? This is supposed to be an objective discussion about a site's reliability. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 18:06, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Can we have an admin here to sort this character out, please? This is supposed to be an objective discussion about a site's reliability. 88.108.30.208 (talk) 10:40, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks to the admin User:Tim Song, the troll who was using the IP range 88.108.x.x has been banned for one month with a block placed on the entire range. If you want to to study the sordid details of a sad affair that has been going on for two years now, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Richard Daft/Archive.

Although this individual is the one person who has seriously questioned the reliability of my site, I am conscious of my obligations towards WP and I would like to take part in an objective and reasoned discussion about the subject with genuine site members and without IP trolls intervening. I've answered the questions above which are mainly around interaction with specialist cricket publications and I would now be happy to answer further questions by genuine site members.

I have to say, and I'm sure User:SGGH will agree with me here, that there seems to be no co-ordination or sense of purpose here. I get the feeling that the now-departed Mr Asquith is the only one with any real interest in the matter, though that is because he is pursuing his little vendetta. Please prove me wrong and ask me some more questions. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 19:08, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

One point I should have made before is that other WP users have seen fit to cite LTL. This has certainly happened with cricket articles edited by members of WP:CRIC but one I was surprised to find recently was English inventions and discoveries. However, I don't see that as conclusive evidence. It might just be the result of a Google search as LTL does register quite well there, depending on who or what you are looking for. For example, see this return. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 20:13, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

There is a fair amount of content to look at here, I'm going to take my time and by thursday or friday this week, I'll give my take on the matter. --Cameron Scott (talk) 05:24, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Can anyone provide *specific* references in regards to the sites (such as the Daily Mail, The Observer) that (as claimed above) have cited this site as an authority - because at the moment, it looks like it should be classified as a SPS and not used as a RS (although I am still investigating). --Cameron Scott (talk) 07:36, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Nothing has turned up yet but people are looking far and wide... --Cameron Scott (talk) 20:57, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm going to look for another couple of days but unless someone can provide any of the links requests above, I will be inclined to say this is a SPS that should not be used because insufficent evidence has been presented that a) it's considered reliable and/or 2) blackjack is a noted expert. --Cameron Scott (talk) 05:29, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Cameron, I note that in respect of the newspapers and magazines, you refer to "sites" and "links". As I said above, the references were in the printed versions, not the online versions. As for the subject expert point, I would remind you of the CA and ACS links plus the precise date of one Cricket Society publication: these are the specialist cricket publications you requested in your first post in this topic. I would also point out that the IP user is a noted troll (see WP:ANI) who has been blocked on umpteen occasions. Although his edits in this topic remain in situ, I would within the terms of WP:BLOCK be entitled to remove them. Finally, have you noted the comments of User:Johnlp per the link provided to WT:CRIC?

It seems to me that there is a distinct lack of interest in this matter and if there are only you and I of genuine site members taking part, then we cannot possibly achieve a consensus. I suggest this topic is closed as WP:RS cannot resolve the issue and that we take the advice of User:Blueboar above and redirect the case to WT:CRIC. After all, with no disrespect to yourself, they are the people with expert knowledge of cricket. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 21:44, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

The Newsbank archive, unlike the newspapers websites, does store every article of the newspaper. Myself and another user have checked the archive which includes the Daily Mail and Observer papers and there are no results for 'From Lads to Lord's'. --88.111.52.213 (talk) 06:59, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I have access to archive material - but I still need to know what editions to check, I've looked and cannot find anything. --Cameron Scott (talk) 14:52, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Arbitrary break (cricket)

I am responding here due to a request on my talk page by 88.111.52.213 (talk · contribs). BlackJack: I may have missed it in the detail above, but if there were an indication that someone reliable has referred to information at your site this would have been finished sometime ago. An online source that acknowledges your site would be ideal, but any form of reference (magazines, books, anything) would be sufficient. Can you provide such a reference demonstrating that some reputable body has referred to your site? A direct answer would be appreciated. Regarding the question "is www.jl.sl.btinternet.co.uk/stampsite/cricket a reliable source?" we would also want to know "reliable for what?", that is, would someone please provide a couple of links to articles where the site in question is used as a reference. It would also help if you could give an indication of why you think the site may not be reliable (stick to the facts of what is in the Wikipedia article and what is in BL's site, and say nothing about BlackJack the person). There are 637 links to jl.sl.btinternet.co.uk (LinkSearch). The top-four users who have added the largest numbers of links are [User (number)]: BlackJack (302), Jim Hardie (120), Michael Romanov (58), Orrelly Man (14). It could be argued that 637 is too many links, but I would be happy to accept a consensus view at WT:CRIC. I see that the discussion currently on that page seems to be happy with BlackJack and the links, and I am inclined towards accepting that, particularly since the couple of articles that I checked were using the site as an external link (not a reference). It is clear that an individual does not like the use of the site on Wikipedia, but I have not seen a precise reason why that dislike should be shared by other editors. Johnuniq (talk) 08:41, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

"the discussion currently on that page seems to be happy with BlackJack and the links" The only user who has taken part in the discussion is Johnlp and he said he's not knowledgeable enough about the subject matter to say whether it's a reliable source or not. Where possible BlackJack has used other sources rather than his own site so identifying his original research is fairly easy, it's where he sources his own site. I believe one area that the IP was particularly vocal about was BlackJack use of his own County Champions list. For example readers of the 1736 English cricket season article are informed that London were the Champion County, sourced to BlackJack's site this has no other basis than BlackJack's opinion (There were no county champions prior to 1890). My understanding of WP:RS is that BlackJack's opinion would only be considered a reliable source if he was considered a 'subject expert', but based on the evidence he has presented above he falls short of that. --88.111.44.236 (talk) 18:56, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, very few have joined the discussion at WT:CRIC, however that is the project, and its page history shows plenty of activity from several users, so it is reasonable to interpret the silence of other editors as agreement with JohnIp (who said "this does seem to keep recurring as a topic on this talk page and I for one am fed up with its repetition and the accompanying backbiting"). Is there any reason to believe the BJ site is unreliable? You point out that "There were no county champions prior to 1890"; however that same point is made in the article you linked to (in a footnote), and it is again made in the BJ reference. I am inclined to think that this issue should be resolved at WT:CRIC. Johnuniq (talk) 01:35, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't want to speak for the majority of WT:CRICians, but I myself have kept quiet because a) I have enjoyed working with Blackjack in the past and b) have not enjoyed my dealings with the various IPs and accounts and am fairly tired over the whole thing. My desire to see this close in BJ's favour is thus somewhat biased. I could join in and review the site with you (my degree taught a lot on this kind of source assessment) if my agenda doesn't bother you. --SGGH ^ping! 14:39, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

as far as I can determine, no evidence has been presented that would satisfy current policy that the site or Blackjack should be considered an expert or used as a reliable source. There has been a lot of waffle but nobody has presented anything that would allow it's inclusion as a reliable source - for our purposes, it's a standard SPS and should be treated as such. --Cameron Scott (talk) 14:56, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Hi, I haven't been paying too much attention to this discussion, but I do want to make two points about policy:

An WP:SPS can be considered reliable if the author is an established expert whose work in the field has been previously published by third-party reliable sources. So the question to ask here is, "Has Blackjack been published by third-party reliable sources?" If not, his site is not a reliable source. End of story.
Even if the author meets the qualification above, it should be used with caution. If the material is worth reporting, then surely a third-party reliable source will have covered it. IOW, WP:SPS should be used sparingly.

Hope this helps! A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 15:02, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

<to Johnuniq> The main reasons for the silence is that; a) like Johnlp, no one at WT:CRIC is knowledgeable enough about early cricket to give an assessment of it's reliability and b) WT:CRIC members respect BlackJack as a long-term editor of Wikipedia and wouldn't side against him. For these reasons it's logical that the matter should be discussed here, this is a more neutral environment and there's no expertise that the WikiProject can give. You don't seem to have grasped the point, there were no county champions before 1890 but BlackJack has created a list of Champion Counties for 1728 to 1796 based purely on his own opinion. He has then presented this information on Wikipedia as fact. If that's OK then perhaps I will set up my own website and proclaim Surrey as the 1736 champions, before changing the article to suit my opinion. At the end of the day, as Cameron Scott and A Quest For Knowledge have pointed out, it comes down to whether BlackJack is a expert in his field and as yet there's been no evidence presented to conclude that he is. --88.111.62.201 (talk) 17:43, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I am amused by your reference to the silence of WT:CRIC given that I have found my way to this page from there. No matter. But I do note that the ACS has been quoted in this discussion and, as I am a member of that association, I feel bound to contribute, especially as I know something of the subject and am uncomfortable with the role being played here by Mr Asquith, who contributed earlier and is evidently acting out of spite. I mention my membership because the notability of the ACS, and indeed of CricketArchive and the Cricket Society, is key to the discussion. I am dismayed that Cameron Scott in particular seems to discount these three organisations even though he has previously asked for evidence based on "specialist cricket publications". With the single exception of Wisden, I do not believe it would be possible to name three more notable cricket publications and so I would put it to Mr Scott that, with respect, he is not an expert on cricket matters and should not be so quick to reach a judgment in this case. The fact that Mr Leach has been published by these three organisations confirms his status as a subject expert.

To the contributor using 88.111.62.201 above, I would add that a third reason for the silence of WT:CRIC is that few if any of them are members of the ACS. I would also point out to you that a great deal of evidence has been presented to conclude that Mr Leach is a subject expert and I will emphasise it in this post. Furthermore, the issue of whether there was a champion county in 1736 has nothing to do with the site's reliability as it is a matter of opinion. The important thing is that the factual information he presents about the 1736 season is reliable and that evidently is so. But, I have been looking at the Lads to Lord's site just now and I cannot see anything about a pre-1890 championship. Has he published that somewhere else?

Coming back to the notability of the ACS, it is recognised by the International Cricket Council (ICC) as the sport's main source of statistical information and so it is a more than merely notable organisation. Since the ACS is essentially a publishing group as well as a research organisation, anyone it chooses to publish extensively must therefore be regarded as noteworthy and as a subject expert. Mr Leach has already cited two examples of his online work for the ACS and I can confirm that his work was regularly published in the Cricket Statistician (the ACS quarterly journal) during the years 2003 to 2007 when he was a very active and prolific member. His submissions were always about early cricket and, although Mr Asquith has rightly criticised some of his more original theories, his factual work is always completely sound and, conclusively for the purpose of this discussion, reliable.

Like Mr Asquith, I completely disagree with Mr Leach's view that what we may term "major cricket" began in the 1660s. He is correct that money came into the game at that time but it is surely not until the middle of the next century that we see what may truly be termed county teams. Nevertheless, this is only opinion and a writer does not become unreliable because he offers a different point of view. Controversial, perhaps. But the reliability of his work is in his factual coverage and Mr Asquith has lost the plot completely if he equates matters of opinion with factual reliability.

Turning to the ACS' Early Cricket Project which was an online collaboration (see links provided above by Blackjack). This was a very important initiative by the ACS which has ultimately led to an accord across many interested parties on the startpoint of first-class cricket. Mr Leach was the prime contributor and in many ways the driving force in this initiative and the ACS would not have accepted his submissions to the Early Cricket Project if he were anything less than an expert on the period. The same is true of CricketArchive where he performed effectively the same service with the added benefit of detailed scorecards. He mentions Andrew Hignell above and I can tell you that Mr Hignell is a highly respected figure in both the ACS and the Cricket Society. I can verify that Mr Leach's historical work was published by the Cricket Society as stated above, but the fact has apparently been ignored by Mr Scott.

Mr Leach says above that he resigned from the ACS because of a disagreement with the committee. That is true. The reason for the disagreement was that Mr Leach put forward some very strong arguments for recognising the 1772 season as the startpoint of first-class cricket. He was unable to budge the committee at that time and so he resigned and both the ACS and CA continued to recognise 1801 as the startpoint. This year, they have agreed to move the date back to his proposed year of 1772 and so, somewhat belatedly, he has won his case. That admission by the ACS and CA that he was right all along underlines his status as a subject expert. In fairness to Mr Asquith, I should add that Mr Leach lost quite a lot of friends through his aggressive approach to that issue, but it does not change the fact that he was proved right in the end and, that being so, he must be regarded as a subject expert.

I would now repeat the point made yesterday by A Quest For Knowledge:

An WP:SPS can be considered reliable if the author is an established expert whose work in the field has been previously published by third-party reliable sources. So the question to ask here is, "Has Blackjack been published by third-party reliable sources?" If not, his site is not a reliable source. End of story.

Mr Leach has been published extensively by third party sources that even Mr Asquith will agree are more than reliable. Only Wisden has a greater reputation than the ACS, CA and the Cricket Society. But Wisden is all about what happened last year, not what happened in 1736. To answer the question posed by A Quest For Knowledge, yes, he has been published by third-party reliable sources and therefore his site is itself a reliable source. End of story. 81.129.117.41 (talk) 08:53, 24 April 2010 (UTC) Submitted by Blackjack

The link (http://www.jl.sl.btinternet.co.uk/stampsite/cricket/histories/champions.html) to the part of the external website that appears to have the list of "County Champions" that people appear to find fanciful now appears to be a dead link. If these references/links (which don't work anyway) were removed from those articles where they occur, along with the statements that depend on them, then wouldn't that solve the dilemma? No one seems to be disputing the reliability of the data on 18th century cricket matches, or BlackJack's status as an expert whose work has been used by organisations of repute; it's just this speculative list of 18th century county champions that isn't backed by third party corroboration. There may be other material in BlackJack's website that is also contentious (see a contribution on my talk page), but I don't see that this has been used in any WP articles, so questions about that don't really arise. Or am I missing something? Johnlp (talk) 22:50, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

I had hoped that I could withdraw from this but I think clarification is needed about the missing link. I was working on the site yesterday morning and I removed that page, which was supplementary to the main body of the site, because I want to do more work on it. I'll admit that my action was partly because of Mr Asquith's objections to the page but it really is of no importance, especially now it's gone. It's removal shows that efforts are made to keep the site both up to date and credible, which is further evidence of the site's reliability. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 05:00, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

In response to Johnlp, the County Champions list is just one aspect of this. BlackJack has written numerous articles based on what he considers first-class cricket rather than what a real reliable source like CricketArchive states. According to CricketArchive none of the following list of players have played first-class cricket, and therefore shouldn't have articles: R. Black (Leicestershire cricketer), Bourke (MCC cricketer), R. Brandling, J. Clarke (Leicestershire cricketer), Dennis (MCC cricketer), Donnithorn (MCC cricketer), Johnston (Middlesex cricketer), Wyman (MCC cricketer), Page (MCC cricketer), L. Taylor (Kent cricketer), William Barsby, William Clarke (Leicestershire cricketer), J. Rowell (Leicestershire cricketer), Mark Graham (cricketer) and T. Watts (Leicestershire cricketer). BlackJack created all of these articles based purely on his minority view of what matches he considers to be first-class, Wikipedia rules allow minority views to be expressed but articles should never be based purely on them. Of course as BlackJack has a different list of 'first-class matches', as well as the above there are numerous articles which feature discrepancies in appearance details etc. A quick sample: George Louch made 134 appearances, CA say 122. Richard Hosmer played 23 matches, CA say 18. Henry Attfield's career ended in 1782, CA says his last FC appearance was 1788. So what's the reliable source is it CricketArchive, the premier cricket statistical source which features in all cricket FAs or is it a personal website featuring minority views? --88.111.63.138 (talk) 09:14, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

M. Avrum Ehrlich

User:Zsero has deleted the following paragraph from the article on Menachem Mendel Schneerson:

According to Erlich, towards the end of his life, particularly after his heart attack in 1977 his scholarship began to fade - one of Schneerson's editors, David Olidort, "told how most of Schneerson’s aides and editors adored him and saw him as virtually infallible, despite their numerous corrections of his failing scholarship."<ref>''The Messiah of Brooklyn: Understanding Lubavitch Hasidim Past and Present'', M. Avrum Ehrlich, Chapter 8, p. 80, note 35. KTAV Publishing, ISBN 0881258369</ref>

His rationale for removing it was untrue. olidort never told ehrlich any such thing. When I objected to this removal, on the grounds that the material was reliably sourced, he restored it again, with the rationale lies do not belong on wp, no matter who wrote them. a source that tells lies is by definition not reliable. The author, Ehrlich, was actually ordained as a rabbi by Chabad, the movement which Schneerson headed (and the movement to which Zsero belongs). Also, according to his bio, Ehrlich:

read Jewish Philosophy and Political Science at Bar Ilan University, completed his doctorate on leadership strategies of Hasidic masters at the University of Sydney. He was awarded a Krytman scholarship to research at the Cambridge based Centre of Jewish – Christian Relations, and was awarded a Chevening and British Commonwealth Scholarships to undertake research on religion, law and government at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Social and Political Sciences and later at the Centre for Advanced Religious and Theological Studies.

In addition to his other books on Judaism, Ehrlich has written Leadership in the Habad Movement: A Critical Study of Habad Leadership, History and Succession, (Jason Aronson, New Jersey, 2000) and The Messiah of Brooklyn: Understanding Lubavitch Hasidism Past and Present (KTAV, New Jersey, 2004). He was also the Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora, (ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara, 2008). He is currently a full professor of Judaic studies at the Centre of Judaic and Inter-Religious Studies at Shandong University.

Now, I understand that this statement is problematic for members of Chabad, who generally consider Schneerson to be the greatest Jewish leader and legal mind since Moses: indeed, many (perhaps a majority), consider him to be the greatest Jewish leader of all time, and, in their belief, the Jewish messiah (or even more). Thus they have worked diligently to keep any hint of criticism of Schneerson's abilities from the article: for example, the "Controversy" section in the article has no material in it at all, merely a link to a different article (Menachem_Mendel_Schneerson#Controversy). In addition, this paragraph is deleted on a regular basis; likely once a week or so, by my estimation. Keeping all that in mind, would Ehrlich be considered a reliable source for this claim? Jayjg ^(talk) 16:57, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I think your agenda here is quite visible, and its funny how you don't even bother to disguise it. "Full professor at...Shandong University".....no kidding!!! He MUST be an expert, then.66.202.61.162 (talk) 19:11, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, Shandong University, with almost 60,000 students, one of the largest universities in China, which offers masters and doctorate programs in almost all disciplines, and which was designated a National Key University. As for the personal comments regarding my "agenda", I have no idea what you are talking about, and don't care either. This board is for discussing reliable sources, not other editors. Jayjg ^(talk) 12:25, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

No Ehrlich would not be a reliable source for this nor any controversial claim. A researcher is only as good as his research, and people like Ehrlich WP:BLP violation removed cannot be trusted. This has nothing to to with Rabbi Schneerson, and everything to do with Avrum Ehrlich WP:BLP violation removed relying on hearsay. Normally, a top-line publisher would independently fact-check controversial claims, but KTAV isn't exactly 'top-line'.... they were best known for Jewish childrens novels, and Hebrew school textbooks. 99.237.138.36 (talk) 03:47, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Please see WP:VERIFY, which states "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—whether readers can check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true." Your depiction of KTAV is inaccurate. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:20, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Note, this IP editor is User:Winchester2313 (see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Elazar_Shach&diff=next&oldid=348773538). Winchester2313, I've removed your WP:BLP violations, but if you continue to make them you will be blocked. Jayjg ^(talk) 23:03, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Why wasn't this discussion linked on Talk:Menachem_Mendel_Schneerson#.22Failing_scholarship.22. The discussion is more there than here. And Jayjg is again pushing his opinions by force. Debresser (talk) 16:46, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Seems like a relevant scholar in his field. Reliably sourced and relevant. I'm not at all sure how big a deal this is: people's scholarship often fades as they get older. That's how life works. People like Euler are rare in that regard. But as a pure matter of reliability, this seems completely reliable. I'm concerned about the apparent attacks leveled at Ehrlich which are at best unproductive. JoshuaZ (talk) 17:34, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Why on earth should this discussion be linked on Talk:Menachem_Mendel_Schneerson#.22Failing_scholarship.22? I was looking for the informed views of uninvolved editors, not the uniform and entirely predictable views of Schneerson's followers. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:29, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. Jayjg 's 'objective' stance in this discussion is admirable, if somewhat humorous.99.237.138.36 (talk) 12:44, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Reliable Sources For Book Reviews

As the section title suggests, What are considered reliable sources for book reviews? I put in a review by Bret Swanson This one which has been reverted out. He seems to be a notable character [13] Op Ed in the WSJ and a fair few other hits. Even though he has put his review on his website, is it still reliable to use as a book review in an article about a book? mark nutley (talk) 17:00, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

It's a self-published source. This is obviously problematic - see WP:SELFPUB. I'm also pretty sure that someone who is a "senior fellow at the Discovery Institute" (the notorious outfit behind intelligent design) would not count as a reliable source for, well, anything really. -- ChrisO (talk) 17:10, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Brett Swanson is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, that is best known for its advocacy of intelligent design. The book reviewed was not even published by the academic press. It should not be used in the article about Michael E. Mann because it is fringe. TFD (talk) 17:36, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

This is not for use in a BLP, it is for an article about a book. The question is, for a book review would someone notable like Swanson be usable? mark nutley (talk) 18:46, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Notability is not established by someone publishing somewhere, but by things being published about someone. And I don't know if even general notability is adequate - would we consider Shakira's opinion on the latest Stephen Hawking book relevant? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:01, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

What's wrong with Shakira? :) A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:11, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I mixed her up with Christina Aguilera. Being an old fart, I primarily listen to musicians who are dead or at least 50+, so I'm allowed to do so. Do you need to know what's wrong with Christina Aguilera? Or is that self-evident? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:29, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

We should use Shakira if RSs reported on her review. If it was on her personal website, then it would be up to consensus. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 19:13, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Is Bret Swanson's web site a reliable source for Bret Swanson's opinions? Yes, per WP:SPS and it's usable in an article about Swanson. But you're not asking right question. The question that I would ask is (and this is beyond the scope of this noticeboard) why would our readers care about this guy's opinion about this book. AFAIK, Swanson isn't a professional book reviewer nor is he an expert in climatology. If a thirty-party reliable source had published his review or covered his opinion, you could establish WP:WEIGHT, but I don't think that exists in this particular case. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:46, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

To whomever post just above, Why would anyone care about anyone`s opinions on a book? People read reviews from various sources to try and get an idea if the book is good or not mark nutley (talk) 19:31, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but we have to choose which to put in and which not to. The way we do that is we put in the ones from Wikipedia:reliable sources, which doesn't quite mean "famous" (hence the Shakira Christina Aguilera comment), but rather that their statements on the subject are generally trusted. You need to show that about Swanson, which is what Quest is saying with the book reviewer or climatologist comment. --GRuban (talk) 13:16, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Many serious newspapers, magazines and journals carry book reviews and that is where we would look in the first instance. A historian's book should be reviewed in academic journals on history. Fiction might be reviewed in the New York Review of Books. A rock biography might be reviewed in Rolling Stone. A scientific book would be reviewed in Scientific American. Itsmejudith (talk) 13:23, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

http://www.arabslavetrade.com/

Is the http://www.arabslavetrade.com/ webpage a reliable source regarding Jews and the Slave Trade? It was apparently written by Owen 'Alik Shahadah, a film-maker and political activist. Jayjg ^(talk) 21:58, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Good gracious, no. It's a creed, right? - Ankimai (talk) 22:37, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly what it is, to be honest, but it didn't look particularly reliable to me. Jayjg ^(talk) 01:00, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

It looks to me to be self-published by Owen 'Alik Shahadah and colleagues, so for it to be acceptable we would need evidence that he is a reputable scholar of this subject (not just his self-description as such). There might be something in the external links on Owen 'Alik Shahadah. Barnabypage (talk) 13:45, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Where is the content that makes it unreliable? because "a filmmaker and activist" like Ali Mazuri and Asante and Henry Louis Gates and "but it doesn't look reliable to me" none of which make content "unreliable". So unreliable has not yet been proven, unless some dubious content is found in the section under fire. Because Tony Martin got written off as unreliable. now this page. the same content you used in the body of the article to prove "Jews were not a slaving majority" now has become unreliable. So when it worked to prove the point it was reliable, now it is working against the point it is "unreliable." So I think Dr. Tony Martin [[14]] does not make films so we should have no problem using him. --Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ (talk) 01:42, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Reliability rather than unreliability has to be proven/demonstrated. A source is unreliable by default. Sean.hoyland - talk 02:23, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Even a cursory glance suggests it is not RS by our standards. --Cameron Scott (talk) 20:48, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Azerbaijan international

In the Nasir al-Din al-Tusi and Conservation of Mass articles,there are claims that is scientist and philosopher developed and early theory of evolution,and that he predicted the principle of conservation of mass.The source provided is an article written by some guy called Farid Alakbarov and published in a magazine called Azerbaijan international.Can this magazine be trusted?And for this claims?--Knight1993 (talk) 16:44, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

At first glance the magazine appears trustworthy and so does the author - he is a historian at the Institute of Manuscripts in Baku, which seems to be a reputable academic institution. See http://www.science.gov.az/en/manuscript/index.htm and http://www.alakbarli.aamh.az/index.htm.

Unless there is some subtle agenda-pushing here which it takes an expert on the subject to spot, I'd say it's okay.

Incidentally, he seems to be referred to variously as Farid Alakbarli and Farid Alakbarov. I guess this is some peculiarity of Azerbaijani, and I don't know which we should use in the citations. Barnabypage (talk) 17:10, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Hansard: a reliable source? A primary source?

Is BritishHansard considered to be a reliable source? And is it considered to be a primary source (despite not being a word-for-word transcript of debates in Parliament)? Varsovian (talk) 17:17, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

I would definitely consider it as a reliable and primary source of what is said in the parliament in Westminster. Dmcq (talk) 18:02, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

So basically the only way it can be used is for direct quotes therefrom? Varsovian (talk) 18:10, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Or to say that so and so spoke on such and such a day. I would not consider the contents of the speeches to be reliable.--Wehwalt (talk) 18:27, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

The contents of the speeches can be reliable to an extent, e.g. as to the speaker's individual political beliefs, or (in the case of a senior politician in the currently governing party) as to the government's policies on a particular matter. Barnabypage (talk) 19:10, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Would you make a distinction between speeches given and statements made by Ministers? Varsovian (talk) 18:29, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

No. Barnabypage (talk) 19:10, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Barnabypage. Strongly so.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:58, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

What about data stated in ministerial answers like this, Wehwalt? Wouldn't it be reliable, at least until challenged? - Pointillist (talk) 01:05, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

No, I favor a bright line rule here. There are three kinds of falsehoods, lies, damned lies and statistics, so sayeth Mark Twain.--Wehwalt (talk) 01:26, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I completely disagree. A statement made in parliament by a minister of the Crown must be considered reliable. Such statements are carefully prepared by civil servants. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:18, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I'd say so too. It may be written with quite a bit of spin so most people including me will probably be deceived but if you vary carefully analyse them they are normally truthful in the straight logical sense. Dmcq (talk) 13:27, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I've got a document about why pensioners' experience doesn't corrspond with government statements and it is very interesting seeing how the government statistics are compiled showing income going up whereas for each individual pensioner they are going down on average. Both are completely correct and yet they seem to be saying the exact opposite. Dmcq (talk) 13:33, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

That is the problem. They are prepared with spin, and our editors may not fully grasp that and misinterpret it in the translation from statement to article.--Wehwalt (talk) 13:42, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

You would hope that it is Reliable. But it is Primary - unless some other source has used the information, then this is WP:OR by the editor wishing to use it.Martinlc (talk) 13:45, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

It's not strictly forbidden to use a reliable primary source like Hansard - it just needs to be handled with caution. WP:PRIMARY: Primary sources that have been reliably published may be used in Wikipedia, but only with care, because it is easy to misuse them. Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. Barnabypage (talk) 13:50, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

That is precisely what I understand to policy to say. We can say "Mr X said in a speech to the House of Commons "Fooian music is rubbish" [link to Hansard where he says it]" but we can not say "The quality of Fooian music has been called into question by Mr X [link to Hansard where he says it]". Varsovian (talk) 14:05, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I think your example would be okay - it's a paraphrase without additional interpretation. What we can't say is Mr X radically challenged conservative views of Fooian music when he said in the House of Commons.... Barnabypage (talk)

(ec)But I don't think it's the same for ministerial answers. If an answer has been prepared and it says this school changed status in this way in this year, then that is factually verifiable. Statistics can be spun and interpreted, but that is the case whether you take them from the ministerial answer or from the statistics.gov.uk website. And I don't think Hansard is the source. The statement in parliament is the source. Itsmejudith (talk) 14:37, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Hansard is even fine for, Mr X radically challenged conservative views of Fooian music when he said in the House of Commons.... It's only a problem if we extended that to "Fooian music is rubbish"<ref>X MP, Hansard</ref>. Hansard is presumed reliable, but this would be the equivalent of direct primary reference to Mr X MP, as if we'd referenced it through his blog. Andy Dingley (talk) 14:44, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

The example taht seems to be mostly under discussion here actually seems to refer to a Written Answer - it's not a statement made off the cuff in the House. See http://www.parliament.uk/about/how/business/written_answers.cfm. In some cases it might be appropriate to say in a written answer, governement minsiter X stated blah. But werhe as in this case it's a simple statement as to the precise legal status of certain schools, it's hard to see how spin comes into it. Prior to 2002 written answers were specifically used to give official data - now replaced by ministerial statemetns. David Underdown (talk) 16:33, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm actually specifically asking with regard to HC Deb 21 May 1946 vol 423 c64W [15]. It states "His Majesty's Government contemplate the inclusion in the R.A.F. contingent in the March of a representative party of 25 Polish airmen (including one officer) who fought in the Battle of Britain. There will he no separate representation of other Polish armed forces now in this country, since these do not form part of His Majesty's Farces, but the Polish Government have been invited to send a contingent of three high-ranking officers, three aides-de-camp or staff officers and a flag party of three men, followed by a detachment of 24 men representative of the Polish fighting services." Can this be used as a source to confirm that before 21 May 1946 the Polish Government had been invited to send a contingent of three high-ranking officers, three aides-de-camp or staff officers and a flag party of three men, followed by a detachment of 24 men representative of the Polish fighting services? Or does the entire quote need to be repeated with no comment as to whether such invitation was actually issued? Varsovian (talk) 16:43, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

A little background explanation is needed here. The invitation to the Polish Government has been sent to the Polish Communist Government which was de facto controlled by the Soviets. The Polish forces in the West did not feel represented by the Polish Communist Government and in fact had not even recognized that Government, see Polish government-in-exile. Varsovian has repeatedly and obsessively tried to whitewash the fact that the Polish Armed Forced in the West had not been invited to the London Victory Parade. Thus he's now trying to sell the fact that the invitation to the Polish Communist Government was in fact an invitation to the Polish Armed Forces in the West something which is blatantly false. Dr. Loosmark 17:50, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

No Dr.Loosmark, I am asking whether a government minister saying in a written answer that “the Polish Government have been invited to send a contingent of three high-ranking officers, three aides-de-camp or staff officers and a flag party of three men, followed by a detachment of 24 men representative of the Polish fighting services.” can be used as a RS to confirm that the Polish Government had prior to 21 May 1946 been invited to send a contingent of three high-ranking officers, three aides-de-camp or staff officers and a flag party of three men, followed by a detachment of 24 men representative of the Polish fighting services. It is already known from the memoirs of General Anders (amongst other impeccable sources) that members of the Polish Armed Forces in the West were invited to the parade. Kindly cease your wikistalking of me and attempt to contribute to the project instead of lying about what other editors say and calling other editors racists. Varsovian (talk) 18:01, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I have this noticeboard on watch and that's how I noticed this discussion. I'd therefore ask you withdraw the uncivil accusation of wikistalking. Dr. Loosmark 19:48, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Hansard is the official Parliamentary record in the legislatures of several countries, including both houses of the UK Parliament. As such it's a reliable source for proceedings in Parliament, and where a secondary source clearly conflicts with it this is good evidence that the secondary source is not a reliable representation.

Some events in Parliament are recorded in sketches and other reports but do not appear in Hansard--one such is the incident where a young opposition spokesman called Michael Heseltine, later a senior minister and a pretender to the leadership of his party, purportedly picked up the mace in the House of Commons and brandished it--a grave breach of protocol--after the Labour government won a close victory. As the precise details of out-of-order actions are not written in the official record and Parliament was not televised at the time, accounts vary. Whatever the facts, Heseltine earned himself the name "Tarzan". Hansard apparently records that the Speaker suspended the session until the following day, and Heseltine apologised unreservedly the next morning.

Written answers are prepared by the civil service. They are normally as accurate as the government can make them, subject to overriding concerns of national interest. They represent an official statement by the government. --TS 18:25, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Za'atar as a part of traditional Jewish Arab cuisine

A recipe on page 159 of this cookbook is being used as a source for the statement "Arab Jews knew of and used the spice mixture in their traditional cuisine," in the article on za'atar. The recipe is for za'atar, and the source is a cookbook of recipes from the author's mother, who is an Iraqi Jew. My question is: can one recipe from a Jewish Iraqi woman be cited for the statement that Arab Jews prepared that same dish as part of their traditional cuisine? There is an ongoing discussion on the topic here. ← George^talk 05:47, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

It's analysis to extrapolate that from the fact that the recipe appears in a cookbook. However, it would be fine to say that the recipe appears in this cookbook, and give the title; we can certainly state that at least one Arab Jew knew of and used the spice mixture in her cuisine. We just can't extrapolate from this to saying that many or most did. --GRuban (talk) 13:21, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

DegreeDirectory.org

Hi,

I an not sure about this site as a Reliable Source and would welcome some input.

The Article it is used in is University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee College of Health Sciences and it is used as a ref for the claim:

"It is largest college of health sciences in the Midwest"

the ref in question is [16].

Things that are a red flag to me are :

Parts of the page have the feel of an advert
there is no "by line" on the piece.
WP does not appear to have an artical on the site
it would appear very few articles reference it (see here)
I was unable to find a contact address other than a e-mail on the site.

To counter that

The about us does say "Our team of professional education writers and librarians have researched and developed a nonbiased comprehensive list of all college degree programming available in the United States"

Any Comments ?

I don't see anything other than the above "About Us" statement that gives me faith in this website as a reliable source. We don't know who the identities of their "writers and librarians" or their qualifications, methods, and sources. That nearly every page lists the usual who's who of for-profit distance educators as their top recommendations makes me doubly suspicious. --ElKevbo (talk) 21:22, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments.

Anyone else ? Codf1977 (talk) 16:35, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Please - I would like more than one opinion ? Codf1977 (talk) 13:12, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

How about UWM itself for a source? "...UWM's College of Health Sciences, the largest Health Sciences college in the Midwest..."? It's puffery, so we'll need to rephrase to "UWM states that ..." but better than using a questionable source, right? --GRuban (talk) 14:32, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that is better and I will change it to that, was looking for a non-primary source so that it could not get challenged at some later point, besides the articles already resemble brochures. Codf1977 (talk) 01:37, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Jensen 1998 writing about Jensen 1969

1. A link to the source in question. [17] Jensen (1998) Intelligence Volume 26, Issue 3, 1998, Pages 181-208. Part of a special issue about the author, Arthur Jensen.

2. The article in which it is being used. History of the race and intelligence controversy

3. The exact statement in the article that the source is supporting.

According to this autobiographical writings, during his year at the Center, Jensen "thought (and wrote) that it was unnecessary to invoke genetic causes for the observed racial differences in IQ, which I thought could be explained in terms of cultural bias in the tests and poor environmental opportunities for acquiring the particular knowledge and skills called for by conventional tests".[23] During that time, an invited presentation titled "How Much Can We Boost IQ and Scholastic Achievement?" came to the attention of the editors of the Harvard Educational Review, who asked Jensen to expand the presentation into a more comprehensive article for the Spring 1969 issue.[23] They specifically requested his view on the heritability of race differences, which he had not previously published.[23] The final paper was 125-pages, and according to Jensen covered four topics:
1. "experimental attempts to raise the IQ of children at risk for low IQ and poor scholastic performance by various psychological and educational manipulations had yielded little, if any, lasting gains in IQ or scholastic achievement"[23] 2. "individual differences in IQ have a high heritability (.70-.80, corrected for attenuation), but environment also plays an important part"[23] 3. "most of the exclusively cultural- environment explanations for racial differences in IQ and scholastic achievement were inconsistent and inadequate, so genetic as well as environmental factors should be considered"[23] 4. "certain abilities, particularly rote-learning and memory (i.e.. Level I ability) have only a weak relationship to IQ. which suggests that these Level I abilities might be used to compensate to some extent for low IQ (i.e.. Level II ability) and thereby make school instruction more beneficial for many children, regardless of their racial or social class background, who raw below average in Level II but are average or above in Level I."[23]
According to Jensen, the 5% of the article that covered race difference in IQ, in which he concluded that "The preponderance of the evidence is, in my opinion, less consistent with a strictly environmental hypothesis than with a genetic hypothesis, which, of course, does not exclude the influence of environment or its interaction with genetic factors"[24], aroused much attention because he had violated "the greatest taboo in the latter half of the twentieth century".[23] Jensen says this one aspect was blow up by the mass media, including coverage in TIME, Newsweek, LIFE, U.S. News & World Report, the New York Times Magazine, radio and TV. At Berkeley, where he was a professor, there was an "uproar" that lased for weeks, "with bands of demonstrators disrupting my classes, slashing all the tires on my car, and painting swastikas on my office door".[23] Jensen's mail was screened for explosives and he was placed under police protection.[23] His research at Berkeley was terminated with one school official explaining that "The Berkeley schools are a political unit, not a research institute."[23]

In that text, citation [23] is the source in question. Citation [24] is the 1969 paper, which was a focal point in history and one of the main points of this article.

4. Links to relevant talk page discussion.

There is an active disagreement here.

Comments:

The reason for inclusion of this source is Wikipedia:Neutral point of view as discussed here: Talk:History_of_the_race_and_intelligence_controversy#The_two_NPOV_problems.

The question appears to be whether this is a reliable source for this topic. It's not a Wikipedia:Verifiability problem. There doesn't appear to be any disagreement about whom to attribute this view -- the publication is a peer reviewed journal, so the author definitely expressed this view.

I do not understand the reliable source objection (discussed Talk:History_of_the_race_and_intelligence_controversy#Primary_sources_-_Jensen_justifying_himself_30_years_after_the_event). But the NPOV problem of excluding this view seems very clear to me.

I'm looking for a policy explanation of what's appropriate here. Thanks. --DJ (talk) 00:21, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

History of the race and intelligence controversy is an article about an issue in the history of ideas or history of science. It should be mainly written up from academic sources in such disciplines. Jensen is a protagonist in the debates and not a historian, so his statements, even when appearing in an academic journal should be treated as primary. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:28, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Okay. Assuming for the sake of argument that there is an NPOV problem, is the solution to use the primary source to fix the NPOV problem or to leave the NPOV program to avoid using the primary source? --DJ (talk) 16:14, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

The solution is not to use the primary source and to also fix the NPOV problem. What's the NPOV problem, exactly? Hipocrite (talk) 16:17, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

The details may be beyond the scope of this noticeboard. In brief, Tucker (2002) The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and the Pioneer Fund wrote a narrative of the events of Jensen (1969) that's very much at odds with the narrative Jensen gives in multiple accounts (1973 and onwards, including 1998). Perhaps just a matter of emphasis on Tucker's part, but the difference in narrative is very clear. These two narratives are essentially two POVs on the events. Jensen's own account casts him in a definitely less sinister light than Tucker's. You could boil their dispute down to "is Jensen evil?" Here at least there are multiple secondary sources that say "no". But the actual facts of the events are mostly in Jensen's own writings. --DJ (talk) 16:29, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

If what you say is true, then certainly a reliable source independent of Jensen will have commented on how Tucker wrote an account at odds with what Jensen later wrote - unless, of course, what you're doing is reading Jensen's later work and then applying your own understanding of what it means to impeach Tucker. Is that what you're doing? Hipocrite (talk) 16:31, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

There's no commentary on either source in the article itself, just an apparent difference in narrative between two sources. NPOV, as I understand it, demands we include both accounts. That's where we hit the RS problem, if as is being suggested the author can't be a source on his own writings. --DJ (talk) 16:34, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

The section is short, you can read and see yourself History_of_the_race_and_intelligence_controversy#1960-1980. --DJ (talk) 16:36, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

I've read it, and it isn't particularly informative. Here we have a major scientific controversy. We do need to spell out both sides of the controversy, but we don't necessarily have to give equal weight to each. If the balance of scholarly opinion is with Tucker then that account should be given more weight. Another great Wikipedia principle that could really help in this case is "let the facts speak for themselves". We should be giving as dispassionate an account as possible. Itsmejudith (talk) 16:44, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

I couldn't agree more, except that all that's at stake in this particular section is a rather trivial subquestion of a much larger issue -- the question is around the motivations of a few people involved in the debate. I don't think we have any way of knowing which way to the majority goes on this question. A more comprehensive survey of secondary sources might help more than he-said-she-said. --DJ (talk) 16:53, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, this is a useful point too. The article should not go into the motivations of the protagonists. It should stick to the way that the debates evolved. Professor Jensen is a living person so our policy absolutely forbids us to paint him as "evil", were this ever to be attempted. There is not even any need to cast him in a positive or negative light. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:23, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

It would be helpful if you (or anyone else who agrees with this) were to become involved in the article and its discussion page. Right now we have an editor who's adding assertions about Jensen's motives back to the article every time they're removed, regardless of how many other editors disagree with him, and complains at AN/I about "tag teaming" if his edits are reverted by more than one person. --Captain Occam (talk) 01:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Use of third-party site as a source of primary source documents

seethroughny.net (also seethroughny.com) is being used as a source in several articles (link search for net & link search for com). The citations are links to PDFs of contracts between school districts and employees. Seethrougny.net is not a government site and states on its main page "The information of this website comes from official government sources, but the Empire Center cannot guarantee data accuracy or completeness". I believe that documents such as this should only be used if they are served from a site belonging to one of the parties involved in the contract, and never from a third-party. Comments? Delicious carbuncle (talk) 20:53, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

That's not exactly it; a third-party site should be OK if it at least has a reputation for archiving the primary sources ( i.e. do unquestionably reliable sources cite it for fact, or at least link to it? ) And a boilerplate disclaimer doesn't disquality it either. But some other questions come to mind. Is this information encyclopedic? If these are contracts for individual employees, are there BLP problems? Are these people public figures? Squidfryerchef (talk) 01:53, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Of course all those questions are explicitly outside the scope of this noticeboard and therefore irrelevant here. Dlabtot (talk) 03:21, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT applies, as does WP:PRIMARY. Based on what other sources say about seethroughny (examples: [18], .[19], [20]), I'd judge it as usable, although the questions Squidfryerchef raises certainly are appropriate, just not for RSN. Dlabtot (talk) 03:34, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Since this involves several articles, where is the best place to raise those questions? Delicious carbuncle (talk) 15:53, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

In each article talk page would be the best place, or WP:NPOVN or WP:BLPN. Dlabtot (talk) 16:07, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I attempted discussion at Talk:Schenectady City School District prior to coming here, but that discussion quickly went off the rails. Given that the links have all been added by the same editor, I doubt the result would be any different at other talk pages. I'll try WP:NPOVN. Thanks. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 03:41, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Discussion started at BLPN. Thanks. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 17:16, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Squid hit it on the nose. As to the question "Is this information encyclopedic?", that is sifted out by the application of our notability guideline, but should not be confused w/the appropriateness of reliance on the primary source. See this for some thoughts on using primary evidence. I'd judge it as usable.--Epeefleche (talk) 00:45, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Squid, which is precisely what I've been saying all along. In addition to RSs, such as the Times Union, non-profits have praised the move, too, since the State (which owns all the documents) has yet to put them online. [21] upstate NYer 03:31, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Colgan Air Flight 3407

An editor, EditorASC is objecting to any inclusion/mention of a PBS Frontline episode, Flying Cheap, that focuses on the Colgan Air Flight 3407 crash. EditorASC objects to the content on the basis that Frontline is inherently biased/POV and not a reliable source. In earlier versions of the article section, the editor added his own counter-point facts or comments to some of the Frontline section to counterbalance his perception of bias or incorrect information. He then removed the section with this edit. This editor is knowledgeable about airline safety issues, and has a site dedicated to airline safety. It's also fair to assume that he takes a very conservative view of what should be allowed in articles related to airline crashes. Is Frontline a reliable source in this context?Mattnad (talk) 13:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I would think the series as a whole is a reliable source, and to exclude this particular documentary there would need to be some special reason why this one was, exceptionally, not reliable. Barnabypage (talk) 13:36, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Frontline is clearly WP:RS. Objections to sources because they are 'biased' or 'POV' are without weight. In fact, our core WP:NPOV policy relies on the fact that contentious issues will have conflicting sources expressing different viewpoints and biases. Dlabtot (talk) 13:46, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Mattnad has conveniently left out the reason why I decided to remove the controversial Frontline section: Because it violated the rules of what is allowed to be in aviation accident articles. That section ended up as a massive violation of the rules for allowable content in aviation accident articles, found at [[22]].

To wit:

Speculation in the article should be avoided and only information from official investigation bodies, operators and airports should be included.

Care should be taken in information from experts and professional bodies with due regard to a neutral point-of-view.

With due regard to a neutral point-of-view the article should not include comments by persons or bodies designed to blame or distance those persons or bodies from actions taken.

That is why I finally reversed myself (I initially tried to accommodate editor Mattnad, but he kept trying to add more of the conflicting opinions from that highly biased POV program, that favored his particular bias, while removing the edits I made which were intended to provide balance, so as to achieve a neutral point of view). I finally decided I made a mistake in trying to accommodate him, because that ended up turning a one-sentence comment about the existence of that program (in the list of reactions to that accident) into a major section all of its own, which did nothing but debate the controversial views and comments in that program, most of which were unsubstantiated. That was a clear-cut violation of the rules above, which limit the allowable content of aviation accident articles, so I quite properly removed that section, even though I was partly to blame for its being there in the first place.

As to a reliable source, that particular Frontline Program amounts to little more than an agenda editorial program, whereby the producers carefully selected out comments which were likely to advance the POV of those producers, while leaving out those that would contradict its agenda. That makes that program a highly biased editorial piece, not a news piece. That was precisely the complaint from Colgan Air:

"Specifically, the PBS "Frontline" program Tuesday night, February 10, was particularly disturbing and represented a microcosm of the situation we faced from the very start. Rushed to completion in time to air on the anniversary of this tragic accident and taped prior to hearing the NTSB's report, the producers showed no regard for the hard work by the NTSB and our team in the investigation. Instead, they presented their own opinions that were selectively supported by one-sided allegations from former, disgruntled employees and former government employees with significant self-interest. This type of journalism, as with many accounts like it during the year-long investigation, disrespects the memory of those lost in the accident as well as all of you whose daily professionalism gives aviation a safety record unparalleled in the transportation industry.

"If you have not seen this program, we would urge you to do so. We believe it is important for you to see for yourself the challenges we face from those who would use our tragedy for their own agendas. The Frontline segment "Flying Cheap," was a collection of half-truths, innuendo,and unsubstantiated opinions that portrayed Colgan and our regional industry in the poorest possible way. Although the creators of the program were careful to fabricate their story with no factual naccuracies, the errors by omission were significant, and the lack of full disclosure in stories like this creates an incomplete and inaccurate picture of an industry whose regulation is indeed effective and where safety - from the smallest regional to the largest major carrier - is absolutely paramount."

The FP made a monumental effort to try and "prove" that "outsourcing" acts in derogation of airline safety. And, how did they "prove" that? Not by citing any objective scientific studies, or NTSB stats. Because there are none. Nope, instead, they loaded the program with a lot of unsubstantiated opinion, from those who have a vested interest in making such arguments. The president of ALPA, for instance, which has long opposed "outsourcing" of "its" jobs, to other airlines. Who would expect otherwise from a labor union president? Of course ALPA has always tried to portray "outsourcing" as a SAFETY issue, because if they simply told the public the truth---that ALPA wants a total monopoly on labor for all pilot jobs---they would be dismissed outright. When I put in the disputed FP section that the ALPA Prez did not supply any statistic evidence to support his claim (that was true), editor Mattnad removed that. When I put in that NTSB stats showed the accident year of 2009 to be one of the safer years, editor Mattnad removed that too.

And, Mary Schiavo, who was an inspector general of the FAA, and wrote a book "Flying Blind, Flying Safe," which was filled with all kinds of factual errors. One example, of her many horrible errors in that book:

Referring to wind shear, "It is also a mystery--no one really understands how it affects plane performance." (p. 288) In fact, wind shear was continually studied since the 1975 Eastern B-727-225 accident at JFK (which Schiavo refers to as an L-1011 on page 265).

I had been thru several years of ground school and simulator sessions on how to recognize and avoid wind shear and how to fly out of it, if it wasn't avoidable, by the time she wrote that. There are so many other, utterly stupid errors in her book, that I rate it on par with the Rodney Stich books.

In addition, Schiavo is an attorney for plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Colgan. Editor Mattnad didn't want that revealed, by way of balance after quoting her in the FP section of the Colgan 3407 article. He also didn't want to accurately quote some of the parties, so he manufactured his own quote and put it in CEO Bethune's mouth.

Each time I tried to correct those errors and provide balance, the section on Frontline grew larger and larger, while editor Mattnad continued to delete anything that would provide balance to the highly biased and self-interested statements from the FP that supported editor Mattnad's apparent bias.

We don't recognize pilot forums, like PPRune and such, as WP:RS, for the reason that those tend to be highly biased sources which often have political axes to grind. This particular Frontline Program is filled with the same kind of unsubstantiated, self-interested forms of "evidence" as the pilot forums are. That is why that particular Frontline Program should not be used as a source, especially since that program seems to parrot the ALPA party line about outsourcing being a threat to airline safety. ALPA has NEVER been able to support that contention with solid, objective statistical studies, so they just pontificate, as a substitute. The fact remains, that although outsourcing (Major airlines contracting with feeder airlines) took off right after the 1978 Airline Deregulation Act was passed, the safety stats have continued to get better and better as the years go by. But, editor Mattnad doesn't want ALPA's unsubstantiated claims to be balanced with such stats from NTSB and/or FAA. He only seems to want to quote the ALPA party line. Which causes me to suspect unrevealed COI.

That Fronline Program does not meet WP:RS and should not be used to try and distort or countermand the Probable and Contributory findings of the NTSB. The rules of content, for aviation accident articles forbids that. EditorASC (talk) 01:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

"That Fronline Program does not meet WP:RS" -- in what way? Keeping in mind that questions of 'bias', 'POV', or the 'agenda' of the producers are entirely irrelevant? Dlabtot (talk) 22:26, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

The Frontline episode did not distort any official findings. It went beyond them to consider contributing factors that led up to the pilot error. I will agree that they did not depend exclusively on statistics but did supply some. Did the cherry pick? Almost certainly but that it itself does not disqualify ANY MENTION of the episode and it's point of view. In wikipedia, we don't exclude content we don't agree with even if we have reason to think they are incorrect per WP:NPOV. So let's keep the focusing on what constitutes a reliable source (and not this editor's objections to the content of that source). This editor equates Frontline, an award winning journalistic program (a reliable source) with Pilot Forums (which are not) based on his objections to the content.

As for the personal attacks, claiming COI, well I can only say that this editor has more than amply demonstrated his position in his diatribe above (pot calling the kettle black). I would ask him to explain why he is so angry with unions? I am not affiliated with any union and have no personal connection with any union person and have no connection to the airline industry except as a passenger (I'm Elite on Contintal and like them very much).Mattnad (talk) 14:18, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Here is my take. That a source is "biased" is no reason for exclusion, in general. We do try to limit advocacy sites to describe themselves only, but otherwise we assume all sources are biased in some way. In this case, however, it seems to me the main problem with this TV source is WP:UNDUE. An aviation accident article should focus primarily on the accident itself and related events. In the "aftermath" of larger accidents there are often long-lasting political and legal consequences, sometimes very contentious, which include huge amounts of detail. I believe that including excessive details in the aftermath part of an article would violate UNDUE, and would make the article less readable. If there are sufficient issues to start a new sub-article, this should be considered, but never as a WP:POVFORK. Such sub-articles could then be linked and included summary-style in the main article. But in general, the "Aftermath" section of an aviation accident article should not be longer than the other main sections. Crum375 (talk) 14:44, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Marsad document

This document from a human rights organization was brought up for discussion before , its released from a human rights organization, co-authored by Ray Murray, senior lecturer in law at the National University of Ireland, Galway

After the last discussion there has now been some new information revealed, A report by the same authors that contains nearly the identical information has been published in the Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law, a peer reviewed journal published by Cambridge University Press (abstract here.)

Not only that, but I have also found two different separate sources that say the same thing as that Marsad document, and that is:

Dar, Shimon (1993).Settlements and cult sites on Mount Hermon, Israel: Ituraean culture in the Hellenistic and Roman periods (Illustrated ed.). Tempus Reparatum. p. 168, That the Israeli settlement Neve Ativ is built on top of the former village Jubata ez-Zeit which is the same thing as is written in the Marsad document on p 33.

And also that Israel destroyed the village of Shayta in the seventies and its population was forcibly transferred is in the Marsad document on p 24. This can be found in: Sakr Abu Fakhr, "Voices from the Golan", Journal of Palestine Studies, Vol. 29, No. 4 (Autumn, 2000), University of California Press, p. 7. which can be accessed through Jstor.

So despite the revelation of this new information, user Pantherskin has repeatedly removed anything written from the Marsad document and claims its not a reliable source despite that I have pointed out these things above to him. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 19:53, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

It would be helpful if you could let us know something about the context of this discussion. Thanks. Itsmejudith (talk) 20:50, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Pantherskin has repeatedly removed info from this document based on that he thinks it is unreliable, I believe it is reliable based on what I have shown above. And now I want to hear other peoples comments about this, is it reliable or not? --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 22:15, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that the publication in the Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law is not 100% identical with the publication of the special interest group Marsad, in particular a long list of allegedly destroyed villages is not included. The Yearbook is obviously a reliable source and should be used, whether Marsad is a reliable source or not is up to discussion. That we can verify tidbits from the Marsad document does not mean that it is reliable, after all even the most unreliable source will usually have a few statements that are true. The problem with Marsad here is that it is an advocacy group, without a reputation for fact-checking and neutrality. The other problem is that the list of allegedly demolished villages is based on an order of the Israel army of villages that were intended to be demolished, but the source presents it as if the order was completely and without any deviations carried out. I am not sure what the non-inclusion of the list in the supposedly peer-reviewed publication implies, but a less than generous interpretation is that the list was not up to the standards of the yearbook. Pantherskin (talk) 09:25, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

The comments above do not properly summarize the issue. The article at stake is Syrian towns and villages depopulated in the Arab-Israeli conflict, which is essentially about the localities on the Golan Heights that were depopulated in the context of Israel's conquest of the region in 1967. Note that the title does not say "destroyed" but only "depopulated", and it also does not state the precise circumstances of the depopulation (i.e. whether the population ran away or were expelled, during the war or soon afterwards). There is no problem at all identifying the villages still populated by Syrians after the Israeli take-over — there were about half a dozen, listed in many reliable sources. The problem is how to determine the localities populated before the Israeli take-over, since the difference (by the sort of elementary logic allowed by WP:OR) is the list of depopulated localities. Unfortunately we do not have a complete authoritative list in a source that everyone is going to accept. We have reliable reports of the number of villages, and we have maps showing populated localities according to the Syrian census of 1960, corresponding mostly (but not perfectly) with village locations on earlier maps. We also have partial lists of village names like the one mentioned above. Until something better comes up, I think the right approach is to be careful about how the data is described. Regarding destruction of villages, we have reliable sources saying that most of the villages were destroyed and we also have such information about some specific villages. However, Pantherskin has a point in that we do not have a good source for each village in the list to say that it was destroyed (alternatives are that it was settled by Israelis and that it remains standing deserted). The solution to this problem is to be careful in not claiming anything for each village more than is available from a reliable source. It is all in the writing. Zero^talk 10:52, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

OK, it seems that there are good historical (i.e. peer-reviewed) sources that say that a number of Syrian towns and villages were depopulated or destroyed during the 1967 war. The priority should be to make sure that that is clearly explained in the article with reference to those good sources. As for listing the actual places depopulated or destroyed, this is difficult to research and sources disagree. That is what we should make clear. We should not attempt to present a definitive list. The Murphy article is on the borderline of reliability, since Murphy is a scholar in a reputable university and an expert in international law, but this text is not with an academic publisher. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:11, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

What sources disagree? all sources say that Israel destroyed all villages except 5. How is the marsad document an unreliable source? --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 17:07, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Per Zero, the names of the villages differ in the different sources. I didn't say the Marsad document was unreliable, I said it was on the borderline and gave the reason why. We have high standards for the sourcing of history articles. WikiProject Military History might be able to help. Itsmejudith (talk) 17:12, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

I would like to hear more comments from people if the marsad document is reliable or not.--Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 22:14, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Marsad document be indeed reliable because wrote by nutral non government organisation, it certain be more relaible than "jewish virtual library" which already be consider "reliable source" by many editor on Wikipedia. Ani medjool (talk) 00:04, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

We had this discussion about the Marsad before at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_50#Not_self-published_less_reliable_than_self-published.3F and not surprisingly the consensus of uninvolved editor was that it is not reliable. Of course you can come back again and again to this noticeboard until you get the answer that you would like to hear. Pantherskin (talk) 13:48, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Use of opinion pieces from reliable sources for facts in a BLP

An editor has objected to the use of an opinion piece from the Wall Street Journal for facts in a BLP. WP:RS#Statements of opinion seems clear to me that they can be used for facts if attributed: "Some sources may be considered reliable for statements as to their author's opinion, but not for statements of fact without attribution. A prime example of this are Op-ed columns in mainstream newspapers. These are reliable sources, depending on context, but when using them, it is better to attribute the material in the text to the author."--Drrll (talk) 04:07, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

What part of "not for statements of fact" in the brief part of WP:RS that you quoted seems difficult to understand? You seem to be asking to do the exact opposite of what that part says. Opinion pieces can be used as sources for the claim that the writer holds that opinion, and not for much else. They are not in general fact-checked by their publishers, unlike regular stories. —David Eppstein (talk) 15:38, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

No, I'm not asking to do the opposite of what the policy says, I'm asking about using the source for an attributed statement of fact per "if attributed."--Drrll (talk) 16:35, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

What's the fact and what's the article? It might be okay for something non-contentious like the author's opening statement that "we have two hands", though in practice in those circumstances it's nearly always going to be easy to source the information to a non-opinion source anyway. Barnabypage (talk) 15:47, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

The fact is the difference in a quote provided by a source (Curt Levey) to the one presented in a news story by Nina Totenberg. The quote was partially construed, but without proper ellipsis, to render a different meaning than was conveyed in the full quote. As far as I know, the only reliable source for this is the opinion piece in the WSJ.--Drrll (talk) 17:02, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

In which article is the source being used? What is the exact statement in the article that the source is supporting? Where is the relevant talk page discussion? Dlabtot (talk) 16:10, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

So I did some sleuthing and discovered: The article is Nina Totenberg. The exact statement the source is supporting is

Totemberg left significant portions of the quote out, including parts from the front, middle and ending, effectively changing the meaning of the quote.

The relevant talkpage discussion is at Talk:Nina_Totenberg#Goodwin_Liu.

The statement being supported by the source is actually not a fact, but an opinion. As such it is ok to use an opinion piece with attribution to support an opinion. Whether the opinion of James Taranto about this quote should be included in this BLP is a topic outside the scope of this noticeboard, although I think the answer is obvious. Dlabtot (talk) 16:19, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Just because an article is labeled an opinion piece doesn't mean that it is less fact-based than a "regular article". Arguments that a source is "opinion" are a frequent wikilawyering tactic. What matters is the substance and explicitness of the sourcing, not the headline/byline. As far as the WSJ editorial and Dlabtot's research above - if someone cuts out a quote out of context and changes the meaning, that change could easily be considered a fact. In this case I think it's quite dubious that there's any real change in meaning, and I don't see this particular op-ed as having many facts. Any facts that it has are better sourced to the sources that the article provides. II | (t - c) 16:33, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, if it was indisputable that the form of the quote changed the meaning of the original, stating so would be a statement of fact. But, as you point out, that's not the case here. Imho the quote does not change the meaning, at all, nor is it in any way deceptive, etc. Dlabtot (talk) 16:32, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

As a general rule, opinion pieces are not considered as reliable as "reporting" and should not be used a source for a fact. As Dlabtot says, they can be used as a source for an opinion, but it needs to be determined whether than opinion has a place in the article --Insider201283 (talk) 16:43, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Seth Roberts

Would a review of a book by Seth Roberts which he posted on his blog be reliable for an article? He is a Professor of Psychology at Tsinghua University and is an author as well. As he is a notable person, and a professor would he fall under wp:prof? mark nutley (talk) 16:55, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Per the instructions at the tip top, you should provide:

A link to the source in question.
The article in which it is being used.
The exact statement in the article that the source is supporting.
Links to relevant talk page discussion.

I'll do it, though.

Source in question: [23]
Article in which it is being used: The_Hockey_Stick_Illusion
The exact statement in the article: [24]
Links to relevant talk page discussion: Talk:The_Hockey_Stick_Illusion#rv_why

Hope that helps! PS - not reliable, because blogs are not reliable sources. If the blog was reliable, it's not a notable opinion. Hipocrite (talk) 17:00, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Ya it`s on his blog, but as he is a professor he falls under wp:prof right? So self published is ok mark nutley (talk) 18:52, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You appear to have over-extended your guidelines. WP:PROF deals with when a professor is notable enough to have an article on themselves. WP:SPS is the document you want - "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications. However, caution should be exercised when using such sources: if the information in question is really worth reporting, someone else is likely to have done so." Hipocrite (talk) 19:02, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Self published works like blogs are acceptable sources if they are by an established expert on the topic of the article. Is Seth Roberts an acknowledge expert on the book The Hockey Stick Illusion? Does he have WP:RS published work about it? If not then the blog is not usable. As Hipocrite points out, if his opinion was considered notable, a RS source would have noted it.--Insider201283 (talk) 20:08, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Sort of agree with Insider. Demanding he be an already published expert about the specific book is a bit strict, but he should be an expert on the subject of the book in some way. As the book is about climate change, and Roberts is accredited as a psychologist, that's a bit of a stretch. Not RS, unless he has meteorology degrees we don't know about. --GRuban (talk) 23:25, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Slightly off topic, but the reason I'm being strict because it otherwise turns wikipedia into a repository of book reviews for anyone who cares to have an opinion. If he was a published climate scientist then his comments about something said in the book might be relevant and allowable, but his opinion of the book? Not notable unless an RS asked him for it. When you start allowing blogs as sources with a less strict version of "expert" you get in a world of trouble deciding what "expertise" is relevant to the article. Climate scientist? Mathematics? Statistics? Politics? Public Relations? History of Science? Enviromentalism? The book covers all these kinds of topics - should we allow the blog post of anyone who is an "expert" in any of those fields to be an RS? Clearly not a path we want to follow. They need to be an acknowledged expert on the topic of the article - full stop. --Insider201283 (talk) 00:08, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

There is no such thing as an "expert" on a book as such. What would that be? Knowledge of its publishing history, editing, author's motivations etc? Expertise is on an academic topic. Experts get to review books because they are about their topic of expertise. If the book is about that topic then an accredited expert's blog may be quoted. Yes, in some cases there may be dispute about what academic topic is most relevant to a particular book, but that's a problem that can only be addressed in specificities, not generalities. In this case the book is clearly about climate science, but whatever more specific expertises may be relevant, its very hard to see that psychology would be one of them. SPS exceptions surely can't apply here. Paul B (talk) 01:59, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

We're all in agreement on the specific case, not usable - however for the general situation of a book, an "expert" would be someone who has published on the book. There are plenty of academic articles and books about specific books. If you want some expert commentary on say, The Bhagavad Gita, you find someone who has studied and published on that book, not someone who has studied and published on say, The Bible. Just because they may both be experts on the general subject of "religion" doesn't make them experts on that specific book. The reason for this is to prevent us having to judge what subjects a book is about and who are or are not experts on that subject(s). Instead, a 3rd Party RS source does it for us by acknowledging the expertise. --Insider201283 (talk) 09:28, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

This is pretty cut-and-dried. The Hockey Stick Illusion is a book about the climate change debate. Seth Roberts is not "an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications" so his self-published review is not WP:RS. Dlabtot (talk) 16:37, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

accademics

Does this prove notability, is it RS that a given professor is notable? http://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_q=&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=%22r+snodgrass%22&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_sdt=1&as_subj=eng&as_sdts=5&hl=en. This is in relation to [[25]].Slatersteven (talk) 13:10, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Pretty much, yup, as per the discussion in the AfD --Insider201283 (talk) 22:02, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Official Websites and Blogs

Are official Website and Blogs classified as a reliable source? I am an editor on G.E.M. and I have noticed that the official Website (from Record Label) and Blogs (direct link from official Record Label: Facebook and Xanga) have been classified as unreliable or should be used as trivia citations. So are they reliable or not? Chingster (talk) 20:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

No simple answer. Official websites closely associated with the subject are primary sources and can be used for information that is not contentious or "unduly self serving" or that does not disparage anyone else. Ideally they should be used to support information that has already been provided by secondary sources. An article should not be written entirely or mostly from such primary sources. Most blogs are completely unacceptable, but to my understanding, if they are clearly official organs of (in this case) the record label, they might be seen as part of their website, and qualify as primary sources. Rumiton (talk) 13:04, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Talk:Ermysted's_Grammar_School#School_Council

I'm having a difficult time explaining why Facebook groups aren't reliable sources. Could someone help? Aditya Ex Machina 09:41, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Puggal.com

Is news.puggal.com sufficiently reliable to verify a person's death? After some anon IPs added some unsourced information, I added this citation on Owsley (musician), as I have not had success at finding something more obviously reliable. Puggal gives the impression that there is some editorial oversight. Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 16:42, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm torn on this, Paul. But I lean slightly towards thinking, as the guidance says somewhere (more or less), that if the person is notable, and the claim is significant, one would think that a clear RS would be reporting it. What's your view?--Epeefleche (talk) 20:12, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Other sources are now reporting it, so I'll leave it in. Thanks Epeefleche. Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 20:27, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Lost literature of socialism

Is the book The lost literature of socialism by George Watson[26], a bibliographer and literary historian, a reliable source for Mass killings under Communist regimes. The book was not published by the academic press, although it was negatively reviewed in The Review of English Studies.[27] In the book he argues that conservatism and socialism are basically the same and that Friedrich Engels was the ideological predecessor of Hitler and the Holocaust, finding evidence in a "lost" article written by Engels in 1849. TFD (talk) 14:10, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

On the face of it yes - Lutterworth is a very respectable publisher and the author is a distinguished academic. You might need to dig into him a bit further to be sure that this is within his usual sphere of expertise, though, given that it's a pretty dramatic claim. Barnabypage (talk) 14:53, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Here is a great documentary on the killings: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1305871 , although probably not suitable as a WP:RS Darkstar1st (talk) 15:05, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Scholarly, but don't forget it's a literary history, so may not be suitable for conclusions of fact. And it probably represents a minority scholarly view on several questions. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:08, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

It seems that Tristram Hunt's recent book on Engels mentioned the same 1849 article with a different conclusion. Here's Hunt's book reviewed in the New Statesman [28]. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:29, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Watson's interpretation is presented in the article as just that: his interpretation. I agree it would be wrong to present his conclusions as fact. I also agree that his view is not the majority view and should not be accorded too much weight in the article. Discussion is ongoing at the article's talk page on how to best do this. TFD is misunderstanding the title of Watson's book when he says it was a "lost" article ("lost" is meant figuratively, as in generally ignored). He posted a notice about this book here several months ago without getting the result he wanted.[29] AmateurEditor (talk) 05:01, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Watson is a Fellow of St. Johns College, Cambridge. He often writes about the relation of literature and politics - it's well within his usual sphere of expertise. Lutterworth is a very respectable publisher. His conclusions are not that different from other respectable scholars in the field see, e.g.. The point in the article that the quote is aimed at is about ideology, not about whether Communist regimes actually committed mass-killings (nobody seriously claims that they didn't). Hunt (and the review) trot out much the same material as Watson does. Hunt does not deny that Engels wrote these things, but only says that it is not important because Engels changed his mind later. Smallbones (talk) 16:28, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Has he published any of the theories expressed in this book in the academic press? If so, could you list them so that we can determine the level of acceptance this "scholarship" has received. Also, could you please note his qualifications if any in genocide studies. TFD (talk) 17:10, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

a search in Google scholar for ' "George Watson" Cambridge ' gives 1960 results - not all his articles of course, but many, many are. You'll find he works in literature and Politics. I hope you are not trying to say that because he did not focus his career on genocide studies, that he can't be a reliable source on anything related to genocide. If we put those kind of hair-splitting restrictions on academic sources, then there would be no end to subject-splitting in these discussions, e.g. somebody who dedicated his career to genocide studies couldn't be cited because he didn't focus on the ideology of genocide, or because he didn't focus on the ideology of Communist genocides, or on the ideology of Chinese Communist Genocides. That of course would be pure nonsense - let's not go there. Smallbones (talk) 22:23, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

You are evading the question. He has not published his theories on this topic because (1) he is not an expert on the subject, (2) no academic publisher would carry his "theories" and (3) publication of these theories in the academic press would be damaging to his reputation as a literary historian. Of course lots of academics have political views and write polemical works. The US president e.g. was a law professor but that does not mean that all his opinions on every subject bear the same weight as those of academic writers. TFD (talk) 03:45, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Just how is he protecting his reputation by publishing for a wider audience? He isn't using a pseudonym and his book was in fact peer reviewed. No one is suggesting giving him high weight in the article. AmateurEditor (talk) 05:01, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Could you please read the article Peer review. If you understood the peer review process then you would be able to address the issues raised here. Books are not peer reviewed. Articles are peer reviewed before they are published. Books published by the academic press are expected to have the same standards as peer-reviewed articles. Obviously this book does not and Watson did not use his normal publisher, the Oxford University Press. You might compare him to an astronomer who believes in astrology. The astronomer may write peer-reviewed articles about astronomy and popular books about astrology but he would damage his reputation were he to publish an article about astrology in an astronomy journal. In fact, the journal would probably reject the article. It would be disingenuous for us to put information from his astrology writings into an astronomy article based on his reputation as an astronomer. TFD (talk) 06:02, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Peer review takes a variety of forms. You are correct that it sometimes means refereed work, but post-publication review of a book in an academic journal by a peer academic is also peer review. But you are wrong on several points here. First, that publication by an academic press is necessary to be a reliable source. It is not.[30] Second, that Oxford University Press is his normal publisher. You can see the publishers for his books at his Amazon.com page here and there have been several, but Lutterworth is most common. For example, his book "The English Ideology: Studies in the Language of Victorian Politics" was also published by Lutterworth Press; his "Politics and Literature in Modern Britain" was published by Macmillan. Third, that there was an effort by Watson to avoid academic scrutiny of this work. The acknowledgments page (page 4) reveals that, on the contrary, he published several sections of the book in journals and was invited to give a presentation to a University about one chapter prior to the book's publication.[31] Additionally, Grant's review and Walicki's citation demonstrate that this is nowhere near a case of an astronomer publishing astrology on the side (especially since Walicki essentially agreed with his most controversial claim). AmateurEditor (talk) 08:18, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

For the purposes of reliable sources, peer-review means publication in a peer-reviewed journal and not that someone wrote a book review, especially when the book review is hostile. While other sources may be reliable it makes no sense to use popular writing when high quality sources exist. If you beleive that sections of this book were published in academic journals, could you please say what they were, and I would have no objection in including them. TFD (talk) 10:29, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Saying that a source is not the highest quality is not reason for rejecting it, although if there is a higher quality source on Watson's view than Watson's own book, I can't imagine what it is (your talk page idea that only sources which refer to Watson second-hand should be used to describe him is not better). If you mean that Watson's book should be excluded from the article altogether, that's simply not Wikipedia RS policy and thus not a decision that would be made on the reliable sources noticeboard. It would be made by consensus on the article's talk page, where no such consensus exists. The consensus that does exist is to keep Watson's weight in the article to the minimum consistent with both clarity and neutrality, the exact form of which discussion there has been trying to determine. AmateurEditor (talk) 14:41, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

We should not sneak fringe theories into articles with arguments like "x" is an expert on bibliography therefore lets give him equal attention with experts on genocide. My suggestion was to report his views as they are reported in reliable sources, viz., writings in academic publications. Fringe theories, such as the Moon landing hoax and 9/11 conspiracy theories are treated this way, and there is no reason to make an exception in this case. TFD (talk) 16:41, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

You have iterated your position. Often. The fact remains that it is RS by WP guidelines. Collect (talk) 00:32, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Being the subject of a review post-publication is most certainly not equivalent to "peer review." However, books can be peer-reviewed in the traditional sense. In fact, that is what distinguishes university presses from other publishers (aside from their university association, of course). --ElKevbo (talk) 07:05, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Using traffic cameras / live traffic information as a source for congested areas

I was wondering if live traffic cameras are acceptable to back up a sentence along the lines of "The DVP is congested from A to B at X time of day", since a user can check the camera between point A and B at that time of the day and see it congested 7 days a week?

http://www.toronto.ca/trafficimages/rtis.htm - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ ^τ _¢ 03:45, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

No. Being on the net doesn't turn personal observation into a source. You need to find a published source that actually states that it is regularly congested. —David Eppstein (talk) 04:52, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

That's what I figured as well, but I thought I'd see what others thought. It's not hard to find numerous sources saying it is perpetually congested, but very few indicate where or when in particular. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ ^τ _¢ 08:06, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Agree w/David E.--Epeefleche (talk) 20:13, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Also what happens if I look and its not congested (for example the roads closed for maintnenace)?Slatersteven (talk) 14:02, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Military Service Publications

In my collection of documents relating from service in the British Army I have a briefing on the Law of Armed Conflict that explains the difference between Rules of Engagement and LOAC. I've looked and never found comparable material openly published. Its an unclassified briefing but not generally available in the public domain. Can I cite this as a reliable source? Justin talk 13:28, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

It would have to be available somewhere to the public to meet WP:V. You could check whether any libraries, including government or repository libraries, have the document. I'm not too familiar with how Britain treats government documents, but if this was a US question I would say if the document was available online or in libraries it would count, if it could be ordered out of a catalog from the government it would count, if it could be ordered from third-party organizations that republish government documents it would count. But if it was an internal publication that was merely not classified, or required a special request such as FOIA to obtain, then no it wouldn't be WP:V. Squidfryerchef (talk) 13:52, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

It depends on the document. In this case I would say it might not have been availible to the public (most army issue documents are for issue to serving solders only, actualy the only ones I have seen were at the time of issue FYEO)). After a long while they may get reprinted (such as some WW2 era manuals). Also the proposer says that it was not avilible to the public, so unless the PRO have made it availible in some form (and I doubt it) I doubt it will be verifiable to the general public.Slatersteven (talk) 14:00, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

If it is available to the public, in any library, then it would be verifiable, and I'd expect how to find it to appear in the reference. If it is not available to the public, it is not verifiable and must not be used. I've used letters from archives, and of course stated exactly where I got them, with a file number if available.--Wehwalt (talk) 14:35, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Alexa rankings

The Global warming pages continue to help keep this board lively. We now have editors edit warring to remove Alexa rankings from articles about environmental blogs. As far as I know, Alexa rankings are currently the industry's standard tool for measuring site traffic. There are criticisms of Alexa, but the Alexa article contains these criticisms, so any readers can simply click over to the Alexa article and decide for themselves. Am I off the mark here in thinking that there is no justification in deleting mention of Alexa from articles on websites as long as the number is attributed to Alexa? Cla68 (talk) 01:14, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Can i ask why you aren't presenting the objections that have been made on the talk page? Perhaps you may even want to link the discussion - so that uninvolved editors can see that the objection is not about Alexa in general - but Alexa in context? Well - since you didn't - here is the discussion: Talk:DeSmogBlog#Traffic. Cooked down summary (of my argument): Alexa rankings are great for general purpose sites that get a distribution of visitors that is similar to the distribution of the general population - but for specialized or niche sites, the visitor distribution is not such. Therefore the information is basically worthless and in worst case directly misleading. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 01:52, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Please, Kim, allow the independent editors here to give their opinion. As I pointed out on the talk page, Alexa is referenced over 900 times in Wikipedia, with most of those referencing the Alexa rankings, so this is an important question as it applies to a lot more articles than just DeSmogBlog. Cla68 (talk) 01:59, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I am allowing them to give their opinions - but you have the responsibility of presenting the case in such a way that people understand what the request is about.... you failed that one, therefore i had to comment. As for your 900 argument - its irrelevant for the case at hand (see talk). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 02:05, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Can i ask why you aren't presenting the objections that have been made on the talk page?

Perhaps because the RS/N is not designed to host disputes as to the propriety of including Alexa sourced data as content in the article but rather whether Alexa as a source is WP:RS for that content. I'd suggest that the appropriate forum for your observations is the article talk page. That being said, any observations you might have as to Alexa WP:RS considerations would be welcome and appropriate here. JakeInJoisey (talk) 11:07, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

(EC) If you truly want independent opinions, why poison the well by leading off with accusations of "edit warring" as you have done here? A dispassionate, neutrally worded request for third-party views would have been far more appropriate. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 02:08, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

From the Alexa site, "Sites with relatively low traffic will not be accurately ranked by Alexa.". So it really is a case by case thing on a scale of 1-100,000+ with 100,000 being complete unreliability and 1 complete reliability. They claim. [32] Weakopedia (talk) 02:28, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Comparatives, when available, can be a helpful determinant of the relative reliability of statistical data rankings. "Quantcast" provides statistical data as well. --JakeInJoisey (talk) 04:59, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, I added the Quantcast number as well. Cla68 (talk) 07:31, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

For the record (and from a link in the Alexa article, Compete.com also returns traffic data that appears to somewhat echo both Alexa and Quantcast. JakeInJoisey (talk) 04:54, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

So far, everyone who has commented here is involved in the AGW topic. Weakopedia's comment, however, is helpful and gives me an idea about how to qualify the information in the article. Nevertheless, I still hope some uninvolved editors will comment. Cla68 (talk) 04:26, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

We now have editors edit warring to remove... gosh, how mysterious - editors edit warring to remove - but no-one edit warring to reinsert? Its another one-sided edit war! William M. Connolley (talk) 11:49, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

As an uninvolved editor, here is my view. On Wikipedia, we try to base articles as much as possible on secondary sources. Alexa ratings are a primary source, and using it directly can violate original research. If there is a reliable secondary source which says site X has Alexa rating Y, then it would be fine to use, otherwise, especially for controversial issues, it should be left out. Crum375 (talk) 13:09, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

With all due respect (and though this rather off-topic issue was introduced as an aside by the OP), this is supposed to be a discussion of RS and attendant considerations for the Alexa statistical data. I would suggest that this thread is better suited to Talk:DeSmogBlog#Traffic JakeInJoisey (talk) 13:23, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

OK, I'm not sure that I would be considered an "independent" editor, to the extent that matters. I've contributed to talk pages on GW articles occasionally, but never edited the articles. On Alexa: it's a straw poll of sorts, as it counts hits by people who have the Alexa toolbar. Thus it is prone to manipulation on the margins, and is a questionable method of gauging site visits. ScottyBerg (talk) 20:53, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

OK, of three independent editors who have commented here, two appear to be against and one suggested using Quantcast in addition to Alexa. Cla68 (talk) 22:39, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps this needs to be looked at from another perspective as well. While Alexa or Quantcast determinations on relative rankings apparently become "less reliable" as traffic decreases, they DO appear to establish the fact of comparatively low internet traffic. That, in and of itself, is a fact that can be both reported and interpreted as the reader of any article might see fit to do. JakeInJoisey (talk) 04:21, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree. Cla68 (talk) 04:25, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Then a second question arises that should be addressable here. Are Alexa and/or Quantcast also WP:RS for a valid factual assertion of relatively lower internet traffic? JakeInJoisey (talk) 04:35, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Since this question applies to more than just this article, I'm thinking of posting a wiki-wide RfC on using Alexa and Quantcast as sources for site traffic information in Wikipedia articles. Cla68 (talk) 04:40, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I believe that is an excellent approach, but PLEASE compose it quite carefully. JakeInJoisey (talk) 04:41, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

If you don't mind, I'll pass it by you before posting it. Cla68 (talk) 04:49, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

That's an interesting point on use of Alexa as an indication of low traffic. However, I'd be reluctant to perform an independent analysis of whether Alexa indicated that traffic is low, as I'd prefer a third party to do so. ScottyBerg (talk) 12:45, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

You raise an interesting point that warrants noting. IMHO, comments/opinions/assertions posted to RS/N's have considerable more influence and/or worth when the guidance and spirit of WP:VERIFY are applied. JakeInJoisey (talk) 14:39, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I have a different point to make. I question whether an Internet search ranking has encyclopedic value at all. I.e., vague claims to being best are not a substitute for having quality content, and Wikipedia is interested in quality content.

I was a webmaster for a major company for years, and yes, I used Alexa to demonstrate to management that our efforts to improve the site were working. We never intended to use Alexa as anything more than a rough estimate of whether we had an effect. We all agreed the Alexa figures were subject to many problems. But when your site is shown to be greatly increasing in popularity relative to competitors ... that was just the double-check to confirm what we already suspected from our own much more careful analysis.

All data has a certain statistical uncertainty. In the case of Alexa, it's huge. Even more, most people don't have the time or patience to analyse how rating sites such as Alexa are particularly weak for their own purposes. Presenting traffice ratings in Wikpedia to innocent readers who do not have even the slightest experience with web analysis is utterly misleading. It is saying, in effect, without any specific supporting evidence that high traffic = truth. This kind of thinking needs to disappear from Wikipedia. Piano non troppo (talk) 13:19, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

It is saying, in effect, without any specific supporting evidence that high traffic = truth.

No, it is saying that high traffic = high traffic. If a reader chooses to equate "traffic" and "truth", I'd suggest that the problem lies not in the presentation of the data but in the thought process of the reader. JakeInJoisey (talk) 11:26, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

An observation was made in the article "talk" that Alexa website traffic data is limited to data obtained from users of the "Alexa toolbar". | According to Alexa, that doesn't appear to be the case (emphasis mine)...

How are Alexa's traffic rankings determined?

Alexa's traffic rankings are based on the usage patterns of Alexa Toolbar users and data collected from other, diverse sources over a rolling 3 month period...

JakeInJoisey (talk) 11:42, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, apparently that was added a couple of years ago and caused some shifts in rankings. I went to the Alexa article here on Wikipedia and did not find it as helpful as it could be. I was struck by the sourcing of the article, which seemed to mainly come from blogs and from Alexa itself. The consensus of sourcing seems to be that Alexa is an imprecise (at best) method of measuring traffic data. Given that, I would question its encyclopedic value in any article, when used as an original resource. I think that an original, first-hand resource should be used only when precise. When subject to interpretation, I'd prefer using a secondary source to make interpretations. ScottyBerg (talk) 13:47, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

The consensus of sourcing seems to be that Alexa is an imprecise (at best) method of measuring traffic data.

One of the difficulties I have with these RS/N discussions is that they too often contain statements or assertions which, though perhaps accurate, provide little or no means of verification. Can you provide a link to some specific cite supporting your summary statement that a "consensus of sourcing seems to be that Alexa is an imprecise (at best) method of measuring traffic data."? Frankly, I'm ambivalent as to whether Alexa (or any website purporting to present traffic analysis) is found to be WP:RS in that regard, but I'm not ambivalent about a need to support such a determination in the spirit of WP:V. JakeInJoisey (talk) 15:26, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually I misspoke when I said "consensus" of sourcing, as that overstates the sourcing of the Alexa article. The only web-accessible source in the relevant section of the Alexa article[33], apart from Alexa itself and articles not dealing with the accuracy of Alexa's rankings, was this article in TechCrunch [34] (". . .it shows just how useless Alexa has become as a method for measuring web traffic and reach.") As you can see, that article says that Alexa is not imprecise, but utterly of no value at all. Clearly we need more sources before rendering a decision, and I'm not sure TechCrunch can be considered a reliable source.ScottyBerg (talk) 18:22, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for providing the link. Having read the article (and the comments), several observations.

The author focuses on Alexa's report that "YouTube.com" had surpassed "Google.com" as representative of "...just how useless Alexa has become as a method for measuring web traffic and reach." However (and as pointed out in a comment critical of the blog post), he neglects to note that the Alexa report (which was generated by the author's own choices) is a comparative of ~~Yahoo.com~~ YouTube.com with Google's US domain only (Google.com), which appears to be a valid comparative.

The post itself is outdated. As noted in a subsequent post, "Alexa Overhauls Ranking System" dated April 16th, 2008, in which the purportedly false Alexa ~~Yahoo/Google~~ YouTube/Google comparative is again cited without explanation, the blog notes (emphasis mine):

Although regularly derided in the past for its often bizarre results (like YouTube having more traffic that Google), Alexa has continued to maintain popularity due to its broad global reach and completely free service provision. Time will tell if Alexa has done enough to appease its strong and vocal critics.

While it appears that the blog itself may be somewhat POV, perhaps reflecting a degree of anti-Alexa/pro Google bias, and although Alexa MIGHT be faulted for its inablility to present a GLOBAL reach comparative of ~~Yahoo.com~~ YouTube.com and Google's multiple domains, the blog cite within Alexa is based on old Alexa data and is, IMHO, essentially worthless itself in a consideration of current Alexa WP:RS for website traffic reporting and, I agree, more contemporary sourcing is warranted to make the case either way. JakeInJoisey (talk) 11:59, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, there doesn't seem to be a lot of independent evaluation of the accuracy of Alexa from reliable third party sources. ScottyBerg (talk) 13:13, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Thus far in this discussion, nothing has been cited that might support a contention that Alexa traffic statistics (nor those of similar web entities) are not WP:RS for web traffic reporting. In the interim, Alexa continues to be cited regularly (assumedly as a reliable source) on what appear to be reputable websites...

NASDAQ, April 14,2010...

In March, the company announced that it had partnered with NBC Sports to manage NBCSports.com's online store. According to a recent article published by TrafficEstimate.com, NBCSports.com sees an estimated 5.2 million monthly website visits and Alexa, an internet traffic analyzer, estimates that the site NBCSports.com is in the top 500 websites in terms of traffic in the United States.

Information Today, Inc., April 1, 2010...

The changes have helped grow the engine from an Alexa traffic ranking of 150,000 to 10,000 in less than one year.

Technorati.com, March 30, 2010...

Did the site owner start out targeting pet memories? Who knows? But as of now, the top keyword driving traffic to that site, (according to Alexa) is "top ten dog names".

IMHO, pending submission of something that might indicate otherwise, Alexa should be considered as a reliable source for web traffic reporting. JakeInJoisey (talk) 13:22, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Alexa ratings are given a lot of press, they are used by many large sites, they are quoted by major news services, so I think they can be considered reliable as a rough indicator of relative rankings for large sites, which is what their disclaimers specify is all they can do. Alexa rankings can be useful in the right article, with proper explanation. They can also be used improperly to attribute a fixed value to smaller traffic sites, which they say they cannot do with any accuracy, so as to it's use as a reliable source that varies with the notability of the site in question. That's something to be worked out article per article, it isn't something RS/N should issue a blanket statement about. Weakopedia (talk) 13:22, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree with your RS opinion as to Alexa's or any other traffic reporting entity's "rankings". Alexa's caveat inre "low traffic" (above 100,000) websites is clear, unambiguous and, I believe, also acknowledged (in some fashion) by the other services. However, doesn't this logically imply that websites failing to return data sufficient to make reliable "ranking" determinations might be legitimately and reliably characterized (and reported when contextually appropriate and defensible) as "low traffic" or whatever descriptive a respective service chooses to utilize in that regard? JakeInJoisey (talk) 14:04, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

I see what you are saying. I guess it all depends on how that information is used within articles. If a website is not notable enough to receive a reasonable Alexa ranking, then is the Alexa ranking enough on it's own to use, or does that add undue weight. Presumably for lower traffic sites there is no human input to their appearing in the Alexa rankings, so the question becomes, are Alexa rankings notable enough, or well enough understood by the general reader, to use in descriptive form within an article. I think then that Alexa rankings can be used even for smaller sites, but care needs to be taken with their use that the descriptive nature of displaying them does not overembelish a site that otherwise lacks notability. Again I think that is an article-per-article decision rather than an overall RS/N responsibility. Weakopedia (talk) 07:49, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I concur that the contextual presentation/purpose of incorporating Alexa data (or that of any other similar, reputable service) within an article is a legitimate consideration and one which I previously raised in the "talk" section related to the cite which generated this RS/N. As to this RS/N itself, I believe we are in agreement that Alexa statistics are RS and citable given a supportable, contextual article incorporation. JakeInJoisey (talk) 11:01, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

A site's traffic rating is not appropriate in any circumstance. JakeInJoisey, briefly rebutting my detailed explanation said, the problem is "thought process of the reader". This is a classic "the reasoning should be self-explanatory" argument applied to anyone who doesn't feel it necessary to explain themselves clearly to readers. The idea of an authoritative encyclopedia is to speak to all readers, not just those who have a degree in statistical analysis. The raw Alexa information is misleading to 99% of Wikipedia readers. And not just that, it's completely unencyclopedic. Why? Because Web ratings change frequently. Maybe a site reached a high watermark rating for a couple months. Is that what *should* be reported in Wiki? Or should be the most recent rating? Or a historical trend? Who is to decide what are the important facts? That it is the "fastest rising"? That it was the fastest rising? All of this is original research, and an opportunity for marketing managers to manipulate Wikipedia in a manner that is most favorable to them. (Or least favorable to their competition.) Unencyclopedic. Piano non troppo (talk) 18:44, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

The idea of an authoritative encyclopedia is to speak to all readers, not just those who have a degree in statistical analysis. The raw Alexa information is misleading to 99% of Wikipedia readers.

This simply doesn't hold water. Alexa statistics are widely reported without any further qualifying explanation to a prospective reader but are always incorporated within some contextual framework related to their citation...just as they would/should be treated when cited within any Wikipedia article. "99% of Wikipedia readers" are no more susceptible to being "mislead" by the citing of Alexa statistics than are 99% of the audience for the numerous RS articles in which those same Alexa statistics are cited.

However, the purpose of this RS/N is to arrive at some consensus as to whether or not Alexa data is a reliable source for citing web traffic statistics. If it is deemed not to be RS in that regard, then everything else is moot. JakeInJoisey (talk) 10:50, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I would suggest that if Alexa site rankings are not RS for one case, that it should be pruned from all WP articles - especially since, at best, it gives a snapshot of one point in time, and is not even claimed to be accurate otherwise. Collect (talk) 10:35, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Your points are arguable but premature and irrelevant to this RS/N. Both Alexa and Quantcast are widely cited as reliable sources and, barring some supporting evidence to the contrary, their RS standing for Wikipedia article inclusion, given an appropriate contextual basis, is warranted. JakeInJoisey (talk) 13:16, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Pray tell -- under what putative case would Alexa be proper "in context"? Would a year old mention about the Drudge Report standings be proper? Other sites giving measures? What would be proper context to have ephemeral measurements from any source given in an article which is intended to be encyclopedic? Collect (talk) 13:21, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Your question is legitimate but irrelevant to the purpose of this RS/N...is Alexa RS for reporting web traffic statistical data. JakeInJoisey (talk) 13:26, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Secondary source contradicted by primary source

There's an outgoing edit war on the article Network TwentyOne regarding a court case in the UK. The issue is that a secondary source (a newspaper article) makes certain claims about the nature of the case, however the actual primary source court judgement is contrary to those claims. There are no other secondary sources known. See Talk:Network TwentyOne for details. How should this be handled? --Insider201283 (talk) 14:41, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Do not substitute your judgement for that of secondary sources, especially with respect to complicated issues like court cases. I will evaluate further and comment again shortly. Hipocrite (talk) 14:46, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You misunderstand the word "distributor" in the secondary source. A distributor is a company that distributes the products of another company. It is not necessarily owned by the company who makes the products it distrubtes. You can both distribute something and "not [be] owned by [the company who makes the product you distribute] or by any of its shareholders or officers. Hipocrite (talk) 14:51, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean? Network 21 does not distribute Amway products.--Insider201283 (talk) 14:52, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

What leads you to believe that, exactly? Even if you were right, that in no way impeaches the source, which is only used to say "In 2007 the UK government attempted to ban the organisation and Amway," which appears to be accurate. Hipocrite (talk) 14:54, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Well, that's not entirely accurate either. BERR can't "ban" companies per se. As the judgement says, what they petitioned to do was wind up the companies, there's nothing stopping them reopening the next day and indeed nothing stopping the "organisation" continuing to exist in the UK, supplied from abroad, which is exactly what happened. This is where the problem is - IMO the case deserves mentioning, but the only source we have is a wholly inaccurate one. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:04, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

If a company is forced to wind up, it no longer exists in the UK, and as such, is functionally banned. While another, identical orginization could attempt to reopen, that would be a new company. Again, you are misinterpreting primary sources and now engaging in your own research as to what things mean. In summary, it's time to lose gracefully. Hipocrite (talk) 15:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

The company, yes, but the term "Network TwentyOne" refers to more than just the company(s) per se. However, that can be fixed by rewording. Please explains how I'm misinterpreting the primary source, which I have read completely numerous times. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:11, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You agree that you are intepreting the primary source, then? Hipocrite (talk) 15:13, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Don't play word games. The primary source clearly states the case was not about business support materials, the muskegon chronicle says it was. No "interpretation" is needed for that much past interpreting "1" and "One" as refering to the same thing. Why did you ask if there was a COI? --Insider201283 (talk) 15:21, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't quite understand. You say the source says one thing. I say it says something else. It appears that you believe I am misinterpreting the source. Doesn't that mean that you are necessarily interpreting it - regardless of how obvious or correct you are? I asked about the COI because if you did have a COI, you should refrain from editing the article, and instead edit the talk page, per WP:COI, and I assumed that if you had a COI, you were unaware of this. Hipocrite (talk) 15:24, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

So you ask every editor if they have a COI then? I don't understand what you mean by "it says something else". Which part? Perhaps best to answer at the "back on point" below. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:31, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

The word "tool" which you attribute to [35] does not appear in the article. Hipocrite (talk) 14:52, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, that was meant as a jargon "quote" not a cite "quote". "Tools" is a common used term in the area for "motivational materials etc", which is mentioned in the Muskegon article, and which the court judgement says the case was not about. With regard N21 distributing Amway products, I know it because I've been studying the topic for a decade, but the court judgement says as much - Amway does not share in any of the risks or rewards of Britt and Network 21. By definition if you are distributing a companies products, that company shares in, at least, the rewards of your success. --Insider201283 (talk) 14:59, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You are misinterpreting primary sources - in summary, you are wrong. Do you have a financial conflict of interest, here? IE, are you paid directly or indirectly by any of the parties? Hipocrite (talk) 15:03, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Of for crying out loud. Why do I have to constantly put up with this #"¤!¤!?? Ever heard of WP:AGF? No I am not paid by any of the parties. The primary source is clear, how do you think I'm misinterpreting it?--Insider201283(talk) 15:09, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

If I were to fail to assume good faith, I would not have asked you if you had a COI, I rather would have just said that you appear to have a COI. I take you at your word that you don't. Thanks. Hipocrite (talk) 15:13, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

It's not the job of Wikipedia editors to interpret primary sources and make judgements about whether secondary sources are 'wrong'. That is original research. But the alleged 'primary source' isn't acceptable even if there were no OR issue. The New York Times, Muskegon Chronicle, etc. are reliable sources. Documents hosted on http://www.amwaywiki.com/ are not. Dlabtot (talk) 14:55, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Amway wiki is a convenience link for the source, not the source. --Insider201283 (talk) 14:59, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

It's not usable as a convenience link or for any other purpose. Dlabtot (talk) 15:01, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Dla. Hipocrite (talk) 15:03, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your concern is here since it's not being used as a source. The only link was in Talk. The source is the court judgement, which is available from the UK government. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Hypocrite too. Also agree about the COI claim, couldnt be more obvious. Financeguy222 (talk) 15:09, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

FG222 is the other editor involved in this dispute. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:12, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

We're aware of that. Hipocrite (talk) 15:13, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

<-My points still haven't been addressed. The Muskegon Chronicle states N21 is a "high level Amway Distributor", all other sources and the primary source itself says it is not. The Muskegon Chronicle states the case was about "motivational materials" etc, the case judgement itself says it was not. This clearly points to the reliability of the source. The Muskegon Chronicle article itself states the complaint was sealed. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:26, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Your point has been addressed. It's original research based on an unreliable hosting of a primary source. Dlabtot (talk) 15:33, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Dlabtot, please stop stating falsehoods. The source is not Amway Wiki, the source is the court judgement, a copy of which I have, and which I obtained from the UK Companies court. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:56, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry you didn't like the answer you've gotten here. But the reality is that your 'source' is unusable and your argument is original research. Insulting me won't change that. Dlabtot (talk) 16:02, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I didn't insult you, you stated something false. Furthermore, you kow appear to be stating that a court judgement is an unusable source regarding what a case was about. You yourself have stated court judgements are primary sources and can be used where appropriate [36] as have many other editors [37] Primary sources are clearly allowable as sources for factual claims about themselves.[38] --Insider201283 (talk) 16:15, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, primary sources can be used, in extremely limited circumstances. Those limited circumstances do not include conducting original research in an attempt to show that a secondary source is 'wrong'. Dlabtot (talk) 16:22, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

So reading multiple sources, and doing no synthesis or interpretation, is now considered "original research"? It's basic WP philosophy that no source is automatically considered reliable, it has to be taken in conjunction with other materials. Taking the position that evaluating a sources reliability is WP:OR is a fundamental change in approach. --Insider201283 (talk) 16:29, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

So reading multiple sources, and doing no synthesis or interpretation, is now considered "original research"? NO. But your argument is original research. And wrong. Dlabtot (talk) 16:44, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

How is my argument original research? The article states some things about a court case. The court judgement states differently. This pertains to the reliability of the source. WP:V clearly states Do not leave unsourced or poorly sourced material in an article if it might damage the reputation of living persons or organizations. We have one single source for the material, and it is clearly not reliable. How does this not qualify as "poorly sourced"? On what basis does WP:V not apply? By the way, I'd also note that my primary issue with this is ultimately one of WP:BALANCE. We have one poor source for a claim about a case that was dismissed. I think we can probably come up with some acceptable text for the body of the article about the case, but does it really qualify for the lead? Indeed, is it notable enough at all? --Insider201283 (talk) 16:53, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

As has already been explained to you, it is original research to interpret primary sources and use them to make judgements about whether secondary sources are 'wrong'. I have no intention in repeating myself to you further. You may have the last word. Dlabtot (talk) 17:26, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You can "explain" this point until the end of the universe. I have zero disagreement with what you have just said. The problem is - so what? What's the relevance to this discussion? There is no interpretation going on. Have you actually read the sources? --Insider201283 (talk) 17:39, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

(unindent) I am reading the source now, and agree with Dlabtot. The judgment says, as you correctly quote, that Amway didn't own or "share in the risks and rewards" of N21. Fine. That doesn't contradict the statement that N21 was a distributor. Your statement "Network 21 does not distribute Amway products" would, but I can't see that in the judgment. As Dlabtot says, a distributor is not necessarily a subsidiary. In fact, point 2 says that IBOs are independent sellers of Amway products, and point 50 says Network 21 was formed by senior Amway IBOs, so your statement is treading quite close to contradicting the judgment itself.("When I wear my red hat, I'm merely a guy who formed N21, and only when I wear my blue hat am I a distributor...") That wouldn't be sufficient for us to call N21 a distributor, of course, but partly supports, and certainly doesn't contradict, the Chronicle's statement. --GRuban (talk) 01:05, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Under that line of thinking, Apple makes movies because Pixar was owned by Steve Jobs. The claim N21 is not an Amway distributor is not reliant on the court case - multitude of the other sources say the same thing. It's not simply a matter of changing hats - Network 21 is a significant company in it's own right with hundreds of employees, the vast majority of whom (including most executives) are not Amway distributors. I'm not quite sure how you can interpret the judges statement and the journalists statement as not contradictory. If you distribute products for a company, and you are successful, that company is clearly going to share in the rewards of your success. --Insider201283 (talk) 10:15, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Where possible, primary sources and secondary sources (this would also hold for two primary sources, or two secondary sources) should be interpreted in a manner that give credence to both sources. Secondary sources sometimes add a gloss of interpretation that a primary source may not have, and -- for example -- in a highly technical area may add to understanding in a way that the primary source alone does not add. It may also put the primary source in context. That said, where it is a matter of fact and there is a clear conflict, the primary source is the better indicia of the fact as to what the primary source says. See this for some thoughts on using primary evidence. As to the specifics of this case, I would suggest you either go to the wp:law wikiproject (where a number of UK attorneys hang out; UK attorneys can be expected to do a better job at construing UK law than Wikipedia editors generally), or contact user:ironholds, whose opinion I trust on matters of UK law.--Epeefleche (talk) 01:58, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

- rubs eyes blearily* if somebody is willing to explain to me the law in dispute, I'm quite happy to give a limited and completely unofficial opinion based on my own knowledge and the mass of company/financial law textbooks I use as a footstool. Ironholds (talk) 02:07, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Ironholds. There's no real law in dispute per se, it's whether what a judge says a case is about in the case judgment trumps what a media article claims was in a sealed complaint. The situation is this - the DTI petitoned to wind up Amway (UK) Limited and two companies (Britt WorldWide and Network 21 Support Systems UK Ltd)that supplied support and training materials to Amway distributors (UK Companies court. Cases 2651,262,2653 of 2007)[39], alleging "objectional practices". The case against Amway, and it's eventual dismissal) was widely reported. The Muskegon Chronicle article is the only one that reports the cases against Britt and Network 21 and has at least two significant errors - (1) it claims BWW and N21 are "high level Amway distributors". They are not, as other sources used in the article explain, and the judge confirms, noting that Amway "does not share in any of the risks or rewards of Britt and Network 21" - clearly impossible if they are your distributors. Britt and Network 21 were founded by people who were Amway distributors, which is where the confusion arises. (2) the article also claims the complaint was about problems with distributors making money from selling these materials rather than from marketing Amway products. The court judgement explicitly states the case was not about that at all. Interestingly, as the article notes, the complaint was sealed, so the journalist was clearly getting his information from a "source" rather than first hand, likely one with an agenda. Now, on top of that, the fact the cases against Britt and N21 were dropped is not reported in any media. I did however obtain a copy of the dismissal against N21, [40]. So, we are left with one secondary source that does not reliably describe the case, and no secondary sources regarding the case being dismissed against Network 21. This has left some editors wanting to include all the allegations made in the secondary source (The Muskegon Chronicle) in the article (and lead) but not allow even reporting of the fact the case was dismissed as all we have is the primary sources, and PDF copies of them are hosted on site space (www.amwaywiki.com) that in itself is not WP:RS (and which, full disclaimer, I admin). My own feeling is that allegations from a court case that was dismissed and not reported anywhere but in one (foreign) press article probably shouldn't be included in an article at all. They would certainly not be allowed if it was an article on a living person (under WP:BLP) rather than an active company. Under WP:V poorly sourced claims about active companies should not be included, and IMO the inaccuracies qualify the Muskegon Chronicle article as a poor source. However some people have passionate views about all things related to multilevel marketing companies like Amway and will fight tooth and nail to include anything critical, so in the interest of consensus I think it's OK to include if its balanced and includes the rather pertinent fact the case was dismissed. As it happens I know from talking to parties involved that the case against Network 21 didn't even make it to hearings. --Insider201283 (talk) 10:15, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

We use secondary sources in preference to primary ones. Now, sometimes good secondary sources may be mistaken. If for example a historian's book said that WW2 ended 1954 rather than 1945 it's obviously a misprint and should be ignored. But that can only be done when it is clear that the secondary source is mistaken. This case does not sound very clear. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:02, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

That's been said by a couple of people and, with respect, I simply don't get that response. How is it not clear? The article says "the case is about this". The case judgement says "the case is not about this". I don't see how you can get any clearer than that? --Insider201283 (talk) 11:11, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Deciding what a case is about involves a degree of judgement. So we need a source such as a newspaper, because we cannot make such a judgement ourselves. Itsmejudith (talk) 13:04, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Again, I'm not suggesting making the judgement ourselves. The judge, Justice Norris, in the published judgement, explicitly stated the case was not about the Business Support Materials. Here is the quote again -

"Nor has this case been (as it might have been) about the volume of BSM produced by Amway or by the organisations (like Britt and Network 21)"(BERR vs Amway UK (para 50)[41]

This flatly contradicts what the Muskegon Chronicle said. No interpretation is necessary. No judgement of what the case was about by us is necessary. The Muskegon Chronicle said "the case is about A". The judge in the case, writing in the judgement, explicitly stated "the case is NOT about A". How is this not clear? --Insider201283 (talk) 13:25, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You're trying to using the statement in the judgment that Amway didn't own or "share in the risks and rewards" of N21 to mean "Network 21 does not distribute Amway products". They're not equivalent. That's what's not clear. That's what the interpretation is. N21 can distribute Amway products without being owned by Amway. We're not saying they do or don't, that's not for us to decide, but a newspaper is, and we need a pretty clear statement to the contrary to say they're wrong; clearer than this.--GRuban (talk) 13:11, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok, well that's not the main point under discussion, it's just a pointer towards the unreliability of the source. The Muskegon Chronicle article is not being used to make that claim, and neither is the court judgement being made to claim the opposite. If you read the article under discussion, and the variety of secondary sources used, that issue is not under dispute. The fact Muskegon Chronicle has it wrong is a just a pointer to unreliability. The key point is that the editor FinanceGuy222 wants serious allegations against a company included in the article, based on one unreliable source and contradicted, with no need of interpretation, by an official primary source, and does not want the fact the allegations were dismissed, based on the primary source of a court dismissal statement, included. If this were a BLP issue it wouldn't even be under discussion, frankly I'm surprised it's even controversial.--Insider201283 (talk) 13:25, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

A general note, since I am not familiar with the specifics here. A primary source can be used to add details or amplify a secondary source, though very carefully, so as not to introduce a new point of view. But a primary source should never be used to contradict or refute a secondary source, since that would create a new interpretation of the primary source, which would constitute original research. In other words, use primary sources (carefully) to add "color", not to create new ideas or new positions about a topic, which are not already described in reliable secondary sources. Crum375 (talk) 13:32, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

So let me get this clear. The argument is that an article by a journalist for a local newspaper in Muskegon, Michigan (pop 40,000), is considered to be a notable and reliable source on a court case in the United Kingdom, involving a UK company, that was so notable it was not mentioned by any other RS, and where the court documents themselves flatly contradict what the journalist says. This is wikilawyering to the extreme. --Insider201283 (talk) 13:41, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You raise a question in this noticeboard in order to get views from uninvolved editors. And when uninvolved editors respond you accuse us of wikilawyering. Nice. Itsmejudith (talk) 13:43, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I did not mean it as an insult, my apologies if it was taken as such. But, how am I supposed to respond? Don't you think it's a bit absurd that a journalist in a small town in the US is considered a more reliable source on a court case in the UK than sitting Judge of the case itself? Don't you think, interpretation of Wikipedia policies aside, it's outright wrong that serious allegations can be made against a company in Wikipedia, but the fact the allegations were dismissed cannot be mentioned because because the whole case was so unnotable that nobody bothered to cover it? Isn't there something wrong with this picture? --Insider201283 (talk) 13:49, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Crumb375 wrote "but a primary source should never be used to contradict or refute a secondary source, since that would create a new interpretation of the primary source." Nonsense. Some primary sources make simple factual statements that require no interpretation, and such statements can be used to contradict or refute any misquote or misrepresentation in a secondary source. Note that court decisions, particularly of lower courts, often do require interpretation by secondary sources, especially in view of the possibility of being overturned by a higher court. Jc3s5h (talk) 13:49, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Jc3s5h, note that I did not say (or imply) that a relevant reliable primary source (which directly addresses the topic) needs to be excluded as a source. But interpreting it to say that it contradicts the available secondary sources would be original research. What we can do, in cases where the contradiction is clear-cut and requires no expert knowledge (e.g. a date of some event), is to include the apparent discrepancy in a footnote. But the secondary sources hold sway in the main text in cases of conflict. Crum375 (talk) 14:10, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, finally a word of sense in this discussion. As an addendum, the case did got to appeal and was not overturned --Insider201283 (talk) 13:52, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Jc3s5h - in this case, the secondary source writes "x is a distributor of y." The primary source writes "x does not share in any of the risks or rewards of y." Do you feel that the primary source as a simple fact contradicts the secondary source? Do you feel this way given that other editors have clearly expressed that their understanding of the primary and secondary sources is that there is no contradiction? Hipocrite (talk) 13:58, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Hipocrite, you are obfuscating, that is not the main point under discussion. The Muskegon Chronicle article is being used as a source to claim there was a court case where allegations were made against Network 21 with regards profiting and marketing the sale of motivational materials (BSM). The Judge, in the official court judgement, explictly states the case was not about that. Now that I think about it, in this situation the judgment is being used as a secondary source, not a primary source. --Insider201283 (talk) 14:10, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Legal documents, such as court findings, are generally primary sources, since any time the authors of a document are involved in the process they describe, it is primary. You need a secondary source, such as a news article, to interpret them. To say that a judge said X or Y based on a legal document would violate WP:NOR, since the judge also said A, B and C, and WP editors are not allowed to either pick and choose pieces or to otherwise interpret them, from inside primary sources. Bottom line: for legal issues, a reliable secondary source, uninvolved with the case, such as a news article or a scholarly publication, must be used as the main source. Crum375 (talk) 14:53, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Eh? Of course we pick and choose from sources all the time. Otherwise we would have to include the whole of every source in every article, which would be absurd. Barnabypage (talk) 15:11, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

(Unindent) I disagree with Crum375. If a secondary source directly contradicts a primary source in a manner not subject to interpretation, and the primary source is more reliable than the secondary source, the best course of action may be to only cite the primary source with respect to the fact in question, unless the secondary source provides additional information that is intertwined with the contradictory information, in which case both should be mentioned.

The idea that a firm was a distributor and the idea that a firm did not share in the risks and rewards of another firm are not contradictory. Also, an allegation could be made in a court case, and the final decision by the judge or court of appeals might determine that the allegation was immaterial, so I see no inherent contradiction between the court case and the newspaper article.

Crumb375's statement that "WP editors are not allowed to either pick and choose pieces" is tantamount to saying Wikipedia is not allowed to be an encyclopedia. No doubt Crumb375 will deny this, but he/she really wants to completely eliminate primary sources from Wikipedia. I will not believe the denial that no doubt will follow. Jc3s5h (talk) 15:03, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

ok, first of all let's forget the "firm is or is not a distributor" part, it's really not that relevant as no one is trying to make that claim in the article, ie nobody is actually disputing that the firm is NOT a distributor, whatever the Muskegon Chronicle says. Having thought about this more and read some of the archives, there is a point of view that court documents can be both primary sources and secondary sources, depending on what you want to use it for. In this case, it's "what is the case about" - ie what's the complaint. A judge talking about what a case is (or is not) about should probably be considered a secondary source by an expert in the topic - by definition a 3rd party expert - and published by a reliable source (Her Majesty's Goverment). As such in this instance it's not really a primary source at all. The primary source would be the complaint, not the judgement. --Insider201283 (talk) 15:20, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree completely w/Jc3s5h. Per discussion here.--Epeefleche (talk) 17:02, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Excellent commentary there Eppefleche. In the case of judicial hearings, a judges reporting on evidence would in fact be a secondary source. The judges decision would be a primary source - and clearly the most reliable and verifiable source for that decision. One concern I have is so much of this discussion occurs with regards to BLP - where getting it wrong may affect one person, but when it's with regards companies - where getting it wrong may affects thousands of people (or in the case of a company like Amway, millions) - there's no clear guidelines and pretty much "anything goes". There is no sensible reason for this. --Insider201283 (talk) 17:34, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

"FinanceGuy222 wants serious allegations against a company included in the article, based on one unreliable source and contradicted, with no need of interpretation, by an official primary source, and does not want the fact the allegations were dismissed, based on the primary source of a court dismissal statement" For those who don't know, the Muskegon source Insider is now trying to rid from the article, is one he originally posted as a reliable source in defence of the recent AfD for the article.

I'm not at all against stating the specific allegations were dismissed, I'm for it, as long as they are properly sourced.

With the "distributor" phrase in question being applied to N21 in regards to Amway, seemingly for the purpose of discrediting a source for use of the term, WP states a distributor is "An organization or set of organizations (go-betweens) involved in the process of making a product or service available for use or consumption by a consumer or business user. The other three parts of the marketing mix are product, pricing, and promotion." N21 is an organisation involved in the promotion of, and making the service of Amway available, clearly a "distributor". Why is that in question? Financeguy222 (talk) 13:35, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

FG222, you are being entirely disingenuous. You have multiple times removed the statement, and source, that the case was dismissed while leaving in the allegations. If you are "for it", then why have you continued to do this, and refused to even discuss the matter in Talk? The most recent time you left the reference in the article body, but deleted it from the lead, leaving people who browse quickly with an entirely false notion. Right now all we have is one minor news reference about the case, and the court document it was dismissed. I've deleted the sentences under discussion unless we can come to agreement or more sources. Please raise it further in the article Talk pages. --Insider201283 (talk) 10:51, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Acharya S

There is an ongoing discussion at BLP/N that involves the reliability of a particular book. Admin User:Jclemens has suggested that a source by a major publisher is presumed reliable unless "impeached" here. The original talk page discussion is here and the discussion at BLP/N here.

The book in question is The Masks of Christ by Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince.
The issue is the whether Wikipedia should publish the subjects first name which she has never released publicly.
The book is published by Touchstone, a Simon & Schuster imprint.

Some Arguments

The disputed material has been on Wikipedia unsourced on and off for five years, sometimes for months at a time. So there is the distinct possibility of a feedback loop. This is difficult to prove conclusively, but the book shows no evidence that the authors have researched the name independently. In my opinion, they got the information from Wikipedia. They give no source for the material.
Per WP:RS - "Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for checking the facts...", and that the authors of a source can affect its reliability:

The book is in the Holy Blood, Holy Grail genre.
Skeptical Inquirer (and [42][43] - same author) has described their work as "pseudohistory", "forays into nonsense" and "ridiculous sources".
Their work was used as a major source for Dan Browns The Da Vinci Code. From Wikipedia: "Picknett and Prince likely took [Holy Blood, Holy Grail] at face value and fully accepted their claims that the Priory of Sion was a real, medieval, secret society, while there is substantial evidence that the Priory of Sion is a late-20th-century hoax." [44]
CNN said their work "makes 'X-Files' look like 'Mr. Smith Goes to Washington'" and their "conclusions are based on the flimsiest of premises which are supported by the slimmest of indirect and circumstantial evidence or, just as often, by the assertion that the lack of evidence justifies their conclusions."
Wikipedia puts their book The Templar Revelation in the "pseudohistory" category.
The authors claim that the Shroud of Turin is a self-portrait of Leonardo Da Vinci and that space aliens built the pyramids.
User:Charles Matthews points out that in this genre, the "mainstream publisher" brand falls down on quality of editorial scrutiny and assurance.

Please keep in mind that WP:BLP urges us to take greater care about proper sourcing. The question is whether this book is a reliable source for biographical information on the subject. I would appreciate input from the community to help get this resolved. ^^James^^ (talk) 10:22, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm familiar with the authors and have one book by them. They are indeed fringe writers and I would not rely on them for anything unreferenced (except for an insight into fringe thinking), and anything referenced I would not rely on unless I checked the reference. It's the authors that matter more than the publisher in this case.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Dougweller (talk • contribs) 11:08, 30 April 2010

I think James's research is an excellent job of "impeaching" the source. Not RS. --GRuban (talk) 02:10, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Unless one can show that the authors used WP, the presumption is that they did not do so. "In my opinion" falls into the WP:Josh Billings category at best. Thus we are left with the presumption that a book which would normally be RS by virtue of being from a major publisher is RS here. Collect (talk) 19:15, 3 May 2010 (UTC) The problem with this sort of analysis is twofold:

1) None of the criticisms above are directed at the book in question, but at other works by the authors.

2) None of the criticisms leveled at the authors dispute their ability or veracity at current, pedestrian fact-checking. The only fact cited to that book in the article is that Acharya S's real first name is "Dorothy"--hardly a contentious tidbit dispensed by lluminati. Jclemens (talk) 20:00, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

David Lynch Foundation

The David Lynch Foundation For Consciousness-Based Education and World Peace was created by film director David Lynch to raise money for scholarships to pay the cost of training schoolchildren in the Transcendental Meditation technique. Lynch is a prominent advocate of the practice. The foundation also creates videos and hosts them on a website called DLF.TV, an "Online TV Channel that celebrates consciousness, creativity and bliss".[45] A page on that site[46] has been added as a source to a BLP, Ali Stephens. Stephens is not an employee of the foundation or of DLF.TV. I've asked the editor who added it for evidence that this is a reliable source but he's replied that it's used sparingly and that the assertions it supports aren't controversial. Talk:Ali Stephens#Sources. Is a profile on this site a reliable source for a BLP? Will Beback talk 19:53, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't see how it is.--Epeefleche (talk) 20:08, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

It seems to be a video interview. That's pretty reliable for non controversial info, per WP:IAR if nothing else. Here are two other, more reliable, sources that clearly say she meditates.Teen Vogue New York Magazine--GRuban (talk) 02:16, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks,GRuban. You probably noticed there is also a written article below the video on the DLF.TV page. At present, the DLF.TV source is used to support the following three sentences in the article:

1) Stephens says she practices Transcendental Meditation and supports the programs of the David Lynch Foundation.[5]
2) In addition to meditation, Stephens is also interested in environmentalism and works with the non-profit group Oceana to preserve the world's oceans.[5][1][6
3) Stephens has walked the runway for many designers including Balenciaga, Dries van Noten, Givenchy, Chanel, Kenzo, Nina Ricci, Miu Miu, and Louis Vuitton. She has appeared in ads for Prada, Chloé, Missoni, Lacoste, Chanel mascara, Georges Rech, Gap, Uniglo, Bergdorf Goodman, Neiman Marcus, Alexander Mcqueen, Karen Millen, Calvin Klein, and appeared in editorials for Numéro, The New York Times, Harper's Bazar, Allure, V Magazine, French Elle, and American, French, Japanese, Italian, Chinese, and British Vogue.[5][3] [1]

As you can see sentences #2 and #3 have multiple sources ie. New York magazine etc., so the DLF.TV source is there in a supportive role. Sentence #1 is supported solely by the DLF.TV article and video sources. However, as pointed out by GRuban above, NewYork magazine does say that one of the subject's interests is meditation. I have no objection to modifying text to more accurately represent a sources but I don’t see the need for a carte blanche characterization of this source as unreliable. While I admit DLF.TV is not the same as the New York Times I don't feel it should be wholly discounted in its source value and that it is OK to use to support non-contentious text in this BLP. What do others think?-- — Kbob • Talk • 18:10, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

The video interview is a self-proving primary source. My concern is with the printed profile. Will Beback talk 16:40, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Investigation show reliable and notable

Is an investigation/documentary show based on the subject and was broadcast across the globe reliable and notable? It was broadcast on NTV (Russia)

You can see a preview of it at Official network site, click 'Архив' then page 2, then click '«Супер Новые Русские»' to watch preview of episode at top of screen.

Or you can watch the entire thing on youtube - part 1 + part 2

Iksanov Maxim Tahirovich. (2009-10-15) (in Russian). From Russia with Love. [Television documentary]. Russia: NTV (Russia).

I included quotes and everything, full details at Talk:Marina_Orlova#addition.--Sinistrial (talk) 18:16, 3 May 2010 (UTC)