Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 18:50, 7 February 2014

Before posting, check the archives and list of perennial sources for prior discussions. Context is important: supply the source, the article it is used in, and the claim it supports.

Sections older than 5 days archived by lowercase sigmabot III.

Additional notes:

• WP:RSN
• WP:RS/N
• WP:V/N

• RFCs for deprecation, blacklisting, or other classification should not be opened unless the source is widely used and has been repeatedly discussed. Consensus is assessed based on the weight of policy-based arguments.
• While the consensus of several editors can generally be relied upon, answers are not policy.
• This page is not a forum for general discussions unrelated to the reliability of sources.

Current large scale clean-up efforts

Large scale clean-ups/answersingenesis.com

Large scale clean-ups/evolutionnews.org

Large scale clean-ups/independentpoliticalreport.com

Large scale clean-ups/kavitakosh.org

Is Astrodatabank reliable?

In 2011, there was a discussion whether Astro-Databank (ADB) was a reliable source, see here. I want to clarify (as an editor of ADB), that the project claims reliability for the birth data section, i.e. birth date, birth time and location. Each entry is rated with the Rodden Rating system, and each entry contains precise source notes naming the source of the birth data information. Many entries carry the AA rating, which means that an original birth record or birth certificate was either in the hands of the editor, or quoted by another data collector of high reputation.

The astrological charts shown in ADB are reliably computed.

Other information found on an ADB page, for example biography text and category classifications reflects the personal knowledge and opinion of the respective author/editor. For newer entries, biography information is often copied from Misplaced Pages. These parts of ADB claim no special reliability.

Sources for the Moors Article

I have a problem with a few sources on the current Moors article as they're currently being misquoted (possibly libeled), one from an Afrocentrist author known for pseudohistory, and one by some obscure author that has no validity.

The sources are the following: Ceylon and the Hollanders, 1658-1796, by, Pieris, P. E. 1874-1959, The Story of the Moors in Spain By Stanley Lane-Poole, Arthur Gilman, and The Golden Age of the Moor by Ivan Van Sertima.

These sources are currently being used in the Moors article as I aforesaid.

• The problem with the content is the fact that the source that involved Ceylon and the Hollanders, 1658-1796, is by some obscure author with no validity, is improperly linked, and has no quotation or page reference. Here it is: Even if it did have all those things correct, it still doesn't change the fact the main problem with the source is that it's some self-published source with no validity and has never been vetted by anyone.

• The next source "The Story of the Moors in Spain" By Stanley Lane-Poole, Arthur Gilman is a book created by an orientalist and orientalism can indeed distort differences between different cultures, not only that but Stanley Lane-Poole has not much scholarship, but the main problem is that the citation is currently being falsely quoted and possibly libeled. Here is what the citation on the page says: as you can see it says "In ancient times, Africans in general were called Ethiopian; in medieval times most Africans were called Moors; in modern times some Africans were called Negroes." and is quoting/claiming Stanley wrote that, but he did not. Here is the book and you can check, he did not write that material, at all.

• The next source is one by Ivan Van Sertima and here it is: as you can see a "better source needed" claim is already there. The citation is substantiating the following material "West Africans from Mali and Niger who had been absorbed into the Almoravid dynasty." That material comes from a self-published source by well known Afrocentrist for extremist views who has been chastised for pseudohistory and this is the epitome of OR.

In my opinion these sources should be replaced by reliable sources that support the material, and if that cannot be done, then the material should go with the source. ShawntheGod (talk) 15:40, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

In order - the American Ceylon Mission Press was not a self-publishing operation, it was (as you can see at that article) part of a highly influential and respectable organisation. Pieris wrote at least a dozen books on Ceylon and related topics which were not self-published, many of which have been felt important enough to see 21st century reprints from a variety of publishers (cf , where you will also discover he spoke on the subject at Kings College, London in 1937). Moors is not the only page he is cited on. You'd do better to put some of this excess energy into writing a Misplaced Pages page about him.

There is not the book, merely its front cover; and I seriously doubt we should have concerns about a libel suit from authors who were writing in the 1880s; they might be a bit old for legal action by now. is a non-machine-readable copy, but since User:Inayity has a copy perhaps they will be so kind as to provide a page reference and save some effort.

Furthermore, all that source is actually cited for is that the Moors were medieval and Muslim. I'm not actually sure that is in serious doubt!

Without going further into Ivan Van Sertima, but "The Golden Age of the Moor" was published by Transaction Publishers, who are not a vanity publisher. However, the idea that the Almoravids married Africans into the dynasty is hardly remarkable (frex their article cites Lange, Dierk (1996), "The Almoravid expansion and the downfall of Ghana", Der Islam 73, pp. 122-59.)

Furthermore, that source was tagged by User:Inayity - perhaps if you stopped trying to crowbar changes in and appealing to meatpuppets, they'd have a bit more time to look for something better? Pinkbeast (talk) 16:53, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Pieris is a complete nobody and just because it was published by a book publishing organization does not mean the book is still not self-published and by "self-published" I mean created by himself, anybody can write a book and get it published by a company, it's not too hard. I really don't even like using books as sources unless they have been vetted quite well. Also, yes here is the book in its entirety. Do you not know how to scroll down the page with your mouse or use the search bar to the left? The book states no such thing and libeling doesn't just involve legal action, that may be a deeper process if the libelous is that serious to whoever the copyright goes to finds it that offensive. Damaging someones reputation by publishing false information under his name is a part of libeling, that misquote can fall under that. If the West Africans entering the Almoravid dynasty is such a common fact, why is that I looked for other sources that state such a thing yet fine none of validity to replace Ivan? Either way, it's not gonna change the fact Ivan is an Afrocentrist known for distorting history and has been chastised for his beliefs and the source is currently making the material OR and is garbage. ShawntheGod (talk) 19:16, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

What do you mean by Self-published source. I just need that clarified. Also being Afrocentric (like Molefi Asante) does not mean we throw it out. The actual statement which uses Ivan is actually not a pseudo historical claim. And hence why we left it in and allow people to seek better sources WP:NODEADLINE and this nit picking with some agenda behind it which remains unclear to me (at least) is not helping us to push on and make this article A grade. Give it a rest at some stage and fix something else. It is exhausting going on about Poole. --Inayity (talk) 19:45, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

When I follow that Google link, the page I get explicitly states "No eBook available".

However, there is a full text of the book here https://archive.org/details/storymoorsinspa02gilmgoog (it might be a different edition, I neglected to check) and, assuming the search function is reliable, that indeed does not appear to contain the sentence you refer to beginning In ancient times. Barnabypage (talk) 19:51, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

What was actually going on with that is that User:Inayity had quoted a section from the introduction which has now been correctly attributed after I found a machine-searchable text.Pinkbeast (talk) 19:54, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Snap, I just figured that out too. :) If anyone is still interested, the quote in question comes from the introduction to the 1990 edition by John G. Jackson (writer). The text of this introduction can be found at http://www.amazon.com/Story-Moors-Spain-Illustrated-ebook/dp/B00EKR1VK2/ref=sr_1_2?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1380653060&sr=1-2&keywords=moors+in+spain. Barnabypage (talk) 20:00, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

"Created by himself"? Every book is created by its author, so I really have no idea what on earth you mean by that. (What "self-published" actually means is that the author paid for publication; that the printer just printed, with no concern as to the commercial viability or quality of the work. Pieris's books were not self-published.) And do you have any evidence for these assertions about Pieris or the publisher? "Anyone can get a book published" - well, I'm sure that will be a relief to various would-be authors, but can anyone also get their work repeatedly reprinted decades after their death?

I don't know if this is an artifact of geolocation, but there is no search bar anywhere on that page, no indication that the text of the book is anywhere present; and please remember that it's your previous persona, 70.126.13.113, who was needlessly offensive: I can use a Web browser.

The idea that whoever now holds the copyright on a book published in 1886 (and we've already got one impossibility there) can be libelled because the book was misquoted is utterly absurd.

The source does not make the material OR; see WP:OR. Only if Van Sertima were to edit the article himself based on his own conclusions would it be OR, and since he is dead that seems unlikely.

I suspect this is increasingly far removed from the business of RSN, so I'm leaving it be. Pinkbeast (talk) 19:54, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Here is the original book by Stanley: http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Story_of_the_Moors_in_Spain.html?id=OMYCAAAAYAAJ the same link I gave you earlier, hopefully it works now to those having trouble. You then click on the front cover of the book and can scroll down through it all, or use the search bar on the left. I just elucidated what I meant by self-published in the post above, referring to all books, whether they be published from a company or not. Stanley's original book says no such thing, but apparently a version by an Afrocentrist does (not surprising). So that excerpt is not by Stanley himself. Also it can possibly fall under the definition of libel Pinkbeast. Yes it can be WP:OR because this is what OR is "Misplaced Pages to refer to material—such as facts, allegations, and ideas—for which no reliable, published sources exist" that is not reliable, but also questionable due to the extremist views expressed in that literature. If Ivan's view is so common, why do I see no reliable source that expresses the same sentiments? ShawntheGod (talk) 20:13, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Colonial era books like Stanley and Pieris are likely to contain nationalistic or racist assumptions and are thus not reliable unless we have recent sources that say that they are still regarded as definitive. Sertima is not reliable for history. Itsmejudith (talk) 09:52, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

I completely concur about your sentiments on Pieris and Stanley, not to mention Stanley is an orientalist, they are well known for distortion of culture and differences between groups. The funny thing is Stanley did not even jot such words in his original book, but a republished version by an Afrocentrist writer is who those words belong to. Obviously self-published Afrocentrist writers like Sertima with extremist views are in no way reliable. ShawntheGod (talk) 13:48, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Does anyone care to share their opinions on the source regarding the Moors which is a republished edited version by an independently owned publisher Black Classic Press of Stanley's original work by the Afrocentrist writer John G. Jackson (writer)? Stanley's original version has been deemed as unreliable, so I don't see how a republished version by a publisher that lacks scholarship with some Afrocentric additions are reliable. You can take a look at some of the book here and I think just by looking through a little of it you can already see the extremist questionable views and the dates are not correct. It does not seem reliable in my opinion. ShawntheGod (talk) 21:30, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

To be honest, the extremist questionable views don't jump out of the page at me. Whatever, this isn't reliable for history. Itsmejudith (talk) 22:13, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Let's get away from the sources used now, and try to construct an accurate sentence with better ones. "In ancient times, Africans in general were called Ethiopian; in medieval times most Africans were called Moors; in modern times some Africans were called Negroes" is oddly put (part 3), and not really right. I would have said using "Ethiopians" for sub-Saharan Africans was medieval, while "Moors" were often all Arabic-speaking Muslims, whether from Iraq or Spain. But of course the medieval concepts of distant races were vague and variable, often difficult to interpret from sources, and very difficult to accurately generalize about. To the Arabic-speaking world, all Europeans were usually "Franks" (ie French). Johnbod (talk) 14:23, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

Or indeed rūm, "Romans". Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:18, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

IMDB reliable source for awards?

Are the awards portion of IMDB part of the curated content that is considered reliable or is that part of the user generated stuff? that we do not use? -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 02:04, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

I wasnt aware that any part was curated? Surely there is an official BAFTE site that could be used tho? Gaijin42 (talk) 03:34, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

I believe there are parts of IMDB that are reviewed, however as Gaijin suggest there must be better sources for all of these awards. Flat Out let's discuss it 03:41, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

I think what is being implied here is why IMDB isn't usually considered useful for information like this. Insofar as the award is itself worth mentioning (BAFTA, Oscars, Golden Globes, major film festival awards, etc.) there exists other more reliable sources. Insofar as there is no other source than IMDB, the award isn't probably worth mentioning. Therefore, IMDB shouldn't be used for this purpose. --Jayron32 04:49, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, the awards section of IMDb is curated. They ask for sources of awards data that are submitted and reject submissions of awards reports that contain information that is contradicted by other sources that they regard as more reliable. I don't know how long they have had the current procedures in place for verification of awards; it's not inconceivable that some entries for lower-profile awards that were added to their database years ago may be incorrect. For high-profile awards (Oscars, BAFTAs, Palmes d'Or) generally, and for recent lower-profile awards, IMDb awards listings should be considered reliable. Info from IMDb's "trivia", "goofs", "quotes", and biography sections are not reliable. Dezastru (talk) 19:08, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, but for higher profile awards, is there a conceivable reason why one would discard a more reliable source in favor of IMDb? --Jayron32 05:04, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

The question was not whether other sources should be discarded in favor of IMDb. It was whether IMDb is reliable as a source for reports of awards. By analogy: Suppose a source is needed for something said during a speech delivered by US President Obama. One source might be the transcript of the remarks prepared by the president's staff and uploaded to the whitehouse.gov website. Another source might be a transcript published by the Washington Post. Another source might be a paraphrased summary from a news blurb broadcast by the BBC. Another might be a video of the speech at cspan's website. Deciding which source is most suitable is a different matter than deciding whether an individual source should be regarded as reliable. One conceivable reason IMDb might be offered as a source is that the IMDb awards page offers a convenient listing of other, related information that is usually not available from the awarding organization. (For instance, the IMDb awards page for Marlon Brando shows that not only did Brando win a best actor Oscar in 1973 for The Godfather, but he also won a best actor Golden Globe that year for the same role, was nominated for the role for a BAFTA, and won 2nd place awards for the role from the NY Film Critics Circle and the National Society of Film Critics. You wouldn't see any of that at the AMPAS website. As a reader, I find that kind of access to additional information very useful.) Dezastru (talk) 20:50, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

All of the sources in your example are equally reliable, and that's not what's happening here. I don't see that IMDb is equally as reliable as the awards organization itself or a dedicated news agency. The Marlon Brando page has an external link for IMDb, so it's not a matter of "liking" the site, it's just not a good site to rely on for verifiable sourcing with clearly understood editorial oversight. In-line citations are primarily intended to show verifiability above all, not to point to interesting sites (even though some sites cited are interesting, of course). "External links" or "Further reading" are where we can put links to sites based on their other charms. __ E L A Q U E A T E 21:27, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

The sources in my example are not equally reliable. The video recording, assuming the audio portion is clear, is the most reliable. A verbatim transcript prepared by the president's staff after the speech has been given should be next (although this point might be open to debate). A transcript published by a major news media outlet next. And a paraphrased summary from a major news organization last. (You might be interested in this: .) Despite the discrepancy in reliability in the example, the usual practice on Misplaced Pages is to cite news agency articles. I suspect a couple of major reasons for that is that they are easier to find (higher search engine indexing) and there is the general preference for using secondary sources. But, getting back to IMDb, the question, again, wasn't whether IMDb awards content is the most reliable of possible sources. Nobody has argued that IMDb is more reliable than the awarding organization itself. I provided an explanation as to why an IMDb citation might be of benefit in some situations, as opposed to an AMPAS citation, in response to Jayron23's question about conceivable reasons why anyone would ever cite IMDb. Readers who require a source that carries the smallest risk of error can follow the IMDb link to the AMPAS website, in those cases in which IMDb has been cited rather than AMPAS.

Perhaps I am misreading you, but you seem to be taking the position that IMDb should never be cited as a source for film awards. But consider Deepa Mehta's film Fire. The film won Silver Hugo awards at the Chicago Film Festival and won awards at LA Outfest (an LGBT film festival). IMDb shows some of those awards that the film won. Good luck finding that same information at the websites for the Chicago Film Festival or LA Outfest. The Chicago Film Festival's website's archive page shows that Fire was screened at the festival in 1996, but the website doesn't list it among the award winners. Yet a contemporaneous news report shows that the film had indeed been an award winner. So apart from the issue of whether IMDb should or should not be used for reports of high-profile awards like Oscars, taking the position that IMDb should never be cited as a source for any film awards would be detrimental to the encyclopedia's mission. Dezastru (talk) 19:57, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Being right about some information is not the same as being reliable enough for verification purposes for citations. From their own FAQ it's clear that they try to demand third party confirmation, but it seems semi-required if the award is lower profile. Please note that we like to see some third party data source for awards. For high profile events that means we definitely like to stick to the official data published. There's no indication what is meant by higher profile so the information is still mostly based on user submission for an unknown amount of awards. Also, Misplaced Pages is not a list of all awards. If an award has not generated any press beyond an IMDb mention, it's probably not notable enough for encyclopedic purposes. The fact that it sometimes takes user submissions for an unknown amount of its list makes it unreliable for verification by itself. It's a great resource for seeing if someone said it was awarded a prize, but it's not reliable enough to repeat it as a known thing in the article. IMDb is suggested as a link for further reading on all of the pages you mention (which is higher profile than being in a citation) but the article is supposed to be for those things found especially notable and verifiable. __ E L A Q U E A T E 22:34, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

"From their own FAQ it's clear that they try to demand third party confirmation, but it seems semi-required if the award is lower profile. Please note that we like to see some third party data source for awards. For high profile events that means we definitely like to stick to the official data published." I don't think that is what that statement says. As I read it, it says that they require confirmation to post an award report. For higher-profile awards, they require that the confirmation be from an official source (which I take to mean the organization making the award).

"Misplaced Pages is not a list of all awards. If an award has not generated any press beyond an IMDb mention, it's probably not notable enough for encyclopedic purposes." No one disputes this. We are discussing whether IMDb reports can be sufficient for citing awards; we are not discussing whether awards that have been noted only by IMDb merit inclusion in the encyclopedia. Dezastru (talk) 00:20, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

I would argue that best practice is to use the awarding institution itself. From time to time we get an argument that such sources are primary, but I don't see any problem at all. If an organisation makes an award then it isn't going to lie about it. Itsmejudith (talk) 17:17, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

TheDrum.com

An editor pointed out on my talk page about using http://www.thedrum.com/ for citations. I am not sure about the reliability of the site. Kindly, let us know. Thank you,--Bisswajit 14:28, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

It looks like a business magazine focusing on marketing out of Glasgow. It looks like it has some editorial oversight, but it seems self-promoted only. It received an award from Professional Publishers Association but that article has also some pretty odd, self-promoting sourcing itself and that award might not mean anything. I'm not seeing any third-party endorsements of this magazine. I would be very hesitant to use this source for much of anything, without more evidence of credibility. (Maybe not relevant to editorial oversight, but I don't see that their articles attract any comments at all). This looks inconclusively iffy to me, unless someone can find something more conclusive.. __ E L A Q U E A T E 19:26, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

they are a marketing firm, not a news organizaiton. they are clearly first and foremost concerned with promotion and not fact checking and accuracy. Potentially usable, but with great caution. Almost everything that would be acceptably sourced to the Drum would probably have a more reliable source available. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 13:26, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

The Drum is a publication with a team of editorial staff and reporters generating content - i.e. primary sources of information. Labelling them as a marketing firm is untrue. The items you linked were 1 - a peer to peer networking "group" they run (I believe it's like a private LinkedIN), paid event coverage (advertising) and a business directory. They exist just as spin-offs from the main magazine, i.e. advertising Jamesfx3 (talk) 17:31, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Additionally, I refer you to . My point is that the content they produce appears on Google News. Google News demands the following standards from any publications it accepts - they have a high requirement for original and reputable content. I appreciate this is not "inheritable". But please remember that syndication by Google News is not given to everyone nor non-news sources before you decide this issue. Jamesfx3 (talk) 17:31, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

gnews does not guarantee reliability as gnews also carries as the examiner dot com which is blacklisted on wikipedia .

The site does not claim nor is there any evidence of any firewall between their publication arm and their marketing wings. in fact they claim the opposite "On one level The Drum Network helps get its members on the radar, by giving them access to The Drum's channels; which include the UK's largest marketing website " and "Are you planning a major event? The Drum can help you build its profile through our Media Partnership programme. It could give you access to: • 750,000 unique monthly online users • 80,000 Twitter followers • 16,000 email newsletter subscribers • And the pages of the PPA Magazine of the Year" -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:22, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Why is Examiner.com blacklisted?

I've seen sites that were blacklisted before (like Exclaim! which I tried to use when it was blacklisted) become acceptable over time, so I don't doubt it could happen here. Nothing about this particular website strikes me as odd, and I wonder why it is not allowed.

Here's the link I want to use (nowiki because I will be prevented from posting if I allow it to link):

http://www.examiner.com/review/earthless-and-joy-bring-a-taste-of-san-diego-psych-rock-to-the-pacific-northwest

For the record, I hope to use it in Earthless discography (I had added a statement to the lead paragraph that I reverted because I was hoping to install a citation for it using this link later in the article). I was trying to point out how the band's live concert performances differ from their studio recordings (they don't play discrete songs, they melt songs into one another so that the concert as a whole is just one long song made of several and they don't stop playing until they've finished their set).

Before you ask: I believe this is relevant to the discussion of the reliability of sources because it appears that has had something to do with the site being blacklisted. I want to make sure this particular link is OK to use before I take it back to the spam whitelist and ask that this one be granted immunity to the overall embargo on the site itself. Does anyone see any reason why this link is not to be trusted? Can I use it to cite factual information? LazyBastardGuy 17:20, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

No, it's not reliable. For the reason look at their "about" page and their ONTopic Custom Content page and "Write for us" pages. The reason they have "100,000 contributors" is Examiner.com takes money from companies to pay writers to write flattering stories and also let's people write about things when they have clear COI. It's not journalism or independent writing. Here's a testimony promoted by the company itself about how small business owners can "position themselves as experts" (on themselves) and skip the hassle of getting attention from third-party writers. There's nothing stopping anybody in any scene or business from writing a bunch of fluff pieces and getting them published on this site as "expert news and opinion". __ E L A Q U E A T E 17:40, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

@LazyBastardGuy: The answer to your question can be found by reading this discussion. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:12, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Thank you both. LazyBastardGuy 18:24, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Sky Valley Chronicle

Wikpedia is allowing an online blog named the Sky Valley Chronicle who refuses post who it's writers are. The Sky Valley Chroncile was also connected with an attack piece and threats made to my life via Facebook and Misplaced Pages attack piece ( Anne Block) which Misplaced Pages removed citing it as an attack piece.

Sky Valley Chronicle does look like a generally weak source, but it depends what it's being used to support. It's a little bothersome that they call themselves a paper when they're admittedly online only. I can only find them being cited in two articles: Frank Colacurcio and KING-TV. They don't look especially notable and seem overly tabloidy in approach, but I don't see where there's anything at issue right now about them, as they're not currently being used to support any claims. I'd probably accept them as a reliable source for local Ace Hardware Store news but not much else, and specifically not for anything considered controversial. __ E L A Q U E A T E 12:55, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

r4rating.com

Hey all, I'd like to get some community opinions about the following site: r4rating.com. I first noticed some edits at the movie Drishyam, where an editor attempted twice to include reviews from r4rating here and here. I reverted both of those contributions because the movie article already presents a number of glowing reviews, and two more from a questionable source didn't seem to improve the article.

The contributing editor has also penned a declined AfC of the site here and based on their edit history, they seem to be here to promote r4rating.com by inserting links and reviews into articles. A rough look at the site suggests that the oddly branded "4 rating for you R RATING" (or R4 rating by you RATING ???) might be attempting to aggregate viewer response, akin to RottenTomatoes audience ratings or IMDb's viewer ratings. Curious if the community has any thoughts about this site's suitability for inclusion in movie articles, since I don't notice a lot of consideration for the audience's feelings in objective articles. I attempted to communicate with the contributor, but they ignored me and re-inserted their content into the Drishyam article. Thanks, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 07:22, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

As I look into it this morning, it appears that the site uses content from Misplaced Pages (without attribution, I might add), for example here, which is also problematic, because that link is used as a reference here. So basically, they've taken content from Misplaced Pages, then used that content as a reference in the Misplaced Pages article. Circular! Cyphoidbomb (talk) 15:32, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

• Not reliable. The r4rating.com circular reference is pretty blatant; it's obviously a verbatim rip from the text of the article, and then added as a "source" after the fact. This unattributed plagirism on the r4rating.com website would suggest to me that it is not reliable as a source, since Misplaced Pages is not a reliable source. Athul noble does seem to be adding a huge number of reviews from r4rating.com to as many articles as possible, and this user was also the one who added the r4rating.com circular reference citing the copy-pasted page. —Josh3580_talk/hist 02:28, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

ARGNet

Can the alternate reality game site ARGNet be considered a reliable source? I found a couple of articles online that I might want to use in an article, but I am not sure about the reliability of the site? SciGal (talk) 13:39, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

Looking at the site I can't find any sign of editorial oversight. The articles therefore are in the category of blogs or at any rate, self published material. They are not reliable, except under very limited circumstances as per WP:SPS and WP:USERG. --Luke Warmwater101 (talk) 05:17, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I asked because I wanted to use a couple of reviews in an article. I wanted to place the reviews under a Reception heading. SciGal (talk) 21:10, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I think that I might have enough material to write the reception without ARGNet. Thank you. SciGal (talk) 14:27, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

AllicinFacts.com

Source: www.allicinfacts.com

Article: Indigenous_peoples_of_the_Americas#European_colonization

Content: "Within a few years smallpox killed between 60% and 90% of the Inca population, with other waves of European diseases weakening them further."

Copyright information says: Natural Health Publications Limited.

Terms of use:

--Langus (t) 00:03, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Why would anyone even think that we should use a website for "selected information about garlic" to source a statement about the effects of smallpox on the Inca? It is an utterly ridiculous source to use - and there is no lack of proper academic material on the subject matter. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:16, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Specific page in question, for completeness. Clearly not reliable for Incan history. Yobol (talk) 00:22, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Did someone really think this would fly as a source? Really? Collect (talk)

Thank you everyone. --Langus (t) 00:52, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Is IndiaMapia reliable?

Is this a reliable source for the existence, location and coordinates of Paloorkavu (and, by extension, of any other stubby village articles I come across and feel inclined to upgrade)? IndiaMapia doesn't say much about itself, and I can't find it in the noticeboard archives. PamD 11:40, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Looks like an aggregator to me, and it says We applogize for any errors if encountered by you or any other incorrect info and pledge you to point out the same so that it can be rectified. The contact address is Gmail and it has a very weird link here. I'm dubious! - Sitush (talk) 11:51, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

How reliable are the abstracts of journals compared to the actual text of the article?

The Misplaced Pages entry on abstract (summary) states: "Consulting the abstract alone is inadequate for scholarship and may lead to inappropriate medical decisions. ... An abstract allows one to sift through copious amounts of papers for ones in which the researcher can have more confidence that they will be relevant to his or her research. Once papers are chosen based on the abstract, they must be read carefully to be evaluated for relevance. It is commonly surmised that one must not base reference citations on the abstract alone, but the entire merits of a paper."

That said, assuming that (in addition to the abstract) the complete article is available, should citations (or selected quotations) be made to the abstract? I have been under the impression that the article's text always takes dominance over the abstract, and that abstracts are not designed to be cited to. Please advise. --Precision123 (talk) 12:02, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Don't cite the abstract. Treat as being only slightly better than a GBooks snippet view, ie: it lacks full context. There may be important provisos or development of argument in the body of the article itself. - Sitush (talk) 12:08, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

In many cases, however, the full paper is behind a paywall while the abstract is freely available. In such a case (perhaps particularly in non-medical contexts) citing the abstract may be better than including no citation at all, which may be the only other practical choice. For example at Great American Lesbian Art Show citation number 11 (Stifler, Sarah L. (2002). "Slippery When Wet: An Exhibition Dossier". GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 8 (1-2): 241-249.) is to an abstract. For the matter of that, citing to a GBooks snippet is common and in many cases is perfectly sufficient. DES 12:49, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry but I don't follow you at all. If an editor can't or hasn't read an article then he or she shouldn't be citing it. If he or she has read an article then it should be cited regardless of whether it's freely available or not. ElKevbo (talk) 17:20, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Whoah there, a Google snippet should never be used as the basis of a cite. I've seen many cases of lazy sourcing to a cite using Google snippets and it nearly always produces misleading results. For example an editor making a claim ignorant of the fact that a negative on the preceding line completed flipped the meaning of line quoted. I see someone has also had a similar experience below. I personally would not quote a source unless I could definitively verify a claim and a snippet simply can't do that. I would go so far as to make it policy that Google snippets are not a WP:RS. Wee Curry Monster talk 18:35, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree that an editor shouldn't rely only on a brief passage from a source as the basis for adding information to an article. I don't mind, however, if someone cites a source and also provides a link to the specific passage in question if it's available in Google books or another website; that's less of a bibliographic issue than a courtesy for readers. The full source is the origin of the cited fact(s), not the complimentary snippet. ElKevbo (talk) 19:06, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

It is all a matter of degree. Nobody will argue that the best thing is to read a source in its entirety and extract information from there. If that is not plausible, one can use some part of the source with differing degrees of danger involved. A Google snippet is one of the most dangerous things, as it is a more or less random bit of text that lacks any selection process that would make it representative. (Once I cited a very clear statement in a snippet only to later discover that the next sentence, invisible in the snippet, said something like "but nobody believes that any more".) Abstracts written by authors (the usual thing for journal articles) are much better than that because they are intended by the authors to be valid summaries. If one wants to summarise a whole article, rather than to cite a detail, the author's abstract is often a very good start and even protects you from a charge that you are not reflecting the author's opinion correctly. To cite a detail from an article, the abstract might not be good enough since the author might have simplified it for brevity (journals often have word limits on abstracts). An abstract written by someone else is much less reliable than one written by the author, and I would not normally trust it unless the writer of the abstract is an expert in the field. Similarly for book reviews. Zero 13:11, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

True, but I often find that a snippet view includes the whole of a section or sub-section dealing with a specific topic, particularly when the source is an "encyclopedia" or "reader" with many short contributions by different authors, a snippet may well contain the whole of the specific contribution. In that case it may well be nearly as good as having the actual book. Again an example from the Great American Lesbian Art Show article (which i recent spent a good deal of time citing, so it is fresh in my mind) Catation #9 is (Hammond, Harmony (2000). "Art, Contemporary North American". In Zimmerman, Bonnie; Haggerty, George E. Encyclopedia of Lesbian and Gay Histories and Cultures. Taylor & Francis. pp. 64–5. Retrieved 1 February 2014.) The link is to a Google books snippet view, but it includes the whole of the "Art, Contemporary North American" entry. In such a case I see no issue with a snippet citaiton. DES 14:56, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

No abstracts, no snippet views, period. If something is behind a paywall then ask around: interlibrary loans, WP:RX etc. There is almost always a way & if something is that obscure that it cannot be obtained nor verified by an alternate source then it probably isn't worth including in the article anyway. Anyone who relies on snippets etc is plain dangerous to this project: there are plenty of examples outside the scope of medicine where this could be demonstrated, eg: in my dealings with caste-related articles. - Sitush (talk) 15:13, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

It's not the point of this thread but I'll add that both abstracts and snippet views are fine for finding potential sources. Just don't use them as the source. Occasionally, I use a Further reading section as a location for something that looks useful but is inaccessible to me. - Sitush (talk) 15:21, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with that view. It may be reasonable for stuff under the WP:MEDRS restrictions, I don't work on that stuff much so I won't offer an opinion there. But in many cases a snippet view clearly includes all the relevant section of a large book, and is ample to work from. I have done so on many occasions and plan to continue where it seems appropriate. Where a snippet is cut-off in the midst of the relevant section, then it is far less safe to rely on it, because missing context may indeed be crucial. As for abstracts, it depends how they are worded, and what fact is being cited. If it is merely that researcher X wrote aboput subject Y and the general tone of the reaction, to help establish notability, in a "reactions" section of an article about a literary work, say, an abstract should be perfectly fine. DES 16:11, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

It will take a bit of time but you might benefit from a read of Talk:Tamil Kshatriya and its archives. Even stuff that appears to be self-contained is not necessarily so ... and you'll never know unless you've read around the limited view. This applies even to such seemingly basic statements as "X are a Hindu caste" - I know because I've seen it happen. - Sitush (talk) 18:11, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Absolutely, I would strongly agree that Google snippets are inherently unreliable and no matter how well intentioned you simply cannot get enough information from them to form a cite. Anyone doing this and thinking its acceptable should be hit with a WP:CLUE stick repeatedly. Wee Curry Monster talk 18:35, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I've found it, the source described Laurence Olivier's performance as "Not one of Olivier's best performances." the quote culled from snippers was "one of Olivier's best performances." Spot an obvious problem with snippets? Wee Curry Monster talk 18:45, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

• It depends. There cannot possibly be a "always yes" or "always no" answer to this question. There are far too many different type of journals and abstracts to have a general answer. My experience is with medical journals, and the answer is sometimes yes, sometimes no. For certain kinds of journal articles like systematic reviews, they will be investigating a very narrow question and often the abstract contains all the information you need, like "Ibuprofen is more effective than paracetamol for treating X" so you do not need the full article. If you get access to the whole article, it'll be 8 pages describing their methodology, and one paragraph at the end stating their conclusion, which is repeated in the abstract. Although sometimes they'll put just enough info in the abstract to let you know if you need to get the whole article to see the conclusion ("We conclude by discussing the relative effectiveness of ibuprofen and paracetamol"--bastards!). Sometimes you'll get the conclusion in the abstract ("Acupuncture was no better than usual care for X") but then you'll need the full article to find out what they mean by "usual care". For other kinds, like for literature reviews, the abstract will probably too brief a summary to be useful and you'll need the full article. It depends. Zad68 15:37, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

• The problem is that you cannot possibly know whether the abstract would suffice without reading the entire thing. I'm no medic but I be hesitant to accept even your Ibuprofen example without reading the detail. As with law, the small print should not be ignored and I'm astonished that people think otherwise. - Sitush (talk) 16:03, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

• Agreed. We should not be using abstracts. Sure, maybe it is the conclusion copied as an abstract, but you can't tell until you read the source. I'd say the same thing about snippets - I've never or rarely seen a snippet of a book that I could be sure presented all the relevant information (including the context). Dougweller (talk) 18:20, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

• Also agreed. Context is key, and you will not know whether context is missing unless you read the entire source. Yobol (talk) 16:47, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree but would be bit more stringent and say that it's a rare instance when it's a good idea to rely on an abstract instead of an entire article. The only time I would think it's acceptable to cite an abstract is if that is the specific item an editor means to use as a source. But that should be a fairly rare occurrence especially if editors are not engaging in original research. ElKevbo (talk) 17:23, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

• Actually this question is regarding a specific situation. An editor has read the entire paper and is citing the entire paper, but is also using a small quote from the abstract as part of the citation. Precision123 is trying to use the discussion here as the basis for disallowing the quote from the abstract as part of the citation. I don't see any support for that in this discussion. I would appreciate comments from uninvolved editors. The article in question is Haaretz, the relevant discussion is here. Dlv999 (talk) 23:14, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

To clarify, my position is that any citation, selected quotation, or inference taken from an article should come from part of the article itself (especially given that the entire article is available). Abstracts are not designed to be cited and I agree with the consensus here that citations are made to the body of the article (and specifically, certain pages therein), and not the abstract. --Precision123 (talk) 23:18, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

So the question is, can a quote be used from the abstract as part of a citation of the full paper, by an editor that has read the full paper and is citing the full paper. Dlv999 (talk) 23:20, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Dlv999, I am unsure what you mean by "citing the full paper." I myself have read the full paper, not that that should make any difference in evaluating the merits of citing abstracts (e.g., citing scholarly journals generally involves citing page numbers). Any conclusion or inference drawn from an article should be drawn directly from a specific part of the article itself. Citing or quoting abstracts is not responsible editing. --Precision123 (talk) 23:22, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Most of the discussion here has been about a hypothetical scenario in which an editor may try to cite the abstract without reading the paper. That is not the situation we are discussing. The editor has read the whole paper and is citing the whole paper. they judge the abstract is a good summary of the whole paper and are quoting from the abstract as part of the citation. Apart from yourself I haven't seen any other editor objecting to that course of action and I would be interested if there are any objections (other than yourself). Dlv999 (talk) 23:36, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Easy peasy. Read the article. Read the abstract. If the abstract is a fair representation of what's in the article then go ahead and use it. If the abstract is not a fair representation of what's in the article then don't. The abstract is usually (though not always) the author's attempt at summary - far better to trust their choice of summary than an anonymous Misplaced Pages editor's (who likely has an axe to grind and doesn't have to go through a peer review process to grind it.) You're welcome.Dan Murphy (talk) 23:26, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Per Dan Murphy, but is this just about the quote in the footnote? If so, it is no problem at all. Leave it in as a quote - add that it is from the article abstract - or leave it out, or find a quote in the article body. Itsmejudith (talk) 23:38, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

The question is not about summarizing the journal article, but rather about citing a certain conclusion or inference from it. As the choice of language and context might differ, even slightly, it is better to cite a specific section of the article rather than the abstract. Indeed, citations are generally made to specific pages, even if it is to the conclusion section at the end of the article, and not to the abstract. This is especially the case when the entire article is readily viewable. --Precision123 (talk) 23:41, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Indeed, Itsmejudith, I had found the relevant part in the article body, which should be favored. --Precision123 (talk) 23:43, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Also, this may give us some insight

• From Indiana State University:

  ABSTRACTS: Sometimes the index entry will include, following the basic citation, an Abstract. An abstract is simply a summary of the main points of the article. This is more common in a specialized subject index. The purpose is to allow the researcher an idea of the article's content before taking the time to go to the actual article. Abstracts often contain important and useful information but using the information in the abstract (perhaps 50-100 words) is in no way the same as reading and summarizing the actual article. Do not cite the Abstract as if it were the complete article!

• From the University of Southern California:

  Never Cite Just the Abstract! Citing to just an article's abstract does not confirm for the reader that you have conducted a thorough or reliable review of the literature. If the full-text is not available, search the HOMER catalog by journal title to see if we have it. If USC does not have the journal, you can request it from our interlibrary loan and document delivery service.

  --Precision123 (talk) 23:59, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Sure, but no one here is considering citing the abstract without reading the paper. We have read the paper and consider the abstract to be a good summary of the paper. The paper is being cited, a quote is being used from the abstract as a footnote in the citation. Dlv999 (talk) 00:04, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Please avoid the use of "we." Second, "using the information in the abstract is in no way the same as reading and summarizing the actual article. Do not cite the Abstract as if it were the complete article!" What they warn against sounds like exactly what you suggest doing (i.e., using the abstract to cite the article in its entirety). These two guidelines point to the same conclusion: the most reliable thing to do is to cite a specific part of "the actual article." --Precision123 (talk) 00:11, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Those are guidelines for undergraduates writing papers for credit in classes. How in the world are they relevant here?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:13, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Actually, both universities have graduate and professional schools and the guidelines are used for PhD and other doctoral candidates. Aside from that, as noted, they were being used for insight as to the reliability and verifiability of abstracts versus the actual article. Both support the conclusion that citation to the actual article is what is optimal. --Precision123 (talk) 00:22, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't see how it makes sense, even where MEDRS applies to say that you can never cite an abstract. We ought to be able to apply some common sense, and it really isn't comparable to using a Google snippet. It might make a difference whether you are citing the abstract for findings or background information, and it's going to be important to consider the possibility that the abstract might lack some important context or caveat. For example, this abstract contains the information that there is no known cure for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. I fail to see what difference it makes whether I source that information to the abstract or the article. It's not as if I am likely to download the full article and find that the statement is false. Formerip (talk) 00:09, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Per the guidelines above, it seems that abstracts are not designed to be cited to, but rather a means by which readers can decide if they would like to read the actual article. It is not about finding the statement to be false once the article is opened; rather, it is about upholding reliability and verifiability of conclusions. As choice of language might differ, it is the actual article that is dominant. Note again that citations are made to certain sections or pages of journal articles--not the abstracts. --Precision123 (talk) 00:14, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Why do you think it should matter what a source was designed for? All that really matters is the level of risk associated with citing to it. If there's no risk, there's no harm. Formerip (talk) 00:23, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

It is not a matter of "harm," but about accurately citing the author's research/viewpoint the best way possible and citing to the language of the source in the most reliable way possible. Per above, citing to the actual article (which is designed to be cited to) is what most reliably and verifiably conveys the merits the article. Note also, that most journal articles have conclusion sections. --Precision123 (talk) 00:31, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

If it's not about harm (i.e. how reliable the source is), then it's not really something that needs discussing on this noticeboard. But you're confusing me because, whether the article or the abstract has been referred to, surely that actual text of the citation is going to be identical, and so no more or less reliable or indicative of merit in either case? Formerip (talk) 00:42, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

I am sorry you were confused. The fact is that the choice of language or a given inference is not always identical in the abstract as in the actual article. When that happens, it appears that the best thing to do is cite the actual article (the reliable source), which is actually meant to be cited to. We come across thousands of citations to journal articles; they are generally cited to specific pages, not the abstract. The university guidelines have given us some definitional insight into what an abstract is and what it is not, and seem to frown upon citations to the abstract as a way of citing to the entire article. Put simply, when we have the actual article's words, why would we use the abstract? If there is a difference, even slight, the actual article is dominant. --Precision123 (talk) 00:52, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

OK you've convinced me that an article is a better thing to cite than an abstract. But that's not the question. It doesn't mean that an abstract can never be reliable. Formerip (talk) 01:03, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Sure, FormerIP, I am sorry for the confusion. Let me try and divide the issue here. An abstract does often do a good job outlining some of the main points, but I found that it would be inappropriately and possibly unreliably used to cite a source in its entirety. I agree with the guideline that "using the information in the abstract (perhaps 50-100 words) is in no way the same as reading and summarizing the actual article." That said, if we want to quote or paraphrase a conclusion from the source, it ought to come from the actual article, not the abstract. I hope we are on the same page now. Best, --Precision123 (talk) 01:16, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

If we're on the page where it says: "it depends", then sure. Formerip (talk) 01:24, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Here are some more citation guides and descriptions of abstracts:

• From Skidmore College:

  Remember: Abstracts do not give you a complete picture. They may sometimes be inaccurate in the details, so you should not cite the abstract. If the abstract and the discussion differ, you should go with the information given in the introduction.

• From the College of Benedict & Saint John's University:

  You should not cite an abstract, which is simply a condensed summary of the article written by the author to help researchers know if the information will be helpful.

• The guidelines of many journals, in accepting submissions, state:

  Abstracts should not be cited unless the abstract is the only available reference to an important concept.

• This guide to scholarly article writing states:

  Abstracts cannot be cited as references.

--Precision123 (talk) 06:55, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

As others have noted, there are several questions being discussed here all at once.

1. Is an abstract reliable? If it's published in a reliable peer-reviewed journal, yes, in Misplaced Pages terms it is, and in all usual cases the abstract is written by the author of the article.
2. Should we rely on an abstract to tell us what the article says, or when we are citing for a fact or claim? No, we shouldn't. Only the article says what the article says: only the article says exactly how confident the author is about facts or claims.
3. (Rare case.) Should we quote from the abstract? Not normally, but we might -- why not? It's like quoting from the first paragraph or the conclusion: it might happen to give the author's view more succinctly than any sentence in the body of the article. But then we should say in our text "X writes, in the abstract to his paper ..." because the reader needs to know that we are doing this.
4. Should we link to the abstract? Well, yes, if we can't link to a free copy of the article, and we can link to a free copy of the abstract, of course we should. The reader can go on from there, buy the article, find it in a library, get it through JSTOR or Athena or whatever. We will be citing the full paper, adding a link to the page that contains a free abstract.
5. Should we cite the abstract? No, we cite the paper. By following the link, all that some readers will be able to see for free is the abstract, but others, e.g. in a subscribing library, will be able to see the whole paper.
6. (Rare case.) If we quote verbatim from the abstract, what do we cite? We cite the paper, and add the word "abstract" -- e.g. where we would normally put the page number. We also make clear in our text that we are quoting from the abstract.

That's how I see it. Andrew Dalby 10:07, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Salutary reminder - even publishers such as ABC-CLIO can slip badly

I just came across The Axis Air Forces:Flying in Support of the German Luftwaffe by Frank Joseph. ABC-CLIO describes him as "professor of world archaeology with Japan's Savant Institute, and recipient of the Midwest Epigraphic Society's Victor Moseley Award. His published works include more than 20 books in as many foreign editions, such as Mussolini's War: Fascist Italy's Military Struggles from Africa and Western Europe to the Mediterranean and Soviet Union 1935–45." Impressive, right? At face value, certainly sounds like a reliable source if you don't question it. But leaving aside the fact that the Savant Institute only seems to be mentioned on the web in connection with Joseph, we know Joseph better as Frank Collin, ex-Nazi and writer of New Age and fringe archaeology material. It's actually disappoint to see such a well known publisher misrepresent an author in this way, but a warning to all of us not to take publisher's statements at face value. Dougweller (talk) 13:08, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Quick check- his Air Forces book is used in several articles: (reviewed here, "Mussolini's War: Fascist Italy's Military Struggles from Africa" used even more widely:, "Western Europe to the Mediterranean and Soviet Union 1935–45"is used in . Dougweller (talk) 13:21, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

International University of Canada

This university appears not to exist. It does have a website, allows emails to be sent to different departments, and has a couple phone numbers to contact the university. However, after several emails were sent during a weeks time none of the emails were ever responded to. I did call the United States phone number listed and it is a boggus number. The university is not identified when you call, only a machine answers and you are not able to leave a message. I have requested accreditation informations several times and no one responds. I can't find anyone who works at this university.

Please add this university to your list of universities that are not accreditated.

thanks

Pamela Geller is right wing

1. Sources:

• Malise Ruthven, Encounters with Islam (I.B.Tauris, 2012), p. 185.
• Gordon Lynch, The Sacred in the Modern World (Oxford University Press, 2012), p. 119.
• Micki McElya, "To "Choose Our Better History": Assessing the Obama Presidency in Real Time", American Quarterly, Vol. 63, No. 1 (March 2011), p. 181.
• Liyakat Takim, "The Ground Zero Mosque Controversy: Implications for American Islam", Religions Vol. 2, No. 2 (2011), p. 136.

2. Article: Pamela Geller

3. Content: "Pamela Geller is right wing" --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 01:01, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Huffington Post

The Huffington Post is notorious for fabrication, particularly in politics. They have often been criticized for their liberal bias and skewing. Essentially, they are a liberal equivalent of FOX News.

• http://www.truthinaction.org/index.php/2012/08/the-huffington-posts-distortions-another-example-of-media-bias/
• http://www.mediaite.com/online/arianna-huffington-asks-is-this-left/
• http://newscastmedia.com/blog/2012/08/28/biased-liberal-media-huffington-post-removes-gop-logo/
• http://dailykos.com/story/2009/05/02/727191/-Science-bloggers-challenge-credibility-of-Huffington-Post-8220-wellness-8221-editor
• http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/pseudoscience-in-medical-news-at-the-huffington-post/
• http://www.salon.com/2009/07/30/huffington_post/
• http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/05/01/what-to-do-about-huffpo/
• http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/12/14/what-do-fox-news-and-the-huffi/
• http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/homeopathy-pseudoscience-at-the-huffpo/
• http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/mar/05/huffington-post-aol
• http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/12/huffington-post-is-target-of-suit-on-behalf-of-bloggers/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0
• http://www.webpronews.com/huffington-post-attracts-new-round-of-criticism-2011-02
• http://www.beliefnet.com/columnists/stevenwaldman/2009/01/huffington-post-cant-replace-t.html
• http://variety.com/2013/voices/columns/why-aaron-sorkin-is-right-about-the-huffington-post-1200586487/

XXSNUGGUMSXX (talk) 18:43, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

The Huff Po has received the Pulitzer - the first given to an only online news source- so like all sources, its reliability depends. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:51, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Opinions remain opinions citable as such. For straight facts - about the same as other sources, but it does very little non-opinion-based reportage. Collect (talk) 19:11, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Reliability depends? Never heard that before, only overall reliability levels..... which in this case is low based on its repeated criticisms for fraudulent claims in things like politics and science and medicine. They are also notorious for distorting information based on their own opinions/bias. XXSNUGGUMSXX (talk) 19:18, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

If you've never heard that "Reliability depends" before read policy. The very statement is made at least 3 times in WP:RS: "Proper sourcing always depends on context", "The reliability of a source depends on context", " Deciding which sources are appropriate depends on context", "News reports may be acceptable depending on the context". IRWolfie- (talk) 20:12, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

In any case, Huffington Post is not under any circumstance reliable due to repeated fraudulence and distorting information (and taking things out of context) with their own bias. XXSNUGGUMSXX (talk) 20:28, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

As always, it depends on the context. Not particularly reliable for science (most of the really unreliable articles are actually blog pieces), but newspapers publish about other things. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:09, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Ballotpedia

Is being added to some BLPs - the problem I have is that it appears less sourced than the corresponding Misplaced Pages articles. In the case of Rick Scott it has his mom working for "J. C. Penny" and the like -- which makes me doubt that it is really a "reliable source" as required by Misplaced Pages. In addition, it is a wiki, though it says most articles are professionally written or reviewed. But whn such silly stuff is in it, and much has no references, I somehow think t fails WP:RS. It even has a place for politicians to "submit your bio to Ballotpedia" which makes me even more credulous.

Other views? Collect (talk) 18:54, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

As a wiki, it's not reliable as a citation. Might be an indication, like Misplaced Pages itself, of where to find citations. I personally wouldn't erase material cited to it before looking to see if it was backed up by something that we'd consider reliable, and then change the citation. But it shouldn't be cited as a source by itself. __ E L A Q U E A T E 19:06, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

In the case at hand, it was given as "further reading" bust since it seems actually less useful than the WP article, I considered that use risible. Cheers. Collect (talk) 19:09, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

That might be covered in the proposed Misplaced Pages:Further reading. Some opinionated sources are fine but only if balanced appropriately by other sources per NPOV? And if there isn't agreement, it's probably better to not have the Further Reading section? For reliability specifically, it advises that further reading can sometimes have links to places considered generally unreliable, but When such sources are listed, the relevance of the work should be explained by a brief annotation. I think the decision to use it is probably a consensus one on the talk page, and if it's linked that way at all, there should be an brief explanation of its wiki-ness. I don't have an opinion about its usefulness in that specific example though; it sounds contentious. But we have plenty of generally unreliable sources linked to in the Further Reading sections of articles, with local consensus for their inclusion. One example is all of the Find-A-Grave links. (and a local consensus should take still take BLP policy into especial consideration, of course). __ E L A Q U E A T E 19:34, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

To clarify Collect's first statement, I added it to the Further reading section of Rick Scott - please see WP:FURTHER - as it provides background sources similar to those included in Template:GovLinks which was recently deleted after being used for years in all the articles about current and fairly recent US governors. I asked Collect about the template three times, and three times he ignored me: see recent Rick Scott edits and talk:Collect#Further_reading. He also repeatedly refused to discuss WP:FURTHER. It appears he is trying to WP:GAME by posting here. Note: Collect did not inform me of this discussion unless you count the cryptic "Query made at RS/N if you care.", and I find that, and his use of "bust" and "risible", un-Wikipedian and quite WP:POINTY. 71.23.178.214 (talk) 20:05, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

As for his "submit your bio" remark, that is exactly what Project Vote Smart does, along with all the rest of the political transparency sources. None of them publish any material "as is", but they ask politicians and the general public for information which they then verify. The most respected news media (TV, newspapers, radio) do "candidate questionnaires". This is standard practice. 71.23.178.214 (talk) 20:05, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

This is the Ballotpedia section I am referring to, similar to the resources which were previously included in Template:GovLinks. 71.23.178.214 (talk) 20:13, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Definitely not a RS for BLPs, I think that should be pretty clear. For the same reason, should not be contained in 'further reading' (it's actually an external link and should be an EL if included). Dubious about it's use for anything else as we should be able to find original sources for any of it. This is a WP:Tertiary source, right? Dougweller (talk) 06:34, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Jevto Dedijer

The new article Skaramuca sounds like a copy of some of the typical Serbian nationalist forum posts - a glaring WP:COATRACK violation which focuses on a purported Serbian nature of a surname and people, who today by and large seem to be Croatian. Specifically, the whole innuendo depends on Jevto Dedijer's 1909 book. Can this source be considered reliable for claims such as these? Given the confusingly wide scope of the article, talking about people having the same surname over a period of centuries (?) up to the present day, this could even be considered a WP:BLP violation. --Joy (talk) 21:01, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Deadspin

While not the most ideal source, can someone comment if this Deadspin article is reliable for the opinions of two journalists who are skeptical that Dock Ellis threw a no hitter while on LSD? This story has been around for decades, and the opinion by these journos seems highly relevant and provides some balance to this claim.Two kinds of pork (talk) 02:15, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Reliability of CollegeAtlas.org for claim that BYU is third-largest private university in U.S.

Is this page at CollegeAtlas.org a reliable source to support the claim that Brigham Young University is the third-largest private university in the U.S.? That page clearly makes that claim but it's unclear where that information came from or what substantiates it. The "about" page of CollegeAtlas.org doesn't seem to tell us anything helpful about where the information came from other than saying that "CollegeAtlas.org relies on feedback from schools, education professionals and students to help keep content up to date and accurate." (It's clear to me that a lot of the information in the website is taken from the Department of Education as much of it is verbatim from College Navigator, including the pie charts and graphs. But it also appears that some of that information is out-of-date and some of the information comes from other sources. I suspect that some of the verbage in some of the descriptions was written by the college or university in question.)

I contend that this source isn't reliable for this claim because it's clearly an incorrect statement. A quick glance at our own article on this topic shows how implausible it is that an institution with only 35,000 students isn't going to be at or near the top of any national enrollment chart unless that chart has some very significant constraints or narrow criteria well beyond "private." To double-check this, I glanced at the 2012 enrollment data in IPEDS and it shows that BYU comes up sixth in 2012 Fall FTE enrollment behind Liberty (72,904), NYU (44,516), Western Governors (40,320), USC (39,958), and Excelsior (34,563) with BYU reporting 34,409.

Another editor fervently disagrees with this analysis and insists that the statement remain in the article because it's found in this allegedly reliable source. It's not clear to me if this source is reliable for anything but it is clear that this particular statement is erroneous and not one we should be repeating unless much better evidence can be provided. Your thoughts and opinions are most welcome. ElKevbo (talk) 04:13, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't think that source should be thought that reliable, as it seems to have a certain crowd-sourced aspect to it. However, that doesn't mean what it say might not be true this time, as it all comes down to how online-only students are counted. If you measure just the ones with physical campuses and leave out online students then I think before last year New York University and USC were number one and two, with Brigham Young considered third. Then the Washington Post announced Liberty was number one here because they added all of their online admissions. Liberty only has about 12,000 offline students out of the 72,904 you quote. There are plenty of only-online universities like the University of Phoenix franchises (and your Western Governors and Excelsior examples) that exceed some of these numbers without having a physical campus, but I don't know if anybody's really checking how committed those students are to their online program, or if they're including a lot of low-fee/super-high-turnover students in order to have inflated numbers. So it is actually quiet likely that BYU is the third largest students-in-classes US private university, so I don't know if it's worth fighting in the article beyond noting the online/offline distinctions. I think BYU has the the third largest (traditionally defined) apple stand, compared to University of Phoenix's number one (full of online inflation) orange stand, in other words. I'd ask for another citation, but it might say something similar to this. __ E L A Q U E A T E 06:14, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

BC Law Review - self-published, unreliable?

At Talk:Puerto Rico#RfC:Can the existence of the PR status controversy be admitted to the article?, I propose the language, “While government sources list Puerto Rico as an "unincorporated" territory, it has also been referred to as "incorporated" into the United States during scholarly disputes over Puerto Rican status.”

I source the existence of a scholarly controversy over the status of Puerto Rico at Burnett and Marshall, Foreign in a Domestic Sense, p.15, 17.

Puerto Rico’s transition into “commonwealth” status in 1952 raised these questions in a debate that continues today. … Whether this means the island ceased to be an unincorporated territory… remain the sources of considerable disagreement. p.15

, and an element of the controversy “incorporated” at Lawson and Sloane, Boston College Law Review, p.1175 which is not currently reflected in the article.

… regardless of how Puerto Rico looked in 1901 when The Insular Cases were decided or in 1922, today, Puerto Rico seems to be the paradigm of an incorporated territory as modern jurisprudence understands that legal term of art. p.1175.

I am told here and in prior discussion that there is no controversy but my disruption and soapboxing, I am not being concise, there is no such controversy in Puerto Rican politics, it does not meet significance, and the Boston College Law Review is a self-published unreliable source. I am unsure how to procede. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:21, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

I can't speak to the argument of how significant this is in the context of the article, but "Foreign in a Domestic Sense" appears to be a scholarly book published by a reputable academic publisher (Duke University Press), and Boston College Law Review appears to be a peer-reviewed academic journal (they publish both scholarly works by law professors and local student essays, so one needs to be careful, but the one you want to cite is indeed by professors not affiliated with Boston College). Both look reliable to me, for sourcing scholarly opinion on the status of PR. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:50, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

RFC

There is an RFC which may be of interest to editors here Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Trademarks#RFC_to_resolve_conflict_between_MOS:TM.2C_MOS:CT_WP:TITLETM_WP:RS_WP:COMMONNAME Gaijin42 (talk) 16:06, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages noticeboards
• Misplaced Pages dispute resolution