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This is Jimbo Wales's talk page, where you can send them messages and comments.

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Should we cite most sentences?

I don't bother you often, but recently something shocked me. I recall few years ago you were in favor of WP:V and WP:CITE. Recently, my arguments that we should cite most sentences have met with sharp rebukes along the lines that "Misplaced Pages doesn't need many references because they are ugly and unnecessary" (see here, for example). What's your take on that? Would you prefer one cite per paragraph or per sentence? (With no prejudice to talk page stalkers joining in, I am really curious what's Jimbo's opinion on that). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 02:45, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I am strongly in favor of WP:V and WP:CITE. But you are asking about a stylistic matter, and for the particular case under discussion, I think you're wrong. I think it is wrong to repeat the same cite over and over for every sentence in a paragraph, when a single footnote at the end of the entire paragraph does the same work and is much more readable.

In general, it is broadly desirable that every fact in wikipedia (other than "The sky is blue" types of claims that are part of universal human experience) be backed up by a quality source. But the stylistic matter of whether the citation should be at the clause, sentence, paragraph, or section level, depends on the individual case.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 09:52, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your input. I wish there was an easy way to reconcile this, but situations like this show why I prefer overciting to underciting. Two evils, huh? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 17:24, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Right. So while we might disagree in individual cases, I think we agree on the broad principle.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 16:59, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Maybe some day links can be unobtrusively hidden inside each sentence with html so if somes reader like me questions its validity, I could simply click anywhere on the sentence for its "proof" Or maybe embed the proof inside each sentences first letter or last punctuation. Thats might "prettyfy" readability. Idk if "prettyfication" is a priority those, and that might be too technically tedious... Idk. Just an idea. (Btw androids dolphine browser stilll has some kinks interacting with sites like wiki, facebook, etc. writting this comment was difficult) --ARKBG1 (talk) 20:08, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I tend to cite more than the average contributor, from what I have seen, but then my topics, Mexican locations, dont tend to have encylopedic or academic sources so I have to piece the information together. Im a writing teacher in my non WP life and the general academic rule is that a citation covers everything before it, up to the previous citation or the beginning of the paragraph. So, a paragraph with a single source at the end indicates that all of the information in that paragraph is from the same source. As none of the information in our articles should be first person experience, techinically all sentences should come from one source or another. I have,however, been asked to repeat citations for DYK hooks, as the hook information came from a sentence prior to the one that carries the citation.Thelmadatter (talk) 01:12, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Really, the only places where the common knowledge issue is likely to come up is in the sciences, such as basic information about water and things like that. Practically everything else (though with some possible exceptions) needs a citation as it isn't common knowledge, even within the discipline. But if you're using a single source for paragraphs of information, it really is best just to put it at the end of each paragraph. (Thus, I agree) Silverseren 01:15, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not so sure, Silver. I think there are lots of statements that are plenty universally known so as not to need a cite. That doesn't form a complete argument against citing, of course. I mean, for many things, even "the sky is blue", if the cite is interesting and valid and stylistically appropriate in the article, well, why not? Michael Jackson was a singer. John Wayne was an actor. Not everyone knows those things (particularly people who don't know much about English-language pop culture) but that doesn't mean that we must cite it, and I'd be opposed to changing this sentence "Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American recording artist, dancer, singer-songwriter, musician, and philanthropist." so that it would have a cite after each of those separate claims.

Balance is the key, as always, even if this leaves us in the deliciously uncomfortable position of not having a simple rule and having to talk about everything all the time. But that's what we do best, I think: chew on things to think up a good solution.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 16:59, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Featured articles normally demand very dense citation. The best reason for this is because if you cite an entire paragraph from a single source (and therefore a single reference is placed at the end of the paragraph), what happens when the next editor adds an additional fact to the middle of the paragraph? It looks cited, but isn't. Or what happens if the paragraph is split up? --Dweller (talk) 17:07, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
Cite every paragraph, sentence, phrase, word and/or character (as required), but please create a mechanism whereby there is a shiny "show citations" button (off by default) for the anonymous reader, and a similar preference-based button (on by default) for the logged-in reader/editor. That way there is no terrifying change to the display of citations for the editors, but the vast majority of WP users (the readers who couldn't give a toss about how the information got there) can have a better experience by not encountering a flood of saccade-inducing superscripted numeric hurdles.  GFHandel.   21:01, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I have a script for that, I can give you the code if you want it --Errant 21:08, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

That's actually a really good idea.Thelmadatter (talk) 15:14, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Disgraceful, thinly-veiled racist comments

I saw on another user's page (User talk:Tothwolf) that you prize respect and civility on the Internet. Perhaps you should police your own web site better, see the comments made at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Foxmail. FuFoFuEd (talk) 13:28, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

What part of that discussion contains racist comments? I did a quick skim and nothing jumped out at me. Can you please be more specific? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 14:20, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Read it as well. Nothing stands out at all as even remotely racist. -- Avanu (talk) 14:28, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Ok, I'm just "going back to China" then, where there's no Misplaced Pages editing. May the English-speaking self-promoters fill your site with all the goodies it richly deserves, and which I had found plenty here, and may your "good faith" editors delete all the content about foreign stuff that has "no sources". At least a black slave counted for 3/5s of a white man, gook sources seem to count for 0. FuFoFuEd (talk) 16:53, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Rest assured that the admin who closes the AfD is supposed to look at the quality of the arguments, and not a count of keep and delete votes, and even if the article is deleted, there's a deletion review you can initiate.

BTW, here are a couple English-language sources you can add to the article. Sorry, I know it's not much, but it's all I could find. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:03, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

<-:::Sorry, which editor has told you to go back to China? That's appalling and they should be strongly dealt with. --Dweller (talk) 17:04, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

By the looks of it, nobody. Unless there is something I am missing, it seems FuFoFuEd is getting bent out of shape because some editors have a (mistaken) belief that no English sources = no English notability. I'm not seeing even the slightest hint of racism in that AfD. Resolute 17:15, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

BTW, if you want to see something genuinely offensive, check out Category:Chinamen which has been nominated for deletion. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:12, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Although the tone is not helpful, I have some sympathy with this complaint. For example, one comment asks "How could we write this?" -- implying that nobody who speaks Chinese can be trusted to write a proper article. There are quite a number of comments in the AfD that I would find unpleasant if I were Chinese. Looie496 (talk) 17:49, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure which comment you're referring to, but I don't think that's what they meant. AFAIK, no one working on the article or participating in the deletion discussion (so far) speaks Chinese. IOW, they're arguing that we lack the expertise/knowledge to write about this topic effectively. I don't agree that that's a valid reason for deletion, but I think that's what they're saying. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:54, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I believe that's my comment, but it certainly can't possibly be the reason why FuFoFuEd is upset; I didn't post anything to that discussion until AFTER FuFoFuEd posted his complaint here. But, yes, your characterization is not far off: I don't doubt the subject is notable. Clearly it is. And of course I realize that we must have some competent bilingual editors. I merely pose what I intend as a pragmatic concern, that there's a difference between citing a few sentences with translations to verify a few facts vs. trying to write an English wiki article where the only secondary sources available are all in Chinese. That sounds like we're translating whole sources to achieve verifiability per WP:NOENG, which seems to raise copyright concerns, if nothing else. Msnicki (talk) 18:05, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I think you'll find that most people are fairly fluent in Google Translate these days. Perhaps that point should be added to the Notability guidelines. Life isn't nearly as difficult as some would try to make it. Flatterworld (talk) 14:37, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

As noted at the AfD, the sources in question are in Google books, which Google Translate doesn't work on because they're images. Msnicki (talk) 16:31, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Try smartphone ocr apps such as Google Goggles (also Google Translate blog report here) and Cam Translator. Flatterworld (talk) 20:11, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I've spoken out against such comments many times myself. I went through this with uCoz (and a SPA account which was AfDing all such services and software) which is a well known Russian service provider, although I've still been unable to find someone who can translate material to expand the English version of the article.

That said, while I agree with FuFoFuEd in that those comments in the Foxmail AfD were probably in poor judgment, I'm not happy with FuFoFuEd's wikihounding behaviour in AfDing things I've edited in retaliation for me bringing up his behaviour at ANI (including AfDing a stub article where notability was established in the last AfD and closed as keep). FuFoFuEd clearly is not a new editor and with things a few other editors noticed, I can now easily connect him to at least two other accounts (and probably more if I were to process and analyze those account contributions). --Tothwolf (talk) 20:17, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

It strikes me that if anyone's skin is so thin they see bias in the discussion at that AfD, perhaps the rough and tumble of online debate just might not be their thing. This is, after all, the same debate where it appears I've been described a lot less obliquely as "the twit only looking for excuses" and my contributions as "trying to reinforce laziness with stupidity" even AFTER I !voted to keep. I think we should be able to discuss an AfD, including any concerns about what to do about sources in another language, without having to chill the room in this manner. Msnicki (talk) 21:25, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Five pillars, again

I'm sorry to bother you with this, because I know you dislike being called on for pronouncements like this, but the endless dispute about how to categorize Misplaced Pages:Five pillars refuses to die. Your three-word response at User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_65#WP:5P is being put forward as proof that the popular introductory page is, itself, an actual, independent policy (like WP:NPOV or WP:DEL) rather than a summary of the community's written policies, like WP:TRIFECTA (the page that 5P was based on) or other pages about Misplaced Pages:Principles.

The practical implications are that if 5P is a policy, and 5P somehow conflicted with another written policy (e.g., NPOV), then we'd need to reconcile the pages as if they were equals; if it summarizes our written policies, then we'd just correct 5P to match the "official" policies. The more immediate, and apparently undying, problem is that it is not possibly to simultaneously categorize the page as being a policy and a not-policy, and demands for clarifying its status on that point have appeared every few months for years. (The talk page archives, especially in comments from its original author, consistently assert that it is technically an essay that summarizes critical policies for new editors, but there are always a few people who believe that the page is, itself, a policy. For myself, I have always assumed that the talk page archives were a reliable guide to the status of the page in the community, and that if a change in status were wanted, we could organize a WP:PROPOSAL in the usual fashion for policies.)

Again, I apologize for bringing this back to you, and I realize that WP:The difference between policies, guidelines, and essays is fundamentally unimportant, but if you have a few minutes that you're willing to spend on this, I'd appreciate a response that involves a little more WP:Bradspeak, in the hope of an end to these time-sucking disputes. Thanks, WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:37, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I like the current situation where 5P is neither fish nor fowl, and hope that 5P remains an unlabeled enigma so editors eventually come to understand what not a bureaucracy means. Or perhaps we could have a setting in each editor's preferences so that some see "policy" when they view WP:5P, while others see "essay", while people who accept life's inconsistencies can have no labels on the page. Johnuniq (talk) 07:12, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Sadly, I don't think that anyone in these endlessly recurring conversations is being educated about Misplaced Pages's anti-bureaucratic notions. The editors who push for it to be labeled as a formal, officially endorsed policy page (rather than a summary of the written policies that actually reside on other pages) seem to be invincibly convinced that essays are always minority views that can and should be disregarded—you know, like all the other widely disregarded, minority-view essays, such as WP:Bold, revert, discuss and WP:Use common sense. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:58, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I can just say this: I regard the page as solid hardcore policy. It is also a summary of very important policies. I don't know why that's poses any difficulty at all. It's sort of like asking "Is the Bill of Rights policy in the United States?" Yes, of course it is, even though the Bill of Rights is actually just a list of 10 separate Amendments, each of which is also policy. What's the problem here?

The advantage of being clear that this is policy is that we avoid the argument that it is "just an essay". If the cost of that is that, as you say, we have to make sure that it harmonizes with the underlying policies, then so be it. In case of some conflict (is there any?) between the precise wording of Five Pillars and the individual pillars, then harmonization is a good idea, and if the harmonization process leads to a valuable clarifying discussion of the meaning of some aspect, that's a good thing.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 22:28, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Rick Santorum

Hello Jimbo,

Do you find it normal and acceptable that when someone googles "Santorum" or "Rick Santorum" the following Misplaced Pages article :

http://en.wikipedia.org/Santorum_%28neologism%29

... appears as the second result in both cases ?

As far as I know no other potential candidate for President of the United States has to suffer from this kind of attack from Misplaced Pages.

Thanks in advance for your reply. 96.21.84.25 (talk) 23:30, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Thats a Google issue, not a Misplaced Pages one.--MONGO 23:46, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Well it kind of is a Misplaced Pages issue as well, as we aid and abet what is essentially a manufactured slander. This is not an actual neologism, it is a deliberate coinage by a journalist with the express intent to embarrass Santorum by association. There was a straw poll on the article talk page to at least rename it to something that focuses on the controversy of the creation rather than the term itself, but apparently WP:BLP doesn't apply to politicians that most editors find disagreeable. Tarc (talk) 00:42, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Hum....it has all the appearances of a BLP issue....do you consider this to be akin to an attack page? This is the first I have even heard of it...I would say the coinage has less to do with embarrassment and more to do with harassment.--MONGO 01:02, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

We reflect the reliably sourced world in all matters encyclopedic. If this article is notable, then it should come up in a search. We're not responsible for google's indexing. User:Ocaasi 00:45, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

It looks as though there was an attempt via Misplaced Pages to spread the term linking this man's surname to anal discharge; and bear in mind that means the surname of his children and other relatives too. There's a stand-alone article about it, recently expanded; then Template:Political neologisms was created to include the term, and a few days later Template:Sexual slang was created that included it too. There are editors who say this has increased the Google ranking, and editors who say it's made no difference; I don't understand the technical issues so I can't form an opinion. But it certainly looks as though the intention was to spread it far and wide. SlimVirgin 01:12, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

That was not the intention. I am sorry that it looks that way to you. I will of course defer to community consensus with regard to the deletion discussion for Template:Political neologisms, and it looks like the community consensus will be for it to be deleted. Community consensus for the other template, Template:Sexual slang, appears to be to retain the term in the template. -- Cirt (talk) 01:41, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Cirt, I think you'd be doing yourself a favour at this point if you were to remove his name from those templates yourself. Whatever the intention was (and I'm assuming good faith that your intention was just to document this), the appearance is that Misplaced Pages is taking part in the creation of a neologism designed to hurt a living person and his family. And I think the appearance matters as much as reality at this point. SlimVirgin 02:08, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

You raise a good suggestion, SlimVirgin, I have changed my comment to "remove" the term from the template for Template:Political neologisms diff, and to "delete" the template itself diff. -- Cirt (talk) 02:31, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for doing that. SlimVirgin 03:11, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

SlimVirgin, you are most welcome. ;) Cheers, -- Cirt (talk) 03:51, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Although I am a lifelong Democrat with liberal tendencies, I personally feel that the very existence of this article is a BLP violation. Looie496 (talk) 01:44, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

The place for the community to assess consensus on whether or not to delete an article is WP:AFD. This article had three (3) attempts to get it disappeared at AFD. All three failed. It has had at least two proposals to get it shifted, merged, or stubbed. Those failed to gain consensus of support, as well. If an editor wishes for the article to be disappeared from Misplaced Pages, perhaps WP:AFD is an option for that editor. -- Cirt (talk) 01:50, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I do not believe that major BLP violations of this sort should require a consensus in order to be deleted. (I was not aware of its existence until I saw this section, by the way.) Looie496 (talk) 01:54, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

WP:AFD is the proper venue to discuss deletion of articles on Misplaced Pages. -- Cirt (talk) 01:56, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

It may very well be that the normal Misplaced Pages content control mechanisms are inadequate to handle an issue that is based on Misplaced Pages's effect on Google. The whole thing is very 'meta' and even WP:IAR would not work to deflect this sort of issue. It's easy to believe that wanting this article stubbed and the links gone is an attack on Cirt, or part of a political position (that's what happened when I proposed stubbing the article early on in this debacle) when actually it's just a desire that Misplaced Pages not be part of spreading a vile attack based on Google rankings. →StaniStani  02:01, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Looie496, "major BLP violations" do not generate the level of discussion found at Talk:Santorum_(neologism)#Proposal with many of the participants being experienced editors. --NeilN 02:03, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Experience is not always synonymous with common sense, as we are plainly seeing with a bunch of knee-jerk "it is reliably sourced so we must cover it" wiki-truisms. If there was ever a proper time for a WP:OFFICE action to call the shots, this is one of them. Tarc (talk) 02:16, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Why? It seems the community processes are working. There's a lively debate, and I think the community will come to a reasoned solution. OFFICE only applies when there's an offwiki complaint, anyway.  :) Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 08:24, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

At this point though, "the community" seems to be more interested in seeing an accused homophobe get his just desserts rather than in applying BLP policy fairly or honestly. As for complaints, I am tempted to drop the senator's people a note and point them to where a complaint can be filed. It'd be just as a valid a complaint as that silly kid's book war was. Tarc (talk) 11:39, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

It's not clear that hosting an article on the neologism is a misapplication of policy. If someone could make that case well, the problem would go away. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 12:03, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

But some of the editors who want to apply BLP policy "fairly and honestly" just want to assume bad faith. It's easier than making cogent arguements. --NeilN 12:21, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Making cogent arguments is always beneficial, I agree. Let me know when you plan to start. Tarc (talk) 13:17, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Ah yes, the old "if you don't agree with me then you have no sense" argument. --NeilN 03:10, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Compared to the even older and tireder "I can't beat my ideological opponents with intelligent, mature dialog so I will therefore emulate monkeys and fling shit upon their character" shtick that is this artificial neologism, yea, I'm comfy with saying that I am better than you on this point, bro. Tarc (talk) 04:46, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

• Note that there is ongoing discussion about the article at the BLP noticeboard: Misplaced Pages:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Santorum. --JN466 02:11, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, at the very least we can say the consensus on retaining this article reveals the mindset of the WP editors who set the consensus. I'm disappointed that Jimbo is not personally stepping in and saying "I didn't found this encyclopedia to this end" and just removing it. (A mention in the Santorum and Savage BLPs would be acceptable.) This is the same encyclopedia that refuses to use the word "Climategate" because it is deemed a pejorative. Wow! Yopienso (talk) 03:18, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Just a quick comment from a non-US editor: I had never heard of Santorum before I heard of the coined term as an internet phenomenon. This guy is probably not well known (as a politician, or a hypocrite, or whatever) outside the US, so given the remarkable publicity of this stunt, from the POV of most of the world it's probably very much a BLP1E situation: An otherwise unknown individual who became notable as a victim. From this POV it actually makes sense that the article on the term should be the first Google hit for Google searches from outside the US. Hans Adler 06:31, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

"An otherwise unknown individual who became notable as a victim" -- is this for real? He was a US Senator, and he might be a Republican presidential candidate. It's fine that you aren't familiar with him, but that hardly makes him not notable or unknown. Classic solipsism... Nomoskedasticity (talk) 08:47, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I think I made it sufficiently clear that I was talking about the international context and that any statements about notability must be interpreted in that context. How well known do you think random US senators are in Germany, Russia, Thailand, Nepal, France etc.? How many politicians of a similar rank (and no higher) do you know from these countries? And of course the international reporting about the US elections is only slowly starting. I found one report in German that mentions Santorum, with two short sentences: "Rick Santorum has hinted at a candidacy. The ex-senator has a socially conservative reputation." There are a small number of Google News hits in German about Santorum, but they are all in connection with agitation against homosexuals, nothing about him as an actual politician so they wouldn't be enough for a real article. The situation in French is similar. Hans Adler 08:56, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure I comprehend the argument you are making there; are you saying that notability should be international? Because that kinda pre-cludes the vast majority of our articles from being notable :) --Errant 09:08, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I am saying that Rick Santorum is nationally notable primarily for being a politician (presumably), and internationally for being a homophobe and the victim of a linguistic attack. I am not drawing any conclusions for articles from that. Hans Adler 10:24, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Hans, I see no evidence at all that the press in Europe has taken note of the incident, or that Santorum is notable there as a homophobe. I am finding zero Google News archive results from Britain, Germany, France, Spain, a single Italian Google News result (cited in our article). Do you have evidence to the contrary? --JN466 13:23, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Not sure where I saw the neologism stuff first; it may not have been a reliable source and it was most likely in English as it is an English neologism. In any case that was the first I ever heard of the person. If I search for "Rick Santorum" on current Google News, the first two hits are about a campaign against some company, based on its association with Santorum. Most notably there is this from Bild. Then there is a very minor mention, and the one I mentioned above. In the archive there is some other stuff, e.g. related to his connections to Opus Dei in an article about the current pope. In French, the first Google News archive hit is actually about Santorum's demand that the road in Saint Denis that is named after Mumia Abu-Jamal be renamed. – Initially I forgot to click on the archive link for Google News, so I guess I overstated his lack of notability. But of course in an international context most people will file the news about him under "one of those American rightwing nuts", and the neologism is the only thing that makes him stick in people's minds. Hans Adler 13:58, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

"Being the victim of a linguistic attack" is not really a strong reason for Misplaced Pages perpetuating the slur. Collect (talk) 10:56, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

My only thought about the whole thing is that WP:COATRACK applies in spades. There is zero reason for this page to exist. It is arguable whether this nonsense even belongs in his biography at all, but at a bare minimum, a merger to his main article seems appropriate.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:00, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I appreciate your comment and am sorry your great encyclopedia adventure demonstrates once again that we sink to the lowest common denominator. Yopienso (talk) 23:51, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

If I were a braver person I would have declared IAR coupled with BLP and merged it to the biography & then locked the article. Sadly I am not that brave :( The article is an example of the kind of mess that can be loaded out of sources to pass AFD --Errant 22:06, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Hello Jimbo Wales, can you help.

I am Netknowle.I do a lot of contributions on geographical articles and i have this one problem,i wrote it on Dr.Blofeld usertalk concerning Nigeria's climate information using isohyets,see it Here.Can anybody help? thanks-yours User:Netknowle.

Intergration with social networking sites

Inspired by a question on help desk, I was wondering if any thought has been given to integrating Misplaced Pages with social networking sites, such as the ability to login to Misplaced Pages with your Facebook account or the ability to Tweet about an article that you like. I think that these are good ideas in and of themselves, but considering that a) Misplaced Pages has a dearth of female editors and b) Women rule social networking, integration with social networking might also be a great way to attract new female editors to the project. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:30, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I am generally all for it, if privacy is respected appropriately. The software for this already exists - Wikia uses it - so it would be a matter of just turning it on. But I don't make these decisions myself, and indeed stay far away from it for the most part, so contacting the Foundation to discuss this might be best. My assumption is that if the community voted to request it, the Foundation would implement it.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 22:07, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I support the general idea here but, A Quest For Knowledge, I do not think that enabling FB login would substantially increase female participation on Misplaced Pages, that is something of a stretch :) In fact, in my experience (of running sites with FB/Twitter login) it really makes no difference because it is the site that is important, not the login method.

Enabling Oauth would be awesome :) --Errant 22:23, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Red link

Should red link remain a "red link" to prove a point?Smallman12q (talk) 23:23, 3 June 2011 (UTC)