Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 288

1. Book reviews of a brand new book are primary sources? (2016): Minimal discussion
2. biased or opinionated

Is Swarajya a reliable or unreliable source for Indian politics, Indian news, international news, or other topics? Also, should the citations of Swarajya in the 305 articles be removed under

Depreciate. for the same reasons above. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 17:41, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

@MJL: Courtesy ping. I added the last question (about Swarajya's print and website eras) right after you submitted your comment. — Newslinger talk 17:46, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

@Newslinger: That last question requires too much thinking, so I'm glad I answered when I did :P –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 17:49, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Deprecate website for same reasons as above. No opinion on the pre-1980 print version, but the gap between 1980 and 2015 is large enough that I don't see much reason to judge the former version by its latter incarnation. Levivich ^{[dubious – discuss]} 17:57, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate per my reasoning above. Praxidicae (talk) 18:19, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Rather than edit my initial statement, I'd like to add that I think one thing we can and should all agree on when it comes to sourcing is that any media outlet which puts out hit pieces on our editors because of political motivations and presents it as gospel is an unreliable (and unethical) source. Praxidicae (talk) 19:05, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Selectively deprecate site’s news section or articles written by Swarajya staff are unreliable. But their opeds seems to have high quality editorial standards. They’ve editorial policies, correction policies and similar structure like any media house. That’s not case with OpIndia. — Brihaspati (talk) 18:30, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Your argument is that their op-eds are of good quality and editorial oversight but their actual editorial board published pieces...are not? Praxidicae (talk) 19:00, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Praxidicae, most of their fake news are being spread on the name of Swarajya Staff. It is unreliable for news reports for sure. Except one case of op-ed, I didn't see much more fake news thing in op-ed and they apologised for it too. Brihaspati (talk) 03:09, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Changing my opinion to reliable as Swarajya took those pieces down.-- Brihaspati (talk) 14:28, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate No way that Swarajya has ever produced unbiased respectable journalistic content. --qedk (t 桜 c) 19:03, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate - Again, based on being accessories to doxxing. My reasoning is above. —A little blue Bori v^_^v ^{Onward to 2020} 20:55, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate as above. Curdle (talk) 09:02, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate Ditto. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 18:38, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate Whilst bias may not be an issue but their stuff may not be reliable.Slatersteven (talk) 18:57, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate Re-doxing & lack of editorial control. Cabayi (talk) 21:45, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
• Reliable - Cited all the time by other Indian newspapers as a news source, albeit a right-wing one.Pectore^talk 21:56, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate. In several years of working on this topic I cannot recall factual information that they reported on that better sources did not also report; conversely, I can think of a number of occasions on which the material they have published is unquestionably inappropriate, including the recent episode. Vanamonde (Talk) 00:22, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate and fuck the Twitterati. ——SN54129 14:55, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate - and Vanamonde makes a good point. If it's significant enough to be included in our articles there will be better sources. Doug Weller talk 14:58, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate unreliable and partisan to an extreme extent, imv Atlantic306 (talk) 22:36, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
• Completely deprecate over doxing of Wiki editors and lack of editorial control; reposting of OpIndia material. SerChevalerie (talk) 07:32, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
• Comment:- Swarajya has took those pieces down. I can't find them on their website.-- Brihaspati (talk) 11:55, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  After Swarajya published the article, they also shared it with their 670,000+ followers on Facebook and their 170,000+ followers on Twitter. The damage has already been done. — Newslinger talk 15:00, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Not to mention they are still tweeting and sharing FB posts about it and encouraging people to continue to dox editors. Praxidicae (talk) 15:05, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable: I was going through the policy on reliable sources and as I understand it, editorial POV alone does not mean a source is unreliable
  WP:NEWSORG, “Whether a specific news story is reliable for a fact or statement should be examined on a case-by-case basis.” In the case of Swarajya, I feel that their news is generally reliable as they present it with evidence to back it up, and they have an editorial policy that they adhere to. So, having a liberal center-right perspective doesn’t make a news source unreliable. Wikipedia editors should have access to a liberal center-right perspective so that Wikipedia as a whole can maintain a neutral point of view and doesn’t become slanted to the left, which is what would inevitably happen to India-focused articles if reliable right-of-center news sources like Swarajya are blacklisted or deprecated.Harshmellow717 (talk
  ) 18:02, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

New Indian Express, Aaj Tak, etc). Tayi Arajakate _Talk

19:22, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate (excluding archives): The news reporting is certainly unreliable, more or less on par with OpIndia with which it has a strong association. It's political stance is more a matter of branding derived from the older magazine. It does maintain the archives of the old magazine which would be reliable though care must be taken in its utilization due to its then connection with the Swatantra Party. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 19:22, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
• Reliable: I feel that Swarajya is a generally reliable news source. It has a distinguished editorial advisory board, and while it does make mistakes like any news source, it also makes corrections when necessary. Also, some people have said it is okay to deprecate it since other available sources offer the same information. However, on the contrary, I find this point to further corroborate against deprecation, since if we are not deprecating other sources that offer the same information, why would we single out and deprecate Swarajya? I also read the policy on reliable sources and didn’t see anywhere in the policy that a news source’s use of publicly identifiable information (as has been done about a Wikipedia editor) is a criterion for evaluating reliability of a news source. If I missed this detail, I am open to being directed to where it is mentioned in the policy. I think we have to stick to stated Wikipedia policy to determine reliability of sources so that an objective decision can be made. PinkElixir (talk) 01:45, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

  Responding to "if we are not deprecating other sources that offer the same information": actually, we are. See the section on OpIndia above. Swarajya regularly paraphrases entire articles from OpIndia under the anonymous "Swarajya Staff" byline. See https://swarajyamag.com/search?q=opindia for a long list, which establishes that Swarajya inherits the unreliability of OpIndia. — Newslinger talk 02:03, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate per above arguments.
  talk
  ) 02:11, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
• Reliable: In reviewing this thread, I didn’t see any evidence presented of its inaccurate reporting or the absence of an editorial policy (WP:RS). In fact, Swarajya Magazine has an editorial policy: https://swarajyamag.com/fact-checking-and-correction-policy editorial policy. Its Wikipedia article lists 8 references as evidence of ‘misinformation,' 2 of which refer to an article reporting misinformation about the name of an actor in a movie. In one of these articles, a third-party news organization acknowledges the actions Swarajya took to correct the misinformation:

  “It is noteworthy Swarjaya later updated its report with the correct information, although clarification on its tweet – “The main accused in Lakshmi’s acid case was Naeem Khan but he is said to have been named “Rajesh” in Deepika’s movie” – is yet to be provided… [Update: Swarajya deleted its tweet after this report was published. Vikas Pandey’s tweet and erroneous reposts published by News18, Inda TV and Jansatta have been added to the fact-check.]”

  Additionally, after reviewing other policies, I feel that sanctions (such as blacklisting or deprecating) against either news organization due to the issue of “doxing” appears to be against Wikipedia policy. The Wikieditor in question made their private information public which technically excludes them from any sanctions as outlined in WP:OUTING:

  “If you have accidentally posted anything that might lead to your being outed (including but not limited to inadvertently editing while logged out, which reveals your IP address, and thus, your approximate location), it is important that you act promptly to have the edit(s) oversighted. Do not otherwise draw attention to the information. Referring to still-existing, self-disclosed posted information is not considered outing, and so the failure of an editor to have the information redacted in a timely manner may remove it from protection by this policy.”

  Unfortunately, because the Wikieditor did not oversight this information in a timely manner, the news organization used that publicly available information to help reveal the identity of the editor in question to raise a related question based on the data they presented. I agree with PinkElixir that doxxing is not a criteria per WP:RS which also means it’s not a valid argument to support deprecating this source. If there are other policies of which I’m unaware, I’d be happy to review them, but for now, Swarajya fails to meet WP:DEPRECATE based on the evidence presented on this thread. Moksha88 (talk) 04:04, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

  "Unfortunately, because the Wikieditor did not oversight this information in a timely manner...": That argument is a form of

  reliable sources guideline. Swarajya frequently republishes lightly rephrased content from OpIndia, so the same arguments apply here. — Newslinger talk

  04:44, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Examples include a case in Begusarai district where the National Commission For Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR)[1] ordered follow up action based on a Swarajya report. This involved the rescue of a minor who had been kidnapped.

Illegal slaughter houses, a major environmental and crime related issue, were ordered to be shut after a Swarajya news report.

The Scheduled Castes Commission, an independent Constitutional body picked up a Swarajya report and ordered help to a member of a marginalised community.

Many of the stories cited as Fake News on the Swarajya page are articles which are citing mainstream news outlets NOT blacklisted here. Hardly evidence of malicious fake news plants - these seem to be stories that relied on large media outlets - how one can read malice here, when the original sin was by other media houses, beats me.--Adurcup23 (talk) 12:01, 13 March 2020 (UTC) — Adurcup23 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Reliable: Swarajya's reporting[2] has forced other news outlets to take down reports and is therefore reliable - Timbim111 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:43, 13 March 2020 — Timbim111 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

  Struck comment from blocked

  sockpuppet. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Adurcup23/Archive for details. — Newslinger talk

  03:49, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

• Comment - I repeat the above, which also applies here: I am generally not in favor of declaring sites "reliable" or "unreliable," since this is not a black-and-white matter. The "best" site is sometimes wrong and the "worst" site sometimes has correct, irreplaceable information. However, given this site's practice of doxxing an editor in an effort to skew WP content, I have no objection to blacklisting in this instance. Carrite (talk) 15:49, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable: - It is clear that this outlet is a pro-Hindu but I consider their reporting is factual and they push more stories discussing the issues related to the Hindu community as compared to news on other topics. This practice does not make this outlet unreliable. I do not see that they have misreported anything or harassed any specific community so far. Especially, due to personal political and ideological hatred, some of the other IFCN-verified fact-checker sources which are often un-reliable and mis-report incidents such as AltNews (the founder of AltNews himself is a public hater of Hindutva and whoever is inclided towards that ideology whereas shows a soft stance towards the left-wing believers) seem to have selectively bashed this (Swarajya) outlet in the past. Vishal Telangre (talk) 18:37, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

• Reliable: - Swarajya's reporting has been factual. Its editorial policy is sound. Reporting on a WP Editor doesn't make it unreliable, unless the report was fake. Is there a policy that makes news sources critical of Wikipedia "unreliable"? IndianHistoryEnthusiast (talk) 21:06, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

  There were a number of false and misleading claims made in the hit piece published by Swarajya (and OpIndia) that contained doxing. The piece was not "factual", and the author(s) clearly did not bother to confirm their claims with the subject(s) of the article or any related people, which reflects a poor reputation for fact-checking. — Newslinger talk 07:21, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

  The website truthofgujarat.com which now redirects to altnews.com

  Pratik Sinha who is the founder of AltNews. AltNews, still continues publishes similar material. So if we do an apple to apple comparison, AltNews should be deprecated, too? Vishal Telangre (talk

  ) 09:05, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

  Can you provide a link to the piece? Did they report anything that was untrue? What claims were false or misleading? I have been reading Swarajya for some time now. I wouldn't disagree that they have an editorial bias, much like the wire or quint, but overall, I haven't seen any problems in their reporting. Marking a publication as unreliable out of vindictiveness sounds petty to me. IndianHistoryEnthusiast (talk) 07:52, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

  We don't provide links to blacklisted sites. That's what "blacklisted" means. As for "vindictiveness", that's a good word for the practice of both OpIndia and Swarajya. Bishonen | tålk 08:35, 17 March 2020 (UTC).

  I didn't know Swarajya was blacklisted. Why are we having this discussion then? Nevertheless, I would stick to my opinion. The source is ReliableIndianHistoryEnthusiast (talk) 08:50, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

  You didn't know that, IndianHistoryEnthusiast? Maybe you'd like to read the opening of this thread that you're opining in, to see that Swarajya is blacklisted and a brief explanation of why we're nevertheless having this discussion. Bishonen | tålk 12:10, 17 March 2020 (UTC).

• Deprecate. The connection with OpIndia and republication of their hit piece on our editor is enough for me. Bishonen | tålk 08:35, 17 March 2020 (UTC).

  Interesting. Who is "our" in "our editor"? Wikipedia do not employ editors, so is there a "group" whose that editor is a member of? I am also an editor (have done some translations) and I have not hit by something like that. Vishal Telangre (talk) 08:57, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

I am unpaid member of a local club, all it members, they would still be referred to as "our members". We are in fact all unpaid) and volunteer) editors. Thus yes, they have doxed one of our editors.Slatersteven (talk) 09:13, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

I have also recevived threats of blocking my editorial rights in the past from a Wikipedia editor. I believe we are not "we" but groups of ideologically parted "we". Good to know and thanks for the information. I also would like to safegaurd myself from getting doxed by someone on Wikipedia, where can I learn about it? How should I report it? Is there a list of community meetups that happen in India? Vishal Telangre (talk) 09:25, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

The argument presented here is flawed, there is no policy that makes a page unreliable or worth deprecating because it published a piece critical of an editor, or even if the site engaged in doxxing. Is there a policy that clearly states that news sources that have doxxed wikipedia editors are unreliable? I think not.IndianHistoryEnthusiast (talk) 09:54, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Swarajya (and OpIndia) doxed the editor without properly fact-checking the article, which is characteristic of a

third pillar of Wikipedia ("Wikipedia is free content that anyone can use, edit, and distribute"). — Newslinger talk

10:10, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

I think it is unfair to lump both Swarajya and OpIndia in a single category. Swarajya has a well defined editorial policy, R Jagannathan is a well respected journalist. While I don't agree with the practice of doxxing, one article is not enough to characterise a source as completely unreliable. Had it been a news source that doxxed someone not related to wikipedia, we wouldn't have had a problem. Editor of pages like AltNews have doxxed twitter accounts in the past, that doesn't make them unreliable. Swarajya has done great reporting in various fields, publishing one article, which I cannot seem to find on their website anymore, doesn't make them worthy of being deprecated. IndianHistoryEnthusiast (talk) 10:32, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

So what? AltNews doxxing someone does not equate to making doxxing ethical for other outlets. OpIndia (and Swarajya) published an article about the very doxxing incident and guess what both of these outlets did now. Ironic, no? Stop defending journalistisic (in the least meaningful sense of the word) institutions which have no integrity. This thread is not about AltNews and no one cares, if you want to raise this in a separate thread, feel free to do so. I'll do you one better, I will lump Swarajya, OpIndia and AltNews in the same category, because above journalism, the editors of these institutions just want to placate their audience and hold on to their bases without a shred of respect for actual fact-based reporting. --qedk (t 心 c) 20:47, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate, for the record. My rationale can be found throughout my comments in this discussion, and in my evaluation of OpIndia. — Newslinger talk 00:57, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
• Deprecate. Too many issues. Maybe they will straighten up their act one day, but for now, this is not a usable source for Wikipedia. Guy (help!) 13:25, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

• Deprecate and it can be seen clearly. Can't agree more with
  WP:NOTHERE. KartikeyaS (talk
  ) 06:45, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

  @KartikeyaS343: I'm not a CU, I'm just a clerk at SPI. As someone who has requested CU before in this area and is familiar with it, the result will be be unrelated - I'm pretty sure it's meatpuppetry, while the editors themselves might not the same, there's off-wiki canvassing going on, it is a reasonable assumption and it has always occurred in this topic area. If it results into more egregious POV-pushing I will block the accounts for disruption. --qedk (t 心 c) 07:56, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I agree and thank you for keeping a watch over this. KartikeyaS (talk) 08:13, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi KartikeyaS343, there is an ongoing investigation here: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Moksha88. — Newslinger talk 07:53, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

They are unrelated to the suspected master. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ --qedk (t 心 c) 13:01, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

You were right but I would still request you to keep a watch because of WP:NOTHERE. KartikeyaS (talk) 15:04, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

No worries, my talk page is always open. --qedk (t 心 c) 22:12, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you QEDK --KartikeyaS (talk) 07:16, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Does anyone know if Birthday Cake for Breakfast is a legitimate reliable source? The writer is based in Manchester, and I came across it because it seems to have several interviews with bands (including one I'm doing some research about, called Field Music) but I had never heard of the site before, and looking at it I can't really tell if it's a legit site or just some blog. Visually it appears to be the latter, but the interviews made me wonder if it's not? — Hunter Kahn 23:35, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

It's just somebody's blog. It says so at the bottom "Create a free website blog at wordpress.com" and the sidebar exhorts you to "follow the blog via email". Note that wordpress.com is listed on

WP:RSP

as a generally unreliable source, except in areas where the author is a legitimate expert.

That said, if they have interviews with notable people, it could probably be cited for statements those people make about themselves, but

primary sources are to be avoided if secondary sources exist. ~Anachronist (talk

) 06:25, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

I have to disagree with Anachronist slightly. A self-published source (blog), even for a validated identity, can't support statements about other people. Anybody can start a wordpress blog and publish fake interviews. Schazjmd (talk) 14:50, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, generally that's true. You'd have to exercise some judgment, though. In this case the interviews seem legitimate, considering that a band he interviewed republished it on their own website.[39] ~Anachronist (talk) 21:04, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Good point, and yes, I wasn't saying these interviews were fake; just that they easily could be. But if Birthday Cake for Breakfast is used for a source on an article and any editor objects, there's not much to stand on. It's a self-published source and, as best I can tell, not by a recognized expert, just a serious fan. Schazjmd (talk) 21:27, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Schazjmd, and a blog with under 300 followers, at that. Seriously, it's a blog. Just... no thanks. Guy (help!) 14:27, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

• newsweekly.com.au  

News Weekly is used as a source in over 60 articles right now. From the About page:

News Weekly has been published continuously by the National Civic Council since 1941, and was originally called Freedom.

The National Civic Council (NCC) is an organisation which seeks to shape public policy on cultural, family, social, political, economic and international issues of concern to Australia.

Five Primacies of the NCC:

• Promoting the national interest
• Assisting small enterprise
• Supporting the family
• Fostering the tested values derived from our Judeo-Christian heritage
• Defending life

In other words, this is not a news organisation, it's the newsletter of a Christian-right group, the National Civic Council. Anti-abortion, of course, and also anti-gay and apparently Dominionist.

I don't think this is suitable for any use other than

I think you may not be paying close enough attention to our longstanding PAGs about what is and isn't a RS, or how we can use sources. Is your plan to rewrite those guidelines? BTW, are you quarantined at home with too much time on your hands? ^[FBDB] ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:57, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Atsme, from our interactions at G. Edward Griffin (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) I think I'd back my understanding of Wikipedia policy on fringe sources over yours any day. And I was self-isolating before it was cool. I work from home and have done for a decade. Guy (help!) 09:51, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Looking over the site, I find headlines like this:

• Victorian Road Map smooths way of NZ anti-life clique to abortion 'reform'
• Where's the evidence for man-made global warming?

Obviously, this isn't a publication dedicated to objective reporting. The non-neutral descriptors and obstinate ignorance of science speaks volumes. Definitely not a reliable source for reporting facts in Wikipedia's narrative voice. ~Anachronist (talk) 06:19, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Agreed except for historical things they were involved in. Had a quick review of the places that it's used and it doesn't seem like they're the sort of things that should be sourced to it. I would add that the NCC is a very significant organisation historically and is relevant to many different Australian topics, so it might have wider

WP:ABOUTSELF usage than your average source in this position - I don't want to find myself having to argue to keep it in articles talking about stuff the NCC did down the track. The Drover's Wife (talk

) 07:34, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

From a policy/guideline standpoint,

due weight, and organizations that are more prominent are more likely to be due. — Newslinger talk

07:43, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

It's less statements about third parties than about themselves - historically, the NCC were effectively built as an "anti-Communist Party of Australia" (working along much the same organisational basis as the CPA with the intention of countering them) and their tentacles run right through certain flavours of political and industrial history over several decades, quite often (at the time) covertly. For example, they effectively took over and ran several extremely important trade unions from the late 1940s to the 1970s. It's a situation where it (in many situations) essentially takes the form of an active historical participant talking about stuff they did: they're obviously biased, but their opinion about/recounting of what they did is generally going to be very relevant in a whole bunch of historical contexts. The Drover's Wife (talk) 07:59, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

The Drover's Wife, interesting. Of the 65 current cites to the website, which do you think are likely to be valid? Guy (help!) 09:48, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Extremely few of them, but something like this is the kind of thing I'm getting at. It's an 80-year old publication of an organisation that was fundamentally involved in important parts of Australian industrial and political history, and they're absolutely a relevant (if obviously biased) source about things they were involved in. We shouldn't give two hoots about their opinions on climate change or science because it's crankery, but we should absolutely be interested in things they publish about (to give two examples from a much longer list) the

Federated Clerks' Union, two things that they effectively ran. The Drover's Wife (talk

) 11:14, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

WP:ATT where you think it's a valid source. The ones I have looked at so far have clearly not been, but you know more about this source than I do, evidently. Guy (help!

) 14:25, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

To be clear, that source I cited might well be the only one in current use. It's obvious to me that the site is widely being cited inappropriately and that those uses should stop. I've just got the historical background to know that there's a limited but important subject area where they've got a valid use (and a subject area that still needs a lot of improvement so wouldn't necessarily cite it already). The NCC are cranks, but once upon a time they were very influential and somewhat less-cranky and I don't want to find my hands tied writing about the NCC and their shenanigans over several decades to not be able to cite them for their side of the story. I would be content with something like "do not use at all on general topics, use with caution on topics relating to Australian history in which the NCC were involved". The Drover's Wife (talk) 18:33, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

WP:UNDUE, in the end, and the fact that this website is not RS for statements of fact, only for the opinions of the site's publishers, right? Guy (help!

) 09:55, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't think there's any disagreement that we should absolutely not cite them on climate change or on current-day issues more broadly. However, it is the 80-year old publication of a once-very important organisation, and they were involved in some really important stuff in which their opinions about what they did are absolutely relevant. In those cases, they absolutely are objectively significant - because it helps tell their side of the story. I also think it's over-egging it slightly to say that it's only RS for "the opinions of the site's publishers" - they have published/will publish relevant things that are not so much their opinions as opinions they approve of, and they should be appropriately cited in context. The Drover's Wife (talk) 11:17, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

• infotextmanuscripts.org  

The home page says "I have published on the Holocaust and Holocaust Revisionism - what is known pejoratively and inaccurately as Holocaust Denial", and further down "We have scored two victories, in particular an out-of-court settlement from the Metropolitan Police after a raid at the behest of Imperial Zion in 1993". I'm prepared to go out on a limb and say this site isn't reliable for anything in any article under any circumstances? FDW777 (talk) 21:03, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Depends for what exactly. Many sources seem to be things like [40], which have no relationship whatsoever to the holocaust/conspiracy theories in general. But for anything from this Alexander Baron, or anything Jewish/Nazi related, in general, it's a complete wackadoodle source.

b

} 01:09, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

It does host various primary sources through the 'David Webb Virtual Archive' which might be permissible under

b

} 01:16, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Is this not (in effect) an SPS?Slatersteven (talk) 10:19, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

It is my understanding that the scope of this noticeboard is as stated in the banner above: Noticeboard for discussing whether particular sources are reliable in context. IN CONTEXT being the descriptor. It appears that quite a few of the most recent discussions are not about context at all; rather, some are about sources that have published opinions which tips the scale as far as "fact"-checking and what

Got, say, three clear examples? - David Gerard (talk) 11:57, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi, David - I think you can begin with any question above that asks if [XXX] is a reliable source. Such a question begs generalization of an entire source (and opens the door to POV creep, inadvertent or otherwise) rather than affording editors an opportunity to reach a consensus by discussing the inclusion of specific material published by that source and its suitability of the material per context, which is the scope of this noticeboard. I'm of the mind that discussions here that involve the deprecation of and/or dismissal of sources as unreliable or questionable (other than the most blatantly obvious junk sources, of course, rather than sources that are debatable) should involve community-wide discussion at venues like the VP that has a much wider reach. Examples off the top of my head begin with some of the questions asked here regarding the reliability of an entire source. There are also some sources on the perennial list that are rated generally unreliable (partly because they are state-owned), yet

Al Jazeera is not among them despite being owned by Qatar. Fox News is rated generally reliable but it states: Editors are advised to exercise caution when using Fox News as a source for political topics, and to attribute statements of opinion. See also: Fox News (talk shows). How is that a NPOV? We see nothing like that for MSNBC or CNN, the latter of which clearly demonstrates a biased opinion. It is difficult to leave POV at login when we have such a list guiding editors. Does the perennial list by its sheer existence tend to circumvent WP:RS, WP:V and NPOV? I am concerned that it may which is not a good thing for the reasons I mentioned above. ^Atsme _Talk 📧

13:23, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

I would agree in context is a bit vague, what context? Usage, policy?Slatersteven (talk) 13:26, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Hopefully the following will clarify context: (see

WP:RSCONTEXT

)

The reliability of a source depends on context. Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content. In general, the more people engaged in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the writing, the more reliable the publication. Information provided in passing by an otherwise reliable source that is not related to the principal topics of the publication may not be reliable; editors should cite sources focused on the topic at hand where possible. Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in the Wikipedia article.

^Atsme _Talk 📧 13:45, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

I think I understand the context. There have been a number of recent RfCs that are focused not on, "is this source reliable for this claim" but instead, "should this source be deprecated". Here is an example [[41]]. I have no idea if "Grayzone" should or shouldn't be a RS but the RfC is an example of what I think Atsme is talking about. My feeling is we should be less reliant on general RfCs and spend more time looking at specific examples. Springee (talk) 13:52, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

It's inconvenient and troublesome when trying to delete thousands of URLs to think about context. -- GreenC 14:06, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Also context must include the context of the reliability of the source in general "st Ralph the liar" cannot be a source for anything, even his own opinion.Slatersteven (talk) 14:09, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Many sources are found to be unreliable generally, but reliable for some things ie. contextually reliable. -- GreenC 14:19, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

We should not be going back in time to delete thousands of urls, particularly if it's being done without consideration for context per WP:V which is one of our core content policies. For the easy to recognize, undisputed junk/spam sources, a BOT with the right instructions could perform the task of removing the url and adding ^{[citation needed]} as necessary (based on certain criteria). ^Atsme _Talk 📧 15:15, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Atsme, yes we should, if the thousands of urls are the result of people not thinking about reliability. Wikipedia has evolved from the barn-raising phase when we were trying to build as much content as possible as quickly as possible, to a global resource and one of the most visited and trusted sites on the internet. We have, rightly, become firmer about the sources we use, not because we have changed our policy, but because we now recognise that we need to be more consistent in meeting our own standards.

The media landscape has also moved on. Over the last five years there has been a sea change in the way the conservative media works, which has not affected left-partisan or mainstream media. This is a pressing problem for Wikipedia: some editors think that the right wing media bubble has parity with the mainstream, but mainstream is the opposite of fringe, not of conservative.

To address the question of verifiability, my (long) experience has been that if you tag a citation as self-published, dubious or whatever, it pretty much never gets fixed. A statement drawn from a questionable source will stand indefinitely. If, however, you remove the source and replace it with {{

cn

}}, it often will get fixed. There are Wikignomes who specialise in sourcing or removing unsourced statements. It's one of the few instances where an unsourced statement, identified as such, is actually better for the encyclopaedia than a sourced statement. Especially in a world of fake news and disinformation where state sponsored propaganda can appear like legitimate news sources, as has been seen with Russian websites masquerading as Ukrainian news sources.

Incidentally, you'll note that I proposed a more robust process for deprecating and blacklisting widely used sources. That would seem to me to be a good first step in alleviating any concerns over weaknesses in the review of deprecations / "generally unreliable" classifications. Guy (help!) 10:18, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Guy, with all due respect, I disagree, particularly your opinion that "there has been a sea change in the way the conservative media works, which has not affected left-partisan or mainstream media." It has been demonstrated time and again that the transition from print to internet, increased competition, and clickbait has effected all media. For you to single out right/conservative media is very disconcerting. I am also concerned over your denigration of FoxNews despite clear consensus here, as well as voicing your generalized criticisms of conservatives and the Republican party. Responsible editors, particularly administrators who are supposed to be above the fray, are obligated to leave their biases at login. With regards to your repeated references to the Griffin BLP - an incident that took place 5 years ago and one that you misconstrued and are repeatedly misrepresenting - keep in mind that this noticeboard is for discussing the use of RS, and should not be used to harass or hound editors with whom you have an opposing view. Your constant dredging-up of the past to discredit me and diminish my input is unconscionable, particularly for an administrator. Let's not forget that you were warned over your behavior at the Griffin article, and argued until the acting admin removed the warning from the DS log - we call that professional courtesy in the media industry. You were clearly not happy with the consensus that favored my position, so please stop spreading misinformation in your attempts to discredit me in an effort to gain traction for your proposal. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 11:48, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

No, he's right and I'm pretty sure you're incorrect. More broadly, old nonsense from bad sources is nonsense from bad sources, and lots of it is a cleanup task, not a reason to claim it has tenure. The cleanup task is quite doable too, I got

WP:DAILYMAIL is now below 20,000 from about 26,000 - David Gerard (talk

) 13:24, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

As far as I know there is a policy that says that poorly or unsourced content can be removed, there is no policy that says we must include information. We are not requited to have everything here.Slatersteven (talk) 13:32, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

David, which part of my comment do you consider incorrect? In my initial statement above, I agree with you in part which is why I said "...the easy to recognize, undisputed junk/spam sources, a BOT with the right instructions could perform the task of removing the url and adding ^{[citation needed]} as necessary (based on certain criteria)." Please consider the following: the sources that have recently been depracated or are being considered for it, and the sources being considered questionable or poor may have been part of a discussion at RSN or an RfC in the past and were approved by consensus for inclusion of a particular statement (in context). We cannot simply ignore that history and start wiping out sources. See DGG's statement below wherein he stated, No source is entirely reliable, almost no source is totally unreliable. The best news sources, such as the NYTimes, have on occasion carried invented stories; the worst, like the Daily Mail, have on occasion carried genuine news that they were the first to report. The scientific journals of the highest prestige, such as Nature, have sometimes carried nonsense, such as the discovery of Polywater, or Duesberg's denial of HIV. I'm of the mind that wiping out sources after the paradigm shift (analog to digital, & from print to internet), or when/if there has been a change of ownership or management may turn out to be a huge mistake. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:09, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Atsme you're welcome to disagree, but that view comes directly from published sources, e.g. Network Propaganda by Yochai Benkler. It's also visible over time in analyses of media bias such as this - note how the conservative media all cluster together with a substantial gap between them and mainstream sources that is simply not present in the left-leaning media. So, yes, you're free to disagree, but my reading of the literature says that makes you wrong. Guy (help!) 14:21, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you, Guy - but we have had this discussion before and I have cited several, not just one, highly reputable academic sources as well as interviews with highly reputable journalists/news anchors that dispute your position, including "The War on the Press: A Conversation with Marvin Kalb and Ted Koppel", and this CJR report about media bias. There are many more, such as Cornell Library which cautions about adfontesmedia by stating they are ...a useful adjunct to your own research and evaluation of the news sources that you rely on provided that you evaluate these rating systems with the same care that you use to evaluate the news sources directly. And Gallop, and on and on. Many highly reputable sources TNT your theory about right and left leaning sources, bias and clickbait. Surely you're not putting all your eggs in the "Network Propaganda" basket. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:09, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

I think you are misunderstanding my argument. The relevance of the Ad Fontes chart is simply that it provides a clear visual picture that illlustrates Benkler's findings. There are many within the Benkler book as well. The thesis is not that right-wing media have become more biased, inherently, but that previously mainstream conservative sources have changed the feedback mechanism from fact-checking to ideology-checking. You can see this in the increasing discoinnect between Shep Smith and the bulk of Fox reporting, leading up to his departure from the station.

The CJR report you cite says Academics are making advances in large-scale content analysis, with new machine-driven techniques and more sophisticated yardsticks with which to measure content. Such approaches can reveal much about news outlets’ choices of stories, sources, and language. - that is exactly what Benkler's analysis is. He and his co-authors used sophisticated network analysis techniques to analyse cross-sharing between media, and found that over a short period of time the conservative bubble effectively isolated itself from the mainstream and its "fact-checking dynamic".

It's very clear that over a relatively short period, conservative media has turned almost entirely inward, forming a positive feedback loop that amplifies tropes regardless of factual accuracy, and this contrasts with a fact-checking dynamic that dominates in the mainstream. Left-leaning sources care about what the mainstream media says about a story, so tend not to publish egregious bollocks, whereas the conservative media bubble does not care at all: when mainstream sources disagree with a conservative narrative they merely dismiss it as "lamestream media" "fake news" and carry on. And yes, that has changed over time, quite profoundly.

And this is consistent with a lot of other research. Example: Reinforcing Spirals: The Mutual Influence of Media Selectivity and Media Effects and Their Impact on Individual Behavior and Social Identity describes the effect of closed media bubbles, and numerous subsequent studies have verified Pew's 2014 finding that liberals consume a broader range of sources than do conservatives. Conservatives cluster around Fox News, they distrust mainstream media, and they reward (with likes and shares, that drive advertising revenue) ideologically consonant information rather than factually accurate informaitont hat contradicts a conservative narrative. Liberals do, however, selectively avoid conservative media. So you now have two disconnected media ecosystems, with different systems of incentives (because only one contains the mainstream). Guy (help!) 14:20, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

If editors followed policy correctly, the majority of discussions would be unnecessary. Editors should always seek to use the best sources available and only provide information that meets weight. A lot of discussions are about using obscure sources for information that does not appear anywhere else. It's only topics that have received very little coverage in mainstream sources where one would expect that obscure sources would come up for discussion. These would be articles about local history, minor political figures, minor novelists and musicians, etc. TFD (talk) 15:36, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't see the problem. Lots of sources are so unreliable, they are unusable in any context except for

WP:ABOUTSELF. It's okay to establish that here. We don't need to discuss every single use individually of, say, Breitbart. Crossroads ^-talk-

15:40, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

In my opinion, questions about

questionable source, that opinion is undue. If the individual/organization is significant (in the context of the article), or if the opinion is published in a reliable source, there is a possibility that the opinion is due. Reliability plays a bigger role in determining whether a factual claim belongs in an article. — Newslinger talk

20:50, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Newslinger, yes. This is where we establish whether a source is reliable for statements of fact, NPOVN is where we discuss whether a source that is not reliable for statements of fact, is, nonetheless, appropriate for citation in a specific article. That seems pretty clear to me, and is not a particularly difficult distinction to draw IMO. Guy (help!) 10:21, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

In July, for using a review mentioning an art gallery by Theodore Dalrymple i.e. an opinion article, Newslinger didn't say "questions about due weight should be discussed at the neutral point of view noticeboard", Newslinger said here on WP:RSN that it was among items that "should be removed because they constitute WP:UNDUE" so an RfC on WP:RSN "addresses" the use. Subsequently David Gerard removed, with a confusing edit summary, the review was in Taki's Magazine. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 14:22, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Since

neutral point of view noticeboard. But the result of the 2019 RfC is clear, and this discussion is moot. — Newslinger talk

22:32, 26 March 2020 (UTC)