Wikipedia talk:WikiProject External links

NOT a link repository.External linksWikipedia:WikiProject External linksTemplate:WikiProject External linksExternal links articles

WikiProject External links tasks you can do: edit history watch purge WikiProject External links This box: (watch • edit • changes • add / remove a task) Open Tasks: Fix the broken links in the Featured Articles using the Checklinks tool Intelligent vehicle technologies (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views ) - Looking for a third opinion on some of the links in the article that appear to be commercial firms. Trying to avoid an edit war. talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views ) There has been a long debate on external links to be included, third opinions invited in particular for the forum websites referenced that may be useful but are not discussed in the main article. Extreme pornography (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views ) This is about the term being used by the UK's Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 but is obviously a controversial topic with a number of arguably useful pornographic example links added 2009 swine flu pandemic (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) As a hot news topic this article can suffer from excessive links from dubious un-official sources notability as having no coverage in independent sources, e.g. Mugen MVVM Toolkit. Is this linkspam? - Pointillist (talk) 09:28, 28 April 2012 (UTC)[reply ]

...has 56 external links in the "External news links" section alone. HELP! Morgan Wick 03:32, 2 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have added it to Wikipedia:WikiProject Spam's to-do list. Some of the links might be references for the article, but not sure which. --Aude (talk | contribs) 03:42, 2 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hello. The

What to editors think about freehostia.com links? They seem to fall into the category of forums, blogs,

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 18:44, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone here or is this project inactive? --

• Same question? Deizio talk 13:59, 7 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Seems very inactive, but I'm going to start using it at least.

Havok (T/C/e/c) 19:47, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply

]

So in order to help more here, Are you interested in preparing the guideline now? Check the talk page archive linked on the top of this page, for the previous efforts made. My plan is to read through them, resolve contraveries, then invite an admin to check it out, and then publish it on the project page and use it. Agreed? huji—TALK 14:31, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This project was set-up the same time as Wikipedia:WikiProject Spam, which has become very active and has much the same goals. If nobody minds, I suggest redirecting these project pages to WikiProject Spam. --Aude (talk) 14:46, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. But just don't forget to pass the list of articles gathered in this project for cleanup, to the fellows in the new project. huji—TALK 16:01, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If we go ahead with this, remember to transfer all templates and such. I just fear the integration process will be to much, as they stand now they are the same but not. As WPEL isn't just spam, but general cleanup of external links as well.

Havok (T/C/e/c) 14:32, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply

]

• Wikipedia:Dead external links
• User:Ocobot

I also noticed that there are bot requests from time to time regarding external links, for example: example request. All this could be coordinated or assisted from here.

I would be happy if this project could be revived, as it seems to be quite inactive. These are some first thoughts on what we could do to make this more lively:

• Link to this project from all relevant pages
• Make a userbox for members of this project — this might sound rather irrelevant but it improves the visibility of this project a lot
• Improve the project page
• Improve the project template
• Invite editors that work on similar stuff to join the project, see Recruiting

I'd be happy to put my energy into this if there's a chance to make this more lively! What do you think? Will you take part? — Ocolon 18:16, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Re:

For now, your comments are invited on Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/VixDaemon 4. Thanks! --kingboyk 23:03, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree about keeping an eye on this ourselves. But sometimes bots get speedily approved — it would be a pity if we miss one. Thank you. — Ocolon 08:26, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I added this project to the list of fix-up projects on the

Cool :) Thanks, ( arky ) 00:30, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I want to add this rule...

1. Links to content providers on pages that elaborate the content should be avoided. For example,
   COM port redirector, Emoticon
   and such articles should link to sites that may clarify the reader on what a serial port is. But it should not link to companies that provide serial port redirectors or companies that offer "free" emoticons.

I added it, but User:2005 removed it without reason... I started a discussion on the talk page to decide whether to have this rule or not... Please support... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:External_links#Add_this_rule_too... Mugunth 17:07, 3 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually you added it without reason. Please start a discussion before adding totally new concepts to a guideline that states it is a consensus of editors. 2005 22:48, 3 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think this is already covered in

WP:EL#Links normally to be avoided, in criterion 5. Happy editing! ( arky ) 02:05, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply

]

External links issues resolved among editors. Not sure how to remove from project page, would someone please remove Morgellons from list? Thank you. Ward20 (talk) 06:11, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Disregard, I figured it out. Ward20 (talk) 20:13, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have only recently started to try and add things on Wiki. I tried to place a link from my website about panic attacks and anxiety, onto several wiki pages (panic, panic attacks, anxiety) and they kept disapearing and so I persisted because I thought I had done something incorrectly to apply it, later I found to my horror it had not only 'not' been approved but I was temporarily grounded :( May I explain, I am a qualified RMN (Registered Mental Health Nurse) residing in the UK and the website (http://www.cragface.co.uk/index.asp) I designed has no pop-ups, no advertising and no commercial backing. It is purely a source of information in plain English for anyone suffering this debilitating problem and there is no other agenda. (Also for your information, the "membership log-in is there purely to ensure that people behave themselves on the message board and nothing else.) All the information is available to anyone and for free. If external links are not allowed...there appear to be at least two up there that need attention. One link doesn't work (second one) and another appears to be similar to mine but less informative. If it is not allowed that's not a problem to me. I just wanted to clarify what was incorrect in my actions or what content in PanicStop was disaproved of? Thanks. CragFaceCragFace (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 22:24, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm having a bit of a problem with an external link recently added, and then re-added after my removal, on Bethlehem Steel. My first reversion was because it seemed like someone trying to advertise their own website, which still seems like it might be the case, and that the website is nothing more than a blog and doesn't represent a website linked to an academic institution or reliable source. User:Haeber and User:67.169.137.214‎ (who very well may be the same person, I'm not sure) are attempting to argue that it has valuable information. Upon reading through the blog post I partially agree that the information is interesting, however it didn't seem to actually include very much new or otherwise relevant information about Bethlehem Steel, but rather seemed more focused on Charles M. Schwab, who is related to Bethlehem Steel. I was wondering if I might have some additional guidance, both on the inclusion of the link in this encyclopedia and on the appropriate article in which it would be inserted. NcSchu_(Talk) 15:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was wondering if someone could help with an edit war I seem to be in on the Flag football page with User:LouPepe. He insists on adding an external link to a web site which I've repeatedly asked him to justify with regard to notability. What information he's provided in return has either directly shown it's lack of verifiability or it's origin as original research. He doesn't seem to be taking the hint. Have I lost my perspective? Could you provide some? Thanks. -- Bdoserror (talk) 05:26, 11 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

.yu TLD is going to be completely replaced with .rs and a number of links will become dead. I suggest that this project deals with this, in the following way: I will make statistics of .yu links, and find what are .rs equivalents for for the most used links. Then perhaps a project member who owns a bot could search/replace all the links so identified, and we'll see what to do with the rest. This is of course relevant for all Wikipedias... Nikola (talk) 20:45, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have now done this. The statistics of .yu domain use on Wikimedia projects are available here. At the time of making the statistics, English Wikipedia alone had 7620 links to .yu domains.

Note that some (perhaps most) domains will stop working as soon as March, while all will stop in October. The domains could be fixed easily with the standard pywikipediabot. Here is a sample command I used on Serbian Wikipedia:

python replace.py -weblink:webrzs.statserb.sr.gov.yu "webrzs.statserb.sr.gov.yu" "webrzs.stat.gov.rs"

The domains

This is a list of domains that are already search/replaced on Serbian Wikipedia or elsewhere. Domains on this list will likely cover more than 1/4 of all .yu domains.

Nikola (talk) 22:05, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Could users familiar with

Discussion moved to Wikipedia talk:External links#NZ on Screen.-gadfium 07:50, 16 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've been dealing with an editor who has added a series of links to the Guardian newspaper's "top ten" lists to numerous articles. (One example is "Gemma Malley's Top 10 Dystopian Novels for Teenagers The Guardian, August 29 2007" in the Dystopia article.) His/her intentions seem good, but as best I can tell this is not an appropriate use of the external links section. The editor has repeatedly restored the links, so I'd like some input here regarding this matter. Thanks in advance. --Ckatz^chat_spy 04:35, 24 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hello everyone, as the editor in question, I also welcome your input. I believe that many of these links could potentially be beneficial to potential readers. For example a teacher for instance may be reading the dystopian article, and at the end they are provided with a list of 10 recommended dystopian novels for teenagers (for example). Ckatz, seems to believe that these violate

WP:EL although he/she has failed (despite repeated requests) to point out specifically how. We have had an ongoing discussion about the matter at my talk page ---> User talk:Redthoreau#External links for those interested. Of note as well, I have reverted Ckatz's reverts once or possibly in a few article twice, however Ckatz may have violated 3 RR against me in the last 24 hours at least 3 separate times .... Instance # 1 = on List of poetry collections - 1rr, 2rr, 3rr. Instance # 2 = on Dystopia - 1rr, 2rr, 3rr. Instance # 3 = on Short story - 1rr, 2rr, 3rr. Any suggestions of possible recourse? Solutions? etc Thanks.   Redthoreau (talk)RT 05:36, 24 March 2009 (UTC)[reply

]

Red, The burden is on the person that wants to include external links. This means that you have to demonstrate that the link complies with this guideline, not demand that Ckatz prove that it doesn't. See

WP:ELNO

for common reasons for excluding a link.

In particular, I think you're going to have to make a case for why links targeted to specific populations are desirable for all of our readers. Wikipedia is not just for teenagers and their schoolteachers. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:00, 24 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

WhatamI, I appreciate your input. I read all of those particular policies, specifically when Ckatz stated that my inclusion of these links was in violation of

WP:EL. How they were, I am still unaware.   Redthoreau (talk)RT 06:11, 24 March 2009 (UTC)[reply

]

I understand your frustration, but it's what Ckatz said is pretty much irrelevant: The fact is that you must have consensus to add links. (Since their addition was reverted, you clearly do not have consensus for their addition.) You get that by explaining the links' value on the article's talk page and why you think the addition is justified. If there's no agreement to add them, then they don't get added. Good luck, WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:03, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

[addendum]] I just wanted to state that I no longer wish to dispute this matter, and am happy to cede to Ckatz's rationale. Thanks   Redthoreau (talk)RT 04:30, 5 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I wonder if I could get an opinion on a link recently added to Sustainability. The link was first added as a citation to a self-published article.[1]. I excluded it as not in keeping with WP:VER. However, another editor suggested that the link could go into the External links section. The individual then re-inserted the link (this time to what appears to be a self-published newsletter).[2] I'm not so sure including it is a good idea, since if we add this link, we will have trouble excluding dozens of others (the article has been a link farm in the past). I've read WP:EL for guidance, but this one seems to be a borderline case. It is related to the article, but... Any advice on groundrules would be much appreciated. Sunray (talk) 07:56, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

By all means no! This guy is clearly a POV spammer as I had a big fight with him over at

WP:EL he accused me and the other editors of "vandalism". ELNO # 1, 4, and 11 applies here. ThemFromSpace 16:53, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply

]

Having read this (and the related Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard#Simple living external link) I've found quite a few links to this site (and the apparently related nariphaltan.virtualave.net) that seem to exist only for the purpose of linking. They have now been cleaned up, but we may need to keep an eye on this. (Se also Special:Contributions/Ruralface, a new account.) --Ckatz^chat_spy 17:50, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks much. This is most helpful. Sunray (talk) 18:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

More to this, regarding possible alternate accounts and URLs... Akraj (who has added "nariphaltan" links in the past) asked about adding an EL from "pune.sancharnet.in/nariphaltan" to an article on dreams (at Dreams); the linked document is identical to one from the other "nariphaltan" URLs. --Ckatz^chat_spy 17:22, 1 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Also, the IP User:218.248.79.4 and the URL "etagriculture.com", which appears to solicit articles for publication. --Ckatz^chat_spy 05:28, 2 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I submitted the first two to

WT:WPSPAM where User:A.B. deferred it to the local blacklist. ThemFromSpace 06:50, 2 April 2009 (UTC)[reply

]

But in the course of cleaning out that mess, I found a list of about three dozen links to search results from Salon.com (click here) that needs to be reviewed and (most likely) removed (or, perhaps, replaced by one particularly good article from the list).

As background, search results are unacceptable primarily because they change: a page that had six interesting links today might be buried by a hundred trivial ones next month. (Also, I like to think that our readers are smart enough to run their own searches.)

My thanks to anyone that looks over a few of these, WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:55, 8 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've tried doing link cleanup for the Diff article. Let me know how I did, or perhaps help me respond to any backlash? This is my first attempt at this, so we'll see how this goes, I guess. --Ashawley (talk) 05:28, 13 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

What you've left looks good to me. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:01, 14 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

 – Link moved from "external links" into references. Gabbe (talk) 13:04, 8 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If there's a dispute on an article talk page over whether a specific link in an article is "directly relevant" or not, what is the proper forum to ask for fresh eyes to look upon the issue? Is there a noticeboard or something remotely similar?

Specifically, there's currently a discussion on whether the article Zeno's paradoxes should contain a link in its "External links" to a BBC article on the shortest time measured, and I'm looking for more people to say what they think. Gabbe (talk) 21:22, 7 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I realize this specific dispute is already resolved, but

the new External Links Noticeboard just went live, and such questions can be taken there. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:36, 8 September 2009 (UTC)[reply

]

I think that most editors simply type the text by hand, but there are templates, e.g., Template:YouTube, that include it. See here for a couple of examples (and a bunch of navboxes that aren't relevant to this discussion). WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:58, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A {{requires flash}} tag or whatever would be simple to knock up, I suppose. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:41, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Though then again there'd be quite a risk of well-intentioned misinformation, as I imagine many editors either don't know what's running the spectacle in front of them or don't know precisely what's missing when there's no spectacle in front of them. (I'm not putting myself above these people: Often I don't know myself.) So perhaps this needs a bit more thinking through before a template is launched. -- Hoary (talk) 14:21, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've been thinking about this since your notice on

Subscription}} and {{Registration required}}. Perhaps we should also be talking to Wikipedia:WikiProject Accessibility to find out what sort of metadata would be helpful to those who use screen readers? Some sites have a separate HTML-only link that might be helpful to provide with such a template too. --Tothwolf (talk) 00:14, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply

]

I'm not sure how popular/used (as opposed to "potentially useful) such a template would be, although I have no objection to its creation.

Template:Official, which has been around for more than three years now, is only used in about 12,000 articles (~0.4% of Wikipedia's articles). I suspect that most editors will simply type the information by hand. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:50, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply

]

This article could use some help in cleaning up the external links. It has been tagged for over 3 years, and at present has almost 40 external links. I will be looking at it over the next few weeks, but any help would be appreciated. DigitalC (talk) 20:30, 5 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Done. I removed all the links to news articles. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 23:45, 12 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion related to this project: Template_talk:Taxobox#Implementation. --Snek01 (talk) 03:21, 27 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. :) To make a (very) long story short (permanent link to long story), a bunch of us are hoping to get a good movement together to take a hard look at Geocities links, either removing the ones that are unreliable/unsuitable under W:EL or finding archives to which they may point. Slightly out of scope for this project, this includes links used as references, but the vast majority of geocities links seem to be in the form of ELs.

Is there any objection to our organizing this under your umbrella as a subpage of your project? --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 11:32, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Opened at

WP:GeoCities. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:08, 27 August 2010 (UTC)[reply

]

Panyd^{The muffin is not subtle} 22:56, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply