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I am a little concerned about the exceptionally widespread use of this source, it is a 2020(!) doctoral thesis by Andrey Nikulin entitled Proto-Macro-Je: Um Estudo Reconstrutivo, which reconstructs the ancestor of a proposed linguistic macro-family. I am not an expert in South-American languages, but I know a fair bit about linguistics, and it looks serious work. The supervisors have published widely in relevant fields. I would suggest it is the kind of doctoral thesis which we might be able to use with care, but it seems to have been added absolutely anywhere it can be put, it is listed as a source in around 40 of our articles.

What does the community think, is it necessary to reduce the use of this source or am I being overly bureaucratic in my interpretation of WP:RS?

Boynamedsue (talk) 16:22, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

They all appear to have been added by a single editor, @Sagotreespirit:. I would like to hear their explanation for using a doctoral thesis so widely before commenting further. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:30, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

Yes, it would be good to know the logic behind it. Boynamedsue (talk) 16:34, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

I cite large surveys many times, only because they are large surveys that are generally considered to be reliable. There are definitely no COI motivations. I added those Brazilian dissertations only because they were large surveys of South American language families, not because of the specific people who had written them. Before, I was working on adding the classifications of Mason (1950), Loukotka (1968), and Campbell (2012) to dozens of articles, and thought it would be good to add some more recent classifications to balance out those other classifications (see Classification of indigenous languages of the Americas). Being completely aware of the need to give due weight and to present different points of view, I decided to add classifications from these more recent sources. As to why they're cited in so many places, it's because these sources deal with over 100 language families. I also cited the other sources like Campbell and Loukotka hundreds of times. Nikulin and Jolkesky are not privileged over Campbell and other sources. Someone with a COI would likely have added every single minor publication by one author starting from the very moment they created their Wikipedia account (and yes, I have seen this COI pattern countless times on Wikipedia, unfortunately). I'm doing the same thing @Kwamikagami: and other linguist editors do: cite large surveys dozens of times because they are, well, large surveys. So, sorry if it also might look like I have a COI with Lyle Campbell (or Terrence Kaufman or Cestmir Loukotka or Glottolog) because of the copious citations. And you can literally count all the major surveys of indigenous American language families using the fingers on your hands. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 16:01, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

• Sagotreespirit's userpage on the Portuguese Wikipedia, listing their interests and the articles they work on there, makes me believe that they very well might be the author of the thesis, or at least someone closely connected to the author... - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 16:57, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

The source is cited a similar number of times on the Portuguese wiki, again added by the same user. But we would probably expect that from any user who had access to the paper, given its subject matter and language, assuming they considered it relevant. Boynamedsue (talk) 17:23, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

@Thomas.W: I've been adding and checking the references for the South American languages listed on Language Isolate, and I've come across another exceptionally widely used doctoral thesis, again seemingly tied to @Sagotreespirit: This one is used more than 100 times, entitled Estudo arqueo-ecolinguístico das terras tropicais sul-americanas by Marcelo Pinho De Valhery Jolkesky, from 2016. Both dissertations are from the University of Brasilia. Boynamedsue (talk) 23:50, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Boynamedsue, Doctoral thesis are generally reliable, so the concern here seems to be more related to possible WP:COI/WP:SPAM than reliability, I think. The question is whether the source is used properly or just added as a 'see also' link. Perhaps this discussion should be taking place at WP:COIN instead of here? _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 05:57, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

See the discussion below. WP:RS and WP:WEIGHT are the main concerns here. The University of Brasilia has one of the most rigorous linguistics programs in all of Latin America, so University of Brasilia Ph.D. dissertations certainly aren't unreliable sources. We're not talking about personal blogs, CreateSpace content, or even a relatively unknown dissertation coming out of a small, obscure college in South America where you can basically write anything you want for your thesis. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 14:17, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

The guidelines say they are to be "used with care as they are often in part primary sources", these sources are almost always used to add the research of the scholars concerned to the article, rather than summarise past work. That probably opens up questions of WP:WEIGHT as well. Boynamedsue (talk) 07:36, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

They're not entirely primary sources though. The dissertations, like Campbell (2012), Loukotka (1968), and other similar sources painstakingly summarize a lot of past work in order to come up with coherent language classifications. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 14:12, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Indeed, should generally not be used especially if better sources are available, —PaleoNeonate – 00:36, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

• User:Degoiabeira, who has also added the thesis to WP, is, based on their user pages here and on the Portuguese WP, obviously the author of the thesis, with User:Sagotreespirit probably being an assistant, working closely with Degoiabeira on WP, editing the same articles and adding works by Nikulin as references etc (not only the doctoral thesis but also other earlier works). So it's at least bordering on being WP:REFSPAM, and a deliberate attempt to promote Nikulin by getting him cited as many times as possible here. - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 10:54, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

I regularly get requests from new editors to help them out with all kinds of matters, and only helped Degoiabeira out when he left me a message on my talk page last year. I don't know Degoiabeira in real life and barely even communicate with him. Being a nice guy, I've helped out over a dozen other newbies too in topics ranging from Papuan linguistics to Sikkim tea. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 14:06, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Almost all of the work done on Macro-Je historical linguistics has been published within the past 20 years in Brazilian dissertations. So naturally, those are the sources that need to be cited in articles about Macro-Je languages. Exclude the past work that has been done by Lyle Campbell, Terrence Kaufman, SIL International, and archaic sources such as Cestmir Loukotka (1968), and you would have almost nothing left. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 14:27, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

• I have left a message on sagotreespirits talkpage asking them to come here to discuss the source, and clarify whether they have any relationship with the authors. Hopefully we can clear this up. --Boynamedsue (talk) 20:08, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

@Boynamedsue: They're well aware of this discussion, since I pinged both users four days ago, but obviously have no intention of explaining themselves, judging by Sagotreespirit's removal of the COIN-template Paleoneonate posted on their talk page two days ago... - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 21:29, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

See my edit summary. A template was left on my talk page without any explanations (no linked pages or non-automated comments), so I had thought that it was a mistake. I checked PaleoNeonate's contributions and thought he had accidentally templated me due to my being one of the first editors of Investigations into the origin of COVID-19 when I moved the article. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 14:01, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Based on a very personal experience I presume it's not a COI-thing, but rather a case of quite indiscriminate use of primary sources. I often have Sagotreespirit's edits in my watchlist because they are also very active in adding material about Australian Aboriginal, Papuan and Austronesian languages. So the South American thing is just a fraction of their edit range. And if you grab a new thesis about a medium-sized understudied language family, it's not all that unsual to have the same source pop up in 40 articles; whether this in accordance with WP:WEIGHT is another thing, especially if the thesis is new and not widely cited yet. I had a few WP:WEIGHT-related discussions (which were NB very collegial and constructive) with Sagotreespirit, including one about Jolkesky. So I think the issue is well-placed here, but of course we also need to hear their clarification about potential COIs regarding Nikulin and Jolkesky. –Austronesier (talk) 21:53, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

@Austronesier:Absolutely, I can agree that there might be an arguable reason, but WP:WEIGHT is a big issue here. I found that a large part of the stuff from Nikulin was related to newly proposed classifications for language isolates, classifications first suggested in a thesis from 2020. I don't know how that can possibly be valid, although, without any doubt, most of Sagotreespirits additions to the South American language articles have been excellent.

@Thomas.W: Their edit summary on the revert suggests they may not know what is going on, and if it is self promotion, it is mixed in with a lot of other very good editing. This has earned the benefit of the doubt from me. If there is no response here, there will definitely be a cull of the use of Nikulin as a primary source and probably Jolkesky too.Boynamedsue (talk) 22:28, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

@Austronesier: @Boynamedsue: No, I don't have any COI, and I'm confused as to why anyone would think so. The reason I cited these dissertations a lot is because it's difficult to come across extensive resources for languages in remote parts of the Amazon (there simply aren't any other big surveys of South American languages other than a few other publications by Campbell and Rodrigues, which I also cite dozens, if not more than 100, times). Much work on South American historical linguistics has been done only in the past 10-20 years mainly by Brazilian Ph.D. students and a few researchers, mostly based at the University of Brasilia, Unicamp, and the Federal University of Rondonia. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 13:42, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

We can discuss WP:WEIGHT and consider adding different opinions by other scholars like Kaufman and Campbell, but certainly not completely culling the UnB dissertations. I would suggest looking for other sources on http://etnolinguistica.org/ to balance out Nikulin and Jolkesky. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 13:49, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

You appear confused. Any discussion of weight would necessarily include the option of completely culling the UnB dissertations... They are inferior sources by definition. If we have no coverage of these views beyond the dissertations themselves than absolutely *nothing* would be due. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:28, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

That is why I have worked hard to make sure that the recent Ph.D. dissertations should be balanced out with other reliable published sources. A good example is Arawakan languages#Languages for instance. However, a reliable source in linguistics should place more weight on the methodologies used, rather than the way it was published. Joseph Greenberg, Merritt Ruhlen, and Sergei Starostin were all famous tenured professors who had been published by big names like Stanford University Press, but their methods were questionable at best. On the other hand, Nikulin (2020) uses very meticulous methodology and was closely supervised by mainstream linguists. Some of the chapters in the dissertation have also already been published in academic journals, so this is reliable peer-reviewed research accepted by mainstream linguists. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 16:39, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Then you can use the chapters which have been published in academic journals. Recent Ph.D. dissertations shouldn't be balanced out, they shouldn't be included in the first place. Also how do you know this? Do you have something that supports the inside information that Nikulin was "was closely supervised by mainstream linguists" Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:46, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Also it appears you’re suggesting we create and use a stand-alone reliability standard for linguistics, I doubt thats going to happen. We will most likely continue to evaluate linguistics sources the same way we evaluate all other sources. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:49, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Much of the recent work on South American linguistics comes out of UnB from researchers such as Ana Cabral and others, and they supervise all of the UnB linguistics theses based on what I can find in the front matter of the dissertations. Aryon Rodrigues and Lucy Seki were also notable linguists there. As for inside information, no, I don't have any. As for reliable sources, I would say that content on http://etnolinguistica.org/ would generally be reliable and suitable for use on Wikipedia, since they are either published papers or dissertations from reputable universities vetted by academics working in the field. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 17:00, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

• This is a kind of overall answer to @Sagotreespirit: and @Horse Eye's Back:. I too am kind of confused by this idea that as linguistics doctorates are the only available sources, they are therefore acceptable for inclusion as primary sources. I fully agree that Campbell and Greenberg are and should be quoted all over the place, but the unpublished original research from a doctoral candidate does not seem to fulfil the same function. On the other hand, Sagotreespirit correctly says the supervisors of Nikulin's doctorate are very serious individuals, although we have no information on their response to it, or even whether he passed or not. Still, I can't really get my head round the argument that because Sagotreespirit says this work is good (and it may well be, it certainly looks the part) it should be added in contradiction to our policies.Boynamedsue (talk) 17:02, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Of course Wikipedia policies should be followed. I only said that methodologies should also be considered in addition to the need to follow WP:RS. WP:RS#Scholarship includes: "Completed dissertations or theses written as part of the requirements for a doctorate, and which are publicly available (most via interlibrary loan or from Proquest), can be used but care should be exercised, as they are often, in part, primary sources. Some of them will have gone through a process of academic peer reviewing, of varying levels of rigor, but some will not. If possible, use theses that have been cited in the literature; supervised by recognized specialists in the field; or reviewed by independent parties." — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 17:06, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

This is why I have always prioritized Campbell and Loukotka over Nikulin and Jolkesky. Wikipedia's policies explicit state that they are sources that can be cited, but with some degree of caution. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 17:09, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

But the caution is with regards to them being used to state the views/research of the author, "original research" rather than to refer the views of others. I, personally, have no problem with using Nikulin and Jokelsky to summarise the views of other scholars, but I do have a problem with adding their own research and views to articles, as until they are widely cited in published sources they don't satisfy WP:RS.Boynamedsue (talk) 17:16, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

If you look closely, a lot of Nikulin's and Jolkesky's classifications in fact synthesize information from earlier published materials and aren't that different from previous classifications (like Ramirez, Campbell, Loukotka, Greenberg, and others). They make some minor adjustments here and there. And yes, I would agree with you on this one, so I might consider excluding them if they diverge way too much from what the earlier scholars had laid out.

Do the dissertations meet WP:RS?

1. Completed dissertations or theses written as part of the requirements for a doctorate, and which are publicly available. Y Check

2. supervised by recognized specialists in the field Y Check

3. have gone through a process of academic peer reviewing Y Check

On the contrary, I have a bigger problem with quoting and citing the numerous messy (often very messy) dissertations coming out of small colleges in places like India and Nigeria, since they don't pass many of the WP:RS guidelines for dissertations.

So thanks for bringing this to my attention. WP:RS does state that we must be careful when using these kinds of sources, so I'll be much more cautious when citing doctoral dissertations such as these. For now, I think they have cited enough, so I don't think I'll be citing them in additional Wikipedia articles any longer until the results have been published in reputable academic journals. I will keep it the way it is now, but don't think it will be good to include much more content from the dissertations beyond basic classification schemes. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 17:25, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

As of now, I have mostly used the dissertations for lists of language names organized into branches and groups, but beyond that, the content takes on more characteristics of primary sources. As a result, I won't be including in-depth information such as detailed arguments about areal phonology/morphosyntax from the dissertations beyond very basic summaries that don't venture deep into "original research" territory. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 17:33, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

I appreciate the sentiment, but I would say that some of the articles in which these doctorates are included cite the research quite widely, and would need quite a lot of text removing. The article on Macro-Jê languages contains original research from no less than 4 doctoral dissertations, for example, explicitly stating the opinions of Nakulin, Jolkesky, Ribeiro and Pache. This is really not how it is supposed to work. Boynamedsue (talk) 21:28, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

The problem is, with under-researched areas like this, that removing what you are spuriously calling "OR" would mean abandoning any attempt at keeping the article up-to-date, which means that readers would have to go elsewhere for good information. — kwami (talk) 04:40, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

The assumption of COI seems unwarranted. I often disagree with Sagotreespirit and have reverted a lot of his work here on WP, much of which I find annoying, but I seriously doubt he is engaged in inappropriate behaviour. Actually, a colleague thinks he knows who he might be in real life, and there is no connection to Brazil. (For whatever that speculation might be worth.) And Sagotreespirit has been similarly enthusiastic about adding multiple citations to refs (by authors unrelated to the ones in question here) to the languages of New Guinea, to the point I've wondered about COI there. So this would seem to be a pattern of adding refs he likes or is impressed by to all the language articles they touch upon. That might be an UNDUE issue, but it isn't COI.

Indeed, Sagotreespirit's edits are like many of mine in the past: I would come across a reference that addresses the classification of a large number of languages, then rewrite those articles to accommodate that ref. For example, I've added refs to self-published articles by Roger Blench to at least this many (40) articles each, and it hasn't been a problem because they cover poorly researched areas that don't provide many other refs we could use -- similar to the situation in the Amazon, where we have an embarrassing paucity of research. And Blench doesn't meet the level of RS criteria that these theses do. Indeed, I've added refs to Rodrigues and Ribeiro to many of these same South American articles after meeting one of them at a conference and being impressed by his work. That of course reflects a bias on my part, but we're all biased by the research we're most familiar with.

I read only partway through the speculations and counter-speculations above (TLDR), but my questions would be:

Do the individual articles all need the ref, or is it better restricted to the family articles?

Is the work pseudo-linguistics like Ehret (who's been published multiple times in supposed RS's, but whose colleagues think his work is mostly useless or even nonsense), or is it sound?

Is there an attempt to erase previous work that is comparably sound but which disagrees with the new ref?

That is, I think we should judge these edits based on their inherit value per WEIGHT/UNDUE and RS, not on assumptions of inappropriate behaviour. And following the lit might mean being more dismissive of older, non-specialist work such as Campbell and Kaufman, who aren't particularly familiar with the languages in question. — kwami (talk) 21:36, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

We definitely do find each other annoying at times, but at the end of the day we both appreciate each other for the tremendous amount of encyclopedia building work that's been done. We're just both language geeks who get overexcited when running into recent large surveys of underdocumented parts of the world.

To answer the questions above:

1. Do the individual articles all need the ref, or is it better restricted to the family articles? Answer: Some of them might be better restricted to the family articles.
2. Is the work pseudo-linguistics like Ehret. Answer: No, except for Jolkesky's claims about a connection between Oto-Manguean and certain languages of Colombia. Nikulin's work certainly isn't pseudolinguistics, and he has no trouble getting published.
3. Is there an attempt to erase previous work that is comparably sound but which disagrees with the new ref? Answer: No, it should be obvious that I have been prioritizing sources like Campbell (2012).

If "Alien, Space (2021). A comprehensive classification of the languages of New Guinea. Working paper, Unaccredited University of Mars." were to come out, chances are I might also get overexcited and cite that all over the place when I probably shouldn't be doing so. So the question is, did I get overexcited by citing some of the recent sources too much? I will let the community decide. At the end of the day, I don't care about promoting anyone and just want to help classify the world's languages. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 03:54, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I wasn't making any accusations, I was just saying that's what I would be asking myself when looking at the edits. I hadn't had time to actually review them. — kwami (talk) 04:16, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Of course you're not. I'm just addressing the general wider community. Thanks for your constructive feedback as always. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 04:25, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

(edit conflict) As for 'annoying', that wasn't aimed at you (though it probably felt that way – sorry!) I said that to make the point that I wasn't here to back you up because of our relationship, but decided to back you up after coming here because I agree with you. — kwami (talk) 04:31, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Don't worry about that, I know how to take a joke. No offense taken of course. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 04:38, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

• General rule should be don't cite a thesis. While I have cited more than one thesis on various publications, as a rule I tried to start with journal articles then go to conference papers then finally a thesis. A thesis in my field is often a conglomeration of several journal articles thus anything in a thesis, most of the time, can be cited to a journal paper instead. Additionally, a thesis is often a document totally internal to a single university. Yes, there are several people on the committee and they are going to scrutinize it but that's not the same thing as people outside the university reviewing the material. There is also the concern that there are many academic papers coming out and we should be careful about treating any recent paper as if it represents an academic consensus vs just a reasoned opinion/view. If the work gains traction and is cited by others then I would be more inclined to accept it. Finally, in this case, if we think the author is adding their own material we should remove it unless it's plain as day obvious it should be included (odds are no). That becomes little more than self promotion. Springee (talk) 04:10, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I tend to follow the same guidelines myself. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 04:25, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Why are we assuming the author is adding there own material? By your logic, no Wikipedian can add any source written by a living person, unless their user page identifies who they are in real life and we can verify that. There has never been such a condition for sourcing articles on WP. — kwami (talk) 04:22, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I think we can all agree by now that COI is not the issue here. The general consensus about these kinds of dissertations is that they can be cited, but with caution. So while we can include basic information like lists of languages, things like in-depth arguments about language origins, haplogroups, and archaeology by Jolkesky (2016) would be better left out. I was tempted to include those, but stopped short of actually doing so. — Sagotreespirit (^talk) 04:29, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I'm not sure I understand your claim we should use the journal articles rather than the thesis. A thesis in most fields is new research. That's the entire point of a thesis!

The quality of theses depends on the quality of the university. Sago made that point above, when noting that a lot of theses from Indian and Nigerian universities are close to worthless. We should evaluate: is the university respected in this field? are the thesis advisers well-reviewed? are there outside thesis advisers? (A lot of U's encourage finding an outside adviser for just the reason you mentioned.) — kwami (talk) 04:36, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I won't speak to all fields but in mine a thesis typically was comprised of several related journal papers. So you might have a high level project idea, call it The Wright Flyer. So to get flight you need research on how to shape a wing (journal article 1), how to make a light engine (journal article 2), and how to control a vehicle in flight (article 3). Putting them together gives you an airplane (dissertation). Now if someone wants to cite your work on wing shapes they shouldn't go to your dissertation, instead they go to the journal article on that specific subject. Certainly the quality of the thesis would depend on the university and its standards but the university is still less independent than the journal publications and, presumably, you will get less institutional like think in the external publication. Springee (talk) 05:04, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

That's not how it usually works in linguistics. You might spin off elements into journal articles, but that's not necessary. It's also common to present elements of your thesis at conferences, but that would only be bits and pieces, or provisional drafts of what you develop more fully in your thesis. After graduating, it's common to rework your thesis for independent publication, but that would be as a book, not a journal article. — kwami (talk) 05:41, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Looking at the final part of the discussion I want to point out that we have the very active WikiProjects Languages and Linguistics. Editors unfamiliar with the structure of the relevant literature in our field can get community advise there too. E.g. conference papers clearly fall below dissertations (I'm talking about calibres of UC Berkeley, Leiden, ANU, etc., not corrupt diploma mills). Many good dissertations get later published as a book, but there's a lot of high impact theses with don't. Dissertations which are composed of previously published journal articles are occasionally produced; but if that material dominates in the thesis, I (and I guess other colleagues as well) look at it as a pitiful endeavor (NB in linguistics). And FWIW if someone still thinks that this a clear case of an author adding their own material, in spite of all statements above, we need to turn to a different noticeboard. –Austronesier (talk) 11:31, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Interesting how much different these things are in other fields. Anyway, my concern would still be if the content being cited is new/novel then we have no idea if it has been accepted by scholars in the field. If the material being cited is basic, is it unique to this work or something that came from a previous source. The first citation of some of my work was actually suspect in this regard. I made a claim which I cited to another paper. The person who cited my work should have cited my source rather than me since I didn't originate the claim. Above Sagotreespirit says they cited the work for more basic things like a classification list. If that list is novel should we be citing this work? If that list isn't then by definition it wasn't new/unique to this work and we should cite the original source which would have been "cited by others". Springee (talk) 13:47, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I am a post-grad student in Linguistics, and I too would happily quote PhD and even some Masters theses in work I was doing for uni. I have also seen theses of both kinds quoted widely by leading academics. However, I don't think the rules of wikipedia are the same, or, as others have stated, linguistics would have to be a special case. It may be that I am misunderstanding the initial policy, but the qualification of "original research" seems very clear.Boynamedsue (talk) 12:04, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

"No original research" applies to WP editors. Editors are prohibited from adding original research regardless of their credentials. If they're IRL researchers, it's self-promotion/soapboxing, if not, it mostly ends up as Dunning-Krugerish stuff. WP reflects third-party sources, and the relevant policies for their inclusion are WP:WEIGHT and WP:RS (especially WP:SCHOLARSHIP and WP:PRIMARY), but not WP:NOR. If dissertations (or even MA theses) are widely cited in the mainstream, nothing precludes citing them here too. –Austronesier (talk) 12:52, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Yes, sorry, I was using the wrong wiki terminology, in my head I had switched "primary source" for "original research". We return to this case, the 2020 dissertation is very much not widely cited (hard to see how it could be) so it shouldn't be here. Boynamedsue (talk) 13:08, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

• I am not an expert on this subject, but I can see from Google Scholar that this thesis has only been cited twice in the academic literature [1]. I can further see that the author has never been substantially cited either [2]. I cannot conclude whether or not he is an established authority. for I do not know how many others may be working on the topic. But if we are to cite his views we should cite his peer-reviewed publications:, which are better sources than academic theses: The most comprehensive seems to be: "Historical phonology of Proto-Northern Jê"

Journal of Language Relationship Volume 14 Issue 3-4" DOI: https://doi.org/10.31826/jlr-2017-143-405 [3], which is, conveniently, open-access. DGG ( talk ) 05:19, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Used on multiple pages. Reliable secondary source? Self-generated source? See [ https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/write-for-us/ ] --Guy Macon (talk) 13:55, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Probably fine. They have an editorial team which seems to check and edit articles, and they solicit articles only from trained industry professionals. It's not a peer reviewed journal, but it's not reddit either. However, most relevant for stuff like this is the to what content are these citations attached to? There are different standards for citing a procedure for making a lemon chiffon cake than there is for the chronology of a controversial political event, and the sort of things a website like this seems to be used to cite mostly seems closer to the "lemon chiffon cake" end of the spectrum than of the "U.S. president incites a mob" end of the spectrum. Allowances for the "reliability" of a source need to be made based on the contentiousness of the text being so cited. If we're using them for details around the internal operations of some technical doofalator, it's unlikely to be contentious and this site probably sufficient. Has anyone challenged the veracity of the text being cited? Which is to say, are the articles published on the site shown to be rife with uncorrected errors? If not, I'd say they look fine to me. --Jayron32 17:37, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

There is some interesting information about how Benjamin Franklin was strategic in his training and placing patriotic printers in what became a network of printers in colonial cities.

I found a site] that says:

The Benjamin Franklin History website was created by the Benjamin Franklin Historical Society as part of of the University of Massachusetts History Club. Our objective is to give honor to Benjamin Franklin as one of our founding fathers and to recognize his importance in the development of civic responsibility, science and entrepreneurship in colonial America.

I am interested in this page for the Ann Timothy (daughter-in-law of Elizabeth Timothee-->Elizabeth Timothy). I like it because the information is clear and concise. I would like to add it for context re: the Siege of Charleston impacts on the family. Would this be a reliable source for that information?

Thanks so much!–CaroleHenson (talk) 23:31, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

This is a summary of previous discussions about AllMusic. I am totaly not repeating the word AllMusic again and again to bring this to the top of the ASllMusic search results. Did I mention AllMusic? :)

• 19:11, 31 May 2008 / 6:32, 18 July 2008: "Allmusic not a reliable source on heavy metal music ... I argue that allmusic cannot be considered a reliable source specifically regarding heavy metal music. My reasoning is thus: They are an authority on mainstream music, something heavy metal generally is not. [they are] a source with little real knowledge of the genre, and I can see no good reason whatsoever to consider them a reliable source on that subject area."
• 08:01, 11 December 2008: "A substantial Allmusic bio or review should be considered significant coverage in a reliable source - they have some very good professional writers and these are generally of good quality. The discographies in allmusic, however, are not reliable and better sources should be found. "
• 01:36, 16 March 2009: "Should [ allmusic.com ] site be still considered a reliable source? A recent AfD turned up errors in the listing for Palladium discography (see: this and this). I also find many of the credits listed on songs and albums to be incorrect or totally missing, and the reviews to be overtly opinionated and factually incorrect"
• 02:40, 16 March 2009: "My experience is that they are generally reliable, although not error-free. Reviews should only be cited as the opinion of the reviewer, of course"
• 19:55, 20 July 2009: " a more apt analogy would be the Rolling Stone versus Allmusic, Allmusic is considerably less notable, but of a greater quality and reliability, it delves into the subject matter in depth and eschews one-paragraph reviews for fact checking and editor responsibility."
• 03:23, 9 November 2009: "For example, Allmusic is accepted because it's a professionally run website and while it's certainly a great resource, it's not always factually accurate. Yet, a self-published fan site, no matter how meticulously researched and well written it is, isn't acceptable for Wikipedia."
• 21:43, 13 August 2010: "I was involved with an article where someone claiming to be the artist and someone claiming to be the artists agent both stated that Allmusic had the birthcountry wrong, so I would say that Allmusic would fall into the category of IMDB where content about the artistic works may be acceptable, but claims about the person should generally avoid using it as a source. "
• 20:52, 7 September 2010: "Hmmm...according to our article, Allgame is owned by All Media Guide, the same company that owns Allmusic and Allmovie. Isn't Allmusic frequently cite by our music articles? OTOH, the About page says 'Some of our descriptions and reviews are written by the All Game Guide's full-time editorial staff,but most are written for us by off-site freelancers.' "
• 4:44, 13 October 2010: "is Allmusic.com a reliable source? ... It says "The AMG editorial staff, along with hundreds of expert contributors (all music fanatics in their own right)" on the about page for that site, making me think it's has user submitted content similar to Discogs, and DIscogs is not a reliable source. I would wait for more opinions though. It does say it has an editorial staff, so I'm not sure which content is the editor content and which is the user submitted content."
• 16:12, 13 October 2010: "AllMusic is mentioned here as an acceptable link for record reviews, I don't if this extends to their general text. It's an important question to answer because the site is referenced a lot."
• 19:46, 25 June 2011: "Relying allmusic is not the best course of action, but Billboard is clearly reliable as a source for music in general."
• 02:10, 23 September 2011: "Rovi [ allrovi.com ] appears to have taken over the All Media Guide, which included AllMovie and AllMusic. I'm not sure about AllMovie, but AllMusic has been considered RS for music articles."
• 01:14, 9 August 2012: "C. Fred mentions allmusic.com as a reliable source. That website as well as other musical artist bio websites are notorious for dubious incorrect information"
• 01:24, 9 August 2012: "WP only allows allmusic, per WP:PSTS and WP:BLPPRIMARY. If you don't agree, you'll need to change the policies in place here."
• 18:22, 20 November 2013: "AllMusic/AMG as a source for biographical info ... The metadata looks like it is in part user-submitted. I would not trust the metadata. The biographies and reviews are all licensed from Rovi, and neither All Media Guide nor Rovi seem to accept user submissions in this area, though they do seem to accept corrections. The corrections are requested to have a citation, but it is not required. Who knows what that means in terms of reliability. I try to avoid using Rovi/AMG as a source, but the reviews and biographies seem to be the most reliable aspect of the site. If you simply must use Rovi/AMG, I guess that's the part to use."
• 15:17, 11 September 2014: "[ Rockabilly.nl ] is far, far more reliable on details than other more general sites such as (one example) Allmusic.com."
• 22:05, 1 April 2014: "as far as I know allmusic.com and billboard.com are reliable sources"
• 14:18, 9 March 2015: "Allmusic - which I think is far less reliable, on almost all criteria, but which seems to be regarded here as generally reliable"
• 19:29, 26 April 2015: "All Music is generally considered a reliable source."
• 11 September 2017: "Posting here for the hell of it, and cause User:Chris troutman dropped me a note saying AllMusic might not be an RS because it had user-generated content; he said he got this from this noticeboard ... IMHO AllMusic should be approached on a case-by-case basis, so neither a universal stamp of approval, nor a universal stamp of disapproval ... I could give some fairly recent examples where editor consensus led to removal of AllMusic from an article, and other examples where editor consensus decided for inclusion."
• 06:46, 7 February 2019: "I won't offer a polling opinion, but will say that AllMusic meets RS and reviews there that contain prose are completely reliable regardless of who the author is."
• 10:24, 29 March 2020: "The bios are mostly an old AllMusic dump. Some indie bands write their own bios. So in general, we should look for better sources "
• 05:37, 31 March 2020: "In the past, editors have considered AllMusic marginally reliable for biographical information. I would cite AllMusic instead of Spotify, since AllMusic has a stronger reputation for music reviews."

Does anyone have any reliability evaluations to add? --Guy Macon (talk) 16:09, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

Overused tertiary across Wikipedia for music articles, and arguably not reliable. Let's see what they tell us about information on the website:

• "The album, artist and song information on AllMusic comes from our data provider, TiVo. TiVo provides us with written content like reviews and biographies, tagged metadata like Genres, Styles, Moods, Themes and Similar Artists, as well as information about credits, album covers, sound clips, music videos and a ton of other good stuff. Providing your product to TiVo is the best way to get your information on AllMusic."
• "You can mail TiVo one copy of the product along with any relevant promotional materials, such as artist bios and press releases, and email a single message containing artist and release images (in JPEG format and at least 300 pixels wide) and other promotional materials using the addresses below.TiVo adds products and other materials to their databases at their discretion. By submitting products and other materials to TiVo, you acknowledge and agree that those products and materials will not be returned to you, will become the property of TiVo upon receipt and may be used by TiVo at its discretion."

It should be easy to see how Allmusic can be used to bolster notability.

In my view a wider discussion needs to be had about use of compromised music sources. The nature of the music industry, with branding, marketing, social media influencing etc., means that there's less 'real' music journalism than ever, coverage has more to do with the size of an act's publicity budget than anything else. Note, Vice, for example, break down how their content is created:

• "Created In Partnership With" is used to describe VMG content that has been co-created with an advertiser and produced in conjunction with VICE’s editorial department. Advertisers may be involved in creating this content by placing their products into the content, collaborating on topics & themes before the content is produced or in select other ways.
• "Presented by" is used to describe editorially independent VMG content that is supported by a client’s advertising spend and produced by VMG’s editorial department.
• “Supported by ” is used to describe editorially independent VICE News content that is supported by a client’s advertising spend and produced by VICE News editorial department.
• “From our advertiser” or “advertisement” is used to describe content that is created and controlled by an advertising partner.

At least they make it clear how content is commissioned. Editors working on music articles should not be inadvertently operating as publicists for record labels and their artists, but many are doing just this. Another example, Fader, is arguably not an independent source it's part of Cornerstone Media, a marketing/advertising agency, they make money pushing product. For the past 18 years, it’s been an open secret that Fader magazine and creative agency Cornerstone have been operating under the same ownership. Guideline states: "An independent source is a source that has no vested interest in a given Wikipedia topic and therefore is commonly expected to cover the topic from a disinterested perspective. Independent sources have editorial independence (advertisers do not dictate content) and no conflicts of interest (there is no potential for personal, financial, or political gain to be made from the existence of the publication)".

There are many such examples of webzines that are fronts for marketing agencies, and editors are using such content as if the information is coming from reliable sources, it's not, it's mostly press copy. We really need to be more aware of this marketing agency/music journalism nexus when sourcing music related content on Wikipedia. Acousmana (talk) 17:22, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

@Acousmana: you are right that many online music publications now just print whatever the marketing departments of record labels tell them too. Sadly this extends to publications that were previously considered totally reliable... it's obvious that the likes of Billboard and Rolling Stone are also full of "watch the latest video from XXXX below" and uploaded by the artist's record label or management, so not even these are exempt from the wider discussion you rightly suggest. Richard3120 (talk) 01:32, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

@Richard3120:agree, yes, this kind of promotional strategy existed before the internet, artist interviews on the back of new releases etc., pitched by label music PR departments, and the perks that were offered, like the journalistic equivalent of payola to some extent. Ultimately it's all about advertising and cross promotion now, that's why these agencies are scooping up these "hip" webzines, or creating their own, broadening their reach, so they can demonstrate niche market competency to their corporate clients. Acousmana (talk) 12:32, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

• I would rate AllMusic thusly:

• For reviews of albums and songs and artists, especially of older entries, many Allmusic reviews are tagged with a by-line from a notable music critic. Insofar as the review is written by such a notable critic, it seems that it would be fine for attributed reviews and quotes.
• For things like album credits and track listings, I don't believe that data is unreliable. It is not user submitted, and appears (especially for older entries) to be correct and stable; if the data provider is themselves getting it from the artists and/or labels, I would consider the artists/labels themselves to be reliable for who appeared on the album/song (equivalent to the liner notes from physical media).
• For the purpose of notability I would consider them not sufficient. Given that the data is likely provided directly from the artist/label themselves, as a primary source, while it is reliable in the sense that it is trustworthy, it does not establish notability in that an AllMusic entry is, in itself, insufficient in that they are not a fully independent source. You would still need to find independent coverage of the song, album, or artist in another reliable source.

That's my proposal on how to write this up. They information is trustworthy, but lacks independence enough to consider it sufficient for notability purposes. --Jayron32 17:32, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

Great analysis. I agree 100%. I guess that's why they pay you^{[Citation Needed]} the big bucks. :) --Guy Macon (talk) 17:38, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

"Given that the data is likely provided directly from the artist/label themselves, as a primary source, while it is reliable in the sense that it is trustworthy..." - curious, why is it assumed to be trustworthy? It's an industry riddled with hype and hyperbole! Acousmana (talk) 17:47, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

If the liner notes on an album say that John Doe played saxophone for track 3, why should I doubt that? If the album jacket says that the title of Track 3 is "Random Song Title", why should I doubt that? What evidence do you have that AllMusic's information to be less reliable than that? Do you really think that AllMusic is unreliable in reporting the names of tracks or the artists that played whatever instrument on them? That's not the kind of information that is subject to hyperbole.--Jayron32 18:50, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

true, basic info like that that isn't the issue, stuff like, "so and so is the most influential/groundbreaking/genre defining/innovative etc. album, in the history of influential/groundbreaking/genre defining/innovative etc. albums," or other such claims, that editors lift verbatim, with nobody raising an eyebrow, well, that's a different story! Acousmana (talk) 19:45, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

• From my experience, I'd rate staff album reviews as generally fine although some weight should be based on who wrote the review. Take bios with a grain of salt, and the track listing and such is generally fine. There's some user-generated stuff that's from my experience fairly clearly identified as such, and of course the WP:UGC content should be avoided. I'm also going to leave a neutral message pointing to this discussion at WT:FAC, because the reliability of AllMusic has come up as a discussion point in multiple FACs lately. Hog Farm _Talk 01:17, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

• I am pleased to read this discussion since most of what comes my way on New Page Patrol is music related. Turkish rappers, Greek songsters, J-Pop, K-pop, and albums / songs created and sung 20 or more years ago. From my experience, Jayron32 is talking sense with regard to track listings and titles. They get repeated ad-nauseum on articles. I don't take AllMusic by itself as sufficiently notable. Notability comes from 3 or 4 or more interviews, articles, reviews, like this. Then you can have lists, some discography, some track listing. Acousmana is definitely on the right track with regard to marketing agency/music journalism nexus where what you read as a (reference) on some articles is the same press release on five different sites. Same heading, same pictures. This comment is reasonable to me, its a strategy that I use a lot: in that an AllMusic entry is, in itself, insufficient in that they are not a fully independent source. You would still need to find independent coverage of the song, album, or artist in another reliable source.(--Jayron32) --Whiteguru (talk) 01:47, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

• Wouldn't it be better to simply relax the rules and allow primary sources for discographies and track listings rather than use an unreliable secondary source that usually gets those things right because they copy the primary sources? --Guy Macon (talk) 02:02, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

what rule prevents using Primary Sources for such lists? If the content of a book or movie is appropriate for a plot summary / character list etc (per WP:PRIMARY) what are we doing differently for music? Koncorde (talk) 02:25, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

No actual rule, just a de facto practice. WP:PRIMARY says "A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge. For example, an article about a novel may cite passages to describe the plot, but any interpretation needs a secondary source." Certainly discographies and track listings are descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge. I would say more so that plot descriptions. Let me see if I can get a change to the example to stick. See [28]. --Guy Macon (talk) 02:54, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

At Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Sources, we say that AllMusic is considered generally reliable for its prose reviews, genre articles and biography prose. The sidebar genres are not reliable; in one such case AllMusic says in the sidebar that an album is reggae, while the prose review says "no reggae in sight". I would also caution against sidebar biographical facts such as birth name or birth date, having seen multiple errors in this department. If there's an AllMusic prose review of the album, written by staff or a music critic, I should think that would add to notability. But a stub page listing of the album with no prose review cannot aide in establishing notability. I agree with Guy Macon that the primary source can and should be used for tracklist and personnel credits; I have been doing exactly that for years, using Template:Cite AV media.

Is AllMusic overused? I don't think we have a problem with that on Wikipedia. It's used a lot because it's available, and it's pretty solid for its prose reviews. Binksternet (talk) 03:59, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

really all depends who wrote the prose and what the subject is, to assume that Allmusic is - across the board - an authoritative source, is a bad idea, lots of bad/inaccurate/hyperbolic writing on there too, which editors use uncritically, or lazily, rather than looking at available secondary sources. Acousmana (talk) 19:22, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

• Im heavily involved in the music subject area. Our current set up seems about right - the prose is generally reliable, while their equivalent userboxes are not. If someone has an issue with how heavily it's used...so be it. It is used awfully heavily. But that's simply because it's so prolific. Sergecross73 msg me 01:10, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
• Reliable there is a lot of supposition here and no evidence of unreliability in terms of the biographies and album reviews which are both in fact often written by well respected music journalists and have a byline so are obviously secondary sources not primary sources. That they accept submissions is entirely in keeping with most reliable sources even the NYT and LA Times accept submissions and AllMusic clearly states that entries will be written at the discretion of the editors and not subject to payment or user-generated. No evidence has been provided that the bios are unreliable and criticism of the style of writing is subjective. It is of course inconvenient to editors seeking deletion results to have a readily available and extensive reliable source such as AllMusic but there have been no valid arguments here for questioning it's reliability in my view, Atlantic306 (talk) 01:13, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
• Not this again. The prose is reliable, don't use the sidebars, and track list and credits are useful as primary sources used case-by-case depending on how complete/accurate they are (I usually pair them with something like Tidal and Spotify).--3family6 (Talk to me | See what I have done) 05:05, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
• The reviews and biographies written/edited/overseen by staff are reliable--these are the only things I use AllMusic for. Caro7200 (talk) 14:53, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
• Reliable for reviews. Several regular AllMusic contributors are well-known music writers and critics, such as Richie Unterberger, Cub Koda, Jim O'Neal, Scott Yanow, Ron Wynn, Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Bill Dahl, et al. However, the details in its sidebars (dates, etc.) are often incorrect as well as composers and track durations, which apparently come from various sources. As noted by others, this type of info is better sourced directly from the actual release using ((Cite AV media notes)). —Ojorojo (talk) 16:12, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
• Reliable for reviews. As noted above, Allmusic has an editorial team made up of notable and reliable critics. The sidebar (or inofox) should never be relied upon for genres etc as this is often arbitrary. Composers and tracklengths are not always right as this information can be user submitted. ≫ Lil-Unique1 -{ Talk }- 21:50, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
• I think it's generally reliable for reviews and biographies, but I have on occasion noticed mistakes. For example, the information in this review was not fact-checked: https://www.allmusic.com/album/even-more-dazed-confused-mw0000626539 It's not true that only a couple of the songs on Even More Dazed and Confused were used in the film—they all were, and they all appear in the film's ending credits. As others have pointed out, I agree the musician credits listings are sometimes less reliable. Moisejp (talk) 21:57, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
• Reliable for staff reviews as mentioned by a number of people above; there are some very well regarded critics working for them. Just don't use the infoboxes, as they're user-submitted and quite often contain complete nonsense as well as being out of date; I looked at one recently which contained at least four factual errors including two that had never been true. Black Kite (talk) 02:11, 2 March 2021 (UTC)
• Ah, AllMusic. Such a problematic relationship with wikipedia. I find content is largely reliable in that both staff and freelancer contributions are vetted and overseen by professionals to a degree that should satisfy reliable source criteria. Yet in context of determining notability, the existence of an Allmusic bio, or album review, merely by itself is, IMO, insufficient to establish notability of an article. A performer or recording can fail every other necessary notability criteria, e.g. no reliable source press, recognition, quantifiable measure of success (sales or chart performance), no-notable label recordings, etc. and still have an AllMusic entry simply because editorial staff accepts and "publishes" an entry. In other words, AllMusic compiles some entries based on mere existence (a classic WP no-no, per WP:EXISTS) at the pleasure of editorial staff, rather than actual real word notability. These are in the minority, I suspect, but enough exist that it makes a blanket proclamation for AllMusic difficult. Sadly, some times I'll see in music AfD discussions a comment such as "subject has an AllMusic bio so therefore is a keep." I think this is lazy; AllMusic should be counted as just one qualifying criteria, just like any other source. But never the end-all factor in determining notability. ShelbyMarion (talk) 21:59, 2 March 2021 (UTC)
• The various music projects have determined that its reviews and staff ratings are reliable for details about the work. The album credits, including release dates and personell are usually reliable. The "genre cloud" is not reliable. The user reviews and ratings should not be used. Walter Görlitz (talk) 17:02, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
• Ah, here we are again, again. Agree with Walter G. above, fully. It's occasionally wrong, like any publication; we evaluate on a case by case basis when needed. I generally find that the presence of an AMG bio is a leading indicator of extant content elsewhere; if there were nothing else about a band other than an AMG bio, I'd look askance, but it's as reasonable as any major music rag for sourcing. Insufficient on its own to establish notability per WP:MUSIC bullet 1, but can contribute in concert with other publications, and the content within is reliable enough to establish WP:V for other bullets of WP:MUSIC. Chubbles (talk) 21:11, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

In the few times it has mentioned before, Daily Beast has been viewed as a usable source, albeit with a clear liberal tint. They seem to have taken a pronounced shift into tabloid journalism recently, with their current home page seeming to be a liberal version of the Daily Mail, involving thinly sourced gossip articles. In cases where there are reporting personal information about a subject who disputes their reporting, I believe their weight on Wikipedia should be strongly depreciated and editors should be discouraged from relying on claims made therein that have not been backed by more reliable reporting. Heron Son of Periander (talk) 18:18, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Note: when saying In cases where there are reporting personal information about a subject who disputes their reporting this user is specifically trying to diminish the credibility of the allegations made against Donald McNeil Jr. I have no other thoughts about the DB as a source, but I entirely disagree with their POV-pushing on that page. Alyo (chat·edits) 19:18, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

The diffs [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37] suggest that you guys are having a WP:BLP dispute rather than a sourcing dispute, so Heron Son of Periander, you might want to take this to WP:BLPN. Besides, could you provide evidence that the Daily Beast has published falsehoods or fabrications?--JBchrch (talk) 20:01, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

It looks like this question is prompted by the Daily Beast's recent article about then NY Times reporter Donald McNeil. I agree that this article has a tabloid feel. It's an "exclusive" based on claims made by high-schoolers on a trip organized by the Times, which McNeil took part in as an expert (the all-caps, slanted, red "Deeply Disappointed" below the headline adds to the tabloid feel). The way the accusations are worded, it's not quite clear whether they're in the Daily Beast's voice, or whether the Daily Beast is just relaying them:

After the excursion ended, according to multiple parents of students on the trip who spoke with The Daily Beast along with documents shared with the Times and reviewed by the Beast, many participants relayed a series of troubling accusations to the paper: McNeil repeatedly made racist and sexist remarks throughout the trip including, according to two complaints, using the “n-word.”

I'm willing to give the Daily Beast the benefit of the doubt here that they don't mean to put these accusations in their own voice. However, the recent additions to Donald McNeil Jr. state definitively that there were public reports of [him] making racist remarks, which is not true. There were reports of him being accused by a group of high-schoolers of making racist remarks. That's very different from there being reports of him having made such remarks. I'll note that as of my writing, the lede still incorrectly claims that the are reports of McNeil having made racist remarks. This is obviously a BLP problem. Donald McNeil has now responded to these accusations in great detail, which certainly calls them into doubt.

If it were just the Daily Beast reporting on this story, I'd say we shouldn't use it. But the story has now generated a large amount of coverage (the media loves to report on media drama), so it has to be included in Donald McNeil Jr.. However, we cannot in any way imply that the accusations are true. We should be very careful about presenting the issue neutrally, about including McNeil's response, and in not giving it undue weight. McNeil was at the Times from 1976 until 2021, and was involved in covering many important stories (including leading the Times' coverage of the coronavirus pandemic over the last year), so this story should be kept in perspective. -Thucydides411 (talk) 21:00, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Thucydides411 Thank you for you input here. The distinction between public reports and the internal investigation is a fine one, but well pointed out. I'll incorporate these comments, but if you have any interest in commenting further on the talk page I tried to start earlier I appreciate all further help on the WP:BLP question. Alyo (chat·edits) 22:51, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

I had not taken a look at their home page in a while, and was taken aback when doing so now - the OP has a point. Upon further research, it turns out that Noah Shachtman, who became the site's editor-in-chief in 2018, has explicitly characterized the Daily Beast as a "high-end tabloid" that embraces gonzo journalism, see this interview:

[...] In the media ecosystem, where do you fit in among the competitors?

[...] I don’t know, necessarily, that I’d compare it exactly to BuzzFeed 2012. To me, we’re more of a mix of like the old-school New York tabloids ... I grew up in New York, and so I grew up reading the Daily News and the New York Post when they were at their height ... And mixing that with, in some ways, my experience working for Condé Nast magazines. It was kind of like the slick, glossy, global, smart outlook of those. You put those two together and give them a bizarre Frankenstein love child and you have the Daily Beast.

Do you think of yourself as a tabloid? Is that something that you communicate to your reporters? Does that bring a different kind of sensibility to your reporting? Does it give you more leeway?

Yeah. I think we consider ourselves a high-end tabloid, a global tabloid, for sure. [...]

[...] Somebody suggested that they feel like you guys have taken up the mantle of Gawker a little bit. [...] Do you feel like you try to fill some of that void of that sort of style? Because you guys, you’re willing to cover things that other outlets might find too insidery, but it’s like if you can get a scoop on it or if it’s an interesting story ...

Look, I think that we like to embrace the gonzo and that Gawker was an inheritor of that gonzo spirit that didn’t originate with Gawker, but that they carried that mantle for a little while. We really like the gonzo. We really like the weird. We really like the fun and we don’t give that many fucks. We don’t give zero fucks, but we don’t give that many fucks.

I still think that discussions on this page too often fail to clearly distinguish between factual accuracy and bias/lack of objectivity. Or to put it differently, even tabloids can differ considerably in their "reputation for fact-checking and accuracy". But yeah, probably not a stellar BLP source.

Regards, HaeB (talk) 01:12, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

I echo HaeB's concerns. The Daily Beast is a sensational tabloid that purposely does not distinguish opinions/commentary from straight facts. They have a poor track record with BLPs (see here and here). If your only source is the Daily Beast, then it simply doesn't meet the requirements of a WP:BLPRS. Dr. Swag Lord (talk) 03:13, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Agreed. Tabloids such as this one cannot serve as the sole source for things cited in BLPS. Thomas Meng (talk) 03:31, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

There had been some disagreement on how The Daily Beast (RSP entry) is classified on the perennial sources list at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 5 § The Daily Beast changed to "no consensus". I think a request for comment may be helpful. — Newslinger talk 09:07, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

I don't think they are entirely unreliable as a source, but I do think that their recent shift into more tabloid style reporting means they should be deprecated on [[38]]. Are there any objections to that? Heron Son of Periander (talk) 18:48, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

You would need to start an RfC if you want a source to be deprecated. Based on past discussions, I find it highly unlikely that there would be consensus to deprecate The Daily Beast, but you are free to start an RfC to ask the community. — Newslinger talk 00:23, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

No previous RSN discussions.

Related: Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard#Bachelor of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery

Used as a source on: Bachelor of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery. ^[1] (EDIT: that page is now a redirect, so we don't have to worry about that use).

Available at https://www.diamondbook.in/educational-analysis-india-usa-digri-english.html at only 250 Indian Rupees (2.46 British Pounds Sterling, 3.43 United States Dollars).

https://www.diamondbook.in/books.html has a section on "Self Publishing: Get Your Self Published", which leads to https://www.diamondbook.in/author-link/ -- "Become an author"

https://www.livemint.com/Leisure/6MDTkDdxvlZt2nuJBkEtgJ/When-everyone8217s-an-author.html says:

"Among the 50 publishers Mohata contacted was Diamond Pocket Books, which was willing to publish it as a vanity project, and offered to print 2,000 copies if Mohata would pay for the privilege."

Looks like a vanity press to me. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:47, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

• Generally unreliable. Yes, the Mint article confirms that Diamond Pocket Books is a vanity press with a reputation for publishing low-quality content. Books from this publisher should be treated as self-published. — Newslinger talk 00:33, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Associated Press (RSP entry) is listed as a generally reliable source, which I think is not disputed at all. However, they have sponsored content that is occasionally used by undisclosed paid editors (see Draft:Cloe Luv, source example: [39]). Could we update the notes on the WP:RSP entry to note that sponsored content is not edited by AP staff and is not considered WP:RS? Does that need an RFC at all? --MarioGom (talk) 19:11, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

That's not AP content. It clearly states that is Accesswire content. It also states clearly at the top that it is a press release, which means it is only reliable as a primary source for what it says, but is not an independent source for the purpose of establishing notability. --Jayron32 19:53, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Jayron32, that's right. We have notes on other entries about being careful with content labeled as sponsored. There's some people that use AP good name to mislead about the source, and I think a note would make sense. That does not mean lowering the rating of AP itself, just explaining this. We have similar notes for Forbes Contributors, which has always been a source of confusion, because it is often assumed it is reliable because it's on forbes.com. There are also notes clarifying for Business Insider, for example. --MarioGom (talk) 20:16, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

I wouldn't, in particular, think we need to note anything about the AP specifically. A general statement that the authorship of the content (and not the website it is hosted on) is what the reliability attaches to. Sources republish content from each other all the time; CBS News website may republish a story written by Reuters, Bloomberg may carry an AP story, etc. The origin of the material, and not where you found it matters. It's like "Is YouTube reliable"? YouTube as an organization produces no content; who produced the video itself? That determines if it is reliable or not. Similarly, who wrote the content need to be the determining factor; this is true about ANY content, and is not particular to AP. --Jayron32 20:32, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Jayron32, I thought it would make sense, since we do it for other generally reliable sources whose press releases are often used for promo. But I don't see this as a big deal. If this doesn't look like a non-controversial change to other editors, I'm ok with it. MarioGom (talk) 20:41, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

• I think it's worth including a note similar to what we use for Forbes contributor pieces, since (as with those pieces) if someone just clicks the link or glances and the URL, the fact that it has AP on it in big letters is likely to make people immediately categorize it as an WP:RS by mistake. It's something worth warning editors about so they know to glance more closely at sources on that domain. EDIT: Although perhaps it's not enough of a problem to be worth it; a quick search only found five uses of it as a source, some of which were for minor details trivial enough that it's probably acceptable. --Aquillion (talk) 07:49, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

• This is actually a big problem and was previously discussed at Nicholas Alahverdian when a self submitted obit was published by AP without any indication it wasn't from their editorial staff. I would say anything that doesn't have a byline shouldn't be considered and in the case of this source, it's clearly labeled as a press release. CUPIDICAE💕 20:34, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
• Since the article in question is explicitly labeled as a press release ("Press release content from Accesswire. The AP news staff was not involved in its creation."), it should be treated as the equivalent of a blog post on the company's (Cloé Luv LLC's) official website, a type of self-published source. It is generally unreliable, but can be used for uncontroversial self-descriptions of the company. — Newslinger talk 21:48, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
• It is very clearly labelled as "PRESS RELEASE: Paid content from Accesswire" on top and "Press release content from Accesswire. The AP news staff was not involved in its creation." on the side. This isn't an issue specific to AP, wire services often re-transmit releases and new organization websites have outside content as well. In my opinion this does not merit a caveat note on AP, as it this applies to most news sources.--Eostrix  (^{🦉 hoot} _hoot🦉) 06:20, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

I think there is a broader point to be made that should probably be noted on RSP if it isn't already that no source can be considered always reliable. As an example of an AP failure, take this obit I referred to earlier which does not indicate whether or not it was checked for accuracy, who wrote it and where it came from. We cannot paint any source as being always reliable like we can for unreliable sources, so sometimes it is worth a discussion. CUPIDICAE💕 14:40, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Per this. Will this affect reliability? SK2242 (talk) 19:12, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Like News Corp, publications owned by the DMGT should be evaulated on a case by case basis, the i newspaper is owned by them but I would consider it reliable. I wrote the rsp entry for the New Scientist (RSP entry). The discussions on New Scientist were not extensive, one was on a chemical attack in Syria, which is very much outside NS wheelhouse. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:30, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Too soon to tell. Worth keeping an eye on. Per The Guardian, it's a profitable property for them to have a hold of, so they might just sit on it and not make any serious changes. Yet to be seen. Looks like they have guaranteed editorial independence and lack of staff cuts, too. Guess we'll see; For now I would treat them as the same they were before unless something changes in a negative direction. --Chillabit (talk) 19:35, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Like Newsweek, we may need to mark a time frame when NS ceases to be an RS due to this, but yes, its too early to tell if that's needed. --Masem (t) 19:38, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

• Like others have said, it is a cause for mild future concern, and if there are indicators that its reliability changes we might look back on this and make it a cut-off date, but generally speaking more than just a change in ownership is needed to render a previously-reliable source unreliable. --Aquillion (talk) 20:10, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

  Yep that is correct. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 20:28, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

New Scientist is already trash. They called me in two different occasions to ask for comments for an article, and badly misquoted me to make it more juicy. I complained that they had published the opposite of what I meant, and they apologized for the misunderstanding, but said they wouldn't correct anything. No wonder the Daily Mail wanted them. Tercer (talk) 12:07, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Ah, I wish you could share the juicy details, Tercer. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:26, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, no, I'm not doxxing myself just to gossip a little. Nothing even hinges on it. Tercer (talk) 14:16, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

No worries. By all means email me! No need to get in a fluster. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:19, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Frankly I agree with Tercer's assessment. See this new article by them entitled A warp drive that doesn't break the laws of physics is possible which then goes on to say it may not be practical in the foreseeable future because it requires ultra dense materials. A lot what New Scientist does is frankly sensationalism and churnalism. If you wanted to read in-depth coverage of Science topics, Quanta Magazine blows New Scientist and other "Popular Science" magazines out of the water. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:49, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Ah yes, blows it out of the water. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:07, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

I have to say, if nothing else, the soundtrack is pretty groovy. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:19, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

• I think the thread above is bifurcating into two mostly unrelated issues. The first is if ownership affects reliability, and the second is if New Scientist is reliable even in the first case. Putting aside the second tangent for the moment, I think that the my answer to the first issue raised in the thread is no, ownership does not necessarily have anything to do with reliability. The editorial and writing staff of a publication does not necessarily have anything to do with the corporate ownership; which is that so long as the people who collect and hoard the profits from a publication do so passively and keep their hands out of the newsroom, then ownership doesn't need to have any impact. As has been noted with other related issues like the public funding of organizations like the BBC and PBS, the ownership and/or funding of a source does NOT have to impact the reliability of a source, so long as the source maintains editorial independence from its ownership. If ownership is shown to exert undue editorial influence, to the point of affecting the trustworthiness of the source, then we can revisit it. But again, reliability is unrelated to who signs the checks and who collects the revenues. So no, the purchase of the New Scientist by the Daily Mail does not make it less reliable. Whether it was reliable enough in the first place is a matter I'll leave for a different discussion. --Jayron32 18:56, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
• This does have potential implications, but I agree it's too early to tell. It will be important to watch for changes in their editorial policy or quality. Shooterwalker (talk) 02:32, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

Does The International Catholic News Weekly (The Tablet) a reliable source on topics related to catholicism? [40] [41] --The good man 232 (talk) 17:42, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Generally yes, but I would say it is situational. If its reporting paints the Roman Catholic Church in a significantly better light than other sources in a given situation we might want to exercise caution over whether to use it. What is the precise case? Boynamedsue (talk) 20:35, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

@Boynamedsue: The case is related to persecution of Catholics. --The good man 232 (talk) 21:04, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Could I have a look at the source? The content of the Tablet includes a lot of comment, I would be uncomfortable sourcing factual data from a comment piece. Also, it helps to know what claim is being made. If it were an extraordinary claim then I might want to see a little more than a single article in a Catholic newspaper, if it is not extraordinary but not widely reported elsewhere, it could be ok to report with attribution. It really depends on context I think. Boynamedsue (talk) 21:15, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Generally yes, for facts like "The Pope is meeting with Ali Sistani", but there is also commentary and church positions like "Honour martyrs by staying faithful, say Pope". How much of that will be appropriate to include is up to editors to decide on the talk page. Spudlace (talk) 06:54, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Reliable They frequently have high quality articles found nowhere else. Nweil (talk) 20:44, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

Maritime Radical by Nicholas Fillmore (1992, Between The Lines Books) is a biography about Roscoe Fillmore, the author's grandfather. Roscoe Fillmore is up for deletion with the argument being that this book is not fully independent and thus cannot be used as a reliable source per WP:GNG. I argue that the book is published by a reputable publisher and has been favorably reviewed in multiple scholarly publications and as such it should be treated as a reliable source. Should this book be treated as reliable and used to demonstrate the subject's notability?--User:Namiba 03:02, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

Is this source and the publisher Dharma Publications reliable? I see they are someway associated with Lulu.com which is a self publishing company. Should we be nnot using the source for being associated with Lulu.com or it is unreliable on it own, publication, author, et al. Help needed. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 12:29, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

• Unreliable. The book Explore Kashmiri Pandits appears to be self-published through Lulu.com (RSP entry). Amazon, Apple Books, and Google Books all indicate that Lulu.com is the publisher, and not Dharma Publications. I found a press release which claims that "Author Bansi Pandit of Dharma Publications, Inc. has written his book completely on a Palmone handheld and published it on lulu.com, the online market place for digital content", confirming that the book is self-published. There is no indication that the author is a subject-matter expert on this topic. I can't find any information on Dharma Publications, Inc. — Newslinger talk 23:42, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks Newslinger . - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 12:41, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

This is about [42]. Basically, Howlongtosing claims that the following claim would be unreliable: Watson, Brian (2020). "The New Censorship: Anti-sexuality Groups and Library Freedom". Journal of Intellectual Freedom and Privacy. 4 (4). doi:10.5860/jifp.v4i4.7177. hdl:2022/25773. The two most popular gateways into this community are Fight the New Drug (FTND; https://fightthenewdrug.org) and Your Brain On Porn (YBP; https://www.yourbrainonporn.com). FTND, which owns and operates NoFap.com, claims to be non-religious but was founded by an all-Mormon team and is supported by donations in excess of a million dollars annually from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Allen 2015; Hamblin 2016). Please chime in. The article is under WP:ARBPS discretionary sanctions.

Why it would be an extraordinary claim that the LDS Church supports FTND with lots of money?

We have:

• all FTND founders are Mormon;
• LDS Church has an axe to grind against pornography, as obvious by multiple public campaigns, see e.g. [43], [44];
• FTND immediately got access in public schools and colleges from the state of Utah, while those are almost impenetrable to mainstream scientific sexual education;
• Donald Hilton, MD, a prominent Mormon, has publicly spoken against masturbation and pornography at religious right forums.

So, in all honesty, I cannot see why WP:REDFLAG would be applicable to Watson's claim. Do notice that NoFap.com is not the same thing as NoFap. NoFap.com is a website; NoFap is an organization.

That NoFap is pseudoscience has been already made obvious and binding for all Wikipedians by arbitration enforcement, if you have a problem with that fill a request at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment. So, most definitely, WP:PARITY does apply. So, we are not going to discuss the ridiculous idea that NoFap isn't pseudoscience. I mean that by the Term of Use you are obligated to accept that NoFap is pseudoscience, unless WP:AE gets overturned. Tgeorgescu (talk) 09:06, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

• The Washington Post also talks about FTND. It says it was founded by Mormons, too. It quotes FTND saying that it receives no "direct funding" from the LDS Church. Where exactly does the claim that they receive in excess of a million annually from the church come from? I can't find the origin, and the closest I can ascertain is that the researcher either misinterpreted this (which was linked in the Daily Beast) to have been about FTND, or this claim originated in another source in the paper and they made a mistaken reference. Either way, we don't have the origin of the claim. Worst comes to worst, you might try emailing the research who produced this paper. They may be able to help, or perhaps you'll show them their mistake instead. Meantime, I would recommend looking through some of the other sources in that paper such as this (if accessible) and this. You may yet find something close to whatever you were looking for. I do notice that some of the sources linked in the paper are dead links. Try using the Wayback Machine and Archive.today if that becomes a problem for you. In the meantime, I'm not certain what's appropriate in terms of article content, but I lean towards leaving it out until this is clarified and replacing it with some more rigorous claims concerning the connection to Morality in Media and/or the LDS Church. I wouldn't consider the simple fact of the founders being Mormon to be notable, necessarily, but it looks like you have more to work with than that anyway. --Chillabit (talk) 09:09, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

• • You may be right: at [45] there are 564 500 USD in private donations plus some smaller figures of other kinds of donations. So, unless they are doctoring their ledger, they don't receive one million dollars in donations from LDS Church. Tgeorgescu (talk) 09:32, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources § Delfi

 –  Newslinger talk 23:50, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

Hi, is there anyone that considers this Delfi (web portal) reliable? I know very little about it.--Mhorg (talk) 12:28, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

Mhorg no thoughts on that site's particular content, but that type of site would tend to be reliable for news. Elli (talk | contribs) 11:10, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Reliable for what? For any source it depends on the claim. Alaexis_¿question? 12:47, 10 March 2021 (UTC)