Recently we had an OTRS "volunteer" lose their access to the tool here. User:KDS4444 is a well known long term paid editor.

This raises the question:

• Should OTRS volunteers be allowed to request money from people sending in question to OTRS?
• Should editors at AfC be able to request money for passing / accepting an article at AfC?
• Should admins be allowed to bill for undeleting an article / use of admin tools?
• Etc

Or should we have policies clearly disallowing this. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:18, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

• Seems like WP:INVOLVED and WP:COI capture most of the spirit of this, and would be the places to amend if clarification is needed. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:40, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
  • That we have had OTRS agents using the system to make money proves that when it comes to paid editing "spirit" is often not enough. We need it to be black and white. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:46, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Obviously not, that's corruption. If our existing policies do not effectively forbid it then we should have news ones that do - perhaps amendments to WP:INVOLVED and WP:COI, as xaosflux says. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:58, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• I think that an explicit prohibition of such would be a good idea. In government and business that is considered to be bribery or a kickback scheme. And since Wikipedia conflates tools with related powers/positions, we should note that it's not just mis-use of tools, it's mis-use of powers/position. North8000 (talk) 17:10, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• The admin aspect was already discussed and rejected as a standalone item. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 17:11, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
  • One difference is that the proposal there was "No administrator may accept payment to edit articles or to perform any administrative function on Wikipedia" (my emphasis). This suggestion is only about prohibiting paid use of tools. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:17, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
  • And after reading a bit through it, the discussion is essentially about whether admins should be prohibited from paid editing. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:32, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Making rules that are impossible to enforce is...problematic. Honest people lose, liars win. As someone who has never gotten a dime for editing Wikipedia, I can only suggest (mostly facetiously) that all editors be required to give WMF regular copies of all bank statements. Or quarantine all editors on a desert island with internet access. What a nightmare this all is. If I had to guess, I’d say that at least 10% of political edits at Wikipedia are financed by somebody. Anythingyouwant (talk) 17:51, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
  • Locking your door does not prevent 100% of break-in, that does not make it useless. Wikipedia improves when good faith editors overall have a greater ability to contribute that bad faith ones. Rules help achieve a positive balance. Google Knol failed as it filled full of advertising. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:06, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Obviously the answer is 'No!' It's odd that the questions even have to be raised, but the goal therein is to make it absolutely clear, because paid editors - some of whom are notorious for their Wikilawyering - will use any 'omission' in the policies to practice their art. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 18:01, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Okay so with respect to wording, what do people thing about adding at WP:COI:

"No one may use admin tools or accepting articles at WP:AfC in exchange for a financial reward. Additionally the WP:OTRS system may no be used for recruiting clients or payment."

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:55, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

• In order to shine a light on this, if we read current policies as prohibiting administrators, editors or OTRS volunteers, from taking actions while at risk of being thought to be paid for those actions, then no funded academic, employee, Wikimedian in residence, should ever take any action using their editing/sysop/access rights which could in any way benefit their employer or funder, even the scenario often used in the past by certain employees that though they are employed, they were editing in their volunteer time... It might actually be better to highlight case studies where administrators that were in a paid contract or had a grant, did legitimately use the tools as they were the best person at that time to do so, while correctly handling their declaration of interest in a transparent way. There may be cases where conflicts of loyalty have nothing to do with money, and those may also make for useful case studies. --Fæ (talk) 17:55, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
  • If you were a WiR at say the NIH and you protected all NIH related article without explicit consensus to do so, that would still be a problem. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:08, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
  • (edit conflict) Some good points there, which were raised in that other discussion (I've just finished reading it). While we should certainly want to prohibit 'corrupt' use of tools, it's hard to word policy so it does not adversely affect honest use as in examples like those. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:11, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• I fully support this. Nick (talk) 18:08, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Anything other than "regular" editing (as can be done by an auto-confirmed user; a name-space restriction has too many edge cases to be reasonable) in exchange for payment should be strictly prohibited. The corner cases (what if a professor who is an admin does admin work on university time) can be figured out by lawyers, the spirit should be clear. power~enwiki (π, ν) 18:10, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• I also support making policy clear against potential corruption. I don't have a problem with Doc James formulation; it's of course always possible to improve it in the future for precision, i.e. WMF legal suggestions welcome... —PaleoNeonate – 19:36, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• My view: No editor should be allowed to use permissions given through community input or tools that allow editors to work in an "official" capacity (OTRS, etc.) to edit for pay. As long as a draft meets all normal AfC requirements, I'm ok with editors being paid for their work. Admins can be paid for their work as long as they don't use their admin toolbox in the process. Of course, all paid contributions should be declared. — Gestrid (talk) 08:24, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• OTRS is outside of our domain, and it seems the question has already been answered. However, I'm not aware of any instance of an admin using tools for pay - I'd be hard pressed to think of a situation where that would occur. Do we need to prohibit a practice that doesn't happen? As to AfC, that is a common job request, so it does represent something that happens. My knowledge of AfC is limited, though - do you need special tools in order to approve an article from AfC? I didn't think that was the case, but maybe I'm mistaken. - Bilby (talk) 08:49, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Bilby, Of course you're not aware of any instance of an admin using tools for pay. I'm not. Nobody is. They are not exactly going to yell it from the rooftops if they are. It's a very plausible concern and I can think of several situations where it might occur. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:23, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Hard pressed to think of a situation where an admin using tools for pay would occur? How about undeleting an article that had been deleted, unblocking a blocked paid editor, protecting an article at a favoured revision? It took me about 30 seconds to think of those three. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:37, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

No, I'm hard pressed to think of a situation where an admin is accepting money to undelete an article. The advantages are clear, but I haven't seen an admin use the tools for pay, and I'm hard pressed to picture that situation arising. - Bilby (talk) 11:41, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Several years ago, a Russian Wikipedia admin was desysopped for using admin tools to promote paid editing.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:24, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

One instance, several years ago, on a different language Wikipedia. Ok. But has this ever happened here? I agree with the principal - no admin should use the tools in return for pay - and if the community wants that to be clearly stated I'm a bit concerned re WP:BUREAU, but it doesn't bother me overly much. I do worry about "the sky is falling" policy changes, though, and pushing through changes without evidence of there being a need for them. - Bilby (talk)

Did you ever hear, (until now), that somebody was actively using OTRS to recruit clients and solicit payments?Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 10:21, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

I can testify for my own part, that this case was particularly egregious and lost me a bit of sleep thinking about it. I realize it may not look that way from our end, but from the perspective of our readers, OTRS is in few ways a higher position of trust than being an admin on wiki. From the perspective of readers, they're getting an email from Wikipedia, and not a message from some anonymous user on Wikipedia. I think per discussion below, I'm personally leaning toward favoring something along the lines of No one may misuse a position of community trust... and perhaps specify that this can include user rights, various coordinator positions, and off wiki access like OTRS and ACC. GMG^talk 10:29, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

The problem with OTRS was a serious one, but that should be handled through OTRS. As I said, I'm not opposed to this on principal. My concern is that I'm seeing a lot of rhetoric and exaggerated claims about paid editing which are leading us to take more extreme steps, but not a lot of data to back up the specific claims. Given that I can't imagine any current admin accepting money to use the admin tools, the change in policy is moot, and I'll support a well worded proposal. It doesn't prevent anyone from doing anything that they were going to do. But I do want to be cautious of inventing problems that don't exist. - Bilby (talk) 11:10, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Well, at least to my mind, the admin bit isn't really special here. It's just one of many rights or positions, of which there are many requiring both more and less community trust, and more or less oversight. And this isn't an expectation of admins; it's an expectation of everyone, and admins are an everyone. The key common factor there is the trust, not the number of buttons. For example, autopatrolled users are trusted by the community to make acceptable quality articles that don't require community review.

Also pretty much just to my own mind, there are really two distinct types of policy formation. There's policy that attempts to create new process to deal with outstanding problems, and there's policy that simply documents widespread community practice that's already in place, but hasn't been explicitly written down anywhere. I believe this is the latter. It's already a de facto policy. When we have, and if we do find someone abusing positions of trust, we will remove them from that position. That's a fact. But we currently don't appear to have explicit, unequivocal wording that says You knew this was going to happen when you made the decision to abuse your position or access. GMG^talk 11:26, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

I understand where you are coming from - I am fully in agreement that admins should not use tools for pay, with the various normal exceptions for WiR and whatever. My caution comes from seeing what can only be described as a war between paid editors and anti-paid editors, and in that war we're giving up progressively more. Thus I need to ask, every time a new policy change is put forward, the basic three questions - is it needed, will it work, what will it cost? This one costs nothing, in that it is such a specific case that it won't have a wider impact. But it isn't needed, because we have no evidence of this ever happening on en.Wiki. Will it work? I can't see how anything can "stop" something that doesn't occur, but I think we'll find that this is going to be very hard to prove to the level where we can desysop someone if it ever does arise, and that from a practical sense we'll end up using a different justification.

In regard to other tools, though, the approach doesn't seem to be the best solution. With AFC, I think we need a clear statement that says "you cannot approve any draft in return for financial remuneration" - it isn't about the use of tools, but the act of approving a draft. Focusing on the tools is the wrong part of the equation - someone just needs to take the longer process of approving it without any special permissions to meet the policy. Similarly, if we remain worried about auto-patrolled users, we need to say that all paid articles must be created through AfC is we want a real fix. It isn't the auto-patrolled status that is the core problem, but paid articles being created in mainspace and not being independently verified - although there will be more of a cost if we make that change. - Bilby (talk) 11:49, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Not to beat the horse into a pulp, but to focus narrowly on existing community practice and reasonable expectation of future practice:

• When we have found users abusing AfC for paid editing, we have removed their access;
• When we have found users abusing OTRS for solicitation, we have removed their access;
• If we did find someone abusing autopatrolled to avoid scrutiny of paid articles, we would remove it;
• If we did find an FA coordinator, a member of the ArbCom electoral commission, etc. abusing their position, we would remove them from it;
• If we did find a sysop doing this (as other projects have), they'd have their mop snatched so fast it would cause whiplash;

So that raises the question to me, of why we haven't taken the time to write this down, when we seem to all agree to some extent that it is the way things work, and the way they can be expected to work for the foreseeable future. GMG^talk 12:05, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

I don't understand enough about OTRS - my assumption is that it was a meta issue, not a en.WP issue, but if I'm wrong it is something to address here.

In the case of ArbCom, FA coordinators and admins, you are correct - we'd act if we found them. In general I don't really care if we wish to formalize those issues, except to note that we're formalizing something that we've never done, never had to do, and which would happen irrespective of any decision here. I'm wary of the principal of creating unnecessary changes. (I'd also note that, if policy reflects practice, in these cases we're reflecting what we believe would be practice, not what actually is, simply because it has never arisen).

With autopatrolled, yes, we would (and have) removed it. Let's put that in Wikipedia:Autopatrolled as the relevant place to discuss this and make the change. This one is far more important to me, and reflects something that we do, should do, and should formally note.

AfC is the other big issue to me - I would like to see that hole filled, as there are a lot of jobs hiring people to pass articles at AfC. But it isn't the tools that are the issue, so much as the approval. I'd like to see a more important change stating that articles cannot be approved from AfC in return for pay, as that would address the actual problem. Focusing on the tools rather than the approval is an error.

Just to be clear, my disagreement isn't with the spirit of the proposal, but with the two basic issues - I don't like creating policy changes that are not needed, and I don't care for skirting around the real issues (permissions) when we should be addressing the actual problems (approving articles for pay; creating paid articles in mainspace). - Bilby (talk) 13:03, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Well... it seems the main difference in approaches is that you would like to wait until each individual right or position is abused, and then add a specific policy on that specific topic. (Also, BTW, OTRS is stand alone project and AFAIK the only one running media wiki that doesn't accept SULs.) To my mind, it just seems simpler to put a blanket statement on a central place, like PAID. GMG^talk 13:11, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Not quite. I have two main differences. a) I'd like to address the real problem at AfC of approving articles for pay, rather than tackling the secondary (and mostly irrelevant) issue of use of permissions. b) I don't think we would need to change in policy even in the unlikely chance that the problems with FAC coordinators, admins or ArbCom members arose, because we would solve it without a change in policy. In that situation, I don't like creating policy changes to address remote issues that have never arisen and wouldn't need a policy change if they ever did arise.

I'm sure we'll end up with a blanket statement at paid. And WP won't end as a result. But I wish this energy went into changes that would have an impact or would address the real problems. - Bilby (talk) 13:22, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

That's part of my concern though, that if we have a blanket statement, we have one arguably time wasting discussion. If we do it piece meal, we end up with separate recurring discussions for each individual piece. GMG^talk 13:49, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I think I've been explaining things badly. If we have this discussion and agree to make this change to WP:PAID - which it is likely we will if we can get the wording right - it won't make any difference to how we respond to the main cases you raise: admins, FaC coordinators and ArbCom members. It may not do any harm, but it won't change the response, make it more or less likely that the problem will arise, or make things any easier if the situation ever appears.

In regard to this change and AfC, based on what I was told below, all the paid editor needs to do is not use any advanced permissions to pass something through. They can either argue that use of the helper script is not an advanced user right, or they simply don't use the script and do it the long way. That's because the AfC problem is not about permissions, but about actions. So if we make this change, we will still need to have another discussion to address the real problem.

In the situation of auto-patrolled users, the change I'd most like to see isn't a ruling that paid editors can't create pages in mainspace if auto-patrolled, but a rule that says that paid editors cannot create pages in mainspace. That second one seems more valuable to me, and will also involve a separate discussion.

Anyway, this is not of much value, because we're having the discussion however I may feel about it. :) Which is fine. But I've been arguing against paid editors for many years now, and what I'd most like to see is discussion around actions which will address the core issues without harming the project. This discussion has the advantage of not harming WP, but it retains the disadvantage of not addressing the problems that matter. - Bilby (talk) 14:19, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Well, part of my concern is once the issue of the paid OTRS agent was raised, it took several days for access to be removed. Even after the evidence was damning, it didn't seem like anyone wanted to unilaterally pull the trigger. Yes, it's technically a separate jurisdiction, but for English agents, it's pretty much the same cops on the beat. (I don't know of specific instances where autopatrolled has been removed for paid editing, but I'd be interested to.) This is the kind of thing that is to be expected where sysops, ideally cautious by nature, are in fairly uncharted territory as far as the letter of the law.

As to AfC, that and the issue of non-user right positions (coordinators, etc), are the reasons for my focus on emphasizing "positions of trust" and not just user rights. From a lower level implementation standpoint, if there is a project wide policy in place to that effect, project or right specific policies can probably for the most part be boldly added, and simply point to the main. Something along the lines of:

No user may use positions of community trust in order to solicit or accept payment for activities which have a direct and foreseeable impact on Wikipedia. This includes advanced user rights for which individual vetting and permission granting is required, positions of authority elected or appointed by the community, and system access on or off wiki not normally available to all users.

I think something like that would fairly well cover everything, including OTRS and AfC. GMG^talk 15:57, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

GreenMeansGo: to your question, the same OTRS agent Doc James mentioned above voluntarily relinquished their autopatrolled flag after I suggested it to them when the issue was first raised. We have no policy as to when to revoke user permissions in cases like this, and as a recent ArbCom case pointed out, the removal of user permissions is one of the most controversial things an admin can do.

Re: your proposed wording, I think I like it. I might also add something such as ...impact on Wikipedia; or use such a position to take actions on behalf of a client. for clarity. TonyBallioni (talk) 16:05, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

My issue with raising OTRS here is not that it hasn't proven to be an issue, but that my understanding is that OTRS policy is managed at meta, so I assumed that a change in that policy in regard to paid editors has to be presented and discussed there. If this is not the case I have no problems with agreeing to the policy change here, but I had always assumed that OTRS policy is outside of our immediate control.

I still need to return to my issue with the AfC problem. I do not see permissions or "positions of trust" as the primary concern, based on what I've been told. What I think we need is not the change being discussed here, but a clear and unambiguous change to Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation that states that you are not permitted to approve an article where you have a COI, and in particular you are not permitted to approve an article in return for remuneration. It isn't about positions of trust or advanced permissions, but simply who can and cannot approve an article. - Bilby (talk) 16:28, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Well, my thought was that AfC would be covered under system access on or off wiki not normally available to all users. It's true that en.wiki can't actually enforce anything at OTRS. But I think we can probably still say that someone abusing OTRS to make changes to en.wiki is exactly half in en.wiki jurisdiction, and we can still say that we don't approve of it.

Also, I'm fine with Tony's suggested addition. And I think the absence of policy on when to remove these rights is part of the problem, and part of why sysops are rightfully hesitant to do so. GMG^talk 17:00, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

• • Yeah, AFC Reviewers need access to a helper-script, designed for the purpose, that heavily eases the process/workflow.It may be noted though, that all auto-confirmed editors have the right to move articles from draft space into mainspace or that any body could choose to follow a tedious manual reviewing process, that existed before the development of the script.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 09:08, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
    • In that case, there are no special permissions needed for AfC? Just optional access to a helper script that is open to any autoconfirmed editor? - Bilby (talk) 10:08, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
      • Manually reviewing articles is sufficiently tedious so as to be prohibitive for most users. It is a de facto user right. GMG^talk 10:27, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
      • Echo Timothy.In a very strict sense, AFC is not a right.But, in my wiki-life, I have neither seen someone evading the script-access-barrier by manually reviewing the submissions nor someone who is moving other author's AfC draft(s) to mainspace without using the script.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 10:45, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
        • I guess what I'm wondering is if you need special community-granted permission to use the tool. Is this the case? Or an anyone use the tool? - Bilby (talk) 11:41, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
          • AfC works similarly to rights granted at PERM, but at a different venue. All you need is to convince one sysop that you're competent. The major differences are 1) it doesn't automatically come with the admin kit, although theoretically any admin could grant it to themselves, similar maybe to the way some things work with stewards (unless I'm mistaken), 2) it's not technically required for reviewing, but it's a bit like saying you don't technically need access to the elevator to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower. GMG^talk 11:49, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• There was "consensus for some language on this issue" last time and it is still a good idea, so support. Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:57, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• Regarding Doc J's wording, if it is to be used, it may be simpler and more effective to say No one may use advanced user rights.... I have a hard time imagining a scenario where any right couldn't potentially be abused, which is why they're restricted. In fact, with ACTRIAL in effect, it could be easily argued that creating a paid article outright, instead of going through AfC is itself a type of abuse of auto-confirmed.

For rights with a greater potential for damage (e.g., sysop, AfC, page mover, AWB), and especially for those which have a comparatively limited amount of public oversight (e.g., OTRS, CU, OS)... Well... until very recently I should have thought that this actually didn't need to be spelled out at all, and that anyone with enough sense to use them would have had enough sense to assume this as a matter of course. But since the laundry list of rights and the myriad ways they could be abused is so lengthy, probably best to spell out the principle, and let the community decide the specifics, For example, is it an abuse of auto-patrolled if an editor doesn't unreview their own paid article creation? I don't know that we've ever needed to answer that question, but we might at some point. GMG^talk 10:59, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Actually, after thinking my way through a hot shower:

1. It may be better to say No one may use abuse advanced user rights...
2. I realize most autopatrolled users probably can't unreview their own article in the first place, because they probably don't have NPP. Which adds another layer of hypothetical problems.
3. It's not entirely clear that pieces of the admin kit that non-admins may also have should be on the one hand, specially covered for sysops, or on the other, specially exempted for non-sysops. GMG^talk 11:10, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• No to allow use of "community granted tools in exchange for money" - for all the obvious reasons. Yes to policies that disallow it.^{Atsme📞📧} 11:56, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• An even more perverse variant of this problem crops up periodically at AFC. An author/submitter of a declined (or deleted) draft is contacted off-wiki by someone who claims they will approve (or undelete) the page for payment. This practice of holding a page (draft or mainspace article) to ransom has been condemned as a form of extortion. There is a standing request that all such incidents be reported to WMF Legal. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 12:07, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• NO - No one should be paid this way. This smacks of bribery. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:15, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• No- this is a horrible idea. Reyk _YO! 12:21, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• I'd like to be clear that the question here is quite different from "Can an editor simultaneously be a paid editor and have access to certain user rights, so long as they do not overlap those roles?" ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 14:12, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
  • I'd planned on commenting on this today and it was closed before I could. Rob makes a good point, and I think it is worth clarifying if there are circumstances when being paid is incompatible with a role: the only thing I feel somewhat strongly about in this regard as an absolute no is the autopatrolled flag since it's impossible to turn off for only paid articles. Other areas I do think need clearer guidelines as well, and I think this is a first step in the direction of setting up those guidelines. Obviously this is a nuanced topic where there are strong opinions on both sides by the community, and I think further discussion (if not on this question then on other questions) is needed. TonyBallioni (talk) 14:24, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
  • (+1) to Rob's queries.But, primarily this discussion has in itself stemmed from an overlap.I have requested CPower678 to vacate their close.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 14:40, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
    • The close is fine, mostly because the question as posed was wrong. The question is "should volunteers in roles of trust be allowed to use their tools for money?" The answer is a snow no, which is obvious. There is quite a separate question of whether volunteers can both hold roles of trust and separately be paid. For instance, should Wikipedians-in-residence be able to be admins? That is a very nuanced issue that would need a very different discussion. We can't have that discussion when it starts with such a flawed question. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 14:59, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

At least to my mind, one of the more intuitive ways to go with this is that if you have an account with basically any userrights other than extended confirmed or autopatrolled, and you want to do disclosed paid editing, then you need to register a separate account for the sake of propriety. GMG^talk 15:11, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

As to off wiki access like OTRS, that's a blanket no from me. It can't be separated technically, since access is granted to a person, and not to an account, and it has comparatively little oversight. Probably similarly with CU since they have access to private information, possibly also ACC, and being part of ArbCom is right out. (Jesus this list gets long fast.) GMG^talk 15:14, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The WiR issue in particular is complex because while generally a wonderful program it has caused issues in the past (I think I'm thinking of one WiR who copied compatibly licensed advocacy pieces into en.wiki about 6 months back). That being said, having worked with Doc James on PAID issues several times, he typically is not referring to individuals employed by orgs that share the WMF's mission and values (the WiR program or similar), but to those who are paid to edit commercially.

This could be spelled out better, I agree, but I don't think the question is fundamentally flawed: establishing a principle that people agree on has value, even if it is only a very basic one. That gives a starting point for agreement for any future conversations on the issue, which as Rob rightly point out will be nuanced out of necessity. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:17, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

The UNESCO fellow? GMG^talk 15:20, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

That's the one I was thinking of. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:25, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Rob, the question, flawed or not, concluded with "or should we have policies clearly disallowing this.". The close failed to address that adequately, or explain why it was overlooking it. I agree with your other sentiments, and a close thus explained would have been fine. -- Begoon 15:28, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• No since this is open again, the answer to the question asked is clearly no. I also disagree with Rob that this is a flawed question, and think we can set out some general best practices here for the less complex cases that will make the more complex cases easier to deal with when the time comes to have conversations on those issues (call it the baby-steps approach if you want). These are the policy things I think are fairly easy to deal with:

1. No one should use a position of community trust to solicit payment for services rendered on Wikipedia.
2. No one should use any user rights or positions of trust to advocate for their clients or to make technical changes that would not otherwise be possible if they did not have the rights (i.e. an admin undeleting a page or a page mover skipping the RM process for a controversial move over a redirect, etc.)
3. Technical permissions, use of tools requiring a checklist, and positions of trust that involve new content cannot be used to evade our normal scrutiny system for new content and COI content.

I think these three principles are things most people can get behind, and can help be the policy basis for any guidelines on how to apply the principles that Doc James is asking about. There are obviously others that might be able to be agreed upon as well and questions that can be raised regarding these points, but I think they would provide a basis for future discussions on the more nuanced and complex cases. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:42, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• Comment I've seen questions raised about whether buying access to admin capabilities is really a big deal. Yes, it is. Look at the number of admins whose talk pages are filled with begging from conflicted editors whose articles were deleted. Won't spell this out due to BEANS but the possibility for a rent-seeking admin with access to deleted revisions are obvious. Also, very few people know about this, but I've communicated privately my evidence-based concern about at least one other CU confirmed socking account that was trying to gain access in 2015 to OTRS. There are good reasons to believe the socking was undisclosed paid/advocacy editing-related as is often the case. This is a big deal since OTRS handles all kinds of private, confidential information that could lead to WP:OUTING at the very least.

If you can't tell I'm leaning very hard towards "no" on the question, but want to see some refinement of the terms before making a commitment. Behavior that even smells of rent-seeking and bureaucratic malfeasance, aka bribery, could be another piece in the puzzle that results in the end of this worthwhile project. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:35, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• Yes? I think Anythingyouwant sort of addresses my viewpoint. There's an unmet need in the economy for moving drafts through AfC and getting images approved at OTRS. I would never want to turn either of those processes into pay-for-play and perhaps that's what the opposition is scared of. The fact is, volunteers do a poor job of meeting our various backlogs. Wikipedians edit where they find satisfaction and avoid the drudgery that's needed to keep our maintenance effort going. So long as editors divulge their payments per ToU, I don't see the problem. I don't think money is universally corrupting. I'd like to see our hard-working Wikipedians get paid for their work, and I'd love if some of our most-talented Wikipedians could make a living off of editing just as we're happy to see our favorite YouTubers be able to focus full time on their content work. Disclosure is the sunshine treatment that prevents corrupt activity. If the WMF would stop spending money on un-asked for coding projects and started on-going investigations for business promotion (among other problems) I think introducing a pay mechanism would help us refine product. I know I've enjoyed getting paid to edit; sadly there aren't many reasonable opportunities anymore. Chris Troutman (talk) 21:42, 4 November 2017 (UTC)
• Hell no and props to Doc James for raising this issue. Support a common-sense prohibition. Coretheapple (talk) 17:14, 5 November 2017 (UTC)
• NO in the strongest possible terms - This does not conform to the spirit of the encyclopedia. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:19, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
• Once again, we have a proposal that would, whether intentionally or not, stop or hinder Wikimedians in Residence in their valuable work. "Should Wikipedians be allowed to use community granted tools in exchange for money?" What, like when I use my account creator status to set up accounts for attendees at an editathon I'm running, as a paid WiR, even thought it was given to me for that purpose? I mustn't move an article that one of my trainees creates? I mustn't use AWB, or rollback, or mark an edit as patrolled, in my WiR role? "No one should use a position of community trust to solicit payment for services rendered on Wikipedia." So, when I apply for a paid WiR role, I mustn't mention my experience as a Wikimedian? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 11:28, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

Usage of ACC right for editathons etc. and WIR does not fall under the purview of this discussion. Winged Blades ^Godric 15:05, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

• No - it seems I inadvertently said this twice; see my comments below under Kudpung's proposal. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:51, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
• No--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 16:09, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

We just need acceptable wording and a place to put it

I agreed with the now retracted close. This is a "snow no" to allowing people to use positions of trust and tools for personal enrichment. There are many cases covered here, mainly at AfC, OTRS, and admins, so we need to refine the wording and place it in the right policies. I say policies in the plural because paid editors routinely ignore guidelines and because OTRS is regulated on enWiki by Wikipedia:Global rights policy, admins are regulated at WP:Admins (specifically at WP:Involved}, whereas AfC reviewing is not regulated by any policy that I know of, only by Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation.

I suggest similar wording for all the above, based on User:TonyBallioni's wording just above. Once we get the wording to almost everybody's liking, then place it for an RfC at WP:GRP and WP:Admin. I'll be bold and start the discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation soon myself.

Basic wording:

No editor may use a position of trust or any user rights to:

• solicit payment for services to be rendered on Wikipedia, or
• accept payment for the use of such a position or rights
  • for the benefit a client
  • for advocating for a client, or
  • to evade our normal scrutiny system for new content and COI content.

Payments and grants made by the Wikimedia Foundation or its affiliates (e.g. chapters) are excepted.

• Support as proposer. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 18:00, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Please see AfC and the related talk page. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 18:38, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• Support since it is based on my wording above, see my reasoning there. I would also extend this to NPP/the NPR flag as well as AfC because that is what gives a user the ability to mark a page for indexing by Google. This wording should cover that, but I did want to mention it explicitly in my support. TonyBallioni (talk) 18:40, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• Support as initial wording, without prejudice to editing or improving as with any policy. This seems concise, reasonable, and easy to understand. Everything a policy needs to be. --Jayron32 19:04, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• Comment How would this apply to Wikipedians in residence (i.e. people who edit on behalf of universities, libraries, and museums). I personally know someone who was paid by a museum to help write articles on 100 notable New Zealand craft artists as part of a GLAM project. It seems like the wording used here could be made to apply to that project as well. "any user rights" seems ambiguous. I am extendedconfirmed, does that count as a 'user right' in this context? Does that mean that autoconfirmed users are not allowed to use the perks of that 'user right' (i.e. creating articles) to create articles for pay? Or is this meant to only apply to user rights that are community granted (i.e. page mover, rollback). — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{(or here)} 19:53, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
  • It'd be pretty simple to deal with WiR's would create distinct accounts, which they do anyway normally, and in most cases, I would expect the accounts wouldn't have additional flags. Autoconfirmed isn't a flag but an implicit group that is determined every time a user action is attempted. Extended confirmed is a flag, but it is automatically granted, so I'd assume we'd use common sense and treat it the same as autoconfirmed. TonyBallioni (talk) 20:23, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• Comment I agree with ICPH any paid editor (disclosed or otherwise), any wikipedian in residence that uses an autoconfirmed user right to create a page or even just to edit is in breech of this text; Wikipedia:User right is redirected to WP:User access levels and ALL user groups have right attached to them. Domdeparis (talk) 20:08, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• Those creating articles for pay are to go through AfC. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:18, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• As I mentioned above, autoconfirmed is not a user right. It is a test that the software does automatically when any action is attempted. TonyBallioni (talk) 20:23, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

You might be right about autoconfirmed. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{(or here)} 21:36, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Insertcleverphrasehere: yes, this is made clearer in Special:UserRights. See yours here. It lists autoconfirmed as an implicit membership rather than a membership. Its just a software check. From the admin side of it, we can't revoke autoconfirmed status once it has been achieved (there is no tick box for it, and removing the confirmed tick box on the rare occasions that flag is granted does nothing once someone meets the software requirements). TonyBallioni (talk) 21:44, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• Support Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:18, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• I definitely support a prohibition such as this. I would suggest that the way to distinguish someone like a Wikipedian in residence etc. from what we want to prohibit, is that the prohibited conduct occurs when there is a quid pro quo in exchange for something that would not be approved if it were out in the open. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:21, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
  • Tryptofish, WiRs who have distinct accounts for their work as a WiR would be in compliance with the user permissions part of this since that role account would not have additional permissions. We do want to prohibit a WiR who is also an OTRS agent (or hell, hypothetical future arbcom member) from using that position to somehow advance the cause of the org they are being paid by just as much as we'd want to prevent those paid for commercial purposes. The WiR program is good but we also need to recognize that some of them do have a COI on advocacy issues, and that the same principles apply to them as well. I think the overwhelming majority would not abuse it, but I don't want to exempt them completely. TonyBallioni (talk) 20:29, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
    • I agree with what you say. I didn't mean to make it sound like I was saying that there should be anything special about WiR, but I see now that it sounded that way. What I meant was distinguishing acceptable from unacceptable conduct. And I think that what defines unacceptable is (i) a quid pro quo and (ii) a result that would have been opposed by the community if it had happened out in the open. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:34, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
• Comment - I don't know if this is exactly the right wording, someone can probably improve upon it, but I would suggest going with something more like No editor may use advanced user rights requiring community trust.... Auto confirmed and Extended confirmed are both user rights, but they're not really an expression of community trust, and they're not really a user right in any meaningful sense that we are talking about now. As for the rest of it, if we did have a user with advanced rights go out for WiR, I think it would be totally appropriate for them to either request their rights be temporarily removed, or register a disclosed second account, especially as it concerns auto-patrolled and sysop. I don't really see a reason why a WiR would need to be active at places like NPP or AfC anyway. GMG^talk 20:24, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

I'd support this proposed change in the wording (which I believe was the original and understood intent of the version proposed above). I propose that we amend the proposal to this new wording, and then continue the voting. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{(or here)} 22:11, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

If we are going to change it lets just come out and add normal editing by autoconfirmed or extended confirmed users is not considered use of permissions for these purposes or something like so we don't get into quibbling as to what an advanced permission is or which ones require community trust. TonyBallioni (talk) 22:19, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Umm... I think I actually disagree on one point. I think the purpose is kindof to be intentionally vague to some extent, and let the community decide the specifics in an actual situation. GMG^talk 22:30, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Not all forms of advanced editing privileges requiring community trust are backed by user rights. I wouldn't want FAC coordinators accepting money to get commissioned articles on the Main Page, for instance. MER-C 12:57, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

Ah ha! Now this is actually a very good point indeed! There are actually quite a bit of coordinator type positions that have nothing to do with a user right in the software but could be just a easily used improperly and in many cases with greater effect. This should probably be covered here somehow. GMG^talk 14:12, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose for now. I'm 100% in support of the sentiment here, but I still think the wording is a little vague. For instance, last year I spent some time in a paid WIR position. I registered a separate account, and made it clear that I would not be using any of my admin/functionary access for anything related to my work as a WIR. I kept the separation going to the point of CSD tagging old userspace drafts rather than deleting them myself. I did not make a secret of the fact that I was an administrator before taking the job, and I suppose that an overzealous individual could say that by making this clear I was trading my 'authority' as an admin and trusted user in exchange for a job? I am also not sure what problem this instruction creep is going to solve, as in the KDS4444 situation the user was quickly evicted from OTRS once their conduct was discovered without the need for a policy change. This does have the smell of security theatre about it. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 02:17, 3 November 2017 (UTC).
  • Wikipedians are not the only audience for this policy. This creates a policy we can point to when reporting spammers to freelance job sites and/or in OTRS tickets regarding commissioned articles. MER-C 12:52, 3 November 2017 (UTC)
• No editor may use a position of trust... may be overly broad. If you were going to legitimately hire someone to make non-promotional edits, you'd want to engage someone who was trusted by the community. Conversely, if an editor is going to provide copy-writing services, the community should prefer someone who is trusted to follow policies, guidelines, and best practices, versus someone who has failed to be proven trustworthy. isaacl (talk) 03:05, 3 November 2017 (UTC)
• Support in principle. Wording wise, I suggest something like "Editors with advanced editing privileges requiring community trust must not solicit or accept payments for using said privileges to advocate for or on behalf of a client or circumvent normal editorial processes regarding new and COI content". As for placement, why not put it in WP:PAID as well? MER-C 12:52, 3 November 2017 (UTC)
• Comment Personally I would go even further and require that any advanced user right cannot be *held or granted* if you are engaged in or offering any commercial or otherwise paid service related to Wikipedia. The inherent conflict of interest that receiving money for services engages means that its too much of a risk. Only in death does duty end (talk) 17:14, 3 November 2017 (UTC)
• Support, with wording to be refined, particularly regarding acceptable exceptions. And yes, per Only in death, no advanced right or permission should be granted or allowed to paid editors. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 20:24, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

  I don't see that working generically for practical reasons. The GLAMwikitoolset right has been given to GLAM and Wikimedia Chapter employees for their "official" user accounts in order to manage donations of image archives to Wikimedia Commons and in some cases to run bot-generated reports (with granted bot flag) to support reuse on Wikipedias. They were being paid to do the work, and there is no reason to waste valuable unpaid volunteer time when projects like these are run transparently. --Fæ (talk) 22:56, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

  @Fæ: minor questions. a) Is this being run to make edits on enWiki? b) is this right covered at WP:GRP? c) does my proposed wording below make your objection mute? Smallbones_(smalltalk) 16:30, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Fæ, what I said in my first short sentence above ("wording to be refined, particularly regarding acceptable exceptions") should be taken as applying also to what I said in the second sentence. Also, what happens on Commons happens on Commons; my opinion expressed here on Wikipedia relates specifically to this project. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 18:43, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose. I'm ok with the principal, but what is meant by "any user rights"? That seems overly broad. The wording makes it sound as if anything you can do as a user - create new articles, edit, revert, etc - would fall under this. The wording needs to better reflect what rights are at issue. - Bilby (talk) 08:14, 4 November 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. The suggestion is that "payment for service" is automatically harming the encyclopedia, that is just suspicion, it's possible to be paid for doing good work, it's also possible for an admin to put their responsibilities to the community last or first, paid is not proof of a problem, it's only proof that we don't trust them. The heart of the issue isn't WHY the editor, or admin might be acting against the community, only that there is a problem with what they actually did. So lets be focused on behavior not mistrust. Dougmcdonell (talk) 19:17, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

Prohibition statements etc. in policies/guidelines oalmost always reflect upon the behaviour of common folks, not that of the outliers.Though, if you had choosen to oppose, because you think, that there's no problem in any editor soliciting payment(s) from potential customers through OTRS channels (as long as the worth the article he/she later churns out is satisfactory) or somebody self-patrolling his own paid creations, despite the elements of obvious cognitive bias or some sysop restoring articles, declining CSDs, closing AfDs in lieu of payments, it's another case.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 14:05, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose I think Wikipedians should always be able to solicit "payment for services to be rendered on Wikipedia". Chris Troutman (talk) 21:46, 4 November 2017 (UTC)
• Support long overdue. Coretheapple (talk) 17:16, 5 November 2017 (UTC)
• Support in principle and most specifics; I prefer the slight modification in the next subsection. It's concise, non-bureaucratic, and consistent with the general community take on these matters. We know there'll be some paid/COI editing, and consensus implemented policy about it. This just closes a loophole.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  00:23, 11 November 2017 (UTC)

With very few exceptions there are no opposes here based on principle. We're just arguing about wording (and where to put that wording). Within the limits of my available time, I'll keep coming back to this. There are several places to put this, and I think several are needed since advanced rights are covered in several places. Progress so far:

• I've placed a simple one line prohibition at WP:WikiProject_Articles_for_creation#How_to_get_involved and opened a discussion at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Articles_for_creation#No_payments_for_reviews. So far - no opposes, 1 support.
• A few days ago User:Godric on Leave added ""you should not accept any such affected article(s) at articles for creation process." to WP:COI and then reverted it as premature. I've put it back and reopened the discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Conflict_of_interest#Using_tools_in_exchange_for_pay. I expect that will stick (based upon further discussion here, and is likely to be made stronger.

Other discussions, with possible wording changes, will have to be held at WP:GRP (for ORTS) and WP:Admin. I don't expect any opposition at WP:GRP, and will start that discussion on Monday. My suggestion for wording follow. I'm just adding a line on Wikipedians in residence, but please note that the "who" in the 1st line will change based on where the policy is proposed. Once everything is done, we can then summarize the changes at WP:Paid.

• I don't get it. As far as I can tell, using any bit in exchange for money is already disallowed so outlining rules for it just makes it easier to game. Anyone misusing any bit is subject to having that bit removed. Doing it for pay is clearly misusing it. There really is no question about it. Any admin unblocking for cash would be dragged to Arb and bit stripped, for instance. No one would oppose that. A new rule is superfluous. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 20:14, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

• @Dennis Brown, the TOU—even in the brave new world of the WMF crackdown—aren't as clear-cut as you think, and there are still quite a few loopholes. Show me where in policy it's forbidden for an admin to profit from their access to deleted revisions, for instance—and that's something that does have commercial potential, there are ad-funded websites that literally do nothing but host deleted Wikipedia articles (Deletionpedia is the best-known). ‑ Iridescent 20:23, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

• As long as policy is based on consensus and consensus is overwhelmingly against selling use of the bits, then it seems obvious to me. If I find any admin using any bit for gain, I won't hesitate to block them, for example. I don't need a specific policy statement, WP:COMMONSENSE covers it well, as bits are based on trust that they will be used only to benefit Wikipedia. Any use of the bit to gain advantage, be it financial, in an edit war, or otherwise, is grounds to lose the bit. Any bit. The community has already said this by providing a vetting system for all the bits, and policies on use of each of the bits. Anyone that doesn't understand that shouldn't have advanced bits, as the reason we have them is to benefit the encyclopedia, not ourselves. I'm afraid once you start setting specific rules, you start creating loopholes. As it is now, ANY misuse of any kind, even those we can't think of ahead of time, is grounds to lose the bit. I truly feel we codify too much that is already covered by common sense, and that is part of the problem with the contradictory maze of policies we have. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 01:35, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

• Without a policy to back it up, the odds of a desysop from arbcom are negligible. Sure we could go the community ban route that we went with within the last few days for an OTRS agent, but that would also lead to the inevitable arbcom case. TonyBallioni (talk) 01:45, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

• I have a bit of a counter-proposal to this, which is that rather than setting out prohibitions for paid editing activities, we should merely set out a very tightly limited list of what paid editors can do, and specify that any action not on that list is prohibited. The list would be something like, following disclosure of having been paid, adding reliably sourced information to a draft, or proposing on an article talk page that content be added or changed. If that is the complete list, then obviously things like unearthing deleted edit histories would be outside the scope. bd2412 T 20:28, 18 November 2017 (UTC)
  • As the United States discovered when it tried to ban alcohol, it is very difficult to regulate that which you prohibit, and I think your proposal comes so close to prohibition that the same principle will apply. If you make the rules too onerous, then at some point paid editors will just not disclose their paid status. I'm sure this already happens, and probably quite a bit, but it will get worse. WP:OUTING is written so strongly (too strongly IMO, but that's a separate discussion) that enforcement will be very difficult. --Trovatore (talk) 21:14, 18 November 2017 (UTC)
• Support this or a similar version. Gandydancer (talk) 04:33, 24 November 2017 (UTC)
• Support in principle. I don't like this wording -- for example, I don't know whether the limitation of the circumstances under which accepting payment is prohibited also apply to soliciting payment. More importantly, the access to non-public or privileged information described by User:GreenMeansGo in his boxed text above is missing. While admins getting a pass for articles about Mzoli's or something is mildly disturbing, I'm far more alarmed (for example) by the prospect that the Turkish government could call up an admin and say that their sockpuppet about to start a big argument with a Gulenist and they'd like to see the admin indef them both. Or that they could use the block to goad the editor into emailing a user or accessing a custom document to give away his IP, or simply get SPI access if they have it. We are wording this policy to fight nuisances, but we need to look at the serious threats above all. Mercs hiring themselves out to hurt our editors under color of etiquette. Wnt (talk) 16:07, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
• support--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 16:12, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

break

New basic wording:

No editor may use a position of trust or advanced user rights to:

• solicit payment for services to be rendered on Wikipedia, or
• accept payment for the use of such a position or rights
  • for the benefit a client
  • for advocating for a client, or
  • to evade our normal scrutiny system for new content and COI content.

Payments and grants made by the Wikimedia Foundation or its affiliates (e.g. chapters) are excepted. Wikipedians-in-Residence should declare their paid status and their paid use of advanced rights, but are otherwise exempt.

Smallbones_(smalltalk) 16:30, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

This is an improvement, but I'm still a little uncomfortable with the word "solicit", which I think could potentially cover a wider range of scenarios than what is intended. Am I correct in assuming the intended effect of that clause is to stop people using OTRS and other WMF-sponsored tools for finding work? Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 02:30, 5 November 2017 (UTC).

Examples where "solicit" may come into play: Orangemoody-type advertising via email, i.e. Pay me to write your article and I'll make sure it sticks because I'm an admin, b) ads on Fiverr "You can pay me to write your article, and I'm an admin". One place that it wouldn't come into play is with Wikipedians-in-Residence because they "are otherwise exempt." I have no problem with a potential WiR saying to a respectable GLAM "BTW I also volunteer at OTRS" because GLAMs are aligned with our aims, and because I think GLAM folks (on- and off-Wiki) would police the activity themselves. I trust librarians!. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 04:20, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

Can the scope of "position of trust" be narrowed? What roles that do not require advanced user rights are being targeted? For example, is a co-ordinator of WikiProject Military history, an elected position, considered a position of trust for the purpose of this proposed guidance? How about the Today's featured article co-ordinators? Teahouse hosts? isaacl (talk) 18:26, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

Sorry for my absence here, real-world obligations catch up sometimes. The answer to @Isaacl:'s question is most that there are many places where the rules for different positions and user rights are set out. I believe that each place needs input from the folks that hang out there and that the exact wording for each position can be worked out, In short, it'll be narrowed by doing one position at a time, and by the people involved. That's not to say that folks here can't be involved at those pages as well. So far:

• small change already made at WP:AFC, with no opposition
• small change at WP:COI reflecting the AfC change
• an interesting discussion at WT:Good articles
• I'll start a discussion very soon at WT:GRP (which covers OTRS and other rights)

Smallbones_(smalltalk) 16:47, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

Can you list some examples of roles that would be covered which do not have associated advanced user rights? This would help me consider what type of wording may be appropriate. Personally, I do not think just being trusted by the community should be in itself a disqualifying factor, even though trusted editors inherently have a greater influence on discussions than those who aren't trusted. isaacl (talk) 17:00, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

My main concern is with holders of advanced rights who use their status, rather than the rights per se for paid editing, e.g. OTRS "volunteers" who might come on to enWiki (their rights, if we call them that are used elsewhere) and post something on a talk page, e.g. "From an OTRS ticket, I'm removing .... until a better source can be found." Or say an admin !voting at ANI. That's not exactly using their tools - it's a use of their position or status.

As far as "trusted positions" without tools - the only ones that concern me at all are AfC reviewer (this seems to have been taken care of) and Good Article reviewer (which is still being discussed). Others may be concerned about different positions - but let them make the proposals. As far as the elected director of WP:Military history - I just don't know enough about it - but I doubt that he'd win an election if he declared that he was willing to sell his services as the director. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 17:49, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

FA coordinator and the ArbCom election commission have been mentioned above. GMG^talk 17:56, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be better to cast the restriction (for editors without advanced user rights) in terms of the type of services offered: the commonality seems to be decisions that are entrusted to one or a small number of persons, or the evaluation of the community's consensus view. So maybe something like this:

• No editor with advanced user rights may solicit or accept payment for any service related to Wikipedia. Examples of services include advocating for a client, or evading scrutiny for any edits benefiting a client.
• No editor may solicit or accept payment for any service related to evaluating the Wikipedia community's consensus view, or to deciding on an outcome either as an individual or within a committee, as opposed to part of a community discussion. Examples of outcomes include decisions made by the feature article co-ordinators, and rulings made by the Arbitration Committee election commission.

Further examples of course can be listed. isaacl (talk) 18:35, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

• Prefer this version to the one in the above section, since it deals with the "coordinators" matter. I do think the admin, CU, etc. policies need to be updated with explicit rules again using such special power/tools/authority on behalf of off-site interests. It really doesn't have anything to do with money changing hands but with PoV, COI, and NOT#ADVOCACY policy.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  00:24, 11 November 2017 (UTC); revised: 12:34, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
• I've made the relevant additions to New Page Patrol: [1][2]. MER-C 09:33, 22 November 2017 (UTC)

(radical?) counterproposal

Instead of running away and pretending we can stop editing (hint - I've only seen reports and instances of paid editing increase since the change in the ToS from my OTRS work), why don't we almost create a "trusted editor" system - editors that are trusted by the community are added to a page, can be contacted by external editors, and if the subject is indeed notable, the page can be created by them for either a charge or a donation to the WMF? (something a bit like WP:JOB but better publicised) Paid editing is clearly not going to go away - as I see it, we can have a choice where both us (with better paid-for articles, so less NPP needed), and the subjects (article less likely to get deleted, less likely to be scammed). I'm aware this does present a potential COI flag over the foundation, but as it is independent editors carrying out the editing, I don't see this as an issue.

Note: I'm not involved in paid editing, I just regularly dealt with the fall out from it. The current approach clearly isn't working IMO - maybe a shift in our approach may well get better results. Mdann52 (talk) 22:50, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

Those hiring paid editors are often looking for promotional rather than neutral content. The problem is growing as we become more well known and respected and the businesses that do this work increase in number. The rise of sites like Elance and Fivver also contribute. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:18, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

@Doc James: True - however, I think if we are going to keep our head into the sands that this issue can be solved with our current approach, promotional content is going to become more widely available. I think that trialing different approaches to see what impact they make would be at least vaguely worthwhile. Mdann52 (talk) 17:01, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

Our current approach appears to be 1) some pretending the problem does not exist or if it does it does not matter 2) a small group trying very hard to keep our rules against paid editing from being applied and try to do everything possible to prevent any new rules from being created to regulate the practice or enforce our TOU.

So it is not surprising we are here. We do need to try things, but I would like to suggest we try enforcing our current rules or ban paid promotional editing directly in article space completely. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:41, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

• See certain portions in this thread.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 09:53, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

• @Godric on Leave: I can see the parallels there, but that seemed to be far more about money from the WMF rather than subjects. I'm under no illusion this proposal is not going to get any real levels of support - sometimes, I think it's best to throw radical proposals out there to get people thinking, as in my time on Wikipedia, towing the same line has only seen the problem get worse... Mdann52 (talk) 17:05, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

• Hi all! My opinion is simply disallowing those types of paied contributions because especially OTRs members as will as admins should be of the most confident users and represent the idea of volunteering for wikipedia and if we allow them to be paied for their contributions then wikipedia will become like any paid website and will lost its main principle of free knowledge. Those paied users are more prone to bias than those who are freely volunteering and sacrificing there efforts and time!. Regards--مصعب (talk) 11:18, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

• @مصعب: There are a few editors involved with Wikipedia who are paid for their work and tend to produce high-quality articles - I'm of the opinion that paid editors != bad editors as a general rule - hence why I'd rather it was members of the community being paid for writing articles outside their comfort areas, rather than unknown people writing paid promotional content. Mdann52 (talk) 17:01, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

• Just no TonyBallioni (talk) 13:13, 4 November 2017 (UTC)
• Hell no! - it would be reputational suicide. --Orange Mike | Talk 20:58, 4 November 2017 (UTC)
• Heck no! - some people get carried away! Smallbones_(smalltalk) 21:44, 4 November 2017 (UTC)
• Absolutely no . This is even worse than the error that was made in the first place by allowing paid editing under the condition of disclosure. No form of paid editing is compatible with the volunteer philosophy of Wikipedia.Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:36, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
• Hahaha Worth imagining just so that in my mind I can see the look on the WMF's face if we tried to turn the platform into a donation machine through community consensus... In all seriousness though: not gonna happen. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{(or here)} 12:31, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

• @Insertcleverphrasehere: Evidently, you've never been on Wikipedia around December while logged out for the annual fundraising drive... :P Mdann52 (talk) 22:12, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

• Presses nuke button - Seriously though, it is a good idea but per above wishful thinking. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:24, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
• No. Such a web site would be possible, and might be no worse than the commercial world already is, but whoever wants to run it, can and must do so entirely independently from WP or the WMF, and I do not think anyone could ethically participate in both. The problem is that our copyright permits anyone to use our material, and then add commercialism onto it, but we always knew that's inherent in the license. Personally I sometimes think we should have chosen -NC, but we didn't. DGG ( talk ) 19:14, 20 November 2017 (UTC)
• No Absolutely not. Bad idea. Qaei ☎ 10:17, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

History - people with privileges who edited for pay

Several folks have asked if this has ever happened. I've been spending a bit of time looking at that...

• Nichalp (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

apparent sock (listed at SPI): Homechap (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

apparent sock (listed in Arbcom decision June 2009): Zithan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

crat, oversighter, admin, OTRS.

per edit count first edit in 2004.

status, Zithan blocked; other accounts not blocked, Nichalp retired; last edit on en-WP was Jan 2009 (left enigmatic note here 31 Jan 2009).

Made a 'crat here in September 2005 ; stripped by arbcom here June 2009.

joined OTRS here October 2007; removed from list here July 2009 with edit note No longer active(!)

June 2009 SPI filed and was put on hold for Arbcom, Arbcom finding is here

btw this from July 2008 looks a lot like trying to figure out how to cover their socking tracks after a goof, using the tools.

The arbcom decision spawned a long discussion at the related talk page here.

Led to a slew of AfDs eg linked from Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Brad Sugars

Led to a mammoth RfC that ran June-July 2009 Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Paid_editing

• Seicer (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

admin

Status. not blocked. Still an admin. not too active per edit count, last edit was Feb 2017

per edit count, created in 2006

diff, June 2009 acknowledged editing for pay; explained here on 11 June that they work for a university and I only add content or modify content with information that is sourced directly from our publications and web-sites, or from accompanying articles.. That diff says that they gave up the bit and they did but they asked for it back in Nov 2009 log)

• Wifione (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

admin

sock of account formerly called Mrinal Pandey, renamed to Empengent (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

See SPI Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Mrinal_Pandey/Archive (I had never looked at that before. Wow)

arbcom case Feb 2015; desysopped and banned for socking and editing for pay on behalf of a university, Indian Institute of Planning and Management

Master account (edit count) created Dec 2006

Wifione account (per edit count) created April 2009.

user rights log, made admin Sept 2010.

• KDS4444 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

OTRS, autopatrol

status, indeffed Nov 2017)

OTRS (removed Oct 2017)

--(That is what I found so far. Jytdog (talk) 18:31, 18 November 2017 (UTC))

• Salvidrim! (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) via Salvidrim! (paid) (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

admin

Currently editing for pay through "Mister Wiki"

— (added by JJMC89 (T·C) 18:56, 19 November 2017 (UTC))

• Malunrenta (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

New Page Patroller

Systematically marked as patrolled new pages created by one of the big UPE sockfarms.

-- added by Rentier (talk) 19:27, 19 November 2017 (UTC))

• Soetermans (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

AFC reviewer

Does work for "Mister Wiki".

- (added by Jytdog (talk) 22:54, 19 November 2017 (UTC))

Other history

Had never seen this list before. Back in 2009 already somebody was tracking ads for paid editing on Elance. See User:Brumski/paid_editing_adverts. Jytdog (talk) 18:31, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

Rather than putting this list on the village pump page, how about including it somewhere under Wikipedia:WikiProject Integrity, such as a subpage of Wikipedia:WikiProject Integrity/Editor Registry, so it can more easily located again in future and kept up-to-date? isaacl (talk) 20:07, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

As I noted at the top, people in the RfC discussion asked about other people with advanced privileges (PWAPs ??) who edited for pay and I wanted to make it easy for folks participating to see. But yes it should be copied to the Integrity page. Jytdog (talk) 21:17, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

You guys should probably take care to separate your own sigs from the list of editors in the section above. ☆ Bri (talk) 00:31, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

thx, added notations and smallified. :) Jytdog (talk) 02:40, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Current developments

In view of the current case (which is going to be accepted) at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Mister_Wiki concerning an admin, the entire proposal should be reworded as:

The holding of advanced rights is incompatible with paid editing

Even if a user with advanced rights creates creates another identity for his/her paid editing (such as user:Salvidrim!), it just creates yet another perceived degree of tolerance for paid editing - and its still the same person. No one can claim to successfully manage a voluntary split personality. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:01, 26 November 2017 (UTC)

• I didn't realize this discussion was happening here, I had been commenting on the case request. I'll just basically expand on what I said there: I think that it would be a very good idea if we made users choose between holding advanced permissions or being paid to edit. To my mind it's pretty simple: if you want to accept payment for doing something on Wikipedia, you first go to WP:BN and say "I've been hired to do a thing, please remove all of my userrights" (yes, rollback and everything, right down to autoconfirmed). Maybe we should require that you describe the work you're being paid to do, or post a link to the request on Fiverr or wherever, that seems like a good idea for transparency. Then you go do your paid gig, making proper disclosures along the way, and once you're done you go back to BN and say "my paid gig is done, please give me back my userrights". Then, obviously, you don't touch that topic again. It's all done from one account so you're accountable for it, and nobody is prevented from doing paid editing if that's a thing they want to do. And if you're being paid to "manage" content on an ongoing basis, you shouldn't be entitled to any advanced permissions.

As for Pigsonthewing's concern about Wikipedians in Residence, I think it stands to reason that being paid to promote Wikipedia and facilitate outreach events is somewhat different from being paid to edit Wikipedia on behalf of a third party. The WiR program is already pretty transparent, and clearly valuable. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:43, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

• I think this would be a very bad idea. There are far too many grey areas and corner cases and times where this would harm the encyclopaedia (making it much harder for someone to revert vandalism they happen across) - not to mention that it would encourage people with rights greater than autoconfirmed to lie about any paid editing making the problem worse rather than better. We will either lose many good editors and admins because of technical violations or the rules will be inconsistently enforced making much more of a mess than we currently have. Thryduulf (talk) 17:15, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Support the principle that The holding of advanced rights is incompatible with paid editing. I'm not sure that lesser rights than admin really need to be covered, but it does no great harm and keeps it simple. Anything in excess of auto-confirmed rights should be covered.

And this seems to me to be consistent with the direction ARBCOM has taken. When I became an admin, the principle seemed to be that I'd be under greater scrutiny when exercising "the mop", but that's now been extended to every edit an admin makes. We should be consistent, and apply this principle to all advanced rights and positions.

But please note I'm not advocating enforcement as a solution. The spirit of wp:5P5 as I see it is, whenever we need to enforce the rules, they have in a sense already failed. The goal should be to write the rules, and build consensus supporting them, so that enforcement is rarely necessary, and so that the cases where sanctions are needed stick out like sore thumbs, because users that are here try to follow the rules whether they agree with them or not. Andrewa (talk) 22:01, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Support Kudpung's proposal that "The holding of advanced rights is incompatible with paid editing". Once money enters the scene the motivation for every action is questionable. In Salvidrim's case, granting rights to the alternate account is (imho) indistinguishable from sockpuppetry. Regardless of the outcome at Arbcom Salvidrim's credibility and impartiality is shot. How can an admin, who accepts payment under another hat, give fair judgement on other paid editors?

A bright-line rule as proposed by Kudpung would leave no room for ambiguity or doubt, and leave no grey area for anybody to stumble into. The restriction needs to be applicable not only to Admins but to Page Movers (for suppressredirect) and Template Editors (for the ability to duck the title blacklist) at the very least. Cabayi (talk) 18:31, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

Not in this form. With the way the question is being framed so far, the proposed solution is missing the aim. The problem underlying all the situations that have been discussed so far is not the fact itself that payments have been made, it is the introduction of a conflict of interest subsequent to these payments. It is the conflicts of interest that we should strive to find ways of tackling, regardless of their form (and there are myriads ways for this to happen: personally, I think the existence of visible edit counts acts as a much stronger disincentive to keep wikipedia's purpose in mind than all the harmful money you could pump into the project). Directly or indirectly receiving payment for any forms of editing (with or without the exercising of advanced rights) can happen in a variety of situations that do not involve such conflicts of interest. How about wikipedians in residence, WMF staff or WikiEdu coordinators, should they be banned from using any advanced tools? Is it wrong for the organisers of a big student editathon to hire a wikipedian to clean up the resultant mess? Is it wrong for a user to start a crowdfunding campaign among her friends so that she can dedicate a month of her time to helping clear the AfC backlog? – Uanfala (talk) 19:27, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

• Comment Hopefully Jimbo will make some sort of statement about the detrimental effect of these issues, along with the detrimental effect of "contributors who are very productive but also very rude to others" and other major problems that undermine the pillars of Wikipedia. Bright☀ 09:22, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

I would like to ask for detailed explanation of the following part of the Manual of Style/Trademarks: "Follow standard English text formatting and capitalization practices, even if the trademark owner considers nonstandard formatting "official", as long as this is a style already in widespread use, rather than inventing a new one."

Does it mean that capitalization of trademarks should always follow standard English capitalization rules or should the editor always search what the usage of the trademark is and then decide? Thank you! --Jan Kameníček (talk) 10:37, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

As a general rule, one should start by reviewing how sources independent of the trademark owner tend to refer to the trademark. If there is more than one formatting variant that is widely used, then the variant that most closely resembles typical English formatting should be preferred. Dragons flight (talk) 11:04, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

In other words... we don't necessarily use the trademark's "official" capitalization (as seen on packaging or advertising)... we use whatever capitalization is most commonly used by independent sources. For more on this, see our WP:COMMONNAME policy and the WP:OFFICIALNAMES supplement. Blueboar (talk) 14:25, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

I'd disagree with this interpretation. I'd say that you should start by following the standard English capitalization rules, and use this as long as this is a style already in use elsewhere. We shouldn't necessarily use the most common style. Also WP:COMMONNAME is not relevant, as this is a style issue, not a naming issue. --woodensuperman 15:30, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

I originally understood it the same way as Woodensuperman, but decided to ask. What is more, there are cases when some trademarks are not mentioned by any independent sources (one example here: [3]). Such companies are not notable to have a separate article, but sometimes may be necessary to be mentioned in articles on other subjects. --Jan Kameníček (talk) 21:07, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

I am currently reviewing Kid A for GA. Three sources have caused concern for me in reference to WP:VERIFY. Two radio interviews are given with a date and a station. However, as far as I can see, there is no legal way to verify the contents of these interviews. Can they therefore be considered reliable sources? A similar question is raised about a promotional interview CD that was sent to the music press by Radiohead's record company. WP:VERIFY states that just because a source is hard to come by, it should not automatically be thrown out. However, in this case, I would say that it is borderline impossible for a regular person to come by this source by legal means. A YouTube video of the audio exists, as does a transcript on a Radiohead fan page. I would however consider both of those as not-reliable sources... Any thoughts? Zwerg Nase (talk) 17:37, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Just for the benefit of the discussion, audio and transcripts of pretty much all these interviews, including the radio interviews, are easily available on YouTube and fan sites. For example, here's the audio of the interview CD mentioned by Zwerg. So in that sense it's very easy to verify them. But yes, I suppose technically these are illegal copies of the original sources, so I don't know what that means for verifiability.

I think you could make the same argument about old magazines - how is someone supposed to verify a claim made in a decades-old magazine without resorting to checking online scans or transcripts? You could track down an old copy on eBay, but that's not always straightforward. Popcornduff (talk) 03:13, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

The Magazine Rack at the Wayback Machine is a useful resource for finding scanned copies of old magazines. It tends to favour computing and gaming magazines, but you can find complete scans of a lot of other stuff. Ensign Magazine (official JC LDS publication), over 1,000 issues of Sports Illustrated, old issues of Playboy, the Austin Chronicle, etc. — Warren. ‘ talk , 05:15, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

There are libraries and other archives that keep copies of old magazines. Please remember that sources do not have to be online. 86.17.222.157 (talk) 11:48, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

I'm sure that the BBC keeps archive copies of all its broadcasts, at least since the relevant date here, but I don't know if it's possible for members of the public to get to get access to them. I can't speak for KCRW, but would be surprised if it doesn't keep copies, and again I don't know if these can be accessed. 86.17.222.157 (talk) 11:48, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

It looks like it is possible to get access to the BBC archives. 86.17.222.157 (talk) 12:05, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Another approach for a case like this would to ask whether the information is WP:DUE. If the only source is a radio interview with no known and legal means of verification, perhaps the information should be removed. If no one has thought to publish or refer to the assertion elsewhere, mentioning it may be dubious. Also, people make mistakes when speaking in an interview so facts that cannot be verified elsewhere such as the name of a person or a date should be regarded as suspect. Johnuniq (talk) 22:37, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

This reminds me of an issue we had on the macOS article recently, where one editor was really insistent that the "X" in "Mac OS X" was a homage to the X in Unix. Their source? An opinion segment in a single BBC broadcast. Because of the BBC's international rebroadcast restrictions, I couldn't even verify that source. This is really hard to justify on topics that receive widespread global coverage, like Kid A or Mac OS. Sure, we have the folks at WP:RX to facilitate access to hard-to-reach sources, but it shouldn't be necessary most of the time. — Warren. ‘ talk , 07:14, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

But... again, the sources in question are extremely easy to verify because they're abundantly reproduced online. The question is whether the fact that listening back to an interview on YouTube is technically piracy means we have to discount it as a source. Popcornduff (talk) 07:21, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Indeed, I think we have touched upon what we in German call "the poodle's core". I had hoped that there were clear policies regarding such issues, but apparently, there are not and eventually, the decision comes down to me as GA reviewer? Zwerg Nase (talk) 09:25, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

As I'm the guy who added these sources in the first place, I'm biased, so take this with a pinch of salt... but the way I see it, the WP:VERIFY guidelines state "Do not reject reliable sources just because they are difficult or costly to access", and there seems to be nothing else relevant on the page, so I think it's OK. You might want to ask more on the WP:VERIFY talk page, and it seems like it might be a guideline thing to have a decision about for future cases. As for the WP:DUE concern, I see nothing in that guideline to advise against using these sources either: most things mentioned in promotional interviews aren't reproduced elsewhere, that's normal and doesn't discount their reliability. Popcornduff (talk) 09:54, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Just one quick comment: I brought this discussion here because the WP:VERIFY talk page specifically says not to discuss such matters there. Zwerg Nase (talk) 10:22, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Good to know! Popcornduff (talk) 11:52, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

The correct place if you have an issue regarding the reliability of a source in context is WP:RSN. Only in death does duty end (talk) 11:48, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

@Only in death: I thought about putting it there, but since I was going for an answer wether there was a particular policy about this, I went for this one. Feel free to move this debate, if you feel it should be over there. Zwerg Nase (talk) 09:50, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

I've noticed a pattern where articles on conservative/right wing organizations often have lengthy criticism, talk about specific controversies, or labels from their opponents tacked on to the lead while left wing counterparts have more generic descriptions and praise for awards. See Breitbart News, Conservapedia, One America News Network, and Drudge Report talk page for example. Compare Daily Kos, Rational Wiki, Democratic Underground, and Huffington Post.

Some specific examples

The site has published a number of falsehoods and conspiracy theories,[9][10][11][12] as well as intentionally misleading stories.[13] Its journalists are ideologically driven, and some of its content has been called misogynist, xenophobic and racist.

the channel has risen to greater prominence due to its pro-Trump coverage.[7] Robert Herring, Sr., founder and CEO of the network, has ordered producers to promote certain types of content, such as pro-Trump stories, anti-Clinton stories and anti-abortion stories, and minimize stories about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.[7]

When you confront editors about this their usual rationale is that everybody agreed with it some day in the past, or that they googled a few links that says what they want and that proves there is an objective consensus for what they're putting in.

I propose that criticism in controversial political articles be preferentially confined to its own section, or if not possible not in the lead, or at the very least some sort of higher standard be imposed on what criticism is allowed in the lead and how its phrased and that editors who want to preferentially frontload conservative organization articles with negative press but not leftwing organization articles provide stronger evidence for their claims than random search engine results. IE just because you can find a link from WaPo and the Huffington Post saying Breitbart News is very mean doesn't necessarily mean its universally agreed on and worthy of being stated as straight fact right at the top and almost the first thing you read about the site on a supposedly unbiased encyclopedia. Jarwulf (talk) 05:09, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

Something like MOS:LEAD? Jack N. Stock (talk) 05:41, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

The issue isn't that the organizations you mentioned are "right-wing", it's that they all actively court controversy, and their chosen methods of presenting themselves result in significant criticism. Wikipedia's article on Cato Institute, for instance, doesn't have the problems you mention because their public statements and publications are significantly less tendentious than Drudge Report. When a subject is mostly notable for its controversiality, then you have to accept that Wikipedia's coverage of that subject is mostly be focused on that. — Warren. ‘ talk , 06:30, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

That still doesn't meant the lede should be frontloaded with the criticism/controversy around the group prior to the basic facts about the group though the criticism still should be in the lede. This is necessitated by the need to be impartial. How a group is seen by other groups is a matter of subjectivity and should follow want can be objectively stated about the group. (However, I know there are a number of editors that insist that if several media sources critize a group , that should be treated as a fact, which is not how we should work). --Masem (t) 06:59, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

I suggest we all reject participating in politicization here. Any labeling of article-subjects as liberal or conservative is irrelevant. Jarwulf has listed two sets of generic articles, suggesting one set may be written with negative bias and/or other set may written with a positive bias. Wikipedia's NPOV policy is that we summarize what Reliable Sources say about each topic, in rough proportion to significance and coverage of each viewpoint. To support those concerns Jarwulf quoted some content from the first set of articles. The copy-paste includes ref-numbers, however I pulled up the list of sources that those numbers represent:

• L.A. Times
• Associates Press
• NBC News
• CNN
• FactCheck(*3)
• Politifact
• Snopes
• Washington Post

If Jarwolf believes those sources are unreliable, or believes they are undue weight and do not reflect prevalent coverage present in a multitude of uncited Reliable Sources, Jarwolf can go to those articles and challenge that content. We have RFCs, other dispute resolution mechanisms, and administrative intervention available if editors are unwilling or unable to respect the applicable policies.

As for the articles which Jarwolf asserts are written with a favorable bias, Jarwolf can to go to those articles and demonstrate a comparable level of critical coverage in a comparable number and quality of Reliable Sources for any content they wish to add. We have RFCs, other dispute resolution mechanisms, and administrative intervention available if editors are unwilling or unable to respect the applicable policies.

There appears to be nothing to discuss here unless and until Jarwolf actually deals with policy issues and addresses sourcing for content they want to add/remove at particular articles.

If the issue turns out to be dissatisfaction with what Reliable Sources are (or aren't) writing about various topics, then that is an issue that we cannot and will not fix on Wikipedia. Wikipedia has a strong and deliberate bias for summarizing what Reliable sources say. Alsee (talk) 09:09, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

Agree with that. Objective criteria should be presented and using reliable sources and especially checking sites like Snopes or Politifact or FactCheck sounds like a good way of going around the business. Wikipedia is not the encyclopaedia of mumbled pleasantries. Noticing things is fine, but that means nothing unless you can show it is something in the real world rather than your own mind. Dmcq (talk) 10:51, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

The reason that Breitbart News' article begins that way is that, whether you agree with them or not, an overwhelming consensus of independent reliable sources describe the site in that manner. Your problem is with the sources, not with Wikipedia. If you believe that all of the reliable sources cited in the lede of Breitbart News are biased, then you are simply editing the wrong website and Conservapedia is thataway --->. We are not here to right the great wrong that you believe exists in mainstream media sources. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 19:00, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

As I suspected nobody here has any actual defense other than what I predicted; that a handful of googled citations equals definitive proof of some phantom consensus. Let me do what nobody else here is doing and provide actual specific logical arguments and evidence for my claims instead of mindlessly posting links to generic template guidelines. If I do a google search for "breitbart is a right" vs a search for "breitbart is a far" I get almost double the results. How exactly do the omniscient maharajis of wikipedia KNOW that 'far right' and 'racist and misogynist' are the 'overwhelming consensus' for describing the site? Snopes 'part of the consensus we don't question even if it might be wrong' has an Alexa rank in the 2000s while Breitbart which is not part of the 'consensus' has a rank of 200. 'But oh Breitbart is not reliable! (whatever that means)' Yeah well the omniscient maharajis have no problem packing articles which references from sites which have tons of criticism for bias and flawed reporting and nakedly partisan sources that proudly state their political alignment.

Look I'm not asking for removal of criticism. Or even partisan sources. All I'm asking is that a partisan editor (left or right) be held to a higher standard. Some vetting before being allowed to plant their flag on a article and put 'X is a naughty bad meanie mean dum dumb![1]' as the first sentence just because they found a HuffPo article that says so, and close down all discussion contesting it. Keep statements from openly partisan sources off the lead. Keep criticism off the lead. Directly attribute them rather than stating their insults as fact in the lead. Have some sort of logical basis for determining consensus other than 'HuffPo and WAPO is all I and 70% of editors read so they're the consensus'. I dunno. Do something that will actually make this place's selfprofessed neutrality meaningful. Or don't I guess, I'm just trying to offer some helpful advice. Take it, or leave it. Nobody takes this place's political articles seriously anyways so you are welcome to stay the course and accelerate wikipedia's rightful place in the rubbish bin of 8th grade poly sci teachers Jarwulf (talk) 23:34, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

Jarwulf if as you describe someone puts that kind of criticism in the lead based on just a HuffPo article, you might have to contest it but you should ultimately win. (Unless the article-subject is barely notable and HuffPo is one of the only sources that exist.) There are various policies, guidelines, and ManualsOfStyle that may be relevant, but the main one you are looking for is Undue weight. The lead should summarize the body of the article, and the body of the article should reflect significant and prevalent views present across the available Reliable Sources. The Breitbart article contains at least 215 sources (some key refs contain multiple sources). A significant portion of those sources are devoted to establishing the Breitbart's ideological stance and the widespread critical commentary about it. Controversy and criticism *are* some of the most noted and noteworthy things about Breitbart. If you look at an article such as National_Review, it doesn't have any criticism in the lead. If someone were to add a flame-throwing HuffPo piece to the National Review lead, that would be flagrant Undue Weight. You would be absolutely justified in reverting and citing policy. If the other editor is combative, there's RFCs and other dispute resolution mechanisms which should ultimately result in policy compliance. Alsee (talk) 22:00, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

• I've been trying to argue what you have been asking for - in that our ledes should progress from the most objective, neutral facts, then into subjective praise or criticism of the topic - to be impartial and neutral. It's not about removing a wide-spread opinion from the lede, but presenting the lede in the order from objective to subjective matters. You see this all throughout most topics on WP (such as highly praised films or books, highly decorated soldiers and officers, proficient athletes and academics, etc.) where the subjective aspects are left for last. The only class of articles where this is completely flipped is anything on conservative/right-wing politics, and it is because of the resistance you speak to. It is claimed "but these people are notable for being bad people", which is not content of issue to include in the lede - the lede at some point needs to ID why the person or group is notable, and for those that are constantly barraged by press criticism, that is it. But it should be after establishing the neutral, objectives facts of the topic rather than frontloading. --Masem (t) 00:30, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Agreed, this doesn't necessarily have to be a full formal policy change. Maybe just a reminder for overzealous editors. But it appears to be a systematic problem which is why I'm bringing it to general attention here instead of like some people suggested by running around like a hamster trying to convince self appointed lord after self appointed lord of each individual article. I'm not necessarily opposed to 'overwhelming consensus' but if you're going to regularly be stuffing in juvenile insults and tangents about specific controversies disproportionately, in what is supposed to be a generalized descriptive lead, we're going to need a bit more to go on than random hits on a fishing expedition in Google. I raised some points here and so far nobody I've seen has bothered to specifically respond to them, or seem to really care. So, I guess its open season on certain articles and you can tack on any rambling criticism you want at the top in there if you can google it up. Because its the 'overwhelming' consensus and 'self evident reality' cause a majority of editors say so. Whatever, I just offered some suggestions. Jarwulf (talk) 11:49, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

While this sounds plausible, I don't think it is true. If you look at WP articles on pseudo-science journals, for example, I believe you will normally find cautionary labels early in the lede. The same for extreme-left political parties, etc. My suspicion is that some editors only notice the cautionary labels when placed on articles that, by their own individual or fringe POV, they feel should not be so labelled. In those cases (only), such editors appeal for "objectivity" in the lede. Then they use false parallels with HuffPo or WaPo - which operate according to much more conventional journalistic standards - to confuse the issue. ---- — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newimpartial (talk • contribs) 01:46, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

In the words of Stephen Colbert, "reality has a well-known liberal bias". This isn't true in general, but in the world of American politics, it certainly is truer than not. Conservative outlets like the National Review are now the exception, not the norm, especially in the age of Trump. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 02:12, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

I don't really think changing the policy would be helpful. The lede should follow WP:RS and subjective criticism should probably not be stated as objective fact in any part of the article, but clearly attributed as an expert opinion that is critical. Something like publishing a conspiracy theory would, however, not be a subjective criticism per se, because it should be verifiable - they have either done this or not. The majority view of WP:RS would have to be discussed on talk pages - a policy-based exclusion of anything "negative" from the lede would introduce its own POV and WP:FALSEBALANCE problems.SeraphWiki (talk) 02:40, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) It is true what Alsee has stated. The coverage in the ledes and elsewhere in these these articles is based on the proportion of coverage received in independent reliable sources. Also, the lede is supposed to be a summation of what is in the article. And since these are well developed articles with controversial material, I have to think that what is in the lede is further discussed in the article. Also, I am pretty sure in all these cases, there was discussion and agreement before placing the material in the article proper and in the lede. As stated above, psuedo-scientific topics and extreme-left political persons and parties get the same treatment. There is no single editor with an agenda going around promoting a point of view. Or several editors with an agenda each working on an article, promoting a point of view. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 02:44, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

As an observer from afar I probably shouldn't put my oar in, but from that distance the most obvious point about negativity in the lead of WP articles on US right-wing mouthpieces is that it is not just greater than for their equivalents on (what passes for) the left; it is also greater than for the former mouthpieces of the NSDAP. It would seem eminently reasonable for the lead of the WP article on Völkischer Beobachter to note (with support from reputable sources) that "it published a number of falsehoods and conspiracy theories, as well as intentionally misleading stories. Its journalists were ideologically driven, and some of its content has been called misogynist, xenophobic and racist." But it contains no such health warning. That disparity seems worrying, but it is not an argument for not pointing out -at proportionate length- negative aspects of current publications. Rjccumbria (talk) 03:59, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

It depends on what it is most noted for in reliable sources. As WP:LEAD says we should say why a topic is notable. And if you look at Conservapedia or Breitbart News where the OP specifically went to complain, their leads do describe them as the secondary sources on balance do. Can anyone find a reliable secondary source that has a good word for Conservapedia? IT is notable because it publishes twaddle like that Einstein's Theory of Relativity promotes moral relativism. And is anyone really going to stand up and say Breitbart News is anything but far right and publishes all sorts of fake news? The stories they are notable for have a common theme of being made up or heavily edited and them having to pay out damages. It is what they are notable for. Dmcq (talk) 14:04, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

• Fixable by applying WP:UNDUE, which means a) removing excessive dwelling on criticism (especially that which is only coming from the far-left quarter) from conservative-subject articles' leads, and b) inserting more mentions of (general and well-supported, not just far-right) criticism into the leads of lefty-subject pages.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  09:29, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
• Comment -- Hello, I think that the phrase "X organization has caused controversy" is generic. What hasn't caused controversy? Everything has detractors, especially in politics. Our focus should be in improving the descriptions of the respective controversies (who, when, why), not on whether X is considered controversial or not (short answer: yes). --NaBUru38 (talk) 20:28, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Please see Talk:2018 in science#RfC about sources for new entries. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 02:24, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

If I propose that articles be merged (as I have at Talk:Pixel density and Talk:MTR Fare Adjustment Mechanism) and (almost) no one ever comments, is the correct procedure to merge the articles anyway, remove the merge templates and close the discussion as "no consensus" (which would be true but next to useless), nominate the smaller article at AfD, or…? Jc86035 (talk) 16:23, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

IMHO just boldly do it yourself, and there's no need to close it - just add a note that you have done so. Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:25, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Probably the only rule is that there's no need to formally close the discussion. Other that, it's down to common sense. Depending on how well you know the subject area and how confident you are in the need for a merger you can either perform the merger straight away, or try to get more eyes on it: relevant wikiprojects can be helpful, and so can the major contributors of the articles concerned. AfD should ideally be a good place too, but it's likely that the discussion will get drowned in a sea of procedural comments about AfD being only for deletion). – Uanfala (talk) 02:11, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

WP:MERGECLOSE suggests that you can merge if nobody objects within 30 days. It doesn't require that anyone supports the merger proposal, only that nobody objects. Personally, I will wait much longer, but typically more than 30 days makes no difference. If nobody has objected in 30 days, you can be reasonably sure nobody will ever object. You can close the discussion with outcome as merge. Jack N. Stock (talk) 02:25, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Merge proposals don't get picked up by the article alerts, so depending on how many watchers the articles have and what a proportion of those passing by are likely to comment, there are varying degrees to which the lack of objections can be taken as a meaningful sign. – Uanfala (talk) 02:41, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

So take the BRD approach - merge them; if someone reverts your merge discuss the issue with them (and anyone else who happens to join in). עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 15:09, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Also @Jc86035: in most cases a redirect would be better then AfD the merged-from page. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:50, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

I'm thinking about this for quite a while, finally think it's better to make a discussion. I actively read three different languages of Wikipedia frequently, namely English, Japanese and Chinese. One thing I noticed here is that English Wikipedia seems like to actively avoid using Red links.

Take Japanese game series, The Idolmaster as an example. This game has a major release (more like sub-series) called "The Idolmaster Million Live!", which hasn't have an English article yet. Without much doubt, it is a worth one and will have one eventually, so I won't say it falls into the criterion of "articles that are not likely to be created and retained in Wikipedia". But none of the seven mentions of this name in this article is (red-)linked.

Furthermore, at the bottom of the page, The Idolmaster Million Live! is not even included at all in that ((The Idolmaster)) template. It feels like people intentionally do not include it in the template, despite being a major release of this game series, just because the article doesn't exist (yet).

I understand one example doesn't say much, but it matches my experience here. So my questions, before I go and modify such articles,

1. is it the correct practice for in-article text to avoid red links, like in case of the example shown above? I read Wikipedia:Red link briefly and my gut says no, but further explanation is welcome.
2. is it the correct practice to avoid red links by not including non-existing articles at all in the template, assuming the article is important enough for such template? I haven't find the relevant policy page for this.

Thanks! --fireattack (talk) 17:45, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

The correct practice, or at least what I have been doing, is to have red links in article prose but not navigational tools such as the hatnotes, templates, and the see also section. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 22:34, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

For years I've believed that people shun red links to articles that should exist far more than they should. It's a harmful habit that needlessly restricts Wikipedia's growth, and is unsupported by Wikipedia:Red link or any other guideline I'm aware of. Even for navboxes, WP:EXISTING supports the addition of certain redlinks. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 05:11, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

There are two major topics for which redlinks are shunned rather fairly: persons and companies. It is not like some rare fish or science: BIO and ORG notability are problematic and controversial. IMO having them redlinked gives them undue prominence in text. If these are notable, it is not rocket science to write a bio or stub, unlike, say, about auctorial self-criticism. Also, different Wikipedias have different criteria of notability. For example, in Lithuanian Wikipedia each and every county-level politician or director of a factory has a detailed article. Staszek Lem (talk) 23:16, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (people)#Conflict between WP:NCP and WP:MOS
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:57, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

What happens to the Featured Lists status of an article when it is split? List of Doctor Who serials had the Featured List status, but was recently split into two separate articles, List of Doctor Who episodes (1963–1989) and List of Doctor Who episodes (2005–present), following consensus via discussion. What is the status of these articles in relation to being Featured Lists? -- Alex^TW 09:31, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Wouldn't Wikipedia talk:Featured lists be the place to ask? This isn't the kind of broad policy discussion for which this page is useful; I very much doubt if anyone outside the WP:FL project cares exactly what their criteria are. (Looking at the histories of the three pages linked here, it seems that what they did previously was keep the FL status for one of the lists and submit the other to Featured List Candidates.) ‑ Iridescent 16:12, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps, but as you can see in the history of the link you gave me, that is a very inactive talk page, and I would likely be given zero response. Unlike this talk page, which is extremely active. Thanks for the linked discussion. -- Alex^TW 15:45, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

I searched for "DC Baltimore area". What the hell is this?! Is there no filter at all on the "from our sister projects" results? Given the very obvious risk of finding the search text in a citation to a random adjective?

If we can't filter out obscene trans-wiki results because Wikipedia is not censored, can we at least check that the Wiktionary page title references the search term, and not just some random text somewhere on the page?Chi Sigma (talk) 19:18, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

What is obscene is a matter of opinion. No algorithm can filter based on such highly subject criteria. Ruslik_Zero 20:04, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

A search for one of America's largest metropolitan areas returns a list of places that have been "fuxated" by "niggers", but that's okay because we can just blame The Algorithm? Chi Sigma (talk) 20:19, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

It's obviously horrible language but part of what Wiktionary does is catalogue horrible language. I agree that a mundane search of a common, everyday topic should not return shocking things--see WP:EGG. Do you have in mind what a solution would be? ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:28, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I suggested it above, at the same time as acknowledging that Wikipedia is not censored! Chi Sigma (talk) 20:34, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

You are correct that return is clearly moronic, if it is not intended to be racist, in which case it is racist. Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:42, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

The only *technical* solution would be to remove the quotations from the searched text in the cross-wiki search, and given the way that Wiktionary determines what a quote is ( *# at the beginning of the line, that strikes me as technically difficult and not worth it. Another surprising result... search for "capstan cucumber". Naraht (talk) 21:45, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

I don't believe for a second that that's the only technical solution. If I'd searched for "John Seegentaler" and the suggested Wiktionary entry had been "murderer", someone at Wikipedia would very quickly be getting locked in a room with a copy of Search Optimisation for Dummies. Chi Sigma (talk) 22:06, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

You could try mw:Talk:Cross-wiki Search Result Improvements. I don't know who reads it now. Registered users have the option "Do not show search results for sister projects on the search results page" at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets. I'm not saying it's a good solution. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:57, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

• This is a valid complaint. Don't start with the not-censored stuff please: that applies to articles, not search. We did not include Commons in search because of things like searching for "fruit loops" yielded (until very recently) a naked porn star taking a bath in fruit loops and milk. Keeping search family-friendly is important, because people expect not to have to see racial obscenities when they are searching for the national capital region of the United States. Given the number of school children who do use this website, that is a very real concern. There is a difference in allowing Wiktionary to document it, which isn't our concern, and making it so unsuspecting readers get it put in their face for no clear reason when they were not looking for it. Prohibiting the former is censorship, removing the latter is giving a damn about our readers. TonyBallioni (talk) 23:09, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
  • There is a meaningful distinction between shock images and shock text. I agree that we should try to control when both appear but it's a much bigger deal if an inappropriate piece of media pops up from commonplace searches versus a word. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:27, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
    • Let's be clear what we are talking about: hate speech. There is a big difference between obscenities (I swear like a sailor) and hate speech, and I don't particularly care if the Klan and the neo-Nazis don't think that niggerfuxated isn't hate speech, it is. For those who don't want to click the interwiki link, the English Wiktionary defines the word as: (slang, derogatory, offensive, ethnic slur) Ruined by black people. A hypothetical person of colour (or any person) should not have to worry about hate speech coming up in Wikipedia search results when they search for the Baltimore DC metro area. We should obviously document the word in Wiktionary: that is part of that projects mission. We should also make sure that our readers aren't forced against their will to see something that they wouldn't reasonably anticipate and that is hate speech. TonyBallioni (talk) 23:46, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
      • If we can control the Algorithm, then the solution is to make sure words pulled from Wikitionary are not from that site's category of "offensive terms" (which this one falls into). However, I throw out the case that maybe I was using en.wp's search to find offensive terminology, in such a case, having the current search results that may include offensive words would actually be helpful. The question becomes a balance of being sensitive to readers (I agree, not censorship in this case), and being useful. I don't know what the right answer is. --Masem (t) 23:55, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
        • Agreed, it would be useful if people were searching for an exact match. I think the concern isn't so much this specific case, but what it tells us could also happen. What random search terms are going to bring up homophobic and anti-Semitic slurs? Controlling the algorithm would be the best option, but if that isn't possible, I do think we may need to revisit including Wiktionary in our cross-wiki search results: there is a text/image distinction I'm willing to make, but at some point, the text search result also have the potential to both do wrong by our readers and also to make a PR nightmare, which would not be good for the site. TonyBallioni (talk) 00:00, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
          • The shock value of the word is only half the problem. If you took that screenshot and replaced "niggerfuxated" with its definition "ruined by black people", it wouldn't be an improvement. When a user searches for a concept that could be an article title, and you give them a single Wiktionary entry, what you're saying is "here is Wiktionary's interpretation of that search term". Businesses would pay a fortune to have their web page be the top search result for "DC Baltimore area"! If you were a white supremacist trying to sabotage Wikipedia, boosting "ruined by black people" up the list of search results for "DC Baltimore area" is exactly the way you'd go about it. Chi Sigma (talk) 00:02, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
            • I was literally just thinking this. TonyBallioni (talk) 00:09, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
              • Thank you for reassuring me I'm not being a snowflake! I'm a British non-snowflake though, so I shall be back in 9-10 hours. Chi Sigma (talk) 00:19, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
                • We are always going to have this problem. As number of user-driven projects across separate servers, it is very easy to inject something COI-ish or POV-ish into a sister project that will show up by happenstance on en.wiki; we do not allow this and take action against those that game the system, but the only checks are human-driven and outside our ability to automatically patrol. It's the unfortunate part of being on an open wiki.
                • I don't know if it is possible to change the algirithm but lets say it is and we can force it to omit "offensive terms" from wikt. At that stage, we'd need to come to consensus to understand if we put more weight in avoiding having readers hit with inappropriate terms when randomly search, vs the usefulness of finding such offensive terms if purposely research them. The algorithm can't make that determination, it would only follow what orders we give it. That would be a question we should be asked. My gut is that we'd prefer to avoid seeing readers see these bad hits, but we should assert consensus while determining what is possible via this algorithm. --Masem (t) 00:26, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

I'm not very technical, but would it be so difficult to make the algorithm:

1. Get the search result from Wiktionary
2. Look for the Wiktionary page title in the search string
3. If it isn't there, truncate the search string at the first space, thus leaving only the first word
4. Try again? Chi Sigma (talk) 10:58, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

I think this would help not give irrelevant results in wiktionary - even ignoring the offensiveness the result is still utterly irrelevant Galobtter (pingó mió) 11:03, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Wiktionary is interesting for search indexing. I guess when entering DC baltimore, the result you'd expect on wiktionary would be wikt:Baltimore, but this includes neither DC nor the word Area, thus making it a significantly less likely search result for that particular combination. I think some reweighing needs to occur there. Not sure who is on the search team these days... —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 17:18, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

The search team is still around. I reached out to the PM and engineering manager to see what can be done. CKoerner (WMF) (talk) 19:34, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Task filed. Looks like this result happens on Wiktionary as well. A possible fix has been proposed, but some testing will need to be done. CKoerner (WMF) (talk) 19:59, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

This is good. I like this. Thank you User:CKoerner (WMF)! Chi Sigma (talk) 21:23, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Chi Sigma We made a stop-gap change tonight to do a title only search for Wiktionary in the sister projects sidebar while we all discuss the best way to deal with content that is undesirable to display. Thanks, DTankersley (WMF) (talk) 02:25, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

Too complicated. There isn't any Wiktionary entry you'd expect to get from "DC Baltimore area". It's not a string that makes sense to search Wiktionary for. Pick one of the three words at random, or don't show a Wiktionary entry, surely? Chi Sigma (talk) 21:07, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

• This is more WMF doing shit without consensus and fucking things up . Jytdog (talk) 07:30, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Noted. How do you suggest we go about discovering what the consensus is? Does posting something on the policy village pump not constitute a request for comment from which a consensus can emerge (if anyone cares)? Chi Sigma (talk) 07:47, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
  • This was discussed here and only enabled after community consensus, see Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 135. —Kusma (t·c) 13:07, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
    • Thanks for pointing me to that discussion! User:DTankersley (WMF) wrote: "We’ve also changed the search query to be title only for the Wikivoyage and Wikiversity projects, rather than full text searches." Is there a reason it's not title only for Wiktionary too? There didn't seem to be any consensus about it in the votes to add Wiktionary results, only a consensus that they should be added. If it's easy to change it to title only, do that! Chi Sigma (talk) 15:34, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with this search behavior, nor with the output. That happened to be Wiktionary's best effort to find "DC and Baltimore area". It is probably an extremely uncommon thing to have happen. There is a way to fix it: define wikt:BC and Baltimore area for Wiktionary. The fact that it is common enough a phrase to search for means it is common enough a phrase to define, using abundant search results for it.

I realize that Wikipedia is out of step with our totalitarian Masters who rule from the thrones of a few corporations, imposing a Chinese model of the internet protested only, ironically, it would seem, by the surviving organ of the Fourth International. But Wikipedia has the potential to be as obstructive and unchanging as the Socialists, if we try, and to do so would be truly a service to the world. Wnt (talk) 22:28, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Nah tho. You can't selectively disown the Mighty Algorithm. You can't say "if we try" like we deserve some kind of credit for raising this thing, and then not bear any responsibility for how it behaves. Chi Sigma (talk) 07:52, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

I should note that I searched [8] and received no Wiktionary suggestion. Apparently this is due to [9], namely the title-only search was done and merged. If you ever need to benchmark how fast WMF developers can possibly move on something, just get a Bad Word involved! Wnt (talk) 01:36, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

@Wnt: this could be ‘bypassed’ quickly, because it was a low risk area (wiktionary) and because it could be toggled with a configuration change (which) are much easier to deploy. Unfortunately for most bugs, that is not always an available option. I wouldnt actually call it fixed, until u can do the same search in the original configuration and get a brtter result. However the priority for that will likely be low. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 14:08, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I tracked down the "fruit loops" issue to this, and I should say that I am disgusted. No, not at the image, which is the top Bing result but I have no idea how to reverse engineer to a real link, but at the sorry excuses made for censoring and destroying our artistic heritage. To be clear, the picture isn't even porn -- nothing is shown that isn't seen often on a Hollywood runway, though of course the rich are as virtuous by nature as the poor are wicked in the eyes of the judgmental. It was an expensive scene to set up and a clever, pretty picture. I will admit I prefer the face one better ([10]) but no one should have to fear for being a creative artist. And yet she did fear, thanks to the miracle of metadata, the notion so aggressively pushed by administrative-types that a picture ought to come with some ream of almost-hidden secret data that no normal people notice but which ought to come back to haunt the person when it is time to pick on them. And so the first AfD. And then the second ... because people made fun of Commons for having art. Just burn it, that's the fix! I mean fuck 'em fuck 'em fuck 'em all. Everybody here, except Tracy, is useless. Wnt (talk) 16:51, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

More and more I get worried about the application of WP:MEDRS on articles. That articles about health need to be true and reliable, I can agree with. But I have seen MEDRS being used against articles only remotely related to health, like Organic food. The group mostly using MEDRS is in fact strangling articles with the application of MEDRS, by not allowing any alternative source than "western medical sources", even with exclusion of agricultural universities in case of the prior mentioned Organic food. This is going way over the top and is preventing solid, reliably sourced information to be added to articles.

To my opinion, the working of MEDRS should be severely restricted. The Banner talk 18:22, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

"Severely restricted" so that editors can add poorly sourced medical claims? There are no "western" medical sources (or indeed "eastern" medical sources), just good medical sources and bad ones. Good sources follow MEDRS; bad ones don't. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:34, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

• When MEDRS is used against the mechanical construction of lightbulbs, you already know which editor is responsible!

MEDRS is terse, and its simple warning against primary sources and the need for secondary review is well-intentioned, but is all too frequently used instead as an excuse for bullying by a handful of editor. WP:PRIMARY covers much the same ground: a single source might be reliable and competent, yet we also need to guard against POV issues. MEDRS though keeps being used to simply strip sources even when the content involved is objective and unchallenged.

And yes, edit-warring is edit-warring, even when the editor is "right". The exceptions for it are narrow and focused on vandalism, absolutely not the sort of ref-weighing content issues here. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:37, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

• Looking over the history of Organic food, I can't see a single mention of MEDRS in any edit summary since 2015 (and that was by yourself); likewise, looking through the talk page archives I can't see a single mention of MEDRS since this thread three years ago. Why is this suddenly now an issue? ‑ Iridescent 18:50, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Because I gave up on that article... My username is The Banner, not Don Quixote. The Banner talk 18:57, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
  • @Iridescent: Probably this --NeilN ^{talk to me} 19:05, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
    • If that's the case, Periodontitis is undoubtedly a medical article by any conceivable definition, so I'm not quite sure what the issue is. ‑ Iridescent 19:06, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
      • That article also shows that by a conflict about MEDRS, there is promptly a tagteam pushing MEDRS. Usually ending in a block for the editor who dares to have a different opinion. The Banner talk 19:14, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
        • That is the same text under discussion on Talk:Periodontitis#Text? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 19:26, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
          • Assuming the content at Talk:Periodontitis#Text is what's in question, then WP:MEDRS is a red herring; no matter what the topic was, we'd look askance at an editor referencing their own book and linking to a bunch of their own YouTube videos. (The publisher of the book looks at first glance suspiciously like a hyper-fringe outfit, too.) ‑ Iridescent 19:38, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

• Can we get back to the issue presented at the top: the misuse of MEDRS and a wish to reduce the working field of it? The Banner talk 22:22, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Please give a specific example of what you object to. Peter coxhead (talk) 23:02, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

I left it for a few year, due to threats of blocks when I continued to be critical. But just a few here: Talk:Organic food/Archive 3#WP:MEDRS, Talk:Organic food/Archive 2#Recent Study from Newcastle, Talk:Organic food/Archive 5 and Talk:Organic milk. The Banner talk 00:24, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Yup this is the issue right here. A user is trying to push their own hypothesis into Wikipedia based on sources from the early 1900s and Youtube videos they made.

User:The Banner is here helping them[11][12]. Neither one has joined the talk page discussion I started to address the concerns I have raised.

This reply appears to imply that The Banner wishes to push fringe points of view within health care based on very poor references. Their current editing appears to be WP:POINTY from a dispute from three years ago... Not impressed.

Maybe a topic ban will be required. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:39, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

• The problem with organic food in general is that it has been co-opted by big business and the holistic nutjobs they sell to. 'Organic' food was originally (and still is in parts, but its getting fainter by the year) about the environment. Less pesticides, less intensive farming etc. It had very little to do with health effects on people. Sadly the general public were/are largely not interested in paying more for food that has no benefit to them in the short term, and only benefits the environment in the long term, so in an attempt to make it marketable (and profitable) it was gradually turned into some sort of health food. Which is why now MEDRS has to be applied to it. Because you cant walk into a supermarket without some organic product touting non-existant or poorly researched health benefits. So really, if you don't want organic food to come near MEDRS, I suggest you take it up with organic food manufacturers. Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:51, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

It doesn't matter whether MEDRS applies or not - the principle simply comes from WP:DUE and WP:NPOV. Medical reviews summarize information, allowing us to know what is due or not. Fringe viewpoints are fringe viewpoints whether MEDRS applies are not; sources can't be cherry-picked to push a POV, whether MEDRS applies, and articles on organic food also need to be "true and reliable". Galobtter (pingó mió) 09:01, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

• The request for a topic ban by Doc James is typical for the bullying you get when you challenge MEDRS.
• And yes, Galobtter, I agree that organic food needs independent and reliable sources. That is why I am amazed that reliable sources, for instance from agricultural universities, are shot down with a claim that they do not satisfy MEDRS. How many medical magazines will publish about farming? The Banner talk 11:14, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Agricultural universities may be reliable for the agricultural aspects, not the health aspects. Do you have an example of where an agricultural university was rejected as not MEDRS for a non-medical claim? Only in death does duty end (talk) 11:19, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Ow, they are there. But with the threat of a topic ban it is loud and clear that the Cabal in unwilling to change even a hairbreadth. Too bad for the reliability of Wikipedia due a systematic bias. I admit defeat against the cabal. The Banner talk 17:09, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

@The Banner: A number of people disagreeing with you is not a Cabal. Considering requesting a topic ban on the basis of your editing behavior is not "bullying". If you do not understand why MEDRS is in place, perhaps it's better to stay away from medical topics. Kleuske (talk) 19:32, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Start wondering why MEDRS is in place for agricultural subjects and not just for medical subjects. The Banner talk 19:41, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

You still haven't provided an example of MEDRS being applied inappropriately. Natureium (talk) 19:46, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

If an article (on any subject) makes medical claims (such as "this, that or the other is good/bad for your health") MEDRS is applicable. This has been explained before. Kleuske (talk) 13:05, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Sources can be reliable for one aspect but not for other aspects. Also like I said, DUE and all that - a few papers or whatever from agriculture universities have to be given due weight. Galobtter (pingó mió) 11:35, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

• All of this is why attribution is so important... there is a HUGE difference between saying “X is good for your health” and “Y claims that X is good for your health”. The first is a statement of fact, and requires a high level of source scrutiny... we need extremely reliable medical sources (as outlined in MEDRS) to verify the statement... the second is a statement of opinion, and appropriate verification does not require the same level of source scrutiny. This isn’t to say that every claim should be included (UNDUE is always a factor in determining what claims should and should not be mentioned)... simply that the type of source that is acceptable for verifying an attributed opinion is different from the type of source that is acceptable for verifying an unattributed statement of fact. An opinion can be total bullshit... and yet may still be noteworthy enough to mention in an article. The key to mentioning opinions is attribution... to make it clear to the reader that the opinion IS just that... an opinion. Blueboar (talk) 14:48, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Replacing "X is good for your health" by "Y says that X is good for your health" (not "claims" as per WP:CLAIM) requires it to be balanced by "there is no reliable evidence to support this". If there is reliable evidence, then "Y says" isn't needed. My experience is that believers in Y's views usually object to this balancing as much as they do to leaving Y's views out. Peter coxhead (talk) 15:50, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

I think the OP is right that MEDRS has been used in an overbearing way. I've seen this at various herbal and biological articles over the years. The main problem is that there is a certain group that tries to make everything "medical" even when it is not. A medical claim would be that a certain herb cures cancer in humans, yes. But reports that the herb is being investigated as an anticancer drug on a research basis should not be subject to MEDRS requirements. We need merely indicate it is research. Likewise, if the herb was traditionally used as an antipyretic, say, (traditional use of herbs against cancer is at best rare ... not sure if it happened at all) we should not need to cite a MEDRS source in order to tell readers that it was used for this purpose for centuries as prescribed by Aulus Cornelius Celsus or described in the Synoptic Essentials of the Golden Cabinet; we should just print the history without hindrance. If people want to assume the historical use was valid or that the ongoing research will pan out, that's their problem and not ours. Wnt (talk) 22:19, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

There are several requests for examples in this discussion, and I can easily provide one, since I've been meaning to take this to RSN for months now. The following sentence (among others, most of which were similar) was removed after multiple discussions about MEDRS (see the talk page, plus the archives of WT:MED, and with an edit summary complaining about a "bad ref": "Sea buckthorn oil is used in shampoo and other hair care products."

The ref in question is this: Zielińska, Aleksandra; Nowak, Izabela (2017-05-19). "Abundance of active ingredients in sea-buckthorn oil". Lipids in Health and Disease. 16 (1): 95. doi:10.1186/s12944-017-0469-7. ISSN 1476-511X. PMC 5438513. PMID 28526097.

Yes, you read that right: At least one editor believes that a peer-reviewed narrative review article, written by actual university chemists, in a scientific journal dedicated to the chemistry of oils, is supposedly a "bad ref" for supporting a claim that this plant extract is used in cosmetics. We do have a problem with MEDRS sometimes being applied to statements that are clearly not WP:Biomedical information, and we do have some editors who want to expand its scope to include as much as possible (including content that MEDRS itself says should not be treated as biomedical information). WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:35, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

That X is within Y product is not a health claim and does not need a MEDRS source.

But wait look at the sentence[13]. The issue is "guarantees recovery, supports regeneration of damaged hair, restores its elasticity and ensures smoothness. Due to a high content of unsaturated fatty acids and related fast rancidity process of sea-buckthorn oil is recommended that it is used in the form of capsules for cosmetic products. It is also significant that sea-buckthorn oil, thanks to its intensive colour, improves skin tone after direct application on skin, giving it a fresh and healthy appearance"

Yes THAT needs a MEDRS source. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:41, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

1. What exactly needs a MEDRS source? You've copied three sentences straight out of the source itself. Nobody proposed copying those sentences into the article. But what exactly is the biomedical information there? The fact that oil makes hair smoother? That oils go rancid over time? That reddish skin is more fashionable than sallow skin?
2. If "THAT" needs a MEDRS source, then one might wonder why a heck of a lot more than "THAT" was blanked, and why the source was declared to be completely unusable for anything at all.

WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:43, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I don't really know if this is too much of a derailment but I know that the Coloring Book article received a template asking for medical sources due to vague mentions about it being considered therapy. I've been intending to actually raise the issue to find if other people found this to be unneeded, but regardless I feel there is that this is a hindrance to the project. While I agree with it on principle, I think we should make it more clear when this policy does and does not apply. --Deathawk (talk) 04:21, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

One of the unresolved questions is whether undisputed statements of fact about what people do or buy constitute "WP:Biomedical information" or "history" or "sociology" or "economics" or something else.

Do you need a source that merely proves that some of them do it? Or a source that proves that it's accepted by mainstream medicine as a scientifically proven, effective remedy for a condition? Do you need to find another source with an opposing POV, and change your sentence to say "Some people do this, but there is no conclusive scientific evidence that this actually works better than placebo"? Does it actually matter if it works, if your point is to discuss the economic effects (e.g., the many hundreds of billions of dollars spent on self-care products each year) or to discuss cultural differences (e.g., people from culture X do this, people from culture Y do that) or social effects (e.g., lost work time)?

In my experience, the editors who spend the most time in those discussions tend to take a maximalist view of MEDRS's scope and are hoping to infuse a rationalist, Wikipedia:Scientific point of view into all articles that mention anything even remotely connected to health. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:07, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I've got at least 3 books on dealing with depression which encourage colouring books as helpful in some cases for some people. And one of those was free on the NHS. So I am pretty sure if required there is a MEDRS source somewhere that at minimum says it can be helpful in some circumstances. But yes, as a treatment claim 'colouring has been found to be useful therapy blah blah' would require a MEDRS source. Only in death does duty end (talk) 00:40, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

There seems to be a disagreement between LovelyLillith and me at Judith Newman. They removed a link to the FB page of the subject of the article and started edit-warring when I reverted, so that I had to go myself to the talk page. They seem to believe that WP:LINKSTOAVOID universally prohibits links to FB (citing #10 and #11). They do not seem to be succeptible to my arguments that the first line of this guideline excepts the links to official pages, and that a FB page controlled by the subject conforms with the definition of the official page at the same guideline. At this point we are deadlocked, and more opinions are welcome at Talk:Judith Newman#Facebook page reference. Thanks.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:33, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

This should be at WP:ELN. I see no useful information at the page. Johnuniq (talk) 08:40, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I am afraid WP:ELN is dead. I tried to use it in the past, I never got any response.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:51, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Not particularly dead. WP:ELNO does grant allowance for an official page per the bolded statement at the top of the section (subject to WP:ELNEVER). However, WP:ELOFFICIAL defines an official page; there are two items that the page must meet: 1) She, or someone of her obvious choosing, controls the page (she does); 2) "The linked content primarily covers the area for which the subject of the article is notable." It is this second criterion which I am doubtful of--the page appears to be her personal page, not one which is dedicated to her topic of notability, that is, her journalism. If there is a dispute here, I would resolve whether the second one meets the intent of ELOFFICIAL. --Izno (talk) 13:08, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Yes, but my understanding is that journalists routinely use FB as public figures, and she is writing about everything. Anyway, it seems like there is a page which is kind of official, if there have been no protests I am going to add it tomorrow on the webpage. The question is more broad though, we have ((Facebook)) with plenty of transclusions. The argument of LovelyLillith, which I believe to be incorrect, means that all of these transclusions must be removed (and the template deleted).--Ymblanter (talk) 14:46, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I would agree that the edit summaries are oddly terse if not decidedly incorrect. Perhaps Lillith can elaborate on the specific meaning of those summaries. --Izno (talk) 15:42, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Based on what she wrote below it is probably not going to happen.--Ymblanter (talk) 06:44, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Is this Wikipedia:External links/Noticeboard#Face Book what you meant by it being dead? Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 14:53, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

This one as well, yes.--Ymblanter (talk) 14:55, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

It looks like I have never posted there, and I must have confused it with WP:RSN. However, that one does not seem dead as well. Now I do not know anymore. I remember I had a bad experience with one of those.--Ymblanter (talk) 14:59, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

The matter seems to have been settled agreeably on the Talk page of the article in question, by the suggestion of using http://www.judithnewman.com as her "official website" instead of the FB page. Accusing me of edit warring to our peers instead of WP:AGF, particularly on such a minor point, can be construed as WP:OWNERSHIP, even if that is not the intention. LovelyLillith (talk) 23:48, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

There is an RFC open for feedback on the proposed re-write of notability guideline for corporations. The re-write is pretty significant. Your feedback is appreciated on NCORP talk page. Thanks, Renata (talk) 20:40, 28 January 2018 (UTC)

As the encyclopedia grows, we have increasingly many articles started but abandoned in essentially useless state (unstructured, no context, hopelessly bad writing, no sources, etc). Some remain that way for years - someone tags them for cleanup, but no-one is interested enough to make a go of it, or doesn't know where to start. We have 9000+ articles in Category:Cleanup_tagged_articles_without_a_reason_field (3000+ tagged for at least 8 years) and 4000+ in Category:Wikipedia_articles_needing_rewrite. There's currently a WP:ANI discussion about one user who's been trying to delete such articles, leading to acrimony since others note the article topics meet the notability bar, that sources are available, but no-one adds the sources or fixes the actual article.

I'd like to get away from the user-conduct-focused discussion/arguing at ANI and see if we can find a better solution to the underlying policy issue, which several others there seem to think is indeed a problem. Testing the waters here if people would be supportive of one of the following, or an improvement thereon. If the discussion goes somewhere, can take to ((rfc|policy)) after sorting out the details.

1. Speedy-delete. Create a CSD to allow speedy-deleting such articles, under some sort of stringent conditions, e.g. tagged for ["major"?] cleanup and no substantive edits for [3+?] years, no or woefully inadequate sources provided.
2. Discuss-delete. Don't allow CSD, but change deletion policy to explicitly allow deleting such articles, with reasonably stringent guidelines as above to prevent abuse or false urgency/brinksmanship. Hope that at least some of the time, someone in the AFD discussion will instead jump in to improve the article.
3. Blank. Don't delete such articles, but replace them with a template like "A Wikipedia article with this title was started, but was abandoned before a usable article was developed. If you feel this topic is notable, we encourage you to create an article using reliable sources. Previous partial content is available in this page's history if useful." Remove from generic cleanup categories. This blanking action could either be allowed as a matter of editorial discretion (Editorial-Blank), again with some guidelines to avoid overuse, or only as a soft-delete outcome of an AFD discussion (AFD-Blank).
4. Flag. As Blank, but keep the existing article content, just preface it with an editnotice, something like "This Wikipedia article has been abandoned in a state which may be of limited usefulness. Wikipedia is a collaborative encyclopedia; if this topic is of interest, we strongly encourage you to dive in and improve it, using reliable sources."
5. And of course, Status quo. There's no problem, leave such articles as-is in the hope someone will improve them, and continue to Keep them if someone nominates them AFD, etc, provided the subject is notable and sources appear to exist, etc.

The Speedy-delete option would of course the swiftest at removing embarrassing, useless stuff, but essentially gives up on the tiny ray of hope someone will improve things. It would require the most stringent, bright-line conditions on where it could be applied to be developed. Discuss-delete would harness multiple pairs of eyes to verify, and perhaps productively force a discussion of "OK, are we going to fix this or not?". The remaining two options keep the so-called content available, caveat it for readers, yet encourage someone to sometime jump in, and reclassify the cleanup backlog to segregate out articles where realistically normal cleanup isn't going to be sufficient or even happen.

Thoughts? ​​​​​​​​​​​I will mention this at the ANI thread and am pinging ~10 top commenters there of this discussion (but let's keep user conduct out of it!). Martinp (talk) 16:55, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

• I'm opposed to "blanking" a page as it will still be indexed, be a blue link, etc. What I don't see above would be something like "send it to Draft:" (which could be an AFD outcome anyway) that could be useful? — xaosflux ^Talk 17:02, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• I think the status quo is probably the right play. Even really crappy articles sometimes have something of merit, or they point to the need for an improved article on the topic. Those that don't meet notability criteria are subject to deletion already; no great need for a CSD criteria, which would be potentially controversial as as enabler of ultra-deletionism by a handful of rogue administrators — just tote them to PROD or AfD as appropriate. The cure appears worse than the illness, from where I'm sitting... Carrite (talk) 17:06, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• Number 5 (status quo) as first and only choice. Anything that allows any driveby editor to unilaterally declare something as "very bad" will just mean a re-run of the current problem in an ever more virulent form since what you consider "very bad" isn't necessarily what I consider "very bad", and the existing of maintenance tags isn't necessarily actually indicative of a serious problem with the article. Anything that requires a consensus before something is flagged as "very bad" would just create an additional layer of bureaucracy replicating AfD. Despite the people who claim otherwise, "this article is terrible and will never be improved" is regularly accepted as a deletion rationale; the current issue is regarding an editor who's been tagging legitimate articles and lying about the non-existence of sources, not with the WP:TNT approach per se. ‑ Iridescent 17:06, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• Status quo--The project has no deadline.As simple as that.By the way, I will concur with Iridescent that TNT is quite used as a successful deletion rationale but the case at ANI differs by a mile.Winged Blades^Godric 17:12, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• As has been shown in recent AfDs, many of these articles are about notable topics, are easily fixed with a little effort, and many could not be described as 'essentially useless'. The best approach in these cases is to encourage good editors to attempt to improve them, and nominate them for deletion only if the articles are genuinely unsalvagable. So basically the status quo, but with greater efforts to get them fixed. --Michig (talk) 17:13, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose It is explicit policy that "Perfection is not required: Wikipedia is a work in progress. Collaborative editing means that incomplete or poorly written first drafts can evolve over time into excellent articles. Even poor articles, if they can be improved, are welcome. ..." Nupedia had the different idea of only publishing polished and reviewed work but that was not successful and so was abandoned. Wikipedia works and so its successful methods should be left alone. Andrew D. (talk) 17:14, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

• Status quo I'd never have gotten involved on WP (for whatever that's worth! ;) ) if not for such a stub... 2Q (talk) 17:27, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

• Any such change to the status quo is incompatible with the very foundation Wikipedia is built on and cannot work. Wikipedia is a constant work in progress, with no article ever being perfect and that's what makes the project great. It's also, as 2Q points out, the main reason people actually start to get involved: They come here, see that something does not exist or lacks information and they add something. We can't force anyone to actually work on those articles the OP mentions but every single one of them might a) be useful to someone already and b) might get someone to fix it. I understand that there are a few editors who believe Wikipedia should work radically different but that would probably also be its demise (it#s basically what Citezendium tried and we do have an article about how they failed miserably). Regards SoWhy 17:38, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• There is one (and as I see it ONLY one) advantage to outright deletion ... any existing links to the article will become redlinks. Redlinking will highlight the need for someone to start over and create a new (better) version. Blueboar (talk) 18:03, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

  ...until the next well-meaning editor comes along and starts removing the red links... Regards SoWhy 20:28, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

  Removing red-links can be done in two ways: (1) removing the wiki-code to leave the potential article topic unlinked; (2) creating a small stub that doesn't get expanded (i.e. turning the red-link blue). I have never quite worked out which is worse, but there is definitely an effect where people rise to the challenge of a red-link and create good articles from scratch. For some reason, the motivation seems to diminish when expanding a stub (well, for some people, some are just as happy expanding a stub as they are creating a new article). Maybe find a way to motivate people to work on permastubs? I am sure there have been editing drives along those lines. Iridescent is right to keep making the sewage analogy, but is there any way to work out whether Wikpiedia (or rather, the small part of it any one person sees at any one time) is a delicately fertilised field with blooms springing up here and there, or a fetid, steaming mess with some diamonds gleaming in the murk? Carcharoth (talk) 23:02, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

• Comment- recently I have been cleaning up and categorising articles about tiny villages in India, which is indisputably some of Wikipedia's worst content. They've frequently got no sources at all and are riddled with such strained grammar and so many misspellings it can often be impossible to decipher what the sentence is trying to say. Many contain advertisements for local tourist attractions, travel blog entries, gushing hagiographies of non-notable local residents, and attempts by article editors to communicate with each other by asking each other questions in the article space. Often there's nothing to be done but aggressively prune them back such that all the content that's left is "Such-and-such is a village in Foobarbaz state, India". It's a lot of work. A lot of work. Yet none of them so far have had no salvageable content. So I'd say there's an option missing from your list, @Martinp: allowing editors very wide freedom to aggressively remove crappy content from articles. Reyk _YO! 18:12, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
  • ​Even the worst of those "Boggley Wollah is a village in Foobar Province, men are brave and women are beautiful and virtuous, is 12 km from railway and have electric light" Indian village stubs still serves some useful purpose, since if nothing else they tell readers where the place is, and generally include at least some kind of external link to the local government website. It's actually vanishingly rare for a non-vandal Wikipedia article to be useless to the reader; where WP:TNT comes into play is when the answer to "would people Googling this topic genuinely be better served if this page didn't appear in the search results, and it is unfeasible for it to be improved to the point where that's no longer the case?" is unambiguously "yes". ‑ Iridescent 18:50, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Stubifying is definitely an option - just replace the text with a source line (to say the census) that the village exists and has such an option. Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:55, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

WP:ATD already mentions reducing something to a stub as an alternative to deletion. Yet people mostly ignore it, just as many ignore ATD altogether. Regards SoWhy 20:26, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

I do what Reyk does. Sometimes I get kickback for it but I have a fairly thick skin. However, the Indian village articles (and indeed those across the subcontinent) specifically have some other issues, notably a lot lack coordinates and they have so many variant transliterated spellings that it is nigh-on impossible to locate them. That is when AfD should come in but, alas, the usual people will turn up with the usual argument, ie: place of habitation, therefore keep. - Sitush (talk) 19:33, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

I haven't had anyone scream at me for my extensive pruning yet. But I also know that if I take them to AfD (even the ones where I can't verify if they exist) it'll be "keepkeepkeep! habited place!" with possibly "block nominator for disruption" thrown in. But I can do something about the travel guides and silly comments about local inhabitants. Reyk _YO! 19:58, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

A few years back when I was working on the inhabited places of Ethiopia, I sent a few to AfD & managed to get those articles removed. While it is difficult to prove a given village or hamlet in a country like Ethiopia or India does not exist -- & the problem with Ethiopia is multiplied due to bad maps & numerous variant spellings -- I was able to do it using some reliable sources. (Citing Google Maps as showing nothing there ought to be a clincher.) While I consider myself an inclusionist, & we should never lightly delete articles, IMHO when sufficient research has been spent on showing such a place does not exist, deletion really is the proper solution. -- llywrch (talk) 17:58, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose any changes along these lines. I totally get where User:Martinp is coming from on this, but articles that aren't in great shape are often a great source of new editors for Wikipedia. Many of our existing ,well-sourced, well-written articles can be very intimidating for a new editor to approach because of the use of complex templates, hundreds of sources, the application of a wide range of MOS guidelines, etc. etc.... three of the oldest articles that is tagged cleanup without a reason are List of Ranma ½ video games, Canadian Radio-Television Commission and Punk rock in Spain. I doubt any substantial support would be found for deleting these articles simply because they have a cleanup tag and need some work. Someday, someone will show up to do more work on these... might be this year, might be 2025. Who knows. What I do know is that our standard AFD process works fine for getting rid of unsalvagable articles. We don't need to employ speedy deletion for this sort of thing. In fact, doing so would be a violation of WP:CONS. — Warren. ‘ talk , 18:17, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• Comment The problem is real and many of these little village articles have BLP violations as well as the other problems discussed. But I think User:Galobtter's answer is best, stubify them or take them to AfD. Doug Weller talk 19:21, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose current policy allows for easy removal of unreferenced material and stubbing if necessary. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:36, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
• Flag might be a good idea and give new editors something to test their teeth on rather than have them create new non-notable trivia to prove themselves. Xxanthippe (talk) 21:31, 20 January 2018 (UTC).
• Strongly support pruning, but ... I'm not sure people realize how bad some of our articles are and how many of them there are. It's very likely that we could use purely mechanical criteria to select the worst 5% of our articles and 99% of our readers and editors would say that these articles are useless to them. 5% of 5.5 million is over 275,000 articles, much too many to benefit from AfD or the other labor intensive methods discussed above. Just to give folks an idea of these types of articles, I I hit the "random article" button about 50-60 times and selected the following:
  • Aliens are to Blame for Everything,
  • Modern Pentathlon Federation of Kazakhstan,
  • Christodoulos Neophytou,
  • Montserrat (1902 film),
  • Ekuona,
  • Euskaltegi,
  • Bass sarrusophone,

I intentionally did not include articles on officially recognized geographical places, species, and sports people, who likely have supporters of even the shortest articles in such a series. I think some of the included articles (e.g. the 1902 film) might be worth being in the encyclopedia, but I wouldn't want to take more than 10 minutes to review it. That would take 46,000 editor hours for the 275,000 articles.

So how to select the articles for review. The mechanical criteria could include articles than have *all* the following

• article length (say less than 4 sentences or xx words)
• page views (say less than 2 per day)
• last substantial edit by a human (i.e. not a new category or spelling correction) older than, say, 2 years.
• less than 2 inline refs
• ORES score, say 90%+ prediction that the article is a stub (see https://ores.wikimedia.org/ui/ )

So get the bottom 1% of the articles. In many cases (50%?) it should be a speedy merge of perhaps 1 line, with a redirect, e.g. Bass sarrusophone into Sarrusophone. It would be nice to have a special Prod that couldn't be removed unless you actually improve the article. That might cover 30% of these articles. So maybe 20% would need special consideration that would actually take more than 10 minutes. Then move on to the next 1% if everybody is happy Smallbones_(smalltalk) 22:35, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

• This is not actually a bad idea in principle, except for one flaw: Then move on to the next 1% if everybody is happy. Has everybody ever been happy here? - Sitush (talk) 01:20, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
• 1% is still 55,000 articles. If ten of us addressed 10 of these every day, it'd still take a year and a half. This isn't a process that can be truly automated, especially if you want to contemplate merging articles together. — Warren. ‘ talk , 01:28, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

My main point above is that we have to semi-automate it, or just leave all the garbage in. Humans are only needed to save the acceptable stuff - but having any discussion would just take too long on the very worst stuff. Merging Bass sarrusophone into Sarrusophone could be done in 10 minutes. Slapping a sticky prod onto Euskaltegi would only take a few minutes to find that there aren't any non-Wikipedia, non-commercial sites to reference. The lost 1902 film might be worth taking a bit more time to see if anything other than crowdsourced sites have anything about it - the crowdsourced sites don't. At some point, it's got to be do something with it (at least 10 minutes worth) or chuck it asap. The mechanical methods would give you the "at some point". Smallbones_(smalltalk) 05:13, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

Re If ten of us addressed 10 of these every day, it'd still take a year and a half.

'If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year,
Do you suppose,' the Walrus said,
'That they could get it clear?'
'I doubt it,' said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear.

– Lewis Carroll (1872), "The Walrus and the Carpenter", from Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There. See also Sisyphus. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:28, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

Can we have that as the Wikipedia disclaimer? :-) Carcharoth (talk) 23:04, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose I would probably just stubify - I think it's good to leave a stub for editors who like to develop stubs. Some of the articles above like Aliens are to Blame for Everything or Christodoulos Neophytou could probably be deleted through AfD, but it's a notability issue more than an article-quality issue. For poor quality articles that are notable I think it is preferable to have a stub instead of a redlink. SeraphWiki (talk) 02:08, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

  ...which is already policy and has been for for years now. Sometimes people are trying to re-invent the wheel instead of simply following policy. I dare say any messy article about a notable subject that people argue to WP:TNT, could be reduced to a stub instead; we just need people to do it. Regards SoWhy 15:43, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

• Improve. Nobody's suggesting edit and improve incomplete articles about notable topics? For a start, we could apply the time used on this discussion, and time wasted on AfDs for notable and verifiable subjects just because Wikipedia:I just don't like it. Be Wikipedia:Here to build an encyclopedia, Wikipedia:Don't demolish the house while it's still being built. Jack N. Stock (talk) 05:57, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
• Thanks for the feedback! To be honest, I'm a bit surprised so many people think there is no problem. We do have lots of basic stubs that are mildly helpful and someone will hopefully expand them, but we also have lots of abandoned stuff which is really not usable in its current state, and it's pretty clear essentially no one has the ability/interest to improve it and feels it is worth their while. It's nice to say "eventually someone might fix it" or "why don't *you* try fixing it rather than just destroying stuff", but we can't force people to volunteer to fix stuff they're just not interested in. However, it's pretty clear there's little support for any of the proposals I suggested. I do think the discussion about when to stubbify and WP:ATD is a useful one, and perhaps provides a good framework for some articles (and requires no change to policies). Anyway: leaving open for a while longer (not everyone is on WP every few hours!)... Martinp (talk) 12:06, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • ​Don't be too surprised. Remember that you're talking to an audience who by-and-large remember the competition between Wikipedia and Citizendium; we have empirical evidence when it comes to whether "the sewage fertilizes the flowers" or "weed out the dead wood" is a more productive approach over the long term both in terms of article production, and in terms of editor retention. Wikipedia's policies sometimes appear arbitrary, but—especially for something fundamental like deletion—they're generally the result of years of watching what works and what doesn't, so we're typically reluctant to change core policies unless there's an extremely good reason to do so. ‑ Iridescent 13:12, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
• Improve. the community is trying to get away from giving deletion editors any tools.--Moxy (talk) 14:51, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose, the day we abandon constructive policies such as WP:PRESERVE or WP:ATD, or principles such as WP:DEADLINE, is the day I abandon Wikipedia. I'd say status quo, but at present we already have far more misuse of AFD than we should to stifle articles that can be fixed, or to address what are really editing problems, such as what to do with subpages of undeniably notable topics or articles that have been WP:SPLIT. postdlf (talk) 15:09, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
• Pruning is good, but do it with care. See William Whitfield for an example (see article history and the talk page). The process of deletion and recreation does already happen, specifically for the case of articles that get prodded and when copyright violations are deleted. An example here is Patrick Forrest (see logs). This article was first created about someone else of the same name and deleted by the prod process in June 2006. An article on the surgeon was created in May 2017 and deleted due to the aftermath of a sockpuppetry case. The current article was created in June 2017. I suppose the question is whether the deletions made any difference to the ultimate outcome? It looks like it didn't. Carcharoth (talk) 23:16, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
• Status quo plus per User:Postdlf. I am particularly alarmed by the comment by User:Smallbones because he seems to target stubs about "ethnic" things like a Serbian film or a Kazakh sports body, which are certainly notable. Providing readers with a basic link to those things is obviously useful, and if the articles don't do anything else, so what? If we had a better geographic representation they would not stay stubs for long. And we're not going to get that by arbitrarily deleting articles for being too short, knowing what bias that is enforcing! Wnt (talk) 02:11, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
• Comment First, the number of articles the OP is concerned about amount to less than 0.1% of the total number of articles. In short, we're discussing what amounts to a rounding error, so in the larger picture we will always have a few thousand problematic articles like these; the "status quo" is a defensible option. On the other hand, something needs to be done about these articles; there are too many articles marked as stubs. (In my experience, as many as a quarter should be upgraded to "Start" or better.) If we had more active WikiProjects, we could simply leave the problem of abandoned very bad articles to those groups to either improve these articles or nominate them for deletion: those group would have the experts who could handle them quickly. Perhaps there should be a competition to encourage dealing with this backlog. (FWIW, currently I am reviewing a number of articles -- maybe as many as 100 -- that were created by a banned user that may be hoaxes. So I am working on this problem from my own direction.) -- llywrch (talk) 17:58, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
• Status Quo (5) as first option. Flag (4) as second option; though an additional flag over all the crap we current tag such articles with is probably of marginal additional utility, so the more I think about it, the more 5 seems the best option. I am unconcerned with substandard articles, all of Wikipedia is substandard to some degree, and I don't see what we gain by deleting some number of articles below some arbitrary quality limit. --Jayron32 20:26, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
• Flag. Cleanup tags get the reader's attention and help encourage involvement. KMF (talk) 01:42, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
• Draftify. These articles are essentially drafts. Move them to draft space and if an editor wants to improve them, they can. If they are garbage, they can be deleted. Natureium (talk) 15:04, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
• Comment I think that either drafting or flagging is a better idea. The problem with flagging is that it might be prone to drive-bys. Why do you think ((cleanup)) has a ten-year backlog? Because people just slap the tag on without explaining what needs cleaning up. Adding a "reason" field has done very little. Pruning and stubifying may help, but it may also leave the content vulnerable to unwarranted A7s. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 23:45, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
• Flag (4) as first option and Status Quo (5) as second option. I concur with Xxanthippe on the testing ground idea; at least this would give incentives for new editors (especially those under mentorship programs like Wikipedia's "Adopt a User") to learn how to find sources and fix an article by being at the field. However the fact that Wikipedia has no dead lines should be stressed on the flag too as we don't want the pace to go unhealthily tight. But if that is unfeasible then I'll opt for the status quo although the large troves of particularly those poorly-written-but-okay articles can still serve as a ground for those newbies to test their hands on which would prove immensely useful for WP:SUP. Even more better when the students/newbies learn about finding reliable sources in the process of the crowdsourced fix-up that would help them to not fall for such "FAKE NEWS" things; as a matter of fact Wikimedia-Deutschland was spot-on in this.14.192.208.93 (talk) 08:41, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
• For things that merit deletion we already have prod, AFD, db-hoax and so forth, but we need to remember that deletion is not cleanup, and by driving editors away deletionism probably does more harm than good. As for cleanup tags, yes there is a problem, but is it that some cleanup tags persist for a long time or that some people think their time is better spent adding cleanip tags rather than actually improving articles? I'm very much of the opinion that if we could steer a few hundred hours a year of the time that is spent template bombing articles into improving articles we wouldn't just be making Wikipedia a better quality encyclopaedia, we would be educating newbies by example instead of biting them and driving many away. Up until template bombing replaced the previous "SoFixIt" philosophy circa 2007 this site was steadily recruiting new active editors and the community was growing. Subsequent to that the community declined for several years before stabilising three years ago at around 5 million edits a month. If we want to speed up the rate at which articles like those improve I suggest we turn most of the maintenance templates into hidden categories and try to get back to the "soFixIt" culture of the years of our exponential growth in editors. ϢereSpielChequers 09:30, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

• WP:SOFIXIT as first option; Flag (4) second option. I understand flagging will be the fav of drive-by twinlke-borg editors, but it will be better than none: readers will be forewarned. Staszek Lem (talk) 23:17, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

• Status quo. Yeah, there's a lot of garbage out there. I admit that I PROD/AfD a solid 30% of articles that I come across when I dive into CAT:ORPHAN. But there's also a lot of really interesting stubs that turn out to be ripe for expansion! It would be a huge loss if we just tossed the baby out with the bathwater. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 23:59, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
• Status Quo the suggested changes are too broad and would sacrifice potentially good articles, and automating deletions would be undesirable as human involvement is needed for careful assessment of the value or lack of value of articles Atlantic306 (talk) 13:36, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

1. If an article was created and/or nominated by paid a COI editor, should that be explicitly disclosed in the nomination?
2. Should articles created and/or nominated by paid COI editors be eligible for DYK?

Discussion at Wikipedia talk:Did you know#DYK_and_COI/paid_editors. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 20:41, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

"Do not disambiguate by genre or format, i.e. "sitcom", "telenovela", "soap opera", etc., unless multiple articles for TV series from the same year, region 
and network exist and further disambiguation is required."

Frequently, templates are built on the assumption that there all pages on a certain topic will conform to the same title scheme, with no ambiguities. However, reality is not that forgiving. Editors therefore come across numerous instances where a template has been constructed that automatically fills in fields by adding an incorrect expected value to article names. Sometimes these links are just wrong. Sometimes these are links to disambiguation pages. An example that I have recently come across is Template:International football competition statistics, which incorrectly assumes that every article on the men's national soccer team for a given country will be at "Foo national football team", despite both United States national football team and United States men's national football team being disambiguation pages, due to the prevalence of American football in the United States. A contrary example (where the disambiguation parameter is done right) is Template:Sortname, which has a clearly delineated "|dab=" parameter for introducing a disambiguating term.

Complicated templates can easily generate errors that are hard for even seasoned editors to find and fix. I therefore propose that every template that has a parameter that can potentially call an incorrect page should have

1. either a clear disambiguation parameter such as "|dab=" or "|link=", or an "#IFEXIST" function that allows an editor to override the parameter by filling it in with a piped link (e.g. [[Correct link target|Desired display text]]
2. a "Disambiguation" section in the template documentation page demonstrating how link fixes can be implemented.

I don't think that it is too much to ask that template editors employ existing common solutions to avoid pervasive errors. bd2412 T 22:50, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

At ((Stnlnk))) I coded an "#IFEXIST" tree that goes through all the disambiguation forms for railway stations (from most- to least-common) to automatically find the correct page. This makes it completely transparent to the user, and after three months I have yet to hear any complaints. Useddenim (talk) 23:49, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Oooookayyyyy then - see User talk:Jc86035#Disambiguating Broad Street and User talk:Certes#Disambiguating Coniston. Two users WP:SUBSTing ((stnlnk)) in order to dab the link. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:56, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

I am not calling out particular templates here. I cited Template:International football competition statistics solely as an example, but I am proposing that this should be a standard for ALL templates that can potentially call a wrong link due to natural inconsistencies in article titles. bd2412 T 23:59, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

• Simple solution.... don’t use the template. Blueboar (talk) 11:44, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Templates are useful shortcuts for a great deal of formatting, and I don't want do discourage their use for that purpose. I only want them to be made with reasonable editing solutions in mind. Also, "don't use the template" is not a solution for editors visiting a page where a complex template is already in use, and only needs a fix. bd2412 T 12:45, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
• So, the more important question we ask is what do we do if they don't. Any proposal of this nature has to be enforceable, if it isn't, it might as well not exist. If the only answer to "what do we do if they don't?" is "we just fix it", then you can do that now. No one is stopping you from making the world better. And I don't really feel like blocking good-faith editors over a matter such as this! If we're not going to enforce this with consequences for not doing it, what's the point? WP:SOFIXIT exists for a reason, you know: being a volunteer organization, we can't make people do anything. All we can do is fix what we want to fix, we can't make anyone fix something they don't want to fix. --Jayron32 13:40, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
  • WP:SOFIXIT is of little use to the typical editor confronted with a complex template that generates errors. Is it preferable to perpetuate these errors? bd2412 T 14:24, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
    • You missed the point of my comment, so let me restate it again: What are you going to do to template editors that do not do this? Are you really going to ban them from Wikipedia? That seems ridiculous and draconian. If you don't have a consequence for violating a policy, then you don't have a policy. You have nothing. If you want to write some guidance in the form of "here's some good ideas when writing a new template", by all means, no one here will stop you, but do you honestly expect to create an enforceable policy that will have actual consequences for violations? --Jayron32 16:14, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
      • I have not proposed any consequence. However, I would like template editors to have these issues in mind when they begin to construct templates. I consider this comparable to an editor making articles without reliable sources. If someone starts doing that, we usually point out to them that there is a policy requiring sources, and ask them to edit their articles to fix the deficiency. It is very rare that an editor who has been informed of this requirement will continue to make unsourced articles, so we have to get through several of problems before we need to worry about addressing intransigent behavior. If an editor starts making templates written in such a way that they tend to introduce errors, I think the same course of action would apply. bd2412 T 17:19, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
• Have you had any pushback attempting to add this parameter to a template? If so, can you given an example? Creating a guideline (there is snow chance this is going to make a policy) that templates "should" allow this syntax isn't going to make it happen - and we're not about to start deleting templates solely due to a lack of this switch. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:42, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Rarely, but my concern is that we not get to the point of an editor making a help request at WikiProject Disambiguation saying that they have spent 20 minutes trying to figure out how to fix an error, and can't penetrate the template. Bear in mind that many of these templates are not merely a single template, but a string of templates or modules that call different subtemplates depending on how they are filled out. bd2412 T 17:22, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
• It seems to me that the first step here is documentation -- first make a guide that explains how to do what you want correctly. Later on, if it needs to become a guideline, that can be discussed at this point. But the heavy lifting of documenting seems uncontroversial and does not require community consensus. CapitalSasha ~ talk 18:32, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
  • That would be a good start. I'm not sure if it is possible, but it would be nice to get a list of templates that generate links from plain text, and which do not have documentation explaining how to disambiguate or otherwise make a direct link to a different title. bd2412 T 19:25, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

I have spent a lot of time recently deciphering templates (and in some cases Lua) to deduce what inputs would cause those templates to produce the desired output. I know others such as Narky Blert have done so too. I would certainly welcome easily found parameters such as link=. I'm certainly happy to help with the implementation, so I hope any discussion of sanctions for not providing them is moot.

The times I've deliberately replaced a template call by a raw wikilink are in single figures. The example Redrose cites was based on my misunderstanding of a tool. I've searched for such accidental edits and found only about a dozen by myself and another dozen by other editors, which I've updated to use templates. Certes (talk) 01:43, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

• Agree and then some. 'Nuff said.

User:Certes flatters me. I know nothing about templates – except for the dozen or so where I've managed to work out how to fix the links they create to DAB pages. Otherwise, all I do is try to kick up a stink when a template creates a bad link which I haven't the first idea how to fix. Bad coding, incomplete documentation, lack of dab fields, etc. = same result – useless links in Wiki which confuse readers, annoy WP:DPL members and waste their time, and (most importantly) are bad for the encyclopaedia. Smug answers from template "owners" spelling out the "obvious solution", or saying "don't break the template formatting by adding ((dn))" are singularly annoying (I've had several of those). Narky Blert (talk) 02:18, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

My 4-step procedure:

(1) Try [[Precise target|ambiguous target]]

(2) Try Precise target((!))ambiguous target

(3) Read the documentation

(4) If the documentation is not immediately intelligible, ((dn)) flag the sucker. I have other things to do.

Narky Blert (talk) 02:36, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

A discussion has been started (or has been ongoing for some time, depending on how you look at it) regarding some clarifications to Wikipedia's no legal threats policy. Interested editors are invited to participate in the discussion. Thanks. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 20:24, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

RfC withdrawn. power~enwiki (π, ν) 19:13, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Should infobox policy (i.e. WP:INFOBOXUSE) be amended to state that all biographies rated at B-Class or higher should include an infobox? power~enwiki (π, ν) 02:43, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Note: it's clear that this proposal isn't going to pass as-written. I've withdrawn the RfC but am leaving the discussion sections open. This is both because there continues to be some useful discussion, and because I feel a close should include an assessment of any consensus by someone uninvolved. power~enwiki (π, ν) 19:13, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Votes: Infoboxes on Biographies

• Support as nom. In my opinion, the infobox wars are over, and infoboxes have won. My estimate is that about 98% of high-profile biographies contain infoboxes. A few articles, such as Cary Grant do not have infoboxes. While the current status is that "Infoboxes are a decision on a per article basis and consensus should be made there", in practice this simply allows for the pro-infobox and anti-infobox crowds to repeat the same arguments on many similar articles. The simplest way to eliminate this controversy is to standardize on including infoboxes on biographical articles, once they are sufficiently developed as to justify them. In general, biographies contain several pieces of information which are suitable to an infobox, including a photograph, date and place of birth/death, familial relations, and primary occupation, so the question of whether there is sufficient information to include an infobox should not be relevant. power~enwiki (π,ν) 02:43, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
  • The purpose of an infobox is to provide a summary of the article. Not all articles about people are easily summarisable in a tabular format. If the infobox can't represent the relevant key points of a poet or a composer's biography, then it's worse than useless as it skews in the direction of trivia. And frankly, if a person's biography could be meaningfully summarised by the places of their birth and death, their occupation and who they married, then well... that person would not be notable. – Uanfala (talk) 05:33, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose no need to dumb down. - Sitush (talk) 03:27, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Support: There is very little reason, for not including an infobox. Wikipedia should be standard across all biogrophies and the claims that it makes an article "ugly" does not hold up to me. Articles should be focused on providing information first and foremost. --Deathawk (talk) 09:16, 30 January 2018 (UTC).
• Oppose Infobox use is subject to local consensus at the article and varies in usefulness. this is just another attempt to shoehorn in pointless infoboxs to a huge selection of articles. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:56, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Weak support One caveat here -- firstly, whether an article is B-class or not is an assessment by decree, so WP:GAME could become an issue with those pesky folks who like to argue about these matters. Therefore, to avoid this, I would like to see the standard upgraded to Good Article status, which means that unless the article is delisted, it enshrines the infobox onto the article, and avoids anyone downgrading an article to C-class and then removing the infobox. But it should stop the arguments in a few cases. Going in the right direction. !dave 12:55, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose yet another attempt to force these on the community. Sitush's comments below is particularly on point. MarnetteD|Talk 13:02, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Drop the stick In just the last week we have had Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive974#The toxicity of Cassianto and his bullying tactics; Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Civility issues; Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#RFC: Infoboxes should be collapsable, in non-politician & non-sports bio articles.; Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Infoboxes#Infobox; and Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#RfC: All Wikipedia articles should have infoboxes (straw poll) - and that's just the ones that I became aware of through my watchlist. Some of these are still open: enough already. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 13:20, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• This was bound to happen sooner or later. Personally, I Support standardising on infoboxes in articles which contain enough information to fill out an infobox. As a Wikipedia reader When I am quickly looking up a fact about a person, filtering through a load of prose takes a lot more time than just looking at the person's DoB in the infobox. This is what they're for, and they're exceptionally useful. I also find the WP:BATTLEGROUND behaviour on talk pages incredibly disruptive - whatever happens, that needs to stop. I concur with notdave, however - there's a risk of the passionate-about-infoboxes crowd attemping to WP:GAME the article class system to forcibly add/remove infoboxes. -- Cheers, Alfie. (Say Hi!) 13:32, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  Not a bad way to incentivize substantial article improvements. Upgrade an article and get an infobox today!! ―Mandruss ☎ 13:50, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  That is not necessarily how it would be gamed. See my comments in the discussion section. - Sitush (talk) 14:19, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

• Support with caveats Personally, I want the consistency of data that infoboxes provide, and would fully agree that they should be used across all biographical articles. However, I do agree that they should only be used where there is a minimum amount of accurate/verified information that can be used to fill it (ala the Homer example brought up should not have one, far too many questions), and there should be a broader discussion regarding infoboxes in general along the lines of the "religion=" field, in which where data fields should not be filled in to avoid drive-by-filling-in of fields. (If you leave it blank, they will come). I know the arguments for Kubrick et al is that the infobox is aesthetically unpleasing, but I think that since our missing is dissemination of data first, and niceness of a page far below that (as long as assessibility is met). --Masem (t) 14:17, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Support per Masem + I think there are some fields (awards, notable works) that would help reduce the trivialness of the infobox too. I'm not sure about this exact formulation though, (concerns about gaming + I think all non-stub articles, or even stub ones should have infoboxes) Galobtter (pingó mió) 14:51, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose, saying this as someone who routinely includes infoboxes, but let's get away from prescriptiveness on things. There will be situations where even a biography doesn't really need an infobox. Trying to set out "rules" for when and when-not will just cause more issues. We're better off with the current situation in the guidelines. This will not solve the "infobox wars" because that is driven by editor behavior - not the infobox rules. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:34, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. While infoboxes are excellent and essential on some articles, sometimes they're not, and a blanket "rule" isn't the best way to avoid dealing with the positives and negatives on an individual basis. - SchroCat (talk) 15:38, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Support with caveats I hold a similar view to Masem. In general infoboxes are good but there are some cases where they have a minimal amount of information and it is better to just not include it. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 16:29, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Comment The proposal is to modify a MOS Guideline. Guidelines are just that not hard rule or policy. Every usage is open to discussion on the talk page. Nothing changes in effect, other than giving the inclusionsists a little more weight in consensus discussions. It doesn't mean they can do mass inclusions because that will be controversial, and controversial edits are supposed to be discussed first. -- GreenC 16:41, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - I think it's fairly clear from the recent goings on that this is not going to get a strong consensus. I like infoboxes. I use them in almost everything I write. Not everyone does, and I would oppose this either way for trying to use B-class as an arbitrary cutoff point. GA itself has a lot of variation, and other than stub, everything below that varies in consistency to the point of being nearly meaningless. That's only setting people up to get into conflicts about article assessments as a by-proxy infobox conflict. GMG^talk 16:42, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• I have often thought that we should divide Wikipedia into two complimentary projects: Wikipedia and a new sister project called “WikiAlmanac”. A main difference would be that the two projects would display information in different formats... Wikipedia would present its information in prose format (like other encyclopedias), while WikiAlmanac would present its information in charts, lists and info-boxy format (like other almanacs). Blueboar (talk) 16:57, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Is that not effectively what WikiData is doing? --Masem (t) 17:03, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - (edit conflict) They should be removed on a case-by-case basis - Infoboxes can be and are extremely helpful however in some cases (like with small articles) they're not .... but again these should be removed on a case-by-case basis not just blanket-removed. –Davey2010^Talk 16:58, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Infoboxes can be very useful on biographies where the subject's notability has a statistical context (such as sport) or in the case of politicans, but I have seen enough biographies where the infobox doesn't particularly enhance the article, so they shouldn't be mandated Betty Logan (talk) 17:49, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Goodness gravy. Can this just stop. The community consensus on Infobox use is clearly to have no guidance on infobox use. Its not that the community is neatly divided into camps supporting their use or opposed to their use. The community at large has a clear viewpoint on this, and the consensus is "there is to be no guideline or policy for or against the use of infoboxes". Holding the same discussion over, and over, and over, and over again is not going to produce a different result, and it is starting to get disruptive. Drop the effin stick already and let it go. --Jayron32 18:28, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Let the relevant wikiprojects decide how articles within their area of interest display information. We don't need a site-wide policy when there are going to be cases where an infobox is unnecessary or not useful. Natureium (talk) 18:35, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - Concerning biographies? infoboxes should be limited to politicians, sports figures, religious leaders. GoodDay (talk) 18:40, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Only commenting that this actually potentially gives a good delineating idea where infoboxes should be used when the person falls into some type of hierarchical larger structure and their notable is due to that - an athlete on a sports team, a politician within a government, a businessman within a corporation. This leaves things like artists, writers, musicians, actors/directors, professors/scientists, etc. that could have more flexibility. I'm not 100% sure on this but it is an interesting thought. --Masem (t) 18:54, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
    • I've seen several people come up with this sort of rule of thumb for biographies (with a lot of flexibility for including others as and when circumstances suggest it), and I think it's a good one. An IB works brilliantly on anyone who has worked through "positions" (politicians, military, clergy, businessmen, etc) where these positions or ranks can be clearly identified; it is also excellent on those with statistics (mostly sportsmen, etc), where a career record can be summed up in appearances, medals, etc. For those in the liberal arts they are less clear in their benefits. Even politicians can be overdone tho: the German article for Angela Merkel has her signature only (too little IMO), while our version is a bloated monstrosity that should be trimmed by about 50%. - SchroCat (talk) 20:07, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
      • For any bios considered iffy concerning infoboxes? We have the option of a collapsed infobox. -- GoodDay (talk) 21:04, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
      • There's definitely an idea there. I have yet to see editors fight over infoboxes about people that are easily slotted in organizations. (There's the infobox kudzo as you point out that we have to weed out, but that's different) and it would be great for these to be consistent, whereas for the liberal arts its less of importance. I'm mulling on this point. --Masem (t) 23:30, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
        • As the person who suggested the compromise of a collapsed IB there, and as I've already pointed out elsewhere, this does not work as the pro-boxers very quickly start demanding it is uncollapsed and/or just start doing so. SagaciousPhil - Chat 08:13, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - Info-boxes are useful for some articles (sporting stats, political offices, ecclesiatical benefices etc) but look amateurish for many biographies where the essential facts cannot be boiled down to info-box simplicity. Tim riley talk 21:49, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Most bios benefit from a box, but some do not, especially some older historical figures for whom none of the basic facts are actually certain - infoboxes handle lack of certainty badly. In the case of artists they take up space that would be better used for an image, and tend to be incompetently filled. For composers they are not liked by local editors, whose views I respect. Johnbod (talk) 22:13, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
• Weak support an infobox is useful to get a quick standard view of known facts. Since it is structured it is easily machine readable and crawled for databases. I do not however think that B-class needs to require it in the text of infobox. The generic B class already says that articles should have infoboxes, templates, tables and pictures. So an infobox is to be expected already for B-class, and should be essential for GA class. Even where very little is known about a real person, an infobox can include a name and some other facts. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 23:00, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  The criteria for B-class (which are transcluded to most WikiProject assessmsnt guides) say

  Diagrams and an infobox etc. should be included where they are relevant and useful to the content.

  The words "should be" are not synonymous with "must be", and the words "where they are relevant and useful to the content" serve to further weaken the requirement. Infoboxes are not "to be expected" and there is no mention of infoboxes in the GA criteria, hence nothing to make them in any way "essential" for a GA. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 00:49, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose - As I mentioned in the previous discussion, while a good proposal in theory, in practice it's unnecessary and could lead to instruction creep. It's good practice to have infoboxes, particularly in long articles, but absolutely mandating them every single time is not a good idea, since some kinds of articles are better off without infoboxes. If this was proposed instead as an essay where mentioning that it's encouraged but not required, that would be a better option. Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 00:22, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Even if it were the case that adding an infobox made sense for all biographies (and it obviously isn't), I'm not sure what is the point of stipulating this in the guidelines. Is there some problem out there that this is trying to solve? – Uanfala (talk) 00:29, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - If an infobox in an article is that necessary, start by adding it to Wikipedia:Featured article criteria (yes, there could be a criterion that "If it's a biographical article about a person born since 1900, it has an appropriate infobox"), then work your way down to Wikipedia:Good article criteria. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 07:57, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose IBs over simplify and do not allow for the nuances necessary in many articles. SagaciousPhil - Chat 08:13, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose overall site-wide blanket ruling, and per above comments. The recent go-around at the Cary Grant page gives a good indication that infoboxes are a good addition to some pages but not needed on others. Randy Kryn (talk) 18:53, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. Unnecessary BURO CREEP. Adequately addressed at this time through individualized talk page consensus. James (^talk/_contribs) 23:51, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose, WP:CREEP. In some cases (such as sportspeople) where there is meaningful statistical data on a person, an infobox is very helpful on a biography. In other cases, they are just clutter and duplication of information better placed in context in prose. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 00:27, 1 February 2018 (UTC).
• Oppose. For many cases infoboxes are useful. For many other cases, they're not; biographical achievements often don't break down neatly into individual facts that can be summarised in a box, and even when they do, deciding what is and isn't included in the box can give undue weight to particular aspects of a person's life. As with many of the others above, I'm also extremely unimpressed at the "shoot-till-you-win" approach taken by those people who are constantly forum-shopping variations on the "make infoboxes mandatory proposal" across Wikipedia. ‑ Iridescent 14:56, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Policy dictating the details of content of articles is a pretty dumb idea. The nature and content of any given article either lends itself to having an infobox or it does not. A diktat requiring compulsory infoboxes for an entire very broad category of articles is just silly. I'm saying this as an editor who almost always includes infoboxes whenever suitable in articles I have created or when expanding stubs to fuller articles. My "default" action is to add one if it fits, so I'm by no means a member of the supposed "anti-infobox faction". In short; article content is subject to consensus on an individual basis. We're building an encyclopedia, not a census database... Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 20:36, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose I would like to see infoboxes on every article but I don't find it appropriate to change policy to force adoption. Chris Troutman (talk) 21:04, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose this creepy proposal. Infoboxes should be added on a case-by-case basis pursuant to local consensus. AdA&D ★ 21:15, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support We need an overall rule. It's the only way to eliminate repetitive individual debate. the method of deciding article by article is the worst possible method of deciding, because it ensures that the entire issue will be discussed at every article, saying essentially the same things . The result is wasted effort, increased conflict, and inconsistency. Guideline spevcifyin nte content of articles is what WP needs to actually be an encyclopedia . DGG ( talk ) 00:14, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support per DGG and - All such decisions should weigh benefit and cost with equal realism and clarity. While the need for local freedom is nonzero, it's greatly overestimated. If we didn't already have site-wide consistency on style in section headings (sentence case, etc.), for example, we would see this kind of opposition to a proposal to make them consistent via guidelines. "There is no one-size-fits-all section heading, and that should be left to the editors of an article." If some B-class biographies don't really need infoboxes, they aren't really harmed by them either. In my view we need to move away from principles that encourage editor conflict and discourage inter-article consistency. ―Mandruss ☎ 01:07, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

• But DGG seems to be saying it should be every bio, which is not the proposal. Furthermore, his argument could equally be turned on its head, ie: saying no to infoboxes in all biographies would fix the issue he claims exists just as well as saying yes to them. - Sitush (talk) 14:01, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

• You'll have to ask DGG for clarification, but I don't read his !vote as "all bios". Consistency only among B-class bios is still a hell of a lot more consistency than we have now. As for saying no to infoboxes in all bios, I think that's a far tougher sell, almost a non-starter, so I disagree that his argument could equally be turned on its head. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:56, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose Sometimes an infobox fits really neatly to the topic without any fuss - I added one to Trellick Tower before nominating it for GA and it worked well. Sometimes it just doesn't do what you want it to do, as was the case with Portway, Bristol when I decided the chosen box didn't really present the most appropriate facts. The problem with mandating them is we'd probably end up with a whole bunch of forked templates just so somebody can create Template:Infobox radio presenter and musician (as I might have when I decided neither of the basic boxes were suitable for Marc Riley), and I see plenty of infobox templates turn up at TfD to know that there is a concerted effort to try and streamline things. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 17:10, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support L3X1 Participate in a deletion discussion! (distænt write) 18:26, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose: this isn't even an FA criterion and nor should it be. By all means add an infobox if you see an article that would clearly benefit from one, but this blanket rule would be unnecessary instruction creep. — Bilorv_(talk)^(c)(e) 04:16, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

  Indeed; it is unreasonable to make something a criterion for B-class when it is not a criterion for either GA or A-class; and it is similarly unreasonable to make something a criterion for either GA or A-class when it is not a criterion for FA. If, and only if, infoboxes become mandated by WP:WIAFA, we can look at top-down propagation of the requirements via WP:WIAGA on the way. Until then, I refer readers to my comment of 13:20, 30 January 2018 (UTC). --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:37, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

• Supportish I am not fan of MOS-type rules crushing the creativity of editors, but this is not going away. At bottom, past the bad behavior - that spins-up and spins-up -- we still have to work through it as a group. It's time for us to seriously consider least painful ways of harmonizing or homogenizing (depending) together. This rule may not be it, and some are right that just throwing something out there for aye and nay is getting us nowhere. So, my thought: those who are deeply engaged in this and anyone else who wants, go to Mediation, a-la Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/11 February 2012/Muhammad-images, where you deeply explore the sources on summary use of infobox type things in reference works/textbooks, you deeply explore policy/guideline such as WP:SUMMARYSTYLE and WP:IMAGERELEVANCE and what ever other principles and 'spirits' of policy can be derived - you layout this research, you lay-out various arguments and you formulate RfC questions breaking down issues, and you put it to the community. Please? Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:05, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

  I think many such problems arise from having too many cooks in the kitchen, and it may work for a task group of perhaps 9 knowledgeable editors to work up proposal(s) to present to the community. No guarantee of success, but I think the odds of it would be significantly improved. If it failed, it would fail with far less total editor time expenditure. ―Mandruss ☎ 23:16, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

I would actually say the opposite is true, and that the problem with Navbox debates come from an editor, or a group of editors coming up with a solution and then putting it to a "yes" "no" vote via RFC. These fail ultimately because even people who are pro-infobox are hesitant to support some of these proposals. I think the solution is that we should close all of the current infobox RFC's and then open a new, relatively open ended question. I'm not entirely sure what that question would look like, but something along the lines of "what should we do about infoboxes?" --Deathawk (talk) 03:32, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

We probably have had enough free wheeling 'what to do's?' (just look at above, so many are just rather vaguely giving their own personal standards of use). There are several interrelated issues about process and form, default rules and directions, which a good faith smaller working group (having a structured discussion, ala mediation) could really work and vet, giving several multiple option to the wide body of editors -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:18, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

• Support infoboxes are handy and give all relevant information at a single glance, in fact they're an innovation that benefits the readability of online encyclopedias, I am not sure if there are any of the "anti-infobox" camp left, but the main arguments against them were WP:IDONTLIKEIT. --Regards, Donald Trung (Talk) 16:16, 5 February 2018 (UTC)

Procedural (when to close)

• ...Is it starting to look to anyone else like keeping this open is just wasting the time of the poor souls who are going to show up and comment on a foregone conclusion? GMG^talk 19:11, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
  • I'm planning to keep it open at least 72 hours. If an admin thinks it's in SNOW territory and the discussion isn't productive, they can close it. power~enwiki (π, ν) 19:15, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
    • I would advise keeping it open for the full 30 days. I suspect what's happening is that the anti-infobox crowd is jumping on. I suspect the section might look very different in a months time. --Deathawk (talk) 20:42, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
      • That's an interesting assessment. Can you indicate which voters are against infoboxes altogether? Because by my count a number close to zero of the opposes indicates they want to get rid of all infoboxes. Most people seem to be indicating that the current policy of dealing with this on a case-by-case basis is preferred. I'd like to know what your methodology is for reaching your conclusion. --Jayron32 21:04, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
        • Just common sense mostly, this is a heated issue on Wikipedia, with one side very feaverishly against a guideline for infoboxes. In the first few days, reason would dictate that they would come out against this police. Furthermore there seems to be a vestige interest in having this discussion closed, which does not seem completely on the up and up. It's obviously a topic that's been burbling under the surface for a while so it would make sense to have a full 30 day vote. If the vote closes without a consensus no guideline would be implemented, thus I worry that some people in the anti-infobox crowd are attempting to make that happen. --Deathawk (talk) 01:49, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
          • While I agree there's some bias in anti-infobox voters voting early and often, I consider it unlikely (though not yet impossible) the proposal will get enough support to be implemented. There still is value in discussion; I have no idea whether a policy that allows this decision to be made on the WikiProject level would pass, or if a less-strongly worded version ("Infoboxes are encouraged on biographical articles") might pass. power~enwiki (π, ν) 02:03, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
          • @Deathawk: there seems to be a vestige interest in having this discussion closed, which does not seem completely on the up and up. Where are you seeing this "vestige" interest? If you're referring only to the comments in this subsection, you might drop by WP:AGF for a read. It's quite common to call for a SNOW close when it's perceived that a proposal cannot pass, and where to draw the line is a legitimate matter for discussion. ―Mandruss ☎ 02:06, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
            • Yes, I understand that, but I do feel, just from looking around at the different angles of this, that this doesn't feel like a "snow close" case, for one there are at least seven votes in favor of this proposal. The second is that these comments about wanting it to close appeared almost immediately after. I'm not opposed to snowcloses in genreal, but it seems when one side overwhelmingly wants one, it may not be appropriate to grant it. Also I would state that if it was a true snowclose that it'd be obvious and there wouldn't have to be a discussion section calling for one. --Deathawk (talk) 02:15, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
              • I make it roughly 25% Support at this time, which I agree is not a SNOW situation now. I've suggested (below) waiting until at least 5 Feb, and in my opinion 25% then would be SNOW-worthy. Just my opinion. Maybe all SNOW close discussions should be restricted to uninvolved editors? ―Mandruss ☎ 02:24, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
                • As I stated above, the fact that we're having this discussion, should make it obvious that it isn't WP:SNOW and likely never will be. The Clause is not supposed to be used as an indicator of one side "Winning" quite the opposite, it means that the vote was so unanimous that there isn't even a discussion to be had. In other words arguments don't just become "snowed" it's either apparent from the outset or it isn't. --Deathawk (talk) 03:06, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
                  • Fine, then remove the word SNOW and use "early close" instead. If we're still at 25% or below on 5 Feb, I support an early close. Not that you need any help with the math, but that's at least three times as many Opposes as Supports. The probability of reaching a consensus to pass (which would be well over half, probably at least 60%) by waiting another 23 days would be extremely low as there is no reason why the trend would take such a dramatic turn after 7 days. I ain't no mathimutishon but I think one would support me on this. ―Mandruss ☎ 05:44, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
  • (uninvolved opinion) Suggest letting it run through one weekend, close 5 Feb at the earliest. This doesn't fall into the "non-starter" category, and poor souls are never required to waste their time. ―Mandruss ☎ 00:58, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm not going to withdraw this yet. While the combination of "people against infoboxes", "people against rules about infoboxes", and "people who feel this should be a WikiProject-level decision" are likely going to numerically outvote support for this proposal, there continues to be valuable discussion on the topic of infoboxes as a whole, and I feel my withdrawing the RfC now would be disruptive to that discussion. power~enwiki (π, ν) 17:50, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Extended discussion: Infoboxes on Biographies

I think one area where infoboxes are generally not used are on composers; unsure about usefulness there and the expectation of having an infobox. Galobtter (pingó mió) 12:30, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

I can't imagine why an infobox would be less useful because they are a composer. Tradition, and editors' fondness for it, is another matter. ―Mandruss ☎ 12:42, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Yeah I don't know. Will have to think of those, though, as it is (as far as I know) the most significant source of non-infobox containing well-developed biographical articles Galobtter (pingó mió) 12:45, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

• This is a terrible idea and will just reignite the infobox wars. What is to stop someone who really, really likes infoboxes upgrading an article to B class simply so they can add one? What happens to articles that are downgraded? What about articles where there really isn't much that could go in the thing? It is just wrong to impose something like this. - Sitush (talk) 12:48, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Definitely shouldn't be linked to article rating/quality Galobtter (pingó mió) 12:54, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Someone has just suggested upping the qualifier to a minimum standard of GA. That doesn't alter my opinion: there are loads of crap GAs, and loads more are added every year because the standard of reviewing is so arbitrary. It is also unnecessary: just why must a B-class or GA+ or whatever have to have an infobox? And what happens if an infobox is imposed because of GA but then the article is delisted? - Sitush (talk) 12:58, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

This s not understanding the point of this proposal. The idea is the every biography should have an infobox. The B level just gives us a place to start and it allows stubs to exist without them, since the may not have had time for such a box to be created. Upgrading or downgrading an article, shouldn't matter in this respect, the idea is that it states that infoboxes are expected and requires high quality articles to have them. --Deathawk (talk) 04:22, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

I understand the proposal perfectly well, thank you. It is seeking what is says, which is not infoboxes for every biographical article. If they or anyone else wants one for every such article then they should propose that. You've done the proposal no good whatsoever by suggesting that there is some ulterior motive. - Sitush (talk) 11:22, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Well, it is a better idea than having the guideline applied to criteria that is rather arbitrary in application. So it's that, no entry criteria at all, all biographies to have infoboxes, or that this proposal is baseless and silly. !dave 13:05, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

The last of your options, I suspect. - Sitush (talk) 13:14, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

• Mmm. I'd be interested to see if an infobox for Homer could benefit the article. Last time wasn't a great success but I expect Wikidata will be able to improve things. Thincat (talk) 13:13, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Very edge case. Could be excluded as not really known who he was, which is reflected in the lead sentence. the name ascribed by the ancient Greeks to the legendary author; could include notable work I guess.. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:30, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

• This is the current policy. To overturn that would require a motion at WP:ARCA. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 13:29, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  6) The Arbitration Committee recommends that a well-publicized community discussion be held to address whether to adopt a policy or guideline addressing what factors should weigh in favor of or against including an infobox in a given article. Finding of Fact 2 just reflects the status at the time; ARBCOM cannot dictate policy (and doesn't, and hasn't). Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:34, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  You beat me to it. ―Mandruss ☎ 13:42, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  The first 2 parts of ArbCom decisions ("Principles" and "Findings of fact") represent the way ArbCom see the current (at the time of the case) situation; it may include an interpretation of the "current" policy, but doesn't prevent changes to policy. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 14:03, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  I'm not sure what the drop the stick is about; discussions about Cassianto et al. are not relevant and the other proposals were quite different; only would be beating a dead horse if it were already decided that this proposal or something very similar relating to infoboxes in biographies was closed as no. Galobtter (pingó mió) 14:54, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  I'm guessing Rose is suffering from Generalized Infobox Fatigue (GIF). ―Mandruss ☎ 15:14, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  Of the five threads I linked, the one at ANI mentions infobox twice in the first sentence; the one at Arbcom mentions infobox in the first sentence of the first statement (that by Volvlogia); whilst the other three (the one at VPR; the one at MOS; and the one at VPP) concerns nothing but infoboxes. They all directly concern the inclusion (or otherwise) of infoboxes, as does this RfC. Were it not for the fact that they have several different initiators, I would have called WP:FORUMSHOP and closed this as soon as I became aware of it. Can we at least agree that holding multiple simultaneous discussions on the same matter is a Bad Thing? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:23, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

  Arbcom have now accepted it as a case. It'll all end in tears, there will be no victors here. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 12:22, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

• Now someone has mentioned a preference for including them even in stubs. I realise that is not the proposal but I'd love to know what the general experience of maintaining infoboxes may be. Of course, on stubs there is often very little that is verifiable and thus capable of populating the things but my own experience - mostly in the India/Pakistan topic areas - is that the things attract people who can't be bothered to read the article. They make changes to the box that contradict the sourced info in the article on a very frequent basis. I must make tens of reverts every week because of the sheer laziness and dumbing-down effect. Yes, I am sure that they can provide some useful overview for people who do not have three minutes to spare but even that is only the case if the information is correct, and there are plenty of GA articles that do not appear to have many watchers acting in a maintenance capacity. I often think that the infoboxes act as honeypots for "dumb" people: as A. E. Housman said, "Three minutes' thought would have told him he was wrong, but thought is irksome and three minutes is a long time". - Sitush (talk) 15:26, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Any article is going to have problems with infobox information matching the body (heck, there's always going to be cross-article inconsistencies too). That's the problem of an open wiki, and not limited to only infoboxes. Yes, infoboxes are honeypots, but so are list/table articles or anything else where it is easy to add "data" without "prose". --Masem (t) 15:29, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

• An interesting question on reading some of the opposes: we should list out reasons why a specific bio should not have an infobox in some cases, excluding the subjective "I hate infoboxes" arguments. Eg we can establish Homer as a case where there's just not enough validated information to make the infobox useful. I don't know other cases, but maybe there's something we can pull from those. --Masem (t) 17:06, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

• As a reader, I often use infoboxes to quickly verify that I am on the right article. Even simple things like "occupation" and "known for" are useful for this. I would say that infoboxes should be encouraged unless there is an article-specific reason to exclude them. (The primary editors of a particular article not liking infoboxes is not an article-specific reason....) CapitalSasha ~ talk 17:55, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

• A frequent comment from those that oppose infoboxes seems to argue that for some articles they're "not appropriate" however there seems to be little explanation as to why. It's often said matter of factly, like everyone will understand the argument, but I don't actually think that many people do. It'd be helpful to understand the issues so that these could be addressed rather than eveything going back and forth as it seems to now. --Deathawk (talk) 03:57, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Well, I don't oppose infoboxes generally but I suppose I do oppose them being required for all (B-class) biographies. I raised the example of Homer (and Masem repeated the example) thinking people might understand why an infobox might not be appropriate in such a case. So, to spell it out, there are scarcely any broadly accepted "quick facts" (maybe none) known about the author. Anything substantial in an infobox is highly likely to be disputed for lacking nuance. Now, this article is C class (aren't these classifications almost arbitrary?) but I don't see why a "promotion" should require an infobox or why someone wishing to force an infobox merely needs to up-rate the article first. Thincat (talk) 08:45, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

I regularly explain why I don't think an infobox is suitable, generally due to layout (particularly on smaller articles with less than about 7K prose) or because the topic falls between two stock types. However, making a civil and well-reasoned argument against (and, indeed, for) an infobox never makes it to the WP:Drama boards, so people aren't really aware of it. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 17:20, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

• A few comments on the discussion so far:
  1. There's a clear sense that articles on certain ancient figures (i.e. Homer) are better off without an infobox. That's an edge case that I'm sure can be fixed.
  2. Regarding "classical composers": I don't see a significant difference in presentation between Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and George Frideric Handel, and yet technically only one has an infobox. I also don't understand why composers are different than authors or painters (beyond the obvious point that the editors on that WikiProject tend towards not including infoboxes).
  3. There is an open ARBCOM discussion (currently at WP:ARC) largely about infoboxes, and the general opinion from arbitrators appears to be that they would like the current infobox situation addressed through the RfC process. I feel the complaints about RfCs on this topic to be ignorable.

  power~enwiki (π, ν) 19:37, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 03:57, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

I think one compromise might be, to come up with an objective criteria for when an infobox is not appropriate, and then require that those articles that don't meet it to have them. I think a lot of the problem comes from those that feel that the people who don't want infoboxes are doing it simply because they don't like them or it makes the article look "messy". However there seems to be an opinion forming that some articles are not appropriate for them on an objective level. So my suggestion is let's kill the ambiguity and come up with a list of valid criteria for not having an infobox. --Deathawk (talk) 06:21, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

WikiProjects route

If it's not possible to get a consensus across the board for the bio articles. Then perhaps getting a consensus on a WikiProject by WikiProject basis would be more successful. For example: I imagine that WP:HOCKEY is alright with infoboxes in their bios. While WP:COMPOSERS would be opposed to infoboxes in their bios. GoodDay (talk) 20:23, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

But local consensus cannot over-ride community consensus? - Sitush (talk) 20:26, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

WikiProjects are usually given leeway. Though sometimes they can clash, when their interests overlap. GoodDay (talk) 20:29, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

So if the Biography wikiproject doesn't go for this, the entire thing would collapse? - Sitush (talk) 20:30, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

In this situation, my guess is that WP:BIO would merely reflect the desires of all the bio-related WikiProjects. A question to ponder though - Can one control all, or does all control one. GoodDay (talk) 20:39, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

To be honest, this entire situation strikes me as being similar to situations where politicians seek referenda and keep on seeking further referenda until they get the result that they want. - Sitush (talk) 20:33, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Oh yeah. This scenario happened at Elizabeth II a few years ago. They kept having RM, after RM to finally get what the wanted -- the page moved from Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom to Elizabeth II. Of course, their view is that it's a done deal & therefore nobody should dare call for the page to be moved back to Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom. GoodDay (talk) 20:39, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of that scenario but, yes, it would appear to be an example. We're going off-topic now but it is an interesting issue, perhaps best discussed elsewhere. Consensus on a very specific Wikipedia issue can change and does. However, once it has gone through the first cycle, from A to B, does it ever revert to A? My suspicion is that usually it would not, if only because of the maintenance cost. But, as I say, this is OT. - Sitush (talk) 00:51, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

What community consensus would be overrided (assuming this rfc fails) if a wikiproject decides whether to include or disinclude infoboxes? Galobtter (pingó mió) 12:56, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

So what to do when projects disagree? See WP:ADVICEPAGE.--Moxy (talk) 13:03, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

I'd say at-least if an RfC is held..certainly not informal advice pages but an RfC can reasonably decide. There will be edge-cases of course. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:09, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

If the broader community can not agree (ie reach consensus), then the question can certainly be devolved to the project level... and if a given project can not agree then the question devolves to the “article by article” level. And if the editors at a given article can not agree, policy says to fall back on “status quo”. Blueboar (talk) 13:22, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

But there is a consensus at present. The consensus is to treat on a case-by-case basis. - Sitush (talk) 15:01, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

I think MOS-style guidelines for consistency would be helpful - not to make infoboxes mandatory, but how they should be used. (As we have for images, punctuation and everything else). For example some articles have two infoboxes, or a large sidebar + infobox. The infoboxes can become overwhelmed with overly detailed statistics, they can become so long that images in the first section of the article don't appear, or it spills over into multiple sections of the article. It creates an unpolished appearance and it is a major ordeal to have even a simple discussion about collapsing sections because a lot of the time POV information is added to the boxes by accounts of dubious provenance who are willing to edit war over it. The situation is out of control, and I think there is a need to reign it in with some style guidelines. Seraphim System ^(talk) 01:13, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Galobtter, saying that "WikiProject Me And My Friends" gets to decide whether to put an infobox on articles that I and my wiki-friends care about overrides the community consensus that infobox decisions are to be made article-by-article, and the principle that WikiProjects don't WP:OWN the pages that they're interested in improving. Also, we've already had significant fights (WikiProject Composers is the classic example, although not the only one) between groups whose members happen to like or dislike infoboxes on "their" articles, or who prefer one infobox over another. Letting self-appointed members of self-created groups determine rules for articles has been a source of significant disputes in the past. Also, the rule is that every group has absolute control over the articles that they want to improve, which means that Wikipedia:WikiProject Infoboxes could declare all articles within their scope (and then editors who disagree could form "WikiProject Lead Improvement", declare the same scope, and make the opposite decision). It's really not functional. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:12, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

​Of course not; I was more meaning that we could have RfCs on whether a class of articles (generally linked to a wikiproject) could have or not have infoboxes. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:22, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

A "subject matter route" might work out well. Very few people object to (normally/IAR/best judgment applies) having infoboxes on articles about diseases, for example, and I expect that such an RFC would pass easily. OTOH, the areas that would pass easily are the ones where disputes already aren't happening now, so I'm not sure if it would really make a difference in practice. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:10, 5 February 2018 (UTC)

Homer Objection?

Homer
Roman bust of Homer from the second century AD, portrayed with traditional iconography, based on a Greek original dating to the Hellenistic Period

@Masem: assuming we treat Homer as a biography and not mythology, an infobox with nothing in it but the subject's name (article title) looks like this, exactly like the present article. In no way does such an infobox cause harm or mislead, at least anymore than the current picture in the article, right? Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:27, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

If that all that it would show, that would be fine. But as I write this and look at the wikicode for the infobox, there's all these tempting empty template fields that are the honeypots that editors unfamiliar with the topic area will want to be filling in, meaning constant maintenance on those. It is much better in such situations simply to have the same image and caption but without the infobox field. --Masem (t) 14:30, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

The obviuous compromise then to make every-thing subject to editorial discretion, except box/name/there will be some kind of caption (cap perhaps info artist/photog/date)" Everyone gets what they want, right? Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:46, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

From above , I think there are a set of intelligent rules where infoboxes should be used (eg where the person falls into a data-heavy field like sports, politics, etc.), where they shouldn't (where there's a lack of data like for Homer), and then a relatively broad grey area that should be handled case-by-case, but I need to think how to flesh those rules out better to provide that. --Masem (t) 14:53, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Well sure, the rule compromise I have suggested, would only go for articles with images of the subject, but it extrapolates from the "consensus" we already have: 1) Almost everyone seems to agree that an image belongs upper right, if one is available; 2) Everyone already is forced to agree on the name(title); 3) everyone already has to reach agreement on any details (but never form: TITLE;LEAD;SECTIONS;REF). If we want to come up with "rules" or guides for other info in the box, we could then do so. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:05, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

I think adding (according to tradition) for a lot of stuff in the Homer article and other similar cases, as I did with the Ariwara no Narihira article, would be a good idea; with, say, Jesus doing so would be problematic because of the insanely large number of conflicting traditions, but including a few legendary, probably counter-factual details, nuanced so such is obvious, does not seem entirely inappropriate for "historical" figures about whom very little is known. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 22:24, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

• All the infobox templates have fields that can act as honeypots for POV editors to add material that is usually inappropriate. We need better instructions about when to use them. And there are always going to be bios where even some of the standard fields may be inappropriate. None of this is an argument against using them generally. The way to handle exceptions is wording such as "normally", or "unless there is some special reason to do otherwise". IAR remains the fundamental policy of WP. DGG ( talk ) 06:00, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

  Virtually all infoboxes are constructed in such a way that leaving a parameter blank, or having it contain only a HTML comment, is treated in the same manner as omitting it entirely, so the example at the top of this subsection could have been constructed as

  ((Infobox person
  | name          = Homer
  | image         = Homer British Museum.jpg
  | caption       = Roman bust of Homer from the second century AD, portrayed with traditional [[iconography]], based on a Greek original dating to the [[Hellenistic Period]]
  ))
  

  and it would look exactly the same. The omission of unused parameters will be less of a honeypot. If somebody later comes along with something valid that could be added - such as a death date that has been verified by reputable historians - the appropriate parameter may then be added. When adding infoboxes to articles, I usually remove unused parameters; I only leave them present when I don't have the information but feel that there is a reasonable chance that somebody else does have it. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:31, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

• It's too bad we couldn't harness this honey-box effect to populate Wikidata. Infoboxes and Wikidata are the same thing - a key:data database. But infobox users generally don't care about Wikidata, they just want to enter data up top article space. -- GreenC 05:12, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Well, speaking as a member of WikiProject Classical Greece & Rome, which is concerned with the article about Homer, there would be one good use for Infoboxes: to provide reference information to the relevant article in Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft & Prosopographia Imperii Romani for the subject. (A third field would be the tribe a Roman belonged to -- which is important when known, but can only be added in a clumsy way to a given biographical article.) The way these two important reference works are organized, it is a challenge to find biographical articles on certain people. For example, to find the article on Julius Caesar, one must skim through hundreds of articles having the title "Iulius" & a number; even for people fluent in German, this is a pain. However -- & this is an important point -- the Infobox person template does not include a field to add these referents to. And without this feature, I feel this template is of little use to our WikiProject -- so I don't see any support for Infoboxes from us. -- llywrch (talk) 18:39, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.