--- David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 29/03/2008, bobolozo bobolozo@yahoo.com wrote:
However, after reading the various responses and
WP:V
and thinking about it all, what I found
surprising was
that the majority here were actually saying, "No
no,
even if a source is totally unreliable, don't
remove
it, any source is better than no source". And
even at
times "Personal websites may be ok if they're
well
written and seem to be accurate", which is the
sort of
understanding of "reliable sources" one generally
has
to correct in new and unexperienced editors.
In uncontroversial fields, though, they are in fact enough. This is the point you're missing.
If this group of wikipedia editors, which are
probably
the most experienced editors around and which as
you
pointed out contains sitting arbitrators, if this group believes that totally unreliable sources
should
be left in place, which is in fundamental
opposition
to the letter and spirit of
Wikipedia:Verifiability,
then we have a problem.
The thing is that they're often not "totally unreliable" for the purpose. They may be low-quality sources, but they are in fact an improvement on nothing.
WP:RS remains utterly unsuitable as a source of robotic directions. Stop trying to use it as one.
- d.
So I believe you're saying that some of the least reliable sources, self published sources such as personal websites and blogs put out by unknown or non-notable people, are acceptable sources when used to support non-controversial claims.
This is certainly not contained in any of our policy or guideline pages, and to me it appears clearly contrary to our policies. However, if you believe this and if you think it either is how we do things or should be, why not try to get it added to WP:V?
Regardless of what the policy pages say, I question why this is a good idea. One of the main reasons to cite sources is to show that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, written based off sources which the public would respect, and not just whatever some random editor thought up himself or heard from his brother or saw written on a message board once.
If we use unreliable sources as references for our articles, if somedudeswebpage.tripod.com or "Megan's Kickass Hannah Montana Fan Site" are what we're using as sources, we're telling the public that Wikipedia articles are unreliable crap. We're saying that we value these references, and that therefore we have basically no standards at all.
Whereas an unsourced paragraph of text says either "this is not controversial so no source is necessary" or "whoops, sorry folks, Wikipedia is still a work in progress, we'll find a source eventually", either one of which is preferrable to "You can trust this, because some 14 year old girl said it on her website".
(And, this is the 3rd time, I believe, that you've mentioned WP:RS to me in this discussion. When I've been using the phrase "reliable sources", I've actually been using it as explained in WP:V, not WP:RS, as WP:V is policy and RS is not. Note that the subject of this thread mentions WP:V)
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