Of course I fully support the spirit and motives behind BLP and obviously I see the urgent need to make sure serious allegations against living people are fully and reliably sourced. But people are stretching BLP far beyond what it should be used to combat - unsourced and unreliable assertions. Now people are using it to remove all sorts of critical information that would reasonably be included and to further their own ideological agendas. Some examples, all typed in with presumably a straight face.
* A man who posted nude pictures of himself on websites whose domains he registered advertising himself as a $200-an-hour gay prostitute can not be identified as a prostitute. * The Financial Times cannot be used as a source in an article about a journalist because they "report on finances issues" and thus are "unreliable" when it comes to other matters. * The Columbia Journalism Review is a reliable source. A blog run by the Columbia Journalism Review on the website of the Columbia Journalism Review is not. * The New Republic, among other reputable, long-standing publications, cannot be used as a source because they are "too partisan". * Partisan organizations and publications, even long-standing and reputable ones, cannot be used in an article at all, even to substantiate the fact that there is partisan criticism of the subject of the article. I'm not taking about someone objecting to "John Doe did this bad thing", I'm talking about people objecting to the article saying "X, Y, and Z criticize John Doe, saying this thing he did may have been bad."
In addition to well-intentioned people wildly misapplying BLP and RS, we may have handed a powerful new weapon to POV warriors, who wish to sanitize all the articles about their ideological fellow travelers. A well-meaning user has created the "Libel Protection Unit", but this is the same person who thinks that you are libeling someone by quoting something said by the "unreliable" Financial Times, and among the people he's unwittingly recruited for his new group and have eagerly signed up are some notorious POV warriors and at least one certified troll. I realize that what I'm writing may not show much good faith, but based on what I've seen from some of these folks and the statements I've noted above, I fear that this LPU will do much to remove legitimate material from the encyclopedia and do little to protect us from actual libel. Some people have weighed in with sensible remarks, like Jmabel at [[Wikipedia talk:Libel-Protection Unit]], but I think more people should do so before this gets out of hand.
On 05/09/06, Rob gamaliel8@gmail.com wrote:
Of course I fully support the spirit and motives behind BLP and obviously I see the urgent need to make sure serious allegations against living people are fully and reliably sourced. But people are stretching BLP far beyond what it should be used to combat - unsourced and unreliable assertions. Now people are using it to remove all sorts of critical information that would reasonably be included and to further their own ideological agendas. Some examples, all typed in with presumably a straight face.
Can I just say "I told you so." Kthx.
- d.
On Tue, 5 Sep 2006 16:35:01 -0400, Rob gamaliel8@gmail.com wrote:
- A man who posted nude pictures of himself on websites whose domains
he registered advertising himself as a $200-an-hour gay prostitute can not be identified as a prostitute.
Seemingly absurd, but actually fixable as long as reliable secondary sources call him that.
- The Financial Times cannot be used as a source in an article about a
journalist because they "report on finances issues" and thus are "unreliable" when it comes to other matters.
Complete bollocks. The FT carries general news as well, and has particularly high journalistic standards. Name the article.
- The Columbia Journalism Review is a reliable source. A blog run by
the Columbia Journalism Review on the website of the Columbia Journalism Review is not.
Seems fair.
- The New Republic, among other reputable, long-standing publications,
cannot be used as a source because they are "too partisan".
Reliable in respect of one party's view of something and if balanced from the other perspective, I'd say.
- Partisan organizations and publications, even long-standing and
reputable ones, cannot be used in an article at all, even to substantiate the fact that there is partisan criticism of the subject of the article. I'm not taking about someone objecting to "John Doe did this bad thing", I'm talking about people objecting to the article saying "X, Y, and Z criticize John Doe, saying this thing he did may have been bad."
Please give details.
Guy (JzG)
On 9/5/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Tue, 5 Sep 2006 16:35:01 -0400, Rob gamaliel8@gmail.com wrote:
- A man who posted nude pictures of himself on websites whose domains
he registered advertising himself as a $200-an-hour gay prostitute can not be identified as a prostitute.
Seemingly absurd, but actually fixable as long as reliable secondary sources call him that.
I'd suspect the problem is that the original primary source no longer exists?
- The Columbia Journalism Review is a reliable source. A blog run by
the Columbia Journalism Review on the website of the Columbia Journalism Review is not.
Seems fair.
Hmm? Some blogs are trustworthy, some are not, despite what some people want WP:RS to read (generally, they want an 'All blogs are untrustworthy' stance, despite the evidence). I'd say an official blog of an organisation is trustworthy. Blogs where we can be sure of the author and that their opinions are notable are also reliable, at least for that individual's thoughts and opinions.
- The New Republic, among other reputable, long-standing publications,
cannot be used as a source because they are "too partisan".
Reliable in respect of one party's view of something and if balanced from the other perspective, I'd say.
Many (most?) sources are partisan one way or another; it's our job to strive for NPOV, regardless. (And NPOV does not mean 'balanced' in a journalism sense; we don't have to give equal airtime to unequal opinions).
-Matt
On Tue, 5 Sep 2006 16:35:19 -0700, "Matt Brown" morven@gmail.com wrote:
- A man who posted nude pictures of himself on websites whose domains
he registered advertising himself as a $200-an-hour gay prostitute can not be identified as a prostitute.
Seemingly absurd, but actually fixable as long as reliable secondary sources call him that.
I'd suspect the problem is that the original primary source no longer exists?
Not a problem if reliable secondary sources repeat the claim; otherwise it's original research (given that it required synthesis from primary data, the name not, as I recall, being given in full on the contact ads).
- The Columbia Journalism Review is a reliable source. A blog run by
the Columbia Journalism Review on the website of the Columbia Journalism Review is not.
Seems fair.
Hmm? Some blogs are trustworthy, some are not, despite what some people want WP:RS to read (generally, they want an 'All blogs are untrustworthy' stance, despite the evidence). I'd say an official blog of an organisation is trustworthy. Blogs where we can be sure of the author and that their opinions are notable are also reliable, at least for that individual's thoughts and opinions.
Yebbut all blogs are essentially opinion rather than reporting. So they might be reliable in terms of documenting the blogger's opinion on a given topic, but in this case they are analogous to the newspaper's leaders or opinion pieces, which are typically not used as sources for factual data.
- The New Republic, among other reputable, long-standing publications,
cannot be used as a source because they are "too partisan".
Reliable in respect of one party's view of something and if balanced from the other perspective, I'd say.
Many (most?) sources are partisan one way or another; it's our job to strive for NPOV, regardless. (And NPOV does not mean 'balanced' in a journalism sense; we don't have to give equal airtime to unequal opinions).
Which is why, without more detail, it's hard to form a view. It might be a case of someone pushing the Aryan Nation website as a "balancing" view on the holocaust, or it might be wanting to cite the majority view that the 9/11 conspiracy theories are Complete Bollocks (i.e. a majority view in an article which mainly discusses the minority view), or more likely it's somewhere between the two.
Guy (JzG)
On 06/09/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Tue, 5 Sep 2006 16:35:19 -0700, "Matt Brown" morven@gmail.com wrote:
Hmm? Some blogs are trustworthy, some are not, despite what some people want WP:RS to read (generally, they want an 'All blogs are untrustworthy' stance, despite the evidence). I'd say an official blog of an organisation is trustworthy. Blogs where we can be sure of the author and that their opinions are notable are also reliable, at least for that individual's thoughts and opinions.
Yebbut all blogs are essentially opinion rather than reporting. So they might be reliable in terms of documenting the blogger's opinion on a given topic, but in this case they are analogous to the newspaper's leaders or opinion pieces, which are typically not used as sources for factual data.
"typically" isn't even close to "all".
- d.
On Sep 5, 2006, at 1:35 PM, Rob wrote:
Of course I fully support the spirit and motives behind BLP and obviously I see the urgent need to make sure serious allegations against living people are fully and reliably sourced. But people are stretching BLP far beyond what it should be used to combat - unsourced and unreliable assertions. Now people are using it to remove all sorts of critical information that would reasonably be included and to further their own ideological agendas. Some examples, all typed in with presumably a straight face.
The pendulum effect? Now that we are being more responsible in what we allow in articles about LP, it is only natural that some will attempt exploit it.
- A man who posted nude pictures of himself on websites whose domains
he registered advertising himself as a $200-an-hour gay prostitute can not be identified as a prostitute.
Was this reported in a reliable source (this person being called a prostitute?). If not, this is OR.
- The Financial Times cannot be used as a source in an article about a
journalist because they "report on finances issues" and thus are "unreliable" when it comes to other matters.
Nonsense
- The Columbia Journalism Review is a reliable source. A blog run by
the Columbia Journalism Review on the website of the Columbia Journalism Review is not.
Only if the Columbia Journalism Review has editorial control of the blog. Otherwise, I would agree that it is not a RS.
- The New Republic, among other reputable, long-standing publications,
cannot be used as a source because they are "too partisan".
Nonsesne
- Partisan organizations and publications, even long-standing and
reputable ones, cannot be used in an article at all, even to substantiate the fact that there is partisan criticism of the subject of the article. I'm not taking about someone objecting to "John Doe did this bad thing", I'm talking about people objecting to the article saying "X, Y, and Z criticize John Doe, saying this thing he did may have been bad."
Only if X, Y and Z and notable people, and the partisan orgs and pubs are so.
As you can see many of your examples above, could be argued with existing policies, and have been argued as such in the past. Nothing new here.
In addition to well-intentioned people wildly misapplying BLP and RS, we may have handed a powerful new weapon to POV warriors, who wish to sanitize all the articles about their ideological fellow travelers. A well-meaning user has created the "Libel Protection Unit", but this is the same person who thinks that you are libeling someone by quoting something said by the "unreliable" Financial Times, and among the people he's unwittingly recruited for his new group and have eagerly signed up are some notorious POV warriors and at least one certified troll. I realize that what I'm writing may not show much good faith, but based on what I've seen from some of these folks and the statements I've noted above, I fear that this LPU will do much to remove legitimate material from the encyclopedia and do little to protect us from actual libel. Some people have weighed in with sensible remarks, like Jmabel at [[Wikipedia talk:Libel-Protection Unit]], but I think more people should do so before this gets out of hand.
This is ungrounded paranoia. If you think that this new "unit" is a threat to WP, join in and help make it better, as some of us are attempting to do.
-- Jossi
Jossi Fresco wrote:
On Sep 5, 2006, at 1:35 PM, Rob wrote:
- A man who posted nude pictures of himself on websites whose domains
he registered advertising himself as a $200-an-hour gay prostitute can not be identified as a prostitute.
Was this reported in a reliable source (this person being called a prostitute?). If not, this is OR.
Based on this description of the situation, he's calling _himself_ a prostitute and we're citing a primary source for that. Doesn't look like OR to me.
- The Columbia Journalism Review is a reliable source. A blog run by
the Columbia Journalism Review on the website of the Columbia Journalism Review is not.
Only if the Columbia Journalism Review has editorial control of the blog. Otherwise, I would agree that it is not a RS.
Depends on what it's being used as a source for. A person's blog can almost always be used as a reliable source for what a person has said on their blog.
On 9/6/06, Jossi Fresco jossifresco@mac.com wrote:
- A man who posted nude pictures of himself on websites whose domains
he registered advertising himself as a $200-an-hour gay prostitute can not be identified as a prostitute.
Was this reported in a reliable source (this person being called a prostitute?). If not, this is OR.
Yes, by multiple mainstream reliable sources. And as Bryan pointed out, he's calling himself a prostitute by posting an ad advertising his wares.
- The Columbia Journalism Review is a reliable source. A blog run by
the Columbia Journalism Review on the website of the Columbia Journalism Review is not.
Only if the Columbia Journalism Review has editorial control of the blog. Otherwise, I would agree that it is not a RS.
Exactly the sort of distinction reasonable editors should be making, but these people are just invoking RS and saying blog=unreliable regardless of the source.
This is ungrounded paranoia. If you think that this new "unit" is a threat to WP, join in and help make it better, as some of us are attempting to do.
If you've had prior dealings with some of these editors, you might not think I was being paranoid. I'd rather overreact now than have to deal with a bigger problem down the line. And one of the reasons I'm posting here is to get more editors to become active in this matter now, to help make things better, exactly what you suggest.
On 06/09/06, Rob gamaliel8@gmail.com wrote:
Exactly the sort of distinction reasonable editors should be making, but these people are just invoking RS and saying blog=unreliable regardless of the source.
Then WP:RS needs an enema. Who's been edit-warring it in?
- d.