charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com wrote:
What is bad, to look at what WP:RS itself, is having material 'likely I don't agree that a page of college-level calculus, known and uncontroversial for two centuries, should be deleted for the pedantic reason that it isn't referenced.
Obviously, what's needed is a middle course.
a) Most of the unreferenced material in Wikipedia is accurate. What do I mean by "most?" 90%? 95%? 99%? Something like that.
b) Most of the accurate-but-unreferenced material in Wikipedia _could_ be referenced. What do I mean by "most" here? A somewhat smaller percentage, but still "most." And the amount depends on the topic area. Yes, there is a substantial amount of material in Wikipedia that is "original research" or original observation or direct personal experience, backed only by the testimony of the editor that inserted it. But most of Wikipedia's content is verifiable. The editor read it somewhere, even if it was in a classroom years ago or even if he or she doesn't remember exactly where.
c) Everything in Wikipedia should eventually be referenced or removed. And by "eventually" I mean in a time frame shorter than the "eventualists." Not like "Possible-Probable, my black hen/She lays eggs in the relative When/She doesn't lay eggs in the positive Now/ Because she's unable to postulate how." But its taken years to put the material into Wikipedia, and it will take a long time to get it referenced.
d) So, the unreferenced material should be tagged. That calls the reader's attention to the fact that the material is untraceable, and its accuracy is hard to judge. Equally important, it also calls everyone's attention to the fact that verifiability is policy, and that it is taken seriously.
e) Once tagged, there should be no big rush about deleting the material, but it should not remain indefinitely, either. How long? Assuming that there's no specific reason to doubt the material, months and months.
The _only_ objections to this I can think of is that that the tags are ugly--which is true but susceptible to a technical fix--or that we are not serious about verifiability and don't truly want to restrict Wikipedia content to things that are supported by published material.
It should also be noted that deleted material is not lost or suppressed or destroyed or gone. It's in the history and can be restored at any time if someone finds a reference. And in most cases courtesy suggests copying the unsourced material to the Talk page to call attention to the deletion and to facilitate others in finding references if they want to.
On 29/11/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
d) So, the unreferenced material should be tagged. That calls the reader's attention to the fact that the material is untraceable, and its accuracy is hard to judge. Equally important, it also calls everyone's attention to the fact that verifiability is policy, and that it is taken seriously.
{{unreferenced}} isn't a horribly ugly tag, and it does serve the reader without gutting the article.
- d.
Although I think we'd gain more through more agressive approaches, the liberal application of an unref notice would at least give much of wikipedia the work-in-progress look that it deserves.
On 11/29/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 29/11/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
d) So, the unreferenced material should be tagged. That calls the reader's attention to the fact that the material is untraceable, and its accuracy is hard to judge. Equally important, it also calls everyone's attention to the fact that verifiability is policy, and that it is taken seriously.
{{unreferenced}} isn't a horribly ugly tag, and it does serve the reader without gutting the article.
- d.
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On 29/11/06, Gregory Maxwell gmaxwell@gmail.com wrote:
Although I think we'd gain more through more agressive approaches, the liberal application of an unref notice would at least give much of wikipedia the work-in-progress look that it deserves.
Every time I hit an article without references, sources or even external links listed, I put an unref tag on it.
- d.
David Gerard wrote:
On 29/11/06, Gregory Maxwell gmaxwell@gmail.com wrote:
Although I think we'd gain more through more agressive approaches, the liberal application of an unref notice would at least give much of wikipedia the work-in-progress look that it deserves.
Every time I hit an article without references, sources or even external links listed, I put an unref tag on it.
Yep, and when it's one of my older efforts, written before the days when referencing was expected, I then go and dig through my library to figure *how* I knew what I knew. In a couple cases I had to delete some bits because I simply couldn't come up with any evidence that it wasn't just my own imaginings.
Stan
David Gerard wrote:
Every time I hit an article without references, sources or even external links listed, I put an unref tag on it.
That's long been my habit too, but I've actually started skipping that in some cases now that I've had some unpleasant experiences with articles going up for deletion on the basis of WP:RS. If the article looks reasonable enough to me but hard to reference within a five-day deadline I don't consider it worth the risk.
I still do {{citation needed}} when I hit statements that seem dubious, though, since that seems less likely to bring ruin on the article as a whole.
David Gerard wrote:
On 29/11/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
d) So, the unreferenced material should be tagged. That calls the reader's attention to the fact that the material is untraceable, and its accuracy is hard to judge. Equally important, it also calls everyone's attention to the fact that verifiability is policy, and that it is taken seriously.
{{unreferenced}} isn't a horribly ugly tag, and it does serve the reader without gutting the article.
God yes. I remember when I worked on the Tintin article, I had a whole paragraph which was all sourced from the one source, so I cited that source at the end of the paragraph, and someone came along and stuck a cite template halfway in the middle of the paragraph. I think the best thing is to use the unreferenced tag and copy the sentences that one is questioning to the talk page, where someone can dig a source out and work out the best way to cite it. I'm finding I'm writing some awful articles in the sense of referencing tags at the minute. I rescued Kieth Chapman from csd recently, and find I reference the same source 6 times in the one article. It just feels like overkill, but I can't really work out how to best cite.
Steve Block wrote:
God yes. I remember when I worked on the Tintin article, I had a whole paragraph which was all sourced from the one source, so I cited that source at the end of the paragraph, and someone came along and stuck a cite template halfway in the middle of the paragraph. I think the best thing is to use the unreferenced tag and copy the sentences that one is questioning to the talk page, where someone can dig a source out and work out the best way to cite it. I'm finding I'm writing some awful articles in the sense of referencing tags at the minute. I rescued Kieth Chapman from csd recently, and find I reference the same source 6 times in the one article. It just feels like overkill, but I can't really work out how to best cite.
One thing I continued from college is rampant overciting, to the point where you have articles like [[Kroger Babb]] where the <ref> tags are used with the same book 20 times, and it's either make the reference section 100 lines long of have a half-a-page-width of letters referring to each use of the book.
I will say, though, I had the same problem with the whole paragraph issue (my general training was to worry about new referencing when you came to a new statement), but the only way to solve this in any particular way would be to mandate a certain type of referencing, something I'm extremely opposed to at this point.
Damned if we do, damned if we don't, I suppose.
-Jeff
Jeff Raymond wrote:
I will say, though, I had the same problem with the whole paragraph issue (my general training was to worry about new referencing when you came to a new statement), but the only way to solve this in any particular way would be to mandate a certain type of referencing, something I'm extremely opposed to at this point.
One possible solution might be to begin a reference that applies to the whole paragraph with a paragraph symbol "¶".
Ec
On 11/29/06, Jeff Raymond jeff.raymond@internationalhouseofbacon.com wrote:
Steve Block wrote:
God yes. I remember when I worked on the Tintin article, I had a whole paragraph which was all sourced from the one source, so I cited that source at the end of the paragraph, and someone came along and stuck a cite template halfway in the middle of the paragraph. I think the best thing is to use the unreferenced tag and copy the sentences that one is questioning to the talk page, where someone can dig a source out and work out the best way to cite it. I'm finding I'm writing some awful articles in the sense of referencing tags at the minute. I rescued Kieth Chapman from csd recently, and find I reference the same source 6 times in the one article. It just feels like overkill, but I can't really work out how to best cite.
One thing I continued from college is rampant overciting, to the point where you have articles like [[Kroger Babb]] where the <ref> tags are used with the same book 20 times, and it's either make the reference section 100 lines long of have a half-a-page-width of letters referring to each use of the book.
I will say, though, I had the same problem with the whole paragraph issue (my general training was to worry about new referencing when you came to a new statement), but the only way to solve this in any particular way would be to mandate a certain type of referencing, something I'm extremely opposed to at this point.
Damned if we do, damned if we don't, I suppose.
-Jeff
I think it would be far preferable for the project goals to be arguing from a position where articles are generally overreferenced down, trying to trim for stylistic reasons.
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
e) Once tagged, there should be no big rush about deleting the material, but it should not remain indefinitely, either. How long? Assuming that there's no specific reason to doubt the material, months and months.
The _only_ objections to this I can think of is that that the tags are ugly--which is true but susceptible to a technical fix--or that we are not serious about verifiability and don't truly want to restrict Wikipedia content to things that are supported by published material.
I don't think deleting accurate, high-quality, unreferenced material is in Wikipedia's best interests. Asking for a source, yes. Adding sources, yes. But *deleting* good material? No.
Steve
I was thinking of an idea that articles could be trimmed down to what's been sourced and the longer (albeit unsourced) article could go to some sort of Crappopedia where it awaits confirmation. Stuff that is confirmed with a source could be added back. That way, Wikipedia could maintain integrity and the other wiki could be a development grounds.
On 11/29/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
e) Once tagged, there should be no big rush about deleting the material, but it should not remain indefinitely, either. How long? Assuming that there's no specific reason to doubt the material, months and months.
The _only_ objections to this I can think of is that that the tags are ugly--which is true but susceptible to a technical fix--or that we are not serious about verifiability and don't truly want to restrict Wikipedia content to things that are supported by published material.
I don't think deleting accurate, high-quality, unreferenced material is in Wikipedia's best interests. Asking for a source, yes. Adding sources, yes. But *deleting* good material? No.
Steve _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Like how Wikipedia was supposed to be a development grounds for Nupedia? My point is that a "Crappopedia" could open a very large can of worms.
--Ryan
On 11/29/06, James Hare messedrocker@gmail.com wrote:
I was thinking of an idea that articles could be trimmed down to what's been sourced and the longer (albeit unsourced) article could go to some sort of Crappopedia where it awaits confirmation. Stuff that is confirmed with a source could be added back. That way, Wikipedia could maintain integrity and the other wiki could be a development grounds.
On 11/29/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
e) Once tagged, there should be no big rush about deleting the material, but it should not remain indefinitely, either. How long? Assuming that there's no specific reason to doubt the material, months and months.
The _only_ objections to this I can think of is that that the tags are ugly--which is true but susceptible to a technical fix--or that we are not serious about verifiability and don't truly want to restrict Wikipedia content to things that are supported by published material.
I don't think deleting accurate, high-quality, unreferenced material is in Wikipedia's best interests. Asking for a source, yes. Adding sources, yes. But *deleting* good material? No.
Steve _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
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Which could be used to catch a very large amount of fish.
On 11/29/06, Ryan Wetherell renardius@gmail.com wrote:
Like how Wikipedia was supposed to be a development grounds for Nupedia? My point is that a "Crappopedia" could open a very large can of worms.
--Ryan
On 11/29/06, James Hare messedrocker@gmail.com wrote:
I was thinking of an idea that articles could be trimmed down to what's
been
sourced and the longer (albeit unsourced) article could go to some sort
of
Crappopedia where it awaits confirmation. Stuff that is confirmed with a source could be added back. That way, Wikipedia could maintain integrity
and
the other wiki could be a development grounds.
On 11/29/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
e) Once tagged, there should be no big rush about deleting the material, but it should not remain indefinitely, either. How long? Assuming that there's no specific reason to doubt the material, months and months.
The _only_ objections to this I can think of is that that the tags are ugly--which is true but susceptible to a technical fix--or that we are not serious about verifiability and don't truly want to restrict Wikipedia content to things that are supported by published material.
I don't think deleting accurate, high-quality, unreferenced material is in Wikipedia's best interests. Asking for a source, yes. Adding sources, yes. But *deleting* good material? No.
Steve _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
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Eventually, maybe, sure. I'd rather have them stay closer to Wikipedia proper, though. I guess it depends on how quickly users wade through it. But how do we know that moving them anywhere will get those statements sourced/referenced/cited/etc. any faster than if they were staring viewers right in the face?
--Ryan
On 11/29/06, James Hare messedrocker@gmail.com wrote:
Which could be used to catch a very large amount of fish.
On 11/29/06, Ryan Wetherell renardius@gmail.com wrote:
Like how Wikipedia was supposed to be a development grounds for Nupedia? My point is that a "Crappopedia" could open a very large can of worms.
--Ryan
On 11/29/06, James Hare messedrocker@gmail.com wrote:
I was thinking of an idea that articles could be trimmed down to what's
been
sourced and the longer (albeit unsourced) article could go to some sort
of
Crappopedia where it awaits confirmation. Stuff that is confirmed with a source could be added back. That way, Wikipedia could maintain integrity
and
the other wiki could be a development grounds.
On 11/29/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
e) Once tagged, there should be no big rush about deleting the material, but it should not remain indefinitely, either. How long? Assuming that there's no specific reason to doubt the material, months and months.
The _only_ objections to this I can think of is that that the tags are ugly--which is true but susceptible to a technical fix--or that we are not serious about verifiability and don't truly want to restrict Wikipedia content to things that are supported by published material.
I don't think deleting accurate, high-quality, unreferenced material is in Wikipedia's best interests. Asking for a source, yes. Adding sources, yes. But *deleting* good material? No.
Steve _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
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On 11/29/06, James Hare messedrocker@gmail.com wrote:
I was thinking of an idea that articles could be trimmed down to what's been sourced and the longer (albeit unsourced) article could go to some sort of Crappopedia where it awaits confirmation. Stuff that is confirmed with a source could be added back. That way, Wikipedia could maintain integrity and the other wiki could be a development grounds.
On 11/29/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
e) Once tagged, there should be no big rush about deleting the material, but it should not remain indefinitely, either. How long? Assuming that there's no specific reason to doubt the material, months and months.
The _only_ objections to this I can think of is that that the tags are ugly--which is true but susceptible to a technical fix--or that we are not serious about verifiability and don't truly want to restrict Wikipedia content to things that are supported by published material.
I don't think deleting accurate, high-quality, unreferenced material is in Wikipedia's best interests. Asking for a source, yes. Adding sources, yes. But *deleting* good material? No.
Steve
From a top-down point of view, a free open encyclopedia based on a free open
knowledgebase, with "interesting notable facts" with supporting citations and references and the like, would be an interesting project.
It is not, alas, the structure of Wikipedia, and I suspect it's not something WP can easily graft on the side.