Quite a few editors have been taking our requirement to cite sources to an extreme...whether this is good or bad, I don't know, but at any rate, it's starting to seep into the public consciousness:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
Johnleemk
I don't generally see such things as worth arguing over. If someone -really- wants a citation for that, or that the Earth's atmosphere is mainly nitrogen and oxygen, or that Einstein was a physicist, you can find one in thirty seconds. If something is really as obvious as you think it is, citation is trivially easy.
On 4/29/07, John Lee johnleemk@gmail.com wrote:
Quite a few editors have been taking our requirement to cite sources to an extreme...whether this is good or bad, I don't know, but at any rate, it's starting to seep into the public consciousness:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
Johnleemk _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On Sun, 29 Apr 2007, Todd Allen wrote:
I don't generally see such things as worth arguing over. If someone -really- wants a citation for that, or that the Earth's atmosphere is mainly nitrogen and oxygen, or that Einstein was a physicist, you can find one in thirty seconds. If something is really as obvious as you think it is, citation is trivially easy.
This may be true if it's one person demanding one citation. This is not so much the case if someone demands twenty citations, each for a different obvious fact. (Or if they slap "citation needed" on a whole paragraph or section and demand citations for all the obvious facts without trying to list them individually.)
It also takes a lot longer than thirty seconds to correctly format a citation. And citations are harder to find than you think. Most sources you'll find in a thirty second search will be self-published web pages, and we can't use self-published sources. Even just figuring out whether or not a web page is self-published within the Wikipedia meaning takes longer than 30 seconds.
On 4/29/07, Ken Arromdee arromdee@rahul.net wrote:
On Sun, 29 Apr 2007, Todd Allen wrote:
I don't generally see such things as worth arguing over. If someone -really- wants a citation for that, or that the Earth's atmosphere is mainly nitrogen and oxygen, or that Einstein was a physicist, you can find one in thirty seconds. If something is really as obvious as you think it is, citation is trivially easy.
This may be true if it's one person demanding one citation. This is not so much the case if someone demands twenty citations, each for a different obvious fact. (Or if they slap "citation needed" on a whole paragraph or section and demand citations for all the obvious facts without trying to list them individually.)
It also takes a lot longer than thirty seconds to correctly format a citation. And citations are harder to find than you think. Most sources you'll find in a thirty second search will be self-published web pages, and we can't use self-published sources. Even just figuring out whether or not a web page is self-published within the Wikipedia meaning takes longer than 30 seconds.
This is all true. It's hard to write a good encyclopedia article, whereas it's easy to slap together a bunch of obvious facts on a wiki and call it an encyclopedia article.
It's also a lot easier to provide sources if you provide them at the same time that you add the text. Formatting still takes time if you're not an expert on the ridiculous formats, but if you just stick in <ref>a text description of your source</ref> someone else will usually format it for you.
A big culture change is necessary if Wikipedia is going to have well-sourced articles. A few Mediawiki changes wouldn't hurt, though. There should be a mandatory field to list a source for all non-minor changes to an article. It doesn't stop people from marking their major changes as minor or from writing "my head" as the source, but at least it does make you consciously decide to break what are apparently the rules of the project.
Anthony
On 4/29/07, Ken Arromdee arromdee@rahul.net wrote:
Most sources you'll find in a thirty second search will be self-published web pages, and we can't use self-published sources. Even just figuring out whether or not a web page is self-published within the Wikipedia meaning takes longer than 30 seconds.
There's nothing wrong with using self-published sources, the key is to find ones that themselves cite their sources and are professional and well-written. If I were to write an article on subject X right now, someone would eventually use it as a source if I wrote a good enough text. They become a problem when you use them to make yourself, your business or your own fringe opinions seem more important than they are. That's when they're not allowed.
Mgm
On 29/04/07, John Lee johnleemk@gmail.com wrote:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
'''Adolf Hitler''' is the Chancellor of Germany[1]. He is noted[2] for his work on the moral fibre of German society[3] and stimulating the economy[4], notably through the Autobahn construction programme[5]. Some have criticised aspects of his work[removed due to BLP policy].
- d.
'''Adolf Hitler''' is the Chancellor of Germany[1]. He is noted[2] for his work on the moral fibre of German society[3] and stimulating the economy[4], notably through the Autobahn construction programme[5]. Some have criticised aspects of his work[removed due to BLP policy].
I would say that is bad sourcing. It should be possible to find one source for all that information and just cite it at the end of the paragraph. Combining lots of sources like that ends up bordering on OR and can introduce bias.
On 4/29/07, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
I would say that is bad sourcing. It should be possible to find one source for all that information and just cite it at the end of the paragraph. Combining lots of sources like that ends up bordering on OR and can introduce bias.
But if you only have one cite in a paragraph someone will slap a [citation needed] on individual facts within the paragraph. There's no way in Wikipedia to differentiate between "This cite covers the entire paragraph" from "This cite covers this sentence" without leaving a comment in the code.
Of all the diffs I have seen, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ballbusting&diff=60117857&oldid=60074942">this</a> is my favorite.
But if you only have one cite in a paragraph someone will slap a [citation needed] on individual facts within the paragraph. There's no way in Wikipedia to differentiate between "This cite covers the entire paragraph" from "This cite covers this sentence" without leaving a comment in the code.
I would hope that someone adding {{fact}} tags will look at a citation at the end of the paragraph and see if it includes the information they are concerned about. If they don't, then it isn't hard to remove the fact tag.
Some way to show what information is covered by what citation would be excellent - any suggestions? The only things I can think of end up destroying the human readability of the source code (which is bad enough as it is).
On 4/30/07, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
But if you only have one cite in a paragraph someone will slap a [citation needed] on individual facts within the paragraph. There's no way in Wikipedia to differentiate between "This cite covers the entire paragraph" from "This cite covers this sentence" without leaving a comment in the code.
I would hope that someone adding {{fact}} tags will look at a citation at the end of the paragraph and see if it includes the information they are concerned about. If they don't, then it isn't hard to remove the fact tag.
That's harder than it sounds - God forbid someone actually read a citation before mindlessly slapping a tag on it! In all seriousness, a lot of citations are for offline material, which makes it difficult to immediately verify that the citations contain the material in question.
I find it really annoying when people tag paragraphs which have already been cited, but often there's no other way to distinguish what is verified content and what is not. I do try to apply the cluestick when people don't bother following up on online citations, however.
Johnleemk
On 4/30/07, John Lee johnleemk@gmail.com wrote:
On 4/30/07, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
But if you only have one cite in a paragraph someone will slap a [citation needed] on individual facts within the paragraph. There's no way in Wikipedia to differentiate between "This cite covers the entire paragraph" from "This cite covers this sentence" without leaving a comment in the code.
I would hope that someone adding {{fact}} tags will look at a citation at the end of the paragraph and see if it includes the information they are concerned about. If they don't, then it isn't hard to remove the fact tag.
That's harder than it sounds - God forbid someone actually read a citation before mindlessly slapping a tag on it! In all seriousness, a lot of citations are for offline material, which makes it difficult to immediately verify that the citations contain the material in question.
I find it really annoying when people tag paragraphs which have already been cited, but often there's no other way to distinguish what is verified content and what is not. I do try to apply the cluestick when people don't bother following up on online citations, however.
Johnleemk
One clue that points to unverified content in verified paragraphs is text that was added later than the original citation. Stuff added by the person who added the original citation is usually covered.
Mgm
On 4/29/07, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
Some way to show what information is covered by what citation would be excellent - any suggestions? The only things I can think of end up destroying the human readability of the source code (which is bad enough as it is).
The concept of having a latex-like "source code" which is edited directly is probably bound to blow up eventually if Wikipedia is going to survive. I really don't think there's a good way to show the myriad of overlapping sources until then, which is probably years away at the earliest.
Adding sources to the edit summaries might be enough to help us extract the sources after the fact, though.
Adding a hidden (by default) reference tag would at least keep the ugliness confined to the editors.
Anthony
C.J. Croy wrote:
On 4/29/07, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
I would say that is bad sourcing. It should be possible to find one source for all that information and just cite it at the end of the paragraph. Combining lots of sources like that ends up bordering on OR and can introduce bias.
But if you only have one cite in a paragraph someone will slap a [citation needed] on individual facts within the paragraph. There's no way in Wikipedia to differentiate between "This cite covers the entire paragraph" from "This cite covers this sentence" without leaving a comment in the code.
The horrible habit of moving the citation *outside* the sentence punctuation does not help.
: This is a fact[1]. This is another fact[2]. These two facts and indeed another one can be supported : by a single reference. [3]
See, that's easy enough to tell that the first two citation markers each apply to the sentence in which they are embedded, and not too difficult to infer that the last applies to the whole paragraph. Sadly it seems to have become the norm to move the markers *after* the concluding punctuation, this leaving it open to interpretation as to whether they might actually to the **following** sentence.
HTH HAND
On 5/2/07, Phil Boswell phil.boswell@gmail.com wrote:
: This is a fact[1]. This is another fact[2]. These two facts and indeed another one can be supported : by a single reference. [3]
See, that's easy enough to tell that the first two citation markers each apply to the sentence in which they are embedded, and not too difficult to infer that the last applies to the whole paragraph. Sadly it seems to have become the norm to move the markers *after* the concluding punctuation, this leaving it open to interpretation as to whether they might actually to the **following** sentence.
No, no one could possible think a reference applies to the following sentence. There is significant ambiguity about whether it applies to the immediately preceding fact, sentence or paragraph though.
Steve
On Sun, 29 Apr 2007 15:41:41 +0800, "John Lee" johnleemk@gmail.com wrote:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
Indeed - and rightly so. Actually it's four fingers and one opposable thumb. Just as well we insist on proper sources, really :o)
Guy (JzG)
On 4/29/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Indeed - and rightly so. Actually it's four fingers and one opposable thumb. Just as well we insist on proper sources, really :o)
Actually, the word finger has two meanings, one which includes thumb, and one which doesn't.
"The English word "finger" has two senses, even in the context of appendages of a single typical human hand:
1. Any of the five digits. 2. Any of the four non-opposable digits."
Wikipedia contributors, "Thumb," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Thumb&oldid=126179729 (accessed April 30, 2007).
On 4/29/07, John Lee johnleemk@gmail.com wrote:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
As anyone who's written an essay should be able to tell you, one doesn't need to cite general knowledge (defined as anything that a lay person would be able to find in a general reference work on the subject, without any extra information).
The response to which in the Wikipedia context is "OMG, but we *are* a general reference work, what do we do?" And the response to that is, link to the article on "hand" (or maybe "finger") through the magic of hypertext, and there the person can find all the details they want.
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
As anyone who's written an essay should be able to tell you, one doesn't need to cite general knowledge (defined as anything that a lay person would be able to find in a general reference work on the subject, without any extra information).
The response to which in the Wikipedia context is "OMG, but we *are* a general reference work, what do we do?" And the response to that is, link to the article on "hand" (or maybe "finger") through the magic of hypertext, and there the person can find all the details they want.
I was assuming that quote was from the article on hand or finger, so a hyperlink wouldn't be very useful.
There was a similar thing on the GameFAQs message boards about Crystallina (who has 20k+ edits) writing a valentine's card.
Card: I love you! Crystallina: No, that's POV Card: You are loved! Crystallina: No, that's original research. Card: You are loved on wheels! Crystallina: Goddammit!
Or something like that. It goes on.
Will "Sceptre" Noble-2 wrote:
There was a similar thing on the GameFAQs message boards about Crystallina (who has 20k+ edits) writing a valentine's card.
Card: I love you! Crystallina: No, that's POV Card: You are loved! Crystallina: No, that's original research. Card: You are loved on wheels! Crystallina: Goddammit!
Or something like that. It goes on.
Link please?
I did try to search but I'd have had more fun transcribing the WP:ANI archives into Braille:-(
TIA HAND
John Lee wrote:
Quite a few editors have been taking our requirement to cite sources to an extreme...whether this is good or bad, I don't know, but at any rate, it's starting to seep into the public consciousness:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
In most cases, the "citation needed" template {{fact}} has nothing to do with the need to cite sources. It's just an ugly way to mark a statement as dubious. It's a visible manifestation of that bubbling turmoil that lies beneath the surface of wiki articles, the turmoil we call the "wiki process". Like {{pov}}, or inconsistent sentences which express a point of view and then discredit it in the same breath, these things are a flag to the reader that this is no ordinary encyclopedia article.
There has always been conflict between our need to warn the reader that what they are reading can't be trusted, and our desire for an ultimately clean and professional presentation. Over time, Wikipedia has moved in the former direction, towards bolder and more visible warnings, which is not something I would have predicted back in 2003.
Personally I would prefer to see some movement in the other direction, towards clean presentation. I understand that uglying up an article while keeping your point in can be an attractive compromise to editors involved in disputes. I certainly made similar compromises while I was an editor. At least the use of templates should make it possible to remove these notices in bulk from published versions of Wikipedia.
-- Tim Starling
There already is a way to prevent the uglification of superscript cite numbers, that will work independently of skin or browser: use the Harvard Referencing method, by which the citation for the (Starrling, 2006) refers to an alphabetically arranged list of references in the reference section (which has to be entered separately, but its no more work than any other way. If you can word it as "based on Starling's essay (2006),..." it looks even smoother. DGG
On 4/30/07, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote:
John Lee wrote:
Quite a few editors have been taking our requirement to cite sources to an extreme...whether this is good or bad, I don't know, but at any rate, it's starting to seep into the public consciousness:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
In most cases, the "citation needed" template {{fact}} has nothing to do with the need to cite sources. It's just an ugly way to mark a statement as dubious. It's a visible manifestation of that bubbling turmoil that lies beneath the surface of wiki articles, the turmoil we call the "wiki process". Like {{pov}}, or inconsistent sentences which express a point of view and then discredit it in the same breath, these things are a flag to the reader that this is no ordinary encyclopedia article.
There has always been conflict between our need to warn the reader that what they are reading can't be trusted, and our desire for an ultimately clean and professional presentation. Over time, Wikipedia has moved in the former direction, towards bolder and more visible warnings, which is not something I would have predicted back in 2003.
Personally I would prefer to see some movement in the other direction, towards clean presentation. I understand that uglying up an article while keeping your point in can be an attractive compromise to editors involved in disputes. I certainly made similar compromises while I was an editor. At least the use of templates should make it possible to remove these notices in bulk from published versions of Wikipedia.
-- Tim Starling
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On 4/30/07, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote:
In most cases, the "citation needed" template {{fact}} has nothing to do with the need to cite sources. It's just an ugly way to mark a statement as dubious.
And there lies a problem. Too many people tag material they find dubious when just a little research would avoid a lot of mess. Before you tag anything, you should check the refs of the paragraph and the article to see if it's covered already and think for yourself. Is it really that dubious? I could cite the fact the sky is blue, but citing it is nonsense. Anyone who knows what [[blue]] is should be able to make that determination for themselves.
Mgm
On 5/1/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
And there lies a problem. Too many people tag material they find dubious when just a little research would avoid a lot of mess. Before you tag anything, you should check the refs of the paragraph and the article to see if it's covered already and think for yourself. Is it really that dubious?
The problem with this is that not every source is easy to get hold of.
I could cite the fact the sky is blue, but citing it is nonsense. Anyone who knows what [[blue]] is should be able to make that determination for themselves.
Unless they live in the UK then 50:50 at best.
On 5/1/07, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:
On 5/1/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
And there lies a problem. Too many people tag material they find dubious when just a little research would avoid a lot of mess. Before you tag anything, you should check the refs of the paragraph and
the
article to see if it's covered already and think for yourself. Is it
really
that dubious?
The problem with this is that not every source is easy to get hold of.
I could cite the fact the sky is blue, but citing it is nonsense. Anyone
who
knows what [[blue]] is should be able to make that determination for themselves.
Unless they live in the UK then 50:50 at best.
-- geni
Is that a humoristic stab at the British or am I missing something? Anyway, I think a certain amount of citation obsession is healthy, it gets problematic when you're asked to cite common knowledge.
Mgm
On 5/1/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
Is that a humoristic stab at the British or am I missing something?
The sky over the UK is frequently not blue. Aside from when it is dark grey is rather common.
geni wrote:
On 5/1/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
Is that a humoristic stab at the British or am I missing something?
The sky over the UK is frequently not blue. Aside from when it is dark grey is rather common.
I'm hoping it was in jest. An overly broad statement deserves to be qualified, not referenced. It should be obvious that sticking a {{fact}} tag on the statement "the sky is blue" is the wrong thing to do.
-- Tim Starling
geni wrote:
On 5/1/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
And there lies a problem. Too many people tag material they find dubious when just a little research would avoid a lot of mess. Before you tag anything, you should check the refs of the paragraph and the article to see if it's covered already and think for yourself. Is it really that dubious?
The problem with this is that not every source is easy to get hold of.
Being "easy to get hold of" should not be a significant factor.
I could cite the fact the sky is blue, but citing it is nonsense. Anyone who knows what [[blue]] is should be able to make that determination for themselves.
Unless they live in the UK then 50:50 at best.
It's worse than 50:50 in most of the world when you take into account that it's black at night
Ec
Ray Saintonge wrote:
geni wrote: On 5/1/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
I could cite the fact the sky is blue, but citing it is nonsense. Anyone
who
knows what [[blue]] is should be able to make that determination for themselves.
Unless they live in the UK then 50:50 at best.
It's worse than 50:50 in most of the world when you take into account that it's black at night
Except for the places where it's *orange* :-(
Bloody light pollution, how am I supposed to show my daughter the stars when you can't see the damn things?
On 4/30/07, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote:
There has always been conflict between our need to warn the reader that what they are reading can't be trusted, and our desire for an ultimately clean and professional presentation. Over time, Wikipedia has moved in the former direction, towards bolder and more visible warnings, which is not something I would have predicted back in 2003.
My observation is the opposite. Our unreferenced tags are drifting towards the bottom of the article, rather than the top. Many other tags are migrating towards the talk page rather than the article itself. Our "expand this article" tags are disappearing altogether.
I do wish we more use of explicit "disputed" tags instead of the rather passive-aggressive "citation needed" tag, though.
Steve
On 5/2/07, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 4/30/07, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote:
There has always been conflict between our need to warn the reader that what they are reading can't be trusted, and our desire for an ultimately clean and professional presentation. Over time, Wikipedia has moved in
the
former direction, towards bolder and more visible warnings, which is not something I would have predicted back in 2003.
My observation is the opposite. Our unreferenced tags are drifting towards the bottom of the article, rather than the top. Many other tags are migrating towards the talk page rather than the article itself. Our "expand this article" tags are disappearing altogether.
I do wish we more use of explicit "disputed" tags instead of the rather passive-aggressive "citation needed" tag, though.
I think both have their uses. I use {{fact}} when I know something is true, but don't know where it can be cited from. I use {{verification needed}} when I think something is not true or probably is not true. Never had to use disputed tags before, though.
Johnleemk
On 4/29/07, John Lee johnleemk@gmail.com wrote:
Quite a few editors have been taking our requirement to cite sources to an extreme...whether this is good or bad, I don't know, but at any rate, it's starting to seep into the public consciousness:
<CtrlAltDestroy> Here is my impression of Wikipedia. <CtrlAltDestroy> "There are five fingers on the human hand [citation needed]"
Johnleemk
On a similar note, this particular webcomic is hilarious:
http://www.wondermark.com/d/291.html
Johnleemk