[WikiEN-l] Referencing policy/guidelines

[Steve Bennett]

On 5/16/07, David Goodman <dgoodmanny at gmail.com> wrote:
> The objection of it being a subscription site is of course wrong, but
> it seems a little more complicated:
>
> Some or all  of the links reverted were to a dead site. This is a
> different problem. I really do not see a how a link to a site that
> cannot be reached by anyone at all  is a reference.  The only way to
> go would be to find it in a old file somewhere--or to have made a
> permanent link by one of the available methods in the first place, or
> to have an equivalent print link.

Do we agree that:
a) A non-subscription reference is better than an equivalent
subscription reference
b) A subscription reference is better than no reference

Also that:
c) A dead link is better than no reference unless there is no hope
whatsoever that the link could be used to retrieve the source in the
future.

The problem arose at [[Smile (band)]] where an excellent source just
disappeared off the web. Archive.org had some of the text, but was
missing the scan of a crucial letter-to-the-editor. I wanted to keep
the link on the basis that it might eventually come back, or serve as
some kind of trail to find the thing again. Not sure whether someone
else killed it.

Steve