User talk:Rhododendrites/2017c
 | This page is an archive of past discussions for the period May 2017 - June 2017. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability. Legobot (talk) 04:29, 3 May 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia & Youtube Project
Hi Rhododendrites,
My name’s Alex. I’m a student at American University, and I’m working on a project on Wikipedia and Youtube. I noticed you made a relatively large amount of edits to the List of Youtubers Wikipedia page and I was wondering if I could get your input on a few questions.
1. After talking to a few Wikipedians and doing some research, it seems as though Youtubers have a harder time obtaining a Wikipedia page and/or higher quality pages than other “traditional” professions. Do you agree with this assessment? If so, why do you think this is?
2. What could Wikipedia change to better accommodate notable figures from newer platforms like Youtube? What could Youtube do to better live up to Wikipedia standards?
3. If you could change the guidelines on Notability in any way, what changes would you make and why? If not, why do you think they’re stable enough that future societal progression could still be covered equally?
I look forward to hearing back from you.
Ah2681a (talk) 09:08, 4 May 2017 (UTC)
- @Ah2681a: My response will reference or be informed by these policies and guidelines (rules the editing community has developed over the years): Wikipedia:Notability, Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, Wikipedia:Verifiability, Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is NOT, Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources.
- Notability is the most relevant thing. It's a way of determining what should have an article, and with extremely rare exception comes down to what subjects have received "significant coverage in reliable sources independent of the subject". That's required for two reasons: first is because, as an encyclopedia and tertiary source, Wikipedia wants other publications to have declared a subject worthy of notice before it's covered here. Second is because without significant coverage in reliable sources, we have nothing to base an article on. Wikipedia is not a database, place for promotion, place for original research, etc., so any article that exists should be able to exist with an in-depth article based only on good sources. Someone can have a million subscribers, but if they haven't been written about by a publication with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, there's nothing more we can say about them.
- It's possible to perceive YouTubers, other social media celebrities, Internet memes, bands, etc. as having a harder time securing an article because anybody or anything with a couple dedicated fans can create articles and write about the subject on Wikipedia to the point of disruption, recreating articles when deleted, spamming other articles repeatedly, etc. So if there's a way that YouTubers may be treated unfairly, it's because disruption by YouTuber fans (sometimes egged on by the YouTuber themselves) is one area (one of many) where disruption is particularly common. Wikipedians are constantly dealing with people who want things they like on Wikipedia irrespective of Wikipedia policies and guidelines, and other people who use Wikipedia for marketing/promotion/advertising purposes. YouTube is far from the worst for this, but happens a lot. It takes the time of other Wikipedians to clean it up, and so while I don't think I've seen people intentionally apply stricter standards, it seems likely that it may happen unconsciously when people come across an article, created for the sixth time, with a bunch of jokes strewn throughout and little-to-no claim to notability (in the Wikipedia sense). One example that came to mind was Filthy Frank. At this point, I don't think anyone disagrees he's notable, but for a while the only decent sources there were were brief mentions of his Harlem Shake video. The article was deleted repeatedly, and deleted repeatedly at his real name, and deleted repeatedly at all sorts of variations, and removed from dozens of other articles -- and those are just the ones that weren't created as a goof (i.e. adding a joke/reference to an unrelated article). It used up so much of people's time that there were still deletion discussions after it was more clear he was notable (but he was kept).
- That said, notability criteria are definitely not biased against YouTubers. If anything, they're biased towards YouTubers. "Significant coverage" is easier for newer subjects than old, easier for subjects in the developed world than for the developing world, easier for subjects active on the Internet than those that aren't, easier for subjects whose activities are based on visibility than for those that don't do their work in front of a camera, etc. The important questions aren't how do we make Wikipedia even more disproportionate in terms of that coverage by applying special treatment to people who already have a huge advantage, but how we recognize the cultural or historical significance of people and subjects important in Papua New Guinea, Ghana, Cambodia, Latvia, or Benin, where it's harder to point to coverage in digital media to support notability. Even subjects that are ubiquitous in those countries (to the extent that's possible) can have a hard time receiving coverage here. Or we could talk about subjects in the US whose work is typically considered important but who don't receive significant coverage about them, like a lot of economists, anthropologists, historians, engineers, etc. Then there are the subjects that have been historically discriminated against, and far less likely to receive recognition in reliable sources of the day. There's a ton of research written on gaps in coverage, unequal coverage, etc. A lot of it comes down to Wikipedia:Systemic bias. All this said, I don't actually think there's anything we should be doing about this. As a tertiary source, Wikipedia to a large degree reflects the status quo, and thus reflects the social, political, and technological problems inherent in the production of "reliable sources" at any place/time in history. Nothing we can do about that. Certainly we should not try to create articles on subjects that don't have such coverage (hence collaborative efforts focusing on, say, African history or women in science). We can try our best to track down all of the notable subjects we can, but if there's no significant coverage in reliable sources, that's sort of the end of the line for Wikipedia.
- Hope this rambling helps. :) — Rhododendrites talk \\ 13:22, 4 May 2017 (UTC)
Editing News #1—2017
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Recent changes
A new wikitext editing mode is available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices. The 2017 wikitext editor has the same toolbar as the visual editor and can use the citoid service and other modern tools. Go to Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-betafeatures to enable the ⧼Visualeditor-preference-newwikitexteditor-label⧽.
A new visual diff tool is available in VisualEditor's visual mode. You can toggle between wikitext and visual diffs. More features will be added to this later. In the future, this tool may be integrated into other MediaWiki components. [1]
The team have added multi-column support for lists of footnotes. The <references /> block can automatically display long lists of references in columns on wide screens. This makes footnotes easier to read. You can request multi-column support for your wiki. [2]
Other changes:
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- A bug caused some section edit conflicts to blank the rest of the page. This has been fixed. The team are sorry for the disruption. [10]
- There is a new keyboard shortcut for citations:
Control+Shift+Kon a PC, orCommand+Shift+Kon a Mac. It is based on the keyboard shortcut for making links, which isControl+Kon a PC orCommand+Kon a Mac. [11]
Future changes
- The VisualEditor team is working with the Community Tech team on a syntax highlighting tool. It will highlight matching pairs of
<ref>tags and other types of wikitext syntax. You will be able to turn it on and off. It will first become available in VisualEditor's built-in wikitext mode, maybe late in 2017. [12] - The kind of button used to Show preview, Show changes, and finish an edit will change in all WMF-supported wikitext editors. The new buttons will use OOjs UI. The buttons will be larger, brighter, and easier to read. The labels will remain the same. You can test the new button by editing a page and adding
&ooui=1to the end of the URL, like this: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Project:Sandbox?action=edit&ooui=1 The old appearance will no longer be possible, even with local CSS changes. [13] - The outdated 2006 wikitext editor will be removed later this year. It is used by approximately 0.03% of active editors. See a list of editing tools on mediawiki.org if you are uncertain which one you use. [14]
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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Notability (organizations and companies)
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Notability (organizations and companies). Legobot (talk) 04:27, 14 May 2017 (UTC)
Sunday May 21: Metropolitan Museum of Art Edit-a-thon + global online challenge
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 The Metropolitan Museum of Art Edit-a-thon: Met Open Access Initiative is the Metropolitan Museum of Art's first edit-a-thon, being hosted on Sunday May 21, 2017 in Thomas J. Watson Library at The Met Fifth Avenue in New York City. The Met is excited to make available over 375,000 images of public domain artworks for contribution to Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons from the museum’s collection spanning 5,000 years of art. The event is an opportunity for Wikimedia communities to engage The Met's diverse collection onsite and remotely. The event is a key marker too of The Metropolitan Museum of Art's first Wikimedian-in-Residence program, with resident Richard Knipel (User:Pharos), along with Wikimedia NYC. We invite you to help enhance Wikimedia communities and platforms with open access images from The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The event requires pre-registration. To register, 1) please sign-up with Eventbrite via The Met's website and 2) add your Wikipedia username to the #Participants on the wikimeetup page. Please check-in with museum staff when you arrive at the Thomas J. Watson Library within the museum. We also welcome remote participation for the global Met Open Access Artworks Challenge (15 May - 30 June, 2017), you can sign up there at Met Open Access Artworks Challenge/Participants. --Pharos (talk) 16:23, 16 May 2017 (UTC) | |
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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability and notability
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability and notability. Legobot (talk) 04:28, 24 May 2017 (UTC)
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A kitten for you!
Thanks for spotting the account impersonating me!
Deku-shrub (talk) 09:46, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- Aww what a cute impersonator. :) Maybe you should take it as a sign of respect -- one wouldn't impersonate some random editor, but rather an authority/experienced user whose edits will be accepted. Or something. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 13:56, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
Page you previously commented at
I see you recently previously commented at this page, maybe you can give your thoughts on Template_talk:Alt-right_sidebar#People_section. Sagecandor (talk) 22:43, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- @Sagecandor: Eh. If I were to return to that template it would be to TfD it. At least last I checked, it was entirely the product of OR. Unclear to me that there are clean enough borders around "alt-right" topics such that a navigation template makes sense. I haven't sent it to TfD because I'm not sure and would rather not get sucked into those articles :) — Rhododendrites talk \\ 22:47, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- That sounds like a good idea. Why don't you do that? You'd be a strong voice to start the discussion. Sagecandor (talk) 22:49, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- Because it's possible I'm wrong -- not about the OR, etc., but about the underlying idea of the template (i.e. it might be possible to do right, and figuring it out isn't a high priority for me). I'll participate if it's there, but I feel too much of an obligation to dig before I nominate for deletion. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 22:51, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- Judging by the talk page, there have been fights in the past by multiple users about who to include in the "People" section. This template seems rife for conflict by its very nature of WP:BLP issues. I think you'd be better skilled to nominate it, than I. What do you say? Sagecandor (talk) 23:52, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- I see you also previously raised concerns about its use at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Politics#Alt-right_sidebar and got no response. Sagecandor (talk) 00:00, 28 May 2017 (UTC)
- Judging by the talk page, there have been fights in the past by multiple users about who to include in the "People" section. This template seems rife for conflict by its very nature of WP:BLP issues. I think you'd be better skilled to nominate it, than I. What do you say? Sagecandor (talk) 23:52, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- Because it's possible I'm wrong -- not about the OR, etc., but about the underlying idea of the template (i.e. it might be possible to do right, and figuring it out isn't a high priority for me). I'll participate if it's there, but I feel too much of an obligation to dig before I nominate for deletion. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 22:51, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
- That sounds like a good idea. Why don't you do that? You'd be a strong voice to start the discussion. Sagecandor (talk) 22:49, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
Just to let you know, I changed it to a footer template. And also removed entries that did not mention the topic "alt right", at all, in their article's body text. Sagecandor (talk) 20:43, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
- @Sagecandor: Thanks. Made a few more edits, removing a few more that don't explicitly mention alt-right (other than in a category or headline). I suppose it's reasonable enough now that deletion isn't necessary. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 18:16, 10 June 2017 (UTC)
- Yeah, it's better now. Alhough it will forever attract irrelevant junk. Sagecandor (talk) 18:18, 10 June 2017 (UTC)
American politics editing
Please carefully read this information:
The Arbitration Committee has authorised discretionary sanctions to be used for pages regarding all edits about, and all pages related to post-1932 politics of the United States and closely related people, a topic which you have edited. The Committee's decision is here.
Discretionary sanctions is a system of conduct regulation designed to minimize disruption to controversial topics. This means uninvolved administrators can impose sanctions for edits relating to the topic that do not adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, our standards of behavior, or relevant policies. Administrators may impose sanctions such as editing restrictions, bans, or blocks. This message is to notify you that sanctions are authorised for the topic you are editing. Before continuing to edit this topic, please familiarise yourself with the discretionary sanctions system. Don't hesitate to contact me or another editor if you have any questions. This is just an informational notice. If you have questions, please contact me.We're on Twitter!
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Please comment on Talk:Blockbuster LLC
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Blockbuster LLC. Legobot (talk) 04:32, 3 June 2017 (UTC)
A barnstar
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The Original Barnstar | |
| This is for researching and writing Sexual assault of migrants from Latin America to the United States, for creating an elegant third option to the rape tree debate, and for immediately following up with the selective merge. Gorgeous work all around! ♠PMC♠ (talk) 18:21, 7 June 2017 (UTC) |
- @Premeditated Chaos: Thanks! Article still needs a lot of work, of course, and I hope to come back to it soon. I have to say, though... after reading through those sources, it's the only time I can think of that I worked on an article while wishing it weren't notable. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 05:26, 9 June 2017 (UTC)
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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Pages needing translation into English
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Pages needing translation into English. Legobot (talk) 04:32, 14 June 2017 (UTC)
Thursday June 22: Wiki Loves Pride Edit-a-thon @ MoMA
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 Join us for an evening of social Wikipedia editing at the Museum of Modern Art Library's third annual Wiki Loves Pride Edit-a-thon, during which we will create, update, and improve Wikipedia articles pertaining to LGBT art, culture and history. All are invited, with no specialized knowledge of the subject or Wikipedia editing experience required. Themes for this event include art related to HIV/AIDS activism and on LGBTQ artists of the African Diaspora as part of the Black Lunch Table project. Experienced Wikipedians will be on-hand to assist throughout the day. Please bring your laptop and power cord; we will have library resources, WiFi, and a list of suggested topics on hand.
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Books and Bytes - Issue 22
The Wikipedia Library
Books & Bytes
Issue 22, April-May 2017
- New and expanded research accounts
- Global branches update
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- Bytes in brief
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery on behalf of The Wikipedia Library team --MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:35, 20 June 2017 (UTC)
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B4 clarification
A clarification to WP:UP/RFC2016 § B4 has been proposed. You participated in that discussion; your input is welcome at Wikipedia:User pages/RfC for stale drafts policy restructuring/B4 clarification. Thanks, — Godsy (TALKCONT) 15:50, 23 June 2017 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Assume good faith
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Assume good faith. Legobot (talk) 04:31, 25 June 2017 (UTC)
This is to inform you that an attempt is being made to overturn an RfC that you voted on
This is to inform you that an attempt is being made to overturn an RfC that you voted on (2 RfCs, actually, one less than six months ago and another a year ago). The new RfC is at:
Specifically, it asks that "religion = none" be allowed in the infobox.
The first RfC that this new RfC is trying to overturn is:
- 15 June 2015 RfC: RfC: Religion infobox entries for individuals that have no religion.
The result of that RfC was "unambiguously in favour of omitting the parameter altogether for 'none' " and despite the RfC title, additionally found that "There's no obvious reason why this would not apply to historical or fictional characters, institutions etc.", and that nonreligions listed in the religion entry should be removed when found "in any article".
The second RfC that this new RfC is trying to overturn is:
- 31 December 2015 RfC: RfC: Religion in infoboxes.
The result of that RfC was that the "in all Wikipedia articles, without exception, nonreligions should not be listed in the Religion= parameter of the infobox.".
Note: I am informing everyone who commented on the above RfCs, whether they supported or opposed the final consensus. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:39, 26 June 2017 (UTC)