Wikipedia talk:No original research/Archive 12

message: JA: I will discuss under this heading a number of logical, practical, and structural problems that are rather apparent in the present configuration of directives regarding self-citation.  As it is a holiday in the U.S., this may take a couple of days.
JA: The present edition of WP:NOR Policy makes its own statement about "Citing Oneself" and then defers by way of a slightly euphemistic bit of piping to a section of the WP:VAIN Guideline, to wit, the statement copied here:
Citing oneself
If you wish Wikipedia to cite your own reliably published work, please bear in mind the neutral point of view and no original research policies.  It is probably best that you do not cite your own work, as this might be misintepreted.  You can however suggest that changes be made to the talk page of the article in question so that other editors can discuss and make those changes if they are worthwhile.
(Wikipedia:Vanity guidelines#Citing oneself, 03 Sep 2006).
JA: This bit of indirection introduces a whole host of problems into WP directives, which I will detail later on, tonight or tomorrow.  Jon Awbrey 01:06, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems to me that this policy page should reflect the fundamental policy, and that the guideline WP:VAIN is more of an elucidation of what the policy means and how to apply it.  If the wording of WP:VAIN is at variance with the actual NOR policy, then it should be changed.  I would hope we hammer out the appropriate wording here, and then take the results of our discussions over to WP:VAIN and make it consistent and correct next.  Does that seem right? -GTBacchus(talk) 01:17, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

text: That is correct. A guideline is not a policy and less watched, so there is no real problem here. Nevertheless, it does deviate from the current policy - which has been like this for a long time and is well-founded. I have noticed it before, without taking action; but now I strongly suggest to adjust the guideline to be consistent with the policy. Harald88 07:04, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Practical and Structural Problems with the Present Directives on Self-Citation 

message: JA: GTB, that was not a mass revert.  I merely restored the lead sections to where they were on 19 Aug 2006.  We wouldn't want anybody to get confused and start calling what is essentially the same thing as the lockdown version "longstanding" or anything, now would we?  Jon Awbrey 19:52, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not calling anything longstanding; I'm just unfamiliar with the distinction between restore and revert.  Whatever it was, it was sloppily done, and I was cleaning it up.  If this starts flip-flopping back and forth again, we'll have it protected again, in the Wrong Version.  Ok? -GTBacchus(talk) 19:57, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

text: Aren't you the 1COWAAT guy, anyway?  Aren't we still working on the "Expert editors" can? -GTBacchus(talk) 19:58, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I'm not sure where it came from, but someone reinserted part of an old version of this article that was disputed and dealt with (or so I believe). I reverted back to the last recent version by GTBacchus. Harald88 20:00, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It wasn't "someone", it was User:Duncharris. He's got a talk page. I've left him a note. -GTBacchus(talk) 20:06, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

text: Look at  there is something dodgy going on with removing the primary sources section.  I am confused. But you shouldn't be making changes without consensus. — Dunc|☺ 20:05, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I think we saw that happen. There is something dodgy going on, and we're trying to work it out here. Please don't engage in any editing of this article that's under discussion without being involved in the discussion. This page will be protected again very soon if people continue to make reversions, restorations, reinsertions, or any other disputed edit without prior establishment of consensus. We have to leave it in the Wrong Version while we talk about it - there is no other way to avoid protection. -GTBacchus(talk) 20:09, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

text: Exactly, that's why I called it a revert.  What point are you making, exactly?  Why is our energy directed to editing the article instead of trying to further the discussion, at this point? -GTBacchus(talk) 20:17, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

text: Right, the "longstanding consensus version" is also not a consensus version.  "No change w/o consensus" also means no change back without consensus.  When there is a dispute, as there manifestly is right now, we all have to stop editing and talk.  If someone makes an edit in a dispute, we have to talk to them (or at least make a good faith attempt) before undoing anything they did.  Otherwise, we get another edit war, and in a war, being right doesn't really mean shit.  If someone calls the Wrong Version the consensus version, then you may correct them, and let me know, and I'll point out as well how wrong they are.... but that's no excuse to edit war. -GTBacchus(talk) 20:54, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

text: Jon, I'm trying to keep an edit war from happening (you'll note the page is protected again), and I'm trying to apply what little I've learned about building consensus on controversial articles.  If it's very frustrating to you, I'm sorry; perhaps you can teach me a better way to be.  I think we need to focus on discussion before editing, and I'm not so naïve as to think anybody ends a revert war by reverting.  What have you got, Jon, what should I be doing better?  Am I one of these "WikiPunk Kids" you're talking about?   Why not be clear about whom you're accusing of what - obscurity leads to misunderstanding. -GTBacchus(talk) 21:41, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: That Was No Revert

message: JA: People keep explaining the very same stuff till they are blue in the face.
# None of us who came to WP to work on subject matter articles like spending our time on these policy pages.
# The only reason we come to a policy page is because some [executive deleterious]-type person sets upon an article we're working on with some typically anti-knowledge commandment like "X is non-encyclopedic", where X is anything from an epigraph to a primary source quotation to a Greek epitome to a bib that's to big for them.
# So we come out to a policy page to check out whether their writ is legit.
# Ninety percent of the time, at least until recently, the policy page states what is just plain common sense to people who have common sense about doing sourced research, and it's only that particular Con-Troll-Freek's super-looney or hyper-literal way of reading the policy that is the real source of the absurdity.
# So you waste a week or so explaining that to the person in question.
# The third time this happens, you realize you will have to rinse and repeat this cycle about every month or two, but that's okay, that's almost bearable, or so you think.
# So you go back to work, feeling a bit reassured, fool that you are.
# Meanwhile, the Hermeneutic Loonies in question, who never actually waste their time on writing articles, have snuck off to their sandboxes to craft a new version of the policy page that will cast in stone their peculiar grasp of the realites of research.
# Then they descend on the policy page in one fell swoop with their sandbox revision, utterly non-incrementally the way it's sposed to be done in a wiki, with their new edition, and start calling it longstanding policy.
# All the people who protest get hounded off the scene, and many of them you never see their name in WP again.
# You can look back through the histories and see this happening time and again.
JA: Jon Awbrey 22:52, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: JA, you're not telling me anything new, nor do I see a direction forward indicated in your post here.  What exactly is your point?  That you're frustrated?  Understood.  Anything else? -GTBacchus(talk) 23:00, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

text: Super.  That's why I'm trying to get Duncharris and Slrubenstein, who seem to be the originators of the changes in question, to come here and discuss those changes.  It sounds like you and I are just about on the same page, no? -GTBacchus(talk) 23:18, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The new paragraph is the result of considerable discussion and proposals, then my editing different suggestions together, then several other people making additional changes based on discussion.  In short, there has already been considerable discussion concerning these changes, and an overwhelming majority of editors participating in the discussion supported the current version.  I have nothing to add to what I have said already and I doubt anyone else does.  The result will be this: Jon will keep writing criticisms.  That no one responds is not a sign that his view is the consensus view, but rather the opposite.  We never censor people on talk pages which is why this kind of thing will happen now and again. Slrubenstein   |  Talk 23:51, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Huh.  As far as I can tell, the current version IS the old version IS the version that Jon Awbrey supports.  Am I missing something? -GTBacchus(talk) 23:54, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

text: I've been mostly lurking here, but I agree that the last two or three weeks have thoroughly muddied the waters of this policy, partly because more than one change has been thrown in. I think we need to go back to before the revert wars broke out and take the latest version that was relatively stable for a while as the basis for discussion. I understand that a consensus can shift, but a version that has been stable for a while may be presumed to represent a consensus, and one person's edit should not be taken as having established a new consensus, unless acquiesced in by everyone else. -- Donald Albury 23:55, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm pretty sure that's where we are right now, with the page protected in something very close to the three-weeks-ago version.  The exception would be the "Expert editors" section, which has changed to a "Citing oneself" section, which is almost identical except for a discreet link to the vanity guidelines. -GTBacchus(talk) 00:04, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

text: That seems accurate to me.  The version in which the page is currently protected appears to be supported by many editors, although Pproctor seems to still have an issue with any kind of link to the vanity guidelines.  Some of us are now attempting to get the vanity guidelines renamed and rescoped as "conflict of interest guidelines", which might solve Pproctor's issue - not sure. -GTBacchus(talk) 00:11, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: If you have a longtanding version that lasts longer than four years, please see a doctor

message: User claims you need a source to claim something doesn't exist. Thoughts? Arbusto 20:07, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Without looking at it, it seems a rather obvious fact that a source is required for such an extreme claim. Harald88 20:10, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  RfC for [[Hyles Anderson College]]