Wikipedia talk:Forum for Encyclopedic Standards/Archive 6

message: Material that is in the topical archive is not intended to be in the chronological archive. Maurreen 14:51, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Archives

message: *Referencing:  Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Fact and Reference Check 
**Also Wikipedia:Cite sources Maurreen 09:53, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recommended archive locations 

message: I've been thinking about Jmabel's suggestion of an "open cabal" and others' ideas of various groups, and a couple of other things I'm involved with in Wikipedia.
And I'm thinking we might be able to help each other in a loosely structured way, as mutual assistance group.
Here are couple of ideas:
#We could put up requests for help here. A couple people did this earlier, and one of them told me it was productive. This wouldn't need to be just for disputes, which leads me to ...
#Whether for just us, or maybe Wikipedia as a whole, we could compile a list of who knows what subjects and is willing to help people who want info on that subject. 
:Maurreen 06:02, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: To some extent, that is how WikiProjects work. I don't know if anybody has studied it, but I'd be willing to bet that articles under the aegis of a WikiProject are on the average of higher quality than other types of articles. Projects tend to focus on articles that come in large groups, all of the same "type"; something to think about is how to extend that to new kinds of areas. For instance, I got a scholarly book on Gabon yesterday (by the guy who wrote EB's entry on it!) and am ready to pump up our Gabon coverage, but there's no "WikiProject Gabon" to bring up questions like "Mba" vs "M'ba" (WP is inconsistent with the book), and it's kind of hit-or-miss to ping talk pages until somebody answers. Stan 06:50, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Our "cabal" :)

message: Archived and copied to Wikipedia:Forum for Encyclopedic Standards/Editorial arbitration. Maurreen 07:33, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Editorial arbitration 

message: I'd like to encourage wider input at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style.
The disagreements concern:
#The quote at the beginning of style guide.
#Fowler's "good" guidelines.
#The expressions "period" and "full stop."
#The serial comma.
#"U.S."
Even if you aren't normally interested in style issues, you might be interested in this discussion, because part of it discourages references. Thanks. Maurreen 08:01, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Style guide

message: I just want to say that some of my most pleasant and productive Wikipedia experiences have grown out of this group. Thank you. Maurreen 04:15, 7 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Thanks

message: I'm creating Wikipedia:Ethics and law. Maurreen 07:31, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Ethics and law

message: The Wikipedia:Library is a good start for getting lists of books and sources together. I'd like to increase the scope of that page to include something like this:
Church History in Plain Language                              	Church History in Plain Language
Shelly, Bruce L. (1995). Nashville:Thomas Nelson Publishers. .	Shelly, Bruce L. (1995). Nashville:Thomas Nelson Publishers. .
Owners
* Ta bu shi da yu                                      	Notes
Ta bu shi da yu:
Originally written by Bruce Shelley for his Bible College students, this book is a review of Church history from the book of Acts to the present day. I tend to find that the end bit focuses too much on American Christian history too much, and it skims over certain things (like the Anabaptists) but overall it's a really solid book if you are just looking for the main story of the history of the church.
My idea is to make WP:Lib more participatory. People get a chance to give their opinion of the reference material and fiction books they have at hand. This will help kick off the Library! After all, if one gets to hold forth on their opinion of something and we suspend NPOV on that bit, then I'm sure we'll all of a sudden get more people adding there books. However, I would suggest that we enforce a rule that says that all criticism/praise must have details why they have come to their conclusion.
I see the Library as being a little like file sharing, only it's really information source sharing... in other words, it a massive distributed library of books that are owned by many people. Think about it: most of us own at least 10 or more books. If 100 of us added all our books to the library with various well formed notes about the books then how much easier would it be to find information when we start researching?
So what do people think? - Ta bu shi da yu 12:11, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, TBSDY, my house has about 8,000 books (rough order-of-magnitude estimate) in it, so if I uploaded the complete list (many, although not all, are in a database), it might make your list a bit hard to use! I think the place we really need to accumulate book titles is in the article themselves (I tend to create both "Further reading" sections, for books I recommend to average readers, plus "References" for works more suitable for specialists, and always try to annote listings with comments on them); that both makes them available to our readers, as well as divides them up by subject. Noel (talk) 17:01, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Library 

message: Hi: Wikipedia is beginning to be peppered with photos that belong in "Playboy" etc. No scholarly person can accept the possible consequences of this development. Please express your views at:
Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Nudity (full frontal) pictures in an encyclopedia? 
Thank you for giving this matter your serious attention! IZAK 13:30, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, images of full nudiy and sexual organs, such as those here and here, have no place in an encyclopaedia. (Hint: wave your mouse over the links to see where they actually go.) Noel (talk) 17:01, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Avoiding the "Playboy" syndrome 

message: I have noticed the biggest problem with the lack of references in articles is that the general culture of Wikipedia is to write what you (think you) know instead of researching and collating other reliable sources.  I am interested in other people's ideas for ways to encourage research by every Wikipedia editor.  Currently multiple articles get nominated at WP:FAC almost daily that have no proper references and certainly few if any facts cited to sources.  That got me to thinking, it should not be an editors first time hearing that they should reference their articles when their nomination gets shot down at FAC.  Little if any of the introductory material for editors talks about the importance of research and citing reliable sources. I think the single most important thing we can do as part of this project would be to figure out how to make sure every introductory message an editor hears reinforces how important that is, and how to do it. Ideas on how to do that? - Taxman 11:10, Jan 22, 2005 (UTC)
: I could not agree more. The introductory material ought to be re-worded to emphasise this. Maybe it should include a kind of 'model article' showing how it ought to be done. Perhaps suitable articles from within Wiklipedia that reach these standards might be 'bookmarked' from the introductory material. I write my original Wikipedia articles off line on a text editor, and when I am satisfied they are OK send it on-line. Articles which start as a stub and have multiple edits by different people will clearly have no consistency. When I began, last summer, I jumped straight in, and have never read any introductory material. Perhaps we ought to have a system that when a new editor formally signs up he is automatically sent the information. I know that some senior editors like Angela have been in the habit of sending a brief personal message along these lines, but it never happened to me. Apwoolrich 16:27, 22 Jan
2005 (UTC)
:: I have had a look at the Wikipedia: Tutorial pages. What is missing is a section at the front saying something about what we are writing about and the format a typical article should follow. Maybe something like this is already in Wikipedia, and just wents a link Does anyone know, please? Apwoolrich 16:44, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Encouraging references and research

message: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Wikicite To add a card catalog and citation features. Stirling Newberry 01:03, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikicite project page 

message: At Talk:Blitzkrieg there is a dispute over the inclusion of material which is unreferenced. RfC is worthless: no neutral parties have troubled themselves with this. This is the most suitable place I can think of to seek additional exposure. Please comment there. 119 21:23, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Request comment on a disputed article

message: I have a proposal called Wikipedia:Baseline revision. Basically the gist is that we find a revision of an article that is as accurate, neutral and well written as possible, with all facts referenced correctly. Details are in the article itself - however, currently this is going under review. At the time of writing, I was thinking that we can start off baseline experiment by creating a baseline subpage that hangs off the article. For instance, the Common Unix Printing System would have Common Unix Printing System/baseline where a baseline could be proposed. Anyway, I figured that this project would be a good place to announce this. I would very much appreciate suggestions, debate, and modifications to the experiment. 
The nice thing, btw, with the thing I'm proposing, is that it doesn't actually impact or disrupt existing articles. It just adds a new subpage and it might be referenced at the top of the articles talk page. And even better: it's an experiment. If it doesn't work, then we can chuck it out as a failed experiment. That said, I hope it doesn't fail! - Ta bu shi da yu 08:10, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  New experiment: baseline revisions 

message: The page Wikipedia:Comparison to Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy grew out of the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy article.  It's got a list of criteria that rose out of the question "which is better WP or SEP?" that appeared in that article.  Would benefit from explanation, obviously relevant to the aims of this project, so I put a link on the project page. ---- Charles Stewart 15:07, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Comparison to SEP

message: For the last few days, there's been an extensive discussion about the suitability of Usenet as a citeable or reliable source for articles on Wikipedia at Wikipedia-EN. As a result one of the participants has added his opinion on the matter at WP:NOR -- & another has now removed as I write this. Because this page is marked as Official Policy, I invite people to enter into the discussion -- before the matter sinks into Yet Another Edit War. -- llywrch 19:05, 8 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Usenet]] as a source 

message: An important policy discussion has started concerning ways in which our content-related polices, such as NPOV, No original research and Cite sources could be better enforced. I've made a proposal to give the Arbitration Committee the ability to consult Wikipedia users who are knowledgeable in subject-areas that apply to cases before them. Such consultation is needed due to the fact that the ArbCom does not by itself have the requisite knowledge to easily tell what is NPOV, original research, or a fringe idea in every field. Please read my proposal at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/RFC#Alternate solution #9 by mav. Content subcommittee and comment. Thank you! --mav 02:36, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/RFC]] 

message: Comments requested at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Inline links discouraged in favor of more complete sources. (SEWilco 08:02, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Inline links discouraged in favor of more complete sources 

message: Do we have a mission statement?  I've been looking around and I can't find one.  What are we trying to accomplish?  How can we discuss standards to accomplish our goal if we don't know what our goal is?
I propose that our highest goal should be to enable people to convey information in the most efficient way possible.  Efficiency of communication is the most important tool available to a society .  A word can be an axiom of generally accepted information.  Combining several of these axioms, we can create a larger idea that is only possible when we think of the complex ideas of each word as an icon of information.  The larger idea can itself become an axiom if we define it concisely and assign a word to it.  This building of complex ideas as "black boxes" of information has enabled modern mathematics and computer hardware/software design, among other things.  To understand computer hardware design, for instance, one might not have to comprehend the fundamental philosophy of XOR gates, only that they work —— the black box returns specific output based on specific input.  When we know that a mathematical equation or piece of computer hardware is reliable, we no longer have to know what it consists of.  We can take its output and combine it with other axioms to create something greater.   Language works the same way when it is codified into black boxes —— packets of distinct information —— complex concepts that can be expressed in a word or small phrase.
A powerful language not only enables people to communicate and build on each other's ideas, it's also essential for organizing icons of thought on a personal basis.  If we can think of a concept, there should be a word for it.  Yet, quite often, the definitions of these words are watered down, confused, and politicized to the point that they no longer have much to do with the concept that needs to be conveyed.  If I talk about terrorism, for instance, there shouldn't be much ambiguity.  The word should obviously have something to do with terror, so the only remaining question could be, "What does the "ism" mean?"  It doesn't matter if you define "ism" as an action, philosophy, process, or practice; the meaning still conveys pretty much the same thing: "a policy intended to strike with terror those against whom it is adopted" - OED.
We can use the OED definition of terrorism as a black box.  It conveys a distinct concept that we can discuss, compare with world events, define examples, and search for solutions.  But we cannot use the Wikipedia definition of terrorism as a black box.  It renders the term essentially useless as a building block of our language.  We can argue that terrorism has been used out of context so much recently that it has taken on a new meaning of essentially "violence for the purpose of evil," but how can we then talk about the original concept: a philosophy of terror?  Have we lost that part of our language?  Can we no longer discuss terrorism objectively?  How can we discuss ways to end terrorism if we don't even know what it is?  I consider this to be the Elephant sitting at out Table.
Wikipedia is fast replacing all other resources of definitions for at least the English language.  Our society relies on the strength of that language to convey distinct icons of information.  This is no longer a game.  If it is taken seriously, Wikipedia will have a major impact on the most powerful tool of our civilization.  What we adopt as our highest principle will determine whether that impact will be positive or detrimental.  Everyone has personal bias.  Only when the bias of every editor has equal weight will it offset to create a balanced article.  Yet, success or failure to achieve that balance must be measured by some standard.  I propose that the standard be, "Does the term more concisely convey a distinct and unique concept?"  --Zephram Stark 03:08, 17 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: The Goal of an Encyclopedia

message: Members of this forum might want to weigh in at this discussion about whether we should recommend our readers to use other encyclopedias as sources or not. — mark ✎ 10:40, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Should we recommend our editors to use other encyclopedias as sources for our own articles? 

message: A straw poll is being taken based on whether using only URLs in an article is an acceptable style for citing sources instead of having more detailed citations.  See Talk:Global cooling#SEWilco.2C disruptive reverts.2C and citations.  (SEWilco 23:42, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Vsmith is presenting a misleading view of the situation, where the original article had dead URL-only links with numbered format, being replaced with standard Wikipedia:Footnote numbered links to citations.  See the discussion in Talk:Global cooling, and if you wish see Vsmith's alternative whose errors and weaknesses are described in Talk:Kyoto Protocol.  While he complains of consensus, Vsmith's edit is even more dramatic a style change than numbered links.  (SEWilco 05:58, 25 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Are URL-only links an acceptable citation style? 

message: User:Wyss says: "Because Wikipedia's applied sourcing methodologies are not at academic levels across its content I will no longer be participating in this project."
At least we did already know there is room for improvement.  (SEWilco 05:10, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I saw a PhD leave for similar reasons, and considered making a list of people who had left for these reasons... — Omegatron 14:58, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: See Wikipedia:Missing Wikipedians. It's really too bad about all the leaving, and we really can't just sit on our asses and bitch (excuse me, but we really need to do something). People talk about Wikipedia as if it's universally accepted and perfect the way it is. It has many great, redeaming features, but also has a few *minor* problems, that, if addressed, could make it perfect. What's it gonna take to get all those opposed to this to see the light and stop pretending we're more Wiki than Encyclopedia. As User:Doc glasgow so appropriately put it, "wiikipedia [[[sic]]] needs to decide if it wants to be a useful and relatively reliable encyclopaedia using a wiki format, or a wiki posing as an encyclopaedia – but actually being a graffiti wall and a dump for all the world’s unverified cruft." -Mysekurity 00:29, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

text: I think we could at least improve from where we are. We need to reve up the fact checking comittes. I think semi-protection will help cut out some nonsense too.Voice of AllT|@|ESP 03:49, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

text: What exactly does it mean to say that Wikipedia is a non-academic project. I've been raising the issue of "academic standards" on some articles, where people are using names and facts that are considered incorrect and inappropriate by academic norms, but are used colloquially. 
This can be handled by suitable notation.  Even the Merriam-Webster has relaxed its standards and entered the 'real' world, where most people live.
Aren't encyclopedias academic by definition. What are the implications of this? deeptrivia (talk) 00:07, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not impressed by a few self-professed 'academics' who pick up their marbles and go home because the game is not played according to their rules or standards(!)  I have any number of advanced degrees (that was my version of dropping-out in the '60s), but my overall impression of the academic profession is— "they need to get a life!"  ⇒  normxxx|  talk  ⇒  email 23:25, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lost a user due to low standards 

message: Alas, I am headed in the same direction as User:Wyss, as the result of vandalism, hoaxes, and POV pushing of the kind discussed in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Licorne and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Carl Hewitt.  I want to discuss my concerns with like-minded WP users, but before I say anything else, let me point out that the membership list has degenerated into a list of comments, so that it is not clear who the "members" are and what principles they agree upon.  Because I am not clear whether I myself am or should be a member of the Forum for Encyclopedic Standards, I hesitate to try to fix this, but I hope someone who knows more about this organization than I do will edit the project page appropriately.
I believe the goal of the WP is or should be the creation of a free on-line universal encyclopdia which offers well written, stylish, fair and accurate articles for the benefit of students, journalists, policy makers, and the general public worldwide.  However, I fear Wikipedia is in very grave danger of being degraded into something which is useless for serious students who come here to read reliable articles about science topics, my primary area of interest as an editor.
My views on the nature of the problem and my suggestions for possible responses are complex.  I am currently trying to much improve my currently disorganized explanation of why I think WP has a quality control problem and why I feel that the basic problem is that Wikipedia's populist ideals tend to conflict with (unintentionally but ineluctably elitist)  scholarly ideals to foster discussion.  Briefly, over the next five years, unfortunately, I expect that serious editors holding a view of the goal of WP similar to my own will gradually be driven out of Wikipedia classic by POV pushers, vandals, and hoaxers.  Some will say that this is not a bad thing for WP (some might even say good riddance!), but this will certainly be an undesirable outcome for those individual users who depart in sadness and disgust!  And I expect this will in the long run prove to be an undesirable outcome for WP as a whole, because I expect that the population of serious-minded editors will be gradually be displaced by persons who come here to rant, spam, or to push their cranky pseudoscience or political views.  Pretty much what happened in the newsgroups over the past twenty years, alas.
On the bright side, I have some ideas about how to buy time while we discuss longer term solutions, which I would like to discuss.  I also have some ideas about systematic migration to venues which might be more suitable for the collaborative creation of high-quality, accurate and WP:NPOV encyclopedia articles on math/sci topics and projects such as WikiProject GTR.  I would like to discuss these concerns and suggestions for both long and short term responses with like-minded Wikipedians.
In reading about the quality control problem over the past year or so, I have noticed that many user comments and several relevant documents, including Academic Standards Disease, appear to claim that those of us who argue that Wikipedia must Jettison its Anti-Elitism or degenerate into a playground for hoaxers, cranks, and spammers, simply do not undertand how WP works.  I'd like to make two points in response to this claim.
First, I think these comments may be confusing several distinct problems facing would-be designers of a techno-political model for creating an collaborative universal on-line encyclopedia, such as:
# Creating a critical mass of articles sufficient to convince more and more serious-minded, knowledgeable and articulate volunteers to contribute new articles on appropriate topics, 
# the problem of protecting high quality articles from mischiveous or malicious tampering,
# encouraging further high quality contributions after one has achieved critical mass,
# discouraging hoaxes, vandalism, inappropriate POV pushing, and other bad edits, bad articles, etc.
How has the Wikipedia model has served WP in addressing these problems?  I'd say
#very well,
#very badly,
#very well, at present (see below),
#very badly,
respectively.  Given the widely appreciated difficulty of political sea change at WP, I think this suggests that ultimately, migration of serious articles to a venue which protects the highest quality articles from mischieveous or malicious tampering is the most obvious long term solution. 
Second, I myself currently have [[more than 6600 edits to my name, and Larry Sanger actually founded the Wikipedia.  So I think we know how WP works, and we have demonstrated by our actions that we care about its future. ----CH 03:03, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: General discussion of encycopeldic goals, WP quality control problem, and possible responses

message: One of the simplest ways of improving the quality of articles is providing a simple bot that allows people to sweep through articles and clean up. We have them for disambiguation, stub sorting and a host of other odd jobs. One good step in this project would be to have a team of people list small, bot assistable, and coherent steps that would improve clean up - for example, adding ISBN numbers to books, or wikisource links to sources that are already in wiki - and then finding developers to work with them in creating these and setting them loose with editors who want to incrementally work through wikipedia.
Another simple step is thwarting edit gangs. We've all seen it - a few like minded editors who have a heavy POV to push take over a page, and procede to cruftify it - it becomes a dumping ground for fringe viewpoints. Often these articles are articles on ideologically charged points. There is a need to find a way to more rapidly raise a red flag and get a lot more editors on the page. In politics "government by obscurity" is holding open meetings that no one knows about, and putting power in the hands of 3 person committees that are theoretically open, but unadvertised. All over wikipedia this goes on - decisions are made by a consensus of two authors and then enforced by "our gang". 
The best way to get a wiki going in the right direction is provide tools that are insertable into the wiki-world. Memetic tools - tools that make people want to spread the word by using them - produce emergent behavior. Rather than hoping to build a (non-scaleable) top down system, we should be looking at making use of habits that are in place to improve the quality of the product.
Stirling Newberry 03:56, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The following section #Arbitration Committee is crazy involves several of the issues mentioned above.  Browse through the case's /Workshop.  (SEWilco 03:25, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Standards enforcement 

message: I don't know how much longer I can participate.  The Arbitration Committee, in violation of Wikipedia policies and Arbiration policy, dragged me into a farce of a case and now placed me on Probation and forbidden me from following policy Wikipedia:Verifiability and improving citations.    Another example of the need for Wikipedia:User Bill of Rights so we know the rules and arbitration actions are limited. (SEWilco 03:25, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: You dragged yourself into the case by your unreasonable behaviour, your refusal to participate in an RFC or to listen to the results, and your determined but failed attempt to sabotage the arbcomm case. Oddly enough the arbcomm didn't like all of that. Presumably, if you behave yourself, you can get your parole lifted. But since in your statement above you've still failed to see what people have been telling you all along - that this is about the reference format, not about verifiability - the omens are not good. William M. Connolley 09:30, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  The RFC had barely begun, and I participated in the arbcomm case as much as was necessary.  (SEWilco 07:45, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I do not know anyone besides SEWilco who supports his particular form of citation, and as far as I can tell he created his bot to convert citations without any community support or even discussion. Slrubenstein   |  Talk 22:28, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  I created the bot to create citations, it was too stupid to convert citations other than ones related to WP:FN.  WP:V makes quite clear that additional detail is preferred over minimal detail.  See WP:FAC for more examples of users of WP:FN, or browse through the thousands of  What-links-here articles.  WP:FN was the best tool for identification of which citation belonged to which segment of text.    That primitive bot is useful primarily because there are so many articles without citations.  (SEWilco 07:45, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Arbitration Committee is crazy 

message: A policy change has been proposed which is relevant to this project.  See Wikipedia:Verifiability/temp.  (SEWilco 04:46, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Policy change proposal: Wikipedia:Verifiability/temp 

message: Could someone try to get this back to a redirect, or at least watch it so nonsense is not put in. This list are way out of control.Voice of AllT|@|ESP 03:28, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[List of sexual slurs]] 

message: m:Wikicite is a project dedicated to implementing many of the mechanisms and processes recommended by The Forum for Encyclopedic Standards.  Technical design of this system is currently underway, and hopefully implementation can be completed this year.  Before that happens, though, we need feedback from the community regarding the project's useability and functionality.  Please take time to read the project proposal on Meta and then post your comments here regarding any improvements or missing features.  Thanks.
:Jleybov 23:46, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikicite Project 

message: This may be very hard for pop culture topics or recent events. Some people feel that means those topics are unencyclopedic, although it is hard to imagine a general consensus on that. We could, however, decide that some subject matter is outside the scope of this forum, even if others in Wikipedia choose to work on these topics.
: I moved this from the main page because it was in the wrong place and making things confusing. Sigrid 23:21, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The remark was basically mine. No problem with it being addressed, but I think we would do well to decide how this project relates to these topics. - Jmabel | Talk 19:55, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  And I see that in over a month of the comment sitting here, no one has addressed my remark. It is one thing to remove it to the talk page. It is another to fail to address it. - Jmabel | Talk 20:43, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Citing Popular culture 

message: What if teachers and professors created assignments for their classes that allowed students to take a Wikipedia page and provide references for it? This would have obvious added pedagogical value. It would have to be carefully monitored, of course. With less trustworthy students, teachers might want to have the class work on a page together and then the teacher could vet it before the changes went up. Sigrid 23:21, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Please have them edit with a username - makes for better accountability, and why not sign up for one yourself? Vsmith 14:19, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

text: And you may be interested to see Wikipedia:School and university projects which is a page documenting and coordinating similar classroom efforts. I agree it would be a great way to teach students research and citing, and of course learn material about a topic along the way. - Taxman Talk 15:17, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, that was just me (Sigrid) again. I must have let my login lapse without realizing it. Thanks for the tips. Sigrid 13:35, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Teachers: Have Our Students Help Reference Wikipedia 

message: Following up on my post from last month, there's a new template for inappropriate citations.  This is a way to flag problems such as quotations out of context, interpretive references to primary sources, and citations of tangential material.  It should be useful when working with editors who are either unfamiliar with proper scholarly citations or who try to legitimize their own OR through spurious references. Regards, Durova 04:36, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As the previous remark fails to note, the template is . - Jmabel | Talk 21:17, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes indeed, thank you. Durova 16:30, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Template 

message: I have made a suggestion at WikiProject Science and wonder what the users of this page think. --Oldak Quill 17:14, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: while this sounds like a good idea... the problem is that you'd need to find a way to keep the articles at the highest standard and I'm not sure that can be done given the dynamic nature of the wiki.   The reasons peer review works in academia is because we have fixed objects... the paper that goes through a revision cycle that ultimately ends in publication or rejections.   You can't really do that with a fluid document with many authors, can you?  --Buridan 19:07, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The path to Wikipedia 1.0 and various validation features are well on the way. --Oldak Quill 22:46, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikipedia:Scientific peer review 

message: The following is an article that became a good article and a featured article candidate despite several copyright problems.  It probably would have damaged the project if it had appeared on the main page: Mango.  I am awarding a barnstar to the sharp eyed editor who first spotted the violations. Durova 14:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The importance of oversight 

message: Just a heads up for people watching this page, there has been some (strange to my mind) resistance to having the Did you know on the main page only allow referenced facts. For reasons I expanded on in that talk page I think highlighting unreferenced facts and articles on the main page is not what we should be promoting and violates the verifiability policy anyway. Please go there and comment so we can move to ecouraging the type of referenced work we need. Thanks - Taxman Talk 18:52, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Where would I go to urge people who like DYK the way it is now (and who think that encouraging newcomers to write articles and having them see the profound improvements to their articles (including the addition of references in many case) when they are selected far outweighs this issue), to come and visit a discussion thread and speak out in the other direction? Because the above para sort of feels like votestackrecruitment to me, although I'm no doubt misinterpreting it. DO NOT take this as a suggestion that I think referencing is bad. Merely that messing up DYK is not the way to achieve the goal. ++Lar: t/c 19:13, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I obviously think it is and on that page is the right place to discuss it in any case. It's not a vote we just need people that understand the relevant issues to have a discussion. - Taxman Talk 19:19, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia talk:Did you know]] unreferenced problem 

message: I'm editing a few fields which have a significant amount of controversy over their scientific standing. In each case there is a relatively limited and hard to track down canon of academic literature, some supportive, some critical, some flawed, (by other researchers' judgements) and some reliable.
What I'd like to do would be an article "List of studies on <subject X>". The aim would be an article that listed researches and their (summary) findings or how they are considered by other (cited) authorities. The aim of doing so would be:
* A list of academic papers and information in some relatively hard to research fields.
* Reduction of NPOV disputes, by means of a single article that lists and summarizes known papers on both sides (rather than footnoting a few selected or drawing conclusions, which leads to allegations of "POV"), and therefore making it more obvious to see what in fact the research does say in reality, which can be agreed by both sides.
I think that a list of sources has a value in and of itself, not just a place in footnotes for other articles. I've had one experienced editor saying such articles are unencyclopedic, and another editor say its exactly what's needed. Would some discussion be possible?
A format for such an article would be:
::List of studies into X-ology documents the range of research, and current viewpoints and findings, by science, into X-ology.
::===Studies 1990-2005===
::* Jim (1994) - double blind study of 200 white males, concluded ___. Supported by Jim (2000) but called pseudoscientific by Ann (2001) due to claimed methodological weaknesses.{CITE/REF}
::* Mark(1996) - metastudy by French Department of inetrior, into usability of X-ology in social security provision. Examined 3000 individuals spread across 14 peer reviewed studies. Concluded some positive indications, no conclusive evidnece. Recommended further review.{CITE/REF}
::* Jane (2000) - clinical study of 23 case reports on X-ology in psychiatric hospitals and trauma clinics. Concluded that X-ology is linked to <Y> but bears little relation to <Z>. Interview questions not listed, no controls, considered "contradictory and questionable" as to reliability by Ann (2001) (p.47).{CITE/REF}
::===See also=== etc
As said, I've been told by an experienced editor this would not be encyclopedic. But on the other hand I've been told by others it is a legitimate list of valuable information, if that information is not readily collated in a source elsewhere. It's not clear whether wikipedia:Listcruft has the upper hand, or WP:LIST ("The list may be a valuable information source. This is particularly the case for a structured list. Examples would include lists... grouped by theme, or annotated lists.")
Comments how others watching encyclopedic standards see it?
FT2 (Talk) 12:44, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This would not belong in the article, but might be useful on the talk page. - Jmabel | Talk 23:47, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Encyclopedic or not? Question seeking comments.