Talk:2020 United States presidential election/Archive 15

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Ballot access table

It looks like the criterion for inclusion of candidates in the ballot access table has been to have ballot or write-in access to most of the electoral college, but the number of candidates satisfying this criterion is growing as more states are publishing their lists of write-in candidates. Currently there are 10 (see here), some of whom haven't been added to the table yet, and several more are expected in a few days. Should we use a more limiting criterion? I suggest the same used for the open debate, ballot access in at least 8 states, which would limit it to 10 candidates.

I also noticed that in the article for the previous election, the ballot access table was only added after the election, listing only candidates who received more than 100,000 votes. So should we just remove the table altogether, and only add it after the election based on the votes? Heitordp (talk) 11:55, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

Heitordp, there was a consensus to include all candidates with access to 270 electoral votes (including write-in access) in that table. If more candidates have achieved that since the table was created, then they can be added. Taking a look at Third party and independent candidates for the 2020 United States presidential election, it seems that Blankenship and Simmons now qualify to be included in the table, in addition to the candidates already listed. ― Tartan357 ^(Talk) 22:59, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

Well personally, if Jade Simmons, who is on the ballot in like two states and has done absolutely nothing of importance meets the criteria for that table, I would rather just remove it. I mean, it's clearly not even showing us the most notable third-party candidates at that point. Devonian Wombat (talk) 23:34, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

Devonian Wombat, I'm personally indifferent, but there may be a well-established consensus behind this that I'm unaware of. ― Tartan357 ^(Talk) 04:58, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

There is also Kasey Wells, who is not listed on any ballot but reached access to more than 270 EC votes by write-in registration alone. See the collapsed table under the main table here. Given that he's not even visible by default in that article, I'm hesitant to list him in the main article. Moreover, I don't think that access to most of the electoral college is a good criterion at all, because it's not difficult to obtain and it's not even a requirement to win the election. In theory, a candidate could win just one state (or even just one unpledged elector) and then get elected in the House (that was Evan McMullin's strategy in 2016). Of course that is extremely unlikely, but so is winning by write-in votes. I'd rather rely on notability such as media coverge or being invited to the open debate. For now I'll add only Don Blankenship as he satisfies both criteria. Heitordp (talk) 09:37, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

I oppose removing the ballot access table, leave it in for now, the number of people in it will be culled after election day when they fail to get the 100,000 votes. Note that the election results table for post election has a lower bar than the ballot access table, every candidate that gets 0.1% of the popular vote or alternatively gets a electoral college vote (via pledged, unpledged or faithless) is included.XavierGreen (talk) 13:50, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

On second thought, I think I can agree with XavierGreen on this one. Looking at the 2016 page though, it looks like the bar for inclusion in the election results table is 0.05%, not 0.1%. Devonian Wombat (talk) 07:27, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

At 0.05%, its entirely possible that anyone from Phil Collins of the Prohibition Party on up ballot access wise could meet the inclusion criteria in terms of the final popular vote tally.XavierGreen (talk) 00:53, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

It's possible sure, but I doubt it would happen. In 2016, Gloria La Riva was on the ballot for a combined 80 electoral votes, and just barely got 0.05%. If we apply the same standard here, Kanye West, Brock Pierce, Don Blankenship, Rocky De La Fuente, Gloria La Riva, Howie Hawkins and Jo Jorgensen would all be in the results table, and that seems fine to me. Devonian Wombat (talk) 01:23, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Please add Jade Simmons, she reached >270 EC with write-in Deniz Demir 28 (talk) 10:51, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. I made some formatting changes to the table: expanded the names of candidates, added wikilinks, lightened background colors to improve legibility, merged states and DC, formatted total access in smaller and italic text, moved and added notes. I also removed the empty columns for now, they can be added after the votes are counted. Let me know if you don't like these changes.

Regarding the criterion for inclusion, I kept the consensus of access to most of the electoral college, which required adding Jade Simmons and Kasey Wells. Tartan357 removed Kasey Wells as he's not listed on any ballot, to avoid undue weight. I agree. Later, Mark Charles also reached access to 270 electors, and I noticed that two other quite unknown candidates might also reach that threshold soon (President R19 Boddie and Tom Hoefling). These candidates are on the ballot in only one state, so to keep them off the table I raised the criterion to being on the ballot in more than one state (in addition to reaching >270 electors with write-in). Do you agree?

The remaining candidates that can still satisfy these criteria are Brock Pierce and Kanye West. Brock Pierce is close so I expect him to reach the threshold soon. But Kanye West would have to register in all remaining write-in states to reach it, which I find unlikely. However, he has been mentioned in the media more than any other minor candidate, so he might even get more votes than most of the others despite having less access and a less serious campaign. Should we change the criteria to include him too? Maybe add an alternative criterion of ballot access to more than 10 states? Heitordp (talk) 12:32, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

Tom Hoefling and Kanye West can no longer reach access to 270 electors. Due to recent edits and lack of response here, I don't really see a consensus to use access to most of the electoral college as the criterion for inclusion in the table, at least not on its own. And as I wrote earlier, it satisfies neither theory (it's not an absolute requirement to be elected president) nor practice (it has little relation to notability or popularity). Instead, I propose including candidates that have ballot access in more than one state and ballot plus write-in access in most states. This would include all candidates currently in the table, plus Brock Pierce and Kanye West. I'll go ahead and make this change, but I'm still open to discussion if someone disagrees. Heitordp (talk) 06:38, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Rename the "issues" section

Issues sounds like it would refer to any issues covered in the campaign, for example, healthcare. Instead, it talks about things that affect the election process. If anybody wants to write about campaign issues, they can do so in a new section, but the title of this current section should be indicative of its contents. The title of this section was previously something like "Issues unique to the 2020 election", which was more descriptive. I don't know what it should be changed to, but maybe "noteworthy issues" or "election considerations." Thanks. 2601:640:4000:3170:4086:D5CA:2B0D:D113 (talk) 06:29, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

• Support "Issues unique to the 2020 election" per nom. ― Tartan357 ^(Talk) 21:29, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

I additionally support changing the name to "Issues unique to the 2020 election" (or some suitable and similar alternative) Przemysl15 (talk) 02:59, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

move the polls from the article to another article - state polls were completely wrong in 2016

I've looked at the polls section and don't think it should be part of the article. These were all the same polls that were wrong in 2016 at the state level while at the national level they were roughly correct. It's a high level of detail and considerable article space for something that likely will not be correct. Plus it is confusing and I question how often it is actually being updated. Thoughts. SailedtheSeas (talk) 01:11, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose: Wikipedia does not evaluate the methodology of predictions and they should be included because they are an important part of the election. ― Tartan357 ^(Talk) 20:03, 28 October 2020 (UTC)
• Support removing state level polls (I wasn't looking for something akin to a rfc, but in case that seems better I'll weigh in that way). I think they should be moved to their own article with a link from this one because they were all wrong in 2016 and there's no reason to assume they'll be right this time. I'm not asking wp to eval the methodology as that was done in 2016 when they were all wrong and i've looked at multiple polls and have yet to find one that has said they modified their methodology in the light of being wrong. And just so I'm clear, it's the level of detail that's my issue ie all 50 states + DC. I think this article should only have national level polls and that another article can have the state level of detail. At some point one has to make a judgement about how long an article is and whether it should be shortened for the good of the article. And lastly i'm not sure why polls are an important part of the election. Do you vote based on the poll of what other people think? Maybe I'm unusual but I have my own mind and I look at the policies of a person and their statements to decide who to vote for and don't vote based upon who an obviously prejudice media wants me to vote for. Frankly, the reason I supported Ross Perot way back in 92 was because I didn't like the other two, but I didn't support him 4 years later. I'd be curious as to some clarity around why polls are so important to you so I can try and understand. Thanks. SailedtheSeas (talk) 02:48, 29 October 2020 (UTC)
• Comment: Where on this page are there any polls, much less state polls? There isn't anything to remove. Przemysl15 (talk) 03:05, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, guess it's actually called "state predictions" but it's all based on polls so it's kind of a word game. actually all the info in the long table is actually available via polls links just above the section and these other pages are current whereas the info in the table is over 2 weeks old which is ancient in light of all the stuff going on. BTW I tried to follow some of the links in the table to what's supposed to be source material and most do not work or do not follow to info that actually supports the table. SailedtheSeas (talk) 03:25, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose per Tartan357. Mdewman6 (talk) 03:29, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Interestingly there is no such section type in any prior election. That table is effectively a "stand-in" for when actual results will come in so for that reason it's useful, but the info in it is completely out of date. I do reserve the right though if when I look at this later still find the links do not actually support the info in the table that i'll remove it. regardless it must be sourced and right now it is not very well and it definitely is not current. SailedtheSeas (talk) 03:38, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

• Opposse, It can be removed once we actually have a results table, for now it serves a useful purpose. And if it is removed, Please take care not to remove the Results table that is currently hidden in the state predictions section. I also query the nom's assertion that they were "all wrong" in 2016. Yes, Trump overperformed expectations with regard to the predictions in some states, especially in the Rust Belt, but that is hardly grounds for a blanket statement such as that. There is a reason why the category "Lean R/D" exists, and its exactly to account for scenarios like that. Devonian Wombat (talk) 06:43, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

What to do on the mid-afternoon on November the Fourth

Here's a good link to a pamphlet on what might happen if Trump tries to steal the [1] election. It could be used as an outline for an article, if worse comes to worst. I think such an article should be built from this draft which I've already started. Or Biden could win by a landslide and Trump concede, in which case, never mind. Arglebargle79 (talk) 12:41, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

No, that is a self-published source on Google Docs, that should not be used under any circumstances. Devonian Wombat (talk) 21:14, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Arglebargle79, no matter how many times you try to get a WP:CRYSTALBALL article created on the "mess" you predict on 11/4, it will not happen. WP:DROPTHESTICK. ― Tartan357 ^(Talk) 21:26, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Not sure, but this sure feels like a good time to invoke WP:DENY Przemysl15 (talk) 03:00, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

I can personally vouch for Arglebargle79, while they have done many things I disagree with and several things I consider misguided and silly, I have no doubt they are here to build an encyclopaedia. Devonian Wombat (talk) 07:51, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Przemysl15, agreed. They've pushed this before and I've previously said to WP:DENY. I should have continued to follow my own advice and not dignified this with a response. ― Tartan357 ^(Talk) 08:43, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

The election is less than a week away. I said it was something to read in case what might happen happens. Suggesting that getting people prepared is a BAD thing, is just really silly. If the result is so clear that Trump decides to accept the results, then fine. It's still something to think about. Arglebargle79 (talk) 10:54, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

• Hi Arglebargle79. While I do believe you are trying to help us by telling us to prepare for the possible election outcome you laid out- there isn't really much we can do at this point except wait for the election to play out, and then update Wikipedia accordingly. You're welcome to make draft articles, but keep in mind that a lot of the content of your potential article would be based on what happens after the election. So a draft article at this stage of the race would only get you so far.

In response to some of the other users on this talk page, please note that WP:AGF applies, and unlike WP:DENY (which is only an essay), WP:AGF is an actual Wikipedia guideline. Of course, assuming good faith does not apply when it is obvious that someone is acting in bad faith. But I don't really think Arglebargle79 is intentionally disrupting this talk page. Prcc27 (talk) 19:15, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Very well. I can assume good faith on the part of Arglebargle. Wombat is right he has a long and protracted history of at least nominally constructive edits in the general US Election space. However, there is a similarly lengthy and protracted history of talk page edits along the line of "when this happens all hell will break loose and we need to be ready", often followed by calls to action for massive page overhauls, restructurings, or something of the sort, all of which are met with responses exclusively deeming such actions premature in nature with the best action being simply waiting until the date of apparent Armageddon. Many such comments can be found in this very thread. I'm not sure if the user in question was taken to ANI over it but I certainly know it was discussed. I know you're supposed to references diffs with this but I am not intending to call out anyone, just state that DENY was probably unfounded and out of frustration that I see no willingness to stop throwing proverbial "we need a massive overhaul" darts at the mainspace dartboard, and the cycle perpetually continues. However, this sort of thing is mildly frustrating at worst and doesn't need DENY or anything else invoked for that matter. Przemysl15 (talk) 21:03, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Przemysl15, agreed. I feel exactly the same way (frustrated) by this and concede that invoking WP:DENY was probably unnecessary. I acknowledge that disruptive editing (WP:ICANTHEARYOU in this case) isn't necessarily bad faith editing. ― Tartan357 ^(Talk) 08:02, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Arglebargle79, please stop worrying about what will happen "after" the election. Just do good work now and it'll all fall into place (on Wikipedia, at least). – Muboshgu (talk) 19:25, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

The file is not opening for me. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:40, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

It wouldn't open for me when I made the first comment, so the Devonian Wombat comment on that it should never be used is well placed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Przemysl15 (talk • contribs)

Let's go back to the Y2K bug, for a moment. In the early to mid-90s, someone noticed that the old code from the '70s would crash when the years went from 1999 to 2000. People started to panic. "oh my GAWWD!!!" they said, "the cyberworld's going to crash!!!" This doomsday scenario was actually taken seriously, millions and millions of dollars were spent trying to fix it, and they were successful. Nothing happened. The general public laughed at these "Cassandras" who were yelling and screaming, but the general public was wrong. Thanks to the Cassandras, we dodged a major bullet.

Unlike previous elections besides 2000 and 1876, all the post-election formalities were, with a tiny blip or two, were unremarkable formalities worth a mention, but not an article, there's a distinct possibility of major disruptions and litigation. There have already been half a dozen Supreme court rulings.

As to doing a draft, I am already working on one. I invite everyone to come and improve the living daylights out of it. if you want to change the title to something like "2020-21 Presidential transition" that would be fine. I am open to suggestions. There is nothing wrong with being ready. The election's in less than a week. Arglebargle79 (talk) 13:58, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Why not calm down, wait & see. GoodDay (talk) 15:19, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

What if Biden does not win though? Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 15:26, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

The draft article would be deleted. GoodDay (talk) 15:29, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Like @GoodDay said. I've no problem with that. Arglebargle79 (talk) 15:30, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Could we please archive this section of the talk page? I tried archiving it, but was immediately reverted. Prcc27 (talk) 23:13, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

As I said archive the whole section when it no longer needed. Don't break out a sub-section that is part of a large section. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 23:17, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @Prcc27: Why? This page archives automatically, and it's very unusual to archive just a subsection of a talk page section. Why can't it just archive normally along with the rest of the conversation, when it meets the criteria for the bot? GorillaWarfare (talk) 23:18, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Adding to issues in lede: immigration

Immigration has been one of the most hotly contested issues of Trump's presidency. I think this deserves a mention in the lede, maybe just a link to Immigration policy of Donald Trump and saying that Biden criticizes it, or also more specifically mentioning aspects like the Trump administration family separation policy. Examples of news coverage: NYT, CNN. -Avial Cloffprunker (talk) 00:42, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 7 November 2020 (3)

In the section "Election night aftermath," the sentence "Fox News projected Biden would win Arizona at 11:20 p.m. EST on election night, and the Associated Press called the state at 2:50 a.m. EST on November 4, several other media outlets concluded the state was too close to call." There should either be a semicolon instead of a comma after "November 4," or the word "but" or "although" after "November 4." Mlb96 (talk) 06:10, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

To editor Mlb96:  done, and thank you very much! P.I. Ellsworth  ed. ^put'r there 13:17, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 7 November 2020 (2)

Kamala Harris IS NOT BLACK! This is a gross error in ethnicity, not to mention ignorance, to say the least. She is, by her very name and parentage (as it states on her own Wiki page) of Indian, Hindu descent, her family hailing from Chennai, which, for the illiterate, is the capital of the state of Tamil Nadu IN INDIA. Moreover from a highly cultured family (read the page). Whoever wrote this illiterate entry about her being black needs to go back to school. Annaclewis (talk) 05:04, 7 November 2020 (UTC) PLEASE CORRECT THIS UNACCEPTABLE ERROR IMMEDIATELY!Annaclewis (talk) 05:04, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

 Not done: this has already been discussed ad nauseam. Just read this talk page and its FAQ. —MelbourneStar☆^talk 05:24, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 7 November 2020 (4)

Wikipedia is biased trump and Biden have yet to win the election is still too close to call we need Arizona Nevada North Carolina Georgia to get votes in before a winner is decided 2600:1000:B06C:7EDD:D4B8:2F63:BE00:379B (talk) 17:06, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

 Not done Wikipedia goes by what reliable sources say. If you have an issue with their choice to call the election, I would recommend taking it up with them. GorillaWarfare (talk) 17:08, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Election night prep

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Election night is less than 1 month away!!! I just replaced the "ongoing" parameter with a parameter that will allow us to say "projected electoral votes" instead of "electoral votes" up until the vote count becomes more official. We need to make a few things clear before the big night (not sure if we should make this into an RFC):

1. How many reliable news organizations must project a state before we add its electoral vote totals to the infobox and the map? I will note that in 2016, it seemed like it only took 1 news organization projection for us to update the map and infobox. This meant that Wikipedia indicated that Donald Trump won the election before most (all?) the major news organizations did. Do we want to continue this to give readers up-to-date information, or do we want to be on the safe side just in case an outlier news organization gets a projection wrong?
2. Do we need to spell out which news organizations qualify as reliable and should be used for our projections, or should work that out on election day as projections come in?
3. When should we add the popular vote tally to the infobox article? If we add it right when votes start coming in, how often would we update the tally? And which source would we use for the popular vote tally while it's in flux? Popular vote tallies will differ across different news organizations up until we get a better idea of what the official tally will be.
4. Are we going to use the dark gray color that we used for the primary election maps on the map in this article? The dark gray color was used to indicate that all the polls were closed in a state, but that no projection had been made for the state. This color was not used in 2016 if I remember right, but I liked having it in the primary election articles, so I would like to see it used in this one.[2] Prcc27 (talk) 01:14, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

Excellent questions. My responses: (1) Two Three reliable news organizations. (2) Yes. My initial list of reliable news organizations (for this purpose): AP, Reuters, CNN, Fox News, ABC, NBC, CBS, BBC, NPR, PBS, New York Times. I don't know if the Wall Street Journal routinely calls states on their website, but if so, add WSJ to the list. Maybe count AP as "two" for this purpose, as long as we know which news organizations rely on AP before they call a state, in which case we would not count them and AP. (3) Do not post until 12 hours after the last polling places close and add an easy-to-see asterisk with an easy-to-find note explaining the preliminary nature of the number. Then every 12 hours. (4) I concur. Grey seems to be a universal "don't know" color, and it's better than white, which I interpret as "the state is so incompetent no one knows if any results will be posted in 2020". Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 22:44, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

I concur with Mark Worthen, but I do have some things to add, namely, should Politico be added to the list of reliable sources?, and I think the gap between updating the popular vote after the first 12 hours should be shortened somewhat, perhaps every six hours, because after the first 12 hours things will probably have calmed down a bit. Devonian Wombat (talk) 02:12, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Mark Worthen as well with the Devonian Wombat alterations of Politico and 12>6 hours. Przemysl15 (talk) 16:04, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

How could I forget Politico!? And yes, 6 hours seems quite reasonable. :) Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 00:26, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

We have to be careful about calling it for two reasons: one it will almost certainly not be clear who wins on election night because many key states are accepting mail-in ballots for a few days after November 3rd. Also, it is also somewhat likely there will be a big fight about the winner-I don't want to get out my crystal ball-but we should just make sure not to get involved on a side of the political debate by calling it before it is official. Hollywood43ar (talk) 12:36, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

We should document any reliable sources who do call it, however. Przemysl15 (talk) 18:28, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

It's very possible that we could have 4 or more news organization calling the race, but we wouldn't be able to "call" the race on the map and infobox if we follow the 3 or more projections criteria strictly. For example, if candidate A only needs either Pennsylvania or Wisconsin in order to win, and those are the only two states that have yet to be called- we could see say CNN and Fox news projecting that candidate A won PA, and thus the election, while Politico and NPR might project that he won WI, and thus the election. In this scenario, 4 news organizations have called the race, yet Wikipedia's map and infobox would not reflect this. On the flip side, we still might end up calling the race before the media does, just like we did in 2016. If candidate B needs both Pennsylvania and Wisconsin in order to win, and those are the only two states that have yet to be called- we could see say CNN, NPR, and CBS projecting that candidate A won PA but WI is still too close to call, but on the other hand NBC, BBC, Politico, and Fox News might project that he won WI, but PA is too close to call. In this scenario, both PA and WI would be added to the map and infobox, and candidate B would be "projected" as the winner by Wikipedia, even though no media organization would have projected a winner for the election as a whole. Honestly, I have no problem calling the race before the media does, if we call the race before any media organization does, we could add a footnote explaining that no media organization has called the election, even though our map might reflect that a candidate has in fact won. By the way, should we also include sources like Bloomberg, the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, The Washington Post, and the Guardian? Bloomberg definitely seems reliable enough for inclusion, and some of the other sources I mentioned may be reliable enough as well. Possible wording for a popular vote asterisk: "these popular vote tallies are preliminary results, and are updated every 6 hours". Also, once this discussion has more or less concluded- we should make sure that this consensus is followed out uniformly for all 2020 U.S. election articles. Prcc27 (talk) 22:54, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

I would think calling the election before any major news source does based on states being called would be a violation of WP:SYNTH. I think adding all of the other sources you named would be good, though. Przemysl15 (talk) 02:38, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

I think per WP:CALC, it should be fine. If 3 reliable sources call PA and 3 other reliable sources call WI, it wouldn't make sense to exclude those states from the map and infobox tally, just to avoid not being the first to call the race. I don't see any other viable alternative. But of course, we would need to make very clear that no major news organization has called the race. We could do this with a footnote that makes this clear. In fact, we could even hold off on bolding the electoral votes total, which we usually do once a candidate hits 270+ votes, until after at least 1 (or possibly more) news organization(s) have called the race for a candidate. Prcc27 (talk) 04:39, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

On the flip side, if 3 reliable sources have called the race, but we haven't called it yet (per one of the possible scenarios above), we should add a footnote noting that 3+ major news organizations have called the race. And maybe we could even bold the electoral votes total of the projected president-elect even if our infobox doesn't yet have them at 270+ votes. Prcc27 (talk) 05:06, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

I see your point about no viable alternatives, although I don't think this is a case of CALC. Przemysl15 (talk) 22:24, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

I do think that WP:CALC and WP:IAR would allow us to overlook the WP:SYNTH concerns. But the other alternative, is to use only 1 source's projections when updating the map and infobox. Since many reliable sources rely on the Associated Press anyways, we could update the map & infobox based solely on AP projections. This would also make our jobs a lot easier, since it could be a huge mess trying to figure out which news organizations have and have not made projections for such and such state. Prcc27 (talk) 00:24, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

While I like this proposal over the prior, what do we do if multiple news orgs report different winners? Przemysl15 (talk) 07:24, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

I think we should add a new color (probably black) to the map and infobox for states with conflicting results. We would also want to leave the conflicting state(s') electoral votes out of the infobox and maybe note that the electoral vote tally reflects the AP's projections minus the conflicting state(s). If the AP and many other organizations project a state/the race for one candidate, but there is only 1 outlier projecting it for the other candidate- I think we could possibly avoid using the black color, have the infobox and map reflect the AP's projection, and maybe add a footnote noting that there is an outlier with the opposite projection. However, if the AP is the organization that is the outlier, this could be an issue. Since the AP seems to be the most prominent (even though they sometimes make wrong projections) and many organizations' projections seem to be directly or heavily influenced by the AP- we would probably want to have those states colored black regardless, and add a footnote about the conflicting results. Another issue we need to deal with is recounts. If a state is projected for a candidate by the AP, but it ends up going to a recount- do we want to have the state colored in for that candidate, even if the AP doesn't retract their projection? Prcc27 (talk) 08:39, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

This is really specific. If this happens we can figure it out then when all the other things we discussed here have a clear consensus. Przemysl15 (talk) 20:19, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

A lot of the scenarios we discussed are quite specific. But the main thing we need to sort out is if we are going to use 3+ reliable sources for projections or if we are just going to use the Associated Press. Markworthen noted that many news organizations rely on the AP, you seem to think that using only the AP mitigates WP:SYNTH concerns, and I support it because using a bunch of sources could be a confusing mess. Given that nobody has expressed opposition to moving forward with a map/infobox sourced by the AP, I think we can assume that consensus leans towards doing this. But maybe we could ping the users to ask them specifically about what they think, just to be sure. But honestly, I think the consensus is headed towards an AP only infobox/map. Prcc27 (talk) 20:37, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

No its not, you are the only person advocating an AP-only infobox. I for one am opposed to it. Devonian Wombat (talk) 19:42, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm also the only person that has tried to address Przemysl15's WP:SYNTH concerns. Wikipedia is not a democracy, so you can't ignore WP:SYNTH, just because you have the !votes. Until you demonstrate that combining sources doesn't violate Wikipedia policy, you can not move forward with combining sources to reach a conclusion that no reliable source has reached themselves. If we are going to move forward with a 3+ sources infobox, someone needs to demonstrate how WP:CALC applies. While I may be the only one "advocating" for an AP only map/infobox (whatever that means), another user has expressed they prefer it over an infobox that might violate WP:SYNTH. So yes, as of now, the consensus leans towards an AP only infobox/map. Prcc27 (talk) 20:35, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

We haven't heard from @Markworthen: and @Hollywood43ar: in a while, so I'm pinging them, because I want to hear what they think about the WP:SYNTH concerns. Prcc27 (talk) 20:44, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

I would be careful about making assumptions about what I prefer. My understanding of the consensus, as evidenced by the first three replies from Mark D Worthen, Devonian Wombat, and myself, and supplemented further down in the thread, is for three reliable news orgs, acceptable orgs being the ones specified by Mark D Worthen, with the addition of Politico and the few you named as well, for updating popular vote tally 12 hours after polls close, then every 6 hours after, and for the use of grey for states with closed polls but no projection. You challenged this initial consensus by stating that using a 3 org system for projections could end up with us calling the race before any org does, or vice versa not calling it when several orgs are calling it. You stated for the former, you were ok with this. I did not share the sentiment that that calling the race before a major org was ok, as doing so would be a violation of WP:SYNTH. You stated that it was fine under WP:CALC, and the alternative would be to exclude the states causing a premature calling of the race on our part. I did not think it was a case of WP:CALC, but conceded I did not have a better alternative than the poor solution of removing the state predictions to align with the media predictions. You then provided an alternative to the removal of states by suggesting an AP only map and infobox. I stated that this proposal was better than the previous proposal, a statement I intended to use to refer to the prospect of removing state predictions to align our national prediction status with major media orgs, but one you took to mean I preferred your AP only solution to the 3 org solution. However, I did state that using only AP could mean we could be using APs projection and claiming one candidate won when most other major news sources were contesting the election and reporting different winners. You took this to mean I was referring to states, which admittedly is a further issue with using only AP as a source, but not what I was referring to, inventing some sort of black color solution to denote a mixed result and trying to add footnotes and a whole bunch of other stuff about who the outlier org was and recounts and retractions which I felt all were really specific, as was the case we began with: Wikipedia calling or not calling the race when major orgs have not or have called the race, respectively. I felt, and still feel, that the possible WP:SYNTH violation occurs in such specific cases that we should work on hammering out the rest of the consensus: i.e.: if sources like Bloomberg, the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, The Washington Post, and the Guardian are acceptable sources, and under what conditions we should call the race, as opposed to this discussion on an AP or 3 org solution, which, contrary to your assessment, I believe clearly and obviously should be the 3 org variant, as does every other person on the thread other than yourself. Admittedly, however, I could have been clearer about this. Then, if on election day we do end up in this scenario where we venture into a possible WP:SYNTH violation, we could determine consensus then and there, when we have already built clear consensus on when and how we should be calling the election, which we could apply to the specific scenario that is causing issues at that time. Przemysl15 (talk) 06:12, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be WP:SYNTH regardless of whether we are the first to call the race or not? What if CNN says candidate A has 268 votes, the AP says he has 265 votes, Fox says he has 266 votes, etc. but our infobox says he has 256, even though that is a number that we came up with ourselves and no reliable source has his tally at 256? Does WP:CALC allow us to come up with an electoral vote number not supported by *any* major news organization? If so, are you saying that WP:CALC only doesn't apply once there is a disagreement between us and the source(s) about whether the race is called yet or not? That is an inconsistent view and I don't think we get to pick and choose when WP:SYNTH does or doesn't apply. I respect everyone's opinion here, and I too previously indicated that I supported a 3+ source infobox/map. However, I am also trying to respect your WP:SYNTH concerns, and am doing my best to address them. Unfortunately, I don't think we will get anywhere if it's only the two of us trying to interpret what that policy means by ourselves. Since you and I are the only ones having a conversation about WP:SYNTH, I genuinely think our best move forward would be to go to the no original research noticeboard to get another opinion on the WP:SYNTH issue. Once we know in what ways WP:SYNTH and/or WP:CALC does and doesn't apply, it will be easier for us to move forward with a discussion. Prcc27 (talk) 10:13, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

@Przemysl15: Thank you for the ping. :) I appreciate your pithy summary of the dialogue thus far. Even though your summary is a long paragraph, this discussion has been complicated, and you summarized it concisely. My suggestion is that to follow the KISS principle as much as possible. Otherwise, on election night, editors will be more likely to ignore the consensus we achieve here b/c it is too opaque and takes too long to decipher. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 13:53, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

@Prcc27: Requesting feedback and suggestions from other knowledgeable Wikipedians in general, and specifically about the WP:SYNTH and WP:CALC considerations, seems wise. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 13:57, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

Hi everyone, I posted on the No original research noticeboard. Please feel free to join the discussion! Prcc27 (talk) 21:13, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

It's all very simple. Two networks for the easy ones. Kentucky for example will be called almost immediately, same with DC or Delaware. This is going to take a week or so, if there aren't any lawsuits stopping everything. So let's get the chart on the page by at least the first. We should know if there's a "Red Mirage" on election night. We're going to have to wait until the fifth to get any good numbers unless it's a Biden Blowout. Get rid of the prediction section on Haloween. We don't need it after that, as those interested are going to more immediate sources. We also need a section on lawsuits. Three of them were already ruled on by the Supreme court. There will be more. More on that below...!Arglebargle79 (talk) 00:40, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Combining sources is likely a WP:SYNTH violation per discussions above and below. Many major news organizations rely on the AP for projections anyways, so we should just use the AP as our source for the infobox and map. Prcc27 (talk) 02:56, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Post noticeboard discussion

Even though I posted in the No original research noticeboard about whether the current consensus violates WP:SYNTH, earlier today I proposed some footnote wording just in case we do move forward with the 3+ sources proposal. But since so far, a user has indicated that yes, combining 3+ sources to make your own electoral vote tally is a WP:SYNTH violation, I'm going to move my footnotes proposal to my sandbox for now. But even though I'm moving this proposal, please feel free to comment on what you think about the proposed footnotes. Given that the 3+ sources proposal may in fact be a WP:SYNTH violation (although we should certainly wait to see if other users chime in at the noticeboard), the alternative would be an AP only infobox. But the user that commented on that noticeboard said that per WP:NOTNEWS and WP:CRYSTAL, that we should wait until after the election's outcome becomes official before adding the results to the article. So that is another option as well. As I said at the noticeboard, I don't think those policies necessarily apply. Prcc27 (talk) 01:31, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Sorry I forgot to turn on notifications for this page and I just saw your ping @Prcc27:. I am concerned about WP:SYNTH but I think I am probably more concerned about WP:NOTNEWS. I think that we shouldn't cloud everything with confusing calls from multiple different news sources. I think we should wait until the election is official either after the electors vote or congress verifies the results. To declare a winner on the page. Hollywood43ar (talk) 12:53, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

As far as I am concerned, three sources is still by far the superior option. We should be hamstringing ourselves to a single source on election night, all that will do is cause confusion and a constant need for reverts. Also, WP:NOTNEWS is completely irrelevant as far as this goes, it is mainly a notability guideline, not a content guideline, and is specifically says we are allowed to update information about current events. Just refusing to do anything and keeping clearly outdated information because of some weak concerns over WP:SYNTH would be as clear a WP:NOTBURO violation as one can get. Devonian Wombat (talk) 21:07, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

I agree WP:NOTNEWS doesn't apply. It doesn't make sense to wait 1 or 2 months before updating the article, when the obvious (a projected winner) might be stated as soon as election night. However, you still haven't explained why we should ignore WP:SYNTH. WP:IGNORE says "If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it." But I don't think it's been demonstrated how exactly a 3+ sourced infobox would be a significant improvement from a single sourced infobox. I respectfully disagree with your assertion that a 3+ sourced infobox would be less confusing. Trying to keep track of which sources have and haven't called a state will be pretty confusing. Since it was suggested that the AP count as 2 sources, and that sources reliant on the AP for projections shouldn't double count, this will likely create confusion with many users. For example, someone might mistakenly think that if the AP, NYT, and NPR all project a state, that it allows them to add that state to the map and infobox. Since NYT and I believe NPR rely on the AP, that would not be the case. I actually think there would be more reverts under the 3+ proposal. An AP infobox is straightforward- either the AP has projected a state or it hasn't. By the way, what even is the rationale for using 3+ sources? Is it to make sure that Wikipedia doesn't call the race before a major media organization does? If so, I already explained how this proposal does not guarantee that we will not be the first to "call" the race. AFAIK, only a single sourced infobox would make it absolutely impossible for us to be the first to "call" the race. Is the reasoning that a 3+ sourced infobox is more accurate? It's important to note that major media organizations are careful about projections, so it's pretty uncommon (although not unheard of) for a projection to be wrong. And of course, a 3+ infobox could still have an error, e.g. there was a 2018 house race that was called by most (all?) of the major news organization for a Republican, that ended up actually being won by the Democrat in that district. But given that we are up front with the readers that these are only projections, I don't think it would be that big of a deal if we call a state or the race for the wrong candidate. Regardless of the perceived benefits of a 3+ sourced infobox, there have been no strong arguments for why we should ignore WP:SYNTH. Keep in mind, that a user at the noticeboard said a 3+ infobox would "definitely" violate WP:SYNTH. We should only violate Wikipedia policy as a last resort and/or when there are no viable alternatives for a functioning infobox. Prcc27 (talk) 02:45, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

I don't understand why you take that one user's opinion of WP:SYNTH and apply it, but disregard their opinion of WP:NOTNEWS. Furthermore, one user's opinion anywhere shouldn't be taken as consensus, especially when that user has views on the application of NOTNEWS and CB that go against consensus here. Przemysl15 (talk) 08:16, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Additionally, my understanding of consensus opinion here so far is that if there is a SYNTH violation, which a significant part of the discussion does not believe there is, it is very minor and/or only occurs in incredibly specific scenarios. You are the only person who uses phrases like "there have been no strong arguments for why we should ignore WP:SYNTH". Everyone else refers to it as things like "possible SYNTH violations" or "weak SYNTH concerns" etc, with the exception of the singular person on the noticeboard who has no prior experience in this area of WP to my knowledge. To be quite honest, I regret ever mentioning SYNTH because it turned a 10 comment thread with each entry being a sentence or two into a 30 comment thread, not including several new sub threads with a noticeboard post, full of long wordy paragraphs over a tangentially and marginally related subject that completely derailed the thread. AS previously stated, you are the only person in favor of an AP only infobox, and furthermore the only person who finds a 3+ sourced infobox more confusing or otherwise worse than an AP only infobox. Przemysl15 (talk) 08:33, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Only one person from this talk page thinks WP:NOTNEWS means we have to wait until December or January to update the infobox and map, whereas another user here and I have demonstrated that it doesn't apply. So that's why the person at the noticeboard's WP:NOTNEWS concerns are being "disregarded". On the other hand, most of the people at this talk page, including you, have conceded that at the very least, there are some WP:SYNTH concerns, albeit "weak" concerns, but concerns nonetheless. IDK where you get that I'm the only one at this talk page significantly concerned about it, given that Hollywood43ar expressed concern as well and never said they were "weakly" concerned. For what it's worth, I do think a 3+ infobox does in fact violate WP:NOTNEWS, whereas an AP only infobox does not necessarily violate it. WP:NOTNEWS says "Ensure that Wikipedia articles are not: Original reporting. Wikipedia should not offer first-hand news reports on breaking stories. Wikipedia does not constitute a primary source." The 3+ sources infobox proposal is the exact definition of first hand reporting since the electoral vote tally will be calculated from Wikipedia users and would not necessarily match any of the major media organizations' electoral vote tally. Furthermore, it might lead us to be the first to report that a candidate has won the election, even if no major media organization has reported this. That is an even worse violation of WP:NOTNEWS, and that's how this WP:SYNTH discussion got started. On Wikinews, maybe you could combine 3+ sources to say that a candidate has 36 electoral votes, even if no major media organization matches that tally, but on Wikipedia, we are not a newspaper, so it is not our jobs to do our own reporting, which is what the 3+ sources infobox would entail. If we do move forward with the 3+ infobox proposal, I did propose something at my sandbox that might help mitigate a premature call for a candidate (see scenario #4). I would like feedback on this scenario and the other scenarios as well. Even though my sandbox proposals would be moot if the 3+ infobox proposal doesn't go through, I still would like input, just in case we do use a 3+ sources infobox. But as far as I'm concerned, the 3+ sourced infobox has WP:SYNTH concerns that still need to be addressed, and the WP:NOTNEWS concerns are even stronger for a 3+ sourced infobox than they are for a 1 sourced infobox. Prcc27 (talk) 19:21, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

He said that while he was concerned about SYNTH his main concern was NOTNEWS, so while they did not say their concern was weak, they did say it was secondary to a concern that you apparently demonstrated as inapplicable. While I should let that user argue for themselves, I don't understand why you disregard their main concern, but use their secondary concern as evidence that there is significant overall concern. All references to SYNTH other than mine, hollywood's, and your own references, are to the SYNTH concerns of those 3 aforementioned people. As stated previously, my concerns over SYNTH were never significant and now are insignificant entirely, and your habit of taking things other people say and arguing in place of them has continued with hollywood, and they should defend statements they make, not you. So in short, no, hollywood has not stated they have significant concerns over SYNTH (and the two of us should stop acting as interpreters for their statements), and the only thing anyone has conceded that there is one person with strong SYNTH concerns on the talk page and two people who at one point had at least weak SYNTH concerns, which is where I got that you're only one at this talk page with significant SYNTH concerns.Przemysl15 (talk) 07:28, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• No, they did not say that. They said that they "think" that they are "probably" more concerned about WP:NOTNEWS. But that doesn't mean that their WP:SYNTH concerns are "weak"- it only means that their WP:NOTNEWS concerns might be stronger than their WP:SYNTH concerns. Their comment where they said "I think that we shouldn't cloud everything with confusing calls from multiple different news sources" seems to be a direct argument that a 3+ sourced infobox probably violates WP:SYNTH, and should not be used. But of course, I agree we should let them speak for themselves, because only they know for sure what argument they were trying to convey. Until then, I just don't think that it is accurate for you to assume that their WP:SYNTH concerns are "weak". Also, I did not "disregard" their WP:NOTNEWS concerns. I just don't think they have fully demonstrated how it applies (although a 3+ sourced infobox does seem to violate WP:NOTNEWS per what I said above). The first sentence of WP:NOTNEWS says "editors are encouraged to include current and up-to-date information within its coverage, and to develop stand-alone articles on significant current events." I don't quite understand how they read that, and interrupted it as meaning that we should wait until the results are official before adding them to the article. But that doesn't mean their concerns are being "disregarded", it just means that they should elaborate more on how it applies. Prcc27 (talk) 10:18, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

I think we could avoid NOTNEWS by saying that "source X called the race for candidate Y at time Z" in the article instead of just taking their calls and citing them. And I especially disagree with the combining of sources because than we could end up calling the race before anyone else has and that would definitely be considered a NOTNEWS violation because we are creating our own story that we wouldn't be able to cite and no one else could verify. As for SYNTH, combing sources in this manner is specifically what SNYTH was designed to protect against. However, I don't have any strong concerns about NOTNEWS or SYNTH concerns about any of the other solutions proposed, my original comment was directed at the combining of sources although I apologize that that wasn't made clear in the way I wrote it. Hollywood43ar (talk) 12:51, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

To the above user, I agree that we should not issue a projection for a winner before another source does. While a 3+ source infobox could end up giving a candidate 270 via aggregation, I think the chance of that happening is small enough that we should simply add a note to some effect stating that no winner has been declared, but all states have 3+ sources projecting the winner we project. I think this is a better solution than tossing out the 3+ source infobox for a version based on less concrete sourcing over this small discrepancy that may occur. Would like your, and others in the above thread, thoughts on this. Przemysl15 (talk) 13:20, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

I think that would be ok. is the best solution currently suggested. Hollywood43ar (talk) 17:07, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

• Does that mean you support a 3+ sourced infobox over an infobox based solely on AP projections, or would you prefer an AP infobox over a 3+ sourced infobox? Please note, that my SYNTH concerns do not stop at the unlikely event that we would be the first to call the race. Combining a bunch of sources to create an electoral vote tally that is not reflected by any major media organization is still very likely to occur regardless, and I'm not sure WP:CALC allows us to do this. Prcc27 (talk) 19:04, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

I would prefer the 3+ sources infobox as long as we aren't combining sources to come up with a new result. If it is just a list of sources and their predictions I am fine with that.Hollywood43ar (talk) 12:36, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

• Could you please clarify what you mean by "new result"? "New result" meaning that we project a candidate as the president-elect even though no major media organization has done so, or does "new result" also include an electoral vote tally not backed by any of the major media organizations? If the 3+ sources infobox rule was in effect during the 2016 presidential election, at 8 P.M. Eastern our infobox would have had Clinton at 68 electoral votes, and Trump at 57 electoral votes. However, out of all the 8 P.M. projections that I found- none of them directly matched what our infobox would have said. ABC, NBC, CNN, CBS, FOX, and AP did not have both Clinton at 68 and Trump at 57 at 8 P.M. So basically, this would be a WP:SYNTH/WP:NOTNEWS violation, and this same violation is likely to occur this year, if we move forward with a 3+ sourced infobox. How would you feel if we had a table in the article that listed all of the major networks and their projections? The infobox could be AP only, but with a footnote telling readers to also check out the table that shows what the other major media networks have projected. I probably wouldn't have enough time to create such a table myself, but I would not oppose any of the other users creating a table like that. That way, the readers themselves can make their own determination about which states should and shouldn't count as being "called" or not. But as for the infobox/map, I just don't see how a 3+ source infobox would work without us coming up with electoral vote tallies not supported by the media per what I said above. That's why an AP only infobox is our best option. [3][4] Prcc27 (talk) 20:21, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

An alternative to making a whole table with major media projections would be to have the AP as our main source for the infobox, but also have a footnote about what the other major media organizations have as their electoral vote tally e.g. "CNN has Trump at 48 electoral votes, ABC has him at 37 electoral votes, NBC has him at 66 electoral votes", etc. Prcc27 (talk) 20:27, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Compromise proposal: use the 3+ sources infobox proposal for adding states to the map, but have the infobox tally reflect the AP's projected electoral vote count with a footnote explaining why the infobox tally doesn't directly reflect what's on the map. Example of possible footnote- "this electoral vote tally is based on the AP's projections. However, states are added to the map using a different criteria: a state is called once at least 3 major news organizations or the AP & at least 1 major news organization that does not rely on the AP, projects that that state was won by the candidate. Using the map's criteria, Trump's projected electoral vote tally would be 229, and Biden's projected electoral vote tally would be 218." Here is an example of what the infobox could look like. This compromise proposal would help mitigate WP:SYNTH & WP:NOTNEWS concerns. The map would probably still violate Wikipedia policy, but since the map is on Commons- it might be okay.. Prcc27 (talk) 21:28, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Since Hollywood43ar mentioned listing a bunch of sources' tallies, we could also add other news organizations' tallies to the footnote that I proposed. But I think it's best not to have a verbose footnote. Prcc27 (talk) 20:34, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

Does the silence in this discussion mean that you guys are fine with my compromise proposal, and that I can proceed with implementing it on election day? Or does it mean that this discussion is dying out and nobody is following it anymore..? Having an electoral vote tally that doesn't match any reliable news source is unacceptable. Hollywood43ar seems to agree that we shouldn't be coming up with a "new result". My compromise proposal wouldn't do away with the 3+ source electoral vote tally entirely and it wouldn't prevent a 3+ sourced map- it would just put that 3+ tally in the footnote. Prcc27 (talk) 19:00, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

Since nobody said they oppose the compromise proposal, on election day, I intend on moving forward with it. However, I tweaked the proposal once more, so this is what the infobox would look like. Prcc27 (talk) 20:05, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Lack of comment for 24 hours does not mean that everyone agrees with your compromise proposal. As stated previously, I support the consensus for three reliable news orgs, acceptable orgs being the ones specified by Mark D Worthen, with the addition of Politico and the few you named as well, for updating popular vote tally 12 hours after polls close, then every 6 hours after, and for the use of grey for states with closed polls but no projection. Przemysl15 (talk) 08:42, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Actually, it has been 5 days since I proposed a joint AP/3+ sourced infobox, not 24 hours. But I have tweaked the infobox once since that original proposal. Our readers deserve to be able to verify the infobox's tally per WP:VERIFY. The "consensus" you are citing does not allow users to be able to click on a link to a source to verify that the tally is backed by a reliable source. Putting the AP tally up there (even if in addition to the 3+ source tally) allows users to do this. Also, please keep in mind that this is not a vote- it is a discussion. If you disagree with a proposal, it is helpful to give a reason for your disagreement. Prcc27 (talk) 18:27, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

You're right I apologize, more than 1 day had gone by. The reason I personally stopped responding is because I have nothing more to say. I have decided: as stated above I support the consensus for three reliable news orgs, acceptable orgs being the ones specified by Mark D Worthen, with the addition of Politico and the few you named as well, for updating popular vote tally 12 hours after polls close, then every 6 hours after, and for the use of grey for states with closed polls but no projection. I disagree with your proposal because the previous consensus proposal is simple, effective, functional, useful, and a whole host of other positive attributes. I stopped responding because it was clear to me your proposals were all unneeded because an effective solution has been devised I agree with, and the only reason I responded here is to prevent conflict on election day. I see no reason to over complicate an info box, much less throw constant proposals at the discussion dart board to see if one sticks and then declaring victory once people become exhausted with what was approximately your 10th suggestion for a new or altered solution to a problem that was effectively figured out by the 5th comment. Furthermore, when challenged, you call on not a vote, even though of all people making assertions based on some sort of understandable logic, you are the sole editor opposed to the general consensus of a 3+ info box stated above, your interpretation of tangentially related comments by other editors notwithstanding. I see no reason to continue a finished discussion. Przemysl15 (talk) 21:30, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

• When a user makes a proposal, and another user concurs and builds on that proposal, and it goes unchallenged- it is easy for one to assume that a new consensus has formed, albeit weak consensus. The fact that so many people are tuned out off this discussion makes it harder to form a strong consensus. And I wouldn't oppose pinging all the users that have commented in this discussion thus far. Nevertheless, at the very least, you have to have a footnote that says something like "a state's electoral vote tally is added to the infobox once at least 3 major news organizations or the AP & at least 1 major news organization that does not rely on the AP, projects that that state was won by the candidate." Not explaining to the readers, as well as other Wikipedia users, what the criteria for the infobox is makes us look unreliable. Anyways, on election night, if our infobox's tally does not match any of the electoral vote tallies of the major media organizations, I very well may make a WP:BOLD edit implementing my proposal. However, I would be deterred from being BOLD, if I heard opposition to my or Hollywood43ar's proposal, from more than just 1 user. Prcc27 (talk) 22:18, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

After much thought, I've decided that a BOLD edit probably wouldn't be the best move. However, I do intend on flagging the infobox as having a possible WP:SYNTH violation. This is what the infobox would look like with the synth flag. Prcc27 (talk) 08:31, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

There have been more comments made at the noticeboard. Based on the concerns raised at that noticeboard, I don't think there is currently any consensus on how to move forward with the map and infobox. Until we can come to some sort of consensus and/or compromise, I think that we will have to hold off on updating the infobox and map. Prcc27 (talk) 21:36, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

On the contrary, as previously stated, you are just about the only, if not the only, editor here who believes there is not a consensus for a 3+ sourced info box. Przemysl15 (talk) 05:29, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• @Przemysl15: Did you check the noticeboard lately..? Over the past few hours, several more users have chimed in there. Consensus is measured by both the discussions here and at the noticeboard. Right now, the consensus is mainly split between a 3+ infobox & not updating the infobox on election night at all (but with only a couple users supporting an AP only infobox). Virtually nobody at the noticeboard supports a 3+ sourced infobox. Most of the users there think we should wait until the results are finalized per WP:NOTNEWS. But 1 user there agreed with me that we should use an AP only infobox. Even if you exclude Hollywood43ar's SYNTH concerns- there are at least 2 other users that explicitly agreed with me that a 3+ infobox would violate that Wikipedia policy. The burden of consensus is on those trying to change the article, so if we can't get a strong consensus on a criteria for the infobox, we would have to default to the status quo which is leaving the infobox as it is now. I strongly suggest we ping the other users that have commented at this talk page to see what they think about the concerns expressed at the noticeboard. That way, we will know whether or not they agree with the concerns expressed there. Prcc27 (talk) 07:44, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

Also, I added a hidden note to the infobox that says "there is currently no consensus on how to add a projected electoral vote tally to the infobox. Please do not update until a consensus is formed at the talk" and a user thanked me for that edit. So no, I am not the only person on this talk page that thinks that there is no consensus for updating the infobox come election night. Prcc27 (talk) 07:54, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

To my understanding, consensus here on this talk page is that an acceptable infobox shall be updated when a state or the race is called by three reliable news orgs, acceptable orgs being the ones specified by Mark D Worthen, with the addition of Politico and the few you [Prcc27] named as well, for updating popular vote tally 12 hours after polls close, then every 6 hours after, and for the use of grey for states with closed polls but no projection. Is this correct? Additionally, does anyone here oppose that consensus? @Devonian Wombat: @Markworthen: @Devonian Wombat: @Hollywood43ar: Przemysl15 (talk) 08:56, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• You are correct that most of the users at this talk page expressed support for a 3+ sourced infobox, and up until yesterday, consensus did seem to lean in that direction. But I'm pretty sure that any discussion conducted at a noticeboard is also included when assessing consensus. A couple of the users at the noticeboard have WP:SYNTH concerns with regards to the 3+ sourced infobox, 1 user there supports my idea to have an infobox based only on the AP's projections. But most of the users there are against updating the infobox on election day altogether due to WP:NOTNEWS. I don't think it would be right to ignore their concerns, so I would say that consensus is probably split if we include the users at the noticeboard in our overall assessment of consensus. @Arglebargle79: was also briefly part of this discussion. Prcc27 (talk) 09:11, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• Can we just implement the 3 source criteria and stop endlessly procrastinating? I personally am in favour of just completely ignoring the noticeboard comments. Devonian Wombat (talk) 10:22, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

We don't edit Wikipedia based on personal preference. I think it's unthinkable to completely disregard the comments of other Wikipedia users, simply because you disagree with them. WP:SYNTH, WP:VERIFY, and WP:NOTNEWS are all Wikipedia policies that should be followed to the best of our abilities. Until those concerns are addressed, I don't think we should move forward with updating the infobox, especially a 3+ sourced synth infobox. The noticeboard discussion should be included in our assessment of consensus. Consensus is split. Prcc27 (talk) 10:47, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

Noticeboards are for for specific problems that editors encounter in writing and maintaining Wikipedia articles. Posting a message to a noticeboard can also be an appropriate early step in resolving disputes on Wikipedia. Noticeboards are best used for simple and urgent matters. While I understand that you may have thought was a specific problem in writing this article and that you wanted to resolve your dispute, there is not problem in writing or maintaining the article, as consensus on this page for that issue had been determined by the time you went on the noticeboard, and thus your dispute is manufactured. While I understand you are coming from a place of good faith and likely do legitimately have those concerns you stated, you are right it is unthinkable to completely disregard the comments of other Wikipedia users simply because you disagree with them, so I find it incredibly frustrating that you would completely disregard all the editors here, ignore a consensus on this page, and even go as far as opening a dispute resolution valve where it was unneeded, just to have a swarm of editors agree with you because only one side of the argument is presented. The editors there don't even agree with your point and want to shut down the article entirely on election day, which flies in the face of every notion of precedent that exists in this space of Wikipedia. While I am not saying that the editors on the noticeboard are anything but well respected editors with a long and positive history of constructive contribution, they clearly have not read this talk page they are supposedly resolving a dispute for, and by this you have created an echo chamber, unwillingly but all the same an echo chamber. Przemysl15 (talk) 16:56, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• Yeah, no. That's not what happened at all.. At the time, you and I were the only ones discussing the WP:SYNTH concerns. I thought it was a problem for only two people to be discussing the issue, so I suggested opening up a discussion on the noticeboard. Once another user said they agreed with my suggestion to open up a discussion at the noticeboard, that's when I brought my concerns there. So going to a noticeboard was not a unilateral decision, even though you seem to be suggesting that it was. I did not disregard the users at this talk page- I suggested going to a noticeboard, then waited for users to chime in before moving forward. Furthermore, I did not open the discussion there just so users would agree with me, like you are suggesting. In fact, in general, they don't even agree with me, and I'm okay with that. Sometimes, consensus is not on my side, and I accept that. But what they are proposing is the status quo of what's currently on our article. And unlike the 3+ sourced proposal, it does not violate Wikipedia policy to wait to update the infobox. By the way, I'm not sure Wikipedia operates on "precedent", and remember, consensus can change. You can't vote to disregard a Wikipedia policy just because it suits your personal preference. You two (with the possible addition of Arglebargle79) are the only users that seem to support a 3+ sourced infobox full stop without any reservations. Hollywood43ar prefers a 3+ sourced infobox, but seems to want a list of sources on the infobox and has some WP:SYNTH and possibly WP:NOTNEWS concerns. I think Markworthen is the one that proposed the 3+ sources criteria, but he also wanted us to go to the noticeboard to get advice from users that are more familiar with WP:SYNTH, and since then, two users at that noticeboard have explicitly said that the 3+ sourced infobox violates that Wikipedia policy. Arglebargle79 seems to concur with a 3+ sourced infobox idea, but would rather use a 2+ sourced criteria for certain states..? The consensus here was already shakey before the developments at the noticeboard that took place yesterday. Prcc27 (talk) 18:06, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

The only reason you and I were the only ones discussing the WP:SYNTH concerns, to my understanding, is because everyone else had felt that the consensus had been decided and moved on and want to continue moving on, as evidenced by Wombats wish to simply implement the 3 source criteria and end the procrastination. However, I am speaking for other users so I will let them chime in instead of talking for them using the pings I slated earlier and stop running this thread into the ground. Przemysl15 (talk) 19:54, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• That's my whole point. You and Wombat seem to be the only users strongly in favor of a 3+ only sourced infobox! One user preferred it but had reservations, another user supported going to the noticeboard to hash out the WP:SYNTH concerns, and another user wants to use a similar 2+ only criteria in certain cases. Please note that I am not the only user that is against moving forward with updating the infobox on election night. Tartan357 thanked me for my edit that you two have since reverted. I will not ping them here though per WP:CANVASS. Prcc27 (talk) 20:47, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

The WP:SYNTH concerns are valid regarding using 3 sources' result predictions that may be collectively biasing toward one party/candidate or another. This is where WP:NOTNEWS comes into play. Synthesised content should not be intentionally generated just to satisfy some media frenzy about the event. We know we will get the election results eventually throughout the proper channels, there is no rush to have all the data available here on en.wikipedia on day 1. Unlike international news organisations wikipedia is not beholden to its readers/viewers for any advertising revenue. There is no pressure placed upon editors to have conclusions reported immediately out of some notion of being the 'first' organisation to report such a winning party/candidate in a given district or state. The media outlets generally do this out of a notion of competing with other such outlets to say they were 'right' about the victor first, but this is done at the risk of being incorrect about the result in the short term. We must wait for accurate reporting to reflect that specific data. If it takes more than 24 for hours for that data to come through, so be it. If it takes more than 1 week, so be it. Readers will naturally seek out predictions from media outlets if they feel the need to and the final data has not yet been sourced here. This is without issue. If a problem will occur with a flood of new editors/editors without proper accounts adding in this inaccurate data for themselves that is precisely what the protect article button is for. It can stay up for as long as is needed for the flood of heavily biased contributors to subside. - Wiz9999 (talk) 21:50, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• Where do you stand on an infobox that only has AP projections? The AP has long standing historical significance, and many major media outlets rely on them. Plus, this would take care of the WP:SYNTH and possibly even some WP: NOTNEWS concerns. Prcc27 (talk) 21:56, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

I would say there are some definate WP:NPOV concerns for relying on a single source for all data projections. However my objection to such a proposal is definitely less than that of the WP:SYNTH issues. I think the decision on using a single RS with relatively minimal bias is something that ultimately should be general consensus here before being implemented. As WP:NOTNEWS would most definatly favour having no assignment made whatsoever to the infobox until the sources can agree. Eventually all the RSs and media outlets will coalesce around a single candidate as the overall winner. When this occurs, and it can be shown in the sources without challenge or controversy, then yes, it may be reported here and in the infobox that one candidate overall is indicated as victor. This may not yet be directly indicated in the data for individual states and districts, but as long as the sources are in agreement it should not be controversial to include in the article. - Wiz9999 (talk) 22:16, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• If you want to be even stricter with WP:NOTNEWS, we would have to wait until all states and districts are projected by every major outlet before adding the vote tally to the infobox. I am absolutely opposed to not updating the infobox initially, and then all of the sudden updating the infobox once a winner is unanimously declared- meanwhile one or two states are still too early to call and we could possibly see news organizations call those races at different times. We should either update the infobox on election night, or wait until every state and district has been projected. All or nothing. But, what we could do (and maybe this is what you were suggesting) is to bold the candidate that won once they are unanimously projected the winner, but leave out the vote total until we get full results. This should maybe be discussed in the national criteria section below. Prcc27 (talk) 22:51, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

Completely unrelated, but why don't we just designate one editor to update the projections every half hour? This will prevent any major edit conflicts, or people that obsessively edit and refresh, hoping to be the one that adds the state. To take it to another level, maybe fully protect it and make an admin edit it every half hour? Thanoscar21_{talk, contribs} 22:34, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

• But what about the rest of the article..? Would we have to make edit requests to update the article as well..? I'm not sure if this is necessary, especially if we can agree on a criteria for the infobox. By the way, do you support a 3+ source infobox, an AP only infobox, or do you think we should hold off on election night projections altogether? Prcc27 (talk) 22:51, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

Prcc27, that was an error on my part. I just now realized that if you're extended-confirmed, you'd probably see the warnings before editing, and follow the rules. I personally support just the AP infobox, as many of the major outlets use that as a gold standard, as well as the campaigns themselves. Clinton didn't concede until the AP called the race, so I consider the AP to be the one that matters. Of course, we won't be getting many calls on election night, as the mail-in ballots can be received later in many states. Thanoscar21_{talk, contribs} 23:01, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

If we were to have a halt on updating the infobox until there was clear sourcing for who won either any state or the entire race, what criteria would we want to use to determine when the dust has settled and we can update the page? I am willing to go along with this principle of don't edit the infobox on election night if the consensus goes this way, but I am against simply saying don't update the infobox for 24 hours after polls close. While it is incredibly likely that the race will not be callable within 24 hours, it is possible that one candidate wins in a massive landslide, and, more importantly, there is a pretty decent chance that some states, namely those considered safe, will be called by most Reliable Sources within a pretty short time and I don't think it is a violation of NOTNEWS to declare that a candidate has won a state/district when most major media outlets are declaring they have. Simply putting a full stop on the page would incorrectly display that no one is considered to have won any state/district when there is a distinct possibility that a candidate has won some districts. I would absolutely want a note saying that the page is out of date and we are waiting for the dust to settle, but I have some concerns that implementing a policy of "no infobox editing for the first 24 hours" conveys a message of "things will be too crazy to call in the first 24 hours", which is undocumented speculation and thus a CB violation. However, I also take issue with statements to the effect of we need all or most major media outlets to call a state/district for us to call it, and I have made such statements in this very response. What counts as all major outlets? Further up in the thread we have a list of around 15 sources we consider reliable. Do we need 10-15 sources to update the infobox in that case? Surely that is a source overkill and thus a violation of WP:OVERKILL. This could possibly by mitigated by finding 10 sources and then only citing AP, but I think that is an issue in it of itself. The answer may be to simply go with the AP only infobox, but my issue with that is it based our infobox off of 1 source could be an WP:NPOV violation, among other things. My point is if we want to say the 3+ infobox violates a bunch of Wikipedia policies, which I'm not sold on the fact that it does but for the sake of argument let's say it does, I am having problems coming up with a solution of my own or finding a previously proposed solution that does not violate some other policy as well. Clearly having an updated infobox is important so surely it would be better to update it some way as opposed to sitting in gridlock here. Przemysl15 (talk) 02:04, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm not really buying the WP:NPOV arguments against an AP only infobox. While the AP is "only 1 source", it is seen by many as the most prominent source for election projections. And many news organizations rely on them. Per WP:DUE, I think it's absolutely fine to give more weight to the AP's projections. It's a stretch to say this proposal violates Wikipedia policy. Prcc27 (talk) 02:53, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Prcc27. AP is the standard. For example, NPR will not call a state until AP has called it.* Carter (talk) 03:09, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I should be more clear: there is at least 1 user here who has concerns that an AP only infobox could violate WP:NPOV. I generally agree that AP is reliable but the point is that every proposed solution here someone somewhere has had some sort of issue with, not over principle or accuracy or whatever but directly over WP policy. If, for the sake of argument, we say that an AP only infobox doesn't violate WP:NPOV, which I don't necessarily agree with but for the sake of argument let's make that assumption, you could argue that because AP is inherently a news organization, using only AP is a violation of NOTNEWS. If we take the stance that AP is the be all end all projection source, which again I don't necessarily agree with but for the sake of argument let's make that assumption, just because the AP puts out news, that does not necessarily mean that it is worthy for the article. From WP:NOTNEWS itself: Wikipedia should not offer first-hand news reports on breaking stories. Thus, this statement from WP policy can directly be taken to mean that precisely because AP is regarded as the first news source for elections, it is the precise definition of "first-hand news reports on breaking stories", and thus we should wait until the dust has settled from the election to be updating the infobox. I'm certain there exists a counter argument back for why an AP only infobox does not, in fact, violate NOTNEWS. While you may believe your proposal doesn't violate WP policy, my point is that "your proposal violated WP policy and mine doesn't" is a poor angle to go on because, at least in the scope of this discussion, that's subjective, and we should be evaluating infobox policy on how to most accurately, efficiently, and consistently provide encyclopedic information about the election, using WP policies to guide us to a solution that achieves that rather than taking firm ideological stances on one particular solution and warping WP policies to justify our most liked solution.

An example of this would be such: due to the fact that WP should not offer first hand news reports on breaking stories, the infobox for the election should not be edited at all for some amount of time, say 6 hours, after polls close. Then, the infobox should be updated only to updates states/districts where the AP has called the race at least 6 hrs after polls have closed AND several news organizations, say 2 or 3, have corroborated the story from the AP after the AP calls the race in that state/district. The race itself should not be called for say 24 hours after polls close and only when the AP calls the race and 3/4 news orgs corroborate this after the AP folks have called the race. This should be used as a building block for further discussion and not as a strict hardline solution I want to die over, but this sort of discussion, I hope, can help break the deadlock on this page. Przemysl15 (talk) 03:45, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Yes, there are WP:NOTNEWS concerns, I'm not denying that. But my point was, those concerns are not specifically related to the AP proposal itself, but rather about any election night inclusion criteria broadly. WP:EVENTCRITERIA seems to allow us to update the infobox on election night and possibly even renders WP:NOTNEWS not applicable. Prcc27 (talk) 04:05, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I don't quite get the rationale for not displaying the results of the election when we know of the results of the election. Our job is to serve our readers, both for today, tomorrow, and 20 years from now, and we have a responsibility to present them with accurate, up to date information, and not giving them that information as soon as we responsibly can is shirking our responsibility. After AP calls the race, and possibly after other news organizations have as well, we should display that; there is no logical argument (as far as I can tell) for arbitrarily denying information to the public for a large amount of time. Zoozaz1 talk 04:37, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I am for displaying in the infobox any result called by the AP and a few other news orgs. Przemysl15 (talk) 10:17, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Przemysl15, You said "the infobox for the election should not be edited at all for some amount of time, say 6 hours, after polls close" and "The race itself should not be called for say 24 hours after polls close," which seems like an arbitrary time limit. Zoozaz1 talk 14:34, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I think we should update the infobox with projected electoral votes immediately when the AP calls races. But, the consensus to hold off on adding popular vote totals until 12 hours after polls close and only update them ever 6 hours still seems to be unchallenged. Prcc27 (talk) 17:16, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Prcc27, are we doing that after the state has ended elections, or all of america has ended elections? Heart ^(talk) 12:46, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

To clarify, this consensus for the popular vote criteria only holds if we agree to update the infobox on election night. Prcc27 (talk) 17:40, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I apologize, I thought you meant the electoral votes. I don't really think the specific number of sources we use is really that important, only that we provide accurate and up to date information. Zoozaz1 talk 18:02, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

@Zoozaz1:, I also said This should be used as a building block for further discussion and not as a strict hardline solution I want to die over, but this sort of discussion, I hope, can help break the deadlock on this page. The point is to try and achieve some workable consensus so we definitely do not need any arbitrary time limit, but we should have some way to ensure we are not reporting numbers not backed by a sweeping RS consensus. I would then prefer to wait until the AP AND a few other sources call the race, the few sources corroborating AP as opposed to calling it before AP, so we have a better way to ensure our information will not be taken back at a later date. Przemysl15 (talk) 19:23, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

A projection is never 100% accurate, even if several media organizations are in agreement. I don't think it's that big of a deal if we have to retract an AP projection tally in the infobox, because it should be quite clear that these are not official results. However, I wouldn't have an issue with holding off on bolding a candidate until at least 1 media organization agrees with the AP. This is something we have already discussed in the national criteria section. Prcc27 (talk) 20:51, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I also mean to say that this should be how state/district calling works as well. Once AP and 1 other source (preferably more but 1 seems to be something we can all agree on) say a candidate has won a state/district, we should reflect that information. Przemysl15 (talk) 20:57, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I think having AP and one or two major news organization call it is the way to go. Zoozaz1 talk 20:58, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, no. That absolutely will not happen. Many users have already expressed that this would violate WP:SYNTH. We can't ignore a Wikipedia policy due to personal preferences. The only viable proposals thus far that can be carried out are using 1 source for the infobox tally (e.g. the Associated Press), or holding off on updating it until the tally is closer to being finalized. Can we please move on away from this proposal that clearly will not be implemented per Wikipedia policy? Prcc27 (talk) 21:22, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

You are confusing this proposal with a prior one. This is a more refined version of the first alternative proposal you suggested. We use the Associated Press as the primary source for the infobox, but we do not put up the AP sourcing until a few other news organizations have corroborated the AP's findings. Przemysl15 (talk) 21:35, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Adding up the electoral votes to me seems to be a pretty clear example of the basic arithmetic described in WP:CALC. We could easily just add up the electoral votes from the states that have been called by a number of reliable sources. Zoozaz1 talk 21:44, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

It still seems like borderline WP:SYNTH. WP:CALC may negate the SYNTH concerns, but my biggest concern is actually WP:VERIFY. Our electoral vote tally should be easy to verify via a source. Waiting for a source to agree with the AP before updating the infobox will likely lead to an infobox tally that does not match any major media organization's electoral vote tally. Maybe we could have a separate color for states that have been projected only by the AP (light blue/light red) and another color for states where the AP projects a state with agreement from another source (regular blue/regular red). But honestly, I worry this will overcomplicate the map and infobox. Prcc27 (talk) 22:00, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Personally, I think it is sufficient to let users verify the result from state results as long as it is clearly stated where the overall tally comes from; my main concern with relying on only one source is the chance of an incorrect call. It's best to be cautious about something as consequential as this and to me, that means not depending on a single source for the results. Zoozaz1 talk 23:17, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

• If more users voice support for that proposal, I wouldn't be strongly opposed to that as a compromise (although I still have reservations about the proposal). But more users seem to support an AP only criteria, so unless more users agree to that proposal- I feel like agreeing on an AP only criteria would be our only viable option. Otherwise, waiting until after the election to update the infobox would seem to be the consensus. Let's see what other users have to say about the proposal though. Prcc27 (talk) 23:53, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm starting an RfC below, where it'll (hopefully) be more organized and easier to follow. Thanoscar21_{talk, contribs} 02:21, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Legions of Lawyers: Part 2

Unless there's a Biden blowout that even Trump can't contest, there's going to be a contested election or at least an attempt by the Trump people to make it one. Now whether how much is going to be on this page and how much will be on a new article will be determined when the time comes. An article called Supreme Court cases related to the 2020 US Presidential election can be started now, as there have been, as I mentioned before two cases, not including Trump's taxes (that would make it five) which have already been ruled on. I suggest we have a list of the cases and their rulings before the big stuff gets going. Then I'm not so sure. Arglebargle79 (talk) 00:40, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

• Do the 2 current cases warrant creating a completely new article? Would we end up with a stub article if we move forward with a new article today? Prcc27 (talk) 02:09, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

A stub will do for now. There are at least ten or fifteen cases that haven't been ruled on yet, including Trump's second bite at the apple on the taxes thing. Arglebargle79 (talk) 12:49, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

National criteria

There seems to be a weak consensus for a 3+ sourced map/infobox, a weak consensus to list other tally/tallies in the infobox as well, and a moderate consensus that there are some WP:SYNTH/WP:NOTNEWS concerns (which might have been mitigated to a small degree in my compromise proposal in one of the discussions above that nobody has explicitly objected to). Many users are not tuned in to the discussion we have had. So it's possible, that on election day (when more users will be tuned into this article) that consensus will change. Nevertheless, we should move forward with the consensus that we achieved here. That being said, while we have a 3+ source criteria for declaring a candidate a winner of a state- we do not currently have a criteria for declaring a candidate the winner of the national election (projected president-elect). When should a candidate be "declared" the winner of the election in the infobox? In other words, when should we bold the candidate's name, running mate's name, and electoral vote tally? Should we bold a candidate once our map shows they have won, so long as at least 1 other major news organization has also projected them a winner? Should we bold a candidate once 3+ major news organizations have declared a candidate the winner, even if our map does not yet reflect that? My answer to both questions is "yes"- both should be the criteria for bolding a candidate. Of course, if the media organizations all declare a candidate the winner simultaneously- this discussion will be moot. Prcc27 (talk) 20:27, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

I see no reason not to extend the consensus for the infobox to the calling of the race. When 3+ sources call the race, we should as well. I also disagree with your characterization of the consensuses in the prior discussion: there is at least a moderate consensus, and I think more accurately a decently strong consensus, for a 3+ sourced map/infobox, at most a weak consensus to list other tallies in the infobox, and at most a weak consensus that there are SYNTH, etc, concerns. Przemysl15 (talk) 08:50, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

• There is moderate consensus for a 3+ sourced map/infobox broadly speaking, but there is weak consensus for an infobox that only lists a tally using the 3+ source criteria. I should have made that more clear. Prcc27 (talk) 18:12, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Anyone object to me closing this so we can eventually get it archived? It's still attracting random comments that are keeping it from archiving. —valereee (talk) 15:53, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

I don't, but the #What to do on the mid-afternoon on November the Fourth section and Archiving section show that some people might object. (Even though the current talk page is nearly the equivalent of three archives.) --Super Goku V (talk) 16:17, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.