Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2022 November 14

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November 14

Chatroom

Hello again. Does Wikipedia host a sort of forum or chatroom to communicate with other Wikipedians? Sort of like a plzce for socialising Wikipedian10282 (talk) 02:00, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

IRC is your best bet; otherwise discussions on Wikipedia are strictly meant for shop talk. See also WP:NOT#SOCIAL. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 02:04, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

@Wikipedian10282: There is also a Discord server. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 02:14, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Thank you.Wikipedian10282 (talk) 02:28, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

There is also a discord server (see wp:discord) Roostery123 (talk) 11:05, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

What if different sources say different things?

If different sources say different things about the same thing, what do you put? Do you put everything each source says? Do you just not put anything? Please help — Preceding unsigned comment added by GenZenny (talk • contribs) 05:02, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

GenZenny, you start by reading both again in order to ensure that you haven't overlooked a difference in what it is that they're describing, or some other subtlety. (For example, a particular Brit may be truthfully described as having been born in February 1748 or February 1749, if the writer of the former respects the year division of the time and the writer of the latter modernizes for ease of comprehension today.) If the contradiction persists, evaluate the number and quality (and, if relevant, the newness) of the sources backing each. If you conclude that sound sources back the minority view, add the minority view in a footnote. An example of something like this? The exact date of Teikō Shiotani's birth is I think of little significance, but I didn't want to get it wrong: see the relevant footnote in that article, and also the much fuller treatment in the article's talk page, provided in order to help future editors. -- Hoary (talk) 07:37, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

@GenZenny - there certainly are options to list (as full text paragraphs) different options when you end up with this. My preferred example is [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_energy#Theories_of_dark_energy dark energy theories) - where we list five, and that's actually an improvement. This is more commonly seen where it's not a biographical thing like a name but also where no option has a clear majority of suitable sourcing backing it. Nosebagbear (talk) 11:56, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

INVASION

On the page REGINA RHEDA there is A FAKE addition to references:

"Regina Rheda Net Worth – Height, Weight". Archived from the original on 2018-04-07. Retrieved 2018-04-07.

We cannot figure out how to delete! It does not even appear in the Edit pages! HELP Charlesaperrone (talk) 06:36, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Charlesaperrone, this source is obviously worthless, and I removed it. That leaves a grand total of one (1) source that's attached to a particular assertion in the article Regina Rheda. This one remaining source is IMDb, which is also worthless. (I don't quite know why I didn't delete it as well; I might delete it later, and anyone else is welcome to do so.) The article does come with a long list of "Sources". Which source is a reference for which assertion, exactly? Additionally, do you have any particular reason for saying "We cannot figure out[...]"? -- Hoary (talk) 07:18, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Of the remaining two sources, one mentions a book by her; the other, arguably informative, seems to be her on CV on her own blog. Uporządnicki (talk) 13:44, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Editorial we. Charlesaperrone (talk) 18:32, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Editing and expanding a Wiki entry

Is it necessary to contact the original author of a Wiki entry in order to edit and expand an entry? If so, how is that done? Thank you. 2601:645:4500:F90:481F:DD63:B7F:B163 (talk) 06:48, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

no. lettherebedarklight〔晚安 おやすみ〕ping me when replying 06:58, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

No it is not necessary. (Indeed, it's not usual.) Just be sure that your expansions and other improvements adhere to Wikipedia policy. But if you do want to consult with the original author (or other authors, or potential authors), which is sometimes a good idea, then the best place is the article's talk page. -- Hoary (talk) 07:04, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

See WP:BEBOLD. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:29, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Most articles do not have a single author to contact- this is a group effort. 331dot (talk) 09:09, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Go to just about any Wikipedia article on anything even slightly significant (and longer than a sentence or two), and open the "History" tab. You'll almost always find many, many edits--typically several pages' worth. At the very end of the list, on the last page of the listing, the last entry will be the creator--who might or might not have contributed recently, or even ever again after creating the page. And if you click on that page as s/he created it, that page might be virtually unrecognizable in the current page. And it's possible that that contributor hasn't even looked at Wikipedia in years. Somewhere here, I've read the warning: If you can't deal with seeing your Wikipedia contributions edited beyond recognition, you probably shouldn't contribute. Uporządnicki (talk) 13:39, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Translation of a page in english

Hello, i would like to translate a page from italian into english. the page is https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnona_(azienda) Can you help me? thanks Alberta Orlando (talk) 09:19, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

You'll find advice at WP:Translation. - David Biddulph (talk) 09:27, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

watchlist notifications

I'm no longer getting mail notices of changes to watched pages, and cannot find anything relevant in Preferences. Was that feature removed? —Tamfang (talk) 10:14, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Tamfang, check your User Profile, see Help:Watchlist#Email notification. TSventon (talk) 10:36, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Whups, there they are! Looks like they were somehow delayed a few days on the way to me. —Tamfang (talk) 19:10, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

BIBLIOGRAPHY REMOVED

We complained about a hack and the person who fixed the invasion also seems to have DELETED the bibliography of critical references. Could that be restored? Please. Entry: Regina Rheda. Charlesaperrone (talk) 21:59, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

 Courtesy link: Regina Rheda

I can tell you it wasn't a "hacker". Wikipedia's ethos is that anyone can edit, and so unless otherwise set anyone, registered or no, can edit any page. What I see is a concerted effort by both an IPv6 and registered users to bring the article up to standards for biographies and notability; the removed sources were added to the talk page for further discussion. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 22:21, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

@Charlesaperrone, the sources are now all saved on the talk page of the article at Talk:Regina Rheda. General references like that don't tell us what information comes from where. See WP:TUTORIAL to learn how to provide inline references. StarryGrandma (talk) 22:22, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Hacker wrote things like the subject of the entry had nine million dollars and earned it as an actress and was two metres tall, etc. That is not editing! That is malicious!

The bibliography is standard academic material. The kind that professors demand in papers. Charlesaperrone (talk) 23:01, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

If you persist in referring to experienced Wikipedia contributors as 'hackers', you are liable to find yourself blocked from editing. AndyTheGrump (talk) 23:04, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

The bibliography, such as it was, was not fit for purpose. All are missing page numbers (i.e. the specific pages in those books being cited) and almost all are lacking an ISBN or OCLC#. That you insist on calling two of our best content editors who are acting in the article's best interest "hackers" betrays a deeper concern with respect to your editing beyond the unfounded personal attacks. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 23:15, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the problem referred to seems to be this edit by an IP back in 2018, adding a source which has since been removed. 199.208.172.35 (talk) 23:22, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for your service. Please note, all who are reading, that I complained and used the word "hacker" because the change was malicious mischief. Claiming that the subject author had millions of dollars earned from acting is not an edit, it is vandalism. We all much appreciate the donation of professional time to make WP work (we donate every year ourselves) but we must must recognize that some people are not well intentioned. I once found an addition to an entry about a world-class author saying she had been a prostitute. That is the kind of intrusion we can't abide. Thanks again. Charlesaperrone (talk) 00:22, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Hi Charlesaperrone. It would probably be best to avoid referring to others in such a way in the future since it could be seen as contrary to the spirit if not not the actual wording of WP:ASPERSIONS and WP:NPA. Even though it can be sometimes hard to do, particularly when feeling frustrated, it's better to try and remain WP:CIVIL in discussions and edit summaries when making comments about others. It's also important to be careful when labeling an edit made by another as "vandalism" or "malicious mischief" because Wikipedia defines the term in a specific way and not every "bad" edit is vandalism or mischief per se as explained here. Assuming that all edits, even wrong edits, are being made in good-faith is generally a good approach to follow since many edits are made edits are made by well-meaning persons who just might not be familiar or at least as familiar with Wikipedia's relevant policies and guidelines.

As for the removal of the disputed section, a discussion about it was started at Talk:Regina Rheda#List of potential sources, moved from the article by the editor who moved the content to the article's talk page. Generally, disagreements over article content or things such as this are best resolved through article talk page discussion because it makes it easier to keep everythingin one place and makes it easier for others interested in the subject matter to participate. Trying to discuss the same thing on multiple pages often leads to redundancy and confusion; so, you're better off making your argument for re-adding the section there instead of here.

Finally, I just going to add that there are probably a lot of things about how Wikipedia articles are written that aren't consistent with how academic papers are written, but that's mainly because Wikipedia articles aren't necessarily intended to be written as such. Wikipedia contributors (i.e. WP:WIKIPEDIANs) come from all around the world and have different backgrounds. Wikipedia encourages contributors to adhere to its MOS:MOS as much as possible, but the MOS tries to make allowances for differences in national varieties of English and other things as much as possible per MOS:STYLEVAR. Wikipedia articles aren't necessarily written by academics or subject-matter experts to be read primarily by other academics or other subject-matter experts. It's important to try and keep that in mind when editing articles. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:53, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Good morning [my time], all. Please chill. No, Charlesaperrone did indeed complain about a change to this article that I would agree made the article worse. I choose not to use the word "hack" or "hacker" to describe the kind of change/perp that Charlesaperrone complains about; but I acknowledge that others do use these words with such meanings. Charlesaperrone says "[T]he person who fixed the invasion also seems to have DELETED the bibliography of critical references": Actually, no. I deleted the junk reference; Gråbergs Gråa Sång moved out the bibliography. Clearly Charlesaperrone disapproves of the latter, but they don't call it a "hack" and they don't call the person who did it a "hacker". Charlesaperrone, you say that "The bibliography is standard academic material. The kind that professors demand in papers." Not the professors with whom I'm acquainted. Rather, they demand evidence of a familiarity with the relevant research literature, and such evidence requires constructive citation of academic sources: attribution of research result, hypothesis, observation or insight A to source X, attribution of research result etc B to source Y, and so on; all of this backing up what the student (etc) is saying. -- Hoary (talk) 23:35, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Incidentally, a comment on "If you persist in referring to experienced Wikipedia contributors as 'hackers', you are liable to find yourself blocked from editing" (above). Let's agree for a moment that "hacker" is pejorative here. I can't speak for the experienced contributor Gråbergs Gråa Sång; but perhaps in part because I'm an experienced contributor myself I'm unfazed by verbal brickbats. (Sometimes I probably deserve them. Anyway, those that amuse me live on within my user page.) -- Hoary (talk) 00:53, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

@Charlesaperrone: As a separate issue, you refer to yourself as "we". Each user of Wikipedia is supposed to have a separate username, and a username is not supposed to be used by more than one individual. Please clarify your status: if more than one person is contributing under this username, then please stop that, explain what happened, and set up separate accounts under separate usernames. If in fact there is only one of you, then please explain the use of "we". A note on your user page would be a good place to do this.-Arch dude (talk) 03:59, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

@Arch dude: I noticed that as well, but I believe the "we" might be meant in reference to the all who are reading part of that particular post; in other words, I think it's being used similarly to a generic you like when one might say something such as "We, the people of (...), ". Of course, I could be wrong and asking for clarification is probably a good idea. -- Marchjuly (talk) 05:53, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

@Marchjuly and Charlesaperrone: We are not amused. The OP's initial use of "we" may have been editorial, but not the later "(we donate every year ourselves)". -Arch dude (talk) 16:38, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

I donate yearly to the Foundation. Charlesaperrone (talk) 18:58, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Notability of stand-alone lists

I've been a little confused about what establishes notability for a stand-alone list. I've made quite a few that clearly pass WP:NLIST because they are "discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources," but I'm unsure how far this guideline can be stretched. I'm currently wondering whether it makes sense to nominate List of ID10T with Chris Hardwick episodes for deletion, but I don't really want to do that if it leads to a speedy keep and someone trouting me. If ID10T with Chris Hardwick is notable does that count as being "discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources" simply because the podcast consists of a group or set of episodes? At what point is an episode list like this in violation of WP:INDISCRIMINATE, WP:NOTDIRECTORY, or WP:LINKFARM? As far as I can tell none of the episodes in the list are notable and I'm unsure how the list is any more helpful to readers than just looking at the list on a podcasting platform like Google Podcasts, Spotify, Apple, or Stitcher, etc. TipsyElephant (talk) 22:17, 14 November 2022 (UTC)