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Links not intended for viewing from a PC web browser

This originated in a post at WT:WPSPAM#.mobi links. I stumbled onto several .mobi links while looking at some city articles. While there may be some legitimate use of the domain, the ones I came across were all intended for mobile devices (which would be better served using Wapedia rather than Wikipedia). The city ones in particular were predominantly a business/travel directory. I can't think of any that wouldn't run into problems under WP:ELNO, WP:NOT#REPOSITORY, and WP:NOT#DIRECTORY.

• mobi: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com

While I hadn't initially spotted a pattern, user:Beetstra looked into it and found some spamming of the link. There's a suggestion there to add the link to XLinkBot's list of patrolled links. But, it was also suggested to bring up the issue here to see if there's consensus to add "Links not intended for viewing from a PC web browser" under WP:EL#Links normally to be avoided.

Does anyone have an opinion on this? Should the guideline be updated for these types of links? --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 15:18, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

While not exactly covered by Links to avoid it seems in keeping with the intent. That is links should be suitable for general readers, not focused on a particular subset. Since Wikipedia isn't particularly designed for microbrowser or mobile viewing it doesn't seem that reasonable that external links should go to such sites except in exceptional circumstances. However I think we need to be careful about making sure we're describing the types of sites rather than declaring a particular domain inappropriate.

Of course spam itself should be dealt with regardless of which sort of site it links to. -- SiobhanHansa 15:40, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree, sites aimed specifically at mobile users and not at standard web browsers should not be in our articles. Doug Weller (talk) 15:45, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

If the articles linked to actually add to the main article then linking could be appropriate, however, I do think that the little info that is available on a .mobi is more easily assimilated, and I am not sure if the sites would make a suitable reference (I don't think they have enough depth for that, as that is not for what they are written). As such I think they are already removable as inappropriate external links. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 15:59, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Fansites?

WP:FANSITE redirects here, but I don't see any mention of it in the article. Are fan sites permitted or discouraged? I'm looking specifically at Password (TV series) which seems to have a lot of geocities-style fan sites in it's external links. TheHYPO (talk) 16:47, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Discouraged, but not entirely banned. It sounds like most of those might fall under the "personal web pages" or "social networking sites" rules. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:18, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

They are not discouraged or encouraged anymore than any other website. The reality is most are low quality and would not qualify as external links, but that is just a coincidence. The guideline offers all the guidance anyone considering a fansite link needs (or any other website too). 2005 (talk) 21:46, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Is WP:EL useful determining sources?

Often when I see a poor source, I'll comment that not only does it not meet WP:RS, it fails WP:EL as well. Generally, I think it's a good rule of thumb that if it doesn't meet WP:EL, it shouldn't be even considered as a source. Going through 21 pages of archives to find the relevant discussions is a bit daunting. Anyone have a good trick for such searches?

In the specific situation that brought me here the proposed references are self-published articles on individuals' business websites. We have no sources showing that these individuals or their businesses are notable. --Ronz (talk) 21:25, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Some of the principles may be useful, but I'd never recommend it. Requiring reliable sources to comply with WP:ELNO #1 (external links should have more/better/different information than a FA-quality article) would be a particular problem. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:36, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with WhatamIdoing. The links you mention sound like ones that shouldn't be anywhere on the article. But not all links that fail WP:EL will be inappropriate as citation links. Pay sites are another example of a bar for EL's that does not apply to citations. In general in terms of actual reliability I think we have higher standards for sources than ELs (at least as community consensus tends to apply in practice) - but the EL guideline is about more than that. -- SiobhanHansa 22:50, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Good examples. Thanks. I will be more careful so as not to confuse anyone. --Ronz (talk) 00:13, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

WB Streaming linkspam

User:64.236.243.16, who may also be User:Onlychild13, has been busy adding WB linkspam to just about everything possible. OC13 tries to add links to [[The WB Television Network] in the body, while User:64.236.243.16 tries to add them in external links. I've gone ahead and reverted as many as I can find, on the basis of the discussion here and the consensus text of [[WP:EL]. Jclemens (talk) 23:49, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

This should be posted at WT:WPSPAM --Ronz (talk) 00:25, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

I've copied it to WT:WPSPAM. Looks like many of his link contributions remain. --Ronz (talk) 00:44, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Charity Navigator

Any thoughts on linking articles on charitable organizations to their profiles on Charity Navigator?—Largo Plazo (talk) 19:01, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

It looks like a genuine site. Has extensive data on various charities and has also been recognized by leading magazines. Unless there is a better alternative, I believe it would serve as an excellent EL. ^LeaveSleaves _talk 19:17, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it's a case by case decision. The links are similar to linking articles on businesses to their Better Business Bureau reports in some ways though I don't think the limits of the CN reports are as well understood by readers in general. The Charity Navigator profiles are not particularly great, especially for readers who are not familiar with them and there are several competing charity "rating" sites so why this one and not others? I think most of the articles on charities generally need far more well sourced content adding. The addition of CN links is fluff we could generally do without - it just encourages other similar profile links to be added. But from time to time they could be a useful additions. -- SiobhanHansa 19:27, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Charity Navigator is a real site. By why choose them instead of Guidestar, which includes information on all US 501(c)(3)s? I'd also be inclined to limit links to reasonably current and reasonably complete information, and to make sure that the page has the least "donate now" links possible. Also, it's worth noting that these are both US-specific sites, and so useless for non-US groups.

The only truly concrete thing we can tell you is that this link is not actually prohibited by the current WP:EL rules. I think I'd leave this decision up to the editors on a given page, or perhaps to a relevant WikiProject. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:22, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

A little off-topic but... one issue with Guidestar (though I personally prefer them) is that they require free registration to view their basic reports so don't meet our EL requirements. -- SiobhanHansa 20:30, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Weeding a link farm

If someone wants to have some fun, the external links at Asbestos are remarkably plentiful. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:19, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

What about external links to link repositories?

I know articles aren't supposed to be link repositories themselves, but should an EL be avoided to something that is basically just a link repository? To my mind, that EL might reduce the pressure for lots of links in the article, but I'm not sure the policy here speaks to this issue. Brian A Schmidt (talk) 19:42, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

The section on ;Links to be considered, specifically entry #3 in that section, suggests that using a neutral third party directory is acceptable in some cases - and that {{dmoz}} is a common one to be used for this purpose. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:47, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

The link in question is http://climatedebatedaily.com/ , a newsblog where the content is constantly updated. It's not a scientific source, just a passthrough, and WP:RS can't be verified by shifting website content to unknown future source providers. --Skyemoor (talk) 20:51, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Links like that are useless. Sometimes a dmoz link is the best solution for an article with longterm or temporary issues, but in general web directory links should not be used in articles with a bunch of other links. In this case, the climate site is not even a web directory. It appears to be a news aggregator, which is something that should never be linked to. 2005 (talk) 22:17, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure how to distinguish a news aggregator on this issue from other link collectors (links in this case are selected by people, not software). Any help on 1. how to distinguish aggregators, and 2. why they're inappropriate, would be great.Brian A Schmidt (talk) 16:01, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree that aggregators should be avoided. I don't think ELNO makes this clear. --Ronz (talk) 18:51, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

I will humbly repeat my question for WP gurus or anyone else - what's the difference between a directory and an aggregator? Is it software v. human-picked, or something else? Thanks! Brian A Schmidt (talk) 17:50, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

The primary issue is stability of content at the target link. Aggregators change their content frequently. When an editor posts an external link to any page, they need to have a pretty good idea of what will be on that page for the reasonably foreseeable future. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:08, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Adding Category:General style guidelines

Since I'm maintaining the monthly style and content policy WP:Update, I'm generally keeping my hands off the style guidelines, but after some research today, I've decided I'd like to start adding the data from this page to the monthly updates, and then others can decide whether they want to keep it in the CAT:GEN category. This isn't a very "serious" category; it's just a subcat of Category:Wikipedia style guidelines that informally represents "what people are keeping track of these days". stats.grok.se tells me "Wikipedia:External_links has been viewed 32168 times in 200809", which is a lot more than most style guidelines pages. I was initially worried that the long list in this page would tend to make it unstable (as people added and subtracted their favorite examples), but my worries were dead wrong: the page has been remarkably stable when compared against Feb 1 of this year. It wouldn't offend me at all if anyone wants to yank this page from Category:General style guidelines, but I'm in favor of giving it a shot. - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 20:30, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

WP:ELNO—a little conflict

User:Piano non troppo and I are a little conflicted of what's stated under WP:ELNO and the interpretation. Piano non troppo sees it as only one external link to a musician's official site and discouraging any MySpace links. I see it as the exact opposite; any official site of the musician, including an official MySpace link. Any clarification here? DiverseMentality^(Boo!) 04:43, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

It isn't crystal clear since life isn't like that. The idea of always only "one" official link is silly. So is the idea of "any" offical sites. If a company has a mass consumer site like somecompany.com and a corporate site like somecompanyplc.com, it's perfectly sensible to link to both. But if a company has 90 offical sites for every little nook of its business, then 90 links is crazy. With bands, if a Myspace page offers important official content not available on the someband.com official site, fine, link to it. If the Myspace is just inane comments, then don't. 2005 (talk) 06:26, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with User:2005. I add that if two or more essentially identical websites exist, then choosing one is best. Each external link at the end of an article must provide information that is (1) not already in the article and (2) not already in some other external link. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:37, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Oops, I've completely forgot to respond to these responses. As for the MySpace link, Piano non troppo says MySpace links are completely not allowed in the external links. I beg to differ, as the MySpace pages offer exclusive content that other sites, including official ones, never offer. I want a clear answer to this question: Are MySpace links allowed in the external links as long as it is the official page of the musician? DiverseMentality^(Boo!) 18:39, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

This guideline neither limits to only one official link ever, nor supports the idea that all official links should always be included. This guideline does suggest social networking sites like MySpace should not be linked Links to avoid #10 - so if there is a none MySpace official link it seems reasonable to me to use that one instead, unless there is something extraordinary about the MySpace site that makes it much more appropriate for the article. But in circumstances when editors disagree on whether a particular link is an improvement to the encyclopedia article they should use the article's talk page and dispute resolution to come to develop consensus. -- SiobhanHansa 19:00, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

The guideline is clear. If there is no other official site, then an official myspace "should" be linked to. There is no blanket ban on mMyspace links. Myspace links are allowed under the right circumstances. 2005 (talk) 21:05, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed, the guideline is clear. That is: if there is no better link, MySpace could be linked to. In fact, on to the page DiverseMentality and I started discussing, I re-added the MySpace link. Neither DiverseMentality nor I felt (in a later conversation not reflected here) that the External link labeled "official" was as satisfactory as the MySpace site -- according to various Wiki guidelines. Being in some doubt, both links in Ludacris remain. Piano non troppo (talk) 19:01, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Inline links

Did I miss it or does the guideline say nothing about inline external links? See e.g. this article. There doesn't appear to be so much as a maintenance template dedicated to this rampant problem. Everyme 03:51, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

The guideline says that normally there should never be such a thing as "inline external links". If you see any, remove them. 2005 (talk) 06:27, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I usually do, but many, particularly new and inexperienced users keep adding them. Not sure if any bot covers such things e.g. by detaching and placing the link into a ref, or (preferably) by removing it altogether. In the meantime, I've found {{External links}}, but its tone is very vague and general. Everyme 06:57, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't get too worked up about newbies adding inline links that are actually being used as references. It's easy enough to convert them to proper references, and since User:Arcadian cleaned up a bunch of mine once upon a time, I feel like I have no business complaining if someone else does the same thing. Furthermore, it's better to have something inelegantly referenced than to have no references for facts.

I'm much less happy about the promotional links, such as when someone adds a link to a particular product or organization. I'm sure you've seen this sort of thing: You have a perfectly neutral, encyclopedic sentence like "Most pencils contain graphite instead of lead", and someone adds "such as those made by [link to company here]." Those should be removed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:04, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

There are some articles that are so thick with them, it would take a day to clean them up-- Scouting in New York, for example, is crawling with them. -- Mwanner | Talk 15:18, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I looked at Scouting in New York, and these links are not being used as references. They're being used as external links to all the various scouting groups, in violation of WP:NOTDIRECTORY. They should all be removed, and proper link, like Girl Scout Councils in New York, substituted in the EL section. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:03, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

dmoz again

Why do we say that dmoz links are OK under "Links to be considered"? What about WP:NOTDIRECTORY? Under what circumstances should a dmoz link be kept as a permanent link in an article? -- Mwanner | Talk

WP:NOTDIRECTORY is designed to prevent WP from becoming a web directory, not from linking to them; the purpose of linking to dmoz is to shunt links that fail WP:EL to dmoz, and then offer only that dmoz link in the WP article. dmoz is chosen above other web directories because it is an open project. Mindmatrix 15:40, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Public domain film links?

Where they exist, might it be a good idea to, perhaps even as policy, link to copies of public domain films/tv shows/episodes viewable on places like archive.org or google video? There'd obviously be no copyright violations, and I feel that if you have an article on a film or something that has a legally viewable copy online, it'd be a good informative external link. Just a thought! Xmoogle (talk) 03:24, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Social neworking sites

Rule number 10 states that links to social networking sites should be avoided. Does this still apply when a notable person has an "official myspace"? What if the person's social networking site happens to be his official website?--Parthian Scribe (talk) 18:01, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

A brief look at this page will show that we answer this question about once a week. YES, you can include MySpace pages if the MySpace page meets all of these requirements:

(1) It is actually an official website (that is, if it didn't have MySpace.com in the name, you'd normally include it for the purposes of complying with WP:ELYES #1).

(2) The official MySpace page isn't linked to on another official website (no duplication/minimum number of links requirement).

(3) The MySpace website doesn't otherwise violate any other rules listed in WP:ELNO (particularly #1).

Perhaps we should put a footnote at ELNO #10 that explains this. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:03, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

For this purpose, that is to say adding a footnote to ELNO #10, some care should be exercised that editors with a passing interest don't fixate on a particular part of a qualifying sentence that seems to agree with their opinion, without encouragement to appreciate the broader context of Wiki's policies of verifiability, neutral point of view and avoidance of original research.

If not otherwise allowed as "official" by Wiki policy, official sites seem to carry a deal of commercial or self-advertising material that is uncited, partial, and subject to unpredictable change. My reasoning about the Wiki guideline is that even if opinionated, a person or organization should be recognized to represent themselves -- outside of Wiki.

This is where the problem arises, which is that casual editors, not understanding that there is a special purpose to an official site, examine the contents of the site itself, and conclude from it that another External Link has just as much valid content, and therefore should also be included. In this peculiar fashion, an argument for a great many sites can be made that are not "official", but have much of the same self-advertising, speculation, and unverifiable claims. Piano non troppo (talk) 19:36, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Having just raised this question redundantly on this page (sorry!), it does seem like this is a very common query here. Shouldn't the rule be clarified to specify the exceptions, because it does seem that there are very well defined exceptions to the rule? cojoco (talk) 06:01, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

The exception is clear. If it is an official site it should be linked. If it isn't, it shouldn't. It's right there in the first line of the section. 2005 (talk) 06:44, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Timely comments, cojoco and 2005. I'm just tussling with how to describe "official site" in a Wiki document. There are legal ramifications to being an official spokesperson. Though it rarely comes to a legal suit, the question still stands. What can claim to be an "official site"? (I was one of two webmasters for a company that lost a class action suit due to content on our "official company site". I was required to document that I had requested that the material be removed ! ) Anyhow, I think this needs to be a very legal definition, because Wikipedia is potentially vulnerable: "Knowingly and intentionally directing others to a site that violates copyright has been considered a form of contributory infringement".[1] It might be possible for Wikipedia to "pass the buck" on copyright violations, if the External Link in question is an "official site". (Rolls eyes.) But even that probably wouldn't do more than help protect us, in the case of a major problem -- such as the one I experienced as a webmaster. Piano non troppo (talk) 07:19, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

The restrictions on linking cover that, WP:ELNEVER. Aside from ELNEVER official sites should be linked. If disputes arise over proff of "officialness", they can be discussed on talk pages. 2005 (talk) 07:37, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) Can we say that if an Artist creates a MySpace page about themselves that this site is automatically "official" (assuming it's not an obvious forgery)? If this is not the case and an Artist's MySpace page, for example, has more information than their "official site", shouldn't that be a good candidate for linking anyway? If a site falsely claims to be created by the artist in question, I can't see how Wikipedia could be held responsible for being fooled. cojoco (talk) 18:32, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't think the standard should be "assuming it's not an obvious forgery" but rather "assuming it is unambiguously the artist's page". If there's any real doubt over whether it's controlled by the entity that is the subject of the article we shouldn't be labeling it as such - that's not reliable (and this applies to any link not just a MySpace one). I don't see this as simply a matter of us being "held liable" (legally or otherwise) for being "fooled" but about the rigor with which we ought to approach inclusion of claims in our articles - given that we are trying to be a serious encyclopedia. I think this is covered by our current guidelines and doesn't really need any changes here or elsewhere. -- SiobhanHansa 18:49, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't think there is much middle ground between "obvious forgery" and "site owned by artist": are such things very common? I would like to see an exception to Rule 10 stated on the page. Would "it is OK to link to such a page if it is clearly owned by the subject of the article in question?" be sufficiently clear? I don't think that the burden of proof is too onerous. cojoco (talk) 22:51, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I think you are missing the point. The guideline is clear: official sites should be linked; and none of the ELNO points apply to official sites. That is all crystal clear, so there is no need for "it is OK" text when there is "should" text already. The only gray area is when there are multiple official sites, and when the multiple official sites are largely redundant to each other. For instance it is silly to link to site.com, and site.co.uk, and site.ca when they are exact duplicates of each other. When a band has an official myspace with content unique to it, then link to it. If there are multiple of these official myspaces, then the issue could be more complex. 2005 (talk) 23:17, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

In light of the above comment by 2005 (which seems a reasonable approach to me), would it be worthwhile amending WP:ELYES #1 to clear up any potential ambiguity? I'm thinking of something along the lines of: "Wikipedia articles about any organization, person, web site, or other entity should link to the subject's official site, if any. If the subject has multiple official sites, link to all official sites with unique content. Do not link to multiple official sites if the content is duplicated or otherwise redundant." --Muchness (talk) 23:45, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I'd support that idea, except the word "English language" should be in there; and then also we should have wiggle room so that when an official corporate site that plainly links to niche official sites, only the main site is linked... like (made up names) redcompany.com has a nav bar at the top that links to redcompanypants.com, redcompanyshirts.com, redcompanyhats.com, redcompanysunglasses.com, redcompanybooks.com, etc etc. My feeling is the web is now set up so that three or four official sites is appropriate, but 10 or 15 is ridiculous. We don't need to duplicate the navigation of a company's main website, but clearly a link to an official corporate site and an official consumer site should normally be done. So, I'd like to see a statement like: "Do not link to multiple official sites if the content is duplicated or otherwise redundant, or if they are simply niche sites that are linked in navigation from a principal official site." Could use better wording, but something like that. 2005 (talk) 00:10, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Another confusing aspect is that by the sound of the previous discussion, it sounds like an artist's own MySpace page *should* be considered an "official site", and linked if it contains useful information. That is certainly not clear, either.cojoco (talk) 00:14, 29 October 2008 (UTC) The reason for my presence here is that an artist's page I was watching had their MySpace page deleted from the official links. By the sound of it, that should not have happened, but when coming to this page cold it is possible to discover the exceptions only by reading the talk page. 2005's recent comments also seem to be drifting away from the original source of this discussion, which is the very common confusion surrounding the linking of social sites. cojoco (talk) 00:31, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

That's just not true. If you read the guideline it says first Wikipedia articles about any organization, person, web site, or other entity should link to the subject's official site, if any. And then, the first part of links to avoid says Except for a link to an official page of the article subject.... Official sites should be linked to; the links to avoid section does not apply to official sites -- period. The exceptions are not somehow hidden on the talk page. The basic idea is spelled out clearly in the guideline. Just read it. If someone removed an official myspace that has significant unique content, just add it back and refer to this guideline. The guideline is very clear about the general concept: myspace pages should not be linked unless they are official ones. The fine lines only come into play if the myspace has no content, or a band has 30 myspace pages, stuff like that. 2005 (talk) 01:06, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm really not keen on the idea of encouraging links to large numbers of official sites on one article. The EL section should not be a directory to an organization's web properties. An official site is a good idea but other sites have to add unique content that's also encyclopedic not just promotional. For instance all of a company's brands - even if well known - shouldn't be linked (imagine for instance the EL section for Proctor and Gamble if we did that). Author's shouldn't have individual book sites linked to if they have separate sites for all their books. There are plenty of entities that have lots of sites that carry particular messages for different reasons - we shouldn't be linking to them all unless they are particularly significant. Choose the most central and any others that are particularly important for a general reader to look at - maybe also link to a page of the corporate/hub site that does list the entity's main web properties if one exists. But don't make the external links section more than it needs to be. Remember it should be short and the official sites shouldn't overwhelm the section. -- SiobhanHansa 00:49, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

With respect to 2005's last comment, there are still three problems with Wikipedia's guidelines with respect to social networking sites. Firstly, there's the matter of definition: it doesn't seem obvious that a MySpace page owned by an artist really is an official site, although that has become clear through this discussion. Secondly, the way the rules are set out, it is not clear that there are any exceptions to the rules against links to social networking sites. Even a pre-amble stating that "These rules are not absolute, and some have exceptions listed here", would be more accurate. Thirdly, it does sound like this issue arises a lot on this talk page, so something should be done simply to reduce the volume of queries here. cojoco (talk) 02:40, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

If my proposed wording could be interpreted to encourage the sort of inappropriate overlinking that you and 2005 describe, then it certainly shouldn't be added. My concern was that the current wording could be read to recommend linking only to one official website, when, as we seem to agree, it's permissible to link to more than one official site if they're particularly useful, relevant, and significant. I'd be open to some amendment that makes this clearer, if you and other interested parties feel it's worth addressing. --Muchness (talk) 02:54, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I agree that there is a possibility of overlinking. However, the reason that I entered this discussion is that I have noticed a couple of times that links to "official" MySpace pages and blogs have been removed by over-zealous editors while citing this rule. As a relatively new editor, I would want to be very careful before adding such a link back again, and a clear explanation of the concepts we have been talking about would give confidence to replace the link (if that was justified), or, alternatively, relieve the sense of injustice if the removal of the link was for good and well-stated reasons. cojoco (talk) 03:06, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

In response to 2005's comment "That's just not true. If you read the guideline it says first Wikipedia articles about any organization, person, web site, or other entity should link to the subject's official site, if any.", I agree, that this almost makes it clear. However, I doubt that anybody on first reading would realize that a "Myspace" page could be regarded as an "official" site, as they are usually informal sites maintained by an individual rather than an "official" organization. I think the concept of "ownership" is at least as important as that of "officialness", because it is less open to mis-interpretation. How about Wikipedia articles ... should link to the subject's own site, if any. cojoco (talk) 07:46, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

"Official" is the point, not "own". No one owns a myspace page, but they are often official sites for bands, or models, or photgraphers. Ownership is irrelevant to the officialness... another example is blog of a newspaper writer. The writer certainly doesn't own the newspaper, but this is his/her's official place on the web. Most people udnerstand Myspace pages are official pages of bands. that's not really the issue. The issue tends to be 1) some people despise myspace and think it should never be linked, 2) some people interpret the guideline to mean only ONE official site so if another one is listed then a myspace should not also be listed. Then also there is the very minor point of knowing if it is actually official or not -- this is minor because the burden is on a erson wanting to add the link. if there is not a clear way to prove it is official, it should not be linked. 2005 (talk) 09:13, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

We can go around and around and around this point, but I really do think that the word "official" causes a lot of confusion. "Official" has connotations of authority, offices and legalities, none of which seem to apply to a MySpace page; and what do you mean, "no one owns a Myspace page"??? It is clear that there is a problem with the rules as stated, which is why discussions come up here so regularly. Presenting your internally self-consistent interpretation of these rules here will unfortunately never remove the confusion that they cause. I think that some re-wording is necessary to avoid this issue appearing again. cojoco (talk) 11:51, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

We've never had someone bring up your interpretation of official, nor what seems to be a unique definition of "own". Rewording can always possibly improve something, but right now the wording is clear and logical, though perhaps it could be even better. Best case scenario is a myspace page is linked from Celine Dion's official site, called her official myspace page, and labeled "Celine Dion's Official Myspace" on the myspace page itself... and then it has original/meritable content. Then there is no doubt. (I'm not sure what you mean by asking '"no one owns a Myspace page"???' Myspace is owned by Fox/Rupert Murdoch. People who have myspace pages obviously don't "own" them themselves.) `2005 (talk)

arbitrary MySpace break

(Unindent) From the conversation above it seems the problem is more that editors want clear hard rules that favor their own interpretation (either always or never) so they don't have to enter into a consensus building discussion on talk pages with other editors that instead looks at what makes for a better encyclopedia article. If there is disagreement about whether a site is "official" then that probably is something that editors of each article should be discussing on that talk page (for instance the MySpace page of one member of a band - is that their "own", is it "official"? These questions should be considered case by case. What benefits the article most?). And if there are several official sites that is also something where editors should be considering the individual circumstances - if there is disagreement then discuss on the article talk page. These guidelines can't reasonably be expected to cover every popular site that acts as a form of webhost individually. Singling out MySpace and saying it "should" or "should not" be linked to in particular circumstances is a temporary solution that simply stops arguments rather than actually improves individual articles - sometimes the right answer will be link to it. Sometimes the right answer will don't link to it. It should be discussed on an article's talk page. -- SiobhanHansa 12:33, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps one reason why MySpace is singled out in these discussions is that it is explicitly mentioned in the rule, but perhaps it should not, being more like a personal web-page or blog. These are covered by Rule 11 and have the "except those written by a recognized authority" exception, which would seem to cover the disagreements we have had here. I completely agree with a consensus-building approach, but when a link is removed from an article while citing the rule, e.g. "Removes External links to social site and fansites, per WP:LINKSTOAVOID", then any disagreement with the edit would appear to be with the rule, instead of with the decision to remove the link. cojoco (talk) 19:48, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

"Official" is what matters. If an artist has a personal MySpace account that talks about his child's birthday present, and what happened at his friend's party last night, and whether his internet connection is ever going to quit acting up, then it is not an official site -- even if it's the artist's only presence on the web.

As for people deleting official MySpace links, you just need to restore them with an explanation. Most people don't know what all the rules are anyway. It might be a good idea to add a hidden comment like <!-- This is the band's official website, which is allowed under Wikipedia policies, even though it's hosted by MySpace.com --> if it's a particular problem. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:14, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I have added two footnotes that I think will clarify the situation for most editors. Perhaps we'll let them be for a while, and then see whether they clear up the confusion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:29, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Those footnotes looks good to me. -- SiobhanHansa 22:31, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

To reiterate the point you seem to not be catching, Rule 11 does not apply to official sites. Period. If someone removes an official myspace and cites rule 11, revert it and point out the guideline states all those rules in that section do not apply to official sites. 2005 (talk) 22:14, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

To reiterate the point you seem to not be catching, it is hard to see a MySpace page as an "official site". I agree with the intention of the rule and its exception, but hope that it can be clarified to remove this easily made misinterpretation. Also, it is Rule 10 that is the problem; the "recognized authority" exception for Rule 11 seems just right.cojoco (talk) 22:36, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Why??? It's not hard at all to think of an offical myspace as official. Obviously this is very common parlance amongs bands especially. If some band says myspace.com/someband is their official myspace, why do you find that a problem? 2005 (talk) 01:19, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't find it a problem at all: if something is labelled as official, then it fits nicely with the rule. However, I'm certainly not aware of this "common parlance", and I'm sure that MySpace pages owned by artists exist without the word "official" anywhere to be seen. Still, I'd be happy to leave this, if this really is in common usage. cojoco (talk) 02:24, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

User:2005, perhaps you would like to "use the talk page" and explain why you deleted the explanatory footnote that is discussed above? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:45, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

It was confusingly worded, stated concepts that are not true in practice, nor discussed have been here. And besides that, if you want to add something to the guideline that significantly differs with common practice, then start a separate discussion about it, with a rationale. 2005 (talk) 02:21, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

when are external links allowed in the body of the article?

I'm involved in a discussion at Template talk:StrategyWiki about when it is/isn't good to place external links in the body of the article. If we could get some input from folks with more expertise in that area, that would be good.--Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 04:14, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I've replied over there. In this particular case, I agree that this is a very non-good idea. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:00, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

This guideline says: External links should not normally be used in the body of an article. Basically external links should never be in the body of an article. 2005 (talk) 21:25, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

By "not normally", we pretty much mean "never, unless the alternative is truly stupid." For example, if you have a List of non-governmental organizations, it would be truly stupid to list a thousand organizations, and then follow it with a thousand-link-long "External links" section that duplicates the list, but this time with external links. Anything much under that threshold of stupidity is unlikely to be acceptable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:56, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Short list under What to link

I'm curious about this little list in the What to link section:

There are several things that should be considered when adding an external link. Is it accessible to the reader? Is it proper in the context of the article (useful, tasteful, informative, factual, etc.)? Is it a functional link, and likely to continue being a functional link?

The first item duplicates WP:ELNO number 7; the second item somewhat overlaps number 13; and the third item is similar to number 16. With some minor tweaking, we could merge these three considerations into WP:ELNO so all caveats would be in one place. Does anyone else think this would be a minor improvement? Qazin (talk) 03:44, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I see your point about them being similar but I'm not sure about removing them from that area. I also don't think there is as much actual overlap as you seem to - though some editing may be in order. ELNO#7 isn't simply about WP:Accessibility type of issues. #7 has also frequently been discussed as meaning, for instance, links that can only be accessed by people in particular countries. Perhaps we should use a word other than "accessible" in ELNO#7?

IIRC (and I'm fuzzy on this and haven't gone back to check) this used to be a list of "Don'ts" which seemed out of place in the section on what should be listed but it seemed important to give some guidance on how to think about links at this point in the guideline so it was reworded to be more positive. If we took the list out it would leave less positive guidance for editors. -- SiobhanHansa 22:23, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Excellent point re wikification of accessibility in item 7 (and thanks for reverting). I erroneously linked it because it was linked in WP:EL#What_to_link. However, now that I've studied it further, I'm wondering if even that existing link is appropriate, or the statement is in the right place.

WP:ACCESS addresses "... the goal of making web pages easier to navigate and read. ... by those Wikipedians with and without disabilities," and in WP:ACCESS#Links guides how to make links more accessible.

The wording of WP:EL#What_to_link ("... things that should be considered when adding an external link ...Is it accessible to the reader?") seems to be about accessibility of the link, not the site it links to, or the content on the site. If the meaning of accessibility here is in this sense, it is about how to make a link, rather than what links to make, and might be more appropriate in WP:EL#How_to_link instead. I like your idea about coming up with some alternate terminology, since the meaning of accessibility is contextual depending on the object and subject: access by a user to the link on WP, access of the user to the site, access of the browser to the code on the site, or access of the user to the content rendered by the browser. Perhaps we should add some nouns with accessibility to clarify which meaning in which place. Which of these meanings do you think was intended in WP:EL#What_to_link? Qazin (talk) 23:58, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I was hoping others would add more to this thread because I my thinking on this issue is not particular deeply considered. I've always thought both sections referred to the content of the site the link pointed to I've never really thought of them as being about how to present the link on the article (which I agree is covered by How to link). I guess I think of the use of accessibility in the What to link section as being more about encouraging readers to remember that not all people have the same faculties when it comes to accessing content while I see the Do not link section to be more about diverse accessing technology. But that's probably down the way the conversations on this page tend to go. -- SiobhanHansa 10:54, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I think your interpretation makes sense. What do you think about clarifying it something like this:

There are several things that should be considered when adding an external link. Is the site content accessible to the reader? Is the site content proper in the context of the article (useful, tasteful, informative, factual, etc.)? Is the link functional and likely to remain functional?

Qazin (talk) 21:13, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

There seems to be a consensus (mostly through silence) on this change, so I'll proceed with the change and link the summary to this thread. Qazin (talk) 20:22, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Linking to Uncyclopedia

Hi all. Sorry if this has been dealt with before... I recently added two links into the "External links" section of Pun which which give humours examples of using Puns. This edit was reverted with a message telling me to come here and read this. I had read this policy before, but perhaps I do not understand. It appears to me that the external links I added support Pun and are no different to the other external references used in that article. Could someone clear this up for me please? MrN9000 (talk) 01:03, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't know about the other articles in the external links section - they my need cleaning up too - but neither of the articles you added actually provided further information about the general subject of puns. They used puns as a comedic device to entertain but as a reader you don't come away from those Uncyclopedia articles actually knowing anything more about puns than you would have reading the Wikipedia article. Humorous external links aren't banned as such, but they they still need to provide encyclopedic information about the article's subject - not just entertain in a way that is related to the subject. Uncyclopedia is also a site whose reputation does not really include accuracy as such - that's not really its intent. So especially since it's a wiki it would rarely be an appropriate external link for one of Wikipedia's articles. -- SiobhanHansa 10:46, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

As Siobhan explains, the problem appears that you linked to examples of puns, not to significant information about puns. And WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is never a sufficient justification. In particular, "this is just like all the others here" is a violation of WP:EL's requirement for the minimum number of external links to be present. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:45, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Hea, thanks for your replies. Firstly, let me clear two things up... As my user page says, I edit mostly at Uncyclopedia, and also I wrote both of the articles which I linked to Pun. Hopefully you will not think that I'm pushing this simply to advertise my work. I think this situation is an example of a wider issue which I'm trying to address here.

I understand what you are saying when you say "neither of the articles you added actually provided further information about the general subject of puns"... It was not my intention to "provide further information" but to provide more comprehensive examples of Puns being used.

Some of the other external links which were at Pun have now been removed. There does still remain a link to the The International Save the Pun Foundation. This link appears to provide no new information other than examples of Puns being used. I noticed this happening on the following pages:

• Alliteration - A List of Alliterations a selection of compiled alliteration examples.
  
• Joke -{{dmoz|Recreation/Humor/Jokes/|Jokes}} – An active listing of links to jokes.
• Humour - *{{Dmoz|Recreation/Humor/|Humor}}
  
• Insult - List of Shakespeare's insults
• Insult -A collection of insults in a comprehensive range of categories
• Mathematical joke - Mathematical Humor — From Mathworld
• Punch line - Punchlines from greatest jokes
  
• Russian jokes - Russian Jokes, Best Russian jokes translated into English
• Bilingual_pun - Filipino - Cebuano Jokes 3
• Daffynition Fuller's Dictionary of Daffynitions
• Knock-knock joke - DeepThought Knock Knock Jokes Collection A collection of Knock Knock Jokes gathered from many sources and rated by the public.
• Knock-knock joke - A lot more Knock Knock Jokes
• Spoonerism - Lists of spoonerisms at fun-with-words.com
• Tom Swifty - Tom Swifty Web Page
• Joke -Funny Jokes
• Blonde_jokes - *The Best Blonde Jokes Archives Blonde Jokes Blonde Jokes Blonde JokesBlonde Jokes Blonde JokesBlonde JokesBlonde Jokes How a Blonde Eats a Banana

I could go on, but I'm sure you would rather I did not... :) Many of the articles listed in Category:Jokes have external links which give examples of the particular humour format with nothing more in terms of information about the subject. Presumably many editors of Wikipedia believe that examples of the style given in the external references section adds to the quality of the article. I understand why WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS has been mentioned here, however it is not relevant. Wikipedia is not a collection of examples, other websites serve that purpose and thus deserve to be linked to. For example wikisource, wikibooks, etc. Uncyclopedia can therefore be considered a wiki of comedic examples.

I obviously understand what you are saying about "Uncyclopedia is also a site whose reputation does not really include accuracy". I agree that the vast majority of articles on Wikipedia should never be linked to Uncyclopedia pages. However, it is the case that not linking to Uncyclopedia as a general guideline precludes the option of providing quality examples of numerous different styles of humour which would be useful to readers.

On the issue of "So especially since it's a wiki it would rarely be an appropriate external link for one of Wikipedia's articles" - Uncyclopedia now gets an average of 100,000 unique visitors per day with around 350,000 page loads, and has a very active regular user base. Like Wikipedia, Uncyclopedia is a wiki and so is subject to vandalism. Presumably if linking to another wiki is not a good idea then linking to a Wikipedia page from within a Wikipedia article is also not a good idea.

"Presumably if linking to another wiki is not a good idea then linking to a Wikipedia page from within a Wikipedia article is also not a good idea" -- Internal linking is so you can find more from the same source. If you don't know what orthocenter means, but it appears in an article, then the internal link is useful for finding out about the orthocenter. External links are about the subject of the article, but on another site. Someone the Person (talk) (aka The Linkifier/Some WHAT!?) 21:50, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

OK, like I said at the beginning of this rant (sorry for the length), I am an Uncyclopedia editor, and so can easily be accused of pushing an addenda. I am doing this because I feel that certain Wikipedia editors hold an agenda to remove as many references to Uncyclopedia as possible from Wikipedia, even if this means a reduction in the usefulness of the given article. I am therefore trying to get agreement over the correct usage of Uncyclopedia as a reference of examples of humour, parody and satire on Wikipedia. Uncyclopedia is a freely accessible, non profit site which has no advertising and an open license which allows the free copying and distribution of its material.

I agree that linking to Uncyclopedia may not be ideal due to the issue raised at point 2 of WP:LINKSTOAVOID. However, in this case I do not think this applies. If Wikipedia wishes to provide examples of humour styles by linking to any humour based website it is likely that the site in question will contain much which is non-factual or misleading. Anyone clicking a link to a humour site would be aware that it was a humour site, and as such would not expect the information it contained to be entirely accurate, they would just expect to find an example. Precluding links to Uncyclopedia for this reason therefore appears to be invalid.

Perhaps the links I added to Pun are not ideal for this article. As the author of those articles, I'm hardly in a position to give an unbiased opinion. I would however like to suggest that linking to Uncyclopedia is sometimes appropriate if it appears to give an excellent example of a given humour style. Many apologies for the length of this post... OK, I will STFU now. ;) MrN9000 (talk) 20:39, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Well I disagree that links to examples are generally an appropriate use of the external links section. There may be lots of other poor links in articles but as said before - WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. Also many of our articles on joke subjects are themselves very poorly written and not in keeping with a lot of our guidelines and policies so they aren't necessarily a good place to look as guide to what should be going in an article. The guideline here says links should be about the subject and that is normally interpreted as excluding links that are simply examples.

On the wiki point - wikis are sometimes acceptable and Uncyclopedia's size and longevity mean that were it in other ways an appropriate site it being a wiki would probably not be a problem. My thought when I wrote that it being a wiki was a barrier was very much linked to the fact that as a site its purpose isn't to be accurate but to entertain - so if there did happen to be an article there that entertained and provided further encyclopedic information it would still be very doubtful that it would be a suitable link because it could so easily by edited by anyone - and the culture is not to try to keep it accurate for Wikipedia's needs. Uncyclopedia is great at what it does and I love browsing through it - but the external links at Wikipedia aren't about entertaining people they're about informing, and Uncyclopedia is not focused on providing for that. That said there's no ban on Uncyclopedia itself and I think the stripping out of links you have seen is more to do with the fact that Wikipedia is raising its standards in some ways and no longer allows some of the more lighthearted approaches that seemed to be more acceptable in the earlier days. -- SiobhanHansa 22:27, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Well I must say that I am very surprised with your "Well I disagree that links to examples are generally an appropriate use of the external links section." statement. Suggesting that giving examples of something is not a good way to help explain that thing is just ridiculous. I have no idea why you are quoting WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS at me. The fact that examples are an excellent accompaniment to an explanation is universally well agreed the world over. Not just on Wikipedia, but in academic texts, other encyclopaedias, scientific journals and any credible publication which attempts to inform about a subject. Sometimes it's not possible (for various reasons) to include such examples in Wikipedia. When that happens external links should be used.

Regarding your "My thought when I wrote that it being a wiki was a barrier was very much linked to the fact that as a site its purpose isn't to be accurate but to entertain" comment... I have no idea why you are talking about accuracy. Obviously Uncyc is not an accurate source of information. It is very unlikely that Uncyc will ever be a suitable reference for accurate information. It does however provide examples of humour styles which can not be included in Wikipedia. As I said before, it is not my intention that links to Uncyclopedia from Wikipedia amuse the reader, but that they increase the quality and usefulness of the Wikipedia article.

Regarding the wholesale stripping out of links to Uncyclopedia by particular users... Let me assure you that this does happen. I do not wish to name users or provide examples as I have no wish to provoke an undesirable response. It does happen, and usually at the expense of the quality of the Wikipedia article in question. I obviously understand that Wikipedia has experienced problems in the past with people adding links to Uncyclopedia articles in an inappropriate manor. Such behaviour is extremely unacceptable, and is defiantly not encouraged by Uncyclopedia. Such behaviour should be treated a vandalism, and dealt with accordingly. Uncyclopedia has banned users (from Uncyc) for vandalising other wiki in the past including users who have vandalised Wikipedia. Uncyc gets 100,000 unique visitors a day and it is likely that users who vandalise Wikipedia by adding inappropriate links to Uncyc are not Uncyc regulars. You might be surprised to discover that Uncyc regularly gets "vandalised" by users inserting text from Wikipedia into the Uncyc Wiki. Vandals are present the internet over, and suggesting that Uncyc creates vandals is a ridiculous position. If anything, the presence of Uncyc reduces the frequency of "humours vandalism" on Wikipedia by providing people who wish to do this kind of thing a place to go. That is one of the reasons why Uncyc was created out of WP:BJAODN.

In your final paragraph you made a comment about standards. I agree that many Uncyclopedia pages are not effective at providing examples related to humour. A list of the best Uncyc articles can be found here. These articles have been featured on the main page of Uncyclopedia and do not get significantly edited. It is likely that on many occasions an Uncyc article may not provide the best example of a given humour style as better examples are available elsewhere. In which case obviously the best example should be used.

I am very aware that as an Uncyclopedia editor this discussion appears that I am attempting to advertise my wiki of choice. Although I agree that I would obviously like to see more Uncyclopedia links in Wikipedia, I also care passionately about Wikipedia and want what is best for the project. On this occasion it appears that both of my interests coincide.

What I am looking for here is agreement that it is sometimes appropriate to link to Uncyclopedia if better alternatives are not available elsewhere. MrN9000 (talk) 23:19, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I was quoting WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS simply because the start of your previous message was a list of articles with links to examples.

I didn't say that using an example was not a good way of explaining something - it's often a great idea to provide examples in the article itself. But external links are not the way to do that we should be adding appropriate content to articles.

There is nothing in the guideline that specifically says Uncyclopedia is not a suitable link so I'm not sure what you would like to see changed about the guideline that is likely to be agreed to. If there are ways it can be used that fit with the guideline it may well be good. I can't think of any off-hand (except in the Uncyclopedia article itself) but then I'm not familiar with every article here or on Uncyclopedia. -- SiobhanHansa 00:11, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

An example is worth a thousand words; showing is better than telling. Someone the Person (talk) 23:26, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

True. But examples, like images, are better placed in the article itself (unless it's impossible) not linked to from the external links section . -- SiobhanHansa 00:11, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

On WP:COI: MrN9000, nobody here has accused you of trying to advance an agenda. You've been very upfront about your connection to Uncyclopedia, and that is to your credit. You will notice that editors here have been discussing the suitability of Uncyclopedia links in general, and not about your motives in adding links to the articles you wrote. However, on that topic, it is a good idea, per our policy on conflicts of interest, not to link to your own work. I would advise posting the links on the talk page first, possibly using {{request edit}}, and making sure that the other editors of the page also agree with you that the links are appropriate. This gets an independent eye on the topic, and removes any chance of being accused of bad faith.

On WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS: when people reference this they mean: "just because you can find other examples of this on Wikipedia, this doesn't mean it's a good idea." This means that SiobhanHansa is arguing that the links you reference should be removed from those articles as well, not just Pun.

On example links in general: no. From Wikipedia:EL#Links_normally_to_be_avoided: "Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article." A featured article would already contain a few really good examples. I see that Pun already contains a number of examples. What is gained by linking to even more?--Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 01:24, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi. Many thanks for the WP:COI nod. I mentioned my links with Uncyclopedia as I thought it better to do so up front rather than be accused later. Your suggestion about using talk pages is very good advice, thanks for that... As I'm sure you are aware, I'm engaging in this discussion not just about the Pun article and the links I added to it, but to open a discussion regarding links to Uncyclopedia in general. I'm encouraged to see that a consensus appears to be forming that Uncyc may (under some circumstances) be an appropriate source of examples of humour. As I said before my previous observations of Wikipedia had led me to believe that this was not the case. If links to Uncyclopedia are to be used to supplement a Wikipedia article I strongly recommend that the link includes a comment explaining that Uncyc is a comedic, deliberately non factual site.

On WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS I sincerely hope that all of the external links I pointed out are not removed. I consider that they greatly add to the quality of the articles by providing examples. I also feel that they would clutter the articles in question if they were all directly included.

On the specific case of Pun... I'm aware that Wikipedia does not encourage list based information, and I noted from looking at the edit history that the list of examples has been removed/chopped down and re-added a few times. I assume this is because some editors felt that the list style information it contains is not particularly encyclopaedic. I also note that Long list of puns has been recently created and added to the "See also" section of Pun. Long list of puns now appears to be flagged for deletion, although it may be moved to Wikisource, I'm not sure what will happen there. Suffice to say that my personal opinion is that more examples are usually better than less.

I felt that the external links I added to Pun showed puns being used in a more useful way than the list which is in the article. Puns are not really stand alone jokes per say and are best understood when viewed in context. When Oscar Wilde said "Immanuel doesn't pun; he Kant." it was part of a longer conversation. To fully understand that pun (and therefore the subject) you need to be aware of how it fits into the wider dialogue which was going on at the time and the context in which it was used. You need to understand the people and things involved and also the timing and how it is delivered. I don't think you get the same effect from reading a list. The timing in particular is a key aspect of the Pun, and can never be appreciated when viewed in list form. I personally thought it would be useful for a reader of the pun article to have access to a longer piece (such as the articles I wrote and offered to Wikipedia as examples) in which they could see how various puns of different types can be used and delivered. In particular the art of "excessive punning" when an individual continuously bombards with a string of terrible puns can only truly be appreciated by reading a longer piece. Trust me, if there's one thing I know, it's my terrible puns ;) MrN9000 (talk) 04:28, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

OK, so no one appears to be disagreeing with what I just said. It is apparent that in certain cases (I have given the example of humours subjects, but there are others) it may be useful to provide external links which break the "Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research. See Reliable sources for explanations of the terms "factually inaccurate material" or "unverifiable research"." guideline of WP:ELNO. I could not help but notice that this fact is particularly apparent regarding articles related to humour. It is a spooky coincidence that Long list of puns has recently been created, and looking at the talk page of this article it appears that Wikisource may not be an appropriate repository of such information. I assume that Long list of puns will be deleted, and great source of pun related examples will be lost. It appears that there is a problem with how we are doing things here... No reasonable person could argue that providing extensive examples related to a subject is a good idea, however by its very nature Wikipedia does not allow extensive humours examples to be kept as part of the project. External links appear to be the answer. As I have said, by their nature external sites which host comedic material are likely to be non-factual in their content. We can choose never to link to such sites, but then we are not providing the most useful article on that particular subject. As a fan of humour myself, that makes me sad. Something needs to changed.

I therefore propose that we change WP:ELNO item 2 from:

2. Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research. See Reliable sources for explanations of the terms "factually inaccurate material" or "unverifiable research".

So that it says:

2. Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research. See Reliable sources for explanations of the terms "factually inaccurate material" or "unverifiable research". An exception may be made in certain cases if the subject matter lends itself to examples which contradict the previous statement. In such cases the link description must include a warning that the site may contain non-factual information.

Hea, I'm no expert in the wording of this types of thing, and perhaps there is a better way to do this. I don't know. The text I have suggested is rather long... It is however clear that there is something wrong with WP:EL as it is preventing us from producing the best encyclopaedia possible. MrN9000 (talk) 19:45, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm the person that reverted the addition of the links, links to that particular site should nearly always be avoided, see my page about it. External links should link to accurate encyclopedic content, uncy is the complete opposite. Which is why it shouldn't be added 99.9% of the time.--Otterathome (talk) 20:10, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I disagree with the proposed change. And also with the idea that examples are good external links and generally lead to better encyclopedia articles. -- SiobhanHansa 20:27, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Otterathome I find it difficult to believe that you are acting entirely in the best interests of Wikipedia. I note this from looking at some of your contributions such as this, this, this, this and perhaps this. I also note from your contributions that you have removed countless references to Uncyclopedia and yet you were happy to leave similar links to other non-factual and less well known websites.

SiobhanHansa I agree that external links to examples are not ideal. I have described above why I think they are sometimes necessary, and am not sure what more I can do to convince you.

This is not just about Uncyclopedia, but it has (in my opinion) highlighted a problem with WP:EL. MrN9000 (talk) 22:47, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

We appear to have a fundamental difference of opinion as to what an encyclopedia article is about. In my opinion external links are never necessary. And none of the examples you have given of links of the nature you'd like to see included seem to me to be great improvements to the articles from an encyclopedic perspective. As a side note I also think - given that we have stayed away from the self-promotional and pretty much single purpose nature of your own editing here - that your criticism of Otterathome above is unwise. -- SiobhanHansa 00:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Such a change is a bad idea. Examples are not very important in an article, and examples from a non-reliable source are by definition worthless. Also the idea that "we are not providing the most useful article on that particular subject" is nonsense. We are an encyclopedia, not a lot of other things like a link farm or self-help book, or game guide, etc. We are making encyclopedic articles, not most useful articles. If we were striving for "most useful", we would never have external links at all. 2005 (talk) 22:20, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Then I apologise. I thought Wikipedia was about creating the "most useful" thing possible. I'm obviously mistaken. MrN9000 (talk) 00:41, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I see nothing wrong with the external links guideline, and going through my contributions doesn't change the usefulness of uncy. We're not changing it just so you can spam uncy links everywhere. Give more examples where the guidelines creates a problem then we can start thinking about changing it. All I see here is a uncy editor trying to change a guideline to allow uncy links to be placed in articles. Uncy=useless, which is why we don't link to it, ever.--Otterathome (talk) 22:58, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I also oppose this change. External links to examples are, and should be, deprecated. They might make fine footnotes in some cases, but they are not generally encyclopedic in nature. External links, when included, must be encyclopedic in nature.

MrN9000, you might want to read WP:What Wikipedia is not. Wikipedia does not attempt to be everything. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:13, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

John Titor

I'd love to have a few extra eyes at John Titor for a few days. I've just deleted several blogs, internet discussion forums, and web.archive.org links, and there is likely to be confusion and unhappiness. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:19, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Yuck, that was quite a putrid list. There are still two forums listed which should be removed because they are forums - and that last link, it could be a prime example of how not to write a link description. 2005 (talk) 22:26, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Could I encourage you to make any changes you think appropriate? I'm not a regular editor at that article, and I don't want to provoke an edit war. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:14, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

DMOZ Template(s)

I propose changing WP:ELMAYBE item 3 from:

3. A well-chosen link to a directory of websites or organizations. ... The Open Directory Project is often a neutral candidate, and may be added using the [Template: dmoz] template.

to:

3. A well-chosen link to a directory of websites or organizations. ... The Open Directory Project is often a neutral candidate, and may be added using the DMOZ category or name template or DMOZ search template, whichever is most effective in creating a link to match the article subject.

This makes editors aware of the dmoz search template which is often much more precise in matching the dmoz results to the article subject than the category template. DMOZ categories often don't exist or align with an article subject. Also, directory entries are not always assigned to the categories consistently by the many DMOZ editors. A properly constructed DMOZ search will often produce a much more appropriate directory link for an article.

There is also a dmoz3 for embedded links to DMOZ, but I suggest we exclude that since embedded links are discouraged. Qazin (talk) 21:18, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

The Dmoz2 template should be deleted since it should never be used as this guideline directly prohibits linking to search pages. Obviously this guideline should not contradict itself, so the currrent wording is better. 2005 (talk) 21:48, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh my that seems like a poor choice of template; we're urged to not add search dumps to the page, and it's only once that I can recall a search result page being of use (and I didn't link to it IIRC). Adding a "suggest a link" component to the template also subverts the purpose of wikipedia to be secondary to another website (DMOZ in this case). I would instead suggest at DMOZ the creation of a relevant page. WLU (t) (c) ^{(rules - simple rules)} 22:52, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure why the "suggest a site" feature is in dmoz2 and not dmoz. Based on other discussions regarding the dmoz template, I suspect the idea was to encourage potential link spammers to make their suggestions at DMOZ instead of spamming WP. However, I wouldn't object to removing it. But, I'm also not sure I understand your objection. That feature seems to do what you suggest: it goes to the suggestion page at DMOZ. Qazin (talk) 03:53, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

WP:ELNO item 9 discourages "Links to the results pages of search engines, search aggregators, or RSS feeds." The DMOZ is a Web directory, not a search engine, aggregator, or RSS feed. If item 9 is intended to discourage links to all results pages, perhaps the three specified types of results pages should either be removed or designated as examples. Qazin (talk) 03:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

No, the template links to a Dmoz search page, not a directory page. We have no problem linking to a Dmoz web diretcory page, but a search page is to be avoided, as the guideline states. (Similarly, we link to newspapers, but we don't link to the search page of a newspaper.) 2005 (talk) 04:19, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

A search template is never a "well-chosen link". There are other ways to advertise the DMOZ templates. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:04, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

The advantage of the dmoz search template over the category template is illustrated in the featured article Batman#External_links. The DMOZ Batman search consolidates ODP Batman listings from 10 categories. Because of the way ODP is organized, there can't be a single category which covers all sites where Batman is the subject. The ODP upper level categories are not based on subjects, but rather on disciplines or classes like the DDC. One dmoz search link gives all relevant dmoz Batman sites, which otherwise would require 10 dmoz category links. This dmoz search link appears to be a better choice than any of the alternative dmoz category links. (Disclosure: I am an ODP editor) Qazin (talk) 03:02, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

That's a perfect example of why the template should be deleted. It brings up a search result page with is specifically something this guideline says should not be linked to. If Dmoz has no well-edited Batman category, then no Dmoz page should be linked to. And, if the Dmoz comic Batman page doesn't link to the other Dmoz Batman categories, then that just means the Dmoz page is a poor example of a Dmoz page, as normal practice should be that all related categories would be linked to. 2005 (talk) 04:19, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Since WP:ELNO item 9 has now be clarified and Dmoz2 is unambiguously in violation, I have nominated it for deletion. Qazin (talk) 19:16, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

External links in infoboxes?

There is ongoing debate over at Template talk:Infobox Film about whether or not is it suitable to have links to IMDb and Allmovie in the infobox. A request for comment has now been made, so some fresh opinions the the matter would certainly be welcome. PC78 (talk) 23:29, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

I'd also add the question of whether a link to an official site needs to be in the infobox, since you're then doing nothing except linking to an advert - this being even less useful from an encyclopedic perspective than a link to imdb or allmovie. With that in mind, is the prominent recommendation to include an external link to an official site entirely appropriate given that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia based on reliable THIRD PARTY sources. Do professional biographies/ers provide such information? GDallimore (Talk) 15:05, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

External links and citations are two different things, and neither WP:RS nor WP:PRIMARY prohibit using primary sources as a source of information. See also this very guideline (specifically, WP:ELYES), which says that an official website should be linked to within an article. Actually, I've just noticed the bit in this guideline which says, "Instead, include appropriate external links in an "External links" section at the end and/or in the appropriate location within an infobox or navbox (my emphasis)", which doesn't help the argument for getting rid of them in the above discussion. PC78 (talk) 00:03, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

The thing about infoboxes is only there because it recognizes standard practice, like putting the official site in corporate boxes. It would be nice to get rid of them all, but it appears lots of people like the official sites ones. 2005 (talk) 02:41, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, yes, and I agree with you, but surely you can see that having that sentence in the guideline is problematic if you are citing this guideline elsewhere to get such links removed? PC78 (talk) 10:35, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Feel free to suggest better wording. 2005 (talk) 10:41, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

I have no intention of making any such suggestion at this point; best to see how the discussion at Template Talk:Infobox Film plays out first. PC78 (talk) 10:47, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

I think that the point behind PC78's original message was to invite participation at the RFC, not to suggest changes to this guideline. This is a reasonable place for a friendly notice about external links. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:05, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Now that concensus was reached over the template and the links have been removed, perhaps it would be best to take out the reference to infoboxes in this guideline? What about external links in navboxes? Personally I'm inclined to think that they should only navigate within Wikipedia and not to external websites, but I don't know if that view is consistant with general opinion. PC78 (talk) 10:44, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

The consensus on the Infobox film template doesn't seem to be a universal infobox consensus so I would say that altering the external links guideline is inappropriate. If I missed a larger discussion please point me to it. On navigation boxes I've always removed external links that I've seen in these, and I see it as entirely separate from infoboxes. -- SiobhanHansa 12:01, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Some of those involved in that discussion who post here were citing this guideline as a reason why external links shouldn't be included in an infobox. PC78 (talk) 13:52, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Automatic external links, other than to an official site, should never be used in an infobox. The current consensus seems clear that official sites can automatically be in infoboxes. It also seems to support that other external links can sometimes be in infoboxes sometimes, but should not just be added automatically. I'd support removing all external links from infoboxes since this is an encyclopedia, not a flash card site. But as long as generally links in infoboxes are usually just official sites, and rarely something else that is individually chosen for that article, then I guess that isn't so bad. Automatic links though should never happen. 2005 (talk) 23:18, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

The reason for consensus agreeing that the links don't belong is based firmly in compliance with Wikipedia guidelines, including WP:EL. As such, I think it should apply to all infoboxes. -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 15:39, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

I think that WP:WikiProject Medicine will scream bloody murder if you try to gut Template:Infobox Disease on the rather flimsy grounds that people decided to removed IMDb links from Template:Infobox Film. While I think the Film decision was reasonably sound, that doesn't mean that every single infobox contains equally unimportant external links. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:30, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

As I read the discussion some people were citing this guideline as a reason why links to some particular sites should not be in the info box. That isn't the same thing as citing this guideline to say no external links should be in the info box. (If I'm mistaken in this perhaps you could point me to the bit(s) of the Infobox film discussion where it was generally agreed that this guideline does not support any external links in info boxes). -- SiobhanHansa 20:12, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

It would be pretty difficult to interpret statements in this guideline like include appropriate external links in an "External links" section at the end and/or in the appropriate location within an infobox... as meaning this guideline prohibits external links in infoboxes (but I'm not saying that it couldn't be done, based on how often we repeat "This guideline does not apply to ==References=="). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:03, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Request editor eyes and opinion at Manufacturing in Mexico

I've been trying to (as I see it) clean up some links at Manufacturing in Mexico and am being reverted by an editor without comment. I would appreciate more experienced eyes on the article and opinions at the discussion at Talk:Manufacturing_in_Mexico#External_links. Thanks. -- SiobhanHansa 20:02, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Spammy External links in Flava Works article

A user and several IP addresses keep reverting my deletions of external links that do not meet the criteria of WP:EL from the Flava Works article. The links to cocostore.com and thugboy.com lead to promotional websited designed to sell gay porn, the first is an online store and the second is a membership based porn site. I'd like some other editors familiar with the External Link guidelines to step in and intervene here, since the user just templated my talk page warning that I was getting in to an edit war. Themfromspace (talk) 23:33, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Your edits are definitely appropriate. The other editor needs to refrain from spamming or he could be blocked. 2005 (talk) 00:13, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

When I created the Flava Works article, my intention in inserting links to various websites associated with Flava Works was not to promote them, but simply to make further information available to readers in the easiest way possible: by allowing them to click on the links. I am aware of the Wikipedia policy on External Links, and I see that the links I created could be interpreted as spam. I will not attempt to restore them. That Themfromspace is involved in edit wars, however, is correct: this editor spends much of his or her time reverting other people's edits, often repeatedly. GBataille (talk) 00:44, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't know about the latter thing, but if you didn't mean to spam, fine. As the guideline says, external links don't go in the body of an article or to websites that aren't directly on the topic of the article itself. So, it is good that part is resolved. 2005 (talk) 01:01, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Confusing statement

one should avoid... Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article.

I'm kind of baffled by this statement. Possibly there should be a comma after "resource"? But even then it's still a hard sentence to understand... 86.134.10.50 (talk) 02:57, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Links to search results

I propose clarification of WP:ELNO item 9 by changing it from:

9. Links to the results pages of search engines, search aggregators, or RSS feeds.

To either A:

9. Links to any search results pages.

or B:

9. Links to search results pages specifically on search engines, search aggregators, or RSS feeds.

There appears to be at least the two interpretations above of item 9 as evidenced by:

1. Discussions on this talk page;
2. The continued existence of a template:dmoz2 which some editors believe conflicts with item 9;
3. The use of that template, which some editors found acceptable enough to leave in a featured article, but which other editors believe violates item 9; and
4. The reversion of a previous attempt by another editor to put a search option in template:dmoz.

To minimize future conflict, I propose we develop a consensus for one of the above meanings (or an alternative) and communicate it clearly in the guideline. Qazin (talk) 05:27, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Rogue templates are created and used all time. Their existence or use means nothing in terms of this consensus guideline. Changing the text to improve it seems fine to me, but Links to any search results pages or RSS feeds. would include the second type of thing, since RSS feeds aren't search results. 2005 (talk) 07:09, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Good point. I had overlooked that. In fact, it seems strange that "RSS feeds" was ever in item 9. Since it is a completely different type of thing than a search results page, I'm wondering if perhaps it should be discouraged in a different item such as:

• A new item 18 discouraging Web_feeds in general (not just the RSS format) and links to online Web feed readers like Google Reader; or
• Item 8, as an added example of "Direct links to documents that require external applications ...", or special browser capabilities, namely the Web feed reader.

Qazin (talk) 06:39, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Archive 20 explains why "feed" is in item 9: "The wording intends to cover (search engine results of course) but also news 'feed' aggregated sites, not just 'search aggregators'." Apparently it is aimed at news aggregation sites using Web feeds, not the feeds themselves, which as I suggested are probably covered by "Direct links to documents that require external applications ...". Qazin (talk) 22:14, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I found references to this item in archives 12, 15, and 20.

I also spot checked some past revisions for some historical wordings of item 9:

• Links to search engine and aggregated results pages. 6/14/08
• Links to search engine results pages. starting 11/19/06
• Links to search engine results. first added 8/26/06

Qazin (talk) 22:21, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Part of the disagreement comes from the ambiguity of search engine which can refer to 1) a site/system specific search engine or 2) a Web search engine. Adding to this confusion is the fact that some Web search engines can be set to search only one site, and that some sites use Web search engines as Application Service Providers to provide local search capabilities on their sites. This is further complicated by the existing link in item 9 to the SERP article, in which SERP is defined as a results page from a search engine, which links to the Web search engine article, thereby suggesting definition 2 is intended.

If definition 1 is assumed, that pretty much excludes the search results page on any site and supports proposal A above. If definition 2 is assumed it only excludes search results pages on Web search sites like Google, etc. (when searching more than one site), and would lead to proposal B. Qazin (talk) 23:01, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Is there any reason that we can't combine these? 9. Links to any search results pages, such as links to search engines, search aggregators, or RSS feeds. is both general enough to cover all the circumstances and specific enough to convince the unwilling that it really does apply in the most frequent cases. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:18, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I like your proposal better than the current wording, but since you link to examples of only Web-search results pages, I worry that it could still be interpreted as discouraging only Web-search results pages and not site-search results pages. Some editors have argued that it is often useful to link to a site-search, while agreeing that links to a Web-search should be discouraged. I lean towards that view, but strongly believe we must remove the current ambiguity, even if the consensus is to discourage links to site-searches. So, maybe we should say something like:

• "Links to any site-search or Web-search results page, such as ..."; or
• "Links to any Web-search results page, such as ... . Links to site-search results pages may be used if otherwise compatible with this guideline.";

depending on the consensus, and followed by appropriate examples if necessary. Also, I'm not sure the search aggregator example is necessary since a search aggregator is a type of meta search engine, which is a type of Web search engine. Qazin (talk) 23:00, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

So perhaps

9. Links to any search results pages, such as links to individual website searches, search engines, search aggregators, or RSS feeds.

would be more instructive?

The consensus opposes any sort of search result, whether it's looking at a single website or millions of them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:13, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I think that removes all ambiguity. I suspect there may be one or two acceptable exceptions to no "individual website searches," but they can be argued on their own merits in the future and added if there is consensus. We seem to have reached a consensus on this, so I will make the change and link the summary to this thread. Qazin (talk) 20:12, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Interestingly a rogue external links template was created today Template:GovLinks that links to newspaper search pages 9and a bunch of other stuff violating this guideline). I've nominated it for deletion, but this shows it is important that this wording be clear. 2005 (talk) 04:59, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

When is linking to a Wikia acceptable?

Alright, there is a debate regarding the Gantz article, whether there should be a link to the Gantz Wikia. On one hand, the Wikia is controlled by WikiMedia, but technically it is a separate project from the Wikimedia projects. On User:Jump Guru's talk page Jump Guru and AnmaFinotera raised concerns that the Gantz Wikia may not follow copyright rules, and that the Wikias are mostly written by fans. What should we do? Should we put more pressure on Wikia to make its Wikis follow copyright rules? WhisperToMe (talk) 08:58, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

"We" should just care about the Wikipedia. Most wikis are terrible links; some are quite good. Our guideline reflects that. Editors at individual articles need to judge whether a specific wiki should be a rare exception or not. 2005 (talk) 09:00, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Please see below post WhisperToMe (talk) 10:13, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Wikia is not controlled by Wikimedia. --NE2 09:07, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Alright - however many of the same people (Jimbo Wales, Angela Beesley) that are in charge of Wikimedia are in charge of Wikia, so the two are highly interconnected. This is not only why I asked about whether Wikia is acceptable, but this is also why we should ensure that Wikia doesn't fall victim to copyright problems; this can affect Wikipedia's fortunes indirectly because several people are in charge of both groups. WhisperToMe (talk) 10:13, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

As a member of the Wikipedia community, I strongly oppose being dragged into similar projects' problems. If I'm a friend of Jimbo Wales and we both like Football and go to Football games together, then that is one thing. If he's also a Basketball fan, while I am not, I am not obliged to watch Basketball with him. (Not that I know Mr. Wales.) The guidelines are here. Wether a certain page on a certain wiki should be linked to from a certain article, should be discussed on the talk page of the article in question. -- Goodraise (talk) 10:35, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Jimbo would tell you that there's no connection, none at all, no-sirree Of course there is a de facto connection, but that's no reason to give Wikia a de jure (or even de facto, since policy is what we do) exception from our external links policies. --NE2 11:16, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

There's nothing special about Wikia, and any affiliation that Jimbo may have with Wikia is irrelevant. The standard rules apply: sites which host copyright violations should not be linked to, and sites hosting user-generated content which do not meet our standards for reliability and notability should not be linked to. If editors want to try to coerce Wikia sites to eliminate copyvio and to meet higher quality standards then that's great, of course - but the way to do that isn't to link to them from Wikipedia and hope that the increase in traffic will magically fix things. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:14, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Here's something that I have observed. Addition of a Wikia link or for that matter link to any other wikis not related to Wikimedia foundation is based on quality of material on that wiki, coverage of the wiki in relation with the topic in concern, number of registered contributors and whether the wiki seriously violates or ignores copyright issues. There are certain wikis hosted by Wikia e.g. Memory Alpha or Wookiepedia which are very commonly linked in articles related with Star Trek and Star Wars respectively. This is primarily because of quality of content offered by these wikis. On the other hand if you some other Wikias e.g. Smallville, The Office, or Scrubs, they do not provide significant coverage or quality desired. I believe such validation can easily be done by a simple discussion between editors interested in related articles. ^LeaveSleaves _talk 14:08, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

I disagree with you about all three of these -- they meet the necessary criterion of being a accessible source of substantial additional information--and probably the best source at that, more than the show websites (though they get included also). What they provide at a minimum is fuller information about the characters. Wikia does have a minimum standard of quality to approve a wiki, and I think it would be quite rare that one of their wikias would not be a good external link. DGG (talk) 03:13, 10 November 2008 (UTC).

A "minimum standard" is about ten miles short of the criteria for a link from an encyclopedia. Wikia's seldom merit an external link. "Fuller information" is no criteria. We seek to link to verifiable, reliable and meritable content. Volume is no part of that. (And that doesn't even mention the over the top advertising on them.) 2005 (talk) 03:44, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Could you tell me what sort of standards are they maintaining when creating wikis such as Samantha Who?? Or if wikia is so trustworthy, why isn't Lost, one of the larger wikias, considered a valid external link by editors? That's probably because Lost articles on Wikipedia are actually better than on wikia. The point is, this is matter of discretion among editors involved in those particular articles to decide if the relevant wikia site actually provides additional information or not. ^LeaveSleaves _talk 04:41, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

On the same page (Gantz) you linked to a blogspot. sigh Do you think that blogs are notable too? -_- — J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 20:31, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand the question here. We provide here some advice on when to link to any website (see WP:ELYES and WP:ELMAYBE and also on when not to link to any website (see WP:ELNEVER and WP:ELNO) as well as when not to link to wikis in particular (WP:ELNO #12: "Links to open wikis, except those with a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors").

That's our advice: general, flexible, useful, and not holding any organization's website to a different standard from any other website. So what's the actual question? Is there something that we need to clarify in this guideline, or did we just want to chat about this subject in general? WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:57, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

We don't link to Wikia, as those sites fail our rules quite dramatically, and we also do not link to blogspot. DreamGuy (talk) 17:16, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Of course we link to Wikia, we've been moving content from here to there for years, and many of them have "a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors" which is the relevant criteria, as pointed out directly above your comment. -- Quiddity (talk) 21:16, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes we have been moving content from here to there. In fact at the Gantz Wikia (which caused this conversation) the whole Gantz Wikipedia article was copied and pasted onto the main page creating several hundred red links. I like to call it the sea of blood. (^-^) What's the point in linking it? It's just a copy of our page. Other wikias are just YouTube videos which create copyright problems and pixelated pictures which also create copyright problems. Might as well link to a spam website, they're no different. — J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 02:08, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

How to deal with random ELs that could be sources?

Does anyone have any bright ideas about how to deal with random links and references that are more or less related to the subject, but not cited? I usually delete or move them to the talk page. I wonder if there is a talk page template or wikiproject that deals with this sort of thing? It's a common problem so I was wondering if we had a more institutional solution. --Adoniscik^{(t, c)} 01:42, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Citations are a relatively recent FA-requirement. There is no requirement that any given links/references need to be cited within the text (especially not "immediately", see WP:TIND), see: all the "Further reading" sections. If they are great links (potential sources), then leave them where they are (or cite them yourself) for the benefit of other readers.

If there are dozens and dozens and dozens in a short article (overwhelmingly too many), then it occasionally makes sense to move some to a dedicated "holdingpen" thread at the talkpage, e.g. Talk:Agrippa (a book of the dead). But, Never just delete useful information, that's a "One step forward, two steps back..." maneuver - "cutting off nose to spite one's face".

Did you have a specific example in mind that I'm not answering here? -- Quiddity (talk) 19:54, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

In current affairs articles, casual editors will post the latest article they just read in the EL section instead of citing it. I was hoping to develop an alternative to using the EL as a repository of random links. --Adoniscik^{(t, c)} 02:15, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Reference vs. Citation vs. External links (newbie alert)

<disclaimer>I apologize in advance for any newbie mistakes.</disclaimer>

I updated the "Maze" article today because I know of a hedge maze in Colonial Williamsburg that wasn't listed in the "Mazes open to the public, North America section". Wishing only to prove that the thing exists, I referenced an image of the maze on the Colonial Williamsburg web site.

I have no preference whether the link remains or not, but in reading more "guideline" pages, I'm wondering whether I should have put the hyperlink under "External Links" or made it a citation instead. Please advise the clueless (me). Thanks. Sciencenerd8 (talk) 02:34, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

None of the above. Images alone are not valid references per WP:RS. A direct link to the site that has the image on it noting its information would be more appropriate, at which point you should list it as a reference by adding it where you added the maze using the <ref>Your reference goes here</ref> tags. You can either format the reference manually, or for nicer appearance, by using the {{cite web}} template. -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 02:38, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your guidance, AnmaFinotera. I'll make the edit.

Sciencenerd8 (talk) 00:37, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Advice requested

I recently removed a few external links from Comparison of Star Trek and Star Wars, reproduced below from the article:

• Stardestroyer.net, an unfairly biased website dedicated to the discussion and comparison of Star Trek and Star Wars
• http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWhi2.html another website dedicated to the discussion and comparison of star trek and star wars
• Spacebattles.com, a third website dedicated to the discussion and comparison of many sci-fi franchises, particularly Star Trek and Star Wars
• alt.startrek.vs.starwars, a Usenet newsgroup dedicated to the discussion and comparison of Star Trek and Star Wars; the above websites are outgrowths from this newsgroup.

They seem to me to fall foul of quite a few of the WP:ELNO restrictions (particularly 2, 10 and 11), but I've since been reverted and was wondering if I was being too strict in my assessment. I'd be interested to hear your thoughts... EyeSerene^talk 20:32, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

They do fall foul of the guidelines. I removed them again linking the guidelines in my edit summary. It was a user with few edits that reverted you. I'll point the guidelines out to him if he adds them again. --GraemeL ^(talk) 20:41, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Thought so, thanks very much. I looked at the user's contribs, but didn't think there was enough there to warrant a warning just yet and wanted to check my interpretation of policy first. Your help is much appreciated ;) EyeSerene^talk 20:52, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Proposed addition to "links to be avoided"

Given the amount of spam we receive on a regular basis, perhaps we could be more explicit with the following addition to the list:

1. In articles about a general type of service or product, one should not add links merely to companies that provide that service or product. For example, in the article about cell phones, one should not add a link to a cell phone service provider or manufacturer.

How does this sound? --Jayron32.talk.contribs 18:30, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

This exists: "Sites that are only indirectly related to the article's subject: the link should be directly related to the subject of the article. A general site that has information about a variety of subjects should usually not be linked to from an article on a more specific subject. Similarly, a website on a specific subject should usually not be linked from an article about a general subject. If a section of a general website is devoted to the subject of the article, and meets the other criteria for linking, then that part of the site could be deep-linked." --NE2 18:37, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

Not really. Sure, existing information in the guideline could be said to already ban these sorts of links, but the language is so hard to follow, and hard for people to understand, that an explicit ban on these kinds of links could go a LONG way towards reducing the sort of edit wars that we run into. As an admin, I often block people for edit warring when they say "Look, it doesn't explicitly say I can't add a link to this site in the WP:EL policy, so I am going to keep adding it". Of course he's wrong, and of course he will still be blocked for edit warring, but I think it would be helpful to add a specific, clear statement that bans these sort of links so that users won't be able to "wikilawyer" around the issue. I am trying to give reasonable people a chance to avoid edit warring here, and a clearer consise statement of this policy (which is, of course, already banned, but not explicitly stated as so) would help. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 18:44, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree that it's needed. I'd copyedit a bit:

1. Do not add links to companies that provide a service or product in articles about that service or product. For example, in the article about cell phones, one should not add a link to a cell phone service provider or manufacturer.

It's a bit more terse, but more explicit. Jclemens (talk) 19:01, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

The guideline is much more clear now than what tou suggest: Links to sites that primarily exist to sell products or services, or to sites with objectionable amounts of advertising. That covers it much better. What you suggest is just wrong since we do want to sometimes link to "companies that provide a service or product in articles about that service or product." IMDb offers the ability to buy a DVD via a couple clicks, but it is more of an information site. If a site has a 10,000 word article on the history of a widget, and happens to have a link to buy the widget at the end of the article, it would be silly to not link to the page because it provides a link to buy the product. 2005 (talk) 19:45, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

Again, not the same thing. For example, linking to a company's website is appropriate in an article about that company, but inappropriate in an article about services that company provides. A company's home page may not directly sell a service, but the act of adding a link to that company to an article about services the company provides is basically using Wikipedia to advertise. For example, you cannot actually buy hamburgers and fries at www.mcdonalds.com, so it can be claimed that www.mcdonalds.com is NOT selling a product or a service. However, adding a link to www.mcdonalds.com to articles such as Hamburger or French fries or fast food should not be aloud. The line you quote does not explicitly forbid the kinds of links I am trying to "head off at the pass"... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 20:01, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

But you miss the point. A link to a McDonalds.com page on a hamburger article will often be an excellent link. For example, mcdonalds.com/history-of-the-hamburger/. You are proposing text that would throw out all useful links when such text is not necessary. The text we have says not to link to a page primarily for selling the product, so from the hamburger article we would not link to mcdonalds.com, but we would gladly link to mcdonalds.com/history-of-the-hamburger/. 2005 (talk) 20:16, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

Excellent example. I think this does illustrate a need for some minor change in WP:ELNO 5: we should change the word "sites" to "web pages." There are many unarguably commercial sites which have very valuable neutral and informative pages with content that cannot be incorporated into WP some reason but which merit linking under this guideline. On the other hand, there are many non-commercial sites (such as NPO's), which have some pages dedicated to selling products related to their cause. Qazin (talk) 21:36, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree. The sites wording is bad. The wording can also be tweaked to include the concept above, but it should not be the blanket text suggested. Something like: For example, in the article about cell phones, one should not add a link to web pages that are simply about a cell phone service provider, product or manufacturer. 2005 (talk) 22:52, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

That should make it a lot clearer. However, I wouldn't object linking a page about a manufacturer or service provider as long as it isn't about the product or service. A page about the manufacturer's history, role in the industry, or current developments might be ok. But a page about the features and benefits of a particular phone or service would definitely be inappropriate. So, I'd lean towards something like:

5. Links to web pages that primarily exist to sell products or services, or to web pages with objectionable amounts of advertising. For example, in the article about cell phones, one should not add a link to a web page that is simply about a cell-phone product or service.

(Hyphen is standard here because cell phone is a compound modifier of product or service.) Qazin (talk) 23:36, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

(undent) I understand the objection to using the word "website" over the word "pages"... It makes sense. I am not trying to create any new policy here, I am only trying to clarify policy to reflect existing practice, and to do so in such a way as to give a single sentance which will unambiguously prevent the sort of gratuitous advertising that I have to block users for all the time. If we have a consise policy statement which covers this specific problem then it would be better. Again, as I already stated, I understand that existing policy already enables us to block users for this problem. What I am looking for is an unambiguous statement which will allow me to point users in the right direction without blocking them. The above attempt still misses the point, in that it only specifically forbids links to websites or pages that ITSELF sells a product or service. Let's try this alternate wording:

1. Do not link to webpages of a company in any article that is not directly about that company. Specifically, links to webpages of a company are inappropriate when added to articles about general types of services or products that company provides. For example, it would be inappropriate to add a link to the main homepage of a cell phone manufacturer to the general article Cell phone. If the text of the specific page itself contains information which is directly cited by the article, it may be relevent to use such a page as an inline citation, however under normal circumstances it is generally inappropriate to advertise a company by adding a link to it's homepage under the external links or references sections of an article if such links are unconnected to specific parts of the text.

That is probably WAY too wordy, and I invite a copy edit, but that specific sort of linking is what I am trying to "head-off at the pass" and the existing list of "verboten" links does not consisely prohibit this sort of problem. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 01:54, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Generally, I think that the existing rule #5 is sufficient, but I'm open to adding an example.

This latest proposal is not acceptable to me. We don't object to linking to Apple.com at the article MacBook, even though the article is about the product instead of the company, and even though you can buy a MacBook directly from Apple Inc at that website. Apple's own information about their product is a perfectly legitimate use of ==External links==.

Qazin, I thought that hyphenation rule applied only to adjectives, not to double nouns. Additionally, I'd rewrite the example more concisely: "For example, do not link to telephone companies or manufacturers of mobile phones in the article Mobile phone." WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:10, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

However, you WOULD object to a link to apple.com in an article titled Computer wouldn't you? Not simply to a page at apple.com which is about the history of the personal computer and which is cited in the text, but rather a direct link to www.apple.com apropos of nothing in the article? See, help me write this policy to stop those sorts of links in an unambiguous way, but which also allows the legitimate use of such links in articles where they belong. See, the current policy can be used to sort-of-kind-of disallow those kind of links if you kinda-sorta read it right and what we need is a sentance that says "Don't do this", where this is adding links like http://www.apple.com to the article Computer. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 02:18, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Isn't that issue addressed by WP:ELNO 13? A link to a domain name is a link to the home page. The content on the Apple home page is not very relevant to the computers article. If there is a relevant Apple.com page, item 13 prescribes a deep link, if any. If someone puts a link in the computer article to the Apple home page, you are justified in removing it because the content on that page is not relevant, not merely because it is a link to a computer manufacturer. Qazin (talk) 05:14, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Two (or more) nouns are hyphenated when they are used together acting as a compound adjective, but not when they are used together as a subject or object. For example, in "She called the phone company" the noun phone acts as an adjective to company. In, "She called the phone-company manager" the nouns phone and company form a compound adjective to company. The way I remember it is that if the first modifier used alone with the object or subject conveys the wrong meaning (e.g. she didn't call the phone manager), then it modifies the second modifier and is therefore a compound modifier and needs a hyphen to avoid confusion. Qazin (talk) 03:06, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Your comment about linking to an Apple web page about MacBook convinces me that my proposal at 23:36 is too restrictive. In the cell phone article example, it is probably ok to link to a company web page about a particular cell phone or service if the page isn't an advertisement or order form for the product. For example, we might link to a Verizon page that shows a block diagram of their network, or to an LG page that shows the typical architecture of their phones. But, we wouldn't want to link to a sell sheet or order page for a phone, or an advertisement listing the features and benefits of Verizon service. This is essentially a corollary to NPOV in that information or links in an article should not champion one point of view, product, or service, over another. Advertising and promotional copy violates that. But it is the contents of the linked page that determines that, not who owns or hosts the page. So, avoid ...

5. Links to web pages that primarily exist to sell products or services, or to web pages with objectionable amounts of advertising. For example, in the article about cell phones, one should not add a link to a web page that is mostly promoting or advertising a particular cell-phone product or service.

Qazin (talk) 03:38, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation. It's always fun to find another person that knows something about these things (and to learn something).

"One should not add a link to a web page that is mostly promoting or advertising..." is wordy. "Avoid links that promote or advertise..." is more concise.

As a slightly different perspective, we might approach this as the "example" problem. We don't generally want links to any pages that are merely examples of the subject. So here we have Mobile phone and we want to avoid linking to examples of companies that make and/or sell mobile phones; previously, we had Pun and wanted to avoid linking to examples of puns.

I've just started thinking about it from this perspective, and I'm not sure it will hold up. There may be counterexamples that make a general rule against examples be inappropriate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:28, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

"Avoid links that promote or advertise..." IS much better. I've taken that and made it even more direct, but I've also left "mostly" in. We wouldn't eschew a page full of relevant content just because it has a small ad on it - only if it is mostly promotion or advertising. So, avoid:

5. Links to web pages that primarily exist to sell products or services, or to web pages with objectionable amounts of advertising. For example, in the mobile phone article, don't link to web pages that mostly promote or advertise cell-phone products or services.

Qazin (talk) 06:11, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

It looks like there is no more discussion or objections on this proposal, so I'll implement it. Please revert and discuss if necessary. Qazin (talk) 23:00, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

External links in film articles

There is currently discussion on the talk page of the film article The Mummy about including external links. The involved websites are Internet Movie Database, Allmovie, Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, and Box Office Mojo. I have a few questions to make sure I understand how WP:EL applies:

1. Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic are websites that compile reviews, and they are usually cited in the article body for the critic consensus of the film. Reviews are cited directly from their sources, and some of them are used in the article body. Is it necessary to avoid redundancy and remove an external link if it is already used in part as a source for the article? The way I see it, the websites are being utilized in two ways. In the article body, the critic consensus is being used, and as an external link, the websites provide a compilation of reviews for readers to explore (thus avoiding a link farm of reviews). For Box Office Mojo, a couple of figures are usually cited in the article body, but it also has numerous box office statistics beyond these figures. Does redundancy factor in here for these websites?
2. Internet Movie Database is a website that is not used as a reliable source for Wikipedia articles. WP:EL does not clearly say, "External links must be reliable sources," and this seems to be by design. IMDb is a popular website for films with many different parts. Some parts, like the trivia pages, are pretty sloppy, being user-submitted. Other parts are electronic copies of what studios and distributors provide. There's also photos and forums. It just seems like a lot of different features for IMDb to be dismiss as a useful external link on the grounds of not being up to par as a reliable source for a Wikipedia article. What do others think?
3. Allmovie is not a website that would be used in a Wikipedia article. It is a kind of "See also" link that shows possible similarities between a given film and others. Is this a website that would be acceptable or not as an external link?

Feedback would be greatly appreciated! —Erik (talk • contrib) 21:12, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

---

On the first question:

1. Redundancy is bad.
2. But, on rare occasions, non-redundancy is worse.

Generally, I'd assume that these were not good candidates for being repeated. For one thing, one of the primary goals at WP:EL is to find the minimum number of links reasonable for any given article, and these don't seem so important to the reader that listing them twice (and thus inflating the size of ==External links==) is worth it. But the real answer is one found when you and the other editors at that article (or those articles, as the case may be) employ your best editorial judgment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:13, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I suppose my thinking is that most items in the "References" section are generally "milked" of their use. The presence of a reference in this section does not necessarily indicate that there's more information enclosed; it more reflects where the information came from (verifiability and all that). So it's not redundancy in the conventional sense of pointing the reader to the same item twice. It's not explicitly clear that a reference will have substantially more information than what has been written into the article body, and it seems like per WP:ELYES, they can be treated as external links because they have more detail than could be appropriately worked into the article (three dozen reviews, associate producers' names, or daily box office performance). For websites like Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, and Box Office Mojo, the most important information is usually highlighted on the main web page with additional substance provided on sub-pages. It's not a matter of how a paragraph from an article could not be worked into the article, so an external link allows a reader to finish it up. These external links are systemic because they have far more content than a Wikipedia article could handle in terms of reviews, cast and crew information, and box office statistics. How about the uses of IMDb and Allmovie, then? —Erik (talk • contrib) 22:30, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, and no. Yes, some users ignore the references as unimportant. No, we're not generally interested in duplicating information just because some users skip directly to ==External links==. The point is the encyclopedic article, not other places to get information. You (in concert with the other regular editors on the article's talk page) can always choose to ignore these rules for non-duplication and minimizing the total number of links, assuming that you think that you have a good reason for doing so in the specific article in question. We are not going to change the rules, however, and I recommend that you comply with them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:49, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Wait, where does it say in the rules that a reliable source used in the article body cannot be duplicated as an external link for a different context? Nothing in WP:EL seems to indicate this. Believe me, in my editing process, I work as much useful information as possible from a website so it does not have to be an external link, but it is unrealistic to incorporate part of its content and not highlighting for readers an available wealth of content on another part of this website. —Erik (talk • contrib) 21:04, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

WP:ELYES clearly implies that something should not be used as an external link if the content can be worked into an article; and the guideline says "try to avoid separate links to multiple pages in the same website". There should almost never be a duplication between citations and external links. In terms of film articles it is particularly inappropriate since, as mentioned above, there are a whole bunch of sites that could commonly be linked in the external links section. We aren't a link farm, so needlessly duplicating links is foolish. Keep links to a minimum, don't add something that is already there. the only clear exception I can see would be if there was something referenced from an official site in the sources, and the official site should again be linked in external links. External links should be kept to a minimum. if there is a reason to not have one, like it is already linked, get rid of it. 2005 (talk) 23:00, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I'd agree with 2005. This case is particularly true about RT and Metacritic. The primary objective of linking these websites is providing access to multiple reviews available other than the ones already incorporated in the article. But when the aggregate ratings of the reviews from these two websites is mentioned in the article along with relevant references, I don't think there is any additional purpose served by putting in an external link for such sites. Box office mojo or IMdB on the other hand, provide a lot of other information that cannot be accommodated in the article. ^LeaveSleaves _talk 23:10, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I disagree with your assessment of RT and MC. Let's put it this way: It so happens that the critic consensus is reported on the web page specific to the film and not a deeper subpage, so the same URL is used to cite this and to "try to avoid separate links to multiple pages" when treated as an external link. If it was a subpage, then there would be varied URLs (with the one used as an external link being the broader one), and perhaps we wouldn't be having this discussion. It strikes me as a matter of semantics; I could try to find another source that mentions what RT reports to be the critic consensus of a film, then all of a sudden the external link is okay to provide readers access to a collection of reviews. The duplication is not on purpose at all; it is happenstance that the detail relevant to the article body is on the most conventional link that could be provided (to avoid linking to different pages on the same website). If they are not highlighted as external links, then expecting the reader to explore a section intended for verifiability for additional content is unrealistic. It's not foolish; it's a matter of convention because the URL happens to be the same, and there are two different benefits to it -- the consensus in the article body, and the multitude of reviews that are provided off-wiki (which in turns prevents a link farm and undue weight in selecting reviewers). The same applies to Box Office Mojo; the opening weekend and the total revenue is on the most conventional URL for a film's page on that website, and there is much more statistical information behind these two article-worthy details. Hope you understand what I'm getting at. —Erik (talk • contrib) 23:28, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Sure, there might, on occasion, be a good reason to duplicate links between the two sections. But in the vast majority of cases, if the reader wants more information, then the reader can go click on things in the references section. Wikipedia is not a linkfarm, and in keeping with that character, the goal is the shortest justifiable list of links under ==External links==. If a reader thinks that no useful information can be found in ==References==, then that's not our fault: we list amazing resources there all the time.

Furthermore, for the purposes of the non-duplication concept, we generally interpret "website.com/somemovie/details" and "website.com/somemovie/" as being sufficiently similar that the inclusion of both is not justified (for ==EL==. For ==Refs==, they'd definitely want each specific webpage being used to be listed separately). So the semantic issue doesn't really exist. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:49, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

---

On the second issue:

External links do not have to meet the requirements for reliable sources. See WP:ELMAYBE #4.

Your task with IMDb (under this rule) is to vet the specific page that you are linking to. If this specific IMDb page looks like it would be valuable or interesting to readers (as determined by considering the principles outlined in this guideline), then you can link to it. What you can't do is assume that every single article about a movie will always, or even usually, benefit from a link to IMDb (or any other website). WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:49, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree; I've had some thoughts about clarifying in MOS:FILM not to use some external links if they are not applicable. For older films, items like Rotten Tomatoes and Box Office Mojo would be useless as external links. I think that IMDb happens to rank highly in universality, but I get what you mean. —Erik (talk • contrib) 21:04, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Linking to archive

If a product/company's official site is now offline, but was archived by the internet archive, would it be appropriate to link to that archive in the EL section? I'm thinking no, myself, per dead links, but would like some outside views before removing such links from some defunct magazine articles. -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 21:15, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't see how such links would ever be appropriate. Certainly some editors add such links, but if you follow this guideline and other policies you should immediately remove them. 2005 (talk) 21:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

It seems like it would be useful. Certainly if the URL is worth noting (often in the infobox) when the site is alive, it's still worth noting (and linking to a convenience copy) after it dies. --NE2 20:14, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't seem useful to me. It might be useful as a reference, but not as an external link. I would support a specific ban on anything at web.archive.org underneath the ==External links== header. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:37, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

What if the article is about a defunct website? Surely it would be useful to let readers see the website. --NE2 11:17, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

What if the owner of the website content took it offline because they wanted to take it offline? There's no reason to ever link to archive pages. 2005 (talk) 11:24, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

So if Yahoo.com were to go down permanently, you wouldn't think we should have a link to the Internet Archive for it? That's silly. --NE2 15:09, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

No, we shouldn't. There is a difference between accessing an archive to source a statement because the content was moved/removed, and linking to a dead site's archive just to say "here is what the official site once looked like." That doesn't provide useful information to the reader. -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 16:41, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Of course it's useful to know what a site looked like; that's why many of our articles (Google search for instance) show a screenshot. If we can legally do that by linking to an archived copy (the Internat Archive's application of fair use has, if I remember correctly, been tested in court), then we should. --NE2 18:03, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

You are quite mistaken. It is not just "silly" to link to a copyvio site, it is rude and sleazy. As discussed before, the Internet archive is a copyvio site. It plainly does not meet the criteria of being a brick and mortar library keeping one hard copy of a document. It should never be linked under any circumstances, but this guideline does not deal with sources, only external links. If Yahoo went off line tomorrow, it would be because they want to take the site offline, and it is completely obnoxious to show what the site used to look like. If the owners of the content want to show the content, they can. If they don't want to show it, it is not our mission to say "here is a snapshot taken without permission of the owners." (I do agree that offline official sites is a less rude use of the archive than linking to other pages on other domains, but there still is never any excuse to display stolen exact copies of content.) 2005 (talk) 22:28, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

OK, so you're just trying to push your own interpretation of copyright law, and I recommend we ignore you and do what's best for the reader. --NE2 22:38, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Don't be a dick. What is "best for the reader" is not the main criteria here. Whether you like it or not, we have a policy not to link to copyvio sites. This guideline follows that. Wikipedia is not a lot of things that could be seen as "best" for the reader, like making a link farm, including gossip about living people, and linking to all sorts of youtube stolen videos. 2005 (talk) 23:02, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Don't call me a dick. I'm done here. --NE2 23:22, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

So, if links to the archives of official sites are not useful external links, why are they useful when the sites are still live? I'm not following 2005 and WhatamIdoing's logic here. It doesn't seem farfetched that the archive could be quite a pertinent external link.--Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 15:50, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't get this either. As I see it, the ELs are supposed to be a service to the reader, not to the owner of that page. If the EL leads to relevant information, it shouldn't matter if it's archived or not. And "if the owner of the website content took it offline because they wanted to take it offline", as opposed to taking it offline because of having no need to keep it online anymore, then he/she/they could make that clear by getting the page removed from the archive as well. - Wikipedia is a repository of knowledge, not a place for free advertising. We should do what's best for the reader. -- Goodraise (talk) 16:29, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

How is it servicing the reader to point to an archive of a dead site? They can half way see what it sort of looked like, except the archive version may or may not even work correctly, may be missing large chunks of data if it was an image heavy site, and may or not have working links depending on when/if the other pages of the site were archived. Using as a reference is one thing, but it does not provide additional/useful information if the site is offline and no longer being maintained. And, from what I've seen, getting pages removed from the archive is not easy once its archived. They can block future archives, but I don't think they can remove existing ones without a lot of hassle. And why should they have to? The site is dead...if people are linking to it, they get that message as well they should. -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 16:41, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

2005's position, that there is never any reason to link to the archive, seems extreme. If a good reference disappears from the internet, a link to the internet archive would seem like the only way to keep that reference verifiable. 2005's justification is that perhaps the owner wishes to take it off-line. However, other than for reasons which are covered elsewhere such as copyright violations, is there any reason we should accede to such an implied wish? Sounds like acceding to a re-writing of history to me, hence websites such as http://www.thememoryhole.org/. cojoco (talk) 16:43, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

If a link is used to back up a claim, it should be listed under references, either exclusively or in addition to under ELs. More to the point, I don't think 2005 is refering to archived references, only to archived ELs. -- Goodraise (talk) 17:08, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not advocating keeping them all, or removing them all. I simply think, it should be decided on a per case basis. If an archived EL is still useful, keep it. If it is not useful, remove it. If I stop selling a book I wrote, that doesn't automatically mean I don't want it to be read anymore. Being considerate of what the owner of the content might be wanting can't really be our responsibility. - Now, IF the information is still useful and IF the page linked is not violating copyright, then I really don't see any reason to deny the reader of that information. -- Goodraise (talk) 17:08, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Discussed 2 months ago. See Wikipedia talk:External links/Archive 22#Archived versions and Wikipedia talk:Dead external links#No reason to link to an archive copy of a page.

They're used in everything from Featured articles on down. There is No reason to mass-remove these links, and there was disagreement over the deletion of these lines from the guideline (which I agree should be replaced). -- Quiddity (talk) 20:13, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Are we all talking about the same thing here?

User:2005 objects to this:

==External links==

* [http://web.archive.org Please go read a copy of this website, which is now totally dead, but we found a archive that's probably only half-broken]

Several comments here make me think that this is being confused with <ref>[http://web.archive.org I found this information at a website that's now offline, but fortunately there's an archive for it]</ref>

Are we all perfectly clear that this guideline only deals with the clickable items under ==External links==, and not anything at all that's enclosed by <ref> tags or otherwise filed under ==References==? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:47, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes. As used in Featured Articles. -- Quiddity (talk) 20:59, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Can you name any recently promoted feature articles that have something like web.archive.org under ==External links==? (I'll take anything that passed FAC in the last year as sufficiently recent.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:34, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Super Mario 64, promoted version. -- Quiddity (talk) 18:17, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Um, the FA notice on its talk page says that it was featured on January 31, 2005, which is slightly more than three years before the link you provide above. At that time, it did not use the Template:Nintendo.com-archive, which was created in December 2007 as a temporary measure when Nintendo reorganized its website (about which, see here). WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:11, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Just to clarify, Super Mario 64 has had 2 FACs. It was first promoted October 20, 2004, featured on the main page, and then demoted November 29, 2006. It's most recent FAC resulted in promotion on February 4, 2008. (Guyinblack25 ^talk 19:29, 14 November 2008 (UTC))

I'm honestly surprised that it passed FAC and not merely because of the web.archive.org link. That line has two dead links in it. Surely we can agree that dead links provide no value to the reader? Why didn't they just link the correct page? WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:17, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

That was indeed a bad example of a webarchive link.

However, I (and others) still believe that the webarchive links at other featured/good articles (such as Encyclopædia Britannica and Metabolism and John Wilkes Booth) can be very useful in certain circumstances, and that the "destroy them all" attitude is extremely unhelpful. We are not obliged to assume that the site owner purposefully took a site down. Just because a site drops/loses its hosting, or owner loses interest, doesn't mean the previously-public information is suddenly irrelevant and disposable. Editors who actually write featured articles agree. Does that seem clear? -- Quiddity (talk) 21:27, 26 November 2008 (UTC) and 07:04, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Australian copyright and YouTube questions

Mark of the Year is at WP:FLC now. It has multiple links to YouTube videos of the different marks (spectacular catches in Australian Football League games). The question is whether these links are allowed, but their copyrtight status is unclear. Could someone who knows more about Australian copyright please take a look at the article and provide feedback on the video links at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/Mark of the Year? Thanks in advance, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 02:50, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

External links don't go in the body of an article. These are references or nothing at all, so you should ask at WP:V or WP:RS. 2005 (talk) 03:55, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

OK, thanks, I will ask there. I am a reviewer, not the main author. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 04:21, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

EL to sites requiring registration

Apologies if this has been discussed before, but I did spend some time searching the archives without finding an answer.

The article Rebreather had an external link to a forum on rebreathers (actually it pointed to the domain, but that's not the issue). The forum allows you to view a few pages before requiring registration. The content of the forum seems to meet ELYES.4 and ELMAYBE.4 (from what I've been able to see) and looks like it would add value in being an external link. Nevertheless, although it doesn't require immediate registration, it forces you into it after a while. Now, while I suspect that it fails ELNO.6 so shouldn't be included, I would appreciate other opinions on the suitability of such links (i.e. free, but "delayed-forced" registration). Thanks in advance for any guidance. --RexxS (talk) 02:27, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Forums are generally not allowed, elno 10. A membership forum seems very unlikely to ever be linked if it isn't an offical site. That's tw huge strikes against it. 2005 (talk) 02:50, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Adding relevant stv interviews

I made an external link from the Daniel O'Donnell page to an article and video interview which we created. The interview is fairly broad, but includes Daniel's account of his early days in Glasgow.

The link was removed (by a bot, i believe). How do I put this and similar articles up for linking? Should we run them past a forum first?Freshnews (talk) 14:08, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, technically, editors aren't supposed to add links to their own websites/other works. So what you should do it leave a note on the discussion page of the specific article, and explain why you think this would be a great link, and encourage someone else to add it for you. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:39, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

References and ELs with "[" or "]" in title

User Zombie433 added a link to the article Benedikt Höwedes, but it doesn't work properly because the link has "[" and "]" in it. I have also expierienced this when adding a reference to Toni Kroos (see reference #4). Is there a way to make these links work? Thanks in advance. Hubschrauber729 (talk) 19:19, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

The square brackets need to be URL encoded, so that [ is %5B and ] is %5D. --Para (talk) 19:34, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

I think you can encase the "[" and "]" section in <nowiki></nowiki> tags, which should cause the text within the nowiki tags to be formatted as written... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 19:35, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

I used the %5B and %5D instead of the brackets and it works fine now. Thanks for the quick responses! Hubschrauber729 (talk) 23:07, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Adding external links to sites already used in references

An issue has arisen about External Links that are already used as references. The article in question is University of Chester, where many more External Links than are currently present used to be present, and were re-inserted by an editor on two occasions. I asked about a relevant project's position on WT:UNI#Adding external links to sites already used in references, but this seems to have sperked off some disagreement about the relevant parts of WP:EL. It would help if some input by editors of good experience with dealing with the content of WP:EL could be made there.

My reading of the guidelines is that if an external link has already been used as a reference, there is no need to include it in the External Links section of the article, and, indeed, the guidelines suggest that one should avoid this. In the main external link in question, the website has been used in a number of refereneces (to different subpages) and it also appears as the official website of the institution in the InfoBox. It can easily also be added as a reference to its main page in the body of the article if this would help resolve the matter. The editor who argues in favour of the external links in the University of Chester article is arguing that WP:IAR allows him to re-add the links, and that wikipedia is being stupid since "Any rule that states that an external links section should not contain an external link to whatever the article is about is inherently stupid." (see discussion on User talk:Ddstretch##University of Chester.) Many thanks.  DDStretch  (talk) 14:46, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

In general links should not be duplicated. But if it is the official site it should be. The guideline mandates official sites should be linked, regardless of restraints that apply to other non-official links. 2005 (talk) 23:05, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

This issue arose in Humane Society of the United States. The official website is cited and linked in the references section 18 times and linked directly from the infobox. I can't for the life of me see the purpose of linking to it a twentieth time in an EL section but someone else does so some wider discussion would be nice. Cheers. L0b0t (talk) 15:40, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

2005 is correct above. Whether a site is used as a reference is really not directly relevant to whether it should be included in the External links section. The inclusion of the link in an infobox also does not necessarily meant the link should not be included in the EL section. Many users (myself included) pretty much ignore the infobox most of the time. If I'm looking for a link to the website of an article's subject, the first place I look is in the External links section. The very last thing I'd want to do is comb through the list of references to identify the official site. So my opinion is that a little redundancy is helpful (so long as the EL section otherwise hews to this guideline). older ≠ wiser 15:57, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

I get what you are saying but am then confused by the guideline where it states in section 7.2 references & citations

"Sites that have been used as sources in the creation of an article should be cited in the article, and linked as references, either in-line or in a references section. Links to these source sites are not "external links" for the purposes of this guideline, and should not be placed in an external links section."

Am I misreading this passage or does the guideline contradict itself? Also, my common sense says 19 links to the same website should be enough and readers are not better served by adding a 20th. L0b0t (talk) 17:18, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

What are you thinking is a contradiction? I would never add a 20th link if it was not the official site, but the official site should lead the external links section, if there is one. As noted by the guideline, official sites are different than others. 2005 (talk) 22:27, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Also, in a quick search through the (poorly organized) references, none of them appear to be links to (just) www.hsus.org. They all go to specific pages on the website. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:54, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

This appears to have been lost in a move, with no specific discussion that I have found:

All items used as sources in the article must be listed in the "Notes" or "References" sections, and are usually not included in "Further reading" or "External links". However, if an item used as a reference covers the topic beyond the scope of the article, and has significant usefulness beyond verification of the article, you may want to include it here as well. This also makes it easier for users to identify all the major recommended resources on a topic. The Wikipedia guideline for external links that are not used as sources can be found in Wikipedia:External links.

The above would seem to run contrary to WP:EL#References and citation and also to what is now WP:FURTHER. PSWG1920 (talk) 22:01, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not reading it as contradictory, but rather just unclear. I think WP:EL#References and citation is just trying to make the distinction between what are considered external links and what are links to sources. --Ronz (talk) 22:12, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps so. Unless someone can point to where the removal of the above wording was discussed previously, it should probably be considered now. As far as I can tell it was simply lost in the move of WP:FURTHER from one guideline to another. PSWG1920 (talk) 22:35, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

It wasn't lost in a move. It was deleted as redundant. It is also a content fork. The Citing Sources guideline should only include text (if any) about external links that comes from this guideline. Whatever that guideline (or any other guideline) said about the external links section is irrelevant. 2005 (talk) 23:20, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Continuing discussion from WT:Layout

We've had some relevant discussions at WT:Layout#Proposal concerning Wikimedia site links; people are welcome to copy arguments over here, or start out fresh. - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 16:55, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Reversion

I notice that there was a reversion of WAID's addition on Dec 1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:External_links&diff=255339240&oldid=255337829). I don't see anything in the discussion that suggests that people didn't want any part of that, although some were put off by the idea of having more than one link if one of the links was to a social networking site. Would that be a sufficient tweak to make everyone happy? - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 03:12, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I that that if you look at #Final call above, that there's no real objection to restoring it as it stood. There may be a few times when linking to a second 'official' website that happens to be hosted by a social networking service is in the best interest of the encyclopedia. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:25, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I can support your suggested wording, but if we still get friction, I'd like to point out that anyone who owns a myspace page could prominently display a link to the other site we're thinking of including if they want to, and we could give a description at the EL link, "crazygoodband's official myspace page, including a link to meancorporateoverlords". Then the second link becomes their problem rather than ours. - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 03:10, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

And even though it's redundant, answering a question from above, I do think we should link to the ELNEVER section just to remind people that this isn't "anything goes". - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 03:12, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

External links in templates?

External links seem to have appeared in some see also templates especially in templates about big businesses such as in Template:Apple and Template:Google Inc. These links actually seem like advertisements trying to promote their website or stocks. 98.166.139.216 (talk) 22:30, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

From Wikipedia talk:WikiProject_Poetry#http:.2F.2Fwww.shmoop.com.2F

I have copied the following discussion here on the advice of User:Bonadea. Please comment; thanks! Lithoderm 20:39, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

http://www.shmoop.com/

I know that numerous individual conversations have take place regarding "Shmoop", both on user talk pages and on article talk pages (see Talk:Jane Eyre#New External Link and Talk:Mending Wall#Shmoop link). Shmoop claims that it is for "High-schoolers raised in the IRC age", or something to that effect. As a recent high school graduate, I despise cloying condescension, which is exactly how Shmoop feels: one of the reason that WP is great is that we don't dumb things down- we assume that people come here to learn. Each article on Shmoop consists of a summary of the material (which is usually not as comprehensive as the wikipedia version-- definitely not the "further research" that ELs are intended to provide) and then, the main basis of my objection, the "Why should I care?" section. Of course, my objection is mainly on policy grounds-- they do not add anything to the content of the article, and the link-adders are not here to add anything to the encyclopedia other than shmoop links. Whatever one's assessment of Shmoop may be, their stereotype of people of my age group is an agenda, and they are here to push it- nothing more. The main point is that external links are there to enhance content and provide scholarly context-- not to dumb it down. I would like to obtain consensus one way or the other in this thread. One point in User:Barriodude's favor is that he has not re-added the links without discussion. I leave you with some excerpts from Shmoop's analysis[2] of London, 1802:

“ A country in the midst of an identity crisis…a passionate need for change…major stress about the state of the nation. Sound familiar?

"London, 1802" doesn't get into specific political issues, but instead asks readers where the character of England went astray. Imagining that very same question being posed on Capitol Hill is not difficult. We can be certain that, were Wordsworth to time-travel his way into modern day America, he'd be pretty riled up about the kind of change going down.

”

“ The second half of the poem dwells on Milton's high points; the speaker gets all swoony about Milton's writing, and uses celestial imagery to show us just how divine it is. Not only is Milton's writing admirable, apparently, so was his character. The man could do no wrong. The speaker goes gaga over the all-around loveliness that was Milton, and ends the poem by praising the deceased poet's humility. ”

“ This poem is extra-special-fancy by Wordsworth's standards; we can imagine him sitting down, clearing his throat, cracking his knuckles, and thinking, "What would Milton like?" This is kind of like buckling down to write a fan letter to your favorite celebrity, dead or alive, in which you want to tell them just how totally amazing he/she is, and how much you really, REALLY love him/her. ”

Lithoderm 16:57, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Hmm... well, I'm not sure this project is the spot to build a Wikipedia-wide consensus. I'm not sure where to go on something like that, but I'm sure there's a spot. Anyone know better? --Midnightdreary (talk) 17:03, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I noticed a link to this being added to the Ode on a Grecian Urn article, but I am not really sure how we can decide on something like this and didn't feel compelled to take it off because it was under external links and was not obvious. As a matter of policy, allowing these links to stay would only open the door to other age-based sites putting their link underneath, and I can only imagine that you would end up with a tedious discussion about making sure all age groups are represented. If the reader comes to wp, I can only imagine they do it to get an encyclopedia article and not an age-appropriate reader guide, but I also fail to see how our project has much of a say in the matter as a whole even if we agree to systematically remove the links from articles without clear policy to back those actions up. Mrathel (talk) 18:43, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I think Lithoderm is absolutely right about shmoop.com, but a WP-wide consensus is probably best discussed in Wikipedia talk:External links. (The site appears to be very US-centric which means that adding links to it would be problematic with regard to WP:GLOBAL. That's in addition to the points brought up above, of course.) --Bonadea (talk) 19:07, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

End of copied discussion--Lithoderm 20:44, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

For reference, here's the link summary of where it's currently used:

• shmoop.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com

--- Barek (talk • contribs) - 20:56, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

There were many more, but I reverted them... Lithoderm 21:22, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I removed the EL from To Kill a Mockingbird primarily because it offers no more insight and is written no better than what is already in the article. In fact, I'm sure it is trying to write for a specific audience of high schoolers forced to read material they find abysmally insipid, but the style in which the review is written for TKaM is informal to the extent it borders on contempt for the novel. The setting is finalist for the Most Boring Town in America, contrary to reviews and criticism that puts emphasis on the nature of the setting. It brushes over the characters' opinions of Atticus: The kids feel kind of dissatisfied with boring old Dad, who can’t do any of the cool things (like playing football or training ninjas) that the other fathers do. Training ninjas? Seriously? I hope not. --Moni3 (talk) 21:43, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

The links that are being spammed should just be removed on sight. WP:WPSPAM would be the place for how to deal with the numerous link drops that add nothing to articles. In general these seem like lame links so they should be removed, but in abstract a link for a page might not be pathetic and could be reviewed on a case by case basis... but when someone is just driving by and dropping links in an article, just remove them immediately. 2005 (talk) 23:10, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely. Clear spam. The editor in question admits working for the company, and, as far as I can tell, every single last edit made by the person is either spam or a clear WP:COI-violation, or both. His only edits that weren't adding external links to his site were writing about the CEO of his/her company. DreamGuy (talk) 23:40, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Hi, All. Thank you for the healthy and civil discussion. We love hearing feedback from people who are as passionate about these subjects as we are. Also, note that we constantly re-edit our content. Our editorial team will review all of your feedback on specific passages and we invite you to keep the feedback coming. Oh, and caveat emptor - I don't write for Shmoop, I work on partnerships and community management... so any typos in the following shouldn't reflect on the quality of Shmoop's writing. :-)

I'd like to address a number of points that you've raised.

First, some Background about Shmoop:

• Shmoop is created by people who love these subjects.
• Most of our writers are Ph.D. and Masters students from Stanford and Berkeley.
• Many of those writers (including the author of our TKaM module) teach these topics to undergrads at Stanford and Berkeley. Some of our writers have taught at the high school level for decades.
• Shmoop has a panel of educators who advise us on curriculum and product development (all are Google Certified Teachers, many are Apple Distinguished Educators, one started the Google for Education program, one is on the board of NCTE - National Council of Teachers of English)
• Shmoop's mission is to make learning fun and relevant for students in the digital age. We are much different from SparkNotes, which is reductive, focuses on summaries more than analysis, and discourages original thought. We're trying to show students the passion and relevance in these topics. So, yes, we use a very conversational tone to make these ideas as accessible as possible to students.
• Shmoop offers schools and teachers free supplementary learning materials that take advantage of the Web. In an era of shrinking school budgets and crazily expensive textbooks, we think this is a worthy cause.
• WP readers who visit Shmoop spend over 7 minutes on our site, on average. This data suggests suggest that this is a relevant and valued EL.

1. The last two commentors on this thread didn't quite get the full story. I posted links (months ago) and learned about the COI issues. Point taken. I backed off entirely. A number of our fans (teachers and librarians with no connection to our company) took it upon themselves to add the links that have popped up over the last month. No COI.

2. lithoderm stated that his primary objection is to Shmoop's "Why Should I Care?" section. Ironically, earlier today Deborah J. Stipek, the Dean of the Stanford School of Education said that "Why Should I Care?" is her favorite section of our content, because we help students see how literature and history are relevant - inspiring, even - to their daily lives. "Why Should I Care?" is, admittedly, lighter fare than our meatier analysis of themes, quotes, literary devices, plot structures, etc. This "appetizer" helps grab students' interest. We want to help students connect to and love these topics. The vast majority of feedback on "Why Should I Care?" (from students, teachers, and librarians) is positive. See quotes below

3. lithoderm raises a completely fair question: "what does Shmoop add to the WP article?" We have between 75-125 pages (if in a Word doc) worth of content for our modules. In addition to summaries, theme analysis, character analysis, quote analysis, we cover some areas generally not covered in the WP article. We go deep into plot analysis (is it a Hero Myth? If so, how do the stages of Hero Myth map to the plot? How would you break down this plot as a 3-Act play, like they do in film school?). We go into detail on character timelines and "character clues" (tools of characterization tools, e.g. speaking style, style of dress, interesting traits, etc.) We have a trivia section ("brain snacks"). We have a timeline of dates and key events in our history modules. We have a "Best of the Web" section (which is more robust in our history modules) that helps students and teachers find video, audio, photos, great websites, movies, and historical documents. We have Study Questions in our lit and poetry modules that pose 30+ tough questions, broken down by theme (some teachers have told us they use these to spur class discussion and a few have even assigned one of our questions as an essay topic). So, there's quite a bit of analysis and information in our modules (by the sheer length, alone) that is not covered in a WP article.

4. I've checked up on a number of our fans' edits... they added quite a bit of content to WP along with their Shmoop edits. They often added other ELs that they lifted from Shmoop's "Best of the Web" section. So, we've lent our own content and research to the betterment of WP. I'll also let you in on some as-of-yet-unannounced info... Shmoop will make a portion of its content available under Creative Commons licenses.

5. A number of lithoderm's reverts were based on Shmoop being "non-encyclopedic." Is there a definition of "non-encyclopedic" on WP and is this an actual requirement for an EL? If so, I'd like to understand the standard so we can strive to satisfy the requirement. Does SparkNotes meet this requirement?

6. Is Shmoop age specific? Happily, I can say "no." Teachers use Shmoop to enhance their lesson plans, find multimedia to present in class, and to insprire topics for class discussion and essays. We hear from adults in Book Clubs who use Shmoop Study Questions and theme analysis to spur discussion. We cover titles in literature ranging in difficulty from The Call of the Wild to French existentialism. We receive positive feedback from students well into their undergraduate years.

7. The tone of our writing. I totally understand that it may not be for everyone and I can assure you that our editorial team values the feedback. Our goal is to make these topics come to life and feel relevant to students. In our survey of Shmoop users, 91% said that they like the tone of our writing. 66% said that they "completely agree" with that statement. I've included a number of quotes from teachers and students below. Many of them specifically mention that they like the tone of our writing. Our writing philosophy is: package smart and complex ideas in a fun and accessible style.

Thanks again (and sorry for the missive... obviously, I'm passionate about making our case). I welcome more feedback (including emails to me - brady at shmoop).

Quotes from teachers, librarians, and students who use Shmoop.

“ Hi! I'm a high school English teacher with a Ph.D. in American lit from Brown, and I'm very impressed with your site. I've assigned sections of your analysis to my classes. The students really take to your style of writing and find it fun to read. Thanks, Shmoop! ”

“ I'm a librarian at a public library. I have only poked around a little bit on your site, but so far, I LOVE what I see. You really strike the right tone with everything you say. Informative, but friendly. And you get big bonus points from me for talking intelligently to teens, not in "teen speak". Good job! ”

“ I teach high school English. I took a peek at your website and I have a lot to praise. I love the conversational style of the character explanation and the various plot analysis breakdown. I really love character clues! So many students cannot connect text. They can't feel the twist and turns and so essays are difficult because they lack they struggle to find the evidence to support their ideas. This gives them the breakdown and will help with concepts like cause and effect and irony. ”

“ I homeschool my children and we love using Shmoop! The information is extremely engaging and presented in a way that is very accessible to a broad spectrum of ages without dumbing or talking down to the reader. I have also recommended Shmoop to other homeschooling parents because I love the attitude of the writing and the website itself. Learning should never be boring and the passion for the subjects really shines in the relaxed feeling of the site. It changes the material from something the student has to know and makes it into something they want to know. The best thing I love about Shmoop is watching my son go to the site because he wants to go to the site, even outside of school hours. ”

“ As a teacher constantly trying to come up with ideas...this hits home! I will be sharing this information with my students and coworkers so all can learn and grow! Thank you so much! ”

“ I've been using it to study for my AP American history tests, and it is so helpful! The "Why Should I Care" section is really cool. I don't remember ever seeing an equivalent to that on any other website, and it gives a context for the information that follows. ”

“ I think Shmoop is a great concept, and it is exponentially better than Sparknotes, which deters kids from studying, as opposed to Shmoop which helps encourage learning. ”

Barriodude (talk) 02:12, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

The links I just removed were very poor -- short/low content and unsigned. In general such pages would never be appropriate for external links. But this is not really the place to talk about your website. We have a guideline for external links that is up to editors to interpret. In general your website clearly fails the criteria for external links, but in some cases it might qualify. That's all that can be really said about that without going through a zillion pages individually. 2005 (talk) 02:28, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't understand your comment. Which links? The last edit in your history was May 2008. And I have a hard time believing that the content is short (Shmoop has 75-125 Word doc pages worth of content on each module). Thanks Barriodude (talk) 02:33, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

What are you talking about? I have thirty edits today alone. Anyway, the content is anonymous. The brevity, triteness and non-encyclopedicness is just piling on. You should look for another way to promote your website. 2005 (talk) 02:46, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Can someone give me a summary of what the question is here? It's too much. - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 03:14, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I believe the question is "Are links to shmoop.com likely to be generally acceptable on Wikipedia?" The question of "Should the owner/employee/agent of a particular website be spamming their links everywhere?" is already settled. (The answer is "No!" for anyone that missed it.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:43, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for any repetition; edit conflict. Whether Shmoop links should be included in Wikipedia articles; whether they should be banned outright or examined on a case to case basis- whether User:Barriodude's actions constitute a conflict of interest, etc, etc. I would remind you of the first criteria on WP:ELNO: "Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article." Lithoderm 03:51, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Hi, I posted a couple of the now-controversial Shmoop links awhile back, one in Tenskwatawa and another I don't remember where. I added those links because I thought the two Shmoop pages I linked to -- one on Tecumseh & Tenskwatawa and another on the US & the Holocaust -- were quite rich substantively and added a useful resource for Wiki users, with quality content and analysis they wouldn't get either in the Wiki entry itself or on another external link. In fact, it was the desire to share those Shmoop pages that actually made me want to stop being only a passive Wikipedia user and edit a page for the first time. I don't know anything about the poetry pages that started this dustup, but I certainly didn't see anything objectionable in the tone or content of the Shmoop pages I linked to. So I sort of object to someone just going through all of Wikipedia and universally erasing anything and everything having to do with that website without even reading it. That said, I didn't want to just revert the links back in because I am a newbie here and it seems there are other issues going on here that I don't totally follow. But long story short, I'm not sure that it's fair at all to make the blanket assumption that everything on Shmoop is garbage and anyone who linked to anything on the site is a spammer. I think Wikipedia was made better by my links and I'd think it would be better to judge all these Shmoop links on a case-by-case basis rather than just wiping them all clean off Wikipedia. Nate5446 (talk) 06:13, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Read the above. Don't just make up stuff. Links that aren't spammed are judged on a case by case basis. External links should follow this guideline. We aren't here to decide about every page on that website, and we don't have exhaustive conversations about every one of the tens of thousands of websites that have links here. In general though, we desire links to expert content, and Schmoop has anonymous articles, which means they don't meet the criteria of this guideline. 2005 (talk) 06:40, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

What are you accusing me of making up exactly? Why are you attacking me? My apologies if the links I added were not acceptable, although -- as I said -- I think they were of better quality than several of the links already on those pages. Are you saying that there is a blanket rule that no external links should ever be made to any site with unsigned articles? If so, my apologies for breaking that rule; I didn't know it existed because such links seem relatively common in actual usage. Nate5446 (talk) 06:56, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Attacking you? What does this even have to do with you? This is the talk page for the external links guideline. And yes, anonymous articles seldom merit links. 2005 (talk) 08:18, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Is there a written guideline stating that EL should (or must) have a byline? I haven't seen one. Shmoop is written by Stanford and Berkeley Ph.D. and Masters students. It's credible. If byline is a requirement for EL, I could easily find you thousands of EL that don't meet this standard. Barriodude (talk) 19:51, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I haven't read most of the above, so have missed most of the points made on both sides of this discussion. But, on the most recent comment made ... be aware that other stuff exists is generally not viewed as a viable argument on Wikipedia. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:57, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Point taken. I still don't see a guideline stating that content on EL sites must have a byline. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Barriodude (talk • contribs) 20:02, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Read WP:EL, that is this guideline. You can't be a "recognized expert" when anonymous. 2005 (talk) 23:30, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Ok, so I'll try to recap a bit, since the above conversation is so lengthy. I think I've addressed every question/criticism that has come up. I'm happy to continue the conversation and I encourage more feedback. Here's a summary:

• Shmoop users posted Shmoop links in EL on many WP articles over the past month
• Many of those edits included other edits to the articles (in a number of cases, they copied content from Shmoop to enhance the WP article)
• No COI (links that I posted months ago were removed)
• lithoderm and 2005 reverted all of those 60+ links over a 2 day period
• I asked our users to hold off on any reverts or edit warring so we could have a civil discussion here.
• Shmoop articles have 75-125 pages worth of analysis and information. Clearly, they add some info beyond what is available in the WP article. (Shmoop is written by Stanford and Berkeley Ph.D. and Masters students)
• On average, users from WP who visited Shmoop spent >7 minutes on our site reading our content. This data suggests that WP readers found this EL very useful.

Barriodude (talk) 20:18, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

The number of pages, or the authors of the articles, are of secondary importance if the content of the articles isn't relevant or valuable. I admit that I haven't spent more than 45 minutes or so browsing the site, but I failed to find anything that added relevant information to the Wikipedia articles the site was linked from. The condescending language in almost every Shmoop.com article I looked at was quite flagrant. PhD students are not guaranteed to produce good content - I know this for a fact, being one myself.

In addition, there is a very heavy US slant to all the Shmoop.com articles. This is at best problematic; at worst it adds bias to the Wikipedia articles. --Bonadea (talk) 20:43, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Here's a thought. Suggest a few WP articles that used to have Shmoop links. I'll have our writers offer up their opinions on new/original info in our coverage that go beyond the WP articles. It would be painful for all involved to do this on a case-by-case basis, but it would be a good test, since this seems to be the key question regarding Shmoop. Also, note that Shmoop offers a free essay outline tool for all of our literature articles. That tool is unique to Shmoop and certainly a valuable and relevant resource that is not available on WP or other sites. Thanks. Barriodude (talk) 21:33, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Once again, we are not here to help you promote your website. Read the guideline. If you want to hope other editors add links from the Wikipedia to your site, then follow the guideline. But don't add such links yourself. The bottom line though is the type of site you have built does not have expert written, verifiable content. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's not the type of thing that is a link for an encyclopedia. 2005 (talk) 23:30, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

This will hopefully be my final statement regarding Shmoop. A: It does not matter what your testimonials have been, or how many Shmoop users want these links on Wikipedia- Wikipedia is not a democracy. B. Reliable, established sources. As you admit, Shmoop is fairly new. Your very offer to change the content shows that it is not stable, and its tone is far from scholarly. So Shmoop is new, and its content can fluctuate- that leads us to C. Spam. You may not be trying to sell something, but obviously you believe your project has value, and if we take your word for it, other people do too. Regardless, Wikipedia is not the place to spread the word about your new project. Whether you, your colleagues, or readers add links to Shmoop, it still constitutes a conflict of interest because they were inherently biased toward Shmoop- they made up their mind to add the link before even looking at the Wikipedia article; obviously there was no thought as to whether it enhanced Wikipedia content- leave that to editors who do things other than add external links to a single organization. Still, about your promise to add further material to Shmoop- what I interpret "Sites with other meaningful, relevant content that is not suitable for inclusion in an article" is a related topic which may not be encyclopedic, but is still of scholarly interest- CH'AN BUDDHISM AND THE PROPHETIC POEMS OF WILLIAM BLAKE, for instance, is linked from William Blake. Because the apparent mission of Shmoop is to create a textbook/study guide for a targeted audience, and in Shmoop's view the teenaged audience requires a simplification of the material, you limit the scope of scholarly inquiry in an attempt to connect with your audience. This is done instead of providing an unorthodox scholarly perspective that would broaden the interested reader's understanding of the topic. And about your audience, D. Wikipedia is not a textbook. We go out of our way to present all scholarly views on a topic of note; we do not go out of our way to accommodate our readership through simplification and condescension, which is the main purpose for adding the Shmoop links. In sum, there is no reason to include Shmoop links, nor will there be in the future, especially when the only editors who are eager to add them are outside entities or edit solely to link to Shmoop. As I said, I hope that this is my last statement on this topic, as I hope to go back to contributing actual content. I will remove any Shmoop links that I see added to William Blake related articles; wiki-wide, I'll let others decide... Lithoderm 23:32, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

a convenience break

I've seen worse. Actually, I can say more than that -- I fact-checked one or two of their articles about things i am very familiar with, and also asked a genuine academic expert to review one of the articles in her subject. Despite the deliberately immature writing, this is in my opinion a highly respectable site indeed. In my opinion as a librarian, i would recommend it to anyone at the high school level, and possibly beginning college level also. After giving the appropriate cautions about copying and citing; it compares pretty well when measured against some conventional sources of this sort--except for two things: first, almost nothing is actually sourced, or attributed to a named author. second, the entire body of content needs translation into English.

My expert, working with the Pride and Prejudice article, found a few things she would have interpreted differently--which is inevitable--no two experts will see a work like that the same way exactly. Except for the nausea induced by the repetitive cute language, thought very highly of it, & was fascinated by the breath of coverage and the excellent choice of links. In terms of actual content, it was judged much more comprehensive than our coverage of the topic, & free from serious error. It was noted that much of it, such as the discussion of plot, was clearly prepared specifically to be suitable for the current methods of teaching this material at a basic level.

I checked a few to see if I could identify authorship. The authors of at least some portions seem to be basically retired faculty--i wonder if they realize the way their work has been rewritten. The material is very highly edited by the staff to produce the unique and deplorable tone. (The cant phrases Lithoderm complains of are repeated in most articles, word for word. The effect is bad enough on a single article. By the third or so, it is incredible.)

But I think Lithoderm is judging on the wrong criteria. What matters is content. Their coverage of literature and start on a coverage of history is very valuable. I see no comment above that refers to this, so i assume he must have thought it acceptable. Bondera correctly noticed a US bias at present. I'm not sure what part he checked and found no better than to Wikipedia coverage, but some portions will normally be stronger than others,

Style is another matter. Every complaint of Lithoderm's is correct. We wouldn't accept the style here, but it's not a standard for other sites. In a sense, its refreshing to see a major project that is even worse written than our's. Personally, I think it a terrible blunder of the publishers. Talking down that way leads to contempt, not acceptance from students, and is likely to lead to rejection by teachers. They do have one advantage for teaching purposes: any plagiarism from it will be instantly recognizable.

They unfortunately do not give their own authorities, so they can not be used as authority in Wikipedia articles at this point, but they can be used as an appropriate external link. WP is not a textbook, and if it were it would still not write in this fashion, but it is perfectly appropriate to link to textbook-level material in our articles. I'd say that indeed it is necessary to do so, at various academic levels. I totally reject the negative judgements above. I would very strongly advise their addition to all of the relevant articles by the people who know, and on the basis of my own judgement as an academic librarian, I would be prepared to revert any removal of the links or attempted blacklisting.

The best course to take going forward is to have an article on it. We should be able to find published reviews, even now. It is of course necessary to distinguish published reviews from blurbs. DGG (talk) 03:56, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

I suppose I can grudgingly accept Shmoop external links, but questions have been raised about the accuracy of its content (particularly at Talk:Mending Wall#Shmoop link). It was only used as a reference in one article that I removed it from.

However, I still have strong reservations about the motives of those who are adding the links- their only contributions are adding shmoop links and arguing for the inclusion of shmoop links. They all seem to be in direct contact with Barriodude or are "shmoop users"- it's very suspicious, and my comments about COI not only applying to Barriodude above are still accurate. I do not mind links to sparknotes or cliffnotes because those are well known and generally respected study guides- they've been around for a while, and have a reputation for accuracy. They also lack the problems of style that have been noted with Shmoop. It bothers me that these editors are here expressly for the purpose of adding links to their new "passion project" (which opened on September 20th of this year)- links to sparknotes or cliffnotes are not necessarily added by enthusiastic new users or people directly affiliated with the site... Ah well. Lithoderm 17:24, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

They should be accepted if they are a good link for an article. That would seem to be very unlikely most of the time. Maybe over on Simple Wikipedia, which is for people who have problems with adult language and reading levels, but not for a more serious encyclopedia like we are. And there is EXTREMELY clear indication of spamming going along. Any account that's only here to add those links should be reverted, warned and eventually blocked per WP:COI and WP:SPAM rules. DreamGuy (talk) 17:34, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree completely that they should not have been added the way they were. When I see people doing that, if the links seem at all usable, I tell them to stop & let people who work on the article regularly consider the links. If they do not stop, I've blocked them to prevent additional links, and then they often do cooperate. I think this user has been sufficiently warned and says above that he will now let people do it right. As for the appropriate WP, these links are high school or Freshman college level in the US, and that's appropriate for us, not simple. They possibly could go into simple too, for selected titles likely to be relevant there. The only parts of them I would be comfortable using as sources, not external links, are any sections which are actually signed and where the author can be identified as an expert. At the moment, such sections seem quite rare. As for accuracy, yes, their Mending Wall article had a very clear prominent error & I can not imagine any expert having written that part. We will now have the opportunity to test them. They're an online resource. How soon will they correct it? In my experience, quite a number of otherwise reputable places do not bother, and apparently think of it as print, & fix it next time they redo the site in 2 or 3 years. Let's see about them DGG (talk) 18:04, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

High school or college level? Not really. Most of their content is written to a lower level than that. High school and college reading level puts people at standard adult reading level, which these articles don't have. Based upon the number of people above calling it insulting the intelligence level of our readers, that doesn't make it appropriate here, and would only make it appropriate for Simple Wikipedia. DreamGuy (talk) 23:18, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

We could address a good deal of the spamming by listing it at XLinkBot. That would prevent anons and newbies from adding the link, but allow established accounts to do so. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:49, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Just wanted to point out that a number of editors who added EL links to Shmoop also made non-Shmoop edits to those articles and to other WP articles (Special:Contributions/Nate5446. I've seen cases where the editor actually borrowed content from Shmoop (citing it in body, or borrowing one of the links from Shmoop's Best of the Web section and adding it to the relevant WP article's EL ([[3]]). Barriodude (talk) 23:38, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Links to other sites wouldn't be affected by listing the domain with XLinkBot. I believe that shmoop.com could also be used as an inline <ref>erence this way. However, any unregistered or new editor (people that are unlikely to be familiar with our guidelines) that added shmoop.com under ==External links== would be reverted. An experienced editor could add such a link with no difficulty. Additionally, XLinkBot won't edit war, so anyone can revert the removal the link. It's an intermediate enforcement approach; it reduces inappropriate external links without blacklisting the site. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:54, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

I think that Xlinkbot is a good idea, but I don't think it should be referenced. As DGG said, they rarely cite their own sources. Lithoderm 21:42, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

From a discussion with them, they will rarely have sources to cite at this point, except in the history section, and are aware that they can't yet be cited in-line. The work is being done primarily by graduate students, writing an explanation of the material without any particular authority, and is in any case very obviously being rewritten extensively to formula. I have suggested to them they have at least named section editors of some degree of interpretation. As for ELs, I see no reason to use a bot to remove will will soon be reinserted by individual people. DGG (talk) 23:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

LyricWiki?

Anyone know if LyricWiki is licensed to serve song lyrics? Best I can tell it isn't. It's not yet being spammed across sites, but I did remove it from one article where it was added as I could not ascertain this. --MASEM 05:39, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Most likely isn't. And we don't link to wikis normally anyway, so it fails our criteria two ways. DreamGuy (talk) 21:17, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

FYI: a quick search turned up over 400 links to lyricwiki.org from Wikipedia. Granted, only a subset of those are from the article namespace; but these links should be reviewed. My guess is that few, if any of the links meet Wikipedia EL and/or RS guidelines/policies. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 21:29, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Man... we need to blacklist it or something... but from a section above even clear spammers don't get blacklisted. Looks like we're stuck removing this kind of crap by hand, only to have people add it all back because they eitehr don't know any better or are trying to spam it. It' worse than whack-a-mole. DreamGuy (talk) 23:13, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Raised it here [4]. dougweller (talk) 17:51, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

All except a handfull are copyvios. I've been a lot less active, but two years ago I was struggling to scrub spamlinks like theirs clean (and they DO spam them). It looks like they're still up to the task today though. See previous archives of this or the wikiproject on spam to gain some historical insight into their presence. JoeSmack ^Talk 04:58, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

See [5] again, most have now been removed and it's clear they are copyvio.

Chatty CREEP

I'm not sure what "chatty CREEP" is, but at any rate I do believe the edits I just reposted make the article clearer to understand, with all the information included that was there before. Yours very sincerely, GeorgeLouis (talk) 23:08, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Artist trading cards

As fast as I remove links to an eBay group and forums, someone replaces them. So, are any of the links acceptable, and any suggestions as to what to do now? Thanks. Meant to add that I have added some book sources on the talk page, as the article is badly sourced (1 dubious source), and sympathise with the desire to have some ELs but am not convinced those are the right noes.dougweller (talk) 15:07, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I concur with your actions, and have blocked one IP. The article looks borderline promotional to me, as in "see, there's this phenomenon, and here's where you can BUY STUFF!" but if you're willing to watch it, I'm sure we can keep it cleaned up. Jclemens (talk) 17:38, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I've asked for it to be added to XLinkBot. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:30, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Blogs in external links

I am having problems on Borongan Airport as User:Wyane keeps on insisting that the blog he puts in the external links of the said article does not violate WP:ELNO rules. Here is the link to the blog that he keeps on inserting into the extra links section of Borongan Airport: [6]. This link violates the WP:ELNO rule, right? pikdig (talk) 05:44, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree and I've removed it, asking the editor to take it to the talk page if he thinks the blog's author is a renowned expert. dougweller (talk) 07:12, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

And now he has posted to my talk page complaining. [7] dougweller (talk) 06:46, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Dispute over linkfarm

Disagreement over links in article's table. See Talk:Comparison_of_wiki_farms#Linkfarm, Talk:Comparison_of_wiki_farms#Notability, Talk:Comparison_of_wiki_farms#Linkfarm_revisited, and Talk:Comparison_of_wiki_farms#Third_opinion. 18:34, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Interesting usage of external link in the Threshold article

The Threshold (online game) article is currently up for AfD. The discussion is long and filled with lots of SPAs and canvassing since the game's online community has found out about the debate. Recently an article was linked to from the Threshold article in an attempt to prove its notability for the AfD. It's written by a notable author who even has his own Wikipedia article, but in my opinion the article was written with a conflict of interest. It was posted to Wikipedia just 20 minutes after it was written and the article itself (as can be seen here) is clearly written with the current AfD in mind, and also in an attempt to give the article some notability. In my opinion the article shouldn't belong at all, as it was no-doubt inspired by the wikipedia article (and not the other way around, as Wikipedia articles should be inspired by external sources) and its current deletion debate. The blog article was basically written for use on Wikipedia. My problem is that I can't find any guidelines for dealing with linkage of this nature. I can't imagine keeping an article that was written as a sermon telling Wikipeda what to do, even if it was written by someone notable in his field. Themfromspace (talk) 05:45, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

The issue isn't whether we get our dander up at being lectured to. The issue is service to our readers. In this instance, ignoring the AfD for the moment, we have a Wikipedia article about an online RPG, and we have an observation about that RPG made by a person who is prominent in the field. Including that observation in the article will give the reader additional information about the subject of the article. The author's motivation is irrelevant.

For purposes of how people respond to the AfD, the context could reasonably be considered relevant to notability. The author might not have commented on the game if it weren't for the AfD. There's an inference that the game is notable because this author is addressing it, and the inference is weaker if the author is addressing it only because of the AfD. That question, however, relates to how people should assess notability in an AfD, not to whether a particular external source is worth citing or linking to in a Wikipedia article. For the latter purpose, it doesn't matter that the author was prompted to write because he found out about the AfD. JamesMLane t c 13:39, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Also, blog postings by a notable person aren't automatically considered reliable sources, but that's really a question for the reliable sources noticeboard, not external links. It appears that the AfD process is capable of handling these situations, though. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:30, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

"The author's motivation is irrelevant." What? No, it very much is. As far as service to our readers goes, it's obvious that we should not let our links be manipulated so crassly. It's offsite campaigning for an AFD, wholly inappropriate as a link. DreamGuy (talk) 16:04, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Barnivore - Your online drink directory

Pages on the site, eg [8] are being added to drinks articles as sources of information for, in this case, whether a beer is Vegan friendly - a bit of minor edit-warring is going on over this, eg the diff here [9] and it's ended up on ANI [10]which is why I'm bringing it here. Any comments? dougweller (talk) 06:52, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Misinformation as an external link?

I noticed an interesting external link in the CAMERA article, which is "Exposed - Anti-Israeli Subversion on Wikipedia". This link is interesting not because of its factual content (which is unreliable), but for the fact that it is blatant misinformation about its topic, and also includes a blatant attack on the credibility of Wikipedia itself. I don't want to get into an argument here about whether or not my interpretation is accurate or not (as that discussion should go here), so I'll frame some questions as hypotheticals:

1. Should an external link ever be included to known factually incorrect material? For example, it may be useful to include an external link to an article which is misinformation and propaganda to show examples of an advocacy group in action.
2. If such misinformation is included as an external link, should some note be placed with the link indicating that it is propaganda, and not reliable, even if this is self-evident?
3. What criteria can be used to establish consensus that an external link is misinformation and/or propaganda, rather than simply being unreliable? Is this a useful thing to do? Is this possible without an external reference?

cojoco (talk) 12:07, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Not to dodge your question, but one of the problems in general is allowing the external links section to devolve into a place where anyone thinks they can link to any site expressing any opinions. The links page of that article was given three different subsections, basically telling people to add new ones willy nilly. The one specifically focused on just the WIkipedia controversy was especially pointless, as it is only a small section of the overall article and does not deserve so much coverage in the links section. I removed the whole thing and suggested that if a site isn't used as a source for the section on Wikipedia it isn't notable enough to link to, and if it is already used as a source there's no need to link to it again. That way we bypass the whole links with misleading titles and so forth and just go back to our policies on reliable sources, NPOV and undue weight, etc. (But as far as links go, links should never be misleading and always have enough info, worded neutrally, so that people going to them knowing what to expect -- no stealth opinion sites posing as fact, etc.) DreamGuy (talk) 16:01, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

I disagree that the Wikipedia controversy is only a minor section; I think that is the major thing that establishes CAMERA's notability. Anyway, I'm happy that the link is gone. cojoco (talk) 20:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Dreamguy brings up an important point about articles with links divided into different sections. Take a look at Ethiopia before I edited it a few minutes ago. Several sections, large numbers of links, most commercial or networking. dougweller (talk) 20:24, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

"Acceptable"

Recently an IP changed the wording of the guidelines from "long lists of links are not acceptable" to "long lists of links are not in the spirit of Wikipedia" with the summary "who are we to say what is acceptable and unacceptable?" Ronz changed it back and GeorgeLouis reverted him. I changed it back to the way that consensus has said it should be for months now but per Ronz's invite I'm bringing it up on the talk page. I'm in favor of keeping "acceptable" myself, as this is indeed the official Wikipedia guidelines for external links. Furthermore, this guideline uses the word "acceptable" three more times. "The spirit of Wikipedia" is vague and wishy-washy. It can be used to defend unencyclopedic linkfarms much more easily than a policy that says its unacceptable. In the very few circumstances where a long list would help the article, it would of course be appropriate to ignore this rule, but stroll through the featured articles and you'll find that most of them only have several external links. Themfromspace (talk) 06:17, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Agree. Given the problems Wikipedia has with WP:SPAM and WP:Linkfarms, I think the firmer wording serves the community better. --Ronz (talk) 16:56, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I also support the stronger wording. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:50, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Should be changed to something less snarky than the snippy "unacceptable." Sincerely, your friend and advocate of politesse, GeorgeLouis (talk) 02:57, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

"Prohibited" is the right word. These mealy-mouthed stuff in guidelines is what causes all the problems. Wikipedia is not a link farm, so therefore link farms are prohibited. 2005 (talk) 00:53, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, that page which Ronz referred us to (WP:Linkfarm) does not use the word prohibit at all; that particular page is a good example of advice and counsel to editors without being mean or impolite. It is, frankly, written in the "spirit of Wikipedia." Yours faithfully, GeorgeLouis (talk) 04:44, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

"Prohibit" is not mean or impolite. Saying it is prohibited to go barefoot in a restaurant is not mean or impolite. The "spirit of the wikipedia" is to offer verifiable information, not be confusing and unclear. That is why the "impolite" word of NOT is both used and the shorthand. 2005 (talk) 07:57, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Being direct and clear is not the same thing as being impolite at all. "Prohibit" is fine. "Unacceptable" is fine too. Rray (talk) 13:36, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

"Prohibited" seems too policing to me. No, it isn't impolite but at the same time it doesn't encourage contributors either. And to be a wikilawyer, adding long lists of links isn't technically prohibited on Wikipedia as an editor has the power to make those lists, but it is definitly unacceptable to do so. Themfromspace (talk) 23:17, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Cold-blooded murder is prohibited every place on earth, and people still do that, too. The fact that I can, with this technology, do X does not mean that X is permitted. "Prohibited" does not mean "prevented". WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:01, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

What NOT to link to

I can't tell you how often I land on a Wikipedia article that features a dead link to a news article. There are several high-profile news sites that don't permantly arrchive thier articles (they remain up for a limited time). Unfortunatly one of thse sites is Yahoo! News. That site is very popular and therefore is often used for citations or external links in Wikipedia articles. I've found this a source of frustration as surely I'm not the only one who knows we need to "just say no" to Yahoo! News.

There are a number of well known news sites that either leave thier articles up permanntly or they feature a permalink for just such purprose. THESE are the sites Wikipedia editors need to rely on. Examples include (but are not limited to): BBC News, CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, & The San Francisco Chronicle. The Washington Post used to be reliable but they have since become selective in what articles are permannt and what are not.

I'm not suggesting we limit oursleves to a handful of news sites for reference/links but that what we need to do is ensure that we are not linking to articles that will in fact expire due to the sites's policy.

There are a number of popular sites that do expire news articles. Off the top of my head the most promient of those is the previously mentioned Yahoo! News. angrykeyboarder (a/k/a:Scott) (talk) 15:22, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Have you read Wikipedia:Dead_external_links & Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Dead_links?--Otterathome (talk) 15:26, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

The citation aspect of this is important, but this is not the page to discuss that. if an external link is dead, especially a news story, it should just be removed. Perhaps soem guidance on this might be useful, but it is much better for the reliable and citing sources guidelines to address this rather than here, and then we can just point to that. 2005 (talk) 00:51, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't think "it should just be removed" is really the ideal approach to a dead reference. For something in ==External links==, sure. For something in <ref>[www.news.com/we-rearranged-our-website Title of New Story]</ref>, then it would be better to look for the updated link, or to find an archive -- and if you personally aren't willing to do the search, then perhaps you'd leave the information there (with a dead link tag) so that someone else could. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:27, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

So you are agreeing with what I wrote then. 2005 (talk) 00:12, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Are these 'references' external links by another name?

See [11] - and I've just removed a bunch of links where the website said "This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner.". I think these really are external links, there are far too many for a very POV article, and I'm not sure they meet our criteria anyway. Thanks. dougweller (talk) 19:02, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I think you're going to have to beg them to separate the stuff-used-when-writing from other-recommended-reading. You might point them at WP:LAYOUT and ask whether any of these so-called refs are properly ==Further reading== material. That, plus advocating for exclusive use of inline refs should help you separate the refs from the external links. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:38, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Numbering "not allowed" reasons

Would it be an idea to fix the numbering of the reasons under "Normally to be avoided"? When an external link is removed, the reason could be summarized by referring to, for example, "EL4" for "promoting the website". This would be similar to the approach of criteria for speedy deletion. Little change would be necessary to the page; it should just be agreed on that no numbers will be inserted into the list and deleted numbers will be replaced by a placeholder like WP:CSD#A4. Han-Kwang (t) 19:30, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I fairly often just link to WP:ELNO with the number, using an edit summary like "Rm internet discussion boards per WP:ELNO #10" or "Rm blog per WP:ELNO #11". I don't think that direct links would actually help, but I do sincerely hope that no one will ever rearrange the list. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:45, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Linking to multiple official sites and social networking sites

Alright - On the Talk:Stephanie_Adams#MySpace_and_External_Links talk page section some editors agreed to not link to official Myspace, Facebook, Bebo etc. pages of people and organizations if the organization has its own official website. The "Except for a link to an official page of the article's subject—and not prohibited by restrictions on linking—one should avoid:" exception had been interpreted as one link to one official page and not multiple links to subject profiles on social networking websites - and this concept has been applied to other discussions such as Talk:Encyclopedia_Dramatica/Archive_13#ED_Facebook.2C_myspace.2C_Bebo_links

So, is this an appropriate interpretation of WP:EL's exception? Should this be coded into WP:EL? How should official social networking websites be handled? WhisperToMe (talk) 19:37, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Social networking site content is dynamic and unpredictable, and generally not appropriate for an EL, in my opinion. If a subject has an official site, it should be linked. If a subject has a myspace and a facebook, why should we try to link to both? I'm willing to be convinced that there's value, but I don't see it right now. Jclemens (talk) 19:46, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

"an official page"; but that means one. Yes, if their only official page is Myspace or whatever, then that's their one; but only one. This isn't a license to create and maintain a linkfarm. --Orange Mike | Talk 19:55, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

No that is not the case. Multiple official sites is both fine, and desirable. It is very common to link to a business' consumer site as well as their corporate site. Both are official, have different content and should be linked to. If an official myspace includes soemthing an official site does not, like four songs or touring information for a band, then it also should be linked. If it is just a myspace with friends and inane comments, then it should not. It's a judgment call, but one size certainly does not fit all here. The main thing though is the language definitely does not mean just one and only one all the time. 2005 (talk) 23:01, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

No that is not the correct interpretation. There is a widespread consensus among editors that often more than one is best for articles. The current text is fine and sensible. 2005 (talk) 23:03, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

What makes a site an "official" site? Just because the person in question uses the site doesn't mean its official at all. I thought blogs like myspace and facebook (especially if they require a user to register like facebook does) were to be avoided at all costs. Stephanie already has an official website http://www.stephanieadams.com/ which claims at the top that it's the official site for her. That alone should be linked to as her official site. Her playboy and IMDB are also acceptable external links. Facebook and Myspace are social networking sites. If she had a Wikipedia account but wasn't notable as a Wikipedian would we link to her userpage? Certainly not! Themfromspace (talk) 23:15, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

An official site is determined by the entity the article is about. If a person says "this is my only official site", then it is. If a business says "this is my official consumer site" and "this is my official corporate site", then they are. If "official-ness" is not obvious for a second link, then don't link it. If it is obvious, then link it if it has substationally different content and isn't just essentially part of the navigation of the first official site. If there are three or four official sites (in English) with a distinct focus, fine, if there are dozens of mini sites, then pick one or maybe a three or four that serve the encyclopedic needs of users. 2005 (talk) 23:21, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

I think User:2005 has done a good job of setting forth the principles: you can provide links to official site(s), but only if there's a good reason to. Multiple links to essentially identical websites don't meet the basic goal of the "minimum" number of links: no one wants to see a list of three dozen "official" websites for a multinational corporation. On the other hand, excluding an otherwise appropriate link simply because the person/organization/company/whatever happens to have more than one "official" website is silly. These principles are in tension, and the editors at the page have to figure out the correct balance in each individual case. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:42, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

First, there's a difference between an official business site, and band's self-written official site. In one, the company is legally responsible for false information. (I was in an company which was successfully sued for Web page content.) In the other, there are few legal constraints, and the band can publish self-serving material with little basis in fact.

Second, WP:ELNO has a long list of things that are normally to be avoided. These include, non-unique resources, unverifiable research, promotion, accessibility, social sites, etc. It defeats their purpose to say effectively: it's ok to give external links to any number of band pages that require plug-ins, login, have advertisements, self-promotion, factually inaccurate and unverifiable research...just as long so long as they are titled "official". That concept is very far from encyclopedic. Piano non troppo (talk) 16:35, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Read the first sentence of ELNO... Except for a link to an official page of the article's subject... The purpose is not "defeated". We specifically, deliberately and very plainly exempt official sites from those ELNO prohibitions. We are an encyclopedia. Linking to official sites is encyclopedic and common sense. If an official site is a piece of crap, we don't care, that is how the entity wants to present itself. We don't link to third party crap sites. If a company wants to present itself to the public badly, we aren't here to say they can't. We have an article on the company, with a link to the company presenting itself however they want (except for viruses and stuff like that). 2005 (talk) 23:19, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

January 2009

"If the page is a piece of crap we don't care"?! You're going to cite a "rule" that says it's ok to reference crap? Then (your interpretation) of the rule is dead wrong. If an external link, for example, has copyright violations or breaks other laws, it absolutely matters: it is absolutely forbidden, the Wikimedia Foundation cannot be involved. Period. It doesn't matter whose official page it is. Let's be honest: Many creators are unaware of copyright law basics, or are even actually hostile to them. According to a recent article, 1-in-20 music downloads is legal. [12]. Wikipedia shouldn't link to ANY site that doesn't provide a legal justification for its music downloads. You 2005, are trying to claim that a businesses that are legally responsible for their content, that will be readily sued for printing misinformation that affects stock price, are in the same class as a self-serving musical group that has everything to gain by lying through its teeth to make itself look better, and is unlikely to ever be called to account, let alone sued. I.e., MySpace articles for musical groups are absolutely the last thing an encyclopedia requires for reliable sources. Piano non troppo (talk) 14:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

My goodness, please take the time to read the guideline. You are going off on a tangent that you would see is fully addressed by the guideline. Official sites trump every part of the guideline except ELNEVER, which covers copyright violations, etc. 2005 (talk) 22:28, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree: Piano, you need to read the whole guideline, and perhaps even to wait a day between writing your replies and actually posting them. Extreme examples and strawman arguments aren't helping. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:47, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

These aren't "tangents", but explain why this article's inattention to details such as resolving conflicting instructions is creating confusion. (Editors are regularly placing MySpace links in Wikipedia that almost certainly infringe on copyright.) Having now reviewed the editing process regarding external links to fansites, for example, in late 2007, one is struck by their superficial nature: "Yes, they should be allowed" vs. "No, they shouldn't". It's a history of one group of editors adding a sentence without change, and another removing it. More of an edit war than a discussion, and one which led to the article being protected on a number of occasions.

Additionally, on May 8, 2007, editor "2005" added this sentence to the article "except for a link to a page that is the subject of the article or an official page of the article subject". Reviewing the discussion for the article on May 31, 2007, I don't see justification for this change. There is a statement by DreamGuy "it's generally accepted to include the subject's website in the External links section", however "generally accepted" on a discussion page is not the same changing the main article to what was stated and later defended by "2005", which is that it's a rule a subject is allowed one official page. I'm not questioning that "2005" hasn't acted diligently, at length, in good faith, and with positive effect to improve this article. I am questioning that this sentence was added because it's unclear and creates situations where it's impossible to resolve conflict.

For the benefit especially of new editors, there needs to be some sort of flowchart or guidebook, something akin to what "2005" is alluding to when mentioning that something "trumps" another. (I'm not suggesting a particular implementation, merely one that is extremely specific and categorical):

MySpace pages may not be added as external links. These exceptions are allowed:

1) X

2) Y

3) Z

However, even if an external link to a MySpace page meets one of the above exceptions, it still may not be used if:

1) P

2) Q

For the sake of those who are experienced, this would be a good way to identify which areas were controversial, and which not. Regards, Piano non troppo (talk) 13:23, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Your repeated tangents are not helpful to whatever your cause is, which at this point is completely lost. You wrote: (Editors are regularly placing MySpace links in Wikipedia that almost certainly infringe on copyright.) So remove them. The guideline says they are prohibited. Why do you keep bringing up this point? You seem to still not have read the guideline since you mention this point again. This guideline, following upon policy, remains directly clear so please stop causing confusion. Material that violates the copyrights of others per contributors' rights and obligations should not be linked. It also says This is particularly relevant when linking to sites such as YouTube, where due care should be taken to avoid linking to material that violates its creator's copyright. Would you understand the guideline if it said "such as YouTube or MySpace"? 2005 (talk) 21:36, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Piano non troppo, I've proposed a flowchart-type outline in the past, but there was no consensus to implement it. The flowchart, just for your own information, is more or less like this:

1. Comply with ELNEVER
2. Provide the official website (assuming it's about a person or organization: obviously plants, animals, natural phenomena, etc. can't have an official website)
3. Exclude anything that violates ELNO
4. Include anything else in ELYES
5. Consider anything from ELMAYBE

I've often considered moving the official site stuff out of ELYES to a new "ELALWAYS" section to make this somewhat more intuitive. But even with a clear path identified, there has to be a certain amount of editor judgement involved. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:59, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi, WhatamIdoing. Yes, there's a fair amount of work involved, maybe even dozens of hours for several editors just to get started. That will be an impediment to getting people involved. However, mulling this over, I realized there's yet another reason to get started. In the LyricWiki discussion section above, there's a reference made to a comprehensive and relatively significant change made by Moonriddengirl [13]. It came about because LyricWiki changed their policy to be more permissive -- and allow infringement of copyrighted material. Regardless of whether one agrees with her edits, it's important for future editors to understand her rationale. Having reviewed her comments and edits, I believe the "rule" she created for herself is something akin to:

• Links to LyricWiki are not allowed anywhere in a Wikipedia article. Reason: LyricWiki policy has changed to allow what Wikipedia may view as copyright infringement under DCMA.

• This exception is allowed:

• A) When it can be demonstrated that the specific LyricWiki text linked to was created before 1923. Reason: Lyrics that were written before 1923 are now in the public domain (in U.S. law).

Many months from now, when her original justification discussion is buried in the archives, it would be handy to be able to pull out this rule for someone with a question. Piano non troppo (talk) 08:10, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

---

This is going to only concern music. MySpace has made it easy for artists, espically indy artists and bands, to create their own space to promote themselves. In the case of a band it is possible that every member of that band has their own MySpace. These can all be "official" pages. It is also very common for a manager, publicity firm or record label to also create, and maintain, an "official" website that may also be a MySpace page. The overall question here seems to be "Why link to more than one official site?" and what I have already said should be enough to explain that but in case it isn't here in only one scenario. A site maintained by the subject will allow someone to have an "inside" perspective on some issues. Some artists do daily tour blogs on their MySpace for example. An official site run by a manager, publicity firm or record label does not exist to "tell all", but rather to solely promote their client. When the "client" is no longer active for them (dropped from the label, new manger, new publicists) the site may never be updated past first postings of a bio, promo photos, record release information or tour dates. And even when the artists it active the day to day information is filtered and posted, sometimes, when it is something major. (i.e - "Due to reasons beyond their control the band has canceled the remainder of their tour"). A subject maintained "official" site would more than likely have details not available elsewhere. Soundvisions1 (talk) 15:18, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

A Myspace for an indivdual band member would never be linked from the band's article. Likewise a manager's Myspace about the band would also never be linked. The guideline is clear on this, only the official site of the entity and not Myspaces simply about the entity. In other words, the Myspace pages of every Pepsi employee should never be linked from the Pepsi article. If a guitarist of a band has his own article, then his Myspace can be linked from his article, not the band's. 2005 (talk) 23:03, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

2005 said A Myspace for an indivdual band member would never be linked from the band's article - have you looked at the music related articles on Wikipedia of late? Also the comment of a manager's Myspace about the band would also never be linked is not true, unless you are misreading what I meant. An artists management can create or maintain "official" websites, this includes ones on Myspace. As my first statement on this issue was "This is going to only concern music" the Pepsi comment is not going to be discussed. Soundvisions1 (talk) 02:23, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Would never be linked if following the guideline. Obviously there are tons of articles with spammy or otherwise inappropriate links. Then you mixed up two concepts: if a Myspace is an official one for a band, obviously it makes no difference who made it, a manager or somebody teenage nephew. Also, the guideline applies equally for Pepsi and bands. there is no difference whatsoever. 2005 (talk) 03:45, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

User:2005 is basically right: if the subject of the article is an organization, then you wouldn't normally consider a website by one individual person to be the "official" organizational website, and WP:EL authorizes multiple official websites only when they're the official websites for the subject of the article. For example, the CEO of Marriott Hotel has a blog, and he discusses the business in his blog, but that still shouldn't be considered an official website for the company for our purposes. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:56, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

It makes a great deal of difference who writes an official site. Some are legally responsible for their statements, some are not. Some have professional reputations to maintain that would be damaged by misstatements, others do not. Some sites have have some form of feedback or peer review, others are slick marketing sites where public feedback is impossible, (there may not even be a "Contact Us" button). I.e., some official sites have a legal responsibility to tell the truth, others are run by those who can be expected to conceal, equivocate, lie, and self-aggrandize. Insider gossip about the latest recording sessions or concert dates belongs on a fan site, not in an encyclopedia. We give bands the benefit of the doubt for one external link -- we wave the rules -- but that can't be done indefinitely. That doesn't open the door to linking to more than one external official site. Every artist thinks everything about their career is important. They cannot be relied on to be the gatekeepers of verifiable fact, and certainly their marketing agents cannot be. One official link suffices, except perhaps in exceptional situations such as the band changing name or the band having a dispute with the official page owners. Otherwise, we will be providing a platform for commericalism, self-promotion and unverifiable information. Piano non troppo (talk) 19:27, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

None of that makes the slightest bit of difference. Official sites can have inaccurate, promotional, one-sided, delusional opinion whatever. An official site still should be linked. 2005 (talk) 23:19, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Just my two cents thrown into this discussion, if that's alright. One site can (and probably should) be linked to the External Links, if appropriate to the page. I have no problem with this idea. However, linking to an official site does not give license to link to multiple "official" sites. We need to remember that Wikipedia is not about self-aggrandizement or advertising. Nor is it about cultivating a linkfarm, as Orange Mike already correctly mentioned. These are well-established, time-honored policies that will not be changing any time soon. J Readings (talk) 06:57, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

We've answered this question a dozen times. YES, multiple links to different official websites are permitted under limited circumstances. I've added a short description of the advice that we keep giving (over and over and over) on this page. It's a footnote, mostly because I don't want to encourage extra links, but also because I don't want to clutter up ELYES with this description. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:27, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Jossi was right to revert WhatamIdoing's edit. There's no consensus for adding multiple links to different "official" websites. Indeed, the opposite seems to be the case...and rightfully so. Sorry, but it's true. J Readings (talk) 03:33, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Nonsense. Obviously there is very strong consensus that multiple official sites can be used. The guideline now allows this. WhatamIdoing"s text was more limiting than the current text. So let's not try and turn this into something ludicrous. Thousands of articles can and should have multiple official sites linked. That's the consensus. So sorry, you are running against an enormous consensus to the contrary. If you want to change that, good luck. 2005 (talk) 03:51, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry right back at you. And if you'd like further participation from those outside of the small choir of 2 or 3 people who seem to agree with you, then it probably makes sense to tone down the rhetoric and use of words like "nonsense" and "ludicrous." It makes little sense to talk to other people like that and expect participation and consensus-building. J Readings (talk) 09:21, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

You made a condescending statement that is false on its face. Next time, tone down your rhetoric before coming to a discussion where you are both unfamiliar with discussions, and intend to ignore common practice. A thought out stating of your position is all that is needed. 2005 (talk) 12:07, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Excuse me, but the only person being condescending here is unfortunately you. I was being quite polite in offering an opinion (unless of course you now choose to continue reading my thoughts for me in bad faith -- please stop that -- and assuming what I have and have not read -- stop that too, please). Simply disagreeing with a comment does not give you license to be rude, 2005. Regards, J Readings (talk) 12:18, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

You could have just said you were sorry for making the dismissive comment. Please keep your comments on only the topic please. 2005 (talk) 12:24, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I would advise you to do the same, 2005. And once again, I did not make a "dismissive" comment. Simply a statement of fact: Jossi is correct in that there is no current consensus for any edits. Attacking me personally is unnecessary. Regards, J Readings (talk) 12:36, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I did not attack you personally. Please stop this. You made a false statement that I stated was nonsense. My opinion of your statement, not you. I am allowed to have my opinions, even if you don't like them. Now please do not persist in this personal junk. 2005 (talk) 12:48, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Now it's "personal junk" on top of "nonsense." The hyperbole does not end. Unbelievable. J Readings (talk) 12:51, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Actually, what I added was taken directly from this talk page, which is where consensus is measured. See for example the conversations here, here, and here, all of which explicitly address this issue and all of which conclude that under some circumstances, the inclusion of more than one (non-redundant, English language, official) website is clearly appropriate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:03, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing, thanks for the links. I have read these conversations carefully. You are -- let me be generous here -- simply mistaken if you think these dialogues offer a "clear" conclusion of consensus in favor of multiple "official" sites being linked. First, in this dialogue alone (to say nothing of the others where multiple editors offer their doubts and objections, but don't respond further, implying that they are neither convinced nor satisfied), we have Themfromspace and Orange Mike stating that they don't think Myspace and other social networking sites should be linked if there is already an official site. We have Piano non troppo stating that social networking sites are not in the same league as an "official" corporate sites and should be avoided. We have Jossi reverting your edits because he doesn't see consensus on this talk page (implying that he is not convinced yet either). Then there are 4 or 5 other editors (myself included) on the original Stephanie Adams page who agree that "an official page" is sufficient. So, with all due respect, it's difficult to claim that there is somehow a consensus when I keep reading a lot of replies or postings from 3 editors stating otherwise. I don't mean any of this as an insult. I'm simply stating a fact. Consensus does not mean a handful of editors repeating their personal preferences. J Readings (talk) 09:52, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

The consensus of discussion, and the editing of thousands of articles plainly establishes that multiple official sites make sense when they are appropriate. You can't just ignore that. Your quoting the opinions of other editors in regards to opposing a specific second (or third) official site is not addressing the issue. Those individuals could be right that in the specific circumstances a second or third official site is not the best choice. The guideline leaves open the possibility that in some cases more than one makes sense; in other cases, only one makes sense. Sometimes people disagree where the line should be drawn, but the overwhelming consensus is very clear: multiple official sites are fine sometimes, but people disagree how often "sometimes" should be. The guideline is thus vague because of divergent views on where to draw the line. 2005 (talk) 12:07, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Once again

I've decided to start this discussion over, for (I hope) the last time. There are, in limited instances, times when linking to more than one official website is perfectly appropriate. Here are some examples:

1. When the organization uses separate websites for separate purposes. See for example Wal-Mart: This Good Article lists three official websites: One where you can buy stuff, one for the corporate headquarters, and one for their public relations division. Does anyone think that just one of these would be sufficient? If we arbitrarily limited this article to a single external link, do you think we would all agree on which one to include?
2. When the organization is a subsidiary. See for example The Economist and National Westminster Bank. These Good Articles link to both the specific publication and the specific bank websites, and also to the corporate entity that owns them. Does anyone think that it is always right to exclude one or the other official website? Which would you exclude?
3. When the organization is enormous. See for example European Union. This Good Article links to half a dozen official EU entities. Do you think that linking to the most important of the EU's entities is wrong? (Note that "unnecessary" is different from "wrong".)
4. When the person has different roles. See for example most incumbent politicians' pages. Is the official website the biography on the government website, or is the official website the one run by their re-election campaign? Which of the two official websites would you choose at the Featured Article Barack Obama#Official_sites?

I could probably go on, but I think you get the picture here.

This has, as I note above, been addressed repeatedly on this page, and always with the same outcome. There are situations in which arbitrarily limiting the number of links to official websites to one would be silly. What we want to do is to avoid legislating silliness (i.e., one official website no matter what reality looks like) while also avoiding abuse (e.g., two dozen links to domain names registered by the company that all happen to redirect back to the same actual website).

If you are still fully convinced that Wikipedia would be harmed by having two or three "official" websites linked at any or all of the articles I give as examples above (and any others that we come up with during this discussion), then please explain, in appropriate detail, what your objections are to each and every one of them. Note that I've numbered them for your convenience in picking apart these (trivially located and easily supplemented) examples. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:36, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Wiki should allow important, valid, verifiable, unbiased information, even if it's from a cereal box. It's obvious that those contributing to this discussion have given sincere thought to their own processes of evaluation. A cereal box, in special circumstances, may have essential information. But something is missing, and that is what use that the general editing public will make of Wiki guidelines that are too blurred, too specialized. And what use they will make of them without them being aware of the underlying Wiki context.

Not long ago, two editors challenged my removing a MySpace link. They came here to resolve the dispute, and what they were told (in their perception) was that multiple external links to official sites are just fine. One editor to the article in question was an anonymous IP, who had only made modifications to one rock group article. The other had a dozen or so Wiki changes, largely additions to articles about popular culture. What they both came away with was an impression that MySpace external links, even multiple external links, are perfectly acceptable, that the guidelines really aren't hard-and-fast, and that they should do whatever they feel is appropriate. This isn't a constructive message to send novice editors, because many aren't looking for "Intro to Wiki Source Guidelines 101", they simply want to add their opinions, and leave. Piano non troppo (talk) 09:54, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

The fact that two inexperienced editors were confused is no excuse for demanding that multiple official sites never be allowed. Which "official" site would you delete at Barack Obama? WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:44, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia has some screwy ideas, one of which is editors can ignore guidelines if they want to. In fact, "guidelines really aren't hard-and-fast" and editors can "do whatever they feel is appropriate". Personally I think that's just no way to run a railroad, but that is the policy here. At the same time, you want rigid guidelines that spell things out in an uncompromising way, while editor Jossi removed some text because it was too specific, too creepy. This just illustrates that different editors have different opinions on how to do things. Guidelines are not here to force 40% of the editors to do things how 44% of the other editors want them to. Guidelines are not here to ram one way of doing things down other people's throats. They are here to give a clear indication of the broadest consensus of the encyclopedia, which in this case is clearly that official sites are different than other sites, and that in some cases more than one official site makes sense, and that in some cases only one official site makes sense, and in some cases more than one but not all oficial sites should be linked. Personally I hate Myspace, but thousands of editors think official myspaces make good links, while virtually all other myspace pages do not. One more link is nothing to burst into flames over. 2005 (talk) 22:49, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

This may be a bit of a project, but it would be a great idea to have Wiki guideline pages that were Simple English, and which focused on a few guidelines -- rather than perplexing new, or marginally interested, or maliciously motivated editors with a bewildering nest of guidelines and qualifications. (Doesn't it sometimes take several minutes to find a guideline that you're sure exists, on a Wiki page you're sure you've bookmarked?) Unnecessary external links are often more of a bother, as Editor 2005 suggests, than anything. But the challenge facing new editors is almost insuperable, for example, regarding how to create a good copyright justification for an image. Someone coming just to add images, quotes and external links to their favorite rock band may be in for a hard time.

A factor that is bothering about the MySpace links is that the sites may well contain material violating copyright. There are plenty of people who don't understand basic copyright laws, others who do, but disagree with the laws, and still others who simply don't care whether they're breaking the law. But as one sees from WP:LINKVIO ("Linking to copyrighted works"), Wiki editors simply can't turn a blind eye to copyright abuse on external links. Piano non troppo (talk) 11:19, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, and this again is why Myspace links are normally not permitted by the guideline. However, an official band myspace should not be violating their own copyright, and as the guideline says, the restrictions on linking section even trumps the official sites aspect, meaning if an official myspace violates someone else's copyright, it can't be linked. 2005 (talk) 11:46, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

The issue is that Wikipedia has policies based firstly upon international law, and secondly, upon the guidelines established by the Wikimedia Foundation. We Wikipedia editors need to distinguish between our thoughtfully designed, law-abiding institution, and casual, commercially-driven Web sites that may be uncaring of legal issues. We, who are thoughtful, may discern that material violates the law in a way that the site or material owners may themselves not understand. It is our more comprehensive understanding of legality that prevails. That is, we cannot accept external links to material that violates copyright, regardless of a Web site owner's perception. Piano non troppo (talk) 05:06, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not understanding the point behind further argument here. Here's what I see:

• Everyone already agrees that copyvios are unacceptable.
• Everyone already agrees that WP:ELNEVER, which flatly bans any and all copyvio sites, trumps the exemption for official pages.

Do we really need to keep discussing something that everyone already agrees and that the guideline already explicitly deals with? Is the goal to reach the point where everyone really, really, REALLY agrees that copyvio sites are unacceptable? Or are we done with this? WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:54, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

The question is whether sites that make no statement about copyright status should be assumed to be legal. WP:ELNEVER doesn't quite address this.

Wikipedia does not allow images with improper copyright justification on its own pages. I.e., our default assumption is that material is copyrighted. The rules applying to external sites such as MySpace cannot be less stringent. As Wikipedia editors, we are not absolved of our responsibility simply because a MySpace editor makes no statement about copyright status.

There's a basic conflict here that people are avoiding. Meeting copyright restrictions is a pain -- I found the guidelines for photograph submission by far the most complicated Wiki process I've been involved with. The temptation to say, "To hell with it, I know this photo is ok" has risen to the surface more than once. If I'm an experienced Wiki editor, with a little legal background, with good intentions -- and I occasionally feel that way -- what can we expect of someone who is new, with no legal background, with not-so-wonderful intentions? The Wiki guidelines need to read, effectively: "No external links to social sites that do not include copyright justification," -- because anything less restrictive allows people to violate copyright with Wikipedia's tacit approval. Piano non troppo (talk) 10:03, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I think that your proposal is far, far too restrictive. Many thousands of acceptable websites do not happen to include a page that explains the copyright status of their (original) material. For example, I've been unable to find a "copyright justification" at whitehouse.gov -- even though we all know what the copyright status is for materials produced by the US federal government. Our existing rule prohibits linking when the editors believe an actual problem to exist (no matter what the website happens to say about the existence or absence of such a problem), not when the website author simple failed to jump through a particular bureaucratic hoop. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

In court there's a difference between minor, unintentional infractions of the law with no economic consequence, and deliberate infractions with large economic consequences. There's a difference between a site that uses a faded, low quality black-and-white picture from 1930 where the copyright status cannot be determined, and which has almost no value, and MySpace and uTube sites which regularly post copyrighted photos and videos of great economic consequence. And, in my personal experience as a Webmaster for large companies, most Webmasters, when contacted about use of OUR company material on their pages, reply with great indignation and hostility that the company has any right to tell them what to do on "their" site (with property we OWN, i.e., photographs we took and did not release into the public domain).

What I'm suggesting is not that we come down hard on typical Wiki editors who link to a site with photos of no economic consequence. I am saying that MySpace sites are likely to be violating the law in respect to property that is worth a very great deal. E.g., videos of famous rock stars. That difference is critical, because it means for the Wikimedia Foundation the difference between a court case and no case.

Furthermore, I'm going to quote J Readings, above: "Consensus does not mean a handful of editors repeating their personal preferences." Editor "2005" seems to be focusing, not on concensus, but on a particular result, which is to allow an indefinite number of external links to MySpace and other official sites. 2005 is not suggesting evaluation procedures, Wiki article monitoring processes, or dispute resolution practices. Or any solution that meets Wiki requirements for verifiability. 2005 is not introducing new ideas, or suggesting compromise. Piano non troppo (talk) 15:26, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Final call

It appears that none of the editors here have any actual desire to ban every single instance of multiple official websites. Can we now go back and add that explanatory (and appropriately restrictive) text to the guideline again? The proposed footnote was:

If the organization, person or other entity has more than one official website (for example, a corporate website and a consumer website), then more than one website may be linked. In this instance, all selected links must meet all of the following criteria:

• The websites must not be redundant in content.
• The smallest reasonable number of websites is linked.
• The selected websites must not prominently link to each other.
• The websites must be in English.

This question has been asked here repeatedly, and IMO it is appropriate to provide this advice without making each individual editor dig through the archives or asking the question again. And for all those editors that are still fixated on lousy MySpace webpages for garage bands, please note that this is not the only possibly instance for multiple "official" websites. In fact, since many minor bands only have a MySpace-type website, and their articles are generally low-traffic, the existence of such websites is probably the least important instance. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:47, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't think The selected websites must not prominently link to each other is good. It's okay if the sites link to each other, but they shouldn't be something like this where at the top of the page the basic navigation of each site in the family of sites is the same. I don't have a great wording suggestion off the top of my head though... so unless someone can word a line that addresses this I'd just drop that sentence. 2005 (talk) 07:35, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the instance that I think we all want to avoid is the official website that is basically a soft-redirect to the other official website ("See our new website at www.slightlydifferenturl.com!"). I'd be happy to hear anyone's ideas for wording this.

I'd also wondered whether we should specifically mention that WP:ELNEVER still applies. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:27, 9 December 2008 (UTC)