User:Popish Plot/sandbox



Popish Plot Talk Page 06:21, 16 March 2015

The way you figure notability out is by seeing if there are reliable sources. Per the notability guideline regarding people: "People are presumed notable if they have received significant coverage in multiple published secondary sources which are reliable, intellectually independent of each other, and independent of the subject." (Footnotes omitted.) We don't look at notability first and then look at sources, whether for people or for other articles, it's the other way around (take a look at a few listed cases over at Articles for Deletion). I agree with KoshVorlon that blogs and YouTube are ordinarily questionable sources about living persons, but I also agree that it is possible for them to be reliable. In many if not most cases, however, they're going to be self-published sources and are only going to be usable when published by the person the article is about. For example, this YouTube video and video page is used in that article to support the assertion that the subject of the article, Julia Galef, was the keynote speaker at the 2013 HCCO 2013 Winter Solstice Banquet. The video was published on YouTube by the Humanist Community of Ohio and that community's YouTube user page states: "We are an all-volunteer organization." That video is, therefore, clearly self-published by the Humanist Community of Ohio and under the policy on self-published material here, "Never use self-published sources as third-party sources about living people, even if the author is an expert, well-known professional researcher, or writer." This video and video page are, therefore, not an acceptable source about Ms. Galef's participation in that banquet since Ms. Galef is a third party as to the Humanist Community of Ohio. Had she been a member, officer, or owner of the Humanist Community of Ohio and speaking in that capacity, this might have been a more difficult question. I go through that to illustrate that this is the kind and degree of analysis which must be applied to each of the YouTube and blog references in that article in order to properly answer the poster's inquiry, rather than just stating generalities about those kinds of sources. Best regards, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 17:49, 14 April 2015 (UTC)


 * It is always wise to self-analyze and make sure your actions are on the correct side of PAGs. Seek a third opinion.  We can certainly have different interpretations but when it comes to BLP policy, strict adherence is a requirement.  One of the policies I find rather confusing and possibly even at the root of many a dispute is WP:IAR.  The policy claims it is a widely accepted standard that all editors should normally follow. The problem I see with it is the fact that common sense isn't so common anymore.  Also keep in mind that there are instances, although rare, when the results of WP:CONSENSUS can also be in violation of BLP policy or the results can be unclear or nonspecific enough that it requires a decision from ARBCOM, the latter of which is evidenced at Griffin.   The hardest part of all is when advocacies get involved to sway consensus, the latter of which happens but is rather difficult to prove and usually ends up at ARBCOM.  In closing, ARBCOM is a long and arduous process, and there are no guarantees.  Editors who have volunteered to serve on that committee deserve our utmost respect, regardless of the outcome.  It is always better to try to work things out and reach a compromise before initiating an ARBCOM but there are occasions when advocacies are pushing a POV so hard they end up being noncompliant with NPOV, therefore violative of BLP policy.  Repeated policy violations and over-the-edge behavioral problems are when ARBCOM becomes the only road to resolve. Atsme  &#9775;  Consult  17:02, 15 April 2015 (UTC)