User talk:Rhododendrites/2017c

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability. Legobot (talk) 04:29, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia & Youtube Project
Hi Rhododendrites,

My name’s Alex. I’m a student at American University, and I’m working on a project on Wikipedia and Youtube. I noticed you made a relatively large amount of edits to the List of Youtubers Wikipedia page and I was wondering if I could get your input on a few questions.

1. After talking to a few Wikipedians and doing some research, it seems as though Youtubers have a harder time obtaining a Wikipedia page and/or higher quality pages than other “traditional” professions. Do you agree with this assessment? If so, why do you think this is?

2. What could Wikipedia change to better accommodate notable figures from newer platforms like Youtube? What could Youtube do to better live up to Wikipedia standards?

3. If you could change the guidelines on Notability in any way, what changes would you make and why? If not, why do you think they’re stable enough that future societal progression could still be covered equally?

I look forward to hearing back from you.

Ah2681a (talk) 09:08, 4 May 2017 (UTC)


 * My response will reference or be informed by these policies and guidelines (rules the editing community has developed over the years): Notability, Neutral point of view, Verifiability, What Wikipedia is NOT, Identifying reliable sources.


 * Notability is the most relevant thing. It's a way of determining what should have an article, and with extremely rare exception comes down to what subjects have received "significant coverage in reliable sources independent of the subject". That's required for two reasons: first is because, as an encyclopedia and tertiary source, Wikipedia wants other publications to have declared a subject worthy of notice before it's covered here. Second is because without significant coverage in reliable sources, we have nothing to base an article on. Wikipedia is not a database, place for promotion, place for original research, etc., so any article that exists should be able to exist with an in-depth article based only on good sources. Someone can have a million subscribers, but if they haven't been written about by a publication with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, there's nothing more we can say about them.


 * It's possible to perceive YouTubers, other social media celebrities, Internet memes, bands, etc. as having a harder time securing an article because anybody or anything with a couple dedicated fans can create articles and write about the subject on Wikipedia to the point of disruption, recreating articles when deleted, spamming other articles repeatedly, etc. So if there's a way that YouTubers may be treated unfairly, it's because disruption by YouTuber fans (sometimes egged on by the YouTuber themselves) is one area (one of many) where disruption is particularly common. Wikipedians are constantly dealing with people who want things they like on Wikipedia irrespective of Wikipedia policies and guidelines, and other people who use Wikipedia for marketing/promotion/advertising purposes. YouTube is far from the worst for this, but happens a lot. It takes the time of other Wikipedians to clean it up, and so while I don't think I've seen people intentionally apply stricter standards, it seems likely that it may happen unconsciously when people come across an article, created for the sixth time, with a bunch of jokes strewn throughout and little-to-no claim to notability (in the Wikipedia sense). One example that came to mind was Filthy Frank. At this point, I don't think anyone disagrees he's notable, but for a while the only decent sources there were were brief mentions of his Harlem Shake video. The article was deleted repeatedly, and deleted repeatedly at his real name, and deleted repeatedly at all sorts of variations, and removed from dozens of other articles -- and those are just the ones that weren't created as a goof (i.e. adding a joke/reference to an unrelated article). It used up so much of people's time that there were still deletion discussions after it was more clear he was notable (but he was kept).


 * That said, notability criteria are definitely not biased against YouTubers. If anything, they're biased towards YouTubers. "Significant coverage" is easier for newer subjects than old, easier for subjects in the developed world than for the developing world, easier for subjects active on the Internet than those that aren't, easier for subjects whose activities are based on visibility than for those that don't do their work in front of a camera, etc. The important questions aren't how do we make Wikipedia even more disproportionate in terms of that coverage by applying special treatment to people who already have a huge advantage, but how we recognize the cultural or historical significance of people and subjects important in Papua New Guinea, Ghana, Cambodia, Latvia, or Benin, where it's harder to point to coverage in digital media to support notability. Even subjects that are ubiquitous in those countries (to the extent that's possible) can have a hard time receiving coverage here. Or we could talk about subjects in the US whose work is typically considered important but who don't receive significant coverage about them, like a lot of economists, anthropologists, historians, engineers, etc. Then there are the subjects that have been historically discriminated against, and far less likely to receive recognition in reliable sources of the day. There's a ton of research written on gaps in coverage, unequal coverage, etc. A lot of it comes down to Systemic bias. All this said, I don't actually think there's anything we should be doing about this. As a tertiary source, Wikipedia to a large degree reflects the status quo, and thus reflects the social, political, and technological problems inherent in the production of "reliable sources" at any place/time in history. Nothing we can do about that. Certainly we should not try to create articles on subjects that don't have such coverage (hence collaborative efforts focusing on, say, African history or women in science). We can try our best to track down all of the notable subjects we can, but if there's no significant coverage in reliable sources, that's sort of the end of the line for Wikipedia.


 * Hope this rambling helps. :) &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 13:22, 4 May 2017 (UTC)


 * Thank you so much for your quick reply Rhododendrites, I really appreciate all your feedback! Ah2681a (talk) 02:15, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Editing News #1—2017
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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Notability (organizations and companies)
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Notability (organizations and companies). Legobot (talk) 04:27, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability and notability
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Verifiability and notability. Legobot (talk) 04:28, 24 May 2017 (UTC)

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A kitten for you!
Thanks for spotting the account impersonating me!

Deku-shrub (talk) 09:46, 27 May 2017 (UTC) 
 * Aww what a cute impersonator. :) Maybe you should take it as a sign of respect -- one wouldn't impersonate some random editor, but rather an authority/experienced user whose edits will be accepted. Or something. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 13:56, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

Page you previously commented at
I see you recently previously commented at this page, maybe you can give your thoughts on Template_talk:Alt-right_sidebar. Sagecandor (talk) 22:43, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Eh. If I were to return to that template it would be to TfD it. At least last I checked, it was entirely the product of OR. Unclear to me that there are clean enough borders around "alt-right" topics such that a navigation template makes sense. I haven't sent it to TfD because I'm not sure and would rather not get sucked into those articles :) &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 22:47, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
 * That sounds like a good idea. Why don't you do that? You'd be a strong voice to start the discussion. Sagecandor (talk) 22:49, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Because it's possible I'm wrong -- not about the OR, etc., but about the underlying idea of the template (i.e. it might be possible to do right, and figuring it out isn't a high priority for me). I'll participate if it's there, but I feel too much of an obligation to dig before I nominate for deletion. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 22:51, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Judging by the talk page, there have been fights in the past by multiple users about who to include in the "People" section. This template seems rife for conflict by its very nature of WP:BLP issues. I think you'd be better skilled to nominate it, than I. What do you say? Sagecandor (talk) 23:52, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
 * I see you also previously raised concerns about its use at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Politics and got no response. Sagecandor (talk) 00:00, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

Just to let you know, I changed it to a footer template. And also removed entries that did not mention the topic "alt right", at all, in their article's body text. Sagecandor (talk) 20:43, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Made a few more edits, removing a few more that don't explicitly mention alt-right (other than in a category or headline). I suppose it's reasonable enough now that deletion isn't necessary. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 18:16, 10 June 2017 (UTC)
 * Yeah, it's better now. Alhough it will forever attract irrelevant junk. Sagecandor (talk) 18:18, 10 June 2017 (UTC)

American politics editing
Lord Roem ~ (talk) 04:11, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Blockbuster LLC
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Blockbuster LLC. Legobot (talk) 04:32, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

A barnstar

 * Thanks! Article still needs a lot of work, of course, and I hope to come back to it soon. I have to say, though... after reading through those sources, it's the only time I can think of that I worked on an article while wishing it weren't notable. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 05:26, 9 June 2017 (UTC)

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B4 clarification
A clarification to WP:UP/RFC2016 § B4 has been proposed. You participated in that discussion; your input is welcome at User pages/RfC for stale drafts policy restructuring/B4 clarification. Thanks, — Godsy (TALK<sub style="margin-left:-2.0ex;"> CONT ) 15:50, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Assume good faith
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Assume good faith. Legobot (talk) 04:31, 25 June 2017 (UTC)

This is to inform you that an attempt is being made to overturn an RfC that you voted on
This is to inform you that an attempt is being made to overturn an RfC that you voted on (2 RfCs, actually, one less than six months ago and another a year ago). The new RfC is at:

Village pump (policy)

Specifically, it asks that "religion = none" be allowed in the infobox.

The first RfC that this new RfC is trying to overturn is:


 * 15 June 2015 RfC: RfC: Religion infobox entries for individuals that have no religion.

The result of that RfC was "unambiguously in favour of omitting the parameter altogether for 'none' " and despite the RfC title, additionally found that "There's no obvious reason why this would not apply to historical or fictional characters, institutions etc.", and that nonreligions listed in the religion entry should be removed when found "in any article".

The second RfC that this new RfC is trying to overturn is:


 * 31 December 2015 RfC: RfC: Religion in infoboxes.

The result of that RfC was that the "in all Wikipedia articles, without exception, nonreligions should not be listed in the Religion= parameter of the infobox.".

Note: I am informing everyone who commented on the above RfCs, whether they supported or opposed the final consensus. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:39, 26 June 2017 (UTC)