Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard/Archive 18

Third Viscount Monckton of Brenchley


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

There have been serial deletions of a sourced reference to the existence and content of a legal Opinion to the effect that Lord Monckton is indeed a member of the House of Lords, and is fully entitled to say so, while the contrary opinion, expressed by the Clerk of the Parliaments, is left in. This is libelous of Lord Monckton, implying that there is only one legally-acceptable point of view on the question whether he is a member of the House, albeit without the right to sit or vote.

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?




 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Not yet.


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

We have tried to insert the sourced reference to the legal Opinion supporting Lord Monckton's view, but enemies of Lord Monckton simply delete it. This is not acceptable.


 * How do you think we can help?

Either insert the missing reference (it will be found in the History) or delete the reference to the Clerk's letter. Either give both sides or give none. Don't allow prejudice in Wikipedia's pages. Wikipedia is potentially in serious trouble over this issue, because an "editor" removed the sourced reference to the existence and content of the Opinion supporting Lord Monckton's view and then locked the page down. That "editor" should have all administrator privileges permanently removed.

86.160.51.116 (talk) 02:20, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Third Viscount Monckton of Brenchley discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

It may be just a mistake, but you seem to have listed only yourself as a party to the dispute and, looking at the talkpage, this is not something that is actually in dispute currently. If it hasn't been done already, this is something that ought really to be discussed on the talkpage of the article before bringing it here. --FormerIP (talk) 02:25, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Assuming the factoid in dispute is this, the comments I've seen talk about it failing WP:RS. Which, being wordpress source, would be about right. Seems to me the OP should explain to us why this factoid should stick with such a poor reference. --Tagishsimon (talk) 02:29, 25 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Per this edit on the talk page I'd suggest you read WP:NLT, and act accordingly. AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:31, 25 January 2012 (UTC)


 * An additional problem with this edit is that it seems to violate WP:OR - as evidenced by the factoid's use of the words "understandably" and "improperly" (I'm looking at what was removed by this diff, [], just before protection), which are subjective words. If they were being directly quoted from a reliable source, there might be room for reasonable doubt, but as it stands (or rather, as it stood before deletion), it poses some serious WP:BLP issues.  It needs to be discussed on the article's talk page (with a possible request for comments), and failing resolution there, it needs to be taken to the BLP noticeboard.  Sleddog116 (talk) 03:41, 25 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Without wishing to pass comment on the substance of this dispute, for the context I suggest that editors should read Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive736. The IP editor above is clearly the same individual, editing from the same ISP, as before. Prioryman (talk) 08:07, 25 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Who are "we"? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 13:46, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
 * We are MofB and his several IP addresses. Kittybrewster  &#9742;  14:30, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, that's just speculation, although the MO is much the same: failure to understand the rules, failure to think the rules apply to him. I'm minded to recommend this "dispute" be closed down and the content reposted to the article talk page. If the OP wishes to engage, rather than make wild legal noises, that would be good. The bottom line is the OP needs to understand WP:V and WP:RS if he is to take this any further. More fulmination will merely lead to mirth. --Tagishsimon (talk) 14:35, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Closing comments: I am a mediator/clerk here at DRN. The requesting editor's request was limited to "There have been serial deletions of a sourced reference to the existence and content of a legal Opinion to the effect that Lord Monckton is indeed a member of the House of Lords..." It appears to me that Tagishsimon has properly identified the edit in question (a later version linking to a blog post about the matter, not just to the legal opinion, is here). Neither the legal opinion itself nor the blog article is a reliable source and under the verifiability policy cannot be used to support an assertion in an article. The other issues alleged by the listing editor — libel, administrator/editor misconduct — are beyond the scope of this noticeboard. — TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 15:02, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Gideon Levy


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

The issue is WP:SYNTH.This statement in the article "his columns have been cited in The New York Times" didn't have any secondary source but an examples of such citation.In my view is a synth because there should be a secondary source that attest notability.Ravpapa say that may argument is reasonable but connects its with some other issue that I don't see how they connected.Ravpapa didn't responded to my last post only after reverting me.--Shrike (talk) 13:58, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?




 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

We have discussed in the talk page but have not reached any agreement it seems--Shrike (talk) 13:58, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * How do you think we can help?

You can counsel whatever it constitute WP:SYNTH or not moreover input of uninvolved editors is always a good thing

Shrike (talk) 13:58, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Gideon Levy discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

I am surprised to see this issue discussed here. I was under the impression that Shrike wanted to see input from additional editors, perhaps an RFC, which I thought would have been an appropriate and productive step. So far only Shrike and myself have been involved in this discussion. User:Sean.hoyland also participated, but did not take a stand one way or the other.

I have never participated in a discussion on this page, so it's hard for me to say what's appropriate. But I would like to see input from other editors on the talk page before seeing the discussion moved to another forum. I should add that, should a consensus develop on the talk page in favor of Shrike's position, I will not stand in the way of a revision. --Ravpapa (talk) 14:36, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I am a regular mediator/clerk here at DRN. It would appear to me that the first issue to be resolved is a choice of which dispute resolution (DR) procedure to follow. Both this noticeboard and RFC are types of DR, and either or both can be used to attempt to come to consensus. The opinions of mediator/clerks and other third parties to the dispute expressed here at DRN can be, and should be (unless otherwise stated by the person giving the opinion), considered in determining consensus about a matter that is in dispute. In my opinion, a request for a RFC made after a listing is made here should ordinarily cause any discussion here at DRN to be terminated and redirected to the RFC (with a note at the RFC pointing back to whatever discussion has occurred here) in order to avoid the possibility of duplication and inconsistent results. (Just to be complete, (a) it should be noted that a request for an RFC made before a listing is made here disqualifies the listing under the guidelines of this project and (b) discussion of a dispute here does not preclude the filing of an RFC if the discussion here fails to resolve the dispute [and the same is true in reverse if an RFC is begun but fails to resolve the issue].)
 * @Ravpapa: It would be well if you would, before substantial discussion occurs here, decide whether you would prefer to participate here or start an RFC.
 * Regards, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 16:53, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Later: In accordance with Shrike's wishes, and without conceding that the offending sentence was synth, I have found a secondary source that says the same thing, so I think the problem is resolved. If not, I will post an RFC. So I think we can close the discussion here. Thanks for your help, --Ravpapa (talk) 07:14, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Please update the reference with hebrew text per WP:NONENG as I couldn't find this in the source that you provided.--Shrike (talk) 10:08, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Sorry for that. I cited the wrong one of Yemini's articles. The attribution now shows both Hebrew and English versions. Regards, --Ravpapa (talk) 11:00, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You new addition again intruduce WP:OR nothing in the source says that "Even his opponents concede that Levy is widely quoted in the world press" its you own interpetation anyhow the article is written by single man so you can't say "opponents" and nothing in the source that says "widely quoted in the world press"--Shrike (talk) 18:40, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Shrike, I am impressed by your single-minded devotion to what you perceive as Wikipedia's editorial policy. I have rewritten the sentence to remove the words you find offensive. Please make any additional comments on the article talk page. That is where these discussions should take place. --Ravpapa (talk) 20:00, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You rewrote but introduced more synth to the article anyhow I want an input of uninvolved editors about the synth issue.So I prefer the discussion will take place here --Shrike (talk) 20:20, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Fine. I will present to the mediators here the facts of the case. The article on Gideon Levy, an Israeli journalist whose articles frequently raise the ire of Israeli right-wingers, included the following sentence in the section on "Praise and criticism": "His articles are frequently cited in the New York Times and other newspapers." The statement was supported by a footnote referring to two out of ten references to his reportage in the New York Times in the last year.

Shrike argued that this statement was WP:Synth. He claimed that it would have been acceptable to cite all ten of the references, but to draw the conclusion that he is often cited was unacceptable. We (myself and User:Sean.hoyland) contended that the statement was no different than, for example, "Lucien Freud has been exhibited in major museums throughout Europe"; that the number of times a journalist is quoted by others is an important indicator of his or her renown, and is, in fact, a criterion for his or her notability.

But Shrike insisted that, without a secondary source stating that he is widely quoted, we could not include the statement. So I found a secondary source. Ben Dror Yemini, an Israeli journalist who, incidentally, despises Gideon Levy, wrote: "He has a global reputation. He is perhaps themost famous and most invited journalist in Israel." This article was translated and reprinted by CAMERA, another of Levy's revilers. I included this quote, and, in order to clarify that Yemini is not a fan of Levy, I added the sentence, "Even his opponents concede that Levy is widely quoted in the world press."

This, too, was unacceptable to Shrike, as you can see from his comment above. There is nothing in the quote, he claims, about being quoted, only about having a global reputation and being invited. Also, he says, Yemini is only one person, so it is wrong to talk about "opponents".

As for the first objection, I removed the words "widely quoted in the world press." as for the second objection, the complaint was written by Yemini, but repeated by CAMERA (both are cited in the footnote). That makes two opponents, so the statement as written is correct.

Throughout this discussion, I have been trying hard to treat Shrike's objections as substantive complaints made in good faith. His arguments have at times been so specious and frivolous that I can't help thinking that his primary concern is not the quality of the article but the excision of any praise of Levy. However, I don't think that is an issue that we need to discuss here. I do, however, want to object to his choice of forum. If this discussion were taking place on the talk page, I would propose revisions, and negotiate a version that would be acceptable to both sides. To do that off the talk page seems wrong, as there is no documentation there of the consensus we would eventually achieve.

Sorry if this post has been long. --Ravpapa (talk) 05:37, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Its really simple you say things that is not in the WP:RS that you brought.This phrase "Even his opponents concede" don't appear there .We can say that "Ben Dror Yemeni states that Levy is widely accepted throughout the world".Do you agree?--Shrike (talk) 06:12, 29 January 2012 (UTC)


 * That's fine. I have removed all the explanatory text, and left only the quote. It should now be acceptable to you.--Ravpapa (talk) 06:39, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you.I am happy that we have reached an agreement.--Shrike (talk) 07:32, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Talk:Occupy Wall Street - Crime and sexual assault sections
{| class="navbox collapsible collapsed" style="background: transparent; text-align: left; border: 1px solid silver; margin-top: 0.2em; " ! style="background-color: #CFC; font-size:112%;" | Closed discussion 
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 * style="border: solid 1px silver; padding: 8px; background-color: white; font-size:112%;" |
 * The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page.  No further edits should be made to this discussion.



Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

Should the Crime/Sexual Assaults section continue to be a part of the Occupy Wall Street article.

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?

User:Amadscientist feels that the Crime section should be deleted from the Occupy Wall Street article and moved to the an article detailing reactions to Occupy Wall Street. I do believe that the Crime section was too long and should have been trimmed but not deleted or maybe even made into an article of its own. Also I don't see how this falls under "reaction". The contents of section were all well cited, and stem from significant news coverage. I am trying to compromise by trimming the section but it is repeatedly deleted.


 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Not yet.


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

The section was deleted before a discussion was conducted. I attempted to restore the section while a discussion was conducted to establish a consensus.


 * How do you think we can help?

Looking for additional opinions.

Racingstripes (talk) 02:05, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Talk:Occupy_Wall_Street#.22Crime.22_and_.22Sexual_assult.22_sections discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

Same problem as before, Amadscientist trying to edit war changes into the article while totally misunderstanding the Wikipedia process and casing accusations at other editors. It's not his changes necessarily, but that he edit wars them in and doesn't seek consensus per BRD. Be— —Critical 05:06, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * There is no consensus for the change so the article should not be altered until the dispute is resolved....if there is one. Right now this is just an editor not happy that he has not gained consensus and you yourself stated I was not acting innappropriately, and given the chance to add your weight to the discussion you just commented and bashed me a bit on the talk page. So....what's your point but more "Amadscientist is wrong and I am right"? You reverted the page and came here to bash me specificly and not add anything to the discussion. Please STOP. This page is not the place to flame other users. Add to the discussion or if you have a complaint you feel should be brought to the attention of administrators please use the right Noticeboard. And again...I am seeking consensus and will certainly follow whatever the decision of editors is. I am not the editor who came here seeking to use DR as a way around consensus.--Amadscientist (talk) 05:24, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * How many times have I explained to you that the state of the article before your changes is what you have to get consensus to change: it is not that others have to gain consensus to revert/contest your changes. It is that YOU have to get consensus to make a change.  If someone reverts you, then you are the one who needs to gain consensus.  You should not edit war changes into an article.  Be— —Critical  05:32, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Explaining something incorrectly over and over will not change guidelines. Consensus is what contributing editors decide.....like when you did this:


 * 01:41, 25 January 2012 (diff | hist) Occupy Wall Street ‎ (→Origin: Remove block quote for regular quotation, I think this was more in accordance with desires on the talk page)


 * So, as you can see you yourself were going against csmall> N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text onsensus in the last situation until that point and admitted as much in the edit summary. look....you don't like me. Fine. Then just don't interact with me. But I have tried in this situation to talk to the editor about the disagreement and suggest ways for them to get a discussion going, but he simply refuses to state his case and explain his reasoning and wants to come straight here. It's here now. So why not add to the discussion in a constructive way.--Amadscientist (talk) 05:42, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I don't dislike you. I want you to stop being disruptive, and I'm tired of you wasting my time trying to get you to stop the disruption.   Be— —Critical  05:59, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * If you really feel you are trying to get someone to stop being disruptive....is more disruption the only method you know to achieve that goal?--Amadscientist (talk) 06:37, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I agree with Becritical here - you can't remove a well-sourced, large section unilaterally and then demand 'consensus' to add it back.  Toa   Nidhiki  05  14:14, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Thank your for your input, however that is not the situation here exactly. The dispute is actually about having a separate crime subsection. and how much to summarize from the reaction section that has it's own article. Another, who brought the DRN here, didn't create a completely different section and not all information was removed from the OWS article. In fact all the information is at the Reactions page incorporated into the Police response section. My objection to having such a subsection is that it is not encyclopedic or neutral and paints a picture falsely and without support from the sources being used, and may be a BLP issue by claiming crimes are being committed by protesters when in fact there has been no legal conviction of such being mentioned or that those were protesters. The protesters themselves are the victims in these sourses. The section in the article as a stand alone subsection labled "Crime" is misleading the reader into believing the protest was either criminal or individuals of the protest have been proven to be criminal.--Amadscientist (talk) 22:14, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Clerk Comment: This has turned into "you need to do this" and "you need to stop telling me...". ALL of you need to calm down. You're bickering and attacking the editors rather than addressing the best way to move forward. Here's what we're going to do to rectify this. The continuation of this discussion will be written in third person and will not include any user names except in signatures. That sounds extreme, but that, I think, is going to be the best way to facilitate a productive discussion. Before switching to third-person, let me address a few specific issues I can see here that I think need to be cleared up.

BeCritical: BRD is only one method of achieving consensus, and it is not a policy. It is a guideline. You cannot require other editors to follow it, you can't use it as an excuse to revert good-faith edits simply because you don't like them, and you can't EVER use it as an excuse to revert a change more than once. (I'm not saying this in an accusatory way; I'm merely presenting the essence of what is said in the BRD article.) Consensus is achieved through edits and counter-edits (not reversions), and through discussion. You've pointed out the claim that the consensus includes the material removed by Amadscientist. Let me clear this up right now for everyone involved: there is no such thing as a "consensus version" of an article. We can't have a clear consensus if the addition or deletion of material is challenged in good faith. This has been challenged, so we don't have consensus. There is no excuse here to "revert to consensus"; the objective here is to build consensus.

Racingstripes: DRN is not going to solve any problems unless all of the involved editors are willing to discuss the issue. We don't make or enforce decisions about articles; we simply facilitate the discussion to try and help people reach a consensus. The clerk who closed the previous discussion (User:TransporterMan) said it was "closed as settled at talk page". Apparently, closing the discussion was either premature or some or all of the involved editors are still convinced that they are right and the others are wrong and are refusing to drop the stick. (I'm not pointing fingers, just pointing out what seems to be the case here.)

Amadscientist: Since the previous version of the article included material that you deleted, it did have consensus. (Not that it does have consensus, but it did have consensus.) Since you are the one who is trying to get the consensus changed (and it's perfectly reasonable to do so), the onus is on you to explain the rationale for changing the consensus - don't continually revert/delete simply because you haven't found a consensus yet. Also, consensus doesn't mean that you will get exactly what you want. We're trying to improve the encyclopedia - not win the argument. Consensus is about building the best version of the article through discussion, proposal, and counter-proposal. When you engage in an edit war (and I'm not singling you out, because this whole thing is a big edit war involving everyone), that has nothing to do with consensus. Consensus doesn't mean, "I'm going to convince everyone to see it the way I see it." In point of fact, you might not like the consensus that is reached, but there comes a point when you have to just let it go.

Everyone: No one's go to get exactly what he wants here. There must be compromise, or nothing is going to get done. It's time to cool down, back up, and consider the best way to improve the project. Let's agree that every editor involved in this discussion is acting in good faith and stop the "disruption" labels. Labelling people's edits is not going to do anything except create a stampede of angry mastodons. Like I said, let's try to keep this discussion in third person and avoid using user names whenever possible. Sleddog116 (talk) 19:29, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Agreed. Also, on the advise of requested mentorship from another party, I am backing away from the article itself and will make my case on the talk page without further edits for a while. I admitt I allowed myself to get caught up in this and became defensive.--Amadscientist (talk) 21:47, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I more or less agreed with the edits, that is, taking out the crime section. I saw them and let them stand, prior to another editor's reverting them.  I disagreed simply with edit warring changes into an article.  I believe that it should be a hard line in Wikipedia that edit warring NEVER works to change content to a desired version (I do sometimes revert, but only after I perceive a consensus, or when nonconsensus edits are being made).  Otherwise, we are promoting a non-consensus process.  I edited only in the belief that consensus is necessary before changes are made, and that a new consensus should develop before changes occur (BOLD is good, but only till a revert).  Had this process been honored, I would have been supporting the change.   Be— —Critical  23:59, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I honestly believe perceptions on both sides in regards to policy, guidelines and process has been missinterpreted and we need to be more open to the suggestions and advice we are being given. I know I have learned more about the actual process of the DR and ANI as well as the community process itself.--Amadscientist (talk) 01:07, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I brought the discussion here to bring in editors that typically do not edit Occupy Wall Street articles. Basically to get fresh eyes.  This is a large section of the article that is being removed.  I don't agree with removing the section entirely.  As a compromise it should remain but trimmed down explaining how crime within the protesters has effected the movement and the surrounding neighborhood.  It has been well sourced, there has been significant coverage, and it is relevant to the article.  I don't believe it is about winning and losing but getting it right, and deleting a large section that is meets that criteria is wrong.Racingstripes (talk) 06:04, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I don't think anyone's questioning the reliability of the information. What I think is the case here is that a few people are questioning the wisdom of including the information in this particular article.  Is there a separate article dedicated entirely to the crime of OWS?  If there is already an article for this, we don't need to include more than one or two sentences here; certainly it merits a general mention in the main OWS movement, but isn't it covered well enough in the "reactions" article?  If it is, then there's no need for a full description (WP does have limited server space, after all; it is important that the encyclopedia not be redundant - that is, it shouldn't be covered in painstaking detail in both places; one or the other with "see also" links should suffice).  If it is not covered well enough in Reactions, should it receive broad coverage there, or in the main OWS article?  Let's have everyone involved think on this and see if we can come to some consensus.  Remember, try to keep your responses as third-person as possible.  Things seem to have calmed down somewhat, but let's try to prevent them from escalating again.  Sleddog116 (talk) 06:39, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I do feel that maybe there should be separate article detailing the crimes associated with OWS. The crime section has been put into the reactions article.  I think there should be a section divider in the primary article, a few sentences explaining the crime and a link to whatever article goes into further detail.  I think thats pretty standard and a fair compromise.Racingstripes (talk) 06:58, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I believe we should not have a section labled "Crime" in this article. It is not a neutral heading for a section or subsection. I also believe that attempting to state in any prose about the meaning "Crime is having on or to the movement" is original research unless referenced correctly, and any such reference is likely to be opinion and would need to be treated as such by quoting in prose any such opinion and attributed to the source as per guidelines. I agree that there should be some mention as it is in the article being summarized but agree a few lines is all that is needed....as well as more information summarized with other information from the other article like the police presense, maybe the hipster cop and information from other sections. Right now the Reactions article is over stuffed and a section there labled "crime" is also POV and misleading. It even seems to have picked up more information I am not sure is anything more than posting news clips in a somewhat random manner just to paint a negative picture and is a definite "troll magnet section".--Amadscientist (talk) 07:01, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * One user's opinion has been stated and another user's opinion has been stated, what do we do now?Racingstripes (talk) 07:23, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Without convictions, I'm in agreement that the word "crime" shouldn't be used. There must be better words to describe what happened, more neutrally.  Would this solve the problem?  If so, find a good word you can agree on.  Pesky  ( talk  …stalk!) 10:05, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Re prior closing, just for the record: The prior listing was about the use or non-use of quotes and the form in which they were to be formatted, along with a bunch of behavioral issues. I closed it on the basis of this edit in which the content part of the issue appeared to be resolved. That left the conduct issues, which are beyond the scope of this noticeboard, so I closed it. Regards, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 15:57, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

A correction: I wouldn't bother making this correction were it not for the fact that related issues are still coming up here, and it may be apropos of nothing at this point, but I would not feel right if I did not make it. In the prior discussion I said:"It is not possible to 'violate' BRD because BRD is not a policy or guideline.... The policy on how consensus is formed is the Consensus policy. What it says, in brief, is that (a) ..., (b) ..., (c) .... It does not say that the editor first proposing the edit loses unless they can obtain consensus to make the proposed change.... An exception to that policy comes if there is a policy or guideline which clearly says that an edit should or should not be done. In that case, the policy or guideline controls..." The statement about what happens if the proposing editor fails to obtain consensus was incorrect in that the Consensus policy does say that:"Some discussions result in no consensus. ... In discussions of textual additions or editorial alterations, a lack of consensus results in no change in the article."While my suggestion that the proposing editor "loses" is deprecated here at Wikipedia because Wikipedia is not a battleground, it is thus true that "a lack of consensus results in no change in the article." Regards and apologies for the error, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 18:05, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * If Crime is not a good title to the section, how about "Security Concerns"? Racingstripes (talk) 18:35, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * At the moment I am not sure there is consensus for the "Reactions" section to begin having separate subsections again. I feel the neutrality of adding a single subsection is undue weight and misleads the reader to think that the subject matter is of utmost importance to the subject itself and adding many subections would lead to confusion and over expansion with the use of full chunks of information being doubled up again. I believe this is a "Police response" subject. Should there be a need for subsectioning (which I don't believe there is) that would probably be the most aproppriate title. However at the moment it might simply be best to use the few lines we have (maybe even less, but that can be discussed), but starting off the prose with something like "Police have responded to complaints and calls of possible illegal activity......." or similar.--Amadscientist (talk) 21:33, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Hey! If conduct issues are beyond the scope of this noticeboard, and I get directed here when I go to AN/I, just where are we supposed to go when there is disruption and it isn't some red line line 3RR? Somebody needed to stand up and say "hey, there are conduct issues here and stop it and if you don't X and Y are going to happen." Where do I go for a reaction like that? Be— —Critical 22:42, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * If you get directed here from AN/I, then it's probably an indication that the administrators who frequent that noticeboard don't think that the conduct issues are bad enough to warrant sanctions at this point in time (I'm speaking in general, here) and that the folks in dispute need to focus on getting the content issues resolved, which will usually remove any reason for conduct errors. If you disagree with the referral and want to pursue the conduct issues, your other choices are WP:WQA, which is only advisory, WP:RFC/U, and ArbCom (or Arb enforcement if applicable). Regards, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 22:53, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Okay, let me be clearer: when there are clear conduct issues, and I just need someone else to confirm that there are conduct issues, how do I get someone to come in and give that outside opinion, and do it in good time? I just wanted someone to come and say "hey, this is what's happening, stop it."  That would have prevented all of this I think. But I don't know how to get a third opinion on conduct issues.  Be— —Critical  04:06, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * The only time I've desired a third opinion I reached out to another user and asked for a third opinion.Racingstripes (talk) 05:42, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Sure, but like an administrative official opinion? Be— —Critical  07:09, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * There are many, ways to request a third opinion as part of "Dispute resolution". The DR page Dispute resolution has a section devoted to such.] You may also make a request from (but not on) Dispute resolution requests which has a number of links to the specific request depending on the issue. I am not sure you get a specific official "Administrator" opinion on any of these steps as Wikipedia generally works through consensus of editors and not specific administrative actions. Admin do contribute, but I do not believe their opinion is "official", but is added to the weight of the discussion unless, of course, an action is deemed appropriate as an outcome of the discussion. The Mediation Cabal and the Mediation Committee require other steps be attempted first I believe. The Last resort: Arbitration is official and binding, and is made up of a committee of elected editors and administrators. Admin hold a great deal of weight in the opinion of most long term veteran editors, and while they may not give an "official opinion" there personal opinion is generally taken very seriously by anyone who wishes to be in good standing to the encyclopedia. I don't believe there are any official opinions outside of office actions and the foundation itself except when in conjunction with other steps, like the 3RR, DR/N, ANI etc, but are never punitive. If at any time you feel requesting an opinion from an administrator is the best route or your favored route, you can find a list of admin and choose one to contact to ask questions, seek advise and guidance. I may well be wrong about some of that, so be sure and read each page or step thoroughly.--Amadscientist (talk) 08:01, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I still don't know what the final decision is regarding this section. Do we put it to a vote?Racingstripes (talk) 08:12, 28 January 2012 (UTC)


 * [Edited by 3/4] When we use a source to reference a fact we are using the documentation of a notable reliable source. We take the information and we transfer these facts as stated with original prose or text. When using a source we don't use opinion as fact but only the stated information that is varifiable and accurate, not the parts where the author or reporter is speculating. We extract only the facts and leave the speculation. Ask the basic 5 W's...the who, what, where, when and why. Also remember liability. Temper the documentation of such things as assault, theft and other similar issues with caution as every complaint is an allegation and not yet a fact. If we are documenting a case that has gone to trial and there has been a conviction, then we can say a crime has been commited without the need to refer to it as an "allegation". Do we know the truth? No...we don't, but with a conviction comes the legal authority to call it a crime. There are a lot of "crimes" that don't have convictions, but these still require deferred and/or non prosecution agreements. But that still requires a documented outcome. What is missing is a legal outcome. Neutrality means that we are not looking for a specific outcome. We don't "Try" to make a crime section because that is simply "Pushing a Point of View. It is attempting to elevate small bits of information as if it were a part of the general subject. Crime is not apart of this subject. A large crowd makes it difficult to say with accuracy who was participating without a solid reference...which makes this a "Biography of Living Persons" issue. Both, attempting to claim these were protesters and trying to claim they committed crime without solid sources is an issue. BLP issues are not just negative, even positive claims are dealing with facts about living people that require varifiable and reliable sources that specificly make these claims and then only add them with due weight.--Amadscientist (talk) 09:57, 28 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Just because something may display something in a negative manner does not mean that it is not encyclopedic, should we not mention Ron Artest's involvement in the Malice in the Palace after all he's played hundreds of games without running into the stand and attacking a fan.(Tongue-in-cheek, he was never convicted of attacking that fan so maybe I can't say he did). We do include incident's like this because they are noteworthy.  Controversy sections are common place in wikipedia, and OWS is no different.
 * Crimes being reported and arrests for those crimes have effected the Occupy Wall Street Movement. So much that protesters needed stand in as their own internal security.  This is not opinion, this not "trying" to show how crime is effecting OWS, this is fact that is cited by reliable sources.  It is a fact that women have complained of being groped by people within OWS.  People have been arrested for these gropes.  One person that was arrested for these groping had arrest warrants, another person arrested for these gropings was a cook in the OWS kitchen.  These are just two incidents that effected female protesters to the point that there was a need for female only tents.  One protester being arrested for tampering with Christmas lights is nonsense and not notable, but one protester saying "In a few days they’re going to see what a Molotov cocktail can do to Macy’s."  About 10 protesters yelled at the police as Nkrumah Tinsley was arrested, so there were other protesters that at best did not like that he was arrested for this let alone probably felt the same.  But that's bordering on original research.
 * There are many good things that have come out of OWS, but there are bad things that have happened as well. The crimes being committed by fellow protesters have effected the security of the other protesters.  By having sections detailing only the positives and the goals of OWS, and omitting the negative occurrences, essentially the controversy section, the article is incomplete.  And controversy are never reaction sectionsRacingstripes (talk) 08:30, 29 January 2012 (UTC)


 * @Racingstripes, Amadscientist, can you pleas reduce your last posts by at least 3/4. While we are here to help you, many editors will not have the time to read very long statements such as the ones you posted. If you could summarize your points in a nutshell that would be appreciated. Take note, this board is to acquire outside opinions and advice on issues, not to continue arguments. If no one has commented in a while, poke someone from the volunteers page. Thanks, Steven   Zhang  Join the DR army! 10:40, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You're right, I apologize. I'll reach out to volunteers. Racingstripes (talk) 16:23, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Edit ✅--Amadscientist (talk) 18:43, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Poke ✅ Thank you.--Amadscientist (talk) 19:09, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I no longer have faith in this process. I will no longer participate on this page. Thank you all for your time, sorry it was wasted--Amadscientist (talk) 23:26, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Specificly, if another editor on this page in another dispute can simply browse through and decide to disrupt the other disputes by just adding the information being disputed...this page almost becomes useless....in fact worse than useless it encourages others to simply say...well, I don't agree with that dispute and instead of adding to the discussion....I'm going to change it myself. How exactly is that not disruption of DR/N? I am sorry for the effort I know it must have taken to create the DR process....but something is wrong if this can happen and then be blown off as "no issue". In fact I was also accused of canvassing for contacting the mediator and ANI or for the pokes I was asked to make. Again...there is indeed something wrong with this process, but I think it is better for me to just walk away at this point.--Amadscientist (talk) 00:46, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Comment I restored the crime section. Crime is not a reaction. Having crime under reactions is just stupid. There had been a lot of crime reported at OWS and is worthy of a section of it's own. Darkness Shines (talk) 10:33, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * While it may or may not be appropriate to be in it's own section, describing another editors actions as stupid is not in the spirit of a collaborative editing environment. I'm going to close this thread, because Amadscientist has withdrawn, making the issue moot. It's a shame that it's ended this way, but if they don't want to participate anymore there's little I can do to remediate that. Steven   Zhang  Join the DR army! 23:59, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Wally Lamb


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

After editing and adding to Wally Lamb's article on December 21, 2011, the article was flagged with three warnings: "A major contributor to this article appears to have a close connection with its subject,"This biographical article needs additional citations for verification," and "This article includes a list of references, related reading or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations." I explained in the talk section of the article that I do have a connection with Wally Lamb (I am an assistant in his office), but that I am trying to create an neutral, up-to-date, accurate article. I have since included inline citations throughout the article and a list of references (on January 26, 2012). I then went back to the talk page and requested that the citations be reviewed and the warnings removed, but I have not heard anything back and the warnings are still there. I am more than happy to do whatever is necessary to ensure the accuracy of the article and to have the warnings removed. Any code violations occurred due to my inexperience with Wikipedia editing, not malicious intent. I welcome any help that anyone can provide.

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?




 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

I have posted twice on the Talk page of the Wally Lamb article. The first post from December 22 states the nature of the corrections and edits I made as well as my goals in making them. The second post from January 26th announcing the inclusion of inline citations, requests that the warnings be removed, and asks for further guidance if more changes are required. Both posts have gone unanswered.


 * How do you think we can help?

My goal here is to achieve a solid, well-supported article and, therefore, to have the warnings removed. I would be so grateful for any advice about what steps to take now as the Talk posts have proven ineffective.

75.21.25.48 (Amandatindersmith (talk) 20:19, 30 January 2012 (UTC)|talk]]) 20:11, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Wally Lamb discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

Osteopathic Medicine in the United States


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

Another editor and myself are currently engaged in a dispute regarding whether or not the term "DO" for Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine is a valid substitute for the phrase osteopathic physician in the article at hand. The objections that have been raised to this have been the personal preference of the other editor, that the term "DO" may cause confusion in lay readers, that the term DO is meant to signify the degree earned by an osteopathic physician and not the holder of the degree, and that DO is a colloquial term. These objections can be seen on the talk page of Wikiproject:medicine and on the talk page of osteopathic medicine in the United States. I have put forth the following logical counterarguments to address each objection: the personal preference of the other editor is not the issue here, articles on wikipedia are meant to be informative and objective, DO and osteopathic physician are synonymous for the holder of the DO degree (it can be used to mean the degree or the holder of the degree) and it will be clear from context which is being referred to (e.g., DOs perform surgery, prescribe medications and attend medical school for four years.), osteopathic physician is a term often conflated with foreign osteopaths and DO is a different enough term so as to be less confusing for lay readers, professional DO organizations use the term this way (I can provide links to support this claim upon request), DO is not a colloquial term since colloquial terms are ones used in an informal, everyday sense, and while this is true of this term, it is also used in academic settings such as peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals and informational government pages (again, I can provide links upon request) DO is a more concise term than osteopathic physician, and the term DO is a more parallel comparison to MD while the osteopathic/allopathic dichotomy has caused understandable anger in the MD community due to the pejorative connotations associated with the term allopath and its variants so the comparison of DOs and MDs is more appropriate. Additionally, other articles (e.g., comparison of MD and DO in the United States) use DO in this manner.

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?

While I respect the other editors, I cannot agree with them on this matter. The fact is that I have responded on the talk pages where we engaged in discussion about this issue with little feedback unfortunately and I provided sound reasons that rendered their points either moot or showed them that their premise was false. I am going to such lengths as to seek advice from a dispute resolution board to avoid an edit war with the editor who reverted my edits. I have notified each user on his talk page mentioned in this note that I am discussing this on this page.


 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

I have attempted to discuss the issue with Hopping (the primary editor with whom I am having this disagreement) and have received little to no response. I have been hesitant to revert the edits that he made to my edits to avoid violating the edit war policy. Additionally, I have brought this issue up on the wikiproject:medicine page to engage other users in discussion and received more feedback (objections mentioned above) that I addressed with evidence and received no response.


 * How do you think we can help?

Regarding the type of help needed I think there are two possible courses of action that can help me. It is unclear regarding the rules of wikipedia (at least to me) whether there is precedent here and which of us is right though obviously I am sticking to my position and for good reasons. So, a clear-cut answer to the thesis of the acceptability of DO as a substitute for the phrase osteopathic physician would be deeply appreciated. Secondly, if there is no clear-cut answer, perhaps pointing me in the direction of a wikipedia page or policy that has clearly defined rules for a disagreement such as this one over professional titles/abbreviations or pointing me in the direction of someone who can mediate/solve the dispute would be perhaps the speediest way to bring this dispute to a conclusion. I am happy to supply the evidence for the statements I have made earlier in this note though it should be noted that they are present on the Hopping's talk page as well as the talk page of the articles Osteopathic Medicine in the United States and Wikiproject:Medicine.

DoctorK88 (talk) 02:22, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Osteopathic Medicine in the United States discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

I'm baffled. I responded to this user's query at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine where it was raised and the response is to immediately vault to DRN? Hardly an encouraging sign for GF collaboration. I don't think I'll be participating.LeadSongDog come howl!  05:24, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * With all due respect LeadSongDog, you did not respond until I decided to discuss this on the DRN noticeboard and also ignored issues I brought up. I am seeking an expeditious conclusion to this dispute instead of dragging it out. I had already laid out my points and I received minimal response (the substance of the arguments presented was barely addressed if at all) so I decided it was time to seek outside help on the matter. There is nothing wrong with what I did. Not to mention that I felt that the dispute at hand was an unclear one and wikipedia's dispute resolution page advises those that need to be pointed in the right direction to solve issues such as these. I responded back on the wikiproject:medicine page and allowed time before coming here. Regardless, this dispute has been going on for too long and needs to be solved and I believe outside help is needed to accomplish this goal, that is why I sought out help. If that offends you, I am sorry to hear that but I stand by my decision to seek out the help. DoctorK88 (talk) 05:42, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Outside view from uninvolved editor: if you can verify (which it sounds as though you may be able to) that DO is in regular use to describe the physician with that qualification, then it seems eminently sensible to use it. My personal suggestion would be to clarify what it means on the first usage of the term (e.g. DO: a physician holding the DO qualification).  Pesky  ( talk  …stalk!) 10:10, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
 * There is already a consensus established on Wiki Project Medicine that went against this editor's viewpoint. See here.Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine. I don't see any special reason for dragging this to dispute resolution board when the consensus is clearly against this editor. Can I ask people here who haven't already to review the discussion on Wiki Project Medicine for background information? I feel that this editor Doctork88 needs to accept WP:CONSENSUS.- Literature geek |  T@1k?  13:24, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

DoctorK88 did not inform me of this dispute case despite my clear involvement in the previous discussion. I discovered this dispute case by chance, after reading Literaturegeek's edit. I am assuming good faith as to DoctorK88's reason for not informing me.

The consensus from the previous discussion is clear to me. DoctorK88's disagreement with the consensus is an inadequate reason to extend the discussion. Axl ¤  [Talk]  14:01, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

It is only your opinion that consensus has been reached. I firmly believe that we are still in the consensus building phase of presenting arguments and evidence, most of the arguments/evidence I have been presented have not been adequately responded to so I believe (yes, also my opinion) that consensus has not yet been established. We also do not have very many opinions weighing in on the issue yet and should strive to be get more voices to participate in the debate for a more comprehensive review of the dispute and ultimately work toward achieving a mutually satisfactory compromise. The responses I have been seeing so far do not feel like they carry the intention to reach a mutual compromise or solution behind them. I would rather you all work with me and address the arguments/evidence I have presented instead of repeating your personal opinions on why you disagree with my position. And yes, it was an accidental oversight not informing Axl of my involvement of the dispute resolution noticeboard, I did notify everyone else but confused his comment with another user's and have acknowledged this accidental mistake both on Axl's talkpage as well as on the wikiproject:medicine page. DoctorK88 (talk) 20:06, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Pesky, I would be happy to supply that evidence. I have found several pages that use DO to describe physicians with this qualification including pages from: DO professional organizations, government pages, peer-reviewed research from academic journals (government pages and peer-reviewed journals are noteworthy to address the objection brought up that the term DO was colloquial and not suitable as a formal word but I have found it is used in formal arenas as mentioned). Where would it be best for me to supply the evidence in the form of links? Here or on your talk page or a different page? As for literaturegeek's response, I do accept the premise of wikipedia consensus but I do not believe wikipedia consensus has been achieved yet since we are still in the phase of presenting arguments/evidence to attempt to persuade other editors and work toward consensus building not to mention only a few of us have even participated in this debate at all though I do not know if a certain amount of people need to participate in a debate to achieve consensus or not. Anyway, please let me know where you would like me to present evidence of my claims and I will do so. DoctorK88 (talk) 20:11, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Actually, I think it's the opinion of everyone except DrK that a consensus has been reached that the abbreviation should be avoided. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:00, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I don't disagree that you all believe that but that doesn't necessarily make it so. What you just said only demonstrates what I said about the antagonism in your words and the need to address the arguments/evidence proposed and not make it personal. Your comments sound passive-aggressive and do not really address the issue here. Let's please stick to that. If you look at the consensus page, I agree with the idea that unanimity is not the same as consensus, but again, my point above remains that I strongly believe we have not yet reached consensus and that we are in the process of building consensus and presenting evidence/arguments to persuade other editors not to mention that only a few editors have participated in this matter at all. It has been suggested to me that I fill out a request for comment to get more opinions on the matter. Not to mention that I am still receiving challenges to provide information to support my argument from people opposed to the edits I have proposed so I stand by what I have said WhatamIdoing. DoctorK88 (talk) 02:25, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I always think that judging consensus is next-to-impossible when there are only a few editors involved. Just my opinion; worth getting it to a wider audience for a more representative view, I think.  Pesky  ( talk  …stalk!) 12:12, 28 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Agreed! A much wider variety of opinions is certainly needed! DoctorK88 (talk) 04:08, 29 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Clerk comment: Just a preface - DoctorK88 came on IRC earlier today to discuss this issue, where I provided them with my opinion on the matter. I would appreciate other editors giving their opinion as well. My opinion on this one is in line with those who opined at WT:MEDICINE. We are a formal encyclopedia, indeed, but at the same time we are a general purpose encyclopedia, where our purpose is to be a free knowledge source that anyone can access. In some ways this extends to making our articles understandable to laypersons. DoctorK88 has noted that the definition of a DO is explained in the lede of the article, but to me, osteopathic physician makes more sense to me. I can, by just looking at the term, search for the article on it and find exactly what I am looking for. Search for DO and I get various results. The other issue potential issue here I see is that, as a reader, Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine (DO) reads to me like a formal degree/qualification where osteopathic physician refers to the actual job. We have MDs (Doctors of Medicine), commonly called physicians (or in general use, just doctors), Doctors of Veterinary Medicine (employed as just vetenarians) and so on. To me, osteopathic physician makes more sense than an abbreviation, and I also note that is the opinion of the editors who weighed in at WT:Medicine. I would ask DoctorK88 to please explain why the term DO (which several users feel is confusing and ambiguous) is preferable over the term which provided more clarity at first glance (osteopathic physician). In a nutshell, to any average reader, a user sees DO and has to find out through further reading what a DO is referring to, then can find out more about the subject. With osteopathic physician, they can search for the term and find all the information they're after right away. It's an ease-of-use thing.  Steven   Zhang  Join the DR army! 10:17, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Agree with Steven Zhang. Bryan Hopping  T  14:52, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Yet another clerk's comment: I agree with Steven, virtually word for word. Regards, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 14:55, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Uninvolved, not-at-all-dispute-resolution-minded editor's unsolicited opinion: What's wrong with just using the word "osteopath"? In contexts where there is an issue over their training or licensed, prefix it with adjective to describe the properties of said osteopath: a licensed osteopath, a degreed osteopath, a state-recognized osteopath etc. —Tom Morris (talk) 15:48, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Again, the substance of the arguments/evidence I have presented go ignored. That really is unfortunate. Anyway, osteopath is considered a pejorative term by some in that community (much the way allopath is not a well-received term by the M.D. community and understandably so) and osteopaths who are foreign trained are not the same as United States trained osteopathic physicians in terms of training and using the term "osteopath" could lead people to mix up foreign osteopaths with U.S. trained ones. That is why that term is not a suitable choice. DO on the page in question links right to the page Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine on wikipedia so I must disagree with clerk Steven Zhang who gave his unsolicited opinion on live IRC (and was quite rude) when I asked a question about how to move this process along. This is really neither here nor there but I think you came on here quite frankly Steve because you said some things that were untrue on the IRC and did not like that I called you out on them. By no means am I trying to provoke you but that is genuinely why I think you are here. Regardless, DO is synonymous with the holder of the professional degree as well as with the degree itself but it is very clear from context that a piece of paper does not perform acts such as surgery, prescribe medications, etc. That is common sense to me (and everyone I have ever known) so I cannot agree with your statement. Even if you are personally not familiar with it, this does not mean that the knowledge is not common to some and just because you and a few other editors (by no means representative of the wikipedia community) have trouble discerning what a DO is with a clear definition at the article's beginning does not mean that other users will have the same issue. Also, I have heard no feedback really on the issue of the plural of DO which I maintain is DOs and not DO's which certain editors have reverted my edits. Several users think the term DO is confusing? Hardly. We have a very small sample size of people here, not at all representative and I have seen other users on wikipedia express the opposite sentiment, that osteopathic physician was indeed more confusing to them than the term DO (which is used in real life) as well as in formal literature, government pages, etc. so the whole "formal tone for an encyclopedia article" argument does not really work here. I am considering filling out a request for comment which was suggested to me in order to get a much wider variety of opinions to see what the wikipedia community really believes. And actually, I just entered the term "DO" in google search and the very first entry to come up with the wikipedia Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine page. Regarding the variety of search results that can come up, the same thing happens with MD (a search result came up as Maryland instead of what I wanted, Doctor of Medicine). Also, let's be clear here. Yes, MDs are physicians and so are DOs. An average reader does not have to read further in this article to find out what DO means if they start at the beginning of the article (which I believe most people do), I believe your argument is an illogical one SteveZahn. The "clarity" of a word is subjective and I think you are making some big assumptions about the "average" reader. DoctorK88 (talk) 03:01, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I admit that I was a bit rude on IRC, at the same time when everyone apart from yourself says X, and you keep talking over everyone saying Y, Y, Y, it does get frustrating. I am well-known for having a good temper, but I am not infallible. I feel that this thread has garnered several opinions and continuing to discuss it here will change very little. I'll ask an uninvolved editor to review the discussion and close it if they feel appropriate. I would recommend if you wish to pursue this further, you create a requests for comment, where the larger community can weigh in. I came here only to give my opinion on the matter, as I am allowed to just as any other editor can. Indeed, I was going to comment on this thread earlier (I noticed the backlog at DRN) but didn't get around to it until then. You are of course allowed to have differing opinions to other editors, but we work on consensus here. You did come to this noticeboard to get the opinions of uninvolved editors, which we have provided, but we unfortunately cannot do much more than that. Steven   Zhang  Join the DR army! 03:44, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I did put out a request for comment today a little while ago. I'm glad to see you admit it and I do not expect you to be infallible but I do expect respect and courtesy from people who are volunteering to help. Regarding frustration, don't you think I'm frustrated? Especially when the editors I have been engaging in discussion largely ignore the substance of what I am talking about? I don't agree that the thread has garnered enough opinions to be representative of the wikipedia community. And as far as I know wikipedia does not have well-defined parameters for consensus (e.g., how many editors need to be participating in discussions to achieve it) or how long the process of building consensus is. It is true that I came here to get the opinions of uninvolved editors, but just as you say, I can still disagree with outside opinions and employ logic to back up my assertions. I'm not one to simply accept others' subjective opinions without evidence. I keep repeating myself because my evidence/arguments stand and I have addressed many of the objections given in the past on this subject (e.g., those of Hopping). If the wikipedia community on a large scale decides that they are not "comfortable" with the substitution, despite the fact that I would not understand why given how much the term is on the page as it is, I will accept the decision, but I do think that solid reasons backed up by sound, logical arguments and evidence are necessary. If they are not, then wikipedia has some deeply flawed policies that need immediate addressing. If that occurs, I will go back to editing articles as I had been and accept the decision I find unusual. Truthfully, I never expected this topic to generate the controversy that it did, I disagree with Hopping that there is no controversy, I sensed strong opinions come through in the other editors' statements and all of this over a small preference in nomenclature. I know I have put this proposal forward with some energy behind it but I have been advocating for a mutually agreeable compromise if nothing else and have so far received no responses echoing a similar sentiment. DoctorK88 (talk) 05:12, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Closing comments: Reading the discussions here and at WikiProject Medicine, I see a clear consensus to use osteopathic physician. I count eight editors supporting the use of osteopathic physician, and two supporting DO or a combined approach. Discussions like these are not votes, but it is hard to ignore such a clear majority of opinion. The argument that DO is ambiguous, and that lay readers will more easily identify with osteopathic physician is also persuasive, as is the argument that DO could be seen as referring to the degree, rather than the person holding it. I also see that the manual of style page on abbreviations asks us to "always consider whether it is better to simply write a word or phrase out in full, thus avoiding potential confusion for those not familiar with its abbreviation". I do agree with DoctorK88's desire to use DO to more easily compare it with MD, but I think the appropriate solution is probably to expand MD into a word or phrase, rather than to abbreviate osteopathic physician. I'm sure the editors involved can work out the best way to word that by discussing it on the article's talk page.

I should stress that this closure isn't a binding decision about the content involved; we don't do binding content decisions at this noticeboard. If DoctorK88 wishes to pursue this issue further, then the correct venue to do that is to create an RfC on Talk:Osteopathic medicine in the United States. Based on the responses so far, however, it is my personal opinion that such an RfC would not be successful, and I urge DoctorK88 to consider dropping this particular issue and to work on improving other aspects of the article. I'm sorry that this post gives a such a bleak outlook for the chances of DO being used, but I don't like seeing editors wasting effort on things that aren't likely to succeed, especially when there are many things to which that effort could be better channeled. If anyone has further questions, I'll be happy to answer them on my talk page. Best regards —  Mr. Stradivarius ♫ 15:11, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Disruptive editing by user Gunnai?


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

Can you look into to behavior of user to verify if my idea that this user blanks out or remove portions of page content, references, changes page content without proving edit summaries or sources and maybe avoids discussions or assumes ownership of articles is legitimate? During January 2012 the talkpage of this user has received several comments by me and other editors. The talkpage is regularly maintained/blanked, so this user reads messages, remarks and suggestions from other Wikipedians.


 * Who is involved in the dispute?




 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes (ipso facto)


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

Contacted user several times on his talkpage to no avail, added paragraphs on the Gewehr 98 and Gewehr 1888 talkpages to explain and referenced to facts that have legal status in many countries. In other countries this may be regarded as a point of view by people who like to risk serious injury or death. But as there are only few users involved I do not see how the impasse with a used that does not provide edit summaries and does not discuss matters can be broken.


 * How do you think we can help?

By establishing if there is an issue and if so by resolving the issue at hand.--Francis Flinch (talk) 12:28, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Disruptive editing by user Gunnai discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

Though perhaps not the most appropriate place, I strongly suspect User Gunnai is a new incarnation of indeff blocked User:MFIreland. Same frustrating MO: refuses to engage, blanks attempts at discussion from TP, no edit summaries. RashersTierney (talk) 13:56, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Grant Cardone


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

A hagiography was initially put up - this was edited back and new information about Cardone's involvement with Scientology included. There is now a concerted effort to have the Scientology information removed and the hagiography as originally written put back up

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?

Central issue appears to be to remove details of Cardone's actions against acting coach Milton Katselas


 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

YES - apart from those unknown


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

tried talking


 * How do you think we can help?

protect page, encourage dialogue

Henry Sewell (talk) 20:34, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Grant Cardone discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

Hunnic Empire


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

I would like to ask some help because there is a debate about merge and there are clashing options. Please see talk page of Hunnic Empire: Talk:Hunnic_Empire

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?




 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?


 * How do you think we can help?

We need more opinions, suggestions.

Fakirbakir (talk) 12:24, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Hunnic Empire discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

Clerk's comments: This discussion has been extremely civil and objective. There are currently 5 editors in favor of merger (or, in one case, deletion) and 3 in favor of retention. The discussion has taken place in two phases, one ending last November and a second, far more thorough, one beginning in early January; of the eight involved editors three made only one or two edits in the earlier discussion and have not participated in the more recent discussion. If only the recent participants are considered there are 3 in favor of merger and 2 opposed. It is 2 and 2 if an IP editor's sole, one-word support !vote is discounted, and the remaining 4 have all been substantially engaged in the discussion. There appears to be agreement from both sides of the matter that it should not be concluded as having no consensus but that additional opinions should be sought. Both the merge side and the opposition have prepared excellent summaries of the arguments pro and con on the article talk page which should be considered in addition to the discussion there. I highly commend everyone involved in this process so far. Best regards, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 15:19, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

One additional word. While the opinions of uninvolved parties and mediator/clerks here at DRN do "count" towards consensus, the real purpose of this venue is to either (a) try to help the parties in a dispute to come to consensus via compromise or via clarification of Wikipedia policy or guidelines or (b) to refer them to a more appropriate dispute resolution venue. It is not a venue whose primary purpose is to create or solicit additional parties to determine consensus, though that does, indeed, sometimes happen here. In light of that I would like to pose this question to the parties and particularly to the DRN uninvolved/mediator/clerk community: Do you see any possibility of a compromise or clarification of policy which would resolve the stalemate here without the mere addition of additional !votes? If not, then this dispute should probably move on to a request for comments which is the proper dispute resolution venue for just that purpose. I, frankly, do not see such a possibility myself, but I am not going to close this listing until others have a chance to weigh in. — TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 16:53, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Agree with TransporterMan's comments. All of you involved editors are already doing an extremely good job of discussing this civilly; there's really no need for dispute resolution if this case. If all you need is opinions from uninvolved editors, then RFC would definitely be the most appropriate venue. This can't even be called a "dispute"; a dispute implies people not getting along. This is just a discussion/debate. Sleddog116 (talk) 20:35, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Aviators who became ace in a day


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

We have three sources for the section on Muhammad Mahmood Alam. Two sources say he claims to have shot down five in a day. The third appears to be a recounting by Alam of the dogfight in question, and as such is a primary source. The article needs to be amended to this version as it is still unknown if Alam is an "ace in a day" It is just a claim.

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?

AS we have two sources saying Alam claims five kills in a day then this is what the article should reflect.


 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes (ipso facto)


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

Have used the talk page. But as there are only two users I do not see how the impasse can be broken.


 * How do you think we can help?

By resolving the issue at hand.

Darkness Shines (talk) 17:36, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Aviators who became ace in a day discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

The source is not a primary source, it is an international publication and a reliable source by an independent writer. The quote by Alam is not the only quote the source mentions. The source has also mentioned quotes from formation members and others. There's no indication that the source conflicts with the other sources cited (infact it is backed up by them). A previous neutral editor already discussed this on two different talk pages who said that the kills are awarded by ace's airforce intelligence and as such those confirmed by the formation member in my view are taken as confirmed. Also, the source is presenting this as a fact as well. -- lTopGunl (talk) 17:45, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Even this source you just added to his BLP says "shot down two enemy Hunter aircraft and damaged three others." Darkness Shines (talk) 18:03, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I did not "just add" it, it was a previous addition, just adjusted its place and the current sources are more reliable than that. There are differences in some less reliable sources but all reliable ones say 5 kills. And here we are considering a different source which you have claimed to be primary and it is not. -- lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 18:10, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
 * There is but one truly reliable source here, the one I added from Naval Institute Press which says he claims 5 kills, it does not say he had 5 kills. Darkness Shines (talk) 18:54, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Even Pakistani sites do not say 5. Muhammad Mahmood Alam in his F-86 Sabre claiming as many as four IAF Hunters There is no choice but to say he claims 5 kills. It can not be stated as a fact that he got them. Darkness Shines (talk) 19:03, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I disagree on your assertion of it not being a reliable source. It is a reliable source and a notable publication itself, maybe we can have an article on the book too. All the current sources in the article are consistent with each other. The source clearly quotes other people. I think we should wait for unrelated editors to comment on this as we've made our points. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 21:19, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Hi there Top Gun and Darkness Shines. I had a look at the source, and it looks reliable to me. John Fricker, the author, was apparently a staff writer on military matters for The Aeroplane magazine, and I don't think we can easily dismiss his work. However, if you need another opinion on this, there is always the reliable sources noticeboard. Also, if there is discrepancy between the sources, then it is perfectly fine to say so in the article - it doesn't have to be a simple black or white distinction. Top Gun, would you say that this is the case here? — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 04:26, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I did not say it was unreliable, I said it is a primary source in that it is a first hand recounting of the events. Per policy we need to use secondary sources, all of which say Alam claims 5 kills. Darkness Shines (talk) 11:40, 8 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Hmm, well Top Gun disagrees with you there. As for myself, I'd have to actually look at the source make a good judgement about whether it was a primary source or not, and I don't have access to it. You don't have a copy of the passage in question anywhere, do you? — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 12:50, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
 * TG supplied quotes, ""before we had completed more than of about 270 degree of the turn, at around 12 degree per second, all four hunters had been shot down." -- "My fifth victim of this sortie started spewing smoke and then rolled on to his back at about 1000 feet."" As you can see this is a first hand recounting of the dogfight. We really need to use the secondary source I found, which does not deny the claim of 5 kills, but does say they are "claims" it does not verify as fact that the 5 kills were actually achieved. Darkness Shines (talk) 12:57, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I see. Top Gun, is this purely a first-hand account transcribed by Mr. Alam, or is there any commentary supplied by the book's author? — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 13:27, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Hi Mr. Stradivarius, I think the biography article already says that Indian sources dispute his kills and such which is the correct place for those details and not this article. This has also been indicated by the page creator of this article that such debates be first dealt with on the BLP article instead of pages where there's just a recount and that kills are awarded by the ace's air intelligence. As for the quotes mentioned here by DS, he missed to mention any clarifications to the quote which I previously gave to him on the article talk page.

The "--" (dashes) between the quote were added by me to differentiate between two separate quotes mentioned in the citation (which might not be a good way.. may be you can do that in a better way?). Infact the quote before the dashes was the only quote cited before DS objected. This first part of the quote is not of Alam but a formation member of his who was taking a turn to attack those hunters too but Alam took them before he completed his turn (so not a primary quotation at all). The second part was added by me on DS's request as he asked me to point out where in the book was the fifth kill mentioned (I also added page no's at that moment). The book contains narrations from different people and not only Alam and the author himself is backing this up too. This in no way would be a primary recount of the incident. Thanks for helping with the dispute. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 13:12, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
 * A narration (which it obviously is) is a primary source. Darkness Shines (talk) 13:02, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
 * That would be true if it was only a narration from Alam. You are saying that on the basis of this one half of the quote while neglecting the rest of the whole book which is not written or narrated by him. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 15:51, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You yourself wrote above, This first part of the quote is not of Alam but a formation member of his This is also a narration from one who was there. It is without a doubt a primary source, or does the author have other sources in his book for the claims? Other than the recounting by Alam and his wingmen? Darkness Shines (talk) 18:27, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Narrations from people other than Alam is not a primary source and is included in a reliable source. The author's own writing suggests the same here. Also, a narration from some one who was there has been published in a secondary source (and that is what is cited here) and does not remain a primary source anymore. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 16:41, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * A narration from anyone there is a primary source. It does not matter if it was published in the bible, it is still a primary source. The only decent source is the one I found, which says he claims 5 kills. It does not say he had five. Darkness Shines (talk) 16:52, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Eyewitnesses are not primary sources when published in secondary ones. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 23:29, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion questions: There obviously seems to be a bit of a discrepancy here over (1) whether the provided research is considered to be solely from primary sources, and (2) whether they can be used, even if they are primary sources. While it's true that primary sources are generally discouraged, sometimes it is necessary to ignore the rules for the good of the project. The question is, does the inclusion of this source (whether primary or secondary) and information referenced to it improve the encyclopedia? More to the point (this is mostly directed at TopGun), can you substantiate the same information from other sources where there is no question as to their secondary nature? A quick Google search reveals that very little information exists about MM Alam apart from his own Facebook page (obviously unreliable), other social media, and ternary and quaternary sources that rely on questionable sources. That being said, does this information even meet WP's notability guidelines? Notability does not, of course, require that information on the subject be available on the Internet, but chances are that a subject of notability will have some mention on the Web. I would also like to quote from the Notability guidelines one of the criterion necessary for notability: "Independent of the subject" excludes works produced by those affiliated with the subject or its creator.. Is that the case here, or do we indeed need better sources for this material? Sleddog116 (talk) 00:51, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't see the facebook pages (which are owned by some unknown person) or rest of the unreliable sources affect this discussion in anyway, your question about subjects notability is answered by the citations that are present on the article as well as the BLP one of which is added by Darkness Shines. This dispute is about the kills and not the notability. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 16:46, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * It is notable in that the claim of five kills in a day makes Alam the only combat pilot to make ace in a day in the jet age. Darkness Shines (talk) 16:52, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * TopGun - an article is not considered notable just because it is sourced. An article can have a citation on every sentence, but if every citation points to a source that is not considered reliable, the article (a) needs to be referenced to better sources, or (b) isn't actually notable if no other reliable sources exist.  Since the information's notability is directly tied to the kills (as that's what defines an "ace"), it is indeed something of a notability discussion.  Can the claim of five kills in one day be attributed to a secondary source (i.e. not by Alam or Alam's wingmen)?  If only Alam and his associates can claim that he made five kills, that's a somewhat dubious claim with no official or third-party reference.  Darkness Shines - same point: is the claim of five kills in a day actually a reliable claim (that can be referenced by a government agency or by a reliable outside source like Jane's)?  Remember, WP's policy does state that "Articles may make ... evaluative claims only if these have been published by a reliable secondary sources."  If the source in question comes from Alam or from Alam's associates, it's not a secondary source - it's a primary source.  Primary sources are often written by "people who are directly involved," and by themselves, they are not considered reliable.  (In other words, primary sources are only useful if they can be substantiated by secondary sources.)  Sleddog116 (talk) 19:19, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, I did find one reliable secondary source which says he claims five kills. Polmar, Norman; Dana Bell (2003). One hundred years of world military aircraft Naval Institute Press. pp. 354. ISBN 978-1591146865. This is the locus of the dispute, this source says he claims five kills. One of the sources from TG also says he claims five kills, the other (which I believe is primary) is Alam and his wingmen recounting the dogfight, in this source he (Alam) says he did down 5 aircraft. I believe the article should say he claims five kills. Not state it as a fact. Darkness Shines (talk) 19:26, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you. That clarifies a lot for me.  TopGun: Seeing the above comment by Darkness Shines, can you explain to us why (or if) you think his suggestion is unreasonable?  Thanks. Sleddog116 (talk) 19:59, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I know the fact needs to be sourced for the kills, and that was what I was talking about when I said notability (with that being the person's main notability). There are reliable sources linked to that stating that he is an ace in a day (regardless of the no of kills he's made/claims/credited). Coming to the dispute itself, DS seems to ignore the book I cited for the fact. DS seems to take eyewitnesses as primary sources while there're present in a reliable source. The author's sequencing of the narrations and commentary suggests the same. In short the source clearly states this as a fact and not just a claim. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 23:29, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Okay, let's just stay cool here. (I apologize for not responding earlier, but I was unable to get to my computer yesterday.)  At the heart of this dispute is whether the source in question can be considered appropriate and, perhaps more importantly, in what way(s) it can be considered appropriate.  We can certainly discuss that here (in fact we won't close this discussion until there is agreement to do so), but I think the Reliable Sources Noticeboard may be a better venue for finding the best option here.  The main problem here is that no one except Alam and eyewitnesses are able to verify that he is an ace in a day - yes, those eyewitness accounts are published in what is arguably a reliable source, but since the only accounts (even the ones appearing in the aforementioned source) are from primary sources (eyewitnesses are primary sources, regardless of whether they're quoted in secondary sources or not), it might be better to say that Alam "claims" five kills (or however many).  That he can even make that claim makes him notable enough for the article, but to state it as fact when no official record of it exists may be a bit hasty.  I don't think anyone's really arguing against the source in question's reliability, but we have to make sure that we're not making assumptions.  The question is not so much whether we can use the source but rather what the source actually says.  Sleddog116 (talk) 02:50, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't have access to the book for now (I did before when I presented quotes) and the online ones are not free I guess, I'll review author's descriptions and quote them here whatever they are so that further analysis can be made when I get to it. If there's a copy online that can be accessed for these pages feel free to link here. I don't think the source is unreliable in anycase the dispute about the 'claim' and 'facts' is the only thing being handled here as far as I know. On other hand, saying that eyewitnesses are primary sources would make any statements quoted in books or news as primary, is that so? -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 03:17, 15 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Not exactly, no. It depends on how the sources are being used, and who exactly the eyewitnesses actually are.  The reason news media are not considered primary sources is because news reporters are not directly involved in the event; they merely report on it.  Also, something like a newspaper or magazine (at least one that is considered reliable) is different because (a) the articles are usually written by professional journalists, and (b) they are reviewed and edited by an editorial staff before publication.  Again, it comes down to how the material is being used.  For instance, if we were discussing Politician X and we saw in a book about him a quote by him saying "I am a conservative," we could take that and record it in the article (weighing it against his actual political record, of course) by saying "Politician X is a conservative."  On the other hand, if the same reliable source quotes Politician X as saying "I have raised more campaign funds than anyone in history," that's more than a personal self-identification.  That is him making a claim that would need to be verified independently, otherwise the article would have to read, "Politician X claims to have raised more funds than anyone in history."  We can't say he has raised more funds, because he's the only one who's said so.  (The same, by the way, is true even if we have similar quotes from say, his interns or his administrative assistant.)  The only way we could say, "Politician X has raised more campaign funds than anyone in history" is if there are additional records from uninvolved persons like, say, the IRS or a Congressional oversight committee.  (All of that is the case whether the source is a blog, Web site, newspaper, or college textbook.)  This isn't really any different - it's a statistic being given, not a matter of something that can be personally identified.  The reliability of your source is not in question.  The information in your source is not even truly in question.  What is in question is how that information can be presented based on the sources we have - we have to decide whether sources completely independent of Alam (i.e. not his squad mates) have confirmed him as being an actual ace.  That makes the difference between "Alam made five kills in one day" and "Alam claims to have made five kills in one day."

To Darkness Shines: I would strongly suggest that you also read WP:No original research, paying particular attention to this section. As I explained to TopGun above, primary sources are, under the right circumstances, acceptable sources. If you think the information in question needs to be further assessed for reliability, add a CN tag to it - or, better yet, do some research and try to find a better source yourself. Our goal is not to win the argument; our goal is to improve the encyclopedia. Sleddog116 (talk) 04:07, 15 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Got your point, in that case I'll see what the author himself notes on incident since that wont be a primary source. On a side note, even if it comes to be a 'claim', it will be a claim of Pakistan airforce rather than Alam alone since the kills are awarded by the airforce. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 16:21, 16 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Sleddog116 I did find another source, and had added it to the article, but TG reverted it. This source says he claims five kills, this is why the article needs to say Alam claims five kills, not state it as fact. Darkness Shines (talk) 08:35, 17 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I did not revert the source, I reverted your 'change' which this dispute is about. I kept the source along with the other references since both the claim and fact can be true at the same time. Recheck the article and refrain from presenting reverts incorrectly. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 14:27, 19 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Ok, did some online review for this to keep going till I get the book back, the author (who is not a primary source) has confirmed the kills by stating:
 * "Another section of PAF Sabres, led by Flt. Lt. Bhatti, was attempting to engage the Hunters but Alam (at that time a Squadron Leader) got there first. Flying top cover in an F-104A Starfighter was Sqn. Ldr. Arif Iqbal who, with intense frustration, watched the brief combat with admiration. On this basis, Alam was originally credited with five IAF Hunters destroyed, although the wreckage of only two could be found in Pakistani territory, within 2 or 3 miles of Sangla Hill railway station. The bodies of the pilots - one Hindu and one Sikh - was burnt beyond recognition. The area of the main engagement, however, some 30 miles east of Sargodha airfield, was only about 55nm inside the Pakistani border - some seven or eight minutes at jet speed."
 * I guess that is enough to confirm the kills as the source itself is reliable. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 10:16, 21 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Are you ready the same text that I am? Were in there does it say he actually got five kills? According to that he only got two. Darkness Shines (talk) 13:25, 21 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Alrighty, so it looks like the two of you are working on the same problem from opposite ends. The way I read this is that he was originally credited with five kills, but only two actually ended up being confirmed.  I think that since this is really the only independent source, the article needs to reflect what it says.  The text you quoted does mention five kills (without being a primary source), but for three of those kills, there seems to be some question as to whether they actually occurred.  Sleddog116 (talk) 16:00, 21 January 2012 (UTC)
 * From the quotation above, he was originally credited with all of those kills while the bodies of only a few were found. The source does not say that those kills were later withdrawn from his tally - can we also try some simple maths with the tally of nine kills and two probable given by the PAF from the official source? (I think that tally includes the five kills from this incident as the total matches up per all sources). -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 22:57, 21 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Instead of doing that, TopGun, why not just present the material like the source presents the material? ("...four being in the first 30 seconds.  Alam was credited with the required five kills aven though only two were actually confirmed.")  After that, cite the source.  Sleddog116 (talk) 16:59, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I could agree to the use of term credited as you said.. but then again, the source doesn't say that the rest were not 'confirmed'... it says the rest were not 'found' (as a negative of only two found) - and that happens in plane crashes. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 17:46, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
 * The exact wording wasn't really my point - my point is, why not just present it like the source presents it? Then there would be no ambiguity. Sleddog116 (talk) 18:25, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Ok, the objection here by Darkness Shines is over "shot down", what would you suggest to replace with from the original quote? I suggest, simply replace "shot down" with "is credited for shooting down". All ambiguity gone. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 18:48, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Do not presume to speak for me, that is not my objection at all. It has to say what the one reliable source found says, he claims five kills. Darkness Shines (talk) 09:28, 24 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not speaking for you but saying what you've been objecting to me (and what you still object on)... "claim" vs "shot down". I've given the secondary source above. Sleddog116 has given a good suggestion... I think you should WP:HEAR that. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 10:22, 24 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Darkness Shines, the quote that was presented (which everyone seems to agree came from a reliable source) says he is "credited with" five kills, not that he "claims" five kills. What exactly is your objection?  (I'm not being belligerent; I'm genuinely not sure what objection you're actually raising.) Sleddog116 (talk) 22:59, 24 January 2012 (UTC)
 * From his last comment what I understand is that he claims that my source is unreliable or primary and wants to use the word "claim" per the book he provided. I think I've given the secondary source (author's own) quotation so that would not be true. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 10:36, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Okay, we really need to come to some sort of consensus here. This topic has been on DRN for over two weeks now, and productive editing should not have to be stalled that long. (It's not one editor stalling it; both sides need to stop trying to win and start working towards building a consensus.) The best way to do that is to present the facts. The above quote that was presented by TopGun seems to come from a reliable source (I checked the ISBN and the details of the book myself, but Darkness, if you're not willing to take my word for it, you can look for other feedback from the Reliable Source Noticeboard), and with that being said, we should simply present what the source presents. Otherwise, it is original research. Darkness Shines, I would like to know what objections you raise to that and why. TopGun, I would like you to please let DS speak for himself. Let's try to resolve this today; it's been on DRN long enough. Sleddog116 (talk) 17:14, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Ok, I think I did step down to your suggestion from my previous stand. DS simply reasserted his claim. That being said, I only clarified what he objected to me. On a side note, DS is not responsive here since he's blocked for editwarring somewhere. We'll either have to wait for his block to expire or to do with your suggestion. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 08:54, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Like I said, I think we should just present what the source presents. If you think you can make the necessary changes to the article while maintaining objectivity, then do so.  I'm not an administrator (I'd like to be, but I'm not); I have no ability to enforce a decision from DRN - that's not what DRN is for.  If you would prefer, I can review the article and make the changes myself (or ask another clerk from DRN to review this discussion and make the changes for the purposes of detachment) so that there are no accusations of bias.  I don't see any reason why we can't present information from the source presented, and I think we should go ahead and do that to move the article forward.  However, I will leave this discussion open for the next few days; I don't want to archive it yet, since one of the involved parties may still have comments or counter-proposals. Sleddog116 (talk) 18:34, 26 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Saying Alam is credited with five kills is no different to saying he got five. It is a claim, not a proven fact. The source I found for this content is not ambiguous in it's wording, it clearly says "claims five kills" So should we, Darkness Shines (talk) 16:57, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
 * That may be, but TopGun found and quoted another reliable source that credits Alam with five kills. (If you doubt the reliability of his source, you can check with the reliable source noticeboard.) Sleddog116 (talk) 19:32, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
 * No he has not. That quote above is from the same book in which Alam recounts the dogfight. Battle for Pakistan: the air war of 1965 On page 11. It is the same primary source he has been using from the start. Darkness Shines (talk) 14:13, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * BTW, TG's source was printed in 1979, we should use newer scholarship, such as the source I found which is from 2003. Darkness Shines (talk) 14:17, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You are wrong. It is not a primary source, it is not Alam's quote but the author's. Sleddog116 has acknowledged that. Your newer source does not contradict my source as the claim and credit are there at the same time. The argument to use the newer source is invalid here. I've given a source and DS's argument is now his insistence. I think the DRN has fulfilled its purpose and should be closed because unless DS listens to the neutral editor who is verifying, this can not proceed and other productive editing is being hindered. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 15:11, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * No, you are wrong. The author of Battle for Pakistan: the air war of 1965 says Alam was "originally credited with five kills" you cannot then use that source to say "he was credited with five" There is suggestion on your source that he did not get the five. It does in fact say he only got two. It is just common sense to use the newer scholarship than an outdated book which relies solely on the eyewitness accounts. It is obviously a primary source, even the authors own words are quotes of those narrating the dogfight. Darkness Shines (talk) 15:22, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Clerk Comment: TopGun, don't put words in my mouth. I'm not "taking your side." I simply said that in my estimation, the source is reliable, but I'm just another editor. Obviously, DS is not willing to accept that it is a reliable source. What we have here is two editors who are both completely unwilling to compromise. I'm beginning to think that DRN may not be the proper venue for this, as the main argument seems to have shifted towards the reliability of the source. Since DS is not willing to accept my estimation of the source's reliability, then obviously, the discussion still needs to continue.

Darkness Shines, I realize how passionate editors can get over something that is, when it comes down to it, purely an argument of semantics. You're right in wanting to improve the encyclopedia by using the best possible sources, but when other editors give interpretations of sources, there comes a point when it's best to just let it go and accept what the discussion says, even if you don't particularly agree. This refusal to compromise (and it's from both editors; I'm not pointing fingers) has stalled the encyclopedia's progress on this particular article for over two weeks now.

Proposal: In the interest of moving things forward, I'm going to suggest that we use both sources and word the article exactly as TopGun's source quote says. Not verbatim (no need for copyvio), but something like this: "Alam was credited with the required five kills, even though only two bodies were recovered." Both of you: If you're opposed to what I have suggested, I want to hear counter-proposals, and I DON'T want a simple restatement of what you've both been saying for the past two weeks. Like I've done on other discussions, I want future responses to be written in third person and without the use of user names except in signatures. Let's work together and get this figured out instead of bickering. This has gone on long enough. Sleddog116 (talk) 00:58, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I already have Darkness Shines (talk) 10:59, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I'll quote Sleddog for my statement about the acknowledgement since he rebutted that, "That may be, but TopGun found and quoted another reliable source that credits Alam with five kills. (If you doubt the reliability of his source, you can check with the reliable source noticeboard.)". How correct he is on that was not mentioned by me, but just an indication to DS on how an unrelated editor saw this. That being said, I agree with Sleddog's proposal to term the kills (and I agreed when it was said before). The above proposal linked by DS is simply a revert of his, the fact it is not acceptable is why we are here in the first place. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 13:54, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Which would be all fine and dandy if you had in fact found another source, you did not. Darkness Shines (talk) 14:00, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Darkness Shines, you are not listening, and that is why we've stalled. I have checked on the source in question, and in my estimation, the source is reliable, because it imparts the analysis of a detached third party (i.e. not Alam or his wing mates).  I'm not forcing you to accept the reliability of the source, but if you're not willing to accept it, then this is not the proper venue for the discussion.  You need to open a thread on the Reliable Source Noticeboard; the editors who tend to monitor that page are better prepared to evaluate the reliability of a source than I am.  EVEN THAT, however, is going to stall if you don't abide by the decision that that discussion reaches.  There is a point that is rapidly approaching where you are just going to have to let it go and accept the compromise (and a compromise is where both editors get something, but nobody - that includes you, TopGun - gets everything).  Right now, the argument has gone around and around over something that should have been easily settled.  It is time to drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass.  Darkness Shines, stay in third person - no use of "you/your" or anyone's user name.  I set those rules down to keep you and TopGun from pointing fingers at each other.  If you're not willing to follow some simple rules of order, then we're wasting our time.  As I said - I want counter-proposals, and by that I mean I want something that hasn't been suggested before.  (In other words, no linking to diffs.  I want actual proposals that have not been previously discussed.) Sleddog116 (talk) 20:43, 29 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Fine, how about this then. During the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Muhammad Mahmood Alam of the Pakistan Air Force claimed five kills in under one minute, with four claimed in the first 30 seconds of the engagement. He was awarded the Sitara-e-Jurat ("The star of courage") and bar for his actions. Darkness Shines (talk) 10:38, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * This is almost the same as the revert. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 15:50, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Following a different line here, has anyone actually considered looking at the article about Alam himself? It has an extensive record of his kills, and that record is extremely well cited from all reliable sources (including the Pakistan Air Force and the Pakistan Military Consortium). It also gives extensive citation to the Indian claim that Alam might not have actually scored all of those kills. I am going to suggest (and, in fact, insist as much as possible while remaining neutral) that we present the information here exactly (not necessarily word-for-word) as it is presented in the actual Alam article - that is, record the official information from the PAF about Alam's kill record while still presenting the fact that the claim is disputed. Look at the article about Alam himself (I'm going to ask that neither of you edit that article for now until this dispute is settled - obviously I can't enforce that, but I just want you to look at it). I think we should present the information here as it is presented there. Sleddog116 (talk) 14:58, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * The issue with the information presented in the BLP is that it is in much detail. The "Ace in a Day" article will be giving undue weight to Alam over other pilots mentioned if we note his kills in that manner. The word "credited" solved all the issues (as it was non contradicting and non suggesting). I've agreed to the previous proposal which DS should have agreed on reasonable basis. Also, if we see the BLP, the information there says the same as here actually only in a more detail. As such the word "credit" seems neutral as it is a fact. I don't know what else to say here because of insistence of using the word claim which is not correct. I'll like to point out what you've stated... this thread is no more about the dispute rather about the reliability. I don't think this can proceed unless the other editor acknowledges that the reference is reliable at all (it obviously can't as proposals will be basing on it). I'm sorry if this has wasted Sleddog's time, but it did help me pulling out some reliable citations from the source. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 15:50, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not suggesting that we present the BLP information in quite so much detail, just with the same candor. I'm thinking of something like this (obviously we'll add the appropriate wikilinks/citations): During the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Muhammad Mahmood Alam of the Pakistan Air Force was credited with five kills in under one minute, a world record.  Some Indian sources have disputed this claim, however, citing the Pakistan Air Force's refusal to declassify gun camera footage of the kill.  There's no need to make it complicated.  All we need to do is relay the information here.  All of the information in the above quote is given in the Alam article, and it is all reliably sourced.  There's no reason I can see that we can't just put the same information here in a simple way.  Sleddog116 (talk) 17:02, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, the citation about gun camera footage not being declassified and the dispute of kills is a primary source. So we will have to put all that after the word 'claim' if we follow this. Further, I don't think this resolved DS's abjection above where he insists on terming it as a claim. Also, I'm sure kills of many pilots are disputed but I'll like to know why are the other pilots' kills in the article and the main flying ace article are not being mentioned with any one who disputes them. I don't think it'll be due to mention the dispute (and if it is, it won't be due to mention all the clarifications that come with it). I think this is a reasonable argument about the issue inherent in placing the Indian dispute of kills with it. If the previous issue was not there, on my part.. I could have given a counter proposal (which would be a modification of the current version to suit and address the issues raised here): "In air to air combat during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Muhammad Mahmood Alam of the Pakistan Air Force shot down five Indian Air Force Hawker Hunter Mk.56 fighters in less than a minute, four being in first 30 seconds. He was awarded the Sitara-e-Jurat ("The star of courage") and bar for his actions. Indian Airforce delines to acknowledge all these kills." Which is just enough weight to the dispute of kills.. but I don't think that is being done for other pilots so will be undue here. The actually issue being the downed-vs-claimed... I can pretty much settle on 'credited' just as the source states. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 17:32, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * You do realize that TG added the same content to the Alam article? Once this is over that BLP will also be changed to reflect the sources. As of now his BLP states he shot down five aircraft, given the doubts about this it also needs to say "claimed" Darkness Shines (talk) 17:24, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I didn't add it after this dispute rather long ago and with citations. I can pretty much settle to use the word 'credited' there too. But 'claimed' is not correct. And also note that much of the information in the BLP was not added by me. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 17:32, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Clerk Comment: Both of you, stop. As TG said, most of the material that was added about Alam's kills on his own article was not added by him, and it was added before this dispute began almost a month ago. I'm not saying that to side with TG; a quick glance at the edit history will confirm that. Darkness Shines - I'm going to say this straight out: we cannot use the word "claim" or its forms in attaching it to Alam's kill rating. Again, I'm not saying that to take sides; I'm saying it for two main reasons:

1) It has been legitimately challenged by a disputant with reliable sources - open a thread on WP:RSN if you disagree with their reliability, but I think you will ultimately get the same answer there. 2) To say "claimed" is, in this case (due to its BLP implications), a violation of the style manual because the Pakistan Air Force (which is, ultimately, the body that determines ace status for a Pakistani pilot) also gives Alam credit for the kills (ergo, the word "claim(ed)(s)", if used, must and will be attached to the Pakistan Air Force, not to Alam himself, to avoid BLP issues)

Darkness Shines: Having said that, the article can't used "Alam claimed" (or any of its synonyms - e.g. "alleged" "asserted" etc.). Having said that, I would suggest that you find another option. If you're going to dispute the source's reliability, then do that on the RSN - again, since it comes from the PAF, you'll likely get the same answer there, so it may be time to just drop it. Otherwise, please suggest something else (that doesn't use the word "claim" and its forms/synonyms) and prove to me that you're not just arguing for the sake of arguing.

TopGun: Since the Indian disputes give legitimate sources to dispute the claims (not all of them are primary), it would be POV to not include at least some mention of it. It would be best to root out any weasel words from the Alam article to remove any perception of primary source bias, but it still has to be at least mentioned, otherwise it's not neutral. Sleddog116 (talk) 18:00, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I actually offered a proposal in that case.. but the point I raised here about neutrality/due weight is that: is it being done in cases of other pilots? If yes.. consider my proposal above which gives the dispute a due mention. If DS still thinks 'claim' has to be used.. I'll propose the closure of this discussion. To help with the escalation, I'll address my further comments to you. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 18:09, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I appreciate the step of good faith, but addressing further comments solely to me instead of discussing them here is not going to help. I am remaining neutral in this case, and discussing it with me instead of with all the involved parties will prevent me from remaining neutral.  Nothing needs to "escalate" if all the involved parties can stay cool.  What I've said with the above statement still stands, though.  I've made that decision based on what I know of BLP policy and by the histories I've seen with similar articles.  Obviously, I don't have the ability to enforce that decision, but I still stand by it.  As for your proposal, it has merit, but I think it may still need some additional modifications.  Darkness Shines, if you have a proposal that goes differently from this (going by what has been said and not using "claim", "allege", etc.), then please present it. Sleddog116 (talk) 18:26, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I am, like Sleddog116, a mediator/clerk here at DRN. I was asked by Sleddog to assist in this dispute. Let me begin by saying that I fully support, agree with, and second what Sleddog has said and done so far. About all that I have to add is, first, that I believe the assertions of undue weight to be inappropriate. MOS:LIST makes clear that list articles must still adhere to NPOV; when there are conflicting reliable sources about a subject, then the differing points of view must be explained in the text. The fact that this creates a large entry where most other entries are brief is not a reason to exclude it. The fact that other entries might need to be expanded when examined in that way is not a reason to exclude the entry under consideration, it is a reason to expand the other entries when and if someone chooses to take the time to do so. Second, if I am not mistaken, the entry on Alam was first made in this edit by TopGun with the "shot down" vs "credited" vs "claimed" objection being raised within 24 hours in this edit by Georgejdorner. Since this objection goes to the heart of the entry initially made by TopGun (that is, if the controversial text were to simply be removed, the entry would not make sense), then under the CONS section of the Consensus policy the entire Alam entry must, by policy, be removed unless consensus can be reached on language which allows it to be included or unless there is a clear policy-based reason to conclude that the offering editor's justification for inclusion or the objecting editor's reason for rejection are wrong (since policy records established consensus). In particular, the policy says: "Some discussions result in no consensus. ... In discussions of textual additions or editorial alterations, a lack of consensus results in no change in the article." Best regards, TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 20:02, 30 January 2012 (UTC) (Underlined material added 21:35, 30 January 2012 (UTC),  TransporterMan  ( TALK ).) (Strikeouts of true but irrelevant discussion added. Must learn to think, then write.  21:42, 30 January 2012 (UTC),  TransporterMan  ( TALK ).)
 * Hi, I'll like to clarify that before this dispute when I clarified my text to the page starter and re-added the content.. that itself proved consensus as it was not then removed. But since that has been struck by you, I'll not comment further. If you are suggesting WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS I can tend to agree with it.. but then again, I was actually looking for examples and if it is being done in any other places in the ace articles rather than "why isn't it being done with all of them". I've also suggested a version with the mention of the dispute on kills. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 08:34, 31 January 2012 (UTC)


 * How is it a BLP violation to say someone claimed something? And the PAF is hardly a neutral observer in this. Darkness Shines (talk) 22:06, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * It is a BLP violation because the PAF is the body that awards ace status in the first place. Ergo, it is not Alam that "claims" five kills - it is the PAF that claims he has five kills.  We have already discussed the fact that we need to mention the disputed claim.  To say "Alam claims" on top of that is not only a BLP vio, but it is also redundant. Sleddog116 (talk) 23:48, 30 January 2012 (UTC)


 * This is a textbook example of where attributing information to the source may be appropriate. It works well in contentious situations. The method is simple, "X said Y about Z". In this situation, "According to the PAF, Muhammad Mahmood Alam shot down five planes in a day. " or something to that extent. Try that. Steven   Zhang  Join the DR army! 00:04, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * This will be a bit long and somewhat be half correct as we'll then have to explain which kills were only claimed by PAF and which were accepted by India too. The word 'credited' is elegant, is neutral with respect to 'shot-down' or 'claim' and kills further clarifications. We can also see that the source states it like that. Sleddog's suggestion of doing it the source's way is good. But I'm not clear if DS still disputes the reliability of the source which will leave this debate pointless. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 08:34, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm good with SG's suggestion However I feel a neutral source other than PAF is required. So According to Norman Polmar during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Muhammad Mahmood Alam of the Pakistan Air Force was credited with five kills in under one minute, with four of these kills occuring in the first 30 seconds of the engagement. He was awarded the Sitara-e-Jurat ("The star of courage") and bar for his actions.
 * This is not only according to Norman, John fricker is another author verifying this. Norman actually only states Alam's claim which is not the full truth. And this is certainly not per PAF... third party sources verify this. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 13:19, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Actually, TG, I'm more partial to Steven's suggestion of how to frame the fact. Using the word "credited" may still be apropos; for instance, "The Pakistan Air Force credited Alam with five kills in one day (and nine throughout the course of the engagement). "  I also agree with Darkness Shines (I think he's the one pushing the Polmar source; the comment isn't signed) to a certain extent, but it doesn't make sense to attach his kill record to an outside author.  I agree that we want neutral sources throughout the encyclopedia, but here, we need to be presenting the facts and the dispute and then letting neutrality speak for itself.  Since the PAF is the body that officially awards kills to a Pakistani pilot, attaching a kill record to any other source makes no sense.  We do still need to mention that the claim is disputed by some, I think, but the actual record of kills needs to be attached to the PAF, since they are the ones who award kills in the first place.  That's simply how an air force works.  TopGun, you said it would be "a bit long", but that shouldn't stop us from doing it.  I'll quote what TransporterMan said: "The fact that this creates a large entry where most other entries are brief is not a reason to exclude it."  I think it needs full coverage, even if not as full as in the Alam article. Sleddog116 (talk) 15:10, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Ok, how about this?
 * "In air to air combat during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Muhammad Mahmood Alam of the Pakistan Air Force was credited by PAF for shooting down five Indian Air Force Hawker Hunter Mk.56 fighters in less than a minute, four being in first 30 seconds. He was awarded the Sitara-e-Jurat ("The star of courage") and bar for his actions.(With all references currently in the article here) Indian Airforce declines to acknowledge all these kills.(reference here)"
 * I think this is the shortest and inclusive mixture of all suggestions given above. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 16:18, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

That seems like a good suggestion (we'll say what DS says), but I would like to amend it a little: "In air-to-air combat during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Muhammad Mahmood Alam of the Pakistan Air Force was credited by the PAF for shooting down five Indian Air Force Hawker Hunter Mk.56 fighters in less than a minute, four being in first 30 seconds a single day's engagement (The official status of the timeframe of kills is not quite as certain as their occurrences). He was awarded the Sitara-e-Jurat ("The star of courage") and bar for his actions.(With all references currently in the article here) Indian Airforce sources (the sources mentioned aren't specifically air force sources), however, decline to acknowledge all these kills, citing the PAF's refusal to declassify certain evidence of the kills.(reference here)" I realize it's a little longer, but I think we do need to paint the complete picture here. Sleddog116 (talk) 17:16, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * This seems good but I'll object on the removal of the detail of the first few being in 30 seconds and also the detail about shooting down in a minute is acknowledged by all sources. The claims are coherent. Also, this is a deviation from the current dispute. Let's stick to that. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 17:32, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * This isn't really a deviation; we're down to figuring out exactly how the wording should be. As far as the details I removed, I rechecked the sources, and the PAF source actually makes no mention of the 30 seconds thing (although you are correct about the "less than a minute" part).  Since the way it is worded attributes the fact to the PAF (as it should, since the PAF is the one that credits him for kills), we can't attach the 30-second fact to the PAF. Sleddog116 (talk) 18:20, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * This can be resolved by attributing only "less than a minute" part to the PAF and then adding the 30 second claim with attribution to the narrating squadron member (as this claim is notable too and is published):
 * "In air-to-air combat during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Muhammad Mahmood Alam of the Pakistan Air Force was credited by the PAF for shooting down five Indian Air Force Hawker Hunter Mk.56 fighters in less than a minute. A squadron member narrates the first four kills being in less than 30 seconds as he turned his own aircraft to position. Alam was awarded the Sitara-e-Jurat ("The star of courage") and bar for his actions.(With all references currently in the article here) Indian Airforce sources (the sources mentioned aren't specifically air force sources), however, decline to acknowledge all these kills, citing the PAF's refusal to declassify certain evidence of the kills.(reference here)"
 * -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 18:33, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * This is a good suggestion. I have a few minor points on the sentence style, but it looks pretty good.  (I would probably change "A squadron member narrates" to "According to one of Alam's squad mates," but other than that, I don't see any problems with it.)  I'm going to give this another 48 hours or so - if no one objects between now and then, I think we can probably close this discussion as resolved (with the resolution we've been discussing). Sleddog116 (talk) 20:28, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree with that modification. This is just as the sources say.. so I think shouldn't be objections now. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 14:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

@Darkness Shines: Are we finished? — TransporterMan  ( TALK ) 16:06, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Do as you wish, I no longer care. Wikipedia will never be factually accurate. Darkness Shines (talk) 16:11, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * And we had the discussion stalled for this. -- <b style="color:#060">lTopGunl</b> (<b style="color:#000">talk</b>) 16:14, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Lotus E20


Dispute overview
 * Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

Ongoing dispute between editors over the appropriateness of certain content on the page.

Users involved
 * Who is involved in the dispute?

I believe that DeFacto is in violation of multiple Wikipedia policies, including WP:OWN, WP:NPOV, WP:3RR and WP:POVPUSH. Many of his edits add content despite a preliminary consensus against them, and he has removed other content that is important to the article as soon as a consensus starts to go against him, claiming it goes against WP:OR and WP:CRYSTAL. When the issue is taken to WP:F1, he joins the discussion as consensus is formed, at which point the discussion goes off-topic and no consensus is reached, which I believe may be sabotage to prevent a consensus against his edits. There have been multiple instances of all of this happening, and sadly, I can no longer assume good faith in his edits.


 * Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.


 *  N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text  in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute
 * Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

Multiple attempts to come to a consensus, both on article talk page and at WP:F1. Have approached adminstrators about the issue with no real resolution (more admin input pending).


 * How do you think we can help?

Can someone please take a look at the content and come to some kind of consensus as to what is appropriate?

Prisonermonkeys (talk) 08:24, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Lotus E20 discussion
''Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.''

This is a mistaken attempt by the complainant to manufacture a "dispute" scenario by rolling two separate and distict disagreements into one. -- de Facto (talk). 08:53, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
 * The first issue, which is still being discussed on the article talkpage and on the project talkpage, is over the weight that is appropriate for the inclusion of the widely reported background of the car's name. There is no edit-warring involved there.
 * The second issue, which the complainant has so far refused to discuss on the article's talkpage - other than to imply that because the info is similarly included in other, undisclosed, articles - is over the quality, in terms of compliance with Wiki policies as summarised in my edit summaries and fully described on the article's talkpage. The complainant reverted to include the questionable content twice, with no attempt to answer the issues I raised with respect to it.


 * You make out that this is a recent issue. It's not. I've seen the way you edit and the way you handle discussions long enough to know that whatever argument I raise, you'll just blow it off. You claim that the current version is based entirely on speculation - but your proposed edit on the talk page is speculative. Worse, it implies that the team never actually developed the system in question. The current edit clearly states that the FIA banned that piece of equipment because they felt it broke the rules. Your proposed edit insinuates that Lotus never actually used the RRH before it was banned, the extended implication being that they never broke the rules. This, paired with your insistence that more emphasis needs to be placed on the naming of the chassis and the success of the team suggests to me that you are trying to make Lotus F1 to look "better" than they actually are. Tell me, when you wrote the original article, why did you dedicate an entire subsection of it to the name of the car, but made no mention of the development a banned technology despite the ban being reported in almsot every major publication dedicated to motorsport? And then why did you argue that the subsection on the name should be included because it was reported by multiple publications, despite having just ignored that when you skipped over the RRH ban. You claimed that Funnily enough, I don't see much, or even any cover for the ride height system that you've built a huge section to cover, but if you look at the references for the section on the ride height development, you would see that they were published just one week before you made those comments. You are picking and choosing what you include, over-emphasising the inclusion of trivia, and outright ignoring well-documented material that needs to be included. If you look at the McLaren MP4-25 page, you will see a section set aside for the F-duct, which was a major innovation at the time. So, too, is the RRH - and yet you chose to ignore it completely despite a wealth of information on it from reliable sources that was published just four days before you created the article. So how am I supposed to accept the idea that anything you do is for the betterment of the article?


 * You also claimed that I haven't seen this content elsewhere, but if Prisonermonkeys has added, or is aware [of], the same poor quality content elsewhere, I suggest they review it and improve it there too, rather than coming here to whinge about it, but despite your insistence that it is in violation of WP:CRYSTAL and WP:OR, you have made no move to alert other users to the offending content so that it can be reviewed. That should have been the first place you went to report it, and yet you didn't do it. So I have to ask, why not. Because it looks to me like you think you WP:OWN the page and that you are the only one capable of making informed decisions about it. Like I have said, I think you are sabotaging discussions before they can reach consensus against you so that you can retain "control" over the content of the page, and thus only include what you think should be mentioned, as opposed to what actually needs to go on the page. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 09:24, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, this is a recent issue, the article in question was only created a few days ago, and I only performed the deletion that you are taking exception to yesterday, and we haven't discussed it on the article's talkpage yet.
 * The introduction at the top of this noticeboard clearly states: "This noticeboard is not for disputes which have been carried out only through edit summaries or which have not received substantial discussion on a talk page." As this "dispute" about the ride height system content hasn't yet been discussed on the article's talkpage, and as you now seem to be offering explanations, and wild allegations and misrepresentations of my position, over some of the reasons I gave for the deletion (singular) I made, I suggest we carry on this debate at the article's talkpage, and come back here at a later date, only if it becomes appropriate and absolutely necessary. -- de Facto (talk). 10:37, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I think that this is the most appropriate place for it. I've seen enough of your behaviour to believe that discussing things on the talk page and at WP:F1 will only be an exercise in the pointless. Why do you think I have not discussed the ride height issue on the talk page? It's because I know that nothing I say there will have any effect whatsoever, and you will continue with your habit of deleting material that you feel has no place on the page, even though I've just demonstrated that you aren't really fit to make that call. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 11:32, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


 * ( Comment from uninvolved editor ) Hi DeFacto, Prisonermonkeys - if I can just stop you both there, I think it will be more productive for a neutral third party to take charge of proceedings now. As it says at the top of this page, "Issues should be raised in a concise, calm, and civilized manner". I can appreciate that tensions are running high here, but simply continuing the talk page discussion here isn't going to help very much. If you give me an hour or so I will have a look through the talk page and give you my opinion on what to do next. Best regards — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 11:58, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Ok, I have read through the discussion on the talk page and at WikiProject Formula One, and it looks like there are two main issues here: first, whether we should include information about the E20's naming in the article; and second, the status of the Enstone "team" and how we should describe it. I see that there has been a great deal of discussion on the second issue on the WikiProject talk page, but less discussion of the first issue. I have also seen some confusion over what should appear in the lede section as opposed to the article body; let me take this last point first. This has already been addressed on the WikiProject talk page, but the lede section should be a summary of the article. From WP:LEDE: "Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article." A corollary of this is that if we want to include something in the lede, it should have a lengthy mention in the article. Another corollary is that if we only have a brief mention of something in the article body, then it probably doesn't belong in the lede. So if we are to include the naming of the E20 in the lede, it has to have more than a brief mention in the article body. Now the matter of whether we should include information on the naming at all. When I looked at the WikiProject discussion, it looked like this issue was conflated with the "Enstone team" issue in many cases, so I think it would benefit from more discussion here. One important thing that we should bear in mind is that Wikipedia is comprehensive; the relevant policy, WP:WEIGHT, says: "An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject", and further, "Keep in mind that, in determining proper weight, we consider a viewpoint's prevalence in reliable sources, not its prevalence among Wikipedia editors or the general public." Some of the arguments have claimed that including information on the naming of the car would be giving that information undue weight, but I find this hard to reconcile with the fact that the naming has been discussed in multiple, reliable, non-specialist sources such as the New York Times, BBC Sport, and Reuters. We cannot exclude sources merely because they are not official FIA sources, and I cannot see any reason to believe that these particular sources aren't reliable in this case. So, now let me cover the issue of the "Enstone team". Here we have two conflicting sources of information - the official FIA statistics and the sources that DeFacto provided. First, it doesn't look like there is any conflict about the use of Enstone as a "team" on par with official constructor teams as specified by the FIA; in such cases, everyone seems in agreement that we should use the FIA's terminology for our official statistics. When we are talking about the "group of people" at Enstone, though, the sources conflict: the official statistics call this group of people different teams depending on which season we are talking about; the media sources call them the same team that just happens to have changed their name a lot of times. As I see it, these two views are both correct, depending on what you mean by "team", and again, I don't think we can exclude the media sources from the article just because they make things inconvenient. In my experience, the only way to do things here is to be verbose - to teach the controversy, as it were. So I think we will have to spell out, in the article text, that X news sources call Enstone the same team, but that the FIA classifies them as different teams, and that the E20 is named after the Enstone team in the first sense, but that we can't call Enstone a "team" in the second sense. It will be long, yes, but when we have worked out the wording I feel it will be a good compromise. Let me know what you think of my suggestions. Best regards — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 14:19, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Hello Mr. Stradivarius, thank you for your thorough, dispassionate and neutral analysis. Let's hope we can now put our differences over these issues to one side, and unite and cooperate in good faith and provide comprehensive and NPOV article content. -- de Facto (talk). 14:56, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I personally think you're giving a Recentism spike too much credit, none of these sources are more than a year old against the age being discussed, most less than a few months. The concept of grouping "Enstone" (even refering collectively under an Enstone banner at all) results together is largely concurrent with the E20 announcement, or at the very least sprang up when legal proceedings over the team names began and media outlets were looking for a neutral tag than was neither Lotus nor Renault. But I'm a party to the dispute and have a strong opinion on the subject so my opinion can be easily dismissed. --Falcadore (talk) 15:12, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I agree with Falcadore - this "Enstone team" concept had little or no coverage before the recent fuss over the Lotus name and the naming of the E20, and coverage of the latter was solely generated by the recent quotes from the team. The sources are themselves pretty weak in my opinion, using an ambiguous term ("team") to suggest a legitimacy for an "Enstone team" which just does not exist officially. There are no official sources (or even semi-official) to support the existence of an "Enstone team" existing since 1984. There are in fact, official sources to suggest that this "team" does not exist. These two systems of defining a team cannot co-exist. Any lengthy explanation of this trivia will only serve to confuse the casual reader trying to figure out what is already a very complex situation, and undermine the official statistics. I am also party to the dispute and I have grave doubts over the ergonomics of including a large amount of trivial material, across a very large multitude of articles, favoured by one single user (who seems to think this debate is concluded) over the wishes of several others. I say a very large multitude of articles because this concept of merging together groups of teams with a perceived joint heritage will affect most of the teams on the grid, not just Lotus. Bretonbanquet (talk) 19:57, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


 * First thank you for taking the time to consider this matter. As another involved editor, I share the same views as Bretonbanquet and Falcadore, and agree with their points. I would like to add on the issue of the E20, that while you are correct in stating WP:LEAD: "Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article.", it is also applicable to refer to the Relative emphasis section where this sentence is also repeated: Significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article, although not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text. This part to me covers the announcement the new naming convention, while it is indeed notable enough to include, fleshing this out to a whole section is undue weight - there is not enough to this beyond a single sentence. It is a similar situation to when McLaren changed their naming designation to the McLaren MP4/1 - a single sentence is more than enough.
 * On the matter of the Enstone debate, another point I would like to bring up is that your idea Mr. Stradivarius of explaining Enstone's history is already included in a much easier way for the reader. On both the Renault in Formula One and Lotus F1 articles, it is made clear to the reader that the facilities at Enstone have been home to several different teams competing in the sport. I can't see what else you would add on the current articles. QueenCake (talk) 21:58, 1 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the replies everyone - they have certainly given me food for thought. I think perhaps some of the confusion here has stemmed from my use (and sources' use) of the word "team". Even if we include the information present in the sources, we don't have to claim that Enstone are a "team" - we could say that the E20 was named after the Enstone factory, which has housed several different constructor teams, for example. Would other editors be willing to include information on the naming of the E20 if we avoided the word "team" when mentioning Enstone? — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 00:19, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Personally, I'd have no problem with that. The careless use of the word "team" would, I believe, cause a lot of confusion for the inexpert reader. With your suggested wording, we'd be keeping all the spirit of the naming without risking an implication that Enstone is something that it's not. The Lotus quote said that the car was named in celebration of the facility and the personnel, which I think is a good way to put it. Bretonbanquet (talk) 00:37, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I think that the the word "team" has been made ambiguous by the insistance that the "group of people" that have operated under different owners and under different "constructor names" are not a "Team" (singular) in the common usage English language sense. It is that some in the F1 world choose to also use the word "team" as a synonym of "constructor" that has caused the problem here, and doing so gives rise to the apparent nonsense sentence: "the Enstone Team has operated as several teams . We cannot redfine English or ban the use of common-use of an established word, and we certainly cannot say, or imply, that there was ever more than one Enstone Team. So, no, I wouldn't support the plural use in that context. If we use the word "team" in place of, or even qualified by, "constructor" cannot pluralise it and we need to disambiguate it in some other way. We could say: "the E20 was named after the Enstone team, which has opererated under several different constructor names". Remember, it is more a tribute to the "bunch of people" than to the building. -- de Facto (talk). 07:31, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Ok, so you're not in favour of using "constructor teams" in the plural, and there seems to be a good consensus from the WikiProject members that we should avoid conflating personnel at Enstone with any official F1 teams. Is there a wording that you can find that avoids both of these pitfalls? At this stage I think it may be best to leave the word "team" out completely. — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 15:05, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I think the best term is "constructor name", or just "contructor". "Team" might be used as a sloppy shorthand in some F1 circles, but I'm not sure it has any official status as representing either. In F1 there are a number of other terms in use too, some overlap and some are used in different ways in different contexts, such as: "entrant" and "constructor", which may, or may not also include the engine maker, as in "Lotus-Renault", "McLaren-Mercedes", etc. The official stats tend to be organiseed around a variation on "constructor" name (with or without the engine maker!). Teams can be bought and sold, renamed and have their "constructor name" changed, which does certainly show that they therefore transcend those things. How about: "the E20 was named in tribute to the achievements, over the last 20 years, of the Enstone-based operation, which has competed under three different owners and with three different constructor names in that time"? -- de Facto (talk). 16:48, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Lotus E20 discussion: convenience break #1
Would somebody please take a loot at this part of the page? This is the latest point of contention, discussing the technical design of the car. DeFacto claims it violates both WP:OR and WP:CRYSTAL (though as I have pointed out, he has made no move to alert other users to it). This paragraph recounts the development of the reactive ride-height system, and the circumstances that led to it being banned. It draws on several reliable sources, including James Allen and Autosport. It is a summary of the details given in the articles that are referenced, carefully rewritten into layman's terms. It is not the first time that I have condensed lengthy techncial explanations into something that readers can understand - I have written entries on off-throttle blown diffusers, the F-duct and DRS concepts, mid-season regulations regarding camber limits, and several other technical points. I have never had a single complaint about them, or even so much as a re-write. I'm not suggesting that I own these parts of the article; I am merely highlighting the way that I am familiar with condensing a lot of technical information into encyclopaedic terms without losing any key details.

This is how the article appears now (I have removed the references, but they are included in the article): The Lotus E20 was developed with a "reactive ride-height" system. It was first proposed in January 2010, and spent the next two years in development before making its debut at the Young Driver Tests in Abu Dhabi where it was spotted by an Italian journalist. The system used hydraulic cylinders located in the brake calipers and suspension push-rods to make minute adjustments to the ride height of the car, thereby keeping the ride height at an optimal level throughout the race and providing stability during braking, and was initially approved by the FIA as being legal but was banned one week later. The FIA later confirmed that the reactive ride-height systems violated Article 3.15 of the technical regulations, which states that "any aerodynamic effect created by the suspension should be incidental to its primary function" and "any device that influences the car's aerodynamics must remain immobile in relation to the sprung part of the car", and that the system's primary purpose was achieving aerodynamic gains as opposed to providing stability under braking and could therefore be considered a moveable aerodynamic device, the use of which is banned by the sport's techncial regulations. This, I think, accurately and concisely summarises the issue. It described the development, the mechanics of the system, the ban and the circumstances under which it was banned. Perhaps the only thing missing is Lotus' reaction to the ban, but nobody appears to have commented. I expect the issue will be raised in four days when the car is launched.

And this is the version DeFacto is suggesting: It had been reported that Lotus Renault GP (now Lotus F1 Team) had tried out a mechanical device, designed to maintain ride height under braking, on a car at the Abu Dhabi young driver test in 2011. Since then, the FIA has ruled that such devices contravene the xxx [whatever] rules, so will not be a feature of the new car. This, I feel, downplays the importance of the system, despite several teams copying it once they learned of it. It also implies that Lotus did not develop the system, which was later banned (and the FIA felt that it hadd been designed for aerodynamics benefit first and foremost), with the extended implication being that Lotus did not break the rules. It makes no mention of the mechanical operation of the system or its development, and even implies that it was never a part of the E20's development (despite the team having spent two years working on it). In short, I think this example best summarises why I cannot assume good faith in DeFacto's edits. It needlessly removes detail, downplays the importance and the coverage of the system, does not ascribe due weight, insinuates that Lotus never developed it and so never broke the rules and he claims it violates OR and CRYSTAL, despite having come from highly-reliable sources when DeFacto had previously used the "it's being reported by several people, so it should be included". Prisonermonkeys (talk) 05:23, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Well, let's have a look at the sources first. It doesn't look like DeFacto was disputing the use of Autosport, but he did say that jamesallenonf1.com was not a reliable source under our guidelines on identifying reliable sources. The site looks like a blog site, but I do see that James Allen is an F1 journalist, so I assume this is what you are basing your claim of reliability on. (I am also assuming it is the same James Allen.) Has there been any discussion of the reliability of this website before? If someone more familiar with F1 sources could enlighten me, it would be very helpful. Also, Prisonermonkeys, would you mind giving your thoughts on the thread above about the naming issue? What we do next is going to depend on your opinion of the tentative compromise I suggested. Best — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 06:37, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Yes, it is the same James Allen. I have often triangulated what he has printed - I have looked for other reliable sources reporting what he posts, and I have never come up short when I check them out. The reliability of his website has never been discussed, because no-one has ever raised objections before. Allen is a well-known journalist in the Formula 1 paddock, and hosts each of the post-race and post-qualifying sessions with the drivers. I see no reasonable doubt as to his reliability. Especially since what Allen posted is supported by what was published by Autosport.


 * As for the naming issue, my stance is that the name of the car should be covered, but there is no need for excess detail. A single sentence summarising the reason for the name is enough. This is precisely what we did with the Ferrari 150° Italia, the last car to carry a signficant name (it does contain an additional subsection, but this is related to a naming dispute with Ford). Anything more than a single sentence would be giving undue weight to the name of the car. I would be happy with a slight re-write for clarity, but any more detail on the reasons behind it is unnecessary.


 * With regards to the name of the team, the answer is simple. The team was known as Renault in 2011, and changed its constructor name to Lotus for 2012. When it did so, the FIA recognised it as an entirely new entry. Any results the team scores will be credited to them and not to Renault, just as any results Renault scored will not be credited to Lotus. We have always dedicated a new page to a new constructor, and this has never been an issue in the past (ie, we have separate pages for Jordan, Midland, Spyker and Force India despite the team changing its constructor name four times in as many years). The issue here is somewhat more complex, since there was another Lotus team in 2011, but it was operated by different people, out of a different factory with no connection to the current Lotus. The FIA recognises them as separate constructors, as do we. I feel that this is important to mention, because even though the Lotus E20 is named in tribute to the Enstone factory, the team itself is considered a new team. Therefore, if we were to mention the championships won by the physical team at Enstone, it may imply that Lotus won those titles when they did not. Sufficiently explaining that the team name has changed several times in the past twenty years would be better-suited to the team page. And I think that if you looked at the team critically, you would find very few people - if any - who joined the team in 1992 and are still there today. If you look at the noted staff section of the infobox on Benetton Formula (the name used when the team first moved to Enstone), all of them have moved on to other teams or retired. So although the car may be named for twenty years at Enstone, too much emphasis on this would be misleading. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 07:13, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys,
 * On the Allen source, as I said in my response to your earlier comments: "If neutral parties can agree that the self-published site you quote is a reliable source, then I won't argue with that...".
 * The choice of name departs from the general cold dispassionate convention of using the next consecutive number appended to a one, two or three letter abbreviation of the team's current constructor name. The way the name was chosen, and described to the press by the team boss; as a tribute to the record of the team over the twenty years that it has been based at Enstone was the main emphasis of much, if not all, of the press coverage so far of the car's reveal. So that there is a cultural and team ethos dimension to it makes it worthy of an amount of article space more than might be the case if it was chosen as just the next number in the sequence.
 * There is widespread agreement in WP:F1, a view which I am also on the record there as subscribing to, that the correct article split is by constructor name - there is no current argument about that, that I am aware of. But we must not imply that "constructor name" is a synonym of the common-use meaning of the English word "team". For that reason it is perfectly legitimate to refer to the 30-year lifetime of the entity (10 years at Witney, 20 at Enstone) by using the singular version of the word "team". The "Witney/Enstone team" (commonly now abbreviated to "Enstone team") has competed under 4 different constructor names, yes - but it is a team with a contiguous history, culture and heritage - we must not seek to obfuscate, or even deny that reliably documented fact.
 * -- de Facto (talk). 10:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, I did not suggest it breaks WP:CRYSTAL, and you say the references are there: the crucial one isn't and there is a question over the reliability of others. Read my sentence-by-sentence reason for removal on the article's talkpage again. My main problem with your content is that it asserts second-hand speculation of the system's existence on an earlier prototype car as fact of inclusion on the new car. The first sentence is not supported by a reference. The reference that the car has such a system is a reference to speculation that the car has such a system (no problem there so long as it is described as specultion). The referenced site reports the speculation of an F1 journalist or photographer, so second-hand speculation, some may call that heresay. If neutral parties can agree that the self-published site you quote is a reliable source, then I won't argue with that, but the account needs accurate representaion as a report of someone else's speculation. Your synthesis at the end, building on your unsupported assertion that the the new E20 car has such a system, then juxtaposing that with a couple of separate references describing the FIA's different interpretations of their own rules (which do not themselves associate the interpretations specifically with any system on the new Lotus E20 car) is pure WP:OR.
 * The version you quote as my suggestion is the starting point I offered for discussion on the talkpage. It makes clear the speculative nature of the story and does not assert anything which is not verifiable. WP:VER is the guiding light here, I believe. -- de Facto (talk). 09:34, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * It makes clear the speculative nature of the story and does not assert anything which is not verifiable.
 * Taken on its own, maybe. But looking at it compared to your other edits related to Lotus, it becomes a problem. Like I said - a lot of your edits portray the team in a very positive light. Like your early edits about the name of the E20 chassis, which suggested that Lotus had won several titles when they have, in fact, not done so. Your suggested edits imply that Lotus did not use or itnend to use the system at all, and with the FIA banning it because they realised that its primary function was aerodynamic gain (which it had previously been pitched as aiding stability), your edits suggest that Lotus did not break any rules, and therefore did not do anything wrong - which goes hand in hand with your havit of making them out to be "better" than they actually are.


 * And, like I said, the extended detail of the RRH system had been in the article for some time before you decided it was unfit. And you did not decide that it was unfit until consensus on the naming issue started to go against you. Once it became apparent that other users did not support your idea of extended coverage on the name of the car, you removed the design content from the page, and you still have not made any move to alert other users to the supposed issues related to it (and you still have not provided an adequate reason for this). I find the timing of your edits and the events surrounding them to be suspicious. I don't know what your purpose is, but I think you are definately pro-Lotus and want to make them out to be as good as possible. This is why I can no longer assume good faith in your edits. What do you not understand about this? Having observed your behaviour, I do not think your edits serve the interests of the page because of your inherent bias towards Lotus. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 09:50, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, I think you are clutching at straws now.
 * You are misrepresenting my comments. I have never implied or "suggested that Lotus had won several titles". I have reflected the widely supported fact that the team (the same one that will now compete using the "Lotus" constructor name), which has a contiguous history transcending different owners and constructor names has (an undisputable fact) won 4 or 5 championships.
 * You are implying that my "aunt Sally" proposal for discussion and refinement implied Lotus were not going to use the RRH system, which I can't see in it, but which we currently have no reliable source for anyway. If you disagree, then upate the draft appropriately, and with RS support, for us to review. Has Lotus broken any rules? I don't know, they haven't raced the E20 yet, and I haven't seen any reliably sources account of what it comprises yet. Don't forget, the car's official launch hasn't taken place yet.
 * I initially accepted your account of the RRH system, in good faith. However, from what I knew of the situation, I thought it did had a ring of "jumping to premature conclusions" about it. It was when, a couple of days later, I re-read it, and attempted to verify the content with the sources, that I decided it needed drastic re-work, and opened the discussion. This was entirely unrelated to the ongoing discussion about how we covered the name choice.
 * I don't quite follow the rest of your last passage above. Who haven't I alerted, and about what? I opened a discussion (this one) to explain my deletion, and offering an improved draft to work on. Are you attempting to imply I have a non-NPOV agenda, or what?
 * -- de Facto (talk). 10:47, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Really? This is one of your earliest edits to the page:
 * The car is named the "E20" as a tribute to the team members and their twenty-year history and achievements at their Enstone facility. When explaining the reasoning behind the name choice, the team's principal, Éric Boullier, is quoted by Autosport.com as stating: "Our naming of the chassis to recognise Enstone's importance to the team's evolution highlights our recognition of the contribution of the facility and the personnel who work tirelessly every year to produce the very best car possible". Since relocating to Enstone in 1992, the team has won four drivers' championships and three constructors' championships
 * Note the final sentence:
 * Since relocating to Enstone in 1992, the team has won four drivers' championships and three constructors' championships
 * It makes no attempt to explain who won those titles, or under what circumstances, despite Lotus F1 being recognised as an entirely new team.


 * As for your open discussion, you know perfectly well that only a small hanful of editors have been working on the E20 page. Despite claiming that the design subsection was both specualtive and based on original research, and that if it had been posted elsewhere it needed to be reviewed, you never did anything more than post on the E20 talk page.


 * I'm not implying that you have a NPOV agenda. I'm stating it outright. Between your edits to this page and others, and some of your "contributions" to discussions (which always end with the discussion going around in circles before a consensus against you can be reached), I believe that you are attempting to edit articles in favour of Lotus, particularly after their negative publicity in 2011 and the court case with Tony Fernandes. You are trying to make Lotus look better than they are by talking up the positive aspects of the team and the car and downplaying their role in developing illegal technology. When I say that I no longer assume good faith in your edits, do you think I'm just kicking around a term I have only learned in the past day or two? No. I'm saying that I don't trust your edits, and I don't trust your ability to edit for the benefit of the article. I've seen enough from you to come to the belief that you are biased in favour of Lotus. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 12:06, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, these are serious accusations, and I don't think we will be able to progress with the normal channels of dispute resolution until this is sorted out. Dispute resolution requires all parties to be able to discuss the disputed content with a view to making a compromise, and from your comments it doesn't look like this is possible here. If you are serious about pursuing these allegations of biased editing, then I'll close this thread and refer you to one of the conduct dispute resolution forums listed at our dispute resolution page. I recommend wikiquette assistance as a good starting place, and I also urge you to compile some convincing evidence in the form of diffs. (Conduct dispute forums tend to look dimly on serious accusations that are not backed up by hard evidence.) Best — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 12:23, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, on your first paragraph; yes, really!. Did you read what I wrote? Did you read the supplied RS (this one that you clipped from your quote)? Let me take you through it, step... by... step...
 * Using this quote that you are holding up from my edit: "Since relocating to Enstone in 1992, the team has won four drivers' championships and three constructors' championships", in conjunction with the Reuters reference that it cites.
 * Me: "Since relocating to Enstone in 1992,"
 * Reuters: "Enstone has been the headquarters since Benetton, who started as Toleman and won titles with the young Michael Schumacher before becoming Renault and winning again with Fernando Alonso, moved there in 1992."
 * Are you able to see where I got the "Enstone" and the "1992" from?
 * Me: "the team"
 * Reuters: "Kimi Raikkonen's Lotus Formula One team, formerly known as Renault,"
 * This one you may find a little more tricky as logic is involved, but let's try: "formerly know as", in that context, means that the name of something has changed. But what we can also say is that, in that context, the only thing that it could possibly be referring to as having had its name changed is "Kimi Raikkonen's Lotus Formula One team". So we can reliably say that the Lotus team was formerly known as Renault. Note that is does not say "which has now replaced the Renault team at Enstone", or anything similar. It is definitely saying that the name of the team (in the singular) has changed, so there was only ever the one team, and it was renamed. Have you followed that?
 * Me: "has won four drivers' championships and three constructors' championships"
 * Reuters: "Benetton, who started as Toleman and won titles with the young Michael Schumacher before becoming Renault and winning again with Fernando Alonso"
 * Schumacher won the DC with them twice, as did Alonso (2 + 2 = 4). They won the CC as Benetton once and as Renault twice (1 + 2 = 3). OK, or do we need to source that breakdown of the numbers?
 * There we have it, so yes: "really"! And no, Lotus F1 isn't an entirely new team, it is the same old team, with an entirely new name. Read the material, apply the logic. If you think that the constructor names and/or the team's name at the time the championship wins need to be explained and spelled out in more detail, then feel free to do that.
 * -- de Facto (talk). 14:41, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, on your "open discussion" paragraph.
 * The first place to discuss the content of the article should be the article's talkpage.
 * As I explained on the the article's talkpage, I wasn't claiming that the design section itself was specualtive, but that it was based on second-hand speculation, conveyed, not as the speculation that it was, but asserted as fact. Yes there was OR too, and at least one unsourced assertion.
 * You haven't informed me where else that content has been posted yet, despite being asked.
 * -- de Facto (talk). 15:05, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I can appreciate that you are frustrated here, but the put-downs (e.g. "This one you may find a little more tricky as logic is involved") really aren't helping things. If we are to have any chance of resolving this to everyone's satisfaction, we must start concentrating on content and stop concentrating on each other. Dispute resolution will not work if everyone is at each others' throats. To both Prisonermonkeys and DeFacto - I recommend taking a day away from this discussion to try and get some perspective, and to think of productive things to try to work out your differences. The alternative to this can be seen at the top of this page: "Off-topic or non-productive discussions can be closed after due warning, as the board is designed to defuse disputes, not escalate them." Regards — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 15:20, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Sorry Mr. Stradivarius, you are right. He keeps repeating the same misapprehensions and not assimilating the expanded explanations given, and is now throwing wild allegations too. I'll tone it down a little. I'll continue to answer the points, but stick to content as you say. -- de Facto (talk). 16:08, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, on your comments related to your statement that you believe that I "have a NPOV agenda" (and given your track-record, I'll assume that what you actually meant was " non- NPOV"). You are making the bizarre allegation that I am attempting to edit articles in favour of Lotus! That wouldn't be because you are a sore loser given that your various attempts (article talkpage, WPF1 talkpage, DRN (here), grovelling, misrepresenting the issue and whinging directly to an admin here and here and here, or even a request for page protection) to get my criticism of your poor quality additions censured has failed, would it? And surely not because you think my good work is undermining your attempts to try to discredit Lotus, is it? Or, and I'll assume good faith (as you should), more likely that you are miffed that, despite your best endevours, you cannot get your own way on the various bits of content?
 * -- de Facto (talk). 16:01, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

This has nothing to do with me being upset about my edits being undone, and everything to do with your behaviour. I have noticed that you have done the following: I am well aware that these are serious accusasions that I am levelling against you. But I wouldn't be making them if I didn't believe them to be true. You are correct in saying that I went to an adminstrator. You will notice I have done this before to deal with a disruptive editor. I went again because I was unfamiliar with the dispute resolution process, and I was asking advice and for a quick review. You were the one who entered a conversation you had no part entering. And as for the RFP, I noticed that you were in the habit of reverting changes as soon as you saw them on the E20 page. And I would restore them straight back, because I felt that your edits were inappropraite to the page. Since I could see the inevitable course that this would follow, I decided to take the initiative and request page protection so that we could sort the issue out.
 * 1) You have ignored a preliminary consensus on the naming issue, editing content into the page despite several users agreeing that it was excessive an unnecessary. You then tried to claim that there was "guarded support" for your edits, and that this was enough to override the preliminary consensus.
 * 2) Whenever an issue has been raised at WP:F1, the discussion rapidly goes off-topic shortly after you join the debate. As a result, no lasting consensus is formed, which I believe is you sabotaging the discussion to prevent a consensus against you.
 * 3) You have assigned undue weight to certain elements of the article, adding detail where it is unnecessary and removing detail that is important. Your own arguments for these have been contradictory at best.
 * 4) You had no issues with the content in the design subsection of the page until a consensus began to form against you on the naming issue.
 * 5) You have proposed edits that have implied Lotus are "better" than they actually are.

It has nothing to do with "being a sore loser". It has nothing to do with "your good work", because your work is not very good at all. I am not trying to misreprsent the team one way or another, because while I don't particularly like them, I don't particularly dislike them, either. I have no interest in discrediting them - I am simply interested in portraying them as accurately as possible. You are the one who overstates the importance of the Enstone team's success whilst downplaying the effect of the RRH. You are the one who tries to stop a consensus being formed by deliberately obscuring the issue, and when that doesn't work, you are the one who holds the page hostage the minute consensus goes against him. You are the one who argues for the inclusion of some content based on reliable sources, but then removes other content and ignores their reliable sources. You are the one who has been over-stating the quality of his edits.

So, here is what I propose: we both back off. We are clearly both too close to this. So I suggest we refrain from editing the E20 page for a week or so. When the car is launched, more detail will be added to the page (like the infobox). After one week, we will assume that the editors have left the page in an acceptable state (we will invite them to edit the page fully). I am fully willing to do this, but it only works on two conditions: that we both do it, and that we do not try lobbying for certain pages when other people edit the page. We simply invite people to review and edit the Lotus E20 page, and leave it at that. After one week, we come back to it and assume it has been reviewed and that the page is in the most accurate and NPOV state that it can be in. The advantage of this arrangement is two-fold: the page will accurately re-written, and because we have to trust one another not to edit the page for one week, we can begin to assume good faith in each other's edits once again. It sounds perfectly fair and reasonable to me, but we both need to agree to it. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 22:06, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Lotus E20 discussion: convenience break #2
For what it's worth, I think that Falcadore's point about recentism is the key here. Pretty much every reference that de Facto has cited can be traced directly back to recent press releases from the Bouiller/Lopez/Genii group, or to interviews given by them to journalists. Very few are more than 12 months old. This seems to be a widespread, orchestrated campaign by the current owners of the Enstone facility to generate some quasi-official "heritage" for their brand new constructor, presumably in an attempt to position themselves better in forthcoming contract negotiations. Why an ever-changing group of employees, some of whom pass on to a new constructor when the previous one is bought out, but plenty do not, should be regarded as a "team" is beyond me. Whether de Facto likes it or not, the term "team" is a loaded one in a Formula One context, and does not simply refer to a "bunch of people", but is used as a common shorthand for "constructor". For a new constructor to be claiming race wins and Championship titles that were bought and paid for by completely different commercial organisations is disingenuous at best, and fraudulent at worst. It seems a shame that Wikipedia seems to be being drawn into this.  Pyrop e  15:42, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Let's bury the myth that the concept of a team, its heritage and its culture, continuing contiguously despite owner changes and constructor name changes, is only a recently conceived one: Three after a quick Google, and specifiacally for "Enstone". I'm sure if all those who are seeking to perpetuate the myth, instead did a few searches themselves, that we could bolster that number no end! -- de Facto (talk). 17:22, 2 February 2012 (UTC) -- de Facto (talk). 17:22, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
 * October 2001: "... there was almost no mention in Suzuka that the Japanese GP was also the last race for the Benetton team - at least in name anyway. The team will become Renault Sport next year and the name Benetton Formula will disappear to the record books."GrandPrix.com
 * June 2004: "Allison started his F1 career with the Enstone team when it was known as Benetton, back in 1991"GrandPrix.com
 * December 2010: "Enstone is no stranger to name changes. In fact, next year marks the 30th anniversary of this team competing in F1 under various names."yallaf1.com


 * The first of those refers to the name change from Benetton to Renault, following the sale of Benetton to Renault, and the corporate entity didn't change at that point. This is a spurious refernce for this discussion. The second, I'll grant, is a reasonable one that backs up your point. The third, however, is a puffed-up blog posting of dubious reliability, and in fact appears to be an near-transcript of recent Lotus Renault GP press releases that still link to the current owners. I did as you suggested, and when the term "Enstone team" is searched for it turns up a slew of blog postings and media snippets, the vast majority of which do not appear to be much more than 12 months old. Interestingly, when the same term is searched for at Google Books or Google Scholar, not a single hit results. Odd that.  Pyrop e  17:46, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * The first was about the the topic of this discussion, the constructor name changing whilst the "team" carried on as the same team regardless (Renault actually acquired the team in 2000, but continued with the Benetton constructor name for 2000 and 2001). You know though, that this about the concept of a "team" crossing owner, team name and constructor name boundaries, and not about how often the term "Enstone team" is used literally. Did you try for other contexts like The Enstone based F1 team, team from Enstone (or from anywhere else) or the Brackley team or the Silverstone team or the Toleman/Benetton/Reanault team there are an infinite number of combinations? -- de Facto (talk). 18:02, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Just trying to compare apples with apples. Renault acquired the constructor Benetton in 2000, and then changed the constructor's name at a later date. Nothing in there tells me about the people who were employed; the continuity of your purported "team". Interestingly, at no point did Renault try and claim any of the 2000 and 2001 Benetton results as belonging to Renault, which surely they should have done if they considered it the same team? I could rearrange the alphabet into whatever order you like, but if you want references that support your point of view it really is up to you to do the legwork to find them.  Pyrop e  19:02, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * You're trying to obfuscate the issue again. The only valid point cited source used the "team" word in the context that some here are attempting to deny exists. Neither Renault nor Lotus have claim to any of the awards won by the team prior to their involvement, and I'm not aware that either have made any such claims; why would they? What is clear though is that the team has won those awards, albeit under different constructor names.
 * Let me try and make it clearer:
 * {| class="wikitable"

! F1 Seasons !! Constructor name !! Main base location !! Drivers' championships (under specified constructor name) !! Constructors' championships
 * + The Enstone team history
 * 1981-1985 || Toleman || Witney || 0 || 0
 * 1986-2001 || Benetton || Witney then Enstone || 2 || 1
 * 2002-2011 || Renault || Enstone || 2 || 2
 * 2012 - ||Lotus || Enstone || 0 || 0
 * Team total || || || 4 || 3
 * }
 * Does that help? -- de Facto (talk). 21:21, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 2012 - ||Lotus || Enstone || 0 || 0
 * Team total || || || 4 || 3
 * }
 * Does that help? -- de Facto (talk). 21:21, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Does that help? -- de Facto (talk). 21:21, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I don't think anyone is arguing that different constructors based at the Enstone facility, and employing some of the same staff, have won various Championships down the years. Most of us engaged in this discussion have already stated that we don't have any problem with that sort of wording. However, you continue to try and force through your opinion that there is some sort of underlying meta-team that should actually take credit for all this. I and many others have disagreed with you. As for not claiming titles that aren't theirs, I suggest you go back an re-read the NYT article that you cited over on the WP:F1 page. In it Eric Boullier states "The strength of the team is that it has won the world championship many times. It is a good size, we have the latest upgrades...". At that time he was head of Renault GP. "Many times" to me indicates that he's including more than just the twice that Renault could legitimately claim. Therefore he is including the Benetton championships. He's repeated similar claims in recent interviews and press releases relating to the E20, as well.  Pyrop e  21:51, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Pyrope, the team is the "meta-team", as you put it. The reality, and the sources bear that out. You may not agree with them, but your personal opinion (and mine) doesn't carry any weight. Boullier was correct, he never claimed that the awards were all won under the Renault constructor name, but by the "team", by which he obviously meant the "meta-team" (see my table above). And he's in a strong position to know who the team are, as team boss, don't you think? The NYT obviously agrees to. This is all leading to the one inevitable conclusion, it seems to me. -- de Facto (talk). 22:13, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * He's also in a strong position to be ambiguous with the statistics and manipulate facts to suit his commercial aims. If you are telling me that he's got Flavio Briatore, Nick Wirth and Pat Fry, and Tom Walkinshaw's coffin, on the payroll then maybe he does know what the "team" of 1994 looked like. I have no access to their payroll details, but I'd be very suprised if the staff turnover at the more junior levels isn't on a similar order. Add in the redundancies and new hirings made every time a new owner sweeps in and your "reality" suddenly becomes just another opinion; a minority one, as we have previously discussed ad infinitum, ad nauseum. Yes, you have a few sources that draw a line from one Enstone entity to another. However, as Bretonbanquet points out below, there isn't any official standing to this, no results databases collate information for the Enstone Team, and the Enstone Team has never won a single thing. As Prisonermonkeys has shown above, at every turn you have tried to push through a form of wording in the affected articles that either obfuscates that issue or outright makes it sound as though "Enstone" ranks up there with the official constructors.  Pyrop e  22:34, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Pyrope, all organisations have a staff turnover, especially over 30 years. Why should the Enstone group be any different? Soccer teams remain intact, despite ownership changes and coach and manager changes. Why should the Enstone group be any different? This isn't an "opinion", as you would like to characterise it, it is a self-evident fact. That there is no "official" recognition of the Enstone team as a 30-year old entity is irrelevent - this is fact-based Wikipedia, not the official FIA F1 handbook. The NPOV is the POV that I am pushing - it seems to me that there might be other agendas at work with one or more other contributors. -- de Facto (talk). 22:51, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
 * As you said, DeFacto, your personal opinion doesn't carry any weight. Regarding the NYT source: of course Eric Boullier is in a strong position to know what he's talking about, but he's also in the strongest position not to be neutral. You're actually interpreting his words the way you want. Plus, as other editors have pointed out, the Enstone based entity-meta team doesn't bear any status of any kind. It doesn't compete in anything. It doesn't win anything. Would you like to have a World Championship for facilities too ? I have read through the entire discussion, and I have to say it is really surprising it got that far. In the end I don't even understand why you're still discussing it. In my honest opinion, I don't think you will succeed in convincing all of the editors involved, not even achieving consensus. And talking about common-sense and logic regarding other editors surely won't help.  Maimai  009  23:18, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
 * (e/c) Here's what's "obfuscating the issue". Benetton won one constructors' championship, and Renault won two. Enstone didn't win any. "The Enstone team" has never won a championship, won a race, scored a point or, in fact, even entered a race. There has never been a team called the Enstone team. The only teams who win championships and races in Formula One are the named constructors, in this case, Benetton and Renault. There is no mechanism for saying that any other outfit won them. To imply that there's a superteam called Enstone that won championships is to utterly confuse matters while adding what is at best, trivia, and at worst, implication that the current Lotus team won them. It's like saying that Manchester have won the FA Cup 16 times, whereas the facts are that United have won it 11 times and City five. What is the earthly point of merging them when the sport just doesn't work in that way?
 * Furthermore, Lotus can be seen to be veering towards claiming the history of other constructors by using the word "team" in an ambiguous way. They refer to themselves as "the Lotus team", and then referring to 500 races "for this team through its different incarnations". It's perilously close to blurring the official line between what are incontrovertibly different constructors. It's obviously in Lotus' interest to do that, as a commercial boost, but we should not be buying into it. Bretonbanquet (talk) 21:55, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Bretonbanquet, you are right, Enstone didn't do any of those things; it was the Enstone "team" that did, under the constructor names of "Benetton" and "Renault" (see my table above). The "mechanism" is common-use or everyday common-sense and logic. No, the team has never won anything as Lotus, just as Renault and Benetton. Manchester teams, not Manchester, have won the FA cup 16 times, as there are two, unlike the one F1 Enstone team. You could say that the Old Trafford team has won the FA cup 11 times, even if over its history it had changed its name (although Pyrope may challenge you as the same people haven't always worked there), as Bolton Wanderers did.
 * It doesn't matter that you think that Lotus have an agenda to big-up the team's achievements, the fact, as supported by common-usage of the word and more explicitly in numerous independent articles, stands. It isn't Wiki's job to try to deny or suppress self-evident facts. The Witney/Enstone team is 30-years old and has been at Enstone 20-years and has won the championships mentioned, under two of the four constructor names it has used. -- de Facto (talk). 22:39, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Way back in the mists of time I mentioned the Longbridge analogy. You dismissed it out of hand because you didn't feel that one car factory and its workforce could compare to the other car factory and its workforce, purely based on the fact that one had a race team and design studio attached and the other didn't. I don't see the difference myself. As I said then, it seems to me absurd to argue that the same "team" that assembled Morris Minors back in the 1950s are the same "team" that now assemble Minis. However, based on your logic they surely are. As for the Old Trafford team I don't recall Mike Atherton or Clive Lloyd ever holding The FA cup aloft, do you?  Pyrop e  22:57, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Cowley wasn't it? And you made the mistake of assuming that BMW have the old Morris works, they don't, they have the old Pressed Steel Fisher site, that used to bash out panels for most UK car makers, Morris included, but they had no car development capability. They were a production facility, not a self-contained car development team, and their skills were dispersed over the decades with the merging and de-merging of Nuffield, BMC, BL, Rover, etc. They are in no way comparable to the relatively small, and self-contained specialised team at Enstone, that has remained relatively intact for 30 years, 20 of them at Enstone. If you had chosen, say, Jaguar, for your analogy, I might have agreed with you. They have always been a relatively small, self-contained car development team. They came from independence, merged into BL/Rover, went back into independence, were acquired by Ford and now have been sold to Tata Motors. Today's team is the same team that it always has been though, based in Coventry (and Gaydon too now), they produced the XK120, the E-type, the Mark 2, the XJ 220 (sort of) and the XK, amongst other notable cars. -- de Facto (talk). 23:15, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Lotus E20 discussion: proposed resolution
Despite the amount of virtual ink that has been spilled over this dispute so far, it doesn't look like we are actually any closer to resolving it. I think implementing Prisonermonkeys' solution would be a very good idea. DeFacto, would you be willing to leave the article alone for one week if Prisonermonkeys also does the same? This will give you some time to reflect, and there should also be more sources available when you come back. If you still have problems after that, then I would recommend filing a case at the mediation cabal. In my opinion the discussions so far have sometimes suffered from a lack of focus, and I think mediation would be the best way to redress this. — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 23:49, 2 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I am fully prepared to observe this, on the three conditions outlined above (I'll repost them here for good measure):
 * Neither of us edit the Lotus E20 page for a period of one week.
 * That we extend an invitation to all editors at WP:F1 and on the E20 talk page to review and edit the article (possibly with instructions to disregard anything on the talk page for the sake of neutrality).
 * That neither of us solicits any kind of edit to the page. That means that we cannot request any kind of edits - even to fix typos - from any editor.
 * It's fairly obvious as this juncture that neither of us trusts the other, and will likely only revert and edits the other makes. Walking away from it for a week and leaving it to the provence of other is the only way I can think of to totally resolve the issue, protect the integrity of the article and rebuild the assumption of good faith between the both of us.


 * If and when DeFacto agrees to this, then I think that Mr. Stradivarius should be the one to post the resolution and the terms of it at both WP:F1 and the E20 talk page. Once he has done that, both of us should leave a comment (and sign it) stating that we agree to the terms of it. Once the second signature has been added (we need to allow for time differences; I'm Australian and I think DeFacto is European or American), the one-week grace period will begin.


 * PS - I made this into a subsection of the discussion so that we can easily find it. Hope nobody minds. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 05:03, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Mr. Stradivarius, I agree to your proposal; which does not include soliciting, touting or inviting edits, by anyone, from anywhere, particularly from WP:F1 or Talk:Lotus E20. Such action would be unacceptable to me.
 * Prisonermonkeys, you speak only for yourself when you say that you "will likely only revert and edits the other makes". I base my edits of the contributions of others on content, not editor. -- de Facto (talk). 07:31, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * DeFacto, please read Mr. Stradivarius' comments again:
 * "I think implementing Prisonermonkeys' solution would be a very good idea."
 * As I said, I re-posted my proposal from earlier, for your convenience in finding it. Please note the following line (although the bold section should read "certain edits" and not "certain pages"; this is an error on my part):
 * ''"I am fully willing to do this, but it only works on two conditions: that we both do it, and that we do not try lobbying for certain pages when other people edit the page. We simply invite people to review and edit the Lotus E20 page, and leave it at that."
 * No solicitation of edits was always part of my proposed solution, and the reason for it is to stop the both of us from agreeing not to edit the page, and then going and asking other editors to include or remove certain content. This is not something that applies exclusively to you. The solution is quite clear on this point - it only works if both of us agree to all of the terms. In the interests in the article, I think the best thing for both of is is to walk away from it. Completely away. That involves no editing, inviting other people to rewrite and expand the article where necessary and appropriate, and doing so in a way whereby we do not attempt to influence the content of the article in any way, shape or form. Otherwise, we're just going to be back here in a week when nothing about the article has changed. I think that this is the fairest way of doing things, and I believe Mr. Stradivarius agrees with me (if this is not the case, Mr. Stradivarius, plase feel free to correct me). If you have some alternative solution to the problem - one that protects the integrity of the article and allows us to assume good faith in one another's edits - then I'm willing to hear it. But the three terms of my proposal (no edits for one week, no solicting edits for one week, and informing the wider F1 editing community of the agreement) are not negotiable. I believe all three are equally-important to achieving a fair and equitable resolution. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 08:06, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys, Mr. Stradivarius wrote: "I think implementing Prisonermonkeys' solution would be a very good idea". I took that to mean just this bit: "So I suggest we refrain from editing the E20 page for a week or so." Not all the misrepresentation, false allegations and fallacious logic that surrounded it, and certainly not this outrageous assertion: "After one week, we come back to it and assume it has been reviewed and that the page is in the most accurate and NPOV state that it can be in."
 * Read my statement again, particularly the piece following this: "... which does not include...". That is where I stood (past tense) on this; until I re-read your earlier complacent diatribe, and your arrogant addition just here. I'm about to review that position now, in the light of your further comments.
 * -- de Facto (talk). 08:40, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Mr. Stradivarius, as a result of reading Prisonermonkeys's latest addition; before the one-week embargo starts, I would also like the article to be reset to include the "Name choice" section that Prisonermonkeys deleted in this edit restored into the article. In that way we will be starting with a level playing field. His revertion of my edit, here still stands, so I think, to be fair, that the section that I believe we also need should be given equal status. -- de Facto (talk). 08:52, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * You already had a preliminary consensus - three to one - against including that before this was raised. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 08:58, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Prisonermonkeys,
 * "Preliminary consensus"? Please point us to the wiki policy defining that concept.
 * "Three to one"? Is consensus now redefined as "majority"?
 * -- de Facto (talk). 09:12, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Ok, it looks like we have a rough consensus for a week-long break. I've written precise terms of the agreement below. (I think putting it here makes more sense than on the talk page, as it's not directly about the article contents.) I've also specified that any other editors can edit the articles, but I don't think there is agreement for advertising for editors to come and improve the article before the week starts. In any case, most of WikiProject F1 know about this dispute now, so the point is mostly moot. — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 09:18, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * DeFacto, about restoring the section on naming before the week - I'm afraid that whatever version we leave it at, it will be the wrong version for somebody. The page protection policy gives admins two options for the version on which to protect: "When protecting a page because of a content dispute, administrators normally protect the current version, except where the current version contains content that clearly violates content policies, such as vandalism, copyright violations, or defamation of living persons. Since protecting the most current version sometimes rewards edit warring by establishing a contentious revision, administrators may also revert to an old version of the page predating the edit war if such a clear point exists." Looking through the page history, I don't see a clear "pre-dispute" version, so the normal thing to do in this case would be to keep the current version. Note that this doesn't preclude what happens after the week is up, or what other editors choose to do during the week. Best — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 09:33, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Mr. Stradivarius, fair enough. I'm cool with that. The lesson there though seems to be: revert, revert, revert, in an attempt to get one's preferred version to be the "current version".
 * Thanks for your efforts to sort this out. -- de Facto (talk). 10:08, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Lotus E20 resolution
Further to the discussion in this dispute resolution thread, User:Prisonermonkeys and User:DeFacto agree to the following conditions, which shall apply until midnight on Saturday 10th 11th February 2012 (UTC): After midnight on Saturday 10th 11th February 2012 (UTC), User:Prisonermonkeys and User:DeFacto will be free to return to editing the article and its talk page. They are reminded to respect the contributions of other editors who may have edited the article in the meantime, and to work towards building consensus on the talk page in the case of further disagreements. If discussions break down, they are urged to seek further dispute resolution, for example at the mediation cabal. Prisonermonkeys, DeFacto, please leave your signature below to indicate that you agree to these conditions. Thank you. — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 09:18, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 1) They will not edit the Lotus E20 article, or its talk page.
 * 2) They will not discuss the Lotus E20, or any of the issues brought up in this dispute resolution thread, anywhere on the English Wikipedia. They are also strongly discouraged from discussing said issues anywhere outside the English Wikipedia.
 * 3) They will not solicit any edits to the Lotus E20 article, or its talk page, or to discussions about the issues discussed in this dispute resolution thread, from any other editor.
 * 4) They agree to leave the Lotus E20 article and its talk page open for normal editing; furthermore, they will not interfere with that editing process in any way.


 * I agree. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 09:35, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree. -- de Facto (talk). 09:39, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for agreeing. I just noticed that I got the date wrong in my resolution text above. To clarify, it should be Saturday 11th February. Sorry for the trouble, but can you both confirm this below? Otherwise I'll leave this thread open for another day or so to avoid any confusion. Thanks for your help. — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 10:56, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Or should that be Friday 10 February? It's more than 8 days until midnight on the 11th. -- de Facto (talk). 11:04, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Friday 10th would give us 6 days, 12 hours, and 50 minutes; Saturday 11th gives us 7 days, 12 hours, and 50 minutes. It should be the 11th in order to get a whole week in. Would this be ok with you? — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 11:11, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * It's about 11:20 3 February 2012 (UTC) now, so 7 days hence will surely be 11:20 10 Februray 2012, so midnight on 11th is in about 8 days 12 1/2 hours time - isn't it? -- de Facto (talk). 11:20, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Ah, I see the problem. I'm talking about 24 hours before that. As in, the midnight where Friday 10th turns into Saturday 11th. 0000 hours. Does that clear things up? :) — <b style="text-shadow:0.15em 0.15em 0.1em #555; color: #194D00; font-style: oblique; font-family: Palatino, Times, serif"> Mr. Stradivarius ♫</b> 11:38, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Perfect, thanks! -- de Facto (talk). 11:42, 3 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I agree. -- de Facto (talk). 11:42, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree, too. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 11:57, 3 February 2012 (UTC)