Wikipedia talk:GLAM/Archive 1

'Two minute guide' revisited
I have suggested a second counter proposal to the "... adding External links to digitized or digital primary sources or finding aids. ...": Wikipedia_talk:COI. I still feel that, for those whose intentions are promotional (which unfortunately does happen every now and then), the current language can be used to wikilawyer, and I still believe that, though adding an external link to information on these sites can improve Wikipedia as well, a bigger improvement can be achieved by actually adding content from the material GLAMs have access to. Making those sections more considerate also does not give the appearance of impropriety which can be connected to adding external links only (so considering WP:PROMO). --Dirk Beetstra T C 17:41, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

My short definition
Notability is a term of art which refers to determining if a topic should or shouldn't be included as a stand-alone article in the Wikipedia. patsw (talk) 23:25, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Fixes needed
In this section, the sentence "Just as such a catalogue..." needs to be fixed (something added at the end). I can vaguely see what it's getting at, but it would be better if Witty Lama does the work of integrating it with the other sentences.
 * Whoops, that was a half-finished sentence :-) Fixed now. It wasn't an "earth shatteringly" importance sentence, I was just trying to demonstrate using an example from their own field, the status/purpose of a FA in Wikipedia.Witty Lama 07:22, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

There are several problems in the editing section. The "I'm the expert" item has the wrong emphasis; rather than explain what I mean, I'll try to fix it later. I'm mentioning it now because I don't know what to do with the "One way of ensuring that your name or your instution is always listed..." text. It seems to be encouraging a practice of putting text on the org's website, then quoting the text in an article like "The Museum of Xyz says 'many vases need to be cleaned when dug up'" – and then the article has to have a message at the bottom saying "this article includes text from the Museum of Xyz[link]". Is that what's meant? If so, I recommend the text be deleted or replaced with something that makes it clear how articles are supposed to be written. Copying text so that the article has to carry a permanent testimonial should not be one of the first pieces of advice.

There are some other problems that I'll probably be able to look at later (e.g. "My work got removed..." again suggests that MLA staff are bullet proof; if there's a conflict it's because the other editor is a dummy who doesn't understand that when it comes to my museum, more links are always better). Johnuniq (talk) 23:36, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
 * On the second point, I read it as meaning they release their texts as GFDL, but there is little evidence so far that museums are ready to give up copyright to their text, as GFDL effectively means. Properly done (ie with suitable bits of text) this could be very welcome - for example texts from the "highlights" guidebook most big museums publish. Probably needs clarifying if retained. Johnbod (talk) 02:03, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
 * This is what I had intended it to mean yes - that the museum release it's own description of the item under cc-by-sa and, if we then chose to copy their "statement of significance" directly into Wikipedia then we are obliged to leave a "this article incorporates text from..." template. There has been some success with this approach so I wouldn't dismiss it completely. Here's an example . One of the common things that museum people ask me is that they be acknowledged as the expert in the subject somehow. Getting them to release their own text on their website under cc-by-sa is one way of doing this. Witty Lama 07:22, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Interesting. I hope these people whispering in your ear will now start posting directly here. The example text would be very likely to be trimmed or tagged by someone under WP:Peacock, probably correctly, and has no external references. It's not immediately obvious why an Australian design museum should be recognised as "the expert" on an American architect and designer, or his German-made chair, beyond being cited as a reference. Expertise is normally recognised on WP by references to books or some RS websites, & really they need to be content with that, especially with a non-unique object. No doubt there is at least one book behind the information in the article, & ideally this should be cited. Authors of such works are likely to be "the expert" in reality - see the very lengthy Gehry bibliography here, which only goes up to 2004. In the linked blog Seb Chan makes his promotional agenda very clear - he is after all "Head of Digital, Social & Emerging Technologies" rather than a curator as such. But the material they have released is useful, though if they are not intending to put it on Wikipedia themselves, I wonder if releasing it in this way really greatly increases the likelihood of it being used on WP. It was apparently online before & could have been reworded, linked & referenced in the usual way. Having said that, I was rather surprised, looking at Category:Chairs to see how many articles on modern "designer" chairs, like Wassily Chair, we have.  Note that we have a stub article Easy Edges, on the Gehry series the chair forms part of - really the chair stuff should be added there. This gives a rather different view of the series, and references a Guggenheim exhibition on Gehry.  The Powerhouse entry seems a bit less than authoritative - they say:"A major exhibition of the artists work, including his furniture, was mounted by the Museum of Modern Art in 2000(?)" [sic] - I wonder if they mean the Guggenheim Exhibition of 2001 (architecture & furniture), or the 1992 MOMA furniture only exhibition?  Both of these are the first items on the relevant Google searches. You have to do a bit better than this to be "the expert".  Johnbod (talk) 16:20, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Removed text: need to put it back
I just edited the "I'm the expert" item. I had intended to keep all the original text, but I decided that my expansion made the paragraph too long. Furthermore, the text is not particularly relevant to the "I'm the expert" heading. The result is that I removed this text and am wondering what to do with it:
 * One way of ensuring that your name or your instution is always listed in the reference section of the article is to change the copyright of the equivalent article on your own institution's website to a compatible one with Wikipedia. If a Wikipedian copies that text across and integrates it (rather than simply quoting) then we are obliged under the laws of attribution to mention that the article incorporates text written by yourself.

I mentioned above that I'm a bit unsure about this text, but it should be returned to the article, but in which section? Johnuniq (talk) 08:22, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

New expert
Here's a new "expert", an ex- and honorary curator she says, also copyvio-ing her own website. Johnbod (talk) 21:16, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

Glossary section
I have a number of issues with this. Firstly it is too far up the article, which now takes far too long before coming down to the more specific advice, much of which is in the FAQs & lower sections, as well as the "principles of editing" one above.
 * I've moved the glossary section lower down the page (after the FAQ) and I've given each heading in the glossary a quick justification sentence e.g. "x is commonly misunderstood [by the cultural sector] to mean y". Witty Lama 07:23, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Secondly I have a number of issues with the content itself:
 * 1) Featured article: Why are we telling them this? What use are they supposed to make of this information in the early stages of editing? I don't myself think the best comparison for a featured article is a catalogue raisonné at all. They generally use very different styles - no catalogue raisonné entry would (even if suitably linked etc) be likely to meet the Featured article criteria as it stands, as they are written for those with a very good understanding of the subject, and take a considerable amount of knowledge for granted. Our FAs aspire more to a monograph style, or that of a good book written by an academic for, or partly for, a general readership. The styles of catalogue raisonnés varies considerably, but some of them exemplify exactly the sort of catalogue style we warn against lower down. The Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum mentioned in earlier discussions, is an example of this dry catalogue style. WP articles, whether featured or not, have to stand alone, while catalogue entries can have much common information and background in introductory sections, or just assume their specialized readership knows the standard books on the subject. That doesn't work for us.
 * I agree that they won't be writing FAs (at least, not yet) but this is a term than has caused confusion to the sector (in my experience) before. They think it means that we think that topic is more important, more worthy of discussion, rather than simply being something that someone was interested in enough to write about. So, when they say they "want to write Featured articles" they are actually meaning that they want to write on important topics not that they want to write front-page material. See what I mean?
 * As for the catalogue raisoné, I agree that the writing-style of a C.R. is not the same as a wikipedia FA. I was not trying to imply that it should be. I've adjusted the text to make that point more clear. What I was trying to do was give an example from their own terminology/experience for something that is considered to have the same respect/status in their community as a FA is in ours. Witty Lama 07:23, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

2) Neutrality. WP:PEACOCK, which should be linked, is likely to be the main issue here, unless there is a forgery/smuggled antiquity/Nazi era Jewish forced sales/aboriginal heritage etc issue. Parthenon Marbles is a good example to point to - that stays pretty neutral, though it is a battle to keep it so.
 * Sure. I see you've added that paragraph in. I might give it a once-over to see if the two paragraphs can be merged into the one. Witty Lama 07:23, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

3) Notability. Again I think the comparison with provenance is a mistake. Provenance reassures the art world an object is genuine, and is nice to have, but may do nothing beyond that. Equally, to take an example, the 12th century Cloisters Cross has no provenance to speak of, having turned up in the fake-ridden collection of a highly dubious Yugoslav collector just after WW2, but this does not affect its notability. Many Vermeers have only recent certain provenances, as he was for long a neglected artist.  Most of the time, "Notability" can in fact be equated with the term "significance" as it is used in the cultural sector, but with certain caveats, and setting a somewhat high standard. If an object really has a special cultural significance, it should be discussed in the specialist literature.
 * I was not trying to say that notability=provenance. But, as with the catalogue raisonné example above, it is simply a way to present something that is similar enough to get across the purpose of the concept. There are similarities with the way the two concepts work (e.g. better provenance increases sale value, better notability increases likelyhood of article being kept) but I'm not trying to say they're synonymous. The point of the glossary in general is to give an idea of the purpose/meaning/importance of the term by using words from their own lexicon. Like any translation there is not work-for-word correspondence but that's ok as long as the fundamental idea is expressed. Witty Lama 07:23, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

-Overall, I think it might be best to shorten the sections per the above, and work them into the FAQs. Johnbod (talk) 23:47, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I think the FAQs have enough sections and questions already. Yes, the glossary is kind of similar and could be rephrased as an FAQ (e.g."what does notability mean?") the purpose of this section is different enough to warrant a different format. Furthermore, although some information (especially about notability) is popping up in different parts of the page this allows people to find the information in different formats and digest it in a way that's suitable for them. Some people might prefer a "2 minute guide" and hate reading FAQs, some people might think the intro section is too generic and require more precise info given in the glossary or FAQ. I say, fair enough. Different people have different learning styles and want the same information presented in different ways. Witty Lama 07:23, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Please add art conservators to your list of persons invited to participate.
There are a few art conservators that are interested in exploring the use of Wikipedia as a way to document and record cultural heritage and cultural heritage events. Most of these folks can be found associated with the art conservation article. Many, many thanks for providing this advice page.

--Richard McCoy (talk) 08:56, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Great to hear from you Richard. Art conservators are most certainly meant to come under the auspices of this page. So, welcome and I hope it has been helpful to you. If you have any specific feedback you would like to give about what we have created here it would be most appreciated. Witty Lama 11:12, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

putting the word out
I've just made this blogpost part 1 and part 2 which discusses this page and related issues. I've also received some good re-tweeting about this page (as seen in part 2). So, I hope that in the next couple of days there'll be a few GLAM folks come through here and leave us a message :-) Best, Witty Lama 14:00, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

More discussion on Stanford archive links
One of the examples that keeps coming up is Stanford. I am not aware of the details, how they were adding, where they were adding and, (even though I may have been the reverting editor ..) how they were treated and why they were so bitten. However, I feel that there is one single key to the whole question:

I am afraid that Stanford, like many others, were plainly adding links, without discussing or consideration.

For me, when I see an editor spamming (i.e., adding links everywhere, I am not talking about what is linked to), I do have a look, consider a handful of additions, and see for each 'does this follow our policies and guidelines'. If out of the small set quite some fail (blatantly), I revert all (yes, also the good ones), and leave a message (or warning) on the talkpage of the editor. Since quite some time, if I feel that the data can be of interest, I also push them in the direction of a wikiproject. It then is to the editor, does the editor persist, or do they go into discussion. Another key point is: do I see that the editor is interacting with others (did the editor discuss before, how and what did they discuss). If that is the case, I am also more reluctant in reverting. (of course, I can't talk for others ..)

I think that this 'guide' could use some points 'what NOT to do when your edits get challenged', containing:


 * 1) do not ignore the editor and go on adding more
 * 2) don't wikilawyer, listen to the concerns
 * 3) create another account and persist
 * 4) run away, and come back 3 months later in the hope that the problem went away
 * 5) don't open a post on the talkpage ánd shortly after add the link without waiting for response

And things that the editor might want to consider before adding links:


 * 1) Contact a suitable wikiproject, ask what they think, if they are positive, you can add links only (somewhere the idea of a noticeboard here was considered, that would be a good place as well)
 * 2) and READ the involved guidelines
 * 3) and BE considerate in adding your links

It was argued that all these things take more time, and interns don't have that time, nor do the GLAMs themselves. However, the work that indiscriminate link placement may give (the reverting and discussion then) also takes time, and it does not take more time to post on the talkpage for the links where one is not sure about.

Would a bit of 'how to start' be an idea here? --Dirk Beetstra T C 08:20, 2 November 2009 (UTC)


 * I think this list of 5 things is something that should be done in any instance of communication - not just regarding external links. Perhaps you'd like to add that kind of info to the "contact" section. More generally though, I am getting a bit worried (not enough to do anything yet) that this page might be getting too much info warning against linking. I still want this page to be primarily encouraging rather than primarily full of warnings and "you'd better watch out that you don't do...or else." As someone else said (can't remember where in the conversations about this page), we should have a look to see what kind of reaction this page causes with GLAM-editors and then adjust the page to suit, rather than trying to cover every contingency now. Yes, it's still possible that some editor will spam us with links to their collection, but I really don't believe that it will be such a flood that would warrant the amount of energy and worry we are putting into this topic now. I understand that you, Beetstra, are particularly concerned about this issue but if all of the information is warning people off then it ceases to be a welcome and looks like our stereotype - an unfriendly community. Witty Lama 11:24, 2 November 2009 (UTC)


 * I agree with that, it should be welcoming. And I agree that it is not going to be an unhandleable flood (though that has happened in the past), but 'just add your links' is going a bit too far.  That is what a lot of accounts in the past did, and the examples I give are just there, from official archives, from private collections (I just reverted such a set, that editor could describe themselves as a 'free lance online archivist'; no, your stamp collection is nice, and the stamps about the 2008 olympics are beautiful, but it is not a suitable link on the 2008 olympics page), from industry.  It should be inviting, but in the same time encouraging discussion, cooperation and moderation, not 'go crazy, we will clean up after you'.  If that happens, we haven't accomplished anything, and we will again scare away just those archives that we have so carefully tried to get here.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 11:36, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
 * These are the Stanford contributions. See the talk page, where her boss comes in & explains: "I am the Principal Manuscripts Processing Librarian at Stanford University. The student who was inputting the links to the finding guides for manuscripts collections for the individuals and organizations was hired by the library for this project - she's the one who you've been corresponding with up to now....I modeled our entries to match resource links we saw from other manuscript repositories and research libraries around the country, including the Harry Ransom Center in Texas. Glynn Edwards" As far as I can see all the links I looked at remain in the articles as either references or links in "research resources", so presumably they are content. Like the Washington University at St Louis (contributions - he never got as much as a warning on his talk page), they have covered their special collections & moved on. This is a typical link destination.  There appears to me to be a consensus at the COI page & in practice that links like this, on biographies to substantial collections of personal papers, are ok. On general subjects (Slavery, World War II) things are probably different.  Personally I'm fairly neutral on this; if there are no items actually online, the utility is pretty limited - anyone likely to actually go to Stanford to see these will surely have access to books where more comprehensive information on archive sources is available.  I wonder how many people actually look at this  collection in a year?  The issues here are very different from those relating to museum objects.  We have text touching on this specific issue at various points, which could maybe be fleshed out & collected together.  The ones we see just tend to go ahead & do it, but there may be others held back by a wish to comply with our rules & uncertainty as to what they are.  We could do with more explicit instructions on what to do when such links are challenged.  It won't seem logical to someone who has added 30 such links if only say 2 are challenged, which unless they hit the COI radar is quite a likely outcome.  But from a WP pov that may be correct, if only the editors of 2 pages dislike the links. Johnbod (talk) 16:18, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

I am looking at the Stanford edits. These seem quite typical links which indeed can't be used as references, and hence, a consideration should be made if they are suitable external links. They do lead to a (sometimes huge) amount of offline data, so as such, generally it is a good external link/further reading/resource. However, some points (I may be nitpicking here, and yes, this is here undoubtedly true and correct, but can we check it? I don't need answers to every specific case, I know it is fine, but as someone who looks at it from the outside, this is what I see, and where my concerns are, citing WP:EL: "No page should be linked from a Wikipedia article unless its inclusion is justifiable according to this guideline and common sense."):


 * 1) here on Luis Leal the link was added to a relatively short page.  As the editor who added the link here, they did have access to the 67 feet (!!!) of papers (and the papers are not online, so someone would have to go there to use the resource).  As far as I checked I do not see any content edits anywhere.  (small note: the number added to wikipedia '82 linear feet' is in contrast with what the page says '67 linear feet'!)
 * 2) Bit minor: the format of the line is James Henry Carleton Papers : typescript transcripts of letters and reports, 1851-1865(call number M0006; 1 binder) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives at Stanford University Libraries, I would have considered James Henry Carleton Papers : typescript transcripts of letters and reports, 1851-1865(call number M0006; 1 binder) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives of Stanford University Libraries to be more neutral and more in line with our thoughts.
 * 3) Minor: the links do not lead to more info, they lead to an aggregate where more information can be found, they are questionable (not forbidden) against WP:ELNO.
 * 4) Minor: sometimes the style is a bit excessive, see Niven Busch, that could be done as well as: Niven Busch's California Street Papers, 1955-59 (0.5 linear ft.), The Gentleman from California Papers, 1964-66 (1 linear ft.), and the The San Franciscans Papers, 1959-1962 (0.5 linear ft.) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives at Stanford University Libraries.
 * 5) Sticking with Niven Busch, the page is unreferenced.  2 feet of references not used?  Someone here close to Stanford?
 * 6) On 18 July 2008 the editor was warned for COI.  A large number of links were already included .  In the warning, Orange Mike says that he is reverting, but he did not do that on most of the edits I checked.  He also explains concerns.  The editor did not respond to this, but proceeded .  More warnings by multiple editors follow, and reverting seems to really proceed on the 21st or 21nd.
 * 7) As expressed in the concerns, the material is only physically available (not online), it is very difficult to check and verify whether the links are correct, if there are really 67 (or is it 82) linear feet, whether the material is actually something that adds.
 * 8) does this 0.75 linear ft. really add something that is not covered by the other 23 external links that are already there?

This pretty much is an example of where my general concerns are expressed (I only checked a subset; the majority of what I checked is fine). It is again about propriety. If there was earlier a response to the concerns, and not just proceeding, then this would not have happened. And these are the situations that just happen too often. We here see a good editor doing this, but I am sure that also in library and museum world there is rivalry, and one library can do a lot of damage by pushing undiscussed a large number of seemingly fine links to pages (Joe jobbing). I therefore would strictly NOT suggest to say "go ahead, 'spam' your links", but built in caution, be considerate, use moderation, even good links can be spammed, and though here certainly generally the information adds, again, I have seen several where the link does not add to the page AT ALL, while it is a fitting and good link with a great image and correct and reliable data. That, in combination with the cases where they are here to promote (which I have seen quite some times now), I strongly oppose with 'do what you want' type of language. We're going to get into trouble. Are we losing something because Stanford is now blocked and the intern will not return .. yes and no. There are many places where the intern could be of a bigger help (actually walking to the shelves and pulling out one or two boxes, yes, it will be a bit slower .. but that really helps us forward), and due to persistence in linking, this turned into a bad example, and therefore I am strongly encouraging you all to incorporate stronger language, yes, allow and invite them to help, by all means, but please with consideration.

Have any of you actually considered a pull-strategy, in stead of waiting for push strategy being applied? Stanford has a huge database, which just can be pulled here, we don't have to wait until someone comes along and adds/pushes the information. Again I go back to the verification work on chemical compounds, members from WikiProject Chemicals are actually pulling information out of commercial (!!) databases (I personally do it using a perl-script), I don't think that anyone will have problems with pulling public domain information out of non-profit maintained databases! --Dirk Beetstra T C 12:46, 3 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure I follow all your points. Very little of this sort of material is in any sort of electronic form, so I'm not sure what your last para means. The great majority of it will anyway be primary source material, so of little or no use for referencing here. I don't believe either this page or the COI one currently says anything like ""go ahead, 'spam' your links"," - which bits of the current versions do you mean?   Some of the numbered points are valid - but eg #8 has been removed at some point anyway, perhaps because the Stanford link is included in a far more comprehensive list of links to library collections at the University of Nottingham (part of the 2nd EL link). One thing we might add to a specific section on such links is that these comprehensive lists are much preferred, and items on them should not be linked a second time.  The Niven Busch links are still there, & as mainly the original MSS of published novels really won't be of relevance to many people.  Like Ms Stanford, you've missed the point that the link at Luis Leal was added to completely the wrong person -a baseball player, not a writer, historian etc! It was reverted by Ryan P the same day.   Johnbod (talk) 13:16, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Heh, I did miss the point of Luis Leal, which strengthens my concerns.

No, this is not a current concern anymore, maybe this should be in a separate section here. It was a bit in response to '...that this page might be getting too much info warning against linking.' I think that that is warranted, but to me it sounded (not being familiar with the Stanford 'case') that this was an example of perfect link additions, with which there was absolutely nothing wrong.

The previous version (the old #7) did give the impression 'go ahead, link what you like' (at least, that would not be a wrong interpretation of the sentence that was there). It may be primary sources, still there is information about the life of the person. It tells more about the person. Maybe you are right, this is a database which can not be used to expand, but I don't believe that that is a generality either, so then it is still not a case of 'add what you like', consider strictly what is linked to.

I was talking about the additions, some where indeed properly removed in the meantime. For me this is again a clear example of someone who is just adding links, without considering the page it was added to. And thát is just what my problem was against saying: 'Adding pointers to useful primary sources in archives, special collections or libraries in the Research resources section of an article. Also, adding External links to digitized or digital primary sources or finding aids.'.

Regarding the last para. The Stanford webpage runs from a database, which links '13030/tf52900414' to the name 'D._H._Lawrence' (that is how you get from an url with that number to the name of the page. All webpages that handle this type of data work like that.  In other words, if you ask Stanford, then I am sure they can give you a list of names with linked the numbers (seen the speed of editing of Sulair.speccoll, they must have worked from such a list, and that also explains the Luis Leal mistake!).  If you have that list, you can add the information (even semi-automatic), in other words, you pulled the information from their server.  If they do it, they push.  The first option avoids impropriety, can be done with several people, can be checked better, whereas the last (which involves an editor who may not be familiar with Wikipedia) may give more errors (if you have a list of numbers and names, then you have to make sure that the name on your list matches the subject of the page, if they make one mistake, who knows if it is one or 10 or 50 .. so how reliable is the linking, hence a strong argument in favour of mass rollback and 'forcing' the editor to stop, how bitey that may seem). Moreover, we don't even have to discuss any possibilities of COI, or need this page.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 15:01, 3 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Ok I understand - of course their bios are not primary, & might be useful. Whether they are pushed or pulled, I think it would be useful to develop clearer guidelines as to what types of archive links are actually encouraged, tolerated or discouraged.  Johnbod (talk) 15:26, 3 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Oh, I think all good archives/databases should be encouraged. I think this guideline however is aimed at 'how should GLAMs push' (excuse my wording), and we should make sure we don't go to far towards 'link what you like' (which is then very inviting), but also not to far towards 'don't link, you have a conflict of interest and you can't do it right' (though there are many examples where there is a significant error rate; I just looked at some of the diffs of Sulair.speccoll, and these are ones which I find questionable, and I did not even notice that one was plainly wrong).  We have to end somewhere in the middle, and unfortunately, look at the past and see where it goes wrong.  I think that massive archives like Stanford should be encouraged, though there is of course also there somewhere a threshold, we can't possibly link to all databases.  Hence that I tried to include something along the lines of 'your data should not be covered by the other external links' (which of course is also difficult, every letter is almost by definition unique, and so not covered by others).
 * Using a collection of letters to write something in Wikipedia is a difficult question, the letters are primary and are difficult to use except for some indirect data and quotes, saying something based solely on the letters may be synthesis. So I do see that the linking of those databases can be of interest there.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 15:43, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

Past examples - Wikipedia Art
What do people think about the recently-added "Wikipedia Art, an art intervention on Wikipedia..." negative example in "Past examples"? I rather think it is out of place because this page is aimed at significant institutions, not a small group involved in art. Johnuniq (talk) 02:49, 3 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree. This was artists, or art students more likely, not curators etc. Johnbod (talk) 02:57, 3 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I think it should stay until we find a better example (such as the Stanford interaction above). Sure it was a bunch of art students but it does illustrate how far you have to go to get Wikipedia to react. filceolaire (talk) 15:29, 3 November 2009 (UTC)
 * However, WP:MLA is all about large institutions with research resources. It is confusing to mention the Wikipedia Art prank here because an MLA person might spend ten minutes trying to make sense of it, and end up baffled (does "MLA" include anything vaguely related to art?). More fundamentally, the prank is absolutely nothing to do with MLA (no research institution is going to establish a website with a name or logo that might suggest an official connection with Wikipedia). Also, we should not mention specific examples like Stanford because that's just unnecessary embarrassment and conflict. It's ok to mention the NPG issue because it is a public case with its own article. If there is no specific reason to keep Wikipedia Art, I think it should removed now. Johnuniq (talk) 09:32, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Agreed. I'm not sure "it does illustrate how far you have to go to get Wikipedia to react" in any meaningful way. Normally all you have to do is vandalize something. I'll take it out, but add it here for anyone interested:

Johnbod (talk) 12:49, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia Art, an art intervention on Wikipedia by Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern. The article was deleted and the Wikimedia Foundation expressed concerns about infringement of their trademark by wikipediaart.org. See the story on "The Signpost" here.

Guideline for what a link looks like
In article William F. Durand we see the following (this is inspired by a point made by Dirk Beetstra above):
 * Research resources
 * Dams, Papers Concerning Design and Construction, 1903-1956 (3 linear ft.) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives at Stanford University Libraries
 * William F. Durand Papers, 1893-1979 (1.25 linear ft.) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives at Stanford University Libraries

Each of the two Stanford lines contains three external links. Can we agree that such formatting is unacceptable? We do not want to make an exhaustive list of dos and don'ts, and I do not expect MLA contributors to read all the MLA guidelines. However, we need a statement somewhere so that when the next contributor wants to add links like the above, we can use prior consensus to guide them to add links like the following (one external link, and one WP link):
 * Option 1
 * Dams, Papers Concerning Design and Construction, 1903-1956 (3 linear ft.) at Stanford University Libraries


 * Option 2
 * Dams, Papers Concerning Design and Construction, 1903-1956 (3 linear ft.) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives at Stanford University Libraries

I favor option 1. The external link goes to a page with all the details (a couple of clicks shows the name and address of the library, with a map of its location). The text "Department of Special Collections and University Archives" is not helpful here. The external links to the library and the university would be wonderful exposure, but they are too open to abuse by encouraging the addition of promotional links.

Our guideline might also suggest that if there is no suitable Wikipedia article for the institution, then the external link would generally not be regarded as part of this MLA procedure. Johnuniq (talk) 09:17, 4 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, if the information is really good and the link is going to appear on many articles, then the archive is notable enough for an own article. I favour one as well, I think that is also the one is similar to the one I mentioned above.  Better may even be, construct with a wikiproject a template, and do something like .  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:29, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
 * As will normally be the case, the internal link goes to the university, as we don't have an article on the Library. I think I would prefer:
 * Dams, Papers Concerning Design and Construction, 1903-1956 (3 linear ft.) at Stanford University Libraries

- just moving "Libraries" out of the link. But I'm not sure we should prescribe too closely - all of these should be acceptable, but not the way Stanford have done it. Johnbod (talk) 12:46, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Standford - a case study?
These points are mentioned above, though it may be better to split them off. I am here looking at the contributions by Sulair.speccoll. I don't want to suggest that there is anything wrong with the database itself, but just as an example of things that raise the questions that this guideline wants to answer. Here again (refactored to take out my 'mistake', and I added some more):


 * 1) here on Luis Leal.  The document on Stanford is not about this Luis Leal.
 * 2) here to Howard_Baker_(poet) the link was added to a relatively short page.  As the editor who added the link here, they did have access to the 33 feet (!!!) of papers (and the papers are not online, so someone would have to go there to use the resource).  As far as I checked I do not see any content edits anywhere.
 * 3) http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Luis_Leal&oldid=227070222 here] on Luis Leal, the number added to wikipedia '82 linear feet' is in contrast with what the page says '67 linear feet'!
 * 4) Bit minor: the format of the line is James Henry Carleton Papers : typescript transcripts of letters and reports, 1851-1865(call number M0006; 1 binder) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives at Stanford University Libraries, I would have considered James Henry Carleton Papers : typescript transcripts of letters and reports, 1851-1865(call number M0006; 1 binder) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives of Stanford University Libraries to be more neutral and more in line with our thoughts.   (addressed above in )
 * 5) Minor: the links do not lead to more info, they lead to an aggregate where more information can be found, they are questionable (not forbidden) against WP:ELNO.
 * 6) Minor: sometimes the style is a bit excessive, see Niven Busch, that could be done as well as: Niven Busch's California Street Papers, 1955-59 (0.5 linear ft.), The Gentleman from California Papers, 1964-66 (1 linear ft.), and the The San Franciscans Papers, 1959-1962 (0.5 linear ft.) are housed in the Department of Special Collections and University Archives at Stanford University Libraries. (addressed above in )
 * 7) Sticking with Niven Busch, the page is unreferenced.  2 feet of references not used?  Someone here close to Stanford?
 * 8) On 18 July 2008 the editor was warned for COI.  A large number of links were already included .  In the warning, Orange Mike says that he is reverting, but he did not do that on most of the edits I checked.  He also explains concerns.  The editor did not respond to this, but proceeded .  More warnings by multiple editors follow, and reverting seems to really proceed on the 21st or 21nd.
 * 9) As expressed in the concerns, the material is only physically available (not online), it is very difficult to check and verify whether the links are correct, if there are really 67 (or is it 82) linear feet, whether the material is actually something that adds.
 * 10) does this 0.75 linear ft. really add something that is not covered by the other 23 external links that are already there?
 * 11) Though variable, links are sometimes added to the top of the list (see diff, above the official homepage of the subject Harry Gamboa, Jr..  No, the archive of Stanford is not more important then the official homepage of a (living) subject.

These are typical concerns with additions like these, concerns which come up over and over. And unfortunately, it happens just as well for good databases as for bad links. If these things come up, and this type of examples can be found, then that raises questions for every other one, as they literally all need to be scrutinized, as there may be more mistakes. I've gone to wikiprojects before when I was in doubt, but I never had someone go through all these additions (as I don't know enough about them sometimes) and saying 'I removed the ones which were mistaken, the rest can stay', so the errors are left there. I also have hardly ever had an editor after they was warned for COI coming back and saying 'oops, what do you want me to do, can we solve this?', I see more often that they proceed or even, start socking. Though this may make the guide here sound condescending, we might want to address these issues. --Dirk Beetstra T C 09:53, 4 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Funny, this morning I was pointed to Arcadia616, who adds links similar to the Stanford links (it may just be that Bancroft Library uses the same database system as Stanford). I've spent some time going through the contributions, looking at diffs etc.  Could we please include Arcadia616 as a good example!  I find the edits generally considerate, and I have hardly found any of the above 11 points, and that over ~125 edits.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 08:23, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

A rare Afd for a museum work of art
See Articles for deletion/Krishna and Radha in a Pavilion - an Indian miniature. Johnbod (talk) 18:24, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

looks good
I haven't visited here for awhile - it looks good. 2 points:
 * 1) The 2 minute overview looks like about 10 minutes now!
 * 2) Is everybody aware of Wikimedia best practices w cultural institutions?

Smallbones (talk) 15:47, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

"Research resources"?
What's this supposed to mean?

If there are, expand the article and include a reference to your catalogue under a section on "Research resources"


 * 1) Does this mean, "Please don't properly WP:CITE your collection to support the additions you've made to the article?"
 * 2) Does it mean, "I don't like calling three linear feet of books WP:FURTHERREADING, so I made up a new title?"
 * 3) Does it mean something else?
 * 4) Is this supposed to be a "Works" section (e.g., books written by this author), or a "Works cited" section (=stuff used to support the article's content) or an "External links" section?
 * 5) Is it none of the above, and we're just trying to circumvent WP:NOTDIR?
 * 6) And is there any reason that MOS:APPENDIX doesn't know about this newly invented appendix? WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:10, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
 * (numbered for convenience)
 * 1-2 No, 3 yes, 4 none of these. 5 None of the above, 6 No one has told them I presume. I'm less concerned about the formailities than the utility of such sections, if they become common. See above, & at COI talk etc. Johnbod (talk) 21:55, 4 December 2009 (UTC)


 * What do you expect to happen here? The archivist is asked to "expand the article" -- a task that requires a citation to a source -- but then to specifically "include a reference" in some place other than the usual ==References== section.  Why should refs to an archive be listed differently and separately from any other reference?  WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:58, 6 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, I'd missed that addition, which didn't make much sense & I've removed it. AFAIK this rewsearch resources bit is meant to be for collections of unpublished material available, mainly in archives. An unpublished museum catalogue would not normally be available for research in the same way, & it can be assumed that any museum owner of an object has some extra info on it, so I can't really see the point. Johnbod (talk) 14:09, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

List of resources for editors to consult
Is there a Wikipedia page where new or major resources are listed by subject area, or by resource type? Or a list of lists of such things? I'm asking because there are two resources I recently became aware of, and I'd like to make more editors aware of them, so they can consider using them for articles they are working on (this can sometimes be better than MLA professionals doing the adding, sometimes worse - I think a mixture of the two works best). The two resource are: Indeed, it would be good to have a comprehensive listing of all the major online (and maybe offline) collections at libraries and museums and archives and so on, and discussions about how best to use them in articles. I'm aware that such a list, or collection of lists, would be absolutely monumental, but it could be an incredibly useful resource. Most lists on Wikipedia at the moment are limited to freely-licensed resources, but I think Wikipedia is doing a dis-service to its readers if it fails to inform them about all the possible material out there about the subject of an article. Now, this may veer dangerously close to WP:NOTDIR, but listings of possibilities are incredibly useful to anyone considering working on an article. It kickstarts the process and avoids having to start from scratch. Clearly what goes on the article page needs to be organised and coherent, but that shouldn't exclude the possibility of having a much longer list on the talk page, or a talk page subpage. Items could be moved to and from that subpage and to and from the main article, as people assess what is relevant or not. Does that ides have possibilities? Carcharoth (talk) 13:44, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * AIP oral histories
 * Pathe News Archive
 * I think a general list would indeed fall foul of WP:NOTDIR, but specialized lists somewhere on relevant project pages would be ok.  Johnbod (talk) 14:26, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Idea of portal-type pages for cultural institutions on Wikipedia
I think it might be a good idea to have portal-type pages for cultural institutions on Wikipedia that would be curated by them, and would list (1) interesting articles and content related to the institution and current exhibitions, etc, as well as (2) whatever collaborations they may have done with Wikimedia projects. Many institutions already maintain presences on a variety of different social media sites; wouldn't it be nice for example to add a puzzle globe to the collection of icons on the Connect with NYPL page?--Pharos (talk) 05:52, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Hmmm - read the (mostly very rude) reader comments on the NYPL YouTube page. Another thing for the poor media departments to have to keep updated. It would make more sense on Commons, & if it led them to categorize, present & even add to the images there would be a good thing. The same might go for the few museums with lots of articles on objects here, but for example what could the NYPL one have on it? Equally I wonder if eg the British Museum or Metropolitan would want to lead people to some of the crap stubs we have. Johnbod (talk) 15:52, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, this type of social media outreach is certainly the type of thing that many cultural institutions value, and I think therefore that we should value their participation here as well (and, fortunately, we don't have the Youtube comments issue; it's well-known, though it is not the case in this instance, that for whatever reason Youtube videos tend to attract quite a fair share of offensive and even highly bigoted comments). I think we have to think bigger in terms of what makes for interesting Wikipedia content than "an article on this particular thing"; for example, I think vistitors to the NYPL exhibit Michael Dal Cerro: Contingent and Eternal City would enhance their experience with some background reading on such topics as Retro-futurism, Woodblock printing in Japan, Giovanni Battista Piranesi and Pop art.--Pharos (talk) 17:03, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Maybe; most museums would prefer you to buy their catalogue, I'm sure, but this doesn't seem to have one. Johnbod (talk) 17:08, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I like this idea. That would be more understandable to many library staff and supporters than a WikiProject subpage. (see my question below about where to organize such collaborations)  +sj+  21:52, 30 January 2010 (UTC)


 * We've now started the first portal-type page in collaboration with the New York Public Library, and you can find it at Culture/NYPL.--Pharos (talk) 17:14, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Suggestion to move this page to Culture
I would like to suggest that we move this page to Culture, a title which may be more convenient for a bunch of things, including hosting portal-type pages for cultural institutions as at Culture/New York Public Library (I have actually recently gotten a positive response from them, and it might be good to work with the NYPL as our prototype).--Pharos (talk) 04:43, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Rather an ambitious & unclear name. I'd rather it stayed where it is. This page is mainly for "industry" users, & I don't see how or why it should "host" portal-type pages Johnbod (talk) 12:12, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I like the current name, as WP:Culture should be a broader summary of how Wikipedia works with cultural groups, and how to participate in that; this page is quite specifically advice for alrge institutions with their own PROJECT:Culture guidelines who are trying to interact with WP (and would of course be one of the links from a more general page on WP and Culture).  +sj+  21:56, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Fair enough that something like Culture should be done as a separate page, rather than being tacked onto this project. I've given the new page a first stab; let me know what you think.--Pharos (talk) 18:28, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Creating project pages
We have strong interest in collaboration with Wikipedia from the Library of Congress and the NYPL. These should have a place to coordinate their work... is that use appropriate for WP:Culture/NAME? Or perhaps more generally WP:Partners/NAME? Do this work deserve a new WikiProject? While Commons is often the first visible recipient of large donations of material, the envisioned project is sometimes more in terms of its impact on Wikipedia (when working with a general library more than an image archive) +sj+ 21:56, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Category:Wikipedia collaborations Category:Wikipedia events and real life initiatives or Category:Wikipedia school and university projects are the models I think. Pages can just be set up and categorized somewhere there, eventually with a specific category when there are a few. Equally there's not much point in setting up a new project until its clear there are a number of people with an enduring interest. Or do it as an offshoot of the Libraries project. Johnbod (talk) 23:23, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

It's time for a re-think of the Artwork Infobox
The Artwork Infobox is a good and useful template for adding tombstone information about artworks, but I think it could benefit from a top down re-think. Is it doing all of the things that are needed for artworks in GLAMs? It's really good in that it auto-converts inches to cm, and vice versa, but could it do more? I recently placed on the Artwork Infobox Talk Page a call for the re-organization of the measurement systems. In addition to that I think it would benefit from having a listing of multiple locations, multiple owners, and multiple control numbers. What I mean by control number is a more generic term for acquisition number, but can really be any number that is assigned to an artwork. The way infoboxes work is that the lines don't show up until you enter info. Maybe something along the lines of


 * Owner


 * Previous owner


 * Previous owner


 * Previous owner


 * Location:


 * Previous location:


 * Previous location:


 * Previous location:


 * Control number:


 * Previous control number:


 * Previous control number:


 * Previous control number:

Thoughts?

--Richard McCoy (talk) 13:36, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * My initial reaction to this is that it seems a lot of arcane information of use to certain specialists but of little interest to the general public. It is also info about institutional processing of the artwork, rather than information intrinsic to the work for what it is, namely art. By this I mean that more relevant information would be e.g. influences, but I'm not suggesting adding this field. If the information suggested above is deemed essential, I would rather it were in a separate infobox at the bottom of the article, such as is used for the holders of public office.  Ty  14:32, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Interesting. I don't think have corrected dimensions, ownerships, location, and ID number to be arcane information for specialists at all. It's the very stuff that museum folks use to verify that an artwork is what it says it is. It's how they are tracked through the ages.

I think keeping subjective things out of the box to be a good idea.

Take for example the LOVE sculpture. The first one ever made is owned by the Indianapolis Museum of Art, LOVE at IMA], but that piece has been in multiple locations, and surveyed by Save Outdoor Sculpture!: LOVE from SOS!. Now there are a variety of different versions out there, of varying dimensions--folks have started to collect all of these versions in the Wikipedia article for LOVE (sculpture).

I think have more fixed data fields the better when talking about art in Wikipedia. In a field that is based on subjective decisions and opinions, the more empirical info the better. --Richard McCoy (talk) 15:12, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I'd like to hear more about why the "general public" would not be interested in such basic information about an artwork as its ownership status and location history. The meaning of art changes as it moves through different geographic and historical contexts--consider the examples of works plundered in war or stolen--so this is vital information. Especially since Infoboxes are designed to minimize clutter, I see no harm in adding a few fields that would supply important information, if available. I'm curious about other ways the Art Infobox could be improved to make learning about art as easy as learning about sports teams or elected officials in Wikipedia. Jgmikulay (talk) 15:32, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Wouldn't some of the above be in violation of WP:NOTDIRECTORY or WP:NOTCATALOG? I don't think that the "meaning of art changes as it moves through different geographic and historical contexts." Its history proceeds apace, but I would tend to think its meaning remains the same. Bus stop (talk) 15:40, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The suggestion is excellent. Since the data only appears when the information is added therefore it may attract professionals as well as the general public to Wikipedia. I am against adding information “e.g. influences.” It is against Wikipedia policy WP:NPOV. {Salmon1 (talk) 15:55, 9 March 2010 (UTC))


 * "Influences" have a place, but only if sourced. Article space is a better space for discussing influences than "infoboxes." Bus stop (talk) 16:02, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Most visual arts editors, including myself, regard infoboxes as a nuisance in visual arts articles (though not necessarily in other sorts) mainly because they considerably restrict the size of the image, and because they are typically added by editors who know little about the subject & are full of howlers. Even for unique works, acquisition numbers tend not to be in the article text for paintings, though they are for illuminated manuscripts. There should be an external link to the institution which enables this information to be found by the very few who might need it. For the relatively small number of works existing in say 2-12 copies, an infobox containing even just the location details is likely to be over-dominant; all that should be in the main text. Most works are either unique or in many copies. There is a section here on the "surviving impressions" of a rare Renaissance print - only about 50 copies known. Try fitting that in an infobox. As Ty says, some other sort of template at the bottom of the page could be useful for small edition sculptures of provenances, but infoboxes are supposed to go in the top by the lead .Johnbod (talk) 15:56, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I think captions under images of artworks suffice in most instances, supplying basic information such as dimensions, basic media used, perhaps a rudimentary descriptive term for a class of technique, and a date of completion, assuming that is applicable. Adaptability of these methods of conveying information is important as not all artwork fits the same descriptive fields. Bus stop (talk) 16:21, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The addition of suggested detailed information is useful for attracting professional and general readers. Editors do not restrict information. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. It provides information in a concise fashion. I am not one of the described editor by you
 * “who know little about the subject & are full of howlers.”

May be this is the time to start to carry on discussions in a civilized fashion. (Salmon1 (talk) 16:37, 9 March 2010 (UTC))
 * Oh calm down. I wasn't referring to you, and in fact wrote my comment before yours appeared - I was edit-conflicted by you. Johnbod (talk) 17:00, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The suggestion was that the external link be provided to the institution, if available, providing this information. I tend to agree that few readers would require detailed information of this nature. I don't know what category of "professional" people you have in mind. And why would average readers want to know ownership history, locations the artwork has resided in, and "control numbers?" Bus stop (talk) 16:43, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm really, really confused as to where this discussion has gone.
 * I think the hitching point seems to be unnecessarily stuck on "meaning of art changes as it moves through different geographic and historical contexts.'' While this is not nearly as true for 2-D paintings, it is abundantly clear for 3-D sculptures. Try putting moving the Statue of Liberty to Iowa and saying that it's historical context won't be changed.


 * I'm not sure why everyone is so distraught about the addition of more information in infoboxes. If nothing is entered in that line, then it simply will not appear.


 * Not all art is owned by museums, and a fraction of museums actually have more than a tiny percent of their collections visible online.

--Richard McCoy (talk) 17:22, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The sort of information you are suggesting is at odds with the general nature of "infoboxes." I don't like infoboxes in general, I will admit that. I won't go into why at the moment. But I think the general nature of infoboxes are to be especially "user friendly." But that sort of information is just the sort of information that the general reader probably doesn't need. I think such information is a low priority. Bus stop (talk) 17:49, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I think the things we need to consider here are a) whether the information is within Wikipedia's scope and b) whether the information is appropriate for an infobox. I'd say that for (b) list-type information such as ownership history is probably not appropriate: the information isn't fine-grained enough. It might be appropriate in the article as part of the history of the artwork; prose. So I see perhaps current owner to be useful, but not historical owners. The identifiers I think fail (a): they don't provide very much information and that information doesn't seem particularly relevant to an encyclopedic presentation of the subject. It might be plausible to mention it in passing, but if these are per-institution identifiers it doesn't seem much more than trivia to the end-user. {&#123; Nihiltres &#124;talk&#124;edits&#124;⚡}&#125; 18:02, 9 March 2010 (UTC) (iPod edit)


 * This is totally absurd! What is this "general nature" of infoboxes and how do I find out more about it?  Art is not general, but usually in itself unique, and often with a unique history.


 * I'm beginning to wonder if anyone has actually looked at the current infobox for artworks and really considered what I'm talking about. This information of course is within the scope and, if you would have looked you would have noticed that there are already lines for Dimensions, Location, and Owner (not fine-grained enough? huh?).  I'm not really clear what nihiltres is saying--it seems contradictory.


 * I really, really, really hope the consensus on this talk page is that historical context is unimportant to artworks. Please tell me that's not the case.--Richard McCoy (talk) 18:25, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The copyright permission is a legal responsibility. The ownership and subsequent ownership presentations are moral responsibility. I believe that the information is critical for establishing authenticity. The same applies to location and previous locations. Control numbers it may or may not to be found. It may require creating an additional box to present the information for specific research interest. If the information in question can be found then it should be presented in Wikipedia. P.S. Describing others frequently a way to describe oneself. It is better to stick to the subject.. (Salmon1 (talk) 18:50, 9 March 2010 (UTC))


 * Richard McCoy, Salmon1, you are proposing presenting the "provenance" for an artwork. Correct me if I am wrong about that. If so, my question to you is why is that so important in a Wikipedia article? Bus stop (talk) 19:33, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I think you good folks may well be having more of an aesthetic disagreement than anything else. Provenance information is quite important, though, and should be represented somewhere if not always in the pretty box at the top-right. What about a solution like at Thinking outside the infobox?--Pharos (talk) 19:35, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I just discovered this: WP:DISINFOBOX. It seems to describe some of the misgivings I've felt about infoboxes. Bus stop (talk) 19:44, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

All the information mentioned may be of importance, & can be included, but why in an infobox? From the MOS: "As you design an infobox template, consider the following questions:


 * Is the field of value? : How important is the field to the articles that will use the infobox? Is it summary information, or more extended detail that may be better placed within the body of an article?


 * Will the field be relevant to many of the articles that will use the infobox? : If the field is relevant to very few articles, it should probably not be included at all. Conversely, very common fields may be included—and made optional—even if they are not applicable to a few of the articles in question."

Is this an attempt to introduce a database by stealth? If that is what you want to do, why not just say so? Johnbod (talk) 20:22, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Johnbod, for applying a bit of logic to this mess. Again, the only thing new to info boxes that I've suggested is a control number, which means a museum acquisition number or some other database number.

Let's answer the questions:

Is the field of value?

Dimensions: Yes, of course: it's summary information. It's already in the infobox, but needs improved for better standardization. Common museum practice is h x w x l. It should be switched to that.

Owner: Yes, of course: it's summary information. It's already in the infobox, but multiple entries would be beneficial.

Location: Yes, of course: it's summary information. It's already in the infobox, but multiple entries would be beneficial. Control number: Yes, of course: it's summary information. It would allow for easy cross-referencing of objects to previous owners, collections, numbering system.

Will the field be relevant to many of the articles that will use the infobox?

As stated, 3 of these fields have already proven to be relevant, even if they aren't always filled out correctly. By adding successive numbers below then this would allow for better clarity. Likewise, have a control number listed will further validate it's collection history as stated in the above example of the LOVE sculpture.

Is this database by stealth?

Interesting idea. Most museums track their artworks by databases (which of course, makes the control number relevant. Having more information in a standardized format like a database would be handy and more translatable to other platforms (and vice versa). I'm most interested in helping to make an encyclopedia that has accurate information about art in it, and verifying this information through other databases.  If I could figure out how to make WP into a database, I'd probably be a lot richer than I am now. --Richard McCoy (talk) 20:49, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * This discussion's content and tone confuse me. The Infobox exists; it's a really helpful way to organize information.Richard McCoy is just asking for the ability to elaborate a bit when more information is available, referenced, and important to understanding the artwork. This seems like a really good idea to me. Jgmikulay (talk) 21:06, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
 * How many artworks have 3 known previous "locations" that are meaningfully summed up in 2-3 words? "Private collection, New York", "London art market" or "Buggins collection" is just clutter for nearly all readers.  Does this include dealers, or the artist?  If all this stuff is included in the template, who knows what less sophisticated infobox-fillers will make of it as they wade through? I've written long sections on complicated provenances like that of the Arnolfini Portrait, but I wouldn't want any of it it in an infobox.  The current location is obviously highly relevant, but the interest of previous ones is best explained in prose.  Infoboxes rapidly fall down if the information included is not utterly simple, unambiguous, and clear for both readers & those filling them out, which is why stuff like "influences" so often is misleading.  What's the problem with the dimensions? Not too many artworks we cover need depth/length, since they are nearly all (unfortunately) paintings, & this can be added manually when it is, surely?  I don't object strongly to that going in - twice I suppose for inches too. Johnbod (talk) 22:27, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree with Johnbod here. On the dimensions, of course, I'll add length in properly soon (once not-tired/not-busy/not-studying/access-to-suitable-text-editor and all). But the other ones are either not simple (i.e. owner history, location history) or of questionable relevance to Wikipedia (i.e. control numbers). I think that there's a strong case that the ownership and location history aren't appropriate for the infobox (in particular, they can be overly complex: write them out in prose) and a weak case for the control number. I'm particularly open on the latter. Even if it's not appropriate per se, there are alternatives, such as placing the control number in the template invisibly (hide the parameter using CSS and let those who care manually make it visible to them using  or some such in their personal CSS) or as a dummy parameter (provided in the page source, but not used in the template). Either way, the consideration I'm making is for the end-users. I think that there's a good case that can be made for control numbers if it can be shown that they are useful for making the content verifiable, e.g. if the object can easily be found in a publicly-viewable database using that number. Bonus points if a URL can be constructed mechanically from the identifier for a significant number of museums (since we could then totally justify linking a control number to the content that verifies everything else in the infobox, perhaps even automatically). {&#123; Nihiltres &#124;talk&#124;edits&#124;⚡}&#125; 06:24, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Infoboxes Part 2
I've made a separator for clarity. Thanks everyone for commenting, and thanks, Nihiltres, for offering to fix the dimensions when you have time. Having those more clearly identified will be extremely helpful for identifying art other than paintings and prints.

I really hope and trust that you all don't decide to go back into the infobox and remove the lines for owner and location after this discussion. That would not only be immensely frustrating and counterproductive, but also likely start quite a row over there.

I want to point out that in mobile versions of Wikipedia, the infobox takes on a new level of importance. Take for example, the article on Mega-Gem, which has been installed in at least 3 different locations in its relatively short life: the infobox serves as the summary of the article and is shown first, at the top of the screen; you have to scroll down to see other information and click boxes to open new sections. See what it looks like on the iPhone. --Richard McCoy (talk) 13:24, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
 * On removing the current owner and location fields: current owner and location data is relevant to an infobox despite the full history not being so. So have no fear, those fields are safe. :) {&#123; Nihiltres &#124;talk&#124;edits&#124;⚡}&#125; 19:52, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
 * But do we actually need both? In the vast majority of cases the owner & location are the same museum, and:


 * Location:Louvre, Paris


 * is much better than


 * Owner:Louvre
 * Location:Paris

(or:
 * Owner:French Government (or "Musées de France", technically the correct answer)
 * Location:Louvre, Paris )

The trouble with optional boxes is that people feel a need to fill them in, however silly the results. Hence the strong prejudice against expanding them which puzzles Richard so much. Johnbod (talk) 20:35, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes, puzzling, because I think we should be trying to create infoboxes that work for the right reasons, not to prevent editors from making obvious mistakes.

Yes, having them both is absolutely essential if you look at artworks not contained within a cultural institution. Take for example public art. A location is totally different thing than an owner. In the U.S. an artwork on a courthouse lawn (county property), could be owned and managed by the city. This is just one example. Please also consider art not contained with a museum.

--Richard McCoy (talk) 22:29, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I realize that is your interest, but the vast majority of articles on artworks are on paintings or antiquities etc in museums, so the MOS guideline becomes relevant. Extra fields can always be added, & you can always keep your own version - I don't think that is discouraged, is it? Johnbod (talk) 01:41, 11 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure if I agree that "the vast majority of articles in WP are about paintings or antiques in museums." I've had a hard time finding comprehensive information to make that kind of statement, so of course I'd be very interested if you'd share your source. Many thanks,--Richard McCoy (talk) 03:56, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Compare Category:Paintings with Category:Sculptures, and other subs of Category:Works of art etc, though of course many articles are not correctly categorized. Antiquities, not antiques. Johnbod (talk) 05:09, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm really surprised at the efforts here to refute what I think is a rather simple and straight-forward requests that benefits articles about artworks. Frankly, this whole discussion has not only been surprising but a little disappointing.  But, for fun, I'll list come other categories for comparision: Category:Public art, Category:Outdoor sculptures (which lists by geographical location), and Category:Monuments and memorials--and I'm sure there are more that I'm not listing.


 * Neither of us are doing any kind of real data crunching here. The point I'm not willing to say that the "vast majority of articles are on paintings or antiques etc in museums" by any stretch.  This is not only because of the categories I just listed and because many of the articles in WP are poorly categorized, but also because my point is not to make infoboxes work just for 2-d artworks even if they actually were the vast majorit, but for all artworks because it's the appropriate thing to do.  Said again, 3-d artworks that live outside have different needs than paintings and prints in museums, and we should be considering things that work for what WP can be, not what it is.  --Richard McCoy (talk) 06:01, 11 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Arguments are for capable parties who are able to reconcile and build. To listen to only one side whose only goal to assert power through denial is futile. Since Wikipedia provides no power to any individual, the contribution of editors will always advance the power of this encyclopedia. I sincerely hope that your reflection ”this whole discussion has not only been surprising but a little disappointing” will not discourage you from your sincere and very important contributions to Wikipedia. (Salmon1 (talk) 19:03, 11 March 2010 (UTC))
 * The largest category of these by far is Category:Monuments and memorials, but this contains a lot of articles that are not sculptures - tv programmes, cemeteries, scholarships etc etc.  There are a lot of outdoor American sculptures with articles, but fairly few internationally.  I notice with interest that the huge "Smithsonian Art Inventories Catalog" database has only one field for "Owner", which includes location, and includes previous owners in the "Remarks" - ie text. example Johnbod (talk) 21:16, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm glad the Save Outdoor Sculpture! database was interesting to you. That data, which was collected in a proto-Wikipedia style, is more than 15 years old, is generally is spotty across the U.S., and is a format that is by current standards cumbersome. Though it's an excellent resource, I wouldn't look to it as a current model for categorizing art. I think I'll just say thanks for the discussion and move along.  Kind regards,--Richard McCoy (talk) 21:48, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

artwork infobox redux
If I may, I'd like to weigh in on this discussion and try to break it down to the constituent issues to be looked at separately.

Control number
Of all the things raised by this discussion, the one that I feel most strongly about is the discussion of the control number. Because we are talking about a unique physical object when we use the artwork infobox, there is a clear encyclopedic reason for having that information. The unique control number of a notable object assigned by that object's owner certainly meets the three infobox critera of being "Comparable, Concise and Materially relevant to the subject". See: Help:Infobox

Furthermore, I find it frustratingly inconsistent (and perhaps even representative of a systemic bias against fine art) that in Wikipedia we often only make the barest of references to the institution that actually owns art objects. We wouldn't write an article about a sports match without an external link reference to the official record by the sport's governing organisation (example) so why don't we make a habit of referencing the official record of artworks? Here is an example I just tested: We have an article about this particular (notable) painting - Max Schmitt in a Single Scull I just added (diff) an external link out to the museum's official record and included the museum's catalogue number (in this case it is an "accession number"). Before I did that, all we had was a link to the article Metropolitan Museum of Art which IMO is not sufficient.

Regarding the type of number to use... I was constantly annoyed in my (former) day-job by the fact that every art institution has its own numbering scheme and often several schemes running in parallel - accession number, catalogue number, reference number, digital object number, call number, item ID, barcode... When, actually, the best thing for our purposes would be a clean, unique and persistent URL. Because of this complexity I agree with Richard McCoy's preference for a general term such as "control number". We can't ask Wikipedians to have a policy for which kind of number to take from each individual institution. We should leave it up to their judgement to decide which is most appropriate. Although this may just be my personal semantic preferences, I would rather use a phrase like "reference number" or "identification number".

Recommendations:
 * 1) Include a new field at the end of the artwork infobox for "reference number"
 * 2) Include a (hidden) field for the URL of the artwork in the owning-institution's online catalogue
 * 3) Display to the user the field "reference number: " [1] as the last line in the artwork infobox and make the number a link to the official catalogue URL [2]
 * 4) If neither field is filled out, the field would not be displayed at all. if the reference number is included but not the URL, then it displays the number but does not link. If the URL is given but not the reference number then it displays simply as an external link reference.

"Specialist info" in infoboxes
I do agree that templates should be kept "short and to the point" and not be intentionally cryptic. However, I don't believe that catalogue reference numbers are "specialist info" or that that, even if it is, that "specialist info" should be excluded from infoboxes. For example, please take a look at the Template:Elementbox (used for chemical elements) and Template:Infobox protein (used for biological proteins) and the filled-out template examples referenced in each of these links. Both are scientific infoboxes that contain many highly specialised data-fields. These are placed there because they are considered by the experts in those wiki-projects as key pieces of information about those subjects. Those fields are there even in spite of the fact that most people do not understand them - but this doesn't mean we should remove them. So, if the experts in artwork deem it important to have a catalogue number (or whatever you want to call it) as part of any reference to the art - then that should be good enough for us too. And, if you've ever licensed images of artworks from an Art Museum, you'll know that this information is of paramount importance to them.

Provenance history
Provenance is another aspect of artworks that both very important to scholarship of art, and therefore falls directly within the scope of Wikipedia articles about art, but is also something that is not easily simplified to infobox format.

Rather, I tend to agree with earlier comments here that whilst the current location and owner of the artwork is important to be kept in the infobox, I tend to think that the provenance (past owners, history of transferal, past catalogue numbers, cost, references to all these...) should instead be included as a section in its own right in the article. The longer and more complex the provenance the more elaborate the section would become - some might be just a prose paragraph, some might be a list/table format, some might even be worthy of breaking out into its own article!

As mentioned in the discussion above, I agree that it could be useful to have a template at the bottom of the article in certain circumstances which presents this information in data-format. I also think it was quite an important point that was raised about the infobox not being a database-lite. Wikipedia, admittedly, does not do very well at structured data - DBPedia and Semantic MediaWiki do this much better. So, whilst an Art Museum's catalogue is nearly always an object-centric database, Wikipedia is an idea-centric folksonomy and doesn't easily incorporate structured datasets (for better or worse). One more reason why, if we don't have good structured-data, that we should link out to the catalogue reference where that data actually is.

Special requirements of Public Art
All of my above points have been from a perspective of knowing a (bit) about fine art but knowing less about Public art and Portable art - the underlying topic of discussion here. So, whilst I hope that my thoughts are applicable to all types, perhaps it is not so. This might be especially the case for art that is not unique (i.e. when there's many "originals" like the aforementioned LOVE_(sculpture)). In which case, and if there is a significantly different enough requirement for Public art than fine art, maybe a infobox specifically for public art should be created. We have great differentiation of infoboxes for scientific or other topics so it stands to reason that we can perfectly well maintain separate infoboxes for broadly different types of art.

I hope this all helps. What do you think, especially of my recommendations regarding the reference number and external link? Witty Lama 12:05, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I certainly agree that where one is available, a link in the references or external links to the museum's page should be included; this is already done by the great majority of good editors and is in the Visual Arts MOS. On catalogue numbers, the fundamental purpose of these is to enable precise identification of the object. How difficult this would otherwise be varies enormously. With paintings it is normally very easy, but with other objects, for example prints, coins, or pottery, it can be very difficult. Currently WP practice pretty closely follows that of museums and art history in general. Generally articles on paintings do not include catalogue numbers, but those on illuminated manuscripts very often do; other types of objects vary.  Many "highlights" website pages by museums give long spiels on paintings or other objects without mentioning a catalogue number, and long discussions of a work in books by art historians (if not exhibition catalogues etc) only normally mention catalogue numbers in the text when there is a possibility of confusion, and sometimes have them in footnotes, but normally not.  I happen to have on my desk right now the "State Tretyakov Gallery; Guidebook, 2000, Moscow, Avant-Garde, ISBN 5863941065", which says it is "Published by decision of the Academic Board of the State Tretyakov Gallery" and written by its staff.  This is 285 pages long and contains not a single catalogue number; that is not untypical for such guides for paintings, especially in non-English-speaking countries.  Paintings are normally very easy to identify by title and artist, with some exceptions - big museums may have a number of "Portrait of a Young Man, 16th century Italian" etc.  We should follow general practice in the sort of reference works and books we try to emulate.  For paintings the catalogue number is certainly not significant enough to go in the infobox - for many manuscripts the number actually is the title: Psalter (British Library, Stowe 2), Codex Vindobonensis Lat. 1235 and many like them. If the catalogue number is not vital for identification, and is on a linked museum page, I wouldn't say it is necessarily needed in the text, never mind the infobox.  If you look at FAs on works, Rokeby Venus is I think not untypical in not having the catalogue number anywhere, though it could be included, and is easily found via links to the NG.  A further consideration is that infoboxes on works of art often get removed, mostly as too restrictive of images, and no information should be only in the infobox.   Johnbod (talk) 12:49, 14 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Witty Lama's proposal seems like a good middle approach to me. There may be some cases when reference numbers are not included in catalogues, but I cannot see the harm in having a standard that is the same as in many catalogues and slightly higher than in that of some others, and adding one highly relevant number like this to the infobox would not I think be any kind of overkill.--Pharos (talk) 16:30, 14 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I concur with Johnbod. Re. Witty Lama: "considered by the experts in those wiki-projects as key pieces of information about those subjects": the fact is that those in WikiProject Visual arts do not consider a reference number as key information. The scientific infoboxes mentioned contain information intrinsic to the subject. Ownership of an artwork is not intrinsic to the artwork, and contemporary ownership usually rather arbitrary, especially for historic works, where e.g. a patron commissioning it has far greater relevance. I don't think the members of WikiProject Visual arts have "a systemic bias against fine art".  Ty  17:00, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

For those that continue to claim that ownership of an artwork is not "relevant" or "intrinsic" to it, I'd really like to see some well-reasoned substance to that argument.

In my opinion, and I really doubt I'm alone, these statements are, at best, misinformed personal opinions that utterly deny and refute the historical significance of cultural property and its global context. While I could give pages of examples, I will give just one that immediately comes to mind and has a Wikipedia article: Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. Try telling the native people of the United States that "Ownership of an artwork is not intrinsic to the artwork." There is probably an example like this for just about every culture in the world, and examples that have followed since the first war in which someone took something from someone else, leading up to what is happening right now around the globe.

I don't suppose I need to restate this, but I will: It bothers me on a profound level me that there are some who are undermining the importance of historical context & ownership as related to artworks. I understand that not everyone wants multiple listings in the infobox of these things, but if you're insistent that context and ownership don't matter, please explain. --Richard McCoy (talk) 17:32, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh calm down. If we're talking about ownership and cultural sensitivity, who was it who put a "Wikpedia Saves Public Art" Project tag on the talk page at Parthenon? I wonder how the Greeks felt about that?  If you want to have a content management system for artworks, which it seems from WikiProject_Wikipedia_Saves_Public_Art you do, the infobox is not the way to go, especially this one - see the MOS section on them. No one is likely to object too much if you add some special template at the bottom of the page.  Johnbod (talk) 20:51, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok, that page just changed. Johnbod (talk) 22:26, 14 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, this weekend we are making an effort to re-work and simplify the WSPA page. It's certainly not a fixed project.
 * My effort above was to bring that fraught argument of historical context to the fore. I don't think my approach to be negative, but clearly it was meant to be direct and pointed. I hope it brings about some clarity.


 * I have no way to gauge the Greek's cultural sensitivity to Wikipedia or WSPA (a bit absurd, to consider also), but I do think the location and physical context of the Parthenon very important. [Edit, Johnbod: there does not appear to ever have been a WSPA Project tag on the talk page of the Parthenon. Further, I think the Elgin Marbles would make another great case study for the importance of talking about ownership & cultural context (not that owner and "current tenants" are listed on the Infobox for buildings).]


 * Wikipedia exists as a quasi content management system for a lot of things, including the National Football League and kids T.V. shows like iCarly.  Recently I was very impressed to find the List of works by Thomas Eakins in Wikipedia and think that if WSPA directly explores the potential for it to happen for art a good thing.  I'm not sure why anyone would disagree if the end goal of Wikipedia is to be the "sum of all human knowledge."--Richard McCoy (talk) 22:51, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok, Perhaps I meant Talk:Arch of Constantine or one of the many other Ancient Roman monuments the projects still has tagged. Johnbod (talk) 04:20, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what you're driving at, Johnbod, or what you're objecting to.--Richard McCoy (talk) 05:01, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Can I suggest that this discussion is not helped by arguing about who owns ancient cultural heritage and the concepts of repatriation/restitution of museum objects? It's tangential to our discussion and an editorial conflict no one wants to get into.

So... looking at the responses so far to my 'redux' proposal, I think I've identified some things that we all agree on:
 * The current location/owner of an art object is considered relevant enough to live in the infobox (but we disagree on whether the owner's catalogue number should be there too).
 * The onwer's catalogue number and link to that cataloge online (if they exist) should be included in a good article about an artwork, at the very least in the References/External Links section.

Two alternative options that might satisfy everyone come to mind: I'm not a big fan of the first idea [1] as this might be forking the infobox because of an editorial dispute rather than for the good of the infobox. However it might be useful if it could be demonstrated that public art has infobox criteria that are unique from other types of art. The second suggestion [2] would allow for a much greater detail of technical/professional information to be included, however I'm not sure what all those fields might be or whether that would be erronously attempting to recreate a Database within Wikipedia. If such a template were created I would argue that it be made applicable to all types of museum object/artworks and have highly extensible fields rather than the deliberately short list of fields in the infobox. Witty Lama 05:12, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) We create a new infobox specifically for Sculpture/Public Art/Movable Art.
 * 2) We create a template dedicated to the more structured-data info for use at the bottom of art/museum object articles. Call it template:Accession or template:museum-data or something like that.
 * I think it's often clear as to who currently owns or is in possession of cultural property. I don't think it an editorial conflict but rather a matter of a belief system if some argue that historical context and ownership is not intrinsic to art.  If what you're saying is that you'd just rather not go down that road and steer to more productive ends, I'm with you.  But there's a clear need to declare the importance of context and I hope others see it too.


 * I may now just be crusty, but I'd rather nothing happen to artwork infoboxes if given the choice of 1 or 2. This is because public art is no different than other art, it's just in the public realm.  Subjugating it to a special infobox may be harmful to its representation in WP.  If the consensus is that no one else finds prior ownership or location importance, I'll just shuffle along without any worries. --Richard McCoy (talk) 05:23, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Richard, I do not think that word means what you intend. Consider: Intrinsic, adjective:  "innate, inherent, inseparable from the thing itself, essential."

If the ownership of a piece of artwork is "innate, inherent, inseparable from [the painting, sculpture, etc], essential", then art sales would be essentially impossible. The thing, as owned by you, would be different than the same object, owned by me. Changing one of its "innate, inherent, inseparable, essential" parts or characteristics would change the artwork itself. To claim that ownership is "intrinsic" is to claim that the ownership is actually part of the work of art.

IMO ownership may be extremely important in certain cases, but I do not think that Warhol's works became different things every time he signed a bill of sale. (Additionally, I believe that ownership is unimportant in other cases.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:22, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the response, WhatamIdoing. Your Warhol analogy applied more generally and abstractly speaks to artworks produced in edition, series, or multiples.  Considering the dearth of information in WP about cultural property, I would be surprised if we soon came to the problem of dealing with a lot of articles describing or cataloging vast amounts of multiples where the point of ownership would diminish.


 * Also, I think that the infobox should be something that can be useful for the whole spectrum of artworks.  --Richard McCoy (talk) 16:51, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

By example, Elgin Marbles
In an effort to be productive, I applied the current artwork infbox to the Elgin Marbles after Johnbods' suggestion to think about the Parthenon. I think it would work a lot better if it had multiple owners, multiple locations, and perhaps even a control number. --Richard McCoy (talk) 05:01, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Several hundred control numbers in this case! An excellent example of why this stuff doesn't belong in an infobox. The current ownership is disputed, and who exactly did they belong to before Elgin?  Nor is it true that the artist is unknown - Phidias is well enough documented as the man in charge of the Parthenon Frieze, though no doubt there were squads of carvers on this and the other elements.  Pieces from several different buildings of different dates are covered by the term, so the dates are not fully accurate either.  How helpful is "type Marble" or "Dimensions 7,530 cm (2964 in)"?!  That is in any case only the figure for the 247 feet of frieze fragments; then there are the pediments (actually the most famous), metope & other fragments.  So only "Present location" is unquestionably accurate.  Their original location would be clear and useful though. Johnbod (talk) 16:38, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
 * As per my CoI declaration on my website about my new role with the British Museum, I'm going to recuse myself from this one completely. Witty Lama 03:20, 16 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I think the content problems in this example aren't primarily the fault of the template. For example, the "owner" field could say "Disputed" or "Title claimed by both the British Museum and the government of Greece" just as easily as it says "British Museum".  WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:05, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Indeed, but, as this example illustrates especially well, by the time you have properly qualified all the information in the various fields, you have an article not an infobox. Johnbod (talk) 08:50, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Johnbod it's clear you don't like many if any of the suggestions that have been made for the artwork infobox; but beyond criticism, do you have positive suggestions to how it can develop?
 * Johnbod's position reflects that of some of the main members of WikiProject Visual arts. I am more in favour of infoboxes, but against overloading them.  Ty  14:51, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * They only become overloaded if people actually put info in them, which doesn't seem to be the case (quite the opposite, really). I did a very quick look around WP:VA and couldn't find a list of main members or a definitive opinion about infoboxes, but perhaps it's buried in the archives? --Richard McCoy (talk) 15:21, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

This is a case of not using the infoboxes appropriately. Where something is disputed, the best approach might be to use an internal section link to a section describing it, so e.g. . Where something isn't relevant or measurable, don't include it. So for a collection of marbles, the length is really not relevant because you can't define length for the group (unless you do something very wierd and concatenative! :) ). It might be relevant to use the  parameter to include something like   and thus explain what's applicable—the   parameter is included specifically for "additional or alternate dimensional data". I do feel that "Type" is a bit unhelpfully vague: mightn't "Medium" or some such be more precise, or should it be split into two parameters, etc.? The one point where I see the infobox format being problematic is the artist one: if this is being used for a group of works, where for some the artist is known and for others unknown, this is problematic. It might work to use something like , though. {&#123; Nihiltres &#124;talk&#124;edits&#124;⚡}&#125; 19:17, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
 * So, to say the same thing in English: If the information doesn't fit its infobox's parameter's format normally, then do one of the following: a) summarize, b) section-link, c) omit the parameter, d) omit the infobox, or, iff all else fails, e) discuss a way to improve the format. I don't think options (a–d) have been exhausted here. I really think that an infobox has to be a short summary at most: if you had to explain as many facts as possible about a piece of artwork in as few words as possible, I think first you'd look at the infobox, second at the lead, and finally at the overall article. Using summaries and section links for complex situations like disputed ownership, etc. is the most elegant situation and avoids the infoboxes being either information-sparse or mini-databases—both situations that are undesirable on Wikipedia. {&#123; Nihiltres &#124;talk&#124;edits&#124;⚡}&#125; 19:34, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
 * The main reason I & others often don't use infoboxes for art articles is that they tend, except for portraits, to restrict using a good-size painting etc image in the lead, which is the most informative lead picture. Plus experienced arts editors get fed up with sorting out questionable or downright misleading information in them, which is especially a problem with older art, where dates are uncertain, "movements" and "influences" a complex matter, and even the title very often has many variants. If the box does not restrict display of the most appropriate image, and useful information can be conveyed succinctly in a few words, I don't have a problem with them.  But there is no strong imperative to include them.  Johnbod (talk) 20:53, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
 * No, I don't think that there is a "strong imperative" to include an infobox, or to use every possible field, just because it's there. I don't think anyone has seriously argued in favor of a one-size-fits-all solution.
 * But there's also no "strong imperative" to discourage them or to provide badly deesigned templates. Editors should use their best judgment, always.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:52, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

COI log
Royal College of Art - SPA claiming to be member of staff replaced nearly all text with copyvio text off the RCA website - reverted, see talk also. Johnbod (talk) 17:12, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

How do you find a Wikipedian in your area
There's no easy way to do it because WP is decentralized by structure. Does anyone have any good ideas how to get in contact with experienced editors in your area? --Richard McCoy (talk) 20:31, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * What I found so far:
 * Regional notice boards
 * Meetup
 * Category:Wikipedians by location
 * --ThT (talk) 18:07, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Nice work, ThT! Perhaps this could be added to the article? --Richard McCoy (talk) 11:52, 16 April 2010 (UTC)


 * An option we discussed at Museums and the Web was museums actually hosting Wikipedian meetups as a way to foster broad outreach to local editors, and there are preliminary plans to pursue this with the Smithsonian in DC and with Balboa Park in San Diego.--Pharos (talk) 14:41, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

The Wikipedia Lists of 100 Project
On Tuesday I participated in a Museums and the Web workshop with members of the Wikimedia Foundation and 50 or so global leaders in the museum web community. Here’s a link to the Workshop.

An idea that surfaced from this workshop is the creation of 3 keys lists within Wikipedia about from what and how art is made, and the materials used to conserve-restore it. Here are the 3 lists:

1) List_of_100_art_materials_every_encyclopedia_should_have

2) List_of_100_art_techniques_every_English_encyclopedia_should_have

3) List_of_100_conservation-restoration_materials_every_encyclopedia_should_have

These lists would not only be used to identify the most important 100 topics, they would be used to determine what Wikipedia articles currently exist about them and therefore identify work that needs to be done within Wikipedia to create or improve them. Ideally, there should be a high-quality articles in Wikipedia about each topic.

Clearly these lists could soon grow way beyond 100 items, but we have to start somewhere. I see this as a kind of first step for the community to begin thinking about ways in which we can add good information to Wikipedia that is useful to the cultural sector.

I think the easiest way to get the entries for this list would be to scan some sets of museum collection databases, or somehow assess Art & Architecture Thesaurus Online (AAT) and the Conservation & Art Material Encyclopedia Online (CAMEO) to determine the entries quasi empirically, or at least in a mildly systematic way (anybody have any hot tips on how to do that, or perhaps a big magic wand?). I can't figure out how to make that happen, so it seems it will have to be done by hand.

Also, along the way there will need to be something like consensus as to what is included in these lists (and what’s not).

Thanks, --Richard McCoy (talk) 06:06, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't understand why these lists are in project space and why they have an arbitrary total/limit of 100. Surely any effort expended should be in mainspace expanding/creating the actual articles. For example we already have List of artistic mediums which regardless of any other considerations makes List_of_100_art_materials_every_encyclopedia_should_have somewhat redundant. Surely the others should be created as List of art techniques and List of conservation restoration materials. Any collaboration can be done on the talk pages.  Nancy  talk  15:56, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * In short, because I have just a second before running out the door, I still don't understand why you took the step to delete it rather then talk about it or try and make it correct, particularly because you know how to do it. I fear that it is exactly these kinds of things that makes WP unwelcoming to newcomers.  --Richard McCoy (talk) 16:21, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * The list seems to be intended as an incentive for museum people to join Wikipedia in it's encyclopedic aim. Therefore I don't understand why NOTWEBHOST shall be the reason for deletion. Could WikiProject Museums be the appropriate subpage incubator until the results move to the mainspace? --ThT (talk) 16:50, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Honestly, at long as it is not in article space, it does not really matter where it is - let's not make it difficult for new people, particularly experts, to edit Wikipedia. Awadewit (talk) 17:48, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree, see my comment in the active discussion regarding MfD. --ThT (talk) 17:56, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

I've changed the title of the article, merged the three lists into one (and redirected them all to the same new article), and added an introduction to explain the purpose of the article. See the new page at: List of 100 Art concepts Wikipedia should have. This should address concerns as well as bring any people interested in any one of the lists into the same space as each other. Witty Lama 20:42, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Nice resolution, Witty. I tidied the article up a bit too. Many thanks,--Richard McCoy (talk) 01:20, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

There's a project with similar approach: Missing topics about History: Museums. --66.245.15.74 (talk) 04:13, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * That list just covers articles on specific museums, & now only includes fairly obscure ones. The arts-related lists at WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles/Hotlist of Art & Architecture cover more general subjects, but show relatively few major omissions these days. Johnbod (talk) 16:58, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

COI links
FYI; copied from Talk:Illuminated manuscript:Johnbod (talk) 13:04, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * The following external link:
 * The Manuscript Studies and Palaeography Collection at Senate House Library, University of London

Was deleted as "spam"!--Wetman (talk) 07:41, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I removed it because it set off my spam radar. User:Palaeography Room, the user adding the link, was a new user whose only contribs were adding this link to several articles with no edit summary, always listing them at the top of the list, and originally calling this site "the best." This made it look a lot like advertising. If you feel this link is appropriate, by all means add it, but the way User:Palaeography Room did it made it look like spam. Thanks. Apparition11 (talk) 11:49, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Marketing director speaks?
There's a row at Talk:Montclair Art Museum over coverage of falls in endowments, sales of objects etc. Johnbod (talk) 08:11, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Collaborative project with the Philadelphia Museum of Art
The Philadelphia Museum of Art wants to start a collaborative project with Wikipedians. See this Raul654 (talk) 16:29, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

24 Hour Museum / Culture24 links need rebranding
Hello, I'm Rosie and I work at Culture24. I've just started out as a wikipedia editor since talking to Wittylama at the GLAM/MCG meetup, and I have a bit of a project on my hands that I could use some help with, if anyone here could advise me. We're an independent government-funded non-profit online publisher promoting the work of museums and galleries by maintaining a massive database of over 4000 museums, galleries, libraries, archives, heritage sites, science centres and architecture centres, listing their educational resources, events and exhibitions. We also publish news, exhibition reviews and interviews about the sector. We've been going for 10 years now, but in Nov 2007 the company name changed from 24 Hour Museum to Culture24, and in Feb 2009 the website URL changed as well. If I search wikipedia for 24hourmuseum (all one word) I get back over 140 results linking to URLs on the old site. I'd like to rebrand the links that are still relevant so they point to the identical articles/venue records in their new home. However, I understand that many of the links to 24 Hour Museum are external links rather than citations, or should not be there at all for various reasons. Could a more experienced wikipedia user or users help me out by deleting the 24hourmuseum links that shouldn't be there in the first place? Then I'm happy to go through and rebrand all the relevant citations. This just seems like a better use of everyone's time than if I change all 140+ links, only to have most of them deleted immediately afterwards. I hope this makes sense - please get back to me if I haven't been clear, or if I should be asking this somewhere else! Thanks very much for any help or advice, RosieClarke (talk) 17:07, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I went through & removed only a couple - others might take a harder view. Lots are used as references for basic info in preference to the museum's own site by people who probably don't realize all the info comes from the museums anyway. This was the right place to ask & thanks for doing so. I mostly left ones that essentially duplicate a link to the museum's own website. arguably duplicates, but yours are usually better laid out imo. Johnbod (talk) 17:50, 23 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Hi Johnbod, thanks ever so much for doing that so quickly! V impressed - I'll get going on the rebranding tomorrow. I think that in many cases, venues had an entry on 24HM/Culture24 long before they set up their own websites, so our entries and related content for their venue date back further. When I make these changes, if they're just external links at the moment I'll try and put them in as citations instead, I understand that will add more value to the Wikipedia pages. If I run into difficulties I'll get back to you. Thanks again, and have a good week! RosieClarke (talk) 18:36, 23 November 2009 (UTC)


 * You can use LinkSearch to find all links to a particular site; there are 251 links to 24hourmuseum.org.uk at the moment. Quite a lot of those are not on article pages, and we generally would not bother fixing links in those cases. A quick look at a small number of articles with the link shows some mixed results: some links are valuable and add to the article; a couple seemed like "just another link". At any rate, you are doing an excellent job by proceeding carefully and responding to comments. I don't have much time at the moment, but may be help later. One point is to choose a good style for how simple external links should occur. One edit that I noticed gave a link with text "Culture24 entry for Museum of English Rural Life". I wonder if the emphasis should be the other way around, perhaps "Museum of English Rural Life entry at Culture24". I personally like the way you did not have one link to the relevant page with a second link to the Culture24 home page (a style used in some articles, and one that I find overly promotional). Feel free to reply here or on my talk page if you want to discuss a problem. Johnuniq (talk) 02:18, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Ah, I just searched on the string as above, & didn't get all those. Johnbod (talk) 08:34, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Goodness, thanks Johnuniq and Johnbod - 251 is a pretty overwhelming number, but will have a go! We're turning off the 24 hour museum site completely very soon, which is why I'm hoping to get all these old links either rebranded or deleted. Yes, I don't want to seem too promotional, but on the other hand we have a lot of in-depth content about arts/science/history and heritage that could be an interesting addition to the WP pages. Rather than jumping in and adding them, though, I'm just going to mention these on the talk pages of each article (like I did yesterday for | the Brennan torpedo) and leave it up to the editor whether they think each link is relevant - it's got to be on a case by case basis, I think, but if they give me the nod then I'll have a go at putting the link in as a citation. Thanks for reassuring me that I'm on the right lines! About editing citations within articles, I'm still not sure that I can do this correctly but will have a go and ask for help if I get confused. All the best, RosieClarke (talk) 14:24, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
 * A case by case basis truly is the best way to handle these, because it will benefit the content the most. However, if needed we can surely find someone with a bot to just change the URL. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 00:23, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I've blogged this request here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Witty_lama#Culture24 Hopefully someone will get on board and help change the links or use a bot. Witty Lama 13:58, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Rosie, I moved your latest to a section at the bottom, as people don't usually notice additions to old sections. Johnbod (talk) 18:16, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Culture 24 (again)
(moved from old thread for visibility Johnbod (talk) 18:21, 17 June 2010 (UTC)) Hello again, guys - I've been away for a few months and am back now! I've added a few more citations to try and improve the Culture24 article, and am wondering whether it would be appropriate to try and upload the company logo. Is there a WP policy about logos anywhere, and what's the best and simplest way of doing this so I don't infringe any rules? My next question is, I think, related to disambiguation. I'd like to set up a new article about Museums at Night, the annual weekend of late openings at museums and galleries across the UK, which takes place the weekend before International Museums Day (May 18th), and is affiliated with the European Nuit des Musees. This is not quite the same as the Long Night of Museums in Europe, which seems to happen on different dates in different countries. What would be the best way of getting this going and avoiding confusion? Any help with these questions would be gratefully appreciated! Thanks very much, RosieClarke (talk) 17:27, 17 June 2010 (UTC)
 * You are fine with a logo on your article, so long as you sort out the copyright release on the image, which needs to be done. I think the article should be ok - I'd call it Museums at Night (UK), as the phrase is rather generic. Otherwise a section at Long Night of Museums, with a redirect there, might be as good. Johnbod (talk) 18:21, 17 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your help, Johnbod - I'm having a go at making the page in what I think is my sandbox (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:RosieClarke/draft_Museums_at_Night_UK_article) - would you mind having a look and seeing if I need to add much more info to it where it is, or whether it's ready to move across to the Museums at Night (UK) page? This is my first time creating a page from scratch and I want to make sure I'm doing it right. Thanks very much, RosieClarke (talk) 17:26, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Seems fine to go - well done! Don't forget to add links to it in related article once it's up, & reactivate the categories I added - just reverse my last edit. Johnbod (talk) 17:40, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh dear, I've had a go but it seems that Museums at Night (UK) has been blacklisted! I'm not sure how this has happened, because there's nothing even on that page at the moment. Or does this mean that I'm not an autoconfirmed user so I don't have permission to make this kind of change? I'm sorry to keep asking for help here, but Johnbod, if you're an autoconfirmed user would you mind moving the page for me? Thanks very much in advance. RosieClarke (talk) 10:33, 23 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I have put a reply at User talk:RosieClarke on the assumption that the problem involves the redlink. Johnuniq (talk) 11:29, 23 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok done. Not sure what the problem was, but I always just click the redlink, & the "start new article lk, & copy the draft into the space that opens. Now you needs to link to it in the other relevant articles. Johnbod (talk) 12:16, 23 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Ah, perhaps that was the problem - I'd gone to the sandbox article and clicked Move instead of using the redlink. Thanks for your help! RosieClarke (talk) 16:07, 23 June 2010 (UTC)
 * If the logo is no more than fancy text then Template:PD-textlogo can be used, good examples can be seen in commons:Category:BBC logos. Fæ (talk) 12:17, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually you would probably just want to upload your logo to English Wikipedia with the Non-free logo copyright template.--Pharos (talk) 15:35, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks, everyone - I've read through lots of pages of guidance about copyright and permissions, and the template you pointed me towards is very simple. However, is it right that I can't just plonk it in to the Culture24 page directly from my computer, but I need to upload it into English Wikipedia separately, then link to it? If so, please would someone direct me to the exact page where I need to go to upload the image? Thanks very much for your patience - I'm finding this really confusing! RosieClarke (talk) 16:43, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Try Upload (set up your account there if it does not already exist). The website has a well designed process to get you started. You would normally copy the file to your computer and then upload it using the form on Commons. Fæ (talk) 16:47, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much, Fae, but I think it's a Non-Free Fair Use image, which means I have to do it through English Wikipedia. However, I think I have now found the link I need, here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Upload - I've successfully managed to upload the logo and put it into the Culture24 entry. I hope this is OK! Really appreciate everyone taking the time to help me out. Now to figure out how to create an info box with the logo in... RosieClarke (talk) 17:09, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Perfectly done. Well done :-) Witty Lama 20:34, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Smithsonian Institute
I am going to start discussion and ideas at WP:GLAM/SI for a meeting which Wikimedia DC is going to have with the Smithsonian this upcoming week. We are just beginning to test the waters with them, so the partnership is not official yet. Please hold off extra publicity to the greater community, such as Wikipedia Signpost, until more details are established and we have found out what the SI wants from us. Any thoughts on what we can offer them would be awesome, however, especially from experienced members of GLAM, and we will be examining the British Museum stuff for ideas. Thanks Sadads (talk) 13:54, 22 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I've had a chat with Pharos about this and given him any thoughts I have on the matter. Good luck! Witty Lama 16:39, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

too much?
Hello -

new and learning about what works and what doesn't in this environment. Posting this external link style to learn if it is viewed as too much. Evolving from a model that was succinct and did not provide enough content value description.


 * World Digital Library presentation of [http://WDL handle script_item name in original language or English/Other Language translation of title.] Partner Institution.  Primary source {item type} with summary description, {#} images with enhanced view and zoom features, text to speech capability {with curator video}. {Language(s) of primary source}  Links to related content.  Content available as {file format}.  {Brief statement of significance of object}.

Thank you for your patience and guidance.

Efmcleanckm (talk) 14:30, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Many of our external links have a poor presentation style and I appreciate your effort to make improvements. However, I feel that your template is indeed too much. Some of your elements are more appropriate for a reference than an external link, such as the name in the original language. All information in the EL listing should be in English, except of course for items that are commonly known by a non-English name. If the content is not in English, then a simple phrase will do, such as (French) after the title or after the description. Here is a more complex example showing the media format and size, if it's not regular HTML, because not all readers can accommodate certain types of files or even large files: (Windows Media Player 10, 7 MB, registration required).


 * The idea is to give readers enough information to make a decision as to whether an EL will be useful for them without turning it into a bibliographical entry. We have a set of EL guidelines that should be of help. Here is an example of an EL section I did recently on a technical topic. Note that I'm able to get 7 ELs into a very compact space while letting the reader make a quick decision as to which ones are best suited for their needs. You can post examples of specific ELs you have questions about at WP:ELN.


 * Our goal is not to list all possible external sources of information. It is the editor's job to select the best ELs that provide useful content that can't be included in the article. We don't normally include things like a zoom feature because the editor should have already selected ELs that provide the best presentation. An exception would a case such as prompting the reader to click on something within the linked page to reach the content applicable to the article in which the EL appears. —UncleDouggie (talk) 20:58, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * A little to much i would say, not sure the long instructional some what promotional sounding dialogue at times is compliant with our external links policies. That said its a great link.  Moxy (talk) 02:41, 21 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I would like to reiterate what's been said before about how these links are useful/helpful - thanks for the additions. But, equally, they are too descriptive - especially things like "...Primary source manuscript with summary description, image with enhanced view and zoom features, text to speech capability. Chinese. Links to related content. Content available as TIF...." I would suggest that these things could be added as footnotes/references and not merely in the External links section - this generally allows you more scope for describing the context of your reference. I would tend to agree that if a primary source work is not in English the the original language title should be used as well as an appropriate English translation. Hope that helps, Witty Lama 05:04, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

New GLAM tool
This is version 1 of Template:GLAM Article, which can be substituted with as a way to easily share one consistent, suggested format for an artifact-related article. The template includes the artifact infobox, appropriate headings, and rudimentary step-by-step suggestions for what to include under each heading. I first experimented with this type of template for the Wikipedia Saves Public Art guides, which help in creating new public art articles.

Before major edits are made to this template, I do want to stress that I purposefully created it for a high school student audience, and one that is just beginning Wikipedia. I'm currently developing a step-by-step guide for high school students at the Children's Museum of Indianapolis to create Wikipedia articles in a four week program (over a four month period from January-April 2011). This template will be used to create consistent headings across their articles. Edits are welcome, but I'd ask that any major revamps wait until after April, if that's OK. Hope this helps. Thanks! HstryQT (talk) 13:23, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

"Two-minute guide" should be "Fifteen-minute guide"
The "Two-minute guide" format is a wonderful idea - but in practice you've got something that would take a newby at least 15 minutes to read through. I'll suggest cutting it in half and re-titling it "Ten-minute guide." When you start a relationship with a major stretching of the truth, people will remember that. Smallbones (talk) 16:18, 22 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think the 2 minutes is supposed to cover the stuff in the show/hide box, & the rest of the section should be easy to get though in that time. Johnbod (talk) 16:33, 22 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Maybe "Quick guide" or "Overview" would be more accurate and not make too many assumptions about how quickly the reader can read. Fæ (talk) 16:56, 22 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Done. Witty Lama 03:29, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

Buttons
Seeing the interest in the backlog drive for unsourced BLPs (which uses a big red button), I was wondering if template buttons like the ones below might help promote interest or improvement to GLAM articles, if only on a handful of project or user pages? Fæ (talk) 16:42, 9 December 2010 (UTC)


 * fwiw, I really like the left-hand button. –SJ+ 07:49, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

feedback request for Temporary exhibitions at the Art Gallery of New South Wales
Dear GLAM 'pedians, I'm a relatively new Wikipedian and Temporary exhibitions at the Art Gallery of New South Wales is my first new article. I first started writing it as a subsection of Art Gallery of New South Wales but obviously it became too big quite quickly so I broke it out to its own article. It is by no means finished (e.g. the missing decades) but as it requires a fair bit of research effort, I would like some feedback about the content, structure, and especially the wikitable formatting, before I continue. The final column in the table which is currently empty I had planned for images (when possible) of the exhibtions/works (as inspired by List of works by Thomas Eakins. As I work on it, it strikes me that similar lists would be helpful for other major galleries (e.g. I've subsequently found List of exhibitions at Contemporary Art Gallery (Vancouver). What do you think? Whiteghost.ink 02:11, 14 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Looks good to me. You might expand the lead a bit to explain about touring exhibitions like the guggenheim one. Most museums cover their past exhibitions on their websites, which somewhat reduces the extra utility of having a WP article. Johnbod (talk) 14:58, 17 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks, Johnbod. A good idea about the touring exhibitions. I will make a note about them and mark them with an asterisk. That should work. The list of exhibitions is supposed to be historic - that is, a list that includes exhibitions given before institutions started putting them on the internet. I haven't found any comprehensive historic listings on organisations' official web sites. However, I haven't yet done a comprehensive search to check. The Louvre site has an easily accessible list of past exhibitions but it only goes back to 2004. Whiteghost.ink 01:13, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

The European Library - suggested changes
Hi everyone -

I work for The European Library and our current Wiki page is out of date, so I've been tasked with trying to make it better.

Because there are so many changes, I made a draft of what I think the new page could look like and you can see it here:

User:Friedel_(EL)/European_Library

I'm aware of COI guidelines and I really want to work with the Wiki community to make this page as accurate and complete as it can be. I'd love to know what you think of my draft and if you have any questions or suggested improvements / clarifications.

I understand from WittyLama that if, after a couple of weeks, no one comments or acts on these changes then it would be okay to implement them myself? Of course, if the community wants to use the info I've provided to update the page, that would be great too.

I'll post a similar message on the discussion page of the live European Library wiki page.

Thanks,

--Friedel (EL) (talk) 10:19, 17 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Short answer, yes (in my opinion).
 * Long answer — I suggest you put a short explanation about your actions to comply with WP:COI (and links to these discussion threads) on the talk page of the article, when it gets moved to be 'live' that can go with it. My only comments would be minor, nothing to stop your draft becoming an article and rather more general than COI issues: the lead text reads as slightly non-neutral in the 4th & 5th paragraphs but only because they talk about what is planned to happen so you might think about rephrasing perhaps to summarize those activities which have committed funded schedules; the links in Partner libraries are given as the country names with the actual names of the libraries hidden, it might be better to do something like " " which gives an impression of international scope but uses the accurate names of the libraries; the references are plentiful but all on-line by various organizations and thus appear as probably un-peer-reviewed web pages, a few journal published articles or book references would help. Fæ (talk) 11:07, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Fæ. Good points. I'll wait for a bit more feedback and then use your suggestions to polish the page.

Friedel (EL) (talk) 11:38, 17 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I left some additional advice, to help clear up whether the sources are fairly balanced on the draft's talkpage, I am mildly concerned with the number of sources that are internally developed (it appears) and are kindof WP:Spammish, and want to make sure that is fully declared in the sources. I would strongly encourage an increase in the number of Secondary Sources, Sadads (talk) 13:19, 17 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I too am concerned about the number of references which are hosted on the subjects own pages (by far the majority - something that is also a 'problem' with the current mainspace page). Friedel, you must be aware of documentation what others have written about the European Library.  It would be good to have more of that information incorporated, and where possible that ówn'references are replaced.  You might want to have a look at the notability guideline (not that I have any doubt that the European Library is notable - it would just be good that that is properly reflected in the Wikipedia page, just to avoid it looking promotional/spammy).  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 13:30, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

I hear what you're saying. I'll see what I can find. As I was saying to Sadads in a message left on another talk page, sometimes we are the only source of the info. This is particularly true because a lot is changing here at the moment (many new projects, members, etc...) and these developments haven't yet been covered by others. However, I'll take a look and see what I can find for secondary sources. Friedel (EL) (talk) 14:48, 17 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I was more thinking about general things of the European Library. I had contact with (a) member(s) of the European Library quite some time ago, the organisation does exist already for quite some time.  Sure, new parts of it may be too new (question is, should that already be in the article here - the different parts of the policy 'What Wikipedia is not', and the verifiability policy, e.g.), but the older subjects must have already had wide media coverage.  I hope this helps.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 14:57, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, I spent some time this morning editing the article. I also tried to make the references more diverse and to put them in a standard format. What do you think? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Friedel_(EL)/European_Library

There are still a lot of links to our website, mainly where I'm trying to show people what I'm talking about (for example, the virtual exhibitions link to the exhibitions). Is this seen as valuable for Wikipedia? Maybe I should just remove the section altogether and put a small mention at the top of the article that creating virtual exhibitions is part of what we do.

Friedel (EL) (talk) 10:56, 18 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Hi. I am following the document, and it indeed improves.  What you mention about the virtual exhibitions was something I was pondering about this morning as well.  On one hand, it is a random list, and indeed primary sourced, on the other hand, giving some typical examples may be useful...  Are there any which are particularly worth mentioning (e.g. because some external source actually used it or a reviewer mentions it as a 'great feature') - then especially those would be good, and use the external reference as well - otherwise, maybe leave it for now.  Having primary sources is not bad, as long as there is a healthy balance with other sources as well (it should certainly not be that the article only has primary sources, or that the main body is based on primary sources, but for other data they can certainly be used), and you are very busy improving the balance!.  Good work!  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 11:09, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I also have to agree with Beetstra's position on the exhibitions, they are fine because they are demonstrative and genuinely useful for our readership, however, I am a little conerned with the lead and some of the other text which sounds a little bit like it's selling the projects usefulness. Remember, Wikipedia articles should be written from a WP:Nuetral Point of View, so the facts that you have in the contact is great, I would just work on toning down the rhetoric a bit. Sadads (talk) 13:45, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I think I've been looking at it for so long that it's hard to take a distant view. If anyone would like to tone down what they see as rhetoric, or point out specific phrases that seem too pushy, that would be very welcome. If no one wants to, I'll wait a few days and try to look at it again. Friedel (EL) (talk) 14:39, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I think between the two of us, I think we have made a good effort. I have absolutely no objection to moving it to mainspace right now, but I would recommend continued changes in content be based largerly on outside secondary sources treating the library (Oh and make sure you fix all the infobox stuff). If you have a press officer or something like that they may be able to give you a list of where to find more sources like the few you already have, Sadads (talk) 16:02, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I am the press officer :) It's a pretty small organisation so handling internal and external comms is a big part of my job. I've just started though, so I'm going to start a list of all known articles about us and I'll certainly put more external references in as I discover them. I think I'll also incorporate Fæ's suggestion to format the libraries list so it uses their accurate names.

I'll leave this a few more days just in case anyone has more feedback and then I'll move it to mainspace. Thanks again. 194.171.184.14 (talk) 07:22, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Refreshing GLAM/BM
The page appears a bit stuck with the achievement of the 2010 programme. As an ongoing collaboration page for BM-related article improvement (as well as further events) would be useful, I was wondering if the the main page at WP:GLAM/BM could point to a WP:GLAM/BM/2011 page for current to-dos, requests, DYKs, event notices etc. Thoughts? Fæ (talk) 10:58, 8 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Generally, yes. We could keep 2010 as the main page for a bit until 2011 has a bit more, then swop them around. Or just add a 2011 section at the top of the page & mark the older stuff as 2010. Johnbod 13:52, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Culture.si
The wiki Culture.si was launched in April 2010. Texts about the culture of Slovenia are available under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 license, the same license as used by Wikipedia. See Enhance Wikipedia! and Terms of Use. Published by the Slovenian Ministry of Culture and Ljudmila (media laboratory). --Eleassar my talk 13:48, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Move to GLAM as dedicated WikiProject?
Given the real flowering of efforts in this area, I would like to suggest that we move the page to GLAM, and 'officially' designate this as a full working WikiProject :)--Pharos (talk) 18:53, 2 March 2011 (UTC)


 * That particular page Advice for the cultural sector aka WP:GLAM should stay as it is - there should be a particular landing point for GLAMs to come in and get advice. As far as making this a Wikipedia project, in general I'm in favor of it, but there are obvious issues to deal with, e.g.


 * 1) Conflicts with other projects
 * 2) What to put on the project page - this page looks like it would be good for the discussion page.
 * 3) Is this a special project of the Wikimedia Foundation, with special requirements? e.g. there's some talk that folks get "certified" and release their real world identities.  Membership in regular Wikipedia projects have no restrictions on membership, that I know of.
 * I think all these issues can be dealt with, but I'd like to see how others want to deal with them, and if there are any other issues that come up. Smallbones (talk) 21:03, 2 March 2011 (UTC)


 * As far as "special project" - what I mean is Outreach GLAM Discussion. Is that separate from this?  I'm frankly seeing a lack of information flow here (and there).  It seems like a fairly top-down project right now.  The real question is "How can we get involved?" Nobody wants to push aside what's already been done, but how do we get involved without conflict with what's been done already?  The usual principal is WP:Be bold, but this looks like a fairly fine-tuned instrument.  Can we get some direction here on what participation by ordinary Wikipedians would be welcomed?  Smallbones (talk) 21:27, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * My understanding is the Outreach wiki is for those interested in outreach activities (such as being a GLAM Ambassador) or discussing the same, whilst the collaboration pages under the Wikipedia GLAM page (such as WP:GLAM/BM) are intended for those interested in improving articles related to a particular GLAM organization and its collections. Consequently if someone wants to get involved, the starting point is likely to be the article collaboration page rather than process-related discussions on Outreach. There is no intention of one wiki being dominant over the other as they have quite different roles. In terms of communication, I would expect GLAM Ambassadors or GLAM organizations to plan activities on Outreach and then only make announcements or put forward invitations (when they are committed and resourced) on the Wikipedia collaboration page. Fæ (talk) 22:11, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Obviously GLAM Ambassadors and GLAM organizations have a special role, but a WikiProject to help on Wikipedia itself would also be very useful. I would suggest that the current text be moved to an "advice" subpage, and then we focus on building up WP:GLAM as the "parent WikiProject" to WP:GLAM/BM, WP:GLAM/SI, etc.--Pharos (talk) 19:06, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I think some alternative procedure should be found. As I understand it, this page (both the URL and WP:GLAM) are used as links in a significant number of places (with the URL being known off-wiki), and it is not helpful to move stuff around so that some newcomer ends up on a project page (even if it has a box at the top saying "click here for advice"). I suppose redirects could be used, but before any action, Witty lama needs to give an opinion. Johnuniq (talk) 22:21, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

I find it amusing (and incorrect) that I need be consulted before changes can be made :-) I'm also a bit worried that people sense a "lack of information flow" - can you tell me what you mean? I'm being as transparent as I possibly can. Perhaps you mistake lack of activity for secrecy when in fact I might just be overseas for a while :-)

Here's what I reckon: I've argued several times that the WP:GLAM/BM (British Museum project) should be moved to a standalone Wikiproject now that it exists in its own right independent/subsequent to the original "residency" project for which I set it up. I agree that "WP:GLAM" is a nice easy one to remember and we can keep that page/redirect it as the "front page" for GLAM collaboration projects in en.wp. The "advice" page is useful as a place where we can send any GLAM professional who asks about how they can personally start editing WP appropriately. However it was very quickly realised that this is not the only way of having collaborations with GLAM professionals - hence the proliferation of subprojects to work with particular institutions (e.g. /SI, /TCMI, /Derby...) Now, it is probably not viable/sensible to require all of these subprojects to go off and make their own Wikiproject and keeping them all "under the one roof" is a good idea. I do agree though that we can't simply keep adding to the list of links to the subpages at the top of WP:GLAM - it's already getting too long. So... It would be best IMO if we could have a "front page" that asked people if they wanted to go to the advice and which also laid out neatly (by geography and/or by type) all of the subproject pages.

As for the relationship of this page (and subpages) to the http://glamwiki.org GLAM portal on outreach wiki... This is English Wikipedia and as such can only really deal with issues relevant to this Wiki (and to some degree Commons). The outreach portal is for coordinating pan-wikimedia like tech tools, chapter projects, documentation, IRL events etc. In the case of "Wikipedians in Residence" or "GLAM ambassadors" the idea is being coordinated/discussed at the Outreach wiki because these roles would have effect across multiple language editions of WP and sister projects especially Commons so it would be unfair to make, for example, user:Trizek a French Wikipedian now working at the Versailles Palace to come here to talk. Witty Lama 06:21, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I have been weakly opposed to the Lama's suggestion of creating an additional WikiProject in the past, however my views have moved on and the discovery that collaboration pages such as GLAM/BM behave exactly the way task force pages should, leads me to conclude that they ought to be governed underneath a WikiProject. It also seems apparent that existing projects such as WP:HISTORY are probably a bit generic and I doubt would want to be hijacked by endless GLAM Ambassador/Outreach related chat. Fæ (talk) 08:33, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I am "the Lama" now, excellent! :-) Yes, Wikiprojects like "history" "museums" " " and subject areas like "dinosaurs" or "roman empire" frequently come into the orbit of individual GLAM projects and should be coordinated with when relevant. However, what sets the GLAM projects aside from things like wikiproject museums or libraries is that they are not about that museum but the expertise and content within that museum. For example, Wikiproject museums is a good place to talk about improving the quality of the article about the British Museum, but not a good place to talk about how to get in touch with a curator. Witty Lama 09:31, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I've made a very cursory stab now with GLAM, while also keeping the 'Advice' page and making it the prominent second tab of the wikiproject.--Pharos (talk) 23:56, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm in! How can I help?  - PKM (talk) 01:13, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
 * In what way would you like to help PKM? If you're interested in Wikimedia-wide GLAM issues then can I suggest http://glamwiki.org (on the outreachwiki - and the associated mailinglist)! Also... I've gone and made the new wp:glam tab headings radically more descriptive. What do people think? Witty Lama 02:45, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

GLAMish editorial
Hey guys, I wrote up a quick piece for the Military history Project newsletter editorial here if someone would like to check it and make corrections as necessary. Thanks :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 06:42, 16 March 2011 (UTC)