Wikipedia talk:Citing sources/Archive 13

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents

Intermediate sources: State where you got it...

Is it not necessary also to read the entire book? Checking it, as cited on a web page, could potentially take it out of context (as much, at least, as the web page itself would). We should probably specify this, ne? elvenscout742 22:48, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Let me see if I understand your concern. Let's say I find a useful quotation on a web site. If it's a reliable site, I could just write a citation along the lines of "Smith as quoted on Jones.com." But maybe I'm not sure if the quote is accurate, so I get Smith's book and read the page in question. Then I just quote Smith, and don't mention Jones.com. The problem is I only read one page of Smith, and the citation implies I read the whole book.
I think the most we shoud expect is the editor who put in the citation should have read the normal amount for the type of work being cited. If it is a novel, that would be the whole novel. For a dictionary, it would be the entry for one word. --Gerry Ashton 23:21, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Well, I wasn't thinking of a quotation. I was thinking of something more like a statement that could easily be misinterpretted when taken out of context, and a user reading only what's referred to on a website would read into it the kind of (potentially unreliable, and uncited) things on the website when they perhaps weren't intended by the original author and woul not be visible to someone reading the book without having seen the website. Something like one of Joseph Campbell's books. elvenscout742 09:58, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
You can't use rules to force people to 'correctly' interpret something. Material may be taken out of context by editors whether or not they have read the whole book. What is important is that the source is given, so that readers can check it out for themselves. If you see something that you believe is misleading because it has been taken out of context, you are free to supply the context (all properly sourced). Just don't be surprised if your choice of what is the proper context is challenged, however. This is a wiki, after all.-- Donald Albury(Talk) 11:39, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Problem

Can anyone fix the problem of the inline refs doubling up on Gastric-brooding Frog. Thanks -- Froggydarb croak 01:32, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Is it fixed now? (If it is, see WP:FN for an explanation of what I did.) Gimmetrow 01:38, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks -- Froggydarb croak 02:31, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Spacing in references

What is the consensus on writing footnotes like this:

"Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet," he said in a 2006 interview.<ref>
{{cite web
| last = Bloggs | first = Joe
| url = http://www.joebloggs.com
| title = Joe Bloggs' Blog
| date = 2006-01-01
| accessdate = 2006-08-28 }}
</ref>

I haven't seen this spacing very often, but I find it much easier to read and edit. Omphaloscope » talk 03:24, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

You can pretty much do it however you want based on whatever editors of the article in question can agree on. Although I wouldn't describe huge six-line jumps in the middle of paragraphs as particularly easy to read or edit. Christopher Parham (talk) 04:12, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Request for comments regarding intermediate sources

See Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Policies regarding intermediate sources. Andries 17:04, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

"Should intermediate sources be sufficiently reliable (that is is there good reason to assume that the intermediate sources correctly quotes or have undistorted copies of reputable sources) or should intermediate sources be reliable in itself? SeeWikipedia_talk:Cite_sources/archive10#Intermediate_sources concerning wikipedia:Cite#Intermediate_sources:_State_where_you_got_it 17:01, 3 September 2006 (UTC)"
I don't understand where this discussion is supposed to take place. The RFC doesn't seem to indicate. Am I missing something? - Jmabel | Talk 06:03, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
HELLO! Will someone please explain where the actual discussion is taking place? - Jmabel | Talk 19:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Is it the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources#A different proposed addition? Hiding Talk 19:59, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
No, it took place here Wikipedia_talk:Cite_sources/archive10#Intermediate_sources Andries 18:48, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
See here [1] Andries 19:08, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Andries is a former webmaster and current "Main Representative, Contact And Supervisor" for the largest site on the world-wide-web that opposes the Indian Guru, Sathya Sai Baba. Andries is trying to include links to his personal website in violation of an ArbCom ruling at: Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sathya Sai Baba. He is attempting to cite a link on his personal website that was duplicated from a Yahoo Group and use that link as a reference for critical and selective (only gives a portion of the text and not the full text) information against Sathya Sai Baba. You can also view This Thread on FloNight's page. It doesn't matter what is agreed here. ArbCom specifically ruled that it is inappropriate for editors to insert links to websites (they are personally affiliated with) and that link to critical sites containing negative, personal stories and original research against Sathya Sai Baba. Perhaps the policy is different on other articles, but ArbCom made a specific ruling on the Sathya Sai Baba page and Andries is trying to circumvent it here. SSS108 talk-email 19:09, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

It is unrelated to the arbcom case. This was already a matter of dispute before the arbcom case openened as can be checked in archive 10. Andries 19:11, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Good. I have you on your word saying that. The argument you are making here is what you have been attempting to argue on FloNight's page and on the Sathya Sai Baba talk page. Better safe than sorry. SSS108 talk-email 19:13, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

So is This a Hypertext Encyclopedia or What?

Of course, I'm kind of a latecomer to all of this citing stuff, but it seems to me that one of the worst misuses of the cite-needed templates (in this case, {{fact}}) is stuff like this (from Red Shift):

The first redshift survey was the CfA Redshift Survey, started in 1977 with the initial data collection completed in 1982.[1] More recently, the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey determined the large-scale structure of one section of the Universe, measuring z-values for over 220,000 galaxies; data collection was completed in 2002, and the final data set was released 30 June 2003.citation needed(Note 1) (In addition to mapping large-scale patterns of galaxies, 2dF also established an upper limit on neutrino mass.) Another notable investigation, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), is ongoing as of 2005 and aims to obtain measurements on around 100 million objects.citation needed(Note 2) SDSS has recorded redshifts for galaxies as high as 0.4, and has been involved in the detection of quasars beyond z = 6. The DEEP2 Redshift Survey uses the Keck telescopes with the new "DEIMOS" spectrograph; a follow-up to the pilot program DEEP1, DEEP2 is designed to measure faint galaxies with redshifts 0.7 and above, and it is therefore planned to provide a complement to SDSS and 2dF.citation needed(Note 3)


Notes:

  1. The fact refers to the final dataset release of the "2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey", but there is a link to an article on that survey in the same sentence. (I'll concede in advance that the fact isn't referenced in the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey article, but I don't think that damages this argument—the solution seems to me to be to put the fact in that article and cite it there.)
  2. The fact refers to the measurement goal of the "Sloan Digital Sky Survey" but, yet again, there is a link to an article on that survey in the same sentence.
  3. The design goals of DEEP2 are marked cite-needed and, yet again, there's a link to an article on DEEP2 right there.

(This is just the latest place I've seen this type of thing—but I've seen this "cite-needed-near-obvious-link" a lot.)

It seems to me that if article MNOP contains 15 facts, all cited, and article MNOP is linked from 200 other articles, all of which are required to do individual cites for the same 15 facts, that this encyclopedia is going to be buried under millions (billions? trillions?) of duplicative cites that no reasonable planetary population can maintain and that will drive the average reader crazy.

I guess I'm wondering what's the point of having a hypertext encyclopedia if every article is required to stand alone? CoyneT talk 01:24, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Articles get deleted, merged, split, moved (renamed). There is no guarantee that linked articles have appropriate sources, either. So it is our policy to require reliable sources for everything in Wikipedia, and to not regard other Wikipedia articles as reliable sources. -- Donald Albury 03:19, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
There is no guarantee that a specific citation in an article references a reliable source, that the source is available to the reader for verification, that the source actually states the fact in the article, that the context of the source matches the context of the article (water boils at 100 C, but not on Mars), that the fact is still considered true, that edits to the article have not changed its meaning to the point that the citation is no longer valid, etc. By festooning our articles with dozens of footnotes we are creating an aura of authenticity, not necessarily the reality. The reality requires a substantial investment in checking each citation and each subsequent edit. This is far more likely to happen in a primary article on a topic than when a fact central to that primary article is incorporate in another article with its own citation. We totally lack the tools and editing staff to maintain footnotes at anywhere near the rate they are being created. There are thousands of well-sourced articles that are quite stable, watched over by a cadre of editors and unlikely to be deleted, merged, split, or moved. We need to leverage that irreplaceable investment to keep citation maintenance manageable. If current policy precludes that, it is a recipe for disaster. Do the math. --agr 21:47, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Dalbury - (I think) you misunderstood the question. It is not being asked if we should treat Wikipedia articles as reliable sources (of course we shouldn't), but where we should put the citations to reliable sources that we should have. I strongly not duplicating citations if at all possible; of course the date of the final dataset release of the "2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey" should be cited in the article on it, not in another article that mentions that. However, there is nothing wrong with adding a {{citation needed}} tag to the other article - what should be done is to make sure the fact is cited (in the correct article), that the correct article is linked to the one with the cite needed tag, and then to remove the tag. I don't think there's a problem, here, although it may be good to clarify this. JesseW, the juggling janitor 22:34, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Citing sources should keep the reader in mind. As a reader I would expect to find a citation to the appropriate original source at the point where I first encounter the material. In the Redshift article there is a note with a proper citation of the source of the discussion of the CfA survey; there is no such note for the Sloan Digital Sky Survey or the DEEP2 Red Shift Survey.
I can see going without a note if the reference were mentioned in the immediately preceding paragraph and it were clear that this is the source for the later material. It doesn't seem fair to expect the reader to know that the reference is in a totally different article. Unlike JesseW, I see duplicating links to original sources as essential to a dynamic and changing Hypertext encyclopedia. Yes, it takes work, but failure to document sources in a derivative article leaves this reader with the strong suspicion that the editor has merely copied material from an existing Wikipedia article without reading the original sources. If an editor read the sources, she should have no problem citing them; if he didn't read them, he shouldn't be writing an article. --SteveMcCluskey 14:46, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
See m:Wikicite, intended to have one definition of a source which would be invoked within needed articles. (SEWilco 17:47, 8 September 2006 (UTC))
Interesting. I was thinking of something similar, with a different implementation:
When Wikipedia was born (or shortly after; I don't know), the only citation style available was for web pages, but it was simple; you just write the URL in brackets, and the links are automatically numbered in order:
  • URNs and URLs are both forms of URI, and can be used in similar ways.[http://www.w3.org/Addressing/]
We could go back to this reference style for all references, not just web sites, by using URNs, and get rid of this difficult-to-use, difficult-to-read Cite.php clutter. For instance, To cite a book, you should just be able to do the same thing with the book's URN:
  • USB cables contain four wires; VBUS, D+, D−, and ground.[urn:isbn:0-471-37048-7]
Then the software would determine the citation information, either from an internal database (I was thinking it would be part of wikisource, but they call it "wikicat") or an external database like isbndb.com, and generate the citation dynamically according to whatever style the user selected in their preferences. — Omegatron 18:21, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
URNs would be a good fix, when they become implemented. But the URN article doesn't refer to the specificity of a range of pages for citations.
One problem, among many, is that early books do not have ISBNs and I don't know how the URN program plans to handle that. I'm a bit worried that writing a URN (in its full specificity) may become extremely difficult. For an example, how would an editor easily determine the URN of Albert Einstein, "Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper", Annalen der Physik, 17(1905):891-921. At the moment, the best may be the enemy of the good.
When one considers the 220 plus pages in the Chicago Manual of Style dealing with the problems of citations in different fields, implementing the URN program and developing software to convert it into human readable citations looks like something that is far from being implemented.
Finally, I don't see why the Cite.php format is described as cluttered. It only becomes cluttered if one tries to implement it in Citation Template form, which I agree is a mess. Writing citations as footnotes or Harvard in-line citations is really quite simple, once you get in the habit of doing it. --SteveMcCluskey 18:50, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
If Omegatron's suggestion could be implemented, it would deal with some references, but not all. Some books are too old to have ISBNs. Software does not have ISBNs. Magazines have ISSNs, but these refer to the periodical as a whole and do not identify a particular issue or article. None of these numbers provide page numbers that a particular fact or quote came from.
Also, the citation style should be chosen on a per-article basis, not a per-user basis. Still, I favor finding some approach that makes it easier to edit text. --Gerry Ashton 18:52, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

For an example, how would an editor easily determine the URN of

I was imagining a pop-up search utility. Type in one or more fields in the search box, like title or author, and it would present a list of works. Select the one you intended and it would either give you the URN to copy and paste or insert it for you.

Finally, I don't see why the Cite.php format is described as cluttered. It only becomes cluttered if one tries to implement it in Citation Template form, which I agree is a mess.

No, it's really quite <ref>"On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies". ( fourmilab.ch web site): [http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/specrel/www/ Translation from the German article]: "Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper", ''Annalen der Physik''. '''17''':891-921. (June 30, 1905) </ref> cluttered and difficult to <ref>Lorentz, H. A. (1904) "Electromagnetic phenomena in a system moving with any velocity less than that of light", ''Proc. Acad. Science Amsterdam'', '''IV''', 669-78.</ref> read around, even without citation <ref> {{cite conference | first = BalaSundaraRaman | last = L | authorlink = | coauthors = Ishwar.S, Sanjeeth Kumar Ravindranath | date = 2003-08-22 | title = Context Free Grammar for Natural Language Constructs - An implementation for Venpa Class of Tamil Poetry | booktitle = Proceedings of Tamil Internet, Chennai, 2003 | editor = | others = | edition = | publisher = International Forum for Information Technology in Internet | location = | pages = 128-136 | url = http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/balasundararaman03context.html | format = | accessdate = 2006-08-24 | doi = | id = }}</ref> templates. It's atrocious. The whole concept of a wiki is that it uses simple, easy-to-use markup, accessible to the most technically-challenged Internet users. If we're going to continue using something in the style of Cite.php, it really needs to be reconstructed with input from the people who are forced to use it every day. For one, the content of the references needs to be in the References section, where it displays, so you can edit them directly, instead of hunting through the entire article for the first occurrence of each. And the links in the midst of text need to be small and unobtrusive.[cite:Zur Elektrodynamik] (Or something like that.[cite:Ein05c]) I've proposed changes like this elsewhere already.

None of these numbers provide page numbers that a particular fact or quote came from.

For page numbers in a journal article, you use the SICI number in the URN instead of the ISSN, for page numbers within a book, you'd use the BICI instead of the ISBN. For instance, to cite Einstein, the code would be:
Maxwell's electrodynamics, when applied to moving bodies, leads to asymmetries 
which do not appear to be inherent in the 
phenomena.[urn:sici:0003-3804(19050630)17<891:ZEBK>2.0.TX;2-B]
As opposed to:
Maxwell's electrodynamics, when applied to moving bodies, leads to asymmetries 
which do not appear to be inherent in the phenomena.<ref>"On the Electrodynamics 
of Moving Bodies". (fourmilab.ch web site): 
[http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/specrel/www/ Translation from the German 
article]: "Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper",  ''Annalen der Physik''. 
'''17''':891-921. (June 30, 1905) </ref>
The SICI is still kind of a long citation, I guess, but nowhere near as long as writing all the info out by hand, and I've seen much longer URLs as web citations. If wikicite plans to have a central database to edit the citation and insert it in article with a shorter code, I wonder what identifier they were planning to use.

One problem, among many, is that early books do not have ISBNs and I don't know how the URN program plans to handle that.

it would deal with some references, but not all. Some books are too old to have ISBNs. Software does not have ISBNs.

True. On the other hand, we need to think of WP:V, too. You can't cite an ancient book that no one can get a copy of. ISBN covers everything printed or reprinted since 1966, and SICI covers every journal article, so that's most of what anyone would be citing. But yeah, there would have to be some mechanism for the exceptions, like a custom namespace.[note:''Title of article'', Author, year]

Also, the citation style should be chosen on a per-article basis, not a per-user basis.

No, it should be uniform from article to article. Since some people prefer styles that they are used to, it should then be a user preference and be consistent for that user from article to article. — Omegatron 23:44, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Omegatron and I certainly have a different concept of simplicity. Compare the clarity and simplicity of the standard footnote style:
<ref>Albert Einstein, "Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper", ''Annalen der Physik'', 17(1905):891-921.</ref>
with the obscurity and complexity of:
[urn:sici:0003-3804(19050630)17<891:ZEBK>2.0.TX;2-B]
As an aside, I cannot and will not defend the citation template style, of which Omegatron gave a typical example. Citation templates clutter articles and make editing of content extremely difficult. One could even add that citation templates suffer from much the same problem of the URN proposal, forcing everything into the same Procrustean bed of standardized format. Wikipedia includes scientists, computer experts, classical scholars, and fans of popular music and films. Writers in these fields have different ways of citing things, and the format of each article will reflect those varieties. Whether an article cites references in Harvard style or footnotes, I see no reason to change it. --SteveMcCluskey 15:10, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
All reference styles which include the citation information inline with the text clutter articles and make editing of content extremely difficult. It's not citation templates; it's the entire paradigm of Cite.php.
You wouldn't be typing in the URN by hand; you'd be given it by an easy-to-use search tool. (And books would be shorter, anyway.[isbn:0-306-40615-2])
If wikicite is implemented, it would need some similar type of identifier to indicate that something is referenced. I wonder what they intend to use?
There is no reason to use either Harvard style or CMS footnotes, when we have infinite possibilities for citation formatting. Why force everything into a horrible little abbreviated list of references, completely distanced from the text that references it, with barely enough information to find a copy, when we have no space or formatting constraints? The print editions of these articles can certainly use such formats, but for web viewing we have much broader possibilities.
What we really want is what Kirill referred to as a "more sophisticated piece of metadata", so the software can format the references in whichever way is preferred by the user. The identifier will be unique to a specific work, allowing people to cite the same thing uniformly, without any missing information, throughout the encyclopedia without having to search for and properly format the complete reference information each time, allowing people to create (Mediawiki, Firefox, ...) extensions for enhanced functionality without going through and adding things to each reference individually. If you want a list of 30 books at the very end of an article in the order they were cited, with partial author information, you can have it.
I, on the other hand, will select a style that allows me to view the references next to the facts they are cited by, as I'm reading, to view extended information that wouldn't be included in standardized styles like Harvard refs, with relevant excerpts, links to copies of the book/article I can read online, links to related publications by the same author, a list of other Wikipedia articles that cite the same reference, etc.
I was trying to think of a short, well-defined, standardized way to identify references for this purpose and discovered the URN concept, which fits perfectly. If you have a better idea, I'd love to see it, but Cite.php and standardized, abbreviated, "we've always done it this way" references are awful. See also URNs, bibliographic citations in web authoring. — Omegatron 18:34, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Page_numbers

What does everyone watching this page think about the removal of material that is sourced from a book, but the editor did not provide page numbers. To clarify the material was added from a book which is a reliable source first. Some six months later page numbers are being asked for with the idea that if they are not produced the material will be removed. Is the removal of this material acceptable, unacceptable, or borderline?--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 19:39, 8 September 2006 (UTC) The material in question does fall under one of the situations decribed as Page numbers must be included in a citation that accompanies. . . emphasis mine.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 20:05, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Hey, that's not what I said. The situation was different. The question is would a citation count for a specific fact if there were no page numbers but just a general reference to a book? The question of whether a book provided at the end of the article is sufficient for every fact in the article is quite a different debate. I'm sorry if you were confused by this. JASpencer 20:24, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
I may still be confused. I asked if you would be satisfied by adding a footnoted ciation and you replied "If it had a page number for the claim, yes" [2] So if we add a footnoted ciation to the fact from the book, you will not be satisfied but not so unsatisfied you would still remove it. Is this correct?--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 20:33, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
I would wait a bit longer but I would argue that they don't meet WP:CITE and so aren't citations. As to removal, well it would go through the talk page as at present. The implication of your previous post was that the assertions were individually cited and that I was complaining about those fictional citations because of the lack of a page number. Your position is more friendly to citations than the others on the page as you do seem to accept that a book announced at the end of an article is sufficient for a controversial article. JASpencer 20:58, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Well I started off asking the question generally, because am really more interested in general interpretation rather than what happens to one particular article. Then realized it would be important to know that whether someone had just added the the statements, or if they had been sitting there for some time first so I looked up how long ago the statements we were discussing were added and didn't realize how that changed the framework of my question. I apologize for misrepresenting you, it was inadvertant.
I don't think a book announced at the end of an article is sufficient, but I would be more hesitant to delete than you and probably wait much longer. I would rather see a book at the end of the article worked into a better style of citations. Honestly if I couldn't contact the original editor, I would order the book myself through the libray before removing another's work (unless it smelled funny). If you look at the history on that talk I was trying to better clarify my postion as you replied, so I reverted myself to maintain the integrity of your answer.
I really just want see where consensus is on the removal of assertions that are individually cited but missing page numbers. I know that is not the current situation we are involved in. But I believe most of the statements you list could be brought up to this level with little effort. I would rather draw the map on what everyone agrees on first before jumping in however. I am not at all interested if people think your actions leading up to now are acceptable or not. Which unfortunately led to me paying too little attention to how I represented them. I just want to figure how we move forward through the current situation, which the first step is determining how to deal with individually cited assertions which are missing page numbers.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 21:24, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

(Unindent) As I read the guideline, any specific quotation or paraphrase should have a page number, or an equivalent method of making it easy for a fact-checker to find the relevant passage in the source. Any editor could remove a quotation or paraphrase on that basis. I personally would weigh how harmful or controversial the paraphrase or quotation was before removing it. I would be inclined to remove it if the paraphrase or passage

  1. Appears to be false or misleading on an fairly important topic
  2. Disparages a living person
  3. Disparages a dead person who played an important role in a present-day religion, political party, etc.
  4. Replaces a passage in an article, if the previous version were better-sourced

--Gerry Ashton 21:46, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be simpler to create a tag someone can put into the text requesting a page number (without removing the quotation) and state that if a page number is not provided within a reasonable amount of time (we can either debate that here, or leave it up to editors working on an article) the quote should be removed to the talk page until a proper citation is provided. Slrubenstein | Talk 21:51, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
I oppose tags for something like this - such a request should go on the talk page. It isn't worth defacing the article over missing page numbers when the source has already been given. If someone has trouble finding the material in the book they can usually use the book's index or in many cases search the book online via Amazon or Google Print. dryguy 23:04, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Unnecessarily strict when the book is short or has a reference of subjects or key words. Andries 22:39, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
And extending the WP:BLP for dead people is I think wrong. Andries 22:40, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
I agree that a page number is not the only acceptable method for finding a quote or paraphrase, and a citation-checker should make a reasonable attempt to use whatever means are available for a particular work.
as for extending WP:BLP to dead people, I only said I would be inclined to delete passages that disparage certain dead people. For me, it would depend on the degree to which disparaging the dead person also disparages the organizations that the dead person was associated with. --Gerry Ashton 23:09, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
If an organizations is stupid enough to have its reputation hinge around the reputation of a deceased person person living or dead then it should suffer the consequences for that. Andries 23:33, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

{unindent} It looks the removal of sourced material missing page numbers is a borderline issue. One idea is that it depends on the source (i.e. if it is indexed or not) I think that should not matter. If someone has the book in hand to know if it is indexed, they can then provide the page numbers. Another view is the removal is based on the nature of the material. Actually I think everyone can agree that if assertion is contraversial or if someone actually disputes the accuracy then it should be removed to the talk page until someone can provide the page numbers. If we just talk about mundane material. Assertions that are not actually disputed. That are sourced from a reliable reasource but were added some time before pages numbers were asked for. I personally think such material should not be removed. It is sourced after all and I don't think the convience of fact-checkers should outweigh the benefits of actually having the material in the first place. I think there could be some kind of tag put on the reference itself where it will not clutter up the reading of the article. I just don't understand the reason we would want remove sourced information that is not disputed by anyone, just because we may not have the page numbers in the near future. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 01:08, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

WP:V says "Any unsourced material may be challenged and removed." Not "Any unsourced material that has not been judged by another editor to be mundand may be challenged and removed." Any unsourced material.
As far as whether the material is sourced or not this is proved by whether it is cited. These are not cited.
I see no problem with removing the material to the talk page until someone can cite it. To turn the convenience argument around, the convenience of individual editors should not bend the rules of WP:V.
JASpencer 10:25, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
I completely agree with the removal of unsourced material. However we are talking about sourced material. Material that was taken from a known reference and added to and article before that article had any citations using page numbers. WP:V does not say uncited may removed, just unsourced. Perhaps this is the real question "Can material be sourced if it is not cited?" I believe the answer is yes. Although the refusal to properly cite a source when adding new information should be viewed as unacceptable, we can not declare that all previously sourced material must now be considered "unsourced" because the article is being converted to citation-style.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 11:04, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
But where does it stop? You could enter some really dubious material and then say that it's from the book, or a book, "at the end". Far easier to cite the information. Otherwise it can go to the talk page. JASpencer 11:07, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
I agree that this may yield some problems in the case the book is lengthy an unindexed, but this is somewhat exceptional. Andries 11:10, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
You reply too fast. I was changing my mind slightly :P If someone has been using the "book at the end" approach convert it to citations. What is the problem with that? We have everything but the page numbers and the first person to fact check the article can add those. Where it stops is when the the arrticle is converted to ciatation-style. Where is stops is when the info is disputed or contraversial. You cannot add dubious information and say it is in the book at the end. No one is supporting that. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 11:16, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
A small problem with that is that Noel is not claiming that all the uncited facts come from the biography, but that some (most?) do. So if you or I entered them in we would not know that they were coming from where we were claiming that they were from.
However as you said before, if you have an indexed copy of the book - how hard can it be to put the citations in so that it meets WP:V?
JASpencer 12:53, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
I don't what you are getting at above. A review of Noel's edits are certainly in order and Noel is around to answer any questions. Maybe we will find problems, maybe we won't; it is hard to say without doing the review. I am not suggesting that we should mark all the uncited facts as being from that book without any further inquiries. I do not understand what you mean by However as you said before, if you have an indexed copy of the book - how hard can it be to put the citations in so that it meets WP:V? Obviously if someone has a book on hand get the page numbers, I am only questioning what to do when months have past since someone had a book open adding info to WP. I don't see what page numbers have to do with WP:V. What do you exactly mean when you say "meets WP:V", because that policy is mainly talking using reliable sources and that the editor adding the info should give their reference, which has been done.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 21:58, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
I have started a section for such a review if anyone here is interested in following how this works out. Talk:Marcel Lefebvre#Noel's edits--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 22:23, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

cite sources that represent a fair and balanced view

if it's ok with everyone, i would like to propose that we add a section entitled "cite sources that represent a fair and balanced view" The problem is that various topics have one major viewpoint and a minor viewpoint or multiple viewpoints. I've run into wikipedians who are citing a onesided viewpoint or citations from a minor viewpoint and trying to state that it is the absolute truth... hopefully this will prevent a one-sided view of the world...Kennethtennyson 17:24, 9 September 2006 (UTC)


  • The specific phrase "fair and balanced" is pretty loaded, and at this point has become identified with a news source many see as slanted. Without entering that debate, would it make sense to change the terminology to something else? "Objective," "even-handed," "neutral" might work? Jameson 23:44, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Difference between Cite journal and Cite confrence

I have not been able to figure out the difference between Template:Cite journal and Template:Cite conference. I realize the second is meant specifically for the Procedings of confrences, but what, in terms of template arguments, or, output style, is the difference? I presume there is one, which is why I'm posting here. Thanks! (copied to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Wikicite also) JesseW, the juggling janitor 05:41, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

GA: Looking at the documentation contained on the talk pages for cite journal and cite template, I found the differences listed below; I put the different attributes at the end of the table.

conference template journal template
first first
last last
authorlink authorlink
coauthors coauthors
date date
year year
month month
title title (REQUIRED)
pages pages
url url
format format
accessdate accessdate
doi doi
id id
booktitle —
editor —
others —
edition —
publisher —
location —
— journal
— volume
— issue

I don't recommend templates; I was just curious to see how citations between the two might be different. --Gerry Ashton 17:57, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks; but I'd put most of those differences down to a lack of development of cite confrence; it's still not clear to me what the difference in style might be. JesseW, the juggling janitor 23:39, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Concordia Libraries link

I'm getting nothing if I click on the wikilink of this in Technical issues with footnotes section:

  1. Many of today's style guides require not using or recommend against using footnotes and reference endnotes to cite sources (Concordia Libraries)

Not sure how to fix it.qp10qp 01:30, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

This is an attempt at Harvard referencing, where the author's last name and the year of publication are put in the text in parenthesis, after a quotation or paraphrase. If you look at Template talk:ref_harvard you will see there is a template available to use in the text instead of simply typing the reference information as plain text. There is a matching template, ref_label, that is supposed to go in the references section. The project page has an entry for Concordia Libraries, but there no ref_label in the Concordia Libraries entry in the references section, so no connection is established. If everything had worked as intended, you would be able to click back and forth between the reference section and the text where the reference is used.
I have not used templates for Harvard references, and I don't know how well they work, or which method is best. I don't know if it is worth fixing or if it would be better to just make it a plain Harvard reference without a template. --Gerry Ashton 02:10, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oh, I see. (It didn't look like a Harvard reference; they usually have a date and page number, but maybe that's just for books, I don't know.) Without being blue, it will just look like something random in brackets, won't it?qp10qp 03:10, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Reference neccesary for short articles without controversial information?

Would it be appropriate for a biographical article that contains nothing more than DOB, names of spouse/children, and education and key positions, with dates to not contain a single reference?

This information is obviously taken from somewhere, and the truthfulness of the facts could be easily verified by a simple web search. But the information is also not controversial. Does an article that contains just this basic information need a reference? Patiwat 18:37, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, all articles need references; this really isn't negotiable at this point. Kirill Lokshin 18:44, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Sure does -- here's an example of a short article that most likely will not grow any larger and just has the basic info (and nothing controversial) but still has its sources -- it's an article I created yesterday: George Rogers Clark Floyd --plange 18:49, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Where to place citations in a paragraph?

Where should the citations for the following paragraph be placed?

This sentence summarizes the paragraph. This fact came from source A. This fact came from source B. This fact came from Soure A.

Like this:

This sentence summarizes the paragraph.A B This fact came from source A. This fact came from source B. This fact came from Soure A.

or like this:

This sentence summarizes the paragraph. This fact came from source A.A This fact came from source B.B This fact came from Soure A.A

or like this:

This sentence summarizes the paragraph.This fact came from source A.A This fact came from source B.B This fact came from Soure A.

or like this:

This sentence summarizes the paragraph. This fact came from source A. This fact came from source B.B This fact came from Soure A.A

or like this:

This sentence summarizes the paragraph. This fact came from source A. This fact came from source B. This fact came from Soure A.A B

-- Patiwat 10:09, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Depending on the length of the paragraph, I'd go with either the second option or the last one; as a general rule, a citation must come after the material it applies to, not before. Kirill Lokshin 15:22, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
My preference for the last option rises in direct proportion to the number of facts cited from each source. It gets ridiculous to have a footnote on every sentence in an article in cases where one or two footnotes per paragraph are sufficient. dryguy 15:34, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
One point to note would be that the last option works best if the footnotes are pure citations; if there are discursive remarks also present, combining them for an entire paragraph is likely to be confusing. Kirill Lokshin 15:40, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks a bunch for the suggestions, dryguy and Kirill Lokshin!

One followup question. If work A is used as a reference for a large part of an article, and works B-F are used as references for some specific parts of an article, then where should I put the citation for work A? At the end of every substantial fact, at the end of every substantial article, at the end of just some substantial facts? Patiwat 17:52, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, it is best to reference specific facts, assertions, or whatever as you go along, rather than trying to make a single reference cover a large part of the article at once, because the reader tends to associate footnote marks with particular sentences or paragraphs in the text. So the sequence of citations might go AAAABAACAAAADEAFAAAA. I would reference A at the end of information culled from one page or sequence of pages in a book (12-16) rather than at the end of every sentence. The reader checking the source will grasp that intuitively.qp10qp 18:08, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
Can you cite any serious publication that makes a practice of repeatedly citing the same reference on several sentences in a row? I believe that is non-standard for a very good reason - it is distracting to the reader to have footnotes applied continuously throughout an article when one or two footnotes at the beginning of an article and on key points will do just fine. No serious publication that I am aware of puts a footnote on every sentence. A far more common practice is to group the relevant citations and place them on one or more key sentences in the introduction, something like this.1-6 dryguy 15:22, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
I just re-read what you wrote - obviously I missed where you said put the citations at the end of the paragraph. dryguy 15:32, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
Also, unfortunately, we have to be more citation happy than a publication who knows who they hired to write the article. Citations help editors combat misinformation being slipped into an article, as it should be easy to spot new info going in without a cite and require they provide one. --plange 16:15, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Which template for streaming media

Hi, can someone tell me which cite template to use when linking to a streaming video/audio? -- Lost(talk) 17:12, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

When not to cite

IMHO mechanical application of WP:CITE and the desire for a cureall results in absurd situation, e.g. the recent idea that WP:GOOD articles do require by all means in-line cites. I very much hold that there a situarions where giving in-line cites is not only unnecessary, but misleading. Top example are overview articles about established area of science.

In special relativity, should we give a cite for:

two events happening in two different locations that occur simultaneously to one observer, may occur at different times to another observer

This can be found in literally every textbook on SR, possibly hundreds of books. If giving just one book reference, a contributor would not only promote a specific book without reason, but leave the possible impression, that only this book supports the sentence, other books possibly not. Also for this example the verifiability argument seems rather silly: If someone needs a reference to verify the correctness of this sentence, I would rather prefer someone other to check the correctness of the article.

Pjacobi 15:41, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

We could really use some feedback from seasoned editors here on the new changes to the GA criteria, which all seems to be pointing back to issues that have to do with WP:CITE..... --plange 14:05, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
WP:CITE is a guideline, the policy that you are trying to follow is verifiability. There are many different ways to cite information, from simply listing a general reference at the end of the article which supports a large part of the information, to actually providing footnotes to the reader. In situtations where an article contains many facts that are basic to the subject and broadly accepted, it might be worth listing a few general references at the end of the article, i.e. some widely used undergraduate texts, and not bothering with footnotes. When such material is challenged, you still ought to provide a specific citation for it, but that need not be done with a reader-visible footnote. You could use {{inote}} or an HTML comment, or simply note the source on the talk page. Christopher Parham (talk) 22:31, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Date wikification in cites

I'm not sure exactly where this belongs, please point me elsewhere if this discussion either belongs or has taken place before. In many articles (such as Tupac_Shakur which is where i noticed it), the publication dates of referenced books etc are wiki links to the date in question. This is neither helpful or consistant as far as i can tell, but i cant see how to edit it, and it seems to be done in a lot of articles so maybe i shouldnt anyway, can anyone clarify this? Provider uk 18:28, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

If you wikilink a date in ISO format (YYYY-MM-DD), user preferences allow the date to be displayed 4 different formats, which is why wikilinking dates is considered useful. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Preferences#prefsection-4 .) Some templates wikilink certain date entries automatically. Armedblowfish (talk|mail|contribs) 21:26, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
the problem with wikilinking dates is that it colorizes and highlights them, thus misleading users into thinking the editors recommend clicking on a link. That tends to disfigure an article and mislead the users. Rjensen 00:05, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Citing newspapers articles which are accessed indirectly

I got this in Factiva:

Starbucks Sued for $10 Million by Glen Cove, N.Y., Woman By Jamie Herzlich, Newsday, Melville, N.Y. Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News 717 mots 30 décembre 2003 Newsday (KRTBN) (N.Y.) Anglais Copyright (C) 2003 KRTBN Knight Ridder Tribune Business News

It looks like KRTBN aggregates the contents from many newspapers: so the date (December 30, 2003) is probably the date of the original article in Newsday, but as I accessed the Newsday article only through KRTBN, should I write, in the References sections, something like "through KRTBN"? Or only Newsday, December 30, 2003? Apokrif 16:33, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

When not to cite Part Deux

We're still debating over at GA our attempt to apply this guideline to our GA criteria. Can we get clarification from the seasoned editors here on whether the following is acceptable?

statements which are undisputed within an academic field need not be inline cited

as that's what we're being asked to make an exception for. We'd appreciate any feedback we can get on this heated debate, thanks! --plange 20:03, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

That's utterly ridiculous. Even if we ignore the necessity of citations for avoiding accusations of plagiarism, copious inline citation is still necessary so that readers/editors from outside the academic field in question can figure out where certain statements are being drawn from.
To give a somewhat more useful example than the silly "the sky is blue" stuff some editors there are throwing around, here is a statement that is entirely undisputed with a certain (but quite obscure) academic field:

Having sacked Brescia, Gaston de Foix returned to the Romagna and laid siege to Ravenna.

Even though the statement is undisputed, its correctness (and even what it refers to) is not at all obvious to someone not familiar with the topic in question; without a direct citation, it becomes extremely difficult for a reader to determine whether this is a valid statement, or merely something a random vandal inserted into the article. Kirill Lokshin 20:15, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
I happen to agree with you, but we're getting hammered over there on GA about this very thing. We're getting flooded by physicists from WP Physics who are upset with our new criteria to require inline citations and are saying we're going overboard on what we're asking. Now I'm at work and so sneaking in time (shh!) so haven't had a chance to look at special relativity to see if what is asked for is out of bounds or not, but I will as soon as I get off so I can weigh in. I do know the editors asking for cites are working in good faith to apply our new criteria though. --plange 20:30, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
That's more of a Catch-22 issue with the idea behind GA itself, I think. The only way they can produce consistent results using single-reviewer methods is to spell out all the criteria explicitly; but the need to do so requires that changes go through an absurdly bureaucratic adoption process (which are prone to the sort of try-to-vote-away-fundamental-policy behavior we're seeing here), rather than simply evolving as needed. (Compare this with FAC, where the explicit criteria only make some mention of "appropriate" inline citation, but where, in practice, an undercited article hasn't a snowball's chance of passing.) Kirill Lokshin 20:46, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
It is overboard. Show me any serious publication that applies inline citations to every fact. It isn't done because the harm to readability would far outweigh any minor benefit gained from adding citations for trivial, non-controversial statements. dryguy 20:38, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Show me any serious publication that "anyone can edit," then! Wikipedia is something fundamentally new; trying to apply traditional standards of citation to it tends to be somewhat unproductive. Kirill Lokshin 20:46, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
In the same vein, applying standards of quality is essential. Quality encompasses readabiliy, verifiability, grammar, style, etc. Sacrificing all other aspects of quality in the name of verifiability isn't the right path. dryguy 20:56, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
The neat thing about cite.php references, of course, is that it would be quite easy to add a CSS feature to hide them entirely, for those readers who preferred not to see them; having more of them has, at worst, a minor and temporary effect on readability. Kirill Lokshin 21:02, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Sound very interesting. Is someone working on an implementation? dryguy 21:04, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
The CSS code itself is quite trivial. If you add the following to your monobook.css (or other skin CSS of your choice), you'll hide the footnote numbers and the rendered footnotes (although there may still be an empty "Notes" section in the article):
.reference {
   display: none;
}

.references {
   display: none;
}
In terms of having this more functional, though (e.g. being able to click a button to show/hide the notes), I'm not sure; JavaScript is not really my strong point. Kirill Lokshin 21:35, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Special relativity is indeed the prime example. It gives an overview over a stable field of science. Standard textbooks are listed in the reference section. Next any assertion in the article can be found in next to any textbook. And: Someone who hasn't read one of these textbooks or has had a course in SR, isn't good in deciding whether or not some insertion in the article is a valid statement. You know, (a) vandals can make up references which are hard to disprove and (b) there are any number of physics cranks in the wild who can be used as sources fro invalid statements about SR (not all of which can be easily detected by being just some AOL-homepage).
It's an unfounded illusion, that everybody can verify articles on every topic.
Pjacobi 20:39, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Citing every sentence will make Wikipedia into something other than an encyclopedia

The argument that because Wikipedia is an encyclopedia that everyone should edit so every statement in Wikipedia should be cited is ludicrous. If that's really the case then we should be fact tagging every sentence in Wikipedia. I'm beginning to believe that there is a group of editors that actually believe this. Citing every sentence is not only amateurish, it is a completely different task to the one of writing an encyclopedia. It's a reference librarian's dream but it makes normal, content-focused editors sick to their stomach. Citing controversial, foundational, or novel pieces of information should be encouraged. Citing mudane and elementary facts should be discouraged. --ScienceApologist 21:30, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I suggest we edit the page to include the statement that elementary facts should not be cited. There are reasons for this. Not the least of which is we should not cite a fact that has dozens, hundreds, or thousands of potential references because we would be biasing our referencing to particular sources. That's unacceptable, in my opinion. If we can find a thousand books that illustrate the pythagorean theorem, it would be inappropriate to choose one that does it to the exclusion of the others. --ScienceApologist 21:34, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm with you on not citing every sentence, but are you seriously suggesting that a significant fraction of the reliable sources explaining the pythagorean theorem present significantly different views on the subject? dryguy 21:48, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
No, he's just saying that, if there are thousands of sources, why would you cite a particular one? -- SCZenz 22:00, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
If they are all the same, why does it matter? If you are really concerned, choose a notable one. In the present example, cite Pythagorus or Tufte or both, but there is no reason on Earth to cite every work that explains the pythagorean theorem. dryguy 22:06, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
But if I cite "Mathematics by Jane Smith, PhD" and not "Mathematical Exercises by Jane Doe, PhD" I'm tacitly endorsing Smith's book over Doe's book. It's basically an advertisement for Smith over Doe. Why should we be in the business of endorsing textbooks? --ScienceApologist 18:35, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Name one serious publication that when citing a reference, cites every single reference in existence that applies to the topic. It isn't done because it isn't necessary. It would not add value. These are not advertisements or endorsements, they are references cited to back up a statement. The practice of citing references is used by literally thousands of reputable, reliable publications. Show me one that has stopped doing so over concerns about tacit endorsement. dryguy 18:47, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Most serious publications when citing references only require them for specific ";;;citable" points not general knowledge facts. That's why we need to clarify when citations are not appropriate. For example, if I write a paper for publication in a physics journal and write "A Galilean transformation cannnot be used in situations where the relevant velocity is a significant fraction of the speed of light", no "serious publication" will demand a cite for this reference. However, there are editors here who would tag this statement with {{fact}} and demand a reference! It's these sorts of elementary, non-controversial, and "common knowledge" facts that we are talking about here, not the points that would normally get cited in "serious publications". What many editors don't seem to realize is that there are a huge number of statements that "serious publications" absolutely would not reference and would criticize authors for attempting to reference. There reasons for this are that it's amateurish and that a reference to a single source to the exclusion of other sources serves as an unnecessary endorsement of one particular treatment of a subject over another. When the statements of fact are about general, common knowledge it is considered improper to cite these statements! --ScienceApologist 20:29, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
This is true because of space limitations and printing costs for paper journals. Also, for journals that use inline citations, citing trivial statements hurts the typography unneccesarily. I'm with you on the need to limit inline citations of trivial, non-controversial statements. I'm especially with you regarding the nefarious {{fact}} tag. However, given that Wikipedia is not a paper journal, the concerns about space limitations don't really apply, and unless you can state some other specific objection, I see no harm in allowing people to include citations for anything, as long as they don't bomb the article with inline junk. Finally, I challenge you to show me the author guidelines for even one publication that discourages citation on the basis that it would be improper endorsement. No publication does that. dryguy 22:33, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I cannot point to author guidelines that state anything as specific as Wikipedia regarding citations, so this challenge is a bit of a red herring as it is not very helpful for either of our opinions. If I'm mistaken in this, point me to author guidelines that are as detailed as this guideline page with respect to citations only. Anyway, the nature of the beast is that Wikipedia is much more explicit about its rationale than most serious publications' guidelines. Let me put it this way, I'm certain that if an author submitted a journal article for review with inline references to a single textbook for elementary facts, this would not be looked upon very favorably by reviewers for reasons close to the improper endorsement reasons I outlined. Even if the journal was an online journal with unlimited space. --ScienceApologist 04:34, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
I've never seen an article in a research journal that provided inline citations, or even general references, for facts that would be found in an undergraduate textbooks. But I can't imagine that the reason has anything to do with endorsing one source over another; many facts that are worth inline citations can be found in more than one source, but I've never heard of any rule that if you cite one source, you have to cite them all. Indeed, this is such an extrordinary claim that I think it is up to ScienceApologist to prove that such a policy exists, and it is fair for everyone else to presume that no such policy exists until proven otherwise. --Gerry Ashton 04:50, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
I agree with ScienceApologist. Citing every sentence in articles on stable scientific subjects is neither feasible nor, in my opinion, particularly desirable. -- SCZenz 21:57, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

As my reputation is ruined anyway, I can do away with politeness: The main problem is, that not everybody can contribute (to the content) of every article. Or has somebody here discovered a magic pill which will do away with the necessity formal (or even informal) education? In-line cites are not this pill. For quite a large number of articles, no amount of inline cites can make an article 100% verifiable for somebody without prior knowledge of the topic. For one, you cannot judge wether the topic is misrepresented by simply leaving important things out? Next obstacle will be the ability to judge on the reliability of the sources. And without some practical training, you may not even see the equivalence between two different formulation. --Pjacobi 22:10, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

No one is an expert in all areas, but fortunately, for most areas, there are experts contributing to Wikipedia. I don't see the need to make every fact in every article reviewable by non-experts (nor am I convinced that would be possible). The experts who write and maintain the articles are usually doing a good job already. If the physics community at Wikipedia is opposed to inline citations on every fact, perhaps it is for a very good reason - they already have a style that works for them. For non-experts that need to verify something, chances are that they are going to have some work ahead of them no matter what style of citation is used. Physics can be a hard subject, and sometimes there are no shortcuts to learn the difficult parts. dryguy 22:34, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
The same is true in mathematics. The content of most math articles is often covered by any of several textbooks on the topic, and mostly in the introductory chapters at that. Rarely a research paper or two might need citing. Verifying that a cited statement is justified by the source text often requires some training in the subject. Articles on elementary math, on the other hand, are generally common knowledge. Inline cites should only be used where they are helpful for the reader and that, in my opinion, demands judgement, not one-size-fits-all dicta. --agr 23:23, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I increasingly wonder whether people who object to dense citations on the basis of readability are being frank. I agree that the present system <ref>, </ref>, <references/> system creates typographic ugliness and interferes with readability, but that's a technical and a UI design problem and it can be solved.

Yet people keep saying "let's have fewer citations" instead of "let's find a better way to present densely-cited material."

I can think of all sorts of workable approaches. Here's one that's used in books, but doesn't carry over well to Wikipedia. Laura Hillenbrand's Seabiscuit: An American Legend is very densely cited, and perfectly readable. It was a bestseller that was made into a movie. It uses a simple technique I've seen in other books. There are no visible footnotes in the text itself. Instead, at the back of the book, are notes, organized by chapter and page number, with each simply introduced by the phrase it is referencing. If you don't care about the references, you don't even need to know they exist. If you do, you can look them up virtually as quickly as if there were numeric superscripts.

I'd like to see a system in which reference markers in the markup identify the whole range, not just the end, of the passage being referenced. I'd like to see references displayed, not with superscripts, but with subtle color differences... which could be turned off by a user setting. If it's turned off, the text appears uniformly black. If its turned on, referenced text is black, unreferenced text is some darkish color that is distinguishable from the referenced text, but just barely. To go to the reference, right-click on the text.

Is that feasible? I don't know. But the existing reference system seemed like an impossible dream until it was implemented a year ago.

Let's be clear about this. Are the people objecting to references really objecting to it on the basis of readability, or is there a faction that actually likes the idea of an encyclopedia that rests on the personal authority of anonymous contributors? Dpbsmith (talk) 23:46, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

There is a component of irritation that you want us to spend five times as long finding spefic page numbers as it would take to simply improve a stub to a quality article, and that a result Wikipedia will have five times fewer quality articles in our area of expertise. We're not relying on our personal authority, and I'm insulted at your implications—we're simply saying that noncontroversial facts are adequately verified if they appear in general references at the bottom of the article. To claim non-experts should be able to verify every Wikipedia article, line by line, is rubbish; we could fool you if we wanted to, even if we did cite every souce. So yes, you have to trust, collectively, the people at Wikipedia:WikiProject Physics not to fuck you over: you're doing that whether you know it or not, and all that you're doing with the rigid inline citation requirements is making more work for everyone. -- SCZenz 00:00, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Dpbsmith - believe it or not, my motivation is concern for the quality of Wikipedia. If you feel my motivations are otherwise, then state why you think so and give me a chance to address your accusations. I don't appreciate having you imply that my motivations are to hurt the verifiability of Wikipedia. I also believe that the majority of people voicing frustration with the overuse of inline citations are doing so in good faith.
Quality encompasses more than verifiability. I do not object to numerous or dense citations that are done intelligently. I object strenuously to dense inline citations that are applied to every sentence, or worse, multiple times per sentence. I don't object to people adding citations in support of trivial facts. I object strenuously to people who insist on adding an inline cite or a {{fact}} tag to every statement lacking an inline cite. Such behavior is absurd, and we don't need rules that actively encourage it. I strongly object to the addition of rules to require such a ridiculous practice. We would be better off with guidelines that gave people a clue about what quality actually means: verifiability, reliable sources, intelligent prose, sensible typesetting, etc. Wikipedia has been widely criticized for poor quality, and has responded well in the area of verifiability, but in my opinion, needs some attention to many of the other factors that determine the quality of an encyclopedia. dryguy 00:34, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
In defense of Agne who put those fact tags on the article in question, she was asked to on the talk page - she did not swoop in and fact-bomb the page as has been implied elsewhere. --plange 01:41, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
No, she didn't. First she informed people that the article would be "failed" and no longer "good" unless they provided inline citations, without giving any specific issues. This was even more problematic. -- SCZenz 01:44, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
True, though she was just a messenger and acting in good faith. Let's move past the method of how you were informed and focus on finding consensus. WP:V is a core principle and though you might be a good mentor for the page in question, and know full well that the whole article is backed up by the references at the bottom, what happens if you leave?? The article might start accreting pseudo-science (shudder) and by the time someone else comes along to monitor the page (who might not be a phyicist) they will have to look in each reference at the bottom to find which backs up each fact/opinion. Now, instead, if there were cites for these, the editor only has to check that one to see if it backs it up and that someone hadn't snuck one by us. The example that Kirill gives in the section above (as it relates to history) is a good one. Also, I'd like to test our review process so if you could submit the Special Relativity page for review so we can see if it does meet the new guidelines, that would be great. --plange 01:58, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I don't think anyone intends to attack Ange. I agree wholeheartedly that we should move past that specific incident, but some hard-working editors did take (unintended, but very real nevertheless) offense at the generic skim-for-inline-citations-and-announce-immininent-delisting approach taken by the Good Articles WikiProject. We need a clearer approach to what GA asks for, in order to avoid such problems in the future. But yes, we should try for consensus; we're not there yet, though, and I don't think GA requirements should reflect things without consensus support. See also my comments here; they are heartfelt, including the apology, and I think working more calmly through the confusion and mutual frustration is very important at this point. -- SCZenz 02:07, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Cool. So what do you think of Kirill's example above as an illustration of why cites are needed for things that are only common knowledge to experts in the field? --plange 02:13, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I looked at the example, and the point is well taken; but I disagree on the conclusion of what the best way to move forward given Wikipedia's current state is. Given the relatively limited number of experts here, in my field at least, I think there isn't time to cite every fact that might seem to be of uncertain veracity. Nor does citation guarentee that a non-expert can/will verify a statement; who's to say a vandal won't cleverly fake a citation, perhaps by referring to a very difficult paper for an incorrect assertion. Believe me, even I can't read most string theory papers; thus I'd rather have some string theorists watching string theory than citations for every line. I think experts' time is more effectively spent improving poor content (of which there is much, in physics), than adding the citations at this time. That's a statement of wanting to use limited volunteer time effecitvely, rather than laziness; perhaps I'll reconsider my position some day if the facts on the ground change. -- SCZenz 02:23, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Also note that often even properly-cited claims aren't verifiable to people without university-level computer access. For example, in my rather puny stub Crystal Ball (detector). (It isn't in-line cited, but it could be, since the ref section includes which references refer to which part, and it's only a few sentences.) I've included proper citations and web-links, but the papers can't be read without paying thousands of dollars to Elsevier or being at a university that does. -- SCZenz 02:33, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Ease of verification isn't a requirement, however, just that it ultimately is. Yes, vandals will find ways to get around things, but it's a lot easier to spot when things have citations.... Also, can you guarantee that you will always have a string theorist in perpetuity watching your article? I understand your point on the other (re: your time). If you think your time is best spent improving content, that's great. There's no requirement that says you have to be "GA-stamped" in order to do so. What we're attempting to do at GA is bring our process more in line with what is required at FAC so that GA articles have a better chance there ultimately (after a good peer review, etc). If there are so few editors for your area, perhaps participation in the GA process shouldn't be a priority for you at this time. Once you get things out of stub status and feel caught up, then perhaps it won't feel so overwhelming to go the next step, etc. Thoughts? --plange 02:44, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I have several thoughts. I'll bullet and sign them separately for easier discussion of them separately (if desired). -- SCZenz 02:59, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree that verifiability is the ultimate issue; that's why I claim that "verifiable by any subject expert" is sufficient for well-settled facts in which the references are available but not in-line cited. It seems peculiar to me that you have no problem with "verifiable only by people with obscenely expensive website access" but object to my position. Can you explain? -- SCZenz 02:59, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Obscene amounts of money being (somewhat) easier to acquire than an expertise in string theory, the former is more verifiable than the latter. (The ideal version, of course, is for everything to be verifiable by a decently educated layman through generally available sources; but this may not always be possible, obviously.) Kirill Lokshin 03:18, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I think it should be verifiable by a non-expert. WP:V says that "any reader" should be able to verify. At least if it's cited, they know where to go, no matter if it is expensive, or only in D.C.'s National Archives. We're writing for non-experts, not experts. Experts on special relativity are not going to be looking up special relativity on WP. Writing for experts is the domain of peer-reviewed journals and the like. How do I know that such-n-such is an established fact in your field and not some pseudo-science slipped in if I'm reading what special relativity is about and what makes it so special? It might seem silly and embarassing to you to cite it because you live and breathe this stuff every day, but we don't and the average reader of your article won't either. --plange 03:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
    Any reader can read the textbook introductions to special relativity. It's hard work, but so is going to the National Archives. Looking at SR fact-by-fact without an understanding of the whole does not enable effective verification anyway, I don't think. -- SCZenz 03:39, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • If we lose our current expert volunteers (who include string theorists), the string theory article is in trouble regardless. One way we might lose expert volunteers is by telling them that articles they thought they've done a good job on and could leave for a while are now officially not "good" anymore. -- SCZenz 02:59, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • No one has delisted articles yet - we were only notifying of a potentiality not an eventuality. --plange 03:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • GA has changed, and I don't think it's for the better. It used to be a significant step below FAC, now a new generation has made it into a category of "ready for FAC" articles. I don't know that the recategorization is a good thing, especially since it's frustrating to article authors. It is also very bureaucratic, another source of frustration. A year ago we used Wikipedia:Peer review to prepare for a FAC. -- SCZenz 02:59, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I get the sense that some people interpreted the negative reactions to the original GA idea as resulting from standards which were too weak, and have been trying to rewrite them into something unnecessarily complicated, when the real objection was that the standards—whatever they happen to be this week—are being inconsistently applied. Kirill Lokshin 03:18, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I think bring it closer to FA is a good thing. Right now, GA is not held in very high esteem (or even good esteem) because of the lax rules. We're attempting to improve this so that the GA stamp will mean something (as well as help editors get closer to FA). --plange 03:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
    But GA doesn't mean anything if it's the same as FA, and it seems to be very close to that right now. -- SCZenz 03:39, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • It's not the same, it's just that we're trying to make it actually fit in actuality and practice, where it is placed in the 1.0 assessment scale. Above B and below A. Cites are basic things to require, but the nuances and fine-tuning of articles to get them to pass FA still makes FA more difficult to attain, as it should be. We're trying to say what's good, not what's fantastic. Fantastic covers what's good, but also includes nice tight prose, well-crafted and balanced leads, etc., etc. Peer reviews are so much easier to sink your teeth into and help perfect when the article is a good solid G or A-class article. --plange 04:30, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Participation in GA isn't a priority for us. For my part, if people really want GA to be pre-FAC, and FAC is demanding in-line citations, then WikiProject Physics might do better to use its own internal rating system (which exists, and which the GA label can be taken out of easy). However, in my personal view if things go in that direction we should ask that physics articles not receive GA-related notices of labels of any kind; if the system can't be applied properly (and if we're not sure it's needed at all), then we shouldn't have to deal with generic, possibly ill-thought-out GA-related requests on talk pages. -- SCZenz 02:59, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • So use the "A-Class" rating in your in-project assessment scale as the mark to aim for and ignore the GA process entirely, then. (But keep in mind that if any physics articles are taken to FAC, a reasonable level of inline citation will almost certainly be asked for.) Kirill Lokshin 03:18, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
    Fine. FA's should be superb; I've made the effort to produce one, it was hard work, and I would expect nothing less in the future. -- SCZenz 03:39, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • One further point that I think people may have missed: inline citation does not mean, per se, that every sentence must be cited. It would be quite possible, for example, to have a single footnote for an entire paragraph or section (e.g. "The material in this section is summarized from Doe (1943), Smith (1972), and Jones (1996)."); while this would not be as rigorous a citation as may be desired (at least for some topics), it would at least give readers and other editors some indication of where to look if they want to track down the sources. Kirill Lokshin 03:25, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • This appears to be a misunderstanding on the part of the GA bureaucracy, one member of which claimed Mathematics may not be adequately cited. It has a cite in just about every single section, I believe. Also, the requests on special relativity were not handled in this way, and our reaction might have been far less frustrated if it had been. Perhaps GA criteria should be amended to make this clearer. -- SCZenz 03:39, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Those were only added to the talk pages of pre-existing GA articles. GA editors are not asking that all articles go through us, etc. If you guys do decide to go this route (not participate) then if you want to avoid us reviewing your articles that already have a GA label on them, then you might want to remove them. Otherwise we're going to assume you do want to participate, etc. --plange 03:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
To add to Kirill Lokshin's points, I've been reading some of the arguing here and elsewhere, and I must say that this chimera of a reference for every line has been invented: there's no policy or good-article principle that requires it, there just isn't; it is a straw man (OK, a straw chimera). Referencing is an instinctive thing; you know when to reference and when not to. The secret lies not so much in the text of the article as in the text of the referenced book: you may put in one reference to cover one or more paragraphs; then as soon as someone checks the reference, they see straight away that the material intervening between two tags is actually covered. In other words, ten sentences might have gone by without another reference mark appearing in the article, but those ten sentences may all be covered in the referenced text. I see nothing wrong, by the way, in giving a range of page numbers (Smith, 2004: 67-76); this prevents the article from becoming clotted with tags and is similar to some entries in indexes where page ranges are given: you find the spot and read on.
I can't think of an article where, say, six successive sentences would require six tags to six different reference works, since the articles here usually represent blocks of knowledge that whole books or articles have already been written about (an exception, I admit, is contemporary POV-war political articles, perhaps, which are indeed often ruined by tag pile ups since no agreed version exists). No-one's asking for a reference a sentence, honest. Even where Agne, perhaps because she was asked to on the Talk page, put some fact tags on the special relativity article, a smart editor could cover several of those in a single inline reference if they were covered in a particular section of a referenced book.qp10qp 03:58, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I say this in all honesty: the impression I have gotten from some GA editors is that citation of individual lines is precisely what would be required in some cases. If we can put a link to the same textbook at the end of every section in special relativity, with a different page number range each time, then that's very different than what I (and others) thought you were asking for. It's really very similar to what we were already doing; giving the source(s) that could be used for the article's basic facts at the end. -- SCZenz 04:12, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
(edit conflict)Another straw dog I've seen in some of the arguments (not on this page, but in other areas where this is being argued) is that we're requiring a certain magic number of cites per article (a certain density), or that since we're not, we can't even require them in the first place. One person even said that since we don't specify a number, then since special relativity had two inline cites, then it should pass since it has some inline cites. This had nothing to do with whether the article had references where it was needed. And if a reviewer goes overboard in their requests for cites, well, I'll keep saying this until I'm blue in the face I guess, but we do have a review process for cases where an article is failed and the nominator doesn't agree with the reasons. This would be precisely the time to protest whether the reviewer was being unreasonable and allow others to judge if this is the case. --plange 04:15, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

In response to Kirill saying "it would be quite possible, for example, to have a single footnote for an entire paragraph or section (e.g. "The material in this section is summarized from Doe (1943), Smith (1972), and Jones (1996)."); while this would not be as rigorous a citation as may be desired. . .", you could make that style rigorous enough by adding the page numbers to those three books. The Chicago Manual of Style has examples of how to do this at any level of precision and detail you wish in a single footnote.qp10qp 04:20, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, my point about the one-per-section citation not being as rigorous was more related to the fact that greatly spaced-out citation make it more difficult to detect later, unreferenced additions. Depending on the nature of the article, this may or may not be a significant problem. Kirill Lokshin 04:27, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

In reply to Plange's comment about density as a "straw dog" (after edit conflict) Well, the wording on WIAGA is entirely ambiguous in this regard, now isn't it? Some of the cite requests we were given looked totally random, and did not reflect the controversial or specific statements in the article, so density was the only thing I could think of that was being asked for. This is why we should be clarifying what requires a cite and what doesn't. -- SCZenz 04:23, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

In reply to SCZenz (not that comment, the one