Wikipedia talk:External links

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Afv2006 (talk | contribs) at 21:16, 10 September 2008 (→‎Blogs: personal web pages). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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An editor at People's General (a video game?) has objected to the removal of his internet discussion forum from the external links. In addition to wanting his own site listed, he adds that other potentially objectionable sites are also included (downloads, and until recently, another chat board). If any of you have an interest in this, please consider reviewing the remaining links in the article, or putting this article on your watchlist. -- WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:04, April 1, 2008 (UTC)

what the article would contain if it became a Featured article.

I objected some time ago to the criterion

"[one should avoid] Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article."

The discussion then was inconclusive. My interpretation of it is that

  • those favouring the wording
    • want to encourage people to add citation references rather than external links
    • want to prevent editors dumping extra links willy-nilly
  • while those opposing it
    • do not want editors trying to incrementally improve low-quality articles to be held to the standards of featured articles
    • want to make it easy for readers to get access to more information about a topic, even if that means going outside Wikipedia

I propose the following rewording to address these concerns:

"[one should avoid] Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what is already available in the article or in existing links in either the references section or the external links section."

Once the article itself reaches FA standard, the new wording is equivalent to the old one. In an article's earlier stages, it offers more room in what I believe to be a sensible restrained manner. The introduction to this page already states "If the website or page to which you want to link includes information that is not yet a part of the article, consider using it as a source for the article, and citing it." Perhaps this advice could be made stronger or more prominent to allay the other concerns raised in the previous discussion. jnestorius(talk) 10:08, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think if we can emphasize the request to build content this might be a good change. Apart from anything else I don't think it really reflects current practice (and hence consensus) as it reads now. - SiobhanHansa 15:49, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have used this link to justify the removal (over objections of website owners) of links that at best contain the same information as the article does, and frequently have substantially less information than the Wikipedia article. I would be sorry to lose this provision.
Editors in substantially incomplete articles have successfully invoked WP:IAR in the service of readers. I'm not really seeing a problem here. I do not support removal. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:25, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No, this is an important provision that must be kept as is, to avoid external link farms and to encourage addition of cited content to our articles, rather than a dump of external links. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:40, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Wording should stay as is. We are not a web directory. Links should be to good quality ones. If not, what's the point? DreamGuy (talk) 23:38, 8 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How does my proposed rewording fail to address these concerns? I am all for favouring adding cites over adding links, but this intimidating text does not do so: it encourages doing nothing over adding links. There is no equivalent "do not add an image to an article that is unsuitable for a featured article" because a small blurry picture is often better than none at all. jnestorius(talk) 16:29, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your version says, "Hey, don't bother expanding a short article: you can put just about any informative link in the external links section." The existing version says, "We reject the lazy approach of dumping information in external links. If you really want that information to reach the reader, then put it in the article itself (i.e., use is as a ref, so that WP:EL doesn't apply)."
So far, it hasn't seemed useful to clutter up ELNO with yet another explanation that this policy doesn't apply to refs, or to advertise to potential spammers that using a link as a footnote is a good way to work your website into an article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:34, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Here's the rub: if someone adds to EL a link to a site that installs malware, an inaccurate site, a promo site, or any other of types 2–17 on the list, the proper response by another user is a simple "rv WP:ELMO". If someone adds to EL a link to a good site with extra info, I don't believe the proper response is "rv WP:ELMO", unless another link covers it already. The more links there are already, the more likely that is to be the case. Demanding a minimum level of contribution, and calling any lesser contribution "lazy", is not how a Wiki should work. Suppose you find an interesting PDF in a university document store that's relevant to about 20 Wikipedia articles, all of which are curently short. You're not currently in "Wikipedia edit" mode, but you can easily take 2 minutes to add an EL to all 20 pages. Adding a ref to all 20 would take maybe 20 minutes. Saying that you're "lazy" because you don't have the extra 18 minutes to spare right now is crazy. Maybe you'll get back to it in a few days to tidy it up properly when you have time; in the meantime, the link is a lot better than nothing. jnestorius(talk) 09:07, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No it isn't, and it certainly is not true if you add the link to 20 articles! What you are doing is making more work for other editors who will have to check if the link is spam, or is useful, or is redundant, etc etc. If you think the link would be useful as a reference, then add it properly, not in a way that wastes the time of other editors, even if it saves your time. Save it to your bookmarks or favorites on your own computer, and add it properly when you have time. 2005 (talk) 10:38, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with User:2005. You've got a userpage; stick the link there until you have time. Drop by Wikipedia:WikiProject Universities and leave them a note about it. Add it properly to one or two pages. Does it really take you that much longer to add <ref></ref> tags around a link instead of square brackets? (Although if you really can identify, load, open, add, preview, and save an external link to a page every six seconds for two minutes straight, then I'm impressed.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:24, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Link names

I've noted that on many articles, there's an ongoing slow-motion edit war over how external links should be named in the text that overwrites the URL itself, but this policy doesn't seem to address the question at all.

For example, which would be the proper way to display the external link to CBC Radio One:

If there's no policy at present, I'd like to suggest that there should be one so that edit warring of this type can be minimized in the future. Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 17:05, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What the guideline does say is this:
"External links should identify the link and briefly summarize the website's contents and why the website is relevant to the article."
Isn't that enough to argue for #3 (CBC Radio One official site) as the most complete link description? --EnOreg (talk) 19:44, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
WP:CREEP. If the editors on a page can't reach consensus on something as minor as this, then they're doomed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:10, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A trivial point. I would support all forms except the last, which is useless. If there is only one link in the section I would prefer the second. If there is room for confusion, I might use a longer form. --Adoniscik(t, c) 17:16, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Putting "further reading" sources into the EL section if they involve online links

The Wikipedia:Layout guideline has been modified, in the Further reading section, to include the following sentence:

Websites and online publications should be listed in the "External links" section instead of in this section.

This means that any article or source of information that is (a) online and (b) not used in a footnote should, per the revised guideline, go in the EL section. The "Further reading" section is limited to offline sources.

I'm posting this because my sense is that those who have worked on the WP:EL guideline don't have agree with this position (because it would lead to a lot more links in the EL section), but I admit that I can't seem to find specific wording in the EL guideline that actually says that - so I could be wrong. I'll let others decide if there is indeed a conflict between the two guidelines, and, if so, what to do about it. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 14:51, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've personally always considered this guideline to apply to any external link that was not actually a citation regardless of where it actually sat on the page. -- SiobhanHansa 19:06, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This "new" text seems to bring the layout guideline in compliance with this guideline and with common sense. Things that are links go in a links section, and things that can be read offline go in a reading section. I'm not sure the initial post means to mean what it says since this doesn't impact or lead to a lot "more links" in the external links section. If some small number of articles have been badly constrctructed to have external links in more than one place, that's just been a problem with those articles. External links being kept to a reasonable minimum is a general widespread consensus. If external links are currently spread into two sections, that still should never lead to more external links in total than if they were in one section. 2005 (talk) 21:28, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As the person who drafted that sentence, let me state for the record that a book that happens to be available online (say, through books.google) is not an "online publication". IMO, whether to list such a book in ==Further reading== or in ==External links== is your choice. However, a publication that is solely available online (say, an online-only magazine article from Slate.com) belongs in the ==External links==. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:17, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Discrepencies with Layout guideline

Thanks to John Broughton's note above I noticed there are a couple of things in the layout guideline that don't entirely reflect what's on this page.

Formatting

The layout guidelines says This section follows the same formatting rules as the "References" section. The references section then says about formating: a bulleted list that should usually be alphabetized, any books, articles, web pages, et cetera ... You may use a generic citation template; this practice is neither encouraged nor discouraged. Example:

* "Wikipedia Reaches 1,000,000 Articles". Slashdot (March 1 2006). Retrieved on June 7 2007.

The use of abbreviated titles for items included in an anteceding bibliography section is permitted; for instance, you may list "Smith 1957, p. 35", and give a full reference in the bibliography.

We show a few ways to externally link and then say the standard format is to place them in a bulleted list under a primary heading at the end of the article. External links should identify the link and briefly summarize the website's contents and why the website is relevant to the article. The heading should be "External links" (plural) even if there is only a single link listed. If several external links are listed and the subject of the article is a living person, organization, web service, or otherwise has an official website, it is normal practice to place the link to that site at the top of the list (if it is not already in an appropriate infobox).

If you link to another website, you should give your reader a good summary of the site's contents, and the reasons why this specific website is relevant to the article in question. If you link to an online article, try to provide as much meaningful article information as possible. With some very generic examples. Then Do not use a citation template in the external links section.

I think here we should get both guidelines on the same page on this issue. I personally believe our page reflects current usage more accurately (except for that bit about not using citation templates - I don't recall that being there before) and is better suited to the nature of much online content - though a more formal style is probably appropriate when online journals are being linked. I would support removing the do not use a citation template from the EL guideline and asking the layout guideline to change their note about EL formatting to point here. -- SiobhanHansa 19:25, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If there is a "guideline fork" the layout guideline needs to brought in conformance with this one. Some of that text doesn't make sense. A non-citation using a citation template is not just obtuse, it would be confusing to new editors, who we certainly want to understand the difference between cites and external links. 2005 (talk) 21:33, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The prohibition against using citation templates was added less than two weeks ago with no corresponding agreement on this page that it should be put in. There's nothing about our current guideline that suggests links should not follow follow that formatting. Templates are just a way to format text. We could make a redundant set of external link templates if you're worried about confusion over the wording (though even then there would be no good reason to actually bar editors from using the others). -- SiobhanHansa 21:48, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It took me a few minutes' thinking -- but the reason I added that was because I'd been cleaning up citation templates again. External links should not have "Accessed (date)" at the end, nor should they begin with the author's name instead of the link. We definitely don't want the two styles mixed together -- it looks awful. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:23, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree the accessed date is inappropriate in external links sections but the author coming first is just a style preference. Both fields are optional and as with using the templates in any section - you don't fill in the ones that aren't appropriate. That people need to learn to use templates well is a good reason for educating them on how to use them. But it's not a good reason for putting your own preference in a guideline when others might find their correct use handy. -- SiobhanHansa 23:04, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We have a heck of a time getting people to keep straight the difference between citations and external links so using the same template is masochistically nutty. Sure, there could be an external link template, without a access date for example, but that's like creating something just to have a fight over. Wikiprojects can determine ways to make articles consistent in their article space, and we can reccomend a general format (like we do), but newbies will never use twmplates, so there is no point in having a rigid rule about how external links should be written -- no easy consensus will occur, and no novices will obey, so don't go through the motions. (But again, my main point here is suggesting using something called the "citation template" is a very, very bad idea.) 2005 (talk) 23:20, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Also, this page has (for a very long time) specified the format for external links:
* [http://www.website.com/ Name of site]
This style cannot be easily created using any of the citation templates. It's therefore silly to attempt it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:45, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This page has shown people how to link using Wikipedia markup and it has shown an example of linking in the * [http://www.website.com/ Name of site] format but it has never specified that that is how links should be formatted. And as you said in this discussion "If the editors on a page can't reach consensus on something as minor as this, then they're doomed." -- 01:24, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
2005 - recommending using the citation templates would not be a great idea on this page, but that doesn't mean we should prohibit their use just because some people get confused about our use of terminology sometimes. -- SiobhanHansa 01:24, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That's the point. if some editor uses it somewhere, fine. It but it should never be reccomended, either here or the layout guideline. 2005 (talk) 03:30, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
So you agree there's no consensus to have this guideline specifically prohibit it? -- SiobhanHansa 18:04, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I would agree that there is no current consensus that would prohibt someone using the citation template in external links. I don't know of anyone who advocates it, and have only seen it done twice in my years of editing, and there probably should be a line saying not to use the citation template, and I'd change any links I found like that. 2005 (talk) 21:21, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Siobhan, I think you're the only person that is concerned about the prohibition. Everyone agrees that using a citation template is a very uncommon approach for external links -- according to the consensus of actual practice, it's "not done". No one supports actually using them.
I'm willing to have a softer statement, like "Avoid the use of citation templates, because they are needlessly complicated and often include extraneous information, such as the date that the editor added the link." if that would address your concerns. In practice, though, I'm with User:2005, and when I find them, I often reformat them into plain old links. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:36, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(Unindent) It annoys me more than it might because it seems to have been added without consensus (or even discussion) so I'm really unhappy about just leaving it in. When I dislike something that seems to have general consensus I don't tend to bring it up or hark on about if it's just me that disagrees. But I'm also generally against our guidelines being proscriptive (or prescriptive) when they aren't addressing an actual problem - it's instruction creep, it's kind of insulting to our editors and it has a tendency to stop innovation. -- SiobhanHansa 00:53, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We can, if you like, soften the language. Even as it stands, the statement reflects the true consensus of thousands of Wikipedia editors, who have what we might describe as a very strong tendency to avoid {{cite web}} for external links (>99% of relevant articles). Talk page discussion is not the only way to determine consensus: for guidelines, the actual practice by the mass of Wikipedia editors also matters.
And, of course, I added it in plain view of the many people who watch this page, and at the time, no one thought there was any need to discuss it. I'm a fan of the Bold, revert, discuss cycle as being more efficient in many cases -- especially when a reasonably experienced editor can reasonably expect no one supporting the opposite view. (And we still have no one supporting the use of those templates in ==EL==.)
Now if you seriously think that "Do not use complicated citation templates here" is WP:CREEPy, then let me know. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:08, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you prefer the BOLD REVERT DISCUSS cycle I'll go ahead and revert. I just find this page in particular has had a history of editing in that style and it doesn't seem to have helped much in encouraging collegial discussion.
I do seriously think it's instruction creep. I really don't see why we mention the templates in this guideline. It's not something I routinely use. (I may have used it where it was the predominate pattern for ELs on a page but that's just to respect the formatting of previous editors. I wouldn't start using it where others hadn't.) But the fact that most editors don't use something is not at all the same thing as most editors believing it should not be used. We have a lot of different styles being used in the external links sections - most of them do not have a super majority following and several are probably used by very few people - but we aren't listing all those as being methods that are not to be used.
If others think the citation style is often misused and really does need specific mention I suggest wording more along the lines of:
Most external links should present different details than citations. For instance a concise description of the contents and a clear indication of its source is more important than the actual title of the page; and access dates are not appropriate in the external links section. If using citation templates in this section editors should be careful to ensure the resulting description is appropriate for an external link. Which could (with much tweaking no doubt) be used to replace the paragraph just above as well. -- SiobhanHansa 12:54, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That more or less works for me. I might add "Because citation templates were not designed for use in the External links section, editors that are using citation templates in this section should be careful...", primarily to avoid any hint of suggesting their use here. I wouldn't bother replacing the existing information above it, which has simplicity to recommend it (especially for newbie editors). WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:04, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I like the "Because..." addition. As you say avoids hinting that they're recommended. If others have no objections I'll change the guideline. -- SiobhanHansa 21:59, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Suggest "that use" over "that are using". 2005 (talk) 23:05, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've incorporated those suggestions and made the change. -- SiobhanHansa 22:11, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Combining with further reading

The layout guidelines says External links may be listed in the section "Further reading", as suggested in Citing sources, instead of having a separate section specifically for external links. We simply say include appropriate external links in an "External links" section at the end and/or in the appropriate location within an infobox or navbox.

I think this is more minor but it wouldn't hurt for them both to say the same thing. I think this sort of decision is probably best left to the editors of an individual article so would generally support amending the EL guideline -- SiobhanHansa 19:25, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Examples of links moved from "External links" to "Further reading" sections

Perhaps examples of articles that I've encountered in the recent past would help clarify the current situation. In these cases, I've moved links because (a) they seemed to make the "External links" sections of articles way long, and/or set a bad precedent (encouraging other editors to keep adding links to articles) and (b) I didn't want to delete the links, since they seemed useful.

If other editors think I was mistaken in moving the links, then it would be helpful (to me) to know if they think the mistake was (a) the EL section really was okay as is, or (b) most or all of the links should have been deleted. Or, to put it differently, are editors okay with moving the external links out of the "Further reading" section, to the EL section, in these articles:

-- John Broughton (♫♫) 21:52, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would tend to think if you're going to have a separate external links section then the reading that is available online should go in it. On the other hand I don't think there's awful about the articles the way you formatted them and I know we have plenty of featured articles that have online texts in the further reading section - so I don't think there's a consensus about doing this in one particular way. -- SiobhanHansa 22:03, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't have made the changes that John did, although I generally support separating books or very long publications (but not short newspaper articles) from websites. I haven't been happy about the WP:LAYOUT suggestion to combine them under the "Further reading" headline, although I suppose it would be silly to have one "Further reading" offline book and one "External link" to a website. I haven't changed it because I wasn't sure whether looking at actual practice would indicate a consensus for removing that suggestion.
Certainly if the external links take you to a non-reading website (e.g., a calculator, a database, a map), then it would be silly to call those links "Further reading". WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:08, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Mixing the two doesn't make sense to me, and is just plain ugly, so I don't see why anyone would do it. Still, I won't lose sleep over the fact that there is not a fully standardized way to do this. I'd prefer the standard way of no external links in further reading or only a single further reading section, since this mixed up way has no apparent logic behind it, but the content is more important than the structure of presenting it. Only the Pablo Ganguli article seems like a way, way, way over the top terrible link farm though. Half those links (regardless of what section they are in) should be deleted. 2005 (talk) 23:13, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Would someone kindly add a link for me ..

Under the subject of 'East grinstead' (West sussex), we would very much like a link to go on which contains the following:

The East Grinstead & District Dog Training Club www.eastgrinsteadddtc.webs.com

We have been part of the East Grinstead Community for very many years and use the council halls for our training. We are the only Kennel Club Registered Club in the area and offer extremely resonably priced dog training for the local community.

We hope you will agree to add this link. Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.96.192.140 (talk) 10:28, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your contribution but I personally object. Next will be the veterinarians, doctors, scientists, engineers, and so on. --Adoniscik(t, c) 17:18, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is the wrong place to propose such a link anyway; such requests should be posted to the talk ("discussion") page for the specific article in question. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:35, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Are these appropriate?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Ekalin - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 00:52, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

They seem to be self-published reviews by some guy called Scott Morrison. IF this guy is a well known critic then they may be appropriate. But if not it seems highly unlikely. I don't know if Wikiproject TV have any recommendations for reviews - but these wouldn't fit under WikiProject Music's. The editor's actions - in editing pretty much only to add external links to a particular site - appear to meet our definition of spam. You might try posting to their user page and pointing this out. -- SiobhanHansa 01:40, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fan sites

WP:FANSITE redirects to this page, but this page says nothing about fan sites. Should it? Could it?--Shantavira|feed me 16:38, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fansites should follow the guidelines that apply to all links. Is there anything else that you think should apply? -- SiobhanHansa 20:09, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The must follow the standard rules, and almost all of them would fail WP:EL quite dramatically. We aren't a web directory. DreamGuy (talk) 17:11, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

External links in article text

I think we need to refine the language that prohibits external links in the article text (and that instead requires they reside only in the EL section at the bottom, or in an infobox or navbox). My reason: we have many templates that contain external links (all of which are reliable and well-known); see Category:External link templates for the full list, but one example is that nearly every WP article on a public company has a ticker symbol template in the first sentence of the article, which links to the website of the primary exchange on which the company's stock trades; this is true even if the same link is also in an infobox fro that company. Another example is the geographic coordinate template {{coord}}, which also has external links. Overzealous editors are reading this guideline as prohibiting these templates from residing in the article text, which I don't think is the intention. Does anyone have an objection to adding a carveout allowing RELIABLE template-generated links in the text of articles? UnitedStatesian (talk) 14:10, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's backwards in several ways. Many external link templates were made by COI editors to spam their personal-interest websites. All of them should be deleted, and then have a process that requires a strong consensus to allow one. In general external link templates should not be in the body of an article, and any that are should be removed and put at in the external links section, duh, where they belong. The language of this section needs to be strengthened to say external link templates should only appear in the external links section at the end of an article or in infoboxes. A reverse of that would encourage more of these trashy things, and more blatant abuse. As a guideline external links should never be in the body of an article, period. Template spam in particular is why this needs to be clearly stated in the guideline. (Also, these spammy templates are often used in an attempt to bypass this guideline by linking a word externally that would not be linked internally, with that word not being the subject of the article -- and such links are prohibnited ny this guideline, which says external links should only go to websites directly related to the topic.) 2005 (talk) 23:36, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What is your basis for saying that "Many external link templates were made by COI editors to spam their personal-interest websites"? Can you give me an example of even one from the category? (I know there have been some in the past, but in my experience they have been rapidly deleted, or the COI link removed). UnitedStatesian (talk) 16:20, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hardly. Mobygames, four BGG templates, mtgcard (not in the category, but an external link template nonetheless), Find_A_Grave are a start. Some of these have been brought under control more than others, but "rapidly deleted" is silly to assert. Templates that even are egregiously COI-spammed survive courtesy of a a few socks and ILIKEIT defenses. However that is not the subject of this guideline. This guideline simply guides people to proper usage, and there is zero reason for a templated external link to ever be treated differently than a non-templated external link. The ease of creating templates and difficulty in deleting them is just a minor aspect of why this is a terribly upside down idea. If anything, a case could be made that non-template links might occasionally be useful in articles, but templated ones should go where they are designed for, the external links section. Otherwise we end up with horribly junked up articles like Magic: The Gathering where individual cards are external linked in the body of an article, even though they would not merit external links at the end of the article, and even though they don't merit wikilinks. 2005 (talk) 22:14, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Also the geo hack coordinates are an internal link, so there is never any excuse for one of these templates to be anywhere except where other external links go. Templates don't make something special, and should never be treated as such. 2005 (talk) 23:48, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The template {{coord}} links to www.toolserver.org. How is that not an external link? UnitedStatesian (talk) 16:20, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I thought we had consesnsus that the geohack coordinates were to be used in articles? Why would any other thing be used, let alone have a template? But again more to the point, if it is an external link not in the "external links" section??? Seriously, is there anything more of a common sense slamdunk in the entire encyclopedia? 2005 (talk) 22:14, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You mean templates like {{ISSN}} and {{Cite patent}} and {{CIA World Factbook link}} and {{PubChem}}? Could we be just a little less ham-fisted here? Individual inappropriate templates can go to WP:AFD. User:2005's personal prejudice against link templates is entirely insufficient to delete hundreds of templates.
UnitedStatesian, most articles about companies should begin with an infobox that lists basic information about the company, including a link to a stock ticker. See Apple, Inc. for an example.
Otherwise, I agree with User:2005's comment that the existence of a template does not change the fact that it's an external link, or that external links should generally ("treated with common sense and the occasional exception") not appear in the text of an article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:00, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, those are other good examples: reliable links (that would otherwise be allowed by this guideline). Those, and the stock ticker templates, are used so frequently within the text of articles that I don't believe they are "occasional exceptions." UnitedStatesian (talk) 16:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
UnitedStatesian, Just to clarify: I don't think that the stock ticker templates should appear in the text of the article. I think stock tickers should be linked in the infobox and removed from the article's text. Linking to a stock ticker twice (four inches apart on the screen) is not desirable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That's fine in theory for the company articles with infoboxes; what about the many, many more that do not (yet) have infoboxes? We are working at WP:WikiProject Companies to get a consistent style across ALL company articles. UnitedStatesian (talk) 19:25, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Then the ticker symbol should be in the external links section. ALL arrticles, companies an otherwise, then have a consistent style. 2005 (talk) 22:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your hamfisted comment doesn't make sense. Let's try and stay focused please. The existence of some useful templates should be totally irrelevant, as is the fact that some templates are spam crap. (And AFD is similarly pointless to bring up here as a few socks can keep a spam template once its been created). Templates themselves are not the issue. Good templates or crappy templates should be used in the external links section like other external links. This should not even be slightly controversial, and is as common sense a thing as we have around here. A templated link doesn't make it better than others and is no reason to circumvent or violate this guideline. Citations should be in articles; external links should be in infoboxes and/or at the end of an article. That concept should be spelled out as clearly as possible in this guideline. 2005 (talk) 07:54, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Deleting several hundred external link templates (and you wrote, All of them should be deleted) is a ham-fisted solution to the presence of the occasional spam template, as in "lacking dexterity or grace, heavy-handed". WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your comment was deliberately unproductive. I said some templates are fine. Others aren't. Suggesting I objected to the ISBN template as one of the COI spam templates is ridiculous. I do believe that templates should exist by gaining a consensus to exist first, rather than avoiding a consensus to delete them. You may disagree that there should be a strong consensus before a template can be made, but calling that "ham fisted" is just rude so please keep such comments out of it, especially since it's not the central point here. 2005 (talk) 22:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree in principle with 2005, in that I have almost never seen an external link in the text of an article that belonged there; of course, they should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, but the wording here is fine. External links go in external links or citations almost all the time. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:04, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Sandy, 2005 and WhatamI above. We do not need to change the wording to in any way encourage MORE external links in the body.
As far as templates created by people with COI to spam the encyclopedia, we see it all the time. Current ones I see there now that appear to be likely examples include Template:Drinkboy recipe, Template:Eliteprospects, Template:Halopedia, the six different INDUCKS templates, all the templates that start with the word "Game", Template:Wipipedia, Template:Spunk, Template:Megalithic Portal and a bazillion more. FindAGrave and, especially, Notable Names Database are two more that should not have templates and generally should never be linked to per WP:EL rules but were everywhere. DreamGuy (talk) 17:09, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Then I encourage you to send them to WP:AFD. (I suggest one or two at a time.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
don';t you mean WP:TFD? DGG (talk) 18:35, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Some may also qualify as speedies per criterion {{db-g11}} UnitedStatesian (talk) 19:36, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That is not just the tail wagging the dog, but the fly on the tail wagging the dog. There is no logical reason to treat templates differently in terms of what should be in the body of an article, but the idea that we should make guidelines that lead to endless wikilawyering is terrible. A simple one sentence understanding is the way to better articles, not a process of tfd's, sockpuppets and lawyering. External links go in two places of an article. This doesn't prevent things from being linked; it keeps links organized; it is far, far more user-friendly in that people will find things consitently throughout articles, and it makes spam maintanence easier. 2005 (talk) 22:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Template:Eliteprospects was a template that was discussed and approved by WP:HOCKEY prior to being created. It is not a spam link. It was decided to be a reliable link by the hockey project. -Djsasso (talk) 15:23, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I find useful links within COI articles, but the useful ones almost always can be converted into a reference, or turned into a conventional external link at the end. It is one of the characteristics of authors with COI to link to their site as much as possible (it goes along with mentioned the company name as much as possible), and can be dealt with by normal editing. It is usually possible to make their articles not just encyclopedic, but more effective-- I usually tell them about our Business FAQ, a comprehensive guide to these situations prepared by Durova DGG (talk) 18:35, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

External link vs. references

Some articles contain a general list of sources consulted, without inline citations. I do realize that inline citations are preferred, but there are many articles that use just a source list, usually under "References".

If an external site was used as such a reference, should it be listed under "References" or under "External links"? Marc Shepherd (talk) 14:28, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

""References". And it is best to use in-text citations rather than just listing the reference in the reference section. UnitedStatesian (talk) 15:44, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's fine for short articles with few references. For longer ones, I immediately stick a {{nocitations}} tag. --Adoniscik(t, c) 16:04, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User replacing all external links with single link to DMOZ category.

(Cross-posted with WP:ANI) A new user has been replacing lists of external links to the relevant DMOZ category page "since Wikipedia is not a directory of links." This is new to me; is this what we're doing now? It hardly seems likely since doing this removes relevant links to issues discussed in articles, and since we have no control over what's selected at DMOZ. At Border Terrier, for example, there was an external link to a page concerning Canine Epileptoid Cramping Syndrome, which affects BTs and is discussed in the article; there is no such information in the DMOZ category. If this is undesirable, and it seems to be, then perhaps DMOZ should be specifically mentioned in the guideline. Exploding Boy (talk) 16:02, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Long lists of random links are undesirable. We want citations, not linkfarms. A few relevant links, to "official" pages and the like are fine. I often move linkfarms to the talk page myself. --Adoniscik(t, c) 16:06, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I know that, but that's not the issue here. Exploding Boy (talk) 16:09, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On that particular example I don't think there was anything wrong with Dogtrainernyc's edit. The clubs don't really meet our guidelines and having more than one makes it a directory. Using a DMOZ link seems like a reasonable compromise (I'd probably have deleted the links without adding a dmoz link personally). The http://www.borderterrier.de/ link that supposedly provided information on Canine Epileptoid Cramping Syndrome didn't link directly to the CECS page and when I followed the links to get there there was no information. So it doesn't seem that anything appropriate to the section was lost. If Dogtrainernyc refuses to discuss their changes when asked then their editing is problematic from a collaborative behavior point of view - but I don't see a problem with them being bold initially in this way. It looked like a good change to me. -- SiobhanHansa 17:06, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Border Terrier linked to several terrier clubs. I think the substitution for DMOZ was pertinent in this case since the links were not about terriers in general, and presumably held limited appeal to people not in the vicinity of the club. If it had been links to scientific articles about terriers I would have objected, but not in this case. --Adoniscik(t, c) 16:45, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It's standard practice on dog breed articles to link to a selection of breed-related clubs. However, this is not an issue solely restricted to this particular article. Anyway, this conversation should, I think, be restricted to the ANI page, where a much more detailed and relevant discussion is taking place. Exploding Boy (talk) 17:07, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Linking to breed clubs is standard practice and well within the guideline. Anyway, as mentioned, the conversation is taking place primarily at ANI. Exploding Boy (talk) 18:31, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That appears to be the problem. Looking at the new user's edits, some of them like Siberian Husky very appropriate as the external links sections were a mess of basically redundant links. It's pretty much a textbook case where a Dmoz link should be used. Any of these articles with more than five external links to similar organizations probably should get a Dmoz link instead. More than ten should for sure get a Dmoz link instead. That's just way too much overkill. 2005 (talk) 21:52, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Linking to breed clubs is standard practice and well within the guideline." It may be done on some articles currently, but it's clearly a violation of WP:EL and WP:NOT. They should be removed. The DMOZ link is a nice compromise. DreamGuy (talk) 02:39, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Replacing external link farms with a dmoz link often is a sound application. Linking to dog clubs seems to be a good example of a sound application for a dmoz link. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:12, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Exploding Boy, between ANI and here you should now be fully aware that your interpretation of how things should work is not the consensus view of what Wikipedia policies say. The ANI thread was closed because the conversation never should have been there in the first place. We are not a web directory... got it? DreamGuy (talk) 02:46, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On the ANI page there seemed a fair amount of opposition to replacing all external links sections with a link to the DMOZ category, with a preference for keeping spam out of external links sections and keeping relevant links in, for several reasons. It was suggested that this might be a way to deal with heavily link-spammed EL sections, but none of the articles edited by that user appeared to have that problem, so no, it's absolutely not as clear-cut as you are trying to make it, and I'm not sure your reversion of another user's restoration of the external links on the Border Terrier article was appropriate. It should be noted that the user in question is suspected of being a sockpuppet who was replacing external links in an attempt at search engine optimization, and this matter is now being investigated separately (not by me). The ANI thread was closed, but probably prematurely: it was never a content dispute. Finally, it may not have been your intent to be rude, but your post immediately above certainly comes across that way. Exploding Boy (talk) 03:22, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And in response to your comment above, DreamGuy, I see nothing in either WP:EL or WP:NOT that prohibits linking to breed clubs. EL specifically allows links of this nature (see the section What should be linked). Exploding Boy (talk) 03:39, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
A Dmoz category is not a solution to spam links. Spam should just be removed. A Dmoz link is a solution to multiple good links. For example, while a link to an Arizona breed club may look good in the abstract, links to similar good breed club sites in each of the 50 US states, plus all the Canadian provinces, plus Aussie states... etc., that would just be a link farm mess, even if all those similar sites individually are fine. There are many very broad topics that have dozens or even hundreds of possible high quality links. This is where a Dmoz link is an obvious solution. With dog breeds, in many cases a Dmoz link will be a good idea, but in other cases where there are very few quality sites (or even no Dmoz link) then a few club links would seem a good idea. So, replacing three links to add a Dmoz link when there are no other good links is not a good idea, but replacing a dozen (or especially 20 or more) similar links with a Dmoz link is the right thing to do. Spam is not the issue; the fact that Wikipedia is not an extensive link directory for quality websites is. 2005 (talk) 03:43, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That's all well and good, and may be a good solution in cases where there are dozens or hundreds of links. But in this particular case, other issues seem likely to have been at work, as mentioned above. As regards the Border Terrier article in particular (which I'm mentioning because it's the article that brought my attention to this issue and it's the one I'm most knowledgeable about), the DMOZ category does not appear a good solution. The information on CECS, for example, which was linked in the original external links section on that page (albeit with a broken link) is not included in the DMOZ category. Additionally, most of the dog breed articles edited by the user in question seem only to have had a small handful of links. So, perhaps some clear statement needs to be made regarding the appropriate use of DMOZ. Exploding Boy (talk) 03:52, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Exploding Boy and 2005, DMOZ is not a solution here. Nor are such drastic changes without discussion on the talk pages first a sensible way to do things. Doug Weller (talk) 04:35, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dmoz is a good solution for some of the articles, and very generally is a good solution for any article with more than a dozen external links. And in response to Exploding Boy above, if some site is such a great resource on the subject, then it should be able to generate some useful sentence that can be sourced in the article. The fact that these are not used as sources in the articles means there is no major loss if they are simply deleted. Just to glance at one, the Border Terrier article is a pretty poor article. Only one reference. If the five current external links could not manage to generate one reference from them, then basically by definition they should be deleted as being essentially useless. I suspect though that is not the case, and those links probably could be converted to sources. 2005 (talk) 06:44, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

[undenting]Ai...We're going around in circles. As I said above, DMOZ may be a solution for some articles, but of the 8 external links sections replaced by the user I originally mentioned, nearly all had 5 links or less.

2005: you may be right about deleting sources not quoted in the articles, but you may be wrong. A look at WP:EL confirms that "Sites that contain neutral and accurate material that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article due to copyright issues, amount of detail . . . or other reasons[, and] Sites with other meaningful, relevant content that is not suitable for inclusion in an article [should be linked]." The fact that the Border Terrier article isn't in great shape is no justification for deleting its small and relevant external links section.

But let's take a closer look at the Border Terrier DMOZ category. Whereas our article contains 5 external links, it contains:

  • 14 breeders' websites (specifically prohibited per WP:EL)
  • 2 breed clubs (one of which was already in the external links of the article)
  • 5 personal "pets" pages (basically sites with photos of people's pet dogs: specifically prohibited by WP:EL)
  • 2 rescue/shelter sites
  • 1 link to a different DMOZ category in English
  • 46 links to the same category in other languages (to be avoided per WP:EL)
  • 1 link with stories about Border Terriers (prohibited)
  • 1 link to the American Kennel Club breed standard
  • 1 link to a Border Terrier webring (prohibited)

The above, plus a look at our own article on DMOZ raises some very good questions about the suitability of that project as even a temporary solution (WP:EL says: Where editors have not reached consensus on an appropriate list of links, a link to a well-chosen web directory category could be used until such consensus can be reached) to external links section problems on Wikipedia. On the whole, I fail to see how linking to DMOZ is any better than, or in any practical sense different from, linking to a Google search result, which is specifically prohibited by WP:EL.

The upshot of all this is that I'm more convinced now that the 8 dog-breed articles whose external links sections were replaced with DMOZ links should have their external links restored (and possibly pruned), and that we need to reexamine DMOZ as a suitable external link on Wikipedia. At the very least, the guideline makes it clear that web directory categories are to be considered a temporary solution in cases where there is disagreement on which links to include. Exploding Boy (talk) 15:33, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Exploding Boy, can you tell me why a reader of this international encyclopedia cares one way or another about a club with 100 members in Northern California? How about a small club in Northeastern America? Furthermore, don't you think that WP:ELNO #13, "the link should be directly related to the subject of the article" might apply? The article is on the dogs, not on clubs for dog owners. I think the existing links should be replaced with these two:
In general, though, the other editor is right. Links to local and regional dog clubs are inappropriate. I'd just delete them, but a DMOZ link is sometimes seen as a more "friendly" option. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:46, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Links to the clubs are given, I presume, because their websites contain good information about the breed that isn't suitable for use in the article, not because the clubs themselves are important. I think the links you give above are fine. I didn't create the links for that article (aside from the one about CECS) and am not concerned with them particularly (that is, I'm not arguing that all of those exact links should be kept): it's fine to prune them down to the best links. But simply replacing them with a DMOZ link was clearly not appropriate in these 8 situations, per WP:EL, which states that web directories can be used in cases in situations where there is disagreement about which links to include: that was not the case here. Exploding Boy (talk) 19:54, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
WhatamIdoing, you are just indiscriminately removing links because they are to 'regional', ie national in most cases, dog clubs. The first Gold Retriver club site I looked at had a lot of information about the breed, which is what I would expect of a nationwide American dog 'club'. It would be more sensible to deal with such links on a case by case basis. Doug Weller (talk) 20:21, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Exploding Boy, most of the small clubs don't provide breed information -- they link to the AKC (or equivalent) pages for information. Their own websites often provide very little original information. Doug, we don't need to provide advertising space even to national clubs -- but I'd be thrilled to have "Golden Retriever Club of X" links turned into "Health information from the Golden Retriever Club of X" links. That sort of link (and label for a link) is much, much more useful to a general reader than "Here's a club website, and there might be some information there, or maybe not." WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:15, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You are missing the point. Wikipedia is not a link directory, period. Dmoz is. Sometimes its categories are great, sometimes they are horrible. In either case we are not Dmoz. The point is when there are many quality links to link to a link directory instea of 15 or 50 or 500 links ourselves. It's not our business if volunteers at the link directory don't make a good category or not. We have a general policy of what we are not. Really, you should focus on what is the problem here -- poor quality articles. If these sites have valuable information, then show this is case by using them as sources. If they are just copies of a national site, or have nothing original to say, they can't be used as either sources or external links and they should be removed. Some of the articles do not have an excess of external links, but those should be sourced better. The articles that are out of control with external links should have a Dmoz link replacing the link farm, and if any of those external links removed do have something unique of importance to say, then they should be sourced. Either way you cut it, the way these articles are external linked is not good. Improve the articles. The external links section is not a place to dump relevant sites. Lots of sites are relevant to the topic. External links are for a small number sites that meet the criteria of this guideline. When there are many such sites, a Dmoz link should be used because we the policy is we are not a link farm. 2005 (talk) 22:30, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
All of which, again, does not apply in this specific situation. We seem to be talking at several cross purposes in this thread. We agree that, per the current guideline, in situations where there is disagreement regarding which specific links to include in a given article, we can temporarily use a web directory instead. (Whether or not DMOZ is a good choice is another matter, and one which should probably be discussed; the current evidence is that it might not be). Web directory links are a temporary solution to allow for consensus building, which suggests that it is better for us to have control over what specific sites we're linking to from Wikipedia articles. In this specific situation there was no disagreement about the external links, no discussion of or attempt to determine consensus regarding external links, and therefore, per the current guideline, no reason to replace the existing links in 8 dog-related articles with a DMOZ link, even temporarily. Whether the articles and their external links sections need improvement is, again, another matter. Exploding Boy (talk) 22:45, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In this particular instance (ignoring the fact this editor may have been a spammer making point-y or strategic edits [1]) we have an editor who made a bold edit in keeping with the spirit of this guideline (at least as far as many editors here have seen it). If other editors disagree they should revert and discuss. But there's no good reason to rain criticism on the editor's head for the action they took if no attempt has been made to request they discuss the edit. It's quite clearly within the broad range of actions that many editors find acceptable. Wikipedia has long worked on the basis that you should go ahead with what you think is right and stop to discuss if others disagree with you. -- SiobhanHansa 23:02, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
With respect, I don't think anyone has been raining criticism on the user's head. We have been trying to determine a point of policy. I have purposely avoided reverting for this reason, and because it is clear that this type of change is expressly intended to be temporary anyway (although there has been some reverting back and forth, by other users). And in this case, the user's intent is important. Although it has yet to be determined whether they were acting maliciously, it is clear that they themselves should have discussed prior to making that change, or at very least made an attempt to clean up the external links sections on the relevant pages, if they perceived them as problematic. Exploding Boy (talk) 23:15, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You've created some false realities. A Dmoz link is not a "temporary solution". In it's best use it is a permanent one. Secondly, a Dmoz link is not something to be used only when there is disagreement. This guideline suggests no such thing. Third, long discussion have taken place and there is a broad consensus both that Dmoz should be the directory linked and that other directories in general shot not be linked (though an exhaustive non-commercial niche directory might be appropriate very rarely instead of Dmoz). And following on this, discussions on this guideline talk page are about this guideline, not specific articles. We make guidelines to broadly cover all the articles in the encyclopedia. Specific articlesmay need more care, or could merit an exception, etc. You have a spcific issue about the dog articles, and hopefully now some clarity. The other editor's actions were not terrible, and was clearly correct for a couple of the articles, though probably not the best action for five or six of the articles. Revert the edit and start a discussion on those talk pages. The articles that had 12+ links, either leave the Dmoz link or start a discussion on the talk page that creates a criteria for external links for that page that cuts the links down to three or four -- and improve the refeneces on these articles, likely by converting some of these external links to sources. of course nobody says you have to do any of this since we all just volunteer, but that is the path to get those articles in shape and have their external links comply with this guideline. 2005 (talk) 00:04, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We are discussing the guideline, and I think you are mistaken about what it says. WP:EL#Links to be considered says:
"Long lists of links are not appropriate: Wikipedia is not a mirror or a repository of links. If you find a long list of links in an article, you can tag the "External links" section with the {{External links}} template. Where editors have not reached consensus on an appropriate list of links, a link to a well-chosen web directory category could be used until such consensus can be reached. The Open Directory Project is often a neutral candidate, and may be added using the links External links at Curlie template." [Emphasis added]
In other words, as I have said, where disagreement exists over which links to include, web directories can be used temporarily until consensus is reached. I see no indication that it is desirable to use DMOZ as a permanent solution. Exploding Boy (talk) 00:17, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The fact it is suggested for use where disagreement exists does not mean it cannot be used where there is no disagreement.
PS - Sorry I misunderstood your intent above. It really isn't clear to me what you're trying to achieve on this talk page. Could you perhaps explicitly state what it is you're hoping to get out of this? -- SiobhanHansa 00:45, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

[undenting] I posted here because I wanted to get a handle on the guideline before proceeding with a particular case of a user replacing external links sections in several articles -- I wasn't about to start reverting her additions without being sure of the guideline. That user seems not have to continued doing this, but it seems that discussion of the guideline is still helpful, since clearly several users are disagreeing on its specific intent. For instance, I see nothing in the guideline that suggests that it is preferable or acceptable to use DMOZ in cases where there is no disagreement instead of a short list of external links. Indeed, everything I see in the guideline strongly suggests to me that it is preferable to have a small number of carefully selected links relevant to the article content. Exploding Boy (talk) 00:54, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'd agree that overall the guidelines is aiming for a small selection of good links. There's nothing to say a DMOZ link should not be one of the links in an article. I think the area of disagreement that really exists here is that very few editors on this talk page think the links originally on the dog articles were good ones while you apparently do. It doesn't seem like the issue is really about DMOZ. As I see read this discussion the real disagreement is about whether the club link are appropriate. If the editor had removed links most editors thought were good that would probably receive a different response - regardless of whether they added a DMOZ link. -- SiobhanHansa 01:09, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We've been discussing several different issues at the same time, so it has been...busy. The first issue was whether or not the user had removed the links inappropriately; this now seems to have been the case, whether for malicious reasons, or perhaps in a good-faith but over-zealous attempt to follow WP:NOT. An issue that emerged from that is whether DMOZ is to be used as a replacement for external links sections. My understanding of the current guideline is that can be, in certain circumstances, and temporarily. You are right that there's nothing in the guideline that prohibits DMOZ being one of a (small) number of external links, but from my reading of the guideline, and from looking at the DMOZ article and the Border Terrier DMOZ category, I would say that DMOZ is not an ideal external link candidate, because they provide links to the types of sites Wikipedia prefers not to link to. As for breed club sites, I think some clubs are better than others: The American or British or Australian X-Breed Club: probably ok. The Middle of Nowhere X-Breed Fancier's Society: probably not so good. So, the upshot is: aim for small sections of good links; prune when necessary; discuss if problematic; replace with a web directory link--possibly DMOZ--temporarily in cases of disagreement, until consensus can be reached. Exploding Boy (talk) 03:54, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Again it seems you want to tailor all reality to your circumstance. A small collection of links that has consensus is the ideal. That really is obvious. Sometimes this is not possible to achieve -- sometimes because of disagreement over whether a link has merit, and sometimes there is disagreement between dozens or even hundreds of meritable links. In the latter case there is nothing "temporary" about the disagreement. There will never be a consensus about three or four non-Dmoz links for the gambling article. A Dmoz link there is not temporary. It's a permanent solution (at least till something better than Dmoz comes along). Some topics like politics even forego the Dmoz link, but obviously there is similarly nothing "temporary" about the vast amount of great poltics sites and the vast divergence of genuine opinion about what are the best three or four. But then we have much, much, much smaller topics like a dog breed where on one hand three or four links could gain a strong consensus, but on another there could be say 30 similar sites. A Dmoz link is a good compromise if consensus can not be reached (and maintained) either temporarily or permanently. The breeds articles simply need to be improved, with better citations and better control of the external links. In the cases of some breeds consensus on a few links may be impossible and a Dmoz link called for. In others, a few links might gain consensus and a Dmoz link not used. (A Dmoz link should seldom be used with other links; rather any meritable sites in the category should be linked directly.) 2005 (talk) 08:48, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. It just isn't the case that all breed club sites are spam, as was suggested by at least one editor. There are breed club sites that I think should be in articles and others that clearly shouldn't. Doug Weller (talk) 08:13, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dog WikiProject be encourage to develop guideline?

  • I'd like to make the point that someone really should go to the dog WikiProject and try to make this a project guideline. Almost every dog breed article I've seen has been stuffed with external links to random breeders. Most are certainly not of encyclopedic value, and it would be nice if the dog project specifically asked people to justify their inclusion on grounds of informational content before adding them. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:06, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've put something on the project talk page linking to this discussing and saying that the project should have a clear guideline on external links
Could someone explain (non-technically) what DMOZ is and what it has to do with links? I followed the link at the top of this section and it took me to Open Directory Project, where a power outage is is one of the topics. I'm mystified.
Also I have not seen the breed articles stuffed with external links to random breeders. Could you provide links to those, so I can understand the objection? Thanks..--Hafwyn (talk) 19:47, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
DMOZ is sort of a Wikipedia-for-external-links. There are a billion categories, and anyone can add links to any website in any category. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:58, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hafwyn I have rarely seen the articles stuffed with links to individual breeders myself - the main focus above was on multiple links to breed clubs - the problems some people saw with them being that the links often simply repeated information already provided or were only relevant to readers in a particular geographic region. The links here (since edited significantly) are the example that was the focus in the discussion above. -- SiobhanHansa 14:48, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You mean there is just one link that a category of article allows, you click on that and it takes you to the approved list of websites? Is there an example of this I could see somewhere? I really don't understand what this is. --Hafwyn (talk) 14:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe I don't understand what you don't understand, but this is dmoz for one breed. (There are 87 links in the category, including ones to beeders, clubs, etc.) 2005 (talk) 00:30, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You can also see how it's used in Wikipedia here. The first two links are DMOZ links. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:12, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ah! Now I see, thank you. I was under the impression from the discussion that using "DMOZ" was a way to limit additional references in Wikipedia articles, but I see that it is actually a way to provide even more information. Thank you for the Wikipedia example, that made the usage clear. The Airedale one only references the American Kennel Club, though.--Hafwyn (talk) 18:31, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Need third opinion on links

Over on Meiling Melançon -- an editor whose only edits are to that article is insistent upon leaving two links I think should be removed. One is just a rumor page about an "upcoming" appearance in an X-Men movie that came out years back and the other is just a photo gallery/fan site. Editor insists that "an actors work is their image therefore it is. Please refer to other actors wiki pages i.e jessica alba". As few people look at that article and as determined as this editor is it won't be resolved without some people coming in from outside to take a look. DreamGuy (talk) 02:54, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Re-drafting ELMAYBE 3

ELMAYBE 3 has bothered me for a long while. Under "Links to be considered," we say, "Long lists of links are not appropriate". Um, did we notice that "not too many" is not really a description of a link to be considered?

The full text is this:

Long lists of links are not appropriate: Wikipedia is not a mirror or a repository of links. If you find a long list of links in an article, you can tag the "External links" section with the {{External links}} template. Where editors have not reached consensus on an appropriate list of links, a link to a well-chosen web directory category could be used until such consensus can be reached. The Open Directory Project is often a neutral candidate, and may be added using the {{dmoz}} template.

I'd like to redraft it to suggest a category of links to be considered, thus:

  • A well-chosen link to a directory of websites or organizations. Long lists of links are not acceptable. A directory link may be a permanent link or a temporary measure put in place while external links are being discussed on the article's talk page. The Open Directory Project is often a neutral candidate, and may be added using the Template:Tll template.

The particular example I have in mind is a list of direct service agencies like AIDS hotlines. If our international encyclopedia chooses to provide a link to any AIDS hotline, it should provide a link to something useful to all its readers, not just those that happen to be in a particular place. But (telephony being what it is) there isn't any single AIDS hotline that is actually useful even to all of the English-speaking world, much less the rest of it, and we absolutely do not want dozens and dozens of links. IMO, a single link to a (fairly complete) list of agencies is the best choice here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:24, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Did you mean to include the first part of the paragraph in your amended version? This is rather a big change in meaning, and it seems to privilege DMOZ. As I've mentioned above, DMOZ may be problematic in terms of content. Also, while you've brought up a good point (that "not too many" is very vague) your proposal doesn't address this problem. Exploding Boy (talk) 19:33, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I propose exactly what I have placed in the bulleted item. I propose that exactly the words following the * be used to replace all of the existing #3 at ELMAYBE.
My point above is not that Long lists of links are not appropriate is vague as to the number of links. My point is that Long lists of links are not appropriate does not describe a class of links that should be considered for inclusion. WP:ELMAYBE is supposed to list classes of links that should be considered for inclusion. Items in it should not begin with a restatement of general principles. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:09, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That seems fine. It would be nice if there was a way to say that a Dmoz link should be used in this circumstance, except when none exists or there is strong consensus to use something else. 99% of link directories are pathetic and should be prohibited from ever being linked, so we should not encourage them to be spammed. A Dmoz link should be used unless a strong consensus exists to choose soemthing else. If no Dmoz category exists, then there is no easy solution no matter what. 2005 (talk) 23:54, 25 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It depends on the subject area. For example, I'd probably pick any list by the National Organization for Rare Diseases over DMOZ. But otherwise I agree: DMOZ makes an acceptable default, and from there the editors need to use their judgment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:38, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I see no particular reason to promote DMOZ. It has been demonstrated above that it may contain undesirable links. Your proposed version also removes some valuable information about tagging. Exploding Boy (talk) 01:47, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The {{Linkfarm}} template is already listed in ==See also==. Ideally, editors will remove inappropriate links, not just tag them. But if you think it's valuable, I'm willing to have an entire section dedicated to maintenance and review. I'm not willing to have it stuck in the middle of an item in a list of links that you might want to consider.
I don't mind recommending the DMOZ directory -- it is often a suitable choice, especially since you can add all the existing WP links to it -- but I also don't want to say anything that indicates that it's the only choice. Thus we start with the general statement of "a well-chosen link to a directory", and later suggest DMOZ as one example among many possibilities. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:03, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
 Done WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:09, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sister links templates for Wikia wikis

See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#External link templates to (mainly) Wikia sites and ongoing discussion at Template talk:FreeContentMeta. Is there a standing consensus to use stylized boxes (very similar to, say, {{commons}} or {{wiktionary}}) to link to some other sites, primarily to other wikis, and mostly to wikis hosted by Wikia? – Luna Santin (talk) 08:52, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So far as this guideline is concerned, these things should be deleted on site whenever they are spammed. They are never appropriate. Wikis not only should rarely get linked at all, they should even more rarely get external link templates, and the idea they should get deliberately misleading stylized boxes is ridiculous. 2005 (talk) 11:25, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
User:2005 seriously overstates the guideline. Links to wikis are not encouraged but are technically permitted under certain circumstances, which have nothing to do with the organization hosting them. To the extent that a special box would both give them official-looking sanction and take up unnecessary space (see Muffin#External links), I'd oppose this approach. What's wrong with using a normal external link format, or a one-line template (along the lines of {{MerckManual}})? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:28, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't overstate anything. Please refrain from being confusing. These templates are not approved by, mentioned, or recognized in any way by this guideline. The basic issue here is somebody made some templates for some external links that are different than other external links templates, and these things are treated differently than other external links. There is no mention in this guideline about double-super-special external links getting special treatment. All external links should follow this guideline. Any external links or structures or HTML that don't meet this guideline should be removed. There is no point to a guideline if someone can just make a template for any sort of external link they want, and place that template anywhere they want on a page. 2005 (talk) 21:40, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
To answer the original question, no, there absolutely is not a standing consensus to use stylized boxes to link to other sites or other wikis... those boxes are generally not even used to things we do link to, and we do not generally link to other wikis per our rules on "Links normally to be avoided" points 1 and 12. DreamGuy (talk) 22:04, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No consensus has been established either way, for the record (of this talk page, that is). -- Ned Scott 04:58, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is false. There is a longstanding consensus on this page that "the standard format is to place them in a bulleted list under a primary heading at the end of the article", plus infoboxes at the lead of the article. The bulleted list concept has been in place for basically forever, as the history of the guideline attests. 2005 (talk) 06:45, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
WP:LAYOUT#Links_to_sister_projects mentions these templates. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:55, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It most certainly does not. These are not sister projects! Wikitionary and Wikibooks are sister projects. The topic under discussion involves links to websites that are not a part of the Foundation. These are links to wikis unrelated to the wikipedia. 2005 (talk) 06:47, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Considering the *very poor quality* of the information in most of the sister links, it's surprising that we allow them at all anywhere, unless the info in one of them specifically meets WP:EL. They should routinely be removed as the unreliable spam that they often are, or at best, they should be closely scrutinized. When stuttering lost its featured status due to spam/adverts, the advert/spam info simply moved over to and was apparently welcomed at Wikibooks. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:18, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The same could be said for some of the Wikipedia articles we wikilink to though :-) I agree more scrutiny of sister links would be advisable though I also see why there is a desire within Wikipedia to promote them and I don't think it's unreasonable. Promoting external wikis takes things much further though. I don't see benefit to the project in promoting wikis in particular and it certainly isn't condoned by this guideline. -- SiobhanHansa 07:38, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just to try and clear up the mistaken title of this thread, the topic under discussion has nothing to do with sister links to stuff like Wikibooks. The issue is 'fancy' templates were made that violate this guideline that link to completely unrelated wikis with zero "sister" affiliation. 2005 (talk) 07:49, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Archived versions

I have a serious concern with some of the current wording under the dead links section:

Such dead links should either be removed, or updated with archived versions, which might be found at the Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

I think encouraging archives is a direct violation of or prohibition against linking to sites with copyright violations. Archive sites -- whether they be unofficial archives of news articles on personal sites or organizations who want to use the article to promote a cause or some organization specifically devoted to archiving the Internet-- do not get prior permission to duplicate copyrighted material. They just work under the assumption that they can violate copyrights until such time as they get a cease and desist. If those sites want to do that, they can decide to do that, but I think that's counter to how we at Wikipedia are instructed to deal with copyrights. If a site is down, it's down, perhaps because they site went out of business/owner lost interest (which tends not to be sites we link to anyway) or the person who had the info up decided to take it down for some reason -- and we don't have any overwhelming need or policy-based reason to have a link to it anymore that would overrule our good faith adherence to copyright laws. DreamGuy (talk) 22:01, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. I never understood this line. Archive.org is a copyvio site, but aside from that it is just obnoxious to do things like liink to an archive.org page when a website has removed an article (or put it in its pay section). There is no justification for this line in regards to external links. (We aren't talking about citations here.) The line should be Such dead links should either be updated or removed. 2005 (talk) 23:14, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If that's the accepted copyright status of sites like archive.org (and it seems reasonable - it had just not occurred to me before) I support 2005's suggested wording. -- SiobhanHansa 09:53, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I also support shortening this rule, and as that makes 100% agreement among four editors, I'll also make the change. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:24, 29 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comments: I revert your edit to WP:DEADLINK the changes where to a description of the {{dead link}}. I should note that it many of the link found there and with my tool are reference external links. While I tend to agree that Wayback Machine appears on the surface to be a copyright infringer. It maybe alot more complicated with US law and archive.org status as a library which might make it eligible for US copyright exemptions.
I do not think we should be tracking down the legal status of every work that we link to. An example: researcher may put a journal paper of his on his website which he does not hold the copyright to. Should we research to see that he actually holds redistribution rights?
Finally, the dead link issue is rather an annoying thing at FAC, and finding new sources because a link has disappear isn't always fun. — Dispenser 23:09, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This comment is addressed to DreamGuy, and would ideally have been left at WP:DEADLINK's talk page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:56, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I do not believe archive.org is "a copyvio site". I believe that this change goes in the wrong direction and should be reverted. My remarks on the matter can be found at Wikipedia talk:Dead external links#No reason to link to an archive copy of a page. If someone finds it useful to copy them here or elsewhere, you have my blessing, but I think I've now said my piece. - Jmabel | Talk 03:53, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Even if it's not a copyright violation (something that reasonable people seem to be able to disagree on), the fact is that it's not really a functional website. We don't want to be recommending that people use the Internet Wayback Machine for external links. We aren't prohibiting it's use; we are just no longer recommending it as the correct response to a dead link. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:09, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Frankly, our copyright rules mean that we should outright prohibit its use. DreamGuy (talk) 20:50, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Maintenance and review

Per one of the above discussions, I've started a new section, Wikipedia:External links#Maintenance and review. My goal was to provide some practical how-to-review information to someone that would like to become an anti-spam warrior, without specifying that a specific procedure needs to be followed. Please expand and revise it as you see fit. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:12, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Request for Comment - The Ross Institute Internet Archives

Please see Talk:Erhard_Seminars_Training#Request_for_Comment_-_The_Ross_Institute_Internet_Archives. Thank you, Cirt (talk) 01:42, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Style or content?

Is this guideline better classified as a style guideline or as a content guideline? WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:19, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

New footnote

We end up defining "recognized authority" every few months, and it came up again at WT:CITE recently, so I thought I'd save us a bit of trouble and provide a more permanent "definition" in a footnote. Please feel free to copyedit. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I removed the excess detail that was both CREEPy and opened the door for any objection at all to make someone unrecognized. We have a notability guideline. We don't need to reinvent the wheel on that, and the "recognized authority" text means that if Michael Jordan writes on brain surgery, he may be notable but he has no recognized authority/notability on this topic. 2005 (talk) 00:27, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The note is significant and should be in the main text, to make it more likely that readers will see it. I incorporated a trimmed version. TheSeven (talk) 18:10, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

vetting?

Do external links need to be vetted for authenticity before inclusion? What would that process be? I wary of "official" sites simply being fan sites with improper nomenclature, especially for deceased subjects. Re this, can I get input on this EL inclusion: [2]? — pd_THOR | =/\= | 02:27, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The process is: You vet all the external links that you want to add, plus all the links that you think someone else didn't properly vet before adding. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:16, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

flickr?

Please share some thoughts on how the External Links guidelines (what to include / what not to include), would apply to the usage of a link to "flickr tagged images of 'x'" in an article about 'x'. See, for example, the Syon House article. Thanks, Lini (talk) 12:27, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am opposed to Flickr external links. I think Flickr is an interesting and useful web site. The biggest problem I see is that the content seems to be pretty dynamic. I have seen a number of cases where copyvio images are used there. They may be eventually caught and tagged, but there is an indeterminant window when a link to a Flickr copyvio may be available. Also, external link directly to images, rather than images in the article namespace are a bad idea. It would be used as a mechanism to get around the normal standards within Wikipedia on images. If an image is worth linking to in an EL section, then why can't it be brought into commons and go through the normal process. Even using this method from commons, I have seen where a Flickr image brought into Commons was marked initially as cc-by-sa-2.0, but goiung back to the link to Flickr, the image on Flickr says "All Rights Reserved". Sure, if it "had" been put in the public domain via cc-by-sa-2.0, it can't be put back to all rights reserved, but are we going to get in a legal battle with the photographer to force using an image? Well, that topic is outside of the scope of this conversation. The point is, Flickr images are too volatile, transient and untrustworthy. We should not be dependent on the image policies used by Flickr (which are different from our own) and the capability and efficacy of their enforcement of their policies. Atom (talk) 14:44, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Flickr is on user:XLinkBot's revertlist for these reasons, it gets often spammed, or there are copyright problems with it. There are only few cases where the link is appropriate, but often it is better to upload the images onto a wikimedia server. --Dirk Beetstra T C 15:52, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds like search engine results to me, and therefore inappropriate under WP:ELNO #9. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:02, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't view Flickr links as an equivalent of search engine result pages, because the site relies on a folksonomic approach. Every image is tagged by a human, as opposed to machine-generated content of SERPs. Whether folksonomic links are appropriate external links is worth discussing, but it's a broader issue than just Flickr. - Eureka Lott 17:33, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think that's good enough. Nearly every page that Google indexes was created by a human, too. The problem with search engine results is not just the fact that people are smart enough to run their own searches; it's that we can't evaluate them usefully because the content changes every day. It's the same problem that we have with links to blogs: a great piece today -- but next month, it could be garbage, and we'd have no way of knowing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:16, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Flikr or no, just links to a bunch of images don't have an encyclopedic purpose. Regardless of where and how these images come up, they are not appropriate per our standards, and the fact that flikr has copyright problems, etc. makes them just that much worse and inappropriate as external links. DreamGuy (talk) 20:47, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Linking to Songs on YouTube that are uploaded to YouTube by the copyright holder

Hi! I linked songs on YouTube to their corresponding artist page on Wikipedia. I was careful to make sure that the version of the song was one that was uploaded to YouTube by the record company or artist that (I thought) owned copright to those songs. My links were reverted nevertheless. I'm discouraged. Please help me understand how to proceed on this. I believe it really strengthens an artist page on Wikipedia when there are direct links to that artist's songs. Are songs directly uploaded to YouTube by an artist or record company not legal to link to? If yes, am I okay to revert the reverts?  :-[ (Whose responsibility would that be? I'm sad at all the time I've wasted if I was operating under the wrong impression.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by RichLindvall (talk • contribs) 10:19, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As long as you are 100% confident that the copyright holder put the work up on YouTube, you can link to it; however, it is generally the case that such songs are linked only from the individual song articles. If you only have the artist's page on WP, you may want to link to the provide that contains all their submissions instead of individual songs. --MASEM 12:25, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not seeing a purpose to link to a video, and I don't feel comfortable with people off the street deciding that the group uploaded it (because most everybody would just choose to assume they did... it'd open ourselves up to massive copyright violations). Better to link to an official site with the video, if at all. DreamGuy (talk) 20:53, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Blogs

Point 11 currently reads as follows.

Links to blogs and personal web pages, except those written by a recognized authority (as a minimum standard, recognized authorities always meet Wikipedia's notability criteria for biographies).

Blogs and personal web pages are two different things; so it seems odd to me that they are listed so closely together. The portion of the sentence about personal web pages seems fine. I question the portion about blogs though: many blogs are devoted to specialized topics, and can be very useful to know about. Is the point worded correctly? Should it instead read "personal blogs and web pages"?   TheSeven (talk) 18:16, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The point is that blogs (of all sorts) and personal web pages tend to have very limited fact checking and editorial oversight of the sort that would make them reliable. They also tend to be more on the opinion side of things than the summary of current understanding side. So only those written by people whose general ramblings could be considered particularly pertinent (regardless of whether they had been fact checked etc.) should be included. A blog from a well respected institution and/or that uses well regarded contributor(s) and is known for the particular topic might be appropriate for instance. But a blog that is simply by, say, a minor academic, even at the same institution, probably wouldn't be. -- SiobhanHansa 19:33, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Kind thanks for explaining. I was thinking primarily about technical subjects, where there is some opinion, but the discussions are mostly about technical issues. For example, there might be a blog on R, or on some aspects of stereos, or on some special type of automobile. Such blogs can be very useful for people in getting up to speed on the subject, yet they might be run by persons who are not notable enough for a Wikipedia entry. I understand what you are saying about reliability. My view, though, is that readers of a Wikipedia article on the subject would benefit from being directed, via External links, to important blogs on technical subjects. And I thought benefit should be the main criterion.   TheSeven (talk) 20:22, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Benefit is subjective. In the end, we are here to provide encyclopedic information and not to be a web directory. Most blogs of any sort do not meet our standards. DreamGuy (talk) 20:46, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Personal web pages in external links section

The issue seems to be having personal web pages in the external link section of the article Statistics, judging by the discussion at Talk Statistics. Spam patrollers have dealt with this article repeatedly (it had close to 40 external links in Dec 06, in spite of several efforts, starting in earnest in Aug 06 [3], in order to control the problematic external links section), and it has been the target of many clean-up efforts since then, so I think it is on people's radar already. But I'm afraid I have to leave the issue of explaining how personal web pages differ from pages by authorities to other participants in the spam project, in light of the following talk page entry [4]. Afv2006 (talk) 21:16, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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