Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

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---

RfC: update Democracy Now! from WP:MREL to WP:GENREL?

Should WP:DEMOCRACYNOW be changed from WP:MREL to WP:GENREL? Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 14:34, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

Comment: Pinging editors from previous discussion:

• إيان
• Slatersteven
• CVDX
• FactOrOpinion
• ActivelyDisinterested
• Simonm223
• Guy Macon
• Aquillion
• The Kip
• Guz13
• Some1
• ElKevbo
• BobFromBrockley
• Bravelake

Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 14:37, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

Survey (Democracy Now!)

• I do not recall it being established ther was any change in their reputation, so no change. Slatersteven (talk) 14:48, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

  Just added sourcing supporting that there was a reputation change, let me know what you think. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 14:59, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

  As ElKevbo noted previously, it doesn't appear the WP:DEMOCRACYNOW accurately reflects the discussions it is supposed to be summarizing, with the last discussion in 2013. The premise for any change in their reputation is that the status quo is not flawed, which is an incorrect premise.

  As I've noted, this case isn't to be understood as one for an "upgrade"; it's one for the rectifying of a flawed downgrade. إيان (talk) 15:46, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

Support based on sources and arguments presented in the previous discussion which I will summarize here.

Bias and reliability are two separate things. A source can be biased but highly factual. Sources should always have opinions attributed, which accounts for bias. And I believe WP:DEMOCRACYNOW is a biased but highly-factual source, and therefore meets the threshold for being considered WP:GENREL. The previous analysis of this source deeming it WP:MREL was over a decade ago and a re-evaluation is WP:DUE.

Reliability checkers

• https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/democracy-now/
• MBFC (not reliable, removed this part of my comment)
• https://app.adfontesmedia.com/chart/interactive?utm_source=SourcePage&utm_medium=OnPageLink
• Adfontes (not reliable, removed this part of my comment)
• https://ground.news/interest/democracy-now
  • Media bias: Left
  • Factuality: This was paywalled, so I wrote a webscraping script to fetch factuality data. And it says High factuality.

Additional sources

• https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0163443712449500
• Journalistic field wars: defending and attacking the national narrative in a diversifying journalistic field
  • While this source does not explicitly say it is "generally reliable", it seems to praise its reporting.
  • Democracy Now! - In contrast to the established networks, alternative media focused their criticisms on U.S. foreign policy and establishment journalism’s reporting of WikiLeaks. The New York-based Democracy Now!, far from framing WikiLeaks as a threat to national security, employed the term ‘whistleblower’ to describe the organization in nearly every story. Amy Goodman, the program’s host, associated the WikiLeaks-released cables with the Pentagon Papers and Assange with Daniel Ellsberg, the man who released the Papers. The name of the program – Democracy Now! – suggests a radical belief in citizen access to information that facilitates self-governance as well as a demand for positive rights. Democracy Now!, consistent with its radically democratic principles, did not merely praise or condemn WikiLeaks but hosted a debate between Steven Afterwood of the Federation of American Scientists, who condemned WikiLeaks as irresponsible, and Glenn Greenwald of Salon, who framed WikiLeaks as a whistleblower.
• https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262514897/digital-media-and-democracy/
• Digital Media and Democracy
  • Again generally positive sentiment.
  • The strategies of practice that are studied or exemplified here include: (a) reform-changing media policy and legislation around ownership and concentration, in order to limit the monopolization of media and exclusion of diversity within public agenda setting; (b) establishment of grassroots, independent news channels and networks such as Pacifica, Democracy Now!, and Al Jazeera English...
  • Democracy Now! is a national, daily, independent, award-winning news program airing on over 500 stations in North America. Pioneering the largest public media collaboration in the United States, Democracy Now! is broadcast on community, Pacifica, and National Public Radio stations, public access cable television stations, satellite television (on Free Speech TV, channel 9415 of the DISH Network), shortwave radio, and the Internet.
• https://transformationsjournal.org/index.php/transformations/article/view/4239/2715
• Transformation (journal)
  • Caveat that this reads like an opinion piece and was written in 2008, but it argues Democracy Now! is free from corporate interests and is a better alternative to mainstream media outlets.
  • It is my contention that Democracy Now! is at the vanguard of an emerging independent media sector that is revitalising US news media at a decisive moment in American (journalism) history.

The reliability checkers are the strongest sources, but other sourcing seems to praise Democracy Now! for its status as a independent news organization that is free from harmful media practices (propaganda model, protest paradigm) that pervade most US mainstream news outlets.

Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 14:58, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

@Alexandraaaacs1989 I’ll hold off on voting for now pending further analysis, but WP:RSP already establishes that for our purposes, Ad Fontes/MBFC are not reliable sources, and I’m also not encouraged by the newest of the academic/journalistic sources you’ve provided being from 2012. The Kip ^(contribs) 15:07, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

That's useful to know, thank you. I'll strike those parts of my comment, and if I don't get around to adding better sourcing soon, hopefully someone else does in the meantime. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 15:11, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

The same is true of ground news. The discussion is about whether the site is reliable for Wikipedia's purposes based on Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. These sites don't base their ratings on those policies and guidelines, so the ratings are worthless. Their left/right bias is even worse as bias has not part in discussions about reliability. They're useful for researching a source, as they report things that can be used here. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:51, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

Basically whenever "reliability" is used the context is always "reliable per Wikipedia's policy and guidelines for Wikipedia's purposes" not a general idea of reliability that other websites might be using. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:54, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

They also have a long list of awards[1], some seem to be minor but others point to a reputation for reliable journalism. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:02, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

Here's some newer sources:

• Media, Culture, & Society

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0163443712449500

Whereas the networks had constructed WikiLeaks-as-criminal-and-threat, Democracy Now! reporters read through the cables to construct news that focused on U.S. crimes and imperial actions abroad: U.S. pressure on Germany to suppress arrest warrants for CIA officers who abducted an innocent man and held him in captivity for several months; Secretaries of State Hillary Clinton and Condoleezza Rice ordering embassies to collect foreign dignitaries’ ‘frequent flier numbers, credit card details, and even DNA material, like fingerprints, [and] iris scans’; pressure to halt Spanish investigations of U.S. torture at Guantanamo Bay, CIA rendition flights, U.S. troops killing of a Spanish journalist in Iraq; transfer of prisoners to countries where, in the words of U.N. Special Rapporteur Juan Mendez, U.S. officials ‘knew that these people were going to be tortured’; the storage of banned cluster bombs in Britain; ‘massive civilian casualties’, in Goodman’s words, following a U.S. attack on Yemen; American opposition to Afghani reconciliation talks with Taliban leaders; and neutralization, co-optation, and marginalization of states opposed to inadequate American plans to curb global warming. Unlike the networks, Democracy Now! correctly pointed out that Assange had reason to conceal his location because of assassination threats coming from talking heads on cable networks and U.S. House members. Fox News commentator Bob Beckel, for example, called for the murder of Assange because a ‘dead man can’t leak stuff’ and U.S. Representative Peter King called Assange a terrorist.

• Social Movement Studies (2019)

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14742837.2019.1681954

Democracy Now! is the flagship program of the pacifist politically left Pacifica Radio Network, and research on activist media consumption suggests the program is an important source of information for movement participants (Rauch, 2007, 2015). The host and public face for Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman, has written and done speaking tours for several solo and co-authored New York Times best-selling books, her most recent titled, 20 years of covering the movements changing America (Goodman, Goodman, & Moynihan, 2016).

Describing themselves as ‘the largest public media collaboration in the country’ (Moynihan,2008), the program is targeted at a U.S. audience, is distributed online (http://democracynow.org), and is currently carried on over 1,400 stations around the world – mostly community and public radio stations, and public television stations in the U.S. As a daily news magazine broadcast from New York City, the journalistic practices of Democracy Now! staff interact with the political actions of activist movements, co-producing narrative resources that listeners/viewers can use to understand what movements ‘mean’. Democracy Now!’s position within the movement milieu makes it a valuable resource for understanding narrative connections among movement labels over time, and this paper draws on it to build a targeted diachronic multi-issue corpus of spoken-word texts that is structurally consistent in size and genre."

• Toft, A. (2018). Chapter 13. Cross-talk in political discourse: Strategies for bridging issue movements on Democracy Now!. In M. Kranert & G. Horan (Eds.) ‘Doing Politics’: Discursivity, performativity and mediation in political discourse (pp. 301-329).

https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1075/dapsac.80.13tof/html

Democracy Now! is one of the most widely distributed independent media programs in the United States. Started in 1996, this nationally syndicated hour-long daily news-magazine broadcast is currently syndicated on over 1400 public access TV stations, and public, community and low-power FM radio stations. Funded in large part by listener/viewer/reader contributions, Democracy Now! offers a well-resourced and professionally produced program that covers the national news for the day, and routinely sources high-profile activists, artists, authors, scholars, journalists, and politicians. The broad grassroots distribution, funding, and political reputation of Democracy Now! elevate the importance of who speaks and what they say, and guests on the program often appear to qualify as what Eyerman and Jamisen (1991) would call “movement intellectuals”: people who develop their expertise and source legitimacy through their leadership in uncovering injustice and working for social change.

• What’s the Point of News?, by Tony Harcup (2020)

https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-39947-4

Chapter 3 will apply the critical theoretical perspectives on journalism and news introduced in Chap. 2 to examine in detail the output from specific alternative media projects ranging from the Liverpool Free Press in the 1970s to Democracy Now! today. This chapter will draw on extant empirical studies where appropriate but will apply fresh thinking and critical reading to such material in an effort to explore the social and journalistic significance of such alternative forms of practice. It will argue that alternative news values are not merely desirable in principle, but that they can be found operating in practice in some forms of media. In their different ways, the approaches to news exemplified in these examples of alternative media all critique what it means to be a journalist, and what we might mean by news.1 Edittttor (talk) 21:40, 18 May 2026 (UTC)

I don’t find these compelling as evidence for reliability.

• Handley & Rutigliano 2012 in Media Culture & Society isn’t making a claim about reliability but about bias: that DN had the opposite (anti-US) bias to the “dominant” (mainstream) outlets and is therefore preferable from a (US) anti-nationalist perspective. It’s also quite old.
• Toft 2019 in Social Movement Studies isn’t making a claim about reliability but about usefulness to an activist audience. It’s saying DN’s embedded in a “pacifist politically left” movement. That doesn’t make it unreliable, but it doesn’t make it reliable either. It emphasises the outlet (and Goodman’s) reputation within this milieu so might suggest due weight when we discuss such movements.
• Toft 2018 (same author) in the book Doing Politics is making the same point again, but also emphasises that it is slick and well funded. I don’t think that’s a reliability data point.
• Harcup 2020: I don’t have access to this but the overview doesn’t seem to be making a claim about reliability. Might be worth getting access to see if it does.

BobFromBrockley (talk) 07:00, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

(Moved under my !vote.) In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 21:48, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

• I'm not against us re-evaluating the source, as the RSP entry is old and may not perfectly represent our discussions, but I don't think the upgrade case has been made yet. As I noted in the preceeding discussion, the evidence presented above simply tells us that its bias is held in high regard by some left-wing media scholars, or was over a decade ago, not that it has a reputation for reliability today. My strong impression is that:

• its "Stories", as it calls them, showcase the opinions of various guests and are reliable primary sources for those opinions and beyond that we should at best see these as RSOPINION or possibly on a case by case basis depending on whether the guests are subject matter experts on the topic the WP article is about.
• its "Headlines" are generally accurate but often with a partisan spin but that they are effectively sourced from other sources such as wires and we'd be better to use the originals. I'd be curious to see what we would gain by using these instead of the legacy networks and wire services they depend on.
• When it does original reporting (e.g. the Tom Morello example report mentioned by Visviva below), these should generally be regarded as reliable.

My conclusion then is we should keep it as "additional considerations apply" to make these distinctions clear and treat it as weakly reliable. But I'm open to persuasion if there is better evidence coming. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:50, 15 May 2026 (UTC) [edited 16.05 to add 3rd bullet point and fix indenting]

Hi Bob. I agree with each of your three bullet points, but I'm not sure why "additional considerations apply" is the conclusion from your three bullet points (likely due to the lackluster strength of my original sourcing provided?). I think ActivelyDisinterested made a very strong case below that responds to some of the points in your argument, so I'm curious what your thoughts are. Paraphrasing where thing seem to be, guests saying something in "Stories" should be treated like RS opinion pieces by requiring attribution like in any other WP:GREL, WP:HEADLINES are not RS regardless, and DN original reporting is factual, which seems to leave no differences between DN and other sources we currently consider to be GREL. The awards list seems like the most compelling piece of evidence yet in favor of DN being GREL if we're making an inductive argument to supplement the other points I just mentioned. Hope to hear your response! Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 20:40, 18 May 2026 (UTC)

+1 I also agree that Bob's conclusion of "additional considerations apply" doesn't follow from their 3 points. Even for GREL sources, WP:RSOPINION always applies (eg. NYT published an op-ed written by Vladimir Putin), so does WP:HEADLINE. VR 23:06, 19 May 2026 (UTC)

Not sure to be honest. I don’t think WP:HEADLINES applies to the posts that DN labels “Headlines”, which is the label it gives to its news bulletin rather than literal headlines. If we discount those, we’re left with opinion and occasional first hand reports. So maybe green flagging but with the kind of warning we give for the Atlantic, the Diplomat or the Hill. One reason I’m hesitant to consider its “Stories” as just RSOPINION is that is geared to written pieces that go through editorial before publication whereas the DN’s format means these are unfiltered oral comments where the speaker is talking off the cuff without the opportunity to check themselves, so I’d always want us to say something like “speaking to DN, X said” or “in an interview on DN, X said” BobFromBrockley (talk) 05:09, 20 May 2026 (UTC)

• Comment (summoned by bot): As noted above it's difficult to imagine a situation in which the DN headline news items are a good source to cite. They are generally just a transcript of the host's summary of the news, and reliable or not, there should almost always be something better. But I would think that what we're really talking about here from an RS standpoint is the show's original reporting, such as its award-winning coverage of the Standing Rock protests, or more routine pieces like this one from today on the May 12 ICE protest in New York. For what it's worth, I have never heard anyone challenge the factuality of DN's reports such as these (or for that matter, the faithfulness with which its interviews are presented). Nor am I seeing any such challenges thus far in this discussion or the one immediately preceding. If we're going to say that there is no consensus that this is a reliable source, I think it would be helpful to see some arguments (or examples) for why it might not be reliable. -- Visviva (talk) 01:55, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

• Support I consider Democracy Now! Reliable and oppose a downgrade of its reliability on Wikipedia—I have watched their news. It has its own point of view, but I have never seen a news report that was unreliable. I don’t consider the score given by Media Bias/Fact Check or Ground News. My vote is based on my personal experience and views. 🐈Cinaroot   04:14, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

  To note there is no proposal to downgrade DM, it's currently considered a reliable source with additional considerations. The question is whether it shouldn't have those additional considerations. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:14, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

  I slightly edited my vote to make it less confusing. 🐈Cinaroot   16:56, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

Generally reliable Their award page[2] is a laundry list but with that list are notable awards. They also have WP:USEBYOTHERS, mostly university presses but also works from Bloomsbury Academic and Springer. I can't find any reports of factually incorrect output. They are biased, but editors should deal with that by separating opinion from fact and if necessary using other sources to balance them. Bias isn't a reliability issue unless that bias effect factual accuracy WP:RSBIAS. There was mention of headlines in the discussion before this RFC, but headlines are always unreliable WP:HEADLINES. A lot of the criticism I see online is about what a guest has said about a situation or event. They do publish a lot of opinion and interviews, these shouldn't be used for statements of fact, per WP:RSOPINION, but should be fine for attributed statements. I don't see why they shouldn't just be handled like any other WP:NEWSORG, they are biased, they publish opinion that shouldn't be used to support statements of fact, that's just like any other news organisation. Unless someone can show they have issue with accuracy bornfact checking I think they should be considered reliable. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:49, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

Awards list stops at 2017. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 18:15, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

That looks to be because it hasn't been updated fully. Amy Goodman won the Frederick Douglass 200 in 2018 and the William Sloane Coffin Jr. Peacemaker Award in 2023. Those are just the two that I could find within a few minutes, there could be more. Edittttor (talk) 15:56, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

They have a more recent Izzy award too, but that seems to get given to multiple unreliable sources (Aaron Mate!) so I wouldn’t let it count for much.[3]

Very few of the awards are ones usually recognised actual solid reliable reporting but a couple of them are. BobFromBrockley (talk) 05:19, 20 May 2026 (UTC)

• Status Quo The source is very biased and we should be careful about both what facts they cite as well as what they may have left out. For this reason we should always be careful about such sources. As a yellow source it's can be citied for statements of fact and to establish weight. It simply means people should be cautious with the source given they are typically writing not just to convey the facts but to support a POV. To be honest, we should always be careful with sources/articles that write to persuade vs simply provide the facts. Also, a note about the use of Adfontes and MBFC. Both sources are cited by scholars as expert sources. I previously found a source that actually compared the various rating cites and said despite different methods they were generally consistent. RSN/RSP discussions have generally said these sources shouldn't be cited in Wiki articles. They do not say they are unreliable or not useful for discussions such as this one. With that said, consider that Democracy Now's Adfontes bias rating of -16.15 makes them more biased than Breitbart (13.59) and near The Heratage Foundation (16.30). Their reliability score of 31.5 is almost the same as the Post Millennial.

Springee (talk) 13:22, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

Is news bias fueled by journalists supplying slanted views or readers’ demanding them? An economist weighs in

There are supply-driven and demand-driven biases. I think many reliable sources in the U.S. and around the world are biased. It all depends on one’s personal point of view. Bias is not a factor to consider when determining reliability. 🐈Cinaroot   17:29, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

If you would like to change the reliability assessment of Adfontes or MBFC you are welcome to submit a new request, but for now we should not be using them as evidence due to their rating as generally unreliable. See WP:ADFONTES and WP:MBFC. Edittttor (talk) 15:36, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

Please read the discussions. The concern in those discussions was because editors were using the ratings in article space (The .... Times is rated as "left/right" by MBFC. The discussions did not say editors aren't allowed to make reliability arguments based on those sources. This is a bit like saying we can't use a SPS to point out issues with another source. As editors on a talk page yes we can. We are allowed to engage in OR and use sources that aren't acceptable for the article space. To be clear, I agree, we should not use those sources for material in article space. We should consider them when discussing topics like this. Springee (talk) 17:00, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

This is just basically ignoring WP:BIASED, which makes it clear that bias doesn't relate to reliability. Katzrockso (talk) 05:16, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

It even goes further and say Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject.

Everyone has bias. Seems like we are using our bias to say the source is biased. Times of Israel is biased. Yet it is a reliable source. Democracy now is no different. 🐈Cinaroot   05:24, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

The problem with bias isn't that the raw facts are false. It's that the source may give excessive weight to facts that support their POV while ignoring ones that refute it. If they say it was a sunny day I would trust them. If they say a company was motivated (a subjective assessment) by X, we should be very cautious about using them if not avoid them as not reliable for such a claim (that would depend on the supporting evidence). This is why yellow makes sense - to the extent that our stupid 3 bucket scale makes any sense. Yellow means we can use them but editors who use them should be aware of their very strong bias and the issues that may come out of the bias. Springee (talk) 12:01, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

It's that the source may give excessive weight to facts that support their POV while ignoring ones that refute it. Well that's the beauty of this website - that we get to decide how to present biased information in a neutral way ourselves (such as by omitting undue facts in an article), as opposed to being required to carbon copy an article's own decisions as to how to weigh and present information. Subjective assessments speculating about how "[company] was motivated by X" should be treated as attributed opinions regardless of whether Democracy Now! is updated to GREL.

Again, I'm getting the sense that the arguments being made against Democracy Now! being updated to GREL are not criticisms of Democracy Now!'s reliability, but are instead general critiques of bias in sourcing that just as easily apply to all GREL on WP:RSP as they do to Democracy Now!. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 14:37, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

Yes, indeed. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 14:59, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

The question isn't whether additional considerations technically apply to every source. They do. The question is whether there are recurring source-specific considerations that editors are likely to encounter often enough to justify retaining guidance. In DN's case, multiple editors have pointed to distinctions between interviews, commentary, and original reporting. If those distinctions are recurring enough that editors keep raising them in this discussion, doesn't that suggest the current entry may still be serving a useful purpose? Tioaeu8943 (talk) 16:30, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

No, to me it suggests that most editors voting against this RfC are conflating partisanship with factual reporting in spite of WP:PARTISAN. There are distinctions between regular articles and Opinion pieces in WP:WAPO too, and this doesn't stop us from treating WAPO as GENREL. So like I've said before, I don't understand why DN is any different than run of the mill GENREL. I suspect it's simply because left-wing political bias is further outside the Overton window than centrist/pro-establishment reporting, so people feel entitled to dismiss it without putting in as much effort as they would for a political source with mainstream bias. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 17:51, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

Yes, the impact of editor bias on the vote count is apparent here, for exactly the reason you describe. I hope that the closer will take into account the stronger argument.

It's telling that one of the major arguments putting DN at risk of maintaining its marginal reliability in this discussion is the mere aspersion of editorial interference on the part of Amy Goodman, unsupported by any affirmative evidence. Meanwhile, the last few discussions about CBS went nowhere, despite being founded in affirmative, if not necessarily definitive, evidence of editorial interference. The latest (and most serious) allegations by Scott Pelley and his colleagues have not even been discussed yet.

In this discussion at least, it seems that a certain reading of WP:SPS has a number of editors convinced that being oligarch-owned is somehow an indication of greater reliability, because of layers of abstraction in the ownership structure. We see with DN, by comparison to CBS, that this couldn't be further from the truth.

In order for Wikipedia to continue being a reliable resource in an era of increasing media consolidation and subordination to powerful interests, source reliability and admissibility must not be determined in a manner that excludes or disfavors independent media. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 02:27, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

I don't think the question is whether independent media should be disfavored or whether large corporate media should be favored. The narrower question seems to be whether the existing guidance remains useful for editors evaluating material from DN. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 16:39, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

Idk, I think that question needs to be answered in the context of how sources are evaluated on the whole. Guidance for independent media should be applied with an even hand to establishment media, to avoid an undue establishment bias, which is especially dangerous at a time when the establishment is cannibalizing the very purported values that supposedly made it the standard for reliability when Wikipedia's policies were written. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 13:27, 17 June 2026 (UTC)

It's true that there are distinctions between reporting and opinion with GREL sources, but the question I'm struggling with is whether the distinctions being discussed here are merely the ordinary distinctions present at most news outlets or whether they are significant enough in DN's case that editors find themselves needing source-specific guidance. It seems to me that this is the central disagreement here. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 16:13, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

WP:RSOPINION applies to everything. In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 17:04, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

whether the distinctions being discussed here are merely the ordinary distinctions present at most news outlets or whether they are significant enough in DN's case that editors find themselves needing source-specific guidance - If this is the case, I still haven't seen any evidence that DN's reporting is not factual that would be necessary if you're going to make that argument. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 16:03, 22 June 2026 (UTC)

If they say a company was motivated (a subjective assessment) by X, we should be very cautious about using them if not avoid them as not reliable for such a claim (that would depend on the supporting evidence) No, we should not conduct WP:OR, analyze evidence ourselves and check if we agree with what sources say. WP:NEWSORGs are given presumptive reliability and actual evidence needs to be presented to downgrade this presumption. Katzrockso (talk) 16:12, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

An aside but "presumptive reliability" is not a thing, NEWSORG says they are "generally consider reliable". Editors still have to use their own good judgement when looking at sources, just because it came from a generally reliable source doesn't mean it will always be reliable in every given context. If a generally reliable source say "bill scored 10", but ever other sources says he scored 9 then maybe they just got it wrong that time. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 15:24, 22 May 2026 (UTC)

I didn't say that every article published by them is reliable, I said that the (rebuttable) presumption is that established WP:NEWSORGS are generally reliable. Generally reliable does not mean that every piece of information they publish is factual/correct. Katzrockso (talk) 21:24, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Sorry misunderstanding over language, I agree. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:00, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

But we don’t seem to have consensus yet that this is a “well-established news organisation” per NEWSORG. BobFromBrockley (talk) 02:33, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

Is that seriously in question? They're a 30 year old, award winning, nationally airing daily news program. A lot of the GREL outlets in the perennial sources list are nowhere near as well established as that. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 02:51, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

It seems some editors question it.[4][5][6][7] BobFromBrockley (talk) 03:01, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

• MREL - As highlighted by many people, updating the discussion to include changes that have occurred in the past 13 years is a good idea, and I am particularly supportive of BobFromBrockley's suggestion in how we break down and consider output from DN. ActivelyDisinterested has highlighted their many awards, and while they seem to stop in 2017 (Edittttor found awards from 2018 and 2023), that is still four more years of awards since the last discussion linked in the Perennial Sources list. As multiple people have highlighted, DN's original reporting seems to meet what we expect of news outlets, so it may be possible to break that out into a separate entry of GREL, but we probably need more evidence to support such action than has currently been presented. -- Cdjp1 (talk) 18:57, 16 May 2026 (UTC)
• Support The close of the previous discussion was incorrect and should have been challenged - the available evidence shows that this source is reliable. ElKevbo (talk) 21:15, 16 May 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo. Per CJR, Goodman is often described as a progressive activist, but she denies that her work is partisan. So it can definitely be used but the weight and attribution should be decided by the editors in each case. Alaexis_¿question? 21:29, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

  She is a host on the program. They have other hosts too. I would prefer if we vote based on the news they air rather than Goodman’s past or her reputation. 🐈Cinaroot   21:53, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

  She is a co-founder, executive producer and basically the face of DN. Alaexis_¿question? 06:43, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

  In addition to what Cinaroot said, are you conflating bias and reliability? There is a difference between the two. Edittttor (talk) 15:32, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

  RS are supposed to be independent. You will notice that we deem very few advocacy organisations generally reliable. Alaexis_¿question? 18:54, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

  Democracy Now! has held steadfast to our policy of not accepting government funding, corporate sponsorship, underwriting or advertising revenue. [8] I think this is one of the best things a RS can do to stay independent. 🐈Cinaroot   18:58, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

  That's right but they are financed by various nonprofit foundations. Alaexis_¿question? 08:46, 18 May 2026 (UTC)

  You are mixing up independent (politician) with WP:RSBIAS. From RSBIAS: Wikipedia articles are required to present a neutral point of view. However, reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject.

  Common sources of bias include political, financial, religious, philosophical, or other beliefs. Although a source may be biased, it may be reliable in the specific context. When dealing with a potentially biased source, editors should consider whether the source meets the normal requirements for reliable sources, such as editorial control, a reputation for fact-checking, and the level of independence from the topic the source is covering.

  Of the perrinnial sources that are currently rated as generally reliable, WP:ALJAZEERA, WP:AXIOS, WP:BELLINGCAT, WP:CNN, WP:CODA, WP:CSM, WP:TELEGRAPH, WP:GLAAD, WP:GUARDIAN, WP:HAARETZ, Hope Not Hate, WP:HUFFPOST, The Intercept, WP:THEMARYSUE, WP:LEMONDEDIPLOMATIQUE, WP:MOTHERJONES, WP:NEWREPUBLIC, Newslaundry, WP:OKO, WP:POLITICO, WP:REASONNEWS, The Register, WP:SPLC, WP:TIMESOFISRAEL, and WP:VANITYFAIR are all listed in their description to have some bias, so clearly that is not a prerequisite.

  DN is also not an advocacy organization, but even if they were, several of the sources I listed above are advocacy organizations and are still rated as generally reliable, so that is not a prerequisite either. Edittttor (talk) 21:51, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

  Independence is a separate requirement - see WP:REPUTABLE. This is related to but distinct from bias. Alaexis_¿question? 08:47, 18 May 2026 (UTC)

  WP:REPUTABLE has a definition which mentions independence. Independence is a link to a definition, which includes An independent source is a source that has no vested interest in a given Wikipedia topic and therefore is commonly expected to cover the topic from a disinterested perspective. Independent sources have editorial independence (e.g., advertisers do not dictate content) and no conflicts of interest (i.e., there is no potential for personal, financial, or political gain to be made from the existence of the publication). and Independence does not imply even-handedness. An independent source may hold a strongly positive or negative view of a topic or an idea. For example, a scholar might write about literacy in developing countries, and they may personally strongly favor teaching all children how to read, regardless of gender or socioeconomic status. Yet if the author gains no personal benefit from the education of these children, then the publication is an independent source on the topic. What definition of independent are you using? Edittttor (talk) 21:44, 18 May 2026 (UTC)

  I acknowledge that this is not a clearcut case. However, the explanatory essay you cited explains why an advocacy organisation may not be independent (Independent sources have ... no conflicts of interest (i.e., there is no potential for personal, financial, or political gain to be made from the existence of the publication).) Alaexis_¿question? 21:48, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

• Support per ActivelyDisinterested. As this is a discussion about the reliability and not bias, I see a consensus forming for upgrading to generally reliable, as long as it is noted that their "Stories" should be treated like RSOPINION and require attribution (like in any other GREL of course).Edittttor (talk) 15:21, 17 May 2026 (UTC)
• Support I wish they had a public editorial standards or ethics policy, but it's unfortunately common for news organizations not to, and I'm not finding evidence of unethical or deceptive reporting.  81567518  W  19:13, 17 May 2026 (UTC)
• MREL/weak GREL Bobfrombrockley pretty much sums up my thoughts. Original reporting can probably be treated as biased but reliable (perhaps look for a supplemental source as well), but opinion pieces are governed by the policy on op-eds, and non-original reporting should probably be sourced from a more neutral/mainstream outlet. The Kip ^(contribs) 01:36, 18 May 2026 (UTC)
• Additional considerations per Bobfrombrockley. Samuelshraga (talk) 12:19, 18 May 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo per Bobfrombrockley. Case is not yet made for an upgrade. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 21:28, 18 May 2026 (UTC)
• Support. It's generally reliable, but it leans left. It's not an neutral source, just a reliable one. Snokalok2 (talk) 21:50, 18 May 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo per Bobfrombrockley.— Preceding unsigned comment added by NorthernWinds (talk • contribs) 23:06, 19 May 2026 (UTC)

• Support per ActivelyDisinterested. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 17:48, 19 May 2026 (UTC)
• Support upgrading to generally reliable per ActivelyDisinterested and my own comments in this section.VR 23:06, 19 May 2026 (UTC)
• Weak status quo I don't think we should be treating news sources, in general, as WP:GREL because this is often used to end discussion about whether or not said news source is appropriate in a specific context. That being said I don't think this is any worse than the New York Times or the BBC. Each has their biases. So, while my preference would be to vacate all news organizations from WP:GREL I'm not going to lose any sleep if this source is added to the ranks of news sources that are called generally reliable. Simonm223 (talk) 16:39, 20 May 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo/MREL per BobFromBrockley. They are not great, and the case for an upgrade is very weak. PARAKANYAA (talk) 16:59, 20 May 2026 (UTC)
• Support for upgrading to WP:GREL. I would agree that this should be done with the intention to rectify a flawed downgrade as إيان says since I believe that Alexandraaaacs1989 provided good evidence for it being WP:GREL and there isn't any source I've seen discussed that refutes that reliability. I believe that the fact-checking sources as well as its recognition among multiple academic sources for factual reporting shows that it is recognized by most to be factual and again, I haven't really seen any source call that into question. Like many others, I would also agree that they are fairly biased in their perspective and what is chosen to be included, but as for Wikipedia's purposes that doesn't seem to be an issue when using a segment in a DN publication to cite a fact. I think that their non-opinion based articles can regularly be relied upon and when looking at any opinion piece, WP:RSOPINION applies just as VR mentioned. Plus, when you consider that other publications like WP:CNN are WP:GREL due to their bias not being seen as affecting their reliability, there seems to be no reason to me that it can't be WP:GREL. ◀ Juniperol (bingus) ▶ --(talk) 00:45, 21 May 2026 (UTC)
• Support. The initial case for MREL was poorly made and not compliant with currently existing policies and guidelines. The mistake here is treating the previous 2013 discussion as if it has a meaningfully durable consensus from 13 years ago. Wikipedia policies and guidelines have changed significantly since then, as has recognition that WP:BIASED sources can be perfectly reliable.Katzrockso (talk) 05:19, 21 May 2026 (UTC)
• Status Quo MREL The organization does not appear to have sufficient structure to produce content that wouldn't be called self published. Most of the content appears to be advocacy journalism or human-interest reporting. The marketing structure implies that the purpose is to engage in advocacy journalism. So at best this source should be treated as RSOPINION. --Kyohyi (talk) 12:35, 21 May 2026 (UTC)
• Weak Support and no-clear-delineation: I disagree with the Before's discussion framing this is as "rectifying of a flawed downgrade", because no consensus is the default state, not assuming all articles should generally be reliable. GRel is an upgrade from the default for sources that have a demonstratively good reputation for accuracy.
  That said, the UseByOthers cited is quite strong as it is academic praise for their writing without mentioning any doubt of their accuracy, so I am inclined to support saying that this source is stronger than default just by reading previous discussions (the discussions besides the one that preceded this RfC are... interesting...), even though I am unfamiliar with this source and a quick skim of their website gives me serious tabloid vibes.
  Also, regardless of what status we give this, we should have consensus that the source doesn't always clearly separate ("delineate" as many RSP entries say) opinion and factual content. Aaron Liu (talk) 20:53, 22 May 2026 (UTC)

  To address "the evidence supplied is of their opinions, not of their factual reliability":

  Per WP:UseByOthers, widespread citation without comment for facts is evidence of a source's reputation, i.e. uncritical reference is endorsement. In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 21:24, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

  WP:NEWSORG does provide a baseline for news organizations; News reporting from well-established news outlets is generally considered to be reliable for statements of fact. Every time a news organization is brought to this noticeboard without a substantive reason, editors always point to this and note that news organizations are presumed generally reliable. So presumably existing consensus is that by default news organizations are WP:GREL. Katzrockso (talk) 02:29, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

  I don't consider Democracy Now! a well-established news outlet by default, and I definitely wouldn't have at the time of our last discussion of Democracy Now! (2013). In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 03:58, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

• Status Quo MREL, partisan source. Use with attribution, maybe relevant in articles where the source has expertise, though as it is partisan, better to utilize non-partisan sources.--RightCowLeftCoast (Moo) 21:03, 22 May 2026 (UTC)

  WP:PARTISAN says reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 22:41, 22 May 2026 (UTC)

• Support—If the low-quality journalism put out by uncritical commercial media outlets like CNN is considered GREL, there is no valid reason why Democracy Now! should be considered less valid. DN!, led by one of the most celebrated independent journalists of our time, provides vital critical reporting on stories corporate media deems unimportant, asks questions corporate media does not, and is used and praised by the academic community in a way that corporate media is not.

As for the claims that this independent media outlet is "partisan"—are we to believe that the corporate media outlets accorded GREL status are not? إيان (talk) 23:07, 22 May 2026 (UTC)

This comment reads as much more based in personal feelings on the media landscape than in WP policy - I'd like to see some backing for statements such as uncritical commercial media outlets like CNN (which is also borderline WP:OTHERSTUFF), provides vital critical reporting on stories corporate media deems unimportant (what makes them "important?"), and led by one of the most celebrated independent journalists of our time. The Kip ^(contribs) 04:51, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

The Kip, you shouldn't read my points as much more based in personal feelings on the media landscape than in WP policy; you should read them as enjoining the community to take a comparative approach that applies standard metrics in the evaluation of sources and not to accept or endorse a status quo prima facie for the sake of precedent when those precedents are flawed.

I will respond to your concerns above with supporting passages from RS soon.

In the meantime, regarding the characterization you made in your statement above expressing preference for a more neutral/mainstream outlet, could you explain why you believe that 'mainstream' is coterminous with or can be slashed with 'neutral'? Do you believe that the corporate media you describe as 'mainstream' doesn't have its own biases or partisanship? If so, why? إيان (talk) 06:58, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

could you explain why you believe that 'mainstream' is coterminous with or can be slashed with 'neutral'? Do you believe that the corporate media you describe as 'mainstream' doesn't have its own biases or partisanship? If so, why?

I will not because doing so will derail this discussion into WP:FORUM territory. The Kip ^(contribs) 18:41, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

• You implied mainstream media outlets are inherently more reliable / inherently less biased than non-mainstream sources
• You used this to inform your opinion on the RfC
• إيان challenged your reasoning, asking you to elaborate
• Your response is that doing so is WP:FORUM? That doesn't seem fair.

Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 21:18, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

It would strengthen your case to provide evidence beyond "I personally hold the source in high regard". SuperPianoMan9167 (talk) 20:26, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

• Comment: Many (but not all) of the !votes seem to be based on personal opinion/perceived reliability by editors as opposed to evidence suggesting (or not suggesting) consistent accuracy in factual reporting. This is undesirable. Descriptors of factual reliability by external sources should take preference over the opinions of editors. SuperPianoMan9167 (talk) 20:22, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  I strongly agree with this. Analysis of reliability by secondary sources is ideal, but this discussion would benefit immensely if editors at least took a look at the external link search [9] for the source so that we could have a meaningful discussion about whether DN's use on-site is improving Wikipedia or not, based in factual analysis of the specific DN articles cited across the project. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 21:11, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

• Support with the note that it is biased when it comes to politics and generally requires attribution. The secondary coverage I could find usually treats it as reliable. Most of these emphasize the awards it won, among other things. Most of the arguments above focus on their biases (which are obvious) and not their reliability; but there's no reason to think they're unreliable, and plenty of reason to think they're reliable. Also, as a particular note, someone above objected that they lack "structure"; this is flatly untrue. From one of the sources above: The program currently lists 22 staffers, and was reported in 2005 to have a $1.8 million budget (p. 30). The program reflects the prototypical hierarchical bureaucratic model of modern news routines, using Reuters video feeds, teleprompters, and the use of specialized personnel such as full-time directors, producers, and graphic designers. Goodman herself received mainstream professional recognition for her journalism, including the George Polk Award, Robert F. Kennedy Prize for International Reporting, and the Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia Award. She also received awards from the Associated Press and United Press International. --Aquillion (talk) 22:19, 25 May 2026 (UTC)
• Support: I have used Democracy Now! in my edits relating to current events and have found it generally reliable and an important component of the media ecosystem used by Wikipedia editors to provide a comprehensive overview of world events. In particular, I think its interviews with experts who are not privileged by mainstream journalism and its attention to international affairs, which often exceeds other English language sources, is valuable to this encyclopedia. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 19:51, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

  I'm noticing that analysis of DN material cited on-wiki is conspicuously absent from this discussion. I don't understand how editors can support an MREL designation in the absence of any affirmative evidence of DN's marginal reliability. Surely, if there is any reason to be skeptical of DN's reliability, examples should exist of its questionable material being used on-site to the detriment of Wikipedia's own reliability.

  That being said, my own comment and those of many in favor of an upgrade are not much better. I hope some more time will be given before the close of this RFC; I would like to comb through the external link search [10] and perform a source analysis so that this decision can be based in evidence rather than popular opinion. I'll be building out the results of my inquiry in the space below

  Secondary coverage of and/or primary source audio recordings from important historical events:

  John Kerry's testimony at the Fulbright hearings (Cited there as an external link): [11]

  Transcript and audio of Assata Shakur's 1998 letter to the pope: [12]

  Interview with Gary Hart: [13]

  Interview with Roger Toussaint, leader of the 2005 New York City transit strike: [14]

  Bobby Ray Inman criticizes NSA domestic surveillance: [15] (Possibly the only coverage of this statement other than Wired.)

  Israeli ambassador Dan Gillerman on the 2006 Qana airstrike: [16]*DN is valuable in this context because its translations and transcriptions of audio make statements by public figures verifiable

  Coverage of interviewees' views:

  Michael Berg (activist) on his decision to run with the Green Party: [17]

  James Ridgeway on an editorial shakeup at The Village Voice: [18] *A note on this citation in context: It is paired with Ridgeway's NYT obituary, which includes a quote from him saying he was never censored at the Voice. It's clear from the context in the NYT article that he's talking about his 1973-2005 career there, not the few months he continued to work for the newspaper under Lacey. The NYT doesn't cover the editorial shakeup that forced him out; only DN does.

  Interviews with experts and investigators whose findings are cited to support facts on-wiki:

  Interview with investigative journalists on the MAINWAY NSA program: [19]

  Coverage of the Dasht-i-Leili massacre supplemented by an interview with the reporter who broke the story: [20]

  One of DN's most important contributions to Wikipedia is in its use as a source that gives voice to the other side of disputes in which there is a severe power differential. When a protest is attacked, when security forces kill someone, when a military's conduct comes into question, mainstream outlets often take the explanation of the powerful at face value. It's independent media like DN that platforms the other side of the equation: eyewitnesses, families of the victims, experts outside the halls of power. We need sources like DN in order to give balanced coverage of controversies in which power is called into question. Here are some examples of such coverage:

  An Italian journalist kidnapped in Iraq disputes American claims about the accidental killing by American soldiers of an Italian military intelligence officer sent to rescue her (multiple interviews cited at Giuliana Sgrena): [21]

  This list is far from complete. This is just what I was able to find in the two hours I spent searching through the external links catalog. But I wanted to get the conversation started about how DN is actually used on-wiki. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 22:42, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

  Note that hosting a copy/record of primary sources (as defined by history—see linked article—not Wikipedia's WP:PRIMARY) is likely a permissible use even if we don't find DN to be GenRel. In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 22:52, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

  Yes to your point about historical primary sources, and I would add that in most other sources, the use of primary material (which would fall under WP:PRIMARY were it not for DN's secondary coverage) would be cited as evidence of good verifiability practices. Democracy Now's frequent use of audio samples (across multiple language, with world-class translation services) make it a source that is in some cases more verifiable about its own claims/coverage than many prestige sources that use print, whom we just have to trust when they say that someone said something. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 23:58, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

  The fact that DN can be used appropriately in many articles is not really in dispute. The question is whether the existing cautionary note remains useful and accurate. Demonstrating that it can be used successfully doesn’t necessarily tell us whether source-specific guidance remains helpful for editors. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 16:52, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

  What source-specific guidance would you propose, and what affirmative evidence of marginal reliability would you point to that justifies it? Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 16:55, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

• Support having a bias, even if a very strong one, is not by itself reason to consider a source anything less than generally reliable (see WP:BIASED). They have a respected by left-wing scholars, which speaks for itself (see WP:USEBYOTHERS). TarnishedPath^talk 06:18, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

• Status quo- I do not think the case for an upgrade to WP:GENREL has been established. Much of the outlet's content consists of interviews, commentary, and opinion-oriented material, which already requires additional editorial judgment under the existing policy - WP:RSOPINION. The current MREL assessment does not prohibit use of the source; it simply reminds editors that additional considerations apply depending on the context. I also find BobFromBrockley's distinction persuasive, original reporting may often be reliable, interviews are generally reliable for what participants said, and opinion/commentary content requires attribution and contextual evaluation. Given these differences, I think the current assessment is better than a blanket upgrade to WP:GENREL. King of Kings III (Dear Sir ...) 13:10, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

  I'm not opposed to maintaining MRel status with a  Jacobin (RSP entry)–like summary (save the first sentence, of course). In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 17:42, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

• Status quo - The news stories are cherry-picked and show up on the website only when they support a progressive view; the opinion columns have a clear bias towards the left. It should remain as is. Their reporting of facts is usually fine, but the editorial lens is definitely leftist. Nothing has changed, except the missing weekly column by Goodman and Moynihan. Ar1201u1 (talk) 18:45, 30 May 2026 (UTC) User:Ar1201u1

  Per WP:BIASED, doesn't that mean it should be GenerallyRELiable then? In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 02:53, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

  Ar1201u1 has stated "Their reporting of facts is usually fine". I read that as an argument for GREL. TarnishedPath^talk 01:07, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

• Status Quo as Democracy Now is an opinion site with an extremely thin veneer of news reporting that reinforces the site's opinions. It has none of the characteristics of verifying information and fact checking that would be necessary to make it a reliable source in its own right. Material from the site should only be used with the needed precautions to attribute it to a biased source, and any opinions expressed on the site by individuals should be attributed directly to the individual who made the claim, both for statements from hosts and from interviewees. The requirements of WP:GENREL are not met here and no upgrade of reliability is appropriate. Alansohn (talk) 04:02, 31 May 2026 (UTC)
• Status Quo, there is not enough new evidence to alter the existing consensus. It needs a clear, demonstrated reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, and not political orientation. Democracy Now! has editorial perspective, this does not by itself support an upgrade to WP:GREL. Reliability and viewpoint are separate considerations as per WP. In fact their unreliability has decreased since the last discussion. The existing WP:MREL designation is the correct reflection of the source.Dz5t 8O12 (talk) 15:54, 31 May 2026 (UTC)
• Status Quo, MREL, clearly a partisan source. Ok to use, but with attribution. BBQboffin^{grill me} 03:58, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

  WP:PARTISAN applies. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 11:55, 4 June 2026 (UTC)

• Status Quo - I don’t see a clear reason to replace the current designation. Much of the discussion about whether DN can be reliable in many circumstances is not in dispute. The question is whether the existing "additional considerations apply" designation is inaccurate, and I don’t see a compelling case that MREL is causing problems or mischaracterizing the source. Retaining the status quo seems the more cautious choice. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 17:54, 4 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status Quo I have found what other editors have found: DN has a left-wing bias and is generally factual. A lot of their reporting does seem like WP:FRINGE to me, so I think keeping it as is would be the most appropriate course of action.Redvelvetvanilaaaaaaaaa (talk) 22:05, 11 June 2026 (UTC)
• Support upgrade to GREL. Alexandraaaacs1989 has made an excellent case for the upgrade and I don't see any compelling evidence or reason why DN!'s reliability should be doubted. They are biased, but bias is allowed. "Additional considerations apply" isn't very useful here, because there are additional considerations to every source, regardless of designation. Those can be taken up by editors on the talk page on a case-by-case basis. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 19:44, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

  Maybe every source requires judgment, but are there recurring source-specific issues that come up often enough that keeping the guidance is still useful? Tioaeu8943 (talk) 16:40, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

  If there are, I do not believe anyone has substantiated them in this discussion. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 16:46, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

  An example of what I'm referring to would be BobFromBrockley's distinction between interviews/opinion-oriented content/original reporting. It seems to be one of the central themes here. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 17:07, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

  The source is used on 2373 articles. Are there any talk page discussions about source-specific issues? TurboSuperA+_[talk] 17:04, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

• Support In my experience, this source is generally reliable. I have not seen any evidence that it is not. Rainsage (talk) 05:05, 17 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo per Bobfrombrockley. ScottyNolan (talk) 15:44, 22 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo This source still falls short of WP:GENREL. The current wording under WP:DEMOCRACYNOW states, "Most editors consider Democracy Now! a partisan source whose statements should be attributed. Syndicated content published by Democracy Now! should be evaluated by the reliability of its original publisher." Given the discussion above, I think that this very much continues to be the case. Gjb0zWxOb (talk) 16:26, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo highly biased, but factually reliable. Seems in line with other similar sources like Jacobin and National Review, both of which we keep in the yellow. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:23, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

  WP:BIASED applies. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 21:34, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

  I don't think it's necessary to point this out every time someone calls the source biased. SuperPianoMan9167 (talk) 21:52, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

  Because "they are biased, but factually reliable" is the very definition of GREL. All sources are biased, what we're interested in is factual reliability. Saying "they're factually reliable, but not generally reliable" is a contradiction. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 22:14, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

• GENREL. Because they are. And also because they are not trying to hide who they are or cover up their bias. NadVolum (talk) 12:03, 11 July 2026 (UTC)
• Reliable I think we need to face up to the fact that mainstream media is mostly controlled by the wealthy and has been for a long time, which creates a strong bias that appears to be neutral, not because it's reliable, but because it's repeated over and over. Democracy Now! is significantly more reliable than MSM and some other alternative media outlets are even better on the subjects they cover. If anything Democracy Now! should be considered more reliable than MSM. Zacherystaylor (talk) 18:37, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

• MREL per Bobfrombrockley and Kyohyi - the Headlines/Stories/original-reporting distinction still requires source-specific guidance, and Goodman's dual role as content creator and organizational president raises a legitimate independence concern that a blanket GENREL wouldn't capture. Michael Boutboul (talk) 10:16, 13 July 2026 (UTC)

• Status Quo I see no evidence that Democracy Now has become more balanced or less biased. Additionally Democracy Now cannot be trusted for reliable independent reporting when Amy Goodman works in both the backend/administrative part of the reporting business and as the main figurehead of the newsroom. Agnieszka653 (talk) 00:58, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

  Do you have any evidence that Amy Goodman's dual role has produced a tangible impact on Democracy Now's reliability? Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 19:53, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

• Status Quo/MREL as news outlets are in the business of crafting inherently biased narratives through emphasis or omission of certain facts. Bias brings into question a source's reliability, the reader should be wary of omission of details and intentional misinformation.

Lechtkaeaeia (talk) 14:24, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

WP:BIASED applies Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 16:46, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Note I've moved this comment + reply here because it was placed right at the top, revert me if that's a problem. Samuelshraga (talk) 11:52, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

• Support Not seen any real tangible proof they are not reliable. ContentEditman (talk) 11:19, 23 July 2026 (UTC)
• Oppose The source has not modified its reporting since the last discussion, so the prior analysis here should stand — WP:MREL as Status Quo. DN continues framing/reporting in a way that advocates its own POV — so an upgrade to WP:GENREL would not be appropriate. This would permit advocacy to speak under the presumption of a neutral voice, in articles here. Status Quo requiring appropriate attribution is the necessary & best course to maintain Wiki article integrity. Dance21c (talk) 14:49, 23 July 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo or depreciate I agree with much of what Bobfrombrockley said. This is a source that goes beyond bias. It uncritically reported victories for Maduro in Venezuela [22] [23] without acknowledging the serious disputes on the election's legitimacy. In this segment, a guest repeatedly describes Maduro as the “constitutionally elected president” without that characterization being meaningfully qualified. Instead, they quoted a so-called "UN expert" who stated as fact that "President Jimmy Carter and the Carter Center went repeatedly to Venezuela to monitor those elections. And Carter had a very good opinion of the system and of the safeguards of elections in Venezuela" [24]. This is not the behavior of a reliable outlet we should be referencing when determining due weight. Dcpoliticaljunkie (talk) 15:13, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

  I'm going to count the first and third link as the same example because what you quote is coming from the same person (Chávez), in the first link she is summarizing what she said in the third link, and in the first link she only does that once and as a bit of a detail (that according to Venezuelan law Maduro is the leader). In the third link, it is a major point. But I don't see anything misleading or unDue here. She is saying that capturing a sovereign (which she defines self-determination as, since here the nation is the state) country's leader is a violation of international law, which is true. These are terms with well-known meaning in International Relations, and if we follow these meanings, we can see that there is nothing implying that Maduro is democracy. China's leader is constitutionally elected by a cabal.

  The second link is a conversation between two, the reporter (Goodman) and a cabinet official. Nearly every time the reporter mentions the election, she mentions it was boycotted by the opposition. They explicitly discuss how that is serious dispute on the legitimacy, and I'm not counting the other person's mentions here because said other person is the Maduro foreign minister being interviewed so it is obvious why he argues for legitimacy; his statements on this are primary and only Goodman's statements are in editorial voice and should be evaluated. Whether the election was legitimate is a major part of the story in this post, the Venezuelan presidential crisis, so I don't see what you mean by "no acknowledgement" here.

  I don't see what's wrong with the third link. The so-called "UN expert" is Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, who was appointed United Nations Independent Expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order by the United Nations Human Rights Council. The UN office of "Independent Expert" is also called "Special Rapporteur". I think that makes him qualified to have a say. See also Wikipedia:Interviews#Primary or secondary?. In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 18:14, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

  You're cherry picking, but the sources you've selected don't even support your point. Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, the first United Nations Independent Expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order, who you consider a so-called, scare quotes UN expert, is within the bounds of reasonable interpretation: The Carter Center observed Venezuelan elections consistently from 1998 through 2013. While making recommendations for improvement each time, Carter and the Carter Center did not reject the results of those elections. The 2024 elections, which the Carter Center did observe and reject, had not occurred at the time of this interview.

  DN's reporting of the 2024 elections contains its strongest acknowledgements of opposition claims of fraud. Their story on the election itself, rather than the subsequent US intervention, goes into much more detail about their contested nature and includes the words contested election in its title. In her introduction to the segment, Goodman says Anti-government protests erupted Monday in Venezuela after the National Electoral Council declared President Nicolás Maduro to be the winner of Sunday’s presidential election, giving him a third term in office. According to the Electoral Council, early results show Maduro received about 51% of the vote, while opposition candidate Edmundo González received 44%. But the opposition is rejecting the official results and claims it has proof of election fraud.. Andreína Chávez, the same guest from the article you cited, then lays out a pro-Maduro case, and Goodman asks the second guest, Alejandro Velasco, to respond. He says There are some really important differences here. I think the primary claim that the Venezuelan government is leading or is feeding into allegations of fraud is that it’s yet to release the vote by vote of machine — by machine tallies, that it has done in previous elections in much shorter time frame than it has at this stage. You know, hacking allegations aside, the question of whether or not it can match the actual returns from each machine to what has been reported as the electoral victory of Maduro remains a big question. And it’s something that we have seen from not just right-wing governments in the region, but also left and center-left governments. The Brazilian Foreign Ministry, the Colombian government under Petro, the Mexican government, as well, all of them issued recently a declaration or a statement asking the Venezuelan electoral authorities to release this data in order to make sure that there is trust in the outcome.

  But even going back to earlier periods of the Venezuelan crisis, DN has acknowledged opposition claims, State Department and US government claims, and the like. The first words in the second source you cited are Update: President Trump has recognized Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó as interim president, calling democratically elected President Maduro “illegitimate.” Later in the article, Goodman acknowledges that the election was boycotted by the opposition. This article is an interview with Venezuela's foreign minister about US interference in the country, which, if you read the article, you'll know was reported by the New York Times and others. The main focus is not on the disputed election, but it is still acknowledged.

  Other coverage of Venezuela from this time period includes an interview with left-wing anti-Chavista Edgardo Lander, and a debate between Lander and a Chavista official. A story from 2017 -- another debate segment -- opens with a clear acknowledgement of the contested nature of the 2017 Venezuelan constitutional crisis: The Trump administration has issued sanctions against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as tensions escalate in the country following a controversial vote to elect a new National Constituent Assembly—which will have the authority to rewrite Venezuela’s constitution. According to the official tally, at least 8 million people—or 40 percent of eligible voters—cast ballots Sunday, despite an opposition boycott. The right-wing opposition has accused Maduro of attempting to consolidate his power. Two prominent leaders of the right-wing opposition—Leopoldo López and Antonio Ledezma—were taken from their homes by security forces early this morning.

  One of the guests in this debate is Francisco Rodríguez (economist), a critic of Maduro and later advisor to Henri Falcón. In contrast to your claim that DN makes no acknowledgement of the allegations of fraud in Veneuela's elections under Maduro, Rodríguez alleges fraud on the airwaves with Democracy Now, saying the Electoral Council claims that 8 million persons came out to vote. That’s not a very credible claim. We did some independent polling, exit polling, and we actually estimate it was about 3.6 million persons. The last election that you had, the last uncontested election, in terms of the results that you had, Maduro got about 5.5 million votes. It would be very difficult to believe that he’s actually regained two-and-a-half million votes in the context of one of the deepest economic contractions in world history. DN coverage of Venezuela similarly promotes an open exchange of ideas and substantive debate going back to a 2013 debate between Rory Carroll and Mark Weisbrot, in which they quite extensively discuss their differing perspectives on the economic and political conditions of Venezuela at the time.

  Venezuela is not the only topic on which DN encourages substantive debate between its guests and seeks to honestly approach contentious issues that are divisive on the left. In January of this year, a number of Iranian dissidents were invited on the show. 1 2 3 4 This is nothing new. DN similarly covered the 2011 protests in Iran. Its reporting on Ukraine has been consistently critical of the Russian invasion. DN has even invited guests like Alan Greenspan and Alan Dershowitz onto the show for debates with left-wing interlocutors. When is the last time a mainstream outlet has invited someone like Andreína Chávez to debate an opponent of Maduro?

  Even though I totally disagree with your comment, I'm glad you made it, because it presents an opportunity to illustrate what I think makes DN such a valuable source for on-wiki use. DN reports from a perspective that is solidly to the left of mainstream western media, and sometimes says things or platforms guests who are in tension with the mainstream consensus. Yet, it does not do so in a way that is campist or intellectually dishonest. It's a shining example of a left-wing, even far left source that bases its reporting and perspective in a comprehensive set of consistently applied principles: Opposition to war and violence, support for human rights, environmental protection, and social justice. This sort of bias is far less a concern for reliability than that of the many outlets who bend the knee to government or corporate power because it serves them to do so. A GREL designation for Democracy Now is well deserved and would improve Wikipedia by broadening the viewpoint and intellectual diversity of the grouping of sources considered generally reliable, increasing editors' ability to evaluate official narratives in light of conflicting claims. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 18:49, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

  I broadly agree with Monk Hall here, but I’ll note a couple of reasons why I think DN is weakly reliable rather than solid GUNREL. first, these examples show how so much of the content is staging opinions rather than reporting facts. Even for the best such source we would always want to attribute such opinions so that’s not an issue in itself. But we need to be cautious about how they describe their guests and whether this source considering those guests’ opinions noteworthy should count towards a determination of whether they are DUE in our article.

  For example that “Venezuela journalist” Chavez is a pro regime propaganda two works for the pro regime website Venezuelanalysis: is she presented as a knowledgeable voice from the ground or as a spokesperson for the government whose affiliations are made clear? Or De Zayas: a decade ago he did have one of those UN expert titles, which seem to have proliferated to the point of meaninglessness over the years, but he is increasingly a marginal conspiracy crank who flirts with fascism, and has zero expertise on Venezuela specifically, so the fact that they thought he was a reliable and noteworthy guest is a little telling and should not translate into us thinking his views are noteworthy.

  On the whole the channel’s own editorial voice in these segments is factually reliable, but I don’t see why we would want to use that material rather than a newswire where the information comes from actual stringers and bureau journalists.

  Finally, as an example of where bias does eat into reliability a little is in the quote above “prominent leaders of the right-wing opposition—Leopoldo López and Antonio Ledezma”: those are both members of centre left social democratic parties, one affiliated to the Socialist international. In Europe they would be classed as of the political centre, where in the US they would probably be seen as left-wing. Calling them right wing is both inaccurate and loads the dice against them for the left wing audience. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:56, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

  It doesn't seem to me like other sources are typically evaluated as weakly reliable based on the criteria you advance here. Maybe they should be, and DN should be too, but in practice they are not.

  Across the segments she's participated in, Andreína Chávez is most consistently identified by DN as a "reporter on the ground in Caracas" which I believe is an accurate characterization. She is variously identified with her work for different outlets, including but not limited to Venezuelanalysis. I don't think your characterization of her as a spokesperson for the government is fair, as the evidence moreso suggests that she is supporting the Bolivarian regime of her own free will. The closest connection I could find between her and the government is the marginal funding provided to Venezuelanalysis by the government on a few occasions, but there is no direct evidence that this affected its reliability or editorial line. It is more likely that the funding was provided because the site's perspective is already reliably pro-Bolivarian. In any event, Chávez has written for a number of other outlets that the Venezuelan government has no meaningful ability to influence. To engage in a comparative analysis, government grants to media orgs are not unusual and grant-funded outlets are commonly accepted as reliable on-Wiki. If the work of Adrian Zenz of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation or reports by congressionally funded "Radio Free" outlets, recently described by the Media and Journalism Research Center as state controlled under the Trump Administration, are considered acceptable for Wikipedia, I see no reason why a segment with Chávez poses a greater problem, especially because these segments themselves typically contrast her view on the situation with those of others, and because Wikipedia editors are supposed to be triangulating between multiple sources to keep each's bias in check.

  Similarly, I'd nitpick your characterization of De Zayas. He was recognized by the UN as an expert on human rights and judicial protection of peoples from violence and abuses. He went to Venezuela in his official capacity as a UN expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order. His analysis of the situation, which is that unilateral coercive measures by the United States do not promote an equitable international order, makes sense given his position. I suppose there has been a proliferation of UN experts in recent decades, and some of them certainly express views that others deem objectionable, but the same could be said about a lot of academics and think tank creatures whose views aren't disqualified from inclusion on Wikipedia. De Zayas doesn't have the strongest pedigree of Venezuela-specific credentials, but it's not as if he is commenting on the situation from a completely unrelated field. The value of his work hinges on his expertise in modern world history and international jurisprudence, and his comparative analysis of Venezuela in the context of his overall work in that field. Again, if Zenz is the bar for what's acceptable, De Zayas clears that. At least he's actually been to the country he analyzes. Of course, any fair coverage of the crisis in Venezuela should contrast De Zayas with his critics, but I don't think excluding his own words or outlets that platform him from our coverage of that controversy improves the encyclopedia.

  Regarding the opposition leaders, I would largely agree with you that the characterization of those two figures as right-wing is reflective of Democracy Now's bias and would not be universally accepted, though I don't consider the perspective that social democrats who align themselves with the western capitalist world are right-wing to be inherently a reliability issue, especially regarding Ledezma, who signed the Madrid Forum charter in 2020. It's a pretty subjective thing. More to the point, I have seen much more severely biased language from sources deemed reliable dealt with through editorial discretion. For example, the Times of Israel and other Israeli sources use the term "terrorist" frequently and flippantly. Because this goes against Wikipedia's MOS and is a word to watch, I have generally seen editors use their discretion to include material from those sources without regurgitating their biased language.

  Like I said in my previous comment, DN deserves an upgrade not because it is perfect, but because it clears the threshold for reliability and [broadens] the viewpoint and intellectual diversity of the grouping of sources considered generally reliable, increasing editors' ability to evaluate official narratives in light of conflicting claims. As official narratives become increasingly brazen in their lies, sources that can counter-balance those narratives are vital. Ask yourself if Chávez saying that Maduro is the constitutionally elected president, or anything you've seen from DN on Venezuela, is further beyond the pale than the claim that Maduro is a "narco-terrorist" who helped Joe Biden steal the 2020 election. Is it worse than the lies parroted in mainstream media in the lead-up to the Iraq War (which Democracy Now got much of its early popularity from contesting)? The only way we're going to reach any real level of reliability as an encyclopedia is to aggregate perspectives from a diverse group of decent sources, recognizing that all are imperfect. DN ought to be a vital part of that effort. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 15:59, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

  Ask yourself if Chávez saying that Maduro is the constitutionally elected president, or anything you've seen from DN on Venezuela, is further beyond the pale than the claim that Maduro is a "narco-terrorist" who helped Joe Biden steal the 2020 election. This is the wrong question because of course it’s not further beyond the pale. but the news outlets that say things like that (NY Post, Fox) are ones we designate unreliable. Similarly, some editors might see Zenz as a good source but I don’t think I’ve ever advocated for him. His opinions might be noteworthy (as De Zayas’ might sometimes) but sources that consistently turn to such hyperpartisan rentamouth talking heads (Dershowitz is another example) are often less than gold standard. BobFromBrockley (talk) 17:35, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

  Yes Chavez supports the Maduro government of her own free will, just as people who work for America First Policy Institute, American Compass, or Heritage Foundation support Trump of their own free will. But it’s an outlet wholly aligned to an authoritarian state that suppresses critical views. If DN don’t give that context when they present her as a voice from the ground, that’s problematic. Not problematic enough to designate unreliable, but enough to raise additional concerns. BobFromBrockley (talk) 17:43, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

  Hmmm. A lot of the sources we consider reliable do use the sort of guiding language that you'd like to see more of from Democracy Now. An early version of The Guardian's coverage on the 3 January raid that captured Maduro said Venezuela’s authoritarian government has accused the US of launching a series of attacks against civilian and military targets in the South American country, after explosions rocked its capital, Caracas, before dawn on Saturday. (This has since been reworded, perhaps because it sounds absurd in light of the Trump administration now running Venezuela as a neo-colony.) The Financial Times says President Donald Trump said the US had captured Venezuela’s strongman leader Nicolás Maduro and flown him out of the country and said Washington would run the country until a transition could be put in place. I'm not sure I agree that vague, loaded, and often unevenly applied terms like authoritarian, strongman and the like are evidence of reliability. If anything, I'd say they introduce bias by implicitly justifying or delegitimizing things and telling readers how to think instead of letting them make their own determination. This is not to say Democracy Now doesn't have its own set of vocabulary to influence its audience's perception toward whatever it believes to be the correct interpretation of events -- it does, and so do all the most reliable sources. But ideally, the reproduction of this language on Wikipedia should be limited and largely attributed where it is necessary. DN not using your preferred designation for Venezuelanalysis shouldn't be grounds to down-rank it any more than The Guardian not using my preferred designation for Trump should be. This stuff should really have limited bearing on on-Wiki application anyway. If a guest on DN is saying things that are massively discordant with the bulk of reliable sources, that perspective should receive relatively little weight. That's a problem that can be solved irrespective of a reliability designation. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 20:51, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

  I find your arguments for a WP:GREL designation of Democracy Now! here wildly inconsistent with your argument for a downgrade of CBS to WP:MREL in the section below. There, you say that use of euphemistic language by a chunk of the most reliable sources presents a problem which creates a context in which I believe bias, especially the systemic bias of a collection of sources usually deemed acceptable, can affect reliability. So you support downgrading one source because of bias involving what it chooses not to report and its use of euphemistic language, where your cited evidence doesn't come from the outlet's actual output but from leaks and accusations from ex-employees and anonymous sources, but when someone brings up extremely similar behaviour, with actual concrete examples of content in the source's output with the kind of framing and WP:DUE concerns you've pointed to but with a different political valence, that's not a concern? Samuelshraga (talk) 10:17, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

  the sort of guiding language that you'd like to see more of from Democracy Now: I have nowhere said I’d like guiding language so please feel free to strike that allegation. To clarify, I don’t want DN to editorialise more: i wouldn’t expect them to describe Maduro’s government as a regime for example. I want them to give accurate context: not to call social democrsts right wingers, not to portray someone from a government-funded/pro-government website as some grassroots voice from the street, not to pretend Maduro was constitutionally elected. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:15, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

• Support GENREL does not imply neutrality. WP:BIASED permits partisan but reliable sources and WP:RSOPINION still requires attribution when appropriate. NicoR8 20:54, 23 July 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo or depreciate per Dcpoliticaljunkie. —Biosketch (talk) 23:54, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

  “Depreciate” is not an option. “Deprecate” is a nuclear option that requires a lot more than bias. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:07, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

• Status Quo The amount of times that Democracy Now's bias has been highlighted as a problem is significant. My view on reliable sources is if an organization has a known bias it should never be elevated to generally reliable regardless of what their area of exertise is. The risk of an editorial slant that is outside of the expertise being referenced in the article is just not worth the citation its used for. Especially in relation to WP:CT and WP:BLP pages.
  The source is marginally reliable (i.e. neither generally reliable nor generally unreliable), and may be usable depending on context. Dd3r1n0 (talk) 22:09, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

  The vast majority of the arguments against this proposal that I have seen, including this one, have engaged in reasoning that is in direct contradiction of WP:BIASED, which myself and others have emphasized a handful of times. To this editor and others about to leave a comment: this is a respectful and lighthearted reminder to please WP:READFIRST before leaving a comment. Every source has bias, so if having a known bias is a sufficient reason to exclude a source from WP:GENREL, then we would have no sources anywhere on Wikipedia that could conceivably be considered WP:GENREL. General reliability is about reliability, not bias. ~ Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 22:29, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

  It is extraordinarily difficult to separate a bias from the information being presented. From my perspective, that negates any expertise Democracy Now brings to their reporting. If we were to replace Democracy Now with Fox News for this discussion it would make them WP:GENREL as well. Dd3r1n0 (talk) 23:00, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

  At the risk of repeating what Alexandraaaacs1989 has already explained, your perspective is completely divorced from Wikipedia policy. Fox News is GUNREL for politics and science and MREL for other topics because it has a documented history of publishing false or misleading information as fact, not just because of its bias. If Fox News was biased but only ever published verified and fact-checked information then it would be GENREL with a note about its bias. Many people have said that Democracy Now is biased, but have failed to demonstrate convincing evidence that Democracy Now publishes false or misleading information because of their bias. If a source is biased but factually reliable, all that is required is that statements of opinion from that source be attributed to that source in the article text. SuperPianoMan9167 (talk) 23:10, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

  Adding to this some above have explicitly acknowledged that the source is generally reliable for reporting of facts while !voting that it should be continued to be considered WP:MREL on the basis of WP:BIASED. That is a contradictory argument which is also contrary to WP:PAG. Any editor who acknowledges that the source is generally reliable for reporting of facts is making an argument for WP:GENREL, regardless of what they !vote. TarnishedPath^talk 03:08, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

  Please avoid bolding things that could look like !votes after you have made a !vote. In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 19:15, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

References

References

Discussion (Democracy Now!)

• Just to note that I've closed the previous discussion with a note directing editors to this RFC. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 19:01, 16 May 2026 (UTC)
• How much of the content is made by Amy Goodman? Is the organization set up so that her content gets some sort of independent review prior to publication? She's the host and executive producer, and I don't see any sort of editor panel which could go/no-go stories. If she is making the content, and controls what gets published we have a self-publishing issue. --Kyohyi (talk) 16:31, 20 May 2026 (UTC)

  [25] states Mike Burke is the editorial director. Katzrockso (talk) 13:45, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

  That would be a good sign for people other than Amy Goodman, but everything I see on that site is done by, or co-done by her. And she is executive producer, and president of the non-profit that funds Democracy Now!. So I'm not seeing how an editorial director has functional veto power over any content she wants to publish. --Kyohyi (talk) 14:06, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

  See the Democracy Now! staff list here. There's a lot of staff in the company, so it's definitely not unilaterally being run by Amy Goodman. If you're worried about higher-ups in a news company domineering, this is how most news companies work, with many run by a board of directors with absolute authority over everything the company reports, e.g. The New York Times run by the Sulzberger family. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 16:03, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

  I'm aware of the staff list, I'm also aware that the amount of content that doesn't have Amy Goodman's name attached is vanishingly small. I'm also aware that Amy Goodman sits at the top of democracy now productions as president. Content created by Arthur Ochs would have similar problems. But content isn't created by Arthur Ochs, it's done by Jeremy Scahil or Ryan Grim, or other writers. Amy Goodman's direct influence in the creation of the material, while also being president of the publishing organization, is the self publishing concern. --Kyohyi (talk) 16:25, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

  Even if she is a self-publisher to a certain extent... if a self-publisher reports information factually, then why can't we consider it GENREL if it's a notable and prolific news source? Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 00:17, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

  I personally don't believe this is selfpublished, but if it was selfpublished information is held to a different standard. See WP:SPS and WP:BLPSPS. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:48, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

  WP:SPS says Self-published sources may be considered reliable if published by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications. So wouldn't this simply be an instance where Amy Goodman is an established subject-matter expert and we can simply deem it RS even if it is self-published, making the whole self-published distinction irrelevant? Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 07:55, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  That's not the relevant part of the sentence, the important part is "previously been published by reliable, independent publications". The point of the policy is that selfpublished work has to be from someone that other unrelated people have published as an expert. Just being an expert is not enough. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:27, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  selfpublished work has to be from someone that other unrelated people have published as an expert Yes, and we have shown this to be the case with sourcing in this discussion, no? Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 08:59, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

  I don't see that anything to show she's published books or articles (in independent sources (not DM)) in the field of political analysis. Again this is an aside, as DM isn't selfpublished. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 20:33, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

  Does it have to be books? She's received lots of awards for DM's indie reporting, five of which while it was under WBAI/PACIFICA Radio, an independent publisher. In solidarity, Aaron Liu (talk) 15:57, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

  I would think that the more important part is the definition, in the paragraph above the one you cite: Self-published material, such as books, patents, newsletters, personal websites, open wikis, personal or group blogs (as distinguished from newsblogs, above), content farms, podcasts, Internet forum postings, and social media postings, are largely not acceptable as sources.

  I think it may be a better approach to interpret this prohibition as applying moreso to sources that can be published without the meaningful assistance of others, rather than sources produced with the nebulous approval of an imagined arbiter of reliability, which seems to be the main thing that is elusively argued around in countless reliability discussions.

  Anyone can start a blog and say whatever they want, but one person, even if they are extremely talented can't be the sole force behind decades of independent reporting and comprehensive daily news coverage. Democracy Now's work is thorough and established enough that it is necessarily the work of many talented people, in the same way that traditional news orgs are. That's what is supposed to be their marker of reliability: a form of peer review upstream of but not dissimilar to Wikipedia's own. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 01:56, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

  There is another section of WP: V that goes more in depth on what is self-published material, Self-published material is characterized by the lack of independent reviewers (those without a conflict of interest) validating the reliability of the content. Further examples of self-published sources include press releases, the material contained within company websites, advertising campaigns, material published in media by the owner(s)/publisher(s) of the media group, self-released music albums, and electoral manifestos And in this case the example of material published in media by the owner(s)/publisher(s) of the media group is the case example why Democracy Now! is largely self published. --Kyohyi (talk) 12:53, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

  I think your assertion that DN falls into this category mischaracterizes the nature of the citeable material produced by DN. Material produced by DN that could be cited on Wikipedia would include excerpts of its headlines segment (I would say that in most cases, another source would be better if one is available, as these are relatively surface-level aggregations/reproductions of news broken elsewhere. However, in some cases DN is the best English-language source for international news.) and its interviews with subject matter experts and people on the ground in developing situations of national and international significance. If an editor cites such material, they would not be citing Amy Goodman's/DN's self-published original research, but rather DN's publication of an independent person's research or perspective on the relevant situation. As host and executive producer, Amy Goodman is setting up the interviews and asking the questions, but an independent source (the interviewee) is giving the answers, and the answer is what would typically be relevant to Wikipedia. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 19:22, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  People on the ground type interviews are not particularly useful for encyclopedic content; it suffers from Primary and recentism issues. Regarding the interviews, there isn't much reason her interviews are any more reliable than those done by podcasts like Joe Rogan. Interview reliability is more dependent on the interviewee than the source so it doesn't really change it from MREL. --Kyohyi (talk) 15:02, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

  I definitely disagree that DN's interviews are like those on the Rogan podcast. On the contrary, I think DN's expert interview-based reporting is far more similar to the way that all mainstream news outlets seek and publish statements from subject matter experts when reporting on a given topic. Can you demonstrate any evidence that DN's interviews are closer to Rogan quality than the comment given by other experts (or sometimes, the same experts!) to outlets like CBS, CNN, the WSJ etc. that are used by them and subsequently by Wikipedia editors to establish facts about the world on good authority? Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 20:10, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

  And I definitely disagree that DN interviews experts. Most of them are moral activists trying to get you to adopt their brand of morality. The problem is that moral expertise and authority is not some universal metric it's actually just another POV. Moral activists are only at best experts on what their morality is, but not at all experts on what is moral. --Kyohyi (talk) 14:31, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

  Some guests on DN that I have used in citations on-Wiki or heard on the program recently, off the top of my head, include Rami Khouri on topics related to conflict in the Middle East, Greg Grandin and Ada Ferrer on Latin America, Jules Boykoff on sports, Maria Hinojosa on immigration, Reed Brody, Francesca Albanese and Craig Mokhiber on international law. In what world are these people "moral activists" lacking expertise in their topic area? They may have strong moral inclinations that you disagree with, but dismissing their expertise is not warranted. Furthermore, I see no contradiction between expertise and advocacy. Many experts are advocates, because their expertise compels them to speak up. DN also interviews people with absolutely no public profile (who therefore couldn't possibly be "moral activists"), such as lawyers in contentious legal cases, who provide an essential counterbalance to government claims. I think you need to check your own POV, because what you're asserting here is not at all based in fact. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 14:56, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

  Sounds like you're speculating about how much influence she has and how resistant she is to the editors. We can't know this. The fact that there are multiple editors employed at the company suggests that they probably do some editing though. Edittttor (talk) 20:45, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

  She's president of democracy now productions, it doesn't matter if she were resistant to the editors or not. That means any internal editors and reviewers are functionally subordinate to her, and not independent. --Kyohyi (talk) 20:59, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

That argument seems absurd. By that logic no source is reliable if anyone is ultimately in charge of it; we would have to declare the New York Times unreliable because all its editors are ultimately subordinate to A. G. Sulzberger; or that the Wall Street Journal is unreliable because it is ultimately owned by Rupert Murdoch; or that Washington Post is unreliable because it is owned by Jeff Bezos. What matters is whether there's structures in place that can give it a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy; and as I noted with a citation above, secondary sources say that does have them. WP:SPS is for sources that lack editorial controls (or ones where there is actual reason to believe the editorial controls are so insufficient as to be just window-dressing and functionally nonexistent); it's not for "someone ultimately owns this source and is in charge of publishing it." If the mere possibility that someone exists who could notionally override a source's editorial controls and fact checking exists were enough to render it a SPS, not a single source would be reliable. --Aquillion (talk) 22:27, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Did you even read the argument? It's that the owner is actively and heavily engaged in content creation for the organization. Is Murdoch on the byline for all the articles on the Wall Street Journal? Is Bezos actively writing all the articles for the Washington Post? No, they obviously are not, so those comparisons have no basis in reality. It's not someone ultimately owns this, it's that the person who owns this is heavily involved in the creation of the content. It's that the person who can override any editorial control is also doing the content work is what makes it an SPS. --Kyohyi (talk) 03:50, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Okay, then let's assume for the sake of argument that Amy Goodman runs Democracy Now! like a dictator and fires employees who write things she does not like.

Even in this circumstance, WP:SELFPUBLISH explicitly says Self-published sources may be considered reliable if published by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications. We have demonstrated they have been published by reliable, independent publications. So DN! is RS, and whether Amy Goodman is pulling all the strings is irrelevant. Alexandraaaacs1989 (talk) 08:35, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

For this to be a factor someone would have to show that DM is not editorially independent of Goodman. The have an editorial staff, so even if she has a lot of influence it appears doubtful that she can simply publish on her own. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 20:39, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Democracy Now Productions LLC is the organization that owns Democracy Now! Amy Goodman is president of Democracy Now Productions. An example of self-published media from WP: V is material published in media by the owner(s)/publisher(s) of the media group which is an accurate description of Amy Goodman's relationship to Democracy Now!. So Amy's content in Democracy Now! would be self published. --Kyohyi (talk) 12:49, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

• I've made a request on WP:CR for a close. The discussion may get archived while it waits, but if that happens it will be unarchived when it's closed. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 19:34, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

Request for Comment: Reliability of CBS News under Bari Weiss

How reliable is CBS News under the leadership of Bari Weiss? Prior discussion here.

The options are:

1. Generally reliable
2. Additional considerations needed
3. Generally Unreliable
4. Deprecate

Generalrelative (talk) 16:18, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

CBS News Weiss Survey

• Option 3: Generally Unreliable for any and all United States political (Federal, state, local), United States geopolitical, and related U.S. geopolitical matters related to Gaza, Iran, Israel, Ukraine, Russia, the European Union, and NATO. Anything sourced to modern Weiss CBS News for same needs additional corroborating non-CBS sourcing. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 14:51, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• The case for general unreliability is not made, imo, Pelley resisted whatever thing Weiss wanted. In other words, that shows editorial controls working. And "propaganda palooza" is another way to say very biased. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:08, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  What do you mean? He was fired. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 12:58, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

• Option 1. - a disgruntled former co-worker is not a reason to make a source unreliable. Also, this statement is patently false. “intentionally trying to kill an ICE officer (though he resisted,” PerseusMeredith (talk) 16:03, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Please put the text in the right section. Also, I made it clearer. RedDeadGuy (talk) 16:15, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  It still has the false statement. Pelley alleges that Weiss wanted him to state that Good was,

  "driving toward the officer" PerseusMeredith (talk) 16:31, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Whatever, the OP was rewritten. RedDeadGuy (talk) 16:48, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  But it's still not accurate. PerseusMeredith (talk) 16:58, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• Option 3 It does appear that editorial interference is causing chaos at CBS. I would also periodize this specifically to the start of the Bari Weiss tenure. Example sources discussing the problems there: [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] Simonm223 (talk) 16:33, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  "Causing choas" and declining ratings are not an indicator of source reliability. For those reasons Al Jazeera America I guess we can say was unreliable [34] [35][36] Longhornsg (talk) 03:14, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

• Option 1. Evidence of unreliability has not been established; that the management has experienced problems is not unreliability. The idea of declaring 60 Minutes, one of the most significant news magazines ever, unreliable for delaying releasing something is ridiculous. PARAKANYAA (talk) 16:59, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Sources also report Weiss pressured Pelley to lie on his report about Renee Good. RedDeadGuy (talk) 17:02, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• Option 1/2/too soon we need to wait until the unreliable news has been published. There are reports they have thrown wrenches in the gears but we are by definition, taking a WP:LAGGING stance of the world (yeah i know thats a notability guideline, but we must take a wait and see approach)
  Bari weiss is definitely concerning but we need a smoking gun, not that she did editorail bias. Maybe we state cbs is a biased source now? (Though i feel we need more evn for that) User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 17:23, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Rhododendrites below captures my feelings exactly User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 18:29, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• Comment: Note that we currently have FOX as MREL for non-political/science topics. Are we saying that CBS is even more biased than FOX, to the point that even their non-political/science reporting has to be considered GUNREL? If so, why? ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 17:26, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  For what it's worth I suppose that I at least Support Option 2 while reserving judgement on whether or not taking the step to Option 3 is warranted. Granted, I think most news outlets should be thought of as MREL for publications that amount to more than just basic news reporting, considering questionable editorial and Pulitzer Prize winners get published next to each other. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 18:37, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• As far as I can tell, there are allegations of editorial interference and a ton of justifiable criticism directed at Weiss, but where is the pile of links showing uncorrected factual errors or other concrete problems with what's actually been published? There are all manner of news organizations more overtly biased than this that we nonetheless consider reliable because what they don't let that bias erode their factual accuracy. There are claims about efforts to do so at CBS, but to what extent has it happened? In general, while the legal and ideological capitulation of CBS News/its parents suggest a deleterious trajectory, we need to actually see that manifest in factual unreliability. TL;DR seriously premature, and as I've said before I'd love it if we could just stop using this genre of source-bucketing RfC for anything other than extreme cases. It's possible to just talk about what's going on with a source without jumping into a vote. Sigh. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 17:27, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Yeah I also feel like we could have just had a standard discussion instead of reaching for the RfC button. It was about half a year ago since the last discussion about CBS and I'm not aware of widespread disputes about usage of it as a source. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 17:37, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• Comment. Option 1. I agree with Rhododendrites. So far no evidence has been presented that CBS News is currently an unreliable source. There has been a lot of upset and a change in leadership that has recieved a lot of coverage. But that does not translate into general unreliability at this point. This survey is premature, imho. --Steve Quinn (talk) 17:44, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2 with a side of too soon - I agree with others that we don't yet have sufficient evidence of breaching norms reliability, and I think Maltazarian's highlighting of how this case compares to FOX is relevant. That having been said, based on the RS reporting of Pelley's firing, there is a credible allegation that the editorial leadership of 60 Minutes insisted on including false reporting relating to Renee Good, that this was rejected by the journalist, and that the journalist was consequently fired; while I wouldn't throw out any of CBS News's coverage just yet, this incident gives cause for serious pause if we were to come across an example of CBS (and especially 60 Minutes) making WP:EXTRAORDINARY claims that aren't repeated by other RS, especially in relation to US politics. That's not GUNREL, but it's not quite GREL either. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 17:47, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  If CBS is firing journalists who refuse to falsify reports then it raises the question of how many journalists are complying to protect their jobs. Simonm223 (talk) 17:53, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  I think that's basically the essence of my argument, yes. CBS also tends to cover topics that get abundant attention from other RS, so it should be relatively simple to identify points where they do step out of line if that happens. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 18:01, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Just to be clear, the firing is not tied to the January reporting, much other stuff happened in May, and it centered on some supposed things he said in a meeting to a new producer who was not there in January. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:05, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  But the biased reporting wasnt published though.

  we cant judge a source for what wasnt published even if they got really close to having put it out. Im close to an option 2 myself but think we really cannot ding for bias until the trigger is pulled and we see cbs put stuff out we know is unreliabel/undue/biased af User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 18:30, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• Option 3: Generally Unreliable There is clear evidence of political interference in CBS News output. This goes beyond WP:BIASEDSOURCES and is broadly on-par with a British tabloid newspaper now. Weiss isn't the only person in this story but her appointment was the crossing of the Rubicon marking a decisive shift away from responsible journalism. The decline started immediately after. Maybe there was some interference before that. Maybe there was some successful resistance to interference for a short time after that. Nonetheless, that's where the line should be drawn. I'm not sure if there is anything to gain by trying to set different levels for different topics. It's like the curate's egg. If any part of it is rotten then the whole thing is bad. It's about the organisation as a whole. (BTW, I see the disparity with Fox News. That's probably worth revisiting separately but it's off-topic here.) --DanielRigal (talk) 18:06, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Bias alone does not make a news source outright unreliable. It's when that bias interferes with their editorial processes to the point that errors are left uncorrected. Could you provide any actual examples of uncorrected errors in its reporting? After all, we didn't downgrade Fox News until we saw a recurring pattern of uncorrected errors in its reporting. SVG-image-maker (talk) 00:17, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

• Let's also note that CBS News New York does not run the news operations of its affiliates, each have there own editorial staff. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:20, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• Comment. I agree with Rhododendrites. Should anyone want to read a copy of the letter firing Pelley / outlining the ostensible reasons for his firing, there's a copy here. FactOrOpinion (talk) 18:38, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• Speedy close Why was their no discussion prior to this, what evidence is there that the factual accuracy of CBS has changed? It's not until they do published fake news or false reporting that anything changes. Presupposing that change before it happens just makes Wikipedia look biased in the way that people tend to make up about us for money. I've watched with growing concerns the details coming out from within CBS, and the growing hyperbole of it's reporting. But bias doesn't mean a source unreliable, that has to be held onto. So until other sources start reporting on a change in the accuracy of CBS's reporting what are we doing here? -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:03, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Ok this report from the independent[37] directly calls into question CBS's reporting, so I've struck my !vote, but we should still have discussion this first. Is there any more of this outside of Pelley's firing? -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:09, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Actively Disinterested. I saw this article from the Independent earlier today. The thrust of the article is criticism of Weiss's behavior but there has been no published anti-factual reporting, so far, that has come from CBS (that I know of). Also, notice that this article from the Independent was published on March 6th. So, that is two and one half months ago, and I have not been made aware of any unreliable reporting from CBS. I am thinking when the unreliable reporting happens other reputable news sources are sure to report on it. I surmise that it will become widely known very quickly. So, maybe Speedy Close is the best option at this point. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 22:59, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Agree. The independent article (reporting stuff from Zeteo and Semafor second hand) has a total of one (1) example of an egregious omission (an anchor not including mention of 1953 in a timeline of US-Iran relations) and zero (0)

examples of factual inaccuracy BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:25, 26 June 2026 (UTC)

Also the Independent article is very Iran-specific, so as grounds for a downgrade it would only point to additional considerations about Iran specifically. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:28, 26 June 2026 (UTC)

This could all have avoided with some discussion before the RFC started, there really isn't enough here to have to go through the whole RFC process. But with more than a dozen editors already taking part it probably best to let this wind it's course. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:06, 26 June 2026 (UTC)

Yeah theres a broader issue of everyone being triggerhappy on rfc process on this noticeboard anyways. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 22:38, 26 June 2026 (UTC)

I try and kill off as many unready and undiscussed RFCs as I can, but this one was well under way before I noticed it. There have been repeated evidenced free discussion about Weiss and CBS, maybe having a RFC result to point will actually help. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 09:55, 27 June 2026 (UTC)

There is no policy that allows

rfcs to be “killed” off early automatically. By the time an rfc is started, it usually has to be closed User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 13:01, 27 June 2026 (UTC)

Sorry just short hand, try and persuade that RFCs are closed early and a normal discussion be had instead. RFCs or any other discussion can be closed by consensus of the participation without forming any consensus on the matter as hand. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:51, 27 June 2026 (UTC)

The issue of hasty RFCs is an editor issue anyway, rather than an issue with this noticeboard. There aren't that many 'regulars' here, and the few that are wouldn't brush to start a RFC. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 10:07, 27 June 2026 (UTC)

Speaking of Scott Pelley this from CBS Evening News the night after he was fired certainly suggests editorial independence from management. Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:59, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

The thing with Pellet is that he's not independent of the situation. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 07:18, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

Well, that's true. But I was talking about CBS Evening News and what looks like some editorial independence from management, evidenced in the link. Alanscottwalker (talk) 09:39, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

• Status quo I don't think the current evidence is sufficient for changing the source's rating. I think that the current evidence indicates that a change will be warranted soon as it seems likely that there will be evidence that the organization's reporting is being significantly undermined and damaged - but we don't yet have that evidence. ElKevbo (talk) 22:25, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo, per Rhododendrites. This is premature, and absent a pattern of specific incidents I don't see how it would benefit editors to change the description at WP:CBS, except perhaps to add a small addendum about political bias. Cheers, Suriname0 (talk) 22:53, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 or anything that isn't option 3... this is WAY too soon, which has already been pointed out by editors above. aesurias (ping me in your reply, or I won't see it) (talk) 23:02, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 with an addendum to WP:CBS. I rewrote the RfC question as a courtesy to the OP, since I thought the issue deserved a hearing. In my view Option 3 is not supported by extant reliable sources, though I wouldn't be surprised if we have to revisit in a year or so. Option 2 is workable, and I agree entirely with Rosguill's !vote above. My own preference would be to retain GENREL (for now) but add to the entry at WP:CBS to state that additional scrutiny may now be required for claims related to politics. Generalrelative (talk) 23:50, 23 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 Obviously we should be watching for any signs of bad reporting and editorial practices by CBS under Weiss, but at this point we really can't point to anything we can call foul on. The bulk of their reporting is in line with all other mainstream sources. They may not be as neutral as they were before Weiss, but remember that bias alone does not impact reliability; it has to be editorial standard going lax or outright failing because of that bias, like with Fox News. Masem (t) 00:02, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2, unfortunately, but it should be politics- and controversy-related – Now with stuff about Weiss and Trump, we can't treat CBS under Weiss the same as WP:CBS, can we? Now with departures of journalists from Weiss's CBS (People), we shouldn't rush into thinking this is the same CBS as it had been before Weiss and SkyDance takeover. George Ho (talk) 07:29, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 there has been nothing yet to indicate a change. We might suspect the change but we need some evidence of it being there. Andre🚐 07:48, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 In reading over the previous discussion I did not see any hard evidence of unreliability. It seemed mostly based on hunches. Slava570 (talk) 12:21, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 While concerns about CBS at the moment are legitimate, there needs to be evidence of a track record of misleading/inaccurate reporting that actually airs/is published before it is reevaluated. Also worth mentioning that the Free Press is listed at WP:Perennial Sources as being under additional considerations. EaglesFan37 (talk) 13:10, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo/Option 1. There is growing evidence of bias - which may or may not be worth including at WP:CBS - but no evidence of unreliability in published reporting has been presented here. Astaire (talk) 15:35, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1: I have yet to see any evidence of widespread falsehoods, or general unreliable reporting from CBS. I'm not opposed to adding a note to its entry at RSP though. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 17:31, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2 Bari Weiss is certainly causing damage, but calling CBS News "generally unreliable" is a bridge too far at this point. We should be careful of editorial bias playing a role in their coverage, but they still have good journalists doing good journalism. – Muboshgu (talk) 17:36, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2. There is strong evidence that leadership attempted to change the facts of a story to fit a political narrative. While there is no evidence that the factual changes made it into the reporting, the Paley interview also contains hints that the framing of the reporting had been changed to suit leadership, like portraying protestors to be more violent for example. So, while there is no clear evidence that factual reporting has been slaved to the political narrative, that seems to have been the goal. Caution is therefore advised using CBS for any contentious reporting. Sławomir Biały (talk) 18:02, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 / Status quo. No evidence has been provided that CBS News has become unreliable, even if a more rightward slant is being imposed. Bias, be it liberal of conservative, isn't defacto reason for unreliablity per WP:BIASEDSOURCES. Acceptable bias include choosing what issues to cover and what not to cover. Mother Jones is considered a biased yet reliable sources, as is the Daily Telegraph and The New Reepublic, although the distinction between news and partisan opinion is often blurred in such sources. It's very fashionable to hate on Bari Weiss because she's not as liberal as many other prominent journalists, and she has made some decisions I'd call bad, but that alone isn't reason for downgrading CBS's reliability yet. What I see is evidence that journalists and commentators assume news media is, and should be, left-leaning by default, and become upset when this worldview is challenged. --Animalparty! (talk) 19:43, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Mostly 1 with a dash of 2, much per Muboshgu above. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:24, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 per others above. Don't see evidence yet that CBS News has become unreliable. Some1 (talk) 01:43, 25 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 Is Bari Weiss a poor manager? Quite possible. Does Bari Weiss have opinions? It seems so. We know/assume every corporate news organization is biased. We know/assume every corporate news organization gets things wrong. What we don't have is evidence that puts the reporting itself beyond the pale, certainly not generally and not even specifically. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:03, 25 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1. No evidence for lack of reliability. I've checked the first three links prvided by u:Simonm223 and none of them even mentions reliability issues. Alaexis_¿question? 12:47, 25 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1. My fellow editors have made the case far better than I could. I think this is premature and I have seen no evidence of decreased factuality CBS' reporting under Weiss. Most of the arguments on the other side here are about bias which is different than factuality. Redvelvetvanilaaaaaaaaa (talk) 13:01, 25 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1, on grounds of anything else would be going out of our way to prove Larry Sanger's point. Samuelshraga (talk) 13:05, 25 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 - no evidence of lack of reliability. DoubleCross (‡) 13:55, 25 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status Quo/Option 1 The evidence of any issues here is limited at best. Certainly there is no evidence of factual errors for false claims. Even the claims of bias are still in the areas where it can be reasonable differences of opinion vs anything more. With any media source we really should be more careful with how we use them and spend more time deciding if the actual facts/claims make sense rather than using any blanket rule. But within the confines of the simpleton 3 bucket system the status quo is fine here. Springee (talk) 10:38, 26 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo Decisions should be based on demonstrated problems and not predictions. My crystal ball isn't reliable enough to downgrade a source before the evidence exists. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 16:35, 26 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status Quo/Option 1 I think there is pretty decent evidence that CBS has shifted to the right. I also think that if all allegations made are true, Weiss has created a less-than-good work environment. But there has been no significant evidence of unreliability, no large-scale change in editorial policy, and no other issues in that category. Bad management and right-wing politics, even if many consider them morally bad, are not factors in reliability. FortunateSons (talk) 17:18, 27 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo I'll by saying Bari Weiss has not done CBS any favors she's taken control of the organization. For example, losing Scott Pelley is certaintly an loss to the image and nostalgic CBS and 60 minutes that many grew up with. However, when I look at CBS and its local affiliates they still do good work. I also have to imagine Bari Weiss will not be at helm forever if this dive in ratings continue. I don't want a downgraded rating to impact the ability of us to use the great local reporting affiliates do or rely on the investigative reporting that's still done. You can argue CBS isn't what it used to be and there is certainly a political shift. But we have to think about its actual reliability and the long-term impact of a downgrade.AadamentAardvark (talk) 15:58, 29 June 2026 (UTC)
• Status quo Weiss is trying her best to make CBS worse, but bias =/= unreliability and I haven't seen any info presented here that they've outright reported false info a la Fox or OAN (yet). The Kip ^(contribs) 14:12, 30 June 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2. Decreasingly reliable on contentious US politics wherever Weiss intervenes. There's a reason we don't consider The Free Press generally reliable. CopyleftEverything (talk) 15:44, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

  We don't consider TFP GREL because they're a start-up publication with a very short/unproven track record in addition to their considerable bias. As much as Weiss is trying to wreck it, CBS has a far longer record. The Kip ^(contribs) 16:02, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

  Yeah thefp is considered a self published substack by bari weiss, isnt it? User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 17:30, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

  Started as a substack, now it’s its own site with a wider news staff iirc. The Kip ^(contribs) 00:03, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

  No, it's not self-published, at least mostly not. It wasn't in 2024, and is still not today. Bari Weiss is the founder, and but one of several senior editors. She may well be chief editor, and until CBS acquired the FP may even have been considered the publisher, but aside from articles she wrote herself, most articles by the various contributors, staff writers, and columnists are not self-published as Wikipedia defines it. --Animalparty! (talk) 04:28, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

• Status quo/Option 1 What's the rush? Stikkyy (talk) 01:11, 2 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1 Too soon. No evidence of a pattern of misleading reporting yet. The Inside CECOT scandal doesn't affect reliability since that's what they didn't air. Start this again when there's proof we're actually at risk of getting false claims sourced to CBS in articles. Flounder fillet (talk) 23:28, 5 July 2026 (UTC)
• 1. Generally reliable – there is no evidence to support any other conclusion, other than editors' personal distaste for Weiss. We're not supposed to be guided by such motivations, however. Bravelake (talk) 06:21, 7 July 2026 (UTC)

  Uh... You or I may wanna move this vote further down. Don't ya think? George Ho (talk) 01:08, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

  Done. RedDeadGuy (talk) 05:50, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

  Sorted chronologically. George Ho (talk) 06:49, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

• Status quo/Option 1. While I'm personally concerned about the direction of CBS under Bari Weiss, no actual examples of unreliability (published false claims) have been provided. CBS is not the same as its editor-in-chief. Plus, being more WP:BIASED in a certain direction isn't the same as being unreliable. Cadddr (talk) 17:23, 9 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option 1. While there's claims of editorial inference from malcontents, but no evidence provided that CBS News has become less systematically reliable for factual claims, or that alleged falsehoods have made it into news reporting. Allegations about editorial direction are not, by themselves, sufficient to overturn the long-standing consensus that a major national newsroom such as CBS News, which has over 1,000 employees, is generally reliable for factual statements. Any concerns about bias or editorial judgment should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis rather than used to evolve the source's reliablability wholesale. Longhornsg (talk) 17:27, 10 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option 3: Generally Unreliable Especially when it comes to reporting on Israel which she admits she's heavily biased about. Scott Pelley, of course, raised major legitimate doubts, and she fired numerous other people for their views on Israel. Given time I could find dozens of sources raising doubt and who she fired. The New owners of CBS are openly biased in favor of Israel, and if it was only based on this subject I might vote for option 3 Deprecate. CBS has become a disaster surprisingly fast, including her killing a story related to ICE. Zacherystaylor (talk) 19:55, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

  Bias itself does not make a source unreliable. We need a pattern of published and uncorrected factual errors to deem a source unreliable. Just for comparison, we didn't downgrade Fox News until we saw a recurring pattern of factual errors.

  (PS: Many scholars now use the terms "pseudo-journalism" or "pseudo-news", instead of the now-weaponized term "fake news".) SVG-image-maker (talk) 20:15, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

  I haven't collected all the stories about this, but I know there are a lot, including many reporters claiming they were fired for political views, and reports of her killing credible stories. Pelley mentioned some of them, others which I'm not sure he mentioned include Former ‘60 Minutes’ Staffers Unload on Bari Weiss: ‘Everything She’s Touched Has Turned to S—’, CBS News chief Bari Weiss pulls '60 Minutes' story, sparking outcry, Bari Weiss faces blowback for spiking ’60 Minutes’ segment: What to know and of course, one of the things Scott Pelley reported is that she wanted to make it look like a protester killed by ICE was trying to run the officer down even though Pelley and other sources claimed the evidence showed this was false. If this can be verified it alone would be evidence of trying to falsify News. Zacherystaylor (talk) 21:18, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

• Option 1, nothing has been shown that I have seen indicates the source under consideration does not meet WP:IRS; just because the source no longer is blatantly biased towards a certain part of a political spectrum as it was in the recent past does not mean it's generally unreliable.--RightCowLeftCoast (Moo) 23:09, 10 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2. I don't think CBS News is generally unreliable at this point, but additional considerations apply when it comes to US politics and especially Israeli politics after they installed Weinstein as a political officer thinly disguised as an ombudsman. Cortador (talk) 09:19, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

  Why Israeli politics? And source that describes Weinstein as a "political officer"? Longhornsg (talk) 20:41, 13 July 2026 (UTC)

  There is no sourcing or basis for most of the opinions expressed here. Its mainly a reflection of their personal distaste for Weiss. Bravelake (talk) 02:30, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

• Option 2 or some form of "additional considerations apply." I would first of all encourage editors to review our own CBS News page, as it does not seem like many of the editors dismissing reliability concerns at CBS are aware of all of the reported evidence, which goes beyond the concerns that their comments demonstrate an understanding of. That being said, much of the strongest evidence of CBS's editorial bias that would affect its reliability relates to what it did not publish, due to political interference. Many editors have said that what an outlet does not publish has no impact on its reliability, but I do not think this is exactly true. If we are using GREL sources to evaluate notability, then CBS cannot be used (at least not on its own) to determine notability on-Wiki. If CBS doesn't publish on a topic, or doesn't publish certain material on a topic, that cannot be used as an argument that the material is non-notable, as we can no longer be sure that CBS's evaluation of its notability is based in an objective, journalistic analysis. I also think it's important to call for some standard of consistency here. Having participated in the above discussion on Democracy Now!, I've noticed several editors making what strike me as ranging from somewhat to blatantly contradictory comments on these two RFCs. Whether or not the evidence against CBS is compelling, I think it is clearly more substantial than anything brought up about DN. On Democracy Now! Springee says The source is very biased and we should be careful about both what facts they cite as well as what they may have left out. (Emphasis mine.) On CBS, they say The evidence of any issues here is limited at best. Certainly there is no evidence of factual errors for false claims. I do agree with their subsequent statement that With any media source we really should be more careful with how we use them and spend more time deciding if the actual facts/claims make sense rather than using any blanket rule., but I would say that applying that principle consistently would require a downgrade to parity with their view of DN. Alaexis believes that Democracy Now's being financed by various nonprofit foundations impacts its reliability, by virtue of a lack of independence, but seems to think that CBS being purchased by an oligarch who installed a loyalist director to axe longtime journalists amounts to No evidence for lack of reliability. Other editors (on both sides) are blatantly ignoring WP:PARTISAN and, in my assessment of their comments, are substantially influenced by their own biases in determining their votes. Altogether, I think that reading these discussions in the context of each other demonstrates that the way discussions on the RSN noticeboard are currently being conducted is not working. A largely vote-based ranking system gives editors too much of a chance to leave drive-by comments based on their subjective assumptions that are difficult to substantively engage with. Consequently, the perennial sources list is tainted by its being in large part a reflection of the pro-Western, center-left systemic bias of Wikipedia editors. My assessment is that we need a system where the discussion of a source (or a compilation of discussions) rather than a vote on it serves as the precedent for its future evaluation. This reform would mean that editors need to apply past discussions to the specific context in which a source is being evaluated for on-Wiki use, leading to more granular, contextual guidance for use of sources rather than sweeping generalizations about them. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 13:05, 12 July 2026 (UTC)

  I believe that my words have been taken out of context. I wrote that DN is "financed by various nonprofit foundations" in response to the claim that they don't have "government funding, corporate sponsorship, underwriting or advertising revenue". So to clarify, I do not think that non-profit funding (or ad funding for that matter) by itself bears on the reliability of a source. I see the point you're making but I don't think the two outlets are comparable, given the more pronounced bias and minimal original reporting of DN. Alaexis_¿question? 16:13, 12 July 2026 (UTC)

  Appreciate your clarification. As your comment is primarily clarifying your stance on DN, I'll reply there when I have some time. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 13:41, 13 July 2026 (UTC)

  If CBS doesn't publish on a topic, or doesn't publish certain material on a topic, that cannot be used as an argument that the material is non-notable, as we can no longer be sure that CBS's evaluation of its notability is based in an objective, journalistic analysis. I think this argument is not based in policy, represents a massive innovation in how we apply notability, and couldn't possibly be consistently applied. In part this is because when an outlet chooses not to cover something, we can never be sure whether they've made a principled, objective, journalistic decision.

  There's no history of downgrading sources for sins of omission in what they choose to cover. Potentially if within a particular story, omissions were so glaring that the coverage was misleading, that would be something to look at. However, even that would be a stretch - generally we can only use a source for something it directly says. If we were to start doing this, we would have to do evaluations of basically every outlet, and maybe even academic sources that can be shown to have "ignored" particular viewpoints/ideas/findings. It's a rabbit hole we shouldn't even think about entering. Samuelshraga (talk) 19:14, 12 July 2026 (UTC)

  On re-reading Monk's comment (specifically If CBS doesn't publish on a topic, or doesn't publish certain material on a topic), we never say that because a particular source didn't write about something, it's not notable. Notability is established by the sources that exist, not by those that don't. There is no "indispensable" source, and CBS is no different from any other source on this basis. If all this is is to say that we should treat CBS just like any other reliable source, let's just say that. Otherwise, the whole analysis is fatally flawed. Samuelshraga (talk) 19:20, 12 July 2026 (UTC)

  I hear you about the difficulty, even impossibility of evaluating a single source based on what it hasn't said. I'm not advocating for the sort of assessment you are describing. I am thinking of a determination of notability in the context of a comparative analysis of reliable sources, which is regularly invoked when deciding on a content dispute and is, to my understanding, rooted in policy. For example, in determining the title of a controversial article such as Israeli invasion of Syria (2024-present) [1] [2], arguments about what some sources have said are weighed against what other sources have not. In this discussion, use of euphemistic language by a chunk of the most reliable sources presents a problem where a plausible WP:COMMONNAME goes against WP:EUPHEMISM and is incongruent with the facts on the ground. This is a context in which I believe bias, especially the systemic bias of a collection of sources usually deemed acceptable, can affect reliability. These cases most often arise in instances where media covers an issue of perceived existential importance to one or more nation-states that have power or influence over their operations, and whom the media outlet depends on for things like source access, broadcasting licenses, or in cases of overt or soft censorship 1 2. In the case of CBS News, what's going on must be understood not just as a shift in its perspective, but as a coordinated attempt to coerce a shift in its perspective by powerful actors. The evidence of its bending the knee to the Trump administration includes editorial pressure to make unverified assertions, granting a preferred interviewer to government officials, uncritical repetition of false claims, and conflicts of interest. I consider that sufficient to warrant a reliability consideration in the context of its weighting during a comparative analysis. I don't consider myself a policy expert, but I am experienced enough in discussions on content to know that this is a common practice. It's a predominant way that controversial content questions are decided. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 13:39, 13 July 2026 (UTC)

  Altogether, I think that reading these discussions in the context of each other demonstrates that the way discussions on the RSN noticeboard are currently being conducted is not working. A largely vote-based ranking system gives editors too much of a chance to leave drive-by comments based on their subjective assumptions that are difficult to substantively engage with. Consequently, the perennial sources list is tainted by its being in large part a reflection of the pro-Western, center-left systemic bias of Wikipedia editors. My assessment is that we need a system where the discussion of a source (or a compilation of discussions) rather than a vote on it serves as the precedent for its future evaluation. This reform would mean that editors need to apply past discussions to the specific context in which a source is being evaluated for on-Wiki use, leading to more granular, contextual guidance for use of sources rather than sweeping generalizations about them.

  This statement is spot on. As I have ventured into RSN more and more, I have supported discontinuing the three-tier "Option 1/Option 2/Option 3" system entirely. The problem with this system is that it assumes that a single publication/website is a monolithic entity, when it really isn't. News websites are frequently divided into "journalistic reporting" and "opinion/editorial" sections with the first being more reliable than the second. When publications change ownership, editors-in-chief, and so on, this may also increase or decrease the reliability of subsequent articles. We learned the hard way with Red Ventures and Valnet. And many other factors play a role. SVG-image-maker (talk) 01:08, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

• Option 2 per Rosguill. While it doesn't seem like we have clear evidence CBS under Bari Weiss has actually falsified information, we do have clear evidence that the higher ups have attempted to and failed, which bodes poorly. Loki (talk) 23:36, 13 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2, Oppose 3 or 4 The reliable source page frequently takes stances of caution in the time between an acquisition and the confirmation of deterioration (e.g. WP:POLYGON, and I believe that there is sufficient cause to view the takeover as warranting a similarly cautionary message at most. Relm (talk) 09:30, 14 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option 2 Option 2 for now but circle back after another 6 months to see if it gets worse. Right now its clear they have lost a lot of their neutrality from past but not all of it; yet. ContentEditman (talk) 20:27, 21 July 2026 (UTC)
• Soft Option 2 per User:Monk of Monk Hall, I think the changes to CBS appear to be more in the omission than the commission. We should take that into account when evaluating overall newsworthiness, but individual stories are likely fine. Deckocard21 (talk) 02:04, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

• Option 1 - They are still a major broadcaster and we don't depreciate sources just because we disagree with them. Weiss having a viewpoint (which is not shared across the newsroom) is not germane to whether the source's reporting itself is accurate. Dcpoliticaljunkie (talk) 15:16, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

CBS News Weiss Discussions

Added these subsections. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 14:52, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Thanks. RedDeadGuy (talk) 15:18, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

As I see, the RFC tag is removed because the OP isn't written neutrally. I'm thinking about writing a more neutral statement for the subsection "Written for RFC tag". Would that be all right? —George Ho (talk) 15:26, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Yeah this was not formulated neutrally and should not be an RfC in its current form. Simonm223 (talk) 15:28, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Can I readd the RfC tag while George rewrites it? RedDeadGuy (talk) 15:53, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

No, you should wait for a neutrally worded RfC statement before adding the tag. Otherwise you're wasting other editors' time. Generalrelative (talk) 16:09, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Go ahead, then. RedDeadGuy (talk) 15:29, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• RedDeadGuy I have rewritten the RfC statement myself, and posted your original non-neutral statement below. You may wish to move this to a !vote in the Survey section. If you do so, feel free to delete this comment. Generalrelative (talk) 16:18, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  The combination of Generalrelative's and my statements was attempted, but then Generalrelative changed it back. (Could've been mixed better, IMO, if Generalrelative let it be, but...) I didn't realize how important deadline or timing may be more than patience. Sorry for letting you both down a lot. Still, I did wanna post right away, but edit conflicts interfered. BTW, Generalrelative's statement is... very, very brief. Too brief perhaps? George Ho (talk) 16:57, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

  Guess we just have to live with it. RedDeadGuy (talk) 17:07, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

@whoever uninvolved closes this RFC discussion: please note that headcount alone does not constitute consensus. Indeed, IMO, arguments should weigh more than mere votes. George Ho (talk) 20:39, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

Any closer that's not doing that shouldn't be closing discussion. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:41, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

I just now (re-)read WP:SOURCEBIAS, and I can't help wonder whether others have read and then enforced that policy. CBS under Weiss may have bias, though bias alone doesn't make sources inherently disallowed. Nonetheless, I really wish other aspects of CBS and Bari Weiss were further explored or researched before this RFC. George Ho (talk) 07:01, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

I am going to toss in this new report from this week from Cecilia Vega, a fired journalist for 60 minutes, who said she was pressured to include misinformation within reports (which she refused and was fired for) [38]. Now, that doesn't mean that what CBS is pushing now is necessarily misinformation, we need sources to point to specific stories that contain such, but this needs to be kept in mind. Masem (t) 11:21, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

Dont think this changes fhe needle, but this is why premature rfcs are problematic as well. Need all these reports to comeout, we need a smoking gun not smoke to change a well worn consensus from decades past User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 21:03, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

Previous OPs (CBS News)

There are currently accusations from reliable sources saying Bari Weiss has turned CBS into a Donald Trump propaganda machine. Inside CECOT was just one of the issues. Former 60 Minutes member Scott Pelley accused her of demanding him to alter the story regarding the killing of Renee Good to show her as intentionally trying to kill an ICE officer (though he resisted), something that is false but in line with the administration's claims, and has been accused of running a "propaganda-palooza" regarding the 2026 Iran War.

Sources:

• https://zeteo.com/p/bari-weiss-cbs-iran-war-dukoupil
• https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/cbs-bari-weiss-iran-war-trump-b2933098.html
• https://www.ms.now/news/scott-pelley-cbs-news-60-minutes-firing-statement
• https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/07/magazine/scott-pelley-interview.html
• https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/07/arts/television/scott-pelley-60-minutes-interview-takeaways.html
• https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/01/media/scott-pelley-nick-bilton-60-minutes-cbs-bari-weiss

RedDeadGuy (talk) 14:48, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

There goes my (other) statement:

The reliability of CBS News has been discussed, e.g. prior discussions from December 2025 (with a conclusion) and from January 2026 (archived without closure). Recently, its reliability has been debated and questioned, especially with the management of Bari Weiss and now ex-CBS anchor Scott Pelley's statement about CBS under Weiss trying to favor President Donald Trump and his views and statements.

As-is, WP:CBS labels CBS News as "generally reliable". However, is CBS News under Bari Weiss also "generally reliable"? If not, then which of the other following options: (2) "additional considerations needed", (3) "generally unreliable", or (4) "deprecate"?

Well... which one is better? George Ho (talk) 16:27, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

I think yours has less bias. Putting it up! RedDeadGuy (talk) 16:38, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Propose speedy close (CBS News)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

This RFC was created in good faith. However, it is too soon. I think it would be better not to waste people's valuable time and have people come here as they see the RFC in the feeds. I suggest that this RFC be speedily closed. So, this begins a survey, with the question: Should we Speedy Close this discussion? Support, Oppose, or whatever you want to post. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 23:06, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

• Support ---Steve Quinn (talk) 23:06, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Oppose-- As the OP. RedDeadGuy (talk) 23:09, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

This shouldn't have been started from scratch. As per the header and edit notice RFCs shouldn't be opened without prior discussion. That discussion could have laid out any new evidence of issues at CBS, rather than the muddle we're currently in. But as so many editors have already engaged with the RFC it has become a bit late to stop it now. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 07:23, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

• What would be useful, is to come up with a kind roadmap for such discussions especially of organizations with long-standing decent reputations, like we had one of these on the BBC awhile ago. Such as, 'pattern of serious erroneous reporting or fabrications'; 'management turmoil is not enough'; multi-program/production outlets require some discussion of each separately; limits due to severe bias have to clearly define what the bias is, and examples, etc. Alanscottwalker (talk) 09:08, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Comment - If this is speedily closed for TOOSOON, I think a warning should still be placed at WP:RSPS that recent changes would suggest we look for an additional source for anything political. O3000, Ret. (talk) 20:07, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

  Seconded. RedDeadGuy (talk) 20:14, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

• Conclude this subsection and let this RFC run its course – Apparently, as ActivelyDisinterested said, it's too late to speedily close, so continuing the proposal to speedily close doesn't help much except... expressing emotions merely. George Ho (talk) 20:21, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• Agree. Conclude this subsection and let this RFC run its course. As the person who opened this sub-section, I don't have a problem with closing this section, based on the arguments that have been presented. I guess we are stuck with a running RFC until it's over. So, any volunteers feel free to close this section, imho. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 22:18, 24 June 2026 (UTC)
• I concur. Let this RfC run its course. RedDeadGuy (talk) 22:25, 24 June 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The Journal of Pan African Studies

Whilst The Journal of Pan African Studies claims to be peer-reviewed, the paper [40] makes me wonder if the journal is an RS. The paper seems more of a political rant than an argued academic piece. It is used in Atlantic slave trade, where I have tagged it with {{better source needed}}.

At a minimum, using this paper is enormously at variance with the views expressed in Chapter 5 of David Eltis's recent book Atlantic Cataclysm. I appreciate that the article should not just rely on Eltis's viewpoint, but if it is to present arguments against it, the paper in the Journal of Pan African Studies does not seem to present anything approaching a significant counterpoint to one of the leading scholars of slavery. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:03, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

The page wasn't loading: https://web.archive.org/web/20251201030140/https://jpanafrican.org/docs/vol9no4/JuneJuly-23-Bonsu.pdf

Looks like it's been cited a few times: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?cites=12026876584102978346&as_sdt=5,48&sciodt=0,48&hl=en — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 20:19, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

This does not read like something that went through peer-review. The conclusion is mostly a long run-on sentence that ends with "students will not only know what happened to people enslaved in Ghana, America and in the Caribbean." Earlier, it states (without citation) that "[I]n Ghana, most engineers and scientists only memorize theories, and it comes to practicality, they are unable to do anything. -- Reconrabbit (talk) 20:25, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

Is it this Nana Osei Bonsu II? Alaexis_¿question? 20:23, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

Unlikely. Appears to be a virtual reality researcher that is currently publishing at Griffith University. -- Reconrabbit (talk) 20:28, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

ResearchGate profile confirms the link to the Griffiths person. Morwen (talk) 20:32, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

I looked into JPAS a bit. It's hard to do so since much of the information is on a site that is offline now. It doesn't seem to be a highly cited or indexed journal. [41] -- Reconrabbit (talk) 20:51, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

Something I'm curious about and been meaning to ask in other discussions: isn't the amount you're cited/indexed relative to field/domain? Some get many, some get few? Wouldn't a low count be terrifically subjective? Like I've heard that particle physics papers can rapidly get gobs of cites, but then... maybe a journal paper on periodontitis or something else may not?

How does that journal stack up against peers in the same sciences/domains specifically? — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 20:59, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

“isn't the amount you're cited/indexed relative to field/domain?” Yes. “Wouldn't a low count be terrifically subjective?” Only in the sense that every evaluation of every notability criterion is subjective. “Low citations” means something different for a particle physicist than it does for a mathematician, but this is easily solved by comparing like to like. ~2026-28259-76 (talk) 13:10, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

In that case he doesn't seem like an expert. Alaexis_¿question? 11:48, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

In what ways is the article at odds with Eltis's chapter? Kire1975 (talk) 15:06, 5 July 2026 (UTC)

Eltis, writing about the population of Ghana: "Even in Ghana, however, the demographic impact of the traffic in those 120 years cannot have been great." (p. 219). Yet the paper's conclusions include "...contributed to the depopulation of the Gold Coast". Depopulation suggests an overall fall in the population numbers, but Eltis argues against this.
The paper also concludes "It created insecurity..." – not sure exactly what that means, but Eltis's section "Did the Slave Trade Destroy Trust between Africans?"(p. 226) mentions the credit system that developed to assist the slave trade. This went on to support other trades once the transatlantic trade ceased. I do not see that this fits with insecurity, nor with "all" the results of the slave trade being negative.
Eltis also argues that the African slave traders were not in any way unequal partners in their trading activities: they got exactly what they wanted from the slave ships.
The paper complains about the introduction of new crops, seeing them as not advantageous. Eltis seems to downplay the role of maize and rice (etc.) being grown in Africa, but other historians see them as an important component in keeping population increase at a good level. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:42, 5 July 2026 (UTC)

It's known as Africology: The Journal of Pan African Studies, by the way. It seems to have had some academic credibility,[42] but that doesn't mean they didn't mess up with this particular article. Fences&Windows 19:08, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

References

Rethinking and reformulating WP:NEWSORGNIGERIA

Editors are using NEWSORGNIGERIA to reject any articles and drafts that have Nigerian sources. Ignoring the racist connotations of it, such categorical rejection of news sources from Nigeria is detrimental to Wikipedia. I have written about a specific example here.

We can do several things:

• Reformulate it so that it is clear that it doesn't mean that all Nigerian sources should be categorically dismissed.
• Remove it altogether and treat the sources like any other, adding them to the RSP list.
• Replace it with a whitelist of reliable sources from Nigeria.

In its current form NEWSORGNIGERIA is doing more harm than good. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 12:09, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

Regarding 'racist connotations', have you read the comments by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani on the subject? She is one of the major sources we cite to explain why we have found WP:NEWSORGNIGERIA necessary. I assume you don't think she is motivated by racism? Beyond that, I'd agree that there is sometimes an overenthusiastic application of what is supposed to be guidance. Possibly the wording needs tweaking. AndyTheGrump (talk) 12:30, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

I know that's not what the guideline says and I know nobody meant it to be racist, but to any non-editor who comes across it, "all news sources from Nigeria are banned" (which is how the guideline is sometimes understood) it might seem racist. I am not denying that a lot of the sources from Nigeria are promotional, paid articles, etc. but it isn't all of them. We painstakingly discuss every source from the US and UK and debate how it should be labeled. But when it comes to Nigeria, it seems it was easier to say "They're all bad, some exceptions may exist." That's why I also proposed we could create a whitelist of sources from Nigeria, as it might be easier to list the ones that are RS, rather than the (presumably) many that aren't. We could also create a guideline on how to spot promotional writing and what to watch out for. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 12:43, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

So, how many potential news sources are there in Nigeria (population 242 million or so), and how long is it going to take to assess them all in order to create a legitimate whitelist? I take it you aren't proposing to do this on your own, so an indication of where you are expecting to find volunteers from would also be helpful. As for guidelines on spotting promotional writing, I can't see any need to create one on Nigerian sources specifically. If we need a more general one (and one doesn't already exist? I've vague recollections of reading at least an essay somewhere on the topic), that probably belongs in a separate thread - probably at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources. AndyTheGrump (talk) 12:58, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

The issue with a whitelist of sources is that the practice is endemic to media in Nigeria, and that includes otherwise top quality news organisations. That's why reports need to be assessed on an individual basis. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:01, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

Then NEWSORGNIGERIA can be a guideline on how to spot promotional and paid articles. It can be similar to how we have a guideline on identifying LLM generated content. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 13:02, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

You could write an explanatory essay if you wanted, and link it from the section. The wording was changed after the June discussion, and nothing in it allows for the wholesale rejection of Nigerian news media. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:06, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

nothing in it allows for the wholesale rejection of Nigerian news media

I know. But I also provided an example of it being used that way, so there is some confusion. The essay is a good idea. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 13:30, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

@ActivelyDisinterested It is now here: WP:SYO. Feel free to add/suggest any corrections or additions. I'll let it simmer in my Userspace for a bit before I link it in the NEWSORGNIGERIA section.

The "feel free to add/suggest any corrections or additions" applies to any editor reading this who wants to contribute. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 13:54, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

I like it. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 18:15, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

Yes, I've seen that and it's an entirely inappropriate use of NEWSORGNIGERIA. That section states that Nigerian news sources are generally reliable, but may carry undisclosed promotional material. Sources still need to be assessed individually on whether the material is promotional. It's not a reason to dismiss the entire countries news media out of hand. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:53, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

This exact same issue was discussed at the beginning of June, see Archive 518. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:56, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

Would just adding a footnote next to "with caution" to that says something like "That does not mean you should outright dismiss sources without having evaluated them first." work? –Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 14:41, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

It does seem problematic that NEWSORGNIGERIA basically makes it so that we can't cover topics based in Nigeria unless they become international news. It's a pretty ridiculous stance for Wikipedia to take. Silverseren^C 18:06, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

The amount of thinly veiled promotional articles created with citations to dubious publications by Nigerian and Indian news organizations unfortunately makes NEWSORGNIGERIA and NEWSORGINDIA necessities. –Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 18:15, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

I agree but it says to be cautious, not to dismiss everything published by Nigerian or Indian media. I think TurboSuperA+ essay is a good explanation (WP:SYO). -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 18:18, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

Agree; as I said above, people shouldn't be dismissing sources out of hand like that. Some effort to take a closer look at it needs to be made. –Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 18:51, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

Agree. Same issue exists when some editors totally dismiss the articles with Pakistani subject. M. Billoo 19:00, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

Yes,, I've noticed similar with WP:TIMESOFINDIA. Most of the articles are fine, it's specific ones that aren't. But people take it as if they all are. InfernoHues (talk) 18:19, 3 July 2026 (UTC)

Are there one or two Nigerian news sources we could point to as examples of generally reliable outlets? That might be a helpful starting point for editors and could show that NEWSORGNIGERIA is about evaluating sources carefully, not dismissing Nigerian media as a whole. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 22:20, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I don't know if that's the ideal way to go about it. Otherwise reliable sources might also print promo articles at times. InfernoHues (talk) 22:45, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

That's a fair point. I wasn't thinking of this as creating a whitelist or suggesting that a generally reliable outlet should be trusted without looking at individual articles. I was thinking more about having examples of reputable Nigerian outlets as a starting point. The same type of source-by-source evaluation that we use elsewhere would still apply to them. Tioaeu8943 (talk) 23:40, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

The Guardian (Nigeria) is described as a broadsheet newspaper on Wikipedia, for example. But as others have said, even reliable sources can publish a promotional article. TurboSuperA+_[talk] 04:08, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

It's simply not possible to create a whitelist, the practice is common across most news organisations. Such a whitelist could also give a false impression, some of the best Nigerian news sources publish promotional articles. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:18, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

If the issue is that outlets have a practice of publishing promotional material without disclosure, then no amount of "evaluate individual articles" fixes the issue. They'll simply adjust to write those same promotional articles in ways that avoid setting off our alarm bells.

We should depreciate any source (or at least disallow it for notability) if it has any history of publishing undisclosed promotional content. A list of any outlet which any history of doing this (regardless of location) would be very useful. Dcpoliticaljunkie (talk) 15:23, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

I think this is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Basically every Nigerian and Indian newspaper does this to some extent, while at the same time doing good journalism as well. In my experience, it's pretty easy to tell if something was written for pay or not; it's written like a press release, often with no byline. I don't think the papers will adjust their writing, they get paid either way. InfernoHues (talk) 16:06, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

I'd lean towards a alteration - i'd also be in favor of putting a bunch of the more prominent ones thru RfCs but since there's so many that might be impractical. Jishara (talk) 18:11, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Blindly reverting articles including a single "Generally unreliable" citation.

I know this has probably been argued to death already, as I've gotten into it with moderators who immediately revert an article citing a single "Generally unreliable" citation despite half a dozen other "Generally reliable" citations, but never bothers to review what changed, and deletes hundreds of bytes of text backed up by reliable citations due to the inclusion a single questionable citation that merely confirms what other citations also state...then accuse the editor of attempting to inciting an editwar when you protest.

It's quite frustrating to invest significant time and effort making an generally good faith edit to see it blindly reverted by editors who spend 30 seconds on an external links search and revert wholesale without looking at context.

It's happened to me multiple times and feel it discourages people from wanting to invest the time and effort editing every time it happens. There needs to be more attention placed on the "What this page is not" clause of "RS is Not...a list of banned sources that can never be used or should be removed on sight", and advice offered that context should be attempted to be determined before blindly acting. - ~ Matsujima (talk) 19:23, 5 July 2026 (UTC)

The existence of WP:PLANESPOTTERS is proof positive that the given site was argued to death, as you put it. When adding material to an article, the burden is on the editor adding the material and always has been. I'm sorry that you find that a frustrating experience. Mackensen (talk) 19:48, 5 July 2026 (UTC)

Briefly touching on each point you're raising:

• I agree the revert was a bit overbearing. At the very least it could have been more precise, and any follow up discussion could have been more focused on the content issue rather than people's actions. Your decision to bring it to additional eyes was, in my opinion, the correct thing to do.
• Making sure reliable sources are actually reliable is key to writing on Wikipedia. Planespotters is a very low quality source, which defeats the purpose of using sources in the first place.
• The editor reverting you isn't a "moderator" except in the sense that everyone on Wikipedia moderates the information, including you. We all come together to discuss disputes and find a reasonable solution, which is what we're doing now. :)

Thebiguglyalien (talk) 22:17, 5 July 2026 (UTC)

This noticeboard is only for discussing the reliability of sources, not editors behaviour or their edits. If an editor reverts you the you should discuss the matter with them on the articles talk page. There's no such things as moderators, we're all equal when it comes to article content. There are admins but they only deal with user behaviour and have no special say over article content. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 23:01, 5 July 2026 (UTC)

• It depends heavily on context, so there's no one-size-fits all rule. A common situation where it would make sense to blanket revert is where one unreliable source is the only thing actually tying the new addition to the topic or where the other sources wouldn't really support anything reflective of the existing addition. Whether to remove content sourced to an unreliable source, tag as better source needed, remove the source and tag with {{cn}}, remove and use existing sources, find replacement sources, or rewrite to use different sources depends on the situation, on whether the text is exceptional or BLP-sensitive, whether the addition itself is worth salvaging, and many other things. --Aquillion (talk) 14:57, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Instead of blinding reverting such a change, I think it's better to first try to replace the source with a more reliable alternative one. Ixfd64 (talk) 16:34, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm in favor of some sort of thing asking editors to be careful about that. Jishara (talk) 18:14, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture and the Law

In a current RfC, an editor suggested that the source Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture and the Law (see [43]) may be unreliable.

Is the source, particularly the chapter titled "High-capacity magazines", a reliable source for the content at Magazine (firearms)#High-capacity magazine? See [44] for some context as to the use of the source, [45] for specific discussion on the reliability of the source. Katzrockso (talk) 23:12, 7 July 2026 (UTC)

• Yes. It is a highly-regarded, three-volume work in its third edition. https://news.bryant.edu/major-reference-work-bryant-professors-guns-american-society-updated-expanded

Lightbreather (talk) 23:54, 7 July 2026 (UTC)

It should be noted that this encyclopedia has separate entries for "High-Capacity Magazines" and "High-Capacity Magazine Ban". The former's first five, lengthy paragraphs are about high-capacity magazines outside the political/legal sphere. It defines them, explains how they work, why they're desired, and their history. Lightbreather (talk) 00:18, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

• In what context are you asking? The source is clearly a guide for use in discussing firearms in a political context. If that is the nature of the discussion it seems like a good source. However, it also is a work that is intended to be used for policy/political purposes per it's own statements. That means it may not be a good source for an industry perspective or as a subject matter expert the way a firearms historian or firearms expert might be. Springee (talk) 00:01, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Please reread my original post, which specifies the context. Katzrockso (talk) 00:26, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  I did. It's not clear what facts or claims you are trying to support with this source. Given this is a guide for people who are interested in policy, it seems reasonable to view it as written by people who are interested in that area. If you wanted to use it for factual claims about firearms technology it would seem more appropriate to use experts in that field instead. Springee (talk) 00:33, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  The facts for which it is cited in the section of the article I wikilinked. Here is the pertinent part of my very short post; Is the source, particularly the chapter titled "High-capacity magazines", a reliable source for the content at Magazine (firearms)#High-capacity magazines?

  Hope this helps Katzrockso (talk) 00:34, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Again, for what specific claims are you trying to use it? Depending on the claim in that section it may or may not be a good source. Springee (talk) 00:45, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Springee, if the source's article is "High-capacity Magazines" and our subsection is "High-capacity magazine", what do you think could be in there that would not be a good source? Lightbreather (talk) 01:04, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  I'm sorry, I didn't realize that despite making over 15 comments in the RfC attempting to remove the content from this section, you hadn't actually read the section in question.

  The content cited to this source is:

  A high-capacity magazine or large-capacity magazine or extended magazine is a magazine capable of holding more rounds of ammunition than the standard magazine for a particular firearm. The standard capacity for semi-automatic pistol magazines may range from 15 to 18 rounds

  Hope this helps, Katzrockso (talk) 01:57, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Please assume good faith. You are misrepresenting the issue at hand. Springee (talk) 02:50, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Then what was the point of these questions?

  In what context are you asking?

  Again, for what specific claims are you trying to use it? Katzrockso (talk) 02:59, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  K. has made a good point. He came here because of your repeated claims on another talk page. Then you come here and ask questions like you don't know what he's talking about. If you have a problem with the source or something it's used for, be specific. Lightbreather (talk) 03:01, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Springee, why do you keep misrepresenting this source? It is not exclusively about policy, and you know it. Lightbreather (talk) 00:50, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  I'm not misrepresenting the source but it's not correct to say I made an exclusive claim. Rather, I noted the work states it's purpose, "Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture and the Law is a three volume set that can help anyone - where a member of the public or a policy maker - tackle the broad array of topics that surround the gun debate." It's clearly about the "gun debate". It's not a reference work for firearms experts or historians or anything like that. The author of the section in question isn't any kind of acknowledged firearms expert, she was a PhD student. That doesn't mean she isn't good in her field but that field was criminology, not firearms. So again, the issue isn't if this source is reliable in any context, rather in what context and what specific claim. Springee (talk) 01:28, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  I don't see any reason why this work would not be considered a reference work for historians. Bloomsbury encyclopedias are made to be accessible to the public but they are very much academic sources aimed at academics. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 01:40, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  The issue is from a firearms history, design, technology POV, the author isn't an expert. The purpose of the work is to provide information for public policy related to guns, not as a history related to the mechanical design, function or industry terminology. Springee (talk) 02:52, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Springee, is it your position that the academics and scholars who edit and write the articles in this three-volume, third-edition encyclopedia about guns in American Society did not and do not in the course of their work study firearms, their designers, manufacturers, sellers, and buyers, nor how they're used by anyone but criminals? Lightbreather (talk) 01:42, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  There is a difference between someone who say, studies ships and how they function vs someone who studies public policy related to maritime trade. If you think the book consulted experts in the field of firearms vs experts in the area of policy, please provide the evidence. Springee (talk) 02:54, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Answer the question please. Lightbreather (talk) 11:16, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  The encyclopedia draws on a vast array of research in criminology, history, law, medicine, politics, and social science. It covers all aspects of the issue: gun violence, including mass shootings in schools and other public spaces; gun control arguments and organizations; gun rights arguments and organizations; the firearms industry; firearms regulation, legislation, and court decisions; gun subcultures (for example, hunters and collectors); leading opinion-shapers on both sides of the gun debate; technological innovations in firearm manufacturing; various types of firearms, from handguns to assault weapons; and evolving public attitudes toward guns. Many of these entries place the topics in both historical and cross-cultural perspective.

  This is from the description of the encyclopedia on the Bloomsbury website. Katzrockso (talk) 01:58, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  @Katzrockso, Lightbreather, and Springee: I think you should all step back and let the community respond rather than continuing your disagreement here. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 11:37, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

  Well the publisher is not an WP:INDEPENDENT source here (for describing the book). That aside, it's perfectly plausible that the publisher's claims about covering all aspects of the issue (including technological innovation, types of firearms etc) is completely accurate, but that is to talk of the book's coverage as a whole. It doesn't follow that this particular entry is reliable for information on technological innovations etc. It's perfectly reasonable in that context to look at the specific claims made and assess the source's reliability for those claims with the expertise of the author in mind. Samuelshraga (talk) 11:34, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Looks like a pretty reliable book to me. Favourable reviews in Reference & User Services Quarterly ([46] Well received by reviewers as a two-volume set at its initial appearance in 2002 [...]this second edition surpasses in quality the already solid initial attempt.), Reference Reviews ([47] The text is, in fact, excellent; it is accessible, factual, and wide‐ranging.) The reviews (and the book, it seems) mainly focus on the societal aspects of guns, however. Considering the article here is on guns, it would be better to find an encyclopedia that focuses on the guns themselves, rather than their societal effects. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 07:32, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

• Yes, Reliable. Seems well written and supported. Not even the first addition so has been updated and if anything gained support. ContentEditman (talk) 16:37, 21 July 2026 (UTC)
• I agree. Based on the evidence presented, this is a reliable source. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 19:49, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Not Reliable. While opposing stances are acknowledged, pro-gun rights positions are consistently presented as less persuasive or not as forward-looking as pro-regulation positions. Written by academics with an agenda, it's a guide for policy makers and not a true encyclopedia. Lechtkaeaeia (talk) 22:18, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

WP:BIASED sources are not any less reliable than purportedly unbiased sources (if such a thing can even exist). Katzrockso (talk) 23:30, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

• Reliable. This appears to be a well-regarded reference work, and I can see nothing in this thread beyond 'I don't like it' arguments to suggest otherwise. AndyTheGrump (talk) 23:44, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

ARY News AI journalist

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I was reading this film review [48] when I realized that it is entirely LLM. Saw that the article carried an actual byline and lo and behold it is an AI journalist [49]. The website doesn't disclose any AI usage and presents these as actual journos. Gotitbro (talk) 10:51, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

Although I very much doubt they are fully AI, there are some problems here. Certainly some of there writers don't actually exist. These two writers[50][51] for example have AI generated picture and pump out many articles per day about the British royal family. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:08, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

Then we should not use it. Slatersteven (talk) 12:10, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I would agree, but this is a established Pakistani 24h news network not an AI slop website. So I'm a bit hesitant to be so blunt. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:04, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I am unsure why that makes a difference; if they are using AI-generated content and falsely attributing it (with a byline) tells me they are not reliable. Reliable sources do not try to mislead readers.Slatersteven (talk) 14:08, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I agree but it's a consensus that could use more than a couple of editors. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:10, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I agree that the source should be prohibited. We cannot cite artificially generated content for one, and the fabricated attribution is likewise ethically affronting. On the other hand, given this is indeed a major television channel, there might be an argument for using discretion. At a minimum, editors should be automatically warned when trying to cite websites known to host artificially generated content.

Cheers, Will Thorpe (talk) 02:26, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Agreed. This is not only cheap and lazy, but deceptive. Cortador (talk) 20:52, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

I've left a notification with WikiProject Pakistan. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:09, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

Some are actual journos but mixing that with deceptively fake journos all the while churning out LLM without any hint is more than just concerning, hence I raised it here. I only realized the fakeness after seeing the AI-generated journo image and the name being picked from elsewhere (Erica Fernandes). Gotitbro (talk) 16:07, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

• DEFINITELY looks AI. But please do not rely on Pakistani reference for some Indian or UK content. This is a Pakistani news channel and so please use it for Pakistani facts and reporting only. M. Billoo 18:57, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

  If that is indeed the case, this should be listed as a deprecated source at WP:ICTFSOURCES. Gotitbro (talk) 19:05, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

I do not understand why would someone needs to go to a Pakistani website to add a review on an Indian film? 1) Indian films are already banned in Pakistan. 2) Deprecating the source may display unnecessary highlighters for those who may have enabled tools like Cite Unseen or similar. 3) Similarly we cannot rely on Indian references for reports about Pakistan. I see no point of discussion. M. Billoo 19:13, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

The domicile and bias of sources are not relevant for determining reliability (for instance The Express Tribune is listed as reliable at ICTF [though I haven't looked if it contains LLM cruft as well]). You are perhaps right in the sense that editorial judgment may require us to go for 'neutral' sources in certain cases (see WP:RSBIAS), say hot topic issues like politics, but neutrality/bias is not the question here. We're talking about outright fabrication, including conjuring up fake journos, which should render it unusable as far as the scope of ICTF is concerned (or even entertainment in general). There may well be other areas where it is doing the same (ActivelyDisinterested lists British political reporting as another above).

One can tolerate LLM usage but not fabrication.

PS: Any listing at WP:ICTFSOURCES is not going to affect "tools like Cite Unseen", its scope is project (films) limited. Gotitbro (talk) 01:57, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

"its scope is project (films) limited" I wish this was true, but I've seen to many "Cite unseen says it's green/red" in AfD discussions. Particularly problematic as Cite Unseen uses non-enwiki discussions. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:59, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

• ARY News's publication of LLM-generated content is a serious problem, and I recommend starting a request for comment here to determine which parts of its coverage should be considered generally unreliable or deprecated.​ — Newslinger talk 21:18, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

  It has been conclusively shown as far as entertainment is concerned that it is not only generating LLM content but creating fake AI journos to go along with it. I think it should be rendered unusable for this area at the very least.

  @Newslinger, M.Billoo2000, ActivelyDisinterested, Cortador, Willthorpe, and Slatersteven: If editors think the scope needs to be expanded let me know and we can get along with a formal RfC if its needed. Gotitbro (talk) 11:38, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

  Let us go ahead. Will Thorpe (talk) 12:02, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

  Yes, let's go ahead. Cortador (talk) 13:47, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

  If there's going to be a RFC let's get it started before editors start voting -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 15:40, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Then it should be carried out neutrally and un-biased. M. Billoo 15:44, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Alright. I'll start an RfC and ping the editors here. Gotitbro (talk) 13:14, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

GUNREL/Deprecate - Doesn't matter if some of their content isn't LLM, the fact they're relying on it so blatantly for any output at all taints the well. As a result, shouldn't be used at all. Rambling Rambler (talk) 12:31, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Totally wrong judgement. Proper decision is that do not use it if the reports are not about Pakistan, because it is a Pakistani national TV channel and a news outlet. Just because they publish AI content about third party countries, does not mean to deprecate at all. You cannot kill every objection with only one PoV. M. Billoo 15:37, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Why would we trust anything it says about Pakistan if it can't be trusted to report about anyone else? If it's using LLMs to generate nonsense then we can't trust it to have any meaningful editorial standards. Rambling Rambler (talk) 16:26, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Reputable authors, journalists, and news. [52] [53] [54] [55] [56] [57] [58] ... The fact that there are currently 262 visible writers, out of which how many %age is AI is definitely not worth looking for. In Wikipedia language, it is UNDUE and non-NPOV decision to ban completely based on a small factor. M. Billoo 17:41, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

That's not "Wikipedia language". NPOV is a content policy.

The more you reply here, the more questionable it is becoming in terms of whether you understand what is or isn't policy. Rambling Rambler (talk) 21:07, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Also, unrelated, you seem to have an erroneous understanding of policy where you're under the belief that sources can only be used if from the same geographic place as where an event happened which isn't policy at all unless I'm mistaken.[59][60] Rambling Rambler (talk) 16:31, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

sources can only be used if from the same geographic place was not my main concern. See my edit summary, where WP:V was my main concern. Please do not misinterpret. M. Billoo 17:41, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

The edit summaries are "Incorrect claim. Does not comply WP:V. How can a Pakistani source accurately report a US event, when no US source report this?" and "Incorrect source for a US event.".

This directly reads as you questioning these sources solely for their geographic location. Rambling Rambler (talk) 21:09, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Really sorry, but despite my clarification and intention, your behaviour goes more towards accusation and harassment. You diverted the thread to blame me. Please strike your words. M. Billoo 14:57, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

Given there is no accusation and certainly no harassment I won’t be striking anything. Rambling Rambler (talk) 15:45, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

NeuroNews International

Is neuronewsinternational.com a reliable source for BLP and corporations? It has been cited 17 times. I know that it’s not WP:MEDRS. HelixUnwinding (talk) 11:52, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

It all traces back to BIBA medical owned by Stephen Greenhalgh, Baron Greenhalgh alone. I am not sure if I would trust them, they live in controversy. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 16:43, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

Thank you. I don’t like the combination of political leaning and medical ownership as a layman, but can’t really find a case of actual unreliability or false reporting. Do you have a source for that? HelixUnwinding (talk) 18:40, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

Just look at the site it says owned by BIBA. Click on BIBA and you get further info. Just do a few searches and you will see. I am not going to read more on that, it stretches my neural capacity, so to speak. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 18:47, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

Okay, thank you HelixUnwinding (talk) 20:09, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

@Yesterday, all my dreams... I’ve looked again and still came up blank on actually inaccurate information. Could you help? HelixUnwinding (talk) 15:49, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

I am sorry that would be beyond my time constraints. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 20:12, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

British Food in America magazine

British Food in America, a website which styles itself as an online magazine, published a large review a few years back of Northern Hospitality: Cooking by the Book in New England by Keith Stavely and Kathleen Fitzgerald. It is quite in-depth, cites a number of sources, and performs historical analysis. I would be summarizing it for the author's article rather than using it to contribute to GNG.

Some considerations:

• The magazine has a manifesto which states a goal of promoting the thesis that British food has been influential in American cuisine. The book is read as supporting that thesis and is reviewed approvingly.
• The masthead lists both the editor and principal writer as Blake Perkins. Perkins is the incoming editor of the journal Petits Propos Culinaires, and has reviewed another of Stavely and Fitzgerald's books in PPC.

Questions: Is this reliable? If a summary of the the review in Gastronomica was included on Stavely and Fitzgerald's page, would a summary of this be DUE, on equal footing? And more generally, should this website be considered a reputable publication that can be used as a reliable source generally for historical claims, e.g. in glossary of historical culinary terms, could it be used to cite a statement that in the second-half of the 19th century, melted butter was a light sauce rather than just butter that had been melted? Whonting (talk) 07:17, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

Gastronomica definitely seems reliable, so you can cite the review that's published in Gastronomica just fine.

I'd say that British Food in America might have a few problems, tho (one, both the editor and the lead writer are the same person, and two, it has a manifesto and stated goal which they are motivated to pursue). My opinion would be treat it like a Substack written by a subject matter expert, essentially - not a reliable source, but citeable with a preface saying that According to culinary writer Blake Perkins, (whatever the thing is) Jishara (talk) 19:43, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

@Whonting, having "a manifesto and stated goal which they are motivated to pursue" has no bearing on reliability. See WP:RSBIAS: "Wikipedia articles are required to present a neutral point of view. However, reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective" (emphasis added).

When we're deciding whether a source is reliable (e.g., the list of qualities in WP:NOTGOODSOURCE), the source's POV is not one of the considerations, even if that POV is about the history of food. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:13, 17 July 2026 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing, I hope you can see by the fact that I asked this here that I understand a source not being neutral doesn't preclude it from being a reliable source. That isn't the same thing as saying a source being biased "has no bearing on reliability":

• For claims such as "the GDP per capita is $900 per capita", a source's POV is broadly irrelevant. The exceptions here are that when our basis for determining a source to be RS is thin (e.g., we don't have outside commentary to establish it as reputable; basing reliability largely on "they say they have an editorial board"), a cautious editor will not use a source to put claims in wikivoice that they would if not for the POV.
• For interpretive claims such as "inequality is going up or down" (depends on how you measure it) or X caused Y, a source's bias is absolutely relevant to whether we are saying a source is sufficiently reliable to put claims in wikivoice rather than attribute or exclude. The best, most reliable sources perform dispassionate/disinterested analysis, that's clear in the broad strokes of WP:INDEPENDENT, and a source failing to do so cuts against it being sufficiently reliable to put statements in wikivoice, or even to include as an attributed statement.
• Third is the consideration of a source being DUE, which I also posed above. To some extent, this is a distinct question than reliability, but it's also not. A source can get all its facts right, and we can avoid citing it for analysis, but an application of BALASP can convey a message which reliability is a relevant consideration for: someone is a hero, they're a villain; so on.

Whonting (talk) 06:42, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reliable sources says "reliable sources are not required to be neutral". Ergo, reliable sources are not required to be neutral, and being biased (in an editor's personal opinion) does not change whether the source is reliable.

If you get a different impression from WP:INDEPENDENT, then we need to re-write that essay. However, as a first step, I suggest that you read Wikipedia:Independent sources#Biased sources, whose opening words are "A source can be biased without compromising its independence", and see if you still believe that it's "clear in the broad strokes" that being biased interferes with being independent. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:33, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

That sentence is not as black and white as you seem to think. It may be read as:

• A source being biased "has no bearing on reliability"; or it may mean
• A source can be biased and still reliable (i.e. "Reliable sources are not required to be neutral" is true in the same sense that "reliable sources are not required to be recent")

I have given several reasons above why the second understanding is more coherent, and it is also supported in the broader context of RSBIAS. The dismissive "in an editor's personal opinion" is a non-starter, given the second half of RSCONTEXT is premised upon editors having a responsibility to make content decisions including attribution and exclusion based on their evaluation of a source being biased.

I did misread INDEPENDENT, and I think you're right that it's worth clarifying in the text. I had read the passage you quoted, and understood that "being biased interferes with being independent" is false, but read "disinterested" in the lead in the colloquial sense of uninterested, which looking online seems a pretty common mix-up. Whonting (talk) 18:19, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing out the language problem. I've added an explanation at Wikipedia:Independent sources#cite note-:0-1 that might help the next person. I'm sure there's more work that needs to be done there; it's been something of a magnet for WP:GAMING edits in past years.

The fact that this online magazine disclosed their POV in a "manifesto" does not make them unreliable. Wikipedia editors cannot be successful at "representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic" as required by NPOV if they are saying "All the sources that forthrightly disclose their views are unreliable" or "All the sources that disclose a ____ view are unreliable". Holding a POV isn't one of the qualities that makes a source generally unreliable; it normally only makes it potentially WP:UNDUE, which is completely separate from reliability.

In this case, it won't even do that. Their "manifesto" announces a mainstream POV, namely that British cuisine affected American cuisine. The 18th-century cookbook by Hannah Glasse was one of the most popular cookbooks in the American colonies. We may think that something is "as American as apple pie", but pies came to the US from England and the Netherlands, and the apples came to the US from England (on the Mayflower itself, no less) and France. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:41, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

In this instance, I agree with your assessment of reliability (mainstream POV, manifesto appears to be a rhetorical flourish in place of mission statement, they are forthright in declaring POV, this author's writing on this subject is published in mainstream outlets so on), and the main reason I raised it was because I was also asking whether a summary was DUE.

I don't agree in the general case. "All the sources that forthrightly disclose their views are unreliable" does not represent my opinion, which is that bias is one consideration in evaluating reliability, like source age. There is also a conflation of general reliability and contextual reliability - I am not sure on general, but am sure that a source being biased, all else equal, can render it insufficiently reliable for putting its analysis in wikivoice. This is another distinction flattened in "All the sources..." -- a source can be reliable for attribution on a subject, but not wikivoice.

It may be helpful to press on an operative part of RSBIAS: "Bias may make in-text attribution appropriate". When would you say bias could make in-text attribution appropriate, where another source identical but for the bias would be appropriate for wikivoice? Whonting (talk) 00:44, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

I don't think it's possible to have "another source identical but for the bias". Two pages that are actually "identical", one of which comes with a disclaimer that they hold a strong POV, are still "identical". Declaring the bias vs concealing it (or doesn't realize how biased they are) doesn't change how we should handle it.

Did you mean two publications, one of which is generally considered to be mainstream/centrist and the other is just this side of fringe/extremism, and which both contain the same fact? For widely accepted, objective facts (e.g., "Donald Trump won the 2024 US presidential election"), WP:INTEXT attribution would be inappropriate no matter what source you cite.

For questions about viewpoints (not objective facts), the decision to make in-text attribution isn't about the source you cite, but about all the sources in the field. For example, it's widely accepted that British and Irish cooking traditions affected American cuisine. It would be silly to say "According to so-and-so, British cooking traditions affected American cuisine". The source you cite at the end of the sentence is irrelevant.

Let me give you a different example. Much of Kary Mullis#Views on HIV/AIDS and climate change needs to be cleaned up. Mullis is widely known for being an AIDS denialist. He's described in ordinary reliable sources with over-the-top language, like being in "the who's who of AIDS pseudoscientists". It would be hard to understate how many people died because of him (and Peter Duesberg, whose article reports that two scholarly studies found him to have been complicit in the AIDS deaths of a third of a million people in South Africa alone). But every time we say "he promoted AIDS denialism", someone tries to change that: It's not actually true; it's just one biased person's opinion. Nobel disease isn't a known pattern; it's just what The New York Times said one day. He's not actually an AIDS denialist; that's just what this one person said. Okay, two people. And this one magazine. Okay, two magazines. And, well, pretty much every reliable publication that's written anything about him this century, but it's not like it's a fact or anything. They're all totally biased, so they need in-text attribution to overcome their pro-mainstream-science biases.

This is why I say that the main thing isn't whether the source is biased. The main thing is whether the claim is WP:DUE. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:51, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

(I've just cleaned up that article.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:07, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Seems fine to use it with attribution. Cortador (talk) 12:35, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

• Just a passing comment that the whole issue will seem meaningless to many readers given the dramatic diversity of "American cuisie", whatever it may be. Was Cajun cuisine influenced, Hawaiian, northern California health food? We can attribute all day, but please let us try not to make readers laugh. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 18:48, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

West Asia News Agency (WANA)

I've been this source used in a number of articles. It does not seem to have been discussed here, but Google AI says "their coverage is heavily influenced by the Iranian state perspective." Does that make WANA an unreliable source?

And can we generally assume that all Iranian state-controlled media is unreliable? Ixfd64 (talk) 18:12, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

If we declare a given nations entire potentail state-controlled media is problematic, that feels like the sort of thing that 100% must be codified somehow.

As in, if X nation fails for Y, then every and any other nation no matter who that fails for Y must meet the same fate. Even if the USA, for instance.

Uniform equally binding standards on all states. No special animals, etc.

Is there policy around this? — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 18:22, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

The de-facto policy is, if they speak English as their first language, we pretend their state news agencies are independent. If they speak any other language we forcefully assert they're unreliable for the weather, let alone politics. It's not a very good de-facto policy. It is, however, what Wikipedia currently does. With that being said, we should not be making reliability decisions on whatever Google AI hallucinates. Simonm223 (talk) 18:36, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

It should depend on the degree of control. If the government only requires news articles to be submitted for approval, then that is probably acceptable. Israel is one such example. But if the state is forcing news organizations to make certain statements, then that's when it becomes problematic. Ixfd64 (talk) 18:39, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

Please do some research of your own instead of relying on LLMs to tell you whether or not a source should be discussed here. Cortador (talk) 11:34, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

KnowYourMeme editorials?

There is repeated consensus that the entries of KnowYourMeme, even confirmed entries, are generally unreliable as they are user-generated and has no referencing requirement. However, what about the site's editorials? I do agree that the site's entries should still be considered unreliable, but what do we think of other material of the site when considered separately from entries?

Editorials on the site are not only written by paid staff but also include a decent amount of research and analysis that I would expect from a secondary source reporting on popular culture. I particularly considered this when looking at this page, which explained an ongoing trend and accurately explaining its origin and impact and evolution over time. Here's some more examples of editorials that I feel can be considered reliable.

They seem to have several subcategories for editorials, titled things like News, White Papers, Insights, Interviews, and more. I'm not certain if there are any differences between them, but they could in theory be considered separately in terms of professionalism and reliability.

I am hoping this discussion ends with a clear consensus (or a clear lack thereof), so that WP:RSPS can comment on KYM editorials and not just KYM entries. Rose Abrams (T C L) 08:57, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

Past discussions have been that their 'know your meme' articles, even if confirmed by staff members, are unreliable. But the consensus about staff written articles is less clear, maybe useable for articles about memes but definitely not for contentious or BLP material. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:06, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

It's better than user generated but that's about the lowest bar imaginable. I don't think there's evidence for reliability. PARAKANYAA (talk) 19:44, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

No editorial standards information, no staff list. Their journalism, if it can be called that, focuses on memes and social media. They cite X posts for example. Low quality sources such as this are unreliable. Their interviews are probably fine with attribution, other than that, there are far better serious alternatives. 11WB 💬 08:59, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Mainstream media cite memes and X posts frequently too, such as The Independent, so that's not particularly concerning, especially when the tweets are the subject matter in question Katzrockso (talk) 03:52, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, you can hardly fault a source for citing social media when they are reporting on memes. I'm inclined to say there might be a limited use case for articles about memes and internet phenomena but I would use it cautiously, if at all. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 23:00, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Never said it was a fault, but it certainly doesn't make them reliable. 11WB 💬 23:07, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Instead of clutching our pearls because people writing about Internet culture are citing Internet and social media sources, it might be better to look at the many, many scholarly sources that use or describe KnowYourMeme. There are a lot so making sense of them would take some time but it would probably be time well spent for those who are genuinely interested in determining if it's a reliable source. ElKevbo (talk) 23:20, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

At of these seem to be discussing KYM articles about memes, which are user generated. Secondary sources don't have to follow Wikipedia's policies are can use WP:UGC but we shouldn't. Secondary sources have the expertise to analyse those pages, but editors shouldn't.
It's also separate from what's being discussed here. I'm not sure how to search for staff articles separate from the user generated meme pages. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:24, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Reliability of NowThis Impact

About a couple of months or so, I came across NowThis Impact, which is a progressive news channel, and I am curious to know if this is a reliable source, and is it okay to cite it. Now the videos I'll be providing are examples.

When it comes to immigration, NowThis Impact believes that being in the United States as an undocumented immigrant is not a criminal charge, but a civil offense. In another video, NowThis Impact talked about the idea that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) should be abolished.

How about abortions? In a video posted by NowThis Impact, Staci T. believes how getting an abortion will not give you depression nor mental health issues, but rather relief. In another video, WyoPlantbasedTeacher believes how people who had an ectopic pregnancy, a septic uterus, or a miscarriage that her body hasn't been released all should be treated with an abortion, otherwise the person will die. In two more videos, Saras and Nessa posted videos saying that abortion bans are disproportionately affecting minorities, making it "racist and deadly."

So, what about Israel? Before the Gaza war, a video was published by NowThis Impact about the proposal for the West Bank (a.k.a. Judea and Samaria) to be incorporated into Israel, which they oppose, saying it's considered illegal. In another video, Jeremy Ben Ami, uploaded a video, which he believes that "radical right-wing settlers" believe that Jerusalem should belong exclusively to the Jewish people, and to "push Palestinian families out of their homes". And a few days after the October 7th attacks, NowThis Impact uploaded a video that shows people protesting in support for the State of Palestine, chanting "Free Palestine" "From the (Jordan) River to the (Mediterranean) Sea", and other slogans that are considered to be anti-Zionist, anti-Jewish, or anti-Semitic by those who support the State of Israel, Jewish people, and the Zionist movement. In fact, the doctrine made by the Islamic Resistance Movement in Palestine (Hamas) directly says "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it".

Speaking of law enforcement, NowThis Impact published a video, believing that Blacks and Latinos are more likely to be killed by police than White peers, which they viewed as racist.

And lastly, when it comes to Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, Transgenders, Queers, and others, NowThis Impact uploaded a video where Vice President Kamala Harris supporting the adoption of children by the LGBTQIA+ community, That's all I have to say. Buddy731 (talk) 05:51, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

• All I have to say: Obviously not reliable. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 07:55, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Fwiw, NowThis. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:11, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

i think the rhetorical questions arent very helpful for discussing this. Also am curious why this is being brought up, is there a specific context or article dispute that is involved?

i mean otherwise, all other things being considered, agree its not a great source. Short form videos really are difficult to use as sourcing in general anyways and a openly political source specializing in clickbait rage videos really arent the best source anyways. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 13:09, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

• I have no opinion on this source, not having any direct experience, but we don't judge sources on their biases unless this leads to reporting that is demonstrably not accurate.

It is not a crime to be present illegally in the US, that is an accurate representation of American law.

The claim that annexation of the West Bank would be illegal under international law is 100% factual and sources which disagree with it are not reliable. The fact right wing (and not so right wing nowadays) Israelis believe Jerusalem should exclusively belong to Jews is demonstrably true, and the fact Palestinians are continuously expelled from their homes is also proven. The fact that people sing "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" is demonstrably true, the interpretation of that chant by anti-Palestinian groups are irrelevant to the reliability of this news item. So on Israel and Palestine, there are no bias problems that might cause us to consider the channel unreliable.

Blacks and Latinos are statistically more likely to be killed by police than White people, and studies indicate this is due to racism. So that is fine.

I'm puzzled why you have linked these stories. All seem to be accurate. It would surely be indications of unreliability that we would be interested in here, no?Boynamedsue (talk) 16:15, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Certainly secondary commentary is more helpful than editors opinions about a source.
Being an undocumented immigrant in the US does appear to be a civil matter in most cases[61].
I've seen discourse in the US over the future of ICE, and the video is marked as an op-ed. This is covered by WP:RSOPED.
The mental health effects of abortion are going vary greatly, this is obvious not a suitable source for it but is anyone trying to use it for such.
Ectopic pregnancy is a medical matter, again this is likely not a great source for information on it.
Abortion bans can prove fatal.[62]
Settlement is illegal under intentional law.
They reported on protests that were happening, the protests did happen. Their framing of ten protests might be biased, but bias doesn't mean it's unreliable (WP:RSBIAS).
The video about policing appears to be an interview with a sociology professor, not journalism by NowThis.
Harris expressed support for LGBT adoption, and they are reliably reporting that she did. I really don't see the point of that being included in your list.
Personally I don't think this is a tune best source, and short form videos make bad sources for contentious material. You argument seems to be you don't like their politics, but sources can be biased, it's editors who are meant to try and write content that neutrally reflects sources rather than their own opinions. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 18:14, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm not saying I don't like their politics, but I could show some respect based off my religious beliefs. Buddy731 (talk) 18:56, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm sorry but your beliefs, my beliefs, or anyone else's are completely irrelevant to reliability. Sources do not have to respected us, our opinions or beliefs. In fact to write content compliant with WP:NPOV requires engaging with sources that we might find repugnant. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:06, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Are you accusing them of publishing outright falsehoods and refusing to correct them? The links you've posted don't demonstrate this, especially since many of them are opinions or otherwise subjective and open to interpretation. Should we stop using all of the sources that have said Harris supports letting queer people adopt children? You honestly would have had a better case just linking to the NowThis article, which at least describes some issues with the organization. A source having strong opinions alone does not make it unreliable (although you can often identify WP:CPUSHers based on who uses strongly opinionated sources) Thebiguglyalien (talk) 06:21, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I didn't say they published outright falsehoods and refusing to correct them. I was just curious to know if sources can be reliable. If anything, I could try to have had a better case just linking to the main articles next time. Buddy731 (talk) 06:32, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

There is no particular policy I'm aware of that forbids the use of short-form videos specifically as sources. Please correct me if I'm wrong though! The source in question is just a standard (in my eyes) progressive news-media organization and will promote standard progressive causes. The statements made in the videos are more statements of political positions than of facts (though yes there are some truth claims in there too). Redvelvetvanilaaaaaaaaa (talk) 15:13, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

They aren't WP:BESTSOURCE, they aren't necessarily academic and it's difficult to gauge an editorial process we can look through. If there's a better source, we should use that instead for citing claims. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 01:44, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

NowThis will rarely be the WP:BESTSOURCE but I would not go so far as to call them unreliable. On their social media platforms especially, they tend to republish clips from other news sources. If you find something they have clipped from, say, CNN, it would be much better to go to CNN and cite that directly where possible. For their original content, I think attribution would be warranted in many cases. If you want to make a statement about whether "illegal" immigration is a criminal or civil offense, a more reliable source on American immigration law would be far better. The abortion statements need WP:MEDRS. In limited cases, an opinion piece labeling the laws "racist" may be acceptable. Overall, it is difficult to assess as these are hypotheticals. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:54, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

The OP has an obvious agenda in aiming to disallow use of a source they politically/religiously disagree with. Absent any direct evidence of unreliablity (taking into account MEDRS), this discussion isn't required. Fences&Windows 13:56, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

The Guardian in the context of the Reform UK donations scandal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

There is currently a discussion on the Reform UK financial allegations talk page regarding the use of an article The Guardian in that article. Two uses propose not to use the Guardian news article in that article due to the news article being political gossip. See the specific arguments here and here. Considering that The Guardian is widely used on Wikipedia I would like some input on this. The questions are:

1. Is The Guardian a primary source in the context of the Reform UK financial allegations?

2. Should this Guardian article be excluded on the basis that it is written too gossipy and/or engaged in gossip as defined by the Cambridge Dictionary and/or engaged in political tittle-tattle as defined by the Cambridge Dictionary?

3. Should this Guardian article be excluded on the basis that it contains speculation?

4. Should this Guardian article be excluded on due to NOTNEWS? Cortador (talk) 12:22, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Well this can be said of any new paper invitation (assuming this is what this is). It is them making the accusation, or reporting someone else's accusation? Slatersteven (talk) 12:31, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I've added a link to the Guardian article above for clarity. It's this one. Based on the article, it was "bankers who were concerned it may have been laundered money", but please read the full article for more details. Cortador (talk) 12:37, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I am asking what the basis of the objection is, I cannot know what is in otehr users' minds. Slatersteven (talk) 12:40, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Apologies, I don't understand what you mean. Cortador (talk) 12:51, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

How is it a primary source, was this them reporting or investigating? What makes this different from any other newspaper report? Slatersteven (talk) 12:56, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

You'll have to ask DeFacto, who made this claim, about that. They stated that The Guardian is "involved" and a primary source. Cortador (talk) 13:02, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Well I am not seeing it, so untill there is some kind of justification I am going with "fine as long as attributed". Slatersteven (talk) 13:07, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I agree. Fine with attribution. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 13:38, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Is the Guardian reliable for its reporting? Yes. Whether the reporting on this particular issue is DUE is probably a better question, and would depend on whether any other sources have considered it important enough to report on. The idea that it amounts to "malevolent speculation" is rather ridiculous. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:36, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I knew before I opened that page that one of the users involved would be User:DeFacto, a big defender of Farage and Reform. No, this is fine, as long as it's attributed. Black Kite (talk) 12:40, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, same. @DeFacto can you provide a more convincing argument why we need to exclude this? User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 12:57, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

@Black Kite, well, no. What I do is try (often without much luck) to ensure that Wiki's policies, especially WP:NPOV and WP:NOR, are applied consistently in articles that I follow or come across. Often I concentrate on recent news event articles.

So, in the same way that correlation is not the same as causation, you should no more assume that I was specifically defending Farage or Reform because I challenged what I saw as policy infringements in that article than that I was attempting to defend Lucy Letby, the Welsh Not, the Toyota Prius, ISO 2848, Harry Dunn's killer, Paula Vennells, the murderer of Brianna Ghey, Huw Edwards, Zack Polanski, vehicle excise duty, the kilogram, the perp of the Southport stabbings, the Mile, Dominic Cummings, speeding drivers, Edward Colston, the murderer of Henry Nowak, Angela Rayner, MG Cars, etc., etc., etc., when I tried to make policy-related corrections in articles relating to them.

To be honest, I find the constant stereotyping (it's not just from you) quite intimidating. Could it just be, perhaps, that you don't think criticism of Farage, or possibly of any right-wing character or organisation, should be so scrutinised? -- DeFacto (talk). 17:05, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The consensus here appears to be that scrutiny of Farage by the media over something they have all been discussing extensively should be included in the article. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:24, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I fully agree, so long as we, per WP:BLP, are "very firm about the use of high-quality, reliable sources". If it's worthy of inclusion there will be ample of those, so we do not need to rely on any compromised sources. -- DeFacto (talk). 17:50, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The Guardian bis a high quality source, and it's investigative journalism is generally held in high regard. I'm unsure why you would consider it compromised. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 18:06, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Yup. I'd really like to know on what grounds DeFacto might think that the Guardian has been 'compromised'? AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:12, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I thought we'd covered all that. Well, The Guardian is considered to be "Generally reliable in its areas of expertise", with the proviso that "Some editors believe The Guardian is biased or opinionated for politics". But that isn't the issue here. The problem is that the article cited is a primary source and they don't pass muster per WP:BLP. -- DeFacto (talk). 18:19, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

You were asked why you think that the Guardian has been 'compromised'. Please give an answer. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:32, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The problem isn't The Guardian per se, it's that specific article. The reason is explained below. -- DeFacto (talk). 18:35, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

At this point, unless you give us a clear and unambiguous explanation as to what exactly you meant by 'compromised', I'm going to assume it is nothing but bullshit. Nothing you have written so far remotely suggests 'compromised' content. The Guardian, has it's perspective on things, like every other newspaper. That isn't being 'compromised', that's how newspapers are. All of them. As Wikipedia policy makes entirely clear. And trying to wrangle Wikipedia policy on not revealing primary-sourced personal details (date of birth etc) into grounds to exclude significant content on a major political topic is simply absurd. That wasn't what the policy was created for. It isn't interpreted that way, clearly: it would rule out swathes of content, from articles on many, many topics, and would make many articles essentially unsourceable. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:50, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

We seem to be making rather hard work of this. If this content is worthy of inclusion it is surely covered by plenty of secondary sources. Why not use some of those?

As for your rather aggressively phrased question; it is compromised (as in not being a secondary source as is generally required for BLP info such as this as well as to give due weight to content) by being a primary source for the £1m/year related content. -- DeFacto (talk). 19:30, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

It seems to me that your argument is 'compromised' by being utterly at odds with the way Wikipedia has been using routine journalism (i.e. a newspaper reporting what people have told them) as a source for as long as it has required sources at all. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:37, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

1. I mean its probably primary, but there is no rule saying we must exclude primary, just dont synth it.

2. wtf. This isnt policy and not worth answering. The closest policy is WP:BLPGOSSIP, and by that overly broad definition watergate is to gossipy to include in nixons article.

3. Wtf also not worth answering we need a policy to point to.

4. Wtf thats not what not news means. Obviously notable beyond news.

at some point these are all some version of WP:IDONTLIKEIT User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 13:02, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

🎯 BobFromBrockley (talk) 22:15, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Similar to Black Kite above, I guessed exactly who it would be trying to have this removed before even scrolling further.

At what point are we just going to get a topic ban because these endless cases of them trying to remove well-sourced but critical content from right-wing to far-right political figures and parties within the UK via stonewalling is just ridiculous now? Rambling Rambler (talk) 13:06, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Yes, the Guardian is a reliable source for this. The article cited is journalism, not 'gossip'. The story they are reporting in has been a major topic of discussion in the British Media. Farage is has resigned from parliament over it, in order to force a bye-election. It is utterly absurd to suggest that we exclude an article on this topic on the basis of multiple gross misrepresentations of Wikipedia policy. AndyTheGrump (talk) 13:55, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm in complete agreement with Andy et al on this. The Guardian is a reliable source. It might have been better if DeFacto had started this discussion in order to better explain the contrary argument. Mackensen (talk) 13:58, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

@Cortador, there are at least 2 problems with your report here:

1. The The Guardian article you linked to above is not the article in question at the talk page you linked to.

   The source in question, about him needing £1m/year, is the one you restored in this edit:

   https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/jul/15/farage-said-he-would-need-a-million-a-year-to-stand-as-mp-in-2024

   The source you linked to above (at least twice), about an older story, is this one:

   https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/jul/07/revealed-farages-5m-gift-reported-to-uk-agency-over-money-laundering-concerns

2. You said "Two uses [sic] propose not to use the Guardian news article in that article due to the news article being political gossip", well the first, from Kind Tennis Fan's edit summary] may have, but the second one from my talk page post did not. I argued there that the The Guardian article in question (not the one you gave the link for above) should not be used because it was a primary source for the opinion it was developing by conflating an existing news story (about the £5m gift) and their new investigation it was reporting (about a £1m/year requirement). Where else was that opinion derived from? WP:NOR policy at WP:No original research#Note c confirms that saying, "investigative reports" are considered to be primary sources and that "reviews and interviews" may be too.

Given that the responses from others above are presumably based on looking at the wrong article and assuming your interpretation of my reason was accurate, then I guess this discussion is null and void, so needs a speedy close. -- DeFacto (talk). 15:20, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I don't see much difference between the two Guardian articles, I doubt anyone who has commented would say that either are unreliable. Secondary sources are preferred, and an article shouldn't be based primarily on primary sources, but WP:PRIMARY doesn't mean bad and they can be used. NOR gives a description of them, it's doesn't proscribe their use.
I don't see how it conflates two stories, it seems to be background to the story about the £5M donation. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 15:41, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Ditto, I see nothing to indicate the "actual" source in question cannot be used with attribution; nothing has changed. Slatersteven (talk) 15:46, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

It's implying a relationship between an anonymously alleged need and a well documented gift. And as the primary source of this implication, we should comply with the BLP policy at WP:BLPPRIMARY which says "Where primary-source material has been discussed by a reliable secondary source, it may be acceptable to rely on it to augment the secondary source, subject to the restrictions of this policy, no original research, and the other sourcing policies". Hence it needs a secondary source. -- DeFacto (talk). 15:51, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

And I do not agree that this says we have to (the clue is in the word "may") as such I do not think we need to do any more than attribute the claim. Slatersteven (talk) 15:54, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

@Slatersteven, "Where primary-source material has been discussed by a reliable secondary source, it may be acceptable to rely on it to augment the secondary source" - that bit?

That means you may use the primary source to augment the secondary source. We don't have a secondary source to augment, hence we cannot augment it with the primary source. -- DeFacto (talk). 16:04, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

BLPPRIMARY say to use caution with primary documents, and that court and public documents can't be used for BLP details. I think it would be a bit of an overwatch to say that all investigative journalism's is banned from BLP articles. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:03, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I would disagree these are primary sources. Contemporary newspaper articles are usually considered secondary for most purposes on wikipedia. It becomes more complicated as they get older. In any case, the Guardian is one of the most reliable UK sources, so it would be reliable for these claims. I would attribute here, but that is a separate argument.Boynamedsue (talk) 16:07, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The policy at WP:PRIMARY seems very clear as to what counts as 'primary', and its big list clearly even includes stuff in those categories that has been "reputably published". -- DeFacto (talk). 16:17, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Is it your theory that the Guardian qualifies as a WP:PRIMARY source under the "breaking news" exception? If so, that seems a stretch. The point of the breaking news exception is that otherwise secondary sources are reporting information as it happens, without sufficient context, in the recognition that it will be overtaken by later reporting. A reported piece such as the 15 July article by Anna Isaac, relying on multiple sources and analyzing those sources, is not that. Mackensen (talk) 18:14, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

No, I don't have a theory. It's a primary source for the £1m/year implications by the definition given in WP:PRIMARY as I read it. -- DeFacto (talk). 19:09, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I don't think that's right. This is from the Guardian story:

Nigel Farage told senior figures in Reform UK he would need “a million a year” to cover lost earnings if he stood for parliament in the 2024 general election, sources have told the Guardian...

Emphasis added. The Guardian is reporting what a source told them and providing analysis. If the source published their own report, that would be a primary source. The Guardian clearly meets the definition of a secondary source:

A secondary source provides thought and reflection based on primary sources, generally at least one step removed from an event. It contains analysis, evaluation, interpretation, or synthesis of the facts, evidence, concepts, and ideas taken from primary sources.

Unless the Guardian reporter was in the room when Farage said it, they cannot be regarded as a primary source. Of course, in situation like that, the framing would be completely different. Mackensen (talk) 19:27, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

That's surely a question for BLPN though, not for here. Here we surely need to comply with it as it stands. -- DeFacto (talk). 16:07, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Your taking the sentence out of context. If any sentence from any guidelines or policy can be used while ignoring the sentences around it then anything could be justified or excluded. If all primary sources are excluded then why does the section start by saying that they should be used with caution. As it's stand it's not a position that makes sense. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 18:10, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The last sentence is crystal clear. If you disagree with it, start a discussion at BLPN. -- DeFacto (talk). 18:27, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Not one person agrees with your interpretation, maybe your wrong. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 20:15, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Reliable with attribution. The actual article from The Guardian that is under discussion, per Special:Diff/1364578559, is "Revealed: Farage’s £5m gift came after saying he needed ‘a million a year’ to stand as MP". The cited article is a secondary source, as it contains "synthesis" of information provided by different sources that The Guardian interviewed about the subject. Additionally, WP:BLPPRIMARY does not preclude investigative journalism from being used for information about living persons; it only precludes directly citing "trial transcripts and other court records, or other public documents" and "public records that include personal details" when such information is not covered by a reliable secondary source. — Newslinger talk 19:29, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

What about the sentence that follows that: "Where primary-source material has been discussed by a reliable secondary source, it may be acceptable to rely on it to augment the secondary source, subject to the restrictions of this policy, no original research, and the other sourcing policies". That tells us that we need a secondary, at least, and if we have that, it may be acceptable to augment that with the primary source. Or do you have an alternative take on that? -- DeFacto (talk). 19:50, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The article under discussion is a reliable secondary source, so WP:BLPPRIMARY is not even relevant here. — Newslinger talk 20:00, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

• Proposal to protect everyone's keyboards by ending this discussion. As Actively said, it is a case of one person vs N here. And N is increasing as we go along. Time to move on to constructive edits, and avoid any possibility of a busted artery by anyone. Please just do it. Thanks. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 20:56, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

  Thanks @Yesterday, all my dreams.... We've got a potential solution to this now. A secondary source has been found to support what The Guardian reported. Here's the post that supplied it. The problem now is, who is going to do the fix. The supplier of the new source, Rambling Rambler, has said they won't fix it because they don't think there's anything to fix, and I'm afraid to fix it for fear of triggering a riot if I do. Here's the full cite if anyone wants to swap it in for us:

  Cooke, Millie (17 July 2026). "Reform could be hit with £3m tax bill because of Farage's £5m donation, tax expert claims". The Independent..

  -- DeFacto (talk). 22:45, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

  @DeFacto: Your disregard for the input of just about every other editor in this discussion shows that the current matter is more of a conduct issue than a content issue, as nobody else here believes that the article from The Guardian needs to be removed from the Wikipedia article. Please remember that WP:CT/BLP is a contentious topic. — Newslinger talk 22:57, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

  What problem are you trying to fix? The Guardian isn't a primary source, and the Independent isn't doing any additional reporting. Both sources are reliable. No one agrees with your interpretation of the relevant policies. Mackensen (talk) 23:15, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

I had a quick look at the discussion and this looks like yet another example of DeFacto reverting calling for BRD to occur and see what consensus develops and then when they don't like the outcome of discussion claiming that they have the correct policy decision and that policy outweighs WP:LOCALCON. Personally I see no issue with usgae of the source as long as there is attribution where appropriate. TarnishedPath^talk 01:32, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Lets not discuss conduct here, either take it to the talk page or ANI. Slatersteven (talk) 16:36, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Is journal Shanlax a credible source?

I was perusing Academia.edu for curiosity and found this paper on North Dravidian, but mostly on Kisan language (which I have been expanding some months ago), and I thought I could add it as a source for the article in regards to the language itself. However, the journal does not seem to be listed as a reliable source. This is a shame, since, in order to expand some stub articles from Asia and Africa, the information that could expand them is found on an unreliable journal.KHR FolkMyth (talk) 22:20, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

By "listed as a reliable source" do you mean the WP:RSP? If so that only lists sources that have been repeatedly discussed, it's not a list of all reliable or unreliable sources. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 23:08, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

I understand. It's also that some of these journals titled "International Journal of ___" are, in most cases, an unreliable source, and Shanlax is Shanlax: International Journal of English. KHR FolkMyth (talk) 23:19, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

I can't find them listed at all in the standard journal ranking websites. SciLit has some stats for their publications. Shanlax has been publishing journals under its arm "Shanlax International Journals" since 2012. The parent company Shanlax has been operating since 1990 and describes itself as an eCommerce platform through which authors can publish and also sell their books, which makes it sound like a self-publishing outfit. -- Cdjp1 (talk) 10:45, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

Dead DOI... Print-on-Demand publisher ... doesn't look great. Shanlax International Journal of English (there are other Shanlax Journal of ...) IS listed in the MLA Periodicals, and it is a UGC-compliant journal, which means it's better than than a bottom-of-the-barrel journal. Sounds like a C-tier, but legit, journal. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 10:58, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

It's also used in many South Asian articles, as seen here KHR FolkMyth (talk) 12:06, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

UGC discontinued its CARE list in February 2025, Headbomb, so listing as UGC-compliant is now meaningless.[63] The publisher has no transparency on who runs it. Their description that "Shanlax Journals are meant for promoting by an interest of the blooming and prospective writers. The Panel of Shanlax Journals are constituted by pre-eminent scholars who have left their footprint in all prominence" should give pause. What are "Studies in Foreign Languages (e.g., French, German, Spanish, Chinese, Arabic, etc.)" and "Cultural Studies and Popular Culture; Film and Adaptation Studies; Media, Communication, and Digital Narratives; Gender, Identity, and Cultural Discourses"[64] doing in a journal of English? Their journal of Arts, Science, and Humanities includes Dr.Alireza Heidari Professor, Faculty of Chemistry, California South University (CSU), Irvine, California, USA.[65] Heidari's presence is a sure sign of a poorly run journal.[66]. KHR FolkMyth, please look elsewhere for references. Fences&Windows 13:12, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

No problem! I was suspecting there was something wrong with the publisher, so I searched Wikipedia to see if there were any other articles using it as reference. KHR FolkMyth (talk) 14:23, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Shanlax is fortunately only used in 43 articles. Fences&Windows 13:14, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Well, Doctor Professor Heidari was an interesting read. I'll get to removing references to Shanlax publications where they still exist in articles. -- Cdjp1 (talk) 19:48, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

RfC: ARY News

How should we assess the reliability of ARY News? Gotitbro (talk) 13:42, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

• A) Generally reliable
• B) Additional considerations apply
• C) Generally unreliable
• D) Deprecate

Survey (ARY News)

• Option C/D Building on from the discussion above (#ARY News AI journalist) and suggestions to formally address the reliability of this source through an RfC. With mutiple instances of this source using not only undisclosed LLM-generated content but further deceptively creating fake AI journalist profiles (presented as real) to go along with it, a deprecation or gunrel (generally unreliable) appears apt. I'd be willing to circumscribe this to international coverage and entertainment as suggested by one editor above but comments by others there convince me that deceptive AI usage such as this does not make us extend good faith to any area. Gotitbro (talk) 13:42, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

  ARY News was founded in 2004, so what would the reliability for pre-2022 articles be? SVG-image-maker (talk) 20:33, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

  While ChatGPT became available in late 2022. I don't think a cutoff date like that possible, ready text/content generators have existed ever since SEO has and I haven't seen any reason to believe otherwise here as well. Gotitbro (talk) 15:51, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

  Have they said when they started to use AI content? Slatersteven (talk) 15:55, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

  Of course not. They don't disclose AI usage at all which is what leads us to this discussion. Gotitbro (talk) 17:43, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

  So we canot have a cutoff point until before the use of AI globally. Slatersteven (talk) 11:10, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

• option C as we do not know what is and is not AI-generated, so we do not know how many of its great reporters are using (or actually are) AI. Slatersteven (talk) 14:13, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

• Option C/D - Per my comments in the previous discussion, any identified repeated LLM use and beyond that creating fake AI reporters taints everything. There is no ability to trust them to have any editorial standards as a result. Rambling Rambler (talk) 15:49, 21 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option C. Not only are they using LLM slop, they are trying to hide it. Cortador (talk) 10:36, 22 July 2026 (UTC)
• Option C. (Summoned by SodiumBot). No apparent apology or indication this was an isolated incident. Generated content seems to be their current strategy. So we cannot generally rely on this source. It’s a somewhat longstanding source that predates LLMs so if we could scope the GUNREL to a recent period we could perhaps continue to use the older articles. Can we tell if there has been any recent change in owner or chief editor? Barnards.tar.gz (talk) 07:34, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Discussion (ARY News)

@Newslinger, M.Billoo2000, ActivelyDisinterested, Cortador, Willthorpe, and Slatersteven: pinging participants from the discussion above. Gotitbro (talk) 13:42, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

@Rambling Rambler: Forgot to ping. Gotitbro (talk) 14:24, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

Airports/airlines as a source?

Can an airport (or airline, either can work) be used, as a primary source, to determine the start date of a flight from said airport? For whatever reason all secondary sources only give the month, and only the airport has the exact day, which seems to be the requirement for adding a flight to the list. Also, the dates reported by the airport I am referring to line up with the airline operating these routes and Google Flights. Just worth mentioning.

Airaglub ^{hello there.} 00:34, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Hi, do you mean date only or date and time? In the past, or present or future? I think it also depends on the airport and airline as well. In my experience, Hawaiian airlines and airports do not have a sense of time and date as such, but no one cares because they are so nice. Aloha. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 00:58, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Date only. So the controversy was that the secondary source only provided the month (e.g March 2027) as opposed to March 11, 2027 which was the actual start date. Per WP:AIRPORT-CONTENT the month, day, and year is required, but not the time. And since this is a starting date, (Hawaiian example:

Honolulu (begins Month Day, 2027),*ref*

it is future. The airport I am concerned about is from Tennessee, though. They only clarify the date it starts, but the time can easily be found on the airline. In my experience, yes, BNA does get the starting dates right. Airaglub ^{hello there.} 02:21, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

WP:AIRPORT-CONTENT doesn't require anything, and is not any kind of a rule. It's purely a suggestion that someone wrote down, and it doesn't have to be followed in any way. Wikiprojects can't dictate content (or anything really.) So I then ask the question, why is the exact date so important? We're not a directory. We're not a news site. We're certainly not a plane/airline spotters website. It's rare that the exact day is important in any way for these articles. Canterbury Tail talk 16:50, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

I fully agree with that. How would this info be encyclopedic? It would not. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 20:15, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Yeah? I mean, anyone fussing over that is a dork, if they do. The existence of a plane leaving a place at a given date/time en route to a different place, in an official record from the government place it left... is fine, in 99.999999% of scenarios. The others are so improbable as to be inconceivable, unless some ultra anti-primary source type of person was a thing. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 02:43, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

If it were in the past, I would be 100% on board with using the primary source. For claims about what will happen in the future I'm more hesitant. Samuelshraga (talk) 13:06, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

For uncontroversial cases (and surely these will almost always be uncontroversial), there should be no issue with using primary sources for this purpose. For statements about the future, I would use in-text attribution along the lines of “Widget Airlines has announced . . . .” John M Baker (talk) 16:30, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Primary sources have been fine to use for destination lists, and were explicitly permitted by RfC not long ago. As long as it's not a booking engine, or otherwise WP:SYNTH, then there's no problems at all. Danners430 _{tweaks made} 17:05, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

I am sorry but per Canterbury above, all this doesn't seem encyclopedic. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 20:17, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

I’m not entirely sure what you’re on about…? Primary sources aren’t encyclopaedic? How does your reply relate to my message…? Danners430 _{tweaks made} 20:35, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

As Canterbury said: We are not a directory. That is all I will say. Cheers. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 21:13, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Again - what does that have to do with this thread, the reliability of the sources being discussed, and my comment? Why are you leaving irrelevant comments? Danners430 _{tweaks made} 21:21, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

If you think my comment is irrelevant, please ignore it. Let us move on. I will say no more. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 21:28, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

Respectfully, inserting a sharp discordant nothing is more harm than simply not commmenting in the first place. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 22:57, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

This has been debated in various forms for years. I'm pretty sure this was settled as a "yes, airlines can be used for statements of basic fact" the last time I saw it. GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 21:23, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

I agree with the general tenor of the discussion so far. An airport or airline should be fine as a primary source for uncontroversial dates. But I also think using exact dates is rarely necessary or encyclopedic, so would tend to avoid it. For future dates/announcements, I would use in-text attribution as has been suggested (Air Mushroom announced…[ref] ) but would be more strongly inclined to not include such details as they are arguably promotional and subject to change. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:46, 22 July 2026 (UTC)

The Dissent

The Dissent, a San Francisco news site that describes itself as "An AI newsroom ... reported, edited & produced by named agents". My instincts are that this is not a reliable source, and that "named agents" means the bylines do not refer to actual humans. I don't find any citations, nor any previous discussion, but I'm tempted to cite this article for the opening date of Wolfsbane (restaurant) since the sources that aren't reporting it in advance as a "target date" are otherwise blogs or something on Medium and Substack. So in case I'm being overly cautious because of the AI self-description, I'd like opinions on the site's reliability as a news site. Thanks to anyone who takes a look. Yngvadottir (talk) 00:23, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

So... this:

• https://thedissentsf.com/article/united-airlines-employee-threatens-to-call-ice-on-mexican-american-passenger-at

Is written by:

• https://thedissentsf.com/staff/bex-connolly

This is on the front page: "Hal reviews every draft on Sonnet · recommends, the human publishes." So that guy is actually doing it, and using tools to aggregate sources... to build articles? — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 00:49, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Actually, if I'm getting the gist of this, it looks like they scan local news, find items covered multiple times/different ways and then put out with AI an aggregate article of sorts that is built up and around of the other things?

I have no idea where that falls, but you can just use the other sources. So like if that one I just linked is drawn from three (3) other sources, presumably the others are fine? You wouldn't even need this one. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 00:51, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

• Rule 1: Generally speaking, when AI walks in through the door, reliability flies out of the window. This site is in effect an aggregator ala Yahoo with no reporters in the field. Not reliable. Should use the original sources. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 01:18, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks, Very Polite Person, Yesterday, all my dreams...; more or less my line of thinking, but I strongly suspect they're using the blogs as well as the local news sites to get, to name the example I was trying to source, that the restaurant actually opened on October 15, 2025. So we can only have the month, looks like. Yngvadottir (talk) 03:05, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

We don't have a stigma about local news blogs and such do we, human-ran? They're in many places the actual news of record in modern times, which is itself neither good nor bad. But something we don't have any say-so over obviously. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 06:59, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

I've left Foodgal commented out. The other source that confirms it opened on the planned date is on Substack and Medium. Since citing even the most beautiful and long-running foodie blog hosted on Wordpress or Blogger gets a warning note added to the edit (and even hyperlocal news sites such as Patch are frowned on), I'm extremely leery of citing those sorts of sources. Yngvadottir (talk) 10:08, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Re FoodGal, "Carolyn Jung is an award-winning food and wine writer based in the San Francisco Bay Area." Yngvadottir, I think "Self-published sources may be considered reliable if published by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications" applies. You can attribute views to her. Better that than an AI agent churning out summaries of local news! Fences&Windows 14:19, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

You are, of course, correct on the expert issue. But I think we must accept that once in a while we run into catch 22 situations, and this may well be one of them, given the notes issue mentioned above. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 14:29, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

djsaviation.net - self-published?

I came across this source being used to verify airline routes - specifically this verifying a route between Moscow and Dubai. However I noticed that each and every article on that website appears to be written by the same person… is this potentially WP:SPS? Danners430 _{tweaks made} 07:59, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

The owner appear to be the editor and author of nearly all the posts. The only article I could find that wasn't by the owner[67] is by someone who seems to have some background in the topic[68]. Even for more established sites the owner's/editor's own article might be considered selfpublished. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:49, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

RfC: Android Police

Moved from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Sources § RfC: Android Police

How reliable is Android Police, specifically for topics related to apps and video games?

Related threads:

• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Sources/Archive 12#Android Police
• Mentions and discussions at AfD: [69]
• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Sources/Archive 38#Android Police

NewAccount7295 (talk) 21:52, 6 July 2026 (UTC)

Why is this an RFC? Do you believe the current consensus assessment of Android Police on this page of unreliable is inaccurate? Has more information come to light or has there been a change that you think would materially affect the reliability of the source? ~ A412 ^talk! 22:11, 6 July 2026 (UTC)

They are a pretty prolific source when it comes to mobile games. Saying they are or aren't reliable has a bit of an impact of what you might cite when writing such articles. I come across it quite often, so I think it deserves more discussion. NewAccount7295 (talk) 22:14, 6 July 2026 (UTC)

But you're not providing anyone with any new information or evidence to change the status quo. What is your argument that the site is reliable? "I come across it quite often" isn't one. -- ferret (talk) 22:37, 6 July 2026 (UTC)

In reply to you and @A412: The first thread was started in 2015 by @ReaderofthePack, who stated: "Offhand this looks good. It has an editorial staff and the article was written by a staff member. I don't see anything that gives off the impression that they charge for anything, so this is likely usable."

The thread received one reply from @Hellknowz, who determined that it was unreliable due to the site's lack of an editorial staff compared to similar sites, stating more precisely, "I doubt this would be above situational." They listed it as unreliable on the source list a month later [70]

In a December 2018 AFD, @Jovanmilic97 stated that the source should be moved to inconclusive, because they claimed it was "certainly was not a consensus in any sense".

The source was acquired by Valnet in 2021. You may view their About page here. [71] I started a thread about it in February, which @Sergecross73 had also replied to, so I'll notify them as well.

I didn't argue in the RFC that the source is reliable. The point of the RfC is to gain a firm consensus on whether or not it is. NewAccount7295 (talk) 23:01, 6 July 2026 (UTC)

A review is below. As a source, I think it's okay. However, a more germane issue is that the site's gaming coverage seems to have been held up almost entirely by RS-affiliated journalist Tomas Franzese, who is no longer writing content for the site as of October 2025 ([72][73]). That has effectively stopped the flow of gaming coverage entirely, which is no longer clearly linked in the site directory. So the utility of this site to WP:VG/S is historically useful but presently minimal.

+ Site has been present for a long time, since 2010.

+ Managing editor is Steven Winkelman ([74]), who has a journalism qualification and is widely published in RS PCMag ([75]) and Digital Trends.

+ There is a documented staff list with tenured editors and a copy editor ([76]). It appears news editor Chandra Steele is an experienced writer and has similarly come from PC Mag as a features writer ([77][78]). Copy editor Coletta Whitehead has written web content for Lifewire and done content editing for Dotdash for years ([79]).

+ There is an onsite review policy committing to integrity when testing products, identifying where content is sponsored, and not being influenced by companies in scoring a review ([80]).

~ The site's editorial policies are not hosted onsite but link to Valnet's editorial standards ([81]). Given concerns, take from that what you will.

- Site was acquired by Valnet in 2021 ([82]): according to WP:VALNET and project discussions, this is cause for caution given publisher-wide questions about reliability and editorial standards, but should be interpreted in context of the site itself.

- As above, gaming coverage was being handled almost entirely by one person, and that person is now gone. That isn't fatal to the site's reliability, but it does suggest the site's editorial focus really isn't in the games department, and was leaning on a former staff member's expertise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vrxces (talk • contribs) 23:30, 6 July 2026 (UTC)

Discussion moved NewAccount7295 (talk) 22:31, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

• Has there been a current discussion before this RFC was created? As per the header notice and edit notice RFCs shouldn't be opened without prior discussion. If not I suggest this is closed and a normal discussion started. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:52, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

  Also I'm not sure what happens if you move a RFC after it's been given a RFCID, hopefully the bot will work out what happened but it might be broken. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:52, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

  The two discussions linked in the opening of the RfC. NewAccount7295 (talk) 23:05, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

  Fair enough on the one from Feb 2026, the one from 2015 isn't relevant. Do you disagree with the comments from the 2026 discussion, and it's listing at WP:VG/S? -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:00, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Mantanweb

I added a Mantanweb article to List of music venues in Asia. This article says that approximately 200,000 people attended a Glay concert at Makuhari Messe on July 31, 1999. Do we consider it to be a reliable source? Achmad Rachmani (talk) 00:01, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

They're a pop culture website that's been around for quite some time. I would be careful using them for contentious or BLP material, but I don't see why they wouldn't be reliable for this use. The 200,000 claim was also reported by Variety back in 1999[83]. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:56, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

The CDC published a page saying autism causing vaccines is "not proven either way" and "needs further study"

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccine-safety/about/autism.html Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 01:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Goverments are reliable for their attributed statements, opinions and positions. NPOV would require that any such use was balanced with secondary sources stating the actual scientific consensus in the matter, something that governments don't get to decide. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:49, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

This makes me worried about the CDC's opinion being considered to be of similar weight to other major health orgs, see for example the first paragraph of vaccines and autism. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 15:14, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

The issue is we should never have relied on government organisations, but they're free and easy to access. It was fine as long as governments were all part of the consensus model, but runs into a wall once governments insert political opinion. The solution I would suggest with something like vaccines and autism would be to drop the first part of that sentence altogether. It was always the scientific research that decided the matter not government organisations. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 15:43, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

In the past, the CDC operated not as a direct organ of the government but as a organization with dual purposes of administrative functionality to address epidemiological concerns and scientific research. In that latter role, the use of the CDC was not problematic and indeed it was one of the best sources reflecting broadly accepted scientific opinion.

However, recent events have made it increasingly clear that the reliability of the CDC has come under attack Katzrockso (talk) 19:56, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

This isn't recent. Scientific research has been under attack from one political party in the US since the 1970s. I recently posted elsewhere on the Vietnam War talk page how this all started with that war and led to the decline of the NSF, civilian R&D, and the general trending decline in science overall in the U.S. This also intersects with one political party cutting federal and state spending across the board for education. At the same time, this was marked by the rise in politically-aligned think tanks publishing doctored research denying science, which continues unabetted to this day. Most people here are aware of the battles fought over AIDS research in the 1980s, but many may not know how one side of the aisle sought to hamstring the CDC in 1996 by refusing to allow federal funds to study gun violence. To suggest that this is all a recent phenomenon is missing the boat by about 50 years. Viriditas (talk) 22:10, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

It's recent enough that a known antivaxx quacker is now secretary of health.

Also not a coincidence that the US is now experiencing a record high cases of measles in the last 35 years.

Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:49, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

This outcome may appear "recent" to you, but this has been in the works for a long time. The biggest supporter of the secretary of health are so-called libertarians of the Koch variety, for example, the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER). Whenever you turn over a rock here, you find the same people. This is what I was alluding to with "the rise in politically-aligned think tanks" in the 1970s. This is all connected. The reality is that this goes much farther back than 50 years. AIER and all the other groups like them came out of the opposition to the New Deal. Until we combat this kind of social transgression, an ongoing, neo-Confederate, cold Civil War against the American people themselves, and specifically uphold democratic institutions with laws not norms, this will continue. Viriditas (talk) 23:22, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Yes, it's all connected. That said, the CDC resisted that shit. Now it's been infiltrated from the inside. That's the difference. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:43, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

I consider it unreliable. First, we have to consider that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is the head of the HHS. As he is an anti-vaccine activist, I wouldn't be surprised if the CDC report was swayed towards a conservative anti-vax perspective as a result. SVG-image-maker (talk) 00:59, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Since reliability depends on context, we can just say that the current (2025-2028) CDC under the second Trump administration and RFK Jr. is generally unreliable for factual information about vaccines and autism because RFK Jr. is well-known for anti-vaccine activism and promotion of public-health conspiracy theories. We can (and should) use that page as a source for how the CDC under RFK Jr. promotes false claims of a link between vaccines and autism. SuperPianoMan9167 (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

I first proposed that in February of 2025, but broader: "All US government sources dated after January 20, 2025, are generally unreliable." Viriditas (talk) 23:34, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Trump is already known for being notoriously unreliable so I don't think explicitly pointing that out is necessary. Of course, the US government will always be the definitive source for the text of laws passed by Congress, presidential executive orders, Supreme Court rulings, etc. SuperPianoMan9167 (talk) 23:42, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Maybe, but even Trump's Executive Orders are unreliable, as they have attempted to override Congress and even the Constitution, which they cannot do. There's a difference between citing something as a primary source and interpreting what it means, which is why this is a problem. This was recently discussed in relation to Executive Order 14224, with wikilawyers basically tabling the discussion and refusing to even address it. In other words, even EO 14224 is unreliable. Viriditas (talk) 23:53, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Sankei Sports

I added a Sankei Sports article to List of music venues in Asia. This article says that Takuro revealed the surprising behind-the-scenes of "Glay Expo '99 Survival" at Makuhari Messe on July 31 attended by approximately 200,000 people. Do we consider it to be a reliable source? Achmad Rachmani (talk) 01:15, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

Sankei Sports is a established news organisation, unless there are specific concerns it's generally reliable with the normal caveats of WP:NEWSORG. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:03, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

To the OP, may help to look at WP:RS for what counts for a reliable source. Ramos1990 (talk) 20:11, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

www.bishop-accountability.org

Very much Wikipedia coverage of Catholic clergy sex abuse relies on news stories which are no longer online, but taken from www.bishop-accountability.org. This site is run by activists with their own agenda, it is rather tendentious, and I am uncomfortable using it if it is the only sourcing we have. May I ask what other editors think of this source? -- Melchior2006 (talk) 15:50, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

Well, an individual editor can probably look at it to find copies of a story, and then just not link the story - it is perfectly okay to cite offline news articles. The reliability of this website would not affect the original stories, reliability of those is based on the publication they were created by. Considering any news stories they reupload would be in violation of copyright, the site should be not be linked for those per WP:COPYLINK. If it produces any new materials, they don't seem reliable, it isn't a professional publication, especially for the higher requirements of BLPs. PARAKANYAA (talk) 15:56, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

They have some use by others, and academic connection[84], but I would be extremely weary about using them directly for BLP material given the subject. It would be better to allow secondary sources to analyse anything they produce themselves.
The reliability of anything they host stays with the original source, that it's hosted by them doesn't change it's reliability. Even if the courtesy link to bishop-accountability.org is removed the reference might still be valid, as it could still be available elsewhere offline.
They have some details about donating material to the database, but the question of copyright isn't clear. As ever if there are questions about copyright, then that link shouldn't be included. They do host government reports as part of the resources they have, and things like that would be in the public domain. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 18:54, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

I have two questions about the way www.bishop-accountability "copies" news stories, presumably without permission. First off, how can we know their transcriptions are correct? Second, what do you mean by "that link shouldn't be included". Do you mean this source should not be used, or literally, that the link / URL should not be named? -- Melchior2006 (talk) 07:24, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

It would be exceptional to think that a site associated with academic endeavours would be falsifying copies, unless secondary sources are calling them out for it. This isn't just some random website serving content slop. The source maybe also be available offline to verify.
As to copyright, see WP:ELNEVER point one. If a website is hosting copyrighted material it should never be linked to unless they're the copyright holder, the content owner has clearly licensed the content to the website, or the content complies with fair use. If you're uncertain about the copyright don't link it. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 10:44, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

If the are hosting content that is ain breach of copyright, the link to their site should be removed and the reference changed to reflect the original source. Just because we can't link to them doesn't mean the original source is unreliable, or that the reference should be completely removed. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:39, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

You'd have to be Daily Mail-tier unreliable to be untrustworthy to merely hold a copy of something. You can cite the story, just do not include the URL. The Cite news template does not require one. PARAKANYAA (talk) 03:29, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

It is inappropriate to link to as a source for copyright reasons. It seems to be reasonably accurate in its reproduction of materials, and it does note what source they copied. As such, we should be able to replace existing links in many, probably most cases by linking to either a digital version of the original story at its publication's website or a copy at a proper legal newspaper archive -- I recently replaced one such link with a newspapers.com link. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 14:46, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

@NatGertler Many, many newspapers are not in online archives or otherwise online. You can simply not link it. PARAKANYAA (talk) 03:31, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm not saying that it's going to work for everything, but there should be a large portion where either the specified source is available or what's there is actually a wire story that can be found elsewhere. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 03:51, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

In general, try to link to the original source where possible. If it's offline, then try something that's more immediately verifiable - newspapers.com has been available through WP:TWL as something you can apply to for a bit. The bigger problem is a WP:COPYLINK consideration: if they're not getting permission to lawfully re-host the material, then we probably should not be linking to them. If they're paying for rights, etc., that would not be as much of a problem.

Another thing to consider is that sometimes stories are taken down for reasons that are not just migration from one website map to another. Even if this were fine WP:COPYLINK-wise, you want to be really careful that this isn't something that was retracted/corrected. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 21:28, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

This is one of my greatest concerns with the source's reliability. It pre-selects materials according to its activist goals. You will only find one type of content there, and perhaps not the retractions/corrections. Also, they use volunteer work, but the website has no corrective mechanisms, like Wikipedia does. -- Melchior2006 (talk) 06:42, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Andrey Rappoport

Andrey Rappoport appears to be notable, but cited sources are all paid except Forbes. Can we deprecate Tech Times and Latin Post? ~2026-41539-18 (talk) 07:20, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

Also, take a look at another specimen, Zack Mozes (writer). ~2026-41539-18 (talk) 07:22, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

Deprecation is only for the worst and most problematic of sources, and would require a WP:RFC. It wouldn't be appropriate in this case.
Some additional opinions would be helpful, but the Tech Times and Latin Post articles look like AI output, and the fact the both decided at random to write full biographies of the subject within two days makes me think it's promo. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 10:56, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

The other sources in the article are equally poor, the Luxuo article also looks like AI generated promo, while the Daily Trust and Tribune articles are undisclosed advertorials (see WP:NEWSORGNIGERIA and the last point of WP:SYO). -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:01, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

I think this is ripe for AfD. The fact that this article was created by an editor who abuses the minor edit tag frequently doesn't give me confidence either. Cortador (talk) 14:20, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

Given it was created only a couple of days after many of the sources were published I'm wonder if it should be at COIN. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:30, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

The Tech Times, Latin Post, Daily Trust, and Tribune articles were published from a period of April 10-13 2026 and every single one of them is structured almost identically and substantially incredibly similar, despite ostensibly having different authors and all the publications supposedly being unaffiliated. These are all really obvious SEO slop blogs; I've never seen a legitimate biography in a newspaper that was full of tables, SEO-style FAQ sections, and a long list of every spelling- and script-variant of the subject's name...

The Luxuo article was published a couple months afterwards, and in another bizarre long table references the subject's Wikipedia article plus some of the aforementioned slop blogs, in addition to even more nearly identical slop blogs that haven't even been mentioned yet! In my opinion, this is all complete paid promo slop, without even having to get into whether it's AI-generated (which is also clearly the case). ^purring_maggot (talk) 16:51, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

It is clearly a COI matter, as Shy Pinguin (talk · contribs) claims to be the of the photo on the page, which was clearly taken during the same photo session as the ones on the subject's website. The file description claims that it was "taken from the family archive", which a) casts into doubt their claim as the photo's author, but b) would indicate that they have access to the family archive. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 17:27, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

AfD may be tricky, because while the Forbes sources used in the article could be dismissed (built around his placements on lists, and not in the top 100 at that), this stand-alone article Forbes Russia would be hard to deny as a sufficiently in-depth piece and would seem at least a major step in asserting notability. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 17:38, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

I've boldly stubified the article given its extensive reliance on AI-generated unreliable sources. The Russian Wikipedia article cites numerous Russian-language sources that could be cited instead. Ca ^{talk to me!} 18:23, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

Dubai Investment Fund

Please do check this as well. Sources cluster was published in 2022. It appears to be another abuse of WP:NEWSORGINDIA and WP:NEWSORGNIGERIA. I'm not sure what we should do when supposedly reliable sources become deceptively unreliable. This is for the history books. Such an unforgivable mistake. ~2026-41511-83 (talk) 16:42, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

Now at AfD. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:19, 26 July 2026 (UTC)