Talk:Ad Fontes Media/Archive 1

Archive 1

Notability

I added a number of sources and made some edits. Some of the articles focus on Ad Fontes or the chart entirely, some of them mention it as part of a larger article. Hopefully this will satisfy the notability question, although there are other places it's been mentioned as well if needed. The media bias chart should definitely be on wikipedia IMHO since it is one of the more well known media watchdog organizations, and currently (again, IMHO) wikipedia does a pretty poor job in covering media watchdog organizations. Nablais (talk) 16:31, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

The coverage in Newsy, MarketWatch, and 9 News is enough to satisfy the general notability guideline, in my opinion. I've removed the notability template. — Newslinger talk 01:09, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

"Did you know"

Thanks for creating this article, Nablais. Would you be interested in submitting this article to "Did you know"? — Newslinger talk 01:14, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for your improvements Newslinger! Sure! I haven't submitted anything to DYK, although I've been meaning to learn how. Do you have any recommendations? Nablais (talk) 01:25, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

To have this article featured on DYK, you'll need to come up with a hook – an interesting fact about the article subject that is phrased in an attention-grabbing way. The highest-quality hooks are usually reserved for April Fools' Day, and you can see last years' hooks at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2019/April § 1 April 2019. The hook for Ad Fontes Media doesn't have to be as impactful as one of those, but it does need to be interesting, neutral, and reliably sourced in the article. Are you up for the challenge?​ — Newslinger talk 01:39, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks! I'll think of something to submit, although I probably won't do it tonight. Cheers!​ Nablais (talk) 01:55, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Take your time, you have a week from when the article is created to submit something. The hook can be adjusted after you submit it, and the review process might take a few more weeks. ​— Newslinger talk 02:03, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 19:44, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

• ... that according to the Media Bias Chart, news sources on one political extreme or another are much more likely to contain factually incorrect information than ones in the middle?
  • ALT1:... that Vanessa Otero, creator of the Media Bias Chart, believes "extreme sources play on people’s worst instincts, like fear and tribalism, and take advantage of people’s confirmation biases"?

• Comment: I (Nablais) created the article and Newslinger helped expand it. This is my first submission to DYK.

Created by Nablais (talk) and Newslinger (talk). Nominated by Nablais (talk) at 01:43, 1 April 2020 (UTC).

• Thanks for submitting this, Nablais. I'm not sure about the main hook, since it appears to be based on an original reading of the chart itself. Ideally, hooks should be based on content in the article that is supported by a reliable secondary source. ALT1 is fine on reliability grounds, but I wonder if there is a way to paraphrase Otero's words. — Newslinger talk 08:18, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

  Source for ALT1: One of Otero's reasons for creating the organization was that "many sources people consider to be ‘news sources’ are actually dominated by analysis and opinion pieces," and that these "extreme sources play on people’s worst instincts, like fear and tribalism, and take advantage of people’s confirmation biases."

— Newslinger talk 08:42, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Full review needed. BlueMoonset (talk) 15:23, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

The proposed hooks are both about a product, and offer no insight at all about the company which is the subject of the article in question. New hooks are needed here that focus on Ad Fontes Media. Flibirigit (talk) 07:01, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

How about:

• ALT2:... that Ad Fontes Media is the company behind the viral Media Bias Chart?

Comment: Not sure if you want "Media Bias Chart" to be bolded too if you want to focus on the company, but I could see either way considering they end up linking to the same place via redirect. Nablais (talk) 02:25, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

"Media Bias Chart" should not be bolded as Ad Fontes Media is the subject of the hook and the MBC link is just a redirect. In a hook there shouldn't be more than one link to the same article. Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 02:41, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

Ok, changed. Nablais (talk) 02:44, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

In any case I don't think ALT2 is suitable either as it sounds promotional (with words such as "company behind" and "viral", which you can frequently find in advertisements). Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 02:52, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

Ok, how about something like:

ALT3:... that Vanessa Otero founded Ad Fontes Media after her Media Bias Chart became popular on Imgur?

Nablais (talk) 03:21, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

[[File:|120px|Version 2.0 of the Media Bias Chart (2017) ]]

Version 2.0 of the Media Bias Chart (2017)

Here are a few more suggestions:

• ALT4:... that after Ad Fontes Media rated InfoWars as "nonsense damaging to public discourse" on its Media Bias Chart (pictured), InfoWars responded with a heavily criticized chart that described the Associated Press as "tyranny"?
  • Source: Alex Jones, the founder of right-wing conspiracy theory site InfoWars, said Ad Fontes' chart represented the "dying dinosaur media's extreme liberal bias" after the chart classified InfoWars as "nonsense damaging to public discourse". InfoWars responded with a chart of their own, putting themselves as "independent" and representing "freedom" while labeling news sources like the Associated Press as "tyranny" and "state-run corporate/foreign influences"; InfoWars's chart was widely criticized by journalists on Twitter.
• ALT5:... that the founder of media watchdog organization Ad Fontes Media compared low-quality news sources to junk food?
  • Sources:
    • ...Otero founded Ad Fontes Media to serve as the publisher of the chart.
    • She compared low-quality sources to junk food, and described sources with extreme biases as "very toxic and damaging to the country".
• ALT6:... that Ad Fontes Media uses a panel of left-, center-, and right-leaning analysts to rate the political bias and reliability of news sources on its Media Bias Chart (pictured)?
  • Source: A panel of three reviewers (consisting of one left-, one center-, and one right-leaning analyst) scores the bias and reliability of each article evaluated for the chart.

I understand that the hook should focus on the organization, but the only documented role of the organization is to administer the Media Bias Chart. — Newslinger talk 08:25, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

• Full review needed now that new hooks have been proposed. BlueMoonset (talk) 17:44, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

• Approved for ALT 5 since it's the only one that I consider really hooky out of the bunch. Was new enough at time of creation, no close paraphrasing or copyvios, sourcing checks out.--3family6 (Talk to me | See what I have done) 17:04, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

References

reversion

Aapelle, I'm sorry, I don't understand the edit summary here? —valereee (talk) 15:45, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Valereee, the text states "the Columbia Journalism Review questioned". This is not accurate. The *journal as whole* did not say anything as an *entity*. It *published* an opinion article by Tamar Wilner. It was not a statement on behalf of the organization as a whole. It would be more accurate to say that Tamar Wilner "questioned" rather than the journal "questioned". The previous wording gives the statement the misleading authority of the whole organization.Aapelle (talk) 18:00, 3 November 2020 (UTC)Aapelle (talk) 18:01, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Why do you think it's an opinion? --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 17:15, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Hipal/Ronz Is it not an opinion piece? Regardless, whether opinion or something else is not material. Most importantly, the byline of the article is explicitly "By Tamar Wilner". It is not "By the Columbia Journalism Review." The Columbia Journalism Review is the publisher, not the author. Attributing the whole article to the organization is inaccurate and misleading.Aapelle (talk) 18:00, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Aapelle, I don't think you understand how this works. Something that is published in a journal like the Columbia Journalism Review isn't an "opinion" just because it's not written by the editorial board. The editorial board reviewed it, since that's how that works; that doesn't mean that everyone agrees with it, but it means that it meets their standards for publication. It is more than an "opinion"--it's a peer-reviewed published article. Would you suggest that "Middle Pleistocene bird consumption at Level XI of Bolomor Cave (Valencia, Spain)" is an opinion piece because it's written by two scientists, and not the entire editorial board? Drmies (talk) 18:04, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

No, you're being very dense. Firstly, this is not a "study" in the CJR. But secondly and of exclusive importance, in that example you cited "Middle Pleistocene bird consumption at Level XI of Bolomor Cav" you would not say "The Journal of Archaeological Science found" when describing the results. You would say "Blascoa and Fernández (2009) found". There is an important distinction here between the publisher and the author.Aapelle (talk) 18:09, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Well, maybe you should read more carefully. If you did, you would have noticed that I didn't take issue with your edit, but with your comment about "opinion piece". If that's too dense for you, I'm really sorry. Drmies (talk) 18:13, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Aapelle, please refactor the ad hominem, and remember to focus on content and policy.

So do we agree it's not simply an opinion piece? --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 18:17, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

I don't object to either version, but Aapelle, you do need to realize that the Columbia Journalism Review, like most academic journals, is peer-reviewed. WP believes they wouldn't publish that unless they had checked her research and didn't think she was just stating an opinion. —valereee (talk) 18:20, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Folks, I apologize for verging on ad hominen. What kind of piece this is is not material to the issue. In fact, I think Drmies and I agree on the issue at hand regarding attribution/citation. Can you confirm? His example makes the issue very clear. I don't know where are wikipedia's citation policies specifically, but if this was an academic paper one would write "Wilner (2018) finds" or in the bird article example "Blascoa and Fernández (2009) found." In neither case would one write "The CJR finds" or "The Journal of Archaeological Studies finds." Please see here regarding in text citation (you are supposed to use the *author* not the publisher): https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa6_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_the_basics.html#:~:text=When%20using%20APA%20format%2C%20follow,the%20end%20of%20the%20paper.Aapelle (talk) 18:31, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi, if you look at Wikipedia's citation guidelines I think the correct way to cite this is clear and supports my edits clearly. Please see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Inline_citation I would like to go back to my changes where the subject of the sentence is the author of the article and not the publisher.Aapelle (talk) 18:44, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Aapelle, again, the objection isn't to the change. The change is not a problem. The problem is with you characterizing this as opinion. The fact someone objects to not using attribution is enough (and while I disagree that in this case it's necessary, I'm neutral on including the author's name.) What I'm objecting to is your assertion that the original version was inaccurate at all. Also to calling another editor very dense; that's not verging on ad hominem. It is ad hominem, and WP doesn't like that at all. I'd appreciate if you'd strike it by enclosing it in <s>(text)</s> . —valereee (talk) 18:54, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

—valereee Happy to strike! To be clear this change is not based on what type of article this is (eg a study or not). It is based only on best practice guidelines for citation that attributes work to the author and not the publisher or journal. This is the basics of citation, but it is an important one as it doesn't misattribute authority. Is there anyone who still takes issue with the guidelines for citation by both Wiki and the APA? Otherwise I will revert the change back to "Tamar Wilner, writing in the Columbia Journalism Review,...". The remaining in-text citation of the Columbia Journalism Review is not strictly necessary and is even a bit wordy, but I will leave that. The insertion of the author's name as the subject (in the grammatical sense) in necessary for an accurate citation.Aapelle (talk) 19:03, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

It is an article appearing in a journal. Op-ed (as per a newspaper) was an unfair characterization. However, the original citation is both objectively inconsistent with best practice guidelines by Wikipedia and others. And further, I think the original woriding is problematic, which is why I'm proposing the change. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aapelle (talk • contribs) 19:14, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

I've revised the content. [1] Does that suffice? If not, why?

In Wikipedia, attributing an author or publisher outside the reference is used for emphasis and to indicate quality. In this case, I believe CJR is being highlighted because it is such a high-quality reference. The arguments for changing it appear to be centered around undermining this emphasis. --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 19:21, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Aapelle, please discuss rather than continue to change the article to your personally preferred version. --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 19:35, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, Hipal/Ronz why did *you* continue to change it without agreement? Anyway, properly attributing the author as per citation guidelines doesn't undermine anything; it promotes accuracy. in fact, the original wording clearly over-emphasized and misattributed the source. moving on...the "a CJR article" change is an improvement (!) from the prior wording. Starting from scratch, the most basic way to cite this article would be "Tamar Wilner (2018) questioned". however, to be clear, I do not propose removing "columbia journalism" from the text. if you insist on emphasizing the quality of the publication, i see no problem in including it. what I propose is adding the author, which you should do for an in line citation. That I propose either (a) "A 2018 CJR article by Tamar Wilmer questioned" or (b) "Tamar Wilmer, in an 2018 article published by the CJR, questioned".Aapelle (talk) 19:50, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm fine with Hipal's tweak. Yes, we can include the name; no, we don't have to include the name. I often do that if it's a notable person, and adding a name adds some weight, but I really don't have a strong opinion. Drmies (talk) 21:20, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

No strong opinion either, just want to affirm it's not necessary in this case. —valereee (talk) 21:25, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm fine with mentioning Tamar Wilmer's name. I agree that it's not necessary unless the writer is notable, or the writer has received attention for the statement made. — Newslinger talk 01:39, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

new version

Marquis de Faux, are you a member of the Ad Fontes Media team? The previous chart was an older version uploaded by them to OTRS for use by Wikipedia under a free use license. We were purposefully using an old version because they want to retain copyright on their newer version. —valereee (talk) 21:15, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

No. I have removed it. Sorry about that. Marquis de Faux (talk) 01:03, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Marquis de Faux, no worries! —valereee (talk) 14:40, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

commas

People keep changing As of September 2020, the organization had a team of around twenty, mostly independent contractors, working as analysts of various news sources to As of September 2020, the organization had a team of around twenty mostly independent contractors working as analysts of various news sources. They aren't "mostly-independent contractors". Most of them are independent contractors. We need to either retain this punctuation or recast this sentence. I'll try recasting, but please let's discuss. —valereee (talk) 14:22, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Potential ref

• Heldebrandt, Beth (2019-12-03). "How a popular media bias chart determines what news can be trusted". Gateway Journalism Review. Retrieved 2020-12-08.

Seems useful, but not how it was initially used. --Hipal (talk) 15:16, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

Use of ACRLog as a reference

Under Reception, I added information about an article written by librarians expressing concerns about the Media Bias Chart. Since librarians often suggest people check Wikipedia to see if a source is credible, it seems essential to include critiques of the chart, not just complimentary works. Can you explain why the addition was revered? Rkmss99 (talk) 02:14, 2 May 2021 (UTC)Rkmss99

Here's the content:

In 2021, an article on the Association of College and Research Libraries' blog explored some of the problematic aspects of the Media Bias Chart. The authors critiqued how the Chart promotes a false equivalency between left and right, lionizes a political “center” as being without bias, reinforces harmful perceptions about what constitutes “news” in our media ecosystem, and is ignored by anyone that doesn’t already hold a comparable view of the media landscape. The authors argued that trying to capture the complexities of source credibility in a visual chart was an oversimplification, and detrimental to information and media literacy efforts.

References

I'm unclear if that blog should be used as a reference at all. To use it for an entire paragraph seems grossly WP:UNDUE and rather unencyclopedic. --Hipal (talk) 16:20, 2 May 2021 (UTC)

The blog is an official outlet for the Association of College and Research Libraries, the national organization for academic librarians."ACRLog advances the ACRL Strategic Plan 2020 which mandates “Increasing ACRL’s communication on major trends and issues in libraries.” I can see that the text should be shortened to match earlier parts of the section , though. Rkmss99 (talk) 01:39, 3 May 2021 (UTC)Rkmss99

Thanks for responding. Let's see what others think: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#ACRLog --Hipal (talk) 16:12, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

References

Another attempt to remove the Columbia Journalism Review reference

In 2018, a Columbia Journalism Review article questioned the thoroughness of the Media Bias Chart and similar initiatives, stating that "the five to 20 stories typically judged on these sites represent but a drop of mainstream news outlets' production".

References

The most recent removal seems to be based upon WP:OR and a non-independent, primary source. --Hipal (talk) 17:56, 12 November 2021 (UTC)

@Hipal:I see this as a very, very fundamental example of an underlying systemic problem regarding how Wikipedia operates in its treatment of sources. Anonymous - and presumably, we can't know - unqualified "editors" are placing their own personal judgement above that of the professionals, the experts, in this particular matter (among others). Ad Fontes Media has received praise from across the mainstream media landscape. More importantly, it has be cited as an authority in peer-reviewed academic studies which actually delve into the issues with which we're all supposed to be talking about here.

To give but one example:

We compared the Media Bias/Fact Check list with a list of 115 sources from a recent paper from the Berkman Center at Harvard and found a 0.77 Pearson correlation with p < 2.2∗10−16 when comparing bias ratings for all 87 sources that the lists had in common. We also correlated the list from Media Bias/Fact Check with 105 sources listed in the Media Bias Chart from Ad Fontes Media. We found a 0.92 Pearson correlation with p < 2.2 ∗ 10−16 for the 85 sources these lists shared. Finally, we compared the larger list with a set of 200 matching sources from the AllSides Media Bias Ratings.6ere, we found a Pearson correlation of 0.81 with p < 2.2 ∗ 10−16. These correlations are strong enough for us to trust the larger partisanship classification of 1,434 sources for our analysis. It is important to have such a large set of sources in order to accurately determine the broader media consumption diets of our participants — as described below our participants visited hundreds of these sources..

— Frank Bentley, Katie Quehl, Jordan Wirfs-Brock, and Melissa Bica., "Understanding Online News Behaviors.", In CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems Proceedings (2019)

EnlightenmentNow1792 (talk) 08:18, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

This is not the venue for questioning how Wikipedia works.

Can you address the policy concerns concerning the content removal? --Hipal (talk) 04:00, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

Have done so, as you well know, in the edit summary, and in the academic, peer-reviewed source I quoted above. EnlightenmentNow1792 (talk) 16:43, 26 November 2021 (UTC)

I guess we're not going to find consensus then if you cannot provide a better explanation. --Hipal (talk) 16:52, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

I've restored it. Sorry I didn't get around to it earlier.

Should the example given above be included as well? --Hipal (talk) 22:24, 7 May 2022 (UTC)