Talk:Fake news website/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

List being updated

creative commons list being updated here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10eA5-mCZLSS4MQY5QGb5ewC3VAL6pLkT53V_81ZyitM/preview

Victor Grigas (talk) 02:19, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

If you check it again, the list itself is gone, and all that remains is tips for how to avoid such sites. Perhaps best used for that purpose. Although maybe you could copy it with that license to another Wiki website for archiving purposes. Sagecandor (talk) 02:25, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

List of fake news sites

I'm not sure that this is encyclopedic.

There are bound to be thousands and thousands of fake news sites both in existence now, and in the future.

If we name all of them, the article will be over dominated by such a list as opposed to discussion about them in paragraph form from cited sources.

Maybe the link given as a source could be most useful in either the "Further reading" or "External links" section.

Also, this source link appears to be a re-hashing of the list made by Melissa Zimdars, a media professor at Merrimack College in Massachusetts, which is already discussed in paragraph form in the article itself, and already linked as further reading.

Sagecandor (talk) 02:21, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

You know, I think you are right. That said, there are many pages on Wikipedia that are 'list of...'. What if we make a new page for 'list of fake news sites? It's not a place to learn ABOUT fake news (like this article is) but a place to identify what sites are fake news.Victor Grigas (talk) 02:42, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

@Victorgrigas:That's a great idea ... I'm not sure any of those fake news sites are individually "notable" to be on a list, are they? I think we should let the outside experts like Melissa Zimdars keep compiling the lists externally, and we can link back to them in the article here, what do you think? Sagecandor (talk) 02:53, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

I think the notability comes from the external list itself? What if at least two external sites claim for a site to be fake? What are the notability rules for this on Wikipedia? Is there an internal list of what sites might be considered noteworthy?Victor Grigas (talk) 03:01, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

Maybe we can use as a model the article you added to the "See also" section, namely List of satirical news websites. In that one it appears that to be listed there, all the sites have to be independently "notable" with their own already existing articles on Wikipedia. Perhaps we should stick to that type of standard? Sagecandor (talk) 03:06, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

I've created List of fake news websites using the list that was here. It should be expanded, but each entry should be individually sourced as I have done using named references. --JFH (talk) 03:10, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

@Jfhutson:That's a great initiative on your part, but I'm not sure Wikipedia is the place for that unless they are all each notable on their own. It's likely over time that page will either get deleted or redirected back to here, probably. Sagecandor (talk) 03:14, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

I don't think any of these are likely to be notable, but a list of them is useful, and I can't think of a guideline that would lead to its deletion as long as we source it.--JFH (talk) 03:15, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

If you want to do the effort to expand it, source it, and maintain it, that's awesome. I hope you're right! Sagecandor (talk) 03:18, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

Added three secondary sources

Added three secondary sources to sources Business Insider, and The Plain Dealer, and The Hollywood Reporter -- with edit here.

Sagecandor (talk) 13:19, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

Also removed reference to citation The Washington Post for same information and solely relying on secondary sources as mentioned above. The fact that many other secondary sources are now reporting on this exact same information from The Washington Post now makes it even more noteworthy. Sagecandor (talk) 13:24, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

Merge "Facebook and fake news" into this article

Proposal to merge "Facebook and fake news" into this article.

Covers exact same topic.

This article here covers it in better detail and better sourcing at section:

Fake_news_website#Responses_from_Google_and_Facebook.

Sagecandor (talk) 15:06, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

• Support I agree that this article covers the same stuff as the other one (which I created) but in more detail. Everymorning (talk) 22:15, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
• Support, as per explanation by Everymorning, basically. Sagecandor (talk) 22:22, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
• As it appears we are in agreement between the merge proposer and the only contributor (creator) to the page-to-be-merged-in, I might do this earlier than was going to. Was thinking about letting this run for one week, but since both parties agree to the merge, might do it sooner. Sagecandor (talk) 23:27, 19 November 2016 (UTC)
  • DONE -- merged all content in here from Facebook and fake news. Sagecandor (talk) 16:58, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

Paul Horner quote

I cut this yesterday with User:Snooganssnoogans's agreement, but User:Sagecandor has added it back - what does the article gain by telling the reader that one particular fake news writer claims to make $10,000 dollars a month and believes that "Trump is in the White House because of me"? It's not a useful figure on the profit from fake news because the next paragraph has a secondary source for Balkan teenagers making ten times that much, and it's all WP:NEWSPRIMARY - a secondary source commenting on one liar's impact might be worth mentioning, but that liar's self-aggrandising assessment of his own work seems inappropriate. --McGeddon (talk) 08:46, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

I understand how you feel and it is certainly most upsetting information. But it has been re-quoted and re-reported by many many secondary sources, three of which I cited in the article text itself, including "According to Business Insider, The Hollywood Reporter, and The Plain Dealer ..." before the quoted text itself. Sagecandor (talk) 13:01, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

1. Inside Edition
2. CBS News
3. TODAY
4. WHDT

Lots and lots of coverage in searches verbatim for "Paul Horner" and "Fake". Whether we like it or not, it is getting lots and lots of analysis from secondary sources. Sagecandor (talk) 13:06, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

Per WP:NEWSPRIMARY, interview quotes are considered primary sources, not secondary. --McGeddon (talk) 19:39, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

Right, but we've got listed above secondary sources reporting on it, and we avoid using the primary source, The Washington Post, in the article for that particular piece of information. Instead, we now rely upon three other secondary sources -- Business Insider, The Hollywood Reporter, and The Plain Dealer. Sagecandor (talk) 20:07, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

WP:NEWSPRIMARY explicitly considers "interviews and reports of interviews" to be the same thing. The real problem here is that most of the quotation is redundant - we already have a stronger secondary source on fake news revenue (giving a higher number), and a secondary source on the BLP claim that members of Trump's staff reposted fake stories. All this quote adds is a self-confessed hoaxer telling us how influential he believes himself to be. --McGeddon (talk) 20:41, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

I think we should remove Horner's quote on his supposed influence on the election. The man is not a political scientist, expert on politics or notable politician, and he shouldn't be quoted on that topic. Its' not a particularly interesting quote either. I'm neutral as to whether we should include Horner's claim as to how much he earns a month on fabricating news. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 20:16, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

I've removed all the quotations from that person, Better? Sagecandor (talk) 21:03, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

Evidently others feel the quotes should be included. After my edit, another user, Thunderforge, added it back as a new paragraph about the quotes, and I removed that in the spirit of collaboration from this talk page here. I've asked him on his talk page to come here to share his views. Sagecandor (talk) 21:37, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

And, it was added back, again, this time by Volunteer Marek at here. Sagecandor (talk) 21:40, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

My main reason for adding it was that there was nothing regarding this widely reported interview (I found it in an Ars Technica article) in the section for the 2016 Presidential election. It didn't even occur to me to look for it elsewhere. I do think that it's worth mentioning that he believes he influenced the election (because so many news sites are repeating that claim), but regardless, I think something needs to be in the 2016 US Presidential election section. -Thunderforge (talk) 21:52, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

So far we appear to have Sagecandor, Thunderforge, and Volunteer Marek for keeping some version of the quotes, and McGeddon and Snooganssnoogans against. Can we come to some sort of compromise resolution somehow? Sagecandor (talk) 21:55, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

As I stated in my edit summary, some of the quote is useful. I thought my version was a "compromise resolution" already.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:19, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

I can live with the current version, since my main concern was having something in the 2016 U.S. president section. I would still like to have Horner's claim that he influenced the election, but I think that the existing quote is acceptable. -Thunderforge (talk) 23:35, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

@Thunderforge:I'm okay with that too, but I'd like to come to a conclusion that makes the article more stable. Sagecandor (talk) 02:36, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

The New Yorker re-quoted the quotes, at "The Failure of Facebook Democracy". Sagecandor (talk) 17:38, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Classifying Politifact.com as a biased and satirical website

There seems to be an unsolicited, not sourced and incorrect claim that Politifact.com is a fact-checking website. Please justify this claim, or keep my edit on there, or let's compromise by not mentioning the website.

It needs a source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by PantherBF3 (talk • contribs) 23:59, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

If you need evidence that PolitiFact.com is a fact-checking website....try clicking on the link and reading the article itself. Please stop making politically motivated edits and pretending you are reverting trolls. Justeditingtoday (talk) 00:07, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

If you think that "source" includes an article from the website itself I think you are deluded and politically motivated. http://www.newsmax.com/Reagan/PolitiFact-Fact-Checkers-Bias/2015/03/20/id/631565/ http://www.breitbart.com/big-journalism/2016/07/12/epic-humiliation-politifact-makes-13-errors-in-a-single-clinton-cash-fact-check/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by PantherBF3 (talk • contribs) 00:09, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Neither are reliable sources, and hurling political invective will lead to a block. GAB^gab 00:11, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Neither is sourcing a claim about an organisation ... from the organisation itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by PantherBF3 (talk • contribs) 00:16, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Nobody said the organization should reference itself. I invited you to read the Wikipedia article on PolitiFact.com which has over 30 references. Justeditingtoday (talk) 00:27, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

@Justeditingtoday:Multiple secondary sources identifying PolitiFact.com as a fact-checking website were already provided in the article. Including the text:

Fact-checking website PolitiFact.com was praised by its colleagues at FactCheck.org and recommended as a resource for readers to check before sharing a potentially fake story.

References

Lori Robertson and Eugene Kiely (18 November 2016), "How to Spot Fake News", FactCheck.org, retrieved 19 November 2016

Praise from their competitors and colleagues over at FactCheck.org. Sagecandor (talk) 00:46, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Possible page move

Should this be called Fake news or Fake news article with content about the sites in a section within? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:17, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

Nah it's big enough for its own independent article. Sagecandor (talk) 13:02, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

Hi Sagecandor. Okay, fair enough. Cheers. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:42, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Anna Frodesiak ! Sagecandor (talk) 21:42, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

And thank you for the feedback, my friend. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:44, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

No problem, Anna Frodesiak. Say, we're having trouble coming to a good compromise resolution down on this page at Talk:Fake_news_website#Paul_Horner_quote, maybe you could weigh in with your wisdom for us. Sagecandor (talk) 21:49, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

Hmmmmm, I don't know what to say about that. Well, you are all fine at that thread. I'm sure you'll work it out. Sorry I can't help. Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 22:04, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

@Anna Frodesiak:Do you want to revisit after the article has now been expanded and see if the title still fits of if there is a wider title that could work? Sagecandor (talk) 04:07, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Hi Sagecandor. Well I'm pretty out of touch with this article. You and others who have been working on it should decide. Best wishes. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:32, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Alright no problem. Sagecandor (talk) 05:54, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Russia removal

I've removed the reference to Russia, as the claimed source on Buzzfeed claims to source that statement from another article (https://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/how-macedonia-became-a-global-hub-for-pro-trump-misinfo yet if you click that article, there is no mention of Russia. I assume this is anti-Russian rhetoric. 151.229.53.102 (talk) 22:50, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Right. The other citation does (this) — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 00:50, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

Re-read what I said please. On your Business Insider link, click the link to the source, it goes to Buzzfeed, but the Buzzfeed article doesn't mention Russia at all. I've reverted your edit, if you wish to remove it please clarify on my Talk page first to avoid an edit war. 151.229.53.102 (talk) 21:38, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

Problem solved. Used many other different secondary sources. Now extensively documented in its own separate subsection in the article. Sagecandor (talk) 01:38, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

@Rhododendrites:Incredibly revealing investigation by two separate expert research groups as reported by The Washington Post:

• Timberg, Craig (24 November 2016), "Russian propaganda effort helped spread 'fake news' during election, experts say", The Washington Post, retrieved 25 November 2016

Added and incorporated into the article and the introduction section. Sagecandor (talk) 03:44, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

@Sagecandor: I misunderstood the IP's original objection, but it looks like you've addressed it. Thanks. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 16:07, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

@Rhododendrites: Glad you approve! Sagecandor (talk) 16:11, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Over-reliability on single source

This article relies heavily on Buzzfeed citations. Is this considered a 'reliable' source to use anyway? The irony of criticising false news and citing Buzzfeed isn't lost on me. Given that it's predominantly left-wing, is it safe to assume that Buzzfeed is fine to quote? (I jest) 151.229.53.102 (talk) 23:06, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Buzzfeed does widely respected investigative reporting, in addition to the lists, gifs and other nonsense on the site. See, for instance, this piece by the Poynter Institute about Buzzfeed's investigative journalism[1]: how it has won and been nominated for journalism awards and how its journalists are highly esteemed. Or this piece about how CNN hired an entire investigative journalism team from Buzzfeed[2]. The stories that were broken by Buzzfeed in this article have been widely reported on elsewhere in reliable sources. So we're not being overly reliant on a bad source. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 23:34, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

The New Yorker significantly relied upon the investigative reporting by BuzzFeed News, at "The Failure of Facebook Democracy". Sagecandor (talk) 02:24, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

respected by whom?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.111.11.118 (talk) 21:31, 25 November 2016 (UTC) 

Geographic Bias

I added a couple of templates to the article because, after reading it, I noticed a very strong geographic bias. That's not necessarily surprising given how many US-based contributors there are on Wikipedia (myself included), but writing an article using primarily US-based research and sources gives a US-slanted article.

For example, in the lead section alone, the following sources are mentioned: BuzzFeed, US News & World Report, PropOrNot and Foreign Policy Research Institute, GWU, RAND, and President Obama. All quite clearly American sources, and no viewpoints from any countries outside the United States. The article itself does provide a greater diversity of sources, but they too are limited to pretty much just the United States and Western Europe.

I'd also like to point out that "fake news" is a broader concept than just the US presidential election, so it's not fitting (and US-biased) for the lead section to solely focus on that topic. --Slon02 (talk) 21:01, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Strongly disagree. The article cites issues involving Russia, Macedonia, Romania, Sweden, Germany, Indonesia, and Philippines. Slon02 has provided zero secondary sources to back up his spurious claims of bias. The article presents a global focus already. Sagecandor (talk) 21:46, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Indeed. You'll need to show some sort of evidence other than your own research/belief to support that. This has been a major story in the United States recently, so a large number of available sources will be based in the US. It's also a neologism that, while it refers to something broader, is specific enough and contentious enough that we'd need sources specifically calling things "fake news" (rather than simply incorrect, sensational, conspiracist, etc.). You may be right, but there needs to be a better justification/explanation for placing a tag like that. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 22:31, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, Rhododendrites, for your helpful explanation here. In addition, I've taken care to make some edits to improve the global and worldwide focus on multiple different countries of the article. Hopefully this shows, right from the introduction itself, that this is a global issue impacting multiple different countries throughout the world, and that the article now covers this. Sagecandor (talk) 22:34, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

I was interviewed by Vice about fake news

I don't know if this is useful for the media section? I certainly won't add it, but wanted everyone to know it's here: http://www.vice.com/en_se/read/a-wikipedian-told-us-how-wikipedia-stays-reliable-in-the-fake-news-era Victor Grigas (talk) 19:33, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Wow, thanks ! Sagecandor (talk) 19:35, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

I saw that, great job Victor! And thank you.Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:11, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

In an article about the reliability of Wikipedia, it's somewhat less-than reassuring to see the words: "How deep is the Mariana trench? Forty-three miles." --Hillbillyholiday ^talk 23:49, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Someone on my facebook feed mentioned that too. Want to reach out to the writer for a correction? I don't think I should, and a Wikipedian doing it would have more weight and would further prove the point of the article.Victor Grigas (talk) 00:47, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Trump vs. Clinton

Pretty much every source I've seen emphasizes that the fake news purveyors tried out both anti-Clinton and anti-Trump stories but it was only the former that took off. This should be reflected in our article.Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:26, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I saw that reported on by lots of secondary sources also. It's already in the article in multiple places. Quite strange times, I wonder why that pattern was? Sagecandor (talk) 23:27, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Just a comment, but fake news websites are specialists in telling people what they want to hear. You shouldn't necessarily believe them when they speak to a liberal newspaper and tell its liberal journalists how smart they are. Although it is certainly true that they particularly seem to have targeted Trump voters. Blythwood (talk) 07:53, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Yeah I wonder why that was. Sagecandor (talk) 08:29, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

PropOrNot called 'experts'

Who can independently verify that PropOrNot are actually 'experts', as opposed to Fake News themselves? So far, Washington Post is refusing to reveal the identity of anyone behind this shadowy, mysterious group that popped up overnight, has claimed endorsements that have been rejected, and has been trashed by respected journalists like Glenn Greenwald of The Intercept as "Garbage journalism".

Until then, I don't think we should refer to these people as 'experts', and DEFINITELY not non-partisan, as they have done nothing to prove any such claims except their own word, and widely-discredited story by the Washington Post. Solntsa90 (talk) 19:40, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Already being discussed here on this page, above. Please see Talk:Fake_news_website#Criticism. Sagecandor (talk) 19:42, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Praise and a topic to consider

In my school's journalism class, I'm learning about the integrity of news sources, and I found this Wikipedia article to be extremely informative to my work. Nice job to all who have contributed to this page!

However, there should probably be a section about traditional fake-newspaper websites like The Onion. It's mostly a fake newspaper but has transitioned to a web-only paper in recent years. "Although satire sites like The Onion are not the target of the policy, it is not clear whether some of them, which often run fake news stories written for humorous effect, will be inadvertently affected by Google’s change."

epicgenius (talk) 22:03, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

@Epicgenius:Thank you very much for the praise and thank you for the helpful copy editing. As for The Onion -- Is that not already covered by the top note link to News satire ? Sagecandor (talk) 22:05, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

@Sagecandor: Yes, it's linked from news satire. But the recent crackdowns on fake news may also affect "traditional" news-satire sites, which is the only reason I'm suggesting this. I'm just suggesting this, but if it's not included, I think the "news satire" Wiki page covers this topic. epicgenius (talk) 22:06, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

What would a suggested title for such a section be, and what order should it appear as a section? Sagecandor (talk) 22:13, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

I actually just integrated some information on this in the "Responses" section. Although it's a start, I think we should mention satire sites in the "Responses" section if applicable. Otherwise, we can create a whole new section near the bottom, in regards to how fake news and news satire differs. epicgenius (talk) 22:21, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Looks good as integrated version so far. Sagecandor (talk) 22:30, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Fake news website discussed by Wikipedia news

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2016-11-26/In the media.

Sagecandor (talk) 01:47, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 29 November 2016

the article states "After journalists from National Public Radio identified Coler" if possible it would nice to make it clear that it was "a journalist from National Public Radio and an independant software engineer identified coler" To our knowledge this is the first such identification of someone who has deliberately hidden their identity, to the extent that I was required to forensically analyse present and past data from many sources.

It seems relevant since fake news creators go to immense trouble to hide their identities

Thank you for your consideration John Jansen (software engineer and the one who found Coler) 71.202.158.81 (talk) 04:17, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

 Done. It is verified by this source, but I worded it a little differently. Let me know if you want to change the wording; I had to fix the grammar a little bit. epicgenius (talk) 04:41, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

@FallingGravity:Maybe we could discuss this edit, here, as that material was in direct response to above, and was change made by Epicgenius ? Sagecandor (talk) 07:15, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Wake up please

I would issue a challenge to the editors of this website, and the editors of articles like this one in particular, to examine their own biases and reality bubbles.

Look, this article is currently full of slanted sources which are viewed by your own confirmation biases as "reliable", such as Full Frontal, PropOrNot, the Foreign Policy Research Institute, among others.

Your own article states "PropOrNot is a nonpartisan foreign policy expert group composed of persons with prior experience in international relations, warfare, and information technology sectors." A rephrasing of a quote right on their own website. The fact is we just cannot say that this website is nonpartisan until we know who these "persons" running it really are. But they do have a clear detectable agenda: to list and condemn as "propaganda" all sites and media which do not bow to the narrative presented by western governments and NGOs.

This article reads like a conspiracy theory, only one which supports the western establishment and paints the Russians as a secretive, all-controlling cabal. Neo-McCarthyism at its finest.

So this is my advice, you may take it or leave it: always question everything. This includes the western establishment's narrative, and especially your own, sometimes subconscious, biases. Keep your reality bubble permeable.

May you find the Love and Light of the Infinite Creator whom you are. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.1.158.251 (talk • contribs) 14:50, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

The article uses WP:SECONDARY sources for that information. None of those WP:PRIMARY sources mentioned above are relied up on as sources for this article.

Sagecandor (talk) 17:08, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

exactly, looking at the amount written of this article and how it is poping out from nowhere makes it obvious people are getting paid for writing these articles. Its really questionable lately and this article is not neutral at all, it was created in 20:00, 15 November 2016‎ just some days ago. Who has so much free time in their hand writing all this out of no where, and why now all of the sudden for such vague and random term like Fake News which could mean a lot of things?--Crossswords (talk) 05:08, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Overabundance of images

There are frankly just too many unnecessary and redundant images in this article, that mostly seem like a way to imprint the 'message' of this article into the mind of someone who will just skim it, and look at the pictures. The images of Russia on the map, and the Russian flag, are just ridiculous. They don't add anything to the article, and only serve to make more transparent the POV of the cadre of editors in control of this article. Likewise the images of Obama, or of the logo for a website, are superfluous. I know my recommendation will be ignored because it goes against the bias of the editors-in-chief, but hopefully others who see this absolute mess of an article, and go to the talk page, will find some encouragement in knowing they are not alone in their outrage at this abuse of Wikipedia. 73.20.33.105 (talk) 16:27, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

What sources do you have to support your claims of bias and POV of this article, please? Sagecandor (talk) 16:52, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Prior comment by same user appears to show support for White nationalism at link. Sagecandor (talk) 16:55, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

There were ten images in the article on 25 November 2016. The Current version has 12 images and only one (town of Veles, Macedonia) is not USA or Russia related.

And that's not proof that the IP supports White nationalism (as if that were a bad thing). He is simply pointing out racism and sexism against certain group (White/European males). Emily Goldstein (talk) 12:29, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Free-use images are used when relevant to the text directly next to the text where discussed in the article by secondary sources. Sagecandor (talk) 14:35, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Screenshot

This is a great article. It really needs an example image of some fake news website to document the problem - this would be acceptable under fair use. Any suggestions for a really blatantly false story? I looked for "Pope Endorses Trump" pages but they all seem to have been deleted now their purpose has passed. Blythwood (talk) 08:26, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

I see that someone has added a screenshot of endingthefed.com. I don't think it's accurate to say it's a valid fair use claim to take any example of a site listed as a fake news site. It would need to be the subject of critical commentary in the article. To that end I grabbed PolitiFact's screenshot of 70news, which is explicitly covered in this article. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 15:27, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

It's preferable to have all images on the page be under a free use license. Sagecandor (talk) 18:55, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

I uploaded this screenshot from realtruenews. ^Falling_Gravity 19:21, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Free is preferable indeed, but screenshots typically don't work that way. :) Except, of course, when there's nothing copyrightable (as is probably the case with this Realtruenews screenshot, which is just text, not laid out particularly creatively). When it's just text, however, it's unclear how much it adds in terms of illustrating the subject (unless it's e.g. a logo of a company in an article about the company). More options is better, and it doesn't hurt to have, but it looks like Realtruenews is another that we don't talk about at all in the article. That matters for non-free rationales, but also just insofar as images connect to the text. Also, the subject is just as much the fake news stories as it is the sites, which is why the 70news screenshot seemed ideal (mentioned in the text, well covered by sources, displays the site along with a well-known headline). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 22:00, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Realtruenews was covered here when some online communities passed a fake Hillary speech transcript as a real one. Additionally, the screenshot contains the admission "Everything on RealTrueNews Was A LIE", illustrating the article's subject. Maybe it could use some more cropping, though, to focus on that text. ^Falling_Gravity 22:18, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Thank you very much to user:FallingGravity for the suggestion. Replaced the fair-use-asserted picture with the Free-Use-Licensed picture. Sagecandor (talk) 23:04, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

@FallingGravity:Thanks for that valuable source. I've added it to the article. Look good? Sagecandor (talk) 23:28, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. The free option doesn't automatically take precedence if it doesn't actually serve to illustrate the subject. You've replaced an illustration of the subject via an actual fake news story headline that has received extensive coverage such that it's representative of what the entire article is about... with an image of a header we could just as easily describe in article text (i.e. the caption says everything the image says -- very little is actually illustrated). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 23:31, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

I'm going to have to say I agree here with the suggestion by FallingGravity and I think we should try to have the entire article be Free-Use-Licensed-Pictures-Only, if at all possible. Sagecandor (talk) 23:32, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

@Sagecandor: You didn't reply to anything I said. Being free isn't sufficient justification. It needs to be free and actually illustrate the subject. Non-free is perfectly acceptable if you cannot otherwise illustrate the subject that way. Again, you've removed an illustration of a well-covered fake news story in a fake news site with text taken from a site intended to mock fake news sites. If a huge caption that makes the image redundant is necessary, it's not the best way to illustrate the subject. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 23:37, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

I gotta go with the recommendation by FallingGravity on this one — this is a website that was actually reported by a major media source, The Kelly File on FOX News, as if it were completely a factual source. That is remarkable. And unique for this particular fake news website, where the other story was a high Google search result, but was not falsely picked up by a major news outlet as factual. That is a major feat. Sagecandor (talk) 23:40, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

It's funny cause the contents of this website were supposed to be so obviously fake that no one could possibly accept it as true. A similar thing happened the same month, though I don't think that's within the scope of this article. Another thing I might add is that the "Everything on RealTrueNews Was A LIE" message was only recently added to the site. ^Falling_Gravity 00:27, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

As comment, I think the 70news screenshot is worth having. It's good to have a specific example of a specific fake news website making a specific fake story that we can show to people a case study. Blythwood (talk) 07:57, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

I agree, Blythwood, and I like where you added it to the article in that location. Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 08:28, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

I still say the Realtruenews screenshot is a terrible one to lead with. That's not to say it shouldn't be anywhere, but we start off saying "it's distinct from satire" and then show a picture of a site "intended to show reader gullibility" that's pointing out its own lies. I still say it doesn't actually illustrate anything, and seems contrary to the entire lead it accompanies. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 14:20, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

I dunno about that -- because in one picture we have represented the idea of being labelled as "news" and also pointing out to the reader it is a "lie" on the same picture. Seems to be a basic summary of the whole idea right there in one image. Sagecandor (talk) 15:02, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Now replaced with template {{Computer security}}, which has links to many relevant topics in this article. Sagecandor (talk) 16:56, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Article is way slanted to the US 2016 election and Russia(?)

Are Wikipedia editors biased against Russia or is it just the "reliable sources"? And why does every image have to be related to Russia or the US?

It's clear from the images in the current vision of the article that something (or someone) is going on with the "fake news" phenomenon.

1) Image says "Standing For America Until They Shut Us Down Or We Take It Back"

2) "European Union parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs drew greater attention to the problem — when it passed a resolution in November 2016, condemning: "pseudo-news agencies ... social media and internet trolls" used by Russia."

3) "The United States Department of State spent 8 months creating a unit to counter Russian disinformation campaigns against the U.S. before scrapping their own program in September 2015."

4) This one has the least connectction to the USA or Russia, even then the section this picture is for claims that a BuzzFeed "investigation" found "100 websites spreading fraudulent articles supportive of Donald Trump were created by teenagers in the town of Veles, Macedonia."

5) The Swedish Security Service issued a report in 2015 identifying propaganda from Russia had the goal to "create splits in society."

6) U.S. President Barack Obama said, "If we can't discriminate between serious arguments and propaganda, then we have problems."

7) "A screenshot of a fake news story, falsely claiming Donald Trump won the popular vote in the 2016 United States presidential election."

8) "Google CEO Sundar Pichai has said there should be "no situation where fake news gets distributed" and that it is possible fake news had some effect on the 2016 election. "

9) "Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg specifically recommended fact-checking website Snopes.com as a way to respond to fraudulent news on Facebook." (Both are American companies, section mentions 2016 election)

10) "Fact-checking website PolitiFact.com was praised by rival fact-checking service FactCheck.org and recommended as a resource for readers to check before sharing a potentially fake story." (Don't they only "fact check" American politics?)

11) The section this picture is for says "Zeynep Tufekci wrote critically about Facebook's stance on fraudulent news sites in a piece for The New York Times, pointing out fraudulent websites in Macedonia profited handsomely off false stories about the 2016 U.S. election"

12) "Samantha Bee went to Russia for her television show Full Frontal and met with individuals financed by the government of Russia to act as Internet trolls and attempt to manipulate the 2016 U.S. election in order to subvert democracy." Emily Goldstein (talk) 14:06, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

The article reflects the weight given to the issues in over 100 secondary sources. Sagecandor (talk) 14:27, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Systemic bias. The best way to fix is to add more sources. (; ^Falling_Gravity 05:56, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Currently the word "Russia" appears 121 times in the article. If editors want to rely on US media hyperbole and US intelligence service allegations to create an collaborative opinion piece called "Evil Russian plots to ruin the 2016 US election" and present it as a balanced encyclopedia article about veracity in news reporting and the purported sudden appearance of "fake news", they could at least try to be honest about what they are doing rather than hiding behind the old lame excuse of "it's what the sources [I've chosen to cherry-pick] all say". As the Taibbi piece about the joke Washington Post article points out, conspiracy theorising comes from all sides these days. N-HH talk/edits 08:41, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

There were complaints, above, that this article was too USA centric. Now it focuses on many different countries. So now there are new complaints that it is too focused on other countries other than USA. In any event, we take our emphasis from the over 100 secondary sources themselves. Sagecandor (talk) 17:01, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

The criticisms do not contradict each other. Indeed, rather obviously, they're all part of the same overall point. The entirely consistent complaint, as voiced by multiple other editors and observers, is that this page is predominantly built up of one-sided criticism of *alleged* Russian actions in respect of the US, mostly sourced to US media, and with any countervailing evidence deleted, all masquerading as some kind of neutral examination of the broad, purportedly new phenomenon of "fake news". N-HH talk/edits 21:28, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Perhaps that is a wider condemnation of all news media and all reliable secondary sources, but on Wikipedia the sources used are guided by WP:RS. Sagecandor (talk) 21:40, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

See my point about lame excuses, as in specious appeals to "RS!", and cherry-picking. This is not what all the media say. Thanks. N-HH talk/edits 21:46, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

But it is represented in a significant portion of WP:RS sources, and this article brings together over 100 sources giving multiple different pieces of information about the topic as a whole. Sagecandor (talk) 21:52, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Subtle vandalism by Emily Goldstein

With this change here by Emily Goldstein (talk · contribs) = subtle vandalism broke links to many citations by removing the domain names from several different links to sources.

Not sure why that was done or what the intent behind that was here.

Sagecandor (talk) 14:43, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Result was blocked by Ritchie333. Sagecandor (talk) 17:24, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

As I've said on the user's talk page, such a regex option should be available on every page to see the pattern of sourcing more clearly (though without having to press "save").

Since then, the following paragraph has been removed (this is a much more serious disruption):

The Washington Post and PropOrNot received criticism from other media including The Intercept, Fortune and Rolling Stone. Matthew Ingram of Fortune magazine felt that PropOrNot cast too wide a net in identifying fake news websites. The Intercept journalists Glenn Greenwald and Ben Norton were highly critical that the organization included Naked Capitalism on its list. The Intercept called the reporting by The Washington Post as "shoddy", and Fortune magazine called the evidence "flimsy". Writing for Rolling Stone, Matt Taibbi described the report as "astonishingly lazy" and questioned the methodology used by PropOrNot and the lack of information about who was behind the organization.

References

One person's vandalism is another's positive contributions. Anyone interested in the sourcing of this article should look at the link above. SashiRolls (talk) 10:44, 2 December 2016 (UTC)→→

Copy edits to intro section

I'm doing copy edits to intro section to make more succinct.

Please can we discuss instead of wholesale reverting all the copy edits?

What is good, what is objectionable, Florian Blaschke ? Sagecandor (talk) 18:30, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Made more copy edits, but this time, for every single copy edit used a very detailed and specific edit summary to document each exact change made. Primarily the purpose was to reduce excess verbiage within the introduction section, while retaining the exact same meaning for each individual sentence. [3]. Sagecandor (talk) 19:14, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

@Corinne:Thank you for your interest to this article. Unfortunately, your revert which you may have done from your view to make grammar changes as you had been previously summoned to do so and make that revert -- but your revert also undid massive amounts of content additions. Instead of reverting, could you please discuss individual concerns with me and others, at the article's talk page? Maybe that way we could come to a better understanding? Perhaps we can be more specific and hammer out a good consensus that way? Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 02:11, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Epicgenius and Neutrality:Not sure what the rationale for this change is? For example, phrase "websites are websites" in the first sentence. That appears quite redundant. Edit also appears to have undone lots of copy editing and adding extra verbose verbiage to the introduction section that is unnecessary. For example, "One Sweden newspaper, The Local," replaced prior wording of: "Swedish paper The Local". As I have no idea what the reasoning is for these edits, I'll wait here for an explanation, please? Sagecandor (talk) 02:41, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Sagecandor: you insist on discussing, yet you re-reverted two other editors, who explained their objections. You're aware of WP:BRD? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 04:56, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Joshua Jonathan:I believe I reverted in order to add back in additions of content that another copy editor Corinne had mistakenly removed in their wholesale revert. (See examples [4] and [5]). And, Joshua Jonathan, you will note you are the first user to comment in this section on this talk page asking for talk page participation from the other parties involved in the WP:BRD cycle. Sagecandor (talk) 05:08, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Joshua Jonathan:The 3rd step in WP:BRD is called "discuss". Kinda hard to "discuss" when one tries to post repeatedly to the article talk page, and user talk pages, and gets ignored, and users refuse to respond. Kinda eliminates the "discuss" step. Not sure what to do in that situation when one has tried to start a new section on the talk page, ask the other party to come to the talk page, and get ignored instead. I've actually had GREAT experience recently in a different situation where the other party to a dispute did come to the talk page. We worked it all out, and it was great, and wonderful. So talk pages are much better places to discuss and work things out than instead relying upon edit summaries as the sole means of back-and-forth communications. Sagecandor (talk) 05:14, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Two reverts [6] [7]; Corinne's revert surely wasn't mistakenly, as she already explained at Florian's talkpage. I took a look at the reverts; I'd prefer "Fake news websites are websites that," and I don't know the word gullibility, so probably a lot of readers don't either. And "newspaper" is to be preferred above "paper." So, I've got the impression that Florian and Corinne have got a point. which they already did discuss at Florian's talkpage, in response to you. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:14, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Joshua Jonathan:They refused to come here to this talk page to discuss. And you are the first person to bring up those specific copy edits in particular. Sagecandor (talk) 05:16, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Epicgenius:My thanks to Epicgenius for the subsequent copy edits. Sagecandor (talk) 16:20, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Good survey source

• Kate Connolly, Angelique Chrisafis, Poppy McPherson, Stephanie Kirchgaessner, Benjamin Haas , Dominic Phillips, and Elle Hunt (2 December 2016), "Fake news: an insidious trend that's fast becoming a global problem - With fake online news dominating discussions after the US election, Guardian correspondents explain how it is distorting politics around the world", The Guardian, retrieved 2 December 2016{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

Good survey source.

Describes impacts in multiple different countries.

Good for global overview and improved worldview of issue.

Sagecandor (talk) 17:32, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

SnooganssnoogansThis source, above, also has more info on Italy. Sagecandor (talk) 18:00, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Discussion about Italy section

[8] = Italy page blanking from section by SashiRolls.

Originally was added by Snooganssnoogans.

Can we discuss?

Sagecandor (talk) 18:00, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

My edit summary was very clear. If Snoog speaks Italian well enough to read the blog, he can provide us with a fluent translation. SashiRolls (talk) 18:02, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

You are at or more likely over 3RR, please refrain from any further edit-warring. diff1, diff2, diff3, reversion of signature / talk page refactoring here, comment: since Corrine's two reversion were not related to copy edits to the intro, I corrected the section title to reflect its content. SashiRolls (talk) 18:43, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:, I see that Neutrality has added [9] the info on Italy back to the article. So my thanks to Neutrality for these helpful edits. Please also notice we have more sources for info on Italy, with The Guardian, as noted above. Sagecandor (talk) 20:04, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes, the text is improved. Thank you for doing what I asked the OP to do, Neutrality. SashiRolls (talk) 20:12, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Glad we both agree on something, SashiRolls. Nice to find common ground on the edits by Neutrality. Thank you for your constructive talk page comments here about that. Sagecandor (talk) 20:16, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

FYI, it's generally considered bad form to delete edit warring notifications from your talk page. (Just a heads up for someone who has a lot of skillz for a "newbie"...) SashiRolls (talk) 20:24, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, SashiRolls, but I'd rather receive input from a previously uninvolved neutral admin who does not have a vested interest in a particular ongoing dispute. But I read your posts and I appreciate your concern for my interests. Sagecandor (talk) 20:28, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Citations in introduction of Fake news website

@Crossswords:, thank you for your interest in Fake news website !

Previously every single sentence in the introduction was cited with a citation.

But Epicgenius moved those citations out of the introduction.

This conforms with WP:CITELEAD.

Everything is cited lower down in the body text of the article.

Hope that explains it okay !

Sagecandor (talk) 04:56, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Previous version had citations for every single sentence in lead section, then removed by Epicgenius who cited the page WP:CITELEAD with this edit [10]. Sagecandor (talk) 04:59, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

And again by Crossswords (talk · contribs) at [11]. User also appears to be engaging in subtle vandalism by removing mentions of Russia. Sagecandor (talk) 05:08, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

what has a single country to do with anything for it to deserve its own links below? And if you did it before why not making it back to it again? And it doesnt conform with CITELEAD at all, you dont see any article written this way unless its extremely short where the introductions are so short that it is next to the sources.--Crossswords (talk) 05:17, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

You are incorrect on all points. The article explains in detail the particular importance of Russia. Moreover, citations are often omitted in the lead when the content is sourced in the body. Neutrality^talk 05:19, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Please see [12], temporarily added back all citations to the introduction section pending further discussion. Due to the topic of this article being contentious perhaps by those representing the Russian government, might be best to keep in all the citations in the introduction section to avoid such complaints in the future? Sagecandor (talk) 05:23, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Fine by me. Neutrality^talk 05:25, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Okay thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 05:27, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

The citations are explicitly not needed in the intro as per WP:LEADCITE, unless the exact statement in the lead is extremely controversial. Moreover, I don't see why {{citation needed}} ever needs to be added to the lead. If the information is not sourced to the body, {{citation needed (lead)}} should be used. Otherwise, the citations in the lead is redundant, given that the lead is supposed to be a summary for the rest of the article (and thus doesn't need a citation). epicgenius (talk) 18:45, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

I see where the problem is, now. In the lead, I think that only the statement about Russia should be cited. The rest of the lead is already explained in detail in the body section. epicgenius (talk) 18:47, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

WP:CITELEAD says: "The verifiability policy advises that material that is challenged or likely to be challenged, and direct quotations, should be supported by an inline citation." In this case, unfortunately, due to the incoming interest by Trolls from Olgino, best way to avoid arguing over cites is to keep the cites in the intro. Otherwise we risk drive-by cite tagging again. Sagecandor (talk) 18:54, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

• Note: I have removed this discussion from Wikipedia:Third opinion because there are now four participants in the discussion. Scolaire (talk) 10:34, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@SashiRolls:Please read this section to see why every single sentence in the lead section now has a citation. Sagecandor (talk) 21:56, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality, Epicgenius, and Scolaire:Strongly disagree with this edit [13] by SashiRolls done without discussion here. See above discussion of cite-tagging in the intro previously by Crossswords (talk · contribs) for why we should keep all citations in the intro. Sagecandor (talk) 22:09, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

I have indeed brought the first two paragraphs of the lead in line with NPOV and LEADCITE. If you wish to restore your point of view and add back all sorts of unnecessary blue links, that's up to you... but please wait 24 hours before reverting anything. Others should feel free to continue cleaning up the article which is -- I agree -- quite biased. A systemic bias tag could also be added in the meantime. SashiRolls (talk) 22:33, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

We should keep all citations in the intro because of this [14]. Sagecandor (talk) 22:35, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Alphabetical order for sections by country name

Changed order for sections:

Alphabetical order for sections by country name.

No content itself changed or removed. [15] [16]

Hopefully this particular change will be seen as an uncontroversial improvement.

Sagecandor (talk) 01:21, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Expand Macedonia to add some balance

It seems a significant number of users are arriving at this page complaining about the Russia content. That's okay, and thank you for your interest in this article.

We have some good sourced content here to reliable, independent sources, and it's a well researched article. I'd suggest we expand other sections instead of deleting sourced content.

To that end, I'd like to expand the "Macedonia" section a bit, as it's true as mentioned above on this talk page that there were lots of sources analyzing influx of fake news websites from Macedonia -- specifically Veles, Macedonia.

We have at least one new really good source for this, Associated Press published by CBS News, at: "In Macedonia's fake news hub, this teen shows how it's done".

• "In Macedonia's fake news hub, this teen shows how it's done", CBS News, Associated Press, 2 December 2016, retrieved 3 December 2016

Hopefully this is another helpful step on how to improve the article and satisfy at least a majority of respondents to this talk page. Sagecandor (talk) 01:44, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Expanded Veles, Macedonia info in Macedonia section. Have a look at the expansion and hopefully this supplements and balances some of the Russia info. Please see: [17]. Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 01:58, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Is PropOrNot over-weighted in this article?

PropOrNot could probably have its own wiki article at this point.

But it is way too overweighted in this article.

This article is about fake news, not PropOrNot.

PropOrNot has at this point been thoroughly debunked by Adrian Chen of The New Yorker at [18].

At the most it could merit a two sentence mention.

One sentence saying PropOrNot was used by The Washington Post.

And another listing a few other news outlets that debunked it.

Sagecandor (talk) 22:19, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Could you please try to write in paragraphs and try to choose section titles that are not leading? (I've changed the title to a question.) Discussion of PropOrNot, along with the conservative think tank the WaPo journalist cited (Foreign Policy Research Institute) are exactly the sort of balance this article needs. Of course the Russians engage in propaganda. It is necessary to counter our own (which is quite often uncritically echoed in Wikipedia due to a very narrow vision of WP:RS ). Thankfully, for once, mainstream RS are debunking the WaPo... as they have been more and more frequently in the last year. SashiRolls (talk) 22:42, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Agreed, but this is not the right article to do that. That would be --> The Washington Post and/or PropOrNot. Sagecandor (talk) 22:47, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

The WaPo was pushing fake news. So they have their place here. Don't hesitate to create that page on PropOrNot. That would show you were a dedicated Wikipedian, to be sure! SashiRolls (talk) 22:52, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

They have their place, sure, but a two sentence mention would be plenty. Sagecandor (talk) 22:56, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Thankfully, the New Yorker, Rolling Stone, Fortune, the Intercept and the co-owner of the Nation gave it more than 2 sentences. IMO, *this* article is way too long, and way too biased, cut it by at least half, "and then", to quote MelanieN, "we'll talk". ^_^ SashiRolls (talk) 23:03, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Biased how? It is telling that you wrote in your words, quote "Western institutions" ? Are you trying to put in Wikipedia's voice in main article space that the article is biased somehow towards "Western institutions", as you say? Sagecandor (talk) 23:10, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

My hope is that you did not write the copy "in an attempt to lessen democratic values", because I'm really not sure what that might have meant. The notion of weakening (European) institutions is indeed in the article that we source to. (facts, just facts) SashiRolls (talk) 23:24, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Clearly you have not checked the cited sources before blatantly removing or changing information. That is quite inappropriate. Sagecandor (talk) 23:28, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

"D. whereas information warfare is a historical phenomenon as old as warfare itself; whereas targeted information warfare against the West was extensively used by the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and has since been an integral part of modern hybrid warfare, which is a combination of military and non-military measures of a covert and overt nature, deployed to destabilise the political, economic and social situation of a country under attack, without a formal declaration of war, targeting not only partners of the EU, but also the EU itself, its institutions and all Member States and citizens irrespective of their nationality and religion;" [19] Apologies will be accepted for the false accusation.SashiRolls (talk) 23:43, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Wow that's misleading and disinformation. That is the WRONG LINK. The citation you changed was from source Deutsche Welle. Sagecandor (talk) 23:46, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Wow, that's misleading disinformation! Indeed in DW, you can find the words "eroding confidence in European institutions", which are in turn -- in different form, of course -- in the resolution that DW makes reference to (cited above). A simple ctrl-f should suffice. Also, we should include the fact that the majority of deputies did not vote for the resolution. (over 200 abstained...) SashiRolls (talk) 23:52, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Way overweighted--the influence of this source should be curtailed. Solntsa90 (talk) 00:39, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Great! Thank you, Solntsa90, for commenting here. So how about the model I proposed, above? What about one sentence about PropOrNot, and one sentence criticizing it? Sagecandor (talk) 00:41, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

With this addition, we now have 3 times more about criticism of "PropOrNot", than about PropOrNot itself, in an article that is not titled PropOrNot. I agree with Solntsa90 that we should significantly trim down size devoted to PropOrNot in this article, both content and criticism of it. Sagecandor (talk) 18:29, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Created new article with content from this article, at PropOrNot. Hopefully that will make it easier to trim down info here, and instead refer readers there for more info on that topic. Sagecandor (talk) 18:59, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

I went and created the new article on the group PropOrNot. Then, as proposed on the talk page here in this section, and agreed to on the talk page by user Solntsa90, I've trimmed down the info on PropOrNot in the Fake news website article to one sentence on the organization, and one sentence listing many publications that criticized it --> [20]. Sagecandor (talk) 19:07, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Created new article on organization and website PropOrNot

I went and created the new article on the group PropOrNot.

This was as suggested to me by SashiRolls at Don't hesitate to create that page on PropOrNot. That would show you were a dedicated Wikipedian, to be sure!.

Please help and go improve and expand the article at --> PropOrNot.

Thank you! Sagecandor (talk) 19:09, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Done. Look forward to reading more about their qualifications. SashiRolls (talk) 11:45, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Propaganda / Scare-mongering

I've restored two quotes that you keep deleting Sagecandor. As is, this page, as many have commented, reads like propaganda or scare-mongering intended to bring us back to a Cold War mentality. While this should still be pretty obvious to the casual reader, it might be wiser to allow those who have criticized this hysteria to be cited directly rather than paraphrasing their words euphemistically. The two examples I've chosen to take a stand on (among the many I have not) are here. If you can get consensus for neutering that criticism below, go ahead, that way we will have Wikipedians on record on the talk page... but please do not change without further discussion of the quotes on the talk page.

I would note that you seem particularly concerned about paraphrasing these very short quotes, but not the much longer quotes such as:

• "But once Zuckerberg admits he’s actually running one of the most powerful media brands on the planet, he has to get more aggressive about promoting real news and weeding out hoaxers and charlatans. The alternative is to watch Facebook’s own credibility decline."
• "It’s not a crazy idea. What’s crazy is for him to come out and dismiss it like that, when he knows, and those of us at the company know, that fake news ran wild on our platform during the entire campaign season."
• In the same blog post, he stated that "News and media are not the primary things people do on Facebook, so I find it odd when people insist we call ourselves a news or media company in order to acknowledge its importance."
• "It's really remarkable to see how big news operations have come around to challenging false and deceitful claims directly. It's about time."
• "Fact-checking is now a proven ratings getter. I think editors and news directors see that now. So that's a plus."

If you wish to paraphrase quotes, these would be good ones to paraphrase or, more likely, identify as padding and delete (which would help cut down the tl;dr effect of this repetitive article which keeps repeating itself over and over again, repetitively). No offence, but we are striving for neutrality here, not to see how many times we can write the words "(Russian) propaganda" in a single WP article. SashiRolls (talk) 11:45, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

McCarthyism section

I notice that in the revert in question, your removal of criticism of the WaPo's poor practices was undone. Why don't you wish for people to know that the "fake news sites" meme has been used to advance a McCarthyist list published by the "venerable" Washington Post on the basis of a shadowy organization called PropOrNot? Looking forward to reading your response to this question, @Sagecandor:. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SashiRolls (talk • contribs)

I was making those edits to directly address talk page complaints about having PropOrNot in the article. Funny how now there are complaints about the opposite. Sagecandor (talk) 15:56, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

@SashiRolls:A lot of people complained about PropOrNot. So I removed it. And you can't just add an entire "McCarthyism" section, to add criticism of PropOrNot to this article, at the bottom, with no prior discussion of what PropOrNot even is. That makes us think you wish to inject "McCarthyism", with no actual discussion of substance from the sources themselves. Sagecandor (talk) 15:59, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Let's keep discussion above at Talk:Fake_news_website#Criticism. Sagecandor (talk) 16:09, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

No, I think it would be better to keep discussion of your "section blanking" in a section with the appropriate title. I notice you did not answer my question. Here it is again: Why don't you wish for people to know that the "fake news sites" meme has been used to advance a McCarthyist list published by the "venerable" Washington Post on the basis of a shadowy organization called PropOrNot? Looking forward to reading your response to this question, @Sagecandor:. SashiRolls (talk) 18:04, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Responded, and more comprehensive discussion of prior issues already, above at Talk:Fake_news_website#Criticism. Sagecandor (talk) 20:02, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

No. You did not respond concerning why you deleted the McCarthyism section. You mistakenly stated that I had objected to PropOrNot being in this article, which I certainly did not. I think it is very important for people to realize that the Washington Post is becoming an unreliable source regarding fact-checking. That's all. Shall we reinstate the original text that @Volunteer Marek: deleted and put them back in the section that you deleted? (I left a message on VM's talk page so that everyone could see that they were exactly the same sources, contrary to his edit summary. SashiRolls (talk) 20:10, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Already being discussed at Talk:Fake_news_website#Criticism. Please discuss up there. Sagecandor (talk) 22:16, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

No, actually it's not. Nowhere do did I see the word McCarthyism up there. Making a GF effort to organize with those resisting the POV-pushing in this article.SashiRolls (talk) 19:07, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Anyone else find it incredibly suspicious that this page's creation date is exactly 1 week after the US presidential election?

What is the process for dealing with pages that are suspected to be outright propaganda? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:184:4601:2C4:F5D9:2FA5:28D4:564E (talk) 23:43, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

That was about the same time coverage significantly increased on this topic from WP:SECONDARY sources. Sagecandor (talk) 23:49, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

It just seems a little ironic that the article covers a topic that allegedly suddenly appeared during the election season, when the article itself suddenly appeared almost immediately after, promulgated by media outlets which were notoriously inaccurate during said election. Are we supposed to take their word for it now after they were wrong about everything else? 2601:184:4601:2C4:F5D9:2FA5:28D4:564E (talk) 23:57, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

This talk page is WP:NOTAFORUM. Sagecandor (talk) 23:57, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure we should be taking the word of someone who doesn't know the meaning of the word "ironic". --Calton | Talk 00:16, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

No.Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:01, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

Too long

This article is too long. The whole thing can probably be cut by 50% — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.182.93.186 (talk) 01:56, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

From time of above complaint as comparison at: [21] reduced size of article from 142.4 Kb to 132.4 Kb with this new version: [22]. Sagecandor (talk) 00:17, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

Fake news led to actual violence - added to article

Added section on fake news leading to recent violent attack with an assault rifle [23], with content from article Comet Ping Pong [24] and one sentence from draft page [25]. Sagecandor (talk) 18:05, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

Criticism section 1

This article urgently needs a criticism section. The unfortunately named propornot site is analysed by one of its targets at Nakedcapitalism.

An echo chamber for The Washington Post? The irony! Shtove (talk) 14:18, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Suggested source fails WP:Identifying reliable sources as it appears to be someone's personal blog that calls itself admittedly "commentary" with no editorial review. Sagecandor (talk) 17:06, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure if a "criticism section" is appropriate here (it's just the criticism of one group), but here's some better sources: The Intercept, Fortune. This information should be added per WP:WEIGHT. ^Falling_Gravity 17:14, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, FallingGravity, those are better sources. Added new highly critical content from both sources to this article. Sagecandor (talk) 17:24, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

The article still does a lot to promote PropOrNot, despite this new section. For example, Footnote A includes three sources that mostly parrot the Post's report rather than look into the matter themselves. ^Falling_Gravity 17:35, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Good point about the footnote, fixed it with attribution to the secondary sources that describe it. Sagecandor (talk) 17:39, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Sorry if I didn't make this clear, but my problem with the footnote is that it ignores the criticisms of PropOrNot and instead focuses on WaPo's favorable coverage, violating WP:DUEWEIGHT. ^Falling_Gravity 18:53, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Valid suggestion, thank you. Added that info into the Footnote as well. Sagecandor (talk) 19:00, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

This term/article definitely needs a criticism section, as I've seen almost nothing but regarding this newspeak. With that said, I don't think PropOrNot should be cited, as it cannot be independently verified, and may very well be 'Fake News' itself. Solntsa90 (talk) 19:45, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Agree that we should not cite PropOrNot, and we don't, we stick to WP:SECONDARY sources only. Disagree about having a "criticism" section, per discussion we already had about this, above in this section itself. Sagecandor (talk) 19:46, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

I don't see any reason given for why a criticism section should be excluded gleaning from the above statements. I continue to endorse a 'criticism' section, and will push for one on this page, hopefully going to a vote. Solntsa90 (talk) 19:48, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

I hear you and your opinions are valid and important. However we've already in response directly to suggestions in this section, incorporated "criticism", directly into the article content itself. Sagecandor (talk) 19:50, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

What would a criticism section even look like? Fake news is easy to criticize because it's fake. ^Falling_Gravity 20:33, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Agree here with FallingGravity. Separate sections for such things are discouraged, per "Avoid sections and articles focusing on criticisms or controversies". Sagecandor (talk) 20:37, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Disagree - this is a new article on a controversial subject and is being heavily edited by an editor who has little track record on wikipedia, although with much skill. A criticism section is appropriate, and as the concept of this article becomes clear that section may be distributed into the main text. Shtove (talk) 20:55, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

What else would you like to incorporate that is "criticism" into the main text? Sagecandor (talk) :56, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

No idea - editors will work it out over time. I expect this article will be deleted as a piece of crystal-ballery.Shtove (talk) 00:26, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Some of this can be mentioned but there's no reason to repost Ingram's column here.Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:37, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, Volunteer Marek, for your recent improvements to the article. As you can hopefully see, here on the talk page, my recent edits were in direct response to suggestions, above, to add more "criticism" to the article. I tried to do so by incorporating suggested sources, above. Sagecandor (talk) 01:47, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Given that the original Washington Post article has even been criticized by the Washington Post, I'm removing the lede content which reference it while preserving the body text. ^Falling_Gravity 04:41, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Okay that makes total sense, no problem here. But just to point out the column you linked to is an Opinion piece. Sagecandor (talk) 04:47, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

@FallingGravity:I've added that suggested source to the article body text. Sagecandor (talk) 05:04, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

I have no objections to including it (nor to excluding it) as an opinion, though the claims mostly echo The Intercept, which is already referenced. ^Falling_Gravity 05:51, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

@FallingGravity:New information from two new sources that it was likely a Russian intelligence operation in the style of Trolls from Olgino, see [26] and [27]. Sagecandor (talk) 05:58, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Removed all references from the article based on any research by the group "PropOrNot" -- hopefully this goes a good way along towards improvements as suggested above in this section. Sagecandor (talk) 01:51, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

You've deleted the Rolling Stone article, the Fortune article, and the Intercept article ?! I do not think the solution to bad reporting by the WaPo is to cover up bad reporting by the WaPo at Wikipedia. SashiRolls (talk) 10:30, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

You complain about having PropOrNot in the article. Now you complain about having PropOrNot removed from the article. Difficult to please you. Alright, I added it back to its previously stable section within the chronology of the time line in that section of how events occurred. I will trim down emphasis on PropOrNot and keep in the criticism of PropOrNot in that section. Hopefully this will be satisfactory to you. Sagecandor (talk) 16:11, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Added back the info that I had removed on PropOrNot, after it was complained about that I had removed it, having previously read complaints, above, that I had added it at all, in the first place. [28] Sagecandor (talk) 16:15, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

This TWP+PropOrNot issue turned into affair and warrants proper section, which I suggests. Not only that, entire paragraph is now so large. Not sure, but it seems to me @Sagecandor: attempted to create section just moments ago, removing entire paragraph there, but other editor restored it to previous state?--Santasa99 (talk) 19:08, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

@Santasa99:Please see new article I created at PropOrNot. Sagecandor (talk) 19:11, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Look, @Sagecandor:, it's troubling to have article on something/someone we don't have slightest idea what or who is it. It's happen to be quite controversial for now, as we can see and read online - other people operating in the same line of work, in attempt to distinguish "fake" from "real" news, are very critical of this PropOrNot. It would be less problematic (and probably less contested) if we had decent section on "Fake news website" article, which still doesn't mean we shouldn't, although I don't think the title is appropriate, and then in time separate article. But, OK, if other accept separate "PropOrNot" article at this point, what you put in it looks fine to me.--Santasa99 (talk) 20:55, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, @Santasa99:, I'm glad you like what I've put in at PropOrNot ! Thank you for your compliment ! Sagecandor (talk) 20:59, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes, the propornot article is succinct and balanced. I wonder if propornot will be reintroduced to this article once its analysis is made clear, as an example of how entangling fake news can be.Shtove (talk) 11:52, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

I've lobbied for a McCarthyism section. It's interesting how independent critical media have been taken down by the WaPo based on POV studies (from a hawkish neocon think tank, according to Ingram, and a fly-by-night shadowy group of people who, according to Chen don't think it's "cool" to "fuck with the American people."). Seriously, you can't make this stuff up. Given the fact that the WaPo has been listed as an RS this is a bit of an emergency for WP:RSN. Reference to one bit of the criticism in the article "The Propaganda about Russian Propaganda" from the New Yorker should be in the lead (no need for a footnote, as it is (was?) mentioned in the article already...) SashiRolls (talk) 19:18, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

References

I also think this article desperately needs a criticism section. There have been criticisms on this very topic and how its been covered in the media from leftwing and rightwing editorial outlets. 1Eternity1 (talk) 07:34, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Criticism of what? Fake news websites? Macedonian teenagers that create fake news websites? Clickbait profiteers that create fake news websites? That they exist is not in dispute. Examples include ABCnews.com.co and National Report. So yes, it is a good thing to have criticism of those types of fake news websites. And that is already integrated directly into the article throughout. Sagecandor (talk) 07:47, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Criticism of the media's coverage and focus on this topic. Honestly, this whole page needs to be reorganized and should include a section on the history of propaganda and yellow journalism. 1Eternity1 (talk) 07:54, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

This article is about fake news websites. This article is not about "media coverage". As you note in your links, both history of propaganda and yellow journalism already have separate existing articles on Wikipedia. Sagecandor (talk) 08:08, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

The only notable aspect of this topic is the media coverage of fake news websites. Otherwise, it's a POV fork that synthesizes information from hoaxes, propaganda and yellow journalism under one page and includes Russian conspiracy theories. Fake news isn't new. 1Eternity1 (talk) 08:29, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

BuzzFeed News

BuzzFeed News is most certainly a good source for this article.

1. BuzzFeed News received official statements from the FBI, and have been cited as an authoritative source for information on this very topic by:
2. The Hollywood Reporter,
3. The New York Times,
4. New York Magazine,
5. and FOX News.

References

Therefore, we have other reliable sources both from "left" and "right" perspectives, all citing and depending on BuzzFeed News for reliable investigative reporting. Sagecandor (talk) 22:44, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

A quote for an article in the Columbia Journalism Review on BuzzFeed: "The viral videos it (BuzzFeed) publishes—generally without vetting—occasionally turn out to be hoaxes, the kind of mistake that delights old print curmudgeons eager to assert their ethical superiority"[29] Sorry, but BuzzFeed is not reliable. 1Eternity1 (talk) 04:26, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

This has been discussed ad nauseam at WP:RSN. BuzzFeed is sometimes a reliable source, and this really looks like one of those times, especially with the avalanche of other sources quoting it. Buzzfeed, like many modern news sites, (and news outlets in general going back much farther), publishes both news and "editorial" content with distinction between them. This is supported by the CJR article you quote, which discusses Buzzfeed's relatively recent addition of a real journalism program. Grayfell (talk) 05:56, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, Grayfell, there certainly have been an avalanche of sources quoting it. As Grayfell helpfully pointed out, the same source the Columbia Journalism Review noted: "And BuzzFeed’s narrative features and investigations will be edited, copyedited, and fact-checked by contract checkers.". Also, note that article is from 2014 - so they've had some time to implement all those forms of editorial review in the 2 years since then. Sagecandor (talk) 06:02, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

As with many sources, there's no blanket rule you can cite or apply – it depends on the context and the actual article being used. Buzzfeed certainly does some "proper" journalism these days and would be OK in some contexts. As would RT of course, but the same editor leaping to defend Buzzfeed comes to the opposite conclusion, and declares that to be universally useless, when that name comes up (see endless comments above re bias and neutrality etc). N-HH talk/edits 10:01, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Already discussed above at Talk:Fake news website#Russia Today fails as reliable source about Russian propaganda by Russian government. Let's keep discussion of Russian propaganda source Russia Today in that section. Sagecandor (talk) 15:35, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Indeed, BuzzFeed would know a thing or two about "hoaxes, propaganda, and disinformation to increase web traffic through sharing on social media". It's indeed a centre of top-notch journalism and not at all biased [30] Bear in mind that the Daily Mail is deemed unreliable here because although they sometimes have a good investigation, it's one in a million between click bait and hyper-partisanship. Why is BuzzFeed considered different? Anarcho-authoritarian (talk) 15:39, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

You gave a link to BuzzFeed, not BuzzFeed News. Separate department, which as noted above by Grayfell has editorial oversight. Sagecandor (talk) 15:40, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Buzzfeed is the very epitome of what constitutes 'Fake News'; to include Buzzfeed on this page as a valid, credible source would almost be making a mockery of this very article. Buzzfeed is not credible, and should be disregarded as a source by anyone seriously interested in making a positive impact on this project. Solntsa90 (talk) 20:43, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Read the fourth paragraph of your link, the one that starts with "BuzzFeed is no scrappy little start-up anymore". Here, I'll make it easier for you: They’ve decided it makes good journalism and business sense to assure readers that their posts are true, so BuzzFeed is embracing the ultimate symbol of the overstuffed print newsrooms of the pre-digital past. BuzzFeed is hiring copy editors. clpo13_(talk) 20:46, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes, Solntsa90, please read what you cite. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 21:12, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

You think a passage that describes them trying to take on the appearance of a legitimate organisation...somehow makes them legitimate? I took it as a sign of them attempting to appear legitimate despite no claim to do so. Solntsa90 (talk) 21:48, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

That's an interesting take on that article. Here's another CJR article, specifically about fake news, that praises Buzzfeed and cites multiple Buzzfeed stories. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 22:13, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Added citations back to intro

Leaving the intro without citations appears to be an opening and an invitation for disruptive drive-by cite-tagging.

Therefore I've added back all citations after every single sentence in the intro.

The intro should be a summary of the article per WP:LEAD.

Please do not add new information directly to the intro, as was done here [31] [32].

Thank you. Sagecandor (talk) 17:27, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

To Everyone Complaining about POV in this article

This article is new (as pointed out above). Because it is new, it is likely written and edited by a fewer number of people than other Wikipedia articles, and thus, most likely, has a less neutral POV than other more mature articles. For those who see a POV, please make the article better by a) pointing out the specific statements that are POV in the article, b) suggest changes to the presentation/language to make the article more neutral, c) suggest new sections to the article to make it more neutral, d) spend some time to edit it and make it better by being a constructive editor. Fake news websites is certainly a notable newsworthy topic and a specific article on it should exist (I've even included Breitbart references to prove this point). 1Eternity1 (talk) 07:22, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

References

No offense, but this is a naïve fairy tale you are spinning. I'm facing a perma ban over reverting an underlying edit that I didn't even originate to this article. There is a cabal of corrupt editors, who are deemed "insiders," who retaliate against contributors for challenging the ideological gatekeeping of articles. Nonetheless, all the power to you, that you succeed in bringing about neutrality to this article. But be careful that you don't trigger retaliation against yourself over edits about journalism ethics, particularly if you are still of the mindset that one person can make a difference in the culture that insulates insider editors from POV-pushing that has emerged and is protected at Wikipedia. Aaron Swartz raised this concern years and years ago, and his concern has gone unheeded. --maslowsneeds🌈 10:30, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

You might be right that it is a naive fairy tale. This article is especially biased, and the behavior of the primary editors makes it difficult to assume good faith. 1Eternity1 (talk) 03:15, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

If you're facing a permaban, it's of your own making. You were given a AE topic ban on post-1932 US politics because you were unable to control yourself, instead blaming everyone and everything for your troubles. Despite the clear topic ban, you add back a clearly political statement -- one that didn't belong here in the first place. Then, after TWO warnings that you were violating your topic ban, you try to repurpose that same political edit into an unambiguously political article Shareblue, so even your fig leaf of a claim that it's about "journalist ethics" doesn't cover it.

As or Eternity1's advice: considering that his links from Breibart News -- already an unreliable source -- have nothing to do with fake news sites -- the actual topic of this article -- but are instead Breitbart's usual blather about the horrible terrible lamestream media, I'd say that your advice is particularly unreliable. So thanks, but no thanks. --Calton | Talk 11:04, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

Please re-read my comment. You seem to have misunderstood the entire comment. Those refs were merely to show the notability of the topic as it appears in popular media. It wasn't meant to be a formal suggestion for an edit in the article. 1Eternity1 (talk) 03:06, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Since your links are to unreliable -- or perhaps I should say reliably unreliable -- sources that aren't actually about the topic, I'm going to go with someone else not understanding. --Calton | Talk 03:17, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Whatever Breitbart is, it is popular media. The claim that I made is that the topic was mentioned in popular media. Of course, if you want to make the counter claim that this topic is not notable and should be deleted, please do so. 1Eternity1 (talk) 03:28, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

You're making a claim, supposedly, to counter something which NO ONE IS SAYING. And by "no one", I include you, since there isn't a breath of a whisper of a hint of a suggestion of this charge which you claim to be countering in your original statement. That hole you're in? That shovel in your hand? They're related. --Calton | Talk 16:39, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

You'd try to argue with me if I said the sky is blue and cited a Breitbart article mentioning the deep blue of the sky on a talk page. You really need another hobby. So chill, Bro. 11Eternity11 (talk) 04:42, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

You may wish to read Wikipedia:Verifiability, not truth. Sagecandor (talk) 04:44, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

You'd try to argue with me if I said the sky is blue and cited a Breitbart article. No, I'm debunking your clumsy attempt at spin. And yes, ANY good Wikipedia editor (not just me) would immediately reject Breitbart as a reliable source for anything other than (maybe) about Breitbart itself.

You really need another hobby. So chill, Bro. And yet here you are, digging that hole deeper still. So who, exactly, needs to chill? --Calton | Talk 05:01, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Spin? This was my original statement: "Fake news websites is certainly a notable newsworthy topic and a specific article on it should exist (I've even included Breitbart references to prove this point). " I've since argued against this point of view (as I think most of this article seems to be a POV fork). Seriously Bro, get another hobby for your own sake. 11Eternity11 (talk) 08:05, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Again, you're arguing against a claim that NO ONE HAS MADE. As for your childish "get a life" suggestion: why are YOU here? I've been here twelve years, you've been here -- what? -- two days? And now that your attempt at spinning has flopped, you've decided to contradict yourself and try to obscure the topic. I'd say that, yeah, someone needs a new hobby because your initial attempts at this new one don't seem to be working out too well. --Calton | Talk 08:15, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Spoken by a user who been accused of vandalizing political pages by replacing "Trump" with "Drumpf". 11Eternity11 (talk) 08:44, 8 December 2016 (UTC)UTC)

Spoken by an editor with both a reading-comprehension AND an intellectual-honesty problem. Perhaps you a) ought to read the talk page of the editor who left the message; and b) avoid dishonest rhetorical tricks to try to distract attention. --Calton | Talk 12:04, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

My advice was to those many many people complaining about the article: help make the article better. Of course, you say that this advice is unreliable, which I can only take to mean that you wish all the critics of this article to go away so that you may be free to push a POV. 1Eternity1 (talk) 03:40, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Your "advice" as you just claimed you made ("make the article better") was of no actual value, but the advice you actually tried to give ("spin it this way, based on these POV and unreliable links") was worse. --Calton | Talk 05:01, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

My advice was clear and made in an effort to encourage consensus and productive behavior. My links included the NY Times, NPR, and criticism of the topic by the National Review and Breitbart. Whatever you want to makeup in your head about my intentions is your issue. 11Eternity11 (talk) 08:31, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Your "advice" -- especially from a two-day old account -- was, at the very best, unnecessary and I'll-informed. The garbage links you threw up and the platitudes about "neutral POV", however, pretty much sealed it. This isn't our first rodeo, you know. --Calton | Talk 12:04, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

I'm really done interacting with you. It's quite clear from your Talk page that incivility is your strategy for POV pushing. (I really can't believe you said this to another user: "And this based on what, exactly? Aside from the voices inside your head?". I guess that your behavior has been worse than it is to me. So, maybe you are just a work in progress). Anyway, cool it and try to be more pleasant. 11Eternity11 (talk) 03:49, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

I believe topic bans apply to talk pages too.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:32, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

This article is about intentional fraud

This article is about intentional fraud.

[33] This hatnote change is inappropriate.

We specifically have a separate article about News satire.

This article is not about News satire.

It is about fraud.

Thank you. Sagecandor (talk) 17:15, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

You're a bad faith leftist shill. Do you think anyone here is stupid enough to believe you aren't pushing an agenda? Rivalin (talk) 15:54, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Politically charged, partisan editors?

The article seems way to biased towards the left as it is now, with examples consistently being target against the right. The sheer length and content of the text gives an impression it was written hastly and by partisan sources. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.241.124.119 (talk) 13:28, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

I agree that there needs to be balance in the presentation of information about fake news sites so that the reliable-sourced presentation can reflect an improved overview on the implication on journalism ethics.maslowsneeds🌈 14:09, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

And I think some people need a refresher on the difference between reflexively symmetrical and appropriate balance. --Calton | Talk 23:27, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

I've encountered some interestingly strange hostility after I encouraged people to make suggestions for edits if they feel there is a POV bias. My experience gives credence to your position of politically charged, partisan editors. 1Eternity1 (talk) 05:00, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Update -- Maslowsneeds (talk · contribs) subsequently blocked for edits related to this article. Sagecandor (talk) 15:36, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Please be careful when talking about other contributors' biases. We're allowed to have our own biases, there's no way around that. There's no neutrality standard for editors. The goal is to end up with an unbiased written product through discussion and consensus-building. Let's work on that and avoid the ad hominem attacks. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:43, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

The way to avoid as much as possible bias is to simply relay facts and opinions from either side, and giving them equal weight. The problem with this article is that it almost only cites pro-american opinions. This should be fixed. 2A02:120B:7FB:C1B0:505A:176C:9D0C:BD68 (talk) 15:44, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

We relay facts and opinions in proportion to their prevalence in reliable sources, otherwise we create false balance. If you think some sources are missing, please identify them. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:11, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

POV

This article ist biased and POV. It needs to be improved. DerElektriker (talk) 11:29, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

This article is based on over 100 secondary sources and reflects multiple perspectives from those secondary sources. Sagecandor (talk) 16:59, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

The problem is, where are the sources from? Most if not all of the sources seem to have the same way of thinking. Now take the problem in reverse. Let's suppose russia didn't make any propaganda and this is just a propaganda attack from the USA who are trying to decredibilize russia because, let's say, they want their version of every important event to spread. How would that be handled? Everything is supposed to be objectively told, yet there's almost no citation of someone who was trying to defend russia in this giant debate. Sites like propornot offer a completely biased version of the scene, and should be considered as propaganda, but this article doesn't actually do better. It smashes russia against the ground, barely letting it a chance to defend itself, and doesn't think about fake news spread by america, who are probably numerous. 2A02:120B:7FB:C1B0:8D9D:314:519D:DBD (talk) 18:06, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

If you are saying all 100 plus sources are non independent, that is a spurious claim. The secondary sources are independent reliable sources whereas for example Russia Today and Sputnik News are operated by the Russian government as Russian propaganda. Sagecandor (talk) 18:10, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

In germany we have state financed and controlled media (eg. ARD, ZDF). DerElektriker (talk) 08:47, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

The problem isn't a matter of independance. It is all about the vision. You'll see I never said they lacked independance, if you read what i wrote carefully. What equilibrates a debate is the fact that there will be an equal amount of defenders of each side. This article takes only citations from defenders of one side, and thus has nil neutrality. It describes the russians and macedonians as horrible woe-spreading monsters, and americans as holy heroic victims. It's like accusating someone, and to ask them to shut up when they try to defend themselves. That's not fair. That's why this article should also cite some sources defending russia and macedonia. 2A02:120B:7FB:C1B0:5D33:39A1:7088:29FD (talk) 21:31, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Those who contend that there must be "an equal amount of defenders of each side" for an article to be neutral should review our neutrality guideline. Reliable sources are to be presented in proportion to their prevalence, otherwise we create false balance. If you believe the article is missing reliable sources, then please identify them. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:11, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

We should take the answers of the russians and macedonians. I see what rule you're invoking, but in this case, the aforementioned points of view cannot be ignored. These are prominent, but they aren't relayed. they should in either case be added. 2A02:120B:7FB:C1B0:505A:176C:9D0C:BD68 (talk) 15:38, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

It's true, we generally include denials by the accused. So relay them, or provide sources that relay them. As I understand it the Macedonian folks have acknowledged there role in making fake news. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:23, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Definition

I added a Definition section. [34], using source, The New York Times:

• Tavernise, Sabrina (7 December 2016), "As Fake News Spreads Lies, More Readers Shrug at the Truth", The New York Times, p. A1, retrieved 9 December 2016, Narrowly defined, 'fake news' means a made-up story with an intention to deceive, often geared toward getting clicks.

I think the article should stick closely to this narrow definition of what fake news is, because to broaden it and to be more vague and allow in alternative definitions would make the scope of the article too broad.

We should keep it to this narrow focus on "fake news": fictitious lies that are deliberately written as false to deceive people for financial gain or propaganda. Sagecandor (talk) 20:35, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Agree. This is the important distinction between fake news and inaccurate news. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:43, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

The impact of "Fake News" on the public

I'm seeing an awful lot of insinuation in the article regarding 'Fake News' (i.e,that it influenced the election) but aside from mere anecdotes, I cannot actually find anything in the article that would attribute a greater-than-average influence to 'Fake News' on the US Election, or any other major event for that matter.

With that in mind, what evidences are there to support that 'Fake News' is even newsworthy, true, or affirmed, aside from being a temporary moral panic? Solntsa90 (talk) 08:39, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

This talk page is WP:NOTAFORUM. Sagecandor (talk) 18:22, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Why? I've added back the citation that Sagecandor deleted making exactly this point. This is a content issue that Solntsa90 is raising. SashiRolls (talk) 11:48, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Fake news is obviously newsworthy as it has been widely reported on by the news media. But your question about how it has influenced the public is a good one. We should continue looking for sources that speak to that. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:45, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

• Solntsa90 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) blocked for three months for failing to adhere to community standards. [35]. Sagecandor (talk) 21:49, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Claims of Certain Hillary Victory before the Election

I have a question: Would HuffingPost claiming there was a 98.4% chance of Hillary winning , and numerous other mainstream "reliable news sites" proclaiming that it was "mathematically impossible" (actual quote ) for Trump to win also count as fake news? Since, you know, it was reported by so-called respectable news outlets and turned out to be hilariously wrong. Could we include that in this article? Or is it only anti-Trump and anti-Russia examples which - coincidentally - just so happen to completely dominate the article as of yet? 92.75.88.4 (talk) 15:06, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

References

That was based on polling data companies, not research by The Huffington Post. And it was not deliberate fraud. Sagecandor (talk) 15:38, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Ah yes, it's only deliberate fraud when it's done by conservatives. Rivalin (talk) 15:57, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

It is deliberate fraud when done by fake news websites. Like, for example, ABCnews.com.co and Denver Guardian and National Report. Sagecandor (talk) 16:03, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

No, sloppy reporting, such as the article you cited by News.com.au, is quite distinct from the fake news phenomenon, which is about deliberately fictitious stories. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:05, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure what world you guys live in, but "mathematically impossible" sounds quite definite and convinced to me. If such determined and clear claims can not be used to call a story "fake news" when they turn out to be wrong, then this just confirms the suspicions of many (including myself) that this subject is approached from a calculatedly partisan perspective. Excuses like "no its just sloppy research" seem to me like they are just moving the goal posts since the same could also be argued in defense of most of the examples of fake news cited in the article. Granted, they would be very stupid or malicious cases of sloppy research, but not any more than presumably respected journalists claiming that an occuring event was "mathematically impossible". 79.194.79.71 (talk) 20:25, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

That was based on polling data companies, not research by the reporters themselves. And it was not deliberate fraud. Sagecandor (talk) 20:31, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

There is a world of difference between mis-citing a source--the cited Independent source said, "If Trump does not at least all three of the big swing states, then he has no mathematical chance at winning a majority in the Electoral College," and that Clinton was "mathematically unlikely" to win, which News.com.au sloppily translated into the blanket "mathematically impossible"--and fabricating news stories from whole cloth without any credible sourcing. This article is about the latter. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:41, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Your suggestion as stated is original research and should not be included (as suggested). However, criticism of media reporting on fake news and the charge of media hypocrisy as it relates to fake news can be found in multiple rightwing publications. Your particular POV was, in fact, stated by Kellyanne Conway in her criticism of the media. This article should include Conway's response. 11Eternity11 (talk) 02:09, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, but that's not "fake news", that's just her saying it's fake news. Fake news would be deliberately reporting lies on purpose, not making a prediction backed up by a polling agency that later after the fact turns out to be incorrect. Sagecandor (talk) 03:21, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

In my statement, there was no assertion that it was fake news. The only assertion made was that Kellyanne Conway, as a Trump surrogate, had a response when she was asked about fake news. If we are going to discuss Russian propaganda and fake news as it pertains to the US presidential election, then we should include the Trump response. 11Eternity11 (talk) 04:07, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Sure that would be great info to add to Donald Trump presidential campaign, 2016. But we have to keep a narrow definition on this article and that has nothing to do with fake news, just because someone uses the phrase when they don't know what the definition is. It means deliberate fraud. Sagecandor (talk) 04:13, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Can you please take a step back for a moment and try to understand why so many people are taking issue with the POV of this article? With every suggestion of relevant content that may be critical of the POV of your sources, you insist on a POV fork. 11Eternity11 (talk) 04:21, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Please focus on content, not on contributors. Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 04:23, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia is supposed to be a consensus. I am simply asking that you seek a consensus. 11Eternity11 (talk) 04:55, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

References

Why Pope Francis

I fail to see the relevance to including Pope Francis's comments in the Lede and giving them undo weight (consider this sentence in the Lede: "Pope Francis said it was a sin to spread disinformation through fake news, calling it coprophilia..."). Why aren't we including what the Eastern Orthodox Pope says about fake news or any infinite number of celebrities and world and religious leaders in the Lede? Why Pope Francis? 11Eternity11 (talk) 03:21, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Um, because he's the Pope ? And maybe we can't cite the "Eastern Orthodox Pope" because the Eastern Orthodox Church doesn't have a Pope ? Sagecandor (talk) 03:32, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

You've just provided a great example of circular reasoning. And I was actually thinking of the Greek Orthodox Church, which certainly has a Pope. 11Eternity11 (talk) 03:47, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Have the heads of other religious groups issued statements which received coverage in secondary sources? Ian.thomson (talk) 03:50, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

What is the purpose of including religious positions on fake news in the Lede? 11Eternity11 (talk) 04:15, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Why don't you answer the question by Ian.thomson directly above? Sagecandor (talk) 04:17, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Pope Francis's statements have received coverage in secondary sources. World leaders (religious or secular) are reasonable to include. Are there secondary sources documenting what other religious leaders have said about fake news? Ian.thomson (talk) 04:33, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

I have no objection including them in the article. I am specifically discussing the lede. 11Eternity11 (talk) 04:36, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

In that case, your question regarding the Eastern Orthodox Pope, other religious leaders, or celebrities isn't exactly relevant. There's a subsection about Pope Francis later on in the article, and the lede summarizes the article. Simplest way to do that is to write a sentence or few about each section. Ian.thomson (talk) 04:49, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

My question was two parts a) why include religious figures' comments in lede, b) if we are to include religious figures' comments in the lede, why are we choosing Pope Francis and not other world leaders and which people are relevant enough to the subject to include in the lede. 11Eternity11 (talk) 05:02, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Can you suggest sources for any other religious figures? Sagecandor (talk) 05:05, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Word of caution about term misuse

User:Sagecandor seems to be pushing the limits of WP:OWNersip by repeatedly deleting an important well-referenced issue under formal pretenses. No amount of style guidelines warrant sweeping deletion of significant directly relevant information. If you think it is misplaced, move it around, but outright deletion is blatant disrespect of fellow editors. - üser:Altenmann >t 04:04, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Good points, Altenmann. Merged into article body text with [36] and [37] and [38]. Please be more mindful in the future not to just dump stuff directly into the introduction of the article, as you've done twice now, at [39] and [40]. Also using phrasing like It was noticed that the term "fake news" is often misused is a bit passive voice and with a topic this contentious, should attribute as much as possible directly to each individual author. Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 04:13, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

nothing wrong with passive voice, because many say so. we dont list zillion persons who say same thing. if you want to know who said that, read the freaking reference. this was a statement of fact, with arguments, not just opinion which of course shoud hve been attributed. - üser:Altenmann >t 01:36, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Hopefully we can all avoid communicating with obscenity in the future. Sagecandor (talk) 01:45, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

"Fake news and propaganda in the Middle East" and US dominance of article.

• Metcalf, Steve (8 December 2016). "Fake news and propaganda in the Middle East". BBC Monitoring.

The above article may be useful for editors who wish to seek to expand the Middle East section in this article. Additionally, I've created Fake news in the United States as a spinoff of this article – the dominance on recent US issues is overwhelming here and needs to be cut down IMO. HelgaStick (talk) 19:27, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Agreed. Thank you.  Doing.... Sagecandor (talk) 19:31, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Done. Reduced size of some material in this article and added to Fake news in the United States, with attribution link given. Sagecandor (talk) 20:26, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Added source per suggestion of HelgaStick [41]. Sagecandor (talk) 20:35, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Here is the lede to the cited BBC article on fake news and "post-truth" and I think it is relevant to discussing the creation of and editing of Wikipedia articles on this topic.

"When Oxford Dictionaries named "Post-truth" as its Word of the Year for 2016, it said usage of the word had increased dramatically due to this year's Brexit referendum in the UK and the US presidential election, although it had first been observed over 20 years ago."

Here, they are simply discussing the term "post-truth", but the point of that statement is that fake news/propaganda is not new and has been around for centuries (see blood libel). There are many wikipedia pages on the topic of propaganda: Category:Propaganda_by_country, Overview of 21st-century propaganda,etc. Using the term "progaganda" (as opposed to "fake news") lends itself to higher quality sources, with academic papers (as opposed to news media sources) that can date back to the 1940's. The BBC source makes the point that several editors here have suggested: fake news and "post-truth" are not new, "there is nothing new about the way of thinking it describes". By creating topically equivalent articles under the term "fake news", as opposed to "propaganda", we are creating redundant content and POV forks. Now, if we were to get specific with an article to focus on the current fake news controversy, we would avoid this particular situation with an ambiguous term being used to mean many different things depending on the context and having a situation of never ending scope. 11Eternity11 (talk) 21:14, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

References

Wait, so let me get this straight, you are comparing fake news to blood libel ? Sagecandor (talk) 21:28, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

It's not me who has made such connections. 11Eternity11 (talk) 21:31, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Okay let's not use talk page as a forum. Sagecandor (talk) 21:34, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Agreed. 11Eternity11 (talk) 21:35, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Moving the forum label. My previous comment on encyclopedic content still stands. 11Eternity11 (talk) 21:46, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

No, it was off-topic and did not suggest how to improve this article itself. Sagecandor (talk) 21:48, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

It was very much on topic with a discussion of a) the title of this article, b) the scope of this article, c) criticism that these newly created articles on "fake news" are content forking, and d) a discussion of what the BBC source cited above actually says and how it relates to the a, b, and c issues. Please stop being disruptive. 11Eternity11 (talk) 21:54, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

I'm sorry you feel talking politely back and forth on a talk page is disruptive. Do you have a specific suggestion or secondary source to use for this article ? Sagecandor (talk) 21:59, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

My suggestion is that since the bulk of this article deals with the 2016 fake news controversy, we retitle it to reflect its content, and limit its scope with other pre-2016 fake news controversy content to be added to the already existing relevant wikipedia pages (such as Overview of 21st-century propaganda). 11Eternity11 (talk) 22:12, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Actually, I'm already in process of greatly reducing size of the article so it is more of a global overview from country to country. Sagecandor (talk) 22:13, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Please discuss and collaborate; we should never be in a situation, on a contentious article, where an editor unilaterally announces "I" am in the process of "greatly reducing" the article. You're an editor like the rest of us, not the editor-in-chief. BlueSalix (talk) 09:30, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

There has been a great deal of both, including with some good advice from admin Neutrality, above. Sagecandor (talk) 09:33, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Agree this should be done collaboratively and with consensus, but any move towards making the page a bit more focused, per its current title, can only be an improvement. There is, or was, too much here about trolling, hacking, general propaganda and misinformation, iffy reporting and online hoaxes etc, which are all separate topics and, as the BBC Monitoring piece cited at the top here says, of course nothing new. There's also the problem of the weight being given to what Russia is supposedly doing to the US as a whole, when the issue is actually broader in geographical scope, but also simultaneously narrower, in terms of being simply about fabricated news websites. N-HH talk/edits 15:23, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you. Sagecandor (talk) 17:26, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Removed Full Frontal with Samantha Bee

I've removed the entire subsection on Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, at link [42]. This is as per multiple talk page complaints including: [43] and [44] and [45] and [46]. Sagecandor (talk) 23:35, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. Beyond the issues about sourcing (and problems with the removal of any material that disputed the reports), there is of course the more fundamental point that this was about online commenting and alleged professional trolling, not "Fake news websites" anyway. It should probably have long gone on that basis, ie lack of relevance, some time ago. N-HH talk/edits 15:08, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, glad you approve of my improvement to the article in this fashion with the removal of Full Frontal with Samantha Bee in response to talk page feedback suggesting to do so. Sagecandor (talk) 17:26, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

References

A Clinton Fan Manufactured Fake News That MSNBC Personalities Spread to Discredit WikiLeaks Docs

This might be a good addition. From The Intercept petrarchan47คุก 17:46, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you I've added this personal opinion commentary to the article. Sagecandor (talk) 17:53, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

U.S. intelligence conclusions

U.S. intelligence conclusions - section directly related to Russian propaganda operation to spread fake news from fake news websites through social media.

Outright censorship of the entire paragraph is inappropriate [47] [48].

Instead, I've removed all material mentioning the Kremlin-organized hacking of the Republican National Committee and Democratic National Committee, reduced size of the paragraph, and kept it only to the entire United States Intelligence Community conclusions more generally. [49] Sagecandor (talk) 16:08, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Reduced size of that section a lot more: [50]. Sagecandor (talk) 16:46, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) I see a third removal [51] of material by N-HH (talk · contribs). Unfortunately, the user is wrong. The sources do mention fake news, and Russian propaganda on social media spreading fake news. I made this much more clear with the copy edits if you could please revisit this version: [52]. Sagecandor (talk) 17:21, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

A fourth removal of large amounts of content by N-HH (talk · contribs) at [53]. That is about Russian propaganda not just hacking. The entire Countering Foreign Propaganda and Disinformation Act, which Neutrality helped me copy edit, is not about hacking but about Russian propaganda spread by fake news. Sagecandor (talk) 17:24, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Your page ownership issues are now out of control. None of this content relates to "Fake news websites", and much of what you are putting back is still very explicitly, and only, about the hacking issue. This page is not about hacking, or indeed about Russian propaganda. I have read the cited pieces. Stop adding this material or variations on it. Your additions were reverted and you now you need to justify them and get consensus. N-HH talk/edits 17:25, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

I've reduced size of the information from a whole paragraph down to just one sentence, hopefully this is now an acceptable compromise. [54]. Sagecandor (talk) 17:27, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

No, there is no compromise that involves the addition of huge paragraphs of utterly non-relevant content about something else altogether. And you didn't bring it down to one sentence, you're readding whole blocks of text about it. Please stop. You have a third opinion now as well. But have at it, I'm taking my weekend back. N-HH talk/edits 17:33, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

---

Do the articles actually use the phrase "fake news" or allude to it? The NYT and USA Today don't seem to. If the articles don't mention them, then I would agree with N-HH on this point. I think this material would be much better placed at Democratic National Committee cyber attacks and 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak. Neutrality^talk 17:30, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:A 5th time now N-HH (talk · contribs) has removed sourced content [55]. I'd like for us to both try to instead reduce size of the section. It is directly relevant to Russian propaganda in the form of fake news. I was trying to reduce the entire section and copy edit it down greatly to a one-sentence-mention. I think a brief one-sentence-mention is acceptable here. Sagecandor (talk) 17:32, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Maybe, but any mention has to be supported by a reference directly invoking fake news or something similar. Otherwise, the content should go on another article (e.g., Russian propaganda). So are there are sources on this point? Neutrality^talk 17:34, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:Yes, there are sources on this point. In addition to the release of hacked emails, a flood of disinformation and conspiracy theories was widely circulated on the internet in the form of false stories that were peddled as news. Much of that fake news — which almost exclusively targeted Hillary Clinton — gained tremendous popularity on social networks like Facebook for months leading up to November 8. News of the CIA’s findings came as President Barack Obama ordered a complete review of the matter Friday. So it can and should be included in this article as at the very least a brief-one-sentence-mention. Sagecandor (talk) 17:37, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

What do you propose, in terms of one or two sentences? Neutrality^talk 17:39, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:If permitted, I will add the content back momentarily and then greatly trim it down with copy editing. I work best by copy editing to make wording briefer that way. Sagecandor (talk) 17:40, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

It would be better to work it out on the talk page here first, come up with some suggested text, then get input on it. Neutrality^talk 17:42, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

And I would say that some of your text (in longer form) would work well at Democratic National Committee cyber attacks and 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak. Those pages do need to be updated as a result of the most recent developments. Neutrality^talk 17:48, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:Here is the suggested additions:

• For section Fake_news_website#U.S._intelligence_analysis - On December 9, 2016, the CIA told legislators U.S. Intelligence concluded Russia conducted operations during the 2016 election to assist Trump in winning the presidency — Trump released a statement disregarding the CIA conclusions.
• For section Fake_news_website#Legislative_and_executive_responses - On December 9, 2016, President Obama ordered U.S. Intelligence Community to conduct a complete review of the Russian propaganda operation.

And yes, I agree with you that longer form content can also be added to Democratic National Committee cyber attacks and 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak. Sagecandor (talk) 17:51, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:What do you think of these brief one-sentence-long suggested additions sourced to a secondary source discussing fake news? Sagecandor (talk) 17:58, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Fine with me, but I want to see what N-HH says first. Neutrality^talk 18:18, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

N-HH (talk · contribs) last said he's taking my weekend back, so that might not be for some time, Neutrality. Meanwhile, I did as you suggested and added longer form material to Democratic National Committee cyber attacks and 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak and Podesta emails. Now that those have much longer versions, can we have a one-sentence-mention here from a source that directly discusses fake news? Sagecandor (talk) 18:23, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

I would give it 2 days or so. There's no deadline here. I understand the frustration but given that there's been an objection and the topic is controversial, I'd wait a bit. Neutrality^talk 18:27, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:Two days over one-sentence-long addition from a source that directly mentions fake news seems a bit much. But I agree with you that the topic has been controversial for some incoming respondents to this page for some reason. We could instead maybe directly attribute the information to the secondary source and use a direct quote from them? Would that make it better? Or would that be too much because we can't cut down from a quote to make it shorter as we can with the proposed one-sentence-addition? Sagecandor (talk) 18:30, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

I can only repeat what I've said: the intelligence conclusions do not relate to "fake news websites" and none of the secondary sources are about fake news or include any suggestion that the conclusions relate to it. Hence, it's simply not relevant. Most don't even mention "fake news", and the one that you have found which does only does it in passing as a bit of background/filler way down the page. That's how news reports are written and padded out. The article could just as easily have said "the accusations came as Russia was also under pressure over doping allegations". Would we then add this to an entry on doping? Add information from these articles to the pages about hacking, since that is what they are about. But given that elsewhere the page is now starting to be a bit more concise and have a bit more focus, there's even less reason to add this tangential point, however briefly. N-HH talk/edits 15:05, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:What to do next? I feel I suggested a brief one-sentence-mention as a compromise from the prior larger paragraphs. This apparently is being rejected. Can we add in this one-sentence-mention from a secondary source that does discuss "fake news" as directly relevant to the intelligence conclusions? Sagecandor (talk) 17:28, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Is there anything else besides Business Insider on point? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Neutrality (talk • contribs)

@Neutrality:In addition to The CIA says it has evidence that Russia tried to help Trump win the US election, we have Intel Officials Believe Russia Spreads Fake News. With those two, can we add the one-sentence-mention to the article as proposed? Sagecandor (talk) 18:24, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

OK, that article is on point (two US intelligence sources directly speaking to Russian efforts to spread "completely fake news stories"). I support adding the 1 sentence. If other editors object then we should bring it here for further discussion. Neutrality^talk 18:36, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, added the one-sentence-mentions per suggestion by Neutrality, at [56] and [57]. Sagecandor (talk) 18:48, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

You don't have to keep pinging me on talk or edit summaries, by the way - I watchlist the article. Neutrality^talk 18:51, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Okay thank you. Sagecandor (talk) 19:29, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

References

FFS, why are you continuing to push the the Business Insider piece on the CIA allegations, neither of which are about fake news? I see you've tried to get round that problem by putting it back in again but this time rewriting the content so that it suggests the CIA was referring to "propaganda" rather than the DNC hacking. So now it's misleading as well as irrelevant. I'm taking it out again. As for the Buzzfeed piece, it is at least relevant to this topic (and that seems to be the one Neutrality was okaying, so you seem to have misread their comment) but it's pretty weak stuff, based on comments from anonymous sources rather than any formal conclusions. N-HH talk/edits 19:17, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

@Neutrality:[58] Removed again by N-HH (talk · contribs). Directly relevant to the article text, as discussed above already. How do we go from here? Sagecandor (talk) 19:23, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

My removal of it is more justified than your constant reinsertion of it. I have explained the problem repeatedly - and indeed how you're now making the problem worse - but if you don't want to take any of that on board or actaully address the problem, that's hardly my fault. N-HH talk/edits 19:28, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Sagecandor, I would hold off on adding this for a week or so and see what other sources emerge, unless you want to put this up to an RfC. N-HH, you're right that the second piece (quoting the two U.S. intelligence sources) was indeed the one I was referring to (I would drop Business Insider). I do think that we can't really require "formal conclusions" — areas like intelligence etc. naturally are shrouded in some mystery, so if we see secondary sources reporting on it, I don't think that fact that the sources are anonymous is really a bar (if it's "two senior U.S. officials" or the like). Neutrality^talk 19:30, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Neutrality another source from The Guardian: "spread disinformation, and generally discredit and confuse the democratic system." Good to include? Sagecandor (talk) 19:38, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

I wasn't outright rejecting that Buzzfeed piece, just noting that it's not ideal, especially in an encyclopedic context. The media can make whole stories out of what they were told over lunch in passing, and that's fine for them, but there have to be higher standards here. WP doesn't have to include everything the media reports, and while intelligence work is always a little opaque, at the same time agencies do make more formal assessments and statements, and where they exist they are far better than this kind of thing (while still warranting a dose of scepticism, precisely because intelligence is a murky world). As for the latest piece being linked to, I don't see what it adds to what is already here. It's a brief round-up analysis piece in the Guardian, with no particular insight or new information. N-HH talk/edits 19:42, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Should Shareblue / Blue Nation Review be added to the 2016 elections section?

[59] this edit by SashiRolls (talk · contribs) appears to direct violate WP:SYNTH.

And edit-wars to add it back in, again, at [60].

Do any WP:SECONDARY sources describe this newly added content as a "fake news website" ?

If not, it's gotta go. Sagecandor (talk) 01:59, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes, this is clearly synthesis. It has been swiftly removed, and rightly so. This is more than just playing fast and loose with the sources; it's disingenuous and transparent POV pushing. Neutrality^talk 03:06, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

No. There's no WP:SYNTH in anything I added, every word was supported by the sources. Pravda-esque was in the New York Times. The argument that the main goal of the paper was to elect Clinton too (this is why it's in the section on the 2016 elections). As to Blue Nation Review being on the list of fakenews fact checker pages, it is listed on two that I've seen (here's one: → http://www.fakenewschecker.com/fake-news-source/blue-nation-review ←). Of course, I don't believe this is any more worthy of inclusion in Wikipedia than most of the rest of the article, so I won't fight. Also, please note there was no edit-warring. Asking someone to discuss on the talk page is not edit-warring. And of course we know the POV of Neutrality.SashiRolls (talk) 06:27, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

No, the article content that has nothing to do with fake news, and furthermore it is difficult to see how any rational observer could see otherwise. Political spin is not "Fake news." Neutrality^talk 13:55, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Text deleted: Websites like Shareblue, formerly Blue Nation Review, have also sought to influence the 2016 USelections: with $2 million in funding from political donors, reportedly / according to the New York Times the main goal of this David Brock-owned site was to get Hillary Clinton elected. The stories written and published during the election by the CEO of True Blue Media, LLC (a former Clinton Senate staffer and web specialist during her 2008 campaign) included "With Bernie Sanders As Their Nominee, Democrats Can Kiss The Presidency Goodbye", "Why does Bernie Sanders keep denigrating Hillary’s supporters?", and "Hillary Clinton’s feat of strength obliterates months of health conspiracies," which have been identified as "Pravda-esque".

References

In retrospect I could have added what is in maroon in the text to make clear this assertion was made by a reliable source and not just in wiki-text. Again, check it out, there is no WP:SYNTH in the text above, every word checks out to the articles cited. Verifiably. SashiRolls (talk) 06:38, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

You're trying to insert that text into an article about FAKE NEWS, so you're damned right it's synthesis in THIS article, especially since there's not a single goddamned word about lying or falsehoods. Trying to put that in is your clumsy attempt at guilt-by-association and will not stand. --Calton | Talk 09:08, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

As Carlton and Sagecandor says, it's clearly synthesis. Neutrality^talk 13:55, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

I stand by my revert. See comments from Carlton, Neutrality and Sagecandor. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 21:52, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

It should also be noted that SashiRolls misrepresents the content of the Times's article, including cherry-picking and misrepresenting the "Pravda-esque" quote. So triple NO to including this spin. --Calton | Talk 01:37, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

I see that SashiRolls has brought up this edit at an unrelated grievance-fest at WP:AE, still trying to justify it. They made reference to a so-called "fakenews fact checker page" (which I'd overlooked above), so I decided to check it out. Of Blue Nation Review -- which is not even its current name -- .fakenewschecker.com says:

Blue Nation Review publishes information from a left biased position with an advocacy for liberal causes. The editorial content and headlines are often loaded with strong words to appeal to emotions and stereotypes. They may publish misleading reports, cite unverified sources, reference bogus reports and omit information that may damage their cause. The information provided should be regarded as speculative opinion and/or propaganda. It is among the most untrustworthy sources in the media.

Yeah, sounds pretty damning, though I don't see any actual attempt at supporting that statement. Hmm, what about other sites? About Counterpunch, which SashiRolls maintains is a reliable source?:

CounterPunch publishes information from a left biased position with an advocacy for liberal causes. The editorial content and headlines are often loaded with strong words to appeal to emotions and stereotypes. They may publish misleading reports, cite unverified sources, reference bogus reports and omit information that may damage their cause. The information provided should be regarded as speculative opinion and/or propaganda. It is among the most untrustworthy sources in the media.

Boy, that looks familiar. How about Democracy Now, which SashiRolls has had no trouble with before?:

Democracy Now publishes information from a left biased position with an advocacy for liberal causes. The editorial content and headlines are often loaded with strong words to appeal to emotions and stereotypes. They may publish misleading reports, cite unverified sources, reference bogus reports and omit information that may damage their cause. The information provided should be regarded as speculative opinion and/or propaganda. It is among the most untrustworthy sources in the media.

Hmm. Mother Jones?:

Mother Jones publishes information from a left biased position with an advocacy for liberal causes. The editorial content and headlines are often loaded with strong words to appeal to emotions and stereotypes. They may publish misleading reports, cite unverified sources, reference bogus reports and omit information that may damage their cause. The information provided should be regarded as speculative opinion and/or propaganda. It is among the most untrustworthy sources in the media.

What about The Onion?:

The Onion publishes information that cannot be validated and that is anti scientific fact. The information provided should be regarded as speculative opinion or propaganda and cannot be substantiated by fact or evidence. It is among the most untrustworthy sources in the media.

Oh, that's a relief, they change the text a...wait a minute there.

I'm beginning to believe that SashiRolls's approaching to fact-checking is "whatever echoes my agenda", not "actually factual". That would be strangely appropriate, given the article in question here. --Calton | Talk 16:31, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

A few critical points:

1. Fakenewschecker.com is not a reliable source.
2. I don't take any position on the specific outlets Calton mentions, but please keep in mind that reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective.
3. Contributors are advised to focus on edits rather than editors and to avoid engaging in personal attacks at all times.

--Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:18, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

A few critical points, too

1) Of course they're not: that was my whole point.

2) Not a single one of those adjectives was on point: it's that the identical text for each entry (with no sources, examples, or explanations) means

a) that it's worthless as an information source of any kind

b) that SashiRolls is trying to have things both ways, using this to claim a website is "fake news" -- which even the boilerplate text doesn't support -- whilst claiming that other websites/news sources which have exactly the same description are genuinely fine reliable sources.

3) A demonstration of an edit's worthlessness and the implied critique of an editor's competence and past behavior is not a personal attack. If SashiRolls doesn't like having their claims dismantled, they need to make better claims -- or at least make claims which are related to the actual topic. --Calton | Talk 14:41, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

What some random, unreliable website says about various media outlets has absolutely zero bearing on any of the outlets' reliability. Focus on WP:RS. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 01:19, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

And of course, the text that I entered in article space did not cite factchecker.com nor did it cite this google squib: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/news/uxSdg4iyKWU/FM7I0cONBQAJ nor did it cite the specific articles (HuffPo, Paste, Counterpunch) mentioned in that google squib. It cited The Daily Beast, and the NY Times. It was reverted because the word "fake" was not in vogue when those articles were written. SashiRolls (talk) 20:15, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 December 2016

See the line below. "traffic is misspelled" : On 14 November 2016, Google responded to the problem of fraudulent sites by banning such companies from profiting on advertising from traffi through its program AdSense.[28][29][121] Charleswagner (talk) 07:05, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Done, thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 07:07, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Russia Today fails as reliable source about Russian propaganda by Russian government

Source Russia Today fails WP:RS as not reliable source about Russian propaganda by Russian government.

Please don't use this source, especially not in this article.

Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 14:25, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

RT is a news station. It may have flaws, but it reported something which appears to contradict claims made by a US comedy programme. It beggars belief that anyone can seriously argue that reports from the latter must be included, while reports from the former must be excised, and more generally that US sources are fine for discussing purported Russian propaganda attacks against the US, but Russian ones responding to such claims are beyond the pale. You also reverted half of my other entirely reasonable minor additions and rephrasings, which were a small attempt to add some balance to the article and avoid it just being stuffed with allegations as if they are all true (for example by removing Zuckerberg's comments – if you objected to the quote being in the lead alongside the Google CEO quote, you could have moved it to where the point was made in the body – and restoring wording that contentious research "confirms" things, although that whole para in the lead was subsequently removed by someone else). As so often on WP, this page is being used to push charges via slanted emphasis and cherry-picked sources rather than to describe a topic neutrally and with balance. And, yes, I know the response is "we're just following the RS". Oh well, if you say so. Have fun with it. N-HH talk/edits 08:16, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Why is RT not reliable? Because your local newspaper says so? What do you mean by "especially not in this article." should we use biased american MSM? DerElektriker (talk) 11:29, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Russia Today is not reliable because it is an overt Russian propaganda arm by the Russian government. The sources cited in the intro section of the Wikipedia article RT (TV network) make this quite clear. Sagecandor (talk) 16:59, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

and CBS and BBC are propaganda from the US and UK as they are sponsored by the goverment?--Crossswords (talk) 17:02, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

No, Crossswords, and this false belief has already been explained to you, repeatedly, by Neutrality in great detail. Sagecandor (talk) 17:07, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

And you haven't addressed the point about why a US comedy show is an unimpeachable source, whose allegations simply have to be included in great detail, when a Russian news source daring to suggest there might be a problem with that show's report is verboten and has to be censored, simply on the basis of your personal declaration to that effect. The brief RT content I added for balance was clearly attributed, and did not assert that it had conclusively debunked the original report. People can read things from both sides and come to their own judgment. And if you can't see the circular reasoning and extensive question-begging involved in your argument as to why X media is OK and Y media is not, please try harder. N-HH talk/edits 21:34, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Let's focus on Russia Today. Sagecandor (talk) 21:38, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

I did. In case the point is not clear, your argument (often heard on WP) is that RT is not "reliable", especially when it contradicts western media reports, because western media have declared it unreliable. That's as rational and helpful – and as circular an argument – as declaring western media unreliable because RT says so, which it frequently does. I agree RT should always be used with caution, and with awareness of where it is coming from, but then so should all media and indeed any other sources to a greater or lesser degree. As I said, I attributed the RT content. As I also said, it certainly stands on a par here with the US comedy show claims. N-HH talk/edits 21:42, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Casting all reliable secondary sources as unacceptable sources as quote "Western Media" belies a POV. Sagecandor (talk) 21:45, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Which I didn't do. N-HH talk/edits 21:47, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

"Russia Today has frequently been called a propaganda outlet for the Russian government and its foreign policy by news reporters, including former RT reporters." -- note that this includes former reporters for Russia Today, itself. Sagecandor (talk) 21:58, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

References

Yes, I know what WP's page on RT says, and I know what people say about RT (just as I know what people say about other outlets, including former employees of those outlets). I don't necessarily disagree with much of it. But copy-pasting all that here is rather obviously still missing the point of what I said about circular argument and about the potential problems with *any* source. Nor does it address the point that you seem quite happy to justify relying, without even a hint of a question, on a US comedy show's report, and reports from other western media, as well as direct accusations sourced directly to western government agencies on this page. Given that context, you have spectacularly failed to explain, let alone justify, why just one of RT's direct responses to some of the allegations here is beyond the pale. Continually posting irrelevant non-sequiturs isn't helpful, unless your aim is simply obfuscation. No wonder "fake news" gains so much traction when people's critical and logical faculties are so manifestly lacking. N-HH talk/edits 20:37, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

You are factually incorrect. Nothing is sourced to a comedy show or to a government source. It is all sourced to secondary sources. Perhaps you may not know the difference between a WP:PRIMARY source and a WP:SECONDARY source? Sagecandor (talk) 20:39, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Er, there's a whole subsection of claims about Russian "trolls" sourced to Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, which is a news-based comedy show. That's the content this discussion was initially about. There are huge swathes of content citing the direct claims of western intelligence agencies and politicians. I never raised the question of whether or not the sources were primary ones. Feel free to be confused yourself, but don't accuse me of it. N-HH talk/edits 20:47, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Nope. Not sourced to Full Frontal with Samantha Bee. Read WP:SECONDARY, please. Sagecandor (talk) 20:49, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes, the original source of the claims is Full Frontal. That's the show the interviews were with and which made the claims in question. Other outlets have, in turn, simply reported/repeated that "Full Frontal did/said this". This is not hard. Or shouldn't be. And please stop telling me about the difference between primary and secondary sources, whether in WP-land or elsewhere. I know the difference, and it just makes you look patronising on top of everything else. N-HH talk/edits 20:55, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Scorned, former employees are not a reliable source. RT is not propaganda anymore than the BBC is state propaganda for the UK. Solntsa90 (talk) 16:45, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

There are huge differences between RT and the BBC. RT is state-owned. The BBC is not. RT has been described by various reliable sources as a propaganda outlet. The BBC has not, as far as I know. The BBC is widely cited by other reliable media outlets. RT is not nearly as much. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:24, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

I think you'll find that RT was one of the very few media (with Al Jazeera & Democracy Now!) to cover the Alabama & national prison strikes on the anniversary of the Attica uprising into their second week... [61] SashiRolls (talk) 19:32, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

@N-HH:Please stop adding Russian propaganda source Russia Today to this article. It may be an okay source about sporting events, but not about reporting about Russian propaganda and Internet trolls paid by the Kremlin, itself. Sagecandor (talk) 15:34, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

I do not think RT is a reliable source for anything per our guideline, as it doesn't have a reputation for accuracy and fact-checking. On top of that it has been widely and reliably identified as owned by the Russian government, which has a reliably sourced policy of spreading disinformation about subjects far beyond Russia itself. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:21, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, DrFleischman, agreed. Sagecandor (talk) 18:23, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

This is merely your invective, and your opinion; RT is as good a source as any. Solntsa90 (talk) 20:44, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

You can say that but you're not exactly convincing anyone. Perhaps you should explain why you think RT is a reliable source, perhaps drawing from our relevant guideline. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 21:08, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

The burden is on you, Solntsa90, to demonstrate reliability -- it is not up to those challenging its reliability. Neutrality^talk 21:12, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

You want me to prove that RT is NOT propaganda? How am I supposed to go about proving a negative? Solntsa90 (talk) 21:50, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

"You are indefinitely banned from the topic of Vladimir Putin on all pages of Wikipedia including talk". Sagecandor (talk) 21:58, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

No, we want you to prove that RT IS reliable. The criteria for reliability are laid out at WP:RS. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 22:09, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

I can only repeat what I have argued above and elsewhere. Sources are not necessarily "always" reliable or "never" reliable (whether in WP terms or standard English). All sources have to be used with caution and with appreciation of the context in which individual bits of information are being used. RT, for all its faults, is a news outlet that does serious news reporting, and unquestionably falls, prima facie, under the WP:NEWSORG section of RS. In this instance, one of its news reports has challenged an earlier report that originated with a US comedy show, suggesting, with evidence, that the US show could have been the victim of a hoax. I included that counter-report with full attribution to RT. No one has explained why the US comedy-show report is unimpeachable, but an attributed RT news report is not. Indeed, no one has even addressed the prior point. All we have is "I don't like RT" and simple assertion that it is nothing more than propaganda, following by kneejerk veto and reverting. And again, can people please think about the circular argument, assumptions and question-begging here? If I call you a credulous and biased idiot with page ownership issues, and you respond "but I'm not a credulous and biased idiot with page ownership issues", we cannot disregard that rebuttal on the basis that you are an idiot (because I said so). As I also said, it would be ironic if this page ends up including hoax news of its own. N-HH talk/edits 19:08, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

I'll try to ignore the backhanded personal attack and say that yes, you're right that sources must be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. That said, some media outlets are unreliable as a matter of course and I believe RT is one of them since it is state-controlled by a country known for its disinformation programs. RT fails WP:NEWSORG for exactly that reason. You don't see RT being cited by established media sources since its connections to the Russian propaganda machine became public. The rest of your comment appears to be off-topic. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 22:42, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Did I say something about circular argument somewhere? "No one has explained why the US comedy-show report is unimpeachable, but an attributed RT news report is not. Indeed, no one has even addressed the prior point. All we have is 'I don't like RT' and simple assertion that it is nothing more than propaganda". Like I said. By contrast every claim in the liberal western media, by a western security service or a right-wing think-tank is flung in as incontrovertible fact "confirming" the allegations (if there's one thing right and left in America agree on it's about the nefarious Russians, hence there are plenty of US editors to write as much and plenty of US reporting to act as "reliable sources" for the content those editors want). As also explained, there is no personal attack in my hypothetical and generic assertion, the point of which, as my wording also says, is that it is rebuttable. N-HH talk/edits 08:13, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Of course it's rebuttable, if there's a reliable source that presents a rebuttal. If you identify one then we can discuss it. No one made the argument that "'I don't like RT' and simple assertion that it is nothing more than propaganda." We don't reach consensus by knocking down straw men, so please don't. It is your burden to establish the reliability of RT. You can do this by presenting evidence that RT has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:30, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Can we get away from the reliability/non-reliability binary argument and focus on particular contexts of reliability? RT has been accused of sloppy journalism and pro-Russian propaganda, but the same can be said of established western media, such as the NY Times and WaPo. I think the discussion should focus on the particular statement in the Wiki article being cited and whether or not RT is a reliable source for that particular statement, instead of universally rejecting RT as a reliable source for the entire article (which is what appears to have happened). 11Eternity11 (talk) 23:28, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

We can, but no matter what context/content we consider the answer will always be the same for media outlets like RT. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 01:16, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

While that may be your answer on RT, editing on wikipedia is to follow consensus, and thus, using absolutes, "never" and "always", aren't applicable words to describe "the answer" of reliability on any source (including RT and BuzzFeed). Let's focus on the statement being cited with RT and answer: a) should the statement appear in the article (does it add encyclopedic content), b) is RT a good source for the statement, c) if not b, then is there a more reliable source for the statement, d) if there are no reliable sources for the statement, then it should be removed. I would like to suggest that we start to discuss problematic edits as statement/source combinations so that we can have more constructive discussions on the actual article content. 11Eternity11 (talk) 00:11, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

I thought this discussion was specifically about the reliability of RT, but okay, what's the content in question? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:55, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Criticism section 2

I see the obvious has already been suggested, and like seemingly all other sections on this page, was argued into oblivion by an account started just to write this article. The Washington Post has been threatened with legal action for their "false news" piece, with Glenn Greenwald saying many other media outlets passed on this story. WaPo is now putting distance between itself and the main source for this brand new "false news" meme, described here. This Wikipedia article's lack of a balanced view, including the omission of valid criticism, and allowing a SPA to rule the day, is problematic. petrarchan47คุก 18:12, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Already discussed, at Talk:Fake news website#Criticism. Sagecandor (talk) 18:34, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

It seems odd that the numerous editors pointing out the major POV flaws in this article is itself becoming a dead horse. Obviously more objective editors need to take the reigns. This is an interesting article. Before the election I always thought the term "fake news" referred to Clickbait, or bait and click advertisements that appeared to be news headlines. I believe a lot of other people thought that as well. I think that it should be pointed out that this topic is relatively new and currently an actual definition is being debated. In other words, certain websites have been accused of being fake news (either recently or recently on a high profile level), and so there is currently a debate about what is meant by this term. Or whether it is even a legitimate term. There are clearly opposing views that believe the term is false or that the term lumps together clickbait sites with websites that simply do not follow the political beliefs of others. In short, this is a new term and its meaning is being formed. Currently this article mostly reflects one side of that debate, whereas at this point in time it should reflect the debate itself. The first thing that stood out to me was an entire section about the reporting and findings of Full Frontal with Samantha Bee. Did the editor really not see the enormous irony of this section? The section treats the show's reporting as serious, traditional journalism. The show is, by definition, news satire, like Chevy Chase in 1975. And it is a very funny and well made satire, but its SATIRE. I am genuinely baffled by the blindness and lack of understanding basic nuance that including this section in this article in this particular way shows. Also, am I wrong or is there not a single mention of freedom of speech in the entire article and how that concept is tied up in the current debate? I admit I haven't checked, but I would be shocked if not a single news article (or other citable content) that discusses the article's subject did not bring up the 1st amendment.--Deoliveirafan (talk) 02:57, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

As mentioned, above, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee is not used as a source, but rather WP:SECONDARY sources that reported on it. Do you have any specific secondary sources to suggest that could be added to the section Fake_news_website#Other_media ? Sagecandor (talk) 03:01, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I see how you cleverly used secondary sources that report on (comedic) reporting, but my question is: Do you not see the irony of its specific use in this particular article?--Deoliveirafan (talk) 03:24, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

We can only rely upon what the reliable secondary sources say, no more, no less. Sagecandor (talk) 03:25, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

OK, one last try: Do you see the irony? Also, in your edits did you use a 27b/6? See that? That's humor. Wikipedia:Gaming the system--Deoliveirafan (talk) 05:06, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

This is a lost cause. A media outlet or specific report someone likes is simply asserted to be "reliable"; one they don't is "unreliable". Also people who claim such perspicacity often, at the same time, show a remarkable lack of understanding about how the media operates in terms of recycling news and claims from other outlets. As for a criticism section, these are, correctly, deprecated on WP, but a little more scepticism and balance across the content would help, rather than it relying on western media, think-tank and security service claims and saying in WP's voice at times that these have been "confirmed" etc. Western media says Russian media crap? Western governments say Russian government engages in propaganda? Well I never. I did try to make a couple of edits in that direction, but the full-time page owner here reverted even that. Along with any content that queried the Full Frontal claim (which, to compound the problem, isn't about a "Fake news website" anyway). N-HH talk/edits 08:21, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

You're showing a remarkable unwillingness to try to understand basic Wikipedia policy, which, whether you like it or not, will be enforced by the community if/when these types of disputes draw broader attention. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:59, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Although there are plenty of sources that have verifiably disputed or contested much of what has been included here, directly or by repetition by other western media, as if it were gospel truth. But as noted ad nauseam, if individual busy editors disagree and misleadingly cite WP policies or guidelines in their defence, and cherry-pick sources, veto others and kneejerk revert any attempt to suggest even a possible contrary narrative, that counts for little in WP-land. For example, huge swathes of this page are still based on the repetition and recycling of the discredited WaPo and Propornot nonsense, even if that is not immediately obvious amid the "well sourced" content. N-HH talk/edits 21:02, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

I haven't formed a solid opinion on the reliability of the WaPo source, but if you are aware of missing reliable sources that suggest a possible contrary narrative, then by all means identify them! --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 21:13, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Well, other news sources have formed a solid – negative – opinion; just as other immediately contemporaneous news sources repeated the Post's claims uncritically (as, as noted, news sources often do) although that's not immediately obvious from the way the related content is being sourced here. As for sources that, more broadly, dispute much of the other content here, as you know, these are instantly reverted. N-HH talk/edits 21:19, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Maybe for good reason, maybe not, but nothing can be done about it unless/until you get specific. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 21:21, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

At first, incoming users wanted to remove PropOrNot [62], so I did. Then, when more criticism came out about PropOrNot, they wanted to keep it in the article [63]. Then, they suggested I create the article on PropOrNot, which I did [64]. I was given praise for writing that article, which was called "succinct and balanced" [65] [66]. I agree PropOrNot has been effectively debunked [67]. And yet perhaps some users want to keep mention of it here in the article as a vehicle for "criticisms". I guess ya can't please everybody. Sagecandor (talk) 21:26, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

PropOrNot wasn't debunked. It's just that its reliability has been called into question by highly respected journalists. The tougher question is whether the WaPo story is still reliable. WaPo has stood by it and says its information was based on multiple sources, not just PropOrNot. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 21:32, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Any information tied back to PropOrNot is unreliable in my view per [68]. All other stuff in that article is fine as it was from much more reputable older organizations with a long history of foreign policy analysis. Sagecandor (talk) 21:36, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

I haven't seen any respected journalists or experts who criticized the WaPo article responding to WaPo's editor's note. That would be informative. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:15, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Abode of Chaos picture

File:Putin @ Abode of Chaos.jpg

A photograph by Thierry Ehrmann of artwork at the Demeure du Chaos

What does this picture added by SashiRolls (talk · contribs) have to do with anything related to this article ?

Sagecandor (talk) 18:37, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Apparently nothing. I've removed it. I understand that the figure depicted in the image is Vladmir Putin but have no idea why this artistic portrayal is helpful or relevant in an article on fake news websites. Neutrality^talk 18:39, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, that was certainly bizarre behavior. Sagecandor (talk) 18:45, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

You two are not very open-minded. The Abode of Chaos is also a formidable media entity, you should read up on it. A lot of Europe's legal records (as well as -- I gather -- the world's largest collection of art estimations (Blue Book type values) are housed in a bunker under this museum. ^^ This place is kind of a big deal. :) SashiRolls (talk) 18:48, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Not related. Not discussed in relation to this article topic in secondary sources. Violates WP:No original research and WP:Neutral point of view. Sagecandor (talk) 18:51, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

um...Actually, it is used as an illustration in an article in which Counterpunch responds to the bogus PropOrNot claims (which PropOrNot withdrew as a result of their letter). Totally related. ^^ (see ref in PropOrNot for more info) SashiRolls (talk) 19:00, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Image not discussed as related to "fake news" anywhere. This is ridiculous. Sagecandor (talk) 19:06, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

• Remove. Weird, and not sufficiently relevant for inclusion. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:24, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Psy-Ops / media intelligence

A comment someone made somewhere led me to this: "During his time as a commander at Ft. Leavenworth, [Lt. Gen. Willam] Caldwell argued for exploiting new technologies like blogging and Wikipedia – a move that would widen the military’s ability to influence the public, both foreign and domestic. According to sources close to the general, he also tried to rewrite the official doctrine on information operations, though that effort ultimately failed. "

References

Is this public affairs vs. psy-op tension worth mentioning on this, our very not-OWN fake news website? SashiRolls (talk) 15:37, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

The fact that Haitian Wikipedia's president page—ht:Prezidan—is a smiling Obama, and that the president-elect ht:Jovenel Moïse has no page (as of yesterday), well, maybe that should lead us to reflect on, say, Wikipedia's soft power, How to Read Donald Duck, etc., etc. ... ^^ SashiRolls (talk) 16:01, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Is there a suggested source in there somewhere, or addition to this article that refers to "fake news", or is this just a snide personal attack ? Sagecandor (talk) 17:25, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Well hmmm... maybe it's the journalist whose car flew into a tree shortly after writing the article listed above (for which he was awarded a Polk). and in which he wrote that a Lt. General was suggesting using Wikipedia and (micro?)blogging to influence perceptions (of what was true and what was fake). SashiRolls (talk) 18:03, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

The word "fake" does not even appear once in the article [69]. This appears to violate WP:No original research and also WP:NOTFORUM as for use of this talk page for personal opinion. Sagecandor (talk) 18:06, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

We need to settle the question of the scope of this article before we can decide this issue. I thought this article was about the recent controversy, not about stuff that was reported back in 2011. We don't wan this article to be redundant with Psychological warfare. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:23, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

This article is about fake news websites and fake news on the internet spread fraudulently by social media. Sagecandor (talk) 20:33, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

What timeframe? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:53, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Good question, perhaps just recent Internet websites, so World Wide Web post 1990 ? Sagecandor (talk) 21:26, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Or maybe whenever the first fake news websites started, which may be fraud medical advice sites, not sure. Sagecandor (talk) 02:19, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

POV fork of Hoax, Propaganda, and Yellow Journalism?

I'm starting to think that this whole page is a POV fork of Hoax, Propaganda, and Yellow Journalism, at least, the way it is written currently. 1Eternity1 (talk) 08:49, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

I agree to some extent. There's nothing new about slanted or even outright inaccurate reporting (whether deliberately so or not), or internet hoaxes. "Fake news" is simply the latest media buzzword for certain alleged instances of it, particularly in liberal elements of the media, and one which comes loaded with all sorts of insinuations that the Russians are behind it all and/or it's stupid Trump fans who fall for it. This page, especially as currently written, is simply repeating that narrative. WP defines topics, not terms. N-HH talk/edits 10:06, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Agree with N-HH and 1Eternity1 that article is a POV fork. BobLaRouche (talk) 04:54, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

I don't think this topic is non-notable, so if it is a POV fork, it would have to be merged with one of the articles which it is supposedly a subset of. But that's quite difficult, because in addition to hoax and propaganda and yellow journalism, we also have to consider clickbait as well as news satire. I actually think that most major mainstream news outlets are guilty of quasi-fake-news practices, for example giving clickbait headlines to their stories nowadays. Back in the 1900s when the newspaper article was called "WAR" you didn't find the first paragraph saying that "...although hostilities have not yet begun, according to an anonymous source war is expected to be imminent." Nowadays, pretty much every major purportedly-reliable mainstream media website has a story about Rex Tillerson being the next Secretary of State in the USA. Which is not actually confirmed yet, as of last night. Just rumoured to be the case, as distinct from any kind of actual official unambiguous announcement. Here are some headlines from Reliable Sources in the wikipedia sense. Clickbait on clickbait on Rick Perry here, clickbait about Rex Tillerson over here. These are not FAKE articles, they are just scoops from anonymous sources that have been given purposely-misleading titles to make people *think* the nomination is official, whereas when you read the body of the article you find out that it is just an expected nominee. Which has usually turned out to be correct... but compare the Wilbur Ross situation, when he was unambiguously reported *as being* the Commerce nominee November 24th, but then no confirmation happened so by November 26th most media headlines were saying the Ross was merely expected to be the nominee, and a few days later he was officially the nominee on November 30th. I don't know if there is a term for writing clickbait headlines that are about "real" events which are actually small potatoes (Trump has decided on a shortlist! Trump has invited Romney to talk! Anonymous sources claim Trump has picked somebody! Trump tweeted that he would announce his pick tomorrow! Trump is going to announce his pick in one hour! Trump announced his pick! The pick announced that they accept the offer! Senators who may be on the relevant committee in the 115th congress commented about the nominee! And so on, ad infinitum.) Maybe churnalism is the closest thing we have to a topic. Fake news is therefore a difficult subject to pin down, and I believe it needs a dedicated article. But I would rather this article concentrate on what fake news IS NOT, and link to the appropriate parent articles (hoax / yellow journalism / The Onion / churnalism / clickbait / etc), than to be purposely designed to prop up the List of Fake News Websites "companion article" ... which gives off the strong whiff of being an attack page, much like List of Mean Things People Have Said About Corporation XYZ would sound inherently POV. 47.222.203.135 (talk) 15:17, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Also, on the topic/term, this page is of course more specifically titled "Fake news website". In which case it needs to lose all the stuff about "trolls", other online activity and individual instances of erroneous or debatable news reporting (which may have occurred in good faith), and simply focus on websites set up to mimic actual news sites and deliberately disseminate misinformation (many of which, as it happens, seem aimed simply at making money rather than being part of some grand propaganda strategy). That would also arguably be a discrete contemporary topic. N-HH talk/edits 10:11, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Feel free to go improve those separate articles Hoax, Propaganda, and Yellow Journalism. Your choice of topic header for this talk page "Hoax, Propaganda, and Yellow Journalism" seems quite inflammatory and POV itself, as if intending to push a particular point across. This is not the article about Hoax, Propaganda, and Yellow Journalism. Sagecandor (talk) 15:32, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Explain how? They're saying that this article is re-hashing material that would be better placed in those articles? If it's inflammatory and POV to say that, then I don't know what Anarcho-authoritarian (talk) 18:50, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean. This article is not "re-hashing" anything. All material is sourced to secondary sources directly discussing the topic of this article itself. Sagecandor (talk) 18:53, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Since most of article discusses Russian propaganda that is disseminated via 21st century forms of communication (the interwebs, social media, etc.), the material should be presented in one of the many propaganda pages: Russian propaganda, Overview of 21st-century propaganda, Propaganda, etc. The material on fake news designed as money making operations should be added to the Clickbait page. I am not exactly certain how this "fake news" as it applies to journalism techniques is any different than yellow journalism. WaPo isn't clear either on the distinction, and those who knowingly engage in Fake News websites call themselves the "new yellow journalists". The sources of this article aren't very academic by in large (BuzzFeed, really?), and have been accused of being Clickbait themselves with sloppy journalism standards and/or disseminating propaganda. Using journalism sources that report on the journalism ethics of their competitors isn't wise. They have a conflict of interest. It's like citing Coke as a reliable source when making claims that Pepsi is a terrible drink. 11Eternity11 (talk) 06:00, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Ah okay, I see, so you want to essentially remove everything from this page. Sagecandor (talk) 06:05, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

No, it's not like that all. You're making a false analogy. The reliability of the actual sources has already been discussed.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:50, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

References

I think you have a wee little too much involvement on this page Sagecandor, and really stop trying to make it your personal baby, as these faithless accusations against other users are not helpful to the construction of this article at all. Solntsa90 (talk) 15:54, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Sagecandor's work on this article has been exemplary. You, on the other hand, are skating right around the edges of your topic ban.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:48, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

As for 11Eternity11's comment, I co-sign, 100%. Solntsa90 (talk) 15:55, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

It's also worth pointing out that "11Eternity11" is a brand new single purpose account created just to edit this particular article.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:51, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

I created this account after reading the complaints about this article on the talk page and thought I might try to add a constructive voice. But please be my guest and assume all kinds of nefarious meanings to my involvement. That's your prerogative. I have no agenda on this topic. I am neither Russian nor pro-Trump nor pro-Hillary nor pro-politician. I don't engage in tribalism. BS comes from every political and national stripe. I will say this though - those writing as political hacks really decrease the quality of Wikipedia articles and Wikipedia in general. These topics are interesting, but seeing the absolutism and disregard for criticism of POV pushing editors who fight tooth and nail (even getting touchy on talk pages) for their POV is both hilarious and sad. People seek out their own confirmation bias. By making an article push a particular POV, or in this case, making a POV fork, you don't change anyone's mind, but simply create distrust with Wikipedia content among skeptics and preach to the choir among converts. 11Eternity11 (talk) 03:00, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

---

• While it has historical antecedents, fake news is a discrete phenomenon and is extensively covered in the reliable sources (journalistic, academic, other expert) as such. That's pretty much conclusively establishes its independent notability. If you believe that it's not independently notable, take it to AfD. (It is exceedingly likely that it will be snow-kept.) Neutrality^talk 16:04, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

No, this is a separate subject which clearly deserves its own article.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:49, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Agree with User:Neutrality, that there are historical antecedents (and many of them still alive and kicking). The question in my mind is not whether this article needs to be upmerged-and-deleted, the question is whether the article as currently written, needs to better explain HOW exactly 'fake news website' is different from a news satire website like the onion, is different from a real news website with clickbait headlines (see examples above), is different from a propaganda website like thePeoplesCube, and is different from your average facebook-hoax-posting and email-chain-letter-scam. See my longer list of examples above, which argue against upmerging as impractical. Fake news website *is* a concept, and is not the same as churnalism and yellow journalism, nor is it the same as propaganda, but it is a FUZZY BLURRY concept, the way the wikipedia article currently covers it. See the complaint of the original poster 'might be a POV fork at least, the way it is written currently'. Emphasis added. 47.222.203.135 (talk) 15:26, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

France section

I believe that some of the edits by SashiRolls to the section on France need some tweaking. In the meantime, bringing here to the talk page to discuss, and I self-reverted back to a version by SashiRolls per WP:Assume good faith on my part: [70].

This is from this source: The Guardian.

For example, the source says:

"Over the last 10 years, France has seen a sharp increase in the readership of alternative, far-right sites, blogs and social media operations, referred to collectively as the fachosphère – (“facho” is slang for fascist)."

and SashiRolls version says:

"Distrust in institutional media led to an increasing audience for alternative sources, including what has been referred to as the fachosphère"

This noticeably leaves out "far-right sites, blogs and social media operations" and "“facho” is slang for fascist".

In order to comply with WP:NPOV, we should probably just include a direct quote from the cited source itself, as it appears we cannot agree on the wording here.

Thoughts? Sagecandor (talk) 18:21, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

I think it's common knowledge that facho refers to fascist, but maybe that's because I speak French and have some (actually more-than-)passing familiarity with the French media. If you feel that *really* isn't obvious you could add (fascist-sphere) I suppose, but there's no need for a blue link to "fascist" we all know what that means more or less.

Regarding the paragraph being summarized, both the first and last line of the paragraph are being summarized and the last line speaks of both far-right and far-left sites (and far-left sites are not considered to be part of the fachosphere). The exploration of the said sphere was supplied by a link to an outsider media (mediapart) that has become mainstream (quite a success story, actually. Going to see what you deleted now. Such behavior is disruptive. SashiRolls (talk) 18:28, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

I didn't know what fachosphere meant and I was glad The Guardian explained it. Yes, I think it should be there as described by the secondary source The Guardian. As for the characterization "alternative sources", leaving out "far-right sites, blogs and social media operations", when the secondary source says that, seems to violate WP:NPOV. We should just quote directly from the source to be most WP:NPOV. Sagecandor (talk) 18:31, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Should we quote directly from the cited source, The Guardian -- "Over the last 10 years, France has seen a sharp increase in the readership of alternative, far-right sites, blogs and social media operations, referred to collectively as the fachosphère – (“facho” is slang for fascist)." — to avoid conflict over wording paraphrasing the quote? Sagecandor (talk) 18:40, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Not at all, because then you would be leaving out the Far Left sites that people have turned to which are alluded to in the same paragraph. Your phrasing is the CenterLiberal POV. NPOV is more general, and refers simply to alternative sources. People who wish to go further into the question can read the article (and follow the links to the "Left" paper MediaPart documenting the rise of the major alt-right players.) SashiRolls (talk) 18:45, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Please focus on content in this discussion. It is not "my phrasing". I am proposing to quote directly from the source itself and use the wording by The Guardian. Can we do that? Sagecandor (talk) 18:50, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Saying you have a point of view is not a personal attack. What you are proposing to do is to quote only half of the Guardian content being covered, as I already said, you want to leave out the bit about the 'far left'. This would lead our readers to believe that all those leaving the mainstream 20h (France 2, TF1, BFM TV, etc.) are going to far-right sources, which would a misrepresentation of what the article says. Going to press save and deal with the latest edit conflict. (5 edit conflicts due to WP:Bludgeoning... just saying, this is the mechanics of how it is done...) SashiRolls (talk) 18:58, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Please don't assume bad faith. I did not say to leave anything out. Why don't we quote both portions of that text, the part that refers to the right, and the left ? Sagecandor (talk) 19:00, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Here's an idea: how 'bout we paraphrase both succinctly as I did well over an hour ago... SashiRolls (talk) 19:32, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Wording was not NPOV. Suggest we just quote from the source itself, as you left out "far-right". Sagecandor (talk) 19:34, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

reality check. This is the wording:Distrust in institutional media led to an increasing audience for alternative sources, including what has been referred to as the fachosphère, how exactly is that NPOV again? Wait, no, don't answer, let someone else answer, please. SashiRolls (talk) 19:39, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

This is getting circular. See above wording from the source The Guardian: "Over the last 10 years, France has seen a sharp increase in the readership of alternative, far-right sites, blogs and social media operations, referred to collectively as the fachosphère – (“facho” is slang for fascist)." You carefully omitted "far-right sites, blogs and social media operations". Sagecandor (talk) 19:41, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Fachosphère is the correct terminology as "far-right" is very different in the European context than the American and may be confusing to US readers. Far-right usually refers to pro-nationalism and anti-EU political leanings in Europe, while radical right in the States may refer to the opposition to socialism and communism and support for libertarianism. In the States, we are starting to use the term "alt-right" when discussing anti-globalist leanings, but even then, it is a constantly developing term due to its recentism. Nonetheless, there is nothing partisan about SashiRolls statement. 11Eternity11 (talk) 00:55, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, I would also like to hear from a third-party uninvolved editor. I must point out, again, that the secondary source says "far-right", and we should go by the language from reliable sources and not our own judgments. Sagecandor (talk) 01:03, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

We are not to plagiarize the reliable source, but paraphrase it. We should use the language that makes the most sense for encyclopedic content read by multiple English speakers and the language that gains consensus. 11Eternity11 (talk) 01:13, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Excuse me, please don't assume bad faith. Read what I proposed above. We can quote the cited source itself with quotation marks around the quoted material. Sagecandor (talk) 01:15, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Please assume the assumption of good faith. 11Eternity11 (talk) 01:23, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Please don't put words in my mouth and assume I wish to quote something without putting quotation marks around it. Agreed? Sagecandor (talk) 01:27, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

I wasn't putting words in your mouth. I wanted to make it clear on what our task is in adding content to an encyclopedia. 11Eternity11 (talk) 01:36, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles frequently quote from reliable sources, using quotation marks, and even blockquote at times. Sagecandor (talk) 01:39, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

We should refrain from overuse of quotations. If we need to tell the user what "fachosphere" means, which we probably should, I suggest we use another source than the Guardian. Looking at the French wikipedia page, the term fachosphère is described as:

"L'expression globalisante « fachosphère » ou encore « réacosphère » utilisée par les détracteurs de l'extrême droite pour désigner ces blogs recouvre différentes tendances au sein de l'extrême droite (le plus célèbre étant François Desouche), et même « une véritable nébuleuse de tendances » pour Marc Jacquemain et Fédéric Claisse."

Roughly translates as: The all encompassing expression "fachosphere" (as well as "réacosphère") is used by critics of the far-right and covers different far-right factions (the most celebrated being François Desouche), and similarly, it describes "a really complex web of factions" as quoted by Marc Jacquemain and Fédéric Claisse.

They have several seemingly academic references for this statement (,, ) I suggest that we consider the term "fachosphere" to be a particular POV neologism. 11Eternity11 (talk) 03:55, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Great. So we can paraphrase from the quoted source and say something like: In the 10 years leading up to 2016, distrust in institutional media led to an increasing audience for alternative sources, including far-right sources online. Sagecandor (talk) 04:01, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

In fact, even the French-language Wikipedia entry fr:Fachosphère redirects to an article on the "Far-right of the Internet". Sagecandor (talk) 04:05, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

I would suggest adding "far-right" or "alt-right" to make it clear to US readers as well as using internal links to both terms. Other than that, I'm ok with it, but let's hear from SashiRolls . 11Eternity11 (talk) 04:29, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Okay thank you. Sagecandor (talk) 04:39, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

References

Please, move forward as you see fit concerning the so called fachosphère (not to be confused with their dreaded opponents the anars ^^) I wouldn't want to hold up the works while I'm at work. SashiRolls (talk) 06:52, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Done at [71]. Thank you, glad we could all come to a mutually acceptable agreement here. Sagecandor (talk) 07:02, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Not sure if everything has been fixed up now... I only noticed this section, after writing up my piece in another talkpage section. I have complained over there about the (standalone) use of fachosphère, and the wikilink to the frWiki redirect. It is not a synonym for fascist, and it is not a synonym for alt-right either... the former is too narrow, and the latter is too broad. As mentioned by several people here, what is considered 'far' right to the Guardian journalists and readership, is definitely distinct from what is considered far-right within the context of United States politics. Strongly suggest proceeding with caution, when dealing with the term fachosphère... though it is one of the concepts at the heart of the fake news controversy, so we cannot very well leave it out. 47.222.203.135 (talk) 17:20, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Fact-checking websites and journalists

This section seems to be borderline on WP:NPOV because it appears to only provide the most positive sources about the websites mentioned. It does not take much effort to find sources that have criticisms of these services: The Hill, US News - this one cites a study from the George Mason University Center for Media and Public Affairs study here. And one has its own dedicated blog fact checking the fact checkers! --Toomanyaccountsargh (talk) 09:11, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Do those sources specifically discuss "fake news" somehow ? Sagecandor (talk) 19:49, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Those sources have nothing to do with this article. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:26, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

The article posits these websites as some kind of antidote to fake news without the slightest criticism of the sites. Describing these websites as a perfect antidote with no alternate views on the sites seems to violate WP:IMPARTIAL. Sources criticizing the fact checkers responses to fake news are as relevant as ones praising the fact-checkers, however there are none presented; currently half the opening paragraph of the section is devoted to quotations praising the websites and claiming they "helped debunk fraud" and the director of one of the websites is quoted referring to critics of the fact checking websites as "zealots". --Toomanyaccountsargh (talk) 23:49, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Source? Sagecandor (talk) 00:03, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

There does seem to be a verifiability issue here. Many of the sources about fact checkers do not say anything about fake news, but our content suggests that they do. I've tagged a couple of sentences. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 00:43, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Fixed those, thank you. Sagecandor (talk) 00:49, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

This continues to be a problem. We say that fact checkers play a role in debunking "fraudulent assertions," implying a connection to fake news, but the sources don't mention fraudulent assertions or fake news. The sources are about inaccuracies in the news and make no mention of intentional inaccuracies. I think we should remove that entire paragraph. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 17:49, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

It is inherent to this topic, that some people (by which I mean people in politics or the media with axes to grind) are going to attempt to broaden the meaning of 'fake news website' aka a website which purposely fabricates lies and dresses them up to look like news-copy, to the much different category of 'false news' which means, basically, anything-I-the-critic-disagree-with. Hence we see people claiming that Breitbart is 'fake' news, when what they mean is biased news. Long discussion of these things is at List of fake news websites talkpage. The screenshot at the very top of the page illustrates the distinction: there is story-headline which falsely claims "Trump won popvote" and then there is presumably a link to the fake news website which manufactured the headline. But that begs the question: is the site which pretended to be writing news, the 'fake news' being criticized, or is the 'false news' Trump won the popvote the target? The former is fighting fraud, the latter is tantalizingly close to imposing censorship (depending on how strict one is with defining truth). 47.222.203.135 (talk) 23:59, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes exactly. That is why we should stick to the intended scope, which is deliberately fraudulent, made-up news stories, and avoid sources that don't discuss them. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 01:07, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

I think the proper scope is deliberately fraudulent *websites* that fabricate made-up pretending-to-be-new stories. The former (the website) is 'fake news' whereas the latter (the story) is just 'false news'. You and I are having a discussion below, about a false news story (by WaPo). That does not make WaPo.com a 'fake news website' because the screwed up truncation of the full quote from the pope was unintentional, not deliberate. It is egg on their face, but not evidence they are some kind of clickbait scam. 47.222.203.135 (talk) 01:59, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Done. Removed first paragraph of that section, per comments above and suggestion to do so, by DrFleischman (talk · contribs), at [72]. Sagecandor (talk) 02:11, 14 December 2016 (UTC)