Wikidata talk:Autobiography/Archive 1

Wikispecies

Probably the page is copied from Wikispecies, but why there are link to wikispecies? (Wikispecies:Village Pump and Wikispecies:Administrators' Noticeboard) --ValterVB (talk) 17:47, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

Please note this edit there. --Succu (talk) 18:09, 4 July 2017 (UTC) PS: And this thread at WS. --Succu (talk) 18:27, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

I mean: why in wikidata we point to "Village Pump" or "Administrators' Noticeboard" in Wwikispecies and not in Wikidata? If you check this line: "You may raise such concerns on the Village Pump, on the Administrators' Noticeboard, or on the talk page of the editor concerned" you can see that they probably point to the wrong place, but if they are correct it isn't clear the reason and it's necessary explain why. --ValterVB (talk) 18:16, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

Yes do; note especially the complete and utter lack of support for Succu's view there, and the fact that the text was kept. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:34, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

It shows WS was not interested in this matter at all. --Succu (talk) 18:52, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

No, it shows me being thanked for creating the page. But keep trying to smear, if that's what makes you happy. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:59, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

Good spot; fixed. Thank you. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:19, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

Use of first-person plural pronouns

This page should use "we " and "our" rather than "Wikidata" and "Wikidata's"; such language is far more welcoming and friendly to the intended, non-Wikimedian audience of this document. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:22, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

No, actually I find it divisive. "you" could well be part of "we"; this page isn't or shouldn't be useful to pure newcomers. ArthurPSmith (talk) 15:26, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

it is also confusing - who is "we"? Wikidata editors? Wikimedia foundation? General wikimedia community?? ArthurPSmith (talk) 15:27, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

"this page isn't or shouldn't be useful to pure newcomers" heaven forbid we help or reassure the people we write about. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:29, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

mistyped - "purely to newcomers" is what I meant. It should be useful to all, and "we" vs "you" I find unhelpful. ArthurPSmith (talk) 15:34, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

Making the page more welcoming and friendly to newcomers doest make it welcoming and friendly only to newcomers. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:36, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

Harmful tagging

I wrote this page so that it would be easy for lay people, who have never edited Wikipedia, much less Wikidata to understand.

How does the jargony {{Draft}} template help them? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 17:49, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

 Support This shouldn't be a policy, but a informational page. d1g (talk) 20:13, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

There's a chance that a lay person who reads the page thinks that it represents accepted Wikidata policy. The template informs them that it isn't. ChristianKl (talk) 23:25, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

You keep banging on about this, despite it already having been refuted. Nowhere on the page does it make any claim to be a policy. It has no {{Policy}} tag. The vast majority of pages in the "Wikidata:" namespace are not policy pages. Your claim is pure FUD. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:04, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

There's no chance whatsoever that even a semi-literate ape could make the assumption that it "represents accepted Wikidata policy". This is helpful advice to any editor who meets the requirements of Wikidata:Notability concerning living persons. --RexxS (talk) 23:14, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

Move to Help namespace, and some concerns

This seems to be a page of advice for newcomers to wikidata; it is however quite incomplete particularly with regard to the state of BLP concerns here (see recent RFC's). It also links to several enwiki pages with the term "our" which I would regard as quite misleading. In any case, I don't see how it belongs in the Wikidata namespace - or Category:Wikidata - possibly if it was intended to accompany a project on improving our data on individuals it could be moved to a relevant Wikiproject page. However, it seems most suitable for this to be in the Help namespace - and edited more closely to reflect the actual consensus on BLP issues here at wikidata. ArthurPSmith (talk) 15:55, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ If you believe this page is "quite incomplete particularly with regard to the state of BLP concerns here", please make or suggest changes to make it less so. I'd be grateful if you could also point out more specifically the part(s) of the RFC(s) to which you refer, as I thought I had done a good job of encapsulating current practice and consensus. However, this page most definitely belongs in this ("Wikidata:") or the "Help:" namespace (in the latter case, with the current name as a redirect as already discussed elsewhere). It is not the work of, nor related to, any single WikiProject, though in any case, all WikiProject pages are in the "Wikidata:" namespace.

The word "our is used in:

• our [[Wikidata:Notability|notability requirements]]
• [[Wikidata:Main Page|our main page]]
• [[Wikidata:Project chat|our 'project chat' page]]
• our [[:w:Wikipedia:ORCID#User pages|guidance for Wikimedians]]
• our [[:w:Wikipedia:A picture of you|guide to uploading pictures of yourself]]

I don't understand what you find objectionable about any (or all?) of these, including the two (not "several") Wikipedia pages which are not en.Wikipedia links, but again, please feel free to elaborate, or to suggest improvements. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 17:44, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

I'm not planning to spend the time to rewrite this page as I'm not sure it should even exist, but it should at minimum point to the proposed wikidata policy here Wikidata:Living people, which was heavily edited in response to the recent RFCs though is obviously not fully accepted as consensus here, when discussing BLP. As to the enwiki links - when I followed two links (is 2 not "several"? they were the only ones I followed) they ended up at enwiki pages, not wikidata pages. How are they "our" guidelines when they are not hosted here? ArthurPSmith (talk) 21:27, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

In the inclusive spirit of the Wikimedia movement. Also, "how to upload a photograph to Commons" is the same for all Wikimedia projects, while the age at :w:Wikipedia:ORCID specifically addresses sister projects, including Wikidata. I find the notion that we should not provide plain-language guidance to the non-Wikimedians about whom we write utterly baffling. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:53, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

If you would state that some guidelines would be the same here on wikidata, you'd best refer to meta as that is the source for all of the guidelines. That would be the general guideline, but meta lets us free to write our own policy. But to just take en.wp as our guideline (without any discussion about it) would be too simple IMHO. Of course we are free to take any guidelines but please take it through a RFC or the Project Chat. The page about ORCID at en.wp is clear about the use on wikipedia and not on wikidata. Therefore you need to adapt it to wikidata at a page named [wikidata:ORCID] or something. Q.Zanden questions? 00:18, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

We don't need an RfC to write every simple help page, such as this, nor one describing, for example, how to upload an image to Commons. The vast majority of pages in the "Wikidata:" namespace have not been through an RfC. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:06, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

Currently, this page tells people what they should do. There's disagreement between different people. There's usually no disagreement about help pages about how to upload images to Commons. That example is a strawman. ChristianKl (talk) 13:32, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

You don't seem to understand the meaning of the strawman analogy; it certainly doesn't apply here. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:49, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

Objections

One of the biggest issues I have with this page is that the reasoning to add a Wikidata item for creators -- especially during a GLAM project effort -- can be a very complicated, complex, and nuanced process. So while it might appear that creating certain entries for let's say, a mid-career professional, might see to be problematic from a notability perspective, if that person is a prolific creator and/or author of consistent academic and/or museum/archive intensive works, their notability may not be clear from someone outside the GLAM project and/or specialized sector. I think it behooves Wikidatans to try and be as responsible as possible about new entries, but also new entries are the crux of establishing notability and turning red links to blue. It is not a simple linear process. So the somewhat rigid and controlling approach expressed on this page is problematic, especially as Wikidata expands to incorporate more and more bibliographic metadata -- and the importance of the creator is even more at the forefront. So I think this page is not helpful at all. There are resources that already exist on EN Wikipedia (like the 5 Pillars) that cover this in a much more productive and collegial tone. And Wikidata needs to be a lot more open than Wikipedia, if it is going to have any sort of flexibility as a semantic backbone to Wikipedia -- and other datasets. Just wanted to weigh in here. -- Erika aka BrillLyle (talk) 17:01, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

@BrillLyle: - this page isn't supposed to be about adding new Wikidata items, but what to do if you find a Wikidata item about yourself. Can you clarify what you find "rigid and controlling" here? ArthurPSmith (talk) 17:22, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

@ArthurPSmith: - Again, I think adding items is a pretty clear issue already addressed very thoroughly on Wikipedia. Why recreate the wheel here. it's the same. My objection has more to do with the tone and somewhat restrictive approach to creating items that the author is endorsing. Again, working on large dataset donations, etc. this constraint will make doing this very difficult -- as well as automating WikiProject task lists of redlinks. I don't know. I am probably not being super clear here, but the whole page and approach rankles. I think there are existing policies in place and that this is both unnecessary and tonally problematic. Best, -- Erika aka BrillLyle (talk) 18:19, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

@BrillLyle: I'm really not following here. This page says nothing one way or the other about how to add an item to Wikidata, or why or under what conditions you can or cannot - all it does in this regard is link to the Wikidata Notability policy. Is the problem the title of the page ("Autobiography")? I've suggested changing it to "Help:Item about me" or something like that. Or is the problem the word "could" in the first sentence, which possibly suggests inviting somebody to create an article about themselves? That's definitely not the intent, perhaps it needs to be reworded. In any case, to reiterate, what this page is (currently) intended to convey is what a person can do if they find that Wikidata already contains an item about them. That's all this is for. It's intended to help people get their information corrected or updated if needed. ArthurPSmith (talk) 18:27, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

If that's really the goal, the name autobiograhy seems wrong. ChristianKl (talk) 18:50, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

Agree. From a pedagogic standpoint, the page is unhelpful and obstructive. Why not replicate the Biographies of Living People and/or Conflict of Interest WikiRulez? Why recreate what is already established there here? And honestly, the documentation and UI for Wikidata is pretty absent and/or badly done, so the guides/help materials need to be a step above to be successful. I think also the tone here is non-ideal. It's just feedback, but I'm offering it here in the hopes of being constructive. I am very pro-Wikidata, but things like this entry reduce my enthusiasm, put my back up, and in general repel me from wanting to contribute. I would hope supporting materials would be the opposite of this. -- Erika aka BrillLyle (talk) 19:12, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

I'm afraid you're leaving me very confused - the page is not mine, but I've tried to edit it a bit to provide what I thought was more useful information. Perhaps you can make edits that improve it along the lines you are thinking? If the name of the page is changed, would that satisfy much of your concern? Also I really don't know what you are referring to when you say "what is already established there" - where? Can you provide links? Thanks! ArthurPSmith (talk) 19:29, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

I think BrillLyle is referring to guidelines on en.Wikipedia; not realising that Wikipedia guidelines do not apply here, and vice versa. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:52, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

"Again, working on large dataset donations, etc. this constraint will make doing this very difficult" That is, of course, completely untrue, not least because this advisory page creates no new constraints, on anything Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:52, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

Lede

Ok, Andy, I am confused by your most recent edit (and revert of ChristianKl - if you are intending this page to also address people creating items about themselves, then I have some further serious concerns. In particular, as I noted just above, the page explains nothing about how you would go about doing that; nor what it would require not to be summarily deleted... Also I share some of the concerns expressed on the deletion page about encouraging self-promotion, etc. particularly as we don't have a formal conflict of interest policy here. ArthurPSmith (talk) 13:11, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

My addition was necessitated by your removal of "If you meet Wikidata's notability requirements, then there could be a Wikidata item about you.". Consider his scenario: Someone is asked "I'm going to start a Wikidata item about you, what's your website address?". What page do we have, other than this one, that offers them advice, in plain and accessible language? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:41, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

I removed the phrase with "could be" because it implied a possible connotation of inviting somebody to create one, which seemed reflected in the confusion of the above discussion - I had originally read "could be" to mean just that there may be an item about you which you haven't found yet. "should be" restores even more strongly an implied invitation to create a page about yourself. We get such pages created regularly; I just found one earlier today that was pure promotion from a new user on Recent changes, and had it deleted. We definitely do not encourage creation of items about yourself here in that fashion. If the above paragraph reflects your real intended purpose here, I't suggest replacing "or should be" in the current text with "or you believe there will be". Do you agree? ArthurPSmith (talk) 18:32, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

The person whose item you had deleted today clearly "believed" there would be one about them. The sentence you removed included as the very first words of the page "If you meet Wikidata's notability requirements...", which is clear, objective, and unambiguous. Your subject clearly failed that test. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:45, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

Maybe "believe" isn't the right word - so what do you suggest to clarify this? "or should" is just not appropriate here. ArthurPSmith (talk) 19:00, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

I suggest restoration of the original intro sentence. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 19:07, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

I don't think that's clear. If you ask a bunch of people who aren't yet members about whether or not they fulfill the notability guidelines of Wikidata, I don't think they can easily tell. The "Create a new item" dialog already tells a person that they should only create notable items. I don't see how telling them another time that they should only create notable items is likely to change their behavior.

Furthermore, even if a person is notable in the sense that there are external IDs to three databases we don't want to invite the person to come to Wikidata to create an item about themselves. We don't want contributors who're primarily interested in contributing to Wikidata to edit items about themselves and to have a better public profile. ChristianKl (talk) 13:39, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

The text included a link to Wikidata:Notability. As to "we don't want to invite the person to come to Wikidata to create an item about themselves"; yet again, please cite a policy, or at least a discussion which came to that conclusion; or stop pretending that there is consensus on this point. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 14:25, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

I think you are the only person who expressed a desire towards such an invitation and there are plenty of people who have problems with such items and such items have a good chance of being deleted on by Recent Change patrols. I don't remember a single instance where we had a discussion about such an item where someone expressed: "we should invite more people to create items like this". I haven't claimed that there's a explicit policy about that and there's no pretending that there is. ChristianKl (talk) 20:50, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

I think you're leaping to conclusions without being in possession of all the evidence. Or indeed without considering the evidence that has been put before you. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:15, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

I changed "should" to "may in future" which I hope reflects our discussion here with reasonably neutral wording. What are the prospects of moving this to Help namespace, is that waiting on the Deletion decision? ArthurPSmith (talk) 19:36, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

It in no way reflefcts my last comment to you (in resoonse to your question): "I suggest restoration of the original intro sentence.". Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:15, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

Take all issues to project chat

The text says "you should not remove sourced statements - if you think they are wrong, please raise the matter at Project chat".

I confirm that when people have problems in Wikidata they raise them in that central forum as the default venue. Wikimedia Commons works mostly in this way with Commons:Commons:Village_pump and it has about as many files as Wikidata does items. I think the situation right now is comparable. If the project chat here ever gets crowded then we can subdivide it. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:35, 19 December 2018 (UTC)

I have added the option to send an email.--Micru (talk) 00:08, 21 December 2018 (UTC)

Better guidance on pictures

This policy currently links to English Wikipedia' "A picture of you". If there were documentation on Commons then that would be best. I thought there was already but perhaps not. Here is what I have:

• Commons:Commons:SELFIE
• Commons:User_talk:Fæ&oldid=331755587#Guidance_on_photos_of_self?

I think there is other discussion somewhere but perhaps no guidance on Commons about the very common case of someone seeking to upload a picture of themselves. With this Wikidata policy the need for Commons documentatation is only greater. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:43, 19 December 2018 (UTC)

There is a link to enwiki about adding pictures. Is that not enough?--Micru (talk) 00:07, 21 December 2018 (UTC)

Final version

@ArthurPSmith, Pigsonthewing, QZanden, ChristianKl, BrillLyle: Any more comments about this or can we put it up for a vote to make it an official policy?--Micru (talk) 15:36, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

•  Support ArthurPSmith (talk) 16:03, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
• My objections from July 2017, now in the archives, stand. In any case, it was never meant to be an official policy, but an advisory note. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:01, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
  • Also, your recent edits misrepresent WMF policy on paid editing. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:06, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
  • I've restored the short paragraph on ORCID iDs. SourceMD uses them, not other personal identifiers. It's in *our* interest to have them. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:10, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
    • @Pigsonthewing: I do not know what your objections were, could you please summarize? Can you also specify what exactly misrepresents the WMF policy on paid editing? About ORCID, it is already on the document, no need to add it twice.--Micru (talk) 23:51, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
      • The statement "If you are editing a page about someone else, for reward (as part of your job, for money, or for some other consideration), you must declare that on your user page according to Wikimedia Foundation policy on paid editing." is false. The previous wording, which was not false, should be restored. The text I restored, about ORCID, was not "already on the document", so I did not "add it twice". My restoration has been reverted with the opaque edit summary of "Try Wikidata talk:Autobiography". The text should be restored, also. As I said, my previous objections are in the archives, under July 2017. You will find them there. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 01:05, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
        • 1) The statement on paid editing is not false, just not entirely accurate, which is different. I can make it more accurate without restoring the previous wording. 2) I did not say that your text about ORCID was already on the document, I said that ORCID was already on the document, so it is not needed to mention twice ORCID when one mention is enough. I can add the relevant information without restoring your text. 3) Please, be specific. What are your objections?--Micru (talk) 07:44, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
          • It is completely false. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:09, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
            • What exactly is it false? What about my other points?--Micru (talk) 14:05, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
              • You've clearly found the answer to your own question as you've just changed the wording on paid editing on the page. It's still not good, and the original wordings should still be restored. I have addressed your other points, above. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 14:39, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
                • Why do you consider that is not good?--Micru (talk) 18:15, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
      • Also, why have you you removed mention of independent sources being needed, and "not your own resume or a web page you control"? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 01:09, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
        • Because as it was argued in the Project Chat, sometimes the only source of information is the subject, and it is reasonable to believe self-stated information if it sounds reasonable, because normally we can assume good faith.--Micru (talk) 07:44, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
          • Link, please. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:09, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
            • The discussion took place here. I find the comment by Ghouston (11:06, 19 December 2018) relevant.--Micru (talk) 14:05, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
              • Do you think consensus for such a change was reached in that discussion? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 14:39, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
                • The participants of that discussion have been notified of my intentions to remove the "draft" template from this page, and link it from the living people policy. If they do not agree with that, they will raise their objections.--Micru (talk) 17:47, 22 December 2018 (UTC)