Wikipedia bans Breitbart as a source for facts

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pa9qvv/wikipedia-banned-breitbart-infowars

by aceperry • 8 years ago

218 166 8 years ago

motherboard.vice.com

pavlov3• 8 years ago

For all their flaws, Wikipedia is one of the few web information sources that are globally accepted as more or less correct. Everybody has something they hate about Wikipedia, but the general gist is that they're more or less credible. Alternative encyclopedic efforts are totally fringe and/or money-making scams like Everipedia.

With this in mind, perhaps social media companies should piggyback on Wikipedia's reputation and flag articles from sources like InfoWars and Breitbart with a banner that reads: "Wikipedia doesn't accept this site as a valid source."

That would let Facebook and Twitter off the hook from having to make these calls themselves, and would provide readers with valuable context.

ta_egdhs• 8 years ago

that doesn't solve the problem it just offloads it.

wikipedia could collapse under the weight of being the internets authority of epistemology.

pavlov3• 8 years ago

That weight has been on Wikipedia's shoulders ever since Google started presenting it as the #1 result on most "established topic" searches.

atoav• 8 years ago

I think this could be about efficiency. If it is codified that Breitbart is not a credible source (which is not a irrational idea), you don't need to have daily discussions about Breitbarts credibility.

repolfx7• 8 years ago

That depends a lot on the topic. I've seen articles on Wikipedia that were ridiculously wrong and couldn't be corrected for some byzantine reasons. For the longest time Wikipedia claimed Bitcoin was a pyramid scheme, despite it failing to meet the criteria on Wikipedia's own page on pyramid schemes.

I certainly wouldn't accept Wikipedia as correct on any topic that gets caught up in the culture wars. Unfortunately, Wikipedia is by its nature very easy to manipulate for small very intense groups who believe they're on a holy mission to cleanse the internet of "bad people".

This change being a case in point. I read all kinds of news sources, from the Washington Post to CNN to the Daily Mail to Breitbart. I wouldn't say Breitbart is wildly different in accuracy to any of the rest, not because it's great, but because so many other outlets (like the NY Times, BBC and CNN) routinely publish things that are false as well. CNN is practically a byword at this point for biased misleading nonsense, they publish stories that collapse all the time. Yet Wikipedia isn't banning CNN, only conservative outlets like the Daily Mail and Breitbart. Isn't that strange?

cooper122• 8 years ago

For the longest time Wikipedia claimed Bitcoin was a pyramid scheme, despite it failing to meet the criteria on Wikipedia's own page on pyramid schemes.

The language in the article [0] regarding pyramid schemes clearly notes that this is a concern raised by "various journalists, economists, and the central Bank of Estonia". An encyclopedia is a tertiary source and summarizes other sources. It has absolutely nothing to do with how Wikipedia itself defines pyramid schemes.

I wouldn't say Breitbart is wildly different in accuracy to any of the rest

Sure.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin#Ponzi_scheme_and_pyram...

aplummer• 8 years ago

I wouldn't say Breitbart is wildly different in accuracy to any of the rest, not because it's great, but because so many other outlets (like the NY Times, BBC and CNN) routinely publish things that are false as well.

I agree that many mainstream outlets have a slant, however this is a frankly ridiculous equivocation between legitimate news organisations with bias reportage and a hack conspiracy website that among others peddled knowlingly false 1) pizzagate and 2) Obama birther conspiracies.

Please provide evidence of the many false stories you refer to, because they just don’t exist.

mjrpes• 8 years ago

Breitbart is no worse than NY Times or WaPo? I gather you have doubts about climate change also.

sharkvszombie• 8 years ago

Only conservative outlets? Did you read the article? It says they banned OccupyDemocrats for similar reasons. They aren't just banning right wing news.

sago2• 8 years ago

For the longest time Wikipedia claimed Bitcoin was a pyramid scheme

[citation needed]

Checked the entire edit history of the article with wiki blame. The phrase 'Pyramid scheme' I could find has been added four times. The first two referred to a specific bitcoin-based third-party scam, which was removed in 2012 when the scam was old news. The second two refer to the multiply-cited opinion of prominent economists, and are presented with disagreement. It was added removed and added again in short order.

CNN is practically a byword at this point for biased misleading nonsense

That is far cry from it being demonstrated. When fact-checked, it ranks among more accurate news sources. The usual rejoiner is that fact-checking can't be trusted.

It is striking how much we live in an era of fear, uncertainty and doubt over truth. And it is stoked much like your comment: some vague innuendo, unsubstantiated claims, false equivalence, and gaslighting of evidence.

Saying something I don't like, is not the same as saying something false. Though our inherent cognitive biases would love us to believe that, and our toxic politics often demands we claim so.

forapurpose7• 8 years ago

I wouldn't say Breitbart is wildly different in accuracy to any of the rest ... because so many other outlets (like the NY Times, BBC and CNN) routinely publish things that are false as well.

I have no idea where the parent gets this (no source is provided), but more generally this is a talking point, throughout history, of liars and propagandists; it's a way of excusing and normalizing their behavior. Propagandists in particular want to neutralize or paralyze, not persuade, their targets - it's easy to see how destroying all trusted institutions would do that.

In the end, it's like someone telling you, after they just lied to your face for the nth time, 'everybody lies!'.

roenxi• 8 years ago

As is sometimes said in management theory "it was a great measure until it was made a target".

Wikipedia is a good reference for what is and isn't likely to be factually accurate, but if it is going to be _the_ standard then it will quickly be corrupted by people pushing a non-factual agenda.

Also, Breitbart being loose with the facts isn't something that the social media platforms want to get involved in. If we count twitter as a publishing platform similar to Breitbart, twitter will spread much more misinformation (arguably in a more damaging way, flash mobs are scarier than anything a print media style organisation can do). You may as well prefix every single tweet with "Wikipedia doesn't accept this tweet as a valid source".

hannob• 8 years ago

As is sometimes said in management theory "it was a great measure until it was made a target".

Wikipedia already is a target. It has been a target of distortion almost as long as it exists. It handles these exceptionally well. Not perfect, but given how attractive Wikipedia manipulation is and how easy you'd think it is it's incredible how well it fights it off.

cyphar2• 8 years ago

As is sometimes said in management theory "it was a great measure until it was made a target".

And in economics this is called the Lucas critique[1] (any economic policy which targets a particular metric eventually results in the metric being gamed and thus no longer being a useful metric -- even if the public does not do this maliciously).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucas_critique

barry-cotter2• 8 years ago

For all their flaws, Wikipedia is one of the few web information sources that are globally accepted as more or less correct.

Only for things that aren’t politically fraught enough for one person, anywhere on the internet to decide to camp on the article. Look at what you get if you look up “Cultural Marxism”.

It redirects to the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory article, with the subheading “Cultural Marxism Conspiracy Theory”. This when there was an excellent article on the academic movement of that name.

Very introductory reddit thread on the history of the academic movement

https://old.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/8q8p6n/cult...

Cultural Marxism and Political Sociology

https://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Marxism-Political-Sociology-...

Talk page for the Cultural Marxism Wikipedia article, which now redirects to Frankfurt School Conspiracy Theory

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Cultural_Marxism

cooper122• 8 years ago

The cultural marxism article being deleted was far from the result of "one person". There was a deletion discussion [0] with input from multiple users, as well as a deletion review. [1] In fact, the discussion was closed by three independent and uninvolved admins. Additionally, the contents of the article were merged, so it's not as if any mention of the topic fell off the face of the earth. You should familiarize yourself with Wikipedia's notability guidelines for standalone [2] and what they entail, as well as the criteria for reliable sources. [3] Lastly, the Wikipedia article explains quite clearly that the so-called "academic movement" you're advocating is a term that was later co-opted by conspiracy theorists. Wikipedia is not for fringe theories. [4]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletio...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Fringe_theories

realusername• 8 years ago

That's because Cultural Marxism isn't part of any serious scientific publication, it's just a non-sense term used by some far right members.

gajjanag• 8 years ago

A funny thing I have noticed about Wikipedia is that although citing Wikipedia itself in an academic paper is still not a good idea generally speaking, the references provided in a Wikipedia article are usually far more relevant than the ones provided in a typical IEEE paper.

It was a shock for me to discover that the "literature review" of an IEEE paper I was reading was essentially useless compared to the one provided by Wikipedia on the same topic. When combined with the fact that the IEEE paper was behind a paywall and the Wikipedia article was accessed within seconds using a search engine, I now know better how to do a literature review...

Why is this the case? Part of what I have noticed about IEEE is that at least 20% of the references provided are simply added at reviewer's insistence to boost their favorite author's citation count (possibly themselves), regardless of what it has to say about the topic at hand. I don't really know how much of this extends to non-IEEE venues. What I can say is that the mathematics papers I have read provide much better references.

geezerjay• 8 years ago

It was a shock for me to discover that the "literature review" of an IEEE paper I was reading was essentially useless compared to the one provided by Wikipedia on the same topic.

That says nothing about wikipedia, and only indicates that you've stumbled on a poorly written paper.

forapurpose7• 8 years ago

the references provided in a Wikipedia article are usually far more relevant than the ones provided in a typical IEEE paper

IME, speaking of academic research in general, often an almost completely different body of knowledge is cited by each. One is high-quality academic research, the other is general 'Internet knowledge', for lack of a better word. The latter often completely misses the boat.

aesthesia• 8 years ago

I've found the opposite--the academic sources cited on many Wikipedia pages (in math and adjacent areas) are seldom comprehensive and often insufficient for the topic. Literature reviews in decent papers, on the other hand, usually clue me in to entire swaths of the literature that I was previously unaware of.

DanBC• 8 years ago

Wikipedia is one of the few web information sources that are globally accepted as more or less correct.

Not even Wikipedia claims this, which is why they tell users to never quote Wikipedia but to go to the sources (which all articles are supposed to have) and quote those instead.

colejohnson66• 8 years ago

Except for those times what is cited is a scientific journal behind a paywall. You can’t really quote those unless you pay up.

Then there’s the whole “WikiGate” (terrible name, but whatever) where Elsevier gave free accounts to Wikipedia editors[1]. That doesn’t help.

[1] https://arstechnica.com/science/2015/09/wikigate-raises-ques...

avs733• 8 years ago

That's not a "Wikipedia" thing though...that's standard practice with any encyclopedia.

koboll• 8 years ago

Wikipedia is one of the few web information sources that are globally accepted as more or less correct.

This is totally wrong. Wikipedia has always been received with skepticism because it's "the site where anyone can write anything", and it's never managed to shake that reputation.

wpietri3• 8 years ago

That's a common complaint, but in practice people generally accept Wikipedia as a source of factual information. It's the 9th-most viewed site in the world [1], and it's not like people go there for the rich multimedia experience. Surveys show a relatively high level of general-audience trust. [2] And for good reason; one of the best places to find criticism of Wikipedia is Wikipedia. [3]

[1] https://moz.com/top500

[2] https://yougov.co.uk/news/2014/08/09/more-british-people-tru...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliability_of_Wikipedia

WilliamEdward2• 8 years ago

Horrifically bad argument that always comes from people who have never contributed to wikipedia or researched for 5 minutes how it works. Pages of high importance are moderated and restricted, so no you can't just write anything, and even in the cases where you can there needs to be a citation.

enriquto2• 8 years ago

perhaps social media companies should piggyback on Wikipedia's reputation and flag articles from sources like InfoWars and Breitbart with a banner that reads: "Wikipedia doesn't accept this site as a valid source."

I'm already tired of the media treating me as an idiot. But when a channel of communication (like a social media site) starts to insert its own comments into the information, well, that's really many steps beyond treating me like an idiot. Completely unacceptable.

pavlov3• 8 years ago

You're always free to use some other site. The unfortunate fact is that a large group of people who seek their news on Twitter and Facebook have zero media literacy. IMHO the big social media sites need to recognize that and start contributing to fixing the problem.

coolso• 8 years ago

With this in mind, perhaps social media companies should piggyback on Wikipedia's reputation and flag articles from sources like InfoWars and Breitbart with a banner that reads: "Wikipedia doesn't accept this site as a valid source."

Yes, Wikipedia: the poster child for factual, accurate, unbiased, trusted information.

I've used Wikipedia for a decade and a half and I love it, but every single time I hear someone mention it, or I mention it myself, be it in an academic context or not, it is always met with a negative comment implying that it is not a "legitimate" source for anything - although most will admit it's a fantastic starting resource.

I also wonder whether you would be as gung-ho about this idea if Wikipedia started flagging articles from sources such as HuffPo, DemocracyNow, the various Gawker offshoots, and "anonymous sources".

CM302• 8 years ago

Eh, I'm not sure I'd agree with that. Many people treat Wikipedia as credible for most topics, but wherever there's a controversy (especially a political one), at least one side of it will probably be skeptical of Wikipedia's coverage of said controversy.

I'm also not a fan of using Wikipedia's criteria for valid sources on social media sites becuase it's not really an accurate measure. It's very much biased in favour of well resourced outlets at the expense of niche or freelance ones, despite what others in the field consider credible. For example, if you're looking for information about the next Pokemon game, what do you consider a reliable source? Something like Serebii.net, or something like Kotaku?

In the gaming field and media, the former is more reliable since they've built up a reputation in their field as an accurate source for information, whereas the latter isn't terrible, but is mostly reposted stories with less vigorous fact checking none the less. On Wikipedia however, they think the latter is more accurate, since it uses paid writers with a more professional layout and real name identification front and centre, which distorts the coverage a bit.

I basically commented a bit more about this in my article here:

https://artplusmarketing.com/trust-is-what-makes-a-source-re...

exolymph2• 8 years ago

As long as Think Progress doesn't make it through either!

arthev• 8 years ago

A web site banned as a source for facts from schools the world over now bans a web site as a a source of its banned facts.

danpalmer• 8 years ago

I get the joke, but it is worth clarifying that schools don’t ban it because it’s unreliable, but because it’s a secondary source. It’s done to teach sourcing discipline.

jstanley• 8 years ago

Unfortunately, most teachers don't understand this, and they tell the kids that Wikipedia is normally wrong about everything.

At least, that was my experience.

saagarjha• 8 years ago

Many teachers accept other secondary sources, though. News article that summarizes a scientific paper? Ok. Wikipedia article citing that paper? Not ok. My impression of this has been a mix of misinformation (anyone can edit it, it must be wrong!), and the fact that it’s just too easy: it really doesn’t make students “work for” their information, so it completely throws off their schedule because everyone has quick access to a reasonably high-quality source.

chki• 8 years ago

I don't think schools ban Wikipedia because it's a secondary source. Because then they would also have to ban most textbooks.

billysielu6• 8 years ago

Why wouldn't you want a student seeking a secondary (or more) source? Just blindly believe what the teacher says and don't question it? That education system is failing that student.

DuskStar• 8 years ago

I'm pretty sure Wikipedia is a tertiary source, actually. Their guidelines recommend preferring secondary sources, and place significant restrictions on the use of primary sources. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research...

jccalhoun• 8 years ago

I'm a college professor and I tell students they shouldn't cite wikipedia because they shouldn't be citing any encyclopedias (except something like a legal encyclopedia or something like that) because they should look for primary sources. However, I tell them to go read wikipedia and look at the sources cited in a wikipedia article.

JohnStrangeII2• 8 years ago

I'm astonished they accepted Breitbart in the first place. When I first heard about it, I checked it out and literally the first discussion in their comment section was about how to most efficiently gas the maximum number of jews in the US. I'm not kidding.

Breitbart is not the only problem of people who read it, many of them are mentally ill (schizophrenia) or they were raised in a way that makes it almost impossible to discern facts from fiction. Before you argue about that, I can guarantee you that I would - and in fact do - say the same about similar radical left-wing "news sites".

One problem at Wikipedia is that there is generally not enough vetting of the citation sources.

To be fair, that's not entirely their fault, because especially in the US there is a vast network of fake science and news sites powered by lobbyists, and it takes a substantial amount of effort to discern these from reputable sources. I've seen some interesting network analysis of the lobby sites of the US oil industry, and have to say that I wouldn't have been able to easily recognize their think-tanks and science information sites as fake. They're well-disguised and you have to look at interconnections, board members, and funding sources to find out who is really behind them. For example, some of them looked like legitimate sources about green energy technologies, but were in reality designed to poison the climate change debate and further the interests of oil concerns.

Conclusion: Don't focus too much on Breitbart, there are plenty of other seemingly legitimate associations, news sites, institutes and think tanks whose primary purpose is to bullshit people, and they are funded from the left and right.

tomohawk• 8 years ago

You're making an extraordinary claim here. Care to provide a link backing it up? If not, this is just a slur.

You're implying that people who go to breitbart are mentally ill. Maybe they need help? Should be committed to an institution for their views? That worked out so well in the Soviet Union...

JohnStrangeII2• 8 years ago

Yes, many of them are mentally ill, which is pretty obvious if you would actually care to check out their comments on Breitbart, which I have done.

I stand by my word, everything I've said about Breitbart is true, whether you like it or not. You can downvote me as much as you want, fact is that Breitbart is a hate speech site that also happens to copy & pastes news from other sources in order to disguise their real purpose. Anyone who thinks there could be a "news site" with a more right wing bias than Fox News is seriously deluded, because the primary goal of news reporting is not to politically influence the public towards radical anti-democratic world views and create chaos.

Just to make this clear, I'm not a US citizen and couldn't care less about Breitbart's fake news if Bannon hadn't recently announced that he wants to invest money to focus his propaganda efforts on the EU with the goal of disrupting the European Union and instigate chaos in Europe. There is no need to write indirect slurs about Breitbart, the truth suffices to discredit this site.

But if you want a real slur, no problem. Yes, the people who run Breitbart are absolutely despicable scum.

Would you read an ISIS "news site" to get your "news"? If the answer is no, then you also shouldn't read utter crap like Beitbart.

blahblahthrow2• 8 years ago

It seems unhelpful to write off Breitbart readers as unaware of reality. They may be uncritical readers of the news, and they may have deplorable beliefs, but many sane, rational people believe terrible things. Or they're willing to associate with people who believe terrible things to further their own agenda, and be complicit in those terrible things.

134152• 8 years ago

I agree in hindsight that my comment was unhelpful. The anectdote about the "gassing the jews" thread was true, that was in 2016, but instead of bashing on breitbart I should have emphasized more that there are plenty of more legitimate looking sources of disinformation, especially in the US where lobbying has such a long and powerful tradition. That was the main point I tried to make, but my disdain for Steve Bannon and his entourage got in my way.

(Posted from another account, because I changed my machine, but I'm the same as OP.)

HissingMachine• 8 years ago

Maybe this speaks more about how Wikipedia works than quality of Breitbart as a source.

First, if you look how credible news organizations work, they need three confirmations from unrelated sources before calling it a fact. If Wikipedia has lower standards than that, then it doesn't really matter whom they choose as a source of information, it still rises the question of validity of the claim if there is only one corroborating source.

Second, this ban seems to assume a position that Breitbart can't be a valid source even if they use outside sources corroborating their claim, and that just goes against journalistic principles in general. But then again, Wikipedia has to my knowledge never claimed to work on journalistic principles, they do have guidelines in place that anyone can verify, but outright banning a source has a negative impact on their validity even if it is for a good reason.

Refusing to use Breitbart as only source is reasonable and valid in my opinion, but accepting any other source as valid enough to be used as a single source raises the same problem, news orgs are wrong from time to time, and that is a fact. So if they really wanted to make a statement, they would flag articles that need more sources and get more sources even if one of them is Breitbart. But positioning yourself as arbitrator of truth and banning sources, even bad ones really doesn't build confidence, instead it just erodes it.

I like that Wikipedia's visual style is black and white, but I'd like it's content principles to be a gradient.

rlpb• 8 years ago

First, if you look how credible news organizations work, they need three confirmations from unrelated sources before calling it a fact.

Based on this criterion, are there any credible news organizations left?

billysielu6• 8 years ago

They can just put a quote in a headline and people will click on it. Whether the truth was spoken is irrelevant to their bottom line.

ndnxhs2• 8 years ago

Its fairly easy to find 3 sources for any story because most articles are just reworded from other articles.

rubyfan2• 8 years ago

Well stated. The problem that the blanket ban on one source introduces is that it becomes a divisive issue. The source and faction that subscribes then believes Wikipedia has lost its objectivity (even if it is trying to maintain the truth). The faction then just starts saying Wikipedia is biased and discounts it as a credible source that speaks the truth universally. To be clear I am not saying that the non-truth should be considered in Wikipedia - I am saying that I like what the parent suggests. Wikipedia should look for a more broad application of standards for sources, as the parent suggests flagging universally around citations not meeting standard, etc.

dsfyu404ed• 8 years ago

I don't see it that way. This is probably just a pragmatic move to keep Wikipedia users and contributors from getting their panties in a knot.

It's basically impossible to have a discussion on the internet about the merit something a strongly right leaning media outlet says (well it's possible, but the discussion won't be very civil). Anything factual Breitbart reports will be reported elsewhere because that's how media works, if one outlet covers it others will too. In light of that there's not much to be lost by banning Breitbart as a source. What you gain is that it gives the monkeys that edit pages one less reason to fling poo at each other.

scarejunba2• 8 years ago

If some group of people think Wikipedia is bullshit, they're going to miss out on the most accessible repository of human knowledge that Man has ever compiled.

That's their own problem. They will fall behind others.

liftbigweights• 8 years ago

Maybe this speaks more about how Wikipedia works than quality of Breitbart as a source.

It has nothing to do with how wikipedia works rather than the pressure being put on it by monied interests and the news organizations.

What is happening to wikipedia is what happened to google, reddit, youtube, twitter, etc.

It's the elite media ( particular nytimes, washingtonpost, cnn, et al ) trying to muscle out everyone else.

In the long run, this isn't going to hurt breitbart or any of the right leaning news sources. Right leaning people are going to find it one way or another. It's going to hurt vox, theverge, huffingtonpost, buzzfeed and the billions of left leading fringe news sources as the big boys get special treatment. I'm certain that breitbart is going to be around 10 years from now. I'm not sure about vox and company.

And also in the long run, it's going to make people distrust the nytimes, washingtonpost, cnn, etc even more. But I don't think they care. Que sera sera.

People really underestimate how much external money pressure is being put on tech companies like wikipedia to serve as propaganda outlets. It's not even tech, even the ACLU is feeling the pressure. The only thing mere mortals can do is see out things play.

ohhellno3• 8 years ago

Upvote

forapurpose7• 8 years ago

if you look how credible news organizations work, they need three confirmations from unrelated sources before calling it a fact

If Wikipedia then uses that news organization as a source, isn't it in effect using the same standard?

manicdee• 8 years ago

When the signal to noise ratio is so low, and the time cost of continually reviewing references and arguing with the right wing article brigadiers is so high, banning the troublesome source is a simple way of ensuring the available editor time is spent constructively.

tzs• 8 years ago

[...] news orgs are wrong from time to time, and that is a fact

The difference is that when news orgs on the top half of this chart [1] are wrong, even the ones that are quite partisan either left or right, it is almost always the case that they thought they were right when the published. The are wrong by accident.

When orgs along the bottom, whether they be far left like AlterNet or far right like Breitbart, are wrong it is often they case that they know they are wrong before they publish, but since their purpose is not news but rather pushing their partisan agenda, they consider that a feature, not a bug.

[1] https://www.adfontesmedia.com/

exolymph2• 8 years ago

if you look how credible news organizations work, they need three confirmations from unrelated sources before calling it a fact.

having worked in journalism, hahahhahhahhahahhhahhahahaha

repolfx7• 8 years ago

Yes that claim is wrong, here's CNN admitting they ran a story that was totally false and aren't going to do anything about it, because it met their standard of two sources:

https://theintercept.com/2017/12/09/the-u-s-media-yesterday-...

Raju went on CNN, in muted tones, to note the correction, explicitly claiming that “two sources” had each given him the false date on the email, while also making clear that CNN did not ever even see the email, but only had sources describe its purported contents.

As Greenwald points out, in this particular case it's implausible that those two sources could have been independent because the mistake was about mis-reading the date on an email in a way that happened to be politically convenient:

All of this prompts the glaring, obvious, and critical question — one that CNN refuses to address: How did “multiple sources” all misread the date on this document, in exactly the same way and toward the same end, and then feed this false information to CNN?

So either the OP is wrong about what credible news organisations do, or CNN is not credible (see my arguments below to that end), or both.

I wonder how much of the commentary about NYT/CNN/etc being "credible" and Breitbart being "not credible" is based on misunderstandings of how journalism works?

rstuart4133• 8 years ago

Second, this ban seems to assume a position that Breitbart can't be a valid source even if they use outside sources corroborating their claim

Really, it isn't that complex. Most people learn this in kindergarten, if not before.

Every heard of the "boy who cried wolf"? At no time does anyone suggest if the boy turned up with the wolf's head under his arm you would disbelieve him. But later when telling people "I believe there is a wolf now" you don't say it's because "the boy told me [again]", instead you hold up the head.

Well, it's the same for Breitbart. Saying "it's true because Breitbart said it's true" is just going to get you tarnished with Breitbart's reputation, but handing out Breitbart's citation might just do the trick.

dmitrygr2• 8 years ago

Unpopular opinion: Sometimes Breitbart does have useful info. They were the only ones who had the full leak of the Google all-hands that was definitely newsworthy, for example. Discard that and you missed some useful info. You canot just color publications as "good" and "not". This sort of maximalism (seeing the world in black and white) is rarely good long term. Almost everything in the world has a use.

blahblahthrow2• 8 years ago

almost everything in the world has a use

Do you routinely read far-left news sources like Current Affairs and Jacobin to make sure you're getting the full picture?

dmitrygr2• 8 years ago

Yes I do. And also foreign news to get a non-usa-centric view.

wemdyjreichert• 8 years ago

I'll second this. I read stuff like Jacobin as well as Breitbart.

pfschell• 8 years ago

This says far more about the credibility of wikipedia’s editors than it says about Breitbart.

YouOkOrNot2• 8 years ago

Breitbart is actually quite accurate, I'd say it's no more misleading than any other mainstream publication. I'd wager that most people here don't actually read the website yet hold strong opinions on its reporting, which in itself is sad.

I challenge everyone who disagrees to look at Breitbart's front page right now and find an article you would consider objectively false or more biased than the average CNN or HuffPo article.

What is the case is that very often Breitbart reports on things more mainstream sites refuse to report on. It's real diversity of perspective like this that's actually valuable in a free society.

But Breitbart doesn't tow the ideological line, so it gets banned.

When we ban websites like Breitbart we lose sources that examine sides of issues that often go unexamined, or issues that get ignored altogether.

imh• 8 years ago

It's one of many that were banned, across the ideological spectrum.

YouOkOrNot2• 8 years ago

That's beside the point, Breitbart shouldn't be banned.

orf5• 8 years ago

I challenge everyone who disagrees to look at Breitbart's front page right now and find an article you would consider objectively false or more biased than the average CNN or HuffPo article.

Sure.

EU Cracks: Juncker Says Brexit Deal Close

https://www.breitbart.com/london/2018/10/06/eu-blinks-juncke...

It's certainly not the EU who are cracking under Brexit, Theresa May's government is.

Danish Minister Rejects EU Migrant Quotas Claiming ‘Too Few Contribute’

https://www.breitbart.com/london/2018/10/07/danish-minister-...

The actual source (https://jyllands-posten.dk/politik/ECE10915137/stoejberg-dan...) says it is the UN quotas it is stopping, not the EU ones as suggested in the title. The title is also misleading, "too few women contribute" is the quote.

They only took in 500 refugees a year before that, something the writing definitely does not reflect, and will continue "throw open their borders" to refugees with disabilities.

And hey, lets throw in a nice bit about rape statistics and putting asylum seekers on deserted islands.

The less said about the comments, the better.

leereeves5• 8 years ago

What's your source for the 500 refugees per year? I saw different:

The country registered 3,500 asylum seekers in 2017, according to the ministry, the lowest number since 2008.

https://www.thelocal.dk/20181004/denmark-refuses-to-take-in-...

As for the rest of your nitpicking, I'm sure you're aware we could do the same with the headlines from any media source. I once saw CNN publish essentially the same story with two opposing headlines: "NFL ratings are down again this season. Is it time to panic yet?", then "Trump says NFL ratings are 'way down.' That's not completely true"

mythrwy5• 8 years ago

If sources which occasionally play lose with facts or spin are to be banned from Wikipedia some mainstream news outlets should probably go as well.

Not a fan of Breitbart, but this reeks of political preference. Wiki should be above this kind of thing but apparently isn't, which speaks to it's own credibility.

mythrwy5• 8 years ago

Really curious about the downvotes (which I don't care about the votes, just what it means).

Do they mean "Breitbart is much much less credible than all other news outlets (except maybe Infowars) so they deserve this!"

Or do they mean, "Yes, but leftism is the correct point of view, they told me so in college, so they deserve this block!"

Or do they mean "We've been trying really hard to resurrect major media as a legitimate source for believable propaganda and don't like your insinuation there!"

Or something else I haven't thought of?

Because from where I sit, Breitbart, the grand total of 3 times I visited it seemed a bit extreme and one sided, but in reporting not any further from what one might consider "accurate" than many biased mainstream news outlets (comments section excluded, that was indeed a circus).

Did I miss something?

Not really a person of strong political persuasions but big tech shoving brave new world down everyone's throats isn't really my thing either. Plus I doubt it will work. I guess I prefer the dumb pipes model but once people are involved that goes out the window? Any way to tone that down?

lolc10• 8 years ago

In your original post:

Not a fan of Breitbart, but this reeks of political preference. Wiki should be above this kind of thing but apparently isn't, which speaks to it's own credibility.

Wikipedia editors concluded that Breitbart News is an unreliable source. If this reeks to you, fine. Maybe there is something there. Maybe they did have other motives. Go dig. But don't just draw general conclusions about Wikipedia's credibility from that reek.

In my opinion, anything touching Breitbart reeks. Wikipedia is doing well to have settled the matter and gotten rid of that reek. At some point you don't discuss the finer points of shit anymore. You close the lid. As they did with a host of other publications.

Just one stinking example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breitbart_News#False_report_of...

beshrkayali• 8 years ago

This is very bad.

malvosenior4• 8 years ago

That's funny. Wikipedia allows Gawker and Vox posts to be used as sources on articles that directly involve Gawker and Vox:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamergate_controversy#cite_ref...

That whole entry is compiled of highly questionable sources.

Seems like a massive double standard.

TarpitCarnivore5• 8 years ago

Gamergate's entire "mission" is highly questionable.

malvosenior4• 8 years ago

Do you think that because of all of the biased media reports about it? That's literally what it's about (as is the topic of this thread). Social media, new media and old media being politicized, cliquish and dishonest.

That Vox and Gawker are viewed as more reputable than Breitbart gets to the very heart of what Gamergate was about (IMO).

justtopost• 8 years ago

Can Vice be next?

writepub2• 8 years ago

Hope the average HN reader is aware that Breitbart is banned on HN, as a submission source.

lolc10• 8 years ago

I was blissfully unaware. For a fleeting moment your post made me wonder whether I should consider the ban problematic. Then I figured that credible sources would report on whatever Breitbart was shouting about, if it was serious.

And I'll live on as before.

writepub2• 8 years ago

Then I figured that credible sources would report on whatever Breitbart was shouting about, if it was serious.

Seems a lot like how authoritarian countries view news. First, they classify (a.k.a. anoint) sources as kosher & credible, and then blanket ban the others. Then they demonize anyone who makes a logical argument for freedom of speech.

You can see this pattern in China, Russia, Iran, ... and HN, Wikipedia, ...

Of course, HN is a private company who is free under US speech laws to pick and choose sources it deems kosher. But it's ironic that HN considers it's audience immature enough to "protect" it from the triggers of opposing viewpoints, of Breitbart & ilk.

malvosenior4• 8 years ago

Then I figured that credible sources would report on whatever Breitbart was shouting about, if it was serious.

To the best of my knowledge, Breitbart was the only place to release all of the court documents from the Damore case.

Interesting enough, because of that, those documents are not cited on the Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google%27s_Ideological_Echo_Ch...

8bitsrule• 8 years ago

Wikipedia, these days is remarkably accurate.

But much more significant than that, it's a compelling demonstration of what a large, committed community can do, together. With a vision for creating value, without a need for satisfying shareholders in anything but reason and adequately-competent, wide-ranging content.

In my view it is becoming one of the wonders of the modern world. Without a sugar daddy.

Wikipedia bans Breitbart as a source for facts

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