Works cited in Wikipedia - WikiEN-l - lists.wikimedia.org

List overview All Threads
Download

Works cited in Wikipedia

Re: [WikiEN-l] Larry Sanger weighs...

What is the fundamental goal of...

Andrew Gray

26 Feb 2007 26 Feb '07

11:54 p.m.

...well, works cited where the citation involves an ISBN, anyway. http://www.librarything.com/blog/2007/02/wikipedia-citatons-with-feed.php Quite an interesting idea to play with, there. -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

Reply

Show replies by date

Stan Shebs

27 Feb 27 Feb

12:04 a.m.

Andrew Gray wrote:

...well, works cited where the citation involves an ISBN, anyway. http://www.librarything.com/blog/2007/02/wikipedia-citatons-with-feed.php Quite an interesting idea to play with, there.

What a coincidence - I was just today pondering how it was that many of the books in my librarything collection seem not to be referenced by WP articles, even some of those to which I personally added the reference. Not necessarily vandalism though, one thing we learn quickly from librarything is just how many dozens of ISBNs can be associated with a particular work... An interesting future possibility is to provide a route for article checkers to get in touch with people who actually own the book being referenced. Stan

Reply

Andrew Gray

12:17 a.m.

On 27/02/07, Stan Shebs <stanshebs(a)earthlink.net> wrote:

Andrew Gray wrote:

...well, works cited where the citation involves an ISBN, anyway. http://www.librarything.com/blog/2007/02/wikipedia-citatons-with-feed.php Quite an interesting idea to play with, there.

What a coincidence - I was just today pondering how it was that many of the books in my librarything collection seem not to be referenced by WP articles, even some of those to which I personally added the reference. Not necessarily vandalism though, one thing we learn quickly from librarything is just how many dozens of ISBNs can be associated with a particular work... An interesting future possibility is to provide a route for article checkers to get in touch with people who actually own the book being referenced.

An excellent idea! Which reminds me... there's a "union catalogue" group for the German wikipedia with much the same goals. I've set one up for enwp; where would be best to spread the word? A sizable number of users could produce an interesting reference resource... http://www.librarything.com/groups/englishwikipedia -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

Reply

Ray Saintonge

8:15 a.m.

Stan Shebs wrote:

Andrew Gray wrote:

...well, works cited where the citation involves an ISBN, anyway. http://www.librarything.com/blog/2007/02/wikipedia-citatons-with-feed.php Quite an interesting idea to play with, there.

What a coincidence - I was just today pondering how it was that many of the books in my librarything collection seem not to be referenced by WP articles, even some of those to which I personally added the reference. Not necessarily vandalism though, one thing we learn quickly from librarything is just how many dozens of ISBNs can be associated with a particular work... An interesting future possibility is to provide a route for article checkers to get in touch with people who actually own the book being referenced.

I added a couple of books to this site in December 2005 just to get the hang of it, but never got back to it. With others now interested I can now take a second look Ec

Reply

Andrew Gray

2 Mar 2 Mar

9:08 p.m.

On 27/02/07, Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote:

What a coincidence - I was just today pondering how it was that many of the books in my librarything collection seem not to be referenced by WP articles, even some of those to which I personally added the reference. Not necessarily vandalism though, one thing we learn quickly from librarything is just how many dozens of ISBNs can be associated with a particular work... An interesting future possibility is to provide a route for article checkers to get in touch with people who actually own the book being referenced.

I added a couple of books to this site in December 2005 just to get the hang of it, but never got back to it. With others now interested I can now take a second look

It's a lovely idea to play with, isn't it? If nothing else it cuts down on my duplicate-buying... Ad left on WP:VP: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_%28miscellaneous%29#Lib… -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

Reply

Kat Walsh

9:12 p.m.

On 3/2/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray(a)gmail.com> wrote:

On 27/02/07, Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote:

I added a couple of books to this site in December 2005 just to get the hang of it, but never got back to it. With others now interested I can now take a second look

It's a lovely idea to play with, isn't it? If nothing else it cuts down on my duplicate-buying...

LibraryThing is a terrible site. Because whenever I remember it exists again, I spend way too much time playing with it. -Kat -- Wikimedia needs you: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Fundraising * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mindspillage | (G)AIM:Mindspillage mindspillage or mind|wandering on irc.freenode.net | email for phone

Reply

Steve Bennett

27 Feb 27 Feb

11:10 p.m.

On 2/27/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...well, works cited where the citation involves an ISBN, anyway. http://www.librarything.com/blog/2007/02/wikipedia-citatons-with-feed.php

Oh dear: ---- What's the most cited books? The most cited book on Wikipedia is... The Official Pokemon Handbook. Surprised? Don't be. In fact, eighteen of the top twenty most-cited works are Pokemon books. It boggles the mind. Somebody, or a bunch of somebodies went ISBN-happy on all the Pokemon entries. Fortunately, the existence of so many citations to Pokemon does not impair the quality of the rest. It's just... Wikipedia. ---- It's actually not surprising though: references are often added "defensively" on Wikipedia, as an argument against deleting the article. Pokemon articles are more likely than others to be nominated for AfD. Steve

Reply

Philip Sandifer

11:11 p.m.

On Feb 27, 2007, at 6:10 PM, Steve Bennett wrote:

On 2/27/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...well, works cited where the citation involves an ISBN, anyway. http://www.librarything.com/blog/2007/02/wikipedia-citatons-with- feed.php

Oh dear: ---- What's the most cited books? The most cited book on Wikipedia is... The Official Pokemon Handbook. Surprised? Don't be. In fact, eighteen of the top twenty most-cited works are Pokemon books. It boggles the mind. Somebody, or a bunch of somebodies went ISBN-happy on all the Pokemon entries. Fortunately, the existence of so many citations to Pokemon does not impair the quality of the rest. It's just... Wikipedia. ---- It's actually not surprising though: references are often added "defensively" on Wikipedia, as an argument against deleting the article. Pokemon articles are more likely than others to be nominated for AfD.

Well this certainly puts a nail in the "citations worked" coffin. -Phil

Reply

geni

11:25 p.m.

On 2/27/07, Steve Bennett <stevagewp(a)gmail.com> wrote:

It's actually not surprising though: references are often added "defensively" on Wikipedia, as an argument against deleting the article. Pokemon articles are more likely than others to be nominated for AfD.

Not quite that simple. If there are a standard set of references on Pokemon once you have used them on one article you can probably use them on all the others. The classic counter case is European monarchs where you are likely going to need a completely different set of refs every time (the upshot of this is featured articles are likely to appear in families where once someone has worked out the formulae for getting one such article to FA status they can then do it to all the others). -- geni

Reply

Steve Bennett

11:31 p.m.

On 2/28/07, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Not quite that simple. If there are a standard set of references on Pokemon once you have used them on one article you can probably use them on all the others.

Yeah, and there is nothing wrong inherently wrong with this. But either of two things can happen: * The references are added by hand each time, meaning each article has slightly different references, or the same ones cited differently, for no apparent reason. * The references are put in a template which is used on every article, whether or not any information from a specific source was actually used on the article. We still lack decent tools for referencing. Steve

Reply

6278

days inactive

6282

days old

wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org

Manage subscription

9 comments

7 participants

tags (0)

participants (7)

Andrew Gray
geni
Kat Walsh
Philip Sandifer
Ray Saintonge
Stan Shebs
Steve Bennett