Powerbase:A Guide to Sourcing

It helps too if you can be as specific as possible about the source of your information in the body text itself, in concise form, as this lends authority and a reassuring objectivity to what you are saying as well as putting potentially controversial views into someone else’s mouth.

Example:

INCORRECT: Joe Bloggs has been called “the biggest idiot who ever sat in the House of Lords”[5].

(NOT ENOUGH INFORMATION ON SOURCE IN THE TEXT OR THE REF BELOW. SAY WHO CALLED HIM THAT)

DEFINITELY INCORRECT: Joe Bloggs is “the biggest idiot who ever sat in the House of Lords”[5].

(SUBJECTIVE, IN THAT THE VIEW IS NOT ATTRIBUTED IN TEXT SO SOUNDS LIKE WRITER’S PREJUDICE; ALSO, NOT ENOUGH INFORMATION IN THE TEXT OR IN REF BELOW)

WORST OF ALL: Joe Bloggs is the biggest idiot who ever sat in the House of Lords.

(SUBJECTIVE AND WILL BE DISMISSED OUT OF HAND)

Notes

5. www.joebloggsanidiot.com/houseoflords

(THERE’S A RISK THAT THE LINK WILL SOON BE DEAD AND THERE IS NOT ENOUGH INFORMATION TO SEEK OUT ARTICLE/SOURCE)

CORRECT: According to Jane Smith, writing in the Guardian, Joe Bloggs is “the biggest idiot who ever sat in the House of Lords”[5].

ALSO CORRECT: Jane Smith, in her biography of Bloggs, calls him “the biggest idiot who ever sat in the House of Lords”[5].

Notes

5. Jane Smith, "Idiot in the House", The Guardian, 4 July 2008, p. xx.

Beware dead weblinks

Many Spinwatch articles are some years old and the weblinks in the refs are dead. We can’t assume that readers will hunt down sources for our information. If the source isn’t easy for them to access, they will simply discount the information.

Portal editors will need to keep an eye on the state of weblinks in their portal’s articles. Often you can track down live links to sources by doing a search at the Wayback Machine at http://www.archive.org/web/web.php

Since anyone can contribute information, why should anyone trust the SpinProfiles as authoritative?

As the authors of a book titled Trust Us, We’re Experts, Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber have given quite a bit of thought to the question of what makes information credible. SpinProfiles intentionally avoids invoking "trusted authority figures." Instead, its credibility will depend on the degree to which articles are well-written and backed with supporting documentation, terms of art from "less social" sciences where these are applicable, and the degree to which credibility specialists themselves feel they can stake their credibility on trusting it.

Burden of evidence

The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation. The source should be cited clearly and precisely to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question.

If no reliable, third-party sources can be found for an article topic, SpinProfiles should not have an article on it.

Any edit lacking a source may be removed, but editors may object if you remove material without giving them a chance to provide references. If you want to request a source for an unsourced statement, consider moving it to the talk page.

Random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced.

Sources in languages other than English

SpinProfiles is a British project and for the convenience of our readers, English-language sources should be used in preference to foreign-language sources, assuming the availability of an English-language source of equal quality, so that readers can easily verify that the source material has been used correctly.

Keep in mind that translations are subject to error, whether performed by a SpinProfiles editor or a professional, published translator. In principle, readers should have the opportunity to verify for themselves what the original material actually said, that it was published by a credible source, and that it was translated correctly.

Therefore, when the original material is in a language other than English:

• Where sources are directly quoted, published translations are generally preferred over editors performing their own translations directly.
• Where editors use their own English translation of a non-English source as a quote in an article, there should be clear citation of the foreign-language original, so that readers can check what the original source said and the accuracy of the translation.