Powerbase:Help Contents

What is "wiki"?

A Wiki is a collection of interlinked web pages.

Getting involved

Spin profiles welcomes volunteers to help expand the database of material on spin and propaganda. See Getting Involved for more information.

Do I have to register to edit pages?

Yes.

Do I have to use my real name?

Yes.

What if someone tries to vandalize or insert disinformation into Spin Profiles?

Currrently all people who want editorial access to Nuclear Spin must register with SpinWatch. This is our first level of security. The Spinprofiles software also includes a number of features that make it possible to detect and manage vandalism.

• As editors to the site are registered, it is easy to track the editing activities of registered user.
• In the case of someone still managing to write malicious material, the software keeps an archive of all past versions of each article, making it easy to undo by reverting to a previous version.

Editorial policy

SpinProfiles is a collection of data on spin, propaganda, Think Tanks, Front Groups, PR Consultancies, 'Fake Persuaders', Industry Friendly Experts and corporate lobby groups. We want to report the spin not be accused of spinning ourselves. Therefore

General structure / layout

Entries should try and give enough information on a person or group so that a person who knows nothing about them can come away informed. Try to write a profile clearly and logically, including background information, funding, current activities and information on key personnel, if it is an organization. Break the article down into sub-headings that are not sensationalist but try and summarise some of the issues in that section.

Please try and avoid over-long sentences and huge swathes of text that do not include paragraph breaks. Don’t of course forget to reference (See A Guide to Referencing).

A basic profile on a person should include some or all of the following headings:

• Background
• Affiliations
• Activities

A basic profile on an organisation shjould include some or all of the followoing headings:

• Context/Background - What is the organisation and what does it say that it is for?
• People - People associated with the organisation
• Funding - Where the organisation gets its funding.
• Activities

When including a long list of people, give each of them a new line, starting with a dot as follows:

*[[Tony Blair]] *[[Gordon Brown]]

Which will look like this when saved:

• Tony Blair
• Gordon Brown

Try and include the function he or she has or had with the organization, for how long, and reference your source - for example

• Tony Blair, UK Prime Minister, 1997-2006
• Gordon Brown, UK chancellor of the Exchequer, 1997-2006

Tone

Try to be as factual as possible. Do not use abusive language or language that is in any way racist, sexist or obscene or could be construed as such. Do not use swear words unless in quotations. Keep any rhetoric or personal comment to a minimum and avoid speculation, innuendo or libel. If comment is provided please be fair. Being fair does not mean not being critical or adding some kind of analysis, though. Just try and strike the correct balance. You want the article to basically contain factual information about the person you are writing about, not your views on the person you are writing about. There is a difference between a profile entry and a blog entry or an opinion piece. Avoid generalizations and unsubstantiated sweeping statements.

If you are making accusations against a person or organization try and support it by as much primary material as possible. Just because someone else has said it is true, it does not mean it is true. Make sure your sources are up to date, and relate to present day situation or indicate that they are historical.

Referencing

Our purpose is to expose manipulation of information and therefore we need to be extra careful in what information we use, how we use it and where we get it from. It is extremely important to provide references that are as authoritative as possible. Try and use primary materials where possible - that is original sources as opposed to secondary reports - and information that is up to date as possible. If the issue is very contentious, try and reference from more than once source. Be careful about quoteing from websites, check the validity of a website: just because it’s online doesn’t mean it’s true. Some websites are seen as more authoritative and reputable than others. Try and use these in preference.

Each article should include a list of quoted references at the bottom: including as much information as possible about the reference as well as a web-link. Please do not just provide a weblink as these change and it is then difficult to find the source unless other information is given. Whenever possible, each resource listed should include the following information in this order:

• name of author
• title of article
• publication date
• name, city (and, in the US, state of publisher) e.g. for books London: Pluto Press or Berkeley, California: University of California Press; for journals and newspapers and websites the title should be given in italics - e.g. International Journal of Obesity, New York Times, Spinwatch
• URL - the Web address (if the report is available online) include the date last visited.

For guidance on how to format references see A Guide to Referencing

Libel

Avoid accusations that are libelous. Just because something that is defamatory has been published elsewhere, it does not mean that you are not immune from legal action. It just makes it less likely. As above, always try and use primary materials from authoratitive sources. Also make sure that any material you post, including photos does not violate copyright laws.

Complaints and legal threats relating to any content on SpinProfiles should be dealt with as soon as possible.

What is reputable?

The evaluation fo reputable sources is not always easy. We think that the accuracy of information in published sources is not governed by how 'reputable' the source is or is regarded as. This is in oart because many of the sources regarded as reputable in the mainstream are in fact often a key part of the problem of spin and propaganda which this database has been set up to expose. So we have a policy which foregrounds accuracy over reputation of sources. So our policy is different from that of Wikipedia, for example. their policy is worth quoting as we think it highlights part of the problem faced in this area.

This is what Wikipedia says about Reputable publications:

“Reputable publications include peer-reviewed journals, books published by a known academic publishing house or university press, and divisions of a general publisher which have a good reputation for scholarly publications.

We agree with this, though it is obviously the case that such sources are not beyond critique. For non academic sources Wikipedia notes

it is impossible to pin down a clear definition of "reputable." In general, most of us have a good intuition about the meaning of the word. A magazine or press release self-published by a very extreme political or religious group would often not be regarded as "reputable." For example, Wikipedia would not rely only on an article in the Socialist Workers' Party's newspaper The Militant to publish a statement claiming that President Bush hates children. However, if that same claim was in The New York Times, then Wikipedia could refer to the article (and to the sources quoted in the article). The political newspaper could, however, be used as a source of information about the party itself.

We think that this is a very revealing passage which helps clarify the difference between reputation, evaluation and accuracy. Any statement that President Bush hates children is an evaluative statement. It should, therefore, be based on evidence. The evaluation cannnot be short circuited by relying on a source 'reputable' or not. It has to be based on evidence which might be gleaned - in principle - from either the New York Times or a radical newspaper or website. But a significant part of what this site is about is provising a critique of mainstream (and sometimes 'radical') sources. How can we criticise the mainstream media and still use them as sources?

Wikipedia goes on:

Ask yourself some questions when you are evaluating a publication. Is it openly partisan? Does it have a large or very small readership? Is it a vanity publisher? Is it run principally by a single person, or does it have a large, permanent staff? Does it seem to have any system of peer review, or do you get the feeling that it shoots from the hip? If you heard that the publication you are about to use as a source was considering publishing a very negative article about you, would you (a) be terrified because you suspect they are irresponsible and do not fact-check; or (b) feel somewhat reassured because the publication employs several layers of editing staff, fact-checkers, lawyers, an editor-in-chief, and a publisher, and will usually correct its mistakes? If it is (a), do not use it as a source. If it is (b), it is what Wikipedia calls "reputable."

When dispute arises regarding whether a publication is reputable, you can attempt to get more editors involved and work toward a consensus. There is no clear definition, but don't ignore your intuition.

(evel: There is another related issue here. We often criticize mainstream media on SpinProfiles and on SpinWatch, for being inaccurate, spinning or straightforward lying. At the same time we use these (NYT, Guardian) to source our claims. I sometimes feel a bit ambiguous about this… Also, we want to promote independent media, take them serious as source – at least I want to. This sort of conflicts with the policy outlined here. (I don’t immediately know the answer to this, we need to think about it)

Corrections and Inaccuracies: Procedures for editorial changes

SpinWatch board is responsible for the content of the SpinProfiles pages. As directors of the non profit company that holds the website, there are four identifiable people who have to respond the complaints and who run the risk of being charged, for libel for instance. We intend SpinProfiles to be a reliable source of information taken serious by other researchers, activists, journalists and the general public. Amongst them will be our funders and possible future funders. One serious complaint, or exposure of faul language, or inaccuracy, can kill the project, its sources, its position and its reliability.

To keep up these high standards we need all our contributors to uphold the same standards, and agree to the procedures below.

libellous, disputable, or otherwise unacceptable language.

The editorial team will remove texts or part of texts that endanger the project in any kind of way. Even if this disrupts the coherence of the rest of the text. Racist, sexist or otherwise offending language will not be accepted. It is for the editorial board to judge about this.

(evel: Do we need to have two board members consulted before we remove text? To prevent the outbreak of ground wars?)

Endangering texts will be moved to the discussion page (evel: only if those pages are not open i.e. traceable for webcrawlers as well), the author will be asked to agree with the removal and/or rephrase the text to an acceptable level.

evel: How do we agree on what is acceptable?

Sources

We want our authors to put a footnote with every link, citing author, title, place and date of publication. If that is not the case, the author will be asked to improve the sourcing, in the box at the bottom of the page

(evel: would that be the best place? How do we notify authors? What if they don’t reply, or don’t deliver?)

Various kinds of problems with sources may occur:

- no sources

- claims not, or not well enough sourced (including giant leaps)

- dead links

- unreliable sources

(coming back to the need for a definition of reliable sources)

Any of these problems could lead to a liable of otherwise unacceptable piece of text, as long as claims lack proof. If so, rule 1 prefails

Editorial

All profiles must have a clear structure based on factual information: what the company or person or organisation intends to do, how they are funded, who works for them, in case of organisations, who they are working for in case of people. History, funding, who they are cooperating with is of importance, as well as examples of wrongdoing. All this information will be presentend in a factual way and well sourced.

Mixing in opinions or strong worded qualification of people or organisations is not accepted and will be removed to the discussion page (or elsewhere?)

Technical Questions

How do I Edit a page?

It's quite simple. Simply click "Edit this page" on the bottom or the side of the page, and type away.

How do I make links?

A link is just the name of the page surrounded by double square brackets. It's also possible to make the link display text that is different to the link:

[[page name]]

[[page name]]s -- suffix text will display as part of the link

[[page name|display name]] -- hide the page name and display something else (but use this sparingly, and never "click here"!)

[[page name (disambiguation)|]] -- the "pipe trick": the part in parentheses will not be displayed.

How do I reference?

For referencing please see A Guide to Referencing

How do I rename a page?

Registered users can move a page; this moves the page content and edit history to a new title, and creates a redirecting page at the old title. This method is better than just copying the content by hand, as it preserves the article's history. Use the "Move this page" link. If you want to move a page, please click the "What links here" and fix the links to the page in question.

What is "Recent Changes", and what do the abbreviations used there mean?

The notations on "Recent Changes" are "N" for new page (new pages often attract a bunch of copyedits); the "M" stands for "Minor edit" or "minor change", which you can set by checking the check box labelled "This is a minor edit" when you edit a page. If you check your "Preferences", you can suppress minor changes in the Recent Changes List. Checking this box is a courtesy to people who suppress seeing minor changes -- check the box if the change is a simple spelling or grammar change.

What is an orphan?

An orphan is an article that no other article links to. These can still be found by using the search function, but it is preferable to find another article where a link can be added. You can find a list of orphan articles here.

What is a minor edit? When should I use it?

When editing a page, one has the option of flagging the edit as a "minor edit". When to use this is somewhat a matter of personal preference. The rule of thumb is that an edit of a page that is spelling corrections, formatting, and simple rearranging of text should be flagged as a "minor edit". A major edit is basically something that makes the entry worth relooking at--either through substantial additions or reorganisation--or fixes a major error.

This feature is important, because users can choose to hide minor edits in their view of the Recent Changes page, to keep the volume of edits down to a manageable level.

Copyrights

I have, or can get, special permission to copy an image or article to Nuclear Spin. Is it OK to do that?

The text and images of Nuclear Spin are covered by the GNU Free Documentation License. Unless an item is covered by the same or a similar license, or is in the public domain, it cannot be used on Nuclear Spin. So you have to ask the copyright holder of the material to license it under GFDL.