Wikipedia:Peer review/Internet forum/archive2

Internet forum

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A script has been used to generate a semi-automated review of the article for issues relating to grammar and house style; it can be found on the automated peer review page for October 2008.

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review to see how it can be improved.

Thanks, ff m 16:18, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Finetooth comments: The instructions for submitting an article for peer review say, "Articles with major cleanup banners in place can not be submitted for peer review." Alas, this article has a big cleanup banner at the top, and it correctly points out that the article violates WP:V in many places because it lacks citations to reliable sources. Please make sure the information is sourced before re-submitting. Finetooth (talk) 05:05, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sourced, banner removed. ff m 17:39, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Further Finetooth comments: I don't think that what you are writing about is something that's easy to explain, and I can see that you have put a lot of time and effort into it. Alas, although the "citation needed" tags are now gone, verifiability is still a big problem in this article. Large blocks of material are still unsourced, and even when sourced, the sources do not necessarily support the claims. It seems to me that a fair amount of what is being stated as fact in the article stems from the personal experiences of the contributing editors rather than from reliable outside sources. It violates WP:V and WP:NOR simultaneously. For example, the section called "Discussion" is completely unsourced yet makes generalizations about Internet forums such as "Personal opinion is commonly more dominant than informative opinion or documented one; often expressing personal opinion over other forms is encouraged or implied. Because of their volatile and random behavior it is not uncommon for nonsense or unsocial behavior to sprout as people lose temper and try to fight each other." It's doubtful that this accurately describes all Internet forums. For example, does it fairly describe the Math Forum at Drexel? Does it fairly describe the Undergraduate General Chemistry Forum? My suggestion would be to re-examine all of the unsourced generalizations in the article and to remove any that are not directly supported by reliable sources. Finetooth (talk) 19:58, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was hoping that a few more editors (content editors rather then maintenance) would pop up at some point and there could be a discussion on the articles place in the encyclopedia and more importantly how the topic should be approached and what in the topic should be approached in the article (I am really a newbie to wikipedia so do not want to risk being too bold). The article should obviously presume the reader is unfamiliar – dare I say clueless – with popular forms of Internet communication, like for example what would be the case for a reader from a undeveloped country (but normal cases can not be excluded as I have had to explain the subject again and again annoyingly numerous times), but, to what extent should a encyclopedia go on such a partially unscientific and volatile topic is nothing I can figure out or decide on my own. Concerning headings such as "Discussion" I am tacking small lazy steps in moving/transclusion-ing parts of the article into their own article (pruning if necessary), it is nice to know I have some moral support (from you) on this idea. Currently, I have done nothing to that extent – still proof-reading checking/fixing some parts of the current version, and waiting – but I have placed a small to do in the talk page suggesting it if anyone is interested in helping.

Concerning your reference to the forum @ Drexel (I can not properly google the other example), it appears to be a hybrid of what I see as a discussion type electronic mailing list rather then a forum; this is a really good example of my point with the need to discuss the articles orientation, currently it makes any form of asynchronous messaging (blogs, mailing-lists and so on) a forum and also in some parts disputes they are. It's very complicated, the opening sentence should probably be reworked. Currently a Internet forum can be one and only one of the following: (there may be other possible truths)

(one of the) web equivalents of the old modem bulletin board system. The article on BBSs doesn't dispute this (i.e forums are related), it just says "there has been confusion with the term bulletin board system"; although the statement is unfounded and I've seen sources identify forums as descendants of BBSs which basically challenges the claim (i.e Internet forums are a re-invention rather then a evolution). Many popular software implementation seem to suggest they consider themselves Internet BBSs.
a subset of asynchronous messaging technology. This is (at least for me) the current status in the article. But the article doesn't treat it as such. This would also imply that being a "Internet forum" doesn't imply it's a "forum on the Internet"
a set of principles and concepts applied to form a type of online community. For example: would a support service where customers can only ask questions to a professional consultant, and are only aware of their questions, considered a Internet forum? Is a social network where individuals have conversations by posting on each others profiles a Internet forum? (to name just the obvious vagueness directed at the reader in the current article)

These are some of the hypothesis I contemplate when researching. The more I look into them the more come up and sources are rare and rarer (reliability is also a big issue). Do you have any suggestions that can help?

7ghost (talk) 03:52, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Breaking the problem down into subsets might help. I was thinking that it would be easier to verify the technical claims than the social claims. You can probably find sources for definitions of terms like "troll", but it might be impossible to find a source that would quantify troll activity. Poking about on the Internet, I found a couple of books that might be used as sources: Managing Online Forums by Patrick O'Keefe and Building Forums with Vbulletin by A. Kingsley Hughes. I don't know what's in them or whether you'd find them useful. Anyway, best of luck with the project. Finetooth (talk) 04:27, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]