Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources

From its first mention in RSP (i.e., before there was a formal process for categorizing items), YouTube has been marked as a "questionable source". Template:Questionable source displays as "Generally unreliable" (red). However, this seems inappropriate to me for any large platform. I think WP:RSPYT should be marked as "additional considerations apply". Specifically, the "additional consideration" that applies is who the publisher is.

See previous discussions:

• Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 1#Youtube?
• Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 6#Youtube should either be completely unreliable or completely reliable.
• Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 11#Imported YouTube videos

There has never been strong support for saying that a copy of a reliable source on YouTube, uploaded in the official channel of its publisher, is worse than a copy of that same source on a different platform. {{cite YouTube}} redirects to Template:Cite AV media, where YouTube is given as the example of how to use the |via= parameter. There are more than 150,000 articles citing YouTube (and that's counting only those using a citation template).

I therefore suggest that we make these changes, to set it to 'yellow' for additional considerations and to reorganize the description.

Does anyone object? WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:22, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

YouTube is a platform primarily consisting of user-generated content, and this list has historically classified this type of platform as generally unreliable. Every other listed social media website is classified similarly, e.g. Twitter (RSP entry). My understanding is that the classification is due to the proportion (vast majority) of the content on these platforms that would not be usable in any Wikipedia article due to their unreliability. — Newslinger talk 03:41, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Newslinger, how sure are you of your first assertion?

I found a website that loads random YouTube videos. Here's what I got (in order): two high-budget music videos, a professionally produced video of a woman wearing brightly colored clothes and being entirely too enthusiastic (estimated target audience: toddlers 12 to 24 months), two sports things from official sports channels (one was MotoGP; I don't remember the other), a clip from The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, a video of someone's kid playing baseball, free clips from a Twitch streamer whose YouTube account has 19 million subscribers, a movie trailer from the studio's official channel, and a news report from the Tamil language news channel, Polimer News.

That's 10 randomly selected videos, and only one (10%) is just some random person on the internet. The rest may not be particularly useful to Wikipedia editors, but it would be difficult to justify calling them WP:UGC. It would even be difficult to justify calling them unreliable. They're mostly primary sources that are technically reliable for content we wouldn't want to include ("Sal Singer sang this song on this TV show on this date") or that we'd frequently choose a more convenient/text-based source for ("Rae Rockstar made a music video of this song"). WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:15, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I doubt that those 10 videos are representative of the distribution of all YouTube videos, as we have no information on how the site selected them, and the video selection has a strong focus on high-budget content while excluding many common categories of YouTube videos such as reaction videos, influencer marketing videos, and YouTube Shorts. Research into YouTube video view counts has consistently found their distribution to be long-tail, just as with other social media sites. While the more polished content is suggested by YouTube's recommendation system more frequently, there are many more videos uploaded by individual creators who are not subject-matter experts, which makes their videos self-published and user-generated by Wikipedia standards. — Newslinger talk 05:42, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

All of these are still user-generated content; the users just happen to be companies. The point is that YouTube as a publisher gives very little assurance of reliability. Aaron Liu (talk) 13:26, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I support this change, many professional news organizations have been moving away from hosting their own videos and towards the major commercial platforms like Youtube. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 03:45, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I would rather leave this as unreliable. The quantity of possibly reliable content on YouTube, in comparison to what is unreliable, is tiny. Most editors adding YouTube links aren't adding news organisation or major commercial platforms. Additional scrutiny of YouTube links is both useful and necessary, given potential copy infringement. Discouraging it's use is also helpful in preventing link rot, as the Wayback Machine doesn't archive YouTube videos. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 10:37, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

@ActivelyDisinterested, do we have any way to investigate the assertion that Most editors adding YouTube links aren't adding news organisation or major commercial platforms?

I looked at a disabled Special:AbuseFilter. In addition to a couple of WP:ELOFFICIAL websites and a couple of false positives (e.g., rearranging existing links, someone typed in just youtube.com in plain text), I found a music video (by a news organization), a news report from Armenia (one of several from this editor), spam about a tech news website (in a section that attracts such additions), a clip from a music awards show (proving the singer won the award), and basically nothing that supports the claim that "most editors adding YouTube links" (back in 2019) were doing anything wrong at all. I didn't find any obviously unreliable sources being added. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:15, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Personal experience from dealing with thousands of articles, that's not a perfect source to base things on but neither is sample a few examples from a disabled filter. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:22, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Grabbing the first an article that uses YouTube and should be some well watched there is Shaquille O'Neal, which uses YouTube 5 times.

1. A video that is now private / permanently and unrecoverable dead, based on it's title I'm guessing it was copyvio.
2. Copyvio
3. Copyvio
4. Reliable if promo source that is backed up to ghost archive (which backs up the video unlike Wayback machine)
5. Another reliable source, but no backup exists so if the publiaher ever pulls the video it's will be useless.

That's the results for a high traffic BLP. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:43, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I found seven in that article:

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fI8bDq3x7Fg which is archived and from @TheGametimeHighlights (business with 762K subscribers, so probably not a serial copyvio source)
2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjqL7bFTsIw which is archived and from @TheNBAHighlighter, which displays the NBA's official logo, which is not a behavior associated with copyvios. (Sure, it's possible that not just their copyright but also their trademark lawyers have been asleep on the job for over a decade, but I personally wouldn't rate that as a very likely possibility.)
3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvzMou9qN1M (archive.org) also strikes me as a probable copyvio (low traffic account, no claim to affiliation, varied content, etc.)
4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6Mv-30qYoQ, I agree
5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYL11q4hb3Y, account closed, looks completely unreliable (I've removed this).
6. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXC5QKLHVUo, official sports channel
7. https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=yFQmosVrLO0, official sports channel

WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:22, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

You marked those as archived as they are on the wayback machine, but as I said the wayback machine does not archive YouTube videos. It just creates a broken page without saving the video. Unless someone had the forethought to manually archived it at ghost archive it's useless. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 10:56, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

The archive links WAID links do have the videos archived, though. IIRC the Wayback Machine started archiving YouTube videos in the 2010s. Aaron Liu (talk) 13:21, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I didn't attempt to play the videos. But it's archived "enough" to determine whether the videos are WP:NOTGOODSOURCES, i.e.:

• It has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy.
• It is published by a reputable publishing house, rather than by the author(s).
• It is "appropriate for the material in question".
• It is a third-party or independent source, with no significant financial or other conflict of interest.
• It has a professional structure in place for deciding whether to publish something, such as editorial oversight or peer review processes.

Note the absence of any criteria that sounds like "It is demonstrably non-self-published, but I don't like their choice of web service for distributing the source to the public. All true editors agree that reliable sources run their own websites instead of using popular commercial alternatives that are also available to the unwashed masses". WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:35, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Really? "I like it" is also a made up quote, and not like an argument that anyone has used. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:03, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

How else would you describe the POV that any specific video should be assumed to be a copyvio solely because it's possible to watch it on YouTube? WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:58, 14 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

What?! I have no idea where you've got that from. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:35, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

With over 20 billion videos, I'd estimate that >99.9% are user-generated and not reliable. There are maybe upto 20 million videos (~0.1%) from reliable news orgs that are reliable. This clearly puts it in the category of generally unreliable. This isn't a case of YT is reliable so long as A, B and C is considered, as it does not concern the overwhelming majority of user-generated content. The fact that approximately half of the most popular YT news channels comes from established news orgs misses the entire point here regarding overall content. Nor is it the case that there lacks consensus (NC) regarding user-generated content as being generally unreliable. CNC (talk) 11:08, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

"NC" isn't just "lacks consensus". It's also the code for "Additional considerations apply". It's this latter that I think is relevant: You have to evaluate the individual video, rather than YouTube as a whole. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:59, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

insert shameless plug of my idea to separate NoCon from AdCon here, which would probably need an RfC at this point Aaron Liu (talk) 17:10, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

1. Most UGC sources with identifiable authorship are marked as generally unreliable and have the same expert-published exception.
2. There is a RfC behind marking YouTube as GUnRel. If you want to change this status, you probably need to ask RSN instead.

Aaron Liu (talk) 13:25, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Do you have a link? The 2020 RfC is about implementing an edit filter not reliability per say, or at least that's the closing statement. According to @Hemiauchenia from that RfC, YT was added to RevertReferencesList after the Facebook RfC, which again I'm not seeing the direct reference of either. Hoping @ProcrastinatingReader can shed some light on this as the closer. Genuinely didn't get anywhere near finding any form of consensus on YT, or edit filter use to be honest. I assume it's in one of the 35 discussions that has occurred over the years, or came via technical request post FB RfC? CNC (talk) 14:50, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes, that RFC link is a little bit misleading, but I don't see any way in RSP's tools to say "This was an RFC, and it's relevant, but it wasn't really about what to say here at RSP". WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:46, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Ah, that's very misleading. The intention of the RfC labeling is clearly for highlighting the an uninterrupted request for comment on the source's reliability that took place on the reliable sources noticeboard as mentioned in the inclusion criteria. I'll change the styling of that into just another regular discussion. Aaron Liu (talk) 17:09, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks, have updated the discussion count to 36. CNC (talk) 17:15, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

• Youtube is a medium or a platform and not a source. We don't generally comment on radio or television as a source and much of the arguments here would apply equally. GMG^talk 14:52, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

This argument I still don't get (after skimming through the previous RfC). The basic definition of a source is "[a] thing from which something originates or can be obtained" (Google); no-ones describing it as publisher here, it's just the origin as the medium/platform as you describe. It's been used as a source 244,000+ times, so it's not immune from criticism, in fact the opposite is true. It's merely included in RSP because it has been discussed repeatedly at RSN, and while TV and Radio stations are in fact discussed often enough at RSN, it's usually not enough to warrant an RSP entry. Being included at RSP otherwise has nothing to do with the validity or the source, only the frequency of discussion, thus the "it's not a source" arguments sounds like semantics to me. The sniff test of a source is whether you can wrap a <ref> tag around it in order to use as a citation. Unless there is some alternative WP meaning of source here, it's a pretty low bar, any url will do. CNC (talk) 15:14, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

If NBC News puts a video on their YT channel, then NBC news is the source. It is immaterial whether that content appeared via television on their nightly broadcast or via YT. GMG^talk 15:19, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

@CommunityNotesContributor, from WP:SOURCE:

"A cited source on Wikipedia is often a specific portion of text (such as a short article or a page in a book). But when editors discuss sources (for example, to debate their appropriateness or reliability) they are usually talking about one or more related characteristics:

• The work itself (the article, book) and works like it ("An obituary can be a useful biographical source", "A recent source is better than an old one")
• The creator of the work (the writer, journalist: "What do we know about that source's reputation?") and people like them ("A medical researcher is a better source than a journalist for medical claims").
• The publication (for example, the newspaper, journal, magazine: "That source covers the arts.") and publications like them ("A newspaper is not a reliable source for medical claims").
• The publisher of the work (for example, Cambridge University Press: "That source publishes reference works.") and publishers like them ("An academic publisher is a good source of reference works")."

Note the absence of anything about "the method used to distribute the work" or "the platform used for hosting the work" or anything like that.

GMG gives an example from NBC News. I expect that all experienced editors agree that last night's NBC Nightly News broadcast, which is at both of the following two links (and probably others, for that matter):

• https://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news-netcast/video/nightly-news-full-broadcast-july-24th-243807813932
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fZBWHnyf7c

is a reliable news source no matter which of the links, leading to identical content, you use.

But the way WP:RSPYT is color-coded, I can easily imagine someone glancing at it and saying "Oh, no. YouTube is Generally Unreliable. It's colored red to warn you away. You shouldn't use anything from the https://www.youtube.com/@NBCNews official channel because YouTube is bad." WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:56, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I get these examples are "usually" (note: not explicitly) examples of reliable sources, I'm not arguing against these characteristics and I've already clarified I don't believe YT is generally reliable. It's interesting to see what editors are referencing to support their arguments over what a source is, so I appreciate the referencing. That said, examples aren't definitions nor is this a universally accepted position (per the RfC). Hence I'll stick to WP:UGC which is crystal clear here: Websites whose content is largely user-generated are generally unacceptable as sources (emphasis included). This if further clarified in the following paragraph "Examples of unacceptable user-generated sources [...]" (emphasis included). This completely eliminates any ambiguity that YT, as UGC, is in fact categorized as a source per wording of guidelines. This is why it has been discussed 35 times at a noticeboard specifically to discuss source reliability, and thus categorized at RSP. Granted there's obviously a lack of consensus over what is a source, despite this UGC inclusion, so that's a big problem that needs resolving. CNC (talk) 17:05, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I don't see anyone arguing that Youtube is generally reliable... The request is for additional considerations apply which seems appropriate in this context. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:04, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

@CommunityNotesContributor: I suggest looking at the wikipedia definition of a source rather than asking google, there is often a wide gulf between the most common understanding of a term and what it means in our specific context. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:02, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

It might be better to start that platforms like YouTube, Vimeo, TikTok, etc. are not publishers, but simply the medium which users can upload and share videos, so that in terms of evaluating sources, we consider who the uploader is, not the platform. These platforms are neither reliable or unreliable. Masem (t) 19:34, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I agree with this change and would generally agree with changing this for all social media sites. IMO saying that Youtube is unreliable because most Youtube videos are unreliable is like saying the internet is unreliable because most websites are unreliable.

I also think the current status of YouTube tends to make it harder to use new-media-primary WP:NEWSORGs. It was surprisingly annoying to get People Make Games declared reliable, for instance, and linking to their channel with certain source marking userscripts (e.g. this one that I use) still marks links to PMG's YouTube channel as unreliable even though they're not. Loki (talk) 19:55, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I agree with the view that YouTube is a platform, not a source, and treating it as a source is inappropriate. I think we should generally try to avoid confusing the two. Of course, for sites that are exclusively generated by anonymous users, like Wikipedia itself, it’s useful to warn editors away. But when a site has significant content that is actually reliable, as YouTube does, it is a disservice to imply that the entire platform is unreliable. John M Baker (talk) 00:10, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Not long ago I was reading an article in the Washington Post which included a video. That video was hosted on Youtube, but the mere fact that it formed part of the WP article makes it a reliable source in principle. It should be possible to write the rules to allow such cases without allowing too much. Zero^talk 02:42, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

• There are effectively two different proposals here, one that YouTube should not be considered a source at all, and one that its classification as a source should be changed. However, this page is supposed to reflect external consensus, and in either case there isn't an external consensus to support the change. Using an "additional considerations" classification would involve overruling not only RSN but also WP:UGC, which says that such sources are "generally unacceptable". I suppose classifying them as non-sources could work, thus creating a fourth category for UGC sources, but that would still implicitly change the meaning of the term "UGC" in a way that would be idiosyncratic to this page. In addition, it wouldn't reflect any practical difference, as UGC sources would still be treated in the same way as other generally unreliable sources - usually unacceptable with some exceptions.

The category of "generally unreliable" inherently allows for exceptions. If an exception applies, the source is perfectly acceptable to use, and this is not a challenge to the classification itself. The fact that UGC sources inherit the reliability of their publishers is a well-established exception, and in this case the summary explicitly points it out. Theoretically, yes, this is a type of additional consideration, but in that case so is ABOUTSELF; they both indicate cases where an otherwise unreliable source can be used, so the argument can be expanded indefinitely until it applies to every source.

The idea that citing YouTube videos from a reliable source is worse than a copy of that same source on a different platform is based on reasons such as copyvio, linkrot, or accessibility. However, RSP is a reliability classification; there is no reason related to reliability to discourage this practice, and the RSP summary does not suggest that there is. Certainly the classification can be misused if applied without context, but this does not change the general rule that YouTube is usually unreliable (or that an "additional considerations" classification would also be misused, and likely at a much higher rate, given e.g. the Shaquille O'Neal example above). However, if the RSP classification and/or the UPSD script are too simplistic for an individual editor, perhaps WP:CiteUnseen would be a useful alternative. Sunrise (talk) 08:42, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for summarizing the discussion so far, there are indeed multiple issues documented here:

1. Lack of consensus on whether YT and other platforms are sources or not (this goes well beyond YT classification).

2. Lack of discussion in a centralized noticeboard, such as RSN or UGC, notifying the other in the process (a basic requirement).

3. Lack of RfC reference regarding the current consensus of YT (consensus appears deferred from UGC, could be wrong).

4. Request to re-categorize YT from GUNREL to MREL at RSP, rather than at RSN where it belongs (not an uncontroversial request).

It should be obvious to most by now that this needs a well crafted RfC in an appropriate ___location to resolve the abundance of issues, as well as lack of consensus, as this serves as nothing more than RFCBEFORE at present. CNC (talk) 09:05, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

This makes sense to me. YouTube - and social media sites in general - blur the line between medium and publisher. In those cases where there is some sort of verifiable official publisher (eg. BBC or Sky publishing to their own channel) the material should inherit the reliability of that publisher, and everything else is SPS (or copyright violations). Void if removed (talk) 10:55, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Just to note that this situation doesn't just apply to YouTube, all UGC sources are considered unreliable. Whether that twitter, Facebook, wordpress, or some vlog site. That some of the content on such sites might be useable as an exception, because the publisher is reliable or the author is an EXPERTSPS, doesn't change any of the others. So I don't see why we should allow an exception from the rule for YouTube. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:05, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

The reason for an "exception" is that YouTube isn't a source in the first place. YouTube is more analogous to "a bookstore" than to "a book". When we wrote WP:UGC, we were primarily thinking about "the Internet Movie Database (IMDB), Cracked.com, CBDB.com, collaboratively created websites such as wikis, and so forth, with the exception of material on such sites that is labeled as originating from credentialed members of the sites' editorial staff, rather than users.

The list of named websites has gotten much longer since then, but it tends to have the same feel: "User-generated content" is part of the self-published sources, and UGC in particular is primarily about self-published collaborative authorship.

Saying "Oh, YouTube is an unreliable source because it's a video host" is also logically inconsistent. Video-hosting platforms, like all websites, are likely to contain self-published content. But Vimeo is a video-hosting platform, and we never say "Vimeo is unreliable per UGC because it's a video-hosting platform". Microsoft Stream is a video-hosting platform marketed to businesses, and we never say "MS Stream is unreliable per UGC because it's a video-hosting platform". Amazon Web Services is a video-hosting platform, and we never say "AWS is unreliable per UGC because it's a video-hosting platform". The fact is that the hosting platform doesn't actually determine whether the source is reliable. What matters is the author and the publisher, not the ___location of the files. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:30, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

The comparison to AWS and YouTube isn't valid, YouTube is not a background service. The much better comparison is WordPress or BlogSpot, sources that let you publish content that they then host. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:07, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I would really like us to try to not classify YouTube or the like as a publisher. If we were filling a cite template, they would be listed in the "via=" part of the template, rather than "publisher=", outside of videos specifically created by YouTube (for example, the old YT Rewinds). A YouTube video, for example, should be considered self-published via YouTube because outside of moderation activities, YouTube does nothing to review the video for content, where as what we call a publisher traditionally (like a book publisher) is going to at least review the book to make sure that's something they want to publish. Which is why YouTube et al should be neither reliable nor unreliable. Masem (t) 17:39, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes they host but do not publish the content, channels on YouTube are similar to blogs on Blogger. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:51, 26 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

And the way to determine whether a blog post on Blogger is reliable is to figure out who actually wrote and published it, and not to assume that (e.g.,) a small town newspaper deciding to use Blogger's website instead of setting up their own is 'generally unreliable' because everything on Blogger is 'generally unreliable'", right? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:48, 27 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Maybe, but consensus is that YouTube and Blogger and Medium and Substack and et cetera (quick challenge: find the RAS syndrome in this enumeration!) are all GUnRel. At this point your best path forward would probably be to start an RfC at RSN on what all such "proxying mediums" (please don't actually call them "proxying mediums" in the actual RfC I beg you) as a category should be classified as. Aaron Liu (talk) 02:03, 27 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think that a "platforms" category is probably the right approach. The explanation would be something along the lines of "Check the actual publisher, not just the hosting service".

But skimming back through this conversation, it feels like a subject that some editors will misunderstand. I mean, we all know, once our brains are engaged, that there's a difference between a video on YouTube from a notable news outlet and a video on YouTube from an ordinary person. But getting this adopted requires getting the brain engaged, plus overcoming the fear that if it's not a big scary red entry, then somebody will abuse it (the old 'written rules must overstate, so we can defend the wiki against bad actors' model of policy writing). WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:16, 14 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Coming back to this because I just saw a RSN discussion where TLDR News was dismissed out of hand due to this. Now, by all accounts TLDR News is a fairly ordinary WP:NEWSORG except for publishing almost exclusively on YouTube. They have ordinary journalistic processes and a published editorial policy, albeit in video+Q&A format. This would ordinarily make them pretty standard reliability except that because YouTube is unreliable it creates this strange bias where they're now unreliable as well. Loki (talk) 04:31, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

again why I think we should be clear "Youtube is neither reliable nor unreliable as they are only a platform for individuals or groups to publish videos with no editorial oversight, so to determine reliability, one must look to the individual or group that published the video." Masem (t) 05:01, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

As a reminder, RSN is this way to discuss such matters. CNC (talk) 09:35, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

RSN is the usual place for discussing a specific source. I think this page is a better choice for discussing whether the categories we put on this page are sensible.

@Masem, in addition to WP:RSPYT, what else in this page is more 'platform' than 'source'? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:14, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

This logic by default assumes YT is not a source and there is no consensus for this ideology, not in this discussion, nor in the previous 36 documented AFAIK (it's probably close but no cigar last I checked and not a lot has changed since then). If consensus had been gained here or another central ___location (with relevant talk pages notified) that it's not a source then sure, it'd make sense to the update list, and a discussion would barely be relevant by that point. Otherwise to overturn the de facto status quo that it is a source, then UGC would also need notifying of the discussion, in order to avoid contradicting current guidelines (as I've already said). So given I've already said this, and nobody has bothered (AFAIK) to notify RSN or UGC, I'll leave it alone now, as this opinion must be considered irrelevant, misunderstood, and/or being ignored. I'm just trying to avoid the inevitable blow up from RSN/UGC if major changes are made to sources without appropriate and necessary consensus . I can only sound the alarm as a preventative measure and I've done that now. Regards, CNC (talk) 16:45, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

@CommunityNotesContributor, I'm not sure we're working from the same set of facts. For example:

• WP:UGC doesn't actually mention YouTube by name.
• Wikipedia:External links/Perennial websites#YouTube says that YouTube videos from official channels are acceptable ("If the source would normally be considered reliable (e.g., a segment from a well-known television news show, or an official video channel from a major publisher), then a copy of the source on YouTube is still considered reliable").

Those "36 documented" discussions (several of which are about whether getting X subscribers or Y views is evidence of Wikipedia:Notability) include statements like:

• "YouTube is not the source. It's the medium."
• "I think we can cut this Gordian knot by distinguishing between Youtube as merely the "carrier" and the uploader as the actual publisher. A library is not the publisher of the books on its shelves. A supermarket is not the manufacturer of the detergent they sell. A cable television service is not responsible for the content of the channels it delivers to your home. So in the question posed by the OP, the publisher is CNN or Reuters, Youtube is merely the "library" where you can find it." (@Dodger67)
• ""YouTube videos" are not inherently reliable or unreliable as sources, any more than "books" or "TV programmes"." (@Hijiri88)
• "YouTube (RSP entry) videos are self-published sources, except...for content produced by a reliable source (who is using YouTube for video hosting and distribution)." (@Newslinger)
• "Can we make an FAQ that people are requested to read before posting here, and have the first one be that "YouTube" is not a publisher but rather a medium, and therefore a "YouTube video" is no more or less reliable than any other source, depending on who the actual publisher (channel owner) and the content being attributed to it?"
• "We can't judge reliability of a YouTube clip simply by being on YouTube... We can use YouTube videos where the channel is clearly identified as the entity it presents itself has (verified), that they are an appropriate expert for the material in the video, that they own the copyright on the video and materials within it, and otherwise thus relevant....We're not judging YouTube itself, since they don't actually publish the works." (@Masem)
• "Nobody has a problem with some random person's YouTube channel, Twitter account, or Facebook page not being an allowable source. And nobody has a problem with allowing anything Anthony Fauci says/writes as an acceptable source, whether he publishes it on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, or in The New York Times -- he is a recognized expert on infectious diseases...who just happens to be using YouTube."
• "YouTube is a self-publishing platform, and its content is as reliable as the publisher - Bloomberg videos are as reliable as Bloomberg, expert videos are as reliable as an expert WP:SPS, crank videos are as reliable as a crank WP:SPS. I don't see a reason for a carveout" (@David Gerard)
• "YouTube is a video hosting platform, and does not make the publisher any more or less reliable than if it had uploaded the video on its own website."
• "Of course we're not going to have a warn filter for YouTube or deprecate it. We link it all the time. It's not a source, it's a platform, and it's a platform used by reputable publishers like The New York Times and the Washington Post to post videos that we link to as sources...YouTube shouldn't even be listed at RSP. It's like listing "television" or "paper" at RSP. It's a medium not a publisher or author." (@Levivich)
• "It’s not a source at all, it’s a platform for thousands of sources with a range from undeniably reliable to mind boggling bad."
• "YouTube is a platform not a source." (@Markworthen)
• "YouTube is a platform, not a source, it is home to many official news stations and professionals whose channels are perfectly good sources" (@Devonian Wombat)
• "as stated by many editors above Youtube is a publishing platform like a book, radio, television, etc." (@Guest2625)
• "YouTube is a platform. It's not a source" (@Softlavender)
• "As people have said, YouTube is a hosting site, not a source in itself. The individual videos hosted on YouTube are the sources. Some are reliable, some are not." (@Blueboar)
• "youtube itself should not be on RSP" (@Beetstra)
• "There's nothing about YouTube per say that warrants concern. Reliable sources can use it as a place to publish videos from their verified accounts, and non-reliable sources can use it as a place to self publish. That right there just about sums up the internet in general."
• "YouTube is a platform"
• "YouTube is platform that hosts diverse content, including unreliable non-expert self-published content (most hosted video on YouTube), reliable self-published material from expert sources, and content from traditional publishers, so the editor needs to assess whether the specific YouTube video that they're linking to is a RS for the specific WP claim that the video is being used to support" (@FactOrOpinion)
• "Warning against using a source published on YouTube is akin to warning against citing a source published on the Internet. No one is actually citing YouTube itself." (@Coffeeandcrumbs)
• "Youtube is simply a media platform like any other"
• "YouTube is a platform used by both highly reliable sources and totally unreliable ones."
• "the reliability depends on the person/company publishing the video"
• "YouTube is a platform, not a source in itself" (@Sjakkalle)
• "As others have said, YouTube is a platform, not a source. What matters is who is posting the video, not that they used YouTube to do such." (@Oknazevad)
• "YouTube is not a source, it doesn't produce the content available on it, which comes from all kinds of producers, some reliable, some not. If in principle you can cite a film as a source (which you can), then it is irrelevant whether it is available on YouTube, broadcast on TV, available on DVD or wherever. The validity of a video/film source is surely down to the reliability of the producer."
• "YouTube is not a source. It hosts sources. The reliability of any video is attached only to the person or organization that posted it."
• just a format..,It's like a decision on if a video uploaded to YouTube can be reliable based solely on YouTube and not the content, or if something on VHS is reliable." (@Canterbury Tail)
• "YouTube is not unreliable in itself. It totally depends who is posting." (@Czar)

As the saying goes, you're entitled to your own opinion, but not to your own facts. This is a lot of editors saying that YouTube is a platform and not a WP:SOURCE for anyone to be saying something like YT is not a source and there is no consensus for this ideology, not in this discussion, nor in the previous 36 documented. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:40, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

All I think we should be doing on RSP here is to explain that YouTube (along with a host of other user-content-sharing platforms like Twitter/X, Vimeo, Instagram, etc, where there is no/minimal editorial control of material before its posted) should not be judged as the source when it comes to evaluating whether the material is reliable, and this question has come up sooooo many times that it should be an entry on RSP even if we are actually saying "YouTube is not a source". It makes sense to answer that question on RSP and not hide it elsewhere. Masem (t) 20:11, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

It's good to discuss categories, but to make this category yellow instead of red you'd need an RSN discussion. Aaron Liu (talk) 04:24, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

If we go the route of introducing a separate category, I think we need an RFC, but it doesn't necessarily need to be at RSN itself. (Though one might reflect on why we believe we need an RSN discussion to change the color, when there was never an RSN discussion to choose the original color. WP:NOTBURO?) WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:39, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Indeed, with WP:STATUSQUO being the main reason here rather than BURO applying (for YT at least). RSN or here is fine for an RfC, with the other being notified, along with RS. FYI this is why I didn't respond to your previous lengthy reply as I wasn't arguing YT is a source in my previous comment, only trying to highlight the current consensus (whether you, I, or others agree with it or not). Otherwise the more I hear of arguments for YT (along with others like FB, Instagram and X) being categorised as platforms the more I agree in principle (as a compromise to avoid being categorised as MREL predominantly), but I'm unable to support this change in this discussion based on the purpose or RSP: to summarise established consensus (or lack of). It's not intended for establishing a change in consensus, only the interpretation of it. We also have the RfC's of Facebook and TikTok/Instagram to overturn as well. For an RfC, I'd also strongly recommend avoiding the selective pinging of editors who have described YT as a platform to support your argument, per WP:CANVASSING. Either ping all relevant contributors of such discussions, or don't bother, otherwise it's got a good chance of derailing it's legitimacy. CNC (talk) 18:34, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

The entries for Twitter, LinkedIn, Blogger, LiveJournal, Flickr, Medium, WordPress, Stack exchange, etc would also need to be looked at. Also maybe HuffPost and Forbes contributors, as the reason they are marked as unreliable is that they are only hosted rather than being under editorial control of Huff/Forbes. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 19:29, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

+1. We need an extensive list of UGC documented at RSP that such a broad change would cover, thus probably worth having a sub-section for RfC crafting/workshop at this point. Using "etc" in an RfC is not going to cut the mustard for a sweeping change (as I have also been doing for reference). Also agree this would cover contributors, but others might disagree with that. CNC (talk) 19:43, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

At least with Forbes contributors, that is not the same as YouTube; contributor articles there do require some type of approval before they are published, but there's no strong editorial control for that; you also have to be sign up and be approved to become a contributor rather than with YouTube where you just need an account. I'd assume the same is true for HuffPost.

But a key thing here is that this WP:RSP, and the question about YouTube is absolutely a perennial question, compared with things like Twitter and those others which are nowhere close to being sources that are asked about frequently. It would be best to address the YouTube here now, and perhaps then develop a separate guideline about such sites. Masem (t) 20:08, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

If we are going to create a new category then it is appropriate to consider all the similar sources that may become part of that category at the same time. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 09:14, 17 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

As CNC mentions I feel like RSN's appropriate and necessary notification since its participants would probably be interested. Aaron Liu (talk) 16:26, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I expect this to be a very widely advertised RFC, no matter what page it's on. It might be best to put it on a separate page, e.g., WP:Requests for comment/RSP platform category.

The more urgent question is how to make this idea legible to someone who just glances at the RFC question. We can hardly write "It's stupid to say 'on YouTube, therefore it's reliable/unreliable' – you've got to look at the uploader/publisher", but that's basically what we're trying to communicate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:40, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I wouldn't use TLDR not because they publish on YouTube but because they are relatively new and not 'well-established' per NEWSORG. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 11:38, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

TLDR News says that it was started in 2017. What's your standard for "relatively new"? For one point of comparison, they've been publishing news for twice as long as you've been editing Wikipedia. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:13, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

In 2017 there was a YouTube channel and one person, something far different from what it is now. If it had started in 2017 with as it is now that would be different, but using a date without any context isn't a good comparison. For instance I edited for some time before making an account, so just using the date my account was created can't tell you how long I've edited. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:09, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

It's still been around for eight years. When does a news outlet stop being "relatively new"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:24, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

That will depend on the organisation itself, but it won't be some arbitrary start date unless it started as a fully established organisation. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:35, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

• Coming from the world of meteorology and the weather (WikiProject Weather), I will say that YouTube videos are cited on a lot of articles, including top-importance articles. Why you may ask? Because every branch of the National Weather Service has their own YouTube channel, where they post analysis, updates, and even do livestreams such as those from the National Hurricane Center, who even livestreamed 2 hours before this message, providing updates for Hurricane Erin, a currently active hurricane. Coming from that realm of Wikipedia, I support the changing YouTube's classification from "generally unreliable" to "additional considerations", given WikiProject Weather already classified a ton of YouTube videos as reliable sources coming from subject matter experts. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 17:44, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  We're currently looking at two options.

  • Change "generally unreliable" to "additional considerations", or
  • Create a new category (might be called "Platform") that says to stop asking whether "YouTube.com" is reliable, and instead focus on the actual publisher (e.g., the official channel for a National Weather Service branch, which would be good, vs a personal channel for an ordinary individual, which would be unreliable).

  Do you (all) have a preference between these two? WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:47, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Well, for my 2¢, creating a "platform" category is the logical choice, as it actually and accurately describes what YouTube is. Who posts the video is important. Not that they used YouTube to do such. Acting like every video on YouTube is inherently unreliable is, to be blunt, stupid. oknazevad (talk) 19:27, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  "No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply" is inappropriate for platforms like YouTube that mostly consist of self-published content, but I don't have any objections to adding a "Platform" section to the page where entries like Medium, WordPress, and YouTube can be moved to. — Newslinger talk 19:28, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  I agree with creating a "platform" category and moving YouTube to that. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 19:51, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  In this case, how are we going to treat professional YouTubers without a presence off the platform, two coming to mind being Kurzgesagt and CGP Grey. Citing their sources would probably just be better anyways, but it is worth considering if we are treating every YouTube channel as semi-independent. ✶Quxyz✶ (talk) 17:22, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Like we would treat any person with a website: self-published and presumably unreliable but not undefeatably so. We already established Anthony Fantano is reliable for music reviews a while ago. Loki (talk) 17:31, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

YouTube is not a source. Its a publisher of other sources. I think its generally fine and preferable to other video platforms (eg facebook, tiktok, instagram), but the actual source of the video should be reliable (eg. a CNN video vs a Daily Mail video). Metallurgist (talk) 18:13, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

• Generally agree with others saying that YouTube is not itself a source, it is a medium, but it is one which hosts an absolute trash dump of unreliable and unusable information. What that means to me is that any YouTube video used as a source should be presumed unreliable, unless it can be demonstrated that the specific source meets our criteria for reliability. The onus should be on editors wanting to add information to demonstrate that their source is reliable; it should not be on editors reviewing additions to demonstrate that it is not, and I see the proposed change as moving the goalposts in the wrong direction. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:39, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Isn't that true for anything on the internet? www.RandomWebsite.com is, and IMO should be, presumbed unreliable (and also self-published) unless and until it can be demonstrated that the specific website is reliable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:41, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  I think I made the first part of my point poorly. The reliability of a Youtube video can't be evaluated on the basis of it being a Youtube video, it needs to be evaluated based on the reliability of the actual publisher of the video, which is not Youtube. It's roughly the same as evaluating the reliability of a newspaper article on the basis of the press it was printed on. I think it's correct that Youtube probably doesn't belong in a citation at all except in a |via= parameter, but I'm not sure that either the original or proposed RSP entries really handles the situation. But I think it's more appropriate to describe it as "questionable", because if it's described as "no consensus" then it will spawn arguments about there being no consensus against using Youtube as a source. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:14, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  We might need two entries:

  • YouTube as a platform (it's really the TV news show, not YouTube), in which case there's a consensus that it's a platform instead of a source, and
  • YouTube as a primary source of for information generated directly by YouTube (e.g., how many views or subscribers), in which case there's a consensus that it's a questionable source at best.

  WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:18, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  I think you're right, but I would argue for a blanket rule that Youtube itself is not an acceptable source for Youtube viewership, due to issues of COI and WEIGHT. Viewership should be based on independent sourcing, both for verifiability and to establish relevance. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:22, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  I assumed a change to platform entries wouldn't be yellow for MREL, but instead a neutral colour indicating 'indeterminable' (or similar) based on being a platform and not a source. White would be that that colour imo with a new entry in the legend to clarify this, assuming there is consensus for such a change in a future RfC. This would benefit by maintaining/updating the current platform entries, instead of lumping them all together into one, given there are subtle nuances across these differing platforms which would be worth retaining (YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Medium, etc). CNC (talk) 19:14, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Agreed with this change. We should not say that YouTube is marginally reliable/additional considerations apply, because we shouldn't say it's of any reliability level. Loki (talk) 19:30, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

• I've made this point before, and should probably make this point in many places throughout this discussion. Yes, there is reliable material hosted on YouTube, but it is a minority. The percentage of material that is useable as a reliable source is staggeringly low, and quite some of it should not be directly linked but linked through the publisher.

• A news company, 'Generic News Network', is interviewing that guy that everyone knows, 'John Doe'. They have a page on their website about the interview with some metadata, and embedded the video, that they uploaded on YouTube. We should not be linking to the YouTube video (even if that is where you orginally foundit), we should link to the page on the website of GNN. Similarly for the chemistry department of Generic Technical University, maintaining a list of videos where they explain explosions of different materials. That is the case for the vast majority of reliable material. In 2020, BBC had 11944 videos on YouTube out of (give or take) 10 billion (7 billion in 2017). Not in scope here, link to the page that embeds the video, the publisher. No entry for YouTube needed, publisher could go on RSP for being generally reliable.
• Similar, but for very unreliable 'VerySpecific News Network'. Thousands of videos. Not to be linked, not to the embedded page, not to YouTube. (Note, I don't expect this volume to be astoundingly different from the volume from reputable sources, and not all of it will be linked on either anyway). Again, publisher goes on RSP as unreliable.
• Then there is a small fraction of material that is directly uploaded by a source that we define as reliable. Not embedded on another website. Given that BBC (in 2020) had 11944 videos out of the (give or take) 10 billion that were there I would expect that most of these would have less than 50. Are all going to be linked? No, but some yes. Worth an entry. No. (and if so, for the publisher being reliable)
• Then there are artists uploading their music videos (with copyvio copies sometimes appearing, or those with added lyrics. With few exceptions not used as a source (but as an external link). Not worth the entry.
• Then there is the rest. Influencers, grandma birthday videos, dogs and cats doing funny stuff, UFO sightings, AI generated videos of fiery meteor impacts on the dark side of the moon, someone doing an interpretation of 'We've only just begun', unboxing of boxer shorts, drone overview of my neighbours greener garden. Billions upon billions of video's. Unreliable home made stuff with at best a primary source that it can be seen in grandma's birthday video that 'Generic city' has a 'McGeneric' restaurant because that is where grandma lives and that is where grandma celebrated her birthday.

Should YouTube be on this list? No, with a few exceptions, youtube itself does not publish.   Agree with the change (maybe use 'However, by far most videos ...'. Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 11:34, 17 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

• I do think RSP needs to keep its entry on YouTube (as this has become a perennial question)… and I agree that the entry should explain that YouTube is a platform, not a source (linking to a more detailed essay that explains the distinction).

I would also agree that we need a new separate RSP category (with a different color… perhaps teal?) for platforms. Blueboar (talk) 19:19, 17 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'm going to start a new section to draft a possible RFC question. Interested editors are invited to join me there. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:10, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Straight Arrow News is a New Media source that's goal is to be as Unbiased as possible. I wonder what you guys think. Fad8229 (talk) 15:17, 2 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

This is the list of sources that are frequently discussed. If the reliability of the source has not been frequently disputed, there is no need to add another clarification to this page, which is already long enough to border on Wikipedia's article size limits. Aaron Liu (talk) 16:29, 2 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think the size-problem was dealt with, stuff is now transcluded from smaller lists. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:16, 6 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I did that; it increased the size of the page (RSP) where the subpages are transcluded onto exactly because the entire list is transcluded. The limit is against the size of text that's transcluded in total and without much deduplication. Aaron Liu (talk) 18:38, 6 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

After a user told me about the shortcuts I created I feel there should be a few points to consider for both adding and removing shortcuts. Since there are many, I think that a criteria for creating shortcuts should make it easier to know if they are necessary or not, and what they must meet so that they can be added. Since I opened this discussion, I propose that some of the following conditions be met:

• To be discussed frequently (the number of discussions should have consensus, like it happens with the inclusion criteria for sources).
• To be state-owned or state-sponsored, considering how influential those sources can be.
• That the source has more than one entry depending on the topic, like it happens with Fox News or Anti-Defamation League.
• To be blacklisted.
• That the community consider that the source is reliable after some of its discussions were about controversial topics.

Other thing is that I think that there should be one or two shortcuts per entry and that all shortcuts must be capitalised.

Once there is consensus on this, we can begin to remove shortcuts that the community deems unnecessary and to ask a mass deletion on Redirects for discussion. 2x2leax (talk) 21:41, 12 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

• Support: Maybe add "frequently used" (if we can even measure that) to the list

🇺🇸Thegoofhere🇺🇸 (talk) 22:14, 12 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think it's far better to have one shortcut inclusion criteria: Whether anyone uses the shortcut. Aaron Liu (talk) 23:45, 12 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Agree with Aaron Liu. We should decide based on their use. I'd add a maximum of 1 shortcut per source (or two for very used shortcuts); the rest will still work, they just won't be displayed. There are more details at the WP:SC guideline. FaviFake (talk) 08:34, 14 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

If you want a rule of thumb, I'd suggest something like this:

• If you (you personally and individually – not other editors in general) find that you need to link to the same line in RSP in three separate/unrelated discussions, then it's probably time to think about creating a shortcut.

BTW, the usual rule of thumb is that while a whole page might list a couple of shortcuts (e.g., WP:OR and WP:NOR), individual bits of a page should normally display only one shortcut. So even if you have two shortcuts pointing at the same bit (e.g., WP:RSPYOUTUBE and WP:RSPYT), only one should normally be displayed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:20, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

That feels weird. What about this?

• If you find that you need to link to an RSP in a few different discussions, you can create a shortcut.

I sthat rule of thumb mentioned anywhere else? Ive never seen it consistently applied or spelled out. FaviFake (talk) 21:12, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think your wording is a more concise way of saying the same thing.

I don't think that there is an officially documented "rule" anywhere, though Template:Shortcut/doc probably says something similar. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:04, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I still like "just link it anywhere else once" better as it is tons simpler, but I would also support that, since it seems to serve the same purpose. Might change "a few" to "three" for objectiveness, though. Aaron Liu (talk) 04:21, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

One of the (small) problems we see in this area is the occasional editor who thinks that creating a large number of shortcuts is helpful. The belief is sincere but misguided. So "I" write an essay (of no particular importance, because that's the fate of most essays), and I think: How can I help editors find and link to this? Ah, I should create several shortcuts! That will really make it look and sound official.

Or they see a long page and think that every section or item on it needs a separate shortcut. And while that's occasionally true (e.g., WP:NOT), it's usually just a waste of time, with the risk that the shortcut picked (and never or rarely used) for something unimportant would have been preferred later for a different thing, and now we need to go through WP:RFD to determine whether there's a consensus to repoint the shortcut. If it hadn't been created in the first place, it would have been better. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:29, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Shouldn't Al Jazeera be highlighted in yellow considering the consensus that it's biased when discussing the IP conflict and areas involving Qatar? Sir Joseph ^(talk) 23:28, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

We already had a lengthy discussion about this in 2024. If you want to challenge its current green status, please provide concrete evidence of unreliability. Adding to your recent comment on Talk:Screams Without Words,[1] which raised concerns of undue weight and bias without supporting evidence, I sincerely suggest that you provide more substantive grounds before posting. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk · contri.) 01:52, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

This status/highlighting is the consensus of an RfC. Aaron Liu (talk) 04:23, 16 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Here's a starting point for the RFC:

Some websites listed in Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources are not WP:SOURCES, but are instead digital platforms that host both reliable and unreliable sources. Examples of these platforms include YouTube, which hosts reliable TV news shows (example) as well as many unreliable home videos, and Flickr, which hosts reliable photos from government agencies such as NASA (example) as well as many unreliable personal photos.

Proposal: Shall we expand Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources#Legend to include a new category, "platform", with a description that says the website itself does not determine whether the source is reliable, and instead editors must look at the publisher. For example, on YouTube, editors must base their decision about reliability on the uploader or user. For example,; https://www.youtube.com/@BBCNews is (the verified official account) is reliable because https://www.bbc.com/news is reliable.

Note:

• Some websites will need to have two entries. For example, YouTube is only a platform for news videos, but editors discourage citing it as a primary source for views and subscriber counts, so it could have one entry for "platform" and another saying "generally unreliable" for views and subscriber counts.
• Which items would get placed in this category is subject to case-by-case editorial consensus. Initially, _______ would get re-classified as platforms.

What should we change first? Are the examples good? What websites (if any) should we put in the blank? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:34, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think we should just merge the entries into a category first (c.f. Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources/Archive 10#Merging some entries), giving it the status-quo GUnRel status, before starting an RfC on the status of that category. Aaron Liu (talk) 16:49, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

The problem there would be something like WP:ACADREP where the hosting site is already marked as MRel. Moving those to GUnRel before the RFC could muddy the waters. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:25, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

The description at ACADREP is pretty close to what we're saying about platforms: don't look at the hosting site; look at the real source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:25, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Ah, I should've realized ACADREP was essentially the same thing. I agree with Void then that focusing on the concept is probably the way to go before turning the RSP stuff into a category. If the PaG thing passes, we should be able to Boldly add a MRel category. Aaron Liu (talk) 19:29, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

That looks like a good RFC question, its a bit on the long side but I think it needs to be to illustrate the issue. Personally the only clear area I see for improvement would be some sort of footnote after "the website itself does not determine whether the source is reliable" explaining that these platforms use proprietary content standards very different from that of publishers. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:54, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'm not sure what you mean by "proprietary content standards very different from that of publishers". Does that mean that YouTube lets publishers post almost anything (that's legal), where as some publishers (e.g., the BBC) have higher standards and other publishers (e.g., a vanity press) do not? WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:08, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

IMO it means that Youtube hosts what it wants to host (note that they choose not to host a lot of legal content), I believe that even vanity presses generally have more control over and liability for the material than a hosting platform does. Its not key to the RfC though, it can be a discussion that happens later if this proposal goes through. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:00, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Youtube hosts what it wants to host, but bbc.com/news does not?

In the US, a vanity press can refuse to print anything they choose to refuse, because Freedom of the press belongs to those who own one. (Under US law, they actually shouldn't have liability except in specified circumstances such as child porn, as they aren't the publisher – legally, it'd be like blaming the manufacturer of a Photocopier if someone makes photocopies of something confidential.) But the same's true for YouTube and the BBC, so I'm not sure that it's relevant. The relevant point is that the BBC has higher standards than any vanity press. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:25, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Vanity presses run a gamut, in some cases they are the publisher and in others it really is much more akin to the photocopier analogy. There certainly are aspects in which these platforms and vanity presses are similar though, especially with promoted posts. I agree that the relevant point is that the BBC has higher standards than any vanity press, but I think its also relevant that they have a fundamentally different mentality/tradition. Amazon also seems to fit into a few different boxes here. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:48, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think that's a good RFC question. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 17:07, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

This seems good assuming we start after "Proposal:". The stuff before seems to assume the conclusion in ways I'm worried would violate WP:RFCNEUTRAL.

I also think we ideally shouldn't repeat "For example" twice. Loki (talk) 19:18, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Agree with this. First paragraph should be part of a !vote, or otherwise adding "Editors have argued" at the start of the paragraph and linking to this discussion in order to include it. Best not to draw any conclusions into it. CNC (talk) 19:40, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

The problem with omitting the explanation is it leaves us with a proposal to create a category called 'foo', with no explanation of what's intended to be in that category. I would expect that to produce confusion.

"Editors have argued" sounds like weasel words, and besides, I don't think that anybody is seriously arguing the opposite (e.g., that the reliability of anything on YouTube can be determined merely by saying 'well, it's on YouTube, so it is/isn't reliable'). WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:11, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I agree with this proposal in principle but I think it should be proposed as an addition to WP:SOURCES first, and that perennial sources should follow suit. Void if removed (talk) 20:31, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'm not sure how that would fit into WP:SOURCES: "When editors discuss sources...they are usually talking about the work itself, the creator of the work, the publication, or the publisher of the work, but we frankly don't care which website the work has been posted to; a book on Google Books or on Perlego or on Amazon is still the same book"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:38, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'd suggest pretty much your proposed text be added as a subsection titled "Platforms", alongside WP:NEWSBLOGS, with a WP:PLATFORMS shortcut. Eg.

Some websites are digital platforms that host both reliable and unreliable sources. Examples of these platforms include YouTube, which hosts reliable TV news shows (example) as well as many unreliable home videos, and Flickr, which hosts reliable photos from government agencies such as NASA (example) as well as many unreliable personal photos. In these cases, it is the reliability of the publisher which should be assessed, rather than that of the platform itself. Where no reliable publisher can be identified, such sources should be considered self-published.

If there's consensus for that then Perennial sources should follow suit. I'd suggest doing it this way round because IMO it is more clearly a policy amendment/interpretation that should cascade out from WP:SOURCES. Void if removed (talk) 20:49, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think I agree with Void, or at least I agree that we should do both of these at the same time.

I'd also maybe include a line saying something along the lines of Information from the platform owner itself (including metadata like view counts as well as announcements directly from the platform) is considered to be published by the platform owner. In general this information should also be considered self-published unless it's reviewed by independent sources. Loki (talk) 21:01, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I think that both of these ideas are feasible.

That means:

• Update Wikipedia:Verifiability#Reliable sources
• Update Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Definition of a source, which doesn't match WP:V (@SMcCandlish, were you talking about that earlier?)
• Update Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources#Legend
• As a consequence, update some RSP entries (e.g., ACADREP)

Does that sound about right? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:31, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes! Loki (talk) 21:29, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Support this. My main opposition previously was the lack of "doing things properly", whereby this is very much a thorough approach, along with UGC referenced below by Sunrise, so there would be no contradictions or varying interpretations of policy leftover. CNC (talk) 09:59, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

I also think this is a better approach. My feedback is:

• I would add Wikipedia:Reliable Sources#User-generated sources as well, given that it describes all such sources as "generally unacceptable". The list of examples may need to be updated, e.g. it seems that an organization's official Facebook page would be covered by this change as well.
• I would emphasize that there must be some confirmation of the publisher's identity (e.g. uploads by other users are likely to be copyright violations). This could be an expansion or follow-up to Void's text of Where no reliable publisher can be identified, such sources should be considered self-published.
• Since this is a broad change to policy, editors from the relevant pages should be invited to comment once text for all the changes has been proposed.

--Sunrise (talk) 23:27, 20 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

• I regret to say that I agree with you about needing to restructure Wikipedia:Reliable sources#User-generated content. I'm currently thinking that we need to separate collaborative content (e.g., Wikia's Fandoms, Reddit discussions) from individual user posts (e.g., a teenage boy posting videos of himself and his friends on skateboards). Collaborative content is user-generated, and the rest is perhaps better filed under this 'platforms' concept. (But where to put a multi-person Twitter thread [as opposed to an individual tweet]]? Obviously I haven't thought about this enough yet.)
• I'm not sure that Void's text is appropriate. Unreliable publishers (e.g., National Enquirer) are not self-published, so they should not be considered self-published. They should be considered unreliable (in the case of the National Enquirer, due to a reputation for the opposite of fact-checking and accuracy). Also, you should be able to determine the publisher on most of these platforms: it's the username of the uploader. The publisher will very frequently be engaged in self-publishing (e.g., that teenage boy on his skateboard) or potential copyvios (e.g., video clips), but IMO the policies and guidelines should normally consider these unreliable (meaning that they have one or more of a long list of disqualifying problems) rather than specifically self-published.
• As I said above, I expect this to be a very widely advertised RFC.

WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:09, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

On point 2, that's a good point that I overlooked when quoting that. The wording would need to be adjusted - I think the key idea is to clarify that a self-published source does not lose that status simply by being published on one of these platforms. On point 3, to be clear, I was recommending getting input from those pages before actually starting the RfC, since RSP is rather specialized in comparison. Sunrise (talk) 02:11, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Half of the usual suspects are already here, but I've no objection to anyone posting notices.

The thing on my mind right now is that this really is a technical adjustment (nobody who understands the problem/proposal thinks we are proposing new rules), but with every additional "Oh, and this other section", it risks sounding so complicated that we may get fear-driven opposition ("I can't support anything unless you show me exact wording changes" – followed inevitably by "Thanks for the exact wording changes, but I can't support this because it's too complicated to change so many separate pages at the same time"). Maybe we should consider an explicitly "in principle" proposal. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:33, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

In principle is fine by me and arguably simpler, as the exact wording (based explicitly on the interpretation of the consensus) can be devolved to local consensus. For here, it'd be no different than summarising any other consensus from RSN for example. Being thorough does not mean everything has to be complete(d). CNC (talk) 10:11, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes I agree, I've struck "reliable", that wasn't my intent. My intention was that if there's no obvious publisher, it is SPS. Void if removed (talk) 07:52, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

@WhatamIdoing Per advertising the RfC (it's come up enough times including from me), I'm happy to notify relevant talk pages, purely so there is assurance that it will happen. Ping me and I'll do it, out of respect for the effort that has gone into developing this RfC. (It'd be lazy for me to push for an RfC and then be unwilling to notify editors). CNC (talk) 10:07, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes, it would have to be clear that by "publisher" we're talking about what on YouTube would be the officially identified channel of the publisher. So if it is on the BBC channel, the BBC are the publishers. If it is a clip from a BBC programme on some random user's channel, it isn't, and is self-published and probably a copyright violation. Void if removed (talk) 10:51, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

The proposal will ultimately impact many different hosting sites. Maybe there should be less focus on specific sites, and more on the concept. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:27, 19 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

• Per Sunrise suggestion. I have notified WP:RS and WP:V of this discussion. I didn't bother with RSN as there is nothing that would significantly change there, and to avoid re-litigating previous discussion that we have moved past. CNC (talk) 10:36, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Thanks. When we reach the point of actually making a proposal, then the advice in Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#Creating a request for comment may be helpful. Something not in there, but which I'd suggest we remember, is that notifications don't have to happen on the very first day of the RFC. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:38, 21 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

  The redirect Wikipedia:Tabloid has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2025 August 25 § WP namespace "tabloid" redirects until a consensus is reached. Left guide (talk) 21:58, 25 August 2025 (UTC)Reply