User talk:GiannaQ

Welcome and notes on sourcing

Hi GiannaQ! Welcome to Wikipedia. Since your recent edits to Etsy have been reverted a couple times, here's a little bit of explanation for how to rewrite the paragraph to fit with Wikipedia standards a little better. We have to use reliable sources that ensure verifiability, and blogs like Regretsy aren't really considered reliable sources. Instead, it's best to rely on established journalistic sources that are known to report neutrally and with fact-checking, such as the Wall Street Journal, which published a related article recently: "Busted by the Crafts Cops: Retail Detectives Scour Sites to Catch Factory-Made Goods Amid the Handicrafts". That would be a good source to include, along with the Houston Press article you've already included. This Consumerist article might also be a useful source, although it's still just a blog, so we can't really rely on it as a source beyond "people on the internet noticed this controversy". It's also important to include a reference for nearly each sentence in your addition - each fact has to be verifiable in an outside source - and it's best to be brief in order to avoid putting undue weight on this event in comparison to the rest of the article. One thing you could consider is putting the paragraph in your user sandbox as a draft and posting on the Etsy talk page to invite other editors to contribute to the draft, and then after it's been worked on a bit, transferring it into the main article. I hope this helps! Dreamyshade (talk) 20:54, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, the information on Regretsy has led Etsy to shut down shops in the past that were exposed as resellers. So, if Etsy considers Regretsy to be the source for credible information, it seems like Regretsy should be able to be used as a source for this article. Regretsy actually produces very compelling information concerning specific resellers. It seems rather convenient to attempt to dismiss them simply because they report information that is not flattering to Etsy. If it were false information, that would be one thing. But this information is verifiable. Also, I would argue that supposedly "legitimate" news sources like NYT and CNN are not neutral. GiannaQ (talk) 21:13, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, identifying reliable sources can be a tricky business. I recommend reading the Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources guidelines - they're detailed, and I consider them fairly reasonable. I imagine Etsy independently verified the Regretsy reports, using the Regretsy research as clues and then doing their own research to confirm the claims. The thing about convenience is that you'd also get reverted if you referenced blog posts with fluffy happy stories about Etsy. We could maybe frame coverage like this: "Etsy has been working on fraud detection[citation to Wall Street Journal], and has been criticized for inconsistently applying its rules about items having to be handmade.[citation to Houston Press] The writer of Regretsy, a popular blog, did independent research into a specific featured vendor, Ecologica Malibu, and found evidence to accuse the vendor of being a reseller, which would be against the Etsy Terms of Service.[citation to Regretsy] The vendor added details to its Etsy profile and asserted that it was in line with the Terms of Service, and Etsy community members posted many forum posts expressing unhappiness with the lack of action taken by Etsy.[citation to Consumerist]" Dreamyshade (talk) 21:58, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've added that draft to the article. If it's reverted, I'll bring up a discussion on the talk page for the article (Talk:Etsy) so that all interested editors can work together on hashing out a version that we all agree on. That's usually more productive than editors reverting each other - see Wikipedia:Consensus for a more formal explanation of this. Dreamyshade (talk) 22:17, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Notes on sectioning

Hi again! I moved the "controversy" section into the "history" section based on Wikipedia standards - see the "Neutral point of view" policy section about article structure:

Segregation of text or other content into different regions or subsections, based solely on the apparent POV of the content itself, may result in an unencyclopedic structure, such as a back-and-forth dialogue between proponents and opponents. It may also create an apparent hierarchy of fact where details in the main passage appear "true" and "undisputed", whereas other, segregated material is deemed "controversial", and therefore more likely to be false. Try to achieve a more neutral text by folding debates into the narrative, rather than isolating them into sections that ignore or fight against each other.

This essay on "criticism" includes more detail: "Rather than create a section dedicated to criticisms, instead try to incorporate negative material into the appropriate topical or thematic section that the negative material relates to (such as a particular event, policy, or product)."

Based on this policy, it makes sense to me to include both positive and negative events in Etsy's history in context together. What do you think? Dreamyshade (talk) 20:39, 10 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]