Jump to content

Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)/Archive 68

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Should Template:POV tags expire?

Had this issue recently. Several editors and I agreed that an article had an NPOV issue, but people didn't have the time to work on them. Another editor removed the NPOV tag due to inactivity.

In Template:POV#When_to_remove, we currently have that the tag can be removed if a discussion becomes dormant. Given Wikipedia editors may get busy, how much sense does it make to remove NPOV tags for this reason?

Should they ever be able to be removed for inactivity or should we specify a minimum time for this such as a year? Bogazicili (talk) 21:20, 23 June 2025 (UTC)

I think it should be that the editors who want the tag get responded to and do not respond further. Like the discussion is inactive but the last word says the tag should be removed. Aaron Liu (talk) 21:24, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
I'm going to move this to Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals) after getting some feedback.
Aaron Liu, how about changing 3rd in Template:POV#When_to_remove?
Current: 3. In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant.
option 1: In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant without any agreement.
option 2: In the absence of any discussion, or if at least six months have passed and the discussion has become dormant without any agreement.
What do you think? Bogazicili (talk) 21:37, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
A time requirement makes no sense and said time requirement isn't the problem with your background situation. I slightly like the first one but "any agreement" should be changed to "consensus". None of these are what I was talking about but the first one would be an improvement. Aaron Liu (talk) 21:43, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
The time requirement is there because many pages in Wikipedia is not as active as people think
For consensus, will we require an RfC for an NPOV tag? Bogazicili (talk) 21:55, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
I still don't get what you mean about the time requirement. Tags are for adding pages to categories so that people who check these categories can act on recommendations to improve a page. They are for attracting activity.
Not many things require an RfC. If this can be resolved through a discussion on Template talk:NPOV, it need not an RfC. See WP:RFCBEFORE. Aaron Liu (talk) 22:48, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
Honestly, while this might be a slightly radical suggestion... what if POV tags didn't display any visible indicator on the article? Or if we moved the indicator to the bottom and made it much smaller and less visible? I feel like the big visible THIS ARTICLE HAS POV PROBLEMS banner is the real reason we have so many problems and disputes over POV tags, because it incentivizes people who have issues with an article to use the tag as a "warning" or "badge of shame", which it isn't supposed to be. While it's true that the visible tag might attract people to talk and that having it as a badge of shame can spur people towards compromises, the flip side is that it leads to lots of wasted time and effort arguing over tags as opposed to trying to improve article content. If its main purpose is categorization, and we specifically don't want people to use it as a highly-visible warning or badge of shame, then... why is it so highly-visible? Why not just make it the category and nothing else? --Aquillion (talk) 13:27, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
Interesting suggestion, though that would lose the ability to use the talk parameter in the tag to point responding editors to the relevant discussion. -- LWG talk 15:11, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
That wouldn't solve the scenario that prompted nom to suggest this—a(n unorganized) backlog drive against the NPoV tag. Aaron Liu (talk) 15:16, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
One reason for the banner is to warn readers that the article isn't (or might not be) neutral. When there are actually POV issues this is good as we don't want to mislead readers if we can help it. However, we are misleading readers if the banner is present but the text is neutral. Thryduulf (talk) 15:23, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
That’s how I’ve always interpreted tags, but as WAID says it violates WP:NODISCLAIMERS Kowal2701 (talk) 15:29, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
Specifically, it doesn't align with the sentence that says "Maintenance templates should not be used to "warn the reader" that an article needs improvements or that a Wikipedia editor disagrees with the current state of the article". WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:35, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
I think it depends in part on the current state of the article and how the discussion went. I suggest the following as rules of thumb (explicitly not to be interpreted rigidly): If the person seeing the old tag things there are (still) POV issues with the current version of the article the tag should remain and they should try and revive the discussion (possibly seeking input from a WikiProject) or, ideally, fix the issues.
If the person seeing the old tag doesn't see any issues with the current version, then if the article is in an objectively very different state to the one it was in when the discussion ended then they should remove the tag. If someone objects to this then the second person should (re)start discussion as there are now at least two editors paying attention to the article.
If the article is in a similar state to how it was when the old discussion happened then, the tag should remain if there was general agreement or consensus there were POV issues but no agreement/consensus about how it should be fixed. Today's editor should probably try and restart discussion.
If there was no consensus/agreement about whether there were POV issues, then try and restart discussion, if that doesn't work or the editors previously discussing matters are no longer active then remove the tag. If someone objects to this, then the person who objects should (re)start discussion. Thryduulf (talk) 22:34, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
This is much more nuanced then current guidance in the NPOV tag. Bogazicili (talk) 23:00, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
I see that as a feature not a bug. Thryduulf (talk) 23:40, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
@Thryduulf: it's not a bug, but should it be modified? Specifically the second part: 3. In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant. Bogazicili (talk) 19:43, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
I think it should be modified to be something along the lines of what I wrote above. Thryduulf (talk) 20:51, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
How about: 3. In the absence of any discussion, or depending on the current state of the article and how the discussion went
I used your wording. Bogazicili (talk) 20:58, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
No, that's the exact opposite of what should be taken from my comment. The vague introduction isn't very useful (and on its own is possibly worse than what we currently have), the important and useful part is the actual guidance. Thryduulf (talk) 21:03, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
That's too vague to answer anything and raises a lot of questions. Aaron Liu (talk) 21:07, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
What we have right now is also vague and raises a lot of questions: Template:POV#When_to_remove
We also don't seem to have space for a paragraph of detailed instructions
Another solution would be to simply remove the following part: 3. In the absence of any discussion,or if the discussion has become dormant.
And perhaps add another sentence: 4. When not sure, raise the issue in the talk page Bogazicili (talk) 21:12, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
It's true that what we have is not great, but that's not a reason to replace it with something even vaguer. I'm not sure why you think that there isn't space for something more detailed? It is usually possible to condense what I write into something more concise, but even if you were to take my suggestions verbatim it would fit perfectly fine. Thryduulf (talk) 21:30, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
If you want you can make a proposal.
Otherwise I think "or if the discussion has become dormant" should simply be removed.
If you make a proposal, I'll add it as an option if and when I bring this as a proposal. Bogazicili (talk) 21:39, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
I don't think that should be removed. We need to be able to remove these tags when:
  • nobody ever explained ("in the absence of any discussion") or
  • there was a brief or useless discussion ("if the discussion has become dormant").
If there isn't a provision to remove in the case of dormant discussion, then Alice can say "This puts too much emphasis on him and not enough on her", Bob can reply "Maybe, but I don't think it's big a problem" – and then they both walk away, and the tag is stuck there for eternity, because there is no consensus that the problem was resolved (#1), the alleged problem was properly identified (#2), and there was a discussion on the talk page (#3). The purpose of "If the discussion has become dormant" is to deal with situations in which nobody cares enough to resolve the problem, or the discussion goes nowhere. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:45, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
Then we need to add something concise for points covered by Thryduulf.
For me, the whole thing that prompted this was that people acknowledged the issue in the talk page, but no one got around to fixing the article. In that case, the POV tag shouldn't be removed due to dormant discussion. Bogazicili (talk) 21:48, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
The template "may" (as in "allowed to") be removed under those circumstances.
The template is not required to be removed under those circumstances.
If you think that the POV tag shouldn't be removed from that article under its specific circumstances, then nobody is forcing you to remove it.
If someone else removes the POV tag from that article under its specific circumstances, then no rule prevents you from re-adding a new one, and starting a new discussion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:00, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
I know but the last point requires supervision and following the page changes. Bogazicili (talk) 22:12, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
I've thought about this before. I ultimately think it won't work.
I think I'm more insistent than average about the POV tags not being used in violation of Wikipedia:No disclaimers. "Warning the reader" that some editor disagrees with the article, but can't get their POV to dominate, is an ongoing problem, especially in less visible pages. We also have a problem, for certain subsets of articles, that an NPOV-policy-compliant article gets tagged as "promotional" because it accurately and appropriately reports positive things about the subject. "If it doesn't disparage, it's not neutral" is a view held by only a small minority of editors, but they're disproportionately likely to add these tags. So I agree: There is a real problem associated with this set of maintenance tags.
I have, over the years, made several trips through lists of elderly POV tags (like this one – warning: large page), and I found that many of them could be removed as stale. Either a significant problem didn't exist in the first place, or it was fixed long ago.
However, I have also found that many other POV-related are there for obvious reasons. They are, in my experience, a minority of what you'll find in Category:Wikipedia neutral point of view disputes, but they are not a very small minority. Some of these are also not easy to fix.
The end result is that I concluded that any automatic system is going to throw the baby out with the bathwater. What we need is something more like a backlog drive to reduce the oldest ones. For example, there are only about 226 articles with POV tags from 2014 to 2019. Maybe we could try to clean those up? Or at least review them, to make sure they're real POV problems, and not just (e.g.,) {{third party sources}} problems? WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:58, 23 June 2025 (UTC)
@WhatamIdoing: I realized I was vague with the title of this topic. What do you think of POV tag being manually removed after few months because the talk page discussion is not active? Even though several editors have acknowledged the POV issues. Bogazicili (talk) 19:42, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
I think that it both is, and should be, "legal" to remove a POV tag after a few months (or even just one), if the talk page discussion has stopped.
Sometimes the removal is what prompts the discussion to restart, and that should be counted as a win for removing the tag (even if it's immediately reverted back in).
However, I also believe that editors should not make edits they personally disagree with. So if you see that the article has a POV tag, you (personally/individually) think that tag is warranted, and you see that the discussion either never started or has petered out, then you might prefer to choose one of the other, equally "legal" options available to you, and instead start a discussion, or try to fix the problem, or ping the people who previously discussed it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:57, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
For really old ones such as those from 2014, they can simply be removed? I mean if someone had the time, the preferable thing to do would be to check if the issue has been resolved, rather than simply removing the POV due to discussion being dormant.
I would support Neutrality issues backlog drive, that actually makes a lot of sense. Bogazicili (talk) 19:47, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
There's only one left from 2014; it's Slovakization#De-Magyarization. (The rest of the article has similar 2024 tags.) It could be removed, or perhaps one of the WikiProjects on the talk page (Ethnic groups, Slovakia, Hungary, Europe) could fix it.
A backlog drive that divided up the oldest tagged across relevant+active WikiProjects might work. That would be a relatively small list for each group. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:39, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
For example, I'd just remove this and mention it in the talk page, no reliable sources seem to be in Talk:Slovakization#POV,_inacurracies. But I am not going to remove it now as I have not read the entire discussion in the topic.
That's why I said a standardized template might help. Bogazicili (talk) 21:55, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
Since we struggle to get editors to start a discussion at all, I'm not sure that we could realistically get them to start a specific, pre-formatted discussion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:01, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
It would remind them to add missing details. For example, a link to a reliable source.
Without adequate information, the POV tag could simply be removed. Bogazicili (talk) 22:11, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
The only issue with the Neutrality issues backlog drive is that editors who may have no idea about the issue making decisions.
A standardized neutrality issues template for the talk page might help when adding POV tags. Things such as the issue, the sources, etc. Those without talk page discussions could be removed. Bogazicili (talk) 19:52, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
Imo WP:DRIVEBY tags should always be removed, even when they explain in the edit summary. Some POV issues are mammoth tasks, like Ian Smith, others too technical for most people. I like the idea, but encouraging POV tagging rather than WP:FIXIT is something we should steer clear from. Kowal2701 (talk) 22:14, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
If the effect of having a routine backlog drive is that it takes the onus off of the tagger to work towards fixing it, then it may be detrimental. Kowal2701 (talk) 22:50, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
Working only on articles tagged in the previous decade, many of which probably don't qualify for the tag any longer, might not have that effect, though. "See? You don't get a permanent badge of shame just by driving by and dumping a tag on the article" might encourage solving problems, or at least removing unexplained tags.
I don't agree in principle that a maintenance tag shouldn't be added by a person who can't fix the problem. Sometimes, pointing out the existence of a problem actually is helpful. But if that's all you are willing or able to do, then the existence of the problem needs to either be obvious or adequately explained. "I spy with my little eye a POV problem that nobody else can see" is not okay. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:52, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
  • @LWG: does a lot of work on this. See the above discussion re a backlog drive Kowal2701 (talk) 13:16, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
  • I don't think that a hard-and-fast number is going to be helpful; it depends on context. For example, in a high-traffic article where there's a lot of discussions about other stuff, or where there was clear discussion that obviously failed to reach a consensus, the fact that a POV tag is not being discussed any further could cause it to "expire" within weeks or even days; it's not serving a useful purpose, further movement is unlikely and leaving it there risks becoming a badge of shame, which is forbidden. On the other hand, on an extremely low-traffic article it wouldn't be inappropriate for a POV tag to last years, especially if nobody has objected to it and it's clear there's a general agreement it needs to be fixed (and just a lack of people to do it.) The key point is the purpose the tag is serving; is it likely to lead to further discussion and improvement? Or are people trying to leave it there to "warn" other people that the article is POV? The latter is not acceptable. --Aquillion (talk) 13:28, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the ping @Kowal2701:. Grinding through the backlog of POV tags has been one of my main wiki endeavors over the years. I have personally removed thousands of tags and I estimate that 80-90% of those required no action other than removal, but about in about 10-20% of cases I make at least some edits before removing the tag. Thryduulf's rules of thumb describe my practices pretty well, but I have some more elaborated thoughts on the matter on my user and talk pages. Every tag that still remains in the 2014-2020 range is an article that I have put eyes on and at least initially did not feel comfortable removing the tag without closer investigation or some edits, either because I saw evident outstanding issues or because the subject was complex and outside my area of knowledge. I would welcome a backlog drive to clean those up. The 2020-2024 date range are articles I haven't looked at yet. I expect that applying Thryduulf's principles to the articles in the 2020-2024 range, we could uncontroversially remove the vast majority of them. But I don't think a timeout is strictly necessary - currently we only get new POV tags at a rate of 3-4 per day so that's a very manageable rate to deal with once we clear the outstanding backlog. -- LWG talk 13:56, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
    Thank you for your work in this area (and thank you, @Kowal2701, for pinging LWG to join this discussion). Since you have already checked the 2014–2019 ones, it sounds like we should push those to more knowledgeable groups.
    @Cryptic, imagine that I wanted a list of every article from Category:Wikipedia neutral point of view disputes from June 2014 through Category:Wikipedia neutral point of view disputes from December 2019, associated with every active WikiProject on its talk pages, split by WikiProject. For example:
    Is that something that Wikipedia:Request a query could produce? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:52, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
    Rather you'd just ask there instead of pinging me to random pages. quarry:query/94925. —Cryptic 19:00, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
    Thank you! (I'll try to remember that in the future.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:10, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
  • The one thing we DON’T want is POV editors saying: “If I do nothing, and allow the template to expire (and be removed)… my POV will “win” and remain in the article” Blueboar (talk) 16:09, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
If the POV editor does nothing, placing a tag is unnecessary, as the POV material can simply be removed or revised. The POV family of tags are for disputes - if all active involved editors are in agreement, there is no dispute. -- LWG talk 16:17, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
No, tags are NOT limited to disputes. They are also notifications that an issue needs to be addressed. Doing nothing and “waiting out the template” is not addressing the issue. It’s gaming the system. Blueboar (talk) 16:31, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
Well, @Blueboar, let's game this out.
If the article is biased, we might see Editor A tag the article. Editor B, who approves of the current/biased state of the article, does nothing to resolve the complaint. What could happen then?
  1. Other editors might see the tag/check the category. They see Editor A's explanation on the talk page and/or already understand the problem. They resolve the problem (despite interference from Editor B) and remove the tag (despite objections from Editor B). Net result: Benefit from tagging; benefit from removing. (This is the best-case scenario.)
  2. Editor A might successfully resolve the problem herself. Net result: Neither harm nor benefit from tagging; benefit from removing when it is resolved.
  3. Editor A might (i.e., should) post an explanation on the talk page. Editor B disagrees with her. The discussion between the two of them resolves nothing. They might use other dispute resolution methods (e.g., a Wikipedia:Third opinion). Net result: Neither harm nor benefit from tagging itself; the benefit came from other dispute resolution methods.
  4. Editor A might post an explanation on the talk page. Editor B might not see it. There might be no response from anyone. Much later, Editor C removes the tag. Net result: No benefit from tagging. Possible future benefit from the tagger being "required" to explain the tag on the talk page (someone might eventually see that explanation on the talk page). No benefit and no (new) harm to the article from removing the tag. The biggest "harm" is that the removal reduces the chance of a future editor finding the talk-page discussion.
  5. Editor A might post an explanation on the talk page. There might be no response from anyone. Much later, Editor C, seeing the explanation, decides to leave the tag in place, in the hope that some hypothetical future editor will know how to fix it. Net result: No harm from tagging, and possibly a small benefit, since it prompted Editor C to look at it and silently confirm that the problem exists. (Not removed, so no result from Editor C's inaction.)
  6. Nobody fixes the article; nobody explains what the problem is. Later, Editor C, not seeing any explanation and not understanding the concern, removes the tag. Net result: No practical benefit from tagging, but no significant harm from either the tagging or the removal.
If the article is not biased, we still might see Editor A tag the article. Then:
  1. Other editors might see the tag/check the category. Realizing that it's wrong, they promptly revert it. Net result: Harm from improper tagging; benefit from removing.
  2. Other editors might see the tag/check the category. They might overly trust that it is accurate and attempt to "fix" the article. Net result: Harm from improper tagging; chance of harm from inappropriate "fixes" (but greater chance of net improvement).
  3. Editor A might try to "fix" the article herself. Net result: Harm from improper tagging; harm to the article from fixing what ain't broken.
  4. Editor A might (i.e., should) post an explanation on the talk page. Editor B disagrees with her. The discussion between the two of them is unlikely to resolve anything. They might use other dispute resolution methods (e.g., a Wikipedia:Third opinion). Net result: Harm from improper tagging; benefit from other dispute resolution methods.
  5. Editor A might post an explanation on the talk page. There might be no response from anyone. Much later, Editor C removes the tag. Net result: Harm from improper tagging; benefit from removing.
  6. Nobody does anything. The tag languishes at the top of the page. Net result: Ongoing harm from improper tagging.
  7. Editor B, not seeing any explanation and not understanding the concern, removes it. Net result: Harm from improper tagging; benefit from removing.
Did I miss any? It seems like your concern is items 4–5–6 in the first set (and 5–6–7 in the second, less likely set). I'm not seeing substantial harms in any of them, though in the first set, there is a chance that removal will prevent a future fix. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:39, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
One area that might be missing from this is that the POV tags are very frequently used as all-purpose "this article is bad" tags when it would have been more appropriate to use a tag like {{Promotional}}, {{COI}}, {{Too few opinions}}, {{Unreliable sources}}, etc that actually identify the specific issue that needs to be addressed. In such a case, it's best if Editor B eventually comes along and replaces the POV tag with a more specific tag. -- LWG talk 19:54, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
@WhatamIdoing: for scenario 1, wouldn't maintaining those tags be useful for WP:GAR and WP:FAR? The harm would be articles that are not neutral would be more likely to maintain GA or FA, or more likely to persist having issues. Neutrality is a core principle in Wikipedia. Bogazicili (talk) 20:16, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
Which #1 is scenario 1? The one in which the POV problem got solved, in which case the tag is now inaccurate and therefore shouldn't be retained, or the one in which the POV problem never existed in the first place, in which case the tag has always been inaccurate and therefore shouldn't be retained? WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:23, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
I meant the top one, If the article is biased ... Bogazicili (talk) 20:38, 27 June 2025 (UTC)

LWG, given you frequently work on this issues, what do you think of Template:POV#When_to_remove? Bogazicili (talk) 20:22, 25 June 2025 (UTC)

In your user page, you have "If talk page contains unresolved POV discussions, but the discussions have not been updated for several years, remove the tag" This is much more sensible than what is currently in there with "if the discussion has become dormant" Bogazicili (talk) 20:24, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
I see my "several years" guideline as a quick-and-dirty approximation of "the discussion has become dormant". The period of time that needs to pass to consider a discussion "dormant" varies from article to article and in low traffic topic areas it wouldn't surprise me if it took a long time for someone to notice and reply to a talk page message. But if no one has touched the issue for years then the tag is failing in its purpose of "attracting editors with different viewpoints". Template:POV#When_to_remove doesn't say you must remove the template if the discussion has stagnated - it says you may do so. That is, you don't need to notify/seek approval from the original tagger (impractical) or prove an article is totally POV-free (impossible!) before removing a POV tag. If there is no active discussion taking place, you are free to act on your own judgement. -- LWG talk 21:33, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
Also, of course, if someone removes a tag and someone else objects to that decision and replaces it, then the discussion is no longer dormant and you can proceed with the normal collaborative consensus-building process. -- LWG talk 21:35, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
I agree.
Since the word may seems to get overlooked (a problem I've seen in several sets of instructions during the last couple of years), I have replaced may with "allowed (but not required) to". If that causes problems (e.g., "You're not required to do this; therefore, you are not allowed to!"), then we can revert it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:28, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
Yes but you have to keep watching the page in your watchlist. Maybe I'm a bit lazy lol. Bogazicili (talk) Bogazicili (talk) 20:40, 27 June 2025 (UTC)
Just watchlist the POV maintenance categories and you'll see all the adds/removes in your feed. -- LWG talk 20:32, 28 June 2025 (UTC)
There's scripts like User:Ais523/watchlistnotifier and my fork of it, User:Aaron Liu/Watchlyst Greybar Unsin, that bring the latest watchlist entry to the top of the screen. I'm still working on supporting category changes, though it should work for per-page changes. Aaron Liu (talk) 22:03, 28 June 2025 (UTC)
@Aaron Liu: do you have something that ignores bot edits? I don't want to check a page if only bots have edited it since last checking. Bogazicili (talk) 20:18, 29 June 2025 (UTC)

Join the new backlog drive

Or, at least, invite some WikiProjects to look at these articles. The list is at User:WhatamIdoing/Old POV tags. Most groups only have 1–3 articles. Everyone's welcome to invite groups to help and to update the list (so we don't duplicate each other's work). Consider this an unoffocial backlog/invitation drive. ;-) WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:27, 25 June 2025 (UTC)

BHL

The Biodiversity Heritage Library is very widely used here and on other projects and is an invaluable reference, but it is currently in a bit of trouble and looking for "partnership opportunities to support its operational functions and technical infrastructure" after the Smithsonian Institution opted to "conclude its long-standing role as BHL’s host on 1 January 2026". Is the WMF able to help in any way? Cremastra (Go Oilers!) 23:58, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

The people who can answer that question are unlikely to see it here. Somewhere on Meta is probably your best bet, but I don't know off the top of my head where. Thryduulf (talk) 00:50, 13 June 2025 (UTC)
I like the idea! I've emailed answers@ for guidance on where the best place for this suggestion would be. HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 18:09, 15 June 2025 (UTC)
Thanks! Cremastra (Go Oilers!) 18:36, 15 June 2025 (UTC)
I heard back a couple days ago; they said they would raise it internally and get back to us. I'll let everyone know when I have further updates :) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 23:22, 21 June 2025 (UTC)
Further update: the relevant WMFer is out of office for a minute, so we are still waiting to hear back. HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 02:03, 2 July 2025 (UTC)
@Cremastra @HouseBlaster this is a great idea, I use the BHL all of the time writing species articles. Without it a lot of good information would be lost and completely inaccessible, especially for obscure species where much of the available information is in the original paper on them, which the BHL often preserves. Mrfoogles (talk) 22:37, 21 June 2025 (UTC)