Wikidata:Requests for comment/Referencing websites: how do we store the website title?

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An editor has requested the community to provide input on "Referencing websites: how do we store the website title?" via the Requests for comment (RFC) process. This is the discussion page regarding the issue.

If you have an opinion regarding this issue, feel free to comment below. Thank you!

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

The conclusion is that published in (P1433) should be used wherever possible. If the website is notable, then an item should be created for it. If not use title of broader work (P6333). Created title of broader work (P6333), updated Help:Sources#Web_page.--Micru (talk) 13:10, 4 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Help:Sources does not specify how to reference the website that a web page is published on. All standard citation styles require this field when citing websites. For example, the correct way to cite a website is in MLA style is:

“Title of Web Page.” Title of Website, Publisher, Date published in Day Month Year format, URL.
“Restricting the World.” Wikimedia Deutschland Blog, Wikimedia Deutschland, 22 February 2013, https://blog.wikimedia.de/2013/02/22/restricting-the-world/.

This is equivalent to the "website" parameter in the Template:Cite web template on en wiki:

{{cite web |url= |title= |last= |first= |date= |website= |publisher= |access-date= |quote=}}
{{cite web |url=https://blog.wikimedia.de/2013/02/22/restricting-the-world/ |title=Restricting the World |last=Vrandečić |first=Denny |date=2013-02-22 |website=Wikimedia Deutschland Blog |publisher=Wikimedia Deutschland |access-date=2018-11-29 |quote=One of the features ... of Wikidata is that you can choose any item as the value for a property.}}


We need the ability to add the statement pointing to the value for "Title of Website." The only current way to this is to use published in (P1433) and create a new item for the website itself. I have created a property proposal to store this information as a string, however, despite having a lot of discussion, there is no consensus, hence the need for this RFC.

We need to develop a consensus on how to add this information, either create or not create the property depending on its outcome, and then update Help:Sources to reflect the result of this RFC.

Here are the options:

Options[edit]

Create a new item for any website that is used in a reference and use published in (P1433)[edit]

  • Pros: Users are able to click on item to get more information about website
  • Cons: Will result in websites that *may* not be desirable being added as items, i.e. blogspot subdomains

Votes[edit]

Create new property to store website title as text in the reference, but recommend using published in (P1433) if item exists or is notable[edit]

  • Pros: Makes it easy for automated tools to add website title without having to create new item, and avoids creation of potentially non-notable websites
  • Cons: Users won't be able to click on the title to get more information about the website itself.

Votes[edit]

Create new property to store website title as text in the reference, but convert to using published in (P1433) once in a while[edit]

Votes[edit]

Comments on options[edit]

Please comment here if you think neither of these options are suitable for you and what you'd prefer instead, or if you have different pros/cons than what is listed above.

I’ve always used title (P1476) in the reference for this, so I’m confused why this isn’t mentioned as an option? Or does that mean something different? I’m not alone in using that property, at least – according to this query, 2415876 statements (1047758 distinct references) use that property. --Lucas Werkmeister (talk) 12:37, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Disregard that, I didn’t see the link to the property proposal and missed that this is about the “container” title, not the individual page title. (May I suggest rewording the RfC to make that distinction clearer?) --Lucas Werkmeister (talk) 12:38, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, do you have a suggestion to do so? I knew it was going to be confusing which is why I highlighted the equivalent bits in green... not quite sure how to make it clearer. Feel free to edit! Mvolz (WMF) (talk) 16:30, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

@Mvolz (WMF): Yeah, looking at it now I really have no idea how I managed to miss that… but I’ve added an example now, perhaps that helps. --Lucas Werkmeister (talk) 14:32, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I can’t decide which option I should support. References typically contain stable information about the source which was valid at the time of reference creation, hence we do not update it later (e.g. if the title of the website changes, an older reference should not be updated with the new title). This approach would favor creation of a new string property that holds the title valid when the reference was created; working with multiple values and start time/end time qualifiers in separate items is probably something that the majority of editors does not understand sufficiently :-( That said, strings are pretty unstructured and not easy to manage. Difficult one… —MisterSynergy (talk) 14:10, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • The change of name of the ressource is far from specific to this issue, for example it occurs in the place of birth of someone if the place changed its name but there is no reason to use a different item besides the change of name. It should eventually be handled by inferences and it can be handled by code of the data users, we started to do this in frwiki in biography infobox recently by using the official name (P1448) View with SQID statements for example. author  TomT0m / talk page 15:12, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Comment How do we handle cases where the publishing website is the official website of some organization? We probably don't want separate items for "XXX Organization" and "XXX Organization's official website", right? ArthurPSmith (talk) 17:48, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    publisher (P123) View with SQID should do the trick. author  TomT0m / talk page 18:36, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • I have no idea :). But it's a good point. In some cases the published in and the publisher would point to the same item perhaps? Or else, as you point out, they'd be split. Mvolz (WMF) (talk) 23:11, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • Websites (any works, not just websites) on en.wp are treated as works rather than used as their publishers where they share a name (or similar name). (Though we do have items on e.g. Amazon.com and Amazon IIRC and Google.com versus Google, this is the uncommon, super-popular, few.) --Izno (talk) 04:15, 30 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Best solution always depends on the individual case/website. There is also a fourth modeling possibility:
⟨ subject ⟩ published in (P1433) View with SQID ⟨ unknown value Help ⟩
object named as (P1932) View with SQID ⟨ title ⟩
-- JakobVoss (talk) 08:04, 30 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
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