Hey comrades,
We need your help for a quick focus group test to shape a new policy we’ve rolled out.
We’re chasing out sourceless edits (see here for info), and we have a question on how much we should reuse a given reference now. It’s now become a discussion and I figure it’s better to see what the readers prefer to base our policy on.
Please look at these two edits of the same page, the “Post-Premiership” section specifically.
Please take the time to read through the section in version 1 first (it’s just one paragraph), and only afterwards open version 2.
Version 1: https://en.prolewiki.org/index.php?title=Boris_Johnson&oldid=61998
Version 2: https://en.prolewiki.org/index.php?title=Boris_Johnson&oldid=62000
If you can’t see a difference, please also tell me (everything you have to say is valuable feedback). But the difference is that in version 1, reference 4 is only used at the end of the entire paragraph to source all the claims in the paragraph, whereas in version 2, every claim has been linked to the admittedly same reference (number 4).
As a reader, which method do you prefer and why?
Also please note that every time we reuse a reference, it shows like this in the References list:
Does this bother you, did you notice it before I brought it up?
Again, add as much as you want in your answer. It will help us decide how to source in the future.
edit: please make a comment and don’t just upvote by the way if you agree with someone! The more feedback we have the more we can refine our policy too, everything is good to hear. Thanks!
I think version 1 works, since there’s no other sources there, and it’s clear the reference is for the entire paragraph.
Agree, version 1 looks the best / cleanest. There’s no need to repeat that source for every sentence.
I prefer the third way of doing it, mark the first footnote as you have done and then subsequent footnotes as ibid.
The second option is a little strange to read. It makes it seem like there are more references than there are.
If there’s only one source for a whole paragraph, you could refer explicitly to the source in the first sentence, which could be a shorter version, and footnote that first sentence with the full bibliographic information. That’s how I’ve done it with different referencing systems such as Harvard (in-text citations) and house-style footnotes.
Otherwise, I agree with Muad and Grain Eater. So long as it’s consistent, one footnote for a paragraph is fine. It could come at the very end or after the first fact.
Otherwise, Spendrill is right but I’ll suggest a fourth way: to use a sequential footnote with ‘ibid’ where the first reference in the next paragraph is exactly the same as the one before it (I wouldn’t do this if the two footnotes refer to specific pages/sections/etc unless it’s the same page/section/etc). But equally, just typing out the same reference in that subsequent footnote will be fine; you’re not restricted by the overall page/word count when you write online.
IMO the first one is better if the citation encompasses the entire paragraph, with no editorializing
also: in the second version, the first sentence has citation 4 placed after both the comma and the period and I’m not sure how to interpret that; if they referred to different sources, I’d have assumed that the part before the comma was covered by one citation and the rest of the sentence was covered by the other
Version 2. If the whole paragraph has only one source, there is no need to put it more than once.
that’d be version 1
Yes, I mistyped
I’m going to say neither is best. The multiple citations in the first one is inarguably overkill, but that doesn’t mean it will never be appropriate to sometimes cite the same reference multiple times, in a long section for example. Just a matter of style I think?
You might be splitting hairs here. The policy could easily be summed up as: “we strongly prefer style 2 but use your best judgement if you think it improves readbility/useability/credibility.”
