Talk:BP/Archive 22

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Archive 15

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Archive 20

Deepwater Horizon oil spill section

After being away from Wikipedia for a while, I saw that the previous discussions about the "Deepwater Horizon oil spill" section have been archived and feel it may be helpful to re-open discussion on this topic as much was left unresolved before. In particular, it seems that no conclusion was reached as to how to approach updating this section. I noticed that Petrarchan has made some edits not too long ago to add some new information and remove older details, and am interested to get a more general sense of how editors feel this section should be developed on an ongoing basis.

My general query is about how the section should be updated as time goes on, but I also have a more specific query about the "Health effects" subsection. It is my understanding that on medical and health topics, the guidelines for citations are different than for other topics, and citations are usually expected to be much more robust. Should this guideline be applied to the "Health effects" section? I see that the three sources used here now to make claims about the health effects are news reports, rather than medical journals. Should there be more reliance on peer reviewed articles? Thanks. Arturo at BP (talk) 19:05, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps you could list, as bullet points, what is in the article now that you believe is inaccurate? Coretheapple (talk) 19:28, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

I would assume that the studies that are referred to in the report are peer reviewed studies. Perhaps the 60 MINUTES info could be replaced with this recent study (from the Health section of the spill article)

A peer reviewed study that focused primarily on the link between oil spill exposure and hematologic and hepatic functions in subjects who had participated in the oil spill cleanup operation was published in September 2013. The investigators compared tests of the workers exposed to the oil spill and dispersants and an unexposed control group consisting of people living at least 100 miles away from the coast. The workers exposed to crude oil and dispersants used during the Gulf oil spill cleanup displayed "significantly altered blood profiles, liver enzymes, and somatic symptoms compared to an unexposed control group...suggesting that the exposed group may be at a higher risk for developing blood-related disorders". Participants involved in the study also reported physical symptoms including headaches, shortness of breath, skin rash, cough, dizzy spells, fatigue, painful joints, night sweats, and chest pain. The researchers stated, “The health complaints reported by those involved in oil cleanup operations are consistent with the previously reported studies on major oil spills. However, the prevalence of symptoms appears to be higher in the present study compared with the earlier findings of other investigators". [1] Gandydancer (talk) 14:59, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

Hi Coretheapple and Gandydancer. My note above was mostly in response to the flag that has been on the "Deepwater Horizon oil spill" section since the summer and the fact that all previous discussions of the section have been archived. I think it would improve the article if we could resolve any outstanding issues so that the flag can be removed.

One area of concern, as I mentioned above, is the "Health effects" section. I think this section could benefit from a review by someone who is well versed in medical topics and appropriate medical sources. So that editors contributing here have a good sense of what should and should not be included (for example, whether the peer reviewed study Gandydancer mentions is more appropriate than the 60 Minutes information), I suggest inviting an editor who is knowledgeable about medical and health articles and specifically WP:MEDRS to take a look at the section.

Also, in the first part of the section, there's a sentence I do not believe belongs as it is an anecdotal statement, and represents opinions rather than fact:

In late 2012 local fishermen reported that crab, shrimp, and oyster fishing operations had not yet recovered from the oil spill and many feared that the Gulf seafood industry will never recover.[386]

In terms of corrections and updates needed in the article in general, I have left several requests on the subpage that have not yet received any response. These requests point out some inaccuracies and outdated information in the article that needs to be corrected. Thanks. Arturo at BP (talk) 06:44, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Arturo, I will ask the editor that I go to when I need expert opinions on sourcing if she can take a look at the health section. She is the best of the best when it comes to sourcing, and she works with our medical articles as well. Gandydancer (talk) 15:40, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Re this sentence, In late 2012 local fishermen reported that crab, shrimp, and oyster fishing operations had not yet recovered from the oil spill and many feared that the Gulf seafood industry will never recover., I can't see where it is not factual that the local fishermen reported that the fishing has not recovered. On the other hand, I wonder if we could find a document that shows the actual numbers before and after the spill? Gandydancer (talk) 16:33, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, Gandydancer. I may also reach out to see if I can find some editors who are knowledgeable in this area, too, in the hopes that at least one editor might be able to review this section soon. Thanks. Arturo at BP (talk) 17:00, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

The sourcing in that section is weak. Technically, for some statements ("She said this"), a newspaper is adequate. However a WP:PRIMARYNEWS report doesn't show that this person's opinion is WP:DUE, which also matters when you're trying to condense a major event into six sentences.

Ideally, for something about human health effects, we'd like to see independent, secondary, scholarly sources. Here are some that might be better choices than any newspaper article (found at PubMed, with gulf oil as the search terms, and with limits set to "review" and "5 years"):

Levy BS, Nassetta WJ (2011). "The adverse health effects of oil spills: a review of the literature and a framework for medically evaluating exposed individuals". Int J Occup Environ Health. 17 (2): 161–7. PMID 21618948.
Gohlke JM, Doke D, Tipre M, Leader M, Fitzgerald T (2011). "A review of seafood safety after the deepwater horizon blowout". Environ. Health Perspect. 119 (8): 1062–9. doi:10.1289/ehp.1103507. PMC 3237364. PMID 21561832. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) (free)
Goldstein BD, Osofsky HJ, Lichtveld MY (2011). "The Gulf oil spill". N. Engl. J. Med. 364 (14): 1334–48. doi:10.1056/NEJMra1007197. PMID 21470011. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) (free, and has a nice structure of the four types of harms)
Barron MG (2012). "Ecological impacts of the deepwater horizon oil spill: implications for immunotoxicity". Toxicol Pathol. 40 (2): 315–20. doi:10.1177/0192623311428474. PMID 22105647. (free, but barely mentions humans)
Wise J, Wise JP (2011). "A review of the toxicity of chemical dispersants". Rev Environ Health. 26 (4): 281–300. PMID 22435326. (about Corexit)

The source that Gandydancer was quoting a description of is this:

D'Andrea MA, Reddy GK (2013). "Health Consequences among Subjects Involved in Gulf Oil Spill Clean-up Activities". Am. J. Med. 126 (11): 966–74. doi:10.1016/j.amjmed.2013.05.014. PMID 24050487. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

This seems to be a decent enough study, but it is an original report of a study, which means that it's a primary source. I would certainly choose this peer-reviewed primary source over a newspaper article; you are allowed to WP:USEPRIMARY sources (carefully).

The difficult question is whether to prefer a primary source on a fairly narrow subject published last month to a broader review that is two or two and a half years old. There is no obvious right answer here. My initial approach would be to use the general reviews, especially the Goldstein paper in NEJM, to provide a description of the types of harms, and to give one sentence to the one study (a sentence that begins with "One study published in 2013...").

Good luck, WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:04, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Waid, looking at what you found:

Helpful perhaps, but I'm not sure that it is useful since it is solely about previous spills. The BP spill is unique in that it "differs significantly from previously studied oil spills in its magnitude, duration of release, source of emission (the deep sea floor), and management techniques used (dispersants and controlled burns)."
Seafood safety is not an issue here.
The Goldstein "review" is not a review of studies. It was not yet even 9 months since the well had been capped and if memory serves me, only a couple of studies related to mental health had yet been completed. I really just do not see how it could be called a "previous review" in the sense that I usually think of as reviews, reviews of a number of studies.
As you said, barely mentions humans.
Not really helpful as it seems to be mostly a comparison of the two forms of Corexit.

I am using a lengthy report on this study in the Health consequences of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill article under the Scientific evidence section. I also have the news report [2] that refers to the study. It seems that you think that I need to trim the amount of info that I take from the study, is that correct? And, what about news reports that mention health effects (as is being used in this article under the Health effects section of the Deepwater Horizon section), what does policy say about that? I hope I not being too dense--sourcing can be very difficult... Gandydancer (talk) 01:40, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Reply to Gandydancer: Sorry, I missed your note about the fishing numbers before. I believe that I have previously linked to the following release from the NOAA, which describes the official catch numbers in the Gulf in 2011 as the highest since 1999.

"U.S. seafood landings reach 14-year high in 2011", NOAA, 19 September 2012. Quote: "Catches throughout the Gulf of Mexico rebounded in 2011 to the highest volume since 1999, following a curtailed 2010 season due to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill."

The NOAA has also published its 2012 figures now, which you can see on its website here, although this does not provide a comparison with previous years. What does provide a comparison is the NOAA's Annual Landing Statistics page. If you run a query there and you can see that the figures for the Gulf in 2011 and 2012 were higher than in previous years. Hopefully this is what you were looking for?

Reply to WhatamIdoing: Thank you for your thoughts here, and for the links to the reviews. As Gandydancer mentions, it seems that some of these reviews are perhaps not quite right for the "Health effects" section, and likewise I am curious about your thoughts on specific sources currently used. Would you be willing to help editors here with improving the section? Arturo at BP (talk) 16:18, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I don't have much time for this, due to the number of real-world things happening in the next few weeks.

I agree that these very early papers can say relatively little except for general statements about, e.g, the kinds of damage. They are, of course, unable to say how much damage, because there is at this time no definitive answer to that question. What you really need is the papers that will presumably be published in the next couple of years. However, given the very broad scope of this article, the inclusion of specifics (e.g., this critic claimed this in a newspaper, or the company disputed some study) is probably WP:UNDUE anyway. I think you should make general statements here and refer the reader to the more detailed article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:26, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree that the Health section has become too detailed. The new information was BOLDly added and I'm going to BOLDly move it to the Consequences of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill article. Gandydancer (talk) 14:09, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I am going to BOLDLY put it back. Whatamidoing did not say the health effects section, or parts of it, was undue, they said " the inclusion of specifics (e.g., this critic claimed this in a newspaper, or the company disputed some study) is probably WP:UNDUE anyway" - which I think is referring to BP's requested additions. Anyway, it is in size similar to other sections, and not detailed but well summarized, imo. petrarchan47 t c 19:44, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Like every other statement in any article on Wikipedia, sourcing for the statements concerning human health need to comply with the WP:MEDRS guideline. As we have the good-quality secondary sourcing that WhatamIdoing identified, the article should not be using primary sources or conference proceedings as sources, especially ones identified as "preliminary". The popular press really should never be used to source biomedical statements, and especially not when WP:MEDRS-compliant review articles are available. WP:WEIGHT is also a concern with the primary sources. Consequently I'm afraid that all of the content currently at BP#Health_effects is problematic. This section should be rewritten using the WP:MEDRS-compliant secondary sources identified. Zad68 03:58, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

If we are to be limited to the only review article available, a short review written less than a year after the well was capped, and we are not able to use any (properly used) primary sources, conference proceedings, especially ones identified as "preliminary" (they are all preliminary to some extent), or the popular press, we may as well remove almost all mention of health effects from this article and the BP spill articles as well. The MEDRS guidelines were formulated to give wise guidance on how to report medical information, but I do not believe that it is their intent that we are to find our hands tied when it comes to reporting medical disaster information. This oil spill has repeatedly been called one of, if not the, most major ecological disaster ever experienced in the U.S. I don't believe for one minute that it is Wikipedia's intent that the health information be limited to reviews or review articles, and if that is correct we would need to get busy and delete most of the health information from the Health effects arising from the September 11 attacks as well, which is mostly based on the popular press. Gandydancer (talk) 13:28, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

I think that you're going to have to limit medicine-related information, but you don't need to completely remove it. For example, based on the NEJM review article, which says this:

Potential health consequences of oil spills fall into four categories: those related to worker safety; toxicologic effects in workers, visitors, and community members; mental health effects from social and economic disruption, which are of particular concern in the Gulf; and ecosystem effects that have consequences for human health.

I think you can fairly state that potential health effects from a disaster like this include worker safety issues; toxic damage to people who work, live, or visit the affected area; mental health effects; and ecosystem damage that harms humans.

Based on the conclusion:

In two Institute of Medicine workshops about assessing the health effects of the Gulf oil spill, the focus of the participants has been on addressing uncertainties by characterizing contaminant mixtures in all environmental media, detecting exposure sources, focusing on vulnerable populations, disseminating information effectively and in a timely manner, and working closely with local leaders, communities, and academic programs to assess and protect public health.

I think you can fairly state that early research tried to identify the amount and type of chemicals that different groups of people were exposed to. Much of the conclusion is a complaint about the inadequacy of the research program and funding, but that's not really a "health effect", so while that might be usable, it's not necessarily appropriate for this section.

And then I really do think that we're going to have to believe that WP:There is no deadline, and that it's okay, especially for such a broad subject as this, not to include details—neither "Dr Critic said this" nor "BP said that"—until there are some really good secondary sources that have actual answers, rather than just people being interviewed by journalists or PR people pushing stuff out on their website. Science by press release is not supported by WP:MEDRS.

As for the detailed subarticle, I think that it might be the case that a few primary sources, carefully handled, would be okay. Primary sources aren't outright banned. But I don't have time to deal with that. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:34, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Gandydancer, well I'm not going to comment on the 9/11 article which surely has its own problems. In the case of the Health effects section here, I am in no way saying the section should be removed entirely. We do have good secondary sourcing that should be the foundation of the section. If good secondary sourcing exists that complies with our relevant sourcing guidelines, we're obligated to use it to replace existing poorly-sourced content based on primary sources and popular press. You are correct WP:MEDRS isn't supposed to tie our hand but rather guide them. I agree with you 100% that the BP oil spill was one of the worst ecological disasters in history, and I am not all saying that fact should be obscured. Rather, I am saying that we owe it to the readers to source the health effects content to the strongest sources available per our guidelines, and we have stronger sources available than the ones currently in use. Look at it this way: quotes attributed to relatively obscure popular press reports can be hand-waved away as cherry-picked partisanship; content sourced to sober secondary-source articles by independent authors, and published in some of the world's most selective and respected medical journals (plus relevant specialist journals) cannot be hand-waved away. WhatamIdoing has laid out the sources and the direction very well here. Zad68 03:37, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm afraid that I'm at a complete loss for words. If we are to limit our reporting of spill health effects to the one review article which speaks of past spills and to one sentence from the one current study, we don't have much left, do we? While I would prefer to delete the recently added info to our health section of this article and I agree that any studies we use must follow the guidelines re primary, secondary, etc., I am not at all ready to gut most of the health information from the spill articles because it is supposedly not properly sourced. I would only agree to that if the Health effects arising from the September 11 attacks is deleted as well. I note, for instance, that WhatamIdoing made an edit to that article in which she corrected cancer information, however the section was using the Village Voice as a source, and she made no mention of that. Furthermore, it would be assumed that she was aware that that article was primarily based on press articles and she made no complaints, nor has anyone else. Gandydancer (talk) 15:24, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

OTHERSTUFFEXISTS isn't a good argument. Furthermore, the edit I made (changing "these cancers" to "some of these cancers" to properly describe excess risk issues) was in 2007, when I was new and MEDRS wasn't accepted as a guideline. I doubt that I've ever read any of the 9/11-related articles; there was probably a request for help at WT:MED about it.

Nobody is saying that you can use only the one source; it's just an example. You can use any review article or similarly appropriate secondary source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:47, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

MEDRS is being used to remove or keep out a tremendous amount of well documented information from this encyclopedia. The original idea was to protect people who might be turning to wiki for medical advise. But when we've extended this to keeping out news articles from respected media outlets on the well known effects of PAHs, this is hurting the pedia, not protecting people. Sandy Georgia had a good idea: a little warning at the top of any page containing anything that talks about human health, saying "this page can be edited by anyone, please do not use this page for medical advice", or something akin to this. This is already displayed on at least one wiki page. I would vote to add this tag and go ahead and present information to our readers. Perhaps another RfC is in order. petrarchan47 t c 22:12, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

If we're truly talking about well-known effects, then you should have no trouble turning up a textbook or review article that describes them. That's the definition of well-known. If, instead, we're talking about a minority viewpoint, or something that's disputed within the field, then we aren't harming the encyclopedia by omitting information that might be wrong. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:04, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

What is BP doing in sustainability engineering?

I would like the major fossil fuel company articles to indicate how they intend to transition to carbon-neutral fuels such as this work also called "power to gas," and in BP's case in particular how they are working with my favorite company (with whom I have no financial, familial, or other conflicting connections, by the way) Air Fuel Synthesis. I would also like to know BP's work on emerging chemical engineering research such as catalysts for carbon-neutral transportation fuels, on compressed air energy storage such as [3] and [4], airborne wind turbines such as [5], and on extracting carbon from seawater such as this PARC method in order to solve their long-term corporate viability issues. I do not believe it is possible to have a truly balanced article on a fossil fuel company without some indication of their long term prospects. Tim AFS (talk) 03:48, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

I also need to know whether they are developing electrical grid energy storage in their existing expended oil and gas caverns along with mineshafts and mines for pumped-storage hydroelectricity where ordinary hydroelectric power is unavailable. Tim AFS (talk) 09:07, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

RfC: Has this article become a forum for anti-BP sentiment?

Consensus is that criticism of BP here is not WP:UNDUE. Closing this archived discussion per a request at WP:ANRFC. --BDD (talk) 17:55, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Some editors believe that, in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon explosion and subsequent oil spill, this article has become a vehicle for the promotion of anti-BP sentiment. Other editors disagree and consider the current content to be encyclopedic and neutral.

Previous RfCs have failed to resolve this issue so comment from as wide a section of the WP community is sought to obtain a definitive decision. 09:43, 5 December 2013‎ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Martin Hogbin (talk • contribs)

Patent nonsense. This article is far too vigorously defended from negative information, no matter how firmly rooted the negatives are in reliable sources. For instance, in September 2012 I tried to point the reader to published analysis of Browne's leadership, showing that a substantial vein of opinion exists that lays the blame for environmental disasters at Browne's feet, because of the corporate culture he set in place emphasizing profit above safety.[6] The response to this was immediate: reverted by Belchfire (now indef blocked). On the talk page we discussed the concerns about BLP, and I showed that Reuters UK, Fortune, Bloomberg, The New York Times, The Guardian, CBS News and more had made this exact point. The next day I returned the material to the article, reinforced this time with more sources,[7] and it was immediately reverted by Rangoon11 (now indef blocked). We talked about the issue some more, but the quantity of argument was superior (not the quality) for this widely reported analysis to stay out of the article. This experience cemented my impression that the article's defenders were not taking a balanced and neutral approach. Despite some personnel changes at this talk page, I am doubtful the culture has shifted to one of neutrality. I find it ludicrous that Martin Hogbin is making the case here that the imbalance falls the other way. Simply astounding. Binksternet (talk) 21:16, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Comment An RfC could just as easily center around the fact that no one has updated the article with information such as the following: petrarchan47 t c 22:29, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Oil Spill Judge 'Deeply Disappointed' in BP
Tar balls found in Gulf teeming with 'flesh-eating' bacteria the water alone had ten times as much vibrio as before the oil spill… and the tar balls themselves had 100-times more vibrio than the water
BP and Shell face new allegations of rigging oil prices in US lawsuit

No -- Quite the opposite is true. It seems like we've had far too many BP public relations staff at work here. I would say that given BP's level of environmental destruction, worker injuries, criminal activity, etc. that the brief and objectively written sections on these things in this article are remarkably mild compared to what a lot of resources have to say about it (I would even suggest that they are so mild that, as Binskternet points out, the article might even be considered biased in favor of BP). -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 06:35, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Who are you claiming are, 'BP public relations staff'?— Preceding unsigned comment added by Martin Hogbin (talk • contribs)

One example would be Arturo_at_BP whose user page reads: "Welcome to my user page. I have established this account to help improve BP-related articles in line with Wikipedia standards and guidelines. In the interest of full transparency, I chose “Arturo at BP” as my username so that my affiliation with BP is abundantly clear to all parties I may interact with on Wikipedia." ... The fact that the creator of this RFC seems so interested in paid editing COI issues also seems rather suspicious to me. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 17:45, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Comment - Please explain: "The fact that the creator of this RFC seems so interested in paid editing COI issues also seems rather suspicious to me." The creator of this RFC is Martin Hogbin. What is being said to be suspicious? Robert McClenon (talk) 23:27, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Jrtayloriv, I have indeed had a lively discussion with anther editor over paid editing and advocacy but my view remains that it is some unpaid editors who are the real problem. This article is a disgrace to WP. Over half of it article is criticism of the subject, that is without parallel in WP. Martin Hogbin (talk) 18:25, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

No, it's not criticism of the subject but negative factual material appearing in reliable sources. It is not unusual for an article to contain significant negative content when the sources so dictate. That point was recently made clear to me in another article in which I raised very much the same point that you are. In fact, I could very well have started an RfC very similar to what you have done here, and I think the outcome, similarly, would have been against me. Coretheapple (talk) 20:16, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Agree The article has vastly too much negative content compared with other articles. Most of it is written in overly emotional and unencyclopedic language. For a detailed analysis see User:Martin_Hogbin/BPRfC. Please place any comments or response to that analysis either here or on the associated talk page. Martin Hogbin (talk) 09:36, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

... as nominator -- Martin, could you maybe incorporate your comment here into the introduction for this RFC? As it stands here, it looks like someone is agreeing with you, when in fact, everyone else disagrees with you, and you are merely agreeing with yourself. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 15:10, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

I think it is normal in RfCs for the instigator to state their opinion in the body of the RfC. The introduction should be neutral. I would be happy to move my comment to the top if you like to just below the intro, Martin Hogbin (talk) 18:25, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

No. An absurd statement. The article is in a state of repair after an extended period during which it was a "poster child" for COI run amok, abetted by editors who placed BP-created text in the article without even cursory vetting. In major respects the article was deficient, toeing the BP line such as by giving grossly disproportionate attention to the alternative energy division, in keeping with BP's PR line. The article for a long time incorrectly stated that alternative energy was a "main business segment" when it was not, and this serious error persisted for many months despite a PR representative scrutinizing this article regularly for every single possible lack of lack of BP spin but not noticing or seeking correction of this serious error. The sorry state of this article resulted in damaging publicity and was a major black eye for Wikipedia. As Binksternet has correctly pointed out, the process of fixing this article is an ongoing process and is as yet incomplete. Coretheapple (talk) 17:56, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
No Saw this on the RfC page, just dropping by. After glancing over the article, with specific time given to read the section mentioned in the RfC, it strikes me as a bit ludicrous to suggest the article is too anti-BP. It reads nothing like that at all. While I think it reads fairly neutral currently, Binksternet makes excellent points that there are ongoing reliable news stories out there that are negative for BP, and are not included in the article. I think it's fair to add some of them to continue the narrative of the oil spill. Best of luck to all, GRUcrule (talk) 19:32, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Absolutely not Through negligence and willful misconduct, BP caused an oil spill that has been called one of the worst ecological disasters in U.S. history. The oil was in the water, on the shorelines, and in the air through evaporation and controlled burns (5% was burned) for months. According to the US Department of Justice, "Oil spills are known to cause both immediate and long-term harm to human health and ecosystems and can cause long-term effects years later even if the oil remains in the environment for a relatively short period of time."[8] It has been suggested (see above) that we are not permitted, per WP guidelines, to include any health related information in this article other than medical review articles. I don't believe that it is Wikipedia's intent to allow health coverage of the 9/11 disaster but disallow similar coverage of a disaster caused by a multinational corporation. I'd suggest to anyone that thinks we have inappropriate health coverage to read the health sections of the September 11 attack article. In fact, I don't see how anyone could read the 9/11 disaster article and suggest anything but that our coverage of the BP disaster is minimal. Gandydancer (talk) 21:05, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
No I have a Pavlovian response to editing this page, and usually updates remain in my files instead of on this page because I don't want to deal with the accusations and inevitable, knee-jerk RfC's. Right now, studies are coming out regarding health and environmental effects of the BP oil spill, but if we have a meme here that editors are being unfair to BP, it serves to keep such additions off the page. I imagine other editors will agree to feeling a certain nervousness when it's time to make an update here, and would probably agree that many times they have chosen peace over updating the page. I raise my hand high. For instance: this is some expected, albeit damning data that needs to be added, replacing the outdated info we currently have. But I don't want the grief, so it remains in my file box. Having a BP PR rep looking over our shoulders has had a negative effect on this article and on Wikipedia, in my opinion. As people have noted: the page is whitewashed. petrarchan47 t c 21:40, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
I believe in transparency, so I'm linking to User talk:Tryptofish#RFC at BP About Too Much Negative Content. Make of it what you will. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:50, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Well done, Trypto. petrarchan47 t c 23:06, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Agree - Every corporation has its controversies. This article contains more controversy content than other content. I am aware that I am probably in the minority. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:33, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

This seems to be a recurring theme: we should judge content here based on other articles, be it corporations, oil companies, or similar. In fact, content for any article on Wikipedia depends on RS. A review of RS turns up what others have echoed: there is a LOT of very negative information out there on this company. "Three Little Piggies" comes to mind. But the bulk of it isn't being reflected here, not by a long shot. petrarchan47 t c 23:59, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

No. I hadn't looked at the article in years, but in reading through it now, I think it looks remarkably evenhanded. Yes, there's a lot of negative content. If there weren't, I'd be very concerned, considering the events of the past several years. There's also a considerable amount of positive content, and I see no glaring WP:NPOV problems with any of the content, positive or negative. Rivertorch (talk) 07:55, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

How do you justify 57% of the article being criticism? This is more than any other article in WP. Vastly more than the Nazi Party or Pol Pot for example. Martin Hogbin (talk) 11:36, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't justify it, and as long as no specific evidence of undue weight has been presented, no one need justify it. While quantifying the criticism contained in an article may be an interesting exercise, it isn't necessarily a good way to identify a problem. Cherry-picking other articles for comparison doesn't prove anything; perhaps this article gets it right and those two articles get it wrong. Rivertorch (talk) 17:23, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

There is absolutely no cherry picking of articles by me. I tried to find ones that would be expected to have much criticism. Can you find one with more than 57% of the text emotive and unencyclopedic criticism? I challenge you. Undue weight in the extreme. Martin Hogbin (talk) 18:42, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Comparative ratios of negative content don't constitute evidence of undue weight. ("Undue" doesn't have a number, absolute or relative, attached to it.) Specific, qualitative examples of "emotive and unencyclopedic criticism" might indicate a problem. If you can provide any such examples, I'm sure they could be discussed constructively, although probably not in the context of this RfC. Rivertorch (talk) 06:41, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

I wonder if we're categorizing history as "negative content", when it's not actually criticism, which is what we usually consider the "negative" section of a Wiki article. In this case, there have been quite a few disasters, and their coverage is not negative or positive, it's simply encyclopedic. petrarchan47 t c 08:47, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

There is no confusion. In the case of BP some people have chosen to fill up the article excessively with negative events from the company's history.

Rivertorch, I am still baffled that you try to defend an article that has an unprecedented 57% negative content but you can see here that not only is it excessive in volume but emotively and enencyclopedically written. What exactly do you think constiutes 'weight' of not volume of text and language? The closest article that I can come up with for negative content is Joseph Stalin with 21% negative. Martin Hogbin (talk) 10:39, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

If the article was full of opinionated comments like "John Smith thinks BP is the most evil corporation on the planet." then I would agree with you that the article is not neutral/balanced. However, there is a difference between opinion and FACTS. In the case of this article, what you have a problem with is that there happen to be a lot of facts that you consider to be "negative", and you would like to see those facts removed so that BP isn't viewed as negatively by people who interpret these facts the same way you do. Sorry, but that's not the way Wikipedia works. You don't get to remove factual information backed by reliable sources because you don't like how it makes something look. If there is other information about BP that you think is missing, you're always welcome to contribute more to the article. But there is nothing in policy that would justify you removing factual information that you feel is "negative". -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 19:16, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Martin, I'm neither defending nor attacking the article; I'm taking issue with your insistence on trying to gauge due weight quantitatively. While I'm at it, I'm also finding fault with your repeated, unsupported claims that the article is emotive and unencyclopedic. If you don't understand what I wrote in my comments above, I'm sorry but I can't think how to make my thoughts any clearer. Rivertorch (talk) 06:45, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Firstly, quantity is one perfectly good indicator of weight, what better one would you propose? Secondly, I have given examples of emotive and unencyclopedic here. Martin Hogbin (talk) 16:02, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

On the first point, I'm afraid we'll have to disagree. I believe due weight should be determined by reviewing the amount and the nature of coverage by reliable sources. In the case of BP, the amount of coverage is vast and its nature, despite the company's enormous efforts to put a gloss on things, is generally negative. That state of affairs is reflected in the article, and it's futile to attempt to paint it as a problem with Wikipedia. Whether it's a problem with BP or a problem with the sources (or both) is a matter of opinion. As for your purported examples of emotive and unencyclopedic content, I assume you're referring to the page in your user space. I've read that twice now, and I don't think it demonstrates what you think it does. Sorry. I've found you to be a highly perceptive editor at other articles, but I think you're barking up the wrong tree on this one. Rivertorch (talk) 17:29, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

I guess we must have completely different views on the meaning of 'encyclopedic'. I take it to mean the style that you might see in a quality written encyclopedia. If WP continues like this they might make a comeback. 20:01, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Fatal flaws in the RFC wording, suggest starting over. First there is the more minor point some confusion on what the actual question is. But if one takes a guess, it is whether or not the article is "vehicle for the promotion of anti-BP sentiment.". If is, I think that Martin has shot themselves in the foot with this......they are in essence asking only if the extreme situation of the entire article being a "vehicle for the promotion of anti-BP sentiment" exists. They should have asked and should ask "is this article overly biased against BP?". Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:29, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

No, the only "flaw" that I can see, from the perspective of the asker, is that the answers are overwhelmingly in the negative, and unanimously so from previously uninvolved editors. The question is clear as a bell, and the responses all deal with whether the article is overly biased. Coretheapple (talk) 15:34, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

I did not realise that the RfC wording would be taken so legalistically, my experience is that they wander around anyway. It is pretty clear what I am getting at, 57% of this article is criticism of BP. That is more than any other article that I can find, including ones like Nazi Party and Pol Pot. Martin Hogbin (talk) 16:09, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure how to answer that. In short, it looks like your question is not whether a bias problem exists, but whether an extreme form of it exists. And I think that many have been answering the latter question. North8000 (talk) 16:25, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

I disagree that the RFC is worded "fatally" however you are correct that the RFC diverges from the recommended need to state the issue of contention clearly and definitivly. Thing is, everyone understands the RFC inquiry regardless, so the RFC is not worded fatally, in my opinion. That's the thing, after all: The request for comment needs to be understood so that people can give relevant replies, and I think people did that. Damotclese (talk) 18:16, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes it has indeed become a vehicle for anti-BP sentiment. The first half may be relatively neutral, but the second half is just one giant hate parade, especially the eight-paragraph long section on the Deepwater Horizon spill. Oddly enough, having a paid BP representative calling the shots left the article much more neutral than it is now.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 16:01, 11 December 2013 (UTC)
Agree, the article has been turned into a WP:COATRACK. There is too much weight given to environmental and anti-corporate advocacy. The editor above me used the phrase "hate parade", which is very apt. All of the hat-noted sections linked to spin-off articles can be -should be- shortened according to WP:SUMMARYSTYLE. Roccodrift (talk) 17:18, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

There seems to be a hierarchy of hate in WP with BP at the top, then other oil and gas companies, then any big business, then everything else. Martin Hogbin (talk) 18:40, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Doesn't make much sense to claim that people on Wikipedia are anti-corporate, considering that the majority of the most commonly used sources on Wikipedia are from the corporate media. In fact, I'd say that the opposite is true -- most editors on Wikipedia are of the U.S./British nationalist and capitalist persuasion, and love corporations. What is generally the case, in reality, is that it is considered "biased" to include anything that contradicts the views widely expressed in the corporate media, while faithfully repeating whatever they say is considered to be "objective". It just happens in this case that BP's crimes have been so extreme, that even the corporate media can't pretend like nothing is happening, so we have a ton of "reliable sources" (i.e. "corporate media sources") talking about it. So even by Wikipedia standards (i.e. only use for-profit media sources), this article is pretty fairly balanced. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 08:13, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Rubbish. Biased editing is reflected in the result and it means absolutely nothing that editors use corporate media sources. Plenty of corporate media sources are all too happy to cater to those harboring anti-corporate hysteria. POV-pushers will use whatever they can get away with. Roccodrift (talk) 21:04, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

To say that editors "hate" BP for fairly reporting, indeed underreporting the overwhelmingly negative portrayal of this company in reliable sources is just grotesquely unfair, assumes bad faith, and inaccurate. Coretheapple (talk) 12:29, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

RFC Comment: This is an interesting question. I think the initiator means to ask, if criticism of BP's environmental impact has been given undue weight in this article. There is no policy stating that 60% of an article shouldn't be criticism, rather if sources devote 60% of their coverage to criticism then 60% is the correct weight to give to criticism in the wikipedia article on the subject. Having perused the article briefly, there would seem to be less than half devoted to criticism. This all turns on sources, so as far as I can see we'd need some kind of source-counting exercise to determine the outcome of this RFC. One possibility would be to assume that coverage of Deepwater Horizon has declined in volume and that most discussion of BP in sources is no longer devoted to it, and consequently the weigh of DH should trend slowly down as time goes by. Cheers, --Dailycare (talk) 18:31, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

The article has an negative bias As noted above, I thing that the wording of the RFC is faulty and would tend to understate the level of agreement with that "negative bias" assessment. In a quick overview, the thing that gives me this impression is that even relatively small items are included if the are negative, and there is quite a collection of such. This is an immense ($388 billion / yr) worldwide company with 100 years of history, an unequal standard has been applied to include a lot of small negative sounding stuff. North8000 (talk) 20:08, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Comment This is a flawed RFC. I acknowledge the attempt at neutrality in the request but I agree with North that we should start over. Simple ask the question in one sentence without referring to what any editors believe and without explaining the need to decide this. A good RFC should not try to define the positions for and against the question and there is never a need to justify an RFC (if it matters then people will participate). Joja lozzo 03:38, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh, please, do you really think that those of us who responded are so feeble-minded? It's been a week, a bunch of editors have already answered, and you don't get a "do-over" because you don't like the way it's going. Coretheapple (talk) 04:10, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

I have to say that I agree with Coretheapple here. It is pretty clear what this RfC is about. I have seen many RfCs worded in the form, 'some editors believe X some others others Y' and so long as this is not formulated as a personal attack I see no problem. However if people here feel that the question should be something more like, 'Is the negative content of this article unencyclopedic and excessive in volume?' I would be happy to add that at the top. On the other hand no doubt someone would cry 'foul' if I try to change the wording half way through or start a new RfC before this one is finished. I think we should all show a little good faith here and try to resolve the content dispute. Martin Hogbin (talk) 10:39, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

My point is that Martin Hogbin accidentally hurt their own case by asking if a more extreme version of the actual problem is present.North8000 (talk) 11:46, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Suggestion The above RFC is on whether the article has "become a vehicle for the promotion of anti-BP sentiment." which is asking whether a severe pair of problems exists. I suggest another RFC directly on the whether or not the article has an anti-BP neutrality problem. More specifically it would ask: "Does the article have an anti-BP neutrality problem." Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 12:03, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

It says that already: Other editors disagree and consider the current content to be encyclopedic and neutral. Gandydancer (talk) 12:39, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

But I think that the question (or the offered alternative to "no problem") is being interpreted as whether the article has "become a vehicle for the promotion of anti-BP sentiment" which includes a statement of mis-use of the article by people, a more severe and problem than simply having an anti-BP neutrality problem. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 12:53, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

That's an awfully condescending attitude to have toward your fellow editors. I think that the RfC was formulated in a perfectly cogent manner and is being answered and interpreted in a rational and intelligent fashion by all persons answering it. Martin himself agrees with me on this. Please drop it. Coretheapple (talk) 14:30, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Quit the crap of inventing "condescending" out of my post. What I said is that editors are likely to be choosing between or commenting on the two choices given, as they are written. Unlike your false invention of "condescending", such is not a negative comment about editors.North8000 (talk) 14:45, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

No, editors have been commenting on the neutrality of the article. So why not just drop it? Coretheapple (talk) 17:39, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

"Drop it" implies that I'm pursuing something, which I'm not. I made a suggestion. I had an exchange for clarity with Gandydancer. Then you broke bad with your 14:30 post. North8000 (talk) 18:21, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

You don't think it's fair to say that you're pursuing something when you've "made a suggestion" in four different threads, and continue to push it even though people (including the creator of the RFC) have made it clear that there is nothing unclear about the RFC? The editors here aren't stupid, and it's very clear that what is being asked is whether we should start censoring factual information about BP in the name of "neutrality". And it seems that the consensus is "no". -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 19:23, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

This thread is deteriorating; I'm not engaging further on it. North8000 (talk) 19:30, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

"Not engaging further in it" -- Yes, I think that's what was meant by "drop it". -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 19:49, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

That is not making sense. The degenerating thread hadn't even occurred yet when "drop it " was mentioned. But either way, I'm not engaging on the degenerating thread. And on the overall topic, I just had suggestions and clarification on them. North8000 (talk) 20:12, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

No, this article has not become a forum for anti-BP sentiment. It is far from unusual that the BP article contains a higher than "normal" negative content. Whatever negative content exists is contingent on the enormous volume of negative factual material appearing in reliable sources. As stated by some above, when fair-minded editors compare the enormous volume of sources which do NOT favor BP against the limited and constrained volume of negative content in the article, I think they will say there is not an imbalance toward negativity. The current article is encyclopedic and neutral. ```Buster Seven Talk 09:10, 13 December 2013 (UTC)
No. Documenting negative events is not the same as advocating a particular pro- or anti-BP position. 21:53, 13 December 2013 (UTC)— Preceding unsigned comment added by Gamaliel (talk • contribs)
No. My experience in trying to edit here was that pro-BP editors would delete everything I did within minutes. My contributions were neutral and well-cited. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 00:07, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
Yes. The article may possibly reflect some sections of anti-BP press but as an encyclopaedic article of a major multi-national it fails completely to be neutral. It gives well over due weight to the recent negative incident. --BozMo talk 11:10, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
No. This article certainly has a lot of negative information about BP, but that information is well-sourced and factual. Checking through the available sourcing, the weight given to the negatives is very due, as the company has faced significant criticism and censure in reliable sources for its practices. If the company would not like its public record to be one of doing harmful things, it should stop doing those things. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 15:56, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
Suggestion One idea would be to take out all of the smaller scale negative stuff. (e.g. one group suing about one thing, or allegations that something that they do is "carbon intensive" (which oil industry/fuel inherently is)). Setting a lower threshold of notability (not referring to wp:notability) for inclusion of negative stuff (and coverage is not the reason, there are mountains of positive, neutral and negative coverage that editors are selecting from) can, of course, raise concerns. North8000 (talk) 16:15, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Not only is there no "small scale negative stuff" in this article, but as was described above a great deal of large-scale negative stuff is currently omitted. If anything, our threshold of notability has been skewed excessively high. Coretheapple (talk) 17:35, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh come off it. A complaint as yet not tested even in a first line Court based on a petition signed by 474 residents in Galveston is not "small scale negative stuff" and really is notable in terms of the activities of a company which scales like the eleventh biggest country in the world (Belgium) in terms of turnover, energy usage, and employment (if you include all the subcontractors, retailers and resellers)? Get real; anything which would not be notable enough to get into the main page for a mid-sized US state should not be included here. You get a 1000 people signing a petition about a single episode of stubble burning by a local farmer. --BozMo talk 21:15, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Neither. Some here have pointed out that there is more negative commentary that needs to go in, which is true. Others point out that there is too little positive information. That is also true. Please, do not try to come to a "compromise" that cuts out valid information - that is villainous. Instead, focus on getting more information in. To begin with: the article presently describes some BP market manipulation, which is absolutely important to have in there. But the article should also have useful information about BP's overall economic strategy - how they decide what to bid on and how much, everywhere, routinely, for example. Ideally there should be enough information here, in articles and sub-articles and sub-sub-articles, that people reading Wikipedia would actually feel like they know how to run an oil company, how to compete with BP, how to work with BP as a supplier or buyer, why they are tempted to cut corners even when it is stupid and going to lead to disaster, how to regulate the industry so it doesn't happen, etc. Our information should be all things to all people, and as a huge company, it's a huge topic. To get there, we need people to add, add, add, and add more, and stop fighting to delete the other guy's stuff. Wnt (talk) 21:09, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree, but with the proviso that any additions should be substantial, notable, neutral, and not authored by BP. Figureofnine (talk • contribs) 18:32, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

No - The point that the negative information is well-sourced is the key. BP has an established history of substantial factual "negatives" that belong in this article. I agree with the comments by Seraphimblade, Gandydancer, Coretheapple, Buster 7, Gamaliel, Petrarchan47, Smallbones, Rivertorch, and Binksternet, all of whom make solid points. We can not allow Wikipedia to become a mere PR outlet. In my view Wnt's comment is valid as long as important material is not drowned in a flood of irrelevant information. Jus da fax 23:59, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
Disagree I was randomly selected to comment on this, and I see that there is a fairly good leaning toward opposing the suggestion that the article is some how "anti-British Petroleum." If anything the article does not contain enough accurate and informative text covering the full extent of the corporation's activities and behavior. Remember: Wikipedia attempts to be encyclopedic, and more information is generally better than less. Since the information covering the corporation's crimes and abuses is accurate and falifiable yet is well cited then the information needs to be retained. Damotclese (talk) 18:05, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
- Fixing a DUE weight problem does not necessarily mean removing information. It can be solved by adding other information. For example: BP's assets have been nationalized in four or five countries; perhaps those major actions deserve more than four or five sentences? Earnings, profits, and dividends are barely mentioned. The number of current employees is listed (twice, and with different numbers), but there is no information about the number of employees in the past. BP produces 40% of Egypt's natural gas: maybe BP's presence in Egypt deserves more than two sentences? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:23, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
No - this article has not, as the header asks, become a forum for anti-BP sentiment. There is negative information, but it appears to be encyclopedic and on par with the prevalence of that same information in reliable sources as required. There is a lot of merit in the suggestions made above by Wnt and WhatamIdoing; expand the non-negative content. Xenophrenic (talk) 21:58, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree that there is a lot of merit to the suggestions by Wnt and WhatamIdoing. I am sure that Martin and some of the others who have long complained about bias in the article would be more than happy to improve the article with more copy that they consider neutral and/or "positive". Gandydancer (talk) 17:23, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Here, here. It would be a much more interesting article if we continued to add information. It seems the arguments made to keep information out of the Pedia are usually done to keep a POV on the page, that, with further evidence, would crumble. I have to admit, I did research into BP's history, and if I were BP, I would want to keep this article as short as possible. petrarchan47 t c 08:42, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

An update of the claims process is clearly in order as well. Also a BP employee just yesterday was found criminally liable for obstruction of justice.[9] For any other company this kind of thing would go in automatically. Here we hesitate. Coretheapple (talk) 19:26, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

I think that that incident was immensely notable and few would argue against inclusion. The issue I think is inclusion of far less notable items unrelated to such major incidents. E.G. somebody circulated a petition or filed a court case. North8000 (talk) 19:54, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Maybe, but in the past such additions would set off an unholy row. Coretheapple (talk) 22:01, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

We might reasonably quibble with the claim that Wikipedia editors automatically add every conviction of every employee to articles. There are far, far too few links at Special:WhatLinksHere/Obstruction of justice for that statement to be even remotely accurate (and 100 of those mainspace links are navbox links). But I agree that this is worth describing in the subarticles, and that it's probably worth a sentence here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:17, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

No. Thank you Martin for requesting my position on your RfC. My response is that this article is not, has not been, and doubtless never will be "a vehicle for the promotion of anti-BP sentiment." The "some editors" who share that belief are mistaken. This article provides only an incomplete glimpse at the misconduct carried out by BP in recent years. If the question were rephrased as "Is this article tilted against BP in any way, shape or form?" my response would be identical. No, it is not. Figureofnine (talk • contribs) 01:05, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Closing the RfC

Should somebody not formally close the RfC. It is pretty clear that the result will go against me so I leave you people to continue your crusade against business, oil, and BP. Martin Hogbin (talk) 16:14, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

While we are crusading, perhaps you can get to helping BP with their needed updates (2 sections above). petrarchan47 t c 00:10, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Should someone not proceed to Wikipedia:Requests for comment#Ending RfCs and evaluate how to, or even whether or not to, formally close the RfC. Myself, I'm to busy searching for the Holy Grail. ```Buster Seven Talk 04:14, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Speaking as the person who wrote most of that section: if nobody disagrees about the (lack of) action to be taken as a result of the discussion, then there is no need for a formal closure. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:13, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Former Employee X estimated that more than 630,000 gallons of oil were spilling daily, three times BP’s estimate in public statements

And three times the spillage information that this article presents to our reader. My confidence in the reliability of BP employees editing or managing the editing of this article is lessened. Every piece of information that came from BP is now in doubt. ```Buster Seven Talk 21:31, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Mother Teresa could be BP's rep here, or elsewhere, and it would still be problematic to rely upon the judgment of an employee to guide placement of facts within this or any article. Coretheapple (talk) 22:04, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Duh. petrarchan47 t c 05:53, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Former Employee X is the first of four current or former BP employees to be charged with spill-related crimes and the first of the four to be tried. ```Buster Seven Talk 15:56, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

No matter how you look at it, a text message from one employee is a primary source. We should be relying on secondary ones.

Additionally, how would you explain this? "A single employee once casually texted that he thought it was really, really, really a heck of a lot of oil (at least at one point in time: the rate of flow may have varied over time), whereas the definitely more considered and possibly better informed official position of the company was that it was really a heck of a lot of oil"? I'm not seeing the value to an encyclopedic summary in this kind of dubious detail. I'd omit this, and focus on giving two numbers: what BP officially said at the time (recognizing that even a perfectly good-faith estimate has a high chance of being wrong), and what independent academic scholars (eventually) concluded is a reasonably accurate estimate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:56, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Considering that what BP officially said at the time is an estimate of 1 to 5 thousand barrels, with the official estimate eventually set at 62,000 barrels, I find it hard to believe that their estimate was made in good faith. Nor did Representative Ed Markey (who headed the congressional investigation), who repeatedly called them either liars or incompetent. However, assuming that press accounts are acceptable sources, this information certainly could be in the article if other editors consider it appropriate, though I haven't seen a need to discuss the flow rate.

You said, "A single employee once casually texted that he thought it was really, really, really a heck of a lot of oil...". I'm not sure what you're getting at here--would you please explain, including why news reports would not be acceptable (if that is indeed what you are saying...). Gandydancer (talk) 16:16, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

The "casual text" must be referring to someone other than Mix, who emailed the estimate to his BP supervisors and to USG officials: "Just two days after the rig explosion, Mix emailed a projection to a supervisor estimating the runaway well could be leaking from 62,000 barrels per day to 146,000 barrels per day. Two days later, BP executives told the Coast Guard their best estimate for the leak was 1,000 barrels per day. A federal scientific group concluded after the well was capped that the flow was 62,000 barrels per day at the beginning of the disaster."

If the BP estimate still sounds like the work of good, honest scientists, consider: "Rainey was charged in November with two felony counts of obstruction of justice for lying to Congress and federal officials about internal BP attempts to measure the size of the leak." It is what it is. But are we allowed to enter this truth about BP into the encyclopedia unencumbered? Rarely. Source: HuffPo petrarchan47 t c 02:07, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Related: Ira Liefer, of the Flow Rate Technical Group, claims that what BP called their "best quality" video recording of the flowing well (provided to the team in order to help with their flow rate estimate), was intentionally made to be blurry - it was not an original, but a shot of a blurry screen playing the video, taken with a shaky camera. More: Scientist Working with Government Says BP Restricting Access to Study Gushing Oil Well. petrarchan47 t c 02:42, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Stuart Smith writes: "Mr. Liefer says that the team was denied quality video of the gushing well and was forced to work with BP-provided images that seemed to have been intentionally taped by pointing a camera at a high-quality computer screen. In fact, he could actually see the outlines of the screen." petrarchan47 t c 03:15, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi Gandydancer,

I'm talking about this:

" According to prosecutors, Mr. Mix deleted a string of more than 200 text messages in October 2010 despite notices from BP that he and others must retain all information about the well. In one of his text messages during the top-kill effort, Mr. Mix estimated that more than 630,000 gallons of oil were spilling daily, three times BP’s estimate in public statements."[10]

Mix was convicted because he deleted text messages, including one text message with this number in it. Both that text message and the non-analytical news story that mentions its existence are primary sources. That means that their contents are WP:Verifiable, but probably not WP:DUE in an overview.

To put it another way: one employee once texted this. We don't know what other estimates he may have texted. We also don't know what the other eighty thousand employees texted. And we have no particular reason to think that this person's estimate was correct, reasonable, important, or even that it wasn't a typo. We know that deleting it got him in legal trouble, but we don't know anything about the importance of the actual message itself.

We can't want to use this to imply conclusions about good or bad faith estimates, or competence or stupidity. We don't know if this guy happened to get closer to the independent estimate (630K gallons is a quarter of the 62K barrels that is now independently estimated), but a dozen other, equally respected employees said that it was much, much less.

We need to say what they claimed, and how that compares to best-estimate independent expert views. If you want to say something about whether their claim is good-faith or bad-faith, then you need a source that directly says this. Saying, "BP said X. Two days before that, a single employee had texted 3X to his boss. Academic people finally decided it was 12X (hint: so you can safely assume that BP was lying through its teeth)" is "combin[ing] material from multiple sources to...imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:11, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

You are the only one that is discussing whether or not it should be in the article. None of the other editors have suggested that it belongs in this article. Gandydancer (talk) 14:59, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Major court ruling

Here's an update that definitely needs to be made, and it's not routine: appellate court ruling, a defeat for BP. [11] Only posting it here because I can't get around to doing it in the text. There is absolutely no need for any nonconflicted editor to post stuff for approval here before improving the article. Coretheapple (talk) 05:52, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I am certain the multitudinous crusaders will get to it asap. petrarchan47 t c 23:10, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

As I put in this update to what I assumed was a paragraph on the settlement, I looked high and low and what did I find? That we didn't have a paragraph or even a sentence on the settlement. It just dropped out during one of the numerous efforts in the past to purge this article of material unfavorable to BP. I certainly never noticed it. So I've added in a reference to that and also changed the "civil proceedings" section header to reflect the settlement. We've been so consumed by ridiculous, time-wasting arguments over whether the article is "anti-BP" or not that we've lost sight of the fact that it doesn't even fairly tell the BP story as it is. Coretheapple (talk) 19:45, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

I will hold my tongue for now, but thank you for noticing this, Core. petrarchan47 t c 21:21, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

I think that we need to go over the article and be sure that nothing else major has been omitted. Coretheapple (talk) 21:27, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

That requires studying the subject... in great depth. A smaller goal, for instance focusing on the current trial, sounds do-able. petrarchan47 t c 21:51, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

For instance, there was actually more than one settlement fund. There was one in 2010. I'm almost afraid to look to see if it's in the article. Coretheapple (talk) 22:03, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Forgive me if this is unhelpful, but it appears to be an OK summary of the legal battle so far. petrarchan47 t c 22:14, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

That's good. It's a Bloomberg piece on the recent appellate court decision. Coretheapple (talk) 22:51, 18 January 2014 (UTC)