Wikipedia talk:Product placement

Non-profit sources

Somewhere in the core pillar pages is a policy to use/favor non-profit over for-profit services. If one agrees or disagrees with this, I dunno, but that is our core policy to support like-minded open-source non-profits similar to Wikimedia. That is the universe we operate in, and are trying to build out to be successful against the established regime of commercial interests. It is essentially a political non-neutral position so many people don't like it when one brings it up, they want freedom to support whoever they like without restraint from ideology. Nevertheless, IMO if you choose to be part of Wikipedia you are inherently supporting a non-profit open-source movement and should act accordingly. -- GreenC 15:46, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

BTW I once ran a task that converted Google Books to Internet Archive books. This caused massive upheaval and complaint. People simply prefer Google over non-profit sources. There are over 2 million GB links on enwiki and around 700k Internet Archive, even though most GB links could be replaced with a non-profit source. And GB is technically inferior and less reliable, for reasons noted in that other essay. So, we can write essays, have policies .. but people will do what they prefer, often for trite reasons such as force of habit and misconceptions. -- GreenC 16:20, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

@GreenC: Yeah, I've encountered that attitude before too. Still, I think it's worth continuing to make the point. If not on Wikipedia, then where?

I also remembered that there was already a policy preferring FOSS tools to commercial ones. Couldn't find it though. Let me know if you remember where it is/was... – Joe (talk) 13:38, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

User:Joe Roe: I think you might refer to WP:VENDOR: "e-commerce links should be replaced with reliable non-commercial sources if available". When it comes to Google Books vs. Internet Archive, the policy could not be more clear.

Compare these two links, the same page of the same book:

• Google Books - commercial profit-oriented vendor
• Internet Archive - non-profit FOSS-centrix public library

There are many problems with the commercial link per WP:GOOGLEBOOKS. Per policy the Google link should be "replaced". But attempts to do so are resisted by the community, who continues to favor adding new Google Books links, over non-profit sources like archive.org .. At least on this issue (and probably others) the WP:VENDOR policy might as well say: "e-commerce links should be favored over reliable non-commercial sources if available". -- GreenC 17:05, 5 December 2023 (UTC)