Talk:Students for Free Culture

I'm going to make Freeculture.org redirect here as well. -- Skyfaller

Name change from "FreeCulture.org" to "Students for Free Culture"

I apologize for editing this page myself... as the co-founder of the organization I understand that it's generally a no-no to edit the article for an organization that I'm involved with. However, I thought it would be important to update this article to reflect the recent name change that FreeCulture.org has undergone, to "Students for Free Culture"... it's just a factual change, not anything that should reflect any bias on my part.

I also made some minor edits to the "Structure" section to reflect the results of the new bylaws that the Students for Free Culture chapters have just ratified. -- Skyfaller 20:59, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

I added Fordham Law to the active local chapters list. As the co-founder of that chapter, I hope that wasn't a COI edit (I just wanted to keep things up to date). Outis010 (talk) 21:11, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Complete rewrite necessary, AfD possible

Currently article seems to fail WP:NOTABILITY, and is a huge WP:SOAPBOX. The only question which is not clear to me is if it is 100% WP:SOAP, or just 99% WP:SOAP. In addition, it is a complete mess (just one example: what is "SCDC" which is referred to all over the place? It is not defined in the article at all). If somebody can clean it up, removing all the inappropriate primary sources (primary source for statements like "has over 30 chapters" is certainly inappropriate) and speculations (example: "These protests may have served as inspiration"), and also to establish connection between 3rd-party articles and this organization (in particular, to provide proof that chapters indeed consider themselves as a part of "Students for Free Culture" - even primary source statement will be IMHO ok in this case but to qualify as WP:RS, it should come from chapter, not from "Students for Free Culture"!), it would be great. If not, I will try to perform such clean up myself, but as I don't know certain things (for example, how to prove relations between chapters and umbrella organization), it might result in removing too many references, which in turn might eventually result in AfD (if after cleaning up irrelevant/unprovable stuff there are no references to prove notability - it doesn't belong on Wikipedia). Ipsign (talk) 05:57, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

SCDC is Swarthmore Coalition for the Digital Commons, as mentioned in the article. Definition on first use added. Article substantiates WP:NOTABILITY using multiple WP:V. e.g. NYT and Wired articles. Article is not WP:SOAP as it describes an organization notable for its achievements (as substantiated) but the description of recent history could be made more Wikipedia:NPOV. Cleanup and primary source fixes for more recent history are needed. I can help on this. Rob Myers (talk) 14:52, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, now I've started to understand some bits of it, but IMHO there is still a loooong way until casual uninvolved reader is able to read the article. One big concern of mine about the article, sources and references is that most of the references apply to what the article calls chapters, but relation between chapters and Students for Free Culture is not really established by verifiable sources. The whole statement "Students for Free Culture had its origins in the Swarthmore Coalition for the Digital Commons (SCDC, now Free Culture Swarthmore)" is not attributed, and without ability to WP:V the link between these three entities applicability of all reliable links to Students for Free Culture becomes questionable.

What I agree is established are references to "Free Culture Swarthmore" (in Wired), to "Free Culture at NYU" (USAToday), and to "Swarthmore Coalition for the Digital Commons" (in NYT). What is not established in the article yet - is answer to the question "how all these three organizations are related to Students for Free Culture?". Without verifiable proof for such a link between mentioned organizations and Students for Free Culture, these articles cannot be used to argue for WP:N of Students for Free Culture (actually without such proof, they cannot be used for anything related to Students for Free Culture, and should be removed). So, if somebody could provide some WP:RS to prove that these organizations mentioned under very different names, are indeed the same organization (or branches of the same organization), it will belong to the article, will make it more understandable (and BTW will also clear the question of WP:N). Ipsign (talk) 15:23, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

I think it's a bit difficult to establish the relationships between these organizations using only external news sources, since few people care about the relationships between organizations, they only care about (and write about) what these organizations are accomplishing. If you can't believe the website of Free Culture Swarthmore http://swarthmore.freeculture.org/about-2/ (that page references both its former identity as the SCDC and its connection with freeculture.org) or Students for Free Culture itself[1], then probably the easiest thing to do is point out references to the same people and organizations using different names. Here are some links.

• "File-Sharing Students Fight Copyright Constraints" https://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/10/education/10students.html - This refers to "Brown’s chapter of Students for Free Culture, a national organization sprouting up on college campuses" and notes that "Established at Swarthmore College in 2004, the group has chapters at more than 35 universities across the country".
• "Mr. Lessig Goes To Washington" from The Nation: http://www.chrishayes.org/articles/mr-lessig-goes-washington/ - This article refers to Nelson Pavlosky founding the first chapter of Students for Free Culture at Swarthmore College. I think it is obvious that this has to refer to Free Culture Swarthmore, there are no other candidates for the Swarthmore chapter of SFC.
• "On Campuses, Free Music Aplenty and Letters from Lawyers" http://www.america.gov/st/business-english/2008/March/20080307140415berehellek0.7545282.html - This article refers to "Swarthmore College’s Free Culture group" as well as "Rich Jones, a Boston University sophomore and head of a Students for Free Culture chapter" which clearly suggests that the Swarthmore College Free Culture group is also a chapter of Students for Free Culture.
• "Know Your (Copy)rights" http://jennvargas.com/academic/copyrights/public_activists.php - Some random academic confirms that "Students for Free Culture started as the Swarthmore Coalition for the Digital Commons" and "In 2004, the FreeCulture.org launched, which began the transformation of the Swarthmore organization into Students for Free Culture."

--Skyfaller (talk) 17:33, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, now I'm convinced (FWIW), the only question I have about it now is how to integrate this information (relation between many different names) and these references into the article. I'll think about it myself, but if somebody has any ideas - please don't hesitate to be bold and do it. Ipsign (talk) 18:59, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

I suggest removing the "Goals", "Purpose" and "Structure" sections, and making sure the first few citations aren't of the sfc web site. Rob Myers (talk) 15:07, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

IMHO "Goals" is perfectly viable for the article (and might include elements from current "Purpose"). Also note that references like the one to manifesto is IMHO perfectly acceptable source (it is primary source, but in this case it can fly; it is no good for the purposes of WP:NOTABILITY, but as soon as notability is established, manifesto can be used from primary source). OTOH, I agree that two sections "Goals" and "Purpose" are too much, and that "Structure" is indeed a mess. Ipsign (talk) 19:05, 30 November 2010 (UTC)