Wikipedia:External links/Noticeboard

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This is an example of a Wikipedia page about a Norwegian company: https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equinor

In the fact box to the right, there is a direct link to that company's page at The Brønnøysund Register Centre (public state agency) in Norway, where all companies and organisations are registered and are given a 9 digit ID.

The link in this case is: https://w2.brreg.no/enhet/sok/detalj.jsp?orgnr=923609016

From now on that link should be replaced with a link to the new web page: https://virksomhet.brreg.no/nb/oppslag/enheter/923609016

More generally, links containing this string: https://w2.brreg.no/enhet/sok/detalj.jsp?orgnr= ...should be globally replaced with this string: https://virksomhet.brreg.no/nb/oppslag/enheter/ ...if possible.

Otherwise all such links will most likely return "404 not found" in the future.

I hope this is possible.

• With apologies for terrible formatting due to mobile; I think a request here would help - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Link_rot/URL_change_requests

This edit by Hipal nuked external links variously citing WP:ELNOT, WP:ELOFFICIAL and WP:ELBURDEN. But I don't see anything in there that would justify the removal of {{Substack pub}}, {{C-SPAN}}, {{LibraryThing author}}; and Official chatbot, Podchaser.

The chatbot is pretty useful, not easily found linked elsewhere, and I found it from a mention at Mearsheimer's blog. And how are non-official CSPAN, Library Thing (comprehensive biblio) and podcast appearances (now a regular thing for Mearsheimer) violative of WP:ELNO? I added these links a while back to what I found to be a barebones EL section, and I don't see any substantive rationale for their removal. And the main outlet for Mearsheimer's regular publications is the Substack not the official website. I don't see a case for its removal either. ... I am not sure how valid external links like those above which give detailed biblios and list appearances on US public TV are detrimental to users or violative of any ELNO criteria. Beyond handwaving at at the EL policies no explanation has to come forward for how these would violate any of them.

These substantive rationales were provided at Talk:John Mearsheimer/Archives/2025/November#External links but beyond a link to the EL guidelines, no explanation came forward for why/how any of these would apply. As such I am bringing this here.

Also pinging Иованъ, who was involved in the discussion. Gotitbro (talk) 07:07, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

@Gotitbro, here's a list of the removed links:

• Official chatbot
• Mearsheimer newsletter on Substack
• John Mearsheimer at Podchaser
• Appearances on C-SPAN
• John J. Mearsheimer at LibraryThing

How many of these would you classify as WP:ELOFFICIAL links?

Which one or two do you believe is the most important to include? WhatamIdoing (talk) 09:08, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The Substack blog is Mearsheimer's primary outlet for regular publications. I would say that is the most important official link (beyond his website). The rest are not official but of these I would say the most important is Podchaser, listing his regular appearances on Podcasts and other shows (not covered by IMDb).

Librarything has an extensive bibliography, but since we already have a dedicated article at John Mearsheimer bibliography, it can be entirely dropped (or moved there).

The chatbot is operated by an AI company but licensed by Mearshseimer. I find it to be very interesting and relevant but not the "most important". Though I do not believe it violates any EL policy.

To summarize, the blog and podcast database I find to be the most important here. Gotitbro (talk) 09:19, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

You realize that there is a prominent link from his official website to his Substack blog? --Hipal (talk) 16:41, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Per WP:ELMIN More than one official link should be provided only when the additional links provide the reader with significant unique content and are not prominently linked from other official websites. and... it is prominently linked from his website, at top right. For other stuff, whether they provide "significant unique content" becomes a WP:ELMAYBE Graywalls (talk) 16:46, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I would say that the blog is still unique and significant enough to be included. But nonetheless, I can defer to the better judgment of others here.

But the inclusion of the rest of these remains well justified from what I can see. Gotitbro (talk) 17:29, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I recommend omitting the Substack as duplicative of the official website, and I like your idea of moving the LibraryThing link to John Mearsheimer bibliography. That would resolve two of them right off, plus putting that LibraryThing link in a place where it might be more valued. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:31, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I added the LibraryThing link to John Mearsheimer bibliography when I saw it was removed from the main article. Ⰻⱁⰲⰰⱀⱏ (ⰳⰾ) 00:49, 10 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Do you know his C-SPAN id? I would certainly support that link here or elsewhere. Ⰻⱁⰲⰰⱀⱏ (ⰳⰾ) 17:03, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

@Иованъ: As linked above, it is: https://www.c-span.org/person/?92628. Gotitbro (talk) 17:23, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I was wondering whether C-SPAN, LibraryThing, and even IMDb could be merged into the Authority Control template. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:29, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I think Pigsonthewing or MSGJ know things about Template:Authority control. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:16, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

You could post these suggestions on Template talk:Authority control to see if others support them — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 22:51, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't expect very many editors to see a discussion on a template's talk page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:33, 10 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

That is the talk page for discussing authority control. I can assure you it will receive attention — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:31, 12 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. Now to see whether anyone other than you is watching Template talk:Authority control. ;-) WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:29, 21 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Is an external link to an archive of graphic violence by security forces of a state acceptable? To keep the discussion in a single place, please comment directly at Talk:2025–2026 Iranian protests#Proposal: Archive of primary source video evidence for External Links, where the archive maintainer has started a discussion (and I replied). The images/videos show graphic violence. Boud (talk) 00:05, 7 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

This blog used to host the content of a source for Lake Tauca but was removed because it was on the spam blacklist. Now the source is reliable but I am not sure whether it is OK from a copyright perspective - while anonymous and pseudonymous works from 1976 apparently end up PD next year, this work isn't anonymous/pseudonymous. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 15:45, 17 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Just reference the book directly as a publication, but not the blog. The blog was only providing a convenience link and should never have been linked to. The source is not anonymous, it clearly has an author. It's a published book, just reference the book and ignore the blog. Obviously a link to the book copy on the blog/wayback is a WP:COPYLINK violation. Canterbury Tail talk 16:26, 17 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

WP:EL states that "With rare exceptions, external links should not be used in the body of an article." Many articles about authors have bibliographies with links to Google Books, Amazon, or Internet Archive. Viktor Frankl is an example. Should these links be removed, or is this not considered part of the "article body"? I think the Google Books links are useless, but maybe Internet Archive is different. Prezbo (talk) 14:05, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

@Prezbo, the usual approach is that bibliographic content is supposed to be formatted the same throughout the article, so if these sorts of convenience links are used in the ==References== section, then they can be used in the ==Books== section (or any other Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lists of works section).

Also, as a general rule: when this kind of question comes up, think about what's nicest for the reader of that article, instead of what's most compliant with a written rule. For example, even if you generally don't think these links are helpful, if a book is particularly hard to find, then you might use your judgement to keep a link for that one. Of course, if you think these are almost always helpful, then you'd want to keep all or almost all of them. We really are trusting you to consider all the specific facts and circumstances for that article and make a reasonable choice. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:05, 23 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Prezbo (talk) 10:55, 23 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Is PreserveTube (https://preservetube.com/) permitted as an archival service for YouTube videos? While it is effective at archiving YouTube videos, it is not listed at Wikipedia:List of web archives on Wikipedia. It appears to be relatively transparent, being open source. Are there any potential issues regarding this website which could in any way prevent its use on Wikipedia? ―Howard • 🌽³³ 16:39, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like a copyright violating site to me. No evidence they have permission for the videos, and the fact they've had DCMA takedowns supports that. As a result WP:COPYLINK. Canterbury Tail talk 17:31, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think this matters when we're talking about web archiving. sapphaline (talk) 17:47, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, this might be owned by the same person who owns archive.today. sapphaline (talk) 17:53, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

If this is true, it should also be blacklisted, but please provide your evidence for this assertion. ―Howard • 🌽³³ 17:54, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Same domain registrar (this is literally the second site I know of with a domain registered on Tucows, first being archive.today) and the description on the main page is a word-by-word copy from archive.today's main page. Not much, I know. sapphaline (talk) 18:03, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

In that case, I am going to open a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Archive.today guidance so that it may be considered whether links to preservetube.com should also be blacklisted. ―Howard • 🌽³³ 18:08, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I will say that using Tucows is not at all evidence that these sites are owned by the same person. It is just a good domain registrar for this kind of thing, I've used it myself. PARAKANYAA (talk) 03:58, 24 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Yup, Tucows is one of the original internet registrars and one of the biggest names from the early days of the internet. Those of us who were in university in the 90s know the name well. Being registered with Tucows indicates nothing. It's like saying they're bad because they use Shopify or Squarespace. Canterbury Tail talk 13:59, 24 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

@Canterbury Tail: we've permitted Ghost Archive which does the same thing and said so openly about its capacity to archive videos at Wikipedia:List_of_web_archives_on_Wikipedia#Ghost_Archive. ―Howard • 🌽³³ 17:54, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Yes and I think that is a gross mistake, but I'm not a lawyer. Canterbury Tail talk 20:48, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

What is the difference between archiving a copyrighted webpage and archiving a copyrighted video? ―Howard • 🌽³³ 20:57, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Nothing. I don't think we should be linking to archived copies of copyrighted webpages either without the copyright holders permission. Canterbury Tail talk 21:16, 22 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

We would have to do away with like 99% of all archives on our citations then. ―Howard • 🌽³³ 03:19, 26 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Yup. Canterbury Tail talk 13:36, 26 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The Template:CVE, which creates an external link to the National Vulnerability Database is commonly used in the body of articles which seems to me as a violation of NOELBODY. The article I personally first came across this use is XZ Utils backdoor and it seems this use is done on most pages that this template is transcluded. Is this one of the exceptions to the guideline? -- Chaos Amber 19:34, 26 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

@ChaosAmber, thanks for the clear example. I haven't seen that template before.

I think that content would be better suited for inclusion in {{Infobox bug}}, don't you? If it's worth mentioning in the text of the article, then the template could perhaps be used inside ref tags, but I'm not sure that the number itself is worth mentioning in the text.

I'm not sure I'm explaining this clearly, so here's an example:

• Current: "The issue has been given the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures number CVE-2024-3094 and has been assigned a CVSS score of 10.0, the highest possible score."
• My suggestion: "Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures assigned a CVSS score of 10.0, the highest possible score." (and the id# is in the infobox)

WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:15, 26 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The suggested version does seem better, but my question was more focused on the use of the template in article bodies in general, not in that article in particular. I am not an editor of the article I linked. -- Chaos Amber 20:29, 26 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

So... I've not heard of this one before, so it's probably not one of the most common/traditional exceptions (e.g., IETF RFCs or Bible verses).

IMO it's not entirely unreasonable (if you're going to have the id number in the text of the article in the first place, it might as well do something useful for the reader, and there is an argument to be made that it is useful to verify that nobody's changed the ID number), but I would recommend following WP:NOELBODY instead. Following NOELBODY probably means one of these three approaches:

• Remove the number and template from the text and put it in the infobox (if the article is about a bug)
• Remove the number and template from the text and put it inside ref tags (if there is other content, e.g., the CVSS score)
• Move it to the ==External links== section (if the bug is particularly relevant to the topic, e.g., not in Microsoft Windows)

WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:44, 26 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

This is something I’ll work on tomorrow when I’m on a computer rather than my phone, but since there are ~40 links to it that I can see with an insource: search, I thought I’d draw further attention to this news story about the hijacking of this domain. • a frantic turtle 🐢 21:54, 4 March 2026 (UTC)[reply]

@A Frantic Turtle, please copy this message to Wikipedia:Link rot/URL change requests. @GreenC may be able to have a bot deal with all of these for you. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:01, 4 March 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Done, with thanks. • a frantic turtle 🐢 22:09, 4 March 2026 (UTC)[reply]