Wikipedia:U.S. political contributions transparency project

This is a pilot project proposal to add information tables to the articles of U.S. federal elected officials using open data about the political contributions they have received.

Scope

Articles about elected federal officials: Congressional Representatives and Senators

Sourcing reliable data

• Opensecrets.org

Bot coding

Spec

• Pull from opensecrets api
• Format a table in Wikimarkup
• Insert table at bottom of article above references
• Include a formatted citation
• Update periodically

• Github:
• Bot approvals group: WP:BAG

Community approval

• Wikipedia:WikiProject_US_Congress
• Wikipedia:WikiProject_Politics/Money_and_politics_task_force
• Wikipedia:WikiProject_U.S._Congress/Congressional_districts
• Wikipedia:WikiProject_U.S._Congress/Members
• Wikipedia:WikiProject_United_States/Members#WikiProject_U.S._Government
• Wikipedia:WikiProject_United_States_Federal_Government_Legislative_Data
• Portal:Government_of_the_United_States
• Village pump proposals
• Village pump tech
• Bot approvals group

Maintenance

• Category:Members_of_the_United_States_House_of_Representatives
• Category:United_States_Senators

Questions

• Can opensecrets data be used directly?
• Is opensecrets a primary or secondary source for this data?
• Are opensecrets categorizations neutral and uncontroversial
• Are top-10 donor/donation lists useful and encyclopedic?

Relevant groups

• Represent.Us
• OpenSecrets.org
• Maplight.org
• Cato Foundation
• Sunlight Foundation
• RootStrikers

Participants

1. Ocaasi ^{t | c} 20:41, 3 April 2014 (UTC)
2. Joshuaglynn (talk) 20:42, 3 April 2014 (UTC)
3. Jimgreer70 (talk) 20:45, 3 April 2014 (UTC)