Talk:Pure Storage

Claims?

How can the PureStorage array use "20% of the space of traditional arrays" if the disks it uses provide about 10-20% of the capacity of traditional SAN arrays? (Flash disks are ~100gb per 2.5 disk, while SAS disks have 600gb per 2.5 disk)? This whole article reads like a copy/paste from their marketing material. --Darkstar (talk) 14:36, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Pure Storage is building an array for IOPS sensitive workloads, and comparing their array to traditional arrays configured for IOPS, which means 15 KRPM drives. At least today (Aguust 2013), the capacities of flash drives and 15 KRPM drives seem pretty comparable with 15 KRPM HDD capacities at 600 Gbyte and high performance SSD capacities around 800 Gbyte I also think you missed the part of the article that says "With an average 5.8-to-1 de-duplication ratio ...". Assuming that's accurate, you get you to the "20% of the power and space required for traditional arrays" claimed. Note that the techniques of compression and deduplication are impractical for use with rotating media used in block-based IOPS sensitive applications because of the additional IOPS they require.

Craigster0 (talk) 21:39, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Well generally I would agree with the first comment above, although the second comment seems technically correct. Wikipedia is probably not a good place for specific marketing claims, and the "big picture" with history and context in neutral tone should be done first. It should be much closer to that right now. From my experience, I would add that 15K RPM drives use generally about three year old technology, while flash continues to improve (note the year lag in those comments - 15K drives are the same speed, while flashes have gotten larger in that year, although many vendors include compression in their claims which clouds things even more). So perhaps something could be said about how the all-flash product is suited for those applications where every ounce of performance matters (there are hints certain US government agencies want this, for example, where "money is no object), while disks are tending to be used in the cases where capacity is the most important dimension (e.g. the multi-terabyte 3.5 inch disks that keep getting bigger), and all the various hybrid architectures in between. Hard to do in a neutral way that does not get dated quickly! W Nowicki (talk) 21:13, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

Needs update

Coming back to this article after three years: it needs to be updated to cover a major event: the IPO of 2015. What I am thinking is to merge the funding and management sections into a history section that presents a chronological narrative, instead of just a point-in-time list of executives. Perhaps even edit down the "Awards" since those are fairly common, and put those in context too, but small steps at a time. W Nowicki (talk) 19:58, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

Draft Proposed Edits for Pure Storage

My name is Ian Wikramanayake and I am the Social Media Manager at Pure Storage. The current page is not accurately representative of Pure Storage's history, nor does it comply with Wikipedia standards. I would like to share a draft [3] of a dramatically improved version that includes an expanded lead and history, a consolidated product section, and the removal of the promotional "awards" section as a replacement for the current page. I was hoping a disinterested editor might take the time to take a look and let me know if they have any feedback. Ianwikramanayake (talk) 16:29, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

@Timtempleton: I noticed you've made some edits in the past before. Do you have any interest in looking at the page? Ianwikramanayake (talk) 19:04, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

New Tag

I work in marketing at Pure Storage. @Sherwilliam: recently added a prominent banner accusing Pure Storage of covertly editing the page. However, there is no explanation of where these accusations are coming from, as the template seems to require.

After reviewing the article's editing history, my former colleague's user page (User:Ianwikramanayake), etc. all I see is @Atsme: implementing content my former colleague proposed and @Wugapodes: reverting a logo image for having the wrong URL, but nothing that would justify a badge of shame alleging malfeasance by Pure Storage in front of Wikipedia's massive readership.

I was hoping someone might be able to provide more context. If a Pure Storage employee is breaking Wikipedia's rules, I would want to investigate internally and see what I can do to make things right, but I can't find anything. KimberlyLe55 (talk) 18:20, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

As your entire marketing team is associated with Pure Storage, you can't directly edit to this page. But as you have admitted it yourself, you guys have done it several times, and probably have created the whole page yourself. As such, it is a severe violation of Wikipedia's terms of use. The tag is therefore justified. Sherwilliam (talk) 21:03, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

As an example, the page creator is a well-known paid editor. He has never made any disclosure regarding this page. Sherwilliam (talk) 21:07, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

@Sherwilliam: It looks like the page was created in 2011 by @AaronEndre:, presumably of Endre Communications. Although this was almost ten years ago, I left Aaron a note asking them to provide a disclosure.

I don't see anything in the Terms of Use that would prohibit Pure Storage from updating the logo image in the infobox from a disclosed account. Maybe you can point me to what you are referring to? Please let me know if there is anything else I should be doing to bring Pure Storage into compliance. KimberlyLe55 (talk) 19:15, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Ok. Ask him to disclose. I am not telling you about any particular edit. We all know Wikipedia's rules can be easily violated. Just ask your employees to edit at home. So, they become "home edits." The reason I tagged the page is because of a disturbingly similar pattern of abuse. Nobody in the right mind would add "The fastest growing company in corporate history" such and such to this page without an undisclosed COI. Since you guys are also openly editing, the tag is to alert other volunteers that "something fishy going on here." Probably good hand bad hands accounts. Any neutral editor may remove the tag. Although I would wait for the creator to disclose, I don't have any particular attachment toward that tag. By the way, stop pinging; I watch this page. In addition, the issue is low on my priority. I am not paid by Pure Storage, just in case you aren't aware. Sherwilliam (talk) 20:55, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I was asked to take a peek. Probably the best guidance at the moment is the wording of the tag itself. It says that there is a concern and leads to talking about article review / improvement with that concern in mind. To say it even shorter, article space tags are for article improvement. Not that anybody has said so, but it is not intended to be a eternal scarlet letter nor a way to deal with potential concerns about editor conduct issues. I'm in a hurry at this moment but would be happy to take a closer peek a later. Sincerely,North8000 (talk) 12:57, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

I gave it a close read. I don't see anything that is over-the-top promotional or biased, but IMO the article has an overall weakness due to being written by people close to or hired by the company. For example, IMO there are a few sentences where this is particularly bad....to a reader saying that AI was added to the 400 series is about as worthless as a sentence can get. A vague content-free statement (with no specifics) that a particular model has the hot-buzz word of the moment technology in it. A reader might be interested if this represents an overall move forward and some details on it, but there is none of that in there. Without me spending a lot of time on the details, my overall suggestion is to find 1 or two independent sources which write about the overall company in depth and incorporate material from them into the article and let them be more of a guide to the article.

Policy strongly discourages but does not prohibit direct editing. I read that to restrict direct editing to very very very safe edits. Either way you could use another set of eyes on edits. If you have any 100% shovel-ready proposed changes that you want me to take a look at and potentially put in, ping me and I'd be happy to. By "100% shovel ready" I mean an exact fully specified substitution (including exactly what text to take out and what to paste in in it's place) ready to go. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 15:00, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi @North8000:. I put together some proposed changes based on your feedback. Do these address your concerns? Or at least address them enough to resolve the tag? KimberlyLe55 (talk) 20:32, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

I'm more interested in helping you improve the article and you mostly focused on getting the tag removed. With a few of those changes you seemed to be taking out real info. But none of your changes are bad stuff regarding a COI. Here's my suggestion / offer:

• Make all of those changes, one sentence at a time.
• I'll revert a few of the changes as being unnecessary removals
• I'll take the tag off an instead put a section in this talk page that it needs improvement but IMO does not require a top level tag.
• You work to improve it from there.

Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 22:08, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

On second look, you should clear up the issues discussed on your talk page before doing any article editing, but maybe you did that already.North8000 (talk) 22:12, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Requested edits

Hi, my name is Zac and I work for Pure Storage. In compliance with WP:COI, I'd like to request a couple edits for an impartial editor to consider as follows:

• Remove COO Paul Mountford from the Key People parameter of the infobox. He no longer works for Pure Storage and nobody else holds the COO title.[4]

  I did this. McKay (talk) 03:53, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

• Update product description in the Products section:

Trim (or incorporate into history if preferred): Pure Storage has three primary product lines: FlashBlade for unstructured data, FlashArray//C which uses QLC flash, and the higher-end NVMe FlashArray//X. Its products use an operating system called Purity.

Replace with: Pure Storage develops and markets FlashArray, FlashBlade, and Portworx product families, as well as the Evergreen family of as-a-Service storage subscriptions. Some of its products use an operating system called Purity.

Explanation: This clarifies the sentence about the Purity operating system, because not all of Pure's products use it. The current content does not include all of Pure's product families and has a lot of technical jargon. This proposed rework is more concise and more complete.

I'm not sure the edits you're proposing? Are these new sources? Or is this some minor changes? McKay (talk) 03:44, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

I'd like to add a few sentences to the end of the Product History section as well. I'll get to work on that next.

Thank you for taking the time to take a look and weigh in. Let me know if I can be of any assistance. Best regards. ZacBond (talk) 22:06, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

So, I don't care enough about your company to really dig in and rewrite the article according to what I currently think are unclear requests. But I do care about the COI policy. There doens't appear to be much edit traffic here, so why don't you update a section or two in userspace, and I'll consider incorporating the text or some variant thereof? McKay (talk) 03:56, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

To illustrate how you might inadvertently introduce issues. From a reader's perspective, your proposed edit is a step backwards, not forwards. The previous version at least says a bit about what business those products / you are in. The wording of the new version is 100% dependent on internal jargon and so says less. North8000 (talk) 18:24, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

@Mckaysalisbury: The proposed new "Products" section is available here per your feedback. This would:

• Correct that the Purity operating system is only used in most (not all) products
• Correct/update the major product families/brands, while trimming lists of individual products
• Add some recent milestones to Product History, while trimming one sentence about an individual product release
• Incorporates North8000's feedback above with summaries of each product family

Thanks again for taking an impartial look. Most of the content in the draft is the same as what's on the page now, just with some updates/corrections/tweaks. However, if you spot anything promotional, it wouldn't hurt for us to fix it. The tag at the top of the page infers the current page has promotionalism issues I think. ZacBond (talk) 21:26, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: Please write a product history section that doesn't get lost in so much detail about product announcements. Best regards, -- Johannes (Talk) (Contribs) (Articles) 16:18, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

References

Following up after the peer review

Hey ZacBond, since I had to close the peer review, here are some improvements I think you could make to your draft so that it can be moved into the live article. In the future, I'd recommend asking questions like these at the Teahouse, where experienced editors can help you out with all kinds of different issues. Alright:

• The main concern I have is the use of overly technical language; phrases such as "generic consumer-grade" and "rapid restore, unstructured data, and analytics" are things that might trip up a reader without an industry-specific background. WP:MTAU § Avoid overly technical language has some useful guidelines that you should check out.
• I'd recommend putting product names in double quotes to identify them as names.
• "Pure Storage started selling storage as-a-service in 2017." is uncited.
• I could see an image of one of the products being helpful to this section. You could search Wikimedia Commons or upload an image following the policy at WP:IUP.
• Also, is it just me, or are there multiple links in the references that lead to error pages? I ran InternetArchiveBot on the draft, which should help things.

Let me know if you have any questions! —TechnoSquirrel69 (sigh) 10:00, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Copyright problem removed

Prior content in this article duplicated one or more previously published sources. The material was copied from: https://www.crn.com/news/storage/231500599/pure-storage-exits-stealth-mode-with-flash-only-array-55-million-in-funding.htm, https://www.purestorage.com/company/news-and-events/press/storreduce.html, https://www.marketwatch.com/press-release/pure-storage-announces-acquisition-of-storreduce-2018-08-21, http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/pure-storage-unveils-channel-partner-program-1683701.htm, http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/pure-storage-unveils-next-generation-flasharray-with-high-availability-flashcare-technology-1658047.htm, http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/pure-storage-advances-flasharray-with-ethernet-connectivity-protection-vmware-integration-1693848.htm, http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Pure-Storage-Present-Leveraging-Flash-Memory-Enterprise-Storage-Tutorial-Spring-2011-1422098.htm, http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/pure-storage-receives-40m-cash-infusion-accelerate-explosive-growth-initiate-european-1690999.htm and http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Pure-Storage-Breaks-Cost-Barrier-Mainstream-Flash-Adoption-With-First-All-Flash-1552544.htm. Copied or closely paraphrased material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a compatible license. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.)

For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, and, if allowed under fair use, may copy sentences and phrases, provided they are included in quotation marks and referenced properly. The material may also be rewritten, provided it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Therefore, such paraphrased portions must provide their source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 10:52, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

NB The infringing content was removed in 2018. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 10:53, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

Paid Contributions Tag

@Timtrent: recently restored the paid contributions tag that says the article does not comply with NPOV. @Johannes Maximilian: previously removed the tag, saying it was not necessary. According to the tag's instructions:

"Use this tag...when the article... is biased or has other serious problems... if you place this tag, you should promptly start a discussion on the article's talk page to explain what is non-neutral about the article. If you do not start a discussion, any editor will be justified in removing the tag without warning... the article should have a specific, articulatable, fixable problem. Do not apply this tag simply because you suspect COI editing, or because there is or was a COI editor."

While Pure Storage (my employer) has contributed a lot of content to the page, I've been having a hard time getting concrete feedback on any "specific, articulatable problem" with that content. I'm starting this discussion in order to comply with the template's instructions to start a conversation and hopefully prompt a discussion on any "specific, articulatable, fixable problem(s)". ZacBond (talk) 17:22, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

I was asked to have a look at it by the user above. The fundamental problem that generally follows articles severely plagued by public relations editing is inherent bias. Even without being as bold as saying "the industry leader in..." or "we're the best in ..." articles written by editors using sources provided by the company's communications/marketing department causes single sided coverage that tend to generous embellish awards, accolades and flattering aspects while omitting controversies, negative criticism and litigations. A neutral encyclopedic article should present contents in proportion to prominence they have received in independent sources. Since Timtrent put the template, we should see their reasoning before getting into specifics. Graywalls (talk) 17:57, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

@Graywalls Simple. See User:AaronEndre. I also concur with your Analysis 🇺🇦 Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 🇺🇦 18:05, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

Is there any reasonable explanation for the tag? I haven't had an in-depth look at the article yet so I cannot tell (yet), but as far as I can tell (as of now), there is no obvious flaw that is so striking that it cannot be overlooked. As stated by the OP, placing the tag is only warranted if there is an explanation present on the talk page. Everyone knows the usual generalisations that are put forward, and frankly, they are neither sufficient, nor helpful. Good paid editors have long switched to writing proper articles that don't contain "single sided coverage that tend to generous embellish awards, accolades and flattering aspects" of a topic. I'm not necessarily saying that this article has no problems (I haven't checked), but tagging good paid articles with the COI tag gives paid editors an incentive not to disclose, and I dare say the average Wikipedian fails to recognise good-quality UPE at first, second or even n-ed glance. I get the reasoning behind the COI tag (AaronEndre, a DPE, created the article back in 2011 and it's unclear whether or not the topic has since been notable, and whether the article has been created with good references to reliable secondary sources). Okay, that makes sense to me, and I let that pass (i.e., I do not disagree with the reinstatement of the COI tag until consensus is established). Now, I would like to point out that the article is now significantly different from when AaronEndre last edited it. Does the COI tag still make sense even after significant changes that have objectively improved the article, i.e., does the current version of the article still have an issue that warrants the COI tag? Maybe there's something that I don't see. Best regards, --Johannes (Talk) (Contribs) (Articles) 20:53, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

Still reads plenty boastful talking about how CIA invested, revenue surpassing certain amount. The coverage is not well proportioned. The amount of coverage on finances is disproportionate to general contents. It looks more tailored to investors than general readers... and promotionalism includes writing to stimulate the interest of investors. Graywalls (talk) 19:16, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

IMO nothing I see merits the severe tag or the criteria for placing and/or retaining it. The wording of the article looks like a pretty good effort at NPOV but is still weaker on the content that an outsider would write. Could use a few tweaks in wording (I might give that a try) plus additional editors adding material. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 23:00, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

@ZacBond: While I think that that tag should be removed, this article definitely needs work. Some of the issue ares are the ones discussed by Graywalls Also, IMO it is currently being IMO an edge case regarding wp:notability. To solve all of that you (or somebody) should find and 1 or 2 independent sources and cover the company in-depth and develop more material from what those sources write. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 12:44, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

I changed the tags. I explained the general slant due to the excessive proportion of article contents devoted to finances that may pique the interest of investors; and the GNG issue as you mentioned. Graywalls (talk) 22:59, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

Notability Tag

@Graywalls added a Notability tag a few months ago. Before removing it I would like to understand why it was added. Pure is apparently a significant technology company that is frequently covered by financial and technology news organizations, and the news searches auto-linked by the tag find many recent examples. Why would notability even be close to being in question? Rolandbd (talk) 05:15, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

I am seeing a lot of coverage on this are dependent sources such as press release derived(churnalism) and routine events like it went public, it got sued. Granted, I have not checked every single source. Which three indepedent, reliable, secondary sources satisfy WP:SIGCOV, WP:ORGDEPTH ? The coverage needs to be significant and include an independent analysis. Not just "according to... this company claims they did this.. and they're suing. Graywalls (talk) 07:18, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

@Rolandbd:, I see that you have no other edits and apparently created this account specifically to post here. Do you have any professional connection to the company? If I was certain that it was non-notable, I would have nominated for deletion. I tagged it as questionable notability as I have doubts about its notability. Courtesy ping to @North8000: as a prior recent participant to see if they have any comment Graywalls (talk) 07:27, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I am a former employee of Pure. I'm not sure what secondary sources you feel should count (I thought the whole point of the wikipedia notability guidelines was to leave the judgement of what is routine and what is worth reporting to the secondary sources). Anyway, a very quick search gives https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/15/technology/as-a-data-deluge-grows-companies-rethink-storage.html , https://blocksandfiles.com/2023/06/01/pure-revenues-shrink/ and https://www.nextplatform.com/2022/12/06/can-anyone-make-money-from-modern-storage/ , all of which include a significant amount of material covering Pure Storage along with independent analysis.

Do you think other pages for small companies such as VAST Data and Qumulo also should be tagged for notability review? Rolandbd (talk) 09:47, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Whataboutism is not useful here. North8000 (talk) 15:04, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, I know tone is hard to communicate. It's not whataboutism, it's a serious question whether it would be helpful to Wikipedia to tag other company pages at a similar level of notability that appear to be missing the tag. Rolandbd (talk) 15:13, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

I'd defer to Graywalls who is doing a more in depth analysis. That said, my quick glance lean is towards taking the tag off. North8000 (talk) 15:09, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Product section

My name is Zac and I work for Pure Storage. I'd like to propose the following rework of the Products section:

1. Products Section

−

Pure Storage develops all-flash storage arrays using DirectFlash modules that communicate directly with raw NAND flash chips, providing efficiencies in flash operations and environmental heating and power usage. It develops its own software and flash storage hardware.

+

The Pure Storage platform is a single, unified data storage and management platform based on all-flash technology comprising hardware and software products and subscription services, supporting a broad range of use cases.

References
References

Explanation: The proposed better represents Pure's current products, which are focused on services/subscription, rather than exclusively hardware/software.

ZacBond (talk) 17:45, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi. I went ahead and made the edit here, but am leaving the edit request open, so the responding editor can revert me if it was a bad edit. ZacBond (talk) 21:16, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

 Partly done Hi, I changed your edit so it better reflects your cited sources, but I think another editor should look over it again. Synonimany (talk) 18:06, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

@Synonimany: I just expanded a bit on the one-sentence Products section, while keeping it much shorter than it used to be. Please feel free to revert me or make edits if I did anything wrong. ZacBond (talk) 22:50, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

 Already done closing this as the products section is sufficiently different to make this completely obsolete. Feel free to open another request if you want anything followed up on. Rusalkii (talk) 00:59, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

Okay, looking into the edit history @ZacBond, please wait for someone to approve your change before making it. This does tend to take a while, sorry, but if you have a conflict of interest the change needs to be reviewed by an uninvolved editor before it happens. Rusalkii (talk) 01:02, 16 August 2024 (UTC)