Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard/Archive 66

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Sri Kumaran Ramalingam

User was creating an article about themself. Rcsprinter (gossip) @ 09:55, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Louise Blouin Media

Louise Blouin Media appears to have been created by someone using a username similar to the real-world name of an employee of that company, and to have been subsequently edited by at least three other editors with usernames very similar to the real-world names of other employees of the company, who of course may or may not actually be those employees. The edit histories of two of them also include massive and systematic additions or modifications of external links to the website(s) of the same company in many articles here. I have left {{Uw-coi}} notices on their talkpages. Can the problems arising from this all be dealt with here? If not, who else should be notified? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 17:55, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm going to take a look now but can you help us out by listing all of the affected articles in the top of the report that you mention in your report?
I'm weary of assuming that these people are actually working for the company, off the bat, but that won't matter. We can still address the issue.
To save us some time, can you provide links that show the comparison between the usernames and the employees?
You obviously have done some work here and have some evidence. It will be helpful to people here at COIN if you share that evidence with us. OlYeller21Talktome 22:30, 11 August 2013 (UTC)
OK, thanks for your reply. I'm concerned that providing too much evidence may come uncomfortably close to outing some editors. I've now added above two more pages closely connected with the first, and three more editors. I have identified the potential connected editors as {{connected contributor}}s on the talkpage of each of those three articles. A quick Google search for "Louise Blouin Media" (with quotes) together with an intelligent guess at the real-world name of each of the seven editors, based on the username, comes up in some but not all cases with the position, past or present, of an individual with a closely similar name within the company. Those that do not immediately show up in such a way show a closely similar pattern of editing, at different times, on one or more of the three articles mentioned above. User:JPLei has over 500 edits, all (well, all that I have checked) adding links to artinfo.com to the pages of various artists; Antonyj0403 has recently been active changing each one of those to Blouinartinfo.com. I believe this to be a serious, far-ranging, substantial and possibly systematic abuse of this wiki, but have nowhere near the skills or experience to be sure. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:04, 11 August 2013 (UTC)
So can anyone offer any response here? I'd really like to know what, if anything, could or should be done about this. Thank you, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:35, 13 August 2013 (UTC)
I'd be really happy to read any comments people might like to make on this. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:32, 19 August 2013 (UTC)
He's still doing it. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:05, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Alumni list for Bronx High School of Science

GabrielF discounted my requests to have my name added to the list of alumni of the Bronx High School of Science by sending me this note after my third or fourth request: "Why don't you post your request at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard? GabrielF (talk) 03:54, 22 August 2013 (UTC)" So that's what I am doing.

I graduated BX Science in 1976. There are already many of my classmates and about 70 more alumni listed. Although some (8) are Nobel Laureates, some only have such notable qualifications as "biologist", "Conservative Rabbi", "ecologist", "Professional ballroom dancer", "Professor", "owner of a printing company", and then there's the former runner up in a beauty pageant. If we forget everything else that I did - forget the acting, which should be good enough since I have been in "multiple notable films, television shows, & other productions" as can be verified on IMDb here: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm4582170/ and elsewhere with minimum searching; forget the authoring, which should be good enough since I have had 10 or more blogs and articles on 12 Step Recovery on InTheRooms.com: http://bamrubenstein.caimanhunter.com/published015_itr_02.html, http://na-blog.com, and have spoken at numerous NA conventions as the keynote speaker, some of my MP3s are listed here: http://bamrubenstein.caimanhunter.com/speakertapes.html; the over 2 years of monthly columns in Biker Living magazine; and forget all the other accolades that I've received, such as attaining the rank of Chief of a fire department, being a crew chief in the US Air Force Fire Department, being the Commander of a medical standby company, and having attained the certifications and degrees as a fire science instructor, HazMat tech and Science Officer and guest instructor at TEEX Fire Science Training School at Texas A&M University.

Forgetting all of those, I believe I rank among notable alumni of Bronx Science due to one undeniable thing that I've accomplished - which meets all of your criteria - and that is my work with caiman. You might not know what they are and you might not think that they or it's a big deal, but caiman are one of only 23 different types of crocodilians, they are the third nastiest of all crocodilians and caiman have been on the endangered species list in the past and are still on the protected watch list. I was called "the US' #1 authority on Caiman" by Reptile Channel. Reptiles magazine called me an "Expert in my Field" and had me do an article on caiman for them - the article can be found here: http://caimanhunter.com/expert.html; Reptile Radio interviewed me and did a one hour show focused on my and my work with caiman, which can be found here: http://caimanhunter.com/images/videos/reptileradioshowwbam.mp3; I was asked to do my own 1/2 hour weekly blogtalkradio listener call-in show on caiman called, "Live with the CaimanHunter" - archives of past shows can be found here: http://my.blogtalkradio.com/bam-the-caimanhunter; my rescue operation was seen on Fox7 News and I was interviewed by Nancy Zambrano - the piece that aired can be seen here: http://caimanhunter.com/images/videos/thrallcaimannews.mpg; I have gotten calls from Texas Fish and Wildlife to capture loose caiman; and I have a web site dedicated to caiman that is extensively used as a resource by Bayou Beasts, ZooKeepers, and other reputable reptile rescues. My work with caiman, alone, should get me on the alumni list, if not a page on Wikipedia all to myself.

GabrielF thought that I should come here since, for some unknown reason, she kept turning my requests down. The first time she wrote: "I will not add your name to the list of alumni of The Bronx High School of Science. Our policy on lists of alumni can be found at WP:ALUMNI. In order for an individual to be considered notable, we require that that person be covered by multiple, reliable secondary sources, for instance, newspaper or magazine articles. We do not consider IMDB or an Amazon authors page to be reliable sources as they can be written by the article subject and there is no editorial review. GabrielF (talk) 16:15, 19 August 2013 (UTC)" But even though IMDb articles may be written by the subjects, checking their stats against the movies pages themselves or doing any number of other searches should remove that obstacle, as well as the fact the IMDb does background checks before they will let you say you were in a movie.

The second time she wrote: "Respectfully, I am certain from the links that you have provided that you have lived a rich and fulfilling life. However, I do not believe that you would meet the notability guidelines for inclusion in Wikipedia. You've presented some articles that you've written and some places in which you've been quoted. Some of this is relevant, some of it is not. For instance, I could not find your name in the Austin American Statesman article. And we do not accept IMDB as a reliable source for reasons that I described above. What's left are a couple of articles that you've written, which we would not consider evidence of notability as they are not independent of you as a source, and a couple of local or specialized publications where you've been interviewed or quoted. All of this is commendable, but I do not believe it meets the notability criteria in terms of depth of coverage. Consider that the alumni list includes eight Nobel laureates. I have no conflicts of interest regarding anything that you've been involved with. If you would like another editor to look at this issue, I would recommend posting at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/noticeboard. GabrielF (talk) 03:52, 20 August 2013 (UTC)" If some is relevant, and that covers the minimum requirements, what's the problem?

And finally she wrote, "Why don't you post your request at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard? GabrielF (talk) 03:54, 22 August 2013 (UTC)" So I am.

Thank you, Lee Bam "CaimanHunter" Rubenstein Bx Science class of 1976 — Preceding unsigned comment added by BRubens (talk • contribs)

Alumni lists are limited to those persons who either have an article on Wikipedia or are likely to have an article in the future. Our inclusion standards for biographies can be found at WP:BIO. From the information you have provided, I agree with GabrielF that you do not meet our notability standards. This is not a slight against you, or an attempt to diminish your work, but a simple interpretation of Wikipedia's inclusion guidelines. The reason we discourage conflicts of interest is that it is generally impossible for a person to think objectively with regard to themselves or very closely related subjects. The advice we always give to people is to not try to add themselves (in an article or in a list) to Wikipedia. If you really think you meet the notability guideline and want to ignore this advice, you may consider submitting a draft article on yourself to WP:AFC, where an experienced editor will review it, and if you have an article, then it would be appropriate to add you to some lists. Someguy1221 (talk) 05:14, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
I'd also advise that you read these essays before submitting an article for creation request:
--Drm310 (talk) 06:03, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Conflict of interest usernames which might be of interest to you

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Sexycristina As far as the talkpage mentions is that the current user violated the Wikipedia's conflict of interest rule by using above as a username. He/she didn't made a single edit, but her userpage was deleted, but the talkpage remained. What should we as a community do?--Mishae (talk) 04:00, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Sovtek The current user is apparently using a Russian company name (see above).--Mishae (talk) 04:34, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Aveda The current user is apparently using his or her user name for a promotional reason. See the top for clarification.--Mishae (talk) 05:01, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

  • No violation. Such a name is allowed, and there are no active or deleted edits to suggest abuse. Drmies (talk) 19:11, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Brooklyn riot This user apparently promotes the music group, see the userpage for more info.--Mishae (talk) 05:06, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

  • already blocked. Drmies (talk) 19:11, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Riddick7 This user uses a brand name of a video game. Conflict of interest?--Mishae (talk) 05:13, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

  • No violation, no active or deleted edits to suggest abuse. Drmies (talk)

Ultra Games This user is using Australian Ultra Games as his user name, a clear username violation here!--Mishae (talk) 05:23, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Agentia imobiliara Inter-Med Sibiu Uses the name of a foreign agency.--Mishae (talk) 05:31, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't necessarily disagree with any of the above and some probably are conflicts of interest. But shouldn't each of these be referred to WP:UAA first? Stalwart111 10:46, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
I tried to do it with Sexycristina and they referred me to here.--Mishae (talk) 14:15, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
I'll address them individually.
It looks like Peridon is handling the Sexycristina issues. There are several but the damage has been reversed at this point.
I can't see deleted edits but Sovtek doesn't appear to be violating WP:USERNAME because they aren't promoting the company. If my last name is Ford and my username is Ford55, the username isn't a violation unless I start posting promotional material for Ford on my userpage (or elsewhere, maybe). I left a COI template on their talk page.
Aveda's edits have all been deleted so I can't see what they did. Assuming there was damage done, it's been deleted and they've stopped editing. I left a COI template on their talk page.
Brooklyn Riot's username is a WP:USERNAME violation because it promotes a group and is seemingly used by a group. They've used "we" to describe themselves but that was probably to describe the musical group as opposed to who has control over the account. I reported the name at UAA and it should be blocked soon.
Riddick7 - I understand the concern but it's not really a problem until they make it a problem. It's definitely not a COI. UAA probably wouldn't even respond. Any promotional edits would probably be best handled with WP:NPOV and WP:SPAM.
UltraGamesAU is a WP:USERNAME violation and has been reported. I'm hesitant to deletion of the userpage because it could be a legitimate article, although notability isn't established yet (there may be a claim of importance). I tagged it as a userpage with no indexing and moved it to a subpage. It's no longer being indexed by Google to curb any hopes of it being an effective WP:FAKEARTICLE. If you ever want to do that, you can always tag such a userpage with {{userpage}} and {{noindex}}.
WP:USERNAME violation. Reported. OlYeller21Talktome 14:47, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
Well, if Softek's user name would have been Smirnov like Smirnov Vodka I won't complain much since its a common Russian last name, just like Ford is in the United States. But Softek is different. Either way, do you mind and see if this user is violating anything as well?
There is no indication whatsoever that Sovtek95 has anything to do with Sovtek and given the name consideration given above, I can't find anything wrong with it. Drmies (talk) 19:04, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
  • user talk:CarbonNeutralCompany The user name refers to The Carbon Neutral Company.
  • User talk:Lifesure Insurance Don't know of such company, but it sounds like an insurance company. Thanks.--Mishae (talk) 17:25, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
  • OK, none of this should be here, really. I have deleted Lifesure's contribution and that of their associate, AKY97; I've blocked both accounts, Lifesure's for spam and username. I've blocked the Carbon joint for a username violation and tagged the article as advertisement; the outfit seems to be notable but the article is not good. Drmies (talk) 18:58, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
  • They're all taken care of; I'm going to close this so it can be archived. Thanks, but please consider two things: WP:UAA, and our username policy. There's more than one dog called Fido (or Sovtek), and resemblance isn't always abuse; one must look at details and contributions. Thanks. Drmies (talk) 19:11, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Obvious COI at McMurry University

Editor keeps re-inserting a very, very fluffy list of "notables". The COI is obvious from their user page, which contains this rather unacceptable message: "I work at McMurry University. Unless you an official of McMurry University, do not undo my edits." They're persistent and they're just asking for a block for COI and OWNership, not to mention plugging their employer, which is what their (non-MOS compliant) version of the "notables" list is doing. Drmies (talk) 18:39, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

  • They just left a rather pissy message identifying themselves, on their talk page. Drmies (talk) 18:50, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
  • And now they are removing their own edits, in a kind of reverse ownership move. An IP has come along, with edits of mixed value--I can't really tell if it's the same editor as the named account. Any admins around who can maybe wave a stick? Oh, and see the account's user page. It's pretty mild for an attack page, but it's not kosher. Drmies (talk) 22:01, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

User:Martin raul campos at Edgar Perez and The Speed Traders

User:Martin raul campos has created extensively edited the above articles, on Perez, "an American author and entrepreneur" and his book The Speed Traders, together with the recently-deleted Knightmare On Wall Street (book) (see AfD [1]), and appears to be unconcerned with the promotional tone of the material, despite being informed of policy and guidelines (see for example his deletion of notability and advertisement tags here: [2]). I have also repeatedly drawn the attention of Martin raul campos to Wikipedia:Conflict of interest policy, but had no satisfactory response. Given his editing behaviour, it seems entirely reasonable to me at least to assume that there is indeed a conflict of interest. I would therefore ask for comment by other editors/admins as to what might be the best course of action to deal with this issue. AndyTheGrump (talk) 14:46, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

He's just removed the notability and advertisement tags again: [3]. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:28, 27 August 2013 (UTC)


Hi Andy, thanks for your help. I have no relationship with Edgar Perez I just found his books particularly interesting and that's why I was editing them. I was trying to make it more neutral but unfortunately you erased the page. I understand all the guideline and policy of wikipedia so I respect what you've done. I'm just learning that's why I couldn't do it correctly. I think I'm going study and practice more before I move a new article. Thanks for everything Martin CamposMartin raul campos (talk) 15:40, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Frankly, given your editing behaviour, I don't believe that for one minute. And I haven't 'erased' anything. The article on Knightmare On Wall Street was deleted is the result of a community discussion - one which you didn't even attempt to participate in. And if you are proposing to recreate the article on Knightmare On Wall Street, I'd strongly advise against it, as it is clear that there simply aren't the third-party sources to establish the level of notability required to meet Wikipedia guidelines. I suspect that this may well be true of The Speed Traders too, given that the 'reviews' linked in the article seem mostly be cited to minor websites and/or blogs of little note. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:47, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
  • Hmm. While the plethora of for instance inline URLs in earlier versions of the Perez article are certainly not acceptable, I can't see as yet that it is evidence of a COI, or of spamming. Ukexpat cleaned it up considerably and Campos has not reverted those edits. As for the book, it's iffy: it's not totally neutral, but what appears to be advertising is sourced to a Bloomberg review. What's more, the four reviews together do suggest notability at least by our (regrettably low) standards for reviews and books, so I can't really argue against their removal of the notability tag. While there certainly is a whiff of more than usual interest in those topics, as an admin I wouldn't act on it. I would suggest that Campos acquaint themselves thoroughly with our guidelines for neutral editing and proper referencing, and that they take Andy's advice to heart. Drmies (talk) 18:47, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
The only citation to Bloomberg in the article was to this [4], which mentions neither Perez nor his book The Speed Traders. Given that it was accordingly being 'cited' for material that it couldn't possibly support, I've removed it. AndyTheGrump (talk) 13:01, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Looking for help with Accenture article

Hello, I'm currently working on behalf of the company Accenture, looking to improve two articles here on Wikipedia: the article for Accenture itself, as well as that of the company's chairman & CEO, Pierre Nanterme. Since I have a financial COI here, I won't be making any edits myself; instead, I've proposed changes on Talk:Accenture and Talk:Pierre Nanterme, and have been trying to solicit help from volunteer editors to review the changes. However, it's been something of a struggle to find folks to help, despite posting in a number of locations, like Paid Editor Help, as well as reaching out to some editors individually. User:FeralOink was helping out at Accenture for a bit, but they seem to be busy now, and one of the remaining issues there is something I'd like another perspective on anyway. So, if someone here is willing to take a look and give me a hand here, it would be very much appreciated. Thanks in advance! ChrisPond (Talk · COI) 18:48, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

I've made the requested changes to Pierre Nanterme. I'm happy to make some changes to Accenture, but some seem to have been made already? I can compare the two but it might be quicker if you could clarify which are still left to make? Maybe start a new edit request? Cheers, Stalwart111 10:47, 28 August 2013 (UTC)
Hey Stalwart111, thanks for your help on Nanterme, and sorry about the confusion on Accenture. The conversation got a bit messy at one point. I've now cleaned it up, creating a new section at Talk:Accenture called Outstanding issues which contains just the requests that have yet to be addressed. If you have time to take a look, would really appreciate it! Cheers, ChrisPond (Talk · COI) 13:53, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

User:Jcmeberhard

User came to WT:MED asking for eyes on a deletion discussion (for Malafa). Entered vote, but upon looking at user page Noticed that all articles they created were physicians from Moffitt cancer center, seemed pretty thin on RS, and were rather obvious resumes. See also this deletion discussion. Articles spring apparently fully formed from this editor, without collaboration, AfC, or sandbox activity. [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 18:51, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

If I am correct, this editor has created three articles, one of which has been deleted. These articles are about cancer researchers. These new articles are not about garage bands or brand new fashion brands, or internet memes, or anime characters. These are about physicians and professors at a leading cancer research center. And on their talk page, this new editor has shown a willingness to learn our policies and guidelines, and comply with them. Of course, this new editor has made mistakes. Most new editors have, though perhaps UseTheCommandLine never has made a mistake. If there was a policy here that says that editors with a conflict of interest are simply not allowed to edit Wikipedia, then I would agree that action should be taken against this editor. But so far, what I see is a new editor creating articles in good faith about people they believe are notable. I was an amateur California mountaineer in my youth. When I started editing Wikipedia, I created quite a few articles about notable California mountaineers, people far more accomplished than I. Experienced editors welcomed me and praised my beginner's work. Why not offer a similar greeting to this new editor? I don't see any cause to pillory this new editor. Encouragement and explanation seem far more appropriate to me. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 03:59, 29 August 2013 (UTC)
Good faith? I disagree. The created articles are promotional. A second of this user's articles looks like it's going to be deleted now, and the user is fighting against the deletion, so I don't know how that fits with a your impression of a willingness to learn policies and guidelines, because if they had read WP:COI and WP:Conflicts of interest (medicine) then they would now not be arguing for the article to kept. Lesion (talk) 10:14, 29 August 2013 (UTC)
The COI seems fairly obvious. Please however don't bite him because (1) he's done a reasonably complete job on the biographies, and this would have taken him time (2) he's only ever been polite. I think this is a case of a new editor not understanding Wikipedia policies and how it works, rather than anything malicious. Barney the barney barney (talk) 15:59, 29 August 2013 (UTC)
That's fine as far as it goes, but people can be polite while still doing harmful things. happens all the time. I'm fairly confident that there is indeed a CoI here, and what I'm most curious about is if this was something this editor was told to do, in which case I feel like that should be pushed back against somehow (how exactly i'm not so sure), or whether it was their own idea, in which case i'd be a lot more inclined to be nicey-nice. If the former, though, I think it's important to relay to decision makers at these sorts of institutions that this is unwelcome behavior.
As for point number one, well it looks like they were more or less editing during typical work hours, and presumably getting paid for it. whether that took them time or not, i don't much care. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 16:10, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Anastasia International

This Anastasia International article has had some really suspicious activity on it for the last 6-8 months. A major contributor was blocked for being a sockpuppet (User:Entyre) and I'm currently in discussions that other users now editing the page might be sockpuppets of that user. However, on that discussion page, which you can see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Alexis418, Alexis418 admitted that he used to work for the company, which for me means he has a Wikipedia:COI. Not only this, all the edits I make trying to improve the article and clarify the companies controversy, he is merely reverting. I personally don't think someone who could be a disgruntled ex employee should be editing this page, especially when all they are doing is reverting edits. Verdict78 (talk) 10:35, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

Still having problems with a disgruntled ex-employee on this page, could someone look into this and advise how to proceed please. Again, on the sockpuppet page (link above) Alexis418 said he'd worked for the company previously. In the last 10 days the user has reverted around 10 attempted improvements. During this 10 day period, he has made no effort to improve the article, merely explain briefly on the talk page why he doesn't think the change should take place. He constantly keeps repeating he knows a lot about the company but yet is to make a single improvement on the page during this period. It wouldn't surprise me if he sees this and does just that! To me its obvious (for whatever reason) this user is blocking any progression of this page, with no intention of making any changes. I hope someone can look into this sooner rather than later, because this is eating into my editing time considerably. Verdict78 (talk) 22:37, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Verdict78 might consider doing more thorough research on the subject material, so that his edits would be accurate and stick. I've repeatedly suggested we try to come up with a clear common description of our common and different viewpoints so that we can solicit 3rd opinions where we differ. Reading the conflict of interest policy carefully, I do not have a conflict of interest. I do have a personal interest, but not a financial or otherwise conflictual one. If we don't allow people to edit areas where they have a personal interest, unfortunately we would also be disabling the editors who have the most knowledge about specific subjects. Any other editors who are interested to help with the Anastasia International article are welcome. I had previously asked for a 3rd opinion but the editor who came to help said we had not articulated our 2 positions well enough on the talk page to be ready for that yet. Alexis418 (talk) 07:02, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

You do have a conflict of interest and I quote - "Any external relationship – personal, religious, political, academic, financial, and legal – can trigger a conflict of interest." You've just admitted above to having a 'personal' interest in the outcome of the article. Not only this you also stated that you were previously an employee of the business on the sockpuppet discussion here. You are yet to make a single edit on the page, and are reverting every change I make. You also seem to 'become active' on the page the minute anyone seems to change the article dramatically as you can see on your history page. My personal opinion in dealing with you and viewing all this information is that for the last 6 months you have sat, reverting edits on a single page. You are a single use account, and have openly admitted to having a COI on TWO occasions now. Can someone please look into this so that myself and other real editors can get on with improving Wikipedia Verdict78 (talk) 08:27, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

That is hilarious, Verdict78. I don't have an external relationship with Anastasia, none whatsoever. I did in the past and I acknowledged it, I have an interest just as many people with knowledge of topics have that knowledge related to their interest in the topic. I doubt you could say the same. Is it a coincidence that the chrunchbase page you just decided to reference was modified to say exactly what you wanted it to say in the past few days? 10 days ago it didn't say what it does now - http://web.archive.org/web/20130807215042/http://crunchbase.com/company/anastasia-web - you've had it changed, or changed it yourself, to support a fantasy that Anastasia's dark past was cut off from its present. Yes, there's a conflict of interest here - now how about you tell the truth and reveal it, because you are the one with the conflict of interest to whitewash the company's business practice. Who is paying you, and how much, to whitewash the Wikipedia page for Anastasia? Alexis418 (talk) 08:44, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Deflecting the investigation to me - nice work! Funny you say that you don't have an external relationship with Anastasia, even though you say on two occasions that you do? Rather than wasting my time arguing with you, I think I'll let others decide who is in the wrong. Verdict78 (talk) 10:10, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

As I have said in the past, I have a PAST employment relationship with the company and at present only an INTEREST but not an external or material interest. Perhaps you should go back and do what I have suggested 5x to you, you should actually READ the references that you keep deleting, instead of creating fake references of your own on the internet - and after you have READ the references, then we can together come up with a common statement of our different opinions of what are the relevant sources and then ask for 3rd party suppert. You are like your president Obama whose strategy in every election has been disqualifying in one way or another and trying to befriend the media and police, rather than making a valid case. Meanwhile, the question remains, why were YOU so INTERESTED in Anastasia that you went out of your way to EDIT an EXTERNAL PAGE in order to support your case that was not based on any publicly available information, Verdict??? You're right, something STINKS in the article, and it's Your Side that is "Interested". I reread your comments on another page and you are talking about MALTA and say "It's not a corporate office"... Well I found at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/5/prweb10740233.htm that MARK BROOKS is currently CHIEF STRATEGY OFFICER of ANASTASIA -> http://www.meetup.com/Expats-Malta/members/12174821/ and is in MALTA. I also noticed that you love to post links to Mark Brooks Blog http://www.onlinepersonalswatch.com/markbrooks/mediterranean/ ?? and that an editor Mcbrooks has editied Anastasia article? But maybe he prefer to IP edit from MALTA? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/McBrooks is deleted and that's fine because I prefer to focus now on the subject material, not so much obsess about other editors. Do you work for McBrooks, is that why you have edited an external page in order to fill out a story to make it something Mark Brooks would approve of? Just wondering but since you bring this subject up in the COI page let's all be honest now. Alexis418 (talk) 07:30, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

It's even more interesting than this. I have taken a look at Graham Philips (supposed sockmaster, if I'm not mistaken Verdict78 is even trying to accuse me of being his sockpuppet.) and Mcbrooks more closely. Look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Mcbrooks - this sockpuppet investigation was "deleted" by Rschen7754 on April 19 at 4:58. Then a few hours later, Rschen7754 closed the "GrahamPhilips" sockpuppet "investigation": http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3ASockpuppet_investigations%2FGrahamWPhillips&diff=560581229&oldid=560579468 - With a $100 million budget, it's likely that this company convinced Rschen7754 to do both these things to ban all editors who disagreed with them. Maybe it was a coincidence and Rschen7754 was just cleaning out the sockpuppet page that day. I'll ask Rschen7754 to comment whether or not anyone contacted him/her with a request to act on these 2 "investigations". Alexis418 (talk) 07:56, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

I deleted that investigation because you provided no proof to back up your claims of sockpuppetry. Before that, a CU had rejected the request for CU. And the accusation of my being paid to close or otherwise handle SPIs in a certain way is ridiculous. --Rschen7754 08:06, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
I agree with Rschen7754 here. I don't understand why you keep making out everyone is a paid editor? It would be great if someone can look at this issue. Alexis418's reverts have caused the page to become protected. Verdict78 (talk) 11:10, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
I raised the point because many of the original editors of this page were sockpuppets who are employees of the company at present, even Corporate officers. You edited an external page in order to support your point. Why would an independent person do something like that? So it's consistent that your edits are motivated. Alexis418 (talk) 20:46, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
Found these two hostile discussions that I think should be noted. Discussion 1 and Discussion 2 Verdict78 (talk) 14:39, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Video Unlimited

The contents of the Video Unlimited Wikipedia are wrong, particularly the countries that Video Unlimited is listed as being available in. We've submitted corrected copy on the Talk page for that entry but we're hoping to expedite the issue by flagging it here.

Here's the page's current copy:

The service includes films from several major studios, including Sony's own studio; Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Fox Home Entertainment, Lionsgate Home Entertainment, MGM Home Entertainment, NBCUniversal (Universal Studios), Paramount Home Entertainment, Walt Disney Home Entertainment, Warner Home Video, 2 entertain, BBC and RTÉ. It can be accessed through Sony Blu-ray players, personal computers, the PlayStation 3, Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc, BRAVIA televisions and some portable music players.[1] It has been announced that the PlayStation 4 will also be able to stream content from VU on launch day. It became available in the United States of America in June 2010, on the night of Sonys E3 2010 announcement it launched Canada, in July 2010. It launched in the United Kingdom and Ireland in September 2010 and in China, Hong Kong and Japan on 26 January 2011. It launched in all European union countries including Scandinavia (except in Finland), Greece, Germany, France, Spain, Italy and Portugal in June 2011 (originally scheduled for November 2010). It launched in Australasia in July 2011. On 2 November 2012, it also became available in South Korea.

Here's our requested edits, which just deal with factual inaccuracies:

The service includes TV episodes and new release films as well as a wide variety of favorites, classics and local language movies from all major studios, including Sony's own studio; Sony Pictures Entertainment, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal Pictures, Paramount Pictures, Walt Disney Pictures, and Warner Bros, as well as many small and independent studios. It can be accessed through Sony Blu-ray players, personal computers, the PlayStation 3, Sony Xperia smartphones and tablets , BRAVIA televisions and some portable music players.[1] It has been announced that the PlayStation 4 will also be able to stream content from VU on launch day.
It became available in the United States of America in February 2010 in the United States and expanded to the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain in November 2010. The service later launched in Japan, in January, 2011, Canada in February, 2011 and Australia in June 2011

Help here would be appreciated since we want to make sure to respect the Wikipedia community and the process for making changes. User:Gbelloni (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

  • I revised the article. Video Unlimited and Music Unlimited probably should be listed at AfD since they merely are software offered by Sony Entertainment Network, where that software may be included in things like Sony's Tablets. The Sony Entertainment Network article can adequately cover both the Video Unlimited and Music Unlimited topics. -- Jreferee (talk) 16:28, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

National Museum of Patriotism

National Museum of Patriotism, about a formerly physical, now virtual museum, has recently been expanded with some overtly self-interested edits[5], including some content expressly credited to the director of the museum. Some of these changes strike me as sufficiently-sourced improvements, other changes may be viewed as excessive and not NPOV. And some of the content sounds like it may have come directly from museum literature, although I haven't yet spotted any clear copying. Attention from some COI-experienced editors would be beneficial. --Arxiloxos (talk) 16:53, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

  • The article should be moved to National Foundation of Patriotism, with information on the National Museum of Patriotism being part of the foundation's history, assuming that "he organization would be renamed The National Foundation of Patriotism. The organizational structure would remain similar to the original." is true. The overtly self-interested edits can be reported at Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard. -- Jreferee (talk) 15:23, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Catalan Way

Dear board, I'm seeking some advice on the above mentioned article. It is about a highly controversial and very recent topic (part of the article has not yet taken place). In my view, Wikipedia is being used for Campaigning as described in WP:COI. This article is used in the following website [6] as campaigning material to promote certain political views by a group of editors. I cannot however prove that these editors are directly involved in the webpage mentioned. In my opinion, this article does not follow Wikipedia's policy as it shows a tendentious approach WP:PEACOCK and WP:POV Arcillaroja (talk) 14:00, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

  • For a conflict, you would need to link a specific editor to a close personal or business connection with the September 11, 2013 event article topic. The topic likely is attracting editors with a bias (which is not the same as a conflict). You may want to post at Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard. The article topic is the September 11, 2013 event, which should be only about things that have happened so far towards the event. All the "this will/may happen" items seem more speculation and, as you mention, promotional. Phrases like "The human chain will follow" should be rewritten to focus on what in fact has already happened, e.g. "The route for the human chain was finalized on xxx, and is planned to cross 86 towns and municipalities." (there's no need to list the towns and municipalities). The Background section should be removed since Catalan independence is a better place for it. In short, post at Neutral point of view/Noticeboard and suggest that the article be trimmed/stubbed until after the September 11, 2013 event per WP:NOTCRYSTAL. You also may want to post at Wikipedia:No original research/Noticeboard with regard to the Background section in the article. -- Jreferee (talk) 14:55, 31 August 2013 (UTC)
  • Thanks for your advice! I'll follow it! Arcillaroja (talk) 15:44, 31 August 2013 (UTC)
  • I don't understand why the "Background" section should be removed. The article "Catalan independence" explains all the history of the movement. But this section is specifically about the recent events since 2010 Catalan autonomy protest, not included in "Catalan independence". The 2012 demonstration received all this international media coverage:
2012 references

The organizers said there will be more than 200 journalists accredited in the Catalan Way, more than last year. Therefore, it will be again in the international focus and it's important to have a complete article. --Davidpar (talk) 17:05, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Utente:L rizzi

Editor appears to be promoting his company, although he's made good previous contributions so unsure as to why he'd decide to promote suddenly, Also I've pointed him to COI, Thanks →Davey2010→→Talk to me!→ 02:11, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

James Cantor

Despite0 a pledge on his user page regarding conflict of interests when it comes to articles relating to transsexualism, a arbitration case involving said COIs, and his well-known professional affiliations with Ray Blanchard, it appears that Dr. Cantor is still editing in areas he, by his own admission, shouldn't. This diff, in particular, is rather disconcerting; it's directly in his userpage pledge, and he seems to be violating the spirit of WP:CLAIM. I haven't looked into the edits to the GID article too closely, but he seems to be removing citations under SPS; while often permissible, the fact that one of the people removed was explicitly thanked in IJT for her work on the issue (doi:10.1080/15532739.2010.509201) is also rather concerning. Sceptre (talk) 13:39, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

  • Give that James Cantor is a long time editor and that there are arbitration decisions related to James Cantor, its important that we take things one step at a time. Please post evidence (diff, etc.) of James Cantor's close personal or business connection with Ray Blanchard. If it is established that James Cantor has a COI with Ray Blanchard topics, we then can figure out what action to take, if any, based on James Cantor's posts in view of WP:COI, Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Sexology, and the talk page pledge. -- Jreferee (talk) 14:32, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
    • Cantor and Blanchard work together at Toronto's Centre for Addiction and Mental Health; see Blanchard's University of Toronto page, which reads "Blanchard’s research in collaboration with two former postdoctoral students ... James M. Cantor" and "In collaboration with his CAMH colleague, James M. Cantor, he is pursuing the hypothesis that ...". ResearchGate lists him, along with Ken Zucker, as mutual top co-authors. And I've linked to his pledge on his user page. Sceptre (talk) 14:43, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
      • COI - James Cantor has a COI with the Ray Blanchard topic. -- Jreferee (talk) 14:59, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
      • Regarding the gender identity disorder topic, many people in the world contribute to the topic's growth, so I don't think it can be shown that James Cantor has close personal or business connection with the gender identity disorder topic so as to establish a COI with the topic. -- Jreferee (talk) 14:59, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
      • Regarding the arbitration case, the Final decision does not appear to offer much guidance in this situation. The standard I would apply here for COI (and non-COI) situations is whether editing by James Cantor of sexology articles draws attention and causes concern. (See SilkTork 22:19, 31 January 2013). -- Jreferee (talk) 16:03, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
      • The talk page pledge was made in February 2009.[7] It doesn't appear to have been made in response to any consensus (such made after an arbitration holding), so the pledge would be limited to what James Cantor posted on his user page. -- Jreferee (talk) 14:59, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
I put on my userpage the main pages (not topics) I decided to stay off of: here and here. (I did this to avoid conflicts with another editor who has since been topic-banned; it was never my intent to topic-ban myself.)
My relationship with Blanchard is a matter of public record: I was his student and then colleague until his retirement in 2010. I don't edit his BLP, but I do edit other pages in sexology, many of which include citations to Blanchard.
Finally, User:Jreferee is exactly correct to refer to the Sexology ArbCom case. Sceptre's accusations in that case that I was inappropriately editing under a COI is here, and the ArbCom's finding that the accusations of COI were being repeatedly made without evidence is here. Although it could probably go without saying, I feel it is unfortunate that Sceptre feels it appropriate to take up the mantle of the now topic-banned editor to re-assert the same COI accusations.
— James Cantor (talk) 15:05, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
Please try to not inflame the situation. Sceptre was correct to post at COIN. You do have a COI with the Ray Blanchard topic. You do not/cannot have a COI with the gender identity disorder, so editors should not in the future accuse you of having a COI with the gender identity disorder topic. The still leaves open the bias issue since COI and bias are not the same thing. Please give me some time to continue reviewing the above COIN request and post my comments. -- Jreferee (talk) 15:13, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Blanchard's transsexualism typology - Regarding the 22 August 2013 edit, changing "Serano noted several flaws" to read "Serano claimed there were flaws" does not help the article, because "claimed" merely is a non-neutral synonym for the neutral said. See Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Words to watch#Synonyms for said. Unless James Cantor has a pattern of such change to Blanchard topics, it does not seem to be a COI problem. The real problem here is the use of "flaw" in the article, which is subjective rather than a factual truth. Adding "claimed" flaw does not fix that. As for the other edits, if the changes to Moser's credentials "Physician and specialist in sexual medicine" and Serano credentials "transsexual biochemist" were inconsistent with the cited references, then that may be a COI issue. -- Jreferee (talk) 16:03, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Gender identity disorder - James Cantor made several edits in August 2013 and April Arcus and Sue Gardner made edits after that. I do not know enough about the topic to review. If they (or other editors) think that James Cantor August 2013 edits to the Gender identity disorder article would/did draw attention or cause concern (such as the attention or concern brought out in the arbitration case), they can post in this thread. Since James Cantor does not have a COI with the Gender identity disorder topic, the edits are not a COI issue. -- Jreferee (talk) 16:03, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

User:Nickpopoff

Nickpopoff (talk · contribs · deleted · filter log · SUL · Google) • (block · soft · promo · cause · bot · hard · spam · vandal)

Despite several warnings, user is a single purpose account whose edits only concern Peter Popoff. Given the username, the claims of intimate knowledge of the Popoff family (diff and diff), and the user's page content, the conflict of interest is quite clear. DKqwerty (talk) 06:00, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

Matthew Bryden

Hi – I have posted on the talk page of the article for Matthew Bryden, who is my client. I work for Bell Pottinger, a PR firm – see my user page for more info. Many thanks. HOgilvy (talk) 17:16, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

I considered making the changes you requested on the talk page. While the sentences are fine, I think you can find better sources and only need one source for one fact. The article suffers from a similar problem. You would be better off focusing on using print newspapers, books, magazines to tell Mr. Bryden's life story. Some government publications are fine as well. Try avoiding citing to websites. The Controversy section should be moved and intermixed with the chronological events of his career, since having a separate section gives the Controversy too much weight. If I were going to work on the Matthew Bryden article, I would ignore what is now in the article, do my own research to find biographical information on Mr. Bryden's life events in newspapers and books and magazines, and then write the article from scratch, using a few example articles from Category:FA-Class biography articles to guide me on how to construct a Wikipedia biographical article. If you consider that approach, develop a draft article at User:HOgilvy/Matthew Bryden (draft) and, when finished, post back in this forum requesting that the draft be moved to article space. -- Jreferee (talk) 15:39, 31 August 2013 (UTC)
Hi – thanks for your response. I agree that the article could use much improvement, but because of my position, along with the highly political nature of some of the controversies and the polarisation of the editors that have contributed, I think it's unlikely a replacement article would be accepted. There are a number of edits I would like to propose, and it seems more feasible to me in this particular case to follow a step-by-step route of building consensus around each one, rather than to propose the wholesale replacement of an article with such a volatile editing history. If you know of any guys with a special interest in the Horn of Africa/Somalia who might be able to offer some input then it would be good to be in touch with them. Thanks for your comments on my initial suggestion – I can't find any news sources that name those specific organisations in the context of Mr Bryden's tenure at WSP. These are the organisations referred to (but not named) in the current article. I am absolutely with you that less is more when it comes to referencing and that newspapers, books and journals are far preferable, but in a situation where we can't find a source like that but we can point to a website that bears out what's being said, then I'd say it's applicable. Let me know what you think, and many thanks again. HOgilvy (talk) 11:14, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
"we can point to a website that bears out what's being said, then I'd say it's applicable" - that is not how Wikipedia works. Also, if the article were limited to print newspapers, books, magazines references, it would be much easier for other editors such as myself to keep out the polarizing content from websites that supposedly bears out what's being said. I understand that you want to present Mr. Bryden in a fair light, but your approach of saying what is applicable will never get the article to where it should be and you will spend your time in equivalent retaliation with editors who are biased the other way than yourself. A better approach would be to use Wikipedia's approach of saying what is applicable. Try working with User:CorporateM on developing a draft article. When it is finished, let me know and I'll take a look at it. -- Jreferee (talk) 11:40, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
We use sources both to verify the facts and to verify that the information is significant enough to warrant inclusion/weight. Adding a mission statement is a sticky area, because it can create the appearance of Mr. Bryden trying to find a way to repeat the organization's messaging. I'm sure the controversy is actually what Matthew has the most significant interest in. I can't comment on whether it's neutral without reading the sources, but it is very editorialized, "accusations of a highly serious nature." It's obviously highly critical, but I'd have to see the sources to evaluate whether it should be. My PR colleagues often feel that making/suggesting small edits is safer or less abrasive. I find that I am often willing to add one sentence or two, but over time when a pattern emerges, I will disdain having ever done so. An editor needs a sample large enough to assess whether Bryden is going to perform well in the uncomfortable position Wikipedia places him in of trying to be neutral about himself. CorporateM (Talk) 13:31, 2 September 2013 (UTC) (Jreferee, minor quibble. Those that have and continue to mentor me do so under the expectation that I will help others and contribute to Wikipedia in general, so I'm happy to be pinged here, but to avoid any misunderstandings, it might be best to state specifically that you meant in a volunteer role. ;-) CorporateM (Talk) 13:40, 2 September 2013 (UTC))
I see the point about making/suggesting small edits is safer or less abrasive for someone with a COI. HOgilvy's suggestions were consistent with the state of the article and would not make it worse, so I do not have a problem if someone else wants to add them. In this case, those editors of the article on the other side of the issue likely are not Wikipedia regulars and the article has been relatively inactive for a while, so a more bold move (e.g., replacement draft response) may be OK given the state of the artice. The controversy section is written in away that is biased and I listed it at BLPN. As for working with HOgilvy, yes, my suggestion is for any help to be in volunteer role, which I think you have done for others in the past. -- Jreferee (talk) 14:05, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
Thanks CorporateM , less abrasive captures it perfectly! And Jreferee, I couldn’t agree more – the ideal would be to have an article based only on the most conventional, authoritative third party sources. The problem I can see arising (although I take your point on inactivity and I’d be interested to hear both your views on this) is that a significant number of the sources for this article are either questionable or self-published or both. Websites such as hiiraan.com cannot be considered neutral when it comes to sensitive issues such as Somaliland, being strongly, openly biased on regional/clan lines. Extremes of opinion are a feature of Somali politics and it’s often the case that there are people or issues about which much is written but very little of it neutral and reliable. Discarding those sources would mean discarding much of the current controversy section. There are a number of inaccuracies and unsubstantiated statements in the article that might well need to be discussed to be resolved, point by point, pointing to contrary evidence (some of it in the form of documentation, dates of reports, etc.) and reaching consensus. There is a good deal of negative content about Mr Bryden in the public domain and that should be reflected in the article, but it should be in a way that’s thought through and in its proper context, i.e. opinions should be presented as opinions and not smuggled in as facts. I like the idea of a 'bold move' and on the one hand I think it's called for, but I anticipate opposition and I would definitely need some help! How can we be certain the effort won't be wasted? Thanks both. HOgilvy (talk) 14:31, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
At-a-glance, I don't think the proposed is better. The current is more concise, more appropriate for WEIGHT and more neutral. I'm going to give it a once-over though to alter the most egregious material. CorporateM (Talk) 14:53, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
Fine – by 'give it a once-over' do you mean the whole article? What's your view on the best way forward here in light of the discussion above? HOgilvy (talk) 15:12, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

I have now become well-read on it enough to speak somewhat intelligently on the article. I've posted a break on the article's Talk page here regarding the WP:ONEEVENT issue and I think the BLP board would have to sort that out before anything that is relevant for COIN. I have not found any secondary sources where he is the subject of the article, only articles that cover political events and criticize his involvement in them, but this is only regarding 4 years of his life where he held a controversial role. I am leaning towards it being a good candidate for deletion under ONEEVENT. CorporateM (Talk) 18:31, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

It could perhaps be argued that Bryden is significant for his role in several events, all tied to his political positions at the SEMG and ICG. But ONEEVENT indeed doesn't seem all that far-fetched either. Middayexpress (talk) 18:45, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
I just spent some time reading them. It doesn't seem like the ONEEVENT and Pseudo-biographies leans towards delete as much as I originally thought. They just say to be careful about balance and article-naming. And the examples they use are very specific events (like the JFK assassination) as oppose to a position he held for four years. But they do say to make a full, balanced and complete biography, paying special attention to weight. So I am wondering if that means we should use some primary sources to balance the article with more on his early career that was not that interesting to the media as the controversial aspects. CorporateM (Talk) 19:54, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Update

I think Midday and I have reached an impasse, mostly regarding the use of a press release and op-eds written by Bryden's political opposition to add controversial information. I've attempted to summarize the issues here and asked Drmies to get involved so we could have more than two editors and maybe figure things out. More eyes would certainly be welcome as well. CorporateM (Talk) 12:58, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

  • Well, I'm no expert here. I dropped a few links on the talk page that hopefully provide more reliable sources for criticism (I agree that Hiiraan should be used sparingly, if at all), but for the moment that's the extent of my involvement. Drmies (talk) 14:46, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

David Lloyd (musician)

Mediababy is a WP:SPA (or dual-purpose account) which has only ever edited pages related to David Lloyd (musician) and his band Uropa Lula. Andreasegde has a much more varied history, but has edited both those pages, and also the page on Andrew Edge, who was a member of Uropa Lula with David Lloyd. COI seems clear in both cases. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:07, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

RyLaughlin

Continuation of previously reported Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_64#RyLaughlin

  • Previously: COI denied
  • Trying to understand the copyright is correct on the image File:Colacino-250x250.jpg as the copyright holder is claimed as Studley, Inc. rather than RyLaughlin. I've asked for clarification on the copyright holder, and if there's a connection with the other two WP:SPA / WP:COI editors.
  • Seems like promo articles based off business listings to me. I'm not sure if these articles are notable or not but I do know the attempt to get Studley, Inc. to be the primarytopic at Studley is pure business promotion and although there's no primary in the outcome at Talk:Studley, Warwickshire, it doesn't sit well that the previous edit consensus was interrupted for the wrong reason (we had the biggest place at the primary, although wrong it's not as wrong as the intended outcome). Now there's two other accounts. hmm. Maybe the previous COIN editors User:Ukexpat User:John Broughton User:Little green rosetta would care to comment? Widefox; talk 20:32, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
    • Studley, Inc., Michael D. Colacino, and Mitchell S. Steir each meet WP:GNG. Real estate company Studley has been around since 1954 and in New York - one of the top media and real estate places in the world. Of course Studley and its leadership are going to receive significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. The would not be in business where they are given what they do if they did receive such media coverage. RyLaughlin did not deny the COI, he stated "I am not being paid to write Wikipedia articles for Studley, Inc., it is a family business and I am writing these on my own time."[8] RyLaughlin, please explain your connection to Studley. -- Jreferee (talk) 02:34, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
      • It looks to me as if RyLaughlin was denying COI when he wrote "I do not see myself as having a conflict of interest with any of the subjects I've written about". Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:30, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
        • I've now notified the four named editors of this discussion, which should have been done much sooner. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:56, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
          • Thanks, I only notified one of the four. In particular [9] this edit seems WP:MEAT. There's a real lack of disclosure here (2nd time at COIN) and I think the meatpuppets should be blocked. I can't make a clear decision if the articles are notable, but clearly they not suitable for CSD or PROD, but so far I'm refraining from AfD for now (which would allow us to check the sourcing). I was hoping the original COIN editors could add to their previous reviews as there's no deadline here. The attempt to get Studley, Inc as the Studley primarytopic is pure business promotion. RyLaughlin (and others) have yet to disclose per WP:COI / WP:NOPAY on his talk page and article talk pages. Widefox; talk 00:53, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
            • You will have seen that I have invited RyLaughlin to participate here, and that he acknowledged. I also speedied both Colacino and Steir as G11 unambiguous promotion; both were declined, not greatly to my surprise. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:46, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

DPR Construction

Hello,
My name is Barry and I work for DPR Construction. I noticed that we’re not here, but I think our projects are on par with the others that are currently available. I hope you agree. In any case, I created a sandbox for your consideration and would really appreciate your feedback (LINK TO SANDBOX). As it is our first attempt, we recognize it will likely need changes. The entry cites independent sources in an effort to verify the content and establish that DPR is notable enough for a Wikipedia entry. Thank you very much for taking the time to review this and provide feedback.
Sincerely,
Barry — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bucktown1980 (talk • contribs) 08:10, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Hi Bucktown. I cleaned up some of the coding and formatting for you. The Organization section needs a citation and I would consider the company website acceptable for that. However, for the DPR foundation, we would need a strong secondary source that verifies the significance of charitable activities. The selected works section should be in paragraph, summary-style and include only the most notable examples (the work that has obtained the most media coverage). Periods should be before instead of after the citation. Nice start! CorporateM (Talk) 14:36, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Rajesh Touchriver

I don't think there's much doubt about this in view of the username and edit history. It is however not 100% a WP:SPA. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 16:26, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

RyLaughlin

Continuation of previously reported Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_64#RyLaughlin

  • Previously: COI denied
  • Trying to understand the copyright is correct on the image File:Colacino-250x250.jpg as the copyright holder is claimed as Studley, Inc. rather than RyLaughlin. I've asked for clarification on the copyright holder, and if there's a connection with the other two WP:SPA / WP:COI editors.
  • Seems like promo articles based off business listings to me. I'm not sure if these articles are notable or not but I do know the attempt to get Studley, Inc. to be the primarytopic at Studley is pure business promotion and although there's no primary in the outcome at Talk:Studley, Warwickshire, it doesn't sit well that the previous edit consensus was interrupted for the wrong reason (we had the biggest place at the primary, although wrong it's not as wrong as the intended outcome). Now there's two other accounts. hmm. Maybe the previous COIN editors User:Ukexpat User:John Broughton User:Little green rosetta would care to comment? Widefox; talk 20:32, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
    • Studley, Inc., Michael D. Colacino, and Mitchell S. Steir each meet WP:GNG. Real estate company Studley has been around since 1954 and in New York - one of the top media and real estate places in the world. Of course Studley and its leadership are going to receive significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. The would not be in business where they are given what they do if they did receive such media coverage. RyLaughlin did not deny the COI, he stated "I am not being paid to write Wikipedia articles for Studley, Inc., it is a family business and I am writing these on my own time."[10] RyLaughlin, please explain your connection to Studley. -- Jreferee (talk) 02:34, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
      • It looks to me as if RyLaughlin was denying COI when he wrote "I do not see myself as having a conflict of interest with any of the subjects I've written about". Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:30, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
        • I've now notified the four named editors of this discussion, which should have been done much sooner. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:56, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
          • Thanks, I only notified one of the four. In particular [11] this edit seems WP:MEAT. There's a real lack of disclosure here (2nd time at COIN) and I think the meatpuppets should be blocked. I can't make a clear decision if the articles are notable, but clearly they not suitable for CSD or PROD, but so far I'm refraining from AfD for now (which would allow us to check the sourcing). I was hoping the original COIN editors could add to their previous reviews as there's no deadline here. The attempt to get Studley, Inc as the Studley primarytopic is pure business promotion. RyLaughlin (and others) have yet to disclose per WP:COI / WP:NOPAY on his talk page and article talk pages. Widefox; talk 00:53, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
            • You will have seen that I have invited RyLaughlin to participate here, and that he acknowledged. I also speedied both Colacino and Steir as G11 unambiguous promotion; both were declined, not greatly to my surprise. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:46, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

DPR Construction

Hello,
My name is Barry and I work for DPR Construction. I noticed that we’re not here, but I think our projects are on par with the others that are currently available. I hope you agree. In any case, I created a sandbox for your consideration and would really appreciate your feedback (LINK TO SANDBOX). As it is our first attempt, we recognize it will likely need changes. The entry cites independent sources in an effort to verify the content and establish that DPR is notable enough for a Wikipedia entry. Thank you very much for taking the time to review this and provide feedback.
Sincerely,
Barry — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bucktown1980 (talk • contribs) 08:10, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Hi Bucktown. I cleaned up some of the coding and formatting for you. The Organization section needs a citation and I would consider the company website acceptable for that. However, for the DPR foundation, we would need a strong secondary source that verifies the significance of charitable activities. The selected works section should be in paragraph, summary-style and include only the most notable examples (the work that has obtained the most media coverage). Periods should be before instead of after the citation. Nice start! CorporateM (Talk) 14:36, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Rajesh Touchriver

I don't think there's much doubt about this in view of the username and edit history. It is however not 100% a WP:SPA. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 16:26, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Yassmin Ghandehari

Hi. I'd like to register my conflict of interest with regard to the creation of an article on Yassmin Ghandehari, a client of mine who is a designer and philanthropist. If you have any questions then do contact me on my talk page. Thanks Vivj2012 (talk) 15:33, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

86.20.42.223

This IP user has exclusively made spam edits promoting the website "sentuamsg.com". There are zero (0) constructive edits by this editor since the dawn of time. Diffs: [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] --benlisquareT•C•E 18:13, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Oscar del Santo, possibly paid editor

This user:

Creator of these articles:

by his own admission (at some point was editing his own (now deleted) self-biographical article) is Oscar del Santo [26].

He has created a number of articles in the same line, regarding mostly professors of a few institutions (see above). These professors/researchers, in most cases do not meet the criteria for notability (if every reasearcher with 40 publication deserves a wikipedia article, there should be tens of thousands of placeholder biographies that would not give any information that is not available in their published CV's on their personal pages). Moreover, the links in the above articles (only the biographical ones, the other are institutions, and as such deserve their articles) only point to self-created materials such as pages in their own institutions, or their own research articles.

I understand wikipedia should not be used for self-promotion or in order to achieve more notability. There are clear hints that this editor has clear ties to the institutions and professors whose articles he is editing, and all of them should be reviewed. It is probably also a case of WP:NOPR WP:NOPAY.

While I do not know personally any of the professors involved or the editor, I am reporting this anonymously. Spain is a "small" country. -- 84.120.179.232 (talk) 19:46, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Addendum, in his webpage there is a remark by one of his customers [27]: “A real expert in social networks” Tomás Gómez-Acebo, Tecnun-Universidad de Navarra. Mr Gómez-Acebo is vice-president of Tecnun, the institution where most of the people cited above are employed. -- 80.174.6.224 (talk) 22:38, 1 September 2013 (UTC)
  • ODS40's last contribution was 17 September 2011. In general, the Tecnun professor biographies seem to be of typical professors, whose lives are unlikely to attract biographical writings of reliable sources. You may want to consider listing some of the articles at WP:AFD. -- Jreferee (talk) 11:23, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
    • I've prodded some of the BLPs that seemed not to meet WP:Academic. It seems likely that Oscar Dell is also the same person, so there may be others to be identified. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:57, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
      • WP:PROF does not require secondary writing about the person's live. In fact, no WP article on a person notable for their work requires writing about the person's personal life, but only about the aspects of their work that are relevant to notability. If anything, excessive biographical details about an individual's person life is often inappropriate and unbalanced content. Whether these individuals meet notability standards depends mostly on the importance of their academic work in their subjects, and I have deprodded a few. Alternatively, there is a good deal to be said for an inclusion standard that which would specify that borderline notability combined with clear promotionalism as a reason for deletion; I've argued according in a few AfDs . DGG ( talk ) 02:44, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
        • If the main topic is to qualify under WP:PROF, then the article should present the main topic so that it clearly is focused on the WP:PROF qualification(s) and not the biography life of the person. If the article is presented as a biography, they it is hard to say it should be judge under something other than as a biography. However, WP:SOFIXIT probably applies in such a situation (notable topic written in a way that does not focus on the notability). This seems to be a common situation. I think if WP:PROF is clarified on these points, topics that meet WP:PROF but are written as biographies are merely to be retained within Wikipedia. -- Jreferee (talk) 02:49, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
          • DGG's comment reflects a fundamental flaw in our biographical notability standards, that people often qualify as notable even when there are not appropriate sources to construct a biography. I've written an essay about this at WP:TWOPRONGS. Until we correct this flaw, we will have many BLPs on subjects that we can't properly write a biography for. Gigs (talk) 17:32, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Direct Democracy Ireland

Jeff Rudd, who is the Louth Chairman of the DDI organization[] and has identified as so on his user page has over the last number of weeks carried out a large number of disruptive edits on the DDI wikipage including the removal of sourced materials, inclusion of other unsourced and POV material, inclusion of material which he claims are sourced but when the source is checked it is found not to contain what he alleges etc. He has also posted on his personal website attacking editors of Wikipedia - this coincided with the appearance of another disruptive editor JohnRo76 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) who has also engaged in this behavior. This occurred after Jeff Rudd put out a call for people to engage in an edit war on the site, see[ here] CommieMark (talk) 17:15, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

  • User:Jeff Rudd has a conflict of interest (COI) for the Direct Democracy Ireland article and Direct Democracy Ireland topics. In determining what action to take, editors are to presume that Jeff Rudd's edits to articles related to the Direct Democracy Ireland topic are made to advance outside interests over advancing the aims of Wikipedia. -- Jreferee (talk) 01:13, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Direct Democracy Ireland (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

I, Jeff Rudd, have asked that the management of Wikipedia to stop anonymous editors of its service, to post ALLEGATIONS up as supposed facts. I have removed at times references that were WRONGLY stated that they were facts (thus proven) when in fact there were just ALLEGATIONS (and NOT proven).

It should be also noted that is ironic that anon' editors are allowed to post inaccurate items up - while those that actually are in such an org and know the truth - in some cases, having been there - that they cannot be allowed to edit and post the truth - with their real name attached and thus stand on public record by what they state.

Wikipedia is currently being edited wrongly and deliberately by people from a political party called Sinn Fein. We know its them, we know were its coming from, we know a lot more. we are willing and will if necessary, post more information about them.

I have argued against ANON editors - ANON' editors - to this page. If people wish to post up items to the DDI page, tell them to stop being cowardly and identify themselves if their facts are supposedly true! ...But no, ANON editors are allowed post inaccurate ALLEGATIONS - not proven facts - and pass them off in reference as supposed then truth facts proved, when they are not and no evidence exists that they have been proven true.

For example, on the site in contention, its stated that DDI is of Freeman nature. This is a complete and utter lie. I have repeatedly asked for this to be proven. Sinn Fein advocates (political opposition) have anon' posted ALLEGATIONS of this as referenced - not posted EVER, actual real proof.

Again I state for the record:

  • There is NO Freeman ideology in the constitution of DDI organisation.
  • There is NO Freeman ideology in the rules of the DDI organisation.
  • There is NO Freeman postings on our forums.
  • There is NO Freeman ideology on our website.
  • There is NO freeman mandate in the Mandate of the DDI organisation.
  • There is NO Freeman direction of any kind in the DDI organisation.
  • Even the founder Ray Whitehead was never a Freeman - and NEVER even ALLEGED to be one!

...Yet a political person we know from another party, is allowed anon' to post that we are of wacky Freeman origin - and ONLY reference ALLEGATIONS, many which their own party has actually put out to try besmirch the name of our growing popular organisation! They continuously reference their own allegations submitted into their own paper tabloids produced from their own offices in Dublin, Ireland!

Does anyone here understand the difference between ALLEGATIONS and PROOF? Allegations are NOT proof - they are just crap made up many a time as tried to be passed as proof. As in the case of Wikipedia and Sinn Fein people posting ALLEGATIONS, they are continuously referencing them into Wikipedia as supposed PROOF - then they are not Proof but just ALLEGATIONS!

  • The "sourced material" referred to, is ALLEGATIONS - NOT proof. 1000 ALLEGATIONS adds up to nothing if there is no PROOF of any description (and there is NONE), to back it. Yet for some bizarre reason, on this particular page, ALLEGATIONS are incredulously accepted as something proved! Why is this? Its completely nuts to do this! It destroys Wikipedias reputation in regard to posting that are factual.
  • I have also NOT called for an all out Wiki war - I request verified proof of this - I have asked others to assist in correcting a number of mistakes - I have asked this through my Facebook page publically and with nothing to hide in malicious intent or underhand desire. If I wanted to go to war with Wikipedia, the last thing I would do, is to announce such daftness publically. More lies being spread it seems.
  • The lies don't end there. Above its stated that "...so on his user page has over the last number of weeks carried out a large number of disruptive edits" - this again is a complete lie.

I have done edits over the last few days - indeed a WIKI moderator (Jreferee) elsewhere has acknowledged already that I have only joined a few days ago - that don't stop others out there however from continuing again to spread lies. The digital dates attached to my edits will be on record for Wiki management to examine at any time of their choosing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeff Rudd (talk • contribs) 12:58, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Now I am stating FOR THE RECORD AND I WILL CONTINUE TO DO SO THE FOLLOWING: the statement publically made at my personal site at: theruddsite dot com

I publically stand by what I say. I am a public face and Louth chairman of DDI. A position I have been democratically and legally elected to. It (at the very least) should be allowed to be posted that a representative of the organisation, has gone on public record to refute the ALLEGATIONS made - especially the ones made on this site by cowardly always anonymous people from another organisation.

I will continue to state this in the forth coming local and national elections here in Ireland and I will continue to highlight the total wrong inaccuracies in the Wikipedia service allowed be entered by anonymous people from another organisation - one thats highly under question within our own island borders, one that has a very history of killing people over decades including many, many British, Irish and international people.

I repeat:

  • There is NO Freeman ideology in the constitution of DDI organisation.
  • There is NO Freeman ideology in the rules of the DDI organisation.
  • There is NO Freeman postings on our forums.
  • There is NO Freeman ideology on our website.
  • There is NO freeman mandate in the Mandate of the DDI organisation.
  • There is NO Freeman direction of any kind in the DDI organisation.
  • Even the founder Ray Whitehead was never a Freeman - and NEVER even ALLEGED to be one!

We have repeatedly asked these people to produce evidence - not allegations, EVIDENCE - they have ALL so far been not able to show anywhere in our constitution, etc anything that is related to either.

I request that the always anonymous posters provide PROOF - do they understand that word? I don't think they want to for good reason. - I request PROOF - NOT ALLEGATIONS just more referenced and tried to be passed as concrete proof - that DDI is of Freeman basis.

IT IS ABSOLUTELY NOT AND THE VAST MAJORITY OF THE PEOPLE IN DDI WANT NOTHING TO DO WITH THAT STRANGE, OUT OF FATE THINKING!

Its requested by myself and my organisation that the ALLEGATION stated be removed from the summary box on the right side of the DDI page - that we are of Freeman ideology. It has not been proven and cannot be - its simply is false and there is no proof out there or posted up referenced as verified proof by ANY independent body.

WE ABSOLUTELY ARE NOT - NOR DO WE WANT TO BE!

Please note also:

ONE person might have links to Freeman thinking - the rest of the other 4,000 plus members and fans do not. ONE person does not automatically make a whole organisation what they are. We have Jewish, Catholic, Protestant and other ideologies and faiths in our organisation - in fact more so in numbers than ONE person what MIGHT be of Freeman thinking.

The statement on the Direct Democracy Ireland page where it states "A number of publications and commentators have highlighted DDI's close links to the Freemen on the land movement and the Christian Solidarity Party" is incorrect. The statement on Wiki of what they allege is incorrect, they allege that ONE person is connect to the daft Freeman stuff - not the org! It is not - there might be one person who is - that that like many others, does not taint the organisation and its many thousands of others, right away.

For the record, there is NO material proof that all the rest of the people in it are of Freeman thinking - there might be material that one person might be - but not all the rest. I ask that the statement on the DDI page be adjusted correctly even along the line of "One of the members has been associated with... - while no verified proof exists that shows the rest are of the same ideology"

If a member tomorrow is associated with a party called "The Monster Raving Looney Party" - does that automatically make the rest of us one too? I don't think so - and I don't think anyone with any sense would think so too! ...However one person (anon' editor) and one org behind them is trying so far successfully espouse that this should be the case. This is absolute nuts, a lie and one posted with a political agenda behind it!

Jeff Rudd (talk) 11:37, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

@Jeff - you are not making a good case that you have no COI. Think about it. --Roxy the dog (bark) 15:33, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I. Jeff Rudd do have no conflict of interest against the aims of Wikipedia. In fact in trying to improve its accuracy and further its aims, I have because of the organisation I'm a Chairman in, edited items directly related to my own organisation. How is this a conflict of interests? I'm trying to advance the interest of most of us here - to have the truth broadcast in the media. I am connected to the matter in hand - there is no debate about that - but conflict of interest? Against what else? I am trying to address the lies perpetuated by anon' names and by a front for a world recognised terrorist organisation that is doing it! This matter must be addressed or else sadly Wikipedia is going to stand worldwide as severely incorrect. Jeff Rudd (talk) 15:46, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

@Jeff Rudd (talk) the people who will decide on this issue will find little or nothing in the text above to help them decide about your case. You still need to address it. Information is provided at the top of this page to guide you in doing that, and if that doesn't help, there is a simplified version that you should see, WP:PLAINANDSIMPLECOI. --Roxy the dog (bark) 16:47, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

CommieMark

Its ironic that I stand accused of conflict of interests when one anon' CommieMark is breaking the COI rules. The rule he is breaking is on the page linked to above - namely: Do not directly edit articles about yourself, your organization, your clients, or your competitors. The anon' editor is an element/supporter of Sinn Fein, a front for an Irish terror organisation known as the IRA - He is constantly altering the data about other political parties that are peacefully opposing his own - that includes Direct Democracy Ireland. All anyone has to do is look that the serious number of edits he does for a number of websites including very regular, his political parties newspaper "An Phoblacht" and other related sites that try to publish information related to other atrocities. These people are know to us as they are known to the Irish Gardi (police) and other countries police as well as investigation departments as home in Ireland, England and elsewhere. He even uses a well known expression on his personal Wiki page "Tiocfaidh Ár Lá" that is TOTALLY connected and used ONLY by the Sinn Fein and IRA organisation. Google it as an image as well as text format. See: sinnfeinbookshop dot com/tiocfaidh-ar-la/ See: img854.imageshack dot us/img854/2468/v7cy.jpg — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeff Rudd (talk • contribs) 18:46, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

This is without question. It can be simply goggled and the facts are there in the hundreds to view. User Commiemark is in conflict of interests as laid used without question, under your current guidelines. Again: namely: "Do not directly edit articles about yourself, your organization, your clients, or your competitors."

I state this knowing that I am putting my life at very risk via other people/supporters out in the real world - and should anything happen to me now or in the future, I wish Wikipedia to notify the Irish Gardi and Interpol as to the events that has occurred here and what might be connected to my sudden death or any injury that might fall upon me. I have already been threatened by phone call prior to this and this matter is being brought to the attention of our Irish police (Gardi) force. I have now made a public similar statement on my own personal website, that my health and welfare might be at risk. Jeff Rudd (talk) 18:21, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

  • @Jeff Rudd, you are coming across like a paranoid crazy throwing around accusations like that. You are a spokesperson for DDI so you have a COI with editing the DDI page - as a previous moderator has pointed out, end of story. I am not a member of any political party although I do have an interest in left-wing politics and Irish republicanism. Hence why most of my edits are linked to such organisations. Cop yourself on. --CommieMark (talk) 20:49, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I hope the administration takes note of the above. . . (1) At the very least he admits he has "an interest in left-wing politics and Irish republicanism" ...This alone conflicts politically - "competitors" as stated in the Wiki rules as being a conflict of interests. ALL his edits and alterations (ALLEGATIONS - not proven facts) that have been posted - are in rival to his own organisation. . . (2) Again, I ask the administrators to google through Google image, the words ""Tiocfaidh Ár Lá"" (meaning: Our day will come) ...This is NOT to be taken likely. These very words are only used hundred of times, if not thousands, by a political and military terrorist elements that has killed and maimed hundreds, if not thousands, over many, many in Ireland and England. This is on historical record. A simple google of this also will prove this sadly all too easily.

If I am in COI then equally CommieMark stands so too. without question and ALL his alterations to our Wiki political section should be taken in that light - as additionally an attempt to besmirch political opposition.

Additionally, the only recourse of this person supporting a political competitor in Ireland is to resort to insults and makes light of a still on going dangerous situation I and many others still find ourselves in within Ireland.

Its NOT "paranoid crazy" to state that serious elements of ...as CommieMark put it himself "left-wing politics and Irish republicanism"... have gone out and killed - even to this day in Ireland.

This is not paranoid crazy talk - events on Irish soil to this day bear this out. A google of Irish news related to Irish political life and Republicanism will easily bear this out.

The violence continues and I have been personally threatened. My wife and four children to not consider the threats to be just "paranoid crazy". They are now seriously worried - as is the rest of my family.

Jeff Rudd (talk) 07:09, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Jeff, I think you will find that concise summaries of your position are more effective than large essays. There is no "administration" per-se in charge of Wikipedia content, this isn't a top-down organization. That said, if there is material on Wikipedia that you believe puts you in physical danger, please post a very short summary of the specific material, and someone will help you remove it, and/or protect the article from its reinsertion. Gigs (talk) 17:45, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Soso.com

This user, 9k7kq3 has exclusively made edits promoting the Chinese website Soso.com. Edits include:

  • Changing the ordering of lists, so that "Soso.com" comes first [28] [29]
  • Adding "Soso.com" to places unnecessarily and unduely, such as at the very top of pages [30] [31] [32] or article sections (even if blatantly un-chronological) [33]
  • Adding unreferenced edits regarding Soso.com information to articles
  • A comment made by the user on his talk page accuses other editors of wanting to "create a monopoly" by not allowing his edits regarding this website (which suggests that he has a stake in this company business, or at least a personal interest)

Not to mention, this user is repeatedly reverting my edits, and the edits of others who undo their edits.

Now, I'm not saying that this guy is definitely a promotion-only account, but from what I've seen so far, I'm strongly suspecting that he is. --benlisquareT•C•E 02:36, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

NextWorth Solutions

On NextWorth's behalf, I've prepared a first draft of a proposed expansion of their article at Talk:NextWorth Solutions that I believe would be an improvement to Wikipedia. If an editor is willing to consider my work for inclusion and/or provide feedback, I would be very appreciative of your time. Since it's a small company/article with an inactive Talk page, I figured it would be best to advertise it here. CorporateM (Talk) 22:27, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Edited by John Broughton and merged into article space by Drmies. CorporateM (Talk) 04:19, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
Resolved

MacKeeper

MacKeeper is a software product for Macintosh OS X computers that may be a legitimate maintenance product or may be malware. Its article was created about a year ago. Two authors made most of the initial edits, creating the majority of the text in the article. One of those authors admitted to a connection to the company marketing the product but has since removed the admission from their talk page. The other didn't make any admission but has a "disclaimer" on his talk page that he "... in the past worked as a consultant for IT and Security Companies and may edit those pages from time to time". He (or she) has only ever edited one page not related to Zeobit, Kromtech, PCKeeper or MacKeeper.

Another editor, whose good faith I have no reason to question, claims that "Copy editing on the article was completed after the article was identified as a having potential advert issues sometime in Jan/Feb 2013." Since that time, that editor has been informally policing the article, ensuring that any competing edits are reverted and, in particular, removed the COI tag. The editor in question has been notified of this posting.

My view is that the COI tag should remain, at a minimum. Reactions, please.... Fiachra10003 (talk) 13:32, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps a link to an old version of that talkpage, before the admission of connection was removed? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 16:11, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

AdultVest

SPA creating and managing articles on AdultVest and its former owner Francis Koenig (PROD-deleted long ago), adding unsourced information and deleting unflattering information. I thought this had stopped with the sale of AdultVest (in an apparently pump and dump that probably leveraged this Wikipedia article considering the peak in editing prior), but the reputation management seems to have resumed. Also deletes unflattering article Talk page commentary.[34] No Talk page communications ever.

I have restored this article to a less sanitized state, will hopefully will find time this weekend to update it. However, whatever I enter is certain to be removed by User:Ibnewswire in the near future. / edg ☺ ☭ 15:30, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

Ibnewswire has been blocked by OrangeMike because of the username, so that may not be such a problem now. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:57, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Harvard University

User continues to remove information about cheating pattern at Harvard -- here and here despite solid information about cheating from NBC News, USA Today, The New York Times and Harvard itself. Seems like a public relations whitewash in clear violation of rules about Wikipedia's neutrality.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 20:32, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

What makes this a COI issue? It looks a lot more like a content dispute to me. Incidentally I agree that one news story does not merit a section like that per WP:NOTNEWS and WP:UNDUE.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:48, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
I agree. I see no reason to look at this as a COI issue. GabrielF (talk) 21:05, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
User:EEng has an affiliation with Harvard and wrote about his removal of the cheating scandal information "while I'm personally ashamed abt this" on one of his edits here. The entire Harvard article is glowingly positive; needs WP:BALANCE. Team of pro-Harvard editors whitewash the article regularly.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 22:16, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
what kind of affiliation? Having a degree from there would not be a COI engendering affiliation for example. Your accusations of teams of whitewshers also needs more evidence.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 22:23, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
Any person "ashamed" of a cheating scandal has some connection with the university, most likely, a graduate. I added two lines about the controversy, with excellent references, and they were reverted, twice, for dubious reasons (eg "college" different from "university", etc).--Tomwsulcer (talk) 00:03, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
If merely graduating from a university constitutes having a conflict of interest about that university then I imagine we'd get very little non-COI coverage of universities. I assume that a lot of the articles about universities are written by people who have some connection to them. I don't see why a Harvard graduate couldn't reasonably be expected to write neutrally about Harvard in the same way that a Bostonian is expected to write neutrally about Boston and an American is expected to write neutrally about the United States. I suppose you could argue that positive coverage of a university might increase the value of someone's degree, but for a university like Harvard (or really any university) the effect of a Wikipedia article will be insignificant. [I should probably point out that I have a Harvard connection but I feel that I'm as likely to write negative things about the university as positive things] GabrielF (talk) 00:51, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Et tu, Brute? You're part of the conspiracy! Conflict of interest! Whitewash! Skull and Bones! Trilateral Commission! Illuminati! Soylent Green is people! (You might want to check out what's going on at the article Talk.) EEng (talk) 01:11, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
The only thing happening on the talk page is YOU insisting that the information be removed. You've reached no consensus with any editors in this regard. Several of editors, including myself, have calmly made some recent revisions (including eliminating about 90% of the content on Summer's resignation, changing heading from "Recent history" to "21st century", etc.). If you have a problem with these edits, or any others to the article, please take them to the talk page. If you simply must remove something, fine, but if that edit is reverted, LEAVE it and discuss the issue calmly and cooperatively on the talk page.    DKqwerty    01:25, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
I linked to the talk page because that's the place to discuss the content issue, not here -- though for the record you are you need to read the discussion more carefully -- a second editor indeed agreed that the cheating material should be removed (or at least severely curtailed). In any event this discussion is, I trust, decisively concluded. EEng (talk) 02:16, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Curtail ≠ blanking.    DKqwerty    02:34, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Again, the content discussion doesn't belong here. EEng (talk) 03:20, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Eh hem. Skull and Bones is YALE. Harvard has its own brand of noxious elitism. GabrielF (talk) 01:28, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Just testing you -- you passed with flying colors -- Crimson through and through, not a Blue bone in your body. You may proceed to the inner sanctum, but don't disturb the Red Mass, already in progress. And no sitting in the Holyoke Chair (unless that's you, Profess Faust.) EEng (talk) 02:29, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
For the record: I can only assume "insider" comments like that are the reason this was brought to COI.    DKqwerty    02:34, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Since you opened this discussion you of all people ought to know why -- but you seem to have employed the following logic: Because EEng is whitewashing the article, we know he went to Harvard. And because he went to Harvard he's obviously whitewashing the article. For the record, we're just having a bit of fun to make the best of things, given that you've wasted so much of everyone's time here. Even if you can't share the amusement you shouldn't spoil it for your betters. Finish your gruel. EEng (talk) 03:20, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
I did not open this COI discussion, Tomwsulcer did, and my first comment was the ninth one made overall. I'm not suggesting you went to Harvard because you're "whitewashing" (I never claimed you were whitewashing), but because you're making glib inside references to the University and its subculture without grasping why these comments might suggest a COI. And the only person wasting your time is YOU: there's nothing necessitating your responses to my comments.    DKqwerty    03:37, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Apologies for the mixup. Glib inside references suggest nothing more than that those making them might be affiliated with Harvard -- which is not a COI, and which is why this discussion has been so ridiculous from the beginning. At this point I'm not wasting my time -- this is fun! Care to continue? There's gruel for you too if you want it. EEng (talk) 03:46, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

((undent) Step back, see the bigger picture: Harvard had a major scandal, reported nationwide, with dozens of students expelled, administrators rethinking policy. It was a big deal. I added two lines, with references, which were removed promptly, twice. Readers familiar with the scandal, who see no mention of it on the Harvard wikipage, will see our beloved encyclopedia as biased and may suspect Harvard PR people are doing a whitewash cover-up, that Harvard graduates editing their page have not yet learned what Wikipedians know -- that Nixon-like coverups are futile.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 10:22, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Now you sound crazy. EEng (talk) 13:20, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
I'm changing my mind. Probably no conflict of interest. My hunch now is that EEng didn't attend Harvard.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 15:37, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
It's agreed then: you'll pretend I'm not a Harvard graduate and I'll pretend you're not a New Jersey handyman. I'd appreciate it if you'd drop the identity preoccupation now so we can we get back to article content. EEng (talk) 17:27, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Vojtěch Huser

Editor created the article about Dr. Huser, and has made contributions to articles about the first name itself and to articles about US immigration visas types.

Most notably (and relevant for this filing), this user has quite frequently added references to Dr. Huser's work, particularly at Trialome but on other pages as well ([35], [36]) raising the possibility of WP:SELFCITE/WP:REFSPAM. There is at least one related IP address that has also added such references, 128.231.203.36 though this seems more consistent with inadvertent editing while not logged in, rather than socking. [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 18:22, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Incidentally, that ip address geolocates to the NIH, where Dr. Huser is employed. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 23:35, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
Just so's you know: I've prodded the article as insufficiently notable to meet WP:Academic. I think his top Google Scholar cite count was 16. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:55, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
Trialome seems like it might be a good candidate for this as well. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 03:15, 14 September 2013 (UTC)
Trialome is now under discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Trialome. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 17:57, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Timkroehler and the Twelve Tribes

User: Timkroehler appears to be on Wikipedia in order to pursue a pro-Twelve Tribes communities perspective, as evidenced by [37] and [38]. This includes removing sourced content concerning the group's teachings on race and cheese, and adding poorly sourced (I. e., WP: PRIMARY) claims in their place. There's also a lot of SYNTH in his edits, such as implying that the group can't possibly be anti-Semitic (which its critics claim) because its members engage in Israeli folk dancing (juxtaposing two unrelated issues to draw a completely unwarranted assumption. That they like Israeli folk dancing proves nothing, there are also a few white supremacist rappers, after all).

According to his userpage, he is a member of the group. What should be done about this? FiredanceThroughTheNight (talk) 20:15, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Aleksandar Vučić

Hi, I have recently proposed an edit to the talk page of the article for Aleksandar Vučić, First Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia. I am registering here that I work for Bell Pottinger and that the Government of Serbia is my client. Many thanks. Vivj2012 (talk) 16:42, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

James T. Butts, Jr.

User:Theairport12 claims to be Butts (and probably is). He has engaged in a long edit war to make the article reflect what he feels should be the proper view of his career, with the highlights he favors. He has also accused other editors, asserting that at least one such individual is mentally ill and/or harbors deep animosity towards him. He has gone so far as to blank the article entirely when he did not like the present content. He has been given templated and non-templated advice, but does not seem to want to listen. Orange Mike | Talk 17:45, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
Yes, problem article. I've put it on my watchlist. Let me know how to help. My initial inclination is to blank everything too since I do not see any sources.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 21:41, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
It's a mess. My first inclination was to suggest restoring the last clean version before Theairport12 started butting in, but that is pretty bad too: even so, I mention it as a possibility. Inglewoodwatcher does not appear to be editing exactly in a dispassionate manner either. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:52, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
I fixed it as best I could -- solid references, neutral tone, etc -- but persons not observing Wiki's rules keep reverting, against WP:BLP, so please will others put this on their watchlist.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 18:38, 18 September 2013 (UTC)
That's a nice bit of work, much improved! I've commented there on the matter of the lawsuits involving him. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:46, 19 September 2013 (UTC)
Hey thanks, I revamped the article, wondering what you think on my sandbox. If the court case mentioned Butts as a defendant (if we can get an inline citation somewhere?) then maybe we should use it like you suggested.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 13:18, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

David Lloyd (musician)

Mediababy is a WP:SPA (or dual-purpose account) which has only ever edited pages related to David Lloyd (musician) and his band Uropa Lula. Andreasegde has a much more varied history, but has edited both those pages, and also the page on Andrew Edge, who was a member of Uropa Lula with David Lloyd. COI seems clear in both cases. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:07, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Mediababy continues to edit David Lloyd (musician), and denies COI. Any thoughts, anyone? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 01:33, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
  • One can't help but notice the close resemblance of the names Andreasegde and Andrew Edge. The band membership connection seems significant, as well. Andreasegde is retired from a lengthy Wikipedia editing career after a bruising final couple years that included a topic ban on Beatles articles, but this report indeed appears to raise new questions. What would you suggest as a remedy? Jusdafax 07:59, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

Emergy

Mtbrown8 identifies himself on his talkpage as acting for Mark Brown and Sergio Ulgiati. Mark T Brown is a systems ecologist at the University of Florida, an academic with an impressive list of publications. Some of those publications are on the topic of "emergy", which as far as I, no scientist, am able to determine, is pseudoscience.

On 4 June 2010 Mtbrown8 inserted a massive ready-made article at Emergy, without an edit summary, but with this comment on the talkpage:

"Content of Emergy page was replaced by MT Brown and S Ulgiati according to a mandate received from the International Society for the Advancement of Emergy Research (ISAER) during the most recent Biennial Emergy Conference (16-18 January 2010). MT Brown is the ISAER Historian and S Ulgiati is President-elect 2010. We thank those who displayed their efforts in earlier attempts of setting up an emergy page and other related pages in Wikipedia. Suggestions on strengthening the article are welcome."

On 21 August (and again on 24 August following a reversion) I restored the article to its status prior to the intervention of Mtbrown8, which I perceived as resulting from an evident conflict of interest. That status was a redirect to Embodied energy. Mtbrown8 then posted on my talkpage, first this, to which I replied on his talk, and then:

"JLAN....an interesting catch 22. Maybe you can help me to understand. The International Society for Emergy Research, after reading the terrible entry regarding emergy, asked that I as it's historian write an article for the Wikipedia. I did as they requested. As a scientist who has spent the last 30 years researching in the field of emergy it was felt that I had the perspective necessary to write such an article. I am now told that I cannot write such an entry because I am too close to the subject. It seems that writing for an encyclopedia subject should come from experts in that field. How do we get around this catch 22?"

I feel that it would be inappropriate for me to continue to respond to his questions on my own, so am posting here both for opinions on whether there is as I believe a conflict of interest here, and also to allow scrutiny by others of the steps I have taken to date. Any thoughts? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 22:51, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Note: the article, or something very like it, is available at User:Mtbrown8/sandbox. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:03, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Ditto here, I provided Mtbrown8 some general advice and links to various WP guidelines and policies when he posted at JLAN's talk page. I'm not particularly concerned about the pseudoscience angle, as we have plenty of WP articles on topics that some people consider pseudoscience, but I do agree with JLAN that it is more appropriate for the broader community to look at the COI issues. On one hand, it is appropriate for people with expertise to create and edit articles on topics where they have knowledge, on the other hand, we have COI rules for a reason, notably, WP:NOADS and (not saying it's applicable here or not) WP:FRINGE. I personally know zilch about the topic, I just spotted the post on JLAN's page and wanted to offer a bit of advice to Mtbrown8. While I do not care to weigh in further on this topic as my on-wiki energy is generally directed elsewhere and I do not have a background in this area, I do believe that folks like Mtbrown8 should be allowed to make appropriate contributions to wikipedia if a way can be found for them to collaborate with others within the scope of our guidelines. If the topic meets our WP:NOTABILITY criteria, broadly construed (and if we have bikini bar, then surely Emergy could have an article too, or a subsection of an existing article), then I say that the main discussion then is simply content and contributors. Montanabw(talk) 19:13, 11 September 2013 (UTC)
    • An IP editor has now twice added the non-encyclopaedic content back. Would it be appropriate to ask for semi-protection until this discussion reaches some conclusion? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 07:42, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Greetings....I posted the following on Montanabwl's talk page in response to his reply to a posting on Justlettersandnumbers (JLAN) talk page....

Montanabw...thanks for weighing in on the emergy catch 22. I'm not sure how to proceed (first let me say that I am not versed in Wikipedia usage, so only tentatively understand how the talk pages work). In your response to me you suggested that I weigh-in on the Emergy talk page. I'd like to, but the page has been removed and replaced by a redirect to embodied energy. I think you also mentioned that I could demonstrate my lack of a conflict of interest by citing the published literature (or something along those lines) The emergy article I wrote was well documented and had many references to the scientific literature. There seemed to be a difference of opinion back in 2010 when I posted the article as one editor suspected COI while another weighed in saying it didn't look like conflict to him/her. At that time, Like currently, I did/do not know how to proceed following the accusation.

You asked for peer reviewed articles. here's a partial list (last 5 years) of my peer reviewed articles on emergy: Campbell, E.T. and M. T. Brown. 2012. Environmental accounting of natural capital and ecosystem services for the US National Forest System. Environment, Development and Sustainability 15 (5):691-724. Brown, M.T. M. Raugei, and S. Ulgiati. 2012. On boundaries and ‘investments’ in Emergy synthesis and LCA: A case study on thermal vs. photovoltaic electricity. Ecological Indicators 15 (2012) 227–235 Brown, M.T. and S. Ulgiati. 2011. Understanding the global economic crisis: A biophysical perspective. Ecological Modelling 223 (2011) 4– 13. Brown, M.T., Ulgiati, S., 2010. Updated evaluation of exergy and emergy driving the geobiosphere: A review and refinement of the emergy baseline. Ecological Modeling, 221(20): 2501-2508. Brown, M.T., Protano, G., and Ulgiati, S., 2010. Assessing Geobiosphere Work of Generating Global Reserves of Coal, Crude Oil, and Natural Gas. Ecological Modeling, 222(3): 879–887. Brown, M.T., A. Martinez, and J. Uche. (2010). Emergy analysis applied to the estimation of the recovery of costs for water services under the European water framework directive. Ecological Modelling 221:2123-2132. Brown, M.T. and K.C.Reiss. 2010. Landscape Development Intensity and Pollutant Emergy/Empower Density Indices as Indicators of Ecosystem Health. in Jorgensen, et. al (eds) Handbook of Ecological Indicators for Assessment of Ecosystem Health 2nd ed. CRC Press, New York.171-188p. Brown, M.T. and S. Ulgiati. 2010. Emergy Indices of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics. In Jorgensen, et. al (eds)Handbook of Ecological Indicators for Assessment of Ecosystem Health, 2nd ed. CRC Press, New York.333-352p. Aries, M. E. and M.T. Brown. 2009. Feasibility of using constructed treatment wetlands for municipal wastewater treatment in the Bogotá Savannah, Colombia. Ecological Engineering 35:1070-1078 Brown, M.T. M.J. Cohen, and S. Sweeney. 2009. Predicting National Sustainability: the convergence of energetic, economic and environmental realities. Ecological Modeling 220: 3424-3438 Ulgiati, S. and M.T. Brown. 2009. Emergy and Ecosystem Complexity. Communications in Nonlinear Science and Numerical Simulation. 14:1 (310-21) Brown, M.T. and M.J. Cohen. 2007. Emergy and network analysis. In Fath, B.D. and S.E. Jorgensen (eds.) Encyclopedia of Ecology. Elsevier. New York 18p. Brown, M.T. and S. Ulgiati, 2007. Emergy, transformity and net emergy yield. In. Capehart, B.L. (ed) Encyclopedia of Energy Engineering and Technology. Marceal Dekker, New York .NY Ferreyra, C. and M.T. Brown. 2007. Emergy Perspectives On The Argentine Economy During The Twentieth Century: A Tale Of Natural Resources, Exports And External Debt. International Journal of Environment and Sustainable Development. Vol 6:1,pp17-35 Brown, M.T., M.J. Cohen, E. Bardi and W.W. Ingwersen. 2006. Species diversity in the Florida Everglades, USA: A systems approach to calculating biodiversity. Aquatic Sciences. Vol 68 No. 3: 254-277.

BTW, I have written several encyclopedia articles (see Brown and Cohen 2007; Brown and Ulgiati, 2007; Brown and Ulgiati 2010; Brown and Reiss, 2010) and was not disqualified or accused of a conflict of interest, In fact was sought out as the expert in the field.

I contacted JLAN asking advice on how to proceed and received no reply. I have read the COI article, neutral point of view, etc. I believe that I have not violated wikipedia's COI. I would like to find out how to remove the re-direct and reinstate the page. Thanks for any help/advice you can provide. Mtbrown8 (talk) 21:39, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Currently the redirect has been removed, but it appears that it may be reinstated? (I don't know what semi-protection means in this case.). BTW a redirect to embodied energy is not appropriate as emergy is NOT embodied energy.

JLAN suggests that energy is a pseudo-science (but admits not being a scientist). While I certainly dispute this assertion, there are hundreds of scientists throughout the world who would take exception as well. I can see how one might feel that way after reading the earlier post on emergy and it was that post which prompted my wholesale replacement in 2010. Also the post on emergy synthesis was authored by the same person and contained inaccuracies and references to inappropriate material. Again if one were to read that post, one might feel that it is a pseudo-science

Other than discussing this here on the COI notice board, what needs to happen to remove this conflict of interest?

Thanks Mtbrown8 (talk) 15:36, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

It appear that Justlettersandnumbers is continually attempting to delete the Emergy page while this discussion is still ongoing. The page is by no means beyond redemption, but I believe it does need some revising. I have tagged it as needing multiple types of fixes. I'm not a scientist in the field, but am a scientist and know that while not mainstream, for Justlettersandnumbers to claim Emergy is pseudoscience is laughable (and also an accusation that doesn't have any evidence backing it up). Also, this discussion is about conflict of interest, so I don't know why the accusation of "pseudoscience" is even relevant here. I propose we close this discussion pending further cleanup of the Emergy page and revisit it in a few months. 24.4.102.221 (talk) 19:47, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

All the Emergy page really needs at the moment is for 24.4.102.221 to leave it alone. That IP has now re-added the unencyclopaedic COI text originally posted by Mtbrown8 for a third time. I'd like to suggest that the page should now be semi=protected. Is there someone here who would be prepared to look at whether that is an appropriate suggestion, or do I need to go and ask somewhere else? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 20:15, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Jim DeMint

Hello. After posting about this at WikiProject Politics it was suggested on my talk page that I bring this request here. I'm an employee at The Heritage Foundation and I'm looking for help making some improvements to the article for Jim DeMint, the current president of Heritage. I've rewritten a section of DeMint's article to address two different tags on the section and I'd like to have an editor look at my updates due to my COI with this topic. The section I have rewritten is about DeMint's Political positions. You can see my rewritten section on the article's talk page if you think this is something you can help with. Thanks! Thurmant (talk) 19:59, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

I've integrated your contribution into the article without modification. If anyone has any objections please feel free to revert. Sperril (talk) 17:30, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
My inclusion was reverted. There is a discussion on article's talk page page between myself and the user who reverted. Some other opinions would be appreciated. Sperril (talk) 20:49, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

Playlist.com

I own and operate Playlist.com, which is a streaming music website, a competitor to Pandora and others. The Wikipedia article has out-of-date information. I attempted to change it, but my changes were reverted. I have never edited a Wikipedia article before, and I came to learn that I have a COI. I'm not sure how to go about getting the article updated. There is actually a lot of information that could be added about the history of the company, including disputes and ultimately resolution with the record labels, although candidly I don't have time to author all of that. I am seeking guidance on how to update the article or perhaps even find someone who is willing to update it instead of me.

Hi Rdavidorf, and thanks for being up front about your connection to the subject. Our standard advice is to propose changes on the article's talk page, where other uninvolved editors can review them, suggest revisions and then post them on your behalf. Keep in mind that any changes you propose need to be verifiable by reliable, independent sources. Thanks again and best of luck. --Drm310 (talk) 16:37, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

Susan C. Aldridge

Can someone take a look at this article? A person contacted me after tags were placed on the article to say that, after repeated deletions by one or two editors who appear to have conflict of interest, news reports about certain events were repeatedly removed from the article. This person also reported that several tries were made to reintroduce newsworthy information into the article, but instead ran into instances of repeated deletions by at least one, if not both editors. If that is the case, the actions of editors in question may also be exhibiting issues related to WP:OWN in addition to WP:COI. At present, this article is clearly written as a resume or curriculum vitae for the subject of the article. →Lwalt ♦ talk 00:16, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

It certainly looks a mess. Can you identify the editors you believe may have a conflict of interest there? If so, please replace "username" in the * {{userlinks|username}} template you see above (when in edit mode) with the name of the editor (you can copy the template to a new line as often as you need if there are several editors); you'll also need to notify each one of them of this discussion. Meanwhile, I've taken the liberty of adding the article name in the appropriate place. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:46, 13 September 2013 (UTC)
I've now added the editors who may be in question regarding this issue and notified them by placing a COI notice on their talk pages. →Lwalt ♦ talk 08:38, 13 September 2013 (UTC)
Thank you. I have now (I hope!) removed all of the copyvio material which has been serially added since 2010 by three of the above editors, Tasj007, Saldridge2 and Anol1098093. In the process I have also restored (and subsequently edited) the account and news reports of those "certain events". As usual, I am open to criticism of my actions. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 19:18, 13 September 2013 (UTC)
Adil.faisal has now confirmed a professional connection to Susan C. Aldridge, which is helpful. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 15:58, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
  • I will be blunt. Even a cursory examination of this situation reveals serious COI. I have commented on the article talk page regarding the article, and the obvious attempt to whitewash the subject. There is a substantial media trail leading to Aldridge, with numerous reliable sources that show some major questions have been raised, including by Senator Tom Harkin in this Washington Post article, regarding Aldridge's professional career, which can be viewed as dubious. Google her name and a big list of controversy pops up. Dr. Aldridge and her defenders may not like it, but a Wikipedia article with a decent amount of neutrality is going to bring this up in detail, including the allegations of lowering of academic standards, removal of faculty objecting, and "hush money.". No amount of Wikilawyering about BLP's can get past this widely reported material. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and we let the chips fall where they may when reliable sources are available. The last-ditch suggestion that we delete the article is unacceptable. Jusdafax 09:17, 21 September 2013 (UTC)
Isn't that the stuff that is currently covered in the article, though in a somewhat less flamboyant style? Anyway, it seems we have a new POV-pusher, MARYLANDSMITH, who appears determined to add a load of resumé-style guff back into the article. Does anyone hear a quacking noise? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 19:58, 21 September 2013 (UTC)
Lots of quacking and the pitter-patter of webbed feet. Nevertheless, User:75.85.139.55 seems to be the odd one out, since he's actually restoring well-sourced content the others were keen to delete and should not be included in the list above. Kleuske (talk) 23:10, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
Quite right, my error in the initial posting, now struck through. Thanks for pointing it out. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:34, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
Except that it wasn't me that made that posting, memory lapse, user error! I hope User:Lwalt doesn't mind that I struck through that IP address? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 19:44, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
I'm confident he will care less about who struck this entry than he would about accidentally blocking a good faith contributor. Just write it down as "collaboration". Kleuske (talk) 10:52, 28 September 2013 (UTC)
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