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This Conflict of interest/Noticeboard (COIN) page is for determining whether a specific editor has a conflict of interest (COI) for a specific article and whether an edit by a COIN-declared COI editor does not meet a requirement of the Conflict of Interest guideline. A conflict of interest may occur when an editor has a close personal or business connections with article topics. An edit by a COIN-declared COI editor may not meet a requirement of the COI guideline when the edit advances outside interests more than it advances the aims of Wikipedia. Post here if you are concerned that an editor has a COI, and is using Wikipedia to promote their own interests at the expense of neutrality. For content disputes, try proposing changes at the article talk page first and otherwise follow the Wikipedia:Dispute resolution procedural policy. | Sections older than 14 days archived by Lowercase sigmabot III. (For help, see Wikipedia:Purge) |
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Greghenderson2006
- Patricia Ford Crass ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Emile Kellogg Boisot ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Jean-Baptiste Boisot ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Lewis Francis Byington ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Byington Ford ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Tirey L. Ford ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Emil Ernest Gloor ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Alexander D. Henderson (businessman) ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Alexander D. Henderson Jr. ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Alexander D. Henderson III ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Girard B. Henderson ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Joseph Henderson (pilot) ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- David H. McConnell ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Ellwood Walter (businessman) ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- George Faunce Whitcomb ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Greghenderson2006 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
Editor was warned about COI seven years ago and posted a generic notice to their user page, to the effect of "I am making pages about my family". Here is a very low quality memorial-type page that they pushed to article space on Patricia Ford Crass,which includes a list of workshops that the subject did, and a section for their travels. Greghenderson2006's user page lists Patricia Ford as their mother. They have apparently made numerous other pages on family members, so these may need to be checked.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 16:28, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
- The editor lists Alexander Henderson as their father on their user page, so I am adding the three Alexander D. Henderson pages that they have edited. This is reminding me a bit of the Mitzi.humphrey family memorial efforts.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 16:40, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
- Additionally, they have been adding various forms of this link, which the user lists on their user page as their own site.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 16:48, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP, there's quite a lot at [1]
- It's perhaps worth noting that the editor in question makes exaggerated claims about his subjects, such as that Cary S. Cox is "best known for inventing the ... the cotton gin ". (His patent is from 1928, Eli Whitney patented the first modern cotton gin in 1794) Vexations (talk) 17:35, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
- @Vexations: I have removed all mentions of hendersonfamilytree.com as a) it was published by the editor who added it. Not a reliable source or appropriate EL. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:18, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
- Another one of these cases. My hand is currently not on the block button, but it twitches closer and closer as I note how almost everything he has contributed is connected in some way to his family (List of Pilot boats? Oh, that looks okay...wait a second, why's this Joseph Henderson linked everywhere...?). There do appear to be some unrelated pages in his contribs, though, and I don't think this is a WP:NOTHERE situation. I will give him some time to explain himself here. I also recommend that those experienced in image licensing take a look at his Commons uploads, I've already see a few doubtful "own work" cases. GeneralNotability (talk) 01:59, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- @GeneralNotability: maybe you could speak to this user on their talk to encourage them to discuss here? They are ignoring requests to stop editing the family-related pages: today's edits. I agree they have made some positive contribs in the past, but they seem dead set on ignoring basic COI principles and continuing to promote the family.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:25, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
I concur with ThatMontrealIP that this COI case is similar to the mitzi.humphrey case. (Which took a long time to clean up). I looked through Greghenderson2006's edit history and it seems that they are WP:NOTHERE to build an encyclopedia, but rather to use Wikipedia as a vanity press, a means to blatantly celebrate and promote his family genealogy/ancestry. It seems that virtually all the articles he's created are about members of his family or their business activities. Netherzone (talk) 16:58, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
- Agree. See their newest creation Carmel Art Association.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 17:40, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
- The user in quesiton has added a COI declaration with articles, but it is still unclear as to whether these are all the articles. They still do not seem to understand that their editing has created a lot of work for other editors who now have to go through and check each of the articles on family members that they edited.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 00:05, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- Agree. I have looked through a number of this editor's articles and they contain excessive quotes from obituaries and trivial mentions which make them read much more like memorials than encyclopaedia articles. I've made edits to several but they will need a lot more careful scrutiny. Melcous (talk) 01:34, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- OK I found the COIN page. You guys are doing your job and I appreciate this. I have been creating Wikipedia pages for many years have loved it! However, in the last two days, you have laid into me with messages and warnings. I am slowly getting it. I can of course improve the pages, but not sure what to do here with so many messages of COI and possible deletions. I thought Wikipedia was a place to add information on important subjects like Sandy Hook Pilots, Attorney Generals, and Developers of Airparks, Patents, companies, etc. When I write a Wikipedia article, I try to follow best practices by asking for help, sticking to neutral language, and having other editors review my work. I have signed a COI Declaration on my user page. What can I do to improve the articles and repair this relationship? Greg Henderson(talk)
- Greghenderson2006 it seems a bit disingenuous to say you "thought wikipedia was a place to add information on important subjects like Sandy Hook Pilots, Attorney Generals" etc when the vast majority of your edits here have not been to do that, but to create and maintain articles about your family members. What you can do? The first step is pretty simple: agree to stop editing articles on topics connected to your family members. Melcous (talk) 16:05, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- And please, Greghenderson2006 stop WP:SPAM spamming the External Links sections of articles with links that go to an Amazon.com sales page to your own self-published book. Wikipedia is not a place to try to sell your "book". Netherzone (talk) 16:14, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- Greghenderson2006 it seems a bit disingenuous to say you "thought wikipedia was a place to add information on important subjects like Sandy Hook Pilots, Attorney Generals" etc when the vast majority of your edits here have not been to do that, but to create and maintain articles about your family members. What you can do? The first step is pretty simple: agree to stop editing articles on topics connected to your family members. Melcous (talk) 16:05, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- OK I found the COIN page. You guys are doing your job and I appreciate this. I have been creating Wikipedia pages for many years have loved it! However, in the last two days, you have laid into me with messages and warnings. I am slowly getting it. I can of course improve the pages, but not sure what to do here with so many messages of COI and possible deletions. I thought Wikipedia was a place to add information on important subjects like Sandy Hook Pilots, Attorney Generals, and Developers of Airparks, Patents, companies, etc. When I write a Wikipedia article, I try to follow best practices by asking for help, sticking to neutral language, and having other editors review my work. I have signed a COI Declaration on my user page. What can I do to improve the articles and repair this relationship? Greg Henderson(talk)
- @Netherzone:, I agree it's a good chance of WP:NOTHERE situation. Have a look at his edits on Pilot boat which involves inserting Henderson mixed with buffer to make it less obvious. Disclosing his COI isn't a pass to make edits for the purpose of inserting things to show his ancestors name visibility Graywalls (talk) 16:04, 13 July 2020 (UTC)
- @Greghenderson2006: thank you for your post above. The reason that we are concerned about your edits is that we don't allow substantial content editing of articles by those who are directly related to the articles.
- @Graywalls:, I saw that also - and there was another boat article with 14 mentions of one of his relatives that I saw you cleaned up. Even the articles that seem unrelated, when you look through them up pops another COI entry. This category he created on Commons says it all.[2] All roads lead to you know who. Netherzone (talk) 16:37, 13 July 2020 (UTC)
- I see you have asked about adding sources at Cary S. Cox. As long as these are independent sources, doing so is fine in my view' the COI policy allows involved editors to make minor non-controversial factual corrections or small additions to the article. You should keep in mind that anything that looks like promotion of your family is probably not a non-controversial item. Any significant changes need to be proposed on the talk page, usually through the WP:REQUESTEDIT process.
- What is not OK is creating articles about your family members, pushing them to article space and then continuing to edit them for years. If you want to write articles about family members you can do that via WP:AFC, where the article will be reviewed by an independent editor.
- Similarly not OK is adding links to books that you have published, unless it was an independent publisher and you add the links very judiciously. The same goes for the family history website that you operate: we are not interested as you are publishing your own material, and ostensibly could be seen to be promoting it via Wikipedia.
- To sum up, the advice here is that you have to stop directly editing articles on your family unless the edits are very minor. Larger edits need to be discussed or approved via Requestedit. New articles on family members need to go through AFC. Does that all make sense? ThatMontrealIP (talk) 17:10, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP Yes, it makes sense. I appreciate the time you have made to educate me on these issues. I will follow the above advice. Greg Henderson(talk)
- Thanks, that is all we needed to hear. It is all about keeping the encyclopedia neutral. We appreciate your future adherence to the policies.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 17:52, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP Yes, it makes sense. I appreciate the time you have made to educate me on these issues. I will follow the above advice. Greg Henderson(talk)
- The disclosure on his user page needs to be clearer and articles by listing articles with COI separately from generic my articles listing. Also, I feel like the anchor text on his user page is more along the line of use of Wikipedia for webhosting and brushing up against WP:NOTAWEBHOST policy. Graywalls (talk) 15:35, 11 July 2020 (UTC)
- Good point,t he user should have a list on their user page of articles for which they have a COI with. That would be "best practice".ThatMontrealIP (talk) 16:04, 11 July 2020 (UTC)
- Special:Diff/947316726 This insertion about Henderson related stuff into the generic article perfume is also a COI concern. This Special:Diff/828212184 one is also inappropriate. Graywalls (talk) 16:18, 11 July 2020 (UTC)
I am starting to think this user should be blocked:
- They have not given us a listing of COI articles on their user page, despite what seems like 20 warnings; See the numerous reuests just above this. They do say "I have a conflict of interest in many of my Wikipedia articles." but it is up to us to find the ones they have a COI on.
- They !vote at AFD without disclosing their COI while !voting.
- Same thing at [the Carmel Art Association AfD], where they edit comment is "My vote is to keep it" and does not mention COI anywhere. Mentioning COI is important for editors unfamiliar with the COI saga.
- Same thing at the AFD for Cary S Cox: no disclosure for unfamiliar editors or admin closers.
- Ten days after this thread started, they've admitted they are a connected contributor on Carmel Valley Airport by adding the tag.
- I just found another article, William_Helm which is obvious COI, but they have not listed it on their user page as a COI article, and haven't tagged the page as connected contributor. At one point they did seek an OTRS release for some of the content, which was copied from their family history web site, so they clearly have a COI.
- In short, they have been using Wikipedia to promote their family for years, and now that we have figured that out, they are not being straight up about their COI in talk page discussions and have stonewalled very clear requests for disclosure. The user is WP:NOTHERE. Pinging GeneralNotability for their opinion.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:00, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP, ugh...I agree with your assessment that they haven't been forthcoming following the previous discussion and that they're pretty much only here to write about family history, but I know I can be quick on the block trigger so I'd rather another admin review and block if needed in this case. GeneralNotability (talk) 18:26, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Newslinger: I know this is a long thread. Still, if you have time: I wonder if you could please share your thoughts about blocking or banning Greghenderson. —Unforgettableid (talk) 22:47, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Unforgettableid, while conflict-of-interest editing is discouraged on Wikipedia, it is tolerated when there is no undisclosed paid editing involved, and the editor does not violate other policies/guidelines to carry out their edits. Now that Greghenderson2006 has begun disclosing their conflict of interest on their userpage and on talk pages of affected articles (e.g. Talk:Emile Kellogg Boisot), as well as using edit requests, I think the conflict of interest issue is mostly under control. As some of the articles created by Greghenderson2006 had survived deletion, e.g. Joseph Henderson (pilot) (AfD), Henri Vincent-Anglade (AfD), and Ellwood Walter (businessman) (AfD), I do not think there is a strong enough reason to block Greghenderson2006 under WP:NOTHERE. For comparison, disclosed paid editors who do everything Greghenderson2006 does (on top of receiving payment) do not get blocked under WP:NOTHERE, so for consistency, I am not able justify blocking Greghenderson2006 when they appear to be trying to comply with our conflict of interest disclosure recommendations. — Newslinger talk 04:31, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
- I also see the user's pattern supports the assessment he is WP:NOTHERE to build the enclopedia, but here with an agenda to make articles and insert contents about those that relate to his own family. His disclosure looks deliberately vague and no kind of disclosure is a pass to increase the prominence of a particular group for their own purpose. Graywalls (talk) 20:13, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Newslinger: I know this is a long thread. Still, if you have time: I wonder if you could please share your thoughts about blocking or banning Greghenderson. —Unforgettableid (talk) 22:47, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP, ugh...I agree with your assessment that they haven't been forthcoming following the previous discussion and that they're pretty much only here to write about family history, but I know I can be quick on the block trigger so I'd rather another admin review and block if needed in this case. GeneralNotability (talk) 18:26, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
- I am in agreement that their contributions indicate WP:NOTHERE. Aside from the obvious COI articles, when I've looked through his edit history of contributions that seem to be unrelated, such as Brooklyn Bridge, Garden State Cemetery, Statue of Liberty, etc. only to find that his edits amount to adding info about a family relative, and do not contribute to the overall quality of the article. I've cleaned up this trivia on multiple articles, as have several other editors. Citations are often low quality, linking to Familysearch.com, his personal family website, or his self-published books or publications. He has been editing since 2007, but still seems unfamiliar with (or disinterested in) our basic policies and guidelines. Netherzone (talk) 20:47, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
- I have reviewed Brooklyn Bridge, and Statue of Liberty and removed his contribution after seeing the relative insignificance, promotional language and apparent COI intentions. There has been the use of non-neutral phrase like "Joseph Henderson, a harbor pilot regarded as one of the most experienced and trustworthy of New York's Sandy Hook Pilots" in multiple articles, inserted by the editor in question. It shares the editing pattern of covert COI similar to Mitzi.humphrey case mentioned earlier that prevents other editors from noticing unless they're looking for it. Graywalls (talk) 22:52, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
- I am in agreement that their contributions indicate WP:NOTHERE. Aside from the obvious COI articles, when I've looked through his edit history of contributions that seem to be unrelated, such as Brooklyn Bridge, Garden State Cemetery, Statue of Liberty, etc. only to find that his edits amount to adding info about a family relative, and do not contribute to the overall quality of the article. I've cleaned up this trivia on multiple articles, as have several other editors. Citations are often low quality, linking to Familysearch.com, his personal family website, or his self-published books or publications. He has been editing since 2007, but still seems unfamiliar with (or disinterested in) our basic policies and guidelines. Netherzone (talk) 20:47, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
- @GeneralNotability:, I think it's most appropriate to bar him from editing on anything related to his family, or addition of any contents even abstractly related to his family is perfectly reasonable. He could still pursue his interest in genealogy in something that is unrelated to Henderson, Cox, Ford, and whatever that does not remotely relate to his own ancestry. Graywalls (talk) 19:33, 17 July 2020 (UTC)
- Yeah, I think a ban or block is the only way we are going to prevent the Henderson promotional memorial editing here. I had a discussion with them on their talk page today where they refused to provide a list of articles they have COI with, just saying that it was most of them. Then they added a connected contributor tag to Archibald Murray Campbell, and promptly added a source along with some puffery "he was one of the richest (physicians)", which is plain old family promotion. They also marked the edit as minor, with the summary "m (Minor addition of citation requested." This editor's refusal to play by the rules is getting to be a royal pain in the something or other. They just do not get it.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 23:51, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
- Agree, that a ban or block is in order, unfortunately, I don't see any other way to deal with this situation. I have never suggested blocking or banning before, so I did not come to this conclusion impulsively. He continues to edit articles with which he has a COI. He has not disclosed on his talk page all of the articles that he has a COI with, just a smattering. 95% of his edits are connected to his family, their businesses, associated businesses and landmarks, he is solely here to promote his family legacy and ancestry. WP:NOTHERE. He has failed to reveal his COI in AfD discussions. He does not seem to want to abide by policy/guidelines, and has not been listening to the recommendations that several other editors have made to him. He has been given substantial time to mend his ways, as his first warning was in 2013, seven years ago. His COI editing has increased dramatically since then, and it is wasting the time of many editors. Netherzone (talk) 16:52, 22 July 2020 (UTC)
- Yeah, I think a ban or block is the only way we are going to prevent the Henderson promotional memorial editing here. I had a discussion with them on their talk page today where they refused to provide a list of articles they have COI with, just saying that it was most of them. Then they added a connected contributor tag to Archibald Murray Campbell, and promptly added a source along with some puffery "he was one of the richest (physicians)", which is plain old family promotion. They also marked the edit as minor, with the summary "m (Minor addition of citation requested." This editor's refusal to play by the rules is getting to be a royal pain in the something or other. They just do not get it.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 23:51, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
- Comment: I would like to say thank you for your concern. I understand you are doing what you think is the best to make Wikipedia the best! In my defense, I would like to say I have learned a lot about editing in the several years, especially in the last two months! You guys are good about pointing out what people are doing wrong. I have done the following to comply and not be WP:NOTHERE.
- I have listed COI articles on my user page
- I forgot to add my COI on AFD pages, but will do so in the future
- I’ve added the COI tag on the William Helm article
- I avoid writing about family ancestors, see recent article Richard Brown (pilot)
- I intend to follow best practices by asking for help, sticking to WP:NPOV, and having other editors review my work.
- Thanks for your understanding and assistance. --Greg Henderson (talk) 18:12, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Greghenderson2006: thanks for cleaning up the COI concerns. You have indeed done some good editing on Wiki. I think you will find that the more you concentrate on topics unrelated to your family the less trouble you will run into, and the more respect you will gain, as an editor in the community. It's all about the neutrality. Thanks for moving in that direction. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:18, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
Wikimayor and page-creation-log retention
Wikimayor
Hi!
Although some of his creations look somewhat spammy to me, and although about 45% of his articles have been deleted, Wikimayor claims he has no COI.
Some of his possibly-spammy-looking creations include:
- International Drinks Festival ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Sound Sultan ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- RocDaMic ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Abimbola Adebakin ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Parminder Vir ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
I'd be curious to hear your thoughts.
Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 07:41, 21 July 2020 (UTC)
- I can't see why he hasn't got a coi. Of the 60 odd article the editor created, only about three of them are standard. Several of them have been recreated that were Afd'd in 2016/2017 and are now back. This Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme has went to Afd this week and is now deleted. It was created along with two other associated articles, one a banker who has MBE award is notable, but the article was real spam, the other a foundation. scope_creepTalk 13:38, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
-
- Dear scope_creep, and dear all:
-
- What did you mean when you wrote "only about three of them are standard"?
- If we all agree that he's probably an undisclosed paid editor, what should we do about it? Should we start putting a series of increasingly-threatening templates on his talk page — and, if so, which templates? Or should we ask some admin to deliver one final warning, and if so, which admin?
- Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 22:28, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
Page-creation-log retention
Dear all:
I'm not an admin.
I was looking at the list of articles which User:Wikimayor created. Three of them were deleted and then recreated. I was wondering who first created them, and who recreated them: was it Wikimayor every time? So I tried checking the page creation log. Unfortunately, that log dates back only to 27 June 2018.
Why doesn't that log date back farther? Did page creation logging only begin in June 2018? Or were old log entries erased at some point?
Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 07:41, 21 July 2020 (UTC)
- At 6 million articles with talk pages, the full page creation log would run to 12 million/50, which makes 240,000 pages of results, each with 50 items... I am guessing that has something to do with limiting a full list of page creation views.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 17:37, 21 July 2020 (UTC)
- Did you try Special:WhatLinksHere for namespace user talk? I think you'll find something interesting for Dupe Olusola. Also in user: namespace you often find CSD logs e.g. User:Passengerpigeon/CSD log/archive-1 where Abimbola Adebakin is logged. - Bri.public (talk) 22:52, 21 July 2020 (UTC)
Edgardo M. Latrubesse
- Edgardo M. Latrubesse ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) ("keep" AfD)
- Araguaia River ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Cerrado ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Amazon3112 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
User Amazon3112 appears to have a COI with Edgardo M. Latrubesse. The user has engaged in a promotional pattern of editing at that page, and has also added citations to the work of Latrubesse at the pages Araguaia River and Cerrado. I'm somewhat sympathetic to some of the editing at Edgardo M. Latrubesse, where part of the desire seems to have been to minimize a (reliably-sourced) sexual harassment complaint, and perhaps should have raised a COI complaint earlier. User has not responded to a query on their talk page, and just reverted to add back promotional and WP:UNDUE material on the Edgardo M. Latrubesse. Pinging @Tom Radulovich: who I reached out to because of his work on tropical rivers including Cerrado; pinging @David Eppstein: who is familiar with the situation from AfD and prior discussion. Russ Woodroofe (talk) 11:22, 22 July 2020 (UTC)
- Should have included above: other accounts that may be run by a connected user include User:Megaalluvialfan and User:Latrubesse. (Possibly a case of forgotten password? These accounts have not recently edited.) Russ Woodroofe (talk) 11:32, 22 July 2020 (UTC)
- A solution suggested to me on a previous case of insistence on autobiographical editing was a partial block of that user from the relevant pages. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:50, 22 July 2020 (UTC)
- Thanks for asking, and for trying to sort out what's going on. I'm not familiar enough with Mr. Latrubesse or his work to opine on the article about him. The edits to Cerrado and Araguaia River citing journal articles by Mr. Latrubesse seem factual and appropriate, but I'm not subject-matter expert.Tom Radulovich (talk) 18:15, 22 July 2020 (UTC)
- Tom Radulovich, thanks for taking a look. I'm still a bit concerned about WP:SELFCITE, but am unable to distinguish WP:EX from self-promotion on the river articles. I added primary source tags and made some other corrections. On the biography, it seems to me that the editor should request COI edits on the talk page for what they are trying to do. David Eppstein, a partial block could perhaps be a good solution here. Would they still be able to edit the talk page? Russ Woodroofe (talk) 08:52, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Russ Woodroofe:
- Amazon3112 has made 20 edits, some quite substantial. Still, the user has never written an edit summary or a message on any talk page.
-
- I've removed the old generic welcome template from the user's talk page. I've replaced the template with {{welcome-COI}}, which in turn links to the simplified WP:BPCOI guide for the unenlightened.
- Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 16:52, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Russ Woodroofe: It looks like {{uw-paid1}} might have worked! :) Thankfully, Amazon3112 has now started writing talk-page messages. —Unforgettableid (talk) 09:31, 24 July 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, thank you! I'll try to let you take the lead (as I did in directing the user to first respond to you), if that's ok, at least until the initial disclosure is resolved. It seems like the user might be more willing to talk to an uninvolved party. Russ Woodroofe (talk) 10:23, 24 July 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Russ Woodroofe: No worries! I hope to try to be gentle and empathetic. Extracting a COI disclosure can sometimes be like pulling teeth. Still, perhaps there's no more-reliable way to convince a user to disclose than by being nice. —Unforgettableid (talk) 14:22, 24 July 2020 (UTC)
- Update: User Amazon3112 is now playing some sort of version of "psychoanalyze the psychologist". They are suggesting on Talk:Edgardo M. Latrubesse that Unforgettableid may have a conflict of interest on the article (!?!). As long as they keep it to the talk page, I don't expect that any further action is required, but it struck me as strange enough that I wanted to post this update. Russ Woodroofe (talk) 09:15, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Russ Woodroofe: No worries! I hope to try to be gentle and empathetic. Extracting a COI disclosure can sometimes be like pulling teeth. Still, perhaps there's no more-reliable way to convince a user to disclose than by being nice. —Unforgettableid (talk) 14:22, 24 July 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, thank you! I'll try to let you take the lead (as I did in directing the user to first respond to you), if that's ok, at least until the initial disclosure is resolved. It seems like the user might be more willing to talk to an uninvolved party. Russ Woodroofe (talk) 10:23, 24 July 2020 (UTC)
Ollimania
- Ollimania ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Olli ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Diederiekje Bok ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Hein Mevissen ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- John's Phone ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Marike Bok ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Rinus van den Bosch ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- John Doe Amsterdam ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Joostwijnberg (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- Hanswillemsen (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
The articles related to Diederiekje Bok and Hein Mevissen, founders of John Doe Amsterdam advertising agency and children's authors, need a cleanup of promotional content. The articles on Bok and Mevissen were deleted from nl wiki as promotional. Joostwijnberg's (active from May 2012) and Hanswillemsen's (active Jan and Feb 2012) editing histories almost exclusively involve articles connected to Bok or Mevissen and one of them is the starter and the largest contributor for all the articles listed except "John's Phone". Their editing focus in nl wiki and commons is similar. TSventon (talk) 22:54, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
- Dear TSventon: User:Hanswillemsen has been inactive for years, so we need not do anything. I've templated User:Joostwijnberg with {{uw-paid1}}, which demands that Joost not make any further edits before replying. I think G11, PROD, and/or AfD would probably be a good way for us to deal with a lot of the created articles; I'll leave that to you. Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 10:49, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
- Melcous, thank you for removing some of the promotional material.
- Unforgettableid, thank you for templating User:Joostwijnberg, hopefully they will respond before they edit again, but that might not be for a few months. I stated in my post that User:Hanswillemsen has been inactive for years, I included them because they are another single purpose account and they started several of the articles. I will do some research on deletion criteria.
- TSventon (talk) 11:01, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- TSventon, no worries! Today I PRODded Ollimania and notified Joostwijnberg. Maybe we can bring him back to Wikipedia and then extract a paid-editing confession from him. If that happens, we can start to move towards a better relationship, working together with him as a disclosed paid editor. Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 04:19, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Neecia Majolly
- Neecia Majolly ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) — now draftified
- Draft:Neecia Majolly ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Neeciamajolly (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
Over a period of ten years, it appears that the mentioned user is adding content to a page related to said user without following the guidelines related to COI nor disclosing COI nor providing references. I have tried to guide the user on multiple occasions but have failed and hence this notice. Vincentvikram (talk) 07:02, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Vincentvikram. Good catch! The page looks like it may be the result of undisclosed paid editing and autobiographical editing; I've draftified it. You may want to add it to your watchlist. If it's not edited, it will probably be automatically deleted in six months. The page got only 160 pageviews per month when it was in articlespace; it's very possible that subject meets neither WP:GNG nor WP:NMUSIC. If Neeciamajolly or any other newbie tries to make even one single edit to the draft, feel free to let me know on my user talk page; I can template them with {{uw-paid1}}, which may help to force the beginning of a productive conversation. Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 23:56, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Unforgettableid. Neeciamajolly is not a paid id but rather makes autobiographical edits as noted. I know Neecia IRL and tried to guide her from editing her own page. Since it did not help I was forced to get community intervention. Will try to set aside some time in the next month to improve the page. Vikram Vincent 10:23, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
Techrebellious
- Techrebellious (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- AFA Sports ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- Draft:Afa sports ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Nairametrics ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
In April, the editor named above has placed a COI tag on their userpage [3] with the edit summary I am trying to show that there is a conflict of Interest on the AFA page I just created
, then yesterday or today, removed it [4]. Their userpage says they help Tech entrepreneurs tell their story to the world
. When I asked if they are engaged with paid editing I got a negative reply with this explanation: during the course of approval of the article, an editor pointed out that it sounded promotional and If I wanted the article to be approved, I should insert that on my userpage
[5]. This makes no sense to me; can anybody else have a look? The other article of concern is Nairametrics which is some kind of financial advisory blog?
Another anomaly is why there is both a declined draft and an articlespace item for AFA Sports. ☆ Bri (talk) 01:33, 29 July 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Bri!
- It's perhaps a bit of an unusual case.
- He also claims: "I do not do paid editing as it is against the guidelines of this community. I only edit articles I have interest in and feel should be on Wikipedia as many big Nigerian brands are not recognized here."
- I've tagged all three pages with {{notability}} for now. But that's not a long-term solution, since the tags can be silently removed.
- The XTools reveal that he's created a fourth page, too, Draft:AFA Sport. It's been deleted as G11.
- If you remind me in four or five days, maybe I can ping MER-C. I haven't yet interacted with MER-C very often, so I don't want to pile too much on his/her plate all in one day.
- Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 04:10, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Eccesale
- John K. Grande ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- Saša M.Savić ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- Eccesale (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
I asked user Eccasle if they have any conflict on Saša M.Savić, where they have added several personal photos of the article subject tagged as "own work". They didn't address the COI question in their answer, so bringing it here. In addition they're listed as the author of this newspaper scan on Commons, and are asking on their talk page about how to upload more. If you have personal childhood photos of the article subject as well as a clippings collection to upload, there is a good bet you have a COI of some sort. The editor has only worked on the two above articles over the past several years, and both are full of the kind of clearly identifiable bloat that usually accompanies COI editing. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 23:40, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
- Mystery solved: the editor Eccesale on Commons signed this post about images "Saša Savić Eccesale". Tagging Saša Savić as an autobiography. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 23:50, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
- this was pretty much solved by an administrator. As the user is blocked, one article is at AFD and the other moved to draft, I think it can be closed.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:21, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
Frithjof Schuon
- Frithjof Schuon ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Maude Murray (talk · contribs)
The editor has been warned on their user talk page that there may be a conflict of interest, since they have a close relationship to the deceased subject. I asked an admin, Keith D (talk · contribs) for advice, as I wasn't sure how to deal with large, multiple edits with a possible COI. He reverted the unsourced edits and also pointed the editor to WP:Conflict of interest guidelines in conversation with her on his own talk page. In reply to her on my own talk page, I have also tried to explain the need for reliable sources, verifiability (etc) and the guidelines on COI.
Today, the editor has again returned to editing the article herself, rather than suggesting changes on the article's talk page as advised.
Could an expert here offer her guidance, please? Esowteric+Talk 13:31, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
- Maude Murray replied on my talk age: "I just wrote you a long explanation; but maybe lost it in technology. I'm 81 years old: this isn't easy! And sorry if I broke some rule: I had no idea what aha words meant! Maude Murray (talk) 14:15, 31 July 2020 (UTC)" Esowteric+Talk 10:04, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
- The editor is finding the technology (eg talk pages) at Wikipedia extremely taxing and has offered to communicate via email. I posted a request at the article's talk page asking if subject experts could help her out, perhaps via email. Esowteric+Talk 11:17, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Esowteric: It is kind that you are helping them, but this user should probably be kept as far away from the article as possible. They are the subject's former wife or partner (per their edit comment, "Maude Murray... was alledgedly the third of the four wives of Frithjof Schuon for 20 years, and a very close disciple.") and their intent is pretty much as biased and non-neutral as it could be ("The man was literally a holy terror. There must be some way to let people see that.", "You've got all your proof here of what I'm trying to tell you. You are veiling a horrible man in sheep's clothing.") Her claims might be true, but the stated bias here is pretty spectacular. She also appears to only be here to promote this view. If we are going to have a neutral encyclopedia, this is not the kind of source/influence we need. Rather, we need neutral editors who provide independent sources.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:57, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
Swaminarayan Sampraday, BAPS, Morari Bapu, Vachanamrut
Discussion was initiated by sockpuppet |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Users Apollo1203 and Moksha88 have a history of trying to dominate users forcing editors into not making any negative or critical appearing edits to Swaminarayan Sampraday, BAPS, Morari Bapu, Vachanamrut and related articles. He has been accused as a sock in the past as well and tries to attack my ability to edit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Moksha88/Archive. Also it is notable that this user has a biased towards baps and this statement from his accusation still stand true: "Most importantly, all of them are removing contents from Criticism of Swaminarayan sect, nothing constructive and opening unnecessary talks on the talk page and supporting each other. This makes single user to be very occupied for editing. Perhaps, a try not to add any criticism about one particular sect." If you look at the talk pages, the same few users try to draw out debates in the talk pages even though there are cited sources and are relentless in not having anything critical about BAPS with constant group attacks and edit warring. Evidence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Bochasanwasi_Akshar_Purushottam_Swaminarayan_Sanstha#WP:OR,_Recent_Lead_Paragraph_Edits_to_state_Founder_Left_the_Vadtal_Temple https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Swaminarayan_Sampradaya#Original_Research https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Kbhatt22/sandbox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Morari_Bapu#Removal_of_Sarcastic_Dig_at_Swaminarayan https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Vachanamrut&type=revision&diff=968031849&oldid=968031601 This is a problem because his history revealed to me the intense conflict of interest and why certain articles are written to only espouse BAPS theology even though it is a breakoff group that was created a 100 years after in 1907 after a judge stated to the founder of BAPS to stay off the premises of the Swaminarayan Sampraday as he create a separate group: "The judge cited an affidavit from Shastri Yagnapurushdas to rule that he had succeeded from the Vadtal diocese, and was now the head of an organization independent of "the holders of the Vadatal[sic] or Ahmedabad Gadi. Ultimately, the judge ruled that BAPS swamis did not have the right to stay or preach in the Swaminarayan Sampradaya and he restrained Shastri Yagnapurushdas from going to the temple." https://www.google.com/books/edition/Introduction_to_Swaminarayan_Hinduism/ODdqDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=affadavit Why isn't this fact that Yagnapurshdasji left the Vadtal temple in the lead of the BAPS article and look at the talk page how much they fight this to include it because of reasons below. They distract mods and other editors with civility and personal attack stuff because I use harsh words out of frustration but my frustration prove correct as you will see below: . I went through the pages and editors entire history and he spend 15 years of his life editing the Sampraday article to make sure slowly that it is presented as BAPS is apart of the original sampraday. That is dedication. After I read that most wikipedia readers spend only a few minutes reading the lead paragraphs and I see why BAPS representatives are particular about controlling the narrative and removing any critical content as more mandirs are being opened and more people are googling the sanstha. My theory was that they are members of the group and are constantly working together to constantly remove items this is true. I wish more moderators took more interest in this topic as BAPS currently is the largest, most controversial sect of Hindiusm in the US and as they open more temples, they will have plentiful editors control the narrative online to portray their sect only in a unbalanced positive fashion. This should not be allowed. If you have time, I request you to look at the BAPS, Morari Bapu and Swaminarayan Sampraday articles and see the tactics they use to make sure sourced edits cannot be made and the same group of users patrol and edit over and over, sourced with BAPS books. The results of this users history are below and I found that Moksha88 is a member of BAPS and discloses this fact in a earlier edit as you can see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Swaminarayan&diff=prev&oldid=93261344. This editor has an extremely NPOV view point. The article and edits in question are heavily sources with biased BAPS materials. How so I report this conflict of interest and how to report this to get him banned from editing more swaminarayan articles? This user is unable to be neutral and make edits that are biased towards his group. All his early edits are pro BAPS and constantly fights with anyone that attempts to make cited edits to BAPS and related topics since 2006. I dug deepter into moksha88's history In his edits during his early years, he stated to other users with the greeting "Jay Swaminarayan" multiple times. This is a common way of a satsangi, member of the swaminarayn faith to began conversations. Next he states "as the representatives of the two largest groups with in the faith, we should try to present'.....The swaminarayan sampraday and baps are the two largest groups thus he is clearly is apart of baps. They need to disclose there conflict of interest. They only talk about baps in advertisement fashion, add baps links and have been constantly been accused by multiple users that they distort swaminarayan articles to BAPS ideology. Evidence:
The editor has been warned on their user talk page earlier that there may be a conflict of interest, since they have a close relationship to the BAPS.Applebutter221 (talk) 14:59, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
Thank you for the response user:moksha88. I apologize for any edits or comments that I made that you perceived as ill will. I am not the final judge of your editing history and I will allow moderators to investigate your conflict of interest but please stop lying. Your early edit history shows only a push to incorporate BAPS in the Swaminarayan Sampraday articles and as much as you try to reword or try to lead us on that what you meant, the article reads that you are a member of baps and the other user was a part of the acutal swaminarayan sampraday -per your editing patterns for exclusively only incorporating BAPS materials and you told them we are representatives of the two largest groups with in the faith...that's an amazing coincidence. Next, for someone to conveniently state an introduction of their early edits with Jay Swaminarayan with a passion about incorporating baps is a little more then fostering goodwill. Per COI, you are still allowed to edit as long as you disclose it. You don't have to convince me, I am nobody. I have noticed your biases and I will continue to call them out. I am humbly requesting a moderator to intervene and study your editing habits and mine. The specific reason I am picking on BAPS articles for neutrality is because BAPS has a large temple opening in 2021 in New Jersey and I know from my knowledge that there is a BAPS team in a Yuvak Mandal and Premvati team that has specifically been dedicated to ensuring BAPS online presence is portrayed positively. I have seen BAPS members firsthand make edits on Amazon of BAPS books done to only leave positive reviews and systemically remove negative materials from websites as more and more people will google baps and swaminarayan as Akshardham and more temples are built. I received materials that show BAPS scandals such as the death of a BAPS satsangi from falling during the construction of the NJ temple, BAPS women instructed not to cover their hair to not appear in line with Islamic head coverings and instructions for BAPS members how to post social media postings to ensure that Pramukh Swami is shown only in a perfect manner. Additionally I have leaked memos from BAPS instructing their leading influences on how to specifically deter and defer from answering questions about the treatment of women, grandeur spending on extravagant temples and festivals, how to refer to other hindu gods with lower prefixs of dev and avoiding any questions about the original swaminarayan sampraday and the acharaya/blood family of Swaminarayan. Unfortunately, your editing pattern of trying to remove and reduce reference to the Desh Vibagh Lekh, constantly interject BAPS Akshar Purushottum Darshan, use BAPS books and draw out discussions for weeks and team up with other userd to remove the slightest bit of criticism fall into the umbrella that you are lying and you are a representative of BAPS. I don't even want someone to look at our recent battles but look at your and apollo1203 history and specifically the BAPS, Swaminarayan Sampraday, Morari Bapu and Vanchamrut articles and the talk pages and how you have influence them to twist and confuse and ultimately mislead readers. You and I both know BAPS succeeded from the Swaminarayan Sampraday about a 100 years after it was established and that article is wrongly titled and should be Swaminarayan Hindiusm. It took you 14 years to get control of the article and only a true BAPS member would believe that they are apart of the Sampraday when a judge ruled that the BAPS group is in fact a separate institution. This is cited and fact. You have taken only initiatives when it comes to removing cited critical materials and dragging out conversation and teaming up with the same users such as apollo1203 and sacredsea in the past such as Morari Bapu. It is clear that you are have a conflict of interest. And finally, I am inspired by the edits from swamifraud as I stumbled upon them when I was googling the Pramukh Swami Sexual abuse allegation. When you search it on google, the archived talk page comes up but it was deleted and reroutes you to mirror sites. I restored it and saw you and other editors demolish someone who tried to post facts. I have used many of the similar arguments and synthesis and will continue to do so. From studying your biases and misleading edits and that users, there was a system employed to remove critical information and literally a battle to get information posted. For me being someone who is greatly familiar with BAPS controversy, scandals, leaked financial statements of property bids, and board of trustee details, I felt it is noteworthy that a corrupt sect like BAPS have a neutral point of view on public site such as Wikipedia as they will attempt to whitewash all perceived negative materials online as they instruct their followers to do so. But regardless of the information I am actively receiving, my edits and the several previous banned editors edits and many other people who have tried to write any criticism towards Swaminarayan as a whole have been attacked by the same group of users to remove that material. So please go ahead and try to link me, ban me and delete my work but it's not going to work in the greater scheme. Any person with common sense that looks at your guy's editing history to get rid of Critisism of Swaminarayan article, Mahatma Gandhi's criticism of Swaminarayan edits, Dayananda Saraswati criticism of swaminarayan edits and so much more will see that you are strongly associated with BAPS per your own words and edits. It's so obvious and out of control and since no one understands the severity, I had to reach out to other users I thought that may be able to help because BAPS members have teams planted to control the narrative and from your editing history many people are starting to see why. I am going to edit the Jay Sadguru Swami arti article next. As you may or may not lol know BAPS does not use the original swaminarayan sampraday aarti and they use a newly manufactured version created in 2019. Since you are claiming you don't have a COI, let's see how long it takes for my edits to be tampered with. Even though I have access to sensitive materials outside of wikipedia similar to wikileaks about BAPS and other sects including Vadtal, all my edits have always been cited and sourced and it usually only you and a few select editors that throw cherry pick and vandalism allegations at me and when I was unregistered with some of the IP's. Keep calling me a sock. There is a goldmine of information in those pages and others that you and similar users have erased. The BAPS talk page is not archived correctly and it can be accessed through google but not wikipedia itself. Why is that there never has been any proactive measures to get that kind of stuff fixed but simply stating baps founder Shastriji left Vadtal in the lead of the BAPS article is a huge edit war and accusations of socking and not addressing the 13 sources that state that is? It almost seems like those talk pages might hurt BAPS perception and you guys don't want that kind of stuff to be visible. I hope this doesn't trigger you and associated editors but we will find out. Again I apologize for my harsh tone at times but it's frustrating when members of a group lie about their COI and then get caught in their editing history. Applebutter221 (talk) 06:13, 1 August 2020 (UTC) |
Joey Manahan
- Joey Manahan ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- ShirleyAnnTemplo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
ShirleyAnnTemplo is a recently created WP:SPA whose sole focus appears to be editing Joey Manahan. Being an SPA is not automatically a bad thing, but some of the edits made seem to be a bit promotional in nature and include the removal of content about Manahan losing a 2014 election for the US House of Representatives. ShirleyAnnTemplo has also uploaded a number of images of Manahan to Wikipedia and Commons which had questionable licensing and which ultimately ended up being deleted, and added copyvio content to the article which needed to be WP:REVDEL'd. The reason I'm bring this up here is because of WP:APPARENTCOI which might also involve WP:UPE. This could be just a case of a politician's representative misunderstanding Wikipedia and things like WP:PAID and WP:COI, and not really an intent to be WP:NOTHERE, but I think it would be a good idea for others to look at this as well. Another editor did place a {{uw-coi}} page on ShirleyAnnTemplo's talk, but there was never a response and the account made some more edits to article even after that uw was posted. FWIW, I did email "paid-en-wp _at_ wikipedia.org" about this yesterday and maybe things will be sorted out that way; however, just on the off chance, my email got lost in the shuffle, I'm bringing it up here as well. -- Marchjuly (talk) 23:34, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Marchjuly: Good catch! I've tagged her talk page with {{uw-paid1}}. If she makes even one single edit to Joey Manahan before replying to the warning, please let us know — ideally both here and on my talk page. Did paid-en-wp ever reply to you? Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 01:58, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
Mark Christopher Israel (filipino actor)
- Mark Christopher Israel (filipino actor) ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- MarCruelty17 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
The username above is a clear evidence of COI because he created an article about his own self. You can also check the social media account that he inserted in the article if you want to. Jayjay2020 (talk) 08:12, 3 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Jayjay2020: Good find! The article survived CSD A7. The AfD is at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mark Christopher Israel (filipino actor). So far, about eight or nine people have voted to delete the article, and nobody has voted to keep it. Regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 23:51, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you Unforgettableid! Jayjay2020 (talk) 02:50, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
- Jayjay2020, no worries! —Unforgettableid (talk) 03:49, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you Unforgettableid! Jayjay2020 (talk) 02:50, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
David Kerr-Munslow editing Cortus
- Cortus ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) (no longer exists: Unforgettableid draftified it)
- Draft:Cortus ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- David Kerr Munslow (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
I am an employee of Cortus, and have edited the Cortus page. I have attempted to maintain a neutral point of view and only added facts - and avoided "marketing" and such puffery as much as possible.
Is it possible to have the "COI" removed?
David Kerr Munslow (talk) 13:51, 3 August 2020 (UTC)
- @David Kerr Munslow: the COI tag belongs there as it is for exactly that reason: to show when someone like an employee of the company has edited the page. It will be removed once an uninvolved editor has examined the page and made any necessary corrections. In future do not edit the page, as it is not possible for an employee to be neutral. Per our WP:COI page, request edits on the talk page. Thanks.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 20:31, 3 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear ThatMontrealIP: Good points. In general, the page appears problematic. It was created, and about 80% written, by David Kerr Munslow. It reads somewhat like a PR piece. I've now draftified it. —Unforgettableid (talk) 23:59, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear David Kerr Munslow: It was kind of you to disclose your COI! I've moved the page to Draft:Cortus, at least for now. —Unforgettableid (talk) 03:49, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear ThatMontrealIP: Good points. In general, the page appears problematic. It was created, and about 80% written, by David Kerr Munslow. It reads somewhat like a PR piece. I've now draftified it. —Unforgettableid (talk) 23:59, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
Toddlute
- Berkshire Grey ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) July 31 2020 creation date
- Robert Zeidman ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) Dec 2 2015 "
- ASSIA (company) ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) April 18 2013 "
I've never seen this before. The user created the above three articles direct to article space, between 2013 and a few days ago. After a discussion with Melcous they fessed up to all three being paid editing and posted the appropriate disclosures to their user page and to the article talk pages. That leaves me with two questions. First, what to do about seven years of UPE? Second: should Berkshire Grey be pushed back to draft to go through AFC, as we would usually recommend to paid editors?ThatMontrealIP (talk) 04:04, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Worth noting that the ASSIA article was before the new paid editing disclosure policy. Entirely possible, likely perhaps, that they just didn't know. As for what to do, the other articles appear to be tagged and can be cleaned up for promo as normal, I suppose. As for the most recent and the draftify idea, not sure. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 13:35, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- I wasn't aware of the paid editing disclosure policy until Melcous informed me a few days ago.Toddlute (talk) 18:13, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- I have moved Berkshire Grey to Draft:Berkshire Grey so that it can go through the appropriate AFC review for paid editing articles.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 19:19, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- I wasn't aware of the paid editing disclosure policy until Melcous informed me a few days ago.Toddlute (talk) 18:13, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
Possible COI with promoting religious beliefs
- Ever approachable ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Jnanadeepa: Pune Journal of Religious Studies ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Sabinabraham (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
A large part of his edits are concerned with promoting the works of "Kuruvilla Pandikattu", (a religious scholar). The 'Ever approachable' article is a quote by him, and the user wrote an article about that. There are also multiple pages(deleted now) created by this user likely related to Kuruvilla, which are now deleted. I sense paid promotion. Daiyusha (talk) 06:32, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Looks to me to be just a normal conflict of interest rather than paid editing, they were likely colleagues. Appears that this user hasn't ever received a warning regarding his COI editing, just deletion notices. He did write a handful of non-Pandikattu articles back in 2012 (Areekara, Emerich Coreth). – Thjarkur (talk) 09:49, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Þjarkur! Could be. Still, if he doesn't reply to this comment within his next five or ten edits, I think {{uw-paid1}} would be a good idea. It can force him to give us more information, even if he's unpaid. Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 01:47, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Daiyusha!
- I'm not sure why you put {{uw-paid2}} on his talk page. I changed it to {{uw-paid1}}, then PRODded one of his articles. Maybe this will help to get him talking with us. Once the conversation is started, we can then ask him what his COI is.
- Upon reflection, I don't actually have any evidence that he ignores direct manually-written talk-page questions. Oh well. {{uw-paid1}} does work, even if it's a template.
- Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 04:43, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Þjarkur! Could be. Still, if he doesn't reply to this comment within his next five or ten edits, I think {{uw-paid1}} would be a good idea. It can force him to give us more information, even if he's unpaid. Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 01:47, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
Refspam across many articles
- Emel Ulusoy (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- Aditi Singh Sharma KN (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- Rabeya Khatun Talukder (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) added refspam to Urdu Wikipedia
- Hilda Lucy Adelaide Low (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) added refspam to Simple English Wikipedia
- Kulraj Randhawa (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) added refspamto Tamil Wikipedia
- Monica Ward (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) added refspam to Italian Wikipedia
- Mei-Xia Yang (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)added refspam to Chinese Wikipedia
- Pastora Vega (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) added refspam to Esperanto Wikipedia
- Anna Maniecka (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) added refspam to Polish Wikipedia
- Dolores Lorenzo Salgado (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) added refspam to Spanish Wikipedia
- Caroline Redon de Belleville (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) ... to French Wikipedia
- Vidyaben Shah (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) ... to Eenadu
- Sharanya Haridas (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) ... to Dainik Bhaskar
- Aakanksha Khatri (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)... to English Wikipedia and Hindi Wikipedia
As reported here this is a crosswiki issue where this paper has been linked to in numerous articles: [6]. It looks as if it should all be removed as WP:REFSPAM but we also need to track down the accounts - I've only found Emel Ulusoy (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) so far, probably need some CU. SmartSE (talk) 16:19, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Aditi Singh Sharma KN (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) too. Seems to be one link added per account. SmartSE (talk) 16:23, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- And there may be more: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=DBpedia&diff=prev&oldid=839887485. Note I started an SPI: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Emel Ulusoy. SmartSE (talk) 17:00, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Search says the paper listed first (Modeling Popularity and Reliability of Sources in Multilingual Wikipedia ) is used in 170 articles on WP-en. I have added a few above. The additions are easy to see in the article histories, as they are about 850 bytes around the end of June-July 2020. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 16:55, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Shame on spammer.--寒吉 (talk) 17:26, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- I reverted 20+ of these - it's one spam reference per account. Expect 150+ accounts... MER-C 18:51, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Point of interest: the research paper these accounts were adding is from the Department of Information Systems, Poznań University of Economics and Business research group in Poznan Poland. The paper analyzed something like 200 million reference uses across multiple wikis by using wiki dumps. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 20:54, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- One of the paper's authors, Lewoniewski, is a user here. Pinging them entirely with good faith to see if they have any insights.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 21:01, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- I'm working from the bottom. scope_creepTalk 21:45, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- Point of interest: the research paper these accounts were adding is from the Department of Information Systems, Poznań University of Economics and Business research group in Poznan Poland. The paper analyzed something like 200 million reference uses across multiple wikis by using wiki dumps. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 20:54, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Scope creep: Thanks for removing the links, but we should also be removing the content and many of the articles contain other references spammed by the same group - see e.g. [7]. SmartSE (talk) 11:18, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- We should also check for bestref.net: [8] Link search results. SmartSE (talk) 08:47, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Alexa - just adding a note here as I'm linking to this in edit summaries - I have also been removing the links to alexa added by the same users e.g. [9] as I presume these were added to try and mask the spam. SmartSE (talk) 08:42, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Smartse, An MDPI publication? And it was spammed? I'm shocked. Nuke from orbit and ban the user. Guy (help! - typo?) 09:20, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Please give opinions at m:Talk:Spam blacklist#bestref.net (global blacklist discussion). Guy (help! - typo?) 09:39, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- I'm starting a writeup/after-action review for this sockfarm since I think this sockfarm showed some interesting tactics, figured this might be of interest to folks here. Started at m:User:GeneralNotability/Paper sockfarm AAR, comments and contributions welcome. I'm also going to throw together a pywikibot script this weekend to a) identify any unlocked socks and b) come up with some stats on how this sockfarm worked. GeneralNotability (talk) 00:09, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
- @GeneralNotability: Good idea. It would be worth widening the net to include the other papers and sites - there's are two researchgate url as well: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320448810 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327265925. Hard to believe that this wasn't being done in at least a semi-automated way. SmartSE (talk) 09:26, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
- Smartse, thanks - I had the two mdpi links and the two known spammed sites, but wasn't aware of the researchgate links. I'll throw those onto the search list. GeneralNotability (talk) 19:13, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Smartse: my guess is that it was all automated. Many of the user sock names that I looked at seem to be real names, often with WP articles or a Wikidata entry (e.g. Dolores_Lorenzo_Salgado, Vidyaben Shah, Sharanya Haridas, Caroline Redon de Belleville Anna Maniecka, Rabeya Khatun Talukder).ThatMontrealIP (talk) 19:48, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP, I agree, though I'm impressed with the appropriateness of the names - a lot of the usernames were names that sounded like someone who might speak that language. For example, we had "Valentina Sergeevna Koelagina-Jartseva" on ruwiki and "Yumiko Yanagisawa" on jawiki. The additions were also localized, so for example frwiki used a comma as the decimal separator instead of a period. That's a good deal more sophistication than I'm used to seeing from these farms. GeneralNotability (talk) 19:53, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
- @GeneralNotability: yeah... agree there is some savvy programming here.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 01:13, 8 August 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP, I agree, though I'm impressed with the appropriateness of the names - a lot of the usernames were names that sounded like someone who might speak that language. For example, we had "Valentina Sergeevna Koelagina-Jartseva" on ruwiki and "Yumiko Yanagisawa" on jawiki. The additions were also localized, so for example frwiki used a comma as the decimal separator instead of a period. That's a good deal more sophistication than I'm used to seeing from these farms. GeneralNotability (talk) 19:53, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
- @GeneralNotability: Good idea. It would be worth widening the net to include the other papers and sites - there's are two researchgate url as well: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320448810 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327265925. Hard to believe that this wasn't being done in at least a semi-automated way. SmartSE (talk) 09:26, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
it's a bit of a postscript at this point, but Lewoniewski seems to have presented Multilingual Ranking of Wikipedia Articles with Quality and Popularity Assessment in Different Topics at Wikimania 2019 in Stockholm.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 22:55, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Older / broader COI issues
- Witold Abramowicz ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- Uladzimir Levaneuski ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- Interstudent ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- Wikirank.net ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- Wikirank.net ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
- UniquePower (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) seems to be the potential master - first active in 2014 and Special:Undelete/Draft:International_Conference_on_Business_Information_Systems is revealing. SmartSE (talk) 10:00, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Lomtikov (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) actually goes all the way back to 2009 but was spamming the same last year [10]. That also means Uladzimir_Levaneuski needs inspecting and probably AFDd again along with the articles below. Afraid to say that does seem to directly implicate Lewoniewski (see the polish name). SmartSE (talk) 10:29, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- PolskaNauka (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) too - created Wikirank.net ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) - users at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Wikirank.net should be checked. SmartSE (talk) 10:03, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Interstudent ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) also needs eyes. WorldProfessor (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) is another sock who defended at AFD and added wonders like
theory of relativity can be used also in other areas. For example it can help to assess data quality of the Wikipedia
[11]. SmartSE (talk) 10:13, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Interstudent sent to AfD; Some !votes at last AFD are, ahem, suspect.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 17:29, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- I'll be asking for a glock and seeing if there's a way to blacklist this sole link. I found 223 additions spammed by several SPAs cross wiki...Praxidicae (talk) 15:39, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- @JzG: this is going to take at least a day to clean up cross-wiki but is there any reason on enwiki that mdpi.com shouldn't be blacklisted? I see virtually no value to allowing links to pay-for-pub journals/paper in any article...Praxidicae (talk) 15:42, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Praxidicae: I think we've cleaned up everything here but I'm not sure what to do about crosswiki abuse. Blacklisting the links is probably a more elegant solution than playing whack a mole with the socks. We need to alert other wikis about e.g. de:Uladsimir_Lewaneuski, es:Vladimir_Levonevsky and fr:Vladimir_Levonevsky which were all created by socks. SmartSE (talk) 15:50, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- I'ts been blacklisted but I'm working on manual removal since undo isn't even an option....sigh. Praxidicae (talk) 15:53, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Here's a list from the first paper [12]Praxidicae (talk) 17:27, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Is there is more to go on this list, e.g. user:Sophonisba Breckinridge. scope_creepTalk 18:01, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Praxidicae, for my money? No. They have been trying to use Wikipedia for PR since forever. Guy (help! - typo?) 22:15, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Praxidicae: I think we've cleaned up everything here but I'm not sure what to do about crosswiki abuse. Blacklisting the links is probably a more elegant solution than playing whack a mole with the socks. We need to alert other wikis about e.g. de:Uladsimir_Lewaneuski, es:Vladimir_Levonevsky and fr:Vladimir_Levonevsky which were all created by socks. SmartSE (talk) 15:50, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- @JzG: this is going to take at least a day to clean up cross-wiki but is there any reason on enwiki that mdpi.com shouldn't be blacklisted? I see virtually no value to allowing links to pay-for-pub journals/paper in any article...Praxidicae (talk) 15:42, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- There is also a close connection from Uladzimir Levaneuski to National Strike Committee of Belarus. It may be worth checking that article as well. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:01, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
- I've filed an SPI for a bunch of sock/meatpuppets who really like editing in areas related to Lewoniewski. GeneralNotability (talk) 18:14, 8 August 2020 (UTC)
IRC discussion
The analysis is getting pretty involved, with several hundred suspected socks, possibly in two different groups, and a whole lot of papers to check for (I'm treating anything by Lewoniewski as suspect since he seems to be the common thread)...I haven't even managed to get to the analysis of the new sockfarm since I keep finding more papers to search for. I could use some help if anyone wants to pitch in; if you want to do so and would like to coordinate in real time, drop me a line on IRC (username: GenNotability) and I can set up a discussion channel. GeneralNotability (talk) 18:21, 8 August 2020 (UTC)
Banner on 10x Genomics page
Hello, my name is Nick, and I created an account to suggest article improvements transparently as part of my work at Consort Partners, starting with 10x Genomics. I've disclosed my conflict of interest on my profile and plan to avoid making changes to articles directly. I was asked to come here by User:MER-C, who added a tag in July 2019 which says, "This article may have been created or edited in return for undisclosed payments". An employee of 10x Genomics removed the banner in October 2019, which was replaced by User:Duffbeerforme in May 2020. I've tried providing disclosures and clearing up some confusion at Talk:10x Genomics. I'll let editors review the details there. I'm willing to help address any concerns if any of the article content is problematic. I hope this helps, and thanks for considering tag removal. NT at Consort Partners (talk) 17:46, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- I've changed
{{UPE}}
to{{Paid contributions}}
per the disclosure. SmartSE (talk) 09:50, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
Instantaneously trained neural networks
- Instantaneously trained neural networks ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Unary coding ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Arlene47 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
It appears that the author, Subhash Kak, has created a web of self-promotion for several articles dealing with neural networks and unary coding.
If you follow the evolution of the page histories you can see the gradual addition of references to his papers, inserted along with non-objective viewpoints, gradually shifting the tone, focus, and share of content towards Kak's papers. In the Instantaneously trained neural network article the Willshaw references are slowly whittled away from primary example (despite being older and established) to an afterthought in favor of Kak's novel (and generally unknown?) approach.
The unary coding article does something similar.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Cottenio (talk • contribs) 17:57, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Cottenio:
- Interesting find! It was thoughtful of you to bring this to our attention.
- "Arlene" strikes me as somewhat suspicious, and possibly a COI account, especially based on her earliest edits.
- I've added a {{Notability}} tag to Subhash Kak; the only AfD discussion was about 15 years ago, and it may be time for another.
- I know basically nothing about neural networks. I did a Google search for [ instantaneously trained neural networks ]. It looks like Dr. Kak's modern approach may be far more popular nowadays than Dr. Willshaw's approach from long ago. Although "Arlene" may well have an undisclosed COI, I'm not sure whether or not she's been making the encyclopedia worse.
- "Arlene" has been away for quite a while. We could tag her with {{uw-paid1}}, but while she's on an extended absence, I'm not sure if this would make things better or worse. Maybe it'd be best for us to add her talk page to our watchlists and then wait until she's back to try {{uw-paid1}}.
- If you have any reply, it'd be welcome.
- Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 01:32, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
Terry Neese
- Terry Neese ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Terryneeseluvr100 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- 2001:579:f128:f0:4c78:e7c4:cf05:5776 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
User named "Terryneeseluvr100" has only edited Terry Neese, adding unsourced information and inappropriately-placed pictures. The user refused to respond to a generic WP:COI template and personalized message asking them to disclose any possible COI. I clearly stated that I would take the issue here if they did not respond. They received a warning from another user and still did not respond. KidAd (talk) 19:11, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Added an IP that is making the same edits.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 19:49, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- I asked Terryneeseluvr100 if they were affiliated with the Neese campaign or a friend/family member of Neese. I will note that the IP is linked to Oklahoma City, where Neese lives. KidAd (talk) 22:05, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi KidAd! It sometimes happens that a COI editor has never posted anything on any talk page, and they refuse to reply to talk-page messages. In such cases, I've found, it can be helpful to template them with {{uw-paid1}}. Even if the user turns out to be unpaid, the template is still helpful. This is because it includes some useful bold text: "do not edit further until you answer this message". This can help to get them into the habit of replying to talk-page messages. I have indeed now templated Terryneeseluvr100 with {{uw-paid1}}. Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 23:12, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- I asked Terryneeseluvr100 if they were affiliated with the Neese campaign or a friend/family member of Neese. I will note that the IP is linked to Oklahoma City, where Neese lives. KidAd (talk) 22:05, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
Daniel W. Nebert AfD
- Daniel W. Nebert ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Daniel W. Nebert
- Nebertdw (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
Of possible interest to this page. It looks pretty egregious, but the subject may be notable. While AfD is not cleanup, this looks to me like it's a case of WP:TNT. I don't know, though, so hopefully those who watch this noticeboard can comment and help.
jps (talk) 20:17, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear jps: Excellent catch! Several editors have now trimmed the article down from a bloated 81 kilobytes to a leaner 5 kilobytes. And at least part of the reason why it happened is thanks to the fact that you started this noticeboard thread. :) Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 12:37, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
Paid editing report (via the Teahouse)
Copying this over from a Teahouse thread:
I have a friend who asked me to create a Wikipedia profile for him but I declined due to conflict of interest rules. I explained this to my friend but he would not understand it and insisted that I create a page for him saying all his mates have Wikipedia profiles. Later, he offered me USD250, again I declined. Days later he told me that he had seen an editor who would do it for him at $200 but I did not say anything because he said I was jealous of his achievements and that was the reason I refused to create the page for him. After few days, he came back to plead that I should guarantee that I would not delete the article. I suspected that the editor he paid to create the page must have advised him to plead with me not to report this issue because the editor is aware of the consequences of such behavior. For days I was confused whether to report the editor that would create the page or not because reporting the editor may lead to the deletion of the article which may be unfair to my friend. But if I keep mute this editor will continue with his unethical activities here. So decided that the issue should come before senior editors to investigate.
Two weeks ago I saw the article live in public space. The subject of the article is in sports. I checked to see the editor that created the article and I was surprised that it is a senior editor who has a number of editor's rights. If anyone had told me that this editor engages in paid editing I would not believe it. This editor has moved hundreds of articles from main space to draft space for the sole reason of 'under sourced' even when many of such articles would survive AFD should they pass through that process. This editor marks several articles for deletion within minutes and I wonder how he conducts WP:BEFORE before nominating articles for deletion. This editor does this to mask his paid editing activities. This editor does this to create the impression that he is doing a great job thereby diverting attention from his paid editing.
I want to plead that the article in question should not be deleted because it's subject is not aware of Wikipedia rules. The senior editor who violated the rules should be punished. This editor is Lapablo. Should this editor attempt to deny it I will bring hard evidence against him. Paid editing is a serious offense here. I urge this editor to disclose all his paid editing immediately.
Supolsanko (talk) 16:39, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
I've added the accounts mentioned above.Supolsanko could you tell us the name of the article in question? Thanks. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 16:46, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
- Supolsanko you can also send the
"hard evidence"
to the email paid-en-wp@wikipedia.org, where an admin will look at it.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 16:59, 9 August 2020 (UTC)- @Supolsanko:, you should not directly reply to my post here due to possible outing or harassment considerations but it may be relevant to others: I did look through the articles created by Lapablo and found at least one recent article that raised red flags. I have nominated the article on Tony Doellefeld for deletion based on the lack of sources in the article and available in wider searches. I don't know if that's the article in question but looking independently at the user's contributions I identified it as not following our guidelines for notability. I hope that helps. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 17:14, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
- I've looked through their page creations and there are a lot of innocuous looking ones (politicians, footballers, historical figures etc.) many of which are translations of existing articles on other wikis. There are others which definitely look suspicious: John McPheters, Jed Stiller, Yu-Ming Wu, Sneaker News and Stadium Goods. M S Faizal Khan - Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/M S Faizalkhan closed delete in January. Hannon Armstrong and Jeff Eckel. SmartSE (talk) 19:01, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
- I'd imagine that Stadium Goods would somehow survive AfD. M S Faizal Khan is very different from deleted M S Faizalkhan and therefore can't be speedily (G4) deleted. But it presents no additional evidence to suggest that the biographee is notable. The article Sneaker News presents feeble evidence for notability (and the website itself -- "Powered by WordPress.com VIP" -- looks to me like a mere outlet for PR puffs). I didn't look at any of the others. -- Hoary (talk) 08:22, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Comment — ThatMontrealIP, Honestly, until they send their “hard evidence” every other thing is just mere talk. How are we to believe a word they say? How do we know these aren’t mere fabrications? I don’t understand how we are to take an editor who had to create a different account in order to report paid editing serious. why didn’t they report via their original account? as any other normal editor would? What’s the essence of concealing their identity? I mean even if that friend of theirs had an IQ of below 85, if they saw that post & how detailed it was, they’d know Supolsanko’s true identity regardless, so what’s really going on here? Something doesn’t feel right about this report, either there’s more backstory we aren’t getting or this is revenge per staments like this This editor has moved hundreds of articles from main space to draft space for the sole reason of 'under sourced' even when many of such articles would survive AFD should they pass through that process. I can’t say which one for sure it is. Like Eggishorn already said, let Lapablo speak up first before we start any trial if need be. Until then I’d say we keep our cool for now. Personally I have seen Lapablo do a lot of anti UPE activity so I’m very much interested in this case. Celestina007 19:58, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Celestina007: I agree, we need to see the evidence. There does not seem to be any evidence provided thus far. I was just posting it here as it's a better forum than the Teahouse for this kind of thing.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 20:18, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- ThatMontrealIP, you have no blame at all, that was the proper move. I was just sharing my opinion with you. Celestina007 20:22, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Celestina007: I agree, we need to see the evidence. There does not seem to be any evidence provided thus far. I was just posting it here as it's a better forum than the Teahouse for this kind of thing.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 20:18, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Celestina007: I don't really believe their story to be honest. My suspicion is that they are a competitor and that's how they know they've been creating articles for pay. SmartSE (talk) 12:30, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
- Smartse, That’s a plausible theory but having stumbled upon comments/entries like this one i’m sensing a deep animosity here. I’m eager to see Lapablo’s response & really know what we are dealing with here. Celestina007 13:20, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
- @Celestina007: I don't really believe their story to be honest. My suspicion is that they are a competitor and that's how they know they've been creating articles for pay. SmartSE (talk) 12:30, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
Hello everyone, I'm deeply disturbed and hugely disappointed that the process of blocking Lapablo is taking this long. By now, all mission objectives (of taking this editor off WP) would have been accomplished if everyone here supports my stand. When ThatMontrealIP copied my intelligence report over here I had a sense of relief that at last the editor who had been terrorising articles and killing them would be slained. But no. Instead those who are supposed to be on my side are calling for evidence. Well, if you're waiting for evidence you may have to wait longer while I try to scoop more intelligence. But first this editor should be removed from editing Wikipedia so I can conduct a more independent intelligent investigation and then present my report here. You Smartse, on whose side are you? You have alleged that I'm also a paid editor but that is from the figment of your imagination. Let me put you on notice here that I will shortly present a damming undercover investigation report of your paid editing here. Please don't be surprised when you see them but be courageous to defend yourself. Please, don't throw a stone when you live in a glass house.
Personal attacks removed
I urge all the right thinking people here to join hands and speedily take Lapablo down just same way he takes down and draftify articles. This is my humble submission. Supolsanko (talk) 6:16, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
Thecapitalking
Page links
- Lord Lamba ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Okiemute ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Gwamba ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Onesimus Muzik ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Draft:Odum Chijioke John ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Nwaora Augustine David ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nwaora Augustine David
- Deleted pages
User links
- Thecapitalking (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
Background information
About a week ago, Celestina007 pointed out to me: "When it comes to the UPE ring in Nigeria or amongst shady Nigerian editors, a major red flag is observing the creation of pages on 'Businessmen'. A perfect example would be their most recent article which is the Dapo Awofisayo article."
In mainspace, 10 of Thecapitalking's 14 created articles have been deleted. The tally is: 7 × AfD, 1 × A7, 1 × G11, 1 × G12.
Evidence of likely UPE
|
---|
Key evidence Thecapitalking has been around for a bit more than a year. He has claimed: "I’m not directly or indirectly being paid for my contributions on Wikipedia [...] Not in anyway paid or promotional." Bonadea has disagreed and explained: "Biographies [about Augustine Nwaora] were created and recreated by seven different sock accounts in March-early April of this year. [...] Sock or not, I am certain that there is WP:UPE involved. One of the blocked sockpuppets said that this was a 'client biography' — and I estimate the likelihood that the current creator would have independently discovered and researched and created an article about this person, under a subtly different title to avoid detection, to be just about zero." Question for the admins
|
Questions for everyone
What would be the best thing to do with his articles which are still in mainspace? [Edit: Are they probably paid? Are they probably notable?]
Edit
At User talk:Thecapitalking § Confession regarding undisclosed paid editing, he has now confessed that he has done undisclosed paid editing. He claims that he'll never do it again, and requests mercy. I've replied there, suggesting that he agree to always use the Article Wizard from now on (which creates drafts, not articles).
His remaining created articles seem to be about musicians and entertainers. I wonder if they meet WP:NMUSIC and/or WP:COMEDIAN.
I wonder if Thecapitalking can likely be a long-term useful contributor to Wikipedia's set of articles relating to Malawi and Nigeria — or not.
Conclusion
Thank you for reading this! —Unforgettableid (talk) 03:33, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Babak Zanjani
- Babak Zanjani ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- بابک زنجانی (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
The username is the same as the article (though in Persian), and is only interested in that exact article. I have warned the user to no avail. Pahlevun (talk) 15:16, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Pahlevun. Good catch! A few points.
-
- Wikipedia:Don't overlook legal threats says: "When editors blank articles ... they may have good cause. Stop and look carefully before assuming they're disruptive, and be careful before using a banhammer." But then again, WP:BLPCRIME would suggest that, once a person is convicted, we can probably announce the conviction on Wikipedia. I'm unaware of any WP:IAR exception for convictions by less-reliable courts in semi-developed countries.
- If you decide that the user is disruptive: Normally, I might suggest {{uw-paid1}}. But I've skimmed through his contributions, and I dunno whether or not his English is good enough to understand such a lengthy template. You could try asking him who he is. If he doesn't reply, maybe you could try {{uw-disruptive1}} through {{uw-disruptive3}}, then requesting a block? I dunno.
- He has an edit count of 27 on the Farsi Wikipedia: uselang=fa / uselang=en. I don't understand Farsi, and Google Translate is imperfect. I haven't evaluated any of his Farsi edits. It looks like there's just a welcome template on his talk page there.
- Kind regards, —Unforgettableid (talk) 15:47, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Unforgettableid, I asked the user if they have any connection to the subject of that article. The article seems neutral and in accordance to WP:BLP to me. If there is no connection between the user and the person in question, maybe it is a violation of Username policy. But if the connection is confirmed, I will ask him to request an edit. Is that OK? Pahlevun (talk) 16:08, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Pahlevun: Good plan! With this user, some worthy goals would be to get him to use talk pages and/or to follow Wikipedia's rules in general. Whether your attempts to achieve these goals succeed or not, please do update us on what eventually happened. :) And, of course, if you have further questions at any time, about this case or any other COI case, please ask us. —Unforgettableid (talk) 18:12, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you User:Unforgettableid, I will keep you informed. Pahlevun (talk) 18:15, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Dear Pahlevun: Good plan! With this user, some worthy goals would be to get him to use talk pages and/or to follow Wikipedia's rules in general. Whether your attempts to achieve these goals succeed or not, please do update us on what eventually happened. :) And, of course, if you have further questions at any time, about this case or any other COI case, please ask us. —Unforgettableid (talk) 18:12, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Unforgettableid, I asked the user if they have any connection to the subject of that article. The article seems neutral and in accordance to WP:BLP to me. If there is no connection between the user and the person in question, maybe it is a violation of Username policy. But if the connection is confirmed, I will ask him to request an edit. Is that OK? Pahlevun (talk) 16:08, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
3M - disclosed paid editors doing some mild canvassing / forum-shopping
- KM at 3M (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) (inactive after Jan 27 and therefore not notified)
- CB at 3M (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) (PR representative since Jan 27)
To start with: the strongest action I would recommend is a talk page explanation of what is OK or not OK, but I am not the good person to do it, due to a lack of familiarity with the relevant guidelines and because I am somewhat involved already.
Editors paid by 3M have been requesting changes to the article about the company. The paid editor status is properly disclosed and they have refrained from performing edits themselves: so far, so good. However, I am somewhat worried about the way they request changes.
My understanding is that the proper procedure is to use the {{request edit}}
template. This brings in whoever patrols first the category associated with COI edit requests, who can accept or decline (partially or fully) the request. To my eyes this brings two important features: accountability (because requested edits can be easily searched even after having been made) and impartiality (because it is more-or-less guaranteed that edit request patrollers will be independent of the subject).
By contrast, the various 3M people have been making edit requests on the talk page without templating them with {{request edit}}
, and making private requests to review the proposed edits. I will focus only on the active account (CB), but similar behavior can be found from the older account.
This message on Constant314's talk page looks like a clear violation of WP:CANVASS to me; this is a smaller violation, it includes a ping to two editors (Sandcherry and myself) who implemented changes in the past (and therefore could be assumed to be more willing to perform new changes).
In reply to that ping, I asked them to use the template (in the diff, I incorrectly say that I warned them about it before - I warned KM, not CB, so not the same person). They did add the template, but when it failed to get a quick reply, they posted this message to WikiProject Companies which seems iffy - it is not neutrally-worded, but more importantly, I suspect forum-shopping is going on (i.e.: ask on the talk page, if nobody wants to make the change ping editors you suppose to be sympathetic, then add the request edit template later on, then post to WikiProjects one by one etc. - of course if the edit is made at any point in the process, you do not go to the next step to ask for a review and possible revert).
Thoughts? TigraanClick here to contact me 12:41, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I think part of the problem is the delay in processing requested edits, which seems to be over 30 days at present. Hopefully that will improve once August is over. TSventon (talk) 18:41, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- Hello, User:Tigraan. Thank you for notifying me of this discussion. Sorry if I've done anything wrong here. I do not mean to "forum shop". I was just not getting any responses to the recent request to update the article, and since the edit request queue seems to be moving very slowly I was trying to see if someone at WikiProject Companies would be willing to help. I assumed seeking help at WikiProjects was a transparent way to get editor feedback. I will continue to use the edit request template when submitting proposed updates to the 3M Talk page. Thanks. CB at 3M (talk) 19:43, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I do not think WikiProject Companies suffers from any sort of bias regarding your edit request; my uneasiness is due to the sequential nature of notifications. I do not think you did anything wrong on purpose either. Getting help from WikiProjects can sometimes be improper due to selection bias. For a striking example, if you are writing about some history of the West Bank and you notify one but not the other of Wikipedia:WikiProject Palestine and Wikipedia:WikiProject Israel, it probably means you are looking at the issue from a certain point of view. TigraanClick here to contact me 15:37, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
Art of Odessa
- Stepan Ryabchenko ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Vasiliy Ryabchenko ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Valentin Khrushch ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Lucien Dulfan ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Vladimir Strelnikov ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Pavlo Kerestey ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Nataliia Zabolotna ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Oleg Tistol ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Art of Odessa (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- Mr.Perepel (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
Art of Odessa has said a couple of times now that they have no connection to the above articles on Odessa artists they have been extensively editing. However I just discovered that three accounts on commons were blocked for socking after the upload of many images. The accounts are Sergiyryabchenko, Рябченко Василий Сергеевич and, of course Art of Odessa]. The Commons account name Sergiyryabchenko is darn close to the Ryabchenko article names above.
Second, the long list of uploads at Commons by Art of Odessa is accompanied by OTRS approval, which can only come via the copyright holder. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:03, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I just write articles about Odessa artists or artists associated with Odessa and supplement information where it can be appropriate. --Art of Odessa (talk) 15:08, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- Sorry but this does not strike me as honest. Over at Commons you have disclosed that you are working with a group. It is in Russian, but via Google translate I see "Good day! Please tell me why we were blocked?... We downloaded photos from our archives. Articles about a number of Odessa artists are being created now.". In the same thread, when asked what "we" means, the answer was " A group that deals with Odessa artists...It means that to create materials for articles about artists, materials are involved in which different people are involved: artists, art historians, curators, libraries, etc."ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:14, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- You did not understand the context and did not read to the end ... This is a problem in Russian Wikipedia, which was a few years ago and was positively resolved. It meant that I write alone, but to create material, I as a professional study the material, consult with historians and find material in the library if it concerns old artists, information about which is very scarce on the Internet. It is incorrect for you to reproach me, there is no reason because all my articles are high-quality and well-developed. --Art of Odessa (talk) 15:47, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I read it to the end. You said you were working as a group and described that group. You also said "photos from our archives". Recently you uploaded a photo to Commons and had it approved via OTRS within three hours. This means you have to be in contact with the copyright holder. Could you explain that please? The point here is that if you are working in a museum, with a dealer or in collaboration with the artists, you need to disclose that. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:53, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- You ask me the same thing several times. I said that I am an independent editor and not affiliated with anyone. I misspelled , meant that I collect materials from various sources. How do I know the answers to your questions if they do not apply to me? Everyone is reacting quickly today, perhaps that's why. --Art of Odessa (talk) 16:06, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, but you never answer how you can upload an image by the artist and the copyright is approved in three hours. You have to be in contact with the artist or the copyright holder.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:00, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I don't owe anything to anyone, I replied that I have no ties with anyone. I don't know why it happened so quickly.--Art of Odessa (talk) 18:16, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- You still have not explained why the Ryabchenko images you upload get OTRS copyright authorized shortly after upload, and why your two other accounts blocked at Commons were named Sergiyryabchenko and Рябченко Василий Сергеевич (English: Ryabchenko Vasily Sergeevich). Ryabchenko is connected to most of what you edit, and the acount names. Add to that the recent addition of Stepan Ryabchenko images to multiple wiki pages, and it is obvious that you are connected or working to promote Ryabchenko work. We just want to know how the details, please.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:40, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I'm just telling you. There is nothing unusual here. It was many years ago. I decided to become a Wikipedia editor in the field of art and decided to start with the of Odessa artists Ryabchenko dynasty since they have contributed so much to Ukrainian art. I then decided to name myself by the names of future articles. It was foolishness for lack of experience. Then he began to study Wikipedia and was renamed Art of Odessa. This name reflected my interests. I write articles in different languages. In addition to Ryabchenko, I wrote a lot about Valentin Khrushch, Alexander Stovbur, Lucien Dulfan. Now I am writing about Victor Marinyuk and other Odessa authors. First I write in Russian and Ukrainian, then in English. What a problem?? --Art of Odessa (talk) 19:05, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- It's not very plausible. You still have not explained how the images get OTRS authorized after you upload them. Are you in contact with one or more of the Ryabchenkos?ThatMontrealIP (talk) 19:12, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- If you look at the Commons category for Stepan Ryabchencko, Art of Odessa has uploaded all of the images. Most have OTRS approval. It is simply not possible that Art of Odessa uploads them and then they suddenly get approved; it has to be a coordinated effort. Many of hte images were also uploaded as "own work"ThatMontrealIP (talk) 19:18, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I don't owe anything to anyone, I replied that I have no ties with anyone. I don't know why it happened so quickly.--Art of Odessa (talk) 18:16, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, but you never answer how you can upload an image by the artist and the copyright is approved in three hours. You have to be in contact with the artist or the copyright holder.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:00, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- You ask me the same thing several times. I said that I am an independent editor and not affiliated with anyone. I misspelled , meant that I collect materials from various sources. How do I know the answers to your questions if they do not apply to me? Everyone is reacting quickly today, perhaps that's why. --Art of Odessa (talk) 16:06, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I read it to the end. You said you were working as a group and described that group. You also said "photos from our archives". Recently you uploaded a photo to Commons and had it approved via OTRS within three hours. This means you have to be in contact with the copyright holder. Could you explain that please? The point here is that if you are working in a museum, with a dealer or in collaboration with the artists, you need to disclose that. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:53, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- You did not understand the context and did not read to the end ... This is a problem in Russian Wikipedia, which was a few years ago and was positively resolved. It meant that I write alone, but to create material, I as a professional study the material, consult with historians and find material in the library if it concerns old artists, information about which is very scarce on the Internet. It is incorrect for you to reproach me, there is no reason because all my articles are high-quality and well-developed. --Art of Odessa (talk) 15:47, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I might add that six of the eight artists in the list above are listed at the web site for artofodessa.com, an art dealer. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:29, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- This is not my site, I assure you. It's just a name coincidence. And the fact that these artists are represented there is natural. These are some of the most famous artists in Ukraine. --Art of Odessa (talk) 15:47, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- Sorry but this does not strike me as honest. Over at Commons you have disclosed that you are working with a group. It is in Russian, but via Google translate I see "Good day! Please tell me why we were blocked?... We downloaded photos from our archives. Articles about a number of Odessa artists are being created now.". In the same thread, when asked what "we" means, the answer was " A group that deals with Odessa artists...It means that to create materials for articles about artists, materials are involved in which different people are involved: artists, art historians, curators, libraries, etc."ThatMontrealIP (talk) 15:14, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- The match between your user name and the gallery's domain name, then, is an interesting coincidence, isn't it? In my dealings with this issue, I also ran across another account that appears, at least at first glance, to be related to some of the ones mentioned above:
- Mr.Perepel (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- I've placed the obligatory COI notice on that user's Talk page. — UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 16:16, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- An uninteresting, common situation. You'd better solve your problems... You apparently have a lot of free time, since you are looking for problems that don’t exist. Articles are edited by different people, do not fit me into a mold. --Art of Odessa (talk) 17:45, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- I've placed the obligatory COI notice on that user's Talk page. — UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 16:16, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
- Suprise, despite multiple attestations of good faith editing, Mr.Perepel and Art of Odessa were sockpuppeting.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:06, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
ASGC Construction Group
- ASGC Construction Group ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Draft:ASGC Group ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Draft:ASGC Construction Group ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
- Ritika.times (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- 2001:8F8:1727:B9A5:A9F6:8CA7:EDE:F3A3 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
SPA, only here to promote ASGC Construction Group and not responding to messages on their talk page. Also, can someone please merge Draft:Ritika.times to User talk:Ritika.times? Thank you. GSS 💬 16:27, 13 August 2020 (UTC)