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::I would actually advocate for (in full knowledge it's a losing battle) that we abolish PR as "COI" and create a guideline on "Doing PR on Wikipedia" just as many news organizations provide guidelines on how they want to receive news, bylines and other pitches, that outlines how Wikipedians want PRs to behave, what type of participation is valuable, what is acceptable and not, etc. [[User:CorporateM|CorporateM]] ([[User_talk:CorporateM|Talk]]) 21:09, 26 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor) |
::I would actually advocate for (in full knowledge it's a losing battle) that we abolish PR as "COI" and create a guideline on "Doing PR on Wikipedia" just as many news organizations provide guidelines on how they want to receive news, bylines and other pitches, that outlines how Wikipedians want PRs to behave, what type of participation is valuable, what is acceptable and not, etc. [[User:CorporateM|CorporateM]] ([[User_talk:CorporateM|Talk]]) 21:09, 26 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor) |
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I think that the initial issue has been incorrectly stated. The real-world definition of conflict of interest is much more stringent. Not only is conflict of interest (defined broadly) prohibited but so is the appearance of conflict of interest. Wikipedia seems to be an outlier that takes an almost comically lax view of COI. This has become evident for all the world to see in this BP incident, where BP is drafting entire chunks of text and many Wiki people are defending that, including Jimbo. What all are ignoring, including Jimbo, is how this hurts Wikipedia's credibility. It doesn't matter whether BP is adding good or bad text. The only thing that matters, from a real-world COI perspective, is that BP is participating actively in an article about BP. The debate over this on various Wikipedia has actually hurt Wikipedia's credibility even more than the BP edits, as it has exposed Wikipedia's tolerant attitude toward large corporations actively participating in their articles. This will encourage other companies to do so. [[User:Coretheapple|Coretheapple]] ([[User talk:Coretheapple|talk]]) 14:01, 27 March 2013 (UTC) |
Revision as of 14:01, 27 March 2013
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Suggested addition:
"Editors are individually responsible for following the laws in their own jurisdiction(s), as Wikipedia's policies may not match those laws by being either more permissive or prohibitive. The Wikipedia database is stored on servers in the United States of America, and is maintained in reference to the protections afforded under those local and federal laws. Where one's local laws conflict with Wikipedia's policies, the policies on Wikipedia take precedence for Wikipedia's purposes, but your local laws still apply to you as an individual." (See also the General disclaimer and Legal disclaimer).
Thoughts? Ocaasi t | c 17:44, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- You mean that when your local laws conflict with Wikipedia's policies, the policies take precedence for Wikipedia's purposes. Clearly for your own purposes, your local laws take precedence. Also I don't believe being more permissive or prohibitive necessarily leads to what we would call a "conflict". Victor Yus (talk) 17:51, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'm not keen on this suggestion. It could be read as "ignore that what you're doing might be illegal in your country; what counts is what the law says in Florida." SlimVirgin (talk) 18:11, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- These rulings are indeed interesting and perhaps relevant for German and UK editors; however what the section as written currently does is reference two regional jurisdictions neither of which are not binding on Wikipedia. My point is "Wikipedia follows its own policies, and the laws of the US and Florida; be aware that your local laws may differ and you're responsible for following them, while also noting that Wikipedia's policies do not necessarily match your local laws." When we mention local laws, I think it's necessary to contextualize them with the guidance in those established disclaimers. I recognize this might seem like encouraging editors to act in the more permissive way, but I primarily intend it rather as a statement of fact about laws and jurisdictions insofar as they apply to Wikipedia. Ocaasi t | c 18:47, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'm not keen on this suggestion. It could be read as "ignore that what you're doing might be illegal in your country; what counts is what the law says in Florida." SlimVirgin (talk) 18:11, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- If we go down this road, also of interest would be the US Federal Trade Commission's guidance: [1] and [2]. Still more the ethical guidelines of the Public Relations Society of America or Chartered Institute of Public Relations' ethical code. Yet, still I suggest caution in providing or even suggesting legal guidance to other editors, or relying on other organizations' rules which are not binding on Wikipedia. Our policies are not legal documents nor are they reviews of jurisdictional law and institutional practice. They reflect Wikipedia policies which may or may not have anything to do with a jurisdiction's legal statutes and court rulings, or a professional association's codes. While these might be informative for forming our policies and guidelines, I am not sure they belong in them. And if we do mention them, then I think we have to construct a representative and global summary of relevant laws and codes, which seems outside the scope of this specific guideline. Ocaasi t | c 19:04, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'd also appreciate renaming the section Jurisdictional rulings and law as it's not just about the German court ruling and implies broader considerations.
- I've never been happy about this section, which leaves me feeling like it's just fine as long as I'm not part of one of the specific countries mentioned. I think it ought to be replaced with a single, very simple sentence that reaffirms the Terms of use, e.g., "In addition to complying with US laws, you should comply with your own country's regulations about advertising". If necessary, we could then link to articles on the legal issues associated with astroturfing or a separate essay that describe the latest legal cases. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:37, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
Draft of a more comprehensive version
- Note, this is far longer than the current version and still not representative of global practices, nor in any way binding on Wikipedia policies/guidelines... but it is interesting. I strongly question whether selecting single recent cases from a court in Germany or a UK case that involved Twitter and not Wikipedia--or picking only large but not all encompassing PR organizations in the US and UK--makes this a meaningful improvement over the current version. My instinct is that the scope of this discussion primarily belongs in an associated essay; I'm collecting notes at User:Ocaasi/coicode. Comments are welcome. Ocaasi t | c 00:16, 5 March 2013 (UTC)
Jurisdictional law and professional codes
- Local and regional laws
Editors are individually responsible for following the laws, rules, and codes in their own jurisdiction(s) and professions, as Wikipedia's policies may not match, either being more permissive or more prohibitive. The Wikipedia database is maintained in reference to the protections afforded under relevant local and federal United States laws. Where one's local laws conflict with Wikipedia's policies, the policies on Wikipedia take precedence for Wikipedia's purposes, but local laws may still apply to editors as individuals. (See also the General disclaimer and Legal disclaimer).
Some court cases suggest editing by corporate representatives may be a violation of national or regional law. For example, in May 2012 the Munich Oberlandesgericht ruled that if a company or its agents edit Wikipedia with the aim of influencing customers, the edits constitute covert advertising, and as such are a violation of European fair trading law (see the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive). The ruling stated that readers cannot be expected to seek out user and talk pages to find editors' disclosures about their corporate affiliation. The case arose out of a claim against a company by a competitor over edits made to the article Weihrauchpräparat on the German Wikipedia. The judgment can be read here.
In another incident, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in the UK ruled in June 2012 in relation to material about Nike on Twitter. The ASA found that the content of certain tweets from two footballers had been "agreed with the help of a member of the Nike marketing team." Since the tweets were not clearly identified as Nike marketing communications, they were therefore in breach of the ASA's code. "Nike becomes first UK company to have Twitter campaign banned", Sweney, Mike. The Guardian, 20 June 2012. The US Federal Trade Commission's advertising guideline and internet rules also guide against deceptive practices or making promotions or endorsements without disclosure.
- Professional ethical codes
Some professional societies such as the Public Relations Society of America in their ethical guidelines of the Public Relations Society of America or the Chartered Institute of Public Relations' in their ethical code require revealing sponsors and not intentionally concealing ones role as representative of a client or employer. The International Association of Business Communicators code requires communication that is ethical, truthful, accurate and fair, that facilitates respect and mutual understanding, that is honest and candid, and that fosters the free flow of essential information in accord with the public interest. The Word of Mouth Marketing Association's code advises promoting an environment of trust between the consumer and marketer through honesty and transparency without manipulation are rejected, with meaningful disclosures of relationships or identities, and disclosure of commercial relationships with marketers; WOMMA also "respects online venues to create and enforces rules as they see fit."
Again, while instructive and perhaps relevant for individual editors, these laws and codes are not binding for Wikipedia unless stated specifically in our policies.
- I think this would be fine material for an accompanying essay. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:16, 5 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think it's sufficient to just say that anonymous corporate participants may be violating marketing regulations that require them to identify the source of their communications, especially on crowd-sourced websites. We don't need to provide them with legal advice or tons of historical context, just a "warning, don't do XYZ, it may be illegal!" CorporateM (Talk) 21:38, 12 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor)
COI template
I have initiated a discussion at Village Pump Proposals regarding applying Template:COI editnotice more broadly, in order to provide advice from WP:COI directly onto the article Talk page. Comments, support or opposition is invited. Cheers. CorporateM (Talk) 21:33, 12 March 2013 (UTC)
Proposal for Fees Paid to Wikipedia for Rapid Adjudication of Edit Changes
This proposal is one that would need to be considered and acted upon by the Wikipedia board of directors, but I'm posting it here in the hopes that those here will perhaps help start a discussion page (I'm not quite sure how to do that. It's been years since I was active on Wikipedia) and contribute to the discussion to the point that maybe it finally moves up to Jimmy Wales' attention.
This idea occurred to me after reading web articles regarding PR professionals, such as Bell Pottinger Private, who have had discussions with Jimmy Wales about trying to balance transparency with neutrality in the editing process. This led me to theConflict of interest editing on Wikipedia article where I was glad to see there is an active discussion taking place to try to find some better balance of interests.
I was never a paid editor, but as a person with some training and expertise in the controversial area post-abortion syndrome(post-abortion syndrome), I did try to fix some clearly slanted article on the subject several years ago. I respected the need for neutrality and verifiablity, so I took great care to document every edit with citations to peer reviewed medical journal articles. But my effort to bring balance to articles net with adamant resistance from hostile point-of-view pushers who consistently deleted material which conflicted with their POV. This small gang of POV pushers engaged in obstruction and [[3]] until I was eventually driven out.
I understand that there are now some opportunities to appeal edits to "the community" asking volunteers to review or mediate disputes. But this takes time and often more effort in communicating and documenting and arguing than it is worth. Plus, volunteer arbiters may simply bring their own biases to their decisions . . . and any sophisticated political or business group might also have "sleepers" in the volunteer dispute resolution groups who are there precisely to tilt the balance their way from an "objective" volunteer.
So here's my suggestion. It is one that would benefit PR professionals, volunteer editors with expertise in a field, and any editor who believe the balance of an article is being distorted by POV editors who block true and verifiable information and front load articles with POV material.
'Per Piece Paid Editing/Judging From Wikipedia Staff Editor/Judges'
Volunteer Wikipedia editorial mediation and arbitration services are fine. But they can take a long time and may not be fair or objective.
Wikipedia should offer an option for users to pay a fee for a professional editor, on Wikipedia's staff, to review the proposed changes and the basis of information for them, and to enter those those changes in the article with a definitive, official order that the approved edit shall not be changed without the consent of the person who proposed the change (and paid for it's review and verification).
This means a professional PR person with a business, for example, can transparently submit a proposed change to the Wikipedia editor/judge and if accepted, have it immediately and authoratitvely "locked into the article", notifying the other editors (especially those who are POV pushers) to not disrupt the edit.
This solution would (a) provide revenue to Wikipedia, (b) provide a mechanism for rapid correction of untruths or omissions, and (c) provide a mechanism to deliver paid, professional, authorative oversight to contentious articles in a manner that still allows for the articles to evolve but will reduce edit wars.
If the person paying the fee is unhappy with the judgement, they should be allowed to pay a second fee to have the issue examined by a panel of 3-5 of Wikipedia's paid staff--whom, of course, should be chosen based on a variety of different political, religious, and ideological views and all committed to striving toward a fair balance of such views in every article.
People willing to pay for accuracy and balance should be able to help improve Wikipedia without having to battle POV pushers as I did.
This proposal would help corporations with paid PR people to participate in Wikipedia in a transparent and timely way, and it would also help those of us with an interest in controversial subject matters to get timely and definitive decisions on edits knowing who is taking responsibility for the "yea" or "nay" decision rather than being subject to the manipulations "gangs" POV pushers and the intricacies of dealing with volunteer arbiters.
Would someone like to start a page to discuss this proposal?
This post is partially a repost of a comment I postedon this Wikipedia page --Strider ♫♫ 15:11, 15 March 2013 (UTC)
- This can't be done, because there is no way to "lock" a change on to a page. The software doesn't permit it. We can lock the entire page, or none of it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:02, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- There are several other drawbacks to this proposal, firstly it looks like giving an advantage to the organisation that pays for the change, and however you put in safeguards and layers of attempted neutrality between the editor and the person paying for the edit, that organisation's competitors will probably not accept that edit as neutral. Secondly it adds a hierarchy to the editing process, some editors who were acting on behalf of people who were paying Wikimedia would have more "authority" than other editors - that sort of change doesn't fit well with our culture.. Thirdly it would require the Foundation to get involved in content, and they have studiously avoided doing that. I'm fairly sure there are sound legal reasons why the Foundation doesn't want to start employing editors. ϢereSpielChequers 16:56, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
BP and large company editing in general
There are some significant issues raised by the editing of User:Arturo at BP on the BP article talk page. I don't want this discussion to be about Arturo's behavior, but rather on the issues raised. Indeed it may very well be the case that he is editing according to the letter of our rules, but not in the spirit that any non-paid Wikipedia editor would recognize.
The issue - BP, through Arturo, is providing the content for the BP article, especially in regards to its environmental performance, by posting a notice on the talk page, which is followed by Wikipedia editors putting the content "as is" into the article. Notice he is not editing the article directly himself. Arturo is not exercising independent judgement during this process. He states on his talk page: "The information I present from news sources is verified by the various subject matter experts within the company. I am not an expert myself on all of the topics..." In other words, the material is cleared by higher-ups first. Probably the most worrisome problem here is that our editors don't appear to be exercising independent judgement either, just posting the material "as is."
It should be clear to everybody that having BP write up the BP environmental record for Wikipedia in a way that is not transparent to our readers is completely unacceptable for Wikipedia, and it should be completely unacceptable for BP as well. Somebody over there hasn't thought this through very well. BP has every opportunity to present its side of the story as often as they want in adverts, press conferences, etc. Putting material in Wikipedia (where the author can not be easily disclosed to the public) is going to be viewed as trying to pull the wool over people's eyes. There definitely is a conflict of interest - and not just in the way Wikipedia defines it - because of things like all the environmental lawsuits BP is involved in.
BP may also be skirting the law in the US that prohibits undisclosed advertising (this was the law long before the internet and has been confirmed in the case of using the internet - google "astroturfing" if you're not familiar with this). BP is certainly violating the codes of ethics of the main US and UK PR associations codes of ethics.
I can think of 3 ways to handle this, though there must be more:
- Appealing to BP's common sense to just withdraw - they must know that this will come out and how bad they will look.
- Just use WP:Ignore all rules to remove the offending content - this rule - Wikipedia's 1st rule - was designed for these cases where the right thing to do is so totally obvious that little discussion is really needed.
- Change the rules so that no large companies (say Fortune 500 sized) can edit even on talk pages.
I'll inform various parties. Thanks for any feedback. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:07, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- "Probably the most worrisome problem here is that our editors don't appear to be exercising independent judgement either, just posting the material "as is.""
- Wow, you have seriously overstepped yourself. Please remove this personal attack on several editors now. SilverserenC 02:23, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- It's best not to try to make this personal. I certainly haven't mentioned any names. But when I describe the general situation, I'll call 'em as I see 'em. There has been a tremendous lack of independent judgement on this matter. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:48, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- You don't need to name names, you've already clearly stated that anyone involved in Arturo's userspace drafts or other talk page suggestions is who you're referring to. So, namely, myself, Beagel, Petrarchan47, Rangoon11, Martin Hogbin, and BozMo. I might be missing a few people. Are you seriously accusing all of us of lacking "independent judgement"? SilverserenC 03:12, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Please add my name to the list of those that have shown a tremendous lack of independent judgement. Gandydancer (talk) 17:22, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- You don't need to name names, you've already clearly stated that anyone involved in Arturo's userspace drafts or other talk page suggestions is who you're referring to. So, namely, myself, Beagel, Petrarchan47, Rangoon11, Martin Hogbin, and BozMo. I might be missing a few people. Are you seriously accusing all of us of lacking "independent judgement"? SilverserenC 03:12, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- It's best not to try to make this personal. I certainly haven't mentioned any names. But when I describe the general situation, I'll call 'em as I see 'em. There has been a tremendous lack of independent judgement on this matter. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:48, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think another troubling aspect is, assuming my interpretation is correct, that some editors were asking the CoI editor to make changes, rather than making them themselves. This cedes editorial control to the subject being written about, and further makes the editorial process (history, etc) totally opaque. It makes things very easy for the editors doing the integrating, but at what cost? -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 02:51, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Because it's being polite to the person's userspace draft. It's generally considered rude to go in and start changing someone's draft page without solicited permission. I don't see how it makes any difference either, as the resulting changes are reviewed just the same. The same suggested sources are used, the wording is scrutinized, what exactly is the difference? SilverserenC 03:13, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think another troubling aspect is, assuming my interpretation is correct, that some editors were asking the CoI editor to make changes, rather than making them themselves. This cedes editorial control to the subject being written about, and further makes the editorial process (history, etc) totally opaque. It makes things very easy for the editors doing the integrating, but at what cost? -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 02:51, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- see WP:NOBAN. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 03:53, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- "...it is usual to avoid substantially editing another's user and user talk pages other than where it is likely edits are expected and/or will be helpful." (emphasis added).
- So then it seems to me you are implying that edits were not expected to Arturo's work? -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:08, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'm saying that most editors feel more comfortable with suggesting changes to a userspace draft and letting the user make the changes. Regardless of expectation, most people feel like they're intruding when they go in to make changes. That's why when drafts, like in Peer reviews, are looked over, changes are suggested by others, rather than the other people just going in and making the changes. SilverserenC 04:13, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- So then it seems to me you are implying that edits were not expected to Arturo's work? -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:08, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- "...it is usual to avoid substantially editing another's user and user talk pages other than where it is likely edits are expected and/or will be helpful." (emphasis added).
- I appreciate that maybe this has been your experience, but it has not been mine. I am wary of your repeated implications that you speak for the community as a whole. I have no quarrel with people making productive edits on my pages, have done so on others without causing drama, and have seen others do the same. WP is a collaborative space, fullstop, and if i can find the sentence i recall seeing stating that even one's userpage or sandbox material may be "mercilessly edited" i would cite that. So thats just, like, your opinion man. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:20, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I certainly don't speak for the community as a whole, but I do think I can understand and represent the opinions of a fair amount of people. And I also know the editors in question and it seems more their style that it's better to look over and gauge neutrality and changes to the drafts than to make the changes yourself. Besides, isn't it a far better method to determine if someone is editing neutrally by having them make the suggested changes and then seeing if the changes were written in an appropriate manner? SilverserenC 04:57, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Silver is right: it is normal to avoid making changes to someone else's sandbox unless (1) you have specifically been invited to do so or (2) it's an emergency. NB that "normal" is not the same thing as "absolutely required".
- More pointfully, who cares? If I see a problem in someone's sandbox, and I leave a note saying "Hey, you should consider saying ____ instead in that third paragraph", and the user agrees, then who actually cares which one of us physically made the change in the draft? Really: we care about the final product, not about the process used to achieve it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:09, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I certainly don't speak for the community as a whole, but I do think I can understand and represent the opinions of a fair amount of people. And I also know the editors in question and it seems more their style that it's better to look over and gauge neutrality and changes to the drafts than to make the changes yourself. Besides, isn't it a far better method to determine if someone is editing neutrally by having them make the suggested changes and then seeing if the changes were written in an appropriate manner? SilverserenC 04:57, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I appreciate that maybe this has been your experience, but it has not been mine. I am wary of your repeated implications that you speak for the community as a whole. I have no quarrel with people making productive edits on my pages, have done so on others without causing drama, and have seen others do the same. WP is a collaborative space, fullstop, and if i can find the sentence i recall seeing stating that even one's userpage or sandbox material may be "mercilessly edited" i would cite that. So thats just, like, your opinion man. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:20, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I agree with Smallbones that this is problematic; it has the potential to make both Wikipedia and BP look bad. The BP employee, User:Arturo at BP, has said he is here on behalf of BP; he's not just someone who happens to work for the company. He has posted 10 fairly extensive drafts that are being ported over into the article without signalling to the reader that these are BP's words. I believe he has acknowledged conferring with BP's subject-matter experts to approve the text.
- The best thing would be for BP to withdraw and for the material to be removed from the article. Alternatively, we can regard the drafts as unpublished primary source material: BP's view of itself, or its interpretation of the news coverage it has attracted. I've asked Arturo at BP (diff) to consider posting his articles to BP's website (that is, if BP will not agree to withdraw). That way, we could use them as published primary sources. It's not unusual to ask article subjects to post material to a website so that we can cite it.
- Looking ahead, we should try to come up with words about this for the guideline. No one minds if a small business makes a suggestion for content, but a multinational can't be allowed to rewrite areas where it has been the subject of media criticism and even criminal charges. It's not only a question of checking the text for errors; there are issues of weight to decide, which sources to use, which vocabulary to choose, and what not to include. These are issues that the company really shouldn't be influencing. SlimVirgin (talk) 03:39, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- How is it going to make anyone look bad? BP following Wikipedia's rules and doing things through the talkpage the proper way, as requested by Jimbo, is somehow bad?
- And you and I both know that Wikipedians get subject matter experts to look over their work all the time. Heck, there was that proposal at FAC for a while on getting a known list of experts for various subjects together that were willing to look over the article submissions for their subject. It seems extremely proper for Arturo to be conferring with the people who know more about the subject than him and getting their input.
- Your WP:PRIMARY suggestion is an utter mockery of the sourcing policy. A userspace draft by an editor is not a source, regardless of how many times you claim that it's "BP's voice", which is just insulting Arturo. He is the one that wrote this material, he is a Wikipedia editor, and you should really stop treating him like a lesser person because of it. SilverserenC 03:45, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
A wrinkle here that I have not seen considered is that if he's writing this in the course of his work for BP, then that seems to me to be a work-for-hire under copyright law. In the US at least, work-for-hire copyrights are owned by the company, rather than the creator. We need some kind of explicit permission from BP for this material to not be a WP:COPYVIO. (If Arturo is an employee, this does in fact mean that this is "BP's voice" -- laws matter.) -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 03:51, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I want to add that several editors on that page have been doing their level best to keep an eye on this and offer opposition. It's unfair to them that they've had to spend their free time, on behalf of Wikipedia, monitoring a multinational that wants to write its own article. I believe Petrarchan47 eventually gave up. Gandydancer and Binksternet are still doing a great job, and there may be others (I'm not familiar with everyone at that article, and have only just started looking at the archives). Clear guidance here for the future will help editors who find themselves in that position. SlimVirgin (talk) 03:56, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think that this page is dedicated to the discussion of the guidelines and not the particular article which should be done at the article's talk page. Also, I would ask you to edit your comment above as right now it divides editors on the BP articles into the camps and as such, increases battleground atmosphere. Taking account the heated situation around this article, I suggest to remove the names or give credits to all editors who have done a lot of work on this article (although they may have different view points in different issues), but again, this is here not a place to discuss BP article. Beagel (talk) 05:44, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- "Opposition" to what? Are you accusing Arturo of something? All i'm seeing here is that you assume every action made by him is slanting the article, with no proof on that. He has been completely open and transparent, only using the talk page. We're supposed to be working with companies and individuals, not trying to fight them, as you think we should be. SilverserenC 04:06, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- "We're supposed to be working with companies..."[citation needed] -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:09, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I've said nothing of the sort. I have already invited you to point out which of my statements you are interpreting in this way, which you have thus far declined to do. I even asked you to do so on my personal talk page, since you appeared to be accusing me repeatedly in the wrong forum. I don't think this is the appropriate forum either, tbqh, and even though it's not as good as my (or your) talk page it's better than Talk:BP. So have at it, if you must. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:14, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- If you don't support working with companies, then you oppose working with them, which means not listening to them when they have a concern. This is all pretty straightforward. And, hey, there's a fair number of editors that think we should just say screw you to companies that come requesting changes, so feel free to go and join that camp if you want. SilverserenC 04:28, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I've said nothing of the sort. I have already invited you to point out which of my statements you are interpreting in this way, which you have thus far declined to do. I even asked you to do so on my personal talk page, since you appeared to be accusing me repeatedly in the wrong forum. I don't think this is the appropriate forum either, tbqh, and even though it's not as good as my (or your) talk page it's better than Talk:BP. So have at it, if you must. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:14, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Your tone seems a bit strident to me. That doesn't strike me as a way to identify and address the underlying issues, whatever they are. And I notice you haven't pointed out what specific statements I've made that lead you to make these assertions about my beliefs. Feel free to do so at any point, if the mood strikes you.-- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:34, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- That's the thing i'm asking, about your beliefs. What exactly is the issue with Arturo's drafts? What is wrong with them? Are they not neutral? Have you read them? Or is this all just a "they have a COI, so they can never be neutral" thing? Because that's what the whole discussion on the BP talk page seemed like. No one actually looking at the content and instead just going after the editor. SilverserenC 04:40, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Your tone seems a bit strident to me. That doesn't strike me as a way to identify and address the underlying issues, whatever they are. And I notice you haven't pointed out what specific statements I've made that lead you to make these assertions about my beliefs. Feel free to do so at any point, if the mood strikes you.-- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:34, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
You know, as I stated initially, I just started digging into this today because of some postings on noticeboards. I haven't really had time to do a thorough accounting of the pages; what i did see was subtle issues of word choice and choice of references that seemed like something a PR person would include, and which were accepted not just uncritically, but enthusiastically without substantial revision by a group of editors, or in a few cases the revision was punted back to the COI editor. One of that group of editors actually started to become accusatory in response.
My personal views on companies and their relationship to WP (or any other domain) are complex, and would be better discussed on my talk page, or off WP entirely. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 04:55, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Then, please, go and point out the issues. Focusing on the content would be great and getting those things changed would be even better. But I don't feel that wholesale removing the changes would be beneficial to the article at all. And I don't actually think Arturo is doing those subtle things on purpose. If you point them out to him, then he can work on making sure he doesn't do those things anymore. But if you look at the article as a whole from what it was before, you can easily see that it markedly improved, minor issues aside. Any small subtle wording issues or reference choices can be done after the fact, but if the overall effect is to improve the article, I believe that's something we should be supporting. SilverserenC 05:13, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
Proposed changes to the guideline
I didn't bring start this discussion to rehash the BP talk page. It has been asserted that everything going on at the BP article is within the rules stated here, though I'm not sure I believe that. If that is indeed the case, then we clearly need to change the rules - we clearly can't have companies writing their own histories on controversial matters and have it presented without disclosure on the article page.
Some of the problems I'd like addressed are:
- BP is currently involved in court cases on their environmental performance, with billions of dollars at stake.
- Arturo at BP is not concentrating on so much on facts, but is rather arguing about interpretation, emphasis and weight. BP has plenty of places where it can present its own interpretation, but these matters on Wikipedia should be left to independent editors
- The material is being cleared with others at BP, perhaps even by the legal department. This means effectively that User:Arturo at BP is a joint account, and not an individual taking individual responsibility for his edits.
Clarification of the current rules could be spread through the guideline and could solve this matter, but the most direct way would be a section on the use of talk pages - perhaps something like:
- Use of Talk Pages by editors with a COI
Editors with COIs are generally invited to use article talk pages to bring verifiable facts to the attention of Wikipedia editors or to point out sources where the COI editor or his employer have presented their opinions and interpretations of the facts. Talk pages should not be used to argue for an employer's opinions or views on the proper emphasis or weight of material within the article, nor should it be used to argue about matters that are currently before the courts.
The talk page should not be used to present the official views of a corporation. Every editor, including editors who have declared a COI and who only edit on talk pages, must be an individual using his or her own judgement. Corporate and joint user accounts are strictly prohibited. Corporations usually have many outlets for presenting their interpretations and opinions, e.g. "public service advertisements", op-eds in newspapers and trade journals, press releases and press conferences. If a corporation wants to draw the attention of Wikipedia editors to their official views, they may simply post a link to these materials on the talk page with a very brief explanation of the link's relevance.
- Well, that might be a start, but I'm not wedded to any particular wording. Comments appreciated. Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:28, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- If a court case is influenced by what Wikipedia says, then the courts have far more serious problems than we could possibly hope to address here.
- If Arturo is not editing the page directly, then these matters are being left to "independent editors". Your complaint seems to be "independent editors are agreeing with Arturo instead of agreeing with me".
- Talking to other people, even seeking their agreement in advance, does not constitute a "joint account" as far as Wikipedia is concerned. As far as we're concerned, a joint account means different humans physically typing the words into the edit box and pushing the 'save page' button. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:15, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Also, you say that "Talk pages should not be used to argue for an employer's opinions or views on the proper emphasis or weight of material within the article", but I wonder why not? Consider the case of some celebrity who had a minor traffic infraction, like a speeding ticket. Imagine that the BLP is wildly unbalanced, with two out of three sentences in the article referring to the speeding ticket. Why shouldn't we welcome the participation of the celebrity's publicist in discussing and correcting that obvious problem about "the proper emphasis or weight of material within the article"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:01, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- 1. Currently WP:COI says
- Legal antagonists
If you are involved in a court case, or you are close to one of the litigants, you should not write about the case, or about a party or law firm associated with the case. Even a minor breach of neutrality in an article that is before the court could cause real-world harm.
- If that is not clear enough we need to let BP know that contributing material about a court case they are involved in is not appreciated.
- Courts are generally concerned about media coverage of cases before them, e.g. if it might bias a jury. If the media coverage is likely to bias a jury then they will move the case to another county. That remedy is not available however when the coverage is from Wikipedia.
- 2. I don't think your point 2 above has anything to do with my point 2. All I'm saying is that corporations can present their opinions off-Wiki, then we can actually quote them. "Independent editors" just passing through Arturo's materials from BP into the BP article without quoting BP, are clearly acting improperly.
- 3. from WP:NOSHARE "Any user account should represent an individual and not a group". From WP:ROLE "Role accounts: Because an account represents your edits as an individual, "role accounts", or accounts shared by multiple people, are as a rule forbidden and blocked." If somebody has to clear their edits through their corporate legal department or just their boss, they are not editing as individuals. People editing with COIs are allowed to edit (even though they are strong discouraged) but they have to be individuals, not corporations.
- 4. You give a BLP example of why corporations should be able to argue on matters of weight and interpretation - aka spin - on talk pages. Clearly WP:BLP over-rides WP:COI, but there is no WP:BLC Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:07, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- We're basically prohibiting corporate representatives or other advocates from editing directly. That seems to be a growing consensus although it's not explicitly banned, at least not in uncontroversial situations. The result of that is we have more editors coming to the talk on behalf or organizations and individuals. We're encouraging them clearly disclose their COI--in their username, their user talk page or userpage, the article talk page, and the COI noticeboard. Those editors are then seeking review about criticisms, sources, suggestions and drafts. This is what policy currently recommends.
- We have a general divide over editors who believe those with a strong COI are inherently biased and should not be trusted or even worked with, and those on the other handwho think that we should judge content not the contributor. This reflects a broader philosophical debate which we're not going to solve here; it's too divided and divisive (see Wikiproject Cooperation and Wikiproject Paid advocacy watch for example). The pragmatic fix we need is to improve the review process for proposed drafts. If a corporate rep suggests a neutral, well-sourced draft, that draft must be reviewed by others. But is that sufficient to ensure neutrality? Smallbones, SlimVirgin, and the other BP watchers at the article think it's not sufficient, that it's parroting a company's views, even to the extent of being a copyright violation or a primary source situation. I think that's a stretch of WP:PRIMARY, but it reflects a broader concern about authorship. Since corporate reps are not editing directly, this is seen as direct editing 'by proxy'.
- The judgement call to make is how much review and criticism can ensure that a proposed draft has been independently judged. The Wikipedia editors who move such a draft into an article, after reviewing/improving it, ultimately take responsibility for the draft, as with any edit request. So what do we need to do to make that review/request process more robust? Also, if we're not reviewing suggestions from paid advocates, are we going to drive them underground? What's the right balance to strike?Ocaasi t | c 17:16, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I don't think the division there is quite so stark as you make it out to be, and I also think that characterizing one side (of an artificial division to begin with) as inherently distrustful is, while understandable, not particularly AGFish.
- I think that you are exactly right about the need to improve the review process for drafts. Yes, I think that there is a meaningful concern about work-for-hire and copyvio, but I have also been characterized as a little woo-woo crazypants about copyvio. That's for a legal team to decide, but I think we would be remiss to discount the issue completely.
- Perhaps a meaningful solution here is to try and use some kind of proportionality principle akin to WP:UNDUE, whereby the extent of a CoI editor's changes should have proportionally greater or lesser attempts to draw in other eyes to review the edits. The edits in question here are extremely significant, so for instance one might post on a number of noticeboards or make an RfC before incorporating that information directly. I could imagine this having the effect of making small, uncontroversial suggestions such as corrections of fact the least disputed kinds of changes. When we have to consider issues of cherrypicking and due weight, the number of active editors on a specific page may not be enough to fully consider the implications of wide-ranging, substantial changes that are made very easy for them. There might also be some sort of tagging system, whereby certain edits can be mentioned as coming from a CoI editor originally, in order to enable more meaningful review by others after-the-fact. Things can get lost in the history.
- I realize that's not much of a solution, exactly, since it brings in even more of these ethereal sorts of considerations, but it's the best I've got. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 18:28, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- There's no copyvio problem here. If you're hired to write something and to post it on Wikipedia, then you are implicitly authorized to license it under Wikipedia's terms. You don't give up your copyright when you post to Wikipedia. You keep the copyright and freely license it. A person in a work-for-hire situation assigns the copyright to the employer and still licenses it to the world.
- Put another way, if there were a lawsuit about the copyright of the comment I'm typing now, then I personally own the copyright and everyone has a license. If there were a lawsuit about the copyright of Arturo's work on Wikipedia, then BP owns the copyright and everyone still has the same license that they would have if I'd typed it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:24, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I get that. I just think it's odd to allow someone to say "I don't own the copyright to this, so I have no say in the matter, but I assure you it's ok to license under these terms." We don't do that for other classes of copyrighted material unless we're claiming afair use exemption. I think we should have some sort of disclosure from the copyright holder (in this case BP) that Arturo's work is freely licensable under CC-BY-SA. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 19:29, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Okay, Smallbones, let's try this again: You say, ""Independent editors" [scare quotes sic] just passing through Arturo's materials from BP into the BP article without quoting BP, are clearly acting improperly."
- I'm telling you that no matter your disdain for the editors involved in that article, it's not at all clear that they've acted improperly. SlimVirgin practically wrote the NPOV policy. If she agrees that a statement complies with that policy, we can safely assume that she's right. There is no evidence whatsoever that our independent editors are acting improperly, or indeed that they are doing anything other than helping out in exactly the way that we regularly beg people to do. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:20, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- WAID, the problem with this situation is this: (1) there were a very small number of editors involved in agreeing to this; (2) most of the editors on the talk page who agreed to the drafts were probably not in a position to judge whether the drafts were neutral, in the sense of accurately representing the body of literature on each of the issues BP rewrote - informing yourself to the point where you're able to judge that is a lot of work; (3) it's clear that some of the editors felt railroaded; and some were supporting only because they support paid advocacy by corporations; and (4) – and this is the most important point – the tens of thousands of readers who read that article between July 2012 and February 2013 were not told they were reading BP's words.
- I'm not familiar with astroturfing and its parameters, but does this not count as a form of it? SlimVirgin (talk) 19:40, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'm sure you could find a blogger willing to say so, but normally astroturfing requires actual attempts at secrecy. If you're putting "Hi, I work for this company" on every single available edit, even if someone (i.e., the Mediawiki software, which is outside your control) makes those notices somewhat hard to find, then that doesn't really count as astroturfing. It's certainly less like astroturfing than filing a complaint with ORTS, which is another legal and community-sanctioned way to deal with bias and errors. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:50, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'm not familiar with astroturfing and its parameters, but does this not count as a form of it? SlimVirgin (talk) 19:40, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think a principle of "adequate review" is a useful way of thinking about this. One of the criticisms here is that Arturo's edits might not have been adequately vetted. So how about, the more extensive the changes, the bigger the net needs to be cast as far as notifications (e.g. wikiprojects, noticeboards, etc) in order to invite active reviewers to vet the material and make sure that it is not, for example, WP:POVPUSH. The greater the amount of material, the more places there is for this sort of thing to hide, so we need to be correspondingly more vigilant in reviewing it. Uncontroversial edits, such as uncomplicated corrections of statements of fact, would be treated the same as they currently are, but Arturo's edits would invite a much wider range of editors to review the proposed content and kick the tires, so to speak. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 00:18, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- During the period from July 2012 up to today, at least five active editors have been around that article all the time. Being around (also at the talk page) they should be aware about these proposals and have had access to drafts to comment and make changes. If they have not done this, it may also mean that they have seen no problems. But in general, I agree that we probably need more precise rules how to disclosure and review proposals made by COI (particularly paid) editors, so maybe a list of relevant forums where it should be notified would be useful. I also think that that kind of drafts should not be placed at the user pages but special drafting subpage should be under the article's talk page to make clear that every editor is invited to make changes and comment. Beagel (talk) 06:24, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
BP's rewrite of the article about itself
To be clear about the extent of this, I've compiled links to BP's drafts, listed how long they were, which ones were posted, and links to any discussion; see BP's drafts.
It appears that between July 2012 and February 2013 BP rewrote around 44 percent of the (currently) 9,215-word article. SlimVirgin (talk) 19:32, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Once again, BP did not wrote the article. In general, these are not new drafts but based on the existing sections/part of the articles. Saying that BP (that means Arturo) is a sole author of these texts is incorrect. Also, it was discussed several times that all these draft where disclosed and open for editing/discussion by other editors. If they used or not this opportunity, is up to any individual editor but that time at least five editors were permanently active on that article and thus were aware of these drafts. No draft was used for posting which was objected by other editors (e.g. in that happened in December as there was no consensus among editors). It was also said above (and also during discussion at the BP's talk page), if any editor put the draft to the article, s/he bear responsibility about that text. I would kindly ask you to go through these posts made by me and to say what exactly is not n line with the WP policies. Otherwise, I kindly ask you to stop accusing editors who in god faith have spent a lot of time improving that article. I would line also say that accounting words may give a wrong impression as since edit conflict which statrted in spring 2012 between editors Rangoon11 and Petrarchan47, which was discussed in different venues and which bring a lot of editors to this article) the article has gone through a serious changes and a lot of improvements. Beagel (talk) 06:11, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- (ec)
People seem to be missing the fact that putting BP's draft into the article is a form of quotation or paraphrase that must be cited according to our rules. Thus I present the following revision. Others are invited to suggest their own revisions.
- Use of Talk Pages by editors with a COI (revision 1)
Editors with COIs are generally invited to use article talk pages to bring verifiable facts to the attention of Wikipedia editors or to point out sources where the COI editor or his employer have presented their opinions and interpretations of the facts. Talk pages should not be used to argue for an employer's opinions or views on the proper emphasis or weight of material within the article, nor should it be used to argue about matters that are currently before the courts.
The talk page should not be used to present the official views of a corporation. Every editor, including editors who have declared a COI and who only edit on talk pages, must be an individual using his or her own judgement. Corporate and joint user accounts are strictly prohibited. Corporations usually have many outlets for presenting their interpretations and opinions, e.g. public service advertisements, op-eds in newspapers and trade journals, press releases and press conferences, or just on the company website. If a corporation wants to draw the attention of Wikipedia editors to their official views, they may simply post a link to these materials on the talk page with a very brief explanation of the link's relevance.
If an editor with a declared COI offers a draft of a section or of a complete article on the talk page, Wikipedia can not include that draft into an article without a complete rewriting. We cannot assume that the proposer of the draft is actually the representative of his employer. We cannot include the views of an interested party in the article without citation and we cannot cite the quote or paraphrase if it hasn't been published. Thus a corporation must publish its views - if only on its corporate website - if it wishes to make its views known to Wikipedians.
- I think that should make it clear that uncited quotes and paraphrases are not allowed. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:43, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Could it be summarized like this?
Company employees, particularly those working in corporate communications, may set up user accounts on behalf of their employer, and proceed to write drafts for insertion by others into the article about that company, rather than engaging in direct editing themselves. These drafts should be regarded as unpublished primary sources. The company employee should be asked instead to submit his material to a publisher, so that Wikipedia can cite it as a source. The company's website may be an acceptable publisher; this would allow the material to be used as a published primary source, with the usual caution.
- This is in line with the advice Jimbo gave Microsoft when they were caught paying someone to rewrite bits of their article. He suggested Microsoft publish that material somewhere independently, so that we could cite it as a source like any other; see "Microsoft Violates Wikipedia's Sacred Rule". SlimVirgin (talk) 20:42, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- How do we verify that the editor represents the company that he claims to represent? It is not a trivial task, and spoofing (e.g. by competitors or just people who want to make them look bad, could be a problem. Publishing on their own website avoids these problems completely. Smallbones(smalltalk) 22:09, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Right, it solves everything. It means we know who the author is, we can cite the source, quote it, and the reader can see where the perspective has come from. It also means we're not giving one source privileged access to the article over any other. SlimVirgin (talk) 22:44, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- (to sv) I think it's a slippery slope and slightly circular logic to characterize any editor's contribution as a primary source. Wikipedia isn't a source in relation to Wikipedia, to me that's just incoherent logic. Unsourced and biased potentially, but I wouldn't call it a primary source. Gigs (talk) 20:50, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- It's material about the company written by the company; that makes it a primary source. It has been posted on Wikipedia, rather than on their own website; that makes it an unpublished primary source. To resolve this, they need to convert it to a published source so that we can use it. The point here is that BP is a source of information on BP. It is not an editor, not directly and not by proxy. We can't choose one of our sources out of the dozens we use, and give it privileged access by saying "you don't need to publish and be cited; instead, we will add your unpublished perspective directly to the article." SlimVirgin (talk) 21:07, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- No, it doesn't. First, if it's published on Wikipedia, then it's published, which is the opposite of unpublished. Second, writing about your employer makes it "affiliated" or "non-independent", but it could still be secondary. WP:Secondary does not mean independent. If an employee read a bunch of news reports about the employer and summarized them, then the result is secondary, not primary. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:54, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- It's material about the company written by the company; that makes it a primary source. It has been posted on Wikipedia, rather than on their own website; that makes it an unpublished primary source. To resolve this, they need to convert it to a published source so that we can use it. The point here is that BP is a source of information on BP. It is not an editor, not directly and not by proxy. We can't choose one of our sources out of the dozens we use, and give it privileged access by saying "you don't need to publish and be cited; instead, we will add your unpublished perspective directly to the article." SlimVirgin (talk) 21:07, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- (e/c in reply to smallbones) I don't like it. Why shouldn't they present the official views of the corporation here? They are pretty much bound by their job to do that. That's like asking the scorpion not to be a scorpion. So we'll just wind up with scorpions in sheep's clothing. Not that sheep ever wear clothes. What were we talking about again?
- On the complete rewrite, that's also no good, since some COI editors produce decent work, and a lot of editors don't blindly approve their drafts anyway. Take a look at AfC sometime. Are we going to require AfC to reject or completely rewrite every article that clearly came from someone with a COI, i.e. nearly all of them?.
- So I'd say this is an idealistic proposal. We need something a little more concrete and workable. Gigs (talk) 20:45, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- We can't actually assume that anybody here is the official representative of the firm (see above). If we want to use material that is claimed to be from the firm, then we have to cite it, which means it has to be published. Note that I'm not saying that anybody with a COI can't write anything, just that people who claim to represent the firm (a big difference) have to publish it off wiki. Smallbones(smalltalk) 22:17, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Hello, I have replied on the BP Talk page but also wanted to leave a note here to clarify some information. The drafts that SlimVirgin mentions above were added into the article by volunteer editors after they had been reviewed. The majority of the drafts that I proposed focused on the company's operations and provided new information. These were not "rewrites" but drafts providing entirely new information on the company's activities that had not previously been included in the article. In mid-2012, there was virtually no information on the organization of the company or its various activities. The drafts I provided for the UK, US and worldwide operations addressed this lack of information. These drafts provided factual information, not the company's views.
- As a side note: I believe Smallbones may have misinterpreted a comment I made about subject matter experts, what I was saying is that I rely on available sources (primarily third party sources such as news articles) to write the drafts but that I check with subject matter experts within the business that the facts in my drafts are correct (for instance, production figures or the chronology of events). This is to ensure that the information I present on Wikipedia is accurate. I am the author of the drafted material and by posting it to Wikipedia discussion spaces, I am releasing the material under Creative Commons just as any other contributor to Wikipedia does.
- I believe that SlimVirgin's estimate of how much of the current article is based on material I proposed is incorrect: some material was edited, shortened or later replaced. Indeed, I should note that the first draft that I presented was an overview of all the operations, which was largely replaced with the more detailed information about the operations by location. Not all my proposed drafts were added, and one was significantly reduced following feedback from other editors.
- As I have said on the BP Talk page, I would be open to a review of the material in the BP article to ensure that it is neutral. I would like to remind editors that edits have been made by other editors to this material since it was added to the article, so please bear this in mind when reviewing. Arturo at BP (talk) 20:52, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
We should look at the context here. While this addition of material was going on (Nov 15, 2012) BP admitted to and settled charges with the Department of Justice of "obstruction of justice" - lying to Congress - effectively perjury, as well as misleading its investors (only a $525 million fine on that one). "The company initially tried to cover up the severity of the spill, misleading both Congress and investors about how quickly oil was leaking from the runaway well, according to the settlement and related charges."BP Will Plead Guilty and Pay Over $4 Billion, NYTimes Passing off BP statements as fact in the article about BP, without labeling them as being from BP is just nuts. I do not blame Arturo - presumably he is just doing what his bosses tell him to do and his livelihood depends on that. I blame a poorly written guideline that some editors interpret as saying that this is ok. It is not ok. It is against all of our fundamental rules: V, NPOV, NOR, you name it and a straightforward reading of our rules prohibits it. It is a violation of our readers' trust. Any proposal (or non-proposal) that will let anybody believe that anything like this is ok is simply a cop-out. We have to very clearly say "this is not ok" or no reader should ever trust anything in Wikipedia ever again. As a practical matter, we have to say this is against the rules in the clearest possible language. Smallbones(smalltalk) 22:02, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- See, this is the problem. You are exactly violating "comment on the content, not on the contributor". What is wrong with the content? Is the content biased? How is it biased? Give exact examples. You have presented no evidence whatsoever that the material in Arturo's drafts aren't neutral. All we care about is our content. Is the content as presented neutral or not. The reason we focus on the content is that, practically all of the time, we don't know the background of the contributor. While Arturo is working above level and openly in his affiliation with BP, he didn't have to. He could have just been a random editor that presented these drafts for inclusion. That is why we focus on the content. If the content he is presenting isn't neutral, then that is indeed an issue. But without the evidence of it not being neutral, you have no argument, since the article is no different than it would be if anyone else wrote it neutrally, because that's what neutral is meant to be. SilverserenC 22:42, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
- Frankly I'm tired of the accusation that I'm commenting on the contributor rather than on the content. Specifics on the content should be discussed at the BP talk page, but I'll give an overview of the general problem here (at the risk of repeating myself). When the group of editors takes on the responsibility of inserting content from a COI editor they have taken on the responsibility of insuring that the content of the article is NPOV. That group has failed spectacularly in doing this. The major problem is that BP, a party to multi-billion dollar lawsuits on the matter being written about, has had its words used directly in the article without quotation or even a reliable source and has not been identified in any way as the source of the wording. There is the matter of Arturo writing approx "BP has a mixed environmental record" - not even close. Thankfully, I don't think this had a chance to be added to the article before the s hit the fan. There are little things in the article that are clearly not NPOV, e.g. BP pleaded guilty to "Obstruction of Congress" - that is of lying to Congress and though "Obstruction of Justice" is mentioned twice, there is no explanation of what it means and no mention that BP itself pleaded guilty. Similarly BP's guilty plea to lying to its investors and the $525 million fine it paid for this is not mentioned at all. Thus, from the NPOV standpoint, the content of the article is simply terrible. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:46, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- You're conflating a discussion about the article itself with a discussion about guidelines. Guidelines have to come from somewhere. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 00:06, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Except this is just a proposal for rule creep to rectify an issue that has yet to actually be expressed on why it's an issue. Like I said, it's about the content and there has yet to be specific reasons expressed on why this content is any different than what any other editor would write. I don't think starting off prejudiced against an editor is the best way to go. Especially since we already have these editors following the post on talk pages only guideline, even though that isn't an actual rule. They've already gone out of their way to make extra restrictions on their editing that isn't even required of them. And now this discussion is trying to restrict them from even being able to do the minimum they put themselves out for. On no basis whatsoever. SilverserenC 00:54, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- all i can conclude from that is you're either not reading carefully, or being deliberately obtuse. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 00:57, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Except this is just a proposal for rule creep to rectify an issue that has yet to actually be expressed on why it's an issue. Like I said, it's about the content and there has yet to be specific reasons expressed on why this content is any different than what any other editor would write. I don't think starting off prejudiced against an editor is the best way to go. Especially since we already have these editors following the post on talk pages only guideline, even though that isn't an actual rule. They've already gone out of their way to make extra restrictions on their editing that isn't even required of them. And now this discussion is trying to restrict them from even being able to do the minimum they put themselves out for. On no basis whatsoever. SilverserenC 00:54, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I read it perfectly fine. There is absolutely no reason to not allow editors to work on draft versions to be submitted for independent review before implementation. COI is utterly irrelevant, as the neutrality of the content is the only important part. That's why our COI guideline says time and again that COI editors are still perfectly allowed to edit, so long as they do so neutrally, the same as anyone else.
- You sound pretty hostile to the idea of coming to any sort of consensus then. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 01:25, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- A consensus on how to make different classes of editors? Yeah, I guess I am hostile to that. I don't believe in telling someone that they're not as equal as someone else, that their edits aren't as worthwhile, when they haven't done anything wrong. I don't believe in segregation. SilverserenC 04:01, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- You sound pretty hostile to the idea of coming to any sort of consensus then. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 01:25, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
Proposal
I'll try again - certainly my proposal can be made simpler
- I won't vote on this proposal myself, but a change of this kind should have wide community input. I strongly suggest an RfC. (olive (talk) 15:41, 20 March 2013 (UTC))
- Wide community input would be wonderful. I've ask to get this listed by the Signpost in their discussions section. I'm not sure that this page has any lower standing than an RfC, but if you think listing it as an RfC will help, please do it. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:57, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Use of Talk Pages by editors with a COI (revision 2)
Editors with COIs are generally invited to use article talk pages
- to bring verifiable facts to the attention of Wikipedia editors
- to present evidence that a purported fact in the article is false, or
- to point out published sources where the COI editor or his employer have presented their opinions and interpretations of the facts.
Talk pages should not be used by Editors with COIs
- to argue about matters that are currently before the courts
- to argue on the proper emphasis or weight of material within the article
- to present the employer's opinions or interpretations of the facts, other than giving a link to a published source and briefly explaining its relevance
- to present a proposed draft of the article or sections of the article, other than pointing out material that the employer or others have published.
It's simple and straightforward and should solve this problem.
- Support as proposer - Smallbones(smalltalk) 04:05, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- This looks good, let's do this. (I added "by Editors with COIs" to the heading for the second section, I hope this is OK.) Herostratus (talk) 04:51, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Support Yes sounds reasonable. Our readers expect our content to be written by people independent of the subject matter at hand. If it isn't this will hurt our reputation and our brand. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 07:37, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- This is better, but the last point (currently #4) is a sharp divergence from current practice. Before adopting such a policy, we need to invite much wider comment, since our policies are supposed to be primarily descriptive of practice, not prescriptive. I wouldn't be opposed to such a change in practice if it is the best solution that we can come up with. Gigs (talk) 12:42, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Agree on 1 & 2, Oppose 3 & 4 However, the way this is worded, "arguing" is very vague. Does that mean pointing out that something is incorrect in such a section or to present reliable sources with no added commentary is "arguing"? And I completely disagree with 3 and 4. COI editors are perfectly allowed to suggest changes to the article in general, whether that is just with sources, rewording, or section re-writes. Furthermore, you seem to be confusing COI editors with paid editors with your use of "employer". This statement makes absolutely no sense in the context of COI. Additionally, this would also apply to POV pushers trying to negatively slant an article (and thus have a COI) as well, correct? SilverserenC 15:35, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I generally support this proposal. I do wonder also whether we have any duty to notify legal authorities when there are attempts by CoI editors to change material that is the subject of a legal dispute? The possibility for this to affect the progress of a court case is small, but not insignificant. Not saying this particular case (BP/Arturo) qualifies, just to be clear. -- [UseTheCommandLine ~/talk] #_ 15:51, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I don't think we have any legal responsibility to report violations or enforce the (multiple countries') laws ourselves, but we do have moral responsibility to make sure that our rules are generally consistent with the law, so people can be fairly sure that if they follow our rules in good faith they are not obviously breaking the law. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:57, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I believe that we should strongly support Wikipedians however who wish to do this sort of work. Let say we have a major device manufacturer that was trying to "improve" the Wikipedia coverage of their product to improve the chance that medicare would continue paying a billion plus for the procedure in the US when the best available evidence does not show benefit? While the procedure itself is fairly neutral in effect, the fact that this billion is not spent on other measures could result in overall harm. Oh wait this happened already a couple of month ago. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:51, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- I don't think we have any legal responsibility to report violations or enforce the (multiple countries') laws ourselves, but we do have moral responsibility to make sure that our rules are generally consistent with the law, so people can be fairly sure that if they follow our rules in good faith they are not obviously breaking the law. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:57, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Support. This would work; points 3 and 4 are particularly important. Volunteer editors are being worn down by the extended arguments from PR people, and the repeated requests to add their drafts directly to the article. The PR employees are being paid to do this, so they can keep going as long as they need to, which means editors get burned out and stop arguing, or leave Wikipedia entirely. Instead, people representing companies or other groups should refer editors to sources, which can include source material published by that company. Then we can cite those sources as we do any other. SlimVirgin (talk) 17:14, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Is this proposal about editors with CoI in general, or specifically about people editing for companies like BP?--Staberinde (talk) 18:29, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- For the most part this is aimed at PR people working for large companies. I don't know whether Smallbones wants to keep it more general. The proposal does talk about employers, so perhaps that just needs to be made clearer.
Actually thinking about it, it would apply to everyone. We don't want (e.g.) individual Scientologists explaining issues at length in drafts in userspace or on talk pages; we want all editors to provide published sources that we can cite. So yes, although this has been prompted by PR intervention, really it's applicable to everyone with a COI. SlimVirgin (talk) 18:58, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I couldn't care less about scientologists and other similar mass movements/organisations. What concerns me is possibility of this rule suddenly popping up then subject of BLP (or relative of one) tries to argue about "emphasis or weight of material" on biography's talk page.--Staberinde (talk) 19:12, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- We could make clear that option 2 doesn't apply to BLPs; BLPs are exceptions to most of these issues, in the sense that, particularly for borderline BLPs, most editors are willing to accommodate any reasonable input. SlimVirgin (talk) 19:21, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- For the most part this is aimed at PR people working for large companies. I don't know whether Smallbones wants to keep it more general. The proposal does talk about employers, so perhaps that just needs to be made clearer.
- Oppose This whole proposal is founded on a non-issue. That a worker at BP proposed changes to a talk page, which were reviewed by independent editors who used their judgement, and then incorporated into the article largely without issue, is indicative that the material was well written in the first place. Who cares how much of his edits got in, if they were good edits, that's good. We don't need arbitrary policy about something that isn't an actual issue. IRWolfie- (talk) 21:14, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- That misses the point about the work involved in judging whether 4,000 words have included all the key facts, focused only on the key sources, and given due weight to everything. That's a huge amount of work. You're arguing that the British Chiropractic Association should be allowed to rewrite the article on chiropractic, so long as they do it via drafts on a user page that are reviewed. But what if the reviewers are largely sympathetic to chiropracty, or aren't knowledgeable, or get driven away because it's such a time sink? The PR reps are being paid, so they can continue it for as long as they need to. SlimVirgin (talk) 21:44, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Are you saying that we can't review things properly? You already know that policy says that when implementing such material the due weight of it and all the rest, from the reviewing, is with those that did the review. If you have a problem with the material and think myself or other editors reviewed it wrong, then please point out specific things that are wrong. Passive-aggressively saying that we can't review properly without giving any proof is not going anywhere. SilverserenC 23:37, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose - editors with a COI have the same rights and responsibilities as any other editor. They can edit articles, and they can use talk pages. And, as with any other editor, they need to follow the same rules of verifiability, reliable sources, and neutrality as everyone else. Indeed, we can and should treat them per WP:Expert editors. That is to say, we have no means to verify that they are who they say they are, and if they wish to add to an article, they should have no difficulty finding reliable sources to support their proposed changes. Rklawton (talk) 22:12, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Comment Consider the impact this would have: We're trying to encourage COI disclosure, right? But under this guideline, as soon as someone does that they can't propose a draft. No disclosure, draft proposal ok. Yes disclosure, draft proposal not ok. Which is going to encourage more disclosure? I think people need to think about the incentives we create when we make rules like this. As in any body, you don't just get what the rule says, you get all the spillover effects of people avoiding the rules they don't like. I've outlined my preferred alternative below, which is to require proportionate scrutiny under robust review. If the community decides that the above, however, is the best way forward, I'll adjust my guidance accordingly. Ocaasi t | c 23:28, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Well spotted! Regardless of the merits of the proposal, this is an absolutely fundamental problem in practice - it creates strong perverse incentives against disclosure. Andrew Gray (talk) 15:12, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose The whole idea of bringing it to the talk page is so that non-COI editors can review and approve changes, making revisions where they feel it is necessary.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 00:34, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose per The Devil's Advocate. We've long (always?) told people with COIs that talk page proposals (including drafts) are the way to go. Why would this possibly be a bad idea? I'm not convinced by your reasoning; the only situations in which I can see it being bad are those in which the COI editors are being disruptive, e.g. posting copyvios, arguing, or attacking other editors. We already prohibit arguing (in the sense of WP:HORSE or WP:TE), because arguing isn't helpful for building consensus; we should continue to tell COI editors that they're not welcome to argue but that they're welcome to present their drafts in a calm and collegial manner. Nyttend (talk) 02:35, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Strong Oppose - You don't tell people who are motivated by money that not only can't they edit the page directly, they may not even suggest positive changes. Not only does this proposal weaken our goal to provide a balanced and neutral point of view to the public, it would just force paid writers to implement the changes themselves (which they already do under the current system). Jimmy Wales said he would personally address any concerns by companies just so they wouldn't edit their own articles. Why would you not allow willing volunteers to help bring an article to a more neutral state? *Hurls waste of editor's valuable time argument out the window.* *Hurls waste.* Marcus Qwertyus (talk) 04:22, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Nobody is saying that they cannot makes comments or suggestions, only that they publish them (e.g. on the company website) so that we can quote them, rather than include their material without disclosure of who wrote it. Smallbones(smalltalk) 04:37, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- I agree that if a paid editor is making suggestions, that the drafts should be sourced from the originating company's websites, but this raises potential issues when, for instance, that website is taken down, or changed, and it's not indexed by the wayback machine. I think a necessary adjunct to this is a tag, akin to the tags that get placed when a section is blanked, that can be used when material is incorporated from primary or CoI editor sources. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ] # _ 05:07, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- But the "proper emphasis or weight of material within the article" may not be brought up? If Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. wants to argue that their article unduly presents a pro-Wikipedia bias and gives rock-solid sources to back their view, I and many others will be happy to hear them out. If I approve that change, then I endorse that edit fully and take complete accountability for that change. Also problematic, writing material with the sole intention of getting it included on Wikipedia, though not explicitly forbidden as far as I can tell, is frowned upon. See also: WP:COS. Marcus Qwertyus (talk) 07:01, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Again, the company can argue whatever it wants on its website or in any of the multitude of other forms of communication available to it. Except its contributions to the talk page, should be about facts, not about spin. If it has an opinion it needs to be presented in a form that we can quote, or it can't go into the article. Anything else on the talk page will simply be soapboxing, which is already prohibited. Smallbones(smalltalk) 13:27, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Nobody is saying that they cannot makes comments or suggestions, only that they publish them (e.g. on the company website) so that we can quote them, rather than include their material without disclosure of who wrote it. Smallbones(smalltalk) 04:37, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose Asking editors to refrain from directly editing articles within their COI is a reasonable (if often ignored) request. Talk pages, however, should be equally open to all, subject only to WP:TPG. Kilopi (talk) 13:23, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Support the first portion (editors are invited to...). Oppose all the rest. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 19:26, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Comment, I would support this if the proposer would strike #s 2, 3&4 of the not to do section. COI editors should be able tp propose changes, should be able to voice their opinion on content and why certain stuff should have more or less weight if they can do it civilly. If this proposal does anything to stop COI editors from positively and civilly make their opinions heard, then it only works against the goal of improving content on articles. Not that their views have any more weight regarding content, but they should not be stopped from voicing their concerns.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:02, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- No. Inappropriate. SilkTork ✔Tea time 19:08, 22 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose. Very inappropriate.--Amadscientist (talk) 10:32, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose Here's what this says:
- Editors with COIs can't talk about "matters that are currently before the courts", even to the extent of saying things like "yes, I'm getting divorced [a "matter currently before the court"], but no, I'm not being charged with child molestation, no matter what my soon-to-be-ex is saying to the gossip rags"—but any uninformed drive-by editor can talk about this all day long.
- Editors with COIs can't talk about "the proper emphasis or weight of material within the article", even to the extent of saying "Look, it was just a plain old speeding ticket. How come that gets six screenfuls and a complete transcript of the discussion, when my Pulitzer Prize gets only two sentences?"—but any fanboy is welcome to argue about whether three sentences is sufficient to describe an actor's cameo appearance in his favorite video game, or if it really ought to be four.
- Editors with COIs can't talk about "the employer's opinions or interpretations of the facts", not even explaining the company's position—but any uninformed editor can speculate about this all day long.
- Editors with COIs can't talk about "present a proposed draft of the article or sections of the article", even to the extent of saying "You have a grammar error here, that would be easily fixed by changing the sentence to read ____" or "This paragraph is confusing, and it ought to say something like ____"—but any ignorant POV pusher can post drafts on the talk page all day long.
- Fundamentally, the problem is that policy writing is hard, because you have to stop thinking about the situation you want to solve, and start thinking about all the other situations. Your efforts to stop one play-by-the-rules corporation from communicating with our regular editors would seriously screw up our efforts to keep WP:BLPs from being distorted. So my recommendation is that you stop trying to solve only your problem, and rethink this in terms of finding a solution that both stops major abuses by corporate publicity departments and protects living people who are trying to get garbage and libel cleaned out of their biographies. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:12, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose as strongly as possible.
- 1 All this will do s encourage people with COI to go underground, and not declare it. The people who will be harmed are the honest editors who do declare it.
- 2 I am not aware of any serious misuse of this. Other editors have sometimes rejected such proposals, which is why they go on the talk pages. I certainly have rejected some, but this is not the same as the sort of misuse that would justify such a restriction.
- 3 The abuse of talk pages I have seen from people with COI is not by paid editors, nut by the advocates of causes. Paifd editors who want to keep being paid will learn to do things in the proper way required here. Zealots will go on regardless.
- 4 Blatant promotionalism is already prohibited anywhere on WP, from paid and non-paid editors alike. Perhaps this needs some stronger enforcement. I would enforce this only with respect to those who continue to add it after warnings, not against newcomers who may not realize, and I would not enforce this if the edit was a good-faith attempt to improve articles.
- 5. what route is left? OTRS? OTRS is already overloaded, and normally refers editors who want to make corrections or addition to put them on the talk pages. This would put the burden on the OTRTS volunteers themselves to make the edits.
- 6 Just as our licensing permits people to make commercial use of anything in WP, and this is the most basic of all our principles; similarly anyone can edit is an almost equally basic principle. I would not compromise it.
- 7 With respect to editors acting on behalf of companies and institutions, this would provide free range for those who wish to insert negative material. FThis is unfair and destructive on NPOV. I could expand on this, but Whatamidoing,above, has explained sufficiently.
- 8 Some people at WP have an anti-capitalist POV, or a anti-large corporation view, or an anarchist view of various sorts. I am not going to say what my own political view exactly is, though in some sense I have considerable sympathy for some but not all of of these positions. that shouldn't matter. We have no business favoring any political or economy POV or any political or economic theory. If we don't have NPOV, we're worthless as an encyclopedia.
- 9 I see from some of the comments above that some of this is motivated by the failure of to have a person's own particular POV on an issue adopted, and the proposals by paid editors accepted instead as being NPOV, or more NPOV. This is an attempt to try to change the rules to win a few particular arguments. DGG ( talk ) 20:27, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose. It's one thing to limit actual article editing over COI issues, but stifling discussion is antithetical to basic principles here. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 21:48, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose - there isn't a problem to solve, and articles should reflect all viewpoints, including those of subjects. We shouldn't be using articles to slander or disparage people/companies/whoever, and we should take deliberate steps to prevent that from happening, not try to silence people who don't want us slandering them. WilyD 10:39, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- Support in principle, but it would be so impractical – the PR people will find other ways to get their points in. If a policy is brought in, they will merely go underground (who knows how many such PR people are already clandestinely functioning on Wikipedia?). I agree with the policy, but unfortunately it will inevitably lead to even more burnout for consciencious editors. The Arturo debate has merely brought into the spotlight something we have all known goes on all the time. We should treat people like Arturo as any other editor – if they propose or add clearly POV stuff, we ignore and/or remove it as biased. BigSteve (talk) 12:18, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
Extended discussion break
The main rule of the talk pages is that they are not forums and should be used only for a discussion how to improve the article. Therefore, the line should be drawn if the the contribution is about improving the article (concrete proposals, drawing attention to the incorrect information in the article etc.) or about promotion or whitewashing the company. The latest should be removed immediately per WP:TALK and WP:PROMOTION/WP:SOAP (the same applies also COI editors with a negative agenda, user:Johnadonovan being probably as the most notable that kind of COI editor]]). Therefore I support the third point (to present the employer's opinions ...) and propose to refer to WP:TALK and WP:PROMOTION/WP:SOAP. I would also support the first point if arguing in this context means just arguing and not a prohibition to propose correction of information. I fully agree that issues before the court are very sensitive (particularly but not only in respect of WP:NPOV, WP:DUE and WP:NOT#NEWS). However, I don't see how forbidding an editor to participate in the discussion would increase the quality of Wikipedia. Concerning discussion of the weight or presenting proposals about wording (every wording proposal notwithstanding its length qualifies as a draft) I strongly oppose the proposal. The problem is not that COI editor propose something but how to ensure that these proposals will get a proper review/examination and they a in line with the spirit and policies of Wikipedia, including but not limited with WP:NPOV, WP:V, WP:RS, WP:DUE, WP:PROMOTION/WP:SOAP. Therefore, more strict rules concerning disclosure of COI, disclosure of proposals made by COI editors, and review process of these proposals are needed. I don't have any concrete proposals at the moment but this area definitely needs work. I have also additional proposals concerning guidelines for COI editors:
- COI editors are forbidden to make any edit to the page they have COI, except minor edits concerning Typos, grammar (e.g. proper tenses, punctuation) and MOS:NUM issues (e.g. proper format of dates; delimiting etc.). Right know there is no such kind of explicit prohibition but it is clearly needed.
- Disclosure of COI is compulsory on the editor's user page and on COI article talk pages where COI editor edits. Failure of this requirement will result with block.
- COI editing means also editing of pages about organizations, persons or issues, who/which are competitors or have a negative COI. This issue was mentioned by DGG in this posting. If to try to find an example, it could be (hypothetically) Shell's representatives editing Rossport Five and Shell to Sea articles and representatives of these organizations editing Shell related articles.
Beagel (talk) 11:45, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Explicit prohibitions have met with resistance in the past. I tried to construct a narrowly construed prohibition in cases of intractable COI even with somewhat weak wording of "should not edit", it met with considerable opposition. See if you can find my intractable COI proposal in the recent archives for some background. I agree with you though, I think we do need much clearer guidance, going beyond our current guidance of "be careful". Gigs (talk) 12:46, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Response to Beagel - perhaps I've made the "should not" section too complicated. The intention of 2-4 is not to say that the employer may not express his or her opinions and interpretations or even drafts, only that they do it in a place where we can quote or paraphrase it and properly cite it. Placing unattributed text written by somebody closely associated with the article is unacceptable. If it crosses the fuzzy line into "undisclosed advertising" then it is illegal in the US and EU. So your suggestions on how to say "may participate, in a citable form" would be appreciated.
- As far as clear enforceable rules that may include some outright prohibitions, I generally agree with you. The rules we have now are interpreted in a dozen different ways - which doesn't help the companies involved at all. Outright prohibitions can help make all this simpler, but I think many folks are afraid to get away from "the encyclopedia that anyone can edit" even the slightest bit. Taking that phrase too literally to include situations that are clearly improper, situations that lead to inherently misleading edits, or even situations where the editor is breaking the law, doesn't help anybody. Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:08, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Could you please provide an example or two when an COI editor by editing the talk page creates "situations that are clearly improper, situations that lead to inherently misleading edits, or even situations where the editor is breaking the law," and how this is unique to COI editor? Thank you. Beagel (talk) 16:50, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'll see if I can role this up into one example , with variations reflecting specific points.
- A member of the UK's profesional PR association places (undisclosed) advertising copy on a talk page. This is clearly improper under the association's ethics code. If the material was put into the article, it would be clearly misleading as advertising copy would be presented as unbiased information. If the PR guy hired a shill to place the material in the article, it would be clearly illegal under US and German law, and probably UK law as well. COI editors are not unique in their ability to make improper, misleading or illegal edits, but the possibility comes up with COI editors and especially PR editors fairly commonly. I think it is quite important that we protect our readers, ourselves, and, yes, even the COI editors by having clearly stated rules on this. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:01, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Well, if this an advertisement, it does not have a place in the Wikipedia notwithstanding who is the editor or author of it. It should be removed in any case. And why to play a game with COI editor declaring his/her COI and then find a shill if you could find a shill and send the prootional material to him/her outside of Wikipedia? Or maybe the PR company is so wicked that they have planted already an editor or a number of editors who looks like regular legitimate editors, and who may insert the text without any COI declaration and without attention which would be created by proposal of the COI editor? The scheme you proposed is, of course, possible, but it will punish most hardly the COI editors who are playing by the rules, and not these wicked souls you described who do not follow any rules and will find alternative ways. Therefore, I still not convinced by your example and still think that we need more precise rules for disclosure of COI and proposals by COI editors as also more precise rules how these proposals by COI editors should be implemented instead of forbidding their contribution at the talk page. We also should make more clear the responsibility of editors making edits based on these proposals by the COI editors at the talk page. And as I said above, it is illogical that in the situation were we don't have an explicit prohibition to edit the articles we would like to prohibit editing at the talk page, so why not start with the most logical steps? Beagel (talk) 18:42, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- It almost seems like you'd like this to be as complicated as possible. I'd like it as simple and straightforward as possible. The basic idea is "COI/PR/employer text in the article needs a citable source." Nothing at all complicated about it. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:02, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Well, if this an advertisement, it does not have a place in the Wikipedia notwithstanding who is the editor or author of it. It should be removed in any case. And why to play a game with COI editor declaring his/her COI and then find a shill if you could find a shill and send the prootional material to him/her outside of Wikipedia? Or maybe the PR company is so wicked that they have planted already an editor or a number of editors who looks like regular legitimate editors, and who may insert the text without any COI declaration and without attention which would be created by proposal of the COI editor? The scheme you proposed is, of course, possible, but it will punish most hardly the COI editors who are playing by the rules, and not these wicked souls you described who do not follow any rules and will find alternative ways. Therefore, I still not convinced by your example and still think that we need more precise rules for disclosure of COI and proposals by COI editors as also more precise rules how these proposals by COI editors should be implemented instead of forbidding their contribution at the talk page. We also should make more clear the responsibility of editors making edits based on these proposals by the COI editors at the talk page. And as I said above, it is illogical that in the situation were we don't have an explicit prohibition to edit the articles we would like to prohibit editing at the talk page, so why not start with the most logical steps? Beagel (talk) 18:42, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Could you please provide an example or two when an COI editor by editing the talk page creates "situations that are clearly improper, situations that lead to inherently misleading edits, or even situations where the editor is breaking the law," and how this is unique to COI editor? Thank you. Beagel (talk) 16:50, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- No, I want it to be logical, transparent and non-discriminatory. Healing a headache with a shotgun is also quite non-complicated solution (at least what concerns the headache) but I have some doubts if it is the best solution. Same applies to your proposal—I just try to explain what are the weaknesses and setbacks of it and why this is not a good solution. Also, I fully agree that "COI/PR/employer text in the article needs a citable source" but actually it applies to all edits by all editors—text which is not attributed and verified by reliable sources should be removed notwithstanding who is the editor. Beagel (talk) 19:19, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- This is creating an outright bias that disadvantages paid editors, since negative POV pushers wouldn't be bound by this rule, meaning they could just edit the article regardless. It's often this issue that paid editors get involved in the first place, as negative POV pushers have completely slanted articles many times before. This is easily and obviously true of the BP article in question. SilverserenC 15:38, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
Proposal: Robust Review
To the extent that a proposed draft from a corporate representative/paid advocate is:
- a) from a large (significant) company, organization, or public figure
- b) about a controversial company, organization, or public figure
- c) contributing a substantial amount of text or revisions
- d) contributing text about the controversies themselves...
- a more robust review process is needed.
I imagine this as somewhat of a sliding scale in which a small non-profit that changes a fact about their history or operations needs just cursory review, but BP editing about their environmental record warrants serious scrutiny. Hopefully we can put some kind of language like that into WP:COI and WP:PSCOI.
The next step is to arrange for some mechanism to actually provide and ensure that review. There are some possibilities to achieve that: 1) edit requests and 2) COI noticeboard messages. 3) We could create a review council staffed with experienced editors. 4) We could have a central noticeboard where these drafts are posted and reviewed (some combination of COI/N and WP:PAIDHELP, Wikiproject Cooperation and Wikiproject Paid Advocacy Watch 5) We could solicit 'opposing drafts' from company/article critics or skeptics 5) We could appoint a neutral mediator, similar to a Mediation Committee person to review the suggestions. 6) We could seek out an expert in the field with an academic background to review or counter-prospose content. 7) We could tag talk pages with connected contributor templates and article pages with COI warning templates for a period of time after the review to alert readers and allow for continued feedback from editors. These are just brainstorming. The key is that the process be transparent and robust where appropriate. Ocaasi t | c 18:19, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'll repeat what I wrote on your talk page. It's impossible to organize a sufficiently robust review, because we're all volunteers with different levels of time and knowledge. But if you stop to think about it, any review that was robust enough would involve us educating ourselves about the coverage of the issue in question. Once we've done that, we can write the section ourselves.
- Realistically, any review would be conducted by editors with levels of knowledge significantly below that of the PR writer (or of the company experts the writer has access to). That's where the danger lies. Where the company is a large multi-national facing criminal charges, it's too much to ask a small group of volunteers to deal with. They will necessarily be overwhelmed, and the result will be what we saw on the BP article – thousands of words of BP's being copied into the article after little or no review. One of the editors copying the words over in that case didn't even realize that the PR person was officially writing the drafts for BP. SlimVirgin (talk) 18:54, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I have to agree with SV here. There's no way we should be simply passing BP's edits through here, no matter how well-reviewed they supposedly are. Writing our encyclopedia at the behest of a major corporation, even subject to our amateur(ish) review, is the kind of reputation-damaging act our various enemies love. Well, we could sign up Noam Chomsky or Michael Moore to do the reviewing, I suppose.... No, actually I don't think so. They can challenge factual errors for which they can present evidence. That's it. Mangoe (talk) 19:32, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- My response is mainly pragmatic. As part of my research to understand this situation, I have spoken with paid editors, freelance editors, Wikipedia consultants, and others who work with corporate representatives. Shocking or unpleasant as it may be, this is happening, right now, and I believe at increasing scale. Corporations (and everyone else) recognize Wikipedia's influence and are hiring people to change Wikipedia's content. Some companies do this out in the open, with disclosure. Others do it in secret. Some get caught, while others remain undetected--how many we simply don't know. I fear, if we do not provide guidance and a review process, it's going to simply drive more activity back underground; plus we lose the opportunity to see someone's suggestions. If we don't establish that there's a 'right way' to engage with Wikipedia, we'll lead others to think that they simply have no alternative but to make changes in secret. Thus, I think we should take steps to encourage transparent engagement, and I don't see how we do that without reviewing talk page drafts with some form of proportionate scrutiny in that process. Even in the case of paid advocates we're faced with the choice of some process or no process. Right now we don't have a robust review process and one isn't even called for in the guideline. It's not a failure to institute such a process, even an imperfect one, when the alternative is nothing at all. If we say no to direct editing, and no to talk page drafts, what options are left that will realistically be followed? Ocaasi t | c 20:13, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Ocaasi, are you willing to spend time personally doing some of these reviews? The reason I ask is that it's easy to propose something that other people have to do, but this is what has caused this situation in the first place. We suggest that companies provide drafts for others to review, but the people who are left to do that are not the people who made the suggestion. SlimVirgin (talk) 22:25, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- I've been doing much less controversial reviews on irc-help and at AfC for years (avoiding promotional language, meeting notability guidelines, finding and citing reliable sources). I also did this along with others at Occidental Petroleum and at Monitor Group when talk page requests were made, so yes, I would do this, but I typically try to find an active editor, or several of them, more expert than me to carry on the process. (I've recently been reminded how important it is to make sure those editors are seen as unbiased, or at least balanced from opposing sides). Whether I'm qualified to do this for BP, especially given my involvement in this debate is less sure. The Paid Help board at WikiProject Cooperation was designed to do this, but it is not sufficiently aligned with community consensus to scale; we'd need to rope in the COI noticeboard and WikiProject Paid Advocacy Watch (now called Wikiproject Integrity) to really get it right. I do realize the 'workload' would fall to volunteers and we're already stretched thin. I'm not saying this process would be simple, I just prefer it to the alternative. If we decided that such a process was necessary, then we'd have to organize to make it work. I imagine some editors might like to be appointed review-clerks and given the role of researching drafts on very controversial companies, but we wouldn't know for sure until we tried to set it up. Ocaasi t | c 22:41, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- Would you be willing to do an experiment? BP's latest draft for its environmental record is at User:Arturo at BP/Environmental record. (Eight or nine of BP's drafts have been added to the article already.) I know it would take me days to review this properly, and probably longer given how contentious it is, because I'd have to start from scratch. You might be faster because you've already worked on BP.
- Are you willing to post that draft on a user subpage and start doing the review, so we can see you making the edits and adding or removing sources? As you're doing it, you could use a watch to make a note of each time you start and finish (whether reading, writing, planning, or going to a library to access sources), so that you can tell us how long it took overall. I think it would make people realize how long high-quality work can take in an area like this. Without that knowledge, people are suggesting things (these robust reviews) that just don't scale. SlimVirgin (talk) 23:30, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- What concerns BP, drafts which were used were about non-controversial topics. This draft you a mentioning here is about a controversial issue and at the moment there seems to be no consensus even about the structure not talking about agreeing about mass changes of this section(s). That is what happened with draft back in December and what will (unfortunately) happen with this draft although that section needs better quality than just the current WP:Laundry list. Therefore, there is no mean to review this specific draft (at least at the moment) and if not reviewed, it will not go to the article. What concerns previous drafts, I personally went through most of them. I spent hours, but it was not so hard as you described. I have said it several times but this seems to be still ignored that these drafts are not totally new – they are based largely on the previously existed text (which also makes the proposal that Arturo should put the to the BP website look strange). Therefore, this is also a reason why your simple arithmetics counting words and making conclusion that BP rewrote 40% of the article is just incorrect (this is in addition to the other reasons I said somewhere above and which are still ignored). Overall, it took much less time than all these hours people have spent during last days here and the BP's talk page and as nobody has not said what is wrong with the text which was added to the article, I have a conclusion that this process worked and actually there is no problem with the BP article regarding these texts (there are still other problems, of course). Beagel (talk) 06:05, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- I don't see the issue. Arturo at BP is proposing material, and other editors are using their judgement. As long as editors are using their judgement, and fix accordingly, the system works, IRWolfie- (talk) 21:09, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
- COI editors are a problem when (A) they subtly insert a POV into articles that slips under the radar and goes undetected for a long time (if not forever) or (B) when they edit overtly and go into major conflict with other editors. When a COI editor makes suggestions and constructively works with other editors, that should be encouraged. -- Atama頭 06:53, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- It seems to me as an objective reader and... observer... that there is an inherent issue with a multibillion dollar corporation editing a webpage about itself where users come to get information about said corporation. I think I see both sides where on is worried that the corporation is acting in it's own interests to maintain its image and slant the history record, and the other side sees no issue with a corporation - or a person who happens to work for a corporation- editing what they see to be deficiencies as far as facts or events are concerned. I would contend that the later part of my last sentence is completely viable as long as there is an independent source to verify the accuracy of what is being edited. This process can go both ways as you can get an editor who has a grudge or issue with a corporation and slants the facts against the corporation. In my own opinion I think there is something intrinsically wrong with a corporation influencing specific facts surrounding incidents in which that corporation or entity was involved in. That would be like George Bush editing his own WP page to say that he did not invade Iraq. It just doesn't make sense, nor is it ethical. I understand both sides of the argument and yes BP is and should be allowed to correct facts if they are wrong but in this case it seems like BP's motives are less than noble.BlaqkMamba (talk) 17:43, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- But do you seriously think other editors can't tell that a suggested edit for such a change like that George Bush one would be inaccurate? Do remember that independent editors reviewed every single one of the proposed drafts for neutrality and proper sourcing and everything. No one has pointed out anything actually wrong with the drafts thus far. By all means, if you have proof that the additions made to the article are POV, point it out, but all of these baseless accusations going around about Arturo and his drafts are pretty ridiculous. SilverserenC 18:22, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
Article on CNET right now: BP accused of rewriting environmental record on Wikipedia. The subtitle: "A British Petroleum representative allegedly rewrote 44 percent of the oil giant's Wikipedia page, including the environmental sections. Some Wikipedia editors are crying foul." Mangoe (talk) 05:35, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- You know, this is always one of my biggest fears. That something I do on occasion as a hobby ends up in a major newspaper somewhere. It's happened to me tangentially a couple of times and it's one of the things that spooks me a bit about being on Wikipedia, especially in the COI areas, which have tended to get some major media coverage now and then over the last few years. I'm just glad I'm not totally transparent about my RL identity when I edit, that's the last thing I need. -- Atama頭 06:51, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- This isn't real coverage. Violet Blue writes these sorts of pieces all the time and they rarely have any neutrality or truth to them (because the main purpose is to attack Wikipedia). If you read the article, she's essentially quoting everything SlimVirgin said as if it was fact and at face value at that for some reason. The only thing i'm concerned about is how she found out about this discussion, as the only way I can think of is that someone here emailed her to get her to write the piece. SilverserenC 06:58, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- It has been picked up by der Spiegel Wikipedia: BP-Mitarbeiter schreibt am BP-Eintrag mit so whatever one thinks of Violet Blue the cat is getting further out of the bag. Mangoe (talk) 15:28, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Why do we care? It's not the first time inaccurate, lying articles about Wikipedia have been written. Heck, The Register does it all the time and The Telegraph has done it a time or two. SilverserenC 16:54, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- True, I've even seen the Wall Street Journal repeat info about Wikipedia that was questionable. I believe it was in regards to the Scientology incident, they suggested that all Scientologists were banned from Wikipedia when all that was banned were connections coming directly from the Scientology offices. -- Atama頭 19:05, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- It's because plenty of journalists don't do the research. They just grab what one person said and treat it like the truth, then churnalism kicks in with everyone repeating the same thing. IRWolfie- (talk) 17:59, 22 March 2013 (UTC)
- Why do we care? It's not the first time inaccurate, lying articles about Wikipedia have been written. Heck, The Register does it all the time and The Telegraph has done it a time or two. SilverserenC 16:54, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- It has been picked up by der Spiegel Wikipedia: BP-Mitarbeiter schreibt am BP-Eintrag mit so whatever one thinks of Violet Blue the cat is getting further out of the bag. Mangoe (talk) 15:28, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- This isn't real coverage. Violet Blue writes these sorts of pieces all the time and they rarely have any neutrality or truth to them (because the main purpose is to attack Wikipedia). If you read the article, she's essentially quoting everything SlimVirgin said as if it was fact and at face value at that for some reason. The only thing i'm concerned about is how she found out about this discussion, as the only way I can think of is that someone here emailed her to get her to write the piece. SilverserenC 06:58, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- I support Ocaasi's proposal for Robust review, but the practical details escape me. We have a similar problem, not so public or controversial, happening at Chevron Corporation (CC). I was invited back to participate at Talk - significant changes requested by CC, request refused due to bias, revised request offered, editor now flummoxed due to difficulty of assessing what's biased and what's not. Process stalled, article not modified. What to do next? Editor (me) now feels bad about appearing to stall, while CC is eager to move forward with something. I would love to throw a flag called {{Request for robust review}}. Feel free to subsection this if appropriate. --Lexein (talk) 15:39, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- this is focussing on the wrong end of the problem in all four aspects.
- 1 Articles on major corporations or organizations or public figures get much more careful watching than those on smaller, and therefore are already receiving the appropriate review. It's the minor ones where the real NPOV promotional edits are usually found.
- 2 controversial subjects are the ones where multi-party editing is most necessary and needs to be encouraged.
- 3 contributing a substantial amount of text is already highlighted in edit histories, and likely to get attention. Further, an large addition is normally an attempt to add relatively factual material.It's the small insidious edits that need the watching. (What does need very careful watching are large deletions--for which we already have an edit filter to call them to attention, and substitutions of one body of text for another.
- 4 Text about the controversies themselves is where we need to encourage all parties to edit, so we can form a consensus and benefit from the cooperative editing. What does need watching is attempts to add a controversy section, because though some are valid, some are attempts at adding POV negative material. DGG ( talk ) 20:41, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
Arturo may be compelled to edit request edits by BP
I've got a feeling that Arturo may be compelled to edit the article as part of the editor's duties at BP. If so, Arturo is faultless and BP is to blame. Is there a way we can notify BP that this is a violation of Wikipedia policy? — DragonLord (talk/contribs) 16:08, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Compelled how? And this isn't a violation of any Wikipedia policy. SilverserenC 17:32, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- How is this not a violation of policy if there is a conflict of interest? My point is that the user may be required by his/her boss at BP to perform the edits. — DragonLord (talk/contribs) 17:48, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Have you ever read WP:COI? Editors with a conflict of interest are even allowed to edit the articles directly however they want. They are discouraged from doing so because of the difficulty of writing neutrally when one has a COI, but there is absolutely no restriction on doing so. And, instead of editing directly, Arturo has even been going a step above and has been putting up suggestions on the talk page for review and allowing other people to implement the material if they feel it is appropriate. If you feel that he is being "compelled", why don't you go ask him? SilverserenC 18:11, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- (edit conflict)First of all, COI isn't a policy. Secondly, there's no policy or rule that prohibits anyone from being paid to edit, see WP:PAID for a proposed guideline (there have been a number of proposed guidelines and policies, but none gained consensus). You'd have to find Arturo violating one of our actual policies, like WP:NPOV, WP:BLP, etc. -- Atama頭 18:11, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- How is this not a violation of policy if there is a conflict of interest? My point is that the user may be required by his/her boss at BP to perform the edits. — DragonLord (talk/contribs) 17:48, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Arturo may be compelled to edit the page? Arturo hasn't edited any article, let alone the BP page [4]. IRWolfie- (talk) 18:26, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Compelled to request edits, I think. I've
revisedthe section heading above. --Lexein (talk) 15:45, 23 March 2013 (UTC)- What's wrong with that? The more suggestions, the better eventual article. And much much better by a known person than someone hiding from scrutiny. DGG ( talk ) 20:47, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- I just wanted to clarify his actual actions, and to clarify the title of this section. The discussion seemed like it was focusing on his "edits" as if they were to articles. In reality they were only in Talk, and that's the WP:COI suggested practice. I'm not arguing a case here, DGG. --Lexein (talk) 09:00, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- What's wrong with that? The more suggestions, the better eventual article. And much much better by a known person than someone hiding from scrutiny. DGG ( talk ) 20:47, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Compelled to request edits, I think. I've
Please provide evidence of POV-pushing by Arturo
Can anyone on either side of this debate please provide some evidence of the alleged POV-pushing or white-washing being done in Arturo at BP's drafts? A lot of people seem to be "crying foul" over the mere fact that a corporation is paying a person to edit, rather than evaluating the content of those edits. I'm not prepared to take sides yet because I legitimately can't tell if there is anything shady going on here, based on the limited amount that I've seen. Axem Titanium (talk) 21:35, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think we need to start routing comments better. This page is more for discussion about potential changes (or not) to the current CoI policy. The Talk:BP page is a better place for discussion of specifics of this incident. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ] # _ 21:56, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- The sentence that alerted me to this situation was Arturo's most recent draft, which Silver seren was about to insert. It began: "In the 1990s and 2000s, BP has had a mixed environmental record, according to government regulators, journalists, activist groups and environmental monitors." The source used [5] doesn't really support that sentence, and it's not the best source to use. Lots of high-quality sources, including the New York Times and PBS, indicate that BP's poor record goes back certainly to the 2000s, at least. Other sentences are red flags too, e.g. that even after the Prudhoe Bay spill in 2006, "the company continued to receive praise in the media for its investment in alternative energy and its focus on greenhouse gas emissions." Did it?
- The whole thing is problematic: (a) have the right sources been used; (b) do they say exactly what BP has used them for; (c) is anything missing; (d) is anything carefully worded; (e) has the correct weight been given to all the issues? And so on. Checking this thoroughly – making it policy-compliant – would involve a lot of research. It would be faster, easier and more ethical to write it from scratch. SlimVirgin (talk) 22:25, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- "which Silver seren was about to insert"
- That's an outright lie. As you very well know, I was actually in the middle of pointing out other sources (covering negative information, mind you) that I felt should be included in the draft.
- As for BP's history, the sources are quite clear on that. While they have been criticized for the oil spills and other incidents, BP has still be ranked year after year in a number of lists just within the past five years, as the top oil company in respect to its attention to environmentalism and renewable energy and climate change. SilverserenC 22:40, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- "BP has had a mixed environmental record" is cited to an article titled "BP Shows It's the Best and Worst at Once". Sounds pretty mixed to me.
- "It would be faster, easier and more ethical to write it from scratch". If this were the case, why hasn't someone else just done that? The fact of the matter is that someone is being paid to spend effort to create a "first draft" of new content which no one else has spent the effort to do. I don't see a reason to discard that effort, regardless of the source, and even if that first draft requires other editors to scrutinize it more. The way I see it, allowing people like Arturo to do whatever it is he's doing isn't going to prevent any other non-COI regular editor from doing a "faster, easier write from scratch" at any time since that regular editor was going to spend that effort anyway. Until that munificent editor strolls along, let the regular editors of BP spend their effort improving/NPOVizing/de-promo-ing Arturo's prose, if that is indeed a problem. Axem Titanium (talk) 01:50, 22 March 2013 (UTC)
- Axem Titanium, what you've explained is one of the main reasons why we've never had a policy that forbids COI contributions. Sometimes the COI editor is more able or more willing to do the work to create or improve an article than other editors. Preventing them from contributing based on a nebulous principle that the article is somehow "tainted" by those contributions is not in Wikipedia's best interests. (That's not an attempt at a straw man argument, I'm not suggesting anyone here has actually suggested that, but that's often the underlying objection to COI contributions.) As long as there is oversight, as long as everything is done transparently, and especially as long as there is no conflict between Arturo and other editors at the article, there shouldn't be any reason why Arturo's contributions should be discounted (especially since they're being presented to the talk page for review before other editors). -- Atama頭 02:37, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
Wikipedia editors still have editorial control of articles
I have watched this become so overblown I can't help but wonder how it got this far...oh wait a minute, now I remember. It was because someone decided to create a figure that I have yet seen qualified that the media has now attached themselves to as gospel and now the community has attached itself to that. This is by far the worse case of circular referencing I have ever seen on Wikipedia. Someone should be ashamed of themselves. Editors are forgetting that a contributor is not a COI editor if they are editing within policy. The page here makes that clear but I still see people calling anyone that has a close association of any kind a COI editor. It ain't that simple. Perhaps the page needs to clarify this in much stronger terms.--Amadscientist (talk) 10:42, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
Proposal for additional wording to the lede
I propose text be added to "When advancing outside interests is more important to an editor than advancing the aims of Wikipedia, that editor stands in a conflict of interest" to be followed by "When editing within Wikipedia standards, editors with close associations are not considered in conflict of interest and are advised to edit with extreme caution to avoid a perception of COI editing"--Amadscientist (talk) 11:11, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Support as proposer.--Amadscientist (talk) 11:11, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose only due to its rather extreme flip of emphasis. We (I) really want to clearly declare that COI is defined by association, and that a (presumed) COI editor must work hard to maintain trust by avoiding all activities which work against Wikipedia's goals mainly by sticking with the WP:COI content and behavioral guideline. --Lexein (talk) 15:55, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- I kinda like that wording you used and see your point. Since we don't actually have a strict policy against close associations editing articles that are associated with (just sternly worded suggestions and advice) we just need to make it clearer about that. Let me try some of your suggestions above.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:28, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose COI exists regardless of your behavior; it's a property of contributors. Neutrality on the other hand exists precisely dependent on your behavior; it's a property of conduct. Ocaasi t | c 17:45, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- No, that is incorrect. Editors are not in conflict of interest if they are following policy and guidelines properly. You do indeed have to "behave' in a manner that crosses a line to be in conflict. Just being related to someone does not make a conflict of interest.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:29, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose. Whether you have a conflict of interest depends on your roles and relationships. It has nothing to do with behaviour or opinions. If you are a judge and your husband is the defendant, you have a conflict of interest, no matter what you think of the case, no matter how you would have handled it, so you recuse. The argument that if you follow the relevant rules you don't have a conflict is to misunderstand what is meant by COI. SlimVirgin (talk) 23:40, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- That's COI as it concerns the off Wiki definition. Yes, there is a misunderstanding of what a COI is...on Wikipedia. We have a different standard as to what constitutes a COI editor and behavior IS part of that...or did you miss the disclaimer on the article here . This is a "behavioral guideline". But I think that we could add a footnote instead of additional wording to the lede itself.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:43, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- We use the same broad definition as anyone else, namely whether any external relationship/role could reasonably be said to undermine your primary role as a Wikipedian, which requires putting Wikipedia's interests first while you're editing. Ocaasi put it well above: COI is a property of contributors, while neutrality is a property of conduct. SlimVirgin (talk) 23:55, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Actually we don't use the same broad definition. This is a behavioral issue. One is not in conflict just for having a close association. One does have to cross a line to be "in conflict". I trust Ocaasi's good faith even if the wording seems rather confusing to me.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:59, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Amadscientist is correct. We don't use the normal definition of COI. Our COI is based on an actual conflict: you want X, and Wikipedia wants not-X. This failure to use the standard definition—the one in which a husband removing libel or vandalism from his wife's BLP has a "conflict of interest" rather than what we actually have, which is a synergistically aligned interest that Wikipedia has every reason to encourage—is a source of perpetual confusion. I'm increasingly sympathetic to suggestions that we rename this guideline to something like WP:Damaging Wikipedia due to a conflict of interest. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:36, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
- Actually we don't use the same broad definition. This is a behavioral issue. One is not in conflict just for having a close association. One does have to cross a line to be "in conflict". I trust Ocaasi's good faith even if the wording seems rather confusing to me.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:59, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Oppose I agree that there are three distinct concepts 1. COI editing 2. Having a COI 3. Being seen to have a COI. Unless we separate these we will go nowhere. Rich Farmbrough, 04:09, 24 March 2013 (UTC).
- The text spells out that one must cross a line to be in conflict so whether other editors agree or not the text makes it clear what are guideline is here. I don't see any ambiguity but many editors here seem to.--Amadscientist (talk) 20:52, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
Instead of adding additional wording to the lede
We could actually add a footnote as was done at WP:VERIFY.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:38, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
COI - does it matter if they are paid?
Currently editors who have a COI who are paid effectively can not edit the article in question. Why was this not extended to all advocates? IRWolfie- (talk) 02:35, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Simply put, that is not accurate. They are very strongly discouraged. So are editors that indeed do have an actual conflict of interest, who have been found to be editing in a manner that could compromise the project.--Amadscientist (talk) 03:11, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- They aren't as discouraged as much, as the text of COI makes clear, IRWolfie- (talk) 18:47, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Obviously the text in COI makes nothing "clear" if people don't even agree with the basic principle that: "When advancing outside interests is more important to an editor than advancing the aims of Wikipedia, that editor stands in a conflict of interest". To me that spells it out very clearly that just having an outside interest is not COI, but when advancing them is more important than our goals, then they are. Yet, even when editors are complying with this they are accused of COI editing. This is unlikely to change until editors can agree on the simple definition of what a COI editor even is.--Amadscientist (talk) 20:57, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- They aren't as discouraged as much, as the text of COI makes clear, IRWolfie- (talk) 18:47, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
Proposal for additional tag or edit summary best practice
When incorporating information that is sourced to an editor with a declared CoI, the edit summary should indicate clearly that this is the case, and identify the editor in question and ideally, the talk page discussion or userpage that is the upstream source. This should be done even in cases where the incorporated text has been modified. As a general rule, if the sourcing is mostly or completely the same as that proposed by an editor with a CoI, it should be tagged in the edit summary, even if the language changes somewhat.
I have no idea on the technical side how tagging works, but since things like section blanking get a tag placed on them, I wonder whether this can be done in a way that doesnt take up all the allotted space for the edit summary. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ] # _ 23:44, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- That depends. If you actually mean an editor who's behavior has become a conflict, but we already have a policy about edit summaries and attributing the page it is copied from. This would require a change to merge guidelines and I think the possibility of abuse is pretty high as editors would begin to use it as a manner of making accusations.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:49, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
Recent addition to lead
Amadscientist, I removed the new words in bold, because a PR employee would not have to be paid specifically to edit WP: "Paid advocacy is any contribution or edit to Wikipedia content that advocates for your employer's point of view made on their behalf, or at their request with payment received for that service. Their job is simply to work in PR for the company. We know this is an employment situation because the rest of the sentence already makes that clear. SlimVirgin (talk) 00:04, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Uhm...no. You are using a PR firm as an example but that is not the only type of paid advocacy. And you didn't remove all the new words. You cherry picked out "with payment for that service" which is what "paid advocacy" is. Just working for a company and editing with a close association is not paid advocacy. The information should be clear that one must actually be paid to be an advocate for the subject. The way you left it anyone who isn't being paid for such work falls under that. That makes no sense.--Amadscientist (talk) 00:08, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- I left some of your words; I removed the ones in bold. Working for a company and making edits to the company article that the company requests is what we call a financial COI or paid advocacy. No one in the company has to hand you money specifically for those edits if you're on salary. The next sentence explains the different forms of paid advocacy. SlimVirgin (talk) 00:19, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- That's receiving payment for services Slim Virgin. Also, I wonder if you should be making changes to this page, as an argument could be made that you now stand in conflict of interest in this regard.--Amadscientist (talk) 00:24, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- I left some of your words; I removed the ones in bold. Working for a company and making edits to the company article that the company requests is what we call a financial COI or paid advocacy. No one in the company has to hand you money specifically for those edits if you're on salary. The next sentence explains the different forms of paid advocacy. SlimVirgin (talk) 00:19, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
To be clear, here are the edits. The changes were made to the first sentence:
Lead as it was | Amadscientist's edit | SlimVirgin's partial revert |
---|---|---|
Paid advocacy is any contribution or edit to Wikipedia content that advocates for your employer's point of view. It includes, but is not limited to, edits made by public relations firms, companies and nonprofit organizations, and editors paid to edit Wikipedia to improve an individual's or organization's image. | Paid advocacy is any contribution or edit to Wikipedia content that advocates for your employer's point of view, made on their behalf, or at their request with payment received for that service. It includes, but is not limited to, edits made by public relations firms, companies and nonprofit organizations, and editors paid to edit Wikipedia to improve an individual's or organization's image. [6] | Paid advocacy is any contribution or edit to Wikipedia content that advocates for your employer's point of view, made on their behalf or at their request. It includes, but is not limited to, edits made by public relations firms, companies and nonprofit organizations, and editors paid to edit Wikipedia to improve an individual's or organization's image. [7] |
SlimVirgin (talk) 00:33, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- As I said, it isn't paid advocacy unless you are receiving a payment for the service.--Amadscientist (talk) 01:06, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- But you could be on salary as a company rep, tasked with defending the company's reputation. The way it was written made it sound as though people had to be paid specifically to make the edits to WP. It's therefore clearer to leave those words out, and simply to say: if you edit for your employer's point of view, on their behalf or at their request (i.e. it's not a hobby that you do in your spare time), then it's part of what we call paid advocacy.
- Your other edits did improve the sentence (adding "made on their behalf or at their request"). I'm only arguing that "with payment received for that service" can be misread. Perhaps there's another way to word it. SlimVirgin (talk) 01:13, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- I do appreciate the fact that you did leave the other wording, but I am not sure I am clear about your concerns that "with payment received for that service" could be misread. That seems rather specific, However, I wonder if instead of that wording we could say something along the lines of:
"Paid advocacy is any contribution or edit to Wikipedia content that advocates for your employer's point of view, made on their behalf, or at their request, receiving payment to make those contributions."
- If I understand you correctly, the misreading might be in relation to being paid as an advocate alone and the distinction that the edit here is what is being paid for. Thoughts--Amadscientist (talk) 01:44, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- Your other edits did improve the sentence (adding "made on their behalf or at their request"). I'm only arguing that "with payment received for that service" can be misread. Perhaps there's another way to word it. SlimVirgin (talk) 01:13, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- That first sentence was added relatively recently (here's an earlier version), so maybe the solution is just to get rid of it. That paragraph would then say (I've tweaked it slightly): "Paid advocacy includes, but is not limited to, edits made by public relations firms, companies, nonprofit organizations, and editors paid to edit Wikipedia, with the aim of improving an individual's or organization's image." Would that work for you? SlimVirgin (talk) 03:30, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
Why does it take so many words to say "Paid advocacy is advocacy which is paid" ? Rich Farmbrough, 04:11, 24 March 2013 (UTC).
- I don't know if I support removing that part of the sentence. Something along those lines is very much needed but it is odd to have all those examples in the lede. I support cutting out: "It includes, but is not limited to, edits made by public relations firms, companies and nonprofit organizations, and editors paid to edit Wikipedia to improve an individual's or organization's image". That is far too wordy. What is needed is a clarification in as simple a wording as possible as Rich says. Maybe even just "'Paid advocacy' is editing for another person or group in which the editor receives compensation in any manner for those contributions." The main issue for me at this point is that we are emphasizing an employer and PR firms in specific and that really seems to it a little confusing. Paid advocacy could be for a political campaign, a feature film, television series, fan site etc., even when not actually employed by a company.--Amadscientist (talk) 10:32, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- I continue to be puzzled why paid advocacy is considered worse than other forms. Even if we're talking about a commercial product, the company will usually do a better job than the fanboys. It is not a "particularly egregious" form of pov. It's a particular easily recognizable form of POV, just as monetary bribes are the most recognizable form of corruption. I think we are showing our own bias about singling it out: all of us have biases that induce us to advocacy on some subject of concern to us; most of us have organizations whose interests we support; very few of us are in a position to be paid in money for editing. We're making that third group the scapegoats, to ease our consciences about the POV we humans can not escape. DGG ( talk ) 22:30, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- I agree with you in spirit but then we also have to take into account the worst case scenario. I do agree that we shouldn't be singling out. That is why I prefer the last prose above that I proposed.--Amadscientist (talk) 01:27, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
- There is no logical argument regarding the difference that would appeal to the critical thinker. The outcome of both is the same. But it's a generally understood societal norm that it does matter where the bias comes from. For example, we know that many consumers leave bias reviews for a product on Amazon, but we look at it differently if the company is writing the reviews themselves.
- As such, I find it appropriate that we treat it differently, but I don't find the propensity for harassment and ABF appropriate. In many cases a PR is more neutral than the average volunteer and are still criticized... CorporateM (Talk) 02:13, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
- You're preaching to the choir with me. I am attempting to add or change the prose to not make it appear that we have a policy against companies paying an editor to represent them. We really don't however, I will say that bias and COI are not exactly the same thing. We all have some bias we may not realize. For that reason, for example< I tend to avoid articles that I am extremely interested in, but will edit pages I may feel I can counter other bias.--Amadscientist (talk) 02:19, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
- This section isn't working for me, and never has. It produces silly disputes, it puts a scarlet letter on editors that tend to be competent, and it is facially invalid. It says, "Paid advocacy is any contribution or edit to Wikipedia content that advocates for your employer's point of view."
- It's the 'point of view' of every employer I've ever had that theft is bad. If I go edit Embezzlement to say that it's a crime, am I suddenly a "paid advocate"? It's the 'point of view' of every manufacturer and every seller that their products have certain features and do not have other features. If I correct outright, verifiable errors about the products my employer sells, am I suddenly a "paid advocate"? Well, according to this simplistic definition, I am. I think we should just kill it. Money can corrupt people's work, but it cannot corrupt people's work more than the other problems we deal with here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:49, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
- I wrote the definition below a while back, which is 100x better than the current in my opinion. CorporateM (Talk) 14:46, 25 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor)
Marketing, financial connection and advocacy
Editors that have a financial connection with the subject of the article, such as an employer or client relationship, are advised to.... In addition to public relations, search engine marketing, reputation management, and Wikipedia consultants, anyone assigned to participate on behalf of an organization or initiative with a potential conflict of interest should follow this advice. This includes editors contributing on behalf of an organized protest, class-action lawsuit, or as a volunteer at a non-profit advocacy group.
- CM, I'd be fine with your suggestion too. SlimVirgin (talk) 20:23, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
And again
Amadscientist, what is your objection to paid advocacy being described as "editing on behalf of a client or employer to improve their image"? [8] SlimVirgin (talk) 02:00, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- "To improve their image" isn't always the objective. I've been hired by clients with promotional articles to make it more neutral and improve the quality. Also, many companies assign an execs wife to edit or the CEO/owner edits themselves. I would just stick with "on behalf of" because the circumstances vary too widely to be more specific. Though "client or employer" should be used as an example, since it's the most common. "Assigned by" might work as well. CorporateM (Talk) 13:50, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- Are you saying yes to "editing on behalf of a client or employer"? Or do you have another suggestion? SlimVirgin (talk) 19:49, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- The current version says this:
Paid advocacy is any contribution or edit to Wikipedia content that advocates for any person or group's point of view, made on their behalf or at their request and receiving compensation in order to improve an individual or organization's image. Advocacy of any sort within articles is prohibited by our policies on neutral point of view and what Wikipedia is not, and paid advocacy is considered to be an especially egregious form of advocacy.
- I don't like any of this. First of all, in the first sentence, we're defining "paid advocacy" as something that improves the image, which as CorporateM points out, is not always the case. A person might well engage in "paid advocacy" with the express goal of denigrating the competition rather than improving the employer.
- In the second sentence, we're talking about two completely different kinds of 'advocacy'. NOT and NPOV are talking about filling an article with religious proselytizing or puffery about the latest cure for cancer. They're not talking about correcting factual errors. If you're a "paid advocate", your job might be to make sure that the infobox has the current financial information or that the article lists the company's current products. That's 100% acceptable under NPOV and NOT; it is not considered 'advocacy' at all by those policies.
- If we're going to define this—and I don't see any need to do so—then let's try something simple, like "Paid advocacy is receiving financial compensation from a person or organization to use Wikipedia to promote the interests of that person or organization". WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:34, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'd be fine with that. SlimVirgin (talk) 20:08, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- Yes, I like that as well WhatamIdoing.--Amadscientist (talk) 21:54, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- As we seem to have consensus, and as it's the lead, I'll go ahead and add it. We can always tweak it further if someone objects. SlimVirgin (talk) 21:57, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- Yes, I like that as well WhatamIdoing.--Amadscientist (talk) 21:54, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- I'd be fine with that. SlimVirgin (talk) 20:08, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- I would suggest "financial connection" instead of "receiving compensation" because most PRs do not receive financial reimbursement for Wikipedia participation. They see it as 1% of their job. The description above makes it sound like advocacy is allowed on Talk pages. While it is often done unintentionally, it is not allowed anywhere. I feel it would help me consult clients to do better work if Wikipedia made this clear that Talk page advocacy is not allowed, and it would help some companies stay out of trouble. I would just say "on behalf of or assigned by" an organization with a potential COI (or some other language to distinguish from GLAM). I don't think this is circular, because COI is defined at the top of the guideline and we have common sense, etc. We should list examples, like public relations, non-profit advocacy groups, etc.
- I don't necessarily support the term "Paid Advocacy" (for what it's worth). PR people are "paid advocates" in their day-jobs, but when they come here they are expected not to advocate. This delta between the role of a PR person and the expectations Wikipedia has is a significant issue. CorporateM (Talk) 22:05, 26 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor)
- CM, can you suggest a sentence containing financial connection? At present, we have "Paid advocacy is receiving financial compensation from a person or organization to use Wikipedia to promote the interests of that person or organization." I take your point about people on salaries not being paid directly to edit, but it's a point others aren't taking, so I've given up as I'm not sure it's worth arguing about. But if you can suggest words, that would help. SlimVirgin (talk) 22:12, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
CM, I think the point you've made above (and you have made it repeatedly) is a really important one, but people aren't listening -- namely that some of these rules protect the PR people and the company employees too, because it gives them something to point the boss to ("look, I'm not allowed to do that). Wikipedians seem to think that by allowing PR people carte blanche we are doing them a favour, but we're not. We're often not doing their clients a favour either. SlimVirgin (talk) 22:16, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- The community often has this naive view that PR people are editors just like us, but who happen to work (almost as if by chance) for the company. But most PRs do not enjoy individual autonomy - we are "corporate representatives" in that we communicate on behalf of the corporation. If our comments represented our opinions individually, this would be COI, but when we are guided by authority within the company, this is PR. My views such as this are guided largely by reading up on the FTC's position (which btw, they use "financial connection")
- Using the language would be easy enough "Editors with a financial connection to the subject of the article, such as...., are expected/advised/should..." CorporateM (Talk) 22:36, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- This has been discussed at length on Jimbo's talk page and I believe on the Village Pump. University professors are salaried and those universities have an interest in the research and publications made by those salaried employees and we still do not call them advocate editors even when they are writing about the university itself, unless it is an issue where they are compromising the integrity of the article and the project. PR people are editors just like us. Some editors feel that demonizing them is a way to better Wikipedia. Again, we have policies and guidelines that make it clear that just being a representative or a corporate entity alone is not a conflict of interest, but that when one's outside interest becomes more important than the goals of the project, then they are COI.--Amadscientist (talk) 22:55, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- If someone works for the university, I would consider that a "potential COI" (not necessarily an actual one) but I would encourage them to edit. By the same token it's on my To Do list to improve Edelman (firm) though I use to work there many years ago. I would only consider it PR editing if they are assigned to do so by the authority of the organization. This came up in the Reverb Communications case where they were astroturfing the iPhone store. Reverb claimed interns were writing the reviews as individuals based on their personal experiences (which is legal), while the FTC demonstrated they were clearly being instructed to repeat corporate messaging. But I don't mean to demonize my own field at all - far from it. Good PR is useful to journalists and it's useful to us. I just don't like us depicting it as "a journalist with a COI" rather than "a PR person working with journalists" or as volunteer editor replacements, rather than a resource for our editors. CorporateM (Talk) 23:25, 26 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor)
- I don't like us depicting editors in any way. Doesn't seem to be our job to me. I feel strongly that the current situation is not the best example of Wikipedia working as it should.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:39, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- If someone works for the university, I would consider that a "potential COI" (not necessarily an actual one) but I would encourage them to edit. By the same token it's on my To Do list to improve Edelman (firm) though I use to work there many years ago. I would only consider it PR editing if they are assigned to do so by the authority of the organization. This came up in the Reverb Communications case where they were astroturfing the iPhone store. Reverb claimed interns were writing the reviews as individuals based on their personal experiences (which is legal), while the FTC demonstrated they were clearly being instructed to repeat corporate messaging. But I don't mean to demonize my own field at all - far from it. Good PR is useful to journalists and it's useful to us. I just don't like us depicting it as "a journalist with a COI" rather than "a PR person working with journalists" or as volunteer editor replacements, rather than a resource for our editors. CorporateM (Talk) 23:25, 26 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor)
BP stuff
I don't think it's practical to outlaw making large content contributions with a COI. This is common practice at AfC and often a large body of content is missing. We also can't outlaw undue complaints, because they are valid in a large number of cases.
What we can outlaw is advocacy and micro-management. PR is founded on the principal of establishing the company's point-of-view and creating cogent arguments to persuade independent sources to see things from their perspective, but this behavior is not accepted here. We expects PRs to have a very unnatural role and we should do a better job defining those expectations.
UseTheCommandLine noted somewhere that Wikipedians make a habit of providing feedback and puppetmastering COIs through contentious content, which is the equivalent of a journalist running a corporate-approved story, rather than boldly making the necessary edits. I agree that's something Wikipedians should change. CorporateM (Talk) 19:44, 24 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor)
- I thought good PR consisted of explaining the company;s POV in such a manner that it would be effective and convincing, not in such an excessive manner that the journalists will reject it and the audience laugh at it. The point here is to include the companys perspective, and in the RW also, sometimes this is all that can be hoped for. I think you ought to be able to do it--but perhaps some of your clients are more foolish than I imagine. DGG ( talk ) 22:22, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
- The intensity of the COI can be measured by the delta between how the company views itself and how they are viewed in secondary sources. It could be argued that good marketing is grounded enough to make this delta relatively small, but marketing is not always done very well. CorporateM (Talk) 00:48, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
- CM, I agree, but it's difficult to change that culture when some Wikipedians are willing to go along with it, or even encourage it. SlimVirgin (talk) 02:04, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- A culture is difficult to change, but providing some guidance is easy. Something like "Ideally content produced by a PR representative will be used as a first draft and an impartial editor will do a fair amount of independent editing. However, if the PR representative has done a reasonably exhaustive search for an editor with enough interest in the subject to spend time on it, editors are encouraged to consider any content that's an improvement over the current. Editors should not feel obligated to help PRs that do not provide any content of reasonable value; a short and polite decline with an explanation is all that's needed. On the other hand, a PR representative is not expected to learn Wikipedia's rules and processes to point out factual errors or blatant bias caused by the community. If you get involved, consider balancing articles yourself rather than providing feedback and try to avoid making PRs jump through hoops if the error is on our side." (or something else)
- CorporateM (Talk) 14:28, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think that's the situation we have at the moment. A big company will put together a Wikipedia engagement team. One of them starts rewriting the article via drafts on a user page. Editors arrive (often the same editors) to add the drafts to the article after very brief discussion, and sometimes no discussion. Sometimes editors with objections arrive too, but the default position is that the draft will be added in some form, so the objections are drowned out, and the objectors are made to feel they are being difficult. The drafts often end up being added word for word, because life's too short.
- What puzzles me is why some big companies get involved in this. I can understand it when a company is selling something directly to the public; they're willing to risk the embarrassment. But a company like BP isn't in that position. If I were in charge of their PR, I'd advise them not to go within a million miles of those articles, because it's all cost and little or no benefit. I wonder whether someone external to these companies (e.g. a PR company) has been offering advice about Wikipedia engagement, telling companies that it's okay. SlimVirgin (talk) 20:03, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- My impression is that they get involved because it's a soft target (low barrier to entry), widely used as reference (high-value), and there are no significant repercussions for getting involved, even if they were to do something skeezy like use a bunch of socks (low downside risk). Further, even when issues like the Gibraltar thing come up, the media coverage seems to paint it as an problem with wikipedia; again, just my impression. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ] # _ 20:19, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- One of the fundamental founding principles of PR is this idea that the public is a stakeholder. For example, if an oil company has a negative image among constituents, this can effect how politicians make decisions that impact their operations, mining agreements, etc. (I'm not an expert, just postulating). Many organizations have a government relations division and they often try to share their message with constituents. On the other hand, if an article is factually inaccurate, most will want to correct that as a matter of course, without formulating a complex strategic objective.
- Large companies are risk-adverse, so they see Wikipedia as extremely high-risk and compared to Twitter and Facebook, the barrier to entry is very high. Additionally, while I think they are wrong, many companies have an irrationally dismissive attitude towards Wikipedia. Often this dismissive attitude is adopted after they tried and failed to write an entry. Someone told me a story about a CMO that said Wikipedia was unimportant - they looked it up and saw he failed to write an entry on himself.
- Many astroturfing and front group operations are designed to instill enough doubt to prevent any action. I think pointing blame at Wikipedia is sometimes along these lines. For example, I read somewhere that Bell Pottinger threatened legal action against the publication that busted them after the controversy had settled, but I think they did that because it effectively prevented the anyone from pursuing legal action against them. They painted themselves as victims to create enough confusion to avoid any concrete action - that's effective spin.
- But keep in mind, most of us are just pushing product news and trying to get the press to write about us, etc. - not running front groups... CorporateM (Talk) 20:57, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
Our way or the real world's way?
We've just acquired a bunch of text re-defining COI according to the real-world standards. As many editors have noted elsewhere on this page, Wikipedia does not use, and never has used, the corporate-standard definitions.
- Real-world corporate definition
- You have a position of fiduciary trust at Company A. You also have a position of fiduciary trust at the unrelated Organization B. This represents a potential conflict of interest. Company A wants to cut a deal with Organization B (or perhaps Organization B is a newspaper, and the editor just asked you to write an article about your other employer). You now have an actual conflict of interest: you have a duty to work in the best interests of two organizations on opposite sides of a deal. (Solution: recuse yourself.)
- Wikipedia definition
- Wikipedia has a goal (good, neutral, encyclopedic articles). You have a goal (to get unverifiable garbage out of an article about your business). There is no conflict of interest here. Wikipedia's interest and your interest are exactly aligned. Wikipedia's interest and your interest are not in conflict at all. (Solution: make the edit.)
Now, we could change our definition to match the real-world definition, but I don't think that there's significant support for it. I think that the more sensible approach would be to remove all of this information about real-world concepts from the guideline as being irrelevant to Wikipedia's approach. What do the rest of you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:44, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think WP's definition hews more to the definition of conflict-of-interest in the medical context, as outlined here. I think your assertion of the corporate definition as "the real world's way" comes off as being a bit dismissive. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ] # _ 20:09, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
- It's not practical to just tell PRs not to get involved, when (a) we have an obligation to our employer/client to do our jobs and (b) our reputations are often treated unfairly on Wikipedia. Besides that there's (c) we often make substantial improvements and correct errors. However, if we're going by the real-world, we don't call it COI at all when a PR person works with the editors of an independent site. That's just called PR. And it would be very odd for a PR person to tell a journalist their coverage is bias and they want to re-write the controversies themselves. But then Wikipedia is a very unusual site.
- I would actually advocate for (in full knowledge it's a losing battle) that we abolish PR as "COI" and create a guideline on "Doing PR on Wikipedia" just as many news organizations provide guidelines on how they want to receive news, bylines and other pitches, that outlines how Wikipedians want PRs to behave, what type of participation is valuable, what is acceptable and not, etc. CorporateM (Talk) 21:09, 26 March 2013 (UTC) (PR guy and frequent COI contributor)
I think that the initial issue has been incorrectly stated. The real-world definition of conflict of interest is much more stringent. Not only is conflict of interest (defined broadly) prohibited but so is the appearance of conflict of interest. Wikipedia seems to be an outlier that takes an almost comically lax view of COI. This has become evident for all the world to see in this BP incident, where BP is drafting entire chunks of text and many Wiki people are defending that, including Jimbo. What all are ignoring, including Jimbo, is how this hurts Wikipedia's credibility. It doesn't matter whether BP is adding good or bad text. The only thing that matters, from a real-world COI perspective, is that BP is participating actively in an article about BP. The debate over this on various Wikipedia has actually hurt Wikipedia's credibility even more than the BP edits, as it has exposed Wikipedia's tolerant attitude toward large corporations actively participating in their articles. This will encourage other companies to do so. Coretheapple (talk) 14:01, 27 March 2013 (UTC)