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    Welcome to Conflict of interest Noticeboard (COIN)
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    This Conflict of interest/Noticeboard (COIN) page is for determining whether a specific editor has a conflict of interest (COI) for a specific article and whether an edit by a COIN-declared COI editor meets a requirement of the Conflict of Interest guideline. A conflict of interest may occur when an editor has a close personal or business connection with article topics. Post here if you are concerned that an editor has a COI, and is using Wikipedia to promote their own interests at the expense of neutrality. For content disputes, try proposing changes at the article talk page first and otherwise follow the Wikipedia:Dispute resolution procedural policy.
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    • The COI guideline does not absolutely prohibit people with a connection to a subject from editing articles on that subject. Editors who have such a connection can still comply with the COI guideline by discussing proposed article changes first, or by making uncontroversial edits. COI allegations should not be used as a "trump card" in disputes over article content. However, paid editing without disclosure is prohibited. Consider using the template series {{Uw-paid1}} through {{Uw-paid4}}.
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    • User:AlexNewArtBot/COISearchResult   This is the large mechanically-generated list of articles having a suspected COI that used to be shown here in full. You are still invited to peruse the list and, if you have an opinion on whether it's a real COI, edit that file directly. When you see a case in that list that needs input from other editors, you may want to create a regular noticeboard entry for it, below.


    EServer.org

    Report

    → See also: Special:Linksearch/*.eserver.org

    Similar SPAs:

    See also Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam/2007_Archive_Jun#eserver.org and Wikipedia talk:External links/Archive_17#Links to online libraries. --Ronz 02:56, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The individual links appear to be customized to the specific article. However the fact there are already 322 links is alarming. I think we should insist that User:Geoffsauer stop adding the links until he gets a consensus that they are appropriate. EdJohnston 05:34, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Customized for many specific articles. It's a massive campaign. — Athaenara ✉ 05:50, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I don't think it's a campaign. This is a high quality web resource that naturally attracts a lot of links. It would be classified as link bait. I don't think this is spamming. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 06:55, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I disagree, this is a classic COI spam campaign. User:Geoffsauer, some SPA's, and some IP's from Iowa create both the EServer.org and Geoffrey Sauer articles, edit them heavily, and add a bunch of eserver.org external links. It doesn't get much more straightforward than this. (Requestion 17:47, 19 May 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    Let's put away the torches and pitchforks. This appears to be an electronic library that makes literature available for free to the public. It's sort of like Project Gutenberg. I checked a few of the articles that contain these links, and I did not see an intentional linking campaign. Is see a large number of independent users citing this database from various articles and discussions. Example: [1] An even better example, added by Administrator User:Doc glasgow: [2] Enforcing COI is very important, but I think we need to be more careful to investigate these things fully before jumping to conclusions.

    → (Interjected.)   The links which Ronz supplied in his initial report here, to specific WT:WPSPAM and WT:EL discussion sections, were intended to support that "investigate these things fully before jumping to conclusions" process. — Athaenara ✉ 19:11, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    User:Geoffsauer needs a friendly warning. I predict he will behave impeccably once he is informed. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 06:53, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    What do you know! He received a warning on 13 December 2006 [3], and hasn't made a single COI edit since. He did do a few little fixes to clear up image licensing problems, but I don't see any problems with those edits. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 07:17, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    That conclusion might be just a bit premature considering all the SPA's and IP's from Iowa. (Requestion 20:11, 19 May 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    You could be right. Do you think you have enough of a case to ask for a checkuser? I don't see how to pursue this other than to look at each edit on the merits. (adding) I just checked all the edits after the December 13, 2006 warning for the reported SPA accounts: 12.216.62.86 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), 129.186.156.5 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - active December 2006 , 129.186.66.214 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). There were no link drops that I could see. The users did correct a few links, possibly to fix broken links. There were some other gnomish edits. I still don't see anything sinister here. Can anyone provide a diff after Dec 13 to show there's a continuing problem? Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 22:26, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I suspect that a checkuser request will be denied because spam and COI violations are not severe enough reasons to bypass the privacy policy. I'll know more in a couple days after all 322 external link additions are tracked down. (Requestion 19:29, 20 May 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    I've tracked down some more socks and the current count is 249 external eserver.org link spams. The complete list is at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam/2007_Archive_Jun#eserver.org. (Requestion 21:17, 21 May 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    I have found a couple more socks. The current count is 278 external eserver.org link spams. (Requestion 06:37, 25 May 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    Jehochman mentioned that User:Geoffsauer received a warning on Dec 13 2006 [4]. I'd like to point out that Geoffsauer violated that warning here [5] on Jan 18 2007. (Requestion 21:17, 21 May 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    I started going down the list of 322 links found by this linksearch. As User:Jehochman has correctly observed, some of these links are to individual digitized books in the style of Project Gutenberg. I have no objection to these so long as they are appropriate to the article and are added with local consensus. Other links, such as the one that User:Geoffsauer added to our Technical communication article on in this edit on 28 March 2005, present a directory of links in a style reminiscent of DMOZ. I personally think that Sauer's Eserver link to http://tc.eserver.org should be removed from the Technical communication article, since Wikipedia is not a directory. In fairness, that article probably has more external links than it needs. If anyone has time, I suggest they randomly look at some other items found by the same linksearch and see what they think.

    This editor doesn't seem to be a bad guy, but the profusion of DMOZ-style directories raises a warning flag. EdJohnston 16:46, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Links to directories are not prohibited. Links to DMOZ are not prohibited. Links to categories in online libraries are not prohibited. Please see: Wikipedia talk:External links. Too many external links on a wikipedia page is what is discouraged. --Timeshifter 18:27, 20 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I added some rules to COIBot (blacklisted/monitor). --Dirk Beetstra T C 15:46, 20 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Edits by this IP are troublesome: 12.216.41.63 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - active May 8 & 18 2007 Shall we send Geoffrey Sauer a friendly email and ask him to look at this thread and explain? If he is using anonymous IP's in a sneaky way to add links, that's a real problem. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 16:49, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Yes, that's fair. Also you might find out why he doesn't use his logged-in account when he adds links to Eserver or edits his own article. If he must do this, at least do it openly. EdJohnston 17:07, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Unfortunately he hasn't enabled email. We seem to have a complex situation. Possible linkspamming and sock puppets, but the resource is somewhat worthy and has attracted some valid links. We probably shouldn't delete them all. We probably need to give fresh warnings before blocking because the old one is almost six months old. We also can't be sure that the sockpuppets are abusive. Maybe it's another person at the organization who's on dial up and doesn't have a Wikipedia account. How about we place {{uw-coi}} on all the fresh socks, and ask them to come here to comment? Maybe the user will help us solve this mystery. If not, we can start blocking. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 22:09, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    The web page 'eserver.org' lists an email address for Geoff Sauer. EdJohnston 22:16, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Message sent. I've asked him to comment here. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 22:24, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Comment. I shrunk down the original set of 322 links to a more modest 14 links to be studied:

    1. http://antislavery.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.antislavery.eserver.org
    2. http://bad.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.bad.eserver.org
    3. http://clogic.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.clogic.eserver.org
    4. http://drama.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.drama.eserver.org
    5. http://elab.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.elab.eserver.org
    6. http://emc.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.emc.eserver.org
    7. http://feminism.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.feminism.eserver.org
    8. http://govt.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.govt.eserver.org
    9. http://history.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.history.eserver.org
    10. http://lectures.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.lectures.eserver.org
    11. http://mamet.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.mamet.eserver.org
    12. http://orange.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.orange.eserver.org
    13. http://poetry.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.poetry.eserver.org
    14. http://reconstruction.eserver.org - Special:Linksearch/*.reconstruction.eserver.org

    These 14 links provide 'web directories with commentary'. So they may run into the rule that Wikipedia is Not a Directory unless they are really notable enough to deserve articles in their own right. Having articles would require reliable third-parties to have commented on their value. (A couple of the above links are not directories, but actual web periodicals, like http://bad.eserver.org, which is an online journal called 'Bad Subjects'.)

    I am not sure we should be accepting the above 14 as external links, unless they are notable enough to have their own articles created. Especially we shouldn't keep them if Geoff Sauer is not willing to discuss the situation, because we'd like the Eserver people to acknowledge our policies and agree to cooperate with them. Your comments are welcome. EdJohnston 15:42, 24 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The first resource on your list has Google PageRank of 6, and has attracted links from more than 1,000 different web pages, including many official university pages. This isn't run of the mill linkspam. See [6] for a list of who's linking to item #1. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 18:30, 24 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree, it takes extraordinary effort to get a PR6. It's interesting that you mentioned the antislavery.eserver.org link. Today, I just found User:Jlockard, a university literature professor, who spent the majority of his edits adding or fixing 63 antislavery.eserver.org links. At first I wasn't sure if this was a spamming but the more I looked at the diffs the more I was convinced. Very little value was added to Wikipedia, mainly just a bunch of eserver.org external links. There was even a run-in with a spam fighter back in May 2006 but the spamming continued. This is a tricky situation. (Requestion 06:37, 25 May 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    I read this discussion with interest, though I'm not a skilled Wikipedia user and don't feel qualified to contribute to the policy debate here about external linking. I'll respect your collective judgment about when external links are appropriate, and won't add any more without a clear policy decision that would encourage me to continue. In my judgment I have never added off-topic or poor-quality links to a Wikipedia entry, and would not do so. But I won't post here again, now that I see how my past contributions might be seen as self-serving. To clarify my past intent adding links to entries, as a professor of English with a speciality in technical communication I have edited entries and added links to online resources which I considered appropriate, as I understood it from my research, my reading of Wikipedia guidelines and existing entries. I don't know about an Iowa bias in posts about the EServer, though I do teach as many as 150 students per semester, all of whom use the site, and it may be that my students have posted some EServer-related entries. But I have never meant to injure Wikipedia's neutrality or credibility, and am concerned that anyone might consider my edits to have done so. I'll do my best, however, to answer any questions I can to clarify the reasoning behind any particular edits I have made.Geoffsauer 06:00, 25 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Thank you for that explanation. It is very helpful. For the future, I suggest you refrain from linking to your resources from articles. Instead, if you want to suggest a link, place a comment on the article talk page and let somebody else make the decision whether to add it to the article. I am not sure what you can do to restrain eager young students from adding these links. Maybe others can advise. Also, we have a project called Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination that might be very useful to you. Jehochman ☎ / ✔ 06:08, 25 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Still working my way down the numbered list of 14 links, from above, benefitting from the Special:linksearch URLs that were added to each one. So far, looking at items 1-4, I see nothing inappropriate. On the whole this is good information. I fixed the citation format a couple of times, and I noticed at least one fluffy and over-linked article, (Praxis intervention), but that's not a problem related to Eserver. EdJohnston 04:44, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree that many of the edits of the eserver.org external links are good and valuable. Many though were spammed. Many were also to low quality linkfarms. If you want to see the COI aspects it might be easier to go the the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam/2007 Archive Jun#eserver.org page and manually go through all the contribution diffs for all of the socks listed there. The COI picture should become clearer when you focus on the contribution diffs. (Requestion 16:52, 1 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    Wikipedia's best purpose really is not as a convenient transfer point to draw readers to external sites, whether eserver.org or any other. Can this be dealt with properly? — Athaenara ✉ 10:05, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I think we should close this one because the editor has stopped making COI edits, and the links have been scanned. Jehochman Talk 04:32, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Linking continues

    The Special:Linksearch/*.eserver.org count, which was 322 when it was first reported, is now up to 353 - click "(500)" on the linksearch page to see that. — Athaenara ✉ 16:40, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Plus 31 links in the past couple weeks is not good. I checked all the larger list of sock IP's at the WT:WPSPAM archive and it wasn't any of them. I'm going to scan the articles now to find out who it was and I'll report back here. (Requestion 18:14, 18 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    This diff by User:RachelBartlett accounts for +12 of the new links and should be cleaned up in my opinion. I found two legit editors that each recently added one eserver.org link, no need to mention them by name. Still searching for the other +17 link sources. (Requestion 23:00, 18 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    All those RachelBartlett links, or most of them, appear in a single edit. [7] She migght be spamming her own cause, but I don't think this is related to EServer.org. Jehochman Talk 12:34, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree. On WP:NOT#DIR criteria I removed 11 gender.eserver.org external links from the Paul Rosenfels article and left one link to eserver.org which seems sufficient. I also added a notability tag. I suspect that Rosenfels is notable so it should be easy for someone to add a proper reference. While eserver.org does have valuable historic documents I don't consider it a WP:RS. I'm still searching for the source of those 17 new eserver.org link additions. (Requestion 20:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    I have removed the blatant spam that was added by the socks on the WTSPAM list. The eserver.org linksearch count is now 256. The {{prod}} tag from the Geoffrey Sauer article was removed by an SPA User:Jefferyev who also added some references. An SPA doing this with such a similar name is suspicious. I hope this doesn't mean that the eserver.org spamming will continue but now in a covert fashion. (Requestion 16:14, 25 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    Count now up to 273. — Athaenara ✉ 01:32, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Two editors (User:Moorlock and User:Rbellin) are blanket reverting my eserver.org spam deletions. I may request some blocks if this continues. (Requestion 19:41, 26 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    As I've explained on User talk:Requestion, no one has "blanket reverted" anything. Rather, two disinterested editors have concluded, after reviewing the linked pages, that some of the deleted links are useful and encyclopedic references and deserve to be reinstated. Rather than engaging in a reasonable discussion about the links' usefulness as references under WP:EL, Requestion has revert-warred, repeatedly threatened blocking, and used spam warning templates. See WP:ANI#Overzealous_.22linkspam.22_deletion and User talk:Requestion. -- Rbellin|Talk 20:05, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Nope, User:Rbellin and User:Moorlock have been blanket reverting my spam cleanup operation. I've tried reasoning with them but all I get is a lot of attitude. They even filed an ANI report about me. (Requestion 20:28, 26 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    See also: "Overzealous "linkspam" deletion" section on WP:AN/I. — Athaenara ✉ 21:25, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Comment. A spammy link that is occasionally useful is hard to deal with in our system. Although 273 links may seem to be a large number, I think it might be worth creating a file containing all the individual links, allowing space for other editors to leave comments on them, pro or con. Leaving it to local editors on each Talk page to decide whether each link belongs is probably not a win because many of these articles are thinly staffed. If anyone agrees with me I'd start work on the list. There seems no other simple way of clearing up this issue once and for all, short of the spam blacklist, and we don't (yet) want to do that. EdJohnston 21:35, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    MobyGames/ Flipkin

    User:Flipkin has established himself [8] as David Berk, a co-founder of the MobyGames website and has added some 900 links to the website, all still there, right up to his most recent edit [9]. See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam#mobygames.com [10]. There seem to be an associated farm of socks which have got the site up to over 6000 links. Some legit editors defend some of the links and any clean up would be messy. --BozMo talk 10:27, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    It is the general problem when 'good' links are spammed. I would strongly advocate a clean up off all links added by this and sock-accounts (per WP:SPAM; "Adding external links to an article or user page for the purpose of promoting a website or a product is not allowed, and is considered to be spam. Although the specific links may be allowed under some circumstances, repeatedly adding links will in most cases result in all of them being removed."; ). Established editors can then revert the edits where they can justify the links. --Dirk Beetstra T C 11:20, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    For something of that magnitude, I would hope the linked websites would be blacklisted. --Butseriouslyfolks 04:44, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    There's two templates which transclude most of the spam. I've nominated them for deletion at Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2007 June 9. MER-C 06:04, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Clever. If only he had used his power for good instead of evil . . . Nice catch. Should we disable the links in the template in the meantime or leave them for reviewers at the TfD? --Butseriouslyfolks 06:08, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I urge you to reconsider this decision. Having glanced over the COI page, th only material that seems like it might apply to the links that have been made thus far would be under the following:

    Conflict of interest often presents itself in the form of self-promotion, including advertising links, personal website links, personal or semi-personal photos, or other material that appears to promote the private or commercial interests of the editor, or their associates.

    1. Links that appear to promote products by pointing to obscure or not particularly relevant commercial sites (commercial links).
    2. Links that appear to promote otherwise obscure individuals by pointing to their personal pages.
    3. Biographical material that does not significantly add to the clarity or quality of the article.
    From this I would say that 1. doesn't apply because the links are not obscure, are relevant to many of the game pages being linked and are not commercial except in the sense that the site in question contains ads within the pages and even merchanting links generated to amazon.com and ebay. I would say that 2. doesn't apply because mobygames is a public project and not a "personal page" in any sense. In fact, all edits by flipkin can be viewed from his own page on the site, and certainly don't cover every aspect or even the majority of content. 3. may or may not apply in some cases, but since the "biographies" of various individuals (game develeopers) is dynamically updated on the Mobygames infrastructure, that means that information is constantly updating and becoming more complete. Like wikipedia, actual biographies, photos and other information must be contributed by users and in many cases, pages linked to will not be "complete" in any sense, similar to many wikipedia pages on various individuals.
    Full disclosure: I am also associated with the Mobygames game project and am considered "staff" for the website. (Apologies for if I haven't used the wikipedia formatting codes properly in this comment, I don't use them often enough.) --WildKard 08:13, 10 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I think the bit you overlooked is: "How to avoid COI edits... avoid... 3. Linking to the Wikipedia article or website of your organization in other articles (see Wikipedia:Spam);"--BozMo talk 11:52, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Please take a look at Wikipedia:Spam and Wikipedia:External links as well. They clearly state that massive linking of this sort is not allowed on Wikipedia. nadav (talk) 09:01, 10 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Funny, I did that, and right on #3 of what to link to is "Sites that contain neutral and accurate material that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article due to copyright issues, amount of detail (such as professional athlete statistics, movie or television credits, interview transcripts, or online textbooks) or other reasons." Are you saying MobyGames doesn't qualify under the 'amount of detail' section, especially credits? --Trixter 06:27, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    This is a COI notice board. You founded a website and you added hundreds of links to it in Wikipedia. That's a conflict of interest violation. --BozMo talk 13:51, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Please note that Trixter and Bhirt have also declared themselves as MobyGames founders in the TfD discussion. --BozMo talk 14:02, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    You must have missed the part in WP:SPAM that says: Adding external links to an article or user page for the purpose of promoting a website or a product is not allowed, and is considered to be spam. Although the specific links may be allowed under some circumstances, repeatedly adding links will in most cases result in all of them being removed. nadav (talk) 00:23, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Proposal

    Looking at the various discussions around on this one there seems to be a lot of support for the idea that we delete the 3500 or so links added by the hard-core COI spammers, put those gentlemen all on a final warning and leave the broader community to sort out any worth adding back over time. Anyone agree/disagree? Anyone got an obvious bot to hand capable of doing this (given the links are all templated and the list of spammed articles we could put together)? --BozMo talk 21:43, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I believe the number of links spammed is closer to 5500. Other than User:Frecklefoot and User:Krótki, no established editors have added a large number of mobygames.com links. On my survey I found an incredible number of SPA's adding moby links in a very systematic fashion; for example alphabetically, or for exactly one calendar year (Jan 1 - Dec 31). The SPA's get warned, some get blocked, but they always return under a new name. Another problem I see repeating is when User:Mathsgeek deleted a bunch of moby spam, the WP:VG community blindly reverted all of it. I like BozMo's proposal but I don't think it is going to work. (Requestion 00:02, 13 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    I think if we do it with an edit summary linked to an explanation page then we would have a good case for warning and sanctioning mindless reverts of links to empty pages. --BozMo talk 11:43, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Isn't there a nuclear option where persistent spammers have their links automatically banned by a bot? Sounds like a job for AN/I. -- THF 00:19, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I completely agree with BozMo. We can then leave it to regular page editors whether to add the links back. Alternatively, if new SPA's continue to spam then the site will have to be added to the blacklist. Has WikiProject Spam been consulted? nadav (talk) 00:29, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    (Yep! Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam#mobygames.com) JoeSmack Talk 14:47, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Spamming shouldn't be tolerated for even a second. DurinsBane87 12:21, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Total support for implementation of BozMo's proposal. — Athaenara ✉ 08:58, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    And nadav's. — Athaenara ✉ 09:04, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The last three comments sum up my opinion entirely. Do not tolerate Spam. Nuke Spammed links and let CVG community re-add the useful ones. If they spam again blacklist the whole site. - X201 12:54, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I agree with X201. After much discussion here, the Mobygames site appears to have some value as an ext link, analogous to IMDB for films. However, if we were aware that the owner of IMDB was adding links to its site by the thousand, we would never tolerate it. The links added in spam fashion have to go. --Butseriouslyfolks 16:54, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Nuke 'em, but keep the templates. MobyGames has some great content (which means the template is still useful), but note I say some; a large number of entries are even stubbier than Wikipedia's, and yet these users have been adding links to them regardless of quality or relevance. GarrettTalk 23:19, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The template is the reason for the massive spamming. It offers an umbrella to work under. Likewise, many inexperienced editors think they should add the template to any plausible article simply because it exists. Nuking the links without nuking the template would make little sense. The template is the problem. The spammign would never have occured without it. And there is no downside as valid links can be added where appropriate like every other site. Special treatment led to abuse. The real issue needs to be addressed. 2005 21:43, 15 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    That sounds entirely reasonable for me. I guess if the template is the problem because other websites/communities are not using a template for their own linking to relevant articles, then we should not have it either. --WildKard 22:21, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    3 comments

    I'm going to copy and paste 3 comments from the TfD, because I believe they're important for you to read:

    One problem for me is the complete lack of attempt to mention the issue at either of the templates' talkpages, or to change its instructions to regulate usage to only useful Moby entries. The instructions for TfD state: "If a template is being misused, consider clarifying its documentation to indicate the correct use, or informing those that misuse it, rather than nominating it for deletion." --Quiddity 23:28, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    So why not be bold and do it? As for changing instructions, a much wider community worked on WP:EL so perhaps you could just link to that. But we aren't talking about odd innocent editors. We are talking about the systematic addition of mainly shallow links to thousands of pages by a group of people who aggressively reply to queries with "its all agreed". I don't think there is any chance at all that this gang would be influence by comments on a template, even if you just posted "see WP:EL" probably it would just get deleted. Most communities on WP are a bit better at self regulation on these kind of things. That's how it should be --BozMo talk 06:35, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    The wp:point is, why didn't you?
    I only noticed this TfD by accident, and am dismayed and disappointed at the zealous/crusading/confrontational attitudes towards other editors (e.g. this comment by BozMo, this initial comment by Hahnchen, ignoring things like the 2 warnings Flipkin gave User talk:69.139.77.86, etc) and towards a free, community-driven reference-project (sound familiar?). More so than that, I'm frankly disturbed at your current discussion of a law-in-your-own-hands solution at WP:COIN#Proposal.
    As Lendorien stated: "Hate to say it, but someone has been going around deleting all the mobygames links from every game article, regardless of whether mobygames link has more or useful information about the game. In some cases, the mobygames link has been the ONLY SOURCE for the article.--Lendorien 23:20, 19 March 2007 (UTC)" Is that going to happen again?
    And now you are seriously, nay, eagerly, contemplating razing Wikipedia of links to an incredibly useful resource. Slash and burn should only be a last resort solution, where the vast good will outweigh any harm, and that is not even close to the case here (see the thread about featured articles, above. and that's just the featured articles...).
    It reminds me of the theory about how police officers should be required to regularly spend a little time working with innocent children or animals, instead of just criminals all the time. You're all displaying a bad attitude, that is not helpful to anyone concerned in the end, and that needs to be made abundantly clear. --Quiddity 04:29, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    End of copy. Uses of "You" intended in the selective/encompassing sense, not singular.

    If you do anything like "nuking" the links to a useful reference, purely to chastise a handful of editors who almost certainly thought they were helping both sites (worldwideweb), you're going to be doing a lot more harm than good, and end up pissing off a lot of bystanders. Please please, take a calm and measured approach, and do not take unilateral action based on the single-minded consensus displayed above. Thank you for reading. --Quiddity 16:56, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I have re-read these comments and appreciate your good faith opinion on the matter which is at one end of the spectrum of good faith opinions I have seen expressed. I am even happy to believe that the TfD which appeared on every one of 6500 links on CVG pages you were lucky to notice by accident. As for the personal overtones you use in terms of "zealous/crusading/confrontational" I am happy to leave anyone to judge my comments and style in raising the issue with a few COI editors versus the way in which you have approached people who in good faith removed some of these links. What I am missing in the above though is your suggestion on what we should do next (apart from your parody of what you think we are proposing). --BozMo talk 17:34, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Quiddity, I think your position is persuasive in the TfD discussion but not here. The question there is whether the template should be deleted because it has been used excessively to spam WP. Your position indicates that there are appropriate uses for the template, as the linked site often has value, so it should be retained.
    Here, however, the question is how should we respond to a large-scale linkspamming operation conducted by an editor with a COI. These links were added indiscriminately without regard to whether the content at the linked site warranted the links. Nevertheless, even if most of them were warranted, they are still spam posted by a user with a COI problem. Useful spam links are still spam links. "Live with the COI spam because it might be useful" is not a workable position here, as it invites spammers to linkspam WP in the hopes that some users will find their links useful.
    In a perfect world, we could assign several paid employees the editorial task of reviewing each of these links for propriety and deleting only the inappropriate links. However, we don't have those kinds of resources. The proper course here is to delete the links added en masse in the same manner as they were added -- indiscriminately. Warn the user but don't blacklist the site yet. --Butseriouslyfolks 18:49, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    To all: I've replied to BozMo at User talk:Quiddity#Hi with some of the background thoughts and impetus I'm bringing to this issue. Just pointing there to assuage any curiosity, and to further clarify who/what I'm frustrated with.
    Here, I'm really trying to make it clear that something is amiss, when the possibility of blacklisting such a site is mentioned, after so little has been done to assist the users at fault from making further mistakes.
    • Examine User talk:Flipkin: He was welcomed and then encouraged/assisted with the usage of the template back in September 2005, then out of the blue he was warned 5 days ago.
    • User talk:TnS, was warned by Chicken Wing in January 2007, and then when TnS offered a measured and intelligent response Chicken Wing replied "Sounds fine. ...".
    • User talk:Krótki was warned for the first time 5 days ago. Welcomed in Jan 2006
    • User talk:Corn Popper was warned for the first time 5 days ago. Welcomed in Jan 2005
    • User talk:Ravimakkar was stomped on in January 2006, but was then told "You don't have to be sorry. ...".
    • User talk:69.139.77.86 was warned twice by Flipkin not to add links unless they were definitely useful.
    And that's it from the list of offenders (those who added 50+ links, excluding frecklefoot. and I'm simplifying, but you get the point). Possibly I'm missing some pertinent facts (?), but after many hours of reading and discussing, I'm left with an uncomfortable feeling that there is a lot more Bite than Good going on, and I'm trying to (emphatically) point that out in the only way I can.
    Thanks again for reading. I really do appreciate the work that Coin and wpspam does, I'm just trying to supply an outside perspective on this particular issue, which seems to be getting potentially way-overblown. --Quiddity 20:37, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Hello Quiddity. I'd like to remove User:Krótki from your list above and add User:Corn Popper, User:59.182.37.97, and User:63.212.164.226. The accounts in the above list are not real editors, they are WP:SPA and I suspect several of them to be the same person. They mass spam, get warned, blocked, create a new account, and repeat. They are what we call serial spammers. Have you looked at the contribution logs for those accounts? The only thing we could do to assist is to help them add mobygames.com links since that's all that they care about. (Requestion 02:49, 14 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    (Corn Popper added, but) Those IPs haven't even gotten a welcome/warning template yet... This is exactly the kind of bad faith/bite attitude I'm trying to point out above.
    To try and explain it another way: Some people contribute without reading any more than the warnings and suggestions from just below the edit window (if that). Someone might see that a link to imdb is missing from a movie article, adds it, then goes through all their favourite movies to check that each one has it. I did that in the distant past. Others work alphabetically, because it's straightforward, and that's what they think will help. Look at List of health topics (S); someone started there, and hopes to return to finish it later or hopes someone else will. That's how this place works (One of many). wp:iar is policy to prevent exactly this kind of overenthusiastic wikilawyering. I'm probably shooting myself in the foot by repetitively trying to help you understand, but I know of no other way to expand your world view to encompass what it currently does not.
    [Perhaps I should've posted these comments at WPSPAM... Sigh. It's tough giving unsolicited "Working with others" feedback to multiple people. Sorry to those uninvolved, I usually try not to be this verbose. Feedback would be appreciated though...] --Quiddity 04:02, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Requestion: You just now added 3 templates at once to User talk:63.212.164.226, a user that hasn't edited since January 2007, and to User talk:69.139.77.86 whom hasn't edited since August 2006, and to User talk:59.182.37.97 whom has only made 12 edits. This is very bad faith. You are gaming the warning templates.
    And before you accuse me of stalking, bear in mind that researching and analysing the activities of individual users in order to come to an objective set of conclusions is part of what you are meant to be doing too, as part of investigating possible spam/coi problems. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?: "Who will watch the watchers?". Anyone who notices problems, that's who. --Quiddity 20:35, 15 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes Quiddity. You are absolutely correct and thank you for stalking. The edits of those IP addresses were in extremely bad faith. You might not be aware of this but in SPAM and COI cases it's standard practice that all socks are considered to be the same individual / entity. I also just found User:68.46.123.33 who is an extremely interesting sock. That IP address has been banned, indefinitely blocked, and somehow added 300 mobygames.com external links. The more I dig the more interesting it gets. (Requestion 00:34, 16 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    The User:68.46.123.33 case is interesting. I'm also curious as to how that happened.
    However, that doesn't address why you added 3 levels of warning templates at once, to users like User:TnS. Is that standard practice too? It seems overtly hostile, and is gaming-the-system in my opinion.
    Are there any admins who could weigh in please? --Quiddity 01:02, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Well, I could I guess. WP:BITE and WP:AGF are important but we also allow an appropriate treatment recognition of "obvious socks". The disagreement is because you look at a pattern of use and read it as "clearly" something different to how requestion does. I think that takes us beyond policy into subjective judgement. I would personally say that a single anon IP who you suspect to be a sock and does nothing but add a dozen links to a site with spamming issues you probably on balance get guided by WP:BITE and WP:AGF, and talk to them gently, but by the time you have multiple such accounts all similar the chances there are genuine naive users behind them becomes vanishing small. So, I am with Requestion on this one. You are welcome to ask another Admin of course. --BozMo talk 20:10, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I meant an uninvolved admin... However you didn't address the only question I asked: Is it standard practice to put 3 levels of warning templates at once on pages like User talk:TnS and User talk:59.182.37.97? Does that not seem excessive and rude? I understand jumping straight to a high-level template is normal, but not posting 3 at once. --Quiddity 21:44, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    What is your problem Quiddity? You follow me around and throw wrenches into the Wikipedia machinery like you are trying to make a WP:POINT about spammer sympathy. User:TnS already had a warning from Chicken Wing and Nposs. I just added a 3rd warning but those previous warnings don't even matter. Like I said, it is standard practice to inherit warnings across accounts. Also many spam fighters start at a spam4 warning in cases of mass spamming which +1600 links definitely qualifies. (Requestion 02:24, 16 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    Well, yes I added a lot of MobyGames links alphabetically to stub video game articles. I can't say anything new, just repeat myself: "I do not work for MobyGames and I am not affiliated with them in any ways. If you noticed I have added MobyGames links mostly to game stub pages. Game stub pages are usually quite uninformative without screenshots." If you noticed I've not added a single link to MobyGames since the warning of Nposs. And thus I would like to ask the removal of the "Courtesy messages" section from my talk page because it is quite embarassing. I did all the additions with good intentions, according to Talk:MobyGames#MobyGames template. I understand that I made a mistake because of adding too many links to low content pages on MobyGames. But that was because of the lack of rules. Someone should update the MobyGames template page and the Talk:MobyGames#MobyGames template section with the guidelines/rules of correct linking to MobyGames. The NeveR SLeePiNG 00:48, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Hello TnS. Wow, your response was quick. I have a deal for you. I'll remove the "Courtesy messages" on your talk page if you agree to remove the 1600 mobygames.com external links / templates that you added. Seems fair. What do you think? (Requestion 02:27, 16 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    Not all the 1600 links are bad, most of them contains more value than the Wikipedia article. That's why I need the guidelines/rules so I can make the removal according to them. The NeveR SLeePiNG 11:51, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The TfD was closed as no consensus. I'll repeat the proposed solution I left there near the end. "The only actual concerning accounts I can determine from the list of suspects are User talk:68.46.123.33 and User talk:69.139.77.86, the edits by those two accounts could legitimately be reverted en masse.". (And any of the edits made after 4 October 2006 by User talk:Ravimakkar too). (The details behind that suggestion are scattered throughout this thread and the TfD, and the contexts are in the individuals talkpages, so I won't repeat it all here.) I don't know much about bots, but I believe mass-reverting the edits of individual editors is a fairly straightforward process? Ask at Wikipedia:Bot requests for more info, I'd imagine. Thanks. --Quiddity 17:21, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Only 2 IP's and a small fraction of Ravimakkar edits? You've got to be kidding. With all due respect Quiddity, your understanding of this situation is woefully inadequate. Please stop interfering. Please stop being a hindrance. Please stop throwing wrenches into the Wikipedia machinery. And please stop following me around. (Requestion 17:54, 18 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    Please please try to assume good faith. I'll give the single example one more time, and let you examine the evidence yourself.
    • User talk:Flipkin. As of September 2006 he had been welcomed, and encouraged in the use of the mobygames template. The first mention of the COI guideline/problem was (the next edit) June 8 2007, the day before the TfD.
    If he didn't know he was doing something wrong, we can't punish him for it.
    (and just to clarify, I was explaining to BozMo how I stumbled upon the mobygames thread, as a reply to his disbelief. I'm just trying to be honest and transparent, in action and motive. (Don't label me just because I happened to agree with anything the argumentative timeshifter said!)) Thanks. --Quiddity 02:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    To be clear if it was a question of "doing something to Flipkin" I could have just done it (sinister laugh). This COI seeks a consensus on some sort of bot removal of links which were put in by Flipkin, and also by a series of SPA IP accounts. Also it has brought up an issue on WP:EL since Quiddity has a view (I hope I am being fair) that we should link to every page which has any information not in the WP article. Getting clarity on that and guidelines for when to link to MG would be a good outcome. --BozMo talk 08:48, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Cutting to the chase

    Has the massive and obvious overlinking been reduced or not? — Athaenara ✉ 01:50, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    AFAIK nothing has been done yet. I'm finishing up the the WP:COIN#EServer.org case and then I'll get to the mobygames.com overlinking. (Requestion 17:47, 26 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    Lest anybody continue in the belief that mobygames.com is a reliable source, let me offer two rebuttals:
    (1.) http://www.mobygames.com/developer/sheet/view/developerId,257587/
    "He is originally from Quatloo, Alberta, Canada." Oh, I doubt that.
    (interjected) I must concur, I do not know this gentleman and have never been to Alberta. Also, I agree that Mobygames.com is not a WP:RS. Not because it contains errors -- everything contains errors, including reliable sources -- but for other reasons. Quatloo 00:03, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    (2.) http://www.mobygames.com/developer/sheet/view/developerId,4916/
    One of his projects was "wwwwolf: Armageddon". That's funny, I heard they were very picky about their content.
    My conclusion from this experiment is that this site is not as useful or appropriate for linkage as we were led to believe. It's absolutely not reliable. --Butseriouslyfolks 23:58, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I should add that the content I quoted from mobygames.com is plaintext. I added the links to relevant users here so that other readers would understand the significance of the names. Also, in fairness, I should add that my attempt to add "Quiddity, Oregon" as the birthplace of another developer was rejected pending further information from me, such as a source. So at least somebody there is paying attention. --Butseriouslyfolks 01:08, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Global Panel Foundation

    The latter is a résumé for an individual who presides to the other two institutions; long but slow warn-and-revert war between inside editors and COI patrollers. Lately an inside editor has resorted to verbal aggressiveness, hence this report. --maf (talk-cont) 00:20, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The following users are all insiders of the organizations and have tried to restore cleaned-up or unsourced deleted content on all three articles - interestingly, as one user leaves, a new one takes his place:

    --maf (talk-cont) 00:20, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    IP lookup results:
    • 64.204.217.21 -  Possible - same geographical area (New York), but too populated.
    • 89.56.164.199 and 89.56.133.222 - wrong side of the country.  Unlikely.
    • 203.234.169.3 - Red X Unrelated - South Korea.
    Be careful of 3RR. MER-C 09:29, 21 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    All of the accounts listed above, anonymous and otherwise, are single-purpose accounts focused on the Ellenbogen-related articles with evident conflict of interest varying from apparent to obvious. It doesn't matter where they are on the planet: look at the contribs. — Athaenara ✉ 10:56, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    One month after maf's initial report here, this crew of COI SPAs is still multiplying accounts and proceeding with near-impunity. — Athaenara ✉ 03:05, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Richard Parnell Habersham

    → See also: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Richard Parnell Habersham

    Article created, edited by article subject. RJASE1 Talk 00:11, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Listed at WP:AFD. YechielMan 08:40, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've extensively edited this article for reliable sources and neutral point of view. As of this writing, the Afd has not yet closed. — Athaenara ✉ 05:54, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Gbooks24 / KatieSimon

    An admitted employee of Simon & Schuster using the above registered usernames and IP is posting numerous S&S author bios using text copied from other websites, including the S&S website. I posted the info to the spamdalism noticeboard and an admin left a very nice message for the editor in question explaining WP:C. I think the WP:COI concern is much more substantial. Another editor notified her of WP's COI policy, and I asked her to disclose her identity on the article's talk pages, but she is reluctant to do so. I think the idea of a major publisher posting copyvio bios of its authors on WP is highly inappropriate and borders on User:MyWikiBiz. Anybody agree? --Butseriouslyfolks 20:50, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I agree, highly inappropriate and violate WP:NOT. — Athaenara ✉ 22:39, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Agreed, also: I have requested a move of Kate brian to Kate Brian. This is one of the articles created by User:KateSimon. Bearian 00:46, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The two registered accounts have been inactive since 8 and 11 June, but 199.106.94.136 was still actively linkspamming yesterday. — Athaenara ✉ 04:48, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Mark Dice

    This is a soapbox matter rather a straight COI but COIN is probably the best noticeboard for it. "John Conner" is a pseudonym used by Mark Dice until recently. His internet radio show and writings appear similar to Alex Jones (radio). Under either name he is known for self-promotion. For the past couple of years promotional edits favoring him have been made to Wikipedia. In the past he's been sufficiently non-notable that most of the references have been removed. The "John Conner" article was successfully AFDed twice, and speedily deleted a couple of more times too. Obviously it's been recreated several times. The various promotional efforts have paind off and he's probably notable enough now to merit at least a short article. If so, we need to watch it closely to prevent it from becoming a soapbox for fringe theories. ·:·Will Beback ·:· 05:20, 10 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    This is another one that needs to be looked at more carefully not onyl for COI, but notability. He's merely famous for stalking and for being in the news, not being or doing anything per se. I've tagged it, too. Bearian 00:51, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Drum Major Institute

    Unclear what to do. Seems to be a notable org, but tone of article is promotional. YechielMan 14:40, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I agree. It seems notable, but What a mess of an article: Red Link City, USA. COI and messy articles seem to go hand in hand. Bearian 16:35, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    And this edit violates NPOV, since Drum Major is a thinktank way to the left of the nonpartisan Brookings, which is characterized as "liberal." THF 16:44, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Note also:

    I notified the first two editors about possible coi issues, and recieved a reply from the first: [11]. I'm concerned that editor Drum Major Institute has continued editing both articles, including removing a likearesume tag, without contributing to the Talk pages of either. I'm hoping a note from another editor would be helpful. -- Ronz  20:01, 15 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I was hoping to close this one, but just a few hours ago coi spa Special:Contributions/Drum Major Institute removed the {{cleanup}} tag. — Athaenara ✉ 05:54, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I gave the user a general note about removing the clean-up tag on his/her talk page. Sancho 15:51, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Bernard J. Taylor

    Article on playwright created by a person claiming to be the webmaster for his promotional website who is also adding promotional information about the playwright to other articles and has started an article about at least one fictional character in playwright's plays. WP:OWN issues are arising -- user is removing appropriate templates. Erechtheus 03:37, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Here's the COI admission. I've left a warning. Block indefinitely on the next COI or spam edit. Somebody needs to go clean up this big mess. This user has been a prolific spammer. Jehochman Talk 04:27, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    User maintains webpage:
    Can we please indef block this abusive editor?
    Grab your mop. Every edit from this account is self-serving COI or linkspam, hitting multiple articles. (e.g. [12][13][14]) Wikipedia is being abused for a publicity campaign. The editor has been warned up, but persists, and has been leaving obnoxious messages with any editor who opposes. Jehochman Talk 14:33, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    48 hour block for WP:NPA violations. Follow up with specific evidence of linkspam, etc. if problems resume. DurovaCharge! 17:50, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    The most vitriolic personal attack is this one.
    Whether or not problems resume, here are the external links that need to be checked. Many look like spam. The editor claims to be the webmaster of this site, so he obviously should not be adding all these links:
    1. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com linked from Wuthering Heights - SPAM
    2. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com linked from User:Siebahn - This one is OK
    3. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/ linked from Bernard J. Taylor - Also OK
    4. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/BOOKINDEX.html linked from Image:Bernard J. Taylor.jpg -OK
    5. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Books.html linked from Detective fiction - SPAM
    6. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Heights/Heights.html linked from Wuthering Heights - SPAM
    7. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Heights/Heights.html linked from Lesley Garrett - SPAM
    8. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Heights/htsbronte.html linked from Wuthering Heights - SPAM
    9. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Htspages/Heights.html linked from Wikipedia:Dead external links/404/w - No issue
    10. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Liberty/Liberty.html linked from List of musicals: A to L - SPAM
    11. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Liberty/Liberty.html linked from Battle of the Alamo - SPAM
    12. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Muchado/Mado.html linked from Much Ado About Nothing - SPAM
    13. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/Nosferatu/nosmoore.html linked from Much Ado About Nothing - SPAM
    14. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/PridePrejudice/pp.html linked from Pride and Prejudice - SPAM
    15. http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/PridePrejudice/ppintro.html linked from Pride and Prejudice - SPAM
    I hope the editor will agree to stop spamming, clean up the above mess, refrain from further COI edits, and agree not to make further insults. Jehochman Talk 18:16, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I'll leave this at a 48 hour block for now. If problems resume the duration will escalate rapidly. DurovaCharge! 18:26, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I've cleaned up the linkspam listed above. Jehochman Talk 19:04, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Blocked 69.218.220.246 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) for blockevation. Agathoclea 22:25, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Block on the sockmaster extended to one week. Report additional problems here and I'll respond appropriately. DurovaCharge! 16:36, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I wonder even about the notability. I don't know about the US venues, but the UK ones - Tonbridge ... Eastbourne ... Rotherham - have a rather small-town flavour, and these productions may even be amdram. And his books track to iUniverse (ie self-published). AFD? Gordonofcartoon 02:31, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Westgate / advertising

    I was told this might be the right place to ask. Westgate Resorts looks like a huge advertisement to me. Am I right? It may be a notable company, but I don't think all of those resort links need to be there. --blm07 15:49, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    This looks like a public relations campaign to me. Editor JRoss09 has only edited articles about Westgate Resorts, its founder, shareholders, affiliates, and places where he can add links. I'll warn him about COI editing, and see what he has to say. Jehochman Talk 17:57, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've tried to fix the main article for formatting and erasing junk from it. Bearian 01:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've done some more cleanup, but it still needs work. Jehochman Talk 03:40, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    NBC Universal IP address inserting program ads

    IP whois shows this user(s) is at NBC Universal itself. Editing includes (in addition to a "Fxxx Y**" edit) a history of "this xNBC show coming on at date/time" adverts in Travolta, Eisner and NBC employee BLP articles. I'd suggest that an IT administrator that presides over that IP range at NBC be contacted by wikipedia that wikipedia should not be used to spam upcoming NBC shows and to post in a manner that I'm sure NBC would not want to be associated with. Piperdown 19:38, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I've added another possible NBC SPA-COI account (Stephenb214) to the list. Jehochman Talk 22:44, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've semiprotected Michael Eisner and Becky Quick for two weeks. The account and IP address don't show any recent activity. If this is an ongoing problem, please post the relevant account or IP. I take this very seriously and I agree: this is the type of situation where it's important to act quickly and with discretion. I don't know whether this is good faith action by a new user, whether it's coming on orders from management or some well-meaning low level employee acting alone, but it's the kind of thing that could really cause negative press backlash for a firm. DurovaCharge! 15:24, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Scientology, again

    A couple of Scientologist editors have engaged in large numbers of edits apparently intended to whitewash the main Scientology article. Their responses to other editors have not been WP:CIVIL both on Talk:Scientology and in edit comments. Two of them have been blocked (see links for details) but this does not seem to have helped much. Is there anything that can be done? SheffieldSteel 14:05, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    How about taking this to Wikipedia:Community sanction noticeboard and requesting a community ban? I think these people have worn out our patience. I believe past investigations have shown that COFS works for the Scientology organization, so these are nothing but COI edits. Jehochman Talk 14:14, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I will try that. Thank you. SheffieldSteel 15:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    For related, information, Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/COFS. Smee 22:25, 20 June 2007 (UTC).[reply]

    SAC Capital Partners

    Ip address that whois's from SAC Capital Partners has edited the article for SAC Capital Partners and [15] the BLP for the person who runs it. Piperdown 17:08, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    • You can add User:Lamphore to the list of miscreants, but the case relates to edits made around February 1, 2007. Based on the normal wiki process, both articles have changed substantially since then, and there's really nothing to be done from the administrative end, except maybe to slap on "cleanup" tags and to warn the users with subst:uw-coi. YechielMan 06:29, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I cleanedup the article a bit, although I am not quite sure what to do with the big list of firms the company has invested in. -- Sparkzilla talk! 07:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Theatre Under The Stars (Houston)

    Created by, and extensively edited by, a new editor with the exact same name. I tagged it for COI2. Bearian 23:06, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    [[WP:PROD|Proposed for deletion]. YechielMan 01:41, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Edits were reverted 3 times or more in a matter of days, and the page was blanked once, by the same user. Does this violate the rule on 3r's? Bearian 16:44, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Kirk Fraser

    → See also: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kirk Fraser

    The user appears to be vandalizing an article he has created, possibly about a business associate. He has twice reverted COI tags. Bearian

    Philip Stanton

    This article was created by an editor called Stanton Studio, probably in violation of conflicts rules and extensively edited by anonymous editors, with content that appears to be original research. Bearian 00:23, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I have confirmed the conflict of interest. There is an equivalent article in the Spanish Wikipedia, es:Philip Stanton, which was authored by an identical username and an identical IP address, 83.33.etc. He doesn't seem to be notable, with about 150 Google hits for "Philip Stanton" with 1962, his year of birth, to distinguish him from other people with the same name. Because he has written and illustrated many books, he is not obviously nonnotable, so I have not decided to take any action. If you wish to be enterprising, you could try listing his article for deletion on the English and Spanish wikis. YechielMan 01:22, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    No thanks. I agree that he's notable, so I won't tag it for deletion. However, I want to keep on the tag as a notice to readers and other editors. Bearian 13:13, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've left him a {{uw-coi}} warning. Jehochman Talk 13:29, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    MFauntroy (talk · contribs)

    Wrote his own biography and significantly contributed to father's biography, as well as self-promotional editing in other articles. Videmus Omnia 03:15, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Also removing negative information concerning his uncle. Videmus Omnia 03:19, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've warned the user. If he continues making COI edits, please let us know. Jehochman Talk 04:23, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Katrina Swett

    I've left a warning for the user. Please report this as an inappropriate username. Thanks. Jehochman Talk 18:58, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for the swift response. I'll be down the hall, to the left. =).--Flamgirlant 19:00, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    broken <s> tag fixed.--Flamgirlant 19:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I have added content and citations I found with a Google search. Bearian 23:01, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    User:Hmartincalle

    Appears to be H. Martin Calle [16] of Calle & Company [17]. In every article he's edited to date he's added material about himself, his company, or what I assume is a relative. I've notified him of WP:COI and removed some of his edits. --Ronz 17:13, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Good call. Short contribution list, possibly factual (although unverified) information. This might be someone who could be persuaded to post cited suggested edits to article talk pages instead of inserting promotional material directly into articles. DurovaCharge! 20:07, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Financial Access Initiative

    Every thing matches, but I can't tell if there's a conflict. The articles were edited by the same user, and Barrineau is a director of Financial Access Initiative. Smoke? Bearian 00:39, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    First person "article" + username similar to company title = blatant spam + conflict of interest. MER-C 08:29, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Branding brand

    → See also: Special:Linksearch/*.collegeprowler.com

    I have tagged the article for: conflict of interest, reads like an advertisement (peacock language, photos and interests of the principals, etc.), red links, lacking third-party sources, and unverified sources. This is an article for PR firm by a PR firm. WP:NOT, WP:OR

    The conflict is that the former employer of three principals and the creating editor have a suspiciously similar name. The creator of the article has most recently only been creating or editing articles about persons or entities that are clients and principals of that PR firm. Also, the editor has made lots of edits, but has not even bothered to make a user page or a user talk page. WP:COI

    I have not suggested to delete it entirely, as it may be notable, or just my error.

    Also, there's possible copy-vio of pictures? Bearian 16:27, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Oh yeah!

    Joey Rahimi = Collegeprowler = College Prowler = Branding brand = Branding Brand = Alumni of United Nations International School [[18]]!

    From Joey Rahimi: "Joey Rahimi (born April 20, 1979) is an American entrepreneur and co-founder of College Prowler, a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based publishing company of college guidebooks and collegeprowler.com, one of the fastest growing websites in its industry. The company was established in 2002 as a project in an entrepreneurship class at CMU's Tepper School of Business.[1] He attended the United Nations International School and graduated with an International Baccalaureate. Upon being accepted into Washington University in St. Louis, Emory University, New York University, and Carnegie Mellon University, Joey decided to attend Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. [2]"

    Also, note the Usertalk on Collegeprowler has several copyright violation notices! Bearian 16:54, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Images have been tagged as no source/license. Videmus Omnia 19:05, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    The portraits in the article are copyvio from company website here. Videmus Omnia 19:13, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Freedompress (talk · contribs)

    → See also: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Green Patriot

    See the above user's user page for self-proclaimed COI. Videmus Omnia 20:45, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Um, yeah. This might be grounds for deletion, but I'm not sure. YechielMan 10:02, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Goguryeo-China wars (1) and (2)

    (1) Military history of Goguryeo
    Notice This list is incomplete (either intentionally or casually). See Talk:Goguryeo-China_wars#Military_history_of_Goguryeo, it is almost a consensus, except the three users who were busy at working on the admin page here.--Jiejunkong 04:22, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    This article was originally named Goguryeo-China wars. However, several users have moved the article to the current name because they fear that readers will think that Goguryeo is not a Chinese kingdom because of the title. I believe that their edits and comments are COI and are preventing the other editors from reaching a compromise. Also, their biased viewpoints on the subject is clear. Assault11 has an RfC filed against him [Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Assault11]. Naus has stated that users Cydevil38 and Good friend100 should be "slapped on the mouth". [19]. There have also been insults such as describing wikipedia as a "circlejerk for ethnocentric Koreans". Good friend100 21:31, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    The administrator moved the article back, so this report is not valid anymore. Thank you for those who reviewed it. Good friend100 23:52, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]


    (2) Goguryeo-China Wars → Military history of Goguryeo

    Admins, a few editors accused Korean Wikipedians here as being ultranationalists for naming the article Goguryeo-China wars so because it sounds "anti-Chinese" - because Goguryeo won most of the battles & KPOV wanted to put emphasis on winning over "China". I personally think that some Chinese editors here are just paranoiac.

    And then come here anti-Korean Japanese editors (the same ones who sweat NPOV in Liancourt Rocks, Sensaku Islands, etc. & also Korea-China disputes such as Mount Baekdu & Heavenly Lake). They're mostly in WikiProject Japan, but you know what they love to mess around with Korean business. They haven't participated in the discussion, but they're like "it's neutral." "it avoids further conflicts". The problem is that they've done this in almost all Korea-China disputed articles. And I guess when I accuse them of being simply anti-Korean, they shrug off, "doing the right thing gets criticism sometimes."

    The following is what I wrote, and none of them in the discussion have been effectively able to counter them.

    • "Two wrongs don't make a right. There is no reason to rename this article to "Military history of Goguryeo" just because of this trash logic that Goguryeo is a constituent of China and therefore cannot war China - simply b/c the two do not link, and there are so many better options."
    • "Everyone should know better that a country's military history is not defined by its single war with another country."
    • Let me elaborate. If you wanted to write a military history article on Goguryeo, then you should include weapons, traditions, strategies, and chronology, etc. But the CPOV editors just can't tolerate an article in which Goguryeo is successful against many modern-day China constituents & when the article title specifically states China (it's really out of convenience & practicality) as the opposing country, so they change it to military history. Then it's not neutral because the military history is seen from Chinese viewpoint, and China is not the universal meter for military histories of other countries.
    • "Second, the consensus is that Goguryeo is a Korean country. See Britannica, etc. above."
    • "Third, you cannot use WP:RM to test ethnic neutrality (that is, the CPOV editors are trying to use this naming dispute to overturn the consensus that Goguryeo is a Korean country)."
    • "Fourth, even a constituent state can fight its containing entity. For example, war between Confederates and the Union. Even then, Goguryeo (even if you were to consider the Chinese tributary system, everyone knows that this didn't mean Chinese control but just diplomatic relations) was a separate country anyways. And it doesn't matter which tribes and people constitute which countries - as long as they're separate countries."
    • "Fifth, there are so many better options: 1) Get rid of this article & categorize other related articles 2) Remain at this article's title 3) Choose another title similar to this"
    • Another reason: Always there are bound to be a loser & a winner in a war. That is really to say, China won in the end so I'm not sure where CPOV is coming from. Thanks. (Wikimachine 03:23, 23 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    User:Good friend100, User:Cydevil38 and User:Wikimachine refuse to answer the following questions about the anachronistic title:

    1. By their exact logic, equally-controversial articles "Goguryeo-Korea wars" and "Goguryeo-Japan wars" should be created. "Goguryeo-Korea wars" includes Goguryeo-Silla war and Goguryeo-Baekje war. For example, the war fought by King Geunchogo of Baekje against Goguryeo, obviously belongs to "Goguryeo-Korea wars". Note that this is based exactly on the same logic of them. They persistently put one's ancestor and one's grand grand sons together to sell a POV, which confuses first-time readers including some admins.
    Maybe they should be created, we never said no. Again, two wrongs don't make a right. Just because something wasn't done before doesn't mean you can't do it yourself now. (Wikimachine 17:38, 23 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]
    1. They admit that Silla must be included in this Goguryeo-China wars article, as Silla led the Silla-Tang alliance (in terms of man-power and need) to destroy Goguryeo and ended Goguryeo's entire military history. Then I asked the question "does this mean Silla is part of China because of this title 'Goguryeo-China wars'?" Then the funny thing is that none of these POV users answer the question, which is right on the target--the inconsistent title. But they do have lots of time to write lots of things here to work on system admins.--Jiejunkong 04:17, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Merge issues

    The merge issues being argued here are beyond the scope of this noticeboard. — Athaenara ✉ 04:27, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I've looked into this and I only see ethnic or national affinity, which we don't consider a COI. That doesn't mean the POV pushing, if it exists, is OK. We all edit articles about things around us or our nations' histories. However whatever we write has to be NPOV. This article may need some outside intervention. Lemme check if it's had an RfC lately. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 08:18, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    It's not that they're of the same nationality concerned in a dispute or anything. It's that they brought the dispute about within a framework which itself is already POV to begin with. They were being overly sensitive. Here's a bad example, but how bad it is portrays how ridiculous this situation is: "Alaska-USA war is POV because it implies that Alaska is part of Russia" (maybe some super anti-communists think that way). (Wikimachine 17:42, 23 June 2007 (UTC))[reply]

    Christopher Elliott

    Christopherelliott (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - has come to edit the article Christopher Elliott (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). However, I doubt this is the same person, and I'm wondering if in fact we shouldn't just block the username unless he says they're the same person. The Evil Spartan 14:31, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Also uploaded a huge number of professional-quality images claiming to be the creator/copyright holder. Videmus Omnia 15:14, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Get rid of the violating pictures. Bearian 13:11, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    They're tagged as GFDL. About the best I can do is mark them as "possibly unfree". Videmus Omnia 15:43, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Gwen Shamblin

    → See also: Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard#Gwen Shamblin and NPOV's "N"

    The above account is a single-purpose account editing the Gwen Shamblin article. Videmus Omnia 15:10, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    • This one's a tough nut to crack. I'll give the user a boilerplate warning, but it's good that the article is very well referenced and receives attention from neutral editors. Maybe someone else can look more closely. YechielMan 09:59, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Omaha Steaks

    → See also: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Nasty mess of SPAs at Omaha Steaks

    The "Beth Weiss" account and the 208.249.105.221 IP seem like blatant COI to me. Power piglet 22:51, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Beth Weiss is the Corporate Communications Director for Omaha Steaks, see the bottom of this page. Videmus Omnia 22:58, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    And Dsimon12 (talk · contribs) is almost certainly associated as well - the Simon family are the founders of the company and still fill most of the corporate offices. Videmus Omnia 23:00, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Possibly Dan Simon, referenced here. Videmus Omnia 03:24, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I torched the most blatantly promotional text -- after which there isn't much left to the article. Raymond Arritt 15:12, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've warned everybody. Next time one of these single purpose accounts makes an improper edit to this article, they should be blocked as a disruptive account. None of these are here to build an encyclopedia. Jehochman Talk 03:02, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    70.171.169.139 (talk · contribs) has challenged by editing again and blanking the COI warning from their talkpage. Videmus Omnia 03:50, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Are these folks slow learners, unfamiliar with WP policy, or what? They've got to know this doesn't look good on top of their earlier incidents with spam. Raymond Arritt 03:53, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    (reset) One of the IPs, User:70.171.169.139, responded after I recreated the warning. As long as they are talking with us and no obviously trying to stall, we should just revert their edits. No blocks needed just yet. I think these are newbies who need help countering bias introduced by their competitors. We have to explain how a corp can use the article talk pages and COIN to get help when needed. Jehochman Talk 06:29, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    70.187.26.152 and 24.252.62.197 are very  Likely, same ISP as 70.171.169.139 and are in nearby Bellevue, Nebraska. MER-C 09:26, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Bruce Wydner

    Dbp653 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) seems to be on a crusade to insert this Bruce Wydner (only 200 Google hits) into a pivotal role in the development of machine translation, apparently on the basis of a personal association self-described here: "I have been working with Bruce Wydner for several years and I decided to tell this story through Wikipedia ... Your attempt to furnish an unbiased opinion on this article is in poor taste, and is much uninformed ... please feel free to ask myself or Bruce Wydner any questions, or even better yet give him a phone call, he is very nice and polite and he doesn’t mind talking, if you would like, just tell him that I told you to call him, we are the best of friends".

    The same editor has been using the address 207.160.210.214 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), and Brucewydner (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has also been involved with some of these articles.

    I've posted a {{uw-coi}} warning to User talk:Dbp653. Gordonofcartoon 11:30, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Dennis Fairclough has been stubbed by removing unreferenced and self-published info. Videmus Omnia 21:10, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Language technology and Brown Prophecy are at AFD. Human language technology I redirected to Language technology, wose content it largely duplicated. Out of interest, I just found these sites - www.worldwideinterlingual.com, fastfluency.org - making similar claims, drawing on the same quotes, and even using the same image - which strongly suggests a promotional connection. Gordonofcartoon 13:02, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    This is getting problematical: now Bruce Wydner himself has posted a lengthy justification for Wikipedia being coopted into revealing this story - in the US national interest, no less [20]. Brucewydner (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has also restarted editing his own article. Help would be appreciated. Gordonofcartoon 16:04, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Knowledge creation

    Knowledgemachine (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), account of Bruce LaDuke of hyperadvance.com / instantinnovation.com

    recently rewrote Knowledge creation (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) in response to a {{prod}}; the new version reads like ad copy from his website. --Piet Delport 19:24, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I've listed the article for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Knowledge creation. Thanks for your alert report. YechielMan 20:11, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Military logistics

    I'm looking for unbiased opinions on recent edits of Military logistics by Hubbardaie. Although sourced, his edits focus on his own Applied Information Economics model, work he has done for the Navy all referenced to his recently published book. In my opinion this borders on self promotion and assigns undue weight to a single aspect of a subject. Ehrentitle 21:20, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Coi Spa Hubbardaie ("aie" presumably for "applied information economics") has created at least four additional articles, listed above. — Athaenara ✉ 04:01, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Michael Lucas (porn star)

    I was not aware of this noticeboard until just now. I'm bringing this over from the BLP noticeboard, and I've edited my comment a bit to focus on the COI issue. The other editor's comment was just added today. The page is currently under full protection due to the continual re-adding of several contested passages which are violations of BLP, one not mentioned here which involves another individual. In this case, I don't think there is any doubt of the subject's notability. The issue is his desire to control the content of his page, via his own edits, and now, apparently, through recruiting others to edit his entry. Here is my edited BLP noticeboard post and a comment placed there by another editor: -Jmh123 21:42, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    It appears that Lucas uses an anon IP (216.57.17.234) and, until "outed," (see the Talk page) the username User:Lucasent (Lucas Entertaiment), to edit his own Wikipedia page. He usually stays within the boundaries, but has apparently recently recruited some of his fans to make sure external links to his blog, myspace, and Lucas Entertainment are included, as well as a passage about an "unauthorized" biography. Another editor has made a good case on the Talk page [21], I think, for not including these links and mention of the biography. Reversions have been going back and forth on this for days. Each contested edit could go either way, as to whether it should legitimately be included or not, but I'm bringing this up now because Lucas may be recruiting others to make sure the entry is written the way he wants it to be written. It is my personal opinion based on a long controversy over an entry on one of his new "stars" (now deleted via 2nd AfD and no longer working for Lucas), an entry that in my opinion was clearly intended to sell a DVD, that Lucas has been around Wikipedia a long time, knows how to work the system, and knows the benefits of Wikipedia for self-promotion and promotion of his company. See also Lucas Entertainment (now merged with and redirected to his biography). Any perspective, advice, recommendations, comments? Thanks. -Jmh123 20:19, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I can offer my observations. When I first came across this article, I immediately noticed some conspicuous omissions vis-à-vis what I'd read about this actor Andrei Treivas (Michael Lucas): e.g., Lucas's work as a male prostitute in Europe and in NYC, Lucas's work under Jean-Daniel Cadinot, the fact that Lucas founded his production company with money he earned from working as a prostitute, and the fact that Lucas located his company in NYC (instead of the more traditional Los Angeles) because of the lack of competition in NYC. Over time these facts were added and some balance was achieved. Along came 216.57.17.234 (hereinafter referred to as "216") who proceeded to, at times, systematically, and at times, haphazardly, delete any mention of these facts or anything else s/he didn't like, most times without any edit summary and almost never with any dialogue on the talk page. The only time 216 wrote on the talk page was in response to a challenge to an awards box; s/he wrote that the challenging editor should go to Johnny Hazzard's page or Chi Chi Larue's page and edit their awards boxes, in effect saying, "this is my page, leave it alone and go edit somebody else's page." I cannot be sure that 216 and Lucas are one and the same, but it's a well-known fact that Lucas is a shameless self-promoter. 216 has added and re-added material that promoted the products of Lucas's production company, sometimes using the same phrasing as that used in the company's website. In a 4 April edit on a related page, that of Lucas's "La Dolce Vita" film, 216 added the entire plot section lifted directly from the production company website. And in one peculiar addition on 24 April, 216 added "lungfish" to the list of animals living with Lucas in NYC. Go try and find anything on the internet about lungfish and Lucas -- you won't. Based on her/his history, I don't think it will be sufficient to place the page under partial protection or to even block 216 from editing. 216's confederates will simply come along and edit as they please, as seen in the activity of Theshape4 while the page was under partial. I don't know the exact jargon to express this, but I would suggest two things: have the activities of 216, Lucasent, and Theshape4 investigated for the issues you've raised; and, have the page placed under the form of protection whereby additions can only be made by an authority from Wikipedia. Thank you for your good work. 71.127.230.77 18:30, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Molefi Kete Asante

    Article subject seems to be doing major edits to his own article. Videmus Omnia 01:15, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Even stated that he is "renowned". Videmus Omnia 01:17, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    This required some digging. I tried to remove COI additions by Masante and 24.126.96.187, but I may have messed it up. Shalom Hello 15:50, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I've been working on the cleanup also; I think Shalom's changes were very much needed. — Athaenara ✉ 03:27, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    European Roma Information Office

    I have removed the COI tag as it is completely bollocks; check the history of the article and you will see it has been written entirely by me, which is why it is in reasonable shape :-) However, the SPA has twice emailed me in the last few hours; the emails have been entirely comprised of an exact copy of content from the website. John Vandenberg 14:20, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    FTR, I didn't add the COI tag, and I also agree that it needn't be there at the present time. This report was filed only because I'm afraid Novoselsky's involvement may eventually turn this into yet another vanity article. Kudos to User:Jayvdb for keeping the article POV-free. —Psychonaut 18:06, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I added the COI first, but now that it's rewritten, I won't add it back. Bearian 19:10, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Let the record also show that the article was not rewritten; there never was a COI. Accidents happen, but lets keep posts on noticeboards factual. John Vandenberg 05:12, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Apologies. Bearian 17:02, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Actaeon Films, Nightwalking, Amelia and Michael, and others

    → See also: A Fitting Tribute Afd + Nightwalking Afd + Amelia and Michael Afd + Make Me a Tory Afd



    In July 2006, Actaeon Films and Daniel Cormack were deleted per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Actaeon Films and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Daniel Cormack respectively. Daniel Cormack has stayed gone, but now the company is back. The two registered users created all but one of the film articles and recreated Actaeon Films (which will probably be re-deleted again per WP:CSD#G4) and the IP comes behind to embellish the articles. These aren't film masterpieces and there's not much about them to reference, and all have been sent to AFD.

    These people may have more film articles that I haven't found, but at least we've found these. - KrakatoaKatie 14:12, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Patrick Murphy

    Edits about a political candidate being made by In2itionmedia (talk · contribs), a single-purpose-account which is the name of the media group that operates the candidate's website. Article hijacking of a disambiguation page. Videmus Omnia 18:36, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Add to that vandalism of an opponent's page. Videmus Omnia 19:00, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]


    This is ridiculous...the other candidates have pages with their history and campaign promotional materials. How is this a "neutral resource" if all the candidates can't have pages with background information.— Preceding unsigned comment added by In2itionmedia (talk • contribs)

    • thats fine the only reason i moved it was because the patrick murphy page was all about the guy running. the reason i didnt change anything on his page was because i commented in the discussion and thats my defense Gang14 04:44, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Scientology

    User:Bravehartbear made a lot edits to Scientology even though he's a Scientologist, I don't really know the policy (after all, is a Christian allowed to make edits to make edits to Christianity) but if you look at the difference, [22], it's pretty different and I'm technically on a Wikibreak. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 19:53, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    As far as I know photographers are allowed to edit photography articles; stamp collectors are allowed to edit stamp collecting articles, astronomers are allowed to edit astronomy articles, Christians are allowed to edit Christian articles, fishermen are allowed to edit fishing articles, and even Scientologists are allowed to edit Scientology articles.
    Are you suggesting that Scientologists should leave it up to other people (aka critics), who know virtually nothing about Scientology, to make sure that the articles accurately reflect information about Scientology?
    This is exactly why I am on wiki break; Simply because a Scientologist edited the article combined with the result being 'pretty different', we conclude that there must be some wrong doing going on (conflict of interest perhaps), so lets come off of wiki break and file an admin report.
    I don't know you Jeffrey, so I don't have a clue what your background or edit history is.. so please don't take this personally Jeffrey.Kleykamp, but do you really think that nobody else is watching that article? Is there something specifically wrong with the edits? Is there a violation of article content? Is there a violation of sourcing? Could you be more specific in your complaint? You took the time to come off of wikibreak to report a user. You named the user specifically in a sort-of-maybe accusation of conflict of interest. The least you could do is point out some 'bad edits'.
    I had never even heard of Scientology before I got to wikipedia, but it sure attracts more non-specific non-accusations than anything I've ever seen before.
    Jeffrey.Kleykamp, technically by your implied definition of COI, anyone from any religion (or Atheist or Agnostic) would have a COI when editing any article about religion. A Christian would have the conflict of interest to make the Scientology article 'bad'. A Jew would have a COI to make a Christian article BAD. etc etc.
    (back to wikibreak) Lsi john 20:12, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    If you read his user page, it seems to be suggesting that Scientologists should edit the Scientology articles to make them more "positive" to Scientologists. Also, he made lots of small edits over 2 days which someone watching the article wouldn't notice, i.e. people watching the article only notice the difference between the current and last versions. And finally, yes, a Scientologist is allowed to edit the Scientology article. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 20:21, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Perhaps s/he believes that the articles are weighted anti-Scientology and that making them more positive means bringing them closer to neutral?

    "I know that if you are a Scientologist you will be very shocked and very offended by the information in these pages."-Bravehartbear

    There is a distinct difference between 'more positive' and unbalanced positive. AGF my friend. AGF. Lsi john 20:23, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Yeah, yeah, but it's beyond whether or not I'm not assuming good faith, I posted this here for someone to just look at the edits and see if they are against Wikipedia policies most particularly COI because I'm not going to do that because I'm, again, on a wikibreak. PS: I don't expect other people (that means you, Lsi john) on wikibreaks to do that, Jeffrey.Kleykamp 20:47, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    PS: if you read the article on conflict of interest you'll notice that a conflict of interest exists,

    "A conflict of interest is a situation in which someone in a position of trust, such as (a wikipedian)..., has competing professional or personal interests. Such competing interests can make it difficult to fulfill his or her duties impartially. A conflict of interest exists even if no unethical or improper act results from it"

    Now whether this made his edits bad is a different matter. 20:56, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
    Again you read, and cite, only the parts you want to apply here. Thats called cherry picking, sir. And even what you cited, only indicates that a conflict of interest 'could' exist, not that it does. Everyone who has a strong belief about any subject, under that statement, could have a conflict of interest. Should we ban Boy Scouts from editing Boy Scout articles due to conflict of interest? Should we ban gays from editing any gay articles? I can name at least four VERY anti-Scientologist editors. Should we ban them too for conflict of interest? If not, then your unsupported post about a Scientologist, and conflict of interest, is in incredibly poor taste. Without having any specific grounds to imply that it does apply, you are making bad faith assumptions.
    So you have concluded that Bravehartbear has a competing personal interest that makes it difficult for him/her to edit impartially. And you concluded that how? And anti-scientologists have no such personal competing interest? .. bah, hang them all.. burn em at the stake.. evil scientologists can't possibly edit impartially. (these types of closed minded bad faith assumptions and mis-application of policy and guidelines are exactly why I'm on wikibreak. I can't bear to see such nonsense get started, and I'm powerless to inject any sanity) (closing browser to avoid responding again) Lsi john 21:14, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I reported this because (1) there is a known conflict of interest and (2) I don't have the time to look if the edits made by the person really were bad which would normally be a reason not to report it (that is the case with boy scouts editing the boy scouts article). So, as you can see I have not looked at the edits, I'm reporting it so that someone else can look and see if the edits are truly worth being reported. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 21:23, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    PS: See Ad hominem, because you're saying that it's not a conflict of interest because I'm not good enough to follow the AGF policy. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 21:41, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    PPS: Lsi john said "And even what you cited, only indicates that a conflict of interest 'could' exist, not that it does" but that is false, "A conflict of interest exists even if no unethical or improper act results from it", that does not mean that the edits were bad, however. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 21:50, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    From Conflict of interest:

    A conflict of interest is a situation in which someone in a position of trust, such as a lawyer, insurance adjuster, a politician, executive or director of a corporation or a medical research scientist or physician, has competing professional or personal interests. Such competing interests can make it difficult to fulfill his or her duties impartially. A conflict of interest exists even if no unethical or improper act results from it. A conflict of interest can create an appearance of impropriety that can undermine confidence in the person, profession, or court system. A conflict can be mitigated by third party verification or third party evaluation noted below - - but it still exists.

    I'm seeking "third party evaluation" to the edits made by User:Bravehartbear to Scientology between 02:31, 22 June 2007 and 17:00, 25 June 2007 because I am temporarily not in a position where I can do that. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 22:21, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I looked at a few of the edits, and they seem fine. You should provide specific diffs if you want to start a COI investigation. Additionally, you need evidence of COI. I don't see any evidence of COI here. If you are concerned about edits that might violate WP:NPOV and want a neutral editor to render a third opinion, you can try WP:3O. Bravehartbear might want to look at their own userpage and make sure it doesn't encourage editors to violate WP:NPOV, because Jeffrey.Kleykamp seems to have gotten that impression. Whether or not it's true, impressions are important. Jehochman Talk 22:32, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I got away from my wikibreak and took the time to look through the edits and found out that there aren't any problems, he just moved paragraphs around which made it look like major edits, i.e. two paragraphs that are approximately the same switch places and make it seem like he rewrote the paragraphs to make them look different when all he did is switch their places. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 23:25, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Jeff many of the edits that you are mentioning were done in coperation with others on the talk page. If you see the talk page your will see extended discusions, agrements and compromises made. Some of the edits I made were made by request of other editors. For example there was an extended discusion about the intro and that some info there should be somewhere else in the page. Acting on that discusion I moved that paragraph. Bravehartbear 02:58, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I agree with most of the editors here that possible WP:NPOV issues and adherence to any given religious faith aren't sufficient to establish WP:COI issues. That said, I continue to observe troubling aspects in the Scientology discussions at this board and WP:CSN. For example, this edit history demonstrates that the Bravehartbear user page was created six weeks ago by Lsi john with a smiley-face-wink ASCII icon. This creates an appearance of impropriety (per WP:MEAT) when they both come to the same noticeboard a few hours apart to voice similar opinions at the same thread. I repeat my recommendation of mentorship: if these editors are acting in good faith then some coaching would help quell the concerns of impartial observers. DurovaCharge! 05:53, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    And, I'd submit that: a neutral observer would have a seen a smiley face, whereas someone looking for diffs to prove a conspiracy theory, will see a meatpuppet. I have no idea who Bravehartbear is. I have no idea if it is a male or female. I have no connection whatsoever to Scientology. My off-wiki identity is known to several admins. I didn't even know that Scientology existed before encountering it on wikipedia. And even then, it took me a month or more before I realized it was not the same thing as Christian Science. It was a smile, Durova.. nothing more. Peace.Lsi john 17:30, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Let's step back for a moment and try to develop a strategy for the Scientology articles. As an example, Search engine optimization used to be the subject of heated debate and lots of reverting between different unsourced versions. As it became a good article, and then a featured article, these problems disappeared. The editors of Scientology should work together to create a thorough, well-sourced article. Instead of this "us versus them" dynamic, all parties should look at the good article and featured article requirements, and try to satisfy them. When everyone works towards a common goal, differences of opinion are less troublesome. Scientology is a contentious subject, so these articles will have to include both positive and negative statements. Our readers must choose for themselves what to believe. Enlightenment cannot be imposed from the outside. Jehochman Talk 06:28, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    To clarify, nobody is suggesting all members of any religion/organization/etc. be automatically banned from editing articles (including CoS members) just by affiliation. However if an editor begins making changes that go against the rules (removing WP:RS/WP:V sources, adding an unsupportable "positive" pov, etc.) and then continues the same behavior after being warned it's at that point a topic ban should be explored. Anynobody 07:28, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    An owner of a company is offering $30-$100 to write a Wikipedia article on it. See [23]. Based on the user profile and this (which I found googling the company name and location), I believe the company involved is Tech-home / Tech-Home / Tech home / Tech Home - can someone pass the salt, please? Their website is http://spam.tech-home.com/ (remove the spam).

    tech-home.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com

    Original report on enwiki-l. MER-C 09:56, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Development and Underdevelopment

    Development and Underdevelopment (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) Subrata Lahiry (talk · contribs)

    The user who created this article is the author of the book that is the subject of the article. The article needs an extensive re-write. This may need to be deleted and started from scratch. Bearian 17:01, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    User:Shattereddd

    --Ronz 17:07, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    User removed this report, which was restored. Videmus Omnia 17:47, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Twice. --Ronz 18:25, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    John summers (basketball player)

    John summers (basketball player) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) John Summers (talk · contribs)

    • Same article name and author. Article has bad misspellings, possible copyvio of pics, and obvious copying from another source, also possible copyvio. Marginal notability of college basketball player.

    Sorry, I forgot to sign this. Bearian 21:09, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Not even marginally notable. He's a freshman backup who shot 14% for a school that was 12-20 in a minor conference, and apparently has been kicked out of the program. This is a speedy-delete rather than a COI problem. THF 01:48, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    User:Terry Tolkin

    Hi, can someone please look at the contributions of User:Terry Tolkin. He/She had been adding content (and adjectives such as "legendery") to a number of indie music articles about an A&R man of the same name. I've reverted a number of the edits, but do not want to go on a spree without a second openion. Thanks Ceoil 19:57, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Yes, he's promoting himself with (almost?) every edit he makes. --Ronz 23:55, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Peter DG Tompkins

    Looks like almost all of his edits have a conflict of interest. --Ronz 23:42, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    3G Studios

    User 3GStudios (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) created:

    and made dubious additions (removed) about their unreleased, unannounced video game to:

    --Piet Delport 00:48, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I have been advised that this editor [31] is editing with a COI. They also seem to be using a corporate username but I think the overall COI is the main issue here. The edits he makes to the pseudoscience article I am working on seem to be highly tendentious, subtle, but distruptive nevertheless.

    They have posted their business on their own userpage [32]

    After making an enquiry over email regarding this, another more experienced editor than myself made this comment 'Not your usual web design company. Besides ([[33]]), the alliances page at his site ([[34]]) has links to "John Grinder" which comaze frequently edits. The biography link at [[35]] pretty much sums it up." "I feel that having the link from his user page to this business page (and one that he owns and operates) clearly proves a conflict of interest situation."

    The edits on the main pseudoscience article look to be working towards pushing the idea that pseudoscience is protoscience (therefore promoting pseudoscientific ideas or reducing criticism for NLP neurolinguistic programming related concepts). The edits in general (in pseudoscience and NLP related articles) seem to be even more strongly tendentious, perhaps because other editors have not noticed his biases, either removing critical views on pseudoscience, or removing pseudoscientific information from NLP related articles.

    Tendentious editing of the main image caption to promote the idea of phrenology contributing to science [36][37][38] [39].

    Restricting criticism to clinical psychology, as opposed to psychology [40] Adding NPOV tag more as a protest or as a way of casting doubt, without suggesting solutions on the talkpage, and without presenting evidence for lack of neutrality [41] and some more subtle (trying to seperate authors out so that support for a specific view is reduced) [42].

    On pseudoscience talkpage: advocating pseudoscience as protoscience [43] Evasive answers to avoid quoting a source [44][45] (possible dishonesty). The discussion style is quite irritating and seems to work towards disruption/evasiveness.

    General edits [46]. [47](removal of negative information) Similar promotion of pseudoscience even after notification on pseudoscience article [48] Sleight of hand removal of NLP from criticism [49] [50]. There seems to be extensive evidence of this throughout the history of the editor. I feel it is not possible to write pseudoscience articles with this editor due to the COI, the corporate username, the tendentious editing towards removal of criticism, and the style seems to be quite disruptive.

    NewtonspeedNewtonspeed 07:58, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    I've replied on the pseudoscience talk page. This is a content dispute only. --Comaze 11:57, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    The examples I gave above seem to be just the tip of the iceberg. Sorry but your business is just getting in the way and no matter how many pro-science shuffles you make, your history is just too consistently moving towards promoting NLP related pseudoscience or removing criticism. Even your more recent edits on other NLP linked articles [51] are strongly towards removing criticism related to concepts propounded in your business interests. I don't know how the editors on that article would feel about you running a related company now, but I'm sure if they noticed they would find it just impossible to edit with you without this rather huge conflict of interest issue getting in the way. Newtonspeed 13:18, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    The accusation here is one of POV-pushing, and is a complex content dispute. This is not a SPA. The issue is subtle enough that other Wikipedia dispute resolution procedures are your best bet. It's not going to get resolved here. (I take no position whether there is improper POV-pushing.) THF 13:34, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Thanks TedFrank. My main problem is that the editor has a COI and its just getting in the way. Firstly I would like a reality check. 1. Does the editor in question run a company that sells NLP? Because if so he seems to have a strong COI. I have no problem with someone holding a view that phrenology eg is constructive. My main problem is that I (and it seems lots of other editors) am having to deal with a company called Comaze who is consistently pushing those views on Wikipedia. But beyond that, just tell me where I should go to deal with this rather obvious problem. Newtonspeed 13:41, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    WP:RFC. There is nothing inherently wrong with an expert in X editing articles about X, so long as WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, and WP:V are adhered to, and if they aren't, then the problem is the persistent violation of those policies, not the COI. -- THF 14:25, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    This is a very complicated case and there's a great deall going on that is probably outside the scope of COIN. However, I agree that there is a COI here. Comaze has a definite financial incentive to promote NLP and has been doing so. Comaze has 1679 edits to Neuro-linguistic programming, 1731 to Talk:Neuro-linguistic programming, and at least a few hundred other edits related to NLP. That's over 60% of all edits related to NLP, but more importantly there's no other topic not related to NLP that he's devoted even 10% of his editing. He's definitely a WP:SPA. --Ronz 14:41, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    The user has over 1000 other edits. The problem, if there is a problem, is NPOV. If his edits are appropriate, then the ostensible COI is irrelevant. He's not promoting himself in the article, and the article seems to have a fair vetting of critiques (though an expert may disagree). But, again, this is far too complex a case for COI/N. Take it to RFC, and if the editor does not adhere to RFC consensus, escalate. Wikipedia lets climatologists edit far more controversial articles, and those articles don't even pretend to adhere to NPOV. THF 15:07, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree. While there is a COI, the issue is NPOV and the possibility of disruptive editing due to the COI. --Ronz 15:24, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Hello TedFrank. This COI problem is about a range of articles centered mostly on the pseudoscience article because that seems to be the core that the editor in question seems to be keen on altering in relation to his NLP company. There was a ruling on the NLP article (looks to be a long time ago) though now the article seems to have had the main criticism packed away in the background. Obviously its going to be practically impossible to remove criticisms altogether after arbcom rulings. But there is the rest of Wikipedia to change in favour of pseudoscience. The ruling seems to be one on NLP in particular, which is a different article from the one I am editing on. Also, in relation to your above comment, there really is an obvious NPOV issue as the editor has made a great many edits that seem to be removing criticism in relation to his particular brand of NLP (Inspiritive.com) and John Grinder which is promoted on his commercial NLP site. I believe a closer look at his edits in that respect is required if NPOV is an issue that is required to accept the COI ruling. Its going to be very easy to post a set of commercially promotional edits/deletes and offset another set that is seemingly science based yet unrelated to the product in question. But when they are on different articles or paragraphs, there is still a promotion going on. Either way, when editing with this NLP company it is just impossible to ignore the ongoing agenda. Newtonspeed 15:51, 28 June 2007 (UTC) Oh, for practical purposes, I appreciate your comments, and want to know which other places I can go to sort this obvious problem if need be. Newtonspeed 15:59, 28 June 2007 (UTC) I can see his edits are not appropriate at all. If you want more diffs I can provide them. Newtonspeed 16:03, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    WP:RFC/SCI for individual articles is your best bet. If others agree with you, and the editor continues to be problematic, you can escalate to WP:RFC/USER. THF 16:16, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    Shannon Perrine (history|Watchlist this article|unwatch) [watchlist?]

    Gmanhoobie could be a fan of Perrine's. The article needs some work, so let's WP:AGF and see how Gmanhoobie contribues further. --Ronz 15:35, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
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