Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard: Difference between revisions

Welcome to Conflict of interest Noticeboard (COIN)
Shortcuts WP:COI/N WP:COIN WP:COIBOARD Sections older than 14 days archived by Lowercase sigmabot III. Click here to purge this page (For help, see Wikipedia:Purge) 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.
You must notify any editor who is the subject of a discussion. You may use {{subst:coin-notice}} ~~~~ to do so.
Additional notes: This page should only be used when ordinary talk page discussion has been attempted and failed to resolve the issue, such as when an editor has repeatedly added problematic material over an extended period. Do not post personal information about other editors here without their permission. Non-public evidence of a conflict of interest can be emailed to paid-en-wpwikipedia.org for review by a functionary. If in doubt, you can contact an individual functionary or the Arbitration Committee privately for advice. 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}}. Your report or advice request regarding COI incidents should include diff links and focus on one or more items in the COI guideline. In response, COIN may determine whether a specific editor has a COI for a specific article. There are three possible outcomes to your COIN request: 1. COIN consensus determines that an editor has a COI for a specific article. In response, the relevant article talk pages may be tagged with {{Connected contributor}}, the article page may be tagged with {{COI}}, and/or the user may be warned via {{subst:uw-coi|Article}}. 2. COIN consensus determines that an editor does not have a COI for a specific article. In response, editors should refrain from further accusing that editor of having a conflict of interest. Feel free to repost at COIN if additional COI evidence comes to light that was not previously addressed. 3. There is no COIN consensus. Here, Lowercase sigmabot III will automatically archive the thread when it is older than 14 days. Once COIN declares that an editor has a COI for a specific article, COIN (or a variety of other noticeboards) may be used to determine whether an edit by a COIN-declared COI editor meets a requirement of the Wikipedia:Conflict of interest guideline.
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Category:Wikipedia conflict of interest edit requests is where COI editors have placed the {{edit COI}} template: Wikipedia conflict of interest edit requests Talk:Bashir Al-Hashimi Talk:Alameda Belt Line Talk:Australian Maritime College Talk:Roy Bahat Talk:Madeline Bell (hospital executive) Talk:Scott Bessent Talk:Black Hawk (Sauk leader) Talk:Cinq Music Group Talk:Clover Health Talk:Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia Talk:Dahua Technology Talk:Sonalde Desai Talk:Nina L. Diaz Talk:Daniel Diermeier Talk:Dixy Chicken Talk:The Donkey Sanctuary Talk:Stephan DuCharme Talk:Earth Journalism Network Talk:Mary Baker Eddy Talk:Edge Hill University Talk:Darnell Edge Talk:Empire (magazine) Talk:Energy Capital Partners Talk:Etraveli Group Talk:Far East Organization Talk:Global Citizen Awards Talk:Globe Life Talk:Golden State Foods Talk:Grayscale Investments Talk:Group-IB Talk:Grove Collaborative Talk:Hannover Re Talk:Harsco Talk:List of Harvard University people Talk:Jacob Helberg Talk:Henley & Partners Talk:Human Appeal Talk:Huron Consulting Group Talk:Illa del Rei Talk:Index Ventures Talk:Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy Talk:Edward D. "Ted" Jones Talk:Christian Kälin Talk:Jeffrey Katzenberg Talk:Kennedy Center Honors Talk:KieranTimberlake Talk:Kathleen Kingsbury Talk:A. Gary Klesch Talk:Labcorp Talk:Kewsong Lee Talk:Leviton Talk:List of compositions for flute Talk:MoneyWeek Talk:MongoDB Inc. Talk:Moody's Analytics Talk:Moody's Corporation Talk:Moody's Ratings Talk:Netvibes Talk:NextEra Energy Talk:Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation Talk:One Energy Talk:Oneok Talk:Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation Talk:Pallywood Talk:V Pappas Talk:Barbara Parker (California politician) Talk:Perkins Eastman Talk:Poster House Talk:Joely Proudfit Talk:Shlomo Rakib Talk:Research Corporation Talk:Reworld Talk:Rivulis Talk:Elizabeth Rowe (flutist) Talk:Rakefet Russak-Aminoach Talk:Science Inc. Talk:Simprints Talk:Dragan Šolak (businessman) Talk:Spotfire Talk:Roger Steare Talk:A. G. Sulzberger Talk:Julie Sweet Talk:Steve Tappin Talk:Tencent Talk:Theatre Development Fund Talk:UK Biobank Talk:United States Postal Service Talk:Vista Equity Partners Talk:Dashun Wang Talk:Mark Weisbrot Talk:Martha G. Welch Talk:Wingtech Talk:Xsolla Talk:Zions Bancorporation Talk:Zyn

• 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.

• Category:Requested edits.  Editors who believe they have a Conflict of Interest may ask someone else to make edits for them. Please visit this category and respond to one of these requests. Whether you perform it or not, you should undo the {{Request edit}} when you are done to remove the article from the category. Leave a Talk comment for the requestor to explain your decision.

User:Gibnews is the self-confessed webmaster of gibnews.net, an aggregator of press releases of organisations based in Gibraltar, which he wishes to use as a primary source in Gibraltar related articles. There has been a discussion at WP:RSN about the reliability of this source [1]. I have asked a series of questions there which got dismissed by some editors (I should have raised it here first, but I didn't know about this page). For example, I asked whether there was any financial relationship between the organizations his site archives press releases for, the site and himself, and this was dismissed as "out of line". To his credit, Gibnews has answered the questions. However, I don't think the COI matters are being treated with the seriousness that they deserve by some of the responders. There appears to be a view that because we "assume good faith" about editors, this automatically transfers to anything the editor does outside Wikipedia. What concerns me most is actually the "campaigning" aspect of COI rather than the financial aspect: the editor is unabashedly pro-Gibraltar and against any return to Spanish rule, and he wishes to use this website as a source. If editors here think there is no COI issue then I will drop the matter, both here and at RSN. The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 13:42, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not aware that being a web developer is actually a crime, or money for it needs to be declared to anyone apart from the tax authorities. Since our first encounter on wikipedia some years ago The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick has been in my face about everything. He has attempted to get me banned alleging I am a banned user engaged in sockpuppetry which is not the case, and complained that the website gibnews.net is not a reliable source. These things have been resolved and this is yet another manifestation of his harassment.

For the record I wrote the scripts and templates for gibnews.net. The domain is owned by a company. That is a separate legal entity to me. I find it to be a useful resource and others do too. It has primary sources which are not available anywhere else. The information is from significant reliable entities, for example:

• The Government of Gibraltar
• The Police
• The Governors office
• The Opposition
• The Ministry of Defence

The content is provided by the above and the site terms of use make it clear that content is not edited and that it is a free service. I do not consider there is any conflict of interest. The fact that I have a similar username on wikipedia is a co-incidence - I chose the name some years ago and its not been a problem. Its as good a name as any, and less pretentious than some.

Neither the content providers, or myself are using links on wikipedia for promotional purposes and given the nature of the above, who comprise the largest contributors and most likely to generate useful links, are of a non-commercial nature.

As regards the suggestion of a political motive, Yes I am totally against 'returning' Gibraltar to Spain that is as absurd as 'returning' Florida to Spain. Its no secret, and its a view that 99.3% of the Gibraltar population share. I fail to see a conflict of interest except with the above editor who may feel differently, but he lives somewhere else, and its none of his business.

If anyone else wants to ask questions, please do. --Gibnews (talk) 15:31, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You give the impression that the above organizations are giving the content to you and have therefore endorsed your site as an accurate and complete repository of their historical press releases. This is not the case (for the organizations above). You take material from their site (which would be a reliable source) and archive it on your site (which may or may not be a reliable source), and you use it in the Gibraltar article (which could present a COI). The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 15:54, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've posted the terms of service of gibnews.net several times, and explained how it works I do not take material from websites it is supplied to Gibnews.net either directly by the content providers -or- by email so what goes happens is with the explicit consent of the providers. That is what it says and that is what happens. Although do I appreciate your twisting, as you did trying to accuse me of sockpuppetry,But I really think its time to give it a rest. If you want to 'scrutinise all my edits' as you claim on my userpage, the next forum will be the one that deals with wp:harass. --Gibnews (talk) 21:57, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I first came across this on the reliable sources noticeboard, and have previously expressed my concerns about The Red Hat's interaction with Gibnews (the editor) (see WP:RSN#Gibnews.net and User talk:Thryduulf#Personal Attacks. Based on everything that Gibnews has said at the reliable sources noticeboard, I don't see that there is any basis for suspecting that Gibnews (the editor) has a conflict of interest when using press releases by third parties hosted at Gibnews.net. Thryduulf (talk) 17:17, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. This should not be a problem. I see no COI. Kittybrewster ☎ 17:36, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Fine on the COI then. However, I must say that it's a pity that Thryduulf is unable to separate in his mind scrutiny and personal attacks. It might do him well to remember that we wouldn't even have had this discussion had Gibnews not twice threatened legal action against me (now retracted) for suggesting that his site was not a WP:RS. Anyway, that is the last I shall say on the matter. The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 18:08, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This looks like forum shopping to me. Keep it at the reliable sources noticeboard. Pfainuk talk 18:09, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For God's sake. At the RS board an editor said it's a COI matter, and as I said in my post "If editors here think there is no COI issue then I will drop the matter, both here and at RSN." I just said "fine" above, did I not? The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 18:11, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Right. My browser for some reason didn't warn me of the edit conflict there. Since you seem happy with the response here, I have no issue. Pfainuk talk 18:14, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm starting to sense harassment here. Tan | 39 00:39, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

On what basis exactly? Don't reply here, reply on my talk page. The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 01:15, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No reply, so I take this to be an unjustified accusation. The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 13:05, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry to come to this late, but I'd say the chief problem here is that gbnews.net is clearly a partisan personal website. A skim through its content shows that it exclusively aggregates news within a framework sympathetic to continued British ownership of Gibraltar ("We invite organisations based in Gibraltar ..." guarantees such a bias). Individual news items are verifiable, but the selectivity makes it de facto an advocacy site, and I'd treat it a) as an unreliable source and b) in conflict of interest for an editor to want their own advocacy site as a primary source. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 17:33, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Gibnews.net is not an organisation that authors primary source material, it is organisational that hosts and provides permalinks to primary source material authored by third parties. As such I do not think that it matters whether the collection is partisan or not - many sources used in Wikipedia are partisan, we use them to cite that $organisation said/did/thought something, and use a different source to cite that $otherorganisation said/did/thought something else. If one organisation only hosts material from one side of a disagreement, then we just cite the other side using material hosted elsewhere. It is our articles that need to be balanced, not our sources. Thryduulf (talk) 14:27, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Putting aside any personal problems between editors, I think that I to agree with Gordonofcartoon that it really isn't the best source and that it is worrying that an administrator of the site is using it as a reference in controversial topic areas. I found this page linked on the list here - it is clearly not a reliable source and should be treated in a similar way to a blog - i.e. removed. Smartse (talk) 00:31, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For the record, this specific link is on a talk page, not on an article, and it is one of the rare occasions where it was not Gibnews himself adding the link. However, what you have found there does raise another issue which I'm currently mulling over, and may have more to say on later. The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 02:22, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Can somebody explain why this Gibnews guy hasn't been hit with a spamusername block long ago? --Orange Mike | Talk 01:28, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Gibnews explained what happened here [2] "For the avoidance of doubt, I registered my username here shortly after doing some work designing templates for that website, and it seemed a good idea at the time, not realising the amount of hassle I might encounter on Wikipedia from some editors. Later realising there might be some confusion - although its a sufficiently general term - I tried to change my username to something else but it did not work." The general view on that page was that, because he's been editing for so long with that name, it would be silly to do something about it now. Despite my issues with him sometimes, I agree it would not be a good move. The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 02:00, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Orange Mike - my understanding was that only new users could be taken to WP:UAA and therefore gibnews can't be blocked for a violation of new username policy. If we found a new editor doing this now they would be instantly blocked without question. It seems a bit stupid to me. Wikipedia:ORGNAME does state "Since usernames that are the name of a company or group create the appearance of intent to promote that group, accounts with a company or group name as a username are indefinitely blocked." so maybe they could be blocked. To be honest it doesn't seem like that would really help matters though, although if gibnews continues to add more links after warnings then action should be taken. Smartse (talk) 12:13, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Given that the reason for such blocks is that they can create the appearance of a conflict of interest, and it has been established above that Gibnews (the editor) does not have a conflict of interest with the organisations that produce the sources (e.g. the Government of Gibraltar) hosted on Gibnews.net (a source that the reliable sources noticeboard has declared reliable - it does not alter the press releases), why would they be blocked for this? If they were adding sources about gibnews.net or editing an article about that site, this would be a different matter. However (afaik) nobody has even suggested that gibnews.net is notable enough for a Wikipedia article, so this is moot.

Whether the individual press releases are appropriate citations is a matter for the editors on the talk page of the article(s) concerned. Thryduulf (talk) 14:27, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I would say that the username is sufficiently generic that their could not be an objection to its use in any context. Indeed it has also been used by another unrelated Gibraltar news organisation, Panorama and is their email address on another server. However, at one stage I tried to change the user name and wikipedia is not very good at that. I think this is more a case of looking for excuses to ban me for something. --Gibnews (talk) 23:53, 17 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

FYI: it's actually pretty simple and straightforward to get your username changed. Although, your talk page signatures don't get updated, if that is what you mean. Also, if you are referring to me there, please note I spoke out against a block on your username above. The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 00:02, 18 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There is another site in Gibnews' portfolio, which does NOT fall into the category of a neutral press release archiver, and which has been prolifically linked to on WP. [3] It has pages like this [4] with headings such as "The Struggle Continues" and words such as "Despite the 'best efforts' of Spain and at times the UK Labour Government, We campaigned and we won the right to vote.". And this [5]("It was a demonstration for the old people, who turned out in force. It was a demonstration for the children, who came on foot and on wheels. It was an event that everyone came to, including the workers that the MoD tried to discourage from participating.") used as a reference for text at the Disputed status of Gibraltar. Surely this can't be OK to be appearing in External Links sections and ref cites of articles? The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 21:39, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have raised the reliability issues with this site at [6] The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 23:18, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Gibnet.com is a long running website which is in a number of parts. The section of reference texts are presented 'as is' most of the other material which he objects to consists of commentary on events in Gibraltar. Yes getting to vote in European elections was a struggle, because Spain attempted to block it happening. That is a matter of record. The section there has original documents and links to support everything said.

The description of the 2002 demonstration is moderate and factual. I thought Wikipedia preferred secondary sources and this is one.

Lets face it, this editor has problems with anything from Gibraltar and me in particular. This is just more forum shopping and harassment. --Gibnews (talk) 23:25, 17 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I don't. Yes, Wikipedia uses secondary sources, but ones that are reliable as defined by WP:RS: ones with known reputation as sources (e.g. quality newspapers where there's known editorial oversight and fact-checking).Gibnet.com is just a personal (or at most small-company) website. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 23:50, 17 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Some of the information presented in the documents section of Gibnet.com is not available anywhere else online and its good enough to be cited by the House of Commons library. However this is the COI noticeboard rather than a discussion of reliability, and I see no conflict of interest in the way original documents are presented there. --Gibnews (talk) 09:27, 18 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have to reluctantly agree that if you have any control over the information at the Gibnet site, then linking to it is a conflict of interest because it can be seen as a form of self-promotion. -- Atama頭 16:19, 18 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think someone adding links to their own website is a COI issue for exactly that reason. And a site owner being hostile about the idea of excluding such links - for instance, treating consensus that they fail WP:RS as "a lynch mob" [7] - is not seeing the issue with the required neutrality, which is exactly the territory that WP:COI exists to address. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 23:25, 18 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For the record I designed the site. I did not create the content referenced. Its like banning references to a newspaper made by the man who operates the printing machine. RH has a long history of disputing everything I do on wikipedia and has tried to get me banned, gibnews.net banned and now gibnet.com banned on various noticeboards. He is now removing links without replacing them and the next step will be to remove the content referenced until the pages support a different view of reality. His allegations of me using an IP to revert him are unfounded. --Gibnews (talk) 15:47, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Gibnews, I suggest you help me find alternative sources for the links you have posted to gibnet.com. I've already started and am finding it relatively easy. e.g. [8] I noticed another helpful individual chipped in with another almost immediately [9] The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick ^t 00:10, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Its very easy to delete things, but unless you replace links with ones that are as good, its very negative. --Gibnews (talk) 15:47, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Gibnews, I asked that references which were not appropriate were removed, as such references give an incorrect sense of accuracy. Indeed, they should, preferably, be replaced by a better reference, but an inappropriate reference or no reference is similar, the information in Wikipedia is not asserted. I see that you started helping finding alternative sources where possible, if you think that there are specific sources which are un-replaceable, then please, report them to the talkpage (and if you wish, to me), and we will see. Note that the last two references that were added and removed were both very likely replaceable! It would be good if the person removing the reference would help in finding an alternative, but the inclusion and proof of it being worthy of inclusion is still with the person who included the information. When that is disputed, revert and discuss. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 16:13, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Brandon Paris (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) - I found this article today and tagged it-for obvious reasons-but also noticed that its likely the subjects wife/girlfriend, Reneelavigueur (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), created teh page and has been main contribtor. _{(unsigned comment by [[User:65.68.72.78]]) Smartse (talk) 14:23, 20 February 2010 (UTC)}[reply]

• It's not just likely, she actually added the phrase "Brandon married Renee Lavigueur in July 28th, 2007. Renee has also been involved with the marketing of Brandon's music to this present date." to the article herself. See this diff: [10]. This looks very clear to me. Smocking (talk) 01:23, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We should assume good faith on Reneelavigueur's part, they have noted on their userpage that they are here to write about Brandon Paris but not to promote him. Unfortunately there are problems related to their editing though as they are a single purpose account and the articles created have original research and some are not about notable subjects. The bio is now at AfD here. They have also created a number of articles about songs which clearly do not meet WP:NSONG so I've proposed these for deletion. Smartse (talk) 14:23, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• One the one hand g Good faith is a reasonable assumption, especially because the COI is so easy to see. She's editing under her real name and makes their marriage clear in the article (although not on her user page). It's also largely written in a remarkably neutral tone for an article by a single purpose account with such a major conflict of interest. On the other, I just found out she also tried to turn a good and much more notable article about Shaggy's hit It Wasn't Me into one about another song with same title by Brandon's band [11]. Although she just might not have known how to make a disambiguation page, that's still pretty inexcusable. Smocking (talk) 14:52, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That was in August 2008, and was immediately reverted by Cluebot. It looks like an honest mistake by a newbie to me - especially as the song wasn't even called "it wasn't me". Smartse (talk) 16:07, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• Point conceded as she also said it was a mistake on her talk page (didn't see that before as it looked like part of the warning), so I guess she deserves the benefit of the doubt. Sorry for the bad faith on my part. The notability of some songs is a discussion for the AfD. Smocking (talk) 16:22, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Klar sagen (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - Just happened to notice an edit by Klar sagen(contribs) to the Medical Imaging article that added a link to http://www.snark09.com/. In addition to placing more of such links on other pages, this user almost exclusively and regularly (>20 occurences) adds references to one particular book on medical imaging (Herman, G. T., Fundamentals of computerized tomography: Image reconstruction from projection, 2nd edition, Springer, 2009), which mentions this piece of software according to [12]. www.snark09.com is affiliated with the Discrete Imaging and Graphics Group of CUNY as evident from the link at the bottom and it appears that Gabor T. Herman is as well [13]. This was probably done in good faith, but it still constitutes refspamming and clear WP:COI continuing despite an earlier warning. Smocking (talk) 00:56, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I was invited to comment here by User:Smocking. I had previously posted at this noticeboard regarding much the same sort of issue. At the time, the user's substantial contributions consisted exclusively of adding references to books by Gabor Herman to a swathe of articles related to medical imaging. The complaint was ultimately dismissed because no one could find a conflict of interests. Although I do rather object to the summary manner in which the original complaint was dismissed: adding references exclusively to the publications of a single author is a fairly clear indication that one has a COI, is it not? I did not pursue the matter further at the noticeboard, although I would like to comment for the purposes of this discussion that "Klar Sagen" is almost certainly a pseudonym, meaning "say clearly" in German. So the fact that "Klar Sagen" is not the name of the author of the added references means nothing. In connection with my own dispute, I ultimately sought outside input from User:Billlion, an established Wikipedia editor whose opinion I trust, and who also at one time or another (I believe) worked on the mathematics of medical imaging. He assured me that the edit to the Radon transform article was a good one. Perhaps someone should again solicit his input, since I am sure he can comment more authoritatively on the overall suitability of these references than I can. Sławomir Biały (talk) 13:11, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

About the usefulness of his references and comments: I happen to be a graduate student and also used to work in another institute in the same field. Note that I do not have a COI as I do not work there any more since December. It's rather hard to check the references as he never mentions [14] on what page of this 300-page [15] (google books: [16]) his claims or reason for adding the reference are supposedly verified. In practically the only non-trivial edit beyond adding the suspected refspam, he (after adding the ref to another phrase) outright deleted a sentence that outlined a major limitation (speed) of Iterative reconstruction without much explanation [17]. He only said in the edit summary that it is outdated. As far as I know, this is still a limitation and it is frequently reported as such. In fact, a PhD in the SPECT group of the aforementioned institute always ran these computations over the weekend! There are some newer algorithms that can improve things, but they have drawbacks and none of them are nearly as fast as traditional filtered backprojection. If an algorithm exists for doing this as fast as FBP with all the benefits of iterative reconstruction, making this disadvantage "outdated", I would certainly like to know about it. Gabor T. Herman would definitely know better than to just dismiss this; he really is an established member of the field. This looks more like a student or PhD of his. In any case his affiliation to the Discrete Imaging and Graphics Group of CUNY seems glaringly obvious. Such a COI is just as severe as a corporate COI in my opinion, because groups and institutes often receive funding based on how much their publications are cited. It is also an increasingly widespread practice among researchers to use Wikipedia to get a quick glance at a concept and look for related scholarly literature, which may then in turn be quoted in scientific publications. Although it is strictly prohibited to cite without reading the source, such things are alarmingly common and rarely caught by reviewers (New Scientist reported on this trend in 2002 [18]). Smocking (talk) 14:23, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Just to get some clarity (no pun intended, for speakers of German): is the evidence of affiliation to the CUNY group just based on the exchange at Medical imaging: [19]? Besides referencing the book by Herman, are there any other edits that would suggest an affiliation with the CUNY group? Sławomir Biały (talk) 15:17, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Like I explained in the first edit, www.snark09.com (proprietary software that Klar sagen has linked from wikipedia several times) is affiliated to the CUNY DIG group as clearly evident from the phrase "Page designed by Joanna Klukowska for Discrete Imaging and Graphics Group (DIG)" on the footer of its webpage (http://www.snark09.com/). His other edits consist mainly of adding the aforementioned references to many different articles and editing Gabor Herman (yes, the very same CUNY DIG researcher), an article full of peacock words. His only edits not directly related to the CUNY DIG group are a few minor changes to Marilyn Kirsch. There might also be a COI with her, but that is not the subject here and there's no evidence beyond her also living in New York. Smocking (talk) 16:17, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Forgot to add that Gabor Herman is the head of the CUNY DIG group, according to his bio [20]. I've copied all these external links from contributions of Klar sagen, so this does not fall under WP:OUTING. Smocking (talk) 16:32, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• DominatorMatrix (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - Apparently I am violating COI. See here. I do not believe that I am violating COI, but this serves as a second opinion. Dominator Matrix 11:35, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Self-published blog that the owner wants to use as a reference in an article about a product - not only is it a clear COI, it also fails RS by a mile. The author is not an acknowledge expert in this area, the blog has not been highlighted anyway as reliable and the use in that article is not to document claims about the owner of the blog (which is one of the narrow exceptions for the use of such a blog - for supporting factual claims about the owner and not in a way that is self-serving). --Cameron Scott (talk) 11:43, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If we're talking about this as a source, agreed 100% with Cameron Scott. It's not a reliable source as defined by WP:RS, and it's a clear COI for a blog's owner to add a link to it (unless there's a consensus that it's within content polices). Gordonofcartoon (talk) 12:06, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It would never fly under any of our exceptions about blogs because he is using the blog to make claims about a third-party. --Cameron Scott (talk) 12:20, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Fine choose as you may. I am no longer active here so I couldn't care less. --Dominator Matrix 22:18, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

UShareSoft (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) - unnotable company currently under AfD

Catherinenuel (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - UShareSoft's marketing coordinator [21] and cross-wiki spammer [22]

The following two are suspected meatpuppets (see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Catherinenuel). All accounts only made edits related to UShareSoft, its AfD and later its SPI.

Topy_w (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Obourdon38 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

These two users are also involved, but are much less disruptive and seem to be acting in good faith:

Ejulien34 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Jgweir (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Issues:

• Spamming (see Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam#UShareSoft)
• Obvious WP:COI for Catherinenuel and very likely for the others as well
• Vandalizing the AfD [23] Smocking (talk) 19:02, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't sweat it. The meatpuppets are pretty obvious in that AfD and their !votes are weak on policy and probably wouldn't be counted by a closing admin. Unless someone finds some evidence of notability for the company, that article will be deleted and it's likely that the marketing folks for the company will move on from Wikipedia. -- Atama頭 23:03, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For the curious, I've identified more people from above. Ejulien34 is likely Eric Julien, who has spammed a couple of web sites about this software he "found" called UShareSoft. Jgweir is pretty clearly James Weir, Chief Technology Officer and co-founder of the company (I confronted him about that fact in the AfD). Obourdon38 is Olivier Bourdon, another co-founder of the company (and "technology guru"). I haven't figured out who "Topy_w" is, but I don't doubt that they are affiliated with the company as well. -- Atama頭 23:40, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Geo-plus (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
User creating new articles and adding subsections to others about products of geoplus.com. Also, user's user page seems to be a promotional piece for the company. --CliffC (talk) 21:12, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I forgot to add that I deleted their user page as a clear advertisement. The articles they've created should be looked at as well, I don't see any of them qualifying for speedy deletion, but a proposed deletion might be appropriate. -- Atama頭 22:32, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your speedy action; it's much appreciated. CliffC (talk) 22:38, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Legalprteam (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - This user has been making some rather suspicious edits to McKenna Long & Aldridge (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). I suspect that there is some sort of third-party COI issue going on here. Eastlaw ^talk ⁄ _contribs 22:35, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Definitely suspicious. I softblocked the account, because it seems to represent a group rather than an individual, and is a violation of WP:NOSHARE. They're free to create a new account or request a name change, however. Aside from that, they may be affiliated with the firm but we'll see what happens. -- Atama頭 22:56, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Unblocked for UNC with a warning about COI and NLT. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 18:20, 23 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'd meant to unblock but got distracted, thanks for taking care of that. Just a note that the account has been renamed to User:Legalprgirl. I now know for a fact that the editor has a very strong COI with the article, but will not say in what way per our outing rules. I've warned her that her edits have been questioned and informed her of this noticeboard discussion, and strongly suggested that she participate. -- Atama頭 22:37, 23 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• Legalprgirl (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• McKenna Long & Aldridge (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Editor has admitted on her talk page that she is the "legal PR manager for McKenna Long." She's now edit-warring on the article itself. Admin talking-to and intervention needed. THF (talk) 16:10, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I sent her an email last night with some advice, and it looks like she's following it. I suggested that she take her issues to the talk page of the article. My advice to her was after the edit war. I think she means well, her intention is only to update the article's information. My concern is that the firm may want to exert some control over the article, and that can't happen. I'm hoping that there can be a compromise worked out. She's a cooperative person but she's new to Wikipedia, so we should go easy on her a bit. Sometimes editors with conflicts of interest can actually be of benefit to an article, because they have knowledge of the subject that others wouldn't, but we also have to take care that everything is verifiable. -- Atama頭 17:25, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree; I don't even object to COI editors editing pages, but just had a preference that someone else approach this editor. The problem comes when there's both COI and either NPOV and/or WP:OWN problems. THF (talk) 03:42, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This Kansas City ad agency represents a number of for-profit colleges and other educational institutions. They claim to specialize in building websites and using social networks to publicize their schools. We seem to have an editor JohnWhite82 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) whose only edits have been to create an article about this Ad Agency and some of its apparent clients. The articles have undergone PRODs and AfDs. 64.126.108.214 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) also edits these articles and adds Gragg Advertising to another ad agency's article Becker Media listing Gragg as a competitor. It is possible that this is a case of paid editing. Racepacket (talk) 10:53, 23 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have PRODed Gragg Advertising and Environmental Technical Institute. Racepacket (talk) 11:10, 23 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• Shamir1 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - I'm concerned that Shamir1 may have a conflict of interests editing the Washington Institute for Near East Policy article.

Short version - Shamir1 has been blocked for edit warring and violating 3RR on this same article for the better part of the last few months, and received a 12-month topic ban on this article. He stated that he was "personally familiar" with one of their scholars, and made what I felt was a highly biased statement, describing the group as "prestigious... taken the most seriously by the State Department". He has declined my requests for clarification on those two statements twice now, so I'm bringing the issue here, in the hopes that someone else can maybe convince him to explain his association with the group. ← George ^talk 06:04, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Long version - On October 27, 2009, Shamir1 wrote: "I am personally familiar with one of the scholars".[24] I replied the same day, expressing my concern with the statement.[25] The conversation went back and forth for a bit, but never really got anywhere as Shamir1 was blocked for 48 hours two days later for violating 3RR on the same article, then blocked for 72 hours four days after that for edit warring so soon after his block was lifted (again, on the same article), and then blocked for 3 months about a month later, this time for long-term edit warring, also on the same article. About a month into his 3 month block, Shamir1 had his block replaced with a 12-month topic ban by the Ban Appeals Subcommittee. The specific terms he agreed to on this were: 1) You are banned from editing Washington Institute for Near East Policy for a period of one year; 2) You are formally warned to avoid any type of edit-warring or ownership of articles especially returning periodically to revert to a preferred version. Repetition of these behaviours will lead to the block being reinstated.[26]

He returned to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy article shortly thereafter, and began discussing his concerns on the talk page, and filing an RfC - things I support and was encouraged by. However, on February 1, 2010, he wrote: "WINEP is a prestigious think tank and taken the most seriously by the State Department."[27] This struck me as a highly biased POV which, combined with his earlier statement about being "personally familiar with one of the scholars", had me concerned. I expressed my concern, replying: "I'm extremely worried about your assessment that 'WINEP is a notable think tank and taken the most seriously by the State Department', especially in the context of your previous statement that you are 'personally familiar with one of the scholars'. I strongly question if you have a conflict of interest in this article, and ask that you explicitly explain what you meant by being 'personally familiar' with a WINEP scholar."[28] Shamir1 declined to elaborate, stating: "Wow. Way to beat around the bush and twist words around. I will not address your last-resort nonsense. It does not deserve a response."[29] I again requested some clarification, stating: "I'm not sure what I'm supposedly trying to find a 'last-resort' around, but the question still stands, and I'd appreciate if you could describe what you meant when you said you were 'personally familiar' with one of their scholars," and suggesting that I was considering bringing the COI issue up here.[30] Shamir1 again declined, saying "I will not respond to any of the ridiculous statements or analogies, most of which have already been needlessly dragged on."[31] ← George ^talk 06:13, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• I notified Shamir1 of this filing. ← George ^talk 19:46, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Completely unfounded. The trivial sentence he notes (from several months ago) had nothing to do with a conflict of interest as George all of the sudden tries to suggest. It was made in parentheses to demonstrate its insignificance, and I explicitly noted that it had nothing to do with the content of the article or the edits. User:George has been editing tendentiously and other editors have agreed that some of his edits have poisoned the well and violated NPOV. I have made very careful and considerate edits to the talk page of the article that addresses the concerns of the editors (myself included) and that of User:George. His attacking me personally is not justified, and he did not demonstrate that any edit or concern specifically is original research or a conflict of interest. My concerns are on par with Wikipedia policy, including reliable sources and neutral point of view.

Erroneous is his idea that it is my personal suggestion that the Washington Institute is the Middle East think tank "taken the most seriously by the State Department." Those are not my words, but from The Guardian: "The Washington Institute is considered the most influential of the Middle East thinktanks, and the one that the state department takes most seriously. Its director is the former US diplomat, Dennis Ross."[32] This source also appeared on the article's page. He falsely claims it was my "assessment" that the Washington Institute is prestigious but I only mentioned that in context of what the lead should say, similar to the notability described in the Heritage Foundation, University of California, Berkeley, and Harvard University. This was in regards to the presence of secretaries of state on the institute's board. I did not under any circumstances suggest that prestigious = great, flawless, etc., and I was very clear about that. My edits include verifiable criticism; George and I do not have a disagreement over the inclusion of that.

All of my suggestions and concerns (largely understandable to other editors) are legitimate and have nothing to do with a conflict of interest. I have been a responsible editor and invited a request for comment. An editor's attempt to intentionally silence or stigmatize another editor for his concerns is not appreciated.

In regards to George's summary of our discussion and chosen words of mine, those had to with different issues on the discussion page, namely, what seemed to be his erroneous summing up of "my" positions that I already carefully explained differently. I declined to wrestle in the mud over his insistence over little things (i.e., his asking that I do not call the paragraph he wrote to be "George's sentence"). I kindly asked to stick with discussion over article content.

--Shamir1 (talk) 20:18, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Let me be as clear as I can here Shamir1 - I'm entirely open to working with other editors on neutral compromises, but I'm not interested in working with editors who harbor conflicts of interest, because they lead to inherent biases. Based on your statement that you are "personally familiar" with one of the groups scholars, and given your attachment to this article in particular (to the point of being topic banned from editing it for 12 months), I've asked you - repeatedly - to explain this relationship. I'm well aware you consider the issue to be ancillary, or just don't consider conflicts of interest to be important. I disagree, and find your reluctance to discuss the issue suspicious. ← George ^talk 20:39, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Here's the deal Shamir1, you voluntarily stated that you were "personally familiar". You opened that door, so being coy about it doesn't help. It will go a long way to inspiring faith in you if you explained it, you don't have to name names or out yourself or anything. But you're playing games here, and that's not good. You're trying to portray yourself as an expert in these matters by "name-dropping" without actually mentioning names. But that's a two-edged sword, once you try to use that as a discussion tool you're inviting suspicion. It's like editing a pop star's article, and then trying to make your point at the talk page that you speak with authority because you're friends with the star. Be careful about pulling out that card.

If you were exaggerating, or want to otherwise retract your statement, that's acceptable. If so I'd suggest that George drop it. Usually with conflicts of interest, if the editor hasn't engaged in any behavior that would warrant a block absent the COI, then the harshest penalty given is to enforce the suggestions made in WP:COI; that the editor refrain from making non-controversial edits to the article and only make suggestions on the talk page. The ban that's in effect is already stronger than what the COI guidelines suggest, so any proposed remedy for the COI would be moot. -- Atama頭 21:07, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with Atama. I retract that statement and apologize if I invited suspicion or tried to bolster my credentials through rather foolish means. It was never played up and made no difference in regards to editing. The erroneous case here solves nothing. Looking for yet another way possible to stigmatize and silence an editor is irresponsible and wrong. I have worked hard to make a reasonable, factual, and comprehensive edit (see talk) that encompasses all of our concerns (including George's) and stands to WP:NPOV. If George is open to compromises as he says he is, I suggest he consider this. --Shamir1 (talk) 23:44, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I don't see what else is actionable, as I said before the existing ban is harsher than the usual COI sanctions already. George, would you be fine with just forgetting that one-time remark from before? Do you have any other reasons to suspect a COI? (Keep in mind that a COI does not equate to having a particular POV, though the two are often related.) -- Atama頭 23:47, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Atama, my suspicions were based solely on Shamir1's own statements and proclivities for edit warring on this article. Given his retraction of the statement above, and his abiding by the existing ban, I'm hopefully that even if he has (or had) a conflict of interests, he won't let it spill over into his edits. Thanks much. ← George ^talk 01:01, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• ArtistReport (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - has created a long stream of articles about a marginal figure, Nat Christian, and any film, no matter how incredibly obscure, which Christian was involved in; is also editing existing articles to add links to Nat Christian films. All this user (real name apparently "Carey Moreno") seems to be doing is trying to build up this Nat Christian's profile in Wikipedia. The articles are lousy: titles in all-caps (I've fixed that), no sources except for links to the IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes. Orange Mike | Talk 16:38, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• Here is where the editor named themselves as "Carey Moreno", so there is no outing on Mike's behalf. -- Atama頭 17:32, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• Showninner888 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is making edits to sanitise the biography of Andrew Landeryou. In December, I expanded the article based on sources after it had been at AfD. Since then, a series of IP editors have repeatedly tried to remove mention of details that Landeryou might not like. The article has been semi-protected three times now. Upon the latest semi-protection, this account has picked up the baton, and has now twice removed verified information and inserted peacock phrasing about the article subject, and wording that does not match the sources.[33] This editor and all the anonymous IPs refuse to discuss their editing (and I'm getting pretty tired of it). Fences&Windows 02:48, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• User has enough unrelated edits to suggest it is not an SPA. Looks more like a few (perhaps biased) users/IPs became involved in an edit war. Their sources are generally pretty crappy, but I think someone's blog is acceptable for "He has said he is not a member of a political party" if it matches the source here [34]. I cannot help but notice that you seem to be an active party in the edit war and are using rollback privileges for reverting edits that do not look like obvious vandalism (e.g. [35], [36] and [37]). Use of rollback in the context of an edit war is questionable and has led to RfCs before. I agree that the editors should take it to the talk page instead of continuing the edit war, but perhaps you would do well to stick with the undo feature for a while until another admin has taken a look at it or at least until their COI is established. Smocking (talk) 18:51, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'll start off by saying not all of their edits are bad. I'm looking at their contributions and I see some positive contributions, such as removing weasel words, and expanding a lead, or clarifying a sentence, or wikifying (though that last attempt was a clumsy one I later fixed). My point is that this isn't a disruption-only account, in fact, their edits outside of the Andrew Landeryou article are all good ones.

I also don't see an actual conflict of interest. I don't know if you're seeing some evidence of a connection between this editor and the article subject that I can't. Were the IPs from before shown to be coming from an organization connected to Landeryou, or did they make some comment declaring as much? Remember that a person can violate WP:NPOV without having a conflict of interest, for example I might be a huge fan of Conan O'Brien (and I somewhat am, actually) and if I acted to make certain that the article only had positive things to say about him, I still wouldn't have a COI because I don't have any actual connection to him. If I was a relative or friend, or worked for him, or anything like that then I'd have a COI.

Back to the edits, it might be worth taking the editor, the IPs, and User:Carola56 to WP:SPI. Or you can simply ask the editor if they're the same person. They started editing at about the same time that Carola56 stopped editing (there's a 1 day overlap). I agree with you that the editor's reluctance to discuss matters is very troubling. That alone, the insistence on engaging in edit wars without discussion, that might be enough for an indefinite block. If this was a disruption-only account, I'd do so, but as I showed above this isn't. Perhaps the most appropriate action, if the editor refuses to engage in discussion about the article, is a topic ban. Their disruption seems limited to that one article, so a topic ban would allow them to continue to be productive in areas where they are doing good, while forcing them to avoid the area where they are causing trouble. -- Atama頭 20:57, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The edits earlier this month before starting editing on Andrew Landeryou look like they were preparing the account to be auto-confirmed so they'd be able to edit once the article was semi-protected (after two previous stretches of semi-protection, they were prepared this time). Smocking, look at their latest edits and see how they're massaging quotes and removing cited information, you seem to be missing the detail of their edits (and whether I undo or rollback is really splitting hairs, but I will refrain from using that option from now on). I was considering an SPI (I don't believe there is more than one person behind all those accounts and IPs, they've been trying to make exactly the same edits), but the IPs have been jumping all over the place so I'm not sure that checkuser will be very enlightening. Most of the IPs locate to Melbourne, which is where Andrew Landeryou is based. Fences&Windows 03:50, 27 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• snowded (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has been editing the page Neuro-linguistic programming with an agenda to preserve a hatchet job on NLP. Most recently he has repeatedly opposed the inclusion of a reference to a paper by Diamantopoulos, Woolley and Spann of the University of Birmingham's Digital Systems and Vision Processing group in the journal "Current Research in NLP Vol 1" edited by Paul Tosey of the University of Surrey's School of Management. The relevance of the paper is that it rebuts many of the arguments currently on the page. His justification for this is that the journal is published by ANLP, the professional NLP body in the UK. He has multiple conflicts of interest. Firstly, according to his comments on Talk:Neuro-linguistic_programming he was formerly a visiting fellow at Surrey University and is personally acquainted with staff in the School of Management. In his own words: "I have never been impressed with the Surrey group from when I had a visiting fellowship there." Secondly, he is the Editor-in-chief of a management journal, so he is opposing the recognition of one of his professional competitors. Thirdly, he makes his living in Management Consultancy and so is competing with the many NLP practitioners also making a living in this field. AJRG (talk) 13:47, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This is really tedious, an editor trying to drag a content dispute into this forum.

• The "journal" referenced by this editor (who is largely a single purpose one around NLP issues over the last few months) is published by a NLP advocacy group. Given that I have asked him for additional sources. Its also just a set of conference proceedings not a normal journal anyway.
• As I have already told him I have no personal acquaintance with the members of staff involved, but I do think that Surrey has had a tendency to take up "popular" causes and its claims should be treated carefully as a result.
• The journal of which I am a Chief Editor is a complex adaptive systems journal, and has noting whatsoever to do with NLP
• I do some management consultancy, some academic work and also software development. To my knowledge I have never ever competed with an NLP practitioner. My user page allows anyone to find out who I am and my interests. This is deliberate, I believe in transparency.
• I have a broad range of interests in WIkipedia, one of those is popular management movements which make claims in science that lack substance. A previous such claim (of which this editor is aware) here has already been dismissed. It seems that this is a tactic to remove editors from discussion
• The phrase "hatchet job" is typical of the level of discourse from this editor. I asked him on his talk page to address content issues and his report here appears to be the result

--Snowded ^TALK 14:17, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There is no COI here. Per WP:COI#Citing oneself, "Editing in an area in which you have professional or academic expertise is not, in itself, a conflict of interest." The COI guideline can be vague in many ways, but it's pretty specific in saying that an editor who edits articles related to his field of expertise is not considered a COI. I agree that this is an attempt to end a content dispute by eliminating the input of an editor with a different POV. Hash this out on the article talk page, and pursue dispute resolution if you can't come to an agreement, but this isn't a matter for this noticeboard. -- Atama頭 23:34, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Russian Wikipedia (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) - clear conflict of interest between RuWiki Administrators and other users. SkyBon^{Talk/Contributions} 16:10, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• I confirm, that some sysops from Russian Wikipedia pushing their point of view.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 16:23, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
• There are also reasons to suspect meatpuppetry as all of the party was inactive in the EnWiki until today. SkyBon^{Talk/Contributions} 16:33, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) There's sock/meatpuppetry involved, too. I just blocked Захама Ассотаре (talk · contribs). Rock It!, could you please explain how you suddenly heard about this dispute after being inactive for weeks? JamieS93^❤ 16:36, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• It was the topicstarter (who is ruwiki editor himself) who kept posting his own original research about alleged persecution of dissidents in ruwiki without any secondary sources. BTW, here is 3RR violation: [38], [39], [40], [41]. And Rock It! keeps stalking of another ruwiki user both here and in ruwiki (by single purpose accounts) [42], [43], [44] and many more. Actually almost all his edits here were stalking of ruwiki users. Probably that will explain something. --Blacklake (talk) 16:47, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

By the way you, Track13 and Alex Smotrov were inactive until 16:00 UTC today when COI started. Probably _that_ will explain something. SkyBon^{Talk/Contributions} 17:00, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I read about the issue in LJ too. And it was you who gave the link here. --Blacklake (talk) 19:39, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I read in LiveJournal, that RuWiki admins pushing their POV, and I decided that I should intervene. Of course, you can ask me, do I have any additional accounts? Yes, I have, but I don't used its for sockpuppet-violations.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 17:48, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Could you please comment on the diffs above? --Blacklake (talk) 19:39, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments, you need a comments? Okay, you get a comments. You are just an operator, and nothing else. Your party of operators must be blocked for an infinite period in all Wikimedia projects. Your party written extremally bad articles like Калан, and pushing it to featured articles. For reference, this article have more than 100 factual errors, a lot of copyright violations and it is featured article (more information at wikireality.ru/wiki/Полное_собрание_ошибок_в_статье_Калан._Том_1). Any attempts to right the wrong were revert and users, who corrected this article were banned. All errors are in article now. And my articles that contains super-rare material were deleted by same admins who reverted the correction. Do you mean IT when you asked me an comments for my violations after indefinite ban due insults in Live Journal? If not — shut up, please, and don't waste my time.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 20:10, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Blacklake is one of ruwiki administrators who deleted perfectly normal articles written by Rock It! in ruwiki. These administrators follow the philosophy that they call "Philosophy of border control". According to this philosophy, ruwiki users who come out of favor of ruwiki administrators should be kept out of Wikipedia by all possible means, even if they do not violate Wikipedia rules. In this episode, Rock It! wrote several very good articles which were all deleted by ruwiki administrators not because the articles were bad, but because they were authored by Rock It! whom these administrators personally dislike. In case the other members of this flash mob show up, here is the list of administrators who deleted Rock It!'s articles: Grebekov, Blacklake, Mstislavl, Yaroslav Blanter, Claymore. SA ru (talk) 18:20, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You for some reason forgot to mention that the article I deleted had been created by the indefblocked user and contained personal attacks in the edit summary. It has nothing to do with personal preferences, hasn't it? --Blacklake (talk) 19:39, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Lie, Blacklake, and you know it. My articles does not cntain any attacks in first versions, but some operators deleted it only because author is me.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 19:55, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Certainly. "Indefinitely blocked" is the stigma that you used to justify your own disruptive behavior. I do not believe you that the article that you deleted contained personal attacks in the edit summary. Could you please show us this edit summary? SA ru (talk) 20:24, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Actually we're discussing not the edit summary in another project, but the behaviour of certain users who added their own OR in the article and engaged in edit warring. Let's not forget about it. And since than Rock It! has insulted me few more time just above. But anyway, I'll answer: the edit summary read that another sysop was an idiot. Of course I realize that Rock It! does not regard the word "idiot" as an insult (see comments above). Actually I believe that Rock It! account should be indefblocked since its contribution consists of trolling, personal attacks and edit warring only. --Blacklake (talk) 20:57, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Stop lying! There NO any attacks in first version of article. And troll are you. Enough to see your contribution in Russian Wikipedia to deduce that.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 21:28, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

See my reply to SA ru below. What's wrong with my contribution in ruwiki? 3 FAs and 5 GAs. --Blacklake (talk) 22:15, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I can certainly understand your desire to block Rock It! as soon as possible, but let's not hurry with that and try first to restore the exact sequence of events. Isn't it the following:

1) Rock It! published a perfectly normal article in ruwiki with a perfectly normal edit comment.

2) One of the admins (you or another one from the list above) recognized that the article was created by Rock It! and immediately deleted it -- not because the article had problems or the edit description was insulting, but only because the article was written by a stigmatized user.

3) After the article was deleted, Rock It! reposted it with a comment "Such and such administrator is an idiot because he deleted my good article". In this situation such comment is very understandable, although it could be toned done to something like: "I am reposting my article previously deleted by the administrator who acted incorrectly".

So, do I understand correctly that you deleted the article repost, not the original article? If so, this makes some sense. However, why didn't you restore the original copy of the article? This way you would remove the bad comment, but keep the good article. You do not have to be a rocket scientist to come up with such solution, or do you? Speaking of bad comments, if I remember correctly, :ru:user:MaxSem used to comment his edits with comments like "where do such mudaks come from", and nonetheless he served as a steward. So, we need some consistency here. Some people make impolite comments and become wiki-authorities, the others you suggest are blocked. I actually have an opposite solution to what you are proposing. Why don't you simply unblock Rock It! and let him work on his articles without disturbances. Would not this serve the goal of Wikipedia? SA ru (talk) 21:24, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I did delete the repost. The whole issue was resolved here. And Rock It! should learn to cooperate with the others first. Unfortunately he failed to do it so far. --Blacklake (talk) 22:15, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

OK. You acted correctly, and it was :ru:user:Yaroslav Blanter who deleted the original version of the article which was perfectly valid. This behavior was very disruptive. I do not understand you comment about Rock It! cooperating with the others, though. Rock It! is blocked in ruwiki. So, the only way he can "cooperate with the others" is by posting articles, which he did in full agreement with the rule Wikipedia:Ignore all rules. He cannot really participate in your discussions. And, besides being a bit emotional, he is the one who is right in this situation. Deletion of his articles was clearly inappropriate. SA ru (talk) 22:34, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Uh, LiveJournal is a blog site, it's not exactly news. Anybody can say anything, that doesn't make it true. Woogee (talk) 20:50, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Without getting involved in this COI discussion at all, I am here to inform User:Rock It! that comments such as "Bullshit, Blacklake, and you know it ... some idiots deleted it only because author is me" will not be tolerated. I advise you to moderate your language before you earn a blocking. SGGH ^ping! 21:00, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

These men insulted me, they called me vandal, troll and copyright violator, but this isn't true. I'm not delete my maybe rude comments until they apologize to me, because wrong characterisation of me as "vandal" or "copyright-violater" is very insulting for me. And Blacklake know it.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 21:28, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with SGGH. There is no need to use this vocabulary on this page. Let's just stick to the basic fact that the original versions of your articles did not have any insulting comments, but nonetheless they were deleted in order to punish you. We all can see how easy it is to provoke you to write emotional comments, but it would be only for your benefit if you resist from being provoked. SA ru (talk) 21:42, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Okay.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 21:46, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The basic fact is that the original versions of the articles were published here. As anyone can see, they are not licensed under CC-BY-SA or any compatible license. There is no way of knowing whether any of sockpuppets that posted this content to Wikipedia really belong to the user who published the original version. According to Wikipedia copyright policies, such contributions construe possible copyright violations and must be deleted. --Grebenkov (talk) 21:58, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Grebenkov, accept the wisdom! You thought up this "reason" only because I am author of article. It's absurd that I could create on this source rough copy of article for Wikipedia with the attribution of authorship to never create this article, and you know it.--Rock It! (Prime Jive) (talk) 22:06, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry, but the site you showed (pastebin.com) is not really for publishing articles. It is used just for storage purposes: "Pastebin.com is a website where you can store text for a certain period of time. The website is mainly used by programmers to store pieces of sources code or configuration information, but anyone is more than welcome to paste any type of text. The idea behind the site is to make it more convenient for people to share large amounts of text online. Users have the ability to make private pastings, so they are only visible to the people they choose to share their links with." Besides, the first line of the text on pastebin clearly indicates the author. To me your claims look pretty bogus. And again, if you agree that Rock It!'s articles are good contribution to Wikipedia, why don't you simply unblock him and let him work without ridiculous obstacles created for no reason. (He did not violate any of Wikipedia rules.) SA ru (talk) 22:45, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

(←) Hi Rock It, I've spoken to you before on your old account where I defended you from what I saw as false vandalism warnings. So you know that I have nothing against you. But let me ask you, please keep your disputes with administrators and others on the Russian Wikipedia away from this one. You may have legitimate problems with them there, you may not, but this isn't where to hash that out. I'd suggest you stay away from the article about the Russian Wikipedia also, just so that you don't step on any toes. It is difficult for editors and administrators on this version of Wikipedia to deal with these disputes because we have little knowledge and no authority over what is done there, and it puts us in a tough spot when a fight from there shows up here. -- Atama頭 22:10, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• London Health Sciences Foundation (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Victoria Hospital (London, Ontario) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• London, Ontario (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Noitadnuof (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• 142.158.254.24 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Several articles edited by several users who may have a conflict of interest. The IP user's conflict is clear, as the IP is registered to London Health Sciences Centre. The other user is less clear, but note that the name is "Foundation" spelled backwards, and the user has only edited on this one subject. I don't quite have the time to unravel all this so some help would be appreciated. Rees11 (talk) 16:26, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• User:Lucky4me13 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - I suspect a conflict of interest with this article, Thomas C. Wiegele. Editor has created the article but has admitted that they are related to this person 5 albert square (talk) 22:27, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

LirazSiri (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has a known COI on TurnKey Linux Virtual Appliance Library (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), edits are often blatantly promotional. The user has no contribs other than in this area. Guy (Help!) 23:38, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

there is an employee of Clorox editing the bleach articles trying to minimize the risks of bleach and the carcinogenic and caustic nature of it. can someone stop him and revert his edits? it is user http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:GVB012009 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.246.254.35 (talk) 00:21, 27 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I gotta say... An employee of Clorox whitewashing the bleach article. You can't make this stuff up. But the latest edits to the bleach page were almost a year ago. I think even hydrogen peroxide can have an expiration date. -- Atama頭 05:20, 27 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

even if its old hes edits should be reverted. the bleach article needs major cleanup because of him. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.246.254.35 (talk) 11:38, 27 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]