Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Goodman]

Considering the purpose of wikidata, it might make sense for it to have
somewhat different rules also. Unlike Wikipedia, it is a directory

On Tue, Apr 25, 2017 at 12:56 PM, James Heilman  wrote:

> The terms of use as explained on meta apply to all projects unless an
> alternative is in place. So sister projects do have similar restrictions on
> undisclosed paid editing.
>
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Terms_of_use#4._Refraining_from_Certain_
> Activities
>
> Different projects of course have varied degrees of enforcement of the TOU.
> Italian WP did delete the article in question a couple of times
> https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/AvaTrade
>
> James
>
> On Tue, Apr 25, 2017 at 5:47 AM, Gabriel Thullen 
> wrote:
>
> > I agree wholeheartedly with Vito. Thank you for bringing up this issue.
> > Wikidata is part of the umbrella group of Wikimedia projects. Wikipedia
> has
> > strict rules governing paid editing (at least in EN), and these rules are
> > not even the same across different language editions.
> > Most of the other projects do not have such rules. Wikimedia Commons, for
> > example. Most of us know what product placement is. Do certain
> contributors
> > earn their living from it? Why don't these "sister" projects have similar
> > restrictions on paid contributions?
> >
> > Gabe
> >
> > On Tue, Apr 25, 2017 at 11:35 AM, Vi to  wrote:
> >
> > > We currently have some mean to fight paid editing, terms of services
> are
> > > "easy to violate" thus giving us a straightforward way to take action.
> > But
> > > too often I see something like: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/
> Q16826370
> > > obvious paid editors left totally free to do their job without even
> > > attracting some attention on them.
> > >
> > > Vito
> > >
> > > 2017-04-23 13:58 GMT+02:00 Peter Southwood <
> peter.southw...@telkomsa.net
> > >:
> > >
> > > > I would think this is up to the chapter/affilate organisation, but no
> > > harm
> > > > in getting a more universal collection of opinions.
> > > > Cheers,
> > > >  Peter
> > > >
> > > > -Original Message-
> > > > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org]
> On
> > > > Behalf Of Gabriel Thullen
> > > > Sent: Sunday, 23 April 2017 10:50 AM
> > > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> > > companies
> > > > that offer paid editing services
> > > >
> > > > I suggest another question, right after your #5. Undisclosed paid
> > editing
> > > > is one thing, dealing with disclosed paid editors within our
> community
> > is
> > > > another. You could add the following question:
> > > > "Asking if we agree to let disclosed paid editors occupy key
> positions
> > > > within the Wikimedia movement such as chapter board, official chapter
> > > > spokesperson, affiliate organization board, etc."
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On Sun, Apr 23, 2017 at 6:16 AM, James Salsman 
> > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > I've proposed asking wikimedians at large what they think should be
> > > > > done about paid advocacy editing, as item number 5 on my periodic
> > > > > survey proposal composed of all the unresolved questions over the
> > last
> > > > > quarter on this list at:
> > > > >
> > > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:James_Salsman#
> > > > > Periodic_survey_prototype
> > > > >
> > > > > On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 2:50 PM Pine W 
> wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community
> > > > > > surrounding
> > > > > > > promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an
> > > > > > > outcome resulting in a specific request for assistance or
> > > > > > > increased action by
> > > > > the
> > > > > > > WMF?
> > > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the
> > > > > > discussion on Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board
> > wants
> > > > > > to take the
> > > > > position
> > > > > > that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such
> > > > > > discussion,
> > > > > I
> > > > > > imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might
> be
> > > > > > beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki
> > > > > > discussion.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting
> an
> > > > > official
> > > > > > > response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the
> most
> > > > > > > part consisted of about 6 people?
> > > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they
> can
> > > > > > initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be
> made.
> > I
> > > > > > already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't
> dig
> > > > > > the hole any deeper.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Many others, I am sure, would 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Heilman]

The terms of use as explained on meta apply to all projects unless an
alternative is in place. So sister projects do have similar restrictions on
undisclosed paid editing.

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Terms_of_use#4._Refraining_from_Certain_Activities

Different projects of course have varied degrees of enforcement of the TOU.
Italian WP did delete the article in question a couple of times
https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/AvaTrade

James

On Tue, Apr 25, 2017 at 5:47 AM, Gabriel Thullen 
wrote:

> I agree wholeheartedly with Vito. Thank you for bringing up this issue.
> Wikidata is part of the umbrella group of Wikimedia projects. Wikipedia has
> strict rules governing paid editing (at least in EN), and these rules are
> not even the same across different language editions.
> Most of the other projects do not have such rules. Wikimedia Commons, for
> example. Most of us know what product placement is. Do certain contributors
> earn their living from it? Why don't these "sister" projects have similar
> restrictions on paid contributions?
>
> Gabe
>
> On Tue, Apr 25, 2017 at 11:35 AM, Vi to  wrote:
>
> > We currently have some mean to fight paid editing, terms of services are
> > "easy to violate" thus giving us a straightforward way to take action.
> But
> > too often I see something like: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16826370
> > obvious paid editors left totally free to do their job without even
> > attracting some attention on them.
> >
> > Vito
> >
> > 2017-04-23 13:58 GMT+02:00 Peter Southwood  >:
> >
> > > I would think this is up to the chapter/affilate organisation, but no
> > harm
> > > in getting a more universal collection of opinions.
> > > Cheers,
> > >  Peter
> > >
> > > -Original Message-
> > > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> > > Behalf Of Gabriel Thullen
> > > Sent: Sunday, 23 April 2017 10:50 AM
> > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> > companies
> > > that offer paid editing services
> > >
> > > I suggest another question, right after your #5. Undisclosed paid
> editing
> > > is one thing, dealing with disclosed paid editors within our community
> is
> > > another. You could add the following question:
> > > "Asking if we agree to let disclosed paid editors occupy key positions
> > > within the Wikimedia movement such as chapter board, official chapter
> > > spokesperson, affiliate organization board, etc."
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sun, Apr 23, 2017 at 6:16 AM, James Salsman 
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > > I've proposed asking wikimedians at large what they think should be
> > > > done about paid advocacy editing, as item number 5 on my periodic
> > > > survey proposal composed of all the unresolved questions over the
> last
> > > > quarter on this list at:
> > > >
> > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:James_Salsman#
> > > > Periodic_survey_prototype
> > > >
> > > > On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 2:50 PM Pine W  wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community
> > > > > surrounding
> > > > > > promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an
> > > > > > outcome resulting in a specific request for assistance or
> > > > > > increased action by
> > > > the
> > > > > > WMF?
> > > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the
> > > > > discussion on Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board
> wants
> > > > > to take the
> > > > position
> > > > > that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such
> > > > > discussion,
> > > > I
> > > > > imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might be
> > > > > beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki
> > > > > discussion.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an
> > > > official
> > > > > > response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most
> > > > > > part consisted of about 6 people?
> > > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they can
> > > > > initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be made.
> I
> > > > > already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't dig
> > > > > the hole any deeper.
> > > > >
> > > > > Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
> > > > > > unilaterally made decisions in this area.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > That is possible if WMF were to do something particularly novel, so
> > > > > your sense of caution here is well taken. I would hope that WMF
> > > > > would discuss its plans with the community and have a conversation
> > > > > before actually initiating novel actions.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > > But please be realistic, this is
> > > > > > a coffee table 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gabriel Thullen]

I agree wholeheartedly with Vito. Thank you for bringing up this issue.
Wikidata is part of the umbrella group of Wikimedia projects. Wikipedia has
strict rules governing paid editing (at least in EN), and these rules are
not even the same across different language editions.
Most of the other projects do not have such rules. Wikimedia Commons, for
example. Most of us know what product placement is. Do certain contributors
earn their living from it? Why don't these "sister" projects have similar
restrictions on paid contributions?

Gabe

On Tue, Apr 25, 2017 at 11:35 AM, Vi to  wrote:

> We currently have some mean to fight paid editing, terms of services are
> "easy to violate" thus giving us a straightforward way to take action. But
> too often I see something like: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16826370
> obvious paid editors left totally free to do their job without even
> attracting some attention on them.
>
> Vito
>
> 2017-04-23 13:58 GMT+02:00 Peter Southwood :
>
> > I would think this is up to the chapter/affilate organisation, but no
> harm
> > in getting a more universal collection of opinions.
> > Cheers,
> >  Peter
> >
> > -Original Message-
> > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> > Behalf Of Gabriel Thullen
> > Sent: Sunday, 23 April 2017 10:50 AM
> > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> companies
> > that offer paid editing services
> >
> > I suggest another question, right after your #5. Undisclosed paid editing
> > is one thing, dealing with disclosed paid editors within our community is
> > another. You could add the following question:
> > "Asking if we agree to let disclosed paid editors occupy key positions
> > within the Wikimedia movement such as chapter board, official chapter
> > spokesperson, affiliate organization board, etc."
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Apr 23, 2017 at 6:16 AM, James Salsman 
> wrote:
> >
> > > I've proposed asking wikimedians at large what they think should be
> > > done about paid advocacy editing, as item number 5 on my periodic
> > > survey proposal composed of all the unresolved questions over the last
> > > quarter on this list at:
> > >
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:James_Salsman#
> > > Periodic_survey_prototype
> > >
> > > On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 2:50 PM Pine W  wrote:
> > >
> > > > >
> > > > > Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community
> > > > surrounding
> > > > > promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an
> > > > > outcome resulting in a specific request for assistance or
> > > > > increased action by
> > > the
> > > > > WMF?
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the
> > > > discussion on Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board wants
> > > > to take the
> > > position
> > > > that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such
> > > > discussion,
> > > I
> > > > imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might be
> > > > beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki
> > > > discussion.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an
> > > official
> > > > > response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most
> > > > > part consisted of about 6 people?
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they can
> > > > initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be made. I
> > > > already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't dig
> > > > the hole any deeper.
> > > >
> > > > Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
> > > > > unilaterally made decisions in this area.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > That is possible if WMF were to do something particularly novel, so
> > > > your sense of caution here is well taken. I would hope that WMF
> > > > would discuss its plans with the community and have a conversation
> > > > before actually initiating novel actions.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > But please be realistic, this is
> > > > > a coffee table discussion.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > I have mixed views on this. Wikimedia-l is not a quiet back room
> > > > with
> > > only
> > > > a few people around, but it's true that a consensus here among a
> > > > small number of people who speak up in a particular discussion
> > > > demonstrates a lower level of consensus than an RfC with hundreds of
> > > > participants. It's not clear to me that there is consensus on which
> > > > tools are appropriate
> > > for
> > > > which exact circumstances, and some discussions happen in multiple
> > > venues.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > The views expressed here are valid but the right
> > > > >
> > > > thing to do would be to further the conversation on wiki and have a
> > > proper
> > > > > community 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Vi to]

We currently have some mean to fight paid editing, terms of services are
"easy to violate" thus giving us a straightforward way to take action. But
too often I see something like: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16826370
obvious paid editors left totally free to do their job without even
attracting some attention on them.

Vito

2017-04-23 13:58 GMT+02:00 Peter Southwood :

> I would think this is up to the chapter/affilate organisation, but no harm
> in getting a more universal collection of opinions.
> Cheers,
>  Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> Behalf Of Gabriel Thullen
> Sent: Sunday, 23 April 2017 10:50 AM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies
> that offer paid editing services
>
> I suggest another question, right after your #5. Undisclosed paid editing
> is one thing, dealing with disclosed paid editors within our community is
> another. You could add the following question:
> "Asking if we agree to let disclosed paid editors occupy key positions
> within the Wikimedia movement such as chapter board, official chapter
> spokesperson, affiliate organization board, etc."
>
>
> On Sun, Apr 23, 2017 at 6:16 AM, James Salsman  wrote:
>
> > I've proposed asking wikimedians at large what they think should be
> > done about paid advocacy editing, as item number 5 on my periodic
> > survey proposal composed of all the unresolved questions over the last
> > quarter on this list at:
> >
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:James_Salsman#
> > Periodic_survey_prototype
> >
> > On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 2:50 PM Pine W  wrote:
> >
> > > >
> > > > Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community
> > > surrounding
> > > > promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an
> > > > outcome resulting in a specific request for assistance or
> > > > increased action by
> > the
> > > > WMF?
> > > >
> > >
> > > Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the
> > > discussion on Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board wants
> > > to take the
> > position
> > > that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such
> > > discussion,
> > I
> > > imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might be
> > > beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki
> > > discussion.
> > >
> > >
> > > >
> > > > If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an
> > official
> > > > response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most
> > > > part consisted of about 6 people?
> > > >
> > >
> > > I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they can
> > > initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be made. I
> > > already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't dig
> > > the hole any deeper.
> > >
> > > Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
> > > > unilaterally made decisions in this area.
> > >
> > >
> > > That is possible if WMF were to do something particularly novel, so
> > > your sense of caution here is well taken. I would hope that WMF
> > > would discuss its plans with the community and have a conversation
> > > before actually initiating novel actions.
> > >
> > >
> > > > But please be realistic, this is
> > > > a coffee table discussion.
> > >
> > >
> > > I have mixed views on this. Wikimedia-l is not a quiet back room
> > > with
> > only
> > > a few people around, but it's true that a consensus here among a
> > > small number of people who speak up in a particular discussion
> > > demonstrates a lower level of consensus than an RfC with hundreds of
> > > participants. It's not clear to me that there is consensus on which
> > > tools are appropriate
> > for
> > > which exact circumstances, and some discussions happen in multiple
> > venues.
> > >
> > >
> > > > The views expressed here are valid but the right
> > > >
> > > thing to do would be to further the conversation on wiki and have a
> > proper
> > > > community conversation.
> > >
> > >
> > > I don't think that there is a single definition of a "proper"
> > > community conversation.
> > >
> > > I have no objection to having an on-wiki RfC (and I can see how a
> > > sophisticated and well-attended one might produce detailed guidance
> > > that would be helpful), but neither do I want this thread to be
> trivialized.
> > >
> > > Pine
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe:
> > > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Peter Southwood]

I would think this is up to the chapter/affilate organisation, but no harm in 
getting a more universal collection of opinions.
Cheers,
 Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
Gabriel Thullen
Sent: Sunday, 23 April 2017 10:50 AM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that 
offer paid editing services

I suggest another question, right after your #5. Undisclosed paid editing is 
one thing, dealing with disclosed paid editors within our community is another. 
You could add the following question:
"Asking if we agree to let disclosed paid editors occupy key positions within 
the Wikimedia movement such as chapter board, official chapter spokesperson, 
affiliate organization board, etc."


On Sun, Apr 23, 2017 at 6:16 AM, James Salsman  wrote:

> I've proposed asking wikimedians at large what they think should be 
> done about paid advocacy editing, as item number 5 on my periodic 
> survey proposal composed of all the unresolved questions over the last 
> quarter on this list at:
>
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:James_Salsman#
> Periodic_survey_prototype
>
> On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 2:50 PM Pine W  wrote:
>
> > >
> > > Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community
> > surrounding
> > > promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an 
> > > outcome resulting in a specific request for assistance or 
> > > increased action by
> the
> > > WMF?
> > >
> >
> > Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the 
> > discussion on Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board wants 
> > to take the
> position
> > that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such 
> > discussion,
> I
> > imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might be 
> > beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki 
> > discussion.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an
> official
> > > response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most 
> > > part consisted of about 6 people?
> > >
> >
> > I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they can 
> > initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be made. I 
> > already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't dig 
> > the hole any deeper.
> >
> > Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
> > > unilaterally made decisions in this area.
> >
> >
> > That is possible if WMF were to do something particularly novel, so 
> > your sense of caution here is well taken. I would hope that WMF 
> > would discuss its plans with the community and have a conversation 
> > before actually initiating novel actions.
> >
> >
> > > But please be realistic, this is
> > > a coffee table discussion.
> >
> >
> > I have mixed views on this. Wikimedia-l is not a quiet back room 
> > with
> only
> > a few people around, but it's true that a consensus here among a 
> > small number of people who speak up in a particular discussion 
> > demonstrates a lower level of consensus than an RfC with hundreds of 
> > participants. It's not clear to me that there is consensus on which 
> > tools are appropriate
> for
> > which exact circumstances, and some discussions happen in multiple
> venues.
> >
> >
> > > The views expressed here are valid but the right
> > >
> > thing to do would be to further the conversation on wiki and have a
> proper
> > > community conversation.
> >
> >
> > I don't think that there is a single definition of a "proper" 
> > community conversation.
> >
> > I have no objection to having an on-wiki RfC (and I can see how a 
> > sophisticated and well-attended one might produce detailed guidance 
> > that would be helpful), but neither do I want this thread to be trivialized.
> >
> > Pine
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and 
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: 
> > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ 
> wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/ 
> wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
>
___
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: 
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and 
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
New messages to: 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gabriel Thullen]

I suggest another question, right after your #5. Undisclosed paid editing
is one thing, dealing with disclosed paid editors within our community is
another. You could add the following question:
"Asking if we agree to let disclosed paid editors occupy key positions
within the Wikimedia movement such as chapter board, official chapter
spokesperson, affiliate organization board, etc."


On Sun, Apr 23, 2017 at 6:16 AM, James Salsman  wrote:

> I've proposed asking wikimedians at large what they think should be done
> about paid advocacy editing, as item number 5 on my periodic survey
> proposal composed of all the unresolved questions over the last quarter on
> this list at:
>
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:James_Salsman#
> Periodic_survey_prototype
>
> On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 2:50 PM Pine W  wrote:
>
> > >
> > > Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community
> > surrounding
> > > promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an outcome
> > > resulting in a specific request for assistance or increased action by
> the
> > > WMF?
> > >
> >
> > Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the discussion on
> > Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board wants to take the
> position
> > that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such discussion,
> I
> > imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might be
> > beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki
> > discussion.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an
> official
> > > response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most part
> > > consisted of about 6 people?
> > >
> >
> > I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they can
> > initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be made. I
> > already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't dig the
> > hole any deeper.
> >
> > Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
> > > unilaterally made decisions in this area.
> >
> >
> > That is possible if WMF were to do something particularly novel, so your
> > sense of caution here is well taken. I would hope that WMF would discuss
> > its plans with the community and have a conversation before actually
> > initiating novel actions.
> >
> >
> > > But please be realistic, this is
> > > a coffee table discussion.
> >
> >
> > I have mixed views on this. Wikimedia-l is not a quiet back room with
> only
> > a few people around, but it's true that a consensus here among a small
> > number of people who speak up in a particular discussion demonstrates a
> > lower level of consensus than an RfC with hundreds of participants. It's
> > not clear to me that there is consensus on which tools are appropriate
> for
> > which exact circumstances, and some discussions happen in multiple
> venues.
> >
> >
> > > The views expressed here are valid but the right
> > >
> > thing to do would be to further the conversation on wiki and have a
> proper
> > > community conversation.
> >
> >
> > I don't think that there is a single definition of a "proper" community
> > conversation.
> >
> > I have no objection to having an on-wiki RfC (and I can see how a
> > sophisticated and well-attended one might produce detailed guidance that
> > would be helpful), but neither do I want this thread to be trivialized.
> >
> > Pine
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Salsman]

I've proposed asking wikimedians at large what they think should be done
about paid advocacy editing, as item number 5 on my periodic survey
proposal composed of all the unresolved questions over the last quarter on
this list at:

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:James_Salsman#Periodic_survey_prototype

On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 2:50 PM Pine W  wrote:

> >
> > Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community
> surrounding
> > promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an outcome
> > resulting in a specific request for assistance or increased action by the
> > WMF?
> >
>
> Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the discussion on
> Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board wants to take the position
> that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such discussion, I
> imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might be
> beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki
> discussion.
>
>
> >
> > If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an official
> > response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most part
> > consisted of about 6 people?
> >
>
> I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they can
> initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be made. I
> already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't dig the
> hole any deeper.
>
> Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
> > unilaterally made decisions in this area.
>
>
> That is possible if WMF were to do something particularly novel, so your
> sense of caution here is well taken. I would hope that WMF would discuss
> its plans with the community and have a conversation before actually
> initiating novel actions.
>
>
> > But please be realistic, this is
> > a coffee table discussion.
>
>
> I have mixed views on this. Wikimedia-l is not a quiet back room with only
> a few people around, but it's true that a consensus here among a small
> number of people who speak up in a particular discussion demonstrates a
> lower level of consensus than an RfC with hundreds of participants. It's
> not clear to me that there is consensus on which tools are appropriate for
> which exact circumstances, and some discussions happen in multiple venues.
>
>
> > The views expressed here are valid but the right
> >
> thing to do would be to further the conversation on wiki and have a proper
> > community conversation.
>
>
> I don't think that there is a single definition of a "proper" community
> conversation.
>
> I have no objection to having an on-wiki RfC (and I can see how a
> sophisticated and well-attended one might produce detailed guidance that
> would be helpful), but neither do I want this thread to be trivialized.
>
> Pine
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Pine W]

>
> Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community surrounding
> promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an outcome
> resulting in a specific request for assistance or increased action by the
> WMF?
>

Aside from the conversation on this list, I'm aware of the discussion on
Jimbo's talk page. If WMF Legal or the WMF Board wants to take the position
that it would like to see a community RfC or some other such discussion, I
imagine that such can be arranged, and I can see how that might be
beneficial. Of course, anyone is free to initiate such an on-wiki
discussion.


>
> If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an official
> response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most part
> consisted of about 6 people?
>

I'm not sure why you would be telling other people to whom they can
initiate requests and the conditions under which they can be made. I
already have a dim view of WMF's customer service; please don't dig the
hole any deeper.

Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
> unilaterally made decisions in this area.


That is possible if WMF were to do something particularly novel, so your
sense of caution here is well taken. I would hope that WMF would discuss
its plans with the community and have a conversation before actually
initiating novel actions.


> But please be realistic, this is
> a coffee table discussion.


I have mixed views on this. Wikimedia-l is not a quiet back room with only
a few people around, but it's true that a consensus here among a small
number of people who speak up in a particular discussion demonstrates a
lower level of consensus than an RfC with hundreds of participants. It's
not clear to me that there is consensus on which tools are appropriate for
which exact circumstances, and some discussions happen in multiple venues.


> The views expressed here are valid but the right
>
thing to do would be to further the conversation on wiki and have a proper
> community conversation.


I don't think that there is a single definition of a "proper" community
conversation.

I have no objection to having an on-wiki RfC (and I can see how a
sophisticated and well-attended one might produce detailed guidance that
would be helpful), but neither do I want this thread to be trivialized.

Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Joseph Seddon]

Pine,

Has there been a recent substantial discussion by the community surrounding
promotional/biased editting paid or otherwise, which had an outcome
resulting in a specific request for assistance or increased action by the
WMF?

If there hasn't, I do not see grounds for you to be expecting an official
response from Legal to a list whose conversation has for the most part
consisted of about 6 people?

Many others, I am sure, would rightly complain if the Foundation
unilaterally made decisions in this area. But please be realistic, this is
a coffee table discussion. The views expressed here are valid but the right
thing to do would be to further the conversation on wiki and have a proper
community conversation. We have mechanisms exactly for this kind of thing.
Lets actually use them.

Seddon



On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 8:29 PM, Pine W  wrote:

> I'm bumping this thread in the hope that there will be official comments
> from WMF regarding their willingness to take a more assertive legal
> approach to addressing and deterring promotionalism and other inappropriate
> changes to Wikipedia content by people and organizations who have conflicts
> of interest, whether or not those conflicts are disclosed.
>
> Pine
> ___
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>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Pine W]

I'm bumping this thread in the hope that there will be official comments
from WMF regarding their willingness to take a more assertive legal
approach to addressing and deterring promotionalism and other inappropriate
changes to Wikipedia content by people and organizations who have conflicts
of interest, whether or not those conflicts are disclosed.

Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Salsman]

Should the Communications team hold a contest asking wikipedians to propose
new trademarks for Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods?

Ref.:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/64yf80/labgrown_meat_is_about_to_go_global_and_one_firm/dg6frig/?context=3

On a more serious note, why don't we quantify and balance systemic bias in
favor of far more pernicious threats?

I.e.,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Economics#Tax_cut_claim_in_Fiscal_policy_section

On Sat, Apr 15, 2017 at 12:36 AM Peter Southwood <
peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:

> So the Americas favorite burger should have been "America's Favorite
> Burger(tm)". Agreed.
> Cheers,
> Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> Behalf Of FRED BAUDER
> Sent: Saturday, April 15, 2017 8:21 AM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies
> that offer paid editing services
>
> "The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite burger, " is a problem as
> it implies that the Whopper is the favorite burger of the American public.
> Perhaps it is, but that is a trademark, not the result of a survey. The
> other stuff, "a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% beef with
> no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and
> onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame
> seed bun." happens to be factually true and cannot be said of the products
> of, say, McDonalds where the "fixings"
> arrive in delivery trucks.
>
> Fred Bauder
>
> On Sat, 15 Apr 2017 08:06:50 +0200
>   "Peter Southwood"  wrote:
> > James,
> > Which parts of those statements to you consider factually inaccurate,
> >and which parts do you consider misleading in some other way?
> > Cheers,
> > Peter
> >
> > -Original Message-
> >From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> >Behalf Of James Heilman
> > Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 5:32 PM
> > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> >companies that offer paid editing services
> >
> > Wikipedia is not for sale. We are not simply another advertising venue
> >available to the corporations of the world. We have mechanisms for
> >corporations to suggest changes to our content and it is called the
> >talk page.
> >
> > Lets look at the changes likely made by Burger King staff in more
> >detail:
> >
> > In this edit this sentence "The Whopper is a burger, consisting of a
> >flame-grilled patty made with 100% beef with no preservatives, no
> >fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh
> >lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun."
> >
> > >773836335=773833110>
> > was
> > added not once but twice. And than was added again following its first
> >removal.
> >
> > In this edit this sentence "The Whopper, also known as America’s
> >favorite burger, has a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100%
> >beef with no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced
> >tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served
> >on a soft sesame seed bun. Whopper and America’s Favorite Burger are
> >trademarks of Burger King Corporation.
> > <
> https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Whopper=773807497=773585358
> >"
> > was added.
> >
> > One of the accounts did not disclosed their relationship to the
> >company in question. And yes this is spam, so they did spam Wikipedia.
> >See [[WP:PEACOCK]]
> > >#Puffery>
> > and [[WP:NPOV]]
> >, the latter of
> >which is pillar number 2.
> >
> >
> > This is not the first time the marketing department at a multi billion
> >dollar company has tried to adjust our content for the company's /
> >shareholder's gains. A few years back a couple of the heads of
> >marketing at Medtronic
> > >-for-pay/393926/>,  along with a number of physicians one of whom they
> >had paid more than a quarter of a million dollars, tried to remove the
> >best available evidence regarding vertebroplasty, a procedure which
> >medicare spent at the time more than a billion dollars a year on.
> >Half a dozen paid editors working together can easily get a majority in
> >many of our decision making processes.
> >
> > Our readers deserve a Wikipedia which is written independently of the
> >subject mater in question. Our readers have been harmed by undisclosed
> >paid editing in the past. These are individuals typically less savvy
> >and less wealthy than the executives at a large corporation. I am sorry
> >but our readers are the ones that deserve our attention and our
> >protection. We already have the 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
The more we change our practice in order to be restrictve, the more we
focus on corner cases like this one, the more we lose sight on what we aim
to achieve.

Our aim is to share in the sum of all knowledge. Giving a burger company or
anyone a black eye by negative attention is fine. Getting lawyers involved,
great. Changing what we do introduces its own negative consequences. Please
do not go there!
Thanks,
  GerardM


Op za 15 apr. 2017 om 15:21 schreef Peter Southwood <
peter.southw...@telkomsa.net>

> I take it that the issue here is that a COI editor changed the opening
> paragraph to be more complimentary of the product, rather than that someone
> reused content for commercial purposes. To me it is irrelevant whether they
> were paid or not, it is the quality of the editing that matters, and
> particularly that they contravened the terms of use by failing to declare
> COI.
> Cheers,
> Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> Behalf Of Gnangarra
> Sent: Saturday, 15 April 2017 1:35 PM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies
> that offer paid editing services
>
> Gabe highlights the issue
>
>
>- its not easy to identify a paid editor with one or two edits only
>- Google home is the service creating the issue
>- this issue is just that first sentence.
>
> flagged revisions would work here to stop the immediacy but would never
> guarantee that a good faith tidy up by an editor reviewing and edit would
> actually identify the problem.  Ok a flagged revision bot could do a
> cursory check and pass all non lead paragraph edits to reduce the backlogs
> but it still needs a human and one thats skilled to identify paid editors.
>
> To solve the issue maybe we need google to be looking at a cache of an
> article not the current version, that both works for us in managing this
> issue and for google in preventing its service being ambushed... We'd have
> to create a way to for humans to review leads less than x weeks old.
>
>
> This ambush editing isnt the same as paid editing where all article
> content is susceptible and should be treated differently, now one has
> succeeded we can assume others will also try then without even warming up
> the beans we can be assured that someone will play the negative side of the
> game as well. ie "Whopper is not as popular as the big mac made fresh on
> demand at mcdonalds"
>
> On 15 April 2017 at 18:58, Gabriel Thullen  wrote:
>
> > Paid editors have been adding content to Wikipedia for a long time.
> > Some of them might even be doing so in accordance with the rules and
> > guidelines, but that is not what makes this case stand out.
> > The PR agency did a total of three edits, and the third one managed to
> > pass under the radar. They deliberately inserted text with minor
> > grammatical errors to bait an editor into fixing it up while at the
> > same time leaving it as an introductory sentence. The TV ad came out one
> week later.
> > What disturbs me is that Wikipedia is being instrumentalized by these
> > big corporations, and we do not need to debate whether the text is
> > factually exact, if it is sourced, or if it is too peacocky. Most of
> > us are volunteer editors, and we must make sure that we do not have to
> > waste our time rooting out these malicious edits.
> > The PR company wrote the text to make it look like it was put there by
> > some ordinary "grammatically challenged" fanboy. A contributor reverts
> > the edit the first time around, saying rightly that it was too
> > promotional, then fixes up the grammatical errors the second time
> > around. Other contributors would no longer touch the article seeing
> > that a community member is already watching over it.
> > We will have the check out the introductory sentences in hundreds of
> > articles. When somebody asks Google Home "what is xyz..." in their own
> > voice, Google will very obligingly spew out the Wikipedia article.
> > IMHA, that is the real issue here. These paid editors are quite
> > willing to turn Wikipedia into the worlds biggest high-tech distributor
> of junk mail.
> >
> > Gabe
> >
> > On Sat, Apr 15, 2017 at 8:36 AM, Peter Southwood <
> > peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:
> >
> > > So the Americas favorite burger should have been "America's Favorite
> > > Burger(tm)". Agreed.
> > > Cheers,
> > > Peter
> > >
> > > -Original Message-
> > > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org]
> > > On Behalf Of FRED BAUDER
> > > Sent: Saturday, April 15, 2017 8:21 AM
> > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> > companies
> > > that offer paid editing services
> > >
> > > "The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite burger, " is a
> > > problem as it implies that the Whopper is the favorite burger of the
> > > American
> > 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Peter Southwood]

I take it that the issue here is that a COI editor changed the opening 
paragraph to be more complimentary of the product, rather than that someone 
reused content for commercial purposes. To me it is irrelevant whether they 
were paid or not, it is the quality of the editing that matters, and 
particularly that they contravened the terms of use by failing to declare COI.
Cheers,
Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
Gnangarra
Sent: Saturday, 15 April 2017 1:35 PM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that 
offer paid editing services

Gabe highlights the issue


   - its not easy to identify a paid editor with one or two edits only
   - Google home is the service creating the issue
   - this issue is just that first sentence.

flagged revisions would work here to stop the immediacy but would never 
guarantee that a good faith tidy up by an editor reviewing and edit would 
actually identify the problem.  Ok a flagged revision bot could do a cursory 
check and pass all non lead paragraph edits to reduce the backlogs but it still 
needs a human and one thats skilled to identify paid editors.

To solve the issue maybe we need google to be looking at a cache of an article 
not the current version, that both works for us in managing this issue and for 
google in preventing its service being ambushed... We'd have to create a way to 
for humans to review leads less than x weeks old.


This ambush editing isnt the same as paid editing where all article content is 
susceptible and should be treated differently, now one has succeeded we can 
assume others will also try then without even warming up the beans we can be 
assured that someone will play the negative side of the game as well. ie 
"Whopper is not as popular as the big mac made fresh on demand at mcdonalds"

On 15 April 2017 at 18:58, Gabriel Thullen  wrote:

> Paid editors have been adding content to Wikipedia for a long time. 
> Some of them might even be doing so in accordance with the rules and 
> guidelines, but that is not what makes this case stand out.
> The PR agency did a total of three edits, and the third one managed to 
> pass under the radar. They deliberately inserted text with minor 
> grammatical errors to bait an editor into fixing it up while at the 
> same time leaving it as an introductory sentence. The TV ad came out one week 
> later.
> What disturbs me is that Wikipedia is being instrumentalized by these 
> big corporations, and we do not need to debate whether the text is 
> factually exact, if it is sourced, or if it is too peacocky. Most of 
> us are volunteer editors, and we must make sure that we do not have to 
> waste our time rooting out these malicious edits.
> The PR company wrote the text to make it look like it was put there by 
> some ordinary "grammatically challenged" fanboy. A contributor reverts 
> the edit the first time around, saying rightly that it was too 
> promotional, then fixes up the grammatical errors the second time 
> around. Other contributors would no longer touch the article seeing 
> that a community member is already watching over it.
> We will have the check out the introductory sentences in hundreds of 
> articles. When somebody asks Google Home "what is xyz..." in their own 
> voice, Google will very obligingly spew out the Wikipedia article. 
> IMHA, that is the real issue here. These paid editors are quite 
> willing to turn Wikipedia into the worlds biggest high-tech distributor of 
> junk mail.
>
> Gabe
>
> On Sat, Apr 15, 2017 at 8:36 AM, Peter Southwood < 
> peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:
>
> > So the Americas favorite burger should have been "America's Favorite 
> > Burger(tm)". Agreed.
> > Cheers,
> > Peter
> >
> > -Original Message-
> > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] 
> > On Behalf Of FRED BAUDER
> > Sent: Saturday, April 15, 2017 8:21 AM
> > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> companies
> > that offer paid editing services
> >
> > "The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite burger, " is a 
> > problem as it implies that the Whopper is the favorite burger of the 
> > American
> public.
> > Perhaps it is, but that is a trademark, not the result of a survey. 
> > The other stuff, "a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% 
> > beef with no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily 
> > sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and 
> > mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun." happens to be factually 
> > true and cannot be said of the
> products
> > of, say, McDonalds where the "fixings"
> > arrive in delivery trucks.
> >
> > Fred Bauder
> >
> > On Sat, 15 Apr 2017 08:06:50 +0200
> >   "Peter Southwood"  wrote:
> > > James,
> > > Which parts of those 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gnangarra]

Gabe highlights the issue


   - its not easy to identify a paid editor with one or two edits only
   - Google home is the service creating the issue
   - this issue is just that first sentence.

flagged revisions would work here to stop the immediacy but would never
guarantee that a good faith tidy up by an editor reviewing and edit would
actually identify the problem.  Ok a flagged revision bot could do a
cursory check and pass all non lead paragraph edits to reduce the backlogs
but it still needs a human and one thats skilled to identify paid editors.

To solve the issue maybe we need google to be looking at a cache of an
article not the current version, that both works for us in managing this
issue and for google in preventing its service being ambushed... We'd have
to create a way to for humans to review leads less than x weeks old.


This ambush editing isnt the same as paid editing where all article content
is susceptible and should be treated differently, now one has succeeded we
can assume others will also try then without even warming up the beans we
can be assured that someone will play the negative side of the game as
well. ie "Whopper is not as popular as the big mac made fresh on demand at
mcdonalds"

On 15 April 2017 at 18:58, Gabriel Thullen  wrote:

> Paid editors have been adding content to Wikipedia for a long time. Some of
> them might even be doing so in accordance with the rules and guidelines,
> but that is not what makes this case stand out.
> The PR agency did a total of three edits, and the third one managed to pass
> under the radar. They deliberately inserted text with minor grammatical
> errors to bait an editor into fixing it up while at the same time leaving
> it as an introductory sentence. The TV ad came out one week later.
> What disturbs me is that Wikipedia is being instrumentalized by these big
> corporations, and we do not need to debate whether the text is factually
> exact, if it is sourced, or if it is too peacocky. Most of us are volunteer
> editors, and we must make sure that we do not have to waste our time
> rooting out these malicious edits.
> The PR company wrote the text to make it look like it was put there by some
> ordinary "grammatically challenged" fanboy. A contributor reverts the edit
> the first time around, saying rightly that it was too promotional, then
> fixes up the grammatical errors the second time around. Other contributors
> would no longer touch the article seeing that a community member is already
> watching over it.
> We will have the check out the introductory sentences in hundreds of
> articles. When somebody asks Google Home "what is xyz..." in their own
> voice, Google will very obligingly spew out the Wikipedia article. IMHA,
> that is the real issue here. These paid editors are quite willing to turn
> Wikipedia into the worlds biggest high-tech distributor of junk mail.
>
> Gabe
>
> On Sat, Apr 15, 2017 at 8:36 AM, Peter Southwood <
> peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:
>
> > So the Americas favorite burger should have been "America's Favorite
> > Burger(tm)". Agreed.
> > Cheers,
> > Peter
> >
> > -Original Message-
> > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> > Behalf Of FRED BAUDER
> > Sent: Saturday, April 15, 2017 8:21 AM
> > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> companies
> > that offer paid editing services
> >
> > "The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite burger, " is a problem as
> > it implies that the Whopper is the favorite burger of the American
> public.
> > Perhaps it is, but that is a trademark, not the result of a survey. The
> > other stuff, "a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% beef with
> > no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and
> > onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame
> > seed bun." happens to be factually true and cannot be said of the
> products
> > of, say, McDonalds where the "fixings"
> > arrive in delivery trucks.
> >
> > Fred Bauder
> >
> > On Sat, 15 Apr 2017 08:06:50 +0200
> >   "Peter Southwood"  wrote:
> > > James,
> > > Which parts of those statements to you consider factually inaccurate,
> > >and which parts do you consider misleading in some other way?
> > > Cheers,
> > > Peter
> > >
> > > -Original Message-
> > >From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> > >Behalf Of James Heilman
> > > Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 5:32 PM
> > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> > >companies that offer paid editing services
> > >
> > > Wikipedia is not for sale. We are not simply another advertising venue
> > >available to the corporations of the world. We have mechanisms for
> > >corporations to suggest changes to our content and it is called the
> > >talk page.
> > >
> > > 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gabriel Thullen]

Paid editors have been adding content to Wikipedia for a long time. Some of
them might even be doing so in accordance with the rules and guidelines,
but that is not what makes this case stand out.
The PR agency did a total of three edits, and the third one managed to pass
under the radar. They deliberately inserted text with minor grammatical
errors to bait an editor into fixing it up while at the same time leaving
it as an introductory sentence. The TV ad came out one week later.
What disturbs me is that Wikipedia is being instrumentalized by these big
corporations, and we do not need to debate whether the text is factually
exact, if it is sourced, or if it is too peacocky. Most of us are volunteer
editors, and we must make sure that we do not have to waste our time
rooting out these malicious edits.
The PR company wrote the text to make it look like it was put there by some
ordinary "grammatically challenged" fanboy. A contributor reverts the edit
the first time around, saying rightly that it was too promotional, then
fixes up the grammatical errors the second time around. Other contributors
would no longer touch the article seeing that a community member is already
watching over it.
We will have the check out the introductory sentences in hundreds of
articles. When somebody asks Google Home "what is xyz..." in their own
voice, Google will very obligingly spew out the Wikipedia article. IMHA,
that is the real issue here. These paid editors are quite willing to turn
Wikipedia into the worlds biggest high-tech distributor of junk mail.

Gabe

On Sat, Apr 15, 2017 at 8:36 AM, Peter Southwood <
peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:

> So the Americas favorite burger should have been "America's Favorite
> Burger(tm)". Agreed.
> Cheers,
> Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> Behalf Of FRED BAUDER
> Sent: Saturday, April 15, 2017 8:21 AM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies
> that offer paid editing services
>
> "The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite burger, " is a problem as
> it implies that the Whopper is the favorite burger of the American public.
> Perhaps it is, but that is a trademark, not the result of a survey. The
> other stuff, "a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% beef with
> no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and
> onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame
> seed bun." happens to be factually true and cannot be said of the products
> of, say, McDonalds where the "fixings"
> arrive in delivery trucks.
>
> Fred Bauder
>
> On Sat, 15 Apr 2017 08:06:50 +0200
>   "Peter Southwood"  wrote:
> > James,
> > Which parts of those statements to you consider factually inaccurate,
> >and which parts do you consider misleading in some other way?
> > Cheers,
> > Peter
> >
> > -Original Message-
> >From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> >Behalf Of James Heilman
> > Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 5:32 PM
> > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing
> >companies that offer paid editing services
> >
> > Wikipedia is not for sale. We are not simply another advertising venue
> >available to the corporations of the world. We have mechanisms for
> >corporations to suggest changes to our content and it is called the
> >talk page.
> >
> > Lets look at the changes likely made by Burger King staff in more
> >detail:
> >
> > In this edit this sentence "The Whopper is a burger, consisting of a
> >flame-grilled patty made with 100% beef with no preservatives, no
> >fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh
> >lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun."
> >
> > >773836335=773833110>
> > was
> > added not once but twice. And than was added again following its first
> >removal.
> >
> > In this edit this sentence "The Whopper, also known as America’s
> >favorite burger, has a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100%
> >beef with no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced
> >tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served
> >on a soft sesame seed bun. Whopper and America’s Favorite Burger are
> >trademarks of Burger King Corporation.
> >  773807497=773585358>"
> > was added.
> >
> > One of the accounts did not disclosed their relationship to the
> >company in question. And yes this is spam, so they did spam Wikipedia.
> >See [[WP:PEACOCK]]
> > >#Puffery>
> > and [[WP:NPOV]]
> >, the latter of
> >which is pillar number 2.
> >
> >
> > This is not the 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Peter Southwood]

So the Americas favorite burger should have been "America's Favorite 
Burger(tm)". Agreed.
Cheers,
Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
FRED BAUDER
Sent: Saturday, April 15, 2017 8:21 AM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that 
offer paid editing services

"The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite burger, " is a problem as it 
implies that the Whopper is the favorite burger of the American public. Perhaps 
it is, but that is a trademark, not the result of a survey. The other stuff, "a 
flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% beef with no preservatives, no 
fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, 
pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun." happens to be 
factually true and cannot be said of the products of, say, McDonalds where the 
"fixings" 
arrive in delivery trucks.

Fred Bauder

On Sat, 15 Apr 2017 08:06:50 +0200
  "Peter Southwood"  wrote:
> James,
> Which parts of those statements to you consider factually inaccurate, 
>and which parts do you consider misleading in some other way?
> Cheers,
> Peter
> 
> -Original Message-
>From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On 
>Behalf Of James Heilman
> Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 5:32 PM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing 
>companies that offer paid editing services
> 
> Wikipedia is not for sale. We are not simply another advertising venue 
>available to the corporations of the world. We have mechanisms for 
>corporations to suggest changes to our content and it is called the 
>talk page.
> 
> Lets look at the changes likely made by Burger King staff in more
>detail:
> 
> In this edit this sentence "The Whopper is a burger, consisting of a 
>flame-grilled patty made with 100% beef with no preservatives, no 
>fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh 
>lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun."
> 
>773836335=773833110>
> was
> added not once but twice. And than was added again following its first 
>removal.
> 
> In this edit this sentence "The Whopper, also known as America’s 
>favorite burger, has a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% 
>beef with no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced 
>tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served 
>on a soft sesame seed bun. Whopper and America’s Favorite Burger are 
>trademarks of Burger King Corporation.
> "
> was added.
> 
> One of the accounts did not disclosed their relationship to the 
>company in question. And yes this is spam, so they did spam Wikipedia. 
>See [[WP:PEACOCK]] 
>#Puffery>
> and [[WP:NPOV]]
>, the latter of 
>which is pillar number 2.
> 
> 
> This is not the first time the marketing department at a multi billion 
>dollar company has tried to adjust our content for the company's / 
>shareholder's gains. A few years back a couple of the heads of 
>marketing at Medtronic 
>-for-pay/393926/>,  along with a number of physicians one of whom they 
>had paid more than a quarter of a million dollars, tried to remove the 
>best available evidence regarding vertebroplasty, a procedure which 
>medicare spent at the time more than a billion dollars a year on.
>Half a dozen paid editors working together can easily get a majority in 
>many of our decision making processes.
> 
> Our readers deserve a Wikipedia which is written independently of the 
>subject mater in question. Our readers have been harmed by undisclosed 
>paid editing in the past. These are individuals typically less savvy 
>and less wealthy than the executives at a large corporation. I am sorry 
>but our readers are the ones that deserve our attention and our 
>protection. We already have the Wifione case 
>s-business-school-316133.html>  were Wikipedia was used to promote an 
>unethical Indian university and therefore we played a role in 
>misleading the students who applied. We must do better.
> 
> James
> 
> On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra 
>wrote:
> 
>> but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or 
>>remove  controversial content, they just put a description of the 
>>Whopper for  the opening sentence.  As Andy said rather than biting 
>>and creating  arguments amongst ourselves would it not be better to 
>>have used the  opportunity to benefit the 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Peter Southwood]

Add the information about their behaviour to the article. Just make sure it is 
accurate, near the top,  and gets published somewhere that can be used as a 
reliable source. Even if this only sticks 50% of the time it is not something 
they will want to risk. If the foundation is willing to stick their neck out a 
little they could tag such pages with a notice that they have been found to 
have been edited in contravention of the terms of use.
Cheers,
Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
David Gerard
Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 7:31 PM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that 
offer paid editing services

On 14 April 2017 at 17:39, Gabriel Thullen  wrote:

> The damage has been done. Theverge.com claims to have done such a 
> modification on Wikipedia, to quote them "as did we, in a test yesterday".
> We will probably see more of this.


Yes. This is why we need to respond in such a way as to deter companies from 
trying this ever again.

Cosying up to them is precisely the wrong response.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[FRED BAUDER]

"The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite burger, " is a problem 
as it implies that the Whopper is the favorite burger of the American 
public. Perhaps it is, but that is a trademark, not the result of a 
survey. The other stuff, "a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 
100% beef with no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily 
sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, 
served on a soft sesame seed bun." happens to be factually true and 
cannot be said of the products of, say, McDonalds where the "fixings" 
arrive in delivery trucks.


Fred Bauder

On Sat, 15 Apr 2017 08:06:50 +0200
 "Peter Southwood"  wrote:
James, 
Which parts of those statements to you consider factually 
inaccurate, and which parts do you consider misleading in some other 
way?
Cheers, 
Peter


-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On 
Behalf Of James Heilman

Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 5:32 PM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing 
companies that offer paid editing services


Wikipedia is not for sale. We are not simply another advertising 
venue available to the corporations of the world. We have mechanisms 
for corporations to suggest changes to our content and it is called 
the talk page.


Lets look at the changes likely made by Burger King staff in more 
detail:


In this edit this sentence "The Whopper is a burger, consisting of a 
flame-grilled patty made with 100% beef with no preservatives, no 
fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh 
lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed 
bun."


was
added not once but twice. And than was added again following its 
first removal.


In this edit this sentence "The Whopper, also known as America’s 
favorite burger, has a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 
100% beef with no preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily 
sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, 
served on a soft sesame seed bun. Whopper and America’s Favorite 
Burger are trademarks of Burger King Corporation.

"
was added.

One of the accounts did not disclosed their relationship to the 
company in question. And yes this is spam, so they did spam 
Wikipedia. See [[WP:PEACOCK]] 

and [[WP:NPOV]] 
, the latter of 
which is pillar number 2.



This is not the first time the marketing department at a multi 
billion dollar company has tried to adjust our content for the 
company's / shareholder's gains. A few years back a couple of the 
heads of marketing at Medtronic 
,
along with a number of physicians one of whom they had paid more 
than a quarter of a million dollars, tried to remove the best 
available evidence regarding vertebroplasty, a procedure which 
medicare spent at the time more than a billion dollars a year on. 
Half a dozen paid editors working together can easily get a majority 
in many of our decision making processes.


Our readers deserve a Wikipedia which is written independently of 
the subject mater in question. Our readers have been harmed by 
undisclosed paid editing in the past. These are individuals typically 
less savvy and less wealthy than the executives at a large 
corporation. I am sorry but our readers are the ones that deserve our 
attention and our protection. We already have the Wifione case 

were Wikipedia was used to promote an unethical Indian university 
and therefore we played a role in misleading the students who 
applied. We must do better.


James

On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra  
wrote:


but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or 
remove 
controversial content, they just put a description of the Whopper 
for 
the opening sentence.  As Andy said rather than biting and creating 
arguments amongst ourselves would it not be better to have used the 
opportunity to benefit the community in a positive way.


On 14 April 2017 at 18:44, David Gerard  wrote:

> On 14 April 2017 at 11:38, Andy Mabbett 


wrote:
>
> > A far better (and less WP:BITEy) outcome would be to get then to
>
>
> Pretty sure WP:BITE doesn't apply in the case of deliberate abuse 
> for clear purposes of spamming.

>
>
> - d.
>
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: 
https://meta.wikimedia.org/ 
> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Peter Southwood]

As far as I can see the edits are slightly peacocky, but not much worse than an 
ordinary fanboy might do on a game or music article. The big issue to me is the 
undisclosed COI, which is unethical. Proving that the edits were paid for does 
not seem reasonably practicable unless you start off by assuming guilt.
Cheers,
Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
Gabriel Thullen
Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 6:40 PM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that 
offer paid editing services

This advertising campaign is particularly interesting, it appears that this is 
the first time we can talk about an exploit (as is said in computer security). 
It has been done once so it can be done again.

What worries me here is that an advertising campaign like this one, mixing TV 
advertising and content editing on Wikipedia is not a last minute thing, done 
on the spur of the moment. IMHA, the agency responsible for these ads must have 
experienced wikipedians working for them. These guys know how the community 
usually reacts. There is a lot of money involved and they know that they will 
have to get it right the first time the ads are aired.

This looks like a bait and trick, and we were all fooled by it (by we, I mean 
the wikipedia community of editors). The bait was the minor grammatical errors 
in the new introductory sentence. An experienced editor got tricked into 
correcting these missing spaces and such, and the text itself gets a "stamp of 
approval", and the edit done by a new account will no longer show up as the 
last modification done to the article.

These paid edits were made on April 4, the article started to be vandalized one 
week later, on April 11. But it looks like the campaign did not create the 
expected buzz because Google reacted quickly (just under 3 hours) and Google 
Home stopped reading out the Whopper article at the end of the advert.

The damage has been done. Theverge.com claims to have done such a modification 
on Wikipedia, to quote them "as did we, in a test yesterday".
We will probably see more of this.

Gabe


On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:39 PM, Dariusz Jemielniak 
wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra  wrote:
> >
> > > but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or 
> > > remove controversial content, they just put a description of the 
> > > Whopper for
> the
> > > opening sentence.
>
>
> I agree with James on this one. They "described" their product in a 
> very flattering way, unnecessarily introducing marketing jargon 
> ("known as America's favorite", "00% beef with no preservatives", "no 
> fillers", "daily sliced" etc.). It is spam and in the future, near 
> rather than far, we need to start seriously thinking how we can combat 
> such content attacks/hijacking. There are some similarities to our 
> work with anti-harassment, but I hope we'll be able to develop a more 
> dedicated approach to this problem, that the Burger King manifestation 
> is only a single example of.
>
> dj
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Peter Southwood]

James, 
Which parts of those statements to you consider factually inaccurate, and which 
parts do you consider misleading in some other way?
Cheers, 
Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
James Heilman
Sent: Friday, April 14, 2017 5:32 PM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that 
offer paid editing services

Wikipedia is not for sale. We are not simply another advertising venue 
available to the corporations of the world. We have mechanisms for corporations 
to suggest changes to our content and it is called the talk page.

Lets look at the changes likely made by Burger King staff in more detail:

In this edit this sentence "The Whopper is a burger, consisting of a 
flame-grilled patty made with 100% beef with no preservatives, no fillers and 
is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, 
ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun."

was
added not once but twice. And than was added again following its first removal.

In this edit this sentence "The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite 
burger, has a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% beef with no 
preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, 
fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun. 
Whopper and America’s Favorite Burger are trademarks of Burger King Corporation.
"
was added.

One of the accounts did not disclosed their relationship to the company in 
question. And yes this is spam, so they did spam Wikipedia. See [[WP:PEACOCK]] 

and [[WP:NPOV]] , the 
latter of which is pillar number 2.


This is not the first time the marketing department at a multi billion dollar 
company has tried to adjust our content for the company's / shareholder's 
gains. A few years back a couple of the heads of marketing at Medtronic 
,
along with a number of physicians one of whom they had paid more than a quarter 
of a million dollars, tried to remove the best available evidence regarding 
vertebroplasty, a procedure which medicare spent at the time more than a 
billion dollars a year on. Half a dozen paid editors working together can 
easily get a majority in many of our decision making processes.

Our readers deserve a Wikipedia which is written independently of the subject 
mater in question. Our readers have been harmed by undisclosed paid editing in 
the past. These are individuals typically less savvy and less wealthy than the 
executives at a large corporation. I am sorry but our readers are the ones that 
deserve our attention and our protection. We already have the Wifione case 

were Wikipedia was used to promote an unethical Indian university and therefore 
we played a role in misleading the students who applied. We must do better.

James

On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra  wrote:

> but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or remove 
> controversial content, they just put a description of the Whopper for 
> the opening sentence.  As Andy said rather than biting and creating 
> arguments amongst ourselves would it not be better to have used the 
> opportunity to benefit the community in a positive way.
>
> On 14 April 2017 at 18:44, David Gerard  wrote:
>
> > On 14 April 2017 at 11:38, Andy Mabbett 
> wrote:
> >
> > > A far better (and less WP:BITEy) outcome would be to get then to
> >
> >
> > Pretty sure WP:BITE doesn't apply in the case of deliberate abuse 
> > for clear purposes of spamming.
> >
> >
> > - d.
> >
> > ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Salsman]

P.S. The paragraph ending "instead of backsliding, and" should have been
followed by "proposing cuts to the payroll tax."

On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 12:54 PM James Salsman  wrote:

> Is it better to think of the problem as paid editing or organized advocacy
> for persuasion at the expense of accuracy regarding all costs and benefits?
>
> Burger King is a commercial enterprise which makes money by mass
> production of beef products, which require more water and produce more
> greenhouse gas per calorie at retail marked-up prices than more frugal and
> healthy alternatives, but their Wikipedia-focused PR budget is tiny
> compared to producers of other products which similarly do not have a good
> cost-benefit ratio in terms of money or productive years of life.
>
> Some of the strongest such abusers of organized advocacy don't spend a lot
> of money on Wikipedia editors, but they do promote a narrative that
> anti-science types are suppressing information about them because of
> Luddite unreasonableness, which causes the many editors who want to defend
> science and their poorly-perceived conceptions of modernity to come to
> their defense. But, like Burger King, they often sell products which cost
> more than their benefits.
>
> Examples beyond beef include: fossil fuels, nuclear power, neonicotinoid
> pesticides, and tax cuts for the wealthy. Luckily, lab grown beef is likely
> to soon provide suitable replacements for those who want to eat beef
> without the environmental, ethical, and some of the health externalities.
> But will it go the way of the texturized vegetable protein of the 1970s? I
> recently discussed the solution to the fossil fuels problem on this list.
> (Sorry I got the name of the King of Saudi Arabia with whom FDR met wrong,
> but I highly recommend the "history teachers edit" of the BBC "Bitter Lake"
> documentary on YouTube for those who don't want to watch the whole thing.)
> Nuclear simply can't compete in the marketplace against renewables.
> Advocacy organizations are telling the story about the true costs of
> various pesticides, and those are making their way into MEDRS sources.
>
> But I have no idea if Wikipedia is strong enough to overcome the
> self-organizing advocacy for greater income inequality, which is a very
> serious health issue as per unopposed MEDRS sources, but the fake news
> narrative is being pushed:
>
>
> http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/04/trump-budget-director-wants-high-inequality-not-low-deficit.html
>
>
> https://www.gc.cuny.edu/CUNY_GC/media/CUNY-Graduate-Center/PDF/Centers/LIS/Milanovic/papers/Econ_letters.pdf
>
> http://talknicer.com/ehip.pdf (full MEDRS-grade, with no substantial
> opposition in other secondary sources.)
>
> My opinion is that when issues like these impact the Mission, including
> the extent that we can effectively educate, the Foundation should get
> involved and do everything they can to set things right. But are these
> appropriate issues for Legal, or Communications?
>
> Would it help if the Communications team did a blog series on solutions
> from the last U.S. presidential election prior to 9/11, when Buchanan was
> Trump's opponent on the far right, taxes were set to be increased on the
> rich by deficit hawks including Trump, and single payer was Trump's
> preferred health care plan? Trump has recently signaled a return to his
> 1999 roots, by demoting Bannon, demanding a superior health care plan
> instead of backsliding, and
>
> Yes, these are political issues, but they are about issues which directly
> impact the ability to execute the mission, and are only incidentally about
> particular candidates. But they are also extremely crucial to restoring our
> a civil society from the distopia of the use of state power against the
> rights of individuals, and the abuse of the encyclopedia with organized
> advocacy for persuasion over accuracy, in persuit of extralegal profits.
>
> On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 11:36 AM Risker  wrote:
>
>> I'm just a bit agog at the idea that this article became "advertising"
>> when
>> Burger King made the connection using Google Home.  Since its very first
>> edit, it has been an advertisement for this product.  It may not have been
>> intended that way, but that is the reality.  Now it's almost 4200 words
>> long - probably the longest writing on this single product anywhere
>> outside
>> of the Burger King home offices - and we're pretending that it isn't an
>> ad.
>>
>> I know it is terribly disillusioning, but an awful lot of our articles are
>> advertisements. There have always been LOTS of paid editors on English
>> Wikipedia. It has never meant that the editor was editing primarily in a
>> promotional manner - in many cases they were facilitating the ability for
>> others to include promotional materials, and I've spotted what in
>> retrospect were obvious paid edits going back to 2001. There are people
>> who
>> I've identified as likely paid 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Salsman]

Is it better to think of the problem as paid editing or organized advocacy
for persuasion at the expense of accuracy regarding all costs and benefits?

Burger King is a commercial enterprise which makes money by mass production
of beef products, which require more water and produce more greenhouse gas
per calorie at retail marked-up prices than more frugal and healthy
alternatives, but their Wikipedia-focused PR budget is tiny compared to
producers of other products which similarly do not have a good cost-benefit
ratio in terms of money or productive years of life.

Some of the strongest such abusers of organized advocacy don't spend a lot
of money on Wikipedia editors, but they do promote a narrative that
anti-science types are suppressing information about them because of
Luddite unreasonableness, which causes the many editors who want to defend
science and their poorly-perceived conceptions of modernity to come to
their defense. But, like Burger King, they often sell products which cost
more than their benefits.

Examples beyond beef include: fossil fuels, nuclear power, neonicotinoid
pesticides, and tax cuts for the wealthy. Luckily, lab grown beef is likely
to soon provide suitable replacements for those who want to eat beef
without the environmental, ethical, and some of the health externalities.
But will it go the way of the texturized vegetable protein of the 1970s? I
recently discussed the solution to the fossil fuels problem on this list.
(Sorry I got the name of the King of Saudi Arabia with whom FDR met wrong,
but I highly recommend the "history teachers edit" of the BBC "Bitter Lake"
documentary on YouTube for those who don't want to watch the whole thing.)
Nuclear simply can't compete in the marketplace against renewables.
Advocacy organizations are telling the story about the true costs of
various pesticides, and those are making their way into MEDRS sources.

But I have no idea if Wikipedia is strong enough to overcome the
self-organizing advocacy for greater income inequality, which is a very
serious health issue as per unopposed MEDRS sources, but the fake news
narrative is being pushed:

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/04/trump-budget-director-wants-high-inequality-not-low-deficit.html

https://www.gc.cuny.edu/CUNY_GC/media/CUNY-Graduate-Center/PDF/Centers/LIS/Milanovic/papers/Econ_letters.pdf

http://talknicer.com/ehip.pdf (full MEDRS-grade, with no substantial
opposition in other secondary sources.)

My opinion is that when issues like these impact the Mission, including the
extent that we can effectively educate, the Foundation should get involved
and do everything they can to set things right. But are these appropriate
issues for Legal, or Communications?

Would it help if the Communications team did a blog series on solutions
from the last U.S. presidential election prior to 9/11, when Buchanan was
Trump's opponent on the far right, taxes were set to be increased on the
rich by deficit hawks including Trump, and single payer was Trump's
preferred health care plan? Trump has recently signaled a return to his
1999 roots, by demoting Bannon, demanding a superior health care plan
instead of backsliding, and

Yes, these are political issues, but they are about issues which directly
impact the ability to execute the mission, and are only incidentally about
particular candidates. But they are also extremely crucial to restoring our
a civil society from the distopia of the use of state power against the
rights of individuals, and the abuse of the encyclopedia with organized
advocacy for persuasion over accuracy, in persuit of extralegal profits.

On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 11:36 AM Risker  wrote:

> I'm just a bit agog at the idea that this article became "advertising" when
> Burger King made the connection using Google Home.  Since its very first
> edit, it has been an advertisement for this product.  It may not have been
> intended that way, but that is the reality.  Now it's almost 4200 words
> long - probably the longest writing on this single product anywhere outside
> of the Burger King home offices - and we're pretending that it isn't an ad.
>
> I know it is terribly disillusioning, but an awful lot of our articles are
> advertisements. There have always been LOTS of paid editors on English
> Wikipedia. It has never meant that the editor was editing primarily in a
> promotional manner - in many cases they were facilitating the ability for
> others to include promotional materials, and I've spotted what in
> retrospect were obvious paid edits going back to 2001. There are people who
> I've identified as likely paid editors who were instrumental in our early
> discussions about notability.  There were people who "worked with" external
> organizations to get access to their commercial repositories of images and
> information - with huge financial benefits to the owners of those
> repositories; sometimes this was innocent, with the editors trying to gain
> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Risker]

I'm just a bit agog at the idea that this article became "advertising" when
Burger King made the connection using Google Home.  Since its very first
edit, it has been an advertisement for this product.  It may not have been
intended that way, but that is the reality.  Now it's almost 4200 words
long - probably the longest writing on this single product anywhere outside
of the Burger King home offices - and we're pretending that it isn't an ad.

I know it is terribly disillusioning, but an awful lot of our articles are
advertisements. There have always been LOTS of paid editors on English
Wikipedia. It has never meant that the editor was editing primarily in a
promotional manner - in many cases they were facilitating the ability for
others to include promotional materials, and I've spotted what in
retrospect were obvious paid edits going back to 2001. There are people who
I've identified as likely paid editors who were instrumental in our early
discussions about notability.  There were people who "worked with" external
organizations to get access to their commercial repositories of images and
information - with huge financial benefits to the owners of those
repositories; sometimes this was innocent, with the editors trying to gain
access to hard-to-find material, but the end result was the same.

The article is an advertisement. It was one from its first edit (which
included product prices) and it is one today.  It's good copy, but it's
still an ad.  I'll guarantee this isn't the first or last time that a paid
editor made significant changes to the article.  And it's just like
thousands and thousands of other articles that turn consumer products into
"encyclopedic content".  A 300-word discussion of Burger King's most
notable product would be appropriate in the main article, or even in a
daughter article about Burger King's products.  But as it stands, we have
literally hundreds of thousands of words about various Burger King
products: lists, articles about individual products, summaries, advertising
campaigns, etc.  These are all advertisements. Don't blame Burger King for
leveraging exactly what we're doing ourselves.

Risker/Anne

On 14 April 2017 at 12:39, Gabriel Thullen  wrote:

> This advertising campaign is particularly interesting, it appears that this
> is the first time we can talk about an exploit (as is said in computer
> security). It has been done once so it can be done again.
>
> What worries me here is that an advertising campaign like this one, mixing
> TV advertising and content editing on Wikipedia is not a last minute thing,
> done on the spur of the moment. IMHA, the agency responsible for these ads
> must have experienced wikipedians working for them. These guys know how the
> community usually reacts. There is a lot of money involved and they know
> that they will have to get it right the first time the ads are aired.
>
> This looks like a bait and trick, and we were all fooled by it (by we, I
> mean the wikipedia community of editors). The bait was the minor
> grammatical errors in the new introductory sentence. An experienced editor
> got tricked into correcting these missing spaces and such, and the text
> itself gets a "stamp of approval", and the edit done by a new account will
> no longer show up as the last modification done to the article.
>
> These paid edits were made on April 4, the article started to be vandalized
> one week later, on April 11. But it looks like the campaign did not create
> the expected buzz because Google reacted quickly (just under 3 hours) and
> Google Home stopped reading out the Whopper article at the end of the
> advert.
>
> The damage has been done. Theverge.com claims to have done such a
> modification on Wikipedia, to quote them "as did we, in a test yesterday".
> We will probably see more of this.
>
> Gabe
>
>
> On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:39 PM, Dariusz Jemielniak 
> wrote:
>
> > On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra  wrote:
> > >
> > > > but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or
> remove
> > > > controversial content, they just put a description of the Whopper for
> > the
> > > > opening sentence.
> >
> >
> > I agree with James on this one. They "described" their product in a very
> > flattering way, unnecessarily introducing marketing jargon ("known as
> > America's favorite", "00% beef with no preservatives", "no fillers",
> "daily
> > sliced" etc.). It is spam and in the future, near rather than far, we
> need
> > to start seriously thinking how we can combat such content
> > attacks/hijacking. There are some similarities to our work with
> > anti-harassment, but I hope we'll be able to develop a more dedicated
> > approach to this problem, that the Burger King manifestation is only a
> > single example of.
> >
> > dj
> > ___
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> > 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Gerard]

On 14 April 2017 at 17:39, Gabriel Thullen  wrote:

> The damage has been done. Theverge.com claims to have done such a
> modification on Wikipedia, to quote them "as did we, in a test yesterday".
> We will probably see more of this.


Yes. This is why we need to respond in such a way as to deter
companies from trying this ever again.

Cosying up to them is precisely the wrong response.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gabriel Thullen]

This advertising campaign is particularly interesting, it appears that this
is the first time we can talk about an exploit (as is said in computer
security). It has been done once so it can be done again.

What worries me here is that an advertising campaign like this one, mixing
TV advertising and content editing on Wikipedia is not a last minute thing,
done on the spur of the moment. IMHA, the agency responsible for these ads
must have experienced wikipedians working for them. These guys know how the
community usually reacts. There is a lot of money involved and they know
that they will have to get it right the first time the ads are aired.

This looks like a bait and trick, and we were all fooled by it (by we, I
mean the wikipedia community of editors). The bait was the minor
grammatical errors in the new introductory sentence. An experienced editor
got tricked into correcting these missing spaces and such, and the text
itself gets a "stamp of approval", and the edit done by a new account will
no longer show up as the last modification done to the article.

These paid edits were made on April 4, the article started to be vandalized
one week later, on April 11. But it looks like the campaign did not create
the expected buzz because Google reacted quickly (just under 3 hours) and
Google Home stopped reading out the Whopper article at the end of the
advert.

The damage has been done. Theverge.com claims to have done such a
modification on Wikipedia, to quote them "as did we, in a test yesterday".
We will probably see more of this.

Gabe


On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:39 PM, Dariusz Jemielniak 
wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra  wrote:
> >
> > > but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or remove
> > > controversial content, they just put a description of the Whopper for
> the
> > > opening sentence.
>
>
> I agree with James on this one. They "described" their product in a very
> flattering way, unnecessarily introducing marketing jargon ("known as
> America's favorite", "00% beef with no preservatives", "no fillers", "daily
> sliced" etc.). It is spam and in the future, near rather than far, we need
> to start seriously thinking how we can combat such content
> attacks/hijacking. There are some similarities to our work with
> anti-harassment, but I hope we'll be able to develop a more dedicated
> approach to this problem, that the Burger King manifestation is only a
> single example of.
>
> dj
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/
> wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/
> wiki/Wikimedia-l
> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Dariusz Jemielniak]

On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra  wrote:
>
> > but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or remove
> > controversial content, they just put a description of the Whopper for the
> > opening sentence.


I agree with James on this one. They "described" their product in a very
flattering way, unnecessarily introducing marketing jargon ("known as
America's favorite", "00% beef with no preservatives", "no fillers", "daily
sliced" etc.). It is spam and in the future, near rather than far, we need
to start seriously thinking how we can combat such content
attacks/hijacking. There are some similarities to our work with
anti-harassment, but I hope we'll be able to develop a more dedicated
approach to this problem, that the Burger King manifestation is only a
single example of.

dj
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Heilman]

Wikipedia is not for sale. We are not simply another advertising venue
available to the corporations of the world. We have mechanisms for
corporations to suggest changes to our content and it is called the talk
page.

Lets look at the changes likely made by Burger King staff in more detail:

In this edit this sentence "The Whopper is a burger, consisting of a
flame-grilled patty made with 100% beef with no preservatives, no fillers
and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and onions, fresh lettuce,
pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame seed bun."

was
added not once but twice. And than was added again following its first
removal.

In this edit this sentence "The Whopper, also known as America’s favorite
burger, has a flame-[[grilling|grilled]] patty made with 100% beef with no
preservatives, no fillers and is topped with daily sliced tomatoes and
onions, fresh lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo, served on a soft sesame
seed bun. Whopper and America’s Favorite Burger are trademarks of Burger
King Corporation.
"
was added.

One of the accounts did not disclosed their relationship to the company in
question. And yes this is spam, so they did spam Wikipedia. See
[[WP:PEACOCK]]

and [[WP:NPOV]] , the
latter of which is pillar number 2.


This is not the first time the marketing department at a multi billion
dollar company has tried to adjust our content for the company's /
shareholder's gains. A few years back a couple of the heads of marketing at
Medtronic
,
along with a number of physicians one of whom they had paid more than a
quarter of a million dollars, tried to remove the best available evidence
regarding vertebroplasty, a procedure which medicare spent at the time more
than a billion dollars a year on. Half a dozen paid editors working
together can easily get a majority in many of our decision making processes.

Our readers deserve a Wikipedia which is written independently of the
subject mater in question. Our readers have been harmed by undisclosed paid
editing in the past. These are individuals typically less savvy and less
wealthy than the executives at a large corporation. I am sorry but our
readers are the ones that deserve our attention and our protection. We
already have the Wifione case

were Wikipedia was used to promote an unethical Indian university and
therefore we played a role in misleading the students who applied. We must
do better.

James

On Fri, Apr 14, 2017 at 5:23 AM, Gnangarra  wrote:

> but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or remove
> controversial content, they just put a description of the Whopper for the
> opening sentence.  As Andy said rather than biting and creating arguments
> amongst ourselves would it not be better to have used the opportunity to
> benefit the community in a positive way.
>
> On 14 April 2017 at 18:44, David Gerard  wrote:
>
> > On 14 April 2017 at 11:38, Andy Mabbett 
> wrote:
> >
> > > A far better (and less WP:BITEy) outcome would be to get then to
> >
> >
> > Pretty sure WP:BITE doesn't apply in the case of deliberate abuse for
> > clear purposes of spamming.
> >
> >
> > - d.
> >
> > ___
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> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> >
>
>
>
> --
> GN.
> President Wikimedia Australia
> WMAU: http://www.wikimedia.org.au/wiki/User:Gnangarra
> Photo Gallery: http://gnangarra.redbubble.com
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>



-- 
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian

The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gnangarra]

but they didnt spam, nor did they introduce any false hoods, or remove
controversial content, they just put a description of the Whopper for the
opening sentence.  As Andy said rather than biting and creating arguments
amongst ourselves would it not be better to have used the opportunity to
benefit the community in a positive way.

On 14 April 2017 at 18:44, David Gerard  wrote:

> On 14 April 2017 at 11:38, Andy Mabbett  wrote:
>
> > A far better (and less WP:BITEy) outcome would be to get then to
>
>
> Pretty sure WP:BITE doesn't apply in the case of deliberate abuse for
> clear purposes of spamming.
>
>
> - d.
>
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>



-- 
GN.
President Wikimedia Australia
WMAU: http://www.wikimedia.org.au/wiki/User:Gnangarra
Photo Gallery: http://gnangarra.redbubble.com
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Gerard]

On 14 April 2017 at 11:38, Andy Mabbett  wrote:

> A far better (and less WP:BITEy) outcome would be to get then to


Pretty sure WP:BITE doesn't apply in the case of deliberate abuse for
clear purposes of spamming.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Andy Mabbett]

On 13 April 2017 at 05:01, Pine W  wrote:

> I would like for WMF to make Burger King feel that their
> misuse of WIkipedia was inappropriate and for WMF to hit them where it
> counts -- in their checkbook -- and with enough force that corporations
> will decide that messing with Wikipedia is both ethically wrong and
> financially not worth the risk.

A far better (and less WP:BITEy) outcome would be to get then to
support our mission, for instance by donating media, or encouraging
staff (I'm thinking of these at HQ, rather than low-paid servers) to
volunteer their time as editors and photographers.

We could also enlist them to encourage similar-sized corporations to
do likewise, and to sign up to ethical editing guidelines.

[CC to Wikimedia Legal  dropped]

-- 
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gnangarra]

I really dont think the Whopper comparison is a good one because the change
they made was reasonable and at least more consistent with my understanding
of  the english language as used here with us having distinct difference
between what is a sandwich and what is a burger.  The Whopper comment does
highlight that the differences in the way in which we all use english is a
significant failing of the english wikipedia to address.

We also have many editors who are paid to edit content on wikipedia within
their role for a number of organisations not only do we condone it but we
actively encourage such editors.  I have trouble labelling all corporate
editors as dishonest in their work didnt we once assume good faith until we
had evidence to the contrary. What makes a glam editor more worthy of that
assumption, or any other random editor?  Paid editors have the ability to
update content regularly and provide additional access to information,
images and media that can enhance the encyclopaedic content. I'm sure
nobody would complain if a paid editor put the original 1800's recipe for
coke or 1980's recipe for new coke on wiki source.

What is being argued against isnt paid editting but rather just the
dishonest representation of a subject on wikipedia for a fee by persons who
believe they have the skills to avoid detection while manipulating the
content.Paid editors who endeavour to act in good faith should be
engaged with not beaten about with the same stick we use for dishonest
editors who charge a fee.  It actually be more effective for WMF to find a
way engage a group of trusted, experienced editors to be available to
address corporate requests for a fee and take the market away from the
dishonest third party brokers of content.



On 14 April 2017 at 15:39, Natacha Rault  wrote:

> Hi there, I agree that we should take action and make it real hard for any
> corporation financially to achieve this result.
>
> Legal action is one thing, but the first thing to be done is to ensure
> that all affairs of the type are detected and publicly outed, on the very
> articles if there is large media coverage. I would be in favor of a banner
> over the article stating the article has been targeted for promotional
> purposes by the company.
>
> Maybe we should start a whole independent wikipedia project proposing a «
> conflict of interest rating » just as wikirating does it for financial
> markets.
>
> James, I dont believe this can be done at chapter level (at the current
> state of things) : it must be addressed by the WMF and the communities.
>
> Regards (I’ve just added sourced chunks of the controversies on the French
> wiki by the way, maybe we could ask the community to do it in every
> language?)
>
> Nattes à chat
> > Le 14 avr. 2017 à 07:49, James Heilman  a écrit :
> >
> > With respect to Pine's request for more legal support to help deal with
> > undisclosed paid editing issues, to that I strongly agree.
> >
> > To better address these concerns we need the WMF, communities, and
> > affiliate organizations to collaborate. It is a difficult problem to
> > address.
> >
> > James
> >
> > On Thu, Apr 13, 2017 at 11:09 PM, Pine W  wrote:
> >
> >> I tend to think along James' lines more than Risker's.
> >>
> >> Responding to Risker:
> >>
> >> It seems to me that the key point that you're missing is that Burger
> King
> >> altered Wikipedia content in order to execute this campaign. This
> wasn't a
> >> simple case of an organization reusing existing Wikipedia content; the
> >> organization appears to have altered Wikipedia content to suit their
> >> purposes regardless of an obvious conflict of interest with Wikipedia's
> >> purpose of being an educational resource rather than an advertising
> >> platform.
> >>
> >> It seems to me that entities of varying sizes -- from a start-up brand
> that
> >> wants to make itself look important by having a Wikipedia article, to
> large
> >> corporations and government officials -- will continue to alter
> Wikipedia
> >> content in ways that are inappropriate and do a disservice to our
> readers
> >> (including advertising, inserting "alternative facts" for medical and
> >> political content, and eliminating negative information that certain
> people
> >> and organizations find inconvenient) and cost editors' and
> administrators'
> >> collective time and attention, until there is a financial price that is
> put
> >> on this kind of behavior that is large enough to deter them. I don't see
> >> why we should stand idly by as our products' quality and trustworthiness
> >> are degraded and our resources are diverted. I'm hoping that WMF's
> >> enforcement actions in this domain would more than pay for themselves
> >> through financial penalties that WMF extracts from the wrongdoers.
> >>
> >> Pine
> >> ___
> >> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/
> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Natacha Rault]

Hi there, I agree that we should take action and make it real hard for any 
corporation financially to achieve this result. 

Legal action is one thing, but the first thing to be done is to ensure that all 
affairs of the type are detected and publicly outed, on the very articles if 
there is large media coverage. I would be in favor of a banner over the article 
stating the article has been targeted for promotional purposes by the company. 

Maybe we should start a whole independent wikipedia project proposing a « 
conflict of interest rating » just as wikirating does it for financial markets. 

James, I dont believe this can be done at chapter level (at the current state 
of things) : it must be addressed by the WMF and the communities. 

Regards (I’ve just added sourced chunks of the controversies on the French wiki 
by the way, maybe we could ask the community to do it in every language?)

Nattes à chat
> Le 14 avr. 2017 à 07:49, James Heilman  a écrit :
> 
> With respect to Pine's request for more legal support to help deal with
> undisclosed paid editing issues, to that I strongly agree.
> 
> To better address these concerns we need the WMF, communities, and
> affiliate organizations to collaborate. It is a difficult problem to
> address.
> 
> James
> 
> On Thu, Apr 13, 2017 at 11:09 PM, Pine W  wrote:
> 
>> I tend to think along James' lines more than Risker's.
>> 
>> Responding to Risker:
>> 
>> It seems to me that the key point that you're missing is that Burger King
>> altered Wikipedia content in order to execute this campaign. This wasn't a
>> simple case of an organization reusing existing Wikipedia content; the
>> organization appears to have altered Wikipedia content to suit their
>> purposes regardless of an obvious conflict of interest with Wikipedia's
>> purpose of being an educational resource rather than an advertising
>> platform.
>> 
>> It seems to me that entities of varying sizes -- from a start-up brand that
>> wants to make itself look important by having a Wikipedia article, to large
>> corporations and government officials -- will continue to alter Wikipedia
>> content in ways that are inappropriate and do a disservice to our readers
>> (including advertising, inserting "alternative facts" for medical and
>> political content, and eliminating negative information that certain people
>> and organizations find inconvenient) and cost editors' and administrators'
>> collective time and attention, until there is a financial price that is put
>> on this kind of behavior that is large enough to deter them. I don't see
>> why we should stand idly by as our products' quality and trustworthiness
>> are degraded and our resources are diverted. I'm hoping that WMF's
>> enforcement actions in this domain would more than pay for themselves
>> through financial penalties that WMF extracts from the wrongdoers.
>> 
>> Pine
>> ___
>> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/
>> wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/
>> wiki/Wikimedia-l
>> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> James Heilman
> MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
> 
> The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Heilman]

With respect to Pine's request for more legal support to help deal with
undisclosed paid editing issues, to that I strongly agree.

To better address these concerns we need the WMF, communities, and
affiliate organizations to collaborate. It is a difficult problem to
address.

James

On Thu, Apr 13, 2017 at 11:09 PM, Pine W  wrote:

> I tend to think along James' lines more than Risker's.
>
> Responding to Risker:
>
> It seems to me that the key point that you're missing is that Burger King
> altered Wikipedia content in order to execute this campaign. This wasn't a
> simple case of an organization reusing existing Wikipedia content; the
> organization appears to have altered Wikipedia content to suit their
> purposes regardless of an obvious conflict of interest with Wikipedia's
> purpose of being an educational resource rather than an advertising
> platform.
>
> It seems to me that entities of varying sizes -- from a start-up brand that
> wants to make itself look important by having a Wikipedia article, to large
> corporations and government officials -- will continue to alter Wikipedia
> content in ways that are inappropriate and do a disservice to our readers
> (including advertising, inserting "alternative facts" for medical and
> political content, and eliminating negative information that certain people
> and organizations find inconvenient) and cost editors' and administrators'
> collective time and attention, until there is a financial price that is put
> on this kind of behavior that is large enough to deter them. I don't see
> why we should stand idly by as our products' quality and trustworthiness
> are degraded and our resources are diverted. I'm hoping that WMF's
> enforcement actions in this domain would more than pay for themselves
> through financial penalties that WMF extracts from the wrongdoers.
>
> Pine
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/
> wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/
> wiki/Wikimedia-l
> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
>



-- 
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian

The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Pine W]

I tend to think along James' lines more than Risker's.

Responding to Risker:

It seems to me that the key point that you're missing is that Burger King
altered Wikipedia content in order to execute this campaign. This wasn't a
simple case of an organization reusing existing Wikipedia content; the
organization appears to have altered Wikipedia content to suit their
purposes regardless of an obvious conflict of interest with Wikipedia's
purpose of being an educational resource rather than an advertising
platform.

It seems to me that entities of varying sizes -- from a start-up brand that
wants to make itself look important by having a Wikipedia article, to large
corporations and government officials -- will continue to alter Wikipedia
content in ways that are inappropriate and do a disservice to our readers
(including advertising, inserting "alternative facts" for medical and
political content, and eliminating negative information that certain people
and organizations find inconvenient) and cost editors' and administrators'
collective time and attention, until there is a financial price that is put
on this kind of behavior that is large enough to deter them. I don't see
why we should stand idly by as our products' quality and trustworthiness
are degraded and our resources are diverted. I'm hoping that WMF's
enforcement actions in this domain would more than pay for themselves
through financial penalties that WMF extracts from the wrongdoers.

Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[James Heilman]

Looking at the Burger King case:

I do not have a concern with the ad they created to have Google read the WP
article about their product.

My concern is them possibly altering the first sentence of said article.
But we now have that under control and it was a fairly innocuous in the
grand scheme of undisclosed paid editing.

James

On Wed, Apr 12, 2017 at 10:46 PM, Risker  wrote:

> Without getting into the details of the situation, Pine, I'll simply point
> out that the budget for the legal team of an international corporation like
> Burger King is going to be significantly larger than the entire budget of
> the Wikimedia Foundation, and punishing organizations that have figured out
> a way to trigger a voice-activated software program to obtain information
> that is likely to come from Wikipedia articles doesn't really seem to be
> within scope. I do not see why you would advocate spending the WMF's tiny
> Legal Department budget like this, instead of on copyright reform, or
> assisting in prosecuting those harassing members of our community, or
> preventing others from claiming they are directly related to the Wikimedia
> Foundation or its projects; all of these are entirely on-mission.
>
> There's nothing there to sue them for, anyway - it's open-licensed content
> that anyone can use in any way they see fit, including for commercial
> purposes.  Indeed, that's exactly what Google does on its own search
> results, every day, all day - and it's exactly why the Burger King "trick"
> works, too. They're taking advantage of the Google interface, knowing that
> it is most likely to search Wikipedia for the information requested.  But
> there's not as much vitriol directed at Google, because after all it was
> Google bumping Wikipedia up in its search result algorithms that has (in
> large part) driven the popularity of  the Wikipedia projects.  There's not
> even a genuine attribution issue; as I recall, Alexa says "From Wikipedia"
> at either the beginning or the end of its report.
>
> In other words, I'm hard-pressed to see why you would want the WMF to take
> legal action against a company that is using Wikipedia as intended.  Okay,
> it's not my favourite way of using itbut this is exactly how it's
> intended to be used. I regularly see links to Wikipedia articles in
> mainstream media, not to mention twitter and facebook news reports. Just
> think if someone says "OK Google, what is Neurocysticercosis?" or "OK
> Google, who's Charlie Murphy?" to reflect two news stories I learned about
> today. I got to the Wikipedia articles on both of those subjects by
> following links in online reports by commercial news outlets.
>
> Risker/Anne
>
> On 13 April 2017 at 00:01, Pine W  wrote:
>
> > I'm bumping this thread because there has been a somewhat high-profile
> > incident of misuse of Wikipedia by a corporate entity.
> >
> > This is not entirely the same as undisclosed paid editing, but it was
> > certainly a misuse of Wikipedia.
> >
> > https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/12/15259400/burger-king-
> > google-home-ad-wikipedia
> >
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Whopper=
> > 773807497=773585358
> >
> > It seems to me that this kind of behavior, and accompanying waste of
> > Wikimedia volunteers' time, is likely to continue until WMF Legal cracks
> > down and starts making it financially painful for organizations to misuse
> > Wikipedia in all their various creative and inappropriate ways.
> >
> > A quote from
> > http://www.marketwatch.com/story/clever-burger-king-ad-
> > attempts-to-hijack-google-home-devices-2017-04-12:
> > “Burger King saw an opportunity to do something exciting with the
> emerging
> > technology of intelligent personal assistant devices,” a Burger King
> > spokesperson said. I would like for WMF to make Burger King feel that
> their
> > misuse of WIkipedia was inappropriate and for WMF to hit them where it
> > counts -- in their checkbook -- and with enough force that corporations
> > will decide that messing with Wikipedia is both ethically wrong and
> > financially not worth the risk. WMF needs to change marketers' thinking
> > from the idea that messing with Wikipedia is "an opportunity" to "a big
> > risk." I would like to see WMF Legal get energized about cracking down on
> > these kinds of situations, and I'd be happy to have WMF make an expensive
> > example of Burger King to deter misconduct by others.
> >
> > Pine
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/
> > wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/
> > wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> >
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Risker]

Without getting into the details of the situation, Pine, I'll simply point
out that the budget for the legal team of an international corporation like
Burger King is going to be significantly larger than the entire budget of
the Wikimedia Foundation, and punishing organizations that have figured out
a way to trigger a voice-activated software program to obtain information
that is likely to come from Wikipedia articles doesn't really seem to be
within scope. I do not see why you would advocate spending the WMF's tiny
Legal Department budget like this, instead of on copyright reform, or
assisting in prosecuting those harassing members of our community, or
preventing others from claiming they are directly related to the Wikimedia
Foundation or its projects; all of these are entirely on-mission.

There's nothing there to sue them for, anyway - it's open-licensed content
that anyone can use in any way they see fit, including for commercial
purposes.  Indeed, that's exactly what Google does on its own search
results, every day, all day - and it's exactly why the Burger King "trick"
works, too. They're taking advantage of the Google interface, knowing that
it is most likely to search Wikipedia for the information requested.  But
there's not as much vitriol directed at Google, because after all it was
Google bumping Wikipedia up in its search result algorithms that has (in
large part) driven the popularity of  the Wikipedia projects.  There's not
even a genuine attribution issue; as I recall, Alexa says "From Wikipedia"
at either the beginning or the end of its report.

In other words, I'm hard-pressed to see why you would want the WMF to take
legal action against a company that is using Wikipedia as intended.  Okay,
it's not my favourite way of using itbut this is exactly how it's
intended to be used. I regularly see links to Wikipedia articles in
mainstream media, not to mention twitter and facebook news reports. Just
think if someone says "OK Google, what is Neurocysticercosis?" or "OK
Google, who's Charlie Murphy?" to reflect two news stories I learned about
today. I got to the Wikipedia articles on both of those subjects by
following links in online reports by commercial news outlets.

Risker/Anne

On 13 April 2017 at 00:01, Pine W  wrote:

> I'm bumping this thread because there has been a somewhat high-profile
> incident of misuse of Wikipedia by a corporate entity.
>
> This is not entirely the same as undisclosed paid editing, but it was
> certainly a misuse of Wikipedia.
>
> https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/12/15259400/burger-king-
> google-home-ad-wikipedia
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Whopper=
> 773807497=773585358
>
> It seems to me that this kind of behavior, and accompanying waste of
> Wikimedia volunteers' time, is likely to continue until WMF Legal cracks
> down and starts making it financially painful for organizations to misuse
> Wikipedia in all their various creative and inappropriate ways.
>
> A quote from
> http://www.marketwatch.com/story/clever-burger-king-ad-
> attempts-to-hijack-google-home-devices-2017-04-12:
> “Burger King saw an opportunity to do something exciting with the emerging
> technology of intelligent personal assistant devices,” a Burger King
> spokesperson said. I would like for WMF to make Burger King feel that their
> misuse of WIkipedia was inappropriate and for WMF to hit them where it
> counts -- in their checkbook -- and with enough force that corporations
> will decide that messing with Wikipedia is both ethically wrong and
> financially not worth the risk. WMF needs to change marketers' thinking
> from the idea that messing with Wikipedia is "an opportunity" to "a big
> risk." I would like to see WMF Legal get energized about cracking down on
> these kinds of situations, and I'd be happy to have WMF make an expensive
> example of Burger King to deter misconduct by others.
>
> Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Pine W]

I'm bumping this thread because there has been a somewhat high-profile
incident of misuse of Wikipedia by a corporate entity.

This is not entirely the same as undisclosed paid editing, but it was
certainly a misuse of Wikipedia.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/12/15259400/burger-king-google-home-ad-wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Whopper=773807497=773585358

It seems to me that this kind of behavior, and accompanying waste of
Wikimedia volunteers' time, is likely to continue until WMF Legal cracks
down and starts making it financially painful for organizations to misuse
Wikipedia in all their various creative and inappropriate ways.

A quote from
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/clever-burger-king-ad-attempts-to-hijack-google-home-devices-2017-04-12:
“Burger King saw an opportunity to do something exciting with the emerging
technology of intelligent personal assistant devices,” a Burger King
spokesperson said. I would like for WMF to make Burger King feel that their
misuse of WIkipedia was inappropriate and for WMF to hit them where it
counts -- in their checkbook -- and with enough force that corporations
will decide that messing with Wikipedia is both ethically wrong and
financially not worth the risk. WMF needs to change marketers' thinking
from the idea that messing with Wikipedia is "an opportunity" to "a big
risk." I would like to see WMF Legal get energized about cracking down on
these kinds of situations, and I'd be happy to have WMF make an expensive
example of Burger King to deter misconduct by others.

Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Sydney Poore]

Thanks, Molly. I encouraged people interested in understanding the
different views on the topic as it relates to Wikipedia English (and
perhaps other wikis) to read this discussion.

Sydney

Sydney Poore
User:FloNight
Co-founder Kentucky Wikimedians,
Co-founder WikiWomen User Group,
Co-founder WikiConference North America
Board member of Wiki Project Med Foundation,
Member of Simple Annual Plan Grant Committee





On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 2:11 PM, GorillaWarfare <
gorillawarfarewikipe...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Following up, this is the conversation I was remembering:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Harassment/Archive_11
>
> – Molly (GorillaWarfare)
>
> On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 11:59 AM, GorillaWarfare <
> gorillawarfarewikipe...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Pine,
> >
> > We quite rarely receive requests to look into suspicions of paid editing
> > based on private information. We have historically been reluctant to act
> on
> > them for a number of reasons: it's very prone to error, it's often an
> > incredible amount of work, and we open ourselves up personally to legal
> > risk by doing so. I believe there was some discussion on this onwiki
> around
> > six months ago, I will try to dig up a link.
> >
> > – Molly (GorillaWarfare)
> >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[GorillaWarfare]

Following up, this is the conversation I was remembering:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Harassment/Archive_11

– Molly (GorillaWarfare)

On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 11:59 AM, GorillaWarfare <
gorillawarfarewikipe...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Pine,
>
> We quite rarely receive requests to look into suspicions of paid editing
> based on private information. We have historically been reluctant to act on
> them for a number of reasons: it's very prone to error, it's often an
> incredible amount of work, and we open ourselves up personally to legal
> risk by doing so. I believe there was some discussion on this onwiki around
> six months ago, I will try to dig up a link.
>
> – Molly (GorillaWarfare)
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Gordon Joly]

On 27/01/17 16:59, GorillaWarfare wrote:
> Pine,
> 
> We quite rarely receive requests to look into suspicions of paid editing
> based on private information. We have historically been reluctant to act on
> them for a number of reasons: it's very prone to error, it's often an
> incredible amount of work, and we open ourselves up personally to legal
> risk by doing so. I believe there was some discussion on this onwiki around
> six months ago, I will try to dig up a link.
> 
> – Molly (GorillaWarfare)
> ___
>


Are these examples of "paid to edit"?

https://www.peopleperhour.com/hourlie/create-a-wikipedia-page/31502

https://www.peopleperhour.com/hourlie/create-a-classy-wikipedia-page/332166

https://www.peopleperhour.com/hourlie/write-and-edit-wikipedia-page/322274

https://www.peopleperhour.com/hourlie/write-create-a-wikipedia-page/335913

https://www.peopleperhour.com/hourlie/wikipedia-page-writing-service-create-your-brand-page-on-wikipedia-for-marketing/245953


Gordo


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[GorillaWarfare]

Pine,

We quite rarely receive requests to look into suspicions of paid editing
based on private information. We have historically been reluctant to act on
them for a number of reasons: it's very prone to error, it's often an
incredible amount of work, and we open ourselves up personally to legal
risk by doing so. I believe there was some discussion on this onwiki around
six months ago, I will try to dig up a link.

– Molly (GorillaWarfare)
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Pine W]

GorillaWarfare,

Thank you for the statement.

Perhaps you and your colleagues at Arbcom could explain your current
efforts against COI editing when evidence of such activity is brought to
your attention in private (in alignment with current ENWP Arbcom guidance),
and also what more you think could be done to address the problem.

I agree that harassment also is a problem, and I would not condone "false
flag" accusations of paid editing as an excuse to effectively dox another
editor.

At the same time, it seems to me that our current systems and resources for
addressing both COI editing and harassment are insufficient. WMF is working
on the harassment issue, both in SuSa and in Community Tech, and that work
may have some spillover benefits into the work that attempts to address COI
editing. I am wondering if you would agree with my previous comments to the
effect that WMF should also take a more active role in pursuing paid
editors, and enforcing financial penalties against them as a deterrent
against engaging in activity that violates the TOS and sucks up countless
hours of high-skill volunteer time in investigations and remediation.

Thanks,

Pine

On Thu, Jan 26, 2017 at 11:45 AM, GorillaWarfare <
gorillawarfarewikipe...@gmail.com> wrote:

> The Arbitration Committee has just published a response to this statement:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#
> Response_to_the_Wikimedia_Foundation_statement_on_paid_editing_and_outing
>
> – Molly (GorillaWarfare)
>
> On Wed, Jan 18, 2017 at 9:17 PM, Jacob Rogers 
> wrote:
>
> > Hi all,
> >
> > As I mentioned in my email earlier this month, we've put together a
> longer
> > statement regarding paid editing and how we see the balance of the
> > communities' role and the role that WMF legal can play in these cases. We
> > tried to address the concerns that people have raised to us, and explain
> > when it's helpful to contact us to assist on a case. Of note, it does
> > explain what actions we can take even in cases that don't involve the WMF
> > trademarks.
> >
> > You can find it here: Wikimedia Foundation statement on paid editing and
> > outing
> >  Foundation_statement_on_paid_editing_and_outing>
> >
> > Best,
> > Jacob
> > --
> >
> > Jacob Rogers
> > Legal Counsel
> > Wikimedia Foundation
> >
> > NOTICE: This message might have confidential or legally privileged
> > information in it. If you have received this message by accident, please
> > delete it and let us know about the mistake. As an attorney for the
> > Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical reasons I cannot give legal
> advice
> > to, or serve as a lawyer for, community members, volunteers, or staff
> > members in their personal capacity. For more on what this means, please
> see
> > our legal disclaimer
> > .
> >
> >
> > ___
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> > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/arbcom-l
> >
> >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[Jytdog temp]

I just want to note that the question i raised here was about what WMF itself 
was doing about paid editing. 

I was unhappy to see so much in that statement about what the community 
can/should do.  

I agree with the Arbcom statement that while it is good that Legal noted that 
its comments about en-wiki were advisory only, the statement fails to deal 
adequately with OUTING in en-wiki.  The issue is not easy and to be frank the 
content in the statement about that was disappointingly not carefully 
thought-through.  The objections were very easy to foresee.  

I hope legal will revise it.

On Jan 26, 2017, at 2:45 PM, GorillaWarfare  
wrote:

The Arbitration Committee has just published a response to this statement:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Response_to_the_Wikimedia_Foundation_statement_on_paid_editing_and_outing

– Molly (GorillaWarfare)

> On Wed, Jan 18, 2017 at 9:17 PM, Jacob Rogers  wrote:
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> As I mentioned in my email earlier this month, we've put together a longer
> statement regarding paid editing and how we see the balance of the
> communities' role and the role that WMF legal can play in these cases. We
> tried to address the concerns that people have raised to us, and explain
> when it's helpful to contact us to assist on a case. Of note, it does
> explain what actions we can take even in cases that don't involve the WMF
> trademarks.
> 
> You can find it here: Wikimedia Foundation statement on paid editing and
> outing
> 
> 
> Best,
> Jacob
> --
> 
> Jacob Rogers
> Legal Counsel
> Wikimedia Foundation
> 
> NOTICE: This message might have confidential or legally privileged
> information in it. If you have received this message by accident, please
> delete it and let us know about the mistake. As an attorney for the
> Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical reasons I cannot give legal advice
> to, or serve as a lawyer for, community members, volunteers, or staff
> members in their personal capacity. For more on what this means, please see
> our legal disclaimer
> .
> 
> 
> ___
> ArbCom-l mailing list
> arbco...@lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/arbcom-l
> 
> 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[GorillaWarfare]

The Arbitration Committee has just published a response to this statement:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Response_to_the_Wikimedia_Foundation_statement_on_paid_editing_and_outing

– Molly (GorillaWarfare)

On Wed, Jan 18, 2017 at 9:17 PM, Jacob Rogers  wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> As I mentioned in my email earlier this month, we've put together a longer
> statement regarding paid editing and how we see the balance of the
> communities' role and the role that WMF legal can play in these cases. We
> tried to address the concerns that people have raised to us, and explain
> when it's helpful to contact us to assist on a case. Of note, it does
> explain what actions we can take even in cases that don't involve the WMF
> trademarks.
>
> You can find it here: Wikimedia Foundation statement on paid editing and
> outing
> 
>
> Best,
> Jacob
> --
>
> Jacob Rogers
> Legal Counsel
> Wikimedia Foundation
>
> NOTICE: This message might have confidential or legally privileged
> information in it. If you have received this message by accident, please
> delete it and let us know about the mistake. As an attorney for the
> Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical reasons I cannot give legal advice
> to, or serve as a lawyer for, community members, volunteers, or staff
> members in their personal capacity. For more on what this means, please see
> our legal disclaimer
> .
>
>
> ___
> ArbCom-l mailing list
> arbco...@lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/arbcom-l
>
>
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