Dear Community:
The volume of corporate vanity/vandalism which is showing up on
Wikipedia is overwhelming. At the office, we are receiving dozens of
phone calls *per week* about company, organization, and marketing edits
which are reverted, causing the non-notable, but self-aggrandizing
authors, to scream bloody murder. This is as it should be. However, I
am issuing a call to arms to the community to act in a much more
draconian fashion in response to corporate self-editing and vanity page
creation. This is simply out of hand, and we need your help.
We are the #14 website in the world. We are a big target. If we are to
remain true to our encyclopedic mission, this kind of nonsense cannot be
tolerated. This means the administrators and new page patrol need to be
clear when they see new usernames and page creation which are blatantly
commercial - shoot on sight. There should be no question that someone
who claims to have a "famous movie studio" and has exactly 2 Google hits
- both their Myspace page - they get nuked. Ban users who promulgate
such garbage for a significant period of time. They need to be
encouraged to avoid the temptation to recreate their article, thereby
raising the level of damage and wasted time they incur.
Some of you might think regular policy and VfD is the way to go. I am
here to tell you it is not enough. We are losing the battle for
encyclopedic content in favor of people intent on hijacking Wikipedia
for their own memes. This scourge is a serious waste of time and
energy. We must put a stop to this now.
Thank you for your help.
-Brad Patrick
User:BradPatrick
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.