[WikiEN-l] More about PR firms

[Gregory Maxwell]

On 8/21/06, Erik Moeller <eloquence at gmail.com> wrote:
[snip]
> The user space has historically allowed POV material. It would give us
> a good record of all PR groups operating within Wikipedia. Surely it
> is in our interest to have such a record?

We have enough problems with people trying to use userspace to
advertise their products and services...  A wikipedia userspace page
is one of the easiest ways you can show up high on google search
results, and as a result userpages are frequently misused by
non-contributors to create a publicly visible pulpit for themselves.

To a random google using reader, it is often not at all obvious that
they have hit a userpage or, even, what a userpage is verses Wikipedia
proper.  When the userpage *looks* like a Wikipedia article, there is
a substantial risk of confusion. A non-wikipedian can not be expected
to know that an wikipedia article with User: at the front is something
substantially different from a wikipedia article without it.

I am very worried that such usage will risk causing additional harm to
our readers and further damage to our reputation.


I, for one, am strongly opposed to any proposal which would further
support the abuse of our resources as an advertising medium.
Userpages exist to help users interact with each other inorder to
further the project. They do not exist to provide a platform for
advertisers to address the world.


That we already have users who believe that all third party edits to
userpages are vandalism to be instantly reverted only increases the
risk of this already risky proposal.