On 1/23/07, bbatsell wikipedia@theskeptik.com wrote:
Although I absolutely agree with the sentiment (and think we should clean up any POV problems in the article), my answer to your question would be, "when people are being paid by the subject to do so", which in my opinion is a clear [[WP:COI|conflict of interest]].
I certainly dispute the fact that an ECMA standard (propsal) is a subject, nor it can pay anyone; extending the COI even to people not affiliated with the subject behind a topic will end up with another conflict of interest: We do want the best people familiar with a subject to contribute to Wikipedia.
We say (for a good reason): "So fix it" to people who spot a mistake in a Wikipedia article. Telling "So don't fix it" especially to the people familiar with a topic is simply annoying (IMHO). In the end,you will not prevent MS from paying 3rd parties to contribute to Wikipedia but you will prevent them from disclosing it.
Mathias