[WikiEN-l] RFC on paid editing

[Durova]

Actually we also get bookspam.  The classic version of this is an IP turns
up at a watchlist making one edit to an article to add an item to the
references section.  Check the IP history and it makes one edit each to a
lot of different articles, each adding a book reference but not building the
article.  All the books come from the same publishing house.  Check the
WHOIS...surprise, surprise...

On Wed, Jun 10, 2009 at 6:09 PM, Carcharoth <carcharothwp at googlemail.com>wrote:

> On Thu, Jun 11, 2009 at 1:32 AM, Sam Korn<smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On Wed, Jun 10, 2009 at 11:35 PM, Andrew Gray<andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk>
> wrote:
> >> 2009/6/10 AGK <wikiagk at googlemail.com>:
> >>
> >>> In practice, however, it would be exceedingly rare for that type of
> editing
> >>> to not be problematic to some degree; the nature of the business world
> is
> >>> such that paid editing would almost certainly not adhere to Wikipedia's
> NPOV
> >>> policies. Consider this: if a client commissions a Wikipedia article's
> >>> creation, would the client be satisfied with an article that did not
> reflect
> >>> a stance that was at least a smidgen flattering? I wouldn't imagine so.
> On
> >>> that basis, I think a blanket discouragement from editing for payment
> to be
> >>> the most sensible approach to the issue.
> >>
> >> This only really applies to one type of paid editing, doesn't it?
> >> Commercial or quasi-commercial, ones where the client has a definite
> >> stake in the "message" of the article.
> >>
> >> You can easily have paid editing where this isn't the case at all - an
> >> educational group, for example, which pays people to produce content
> >> about a specific field without presupposing the tone of that content.
> >> In many cases, it may just be that the topic is one where it's hard to
> >> put the "sponsor's" slant in - mathematics, for example, would be a
> >> lot more resilient than alternative medicines!
> >>
> >> We've already had a very limited form of this - the project on Commons
> >> which pays for the creation of images - and there's no doubt that, if
> >> done carefully, this could be extended to article-writing without the
> >> danger of producing editorial slant in the end product. This is pretty
> >> much the traditional encyclopedia model, in fact - paid generalist or
> >> specialist editors, who may well bring their own prejudices to the
> >> text but aren't expected to comply with the "central editorial slant"
> >> on each.
> >>
> >> I agree entirely paid editing can be a bad thing - but so can unpaid
> >> editing for a topic you hold dear. Likewise, both can be forces for
> >> good. I'm not sure it's wise to completely throw away the opportunity
> >> for a powerful tool which we haven't used much yet, due to short-term
> >> fears about commercial interests.
> >>
> >> (In short: regulate, sure. Don't forbid; it'll bite us in the long run.)
> >
> > These are all excellent points.
> >
> > I would like to see the guideline state something along the lines of
> > "You are not required to state that you are being paid to edit.
> > However, if it is later discovered that you have been doing so and you
> > did not state this openly, people will be very suspicious about your
> > motivations.  If you are open, honest and neutral, people are more
> > likely to trust you."
> >
> > Also, I would like to see the end of COIN and direct its traffic to
> > the NPOV noticeboard -- it is highly misleading to suggest that the
> > conflict of interests is the problem; it is the lack of neutrality
> > that is the problem.
>
> My points, from a post I prepared yesterday (which I may post on-wiki
> at some point):
>
> *One point I don't think has been raised is that paid editing mostly
> focuses on living people and contemporary organisations. I can't
> actually think of examples of paid editing that don't involve
> biographies of living people ([[WP:BLP]]) or corporate companies
> ([[WP:CORP]]), plus a side-serving of political and non-corporate
> organisations (e.g. non-governmental organisations and charities) and
> I'm sure that is an important point, but maybe someone else could
> articulate that? What I'm thinking here is that editing on 'academic'
> topics such as history and science (if you ignore paid attempts to
> push fringe points of view - such as crackpot, pseudo and fringe
> history and science), is largely done either by academics or volunteer
> amateurs with interests. The editing on living people articles and
> corporations (and music groups) is largely done by fans (volunteers)
> or paid editors. But the editing on long-dead people (I've created
> several articles on 19th-century scientists) and organisations (think
> 19th-century independence movements, such as [[Hellenoglosso
> Xenodocheio]]). I'm not saying that paid editing is impossible in such
> situations, but it does seem that *corporate* and *contemporary* paid
> editing is mostly limited to certain areas.
>
> *The final point is that no-one seems to have mentioned the model of
> having paid editing done outside Wikipedia under a compatible license,
> and then filtered in through a vetting process (with strict disclosure
> of amount of money, the authors, and the WP accounts, if any) and
> suffrage restrictions in place). It is ironic, considering the history
> of that sort of editing in the past, but I think that is a viable
> model that should be considered as an alternative to in-house paid
> editing.
>
> *Actually, that's not the final thing. The final point I wanted to
> make was about paid corporate editing versus individual wealthy
> individuals paying for specific requests, versus philanthropists
> providing "editorial support" in general (if I had the money, I'd pay
> into a fund to support volunteer Wikipedia editors who needed the
> money - goodness knows how they would distribute it though), versus
> charities and other non-corporate groups paying, versus academic
> funding and grants, versus completely altruistic, gratis volunteer
> editing. I think that covers the whole spectrum.
>
> Carcharoth
>
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