[WikiEN-l] Fwd: The counterattack of the PR companies

[Thomas Morton]

On 18 April 2012 14:44, Andreas Kolbe <jayen466 at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Wed, Apr 18, 2012 at 1:55 PM, Charles Matthews <
> charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
>
> > Yes indeed. Jimbo neither makes policy nor enforces it, of course. What
> we
> > have here is an ongoing "loop" in being able to read WP:COI properly. I
> > believe the guideline on COI to be the best available take on this issue.
> > However - and it's a big however - we are learning that the limitation on
> > COI to a "universal" statement makes it harder for those with particular
> > types of COI to understand. This applies both to paid editing, and to
> > "activist" editing (I think you will have no trouble understanding this,
> > Andreas ...), as well as autobiography.
> >
>
>
> That is one of the points the authors of the study picked up on, too:
>
> ---o0o---
>
> There are problems with the “bright line” rule. By not allowing public
> relations/communications professionals to directly edit removes the
> possibility of a timely
> correction or update of information, ultimately denying the public a right
> to accurate
> information. Also, by disallowing public relations/communications
> professionals to make
> edits while allowing competitors, activists and anyone else who wants to
> chime in, is
> simply asking of misinformation. If direct editing is not a possibility, an
> option must be
> provided that can quickly and accurately update Wikipedia articles; as this
> study found, no
> such process currently exists.
>
> ---o0o---
>
> Unfortunately, they do have a point.
>
> Positive bias and advertorials *can* be odious, but activist editing with a
> negative bent has traditionally been the greater problem in Wikipedia, in
> my view, and is the type of bias the Wikipedia system has traditionally
> favoured. Not doing harm is, in my view, more important than preventing the
> opposite.
>
> Andreas


It would be interesting to study what sort of edits are being talked about.

>From my dealings with PR-style edit requests there is a fairly broad form
ranging from:

- desire to remove sourced negative material (whitewashing)
- correction of serious innacuracies/POV (i.e. defamation or other)
- simple information updates/corrections (like: circulation in 2012 is
41,000, you currently use the 2010 figures).
- desire to add PR-style gushy material

Of those I'd consider only #2 important to address quickly and seriously.
Finding a way to filter major problems would be good. OTRS isn't
(currently) a good way, IMO.

Tom