[WikiEN-l] Notability of commercial organisations

[WereSpielChequers]

A more neutral way to put it would be "is there a need to review the
notability requirements for commercial organisations". Tighten up rather
skews the debate.

As for why we should be discussing this, a lobby group for paid editors has
published a somewhat flawed report dissing Wikipedia and Wikipedians,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Wikipedia_Signpost/2012-04-23/Investigative_reportand
the whole issue of COI and paid editing is somewhat topical. Whilst I
normally consider myself one of the more inclusionist members of the
community, I'd concede that we have an unusual situation re business
related topics, and that a more deletionist approach might be helpful. In
my view:


   1. The ratio of volunteers whose hobby it is to write about business to
   hired hands operating covertly is probably not as healthy for Wikipedia on
   general business issues as it would be re hill forts, classic cars or
   hurricanes.
   2. Some businesses have annoyed people, and I suspect that articles on
   businesses in general get more hostile unbalanced editing than do articles
   on extinct megafauna, asteroids or mathematical formulae.
   3. There are areas where our coverage is, or aims to be, comprehensive,
   and there are areas where we merely cover the most notable. with crinoids,
   cathedrals and corsairs this doesn't bring up a fairness issue. But with
   business it does. If we only create articles for the "main players" in a
   market then we are potentially giving them an advantage over smaller or
   newer rivals, especially if those articles emphasise the positive.


In my view it would be fair and reasonable to respond to the existence of
paid editing in business related articles by upping our minimum requirement
for referencing new articles on businesses. So following on from the sticky
prods we introduced for BLPs, we could introduce a BizProd; Any article
created after 1st June 2012 where the subject is a currently trading
business needs at least one independent reliable source. This would be a
tougher and simpler standard than for BLPs, but that reflects the reality
that some of these authors are actually paid to edit, and if our rules
clearly state that they must be able to cite a reliable source such as a
newspaper then it is reasonable to expect them to do so. It doesn't
directly address the fairness issue, but IMHO there is more of a
responsibility on the community to keep business articles neutral than
there is for articles on waterways or wrestlers, and requiring a reliable
source is a step in the right direction.

If we did this then we would not need to simultaneously review the
notability criteria. Also the NoIndex until patrolled feature that is
likely to be implemented would take away some of the incentive for
businesses to create articles knowing they would only be up for a few days
to take advantage of search engines

WSC


On 27 April 2012 05:17, Alan Liefting <aliefting at ihug.co.nz> wrote:

> This is a bit of a straw poll.
> Is there a need to tighten up notability guidelines for commercial
> organisations?
> Yes/No/Maybe?
>
>
> Alan Liefting
>
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