Template:Did you know nominations/Dan Gertler

Dan Gertler

 * ... that Israeli businessman Dan Gertler bought the Kolwezi tailings project for $20 million and two months later sold half of it for $175 million?
 * Reviewed: Non-ferrous metal
 * Comment: I put a list of links to the Duplication Detector for all the cited sources in Talk:Dan Gertler/dupcheck. Maybe a script could be developed to automate this based on all the urls in an article. Better, it would generate a consolidated set of results. It still would not catch plagiarism from a non-cited source, book, PDF etc., but would help.

Created/expanded by Aymatth2 (talk). Self nom at 04:14, 17 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Symbol voting keep.svg Date, hook citations, length good. Note that this WP:BLP reports allegations of bribery and corruption in the blood diamond trade, associated with or committed by Dan Gertler, who has never been convicted of a crime. I'm comfortable that the article handles the issues in an even handed way, although I think there is excessive WP:WEASEL language: "Despite speculation that...", "Some reports say...", "Others say that...", "Letters allegedly written..." should all be changed to the name of the writer, and/or the name of the publication. Because of the difficulty in writing this type of article, it might be a good idea for a second editor double check the controversial allegations in the article before promoting it to the front page, just to be on the safe side. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 03:12, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I have taken a shot at removing weasel words. I welcome another set of eyes since the article is about a controversial subject. Aymatth2 (talk) 15:12, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Close paraphrasing from multiple sources. Examples: "Gecamines sold its 20% share of the Mutanda project, worth an estimated $600 million, for $137 million. The buyer was Rowny Assets, a company registered in the British Virgin Islands and "associated" with Gertler. Gecamines sold its 25% percent share in the neighboring Kansuki copper and cobalt project to another British Virgin Islands entity associated with Gertler for an undisclosed price. Kansuki was said to potentially be a larger producer than Mutanda" vs "Gecamines sold its 20 percent share of the Mutanda copper and cobalt project earlier this year for $137 million, according to its submission to the IMF. The stake was bought by Rowny Assets Ltd., a British Virgin Islands-registered entity “associated” with Gertler...Gecamines had sold its 25 percent stake in a neighboring copper and cobalt project known as Kansuki to another British Virgin Islands entity associated with Gertler. Kansuki has “the potential to be a bigger producer” of minerals than Mutanda"; "contract to buy rough diamonds worth $2 billion over a period of 24 months" vs "contract for the purchase $2 billion in rough diamonds over a period of 24 months"; "Gertler bribing Congolese government officials and Angola Army generals hired to protect Kinshasha" vs "he bribed Congolese government officials and Angola Army generals who commanded Angola Army troops protecting the Congo capital Kinshasa"; "An electricity problem caused the pumps to fail and the mine to flood in November 2010, and emergency measures had to be taken to drain the mine" vs "electricity problems caused its pumps to malfunction, forcing emergency measures to drain the site". Please note that these are examples only, and that all sources should be checked thoroughly. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:28, 8 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Mere facts are not subject to copyright. The article presents facts from many sources in roughly chronological sequence. It avoids any repetition of analysis or creative writing, but is careful to reflect the facts provided by the sources as accurately as possible. With a topic like this, the greater concern may be that the sources will consider their statements have been misrepresented. Does Nikkimaria have any suggested changes? For example, how should "contract for the purchase of $2 billion in rough diamonds over a period of 24 months" be rephrased while accurately describing the nature of the contract? Aymatth2 (talk) 01:19, 8 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't really know where we're supposed to come down on this. If this were a GA nominee or something, I would say, definitely, that violates WP:PARAPHRASE and must be rewritten. But unless there is some new push to eradicate questionable paraphrasing from DYK candidates, I don't think it's disqualifying. There is a minimal degree of creativity in the original reports, such as "X bought a N% interest in Y", which can only be phrased so many ways. See . But a rewrite would not be difficult and would moot the issue. I'll help out myself if I have a chance. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 18:40, 8 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Any help would really be appreciated - as author I probably cannot see the most obvious problems. The difficulty with this one, to me, is that it covers controversial deals involving very large sums of money. My guess is that the sources triple-checked their information and then got two lawyers to review the wording before publishing. So we are between Scylla and Charybdis: copyright violation versus misrepresentation. "Bloomberg L.P. did not say it was two-year contract; we said it had a period of 24 months". Putting half the article in quotations cannot be the answer. Aymatth2 (talk) 02:09, 9 December 2011 (UTC)


 * I took at shot at reshuffling the paragraphs Nikkimaria dislikes. Two of them I just dropped: the $2 billion contract and the bribery allegation. If there are any further concerns, just point them out and I will delete the offending content. Aymatth2 (talk) 21:31, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Much better than it was. However, there are still smaller phrases that are verbatim or near-verbatim from sources. Here are some examples: "was eventually awarded an 18-month monopoly on DRC diamond exports in July 2000" vs "was awarded an 18-month monopoly on diamond exports from the DRC in July 2000"; "in exchange for lending MIBA $15 million to be used in modernizing its mining equipment" vs "In exchange for the discount, Emaxon will lend Miba $15 million to modernize its mining equipment"; "another British Virgin Islands entity associated with Gertler" vs "another British Virgin Islands entity associated with Gertler". Nikkimaria (talk) 15:29, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I have cut out mention of the 18-month monopoly, the $15 million loan and the Mutanda property sale. Anything else that should be dropped? Aymatth2 (talk) 16:33, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Nope, I think we're probably good to go now. Thanks for taking the time to address this! Nikkimaria (talk) 03:37, 15 December 2011 (UTC)