User talk:70.52.158.33

repeated vandalism of Ed Greenwood page (removal of verified publishing credits)

Help me!
Please help me with... Ed Greenwood Dear 8.37.179.254, kindly stop vandalizing my Wikipedia page by repeatedly removing books and games I've designed or worked on. They've all been verified many times, my name is on the covers or in the credits, they are verified on Amazon or at publishers' websites or in the imdb listings, and so on. It doesn't hurt me, these projects are in the past for me, but it hurts fans and researchers trying to find stuff. Thanks to the librarians in four countries who noticed this. Dec 13/2021 70.52.158.33 (talk) 04:08, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Please discuss this on the article talk page (Talk:Ed Greenwood) and provide your sources rather than edit warring. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 04:13, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
 * GorillaWarfare, thank you for intervening. This IP user has incorrectly accused me of vandalism, when I was merely removing unverified content (no sources at the Greenwood article, no sources on each of the listed articles to mention Greenwood). I note that the above comments seem to suggest that the IP is claiming to be Ed Greenwood, and if so isn't heavily editing your own page a WP:COI issue? 8.37.179.254 (talk) 04:30, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

I am Ed Greenwood (the Ed Greenwood this Wikipedia page is about). For the record, I did not create my Wikipedia page, and have NEVER edited my Wikipedia page. I have in the past sent messages to Wikipedia editors offering to correct publication credits (wrong titles and dates on books and games that could cause them to be confused with works by others). I believe some of these messages survive. The edits/reversions to my page the last few days were done by librarians working at the same address I work at (same library), undoing content takedowns from 8.37.179.254, which seem to be based on lack of references to me in other Wikipedia articles, rather than by any references to primary sources (the works themselves ["my name on the cover"]) or secondary sources (their catalogue entries, sale listings at Amazon, imdb listings, etc.). These librarians brought this matter to my attention. The credits this IP user keeps removing have all been sourced in the past, by others (those who added them to my page, NOT me), and aren't questioned by anyone in the gaming industry familiar with the particular games. Are the only standards for acceptance mentions in other Wikipedia articles? That would seem a system ripe for abuse. A fan online pointed out to me that this same user, back in January 2021, removed someone else's text from my Wikipedia page saying that I was the son of the writer Barbara Greenwood, as "unsourced." How does anyone "source" someone's parentage? (I would do it by looking in the Canadian Who's Who, in which we're both listed AND our relationship to each other. Isn't that the sort of basic scholarship that should be going on here? For these computer games, I'm listed as a designer on the cover or back of box or in the manual for all of them.) And repeated removal of credits is very much "vandalism;" academics and librarians defined this precise activity as such long before Wikipedia or the Internet existed. And back in my ARPANet days, obscuring the source of a message or modifying its content was "vandalism." So the librarian who flagged these removals as "vandalism" was entirely correct. I am happy to work with Wikipedia to resolve this issue, but deleting chunks of publication credits hardly seems helpful to anyone. (GorillaWarfare, I'm posting this here because the Talk page you directed me to, for discussion, is locked to me.) FYI, I worked on EVERY Forgotten Realms-related desktop, online, and console game throughout the TSR years and into the Wizards years (yes, every last SSI game, all of the Baldur's Gate games, etc.). I never wrote a single line of code, the industry had already moved beyond my paltry early programming training, but I was continuity and lore "sage" for them all, and wrote such things as the titles of all the books PC avatars can find in the Baldur's Gate II game. I SUSPECT that of all of these games, the handful that appear on my Wikipedia page are those in which I am specifically, publicly credited (and that the other games were removed in editing, or never put up on the page in the first place, because of this lack of obvious credit; some of the earliest, crudest games have Easter Eggs deep in play, in which I and others are credited). These few all have clear Ed Greenwood credits, the Pool of Radiance game has a novelette by me in its manual that foreshadows and explains in-game lore, to guide players, and for the Haunted Halls of Eveningstar I provided additional lore for my original dungeon, wrote new story, and did an in-game voiceover commentary (and interactive NPC vocals, monster noises, and sound effects).

Notice of Conflict of interest noticeboard discussion
There is currently a discussion at Conflict of interest/Noticeboard regarding a possible conflict of interest incident with which you may be involved. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 8.37.179.254 (talk) 16:21, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

Conflict of Interest
You seem to clear conflict of interest. I would suggest you don't edit your own article. You must the WP:ER Edit Request mechanism, where you make a request to edit the article on talk talk page, an editor in good standing will come along and review the edit requests to determine if it suitable to be included in the article. If it is, it will go in. If it not, it wont'. Please do not edit the article directly. It is deeply uncool, and will likely lead to disruption as your edtits will be reverted. Thanks for your time.  scope_creep Talk  10:52, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

Ed Greenwood here. Is this above scope creep message directed to me? If so, it's out of order and completely incorrect. Does no one editing at Wikipedia read what I say, or is the default just to assume I'm lying? As I have repeatedly stated, I have NEVER edited my own article. I have in the past, when there was no such mechanism, sent messages to the Talk page of title and date CORRECTIONS in publication credits others have added to my page, for others to review and add/implement if they see fit; I have never edited the page. Apparently other librarians restoring vandalism show up as having the same IP as I do. So, sorry, but I see no Conflict of Interest at all.