User talk:Bob at the CIA

Paid editing notice
Hello Bob at the CIA. Your username, along with the the content on your user page, gives the impression you have an undisclosed financial stake in promoting a topic. You have not complied with Wikipedia's mandatory paid editing disclosure requirements as of the time of this writing. Paid advocacy is a category of conflict of interest (COI) editing that involves being compensated by a person, group, company or organization to use Wikipedia to promote their interests. Undisclosed paid advocacy is prohibited by our policies on neutral point of view and what Wikipedia is not, and is an especially serious type of COI; the Wikimedia Foundation regards it as a "black hat" practice akin to black-hat search-engine optimization.

Paid advocates are strongly discouraged from direct article editing, and should instead propose changes on the talk page of the article in question if an article exists. If the article does not exist, paid advocates are strongly discouraged from attempting to write an article at all. At best, any proposed article creation should be submitted through the articles for creation process, rather than directly.

Regardless, if you are receiving or expect to receive compensation for your edits, broadly construed, you are  required by the Wikimedia Terms of Use to disclose your employer, client and affiliation. You can post such a mandatory disclosure to your user page at User:Bob at the CIA. The template Paid can be used for this purpose – e.g. in the form:. If I am mistaken – you are not being directly or indirectly compensated for your edits – please state that in response to this message. Otherwise, please provide the required disclosure. In either case, do not edit further until you answer this message.  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   06:18, 4 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Hi there Oshwah. I'm not receiving, nor do I expect to receive, any form of compensation for my edits. I'm not directly affiliated with CIA, I'm just a fan of theirs, and I'd like to improve their coverage on Wikipedia. Please let me know if that is allowed. Bob at the CIA (talk) 07:58, 5 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Hello @Oshwah. I would like to clarify if you have reviewed my previous comment, and if I am allowed to continue editing Wikipedia. Upon further reflection, I realize that my chosen username could give the wrong impression about my connection to CIA. If it is possible to change my username, and you think this would be advisable, I'd happily accept a change to "Bob loves the CIA" or even simply "I love the CIA". Let me know how you think I should proceed. Thank you. Bob at the CIA (talk) 22:43, 9 June 2024 (UTC)
 * If you're not being compensated to edit Wikipedia, then you're fine. You're good to go, and you can edit as usual. :-)  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   22:46, 9 June 2024 (UTC)