User talk:ChristopherDownie

Managing a conflict of interest
Hello, ChristopherDownie. We welcome your contributions, but if you have an external relationship with the people, places or things you have written about in the page Clerks, you may have a conflict of interest (COI). Editors with a COI may be unduly influenced by their connection to the topic. See the COI guideline and FAQ for organizations for more information. We ask that you:


 * avoid editing or creating articles about yourself, your family, friends, company, organization or competitors;
 * propose changes on the talk pages of affected articles (you can use the request edit template);
 * disclose your COI when discussing affected articles (see WP:DISCLOSE);
 * avoid linking to your organization's website in other articles (see WP:Spam);
 * do your best to comply with Wikipedia's content policies.

In addition, you must disclose your employer, client, and affiliation with respect to any contribution which forms all or part of work for which you receive, or expect to receive, compensation (see WP:PAID).

Also, editing for the purpose of advertising, publicising, or promoting anyone or anything is not permitted. Thank you. Theroadislong (talk) 17:19, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

This information was not added to advertise it's simply stating a fact - Shooting Clerks is a related project as it #details the making of Clerks and how it came to be. Would you not consider this worthy of inclusion on the Clerks wiki page? A Kevin Smith produced biopic about his early days as a filmmaker?
 * The point here is that you have a conflict of interest, and you must follow the instructions above. 331dot (talk) 17:38, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

That's fine.

Shooting Clerks
Hello, ChristopherDownie. We welcome your contributions, but if you have an external relationship with the people, places or things you have written about in the page Shooting Clerks, you may have a conflict of interest (COI). Editors with a COI may be unduly influenced by their connection to the topic. See the COI guideline and FAQ for organizations for more information. We ask that you:


 * avoid editing or creating articles about yourself, your family, friends, company, organization or competitors;
 * propose changes on the talk pages of affected articles (you can use the request edit template);
 * disclose your COI when discussing affected articles (see WP:DISCLOSE);
 * avoid linking to your organization's website in other articles (see WP:Spam);
 * do your best to comply with Wikipedia's content policies.

In addition, you must disclose your employer, client, and affiliation with respect to any contribution which forms all or part of work for which you receive, or expect to receive, compensation (see WP:PAID).

Also, editing for the purpose of advertising, publicising, or promoting anyone or anything is not permitted. Thank you. -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:46, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I disagree on their being a conflict of interest in this case. Ensuring a page has accurate information/content is not a conflict regardless who provides that information/content. The content is not to advertise nor is it meant to influence. It's to ensure the page has the most accurate content which only the content provider would have the copyright rights to add. --Tearstar (talk) 08:02, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Please read WP:COI for yourself. From the first lines: "Conflict of interest (COI) editing involves contributing to Wikipedia about yourself, family, friends, clients, employers, or your financial and other relationships. Any external relationship can trigger a conflict of interest. That someone has a conflict of interest is a description of a situation, not a judgement about that person's opinions, integrity, or good faith.  COI editing is strongly discouraged on Wikipedia. It undermines public confidence and risks causing public embarrassment to the individuals and companies being promoted. Editors with a COI are sometimes unaware of whether or how much it has influenced their editing."  There is a clear COI here, just as we would not want Donald Trump to edit the article about him. 331dot (talk) 09:59, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
 * FWIW, the notification I added was meant more for informational purposes than to accuse someone of wrongdoing. The template contains links to relevant policy and guidelines pages related to COI editing which explain the kinds of things that are expected of COI editors. It's quite possible for a COI editor to contribute positively to improving articles about subjects they are connected to by simply following the suggestions given in WP:COIADVICE, but they aren't required to do so. They can edit the article themselves if they are able to do so in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines, and the only time they should start having problems with others is if their edits start becoming problematic. WP:PAID, however, is something that is required to be complied with regardless of how good the intentions of someone may be and the director/writer of a movie is almost certainly going to be considered to have a WP:FCOI when it comes to content about that movie on Wikipedia. There's more restrictions placed on such editors and this is part of the wmf:Terms of Use. I think your post was well-meaning and I can even agree with the basic premise behind it; however, the reality of the situation (such as this post below about protecting one's brand) often turns out to be more of an editor being WP:NOTHERE than WP:HERE, which is one of the main reasons why COI editing is highly discouraged and viewed with suspicion by much of the Wikipedia community. -- Marchjuly (talk) 13:41, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Your username
Welcome to Wikipedia. I noticed that your username, "ChristopherDownie", may not meet Wikipedia's username policy because usernames that imply the editor is a specific identifiable person (such as the writer/director of the film Shooting Clerks) should only be used if its your WP:REALNAME; however, even in cases where it's your real name, the account may be soft-blocked as a precaution against damaging impersonation until your identity can be verified. If you believe that your username does not violate our policy, please leave a note here explaining why. As an alternative, you may ask for a change of username by completing the form at Special:GlobalRenameRequest, or you may simply create a new account for editing. Thank you. -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:51, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I can attest to the identity of this editor. He is in fact Christopher Downie, the writer and director of the film Shooting Clerks -- Tearstar (talk) 08:04, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
 * While it might WP:AGF to take you at your word, your account hadn't edited for more than five years before suddenly re-appearing to post the above. If Downie wants to eliminate any doubts as to who he is, he can have his identity verified by emailing Wikipedia OTRS. An OTRS volunteer will check the email and add Verified account to his userpage if everything checks out. FWIW, being "Christopher Downie" doesn't give him any special editorial control over "Shooting Clerks" or any other content posted about him on Wikipedia; he will still be expected to comply with Wikipedia:Plain and simple conflict of interest guide and most likely also Wikipedia:Paid-contribution disclosure. -- Marchjuly (talk) 08:14, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

You know what, this is really not worth the hassle. Do as you wish with the page, my account name and film poster.

I understand and appreciate the clarification. I only logged in after such a long absence because I was having a discussion with him externally and he expressed his frustration with the issues surrounding his activity, so I figured as an old contributor I would try to offer him my assistance. -- Tearstar (talk) 08:23, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Just make sure the release date stays the same; incorrect information like a wrong release date effects our brand.

Let's try again
Hi. It appears from some of the above posts that you're feeling a bit overwhelmed at the moment by all things Wikipedia. That's really wasn't the intention of those posting above, and perhaps the problems your experiencing can still be sorted out. I think it might help if I tried to further clarify some things about Wikipedia. I think the above four things seem to be the ones which were frustrating you the most. I hope I was able to clarify things for you a bit. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them below. One last thing though is that you should always try to remember to "sign" your talk page posts. Signing your posts makes it easier for others to see who posted what and when without having to dig through the page history. Signing is particularly helpful when multiple people are posting because unsigned posts tend to flow into subsequent posts so two separate posts by different editors might be mistaken for one single post by one editor. There are a couple of ways to WP:SIGN a post but the easiest is probably as explained in WP:TILDE. -- Marchjuly (talk) 23:24, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
 * 1) The notifications added above about conflict-of-interest editing and your username are standard notification templates generally used to try and help editors better understand certain things about Wikipedia. Wikipedia has lots of policies and guidelines and it's hard for even long-term experienced editors to keep track of them all. The templates sort of provide a super condensed version of various policies and guidelines which might be useful for an editor in a certain situation to be aware because knowing what can and cannot be done on Wikipedia is a good way to avoid running into trouble when editing. The templates contain blue links to Wikipedia pages where more detailed information about a particular policy or guideline can be found.
 * 2) You can use your real name for your username if you want as explained in WP:REALNAME, and doing so shouldn't be an issue as long as your edits comply with relevant Wikipedia policies and guidelines. Moreover, if you edit articles about things completely unrelated to you or your project, pretty much nobody is going to care who you really are. Other editors, however, might start expressing concern if you start creating/editing content about yourself or your projects on Wikipedia (see WP:APPARENTCOI) or if you start making edits which are serious policy/guideline violations (e.g. WP:BLP violations, copyright violations, vandalism, disruption). Nobody can tell just from your username who you really are (see On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog); so, all other editors will have to go by is how you edit and your account will only run the risk of being blocked if you starting creating problems. Having your account verified just makes it clear that you are really you (at least for Wikipedia's purposes); it's sort of like a verified Twitter account, etc. It's optional, but it's an option pursued by those who are concerned about being impersonated online. There is, however, a downside to using your real name as explained in Wikipedia:Wikipedia is in the real world. There have been cases where others have tried to use an editor's Wikipedia activity out in the real world to further their agenda as well as where others have attempted to use Wikipedia as a way to seek resolution of real world disputes. This is probably also something you should consider when deciding on a username.
 * 3) A conflict-of-interest merely describes a situation; it doesn't make any inferences on an editor's intentions. Wikipedia doesn't expressly prohibit COI editing, but it does highly discourage it because persons closely connected to a particular subject matter (e.g. a person editing an article about his or herself, or their business) often has a hard time adhering to Wikipedia:Five pillars. Even though they might intentionally be intended to promote themselves or their business, etc., the end result is that they often do either by adding content not really suitable for Wikipedia or removing content that they feel is detrimental to them. So, the Wikipedia community has created some guidelines like Wikipedia:Plain and simple conflict of interest guide to help these editors avoid problems and help them improve articles. Compliance with these guidelines is not mandatory, but it is highly encouraged. So, if you find problems in articles containing content about your or your projects, the best thing to do would be to follow WP:COIADVICE, WP:PSCOI and WP:BIOSELF to try and get other uninvolved editors to help sort things out. By seeking out assistance from others, you are showing them that you're not trying to use Wikipedia to further you own goals. Wikipedia:Paid-contribution disclosure is the one thing where there's really no wiggle room. Undeclared paid editing is expressly prohibited by the Wikimedia Foundation's Terms of Use and is one way for an editor to find their account quickly blocked. Being the director/writer of a motion picture like Shooting Clerks is almost certainly going to be seen as you have a financial conflict of interest in everything related to the film, and your concern about protecting your brand, while understandable, is not really Wikipedia's concern. You have a vested interest in making sure your projects are presented a certain way, whereas Wikipedia's main concern is that article content be in accordance with its policies and guidelines. These two goals don't necessarily have to be in conflict, but they often are when people have a financial stake in something written about on Wikipedia.
 * 4) The file you uploaded that was deleted from Wikimedia Commons. Commons and Wikipedia are both projects run by the Wikimedia Foundation, but they each have their own respective policies and guidelines. Commons doesn't accept any kind of fair use content; so, all files uploaded to it need to meet c:Commons:Licensing. Basically, Commons will only host content which is considered to be public domain (for some reason) or has been released by the original copyright holder under a free license that it accepts. Since the only free licenses that Commons accepts are only ones where the copyright holder agrees to allow their work to be downloaded by anyone in the world at anytime for any purpose (including derivative use and commercial use) and that such a license is non-revocable, Commons will delete files whose licensing cannot be properly verified; this is done not only to protect Commons, but also to protect the rights of original copyright holders. There are lots of people out there in the world who think that something being available for free online means that it's also free from copyright protection, and I'm sure you probably understand this type of thing quite well since you're a filmmaker/creative professional. If you look at your Commons user talk page (c:User talk:ChristopherDownie), you'll see why your upload was tagged for speedy deletion. The Commons editor had know way of verifying who you are and complex copyrighted content such as movie poster art is often tagged as such for the reasons given above. A deleted file is not gone forever; it's only hidden from public view and can be restored if the problem(s) which led to its deletion are resolved. So, if you read through Commons licensing policy and have no problems releasing the file under the terms of a free license that Commons accepts, you can request that the file be restored by verifying your copyright ownership over the poster. There are a couple ways to do this as explained in c:Commons:OTRS, but the easiest would be to email (see WP:CONSENT and c:COM:ET for some example emails) to Wikimedia OTRS clearly stating your intention to release the file under a free license that Commons accepts. An OTRS volunteer will verify the email and have the file restored if everything checks out. The entire verification process might take some time, but it will be eventually sorted out. Once the file has been restored, it can be re-added to the Wikipedia article about the film. You try to use an official business email address for this if possible because it makes verification a bit easier; free email accounts like Gmail, etc. can be created by anyone and thus tend to viewed with suspicion when it comes to copyrighted commercial content such as a movie poster. There is another option to Commons that  mentioned in his reply to your Teahouse question in which you upload the file locally to Wikipedia as non-free content which doesn't not require copyright holder permission. This is similar to treating the file as fair use/fair dealing, but there are some more restrictions involved.