User talk:Dpalame

Please do not add inappropriate external links to Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a mere directory of links nor should it be used for advertising or promotion. Inappropriate links include (but are not limited to) links to personal web sites, links to web sites with which you are affiliated, and links that exist to attract visitors to a web site or promote a product. See the external links guideline and spam policies for further explanations of links that are considered appropriate. If you feel the link should be added to the article, then please discuss it on the article's talk page rather than re-adding it. See the welcome page to learn more about Wikipedia. Thank you. Notinasnaid 20:54, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't understand why Barilla is allowed to advertise their company and have external links to there website and DaVinci can't. It seems unfair. Please explain. Thank you.

Response
Although anyone can edit Wikipedia, this is in a way a little misleading. Behind this there are a lot of rules and guidelines which take a long time to learn, and things which don't follow the rules are likely to be ruthlessly removed.

There are two particular issues with what you mention, writing an article about your company or product: notability and conflict of interest.

Notability
Wikipedia is not a business directory, free advertising space, or personal web space. It is an encyclopedia. The general feeling is that some companies belong in the encyclopedia, but most do not. For example, Microsoft and Air France do belong, and a dry cleaning shop in Springfield does not. The difficult part is drawing the line between.

The idea that is used to decide is "notability". Microsoft is notable because people have written books and newspaper articles about it, and for other reasons. Other reasons might be things like being the first ever company of its kind (when there are now many successful companies like it). The dry cleaning shop isn't ever likely to have people (other than the shop owner) write books about it, or get a series of national newspaper articles, and so forth.

The guidelines that apply to companies can be found in Notability (organizations and companies).

Now, it's not enough for a company to just be notable, and hence deserve an article. The article must say why it is notable, and must prove it (by references to things like books, newspaper articles or whatever, that other people can check).

Conflict of interest
People want to be able to trust Wikipedia, and this means that they want to know that the information is there because objective people decided it was important, reported accurately, and not there for advertising purposes. It's very hard for people to trust, for example, a biography of a "famous person" that's written by that famous person. To deal with this, it is very strongly recommended that people do not write about things they are to close to: themselves, their personal friends, the companies they own or work for, and so forth.

The relevant guideline here is Conflict of interest. It is possible for interested people to use the talk page of an article to point out errors or suggest improvements, but they should not create or edit the article. The idea is that if the subject is truly notable, someone else will be along to edit the article in time.

It seems very difficult for many people to accept that this guideline really applies to them, to their company, but it really does.

Notinasnaid 15:10, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Orphaned fair use image (Image:Davincipastalogo.jpg)
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