User talk:Mark McKinney

Welcome!

Hello, Mark McKinney, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful: I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on discussion pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place  before the question. Again, welcome! JamesBWatson (talk) 12:08, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
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I have read the contents of your user page, and I think it may be helpful to you if I explain a few things about how Wikipedia works. It is important to realise that WIkipedia is an encyclopedia; sometimes new Wikipedia editors do not understand that Wikipedia is not a free web host, and Wikipedia pages are not provided for use for any purpose at all, but only for working towards improving the encyclopedia. Your user page may be a first draft towards creating a Wikipedia article, but if so it is, unfortunately, not suitable, for several reasons. Firstly, the use of the word "our" (in "Please visit our Vimeo Channel for online videos...") indicates that it was written by someone involved with the Philip Simmons Documentation Project, which would mean that it runs against Wikipedia's conflict of interest guideline: articles must be objective, written independently of their subjects. If the project is notable in the sense required by Wikipedia's policies then it is likely that someone independent of the subject will, sooner or later, write an article about it, while if it is not notable any article on it is likely to be deleted. In either case it is better not to have an involved party writing the article. For another thing, the same invitation to "visit our Vimeo Channel" suggests that the intention is to attract people to that site, rather than to inform them objectively about the project; this would be in conflict with Wikipedia's policy on not using Wikipedia for promotion. Also the general tone and nature of the information is not suitable for an encyclopedia article. It is also unclear whether the project is sufficiently notable for an article according to Wikipedia's criteria: I have made web searches, and most of what I have found is either from the project itself or other involved parties, or is merely chat on blogs etc: there is little evidence of substantial third-party coverage. Finally, what you have written is copied from http://vimeo.com/groups/17024/videos/4799406, and is almost certainly unacceptable under Wikipedia's licensing conditions for copyright reasons. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:08, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Copyright problems with User:Mark McKinney
Hello. Concerning your contribution, User:Mark McKinney, please note that Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images obtained from other web sites or printed material, without the permission of the author(s). As a copyright violation, User:Mark McKinney appears to qualify for deletion under the speedy deletion criteria. User:Mark McKinney has been tagged for deletion, and may have been deleted by the time you see this message. If you believe that the article or image is not a copyright violation, or if you have permission from the copyright holder to release the content freely under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License (CC-BY-SA) then you should do one of the following:


 * If you have permission from the author, leave a message explaining the details at and send an email with the message to . See Requesting copyright permission for instructions.
 * If a note on the original website states that it is licensed under the CC-BY-SA license, leave a note at with a link to where we can find that note.
 * If you hold the copyright to the material: send an e-mail from an address associated with the original publication to or a postal message to the Wikimedia Foundation permitting re-use under the CC-BY-SA and GFDL, and note that you have done so on.

However, for textual content, you may simply consider rewriting the content in your own words. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with our copyright policy. Wikipedia takes copyright concerns very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. Thank you. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:07, 14 October 2009 (UTC)