User talk:RickDavis

Welcome!
Hello, RickDavis, and welcome to Wikipedia!&#32;Thank you for your contributions.

I noticed that one of the first articles you edited appears to be dealing with a topic with which you may have a conflict of interest. In other words, you may find it difficult to write about that topic in a neutral and objective way, because you are, work for, or represent, the subject of that article.&#32;Your recent contributions may have already been undone for this very reason.

To reduce the chances of your contributions being undone, you might like to draft your revised article before submission, and then ask me or another editor to proofread it. See our help page on userspace drafts for more details. If the page you created has already been deleted from Wikipedia, but you want to save the content from it to use for that draft, don't hesitate to ask anyone from this list and they will copy it to your user page.

One rule we do have in connection with conflicts of interest is that accounts used by more than one person will unfortunately be blocked from editing. Wikipedia generally does not allow editors to have usernames which imply that the account belongs to a company or corporation. If you have a username like this, you should request a change of username or create a new account. (A name that identifies the user as an individual within a given organization may be OK.)

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

Here are some pages that you might find helpful:
 * The plain and simple conflict of interest guide
 * The five pillars of Wikipedia
 * Contributing to Wikipedia
 * Tutorial
 * How to edit a page and How to develop articles
 * How to create your first article (using the Article Wizard if you wish)
 * Simplified Manual of Style

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on talk pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, or ask your question on this page and then place  before the question. Again, welcome! TonyBallioni (talk) 02:22, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia and copyright
Hello RickDavis, and welcome to Wikipedia. All or some of your addition(s) to Eckankar have been removed, as it appears to have added copyrighted material without evidence of permission from the copyright holder. While we appreciate your contributing to Wikipedia, there are certain things you must keep in mind about using information from your sources to avoid copyright or plagiarism issues here.


 * You can only copy/translate a small amount of a source, and you must mark what you take as a direct quotation with double quotation marks (") and cite the source using an inline citation. You can read about this at Non-free content in the sections on "text". See also Help:Referencing for beginners, for how to cite sources here.
 * Aside from limited quotation, you must put all information in your own words and structure, in proper paraphrase. Following the source's words too closely can create copyright problems, so it is not permitted here; see Close paraphrasing. (There is a college-level introduction to paraphrase, with examples, hosted by the Online Writing Lab of Purdue.) Even when using your own words, you are still, however, asked to cite your sources to verify information and to demonstrate that the content is not original research.
 * Our primary policy on using copyrighted content is Copyrights. You may also want to review Copy-paste.
 * If you own the copyright to the source you want to copy or are a designated agent, you may be able to license that text so that we can publish it here. However, there are steps that must be taken to verify that license before you do. See Donating copyrighted materials.
 * In very rare cases (that is, for sources that are public domain or compatibly licensed), it may be possible to include greater portions of a source text. However, please seek help at the help desk before adding such content to the article. 99.9% of sources may not be added in this way, so it is necessary to seek confirmation first. If you do confirm that a source is public domain or compatibly licensed, you will still need to provide full attribution; see Plagiarism for the steps you need to follow.
 * Also note that Wikipedia articles may not be copied or translated without attribution. If you want to copy or translate from another Wikipedia project or article, you can, but please follow the steps in Copying within Wikipedia.

It's very important that contributors understand and follow these practices, as policy requires that people who persistently do not must be blocked from editing. If you have any questions about this, you are welcome to leave me a message on my talk page. Thank you. TonyBallioni (talk) 02:23, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

June 2017
Your addition to Eckankar has been removed, as it appears to have added copyrighted material to Wikipedia without evidence of permission from the copyright holder. If you are the copyright holder, please read Donating copyrighted materials for more information on uploading your material to Wikipedia. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted material, including text or images from print publications or from other websites, without an appropriate and verifiable license. All such contributions will be deleted. You may use external websites or publications as a source of information, but not as a source of content, such as sentences or images&mdash;you must write using your own words. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. ''Additionally, I have removed any content that had previously been challenged with citation needed tags. If you want to remove sourced content, please discuss it on the talk page.'' TonyBallioni (talk) 14:53, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Edit war warning
Your recent editing history at Eckankar shows that you are currently engaged in an edit war. To resolve the content dispute, please do not revert or change the edits of others when you are reverted. Instead of reverting, please use the talk page to work toward making a version that represents consensus among editors. The best practice at this stage is to discuss, not edit-war. See BRD for how this is done. If discussions reach an impasse, you can then post a request for help at a relevant noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases, you may wish to request temporary page protection.

Being involved in an edit war can result in your being blocked from editing&mdash;especially if you violate the three-revert rule, which states that an editor must not perform more than three reverts on a single page within a 24-hour period. Undoing another editor's work—whether in whole or in part, whether involving the same or different material each time—counts as a revert. Also keep in mind that while violating the three-revert rule often leads to a block, you can still be blocked for edit warring&mdash;even if you don't violate the three-revert rule&mdash;should your behavior indicate that you intend to continue reverting repeatedly. Jytdog (talk) 16:03, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Conflict of interest and advocacy in Wikipedia
Hi RickDavis. I work on conflict of interest and advocacy issues in Wikipedia, which are closely related.

Hi xxxx I work on conflict of interest issues here in Wikipedia, along with my regular editing. Your edits to date have a focus on Eckankar, in which you have removed negative content, added positive, and added copyright-violating content belonging to the organization. I'm giving you notice of our Conflict of Interest guideline and Terms of Use, and will have some comments and requests for you below.

Hello, RickDavis. We welcome your contributions, but if you have an external relationship with the people, places, or things you have written about on Wikipedia, you may have a conflict of interest (COI). Editors with a COI may be unduly influenced by their connection to the topic, and it is important when editing Wikipedia articles that such connections be completely transparent. See the conflict of interest guideline and FAQ for organizations for more information. In particular, we ask that you please:


 * avoid editing or creating articles related to you and your family, friends, school, company, club, or organization, as well as any competing companies' projects or products;
 * instead, you are encouraged to propose changes on the Talk pages of affected article(s) (see the request edit template);
 * when discussing affected articles, disclose your COI (see WP:DISCLOSE);
 * avoid linking to the Wikipedia article or to the website of your organization in other articles (see WP:SPAM);
 * exercise great caution so that you do not violate 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).

Please take a few moments to read and review Wikipedia's policies regarding conflicts of interest, especially those pertaining to neutral point of view, sourcing and autobiographies. Thank you.

Comments and requests
Wikipedia is a widely-used reference work and managing conflict of interest is essential for ensuring the integrity of Wikipedia and retaining the public's trust in it. As in academia, COI is managed here in two steps - disclosure and a form of peer review. Please note that there is no bar to being part of the Wikipedia community if you want to be involved in articles where you have a conflict of interest; there are just some things we ask you to do (and if you are paid, some things you need to do).

Disclosure is the most important, and first, step. While I am not asking you to disclose your identity (anonymity is strictly protecting by our WP:OUTING policy) would you please disclose if you have some connection with the Eckankar movement, directly or through a third party (e.g. a PR agency or the like)? You can answer how ever you wish (giving personally identifying information or not), but if there is a connection, please disclose it. After you respond (and you can just reply below), I can walk you through how the "peer review" part happens and then, if you like, I can provide you with some more general orientation as to how this place works. Please reply here, just below, to keep the discussion in one place. Thanks! Jytdog (talk) 16:09, 22 June 2017 (UTC)
 * You have not replied here. You appear to be editing under a separate account now, or perhaps have recruited a colleague, .  Discussion is fundamental to how WIkipedia works.  Please reply to my inquiry above. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 01:09, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

June 2017
You may be blocked from editing without further warning the next time you disrupt Wikipedia, as you did at Eckankar. ''The content you added was under copyright and has no evidence of permission to use. It has been removed and the revisions have been tagged for deletion from the article history. If the owner wants to donate the material for use, they need to follow the instructions on WP:DCM. Please note that should they do this, just because material has been donated for use under a free license, it does not mean that it has to be included on Wikipedia.'' TonyBallioni (talk) 17:05, 26 June 2017 (UTC)

This is your final warning. Further copyright violations will result in you being blocked from editing. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 21:43, 27 June 2017 (UTC)
 * , as an FYI, this is a CU blocked sock. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:47, 27 June 2017 (UTC)
 * Not sure why I didn't notice that. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 21:49, 27 June 2017 (UTC)