User talk:Ricste

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Hello, Ricste, 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!
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Public domain texts
Please examine WP:Copyright and avoid copy/pasting texts from the Internet. Whereas federal US documents might be in the public domain, by default, local government documents are not, thus you might need to prove that Northern California court files can be copy/pasted. Materialscientist (talk) 23:28, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
 * My reverts are all about possible copyright issues (involving wikipedia site). It is the first time I ever heard of Barney Glaser. PD texts might be copy/pasted. Non-PD texts better be rephrased. Materialscientist (talk) 23:34, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Please understand that what you are posting, true or not doesn't matter, may well be considered as a libel (see WP:BLP, WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE). You have to provide verifiable sources and clearly explain the possible copy/paste issues. In other words, your edits might well be valid, but all such issues do require a great deal of diplomacy. Materialscientist (talk) 23:49, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
 * How can we verify your information ? Materialscientist (talk) 23:54, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Give me your email and I will send you the document? All you are doing now is censoring public, non-copyrighted information.
 * Please understand how wikipedia works. We need information to be neutral, encyclopedic, notable and verifiable (we are an encyclopedia, not a blog, forum or complaint site). In the vast majority of cases we may not personally verify the veracity of your document - we need some reliable third party verified and published it. WP:OTRS is a team which can process some documents - you can try emaling them, asking to confirm that what you posted is an official and non-copyrighted document. This case is so borderline that we would rather remove potentially true information than risk spreading a libel. Materialscientist (talk) 00:12, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

I had to laugh at your claim of a purported need to be "neutral". I'm sure the Chinese censors and East German radio jammers told themselves and the affected populations that all they were doing is being "neutral". So, Are you being neutral about Pol Pot, Hitler, Mao and Stalin? Should they always get the benefit of the doubt because you are an encyclopedia? It looks very much, from where I sit, that an enforced political correctness is being stamped on Wikipedia, out of some fear, in this case, that some living person may be offended by an article. In this case, Dr. Glaser, should be offended. In fact if he is not offended, then there simply isn't enough information about the crimes he committed and was found guilty.

But, I shall make a bona fide attempt to summarize the court document and cite it as a reference. But I will not hide what is in it out of any need to spare Dr. Glaser's feelings. The only thing separating him and Bernie Madoff is a lack of ambition.
 * The difference is that we know about Mao, Stalin, etc., from verifiable sources. Please understand that hundreds of individuals use wikipedia merely for putting a living person in a mud because the feel like doing so, and that living person may sue wikipedia for spreading libels. So try looking at all such situations by the eyes of bystander, or better of a lawyer. We don't see many words like "terrorist group", "scam" or alike in books like Britannica, and there are good reasons for that, emotions aside. Materialscientist (talk) 01:15, 11 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Please understand that my goal is not to perform a character assassination via Wikipedia. I simply want to get out a summary of the truth of how this man has conducted himself after the end of his academic career. I do not intend to call him names, or to include any information that is not freely available, though, like books, not necessarily on the public Internet. I only refer to public, non-copyrighted material from the California Court system. I will cite Case numbers and Document numbers, dates and authors.

I have re-edited the Barney Glaser article, shortened it, and only quote very short sections from the court document. There is no public judgment of Dr. Glaser, only facts as ascertained by the bankruptcy court.
 * Great. Re-edited where? Your last edit to that article was 4+ hours ago. Materialscientist (talk) 03:56, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Edits just added. Much more concise and strictly objective.
 * I tweaked some formatting and leave it to others. Be prepared that it may be removed. Your approach is correct, the court case is a strong support, and focusing the text was an important step, but there might be legal loopholes in all this story which I don't see. Materialscientist (talk) 04:08, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

OK. I will leave this in its present, slightly tweaked, form.

Your recent edits
Hello. In case you didn't know, when you add content to talk pages and Wikipedia pages that have open discussion, you should sign your posts by typing four tildes ( &#126;&#126;&#126;&#126; ) at the end of your comment. You could also click on the signature button located above the edit window. This will automatically insert a signature with your username or IP address and the time you posted the comment. This information is useful because other editors will be able to tell who said what, and when. Thank you. --SineBot (talk) 21:34, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Talkback
I have traced that IP to Santa Rosa, CA, which is where the ISP has its regional hub. I cannot prove it, but I think the person behind the IP must be Dr. Glaser himself, as he lives in this area, and it is unlikely an other person would take such an interest in purging/censoring this page. FWIW - He basically stole money ("fraudulent conveyance" is what the bankruptcy court called it) from about 100 investors who trusted him with their life savings. I have no plan whatsoever to use Wikipedia as a forum to attack any living person. But I do think it is within bounds to at least briefly describe what the bankruptcy court found and publicly released. I would like to add 1 or 2 sentences to the page as it exists today, but I will wait until things settle down. Ricste (talk) 23:15, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Conflict of interest
Hello Ricste. If you are affiliated with some of the people, places or things you have written about in the article Barney Glaser, you may have a conflict of interest or close connection to the subject.

All editors are required to comply with Wikipedia's neutral point of view content policy. People who are very close to a subject often have a distorted view of it, which may cause them to inadvertently edit in ways that make the article either too flattering or too disparaging. People with a close connection to a subject are not absolutely prohibited from editing about that subject, but they need to be especially careful about following the reliable sources and writing with as little bias as possible.

If you are very close to a subject, here are some ways you can reduce the risk of problems:


 * Avoid or exercise great caution when editing or creating articles related to you, your organization, or its competitors, as well as projects and products they are involved with.
 * Be cautious about deletion discussions. Everyone is welcome to provide information about independent sources in deletion discussions, but avoid advocating for deletion of articles about your competitors.
 * Avoid linking to the Wikipedia article or website of your organization in other articles (see Spam).
 * Exercise great caution so that you do not accidentally breach Wikipedia's content policies.

Please familiarize yourself with relevant content policies and guidelines, especially those pertaining to neutral point of view, verifiability of information, and autobiographies.

For information on how to contribute to Wikipedia when you have a conflict of interest, please see our frequently asked questions for organizations.
 * Although you are not "affiliated" with Glaser, by your own statement on my Talk page, you claim he defrauded you. Obviously, that may influence you in your editing. Therefore, I strongly urge you to avoid editing the article directly but request changes through the Article's Talk page.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:54, 4 September 2011 (UTC)