Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard/Archive 144

Assange


Replace this with a brief explanation of the situation. Rebecca jones (talk) 14:08, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Activities of these users on wiki ask question about Assange : User:Neutrality,User:Snooganssnoogans,User:Geogene, O3000 They have same interests on wiki about politics and spend all their time on wiki on same talks. Moreover O3000 has more 300 contributions about Trump during 2018. How consider his neutrality about Assange? These users are a same person ?

They drop contributions with famous newspapers like Le Monde for example without explanation about it. Why ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rebecca jones (talk • contribs)
 * Rebecca jones was blocked for one week for edit-warring on Julian Assange last month, and has returned to continue this edit-war. I have no idea what her COI claims are about. (First time I've been accused of being an admin.) O3000 (talk) 14:13, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * As I explained, all these users User:Neutrality,User:Snooganssnoogans,User:Geogene, O3000 spend their time on wikipedia on the same subjects. They drop contributions from famous newspapers without explanation. Are they a same person ? They know well very well ? I don't know but I I ask me questions about their activities on Wiki. How explain neutrality of O3000 with more 300 contributions about Trump in 2018? Rebecca jones —Preceding undated comment added 14:38, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * Do you have any basis to claim that any of 's edits have been non-neutral? Just because someone has made many edits to an article does not mean that they have failed to exercise neutral POV concerning the subject. Are you suggesting that the only way to demonstrate neutrality is not to edit a given article?  General Ization  Talk  15:54, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * And no, there is no reason to think that the multiple editors you mentioned are the same person, and that claim, which amounts to an accusation of sockpuppetry, is one you had better have some evidence to back up other than the fact that they are all actively editing articles related to Julian Assange (and presumably all disagreeing with you about something). Lastly, this page is not the place to make such accusations.  You are at the Confict of Interest noticeboard, and you have said nothing that amounts to a claim of COI with respect to any editor. Even an assertion of lack of neutrality is not the same thing as COI.  General Ization  Talk  15:59, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * All these users drop contributions published from several famous newspaper without explanation, why ? Moreover contributions of these users ask question about their neutrality, I have checked their contributions on wikipedia. Why they spend all their time on political subjects ? More 300 days by year for O3000 ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rebecca jones (talk • contribs)
 * The problems with your edits have been explained by multiple editors on the article talk page. If you want your edits added; then you need to respond to the stated concerns on the talk page and gain consensus. Repeatedly forcing the material in (which is how you got blocked) and making wild, baseless accusations about other editors (which is how you lost your talk page access during your block) clearly isn’t working. O3000 (talk) 16:57, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * The fact that a newspaper or other source is "famous" means absolutely nothing in terms of its utility to cite a specific claim in an article, nor whether the claim even belongs in the article to begin with. We don't judge content by the "famousness" of the source cited to support it. Editors can try and have tried to use reliable sources to support patently false content here, and not everything that is true necessarily belongs in a given article. Editors here are entitled to focus their attention on any topic that interests them; there is nothing remarkable about an editor who focuses on political topics. Many do.  General Ization Talk  18:41, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm taking this noticeboard off my watchlist. Ping me if there's something of note. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:09, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * How do you say Boomerang in French? BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 17:04, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * You're assailing the neutrality of other editors after adding a section heading with the title Indictment and arrest of Julian Assange : an attack on freedom of expression ?  If you make further blatant point-of-view edits like that, you'll be blocked for a longer duration. OhNo itsJamie Talk 17:16, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * I have noted the lack of neutrality of wikipedia : the question about an attack of expression is not a point-of-view but a question, because several jurists in Europ consider this indictment as an attack on freedom of expression. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rebecca jones (talk • contribs) 19:09, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * Perhaps we are encountering some language issues here. In English, and here at Wikipedia, creating a header like that is called stating an opinion as fact (the question mark at the end doesn't make it any less of a non-neutral statement).  See WP:WIKIVOICE, which explains that you should avoid doing exactly that.  You can relate the opinions of "jurists in Europe" without constructing a header that seems to be asking the question  and suggesting a conclusion  in Wikipedia's voice. And if you do so, you must also fairly and accurately describe other viewpoints; see Due and undue weight.  General Ization  Talk  19:37, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Chris Troutman ( talk ) 19:18, 31 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia accepts to drop : "Several magistrates, politicians and associations consider that the arrest of Assange constitutes an attack on freedom of expression and international law ." Why ? Le Monde is not serious for Wikipedia ?

Wikipedia accepts to drop also : " Tiny Kox asked the Council of Europe's commissioner for human rights, Dunja Mijatovic, whether the arrest of Assange and his possible extradition to the US are in line with the criteria of the European Convention on Human Rights, because Assange can benefit from the protection of the right to freedom of expression and information according the Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights ." Why ? Tiny Kox is not an american ? He is a dutch politician and a chairman of the Party of the European Left in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe?

Wikipedia accepts to drop : "In effect, a United Kingdom tribunal recognised WikiLeaks as a media organisation and United Kingdom, a member of the Council of Europe, is committed to respecting Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights ." Why ? The Guardian is not serious for Wikipedia ?

Wikipedia accepts to drop : "Ben Wizner .... adds "For the first time in the history of our country, the government has brought criminal charges against a publisher for the publication of truthful information. This is an extraordinary escalation of the Trump administration's attacks on journalism, and a direct assault on the First Amendment. It establishes a dangerous precedent that can be used to target all news organizations that hold the government accountable by publishing its secrets. And it is equally dangerous for U.S. journalists who uncover the secrets of other nations. If the US can prosecute a foreign publisher for violating our secrecy laws, there’s nothing preventing China, or Russia, from doing the same" Why ? Ben Wizner and ACLU are not serious for Wikipedia ?

For me, administrators of Wikipedia are not serious. Rebecca jones
 * Law of holes. O3000 (talk) 21:33, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * “Although I am a typical loner in my daily life, my awareness of belonging to the invisible community of those who strive for truth, beauty, and justice has prevented me from feelings of isolation.” Albert Einstein Rebecca jones —Preceding undated comment added 21:44, 31 May 2019 (UTC)


 * I have already explained to you that this noticeboard, the Conflict of interest noticeboard, is designed for the specific and exclusive purpose of discussing editors with potential conflicts of interest concerning the articles they are editing. Your complaints have nothing to do with conflict of interest; rather, you are complaining that editors have reverted your edits which you claim are supported by reliable sources.  That means that the appropriate place for you to raise this issue is the Reliable sources noticeboard, not here.  Rather than further inconvenience the admins and editors who handle COI complaints here, I am closing this discussion.  If you want to raise the issue again at the appropriate noticeboard, please do.  General Ization  Talk  01:52, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

Israel Adesanya


Replace this with a brief explanation of the situation. OmoYoruba45 (talk) 16:32, 2 June 2019 (UTC) I have a dispute with user: sfinlayson over Isreal Adesanya's page and I just want everyone to hear my side of the story and also contribute to the matter. Israel Adesanya is a Nigerian who moved to New Zealand at the age of 13 and he is a current UFC champion. Isreal Adesanya is a Nigerian and it only shows that he his a New Zealander on his page so I simply tried to change that to reflect that he is both but the user: sfinlayson reverted what I did and stated that I needed a reliable source saying that he is Nigerian and I replied by saying he is a Nigerian Because he was born in Nigeria and he only moved to New Zealand when he was 13. I also said moving to New Zealand doesn't change the fact that he his Nigerian. I then asked him What qualifies as a reliable source and gave the definition of who is a Nigerian by birth I said: "He is Nigerian by birth and this is my source [1] Every person born in Nigeria after the date of independence (October 1, 1960), either of whose parents or any of whose grandparents belongs or belonged to a community indigenous to Nigeria is a Nigerian" He then withdrew from reverting my edit. Secondly his profile says Nigerian-born New Zealander professional fighter... I changed it Nigerian-New Zealand professional fighter... because saying Nigerian born makes it seem like he is not Nigerian anymore or he is Officially representing New Zealander but that is not the case. UFC is an individual sport and he isn't officially representing New-Zealand he his only a New-Zealand citizen. If anything he is actually representing Nigeria because anyone that watches is fight will know that he has a Nigerian Flag beside is name during is fights also his official UFC profile says his home town is Lagos not Auckland New Zealand. The user: Rsfinlayson is a New Zealander and wants his page to only recognize him as a New Zealander and I was only trying to establish the fact that he is Nigerian also. He was even recently in Nigeria to present his championship belt to the governor of Ogun state because that is his state of origin. I would like you to include that he is a Nigerian-Zealander on his page and also a Nigerian-New Zealand professional fighter.... I would like everyone's opinion on the request. Thank you very much have a niceOmoYoruba45 (talk) 16:32, 2 June 2019 (UTC) day.
 * This isn't the appropriate place to bring up content disputes. Please have a look at Dispute_resolution - first try to resolve the issue on the talk page, and if that fails, ask for other editors to help mediate the content dispute through channels like the dispute resolution noticeboard. creffett (talk) 18:45, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

West Virginia Radio Corporation


50.73.174.35 is licensed to the West Virginia Radio Corporation (WVRC). WVRC owns a slew of radio stations under WVRC, but also as AJG Corporation, along with The Dominion Post newspaper. In 2016, they attempted to edit some of their company's station's pages here on Wikipedia and that was successfully shut down with a simple COI warning. In the past week or so, they have started up again. I have issued 2 more COI warnings. It's clear all the edits are coming from the WVRC IP and they are trying to make the articles less than neutral or more kind to WVRC and their owners. The latest edit was pure OR. I have done what I can, so I bring it to this board for assistance. -  Neutralhomer •  Talk  • 11:09 on May 25, 2019 (UTC)
 * I previously had this as an ANI thread but was told to move it here. - <small style="white-space:nowrap;border:1px solid #FF7518;padding:1px;"> Neutralhomer •  Talk  • 11:09 on May 25, 2019 (UTC)
 * Is this going to be looked at? - <small style="white-space:nowrap;border:1px solid #FF7518;padding:1px;"> Neutralhomer •  Talk  • 13:38 on May 27, 2019 (UTC)
 * It's been 8 days, people. Really? - <small style="white-space:nowrap;border:1px solid #FF7518;padding:1px;"> Neutralhomer  •  Talk  • 00:46 on June 3, 2019 (UTC)
 * I've trimmed the puffiest parts of the article and added a sourcing tag. Following the trim, the article seems reasonably neutral and factual (if undersourced). creffett (talk) 01:12, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Fingerprint Cards


Listed in MER-C's June suspicious articles table. This has some weird buried news about insider trading, CEOs going to jail, etc. Needs someome able to determine if it's neutrally presented as written. Just doesn't seem the article quite matches its own sources with titles like "Insider Trading Arrests Hit One-Time Swedish Technology Star". ☆ Bri (talk) 05:16, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

World Water Council


These IPs belong to the relevant organisations whose page they have been editing, edits have removed critical language, replacing it with the organisation's promotional language. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.246.134.80 (talk) 06:45, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Removed
My bad, I didn't see the references section nor its addition in the diff on my phone. This section can be viewed in the revision history of this page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:36, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Erick Guerrero


This promotional article has been heavily edited by Luis 0001, who hasn't edited any other articles. Help with cleaning up the article (and deciding whether the subject is notable) would be appreciated. Cordless Larry (talk) 06:12, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Michael Milken


Openly declared representative for the criminal financier, here since 2011, has been shamelessly editing the article about his client to make him look better. This is not the first time this has happened, nor the first time we've tried to warn Weisenberg about this behavior. Orange Mike &#124;  Talk  17:54, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Houzz
This article has almost exclusively written by these single purpose accounts with some IPs thrown in to the mix as well: * Sorry this was a mistake SmartSE (talk) 23:02, 4 June 2019 (UTC) The most recent editor has confirmed they are an employee. The article is currently way too detailed, promotional and uses too many primary sources. Combined, it appears as if there has been a concerted effort over the last 8 years for this company to promote itself through Wikipedia. As well as the main article, they've added links to it to ~50 celebrity articles e.g.. I've removed some, but there is more clean up to do, either via those contribs or Special:WhatLinksHere/Houzz. This is a fairly blatant case of a major company abusing the project and far worse than North Face both in scale and time. SmartSE (talk) 17:44, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Thank you for bringing this to our attention. There have been 15 My Houzz episodes in total. All 15 My Houzz episode references have now been removed from the associated celebrity pages. These references were added in the context of cataloging their body of work, and in the same format as other references on their page. AGinCA (talk) 19:26, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Dongle
User:Trusley Mike identifies himself as having been involved in the "invention" of the article subject, and has been adding self-citations of historical information pertaining to it that have not appeared in other secondary sources. He claims COI no longer applies because the company is defunct.

Any opinions? ViperSnake151  Talk  21:14, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Note from user Trusley_mike.

I am not sure where to respond to this so I have added an entry to my own "Talk" page. Please let me know if it should have been placed elsewhere.

Trusley Mike (talk) 06:56, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
 * You could post it here. ViperSnake151   Talk  07:05, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Thank you - I have have done so.

Trusley Mike (talk) 14:52, 31 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Trusley Mike is continuing to edit war references to himself / his software into the Dongle article. He's now adding primary sources, but they support that there was *a* dongle, but don't really support claims that this was the *first* dongle. He's now personalizing the dispute (accusing me of 'trolling' and 'hiding behind a user name', so it would be very helpful if some additional voices could join the discussion on Talk:Dongle. - MrOllie (talk) 12:54, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Teresathorne


Is creating very promotional content in a draft space and user space. The user may also be using as their sandbox has the same content. <b style="color: blue">AmericanAir88</b>(<b style="color: darkred">talk</b>) 20:50, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

advisorshares


On August 10, 2018‎ a user with name 50.249.10.69 deleted two pieces of information from the AdvisorShares page giving the explanation that "fund.com no longer has any equity interest in AdvisorShares and Chuck Roberston passed away". I undid these changes on August 21, 2018‎ and commented that "These changes are made without citing any secondary sources of information. Also if the information reflected in these changes is not public, it is possible that the editor is connected to the company and has a conflict of interest". UserNameUnderConstruction made a similar change on January 16, 2019‎, which also stated that Charles Robertson passed away. I couldn't find any publicly available information online to confirm this. UserNameUnderConstruction should cite where they found this information or disclose if they have inside knowledge of the company's affairs. Zwx24f7 (talk) 21:27, 7 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Looks like someone raised a similar concern about the same account four years ago on the talk page: Talk:AdvisorShares creffett (talk) 21:33, 7 May 2019 (UTC)
 * Highly suspicious to note that User:Zwx24f7 has only 12 edits and is already on this noticeboard. Also note that User:UserNameUnderConstruction was in the past a target of noticeboard complaints by users who are now banned socks.Adoring nanny (talk) 07:57, 21 May 2019 (UTC)
 * User:creffett you might want to take another look at this. Idk what is going on here, but it is awfully suspicious.Adoring nanny (talk) 08:11, 21 May 2019 (UTC)
 * User:creffett the user above, User:Adoring nanny opened a sock puppet investigation into me and the check user failed to show that I was related to these banned socks. There are serious reasons to believe that UserNameUnderConstruction and these edits with only IP addresses are made by employees of the company.  They keep trying to hide publicly available information about AdvisorShares and they are adding information that is not publicly available and probably only known by a few people related to the firm, such as the death of an employee.Zwx24f7 (talk) 13:45, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

An anonymous editor, 2603:3003:703:c500:2907:fcb:ad77:cbea, again edited the AdvisorShares entry by deleting the information about fund.com, deleting the name of Charles Robertson and this time adding an unsourced sentence in the article that states, " The suit was later dismissed without merit." Instead of naming public sources for where they are getting information for these changes, they falsely accuse a "penny stock pump and dump" of being behind the changes they object to. If this user wants to make changes to the content of the article, I believe that they are supposed to cite secondary sources to back up their edits.Zwx24f7 (talk) 15:46, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

Our Planet


Someone associated with Silverback Films has been editing the article recently. -- Another Believer ( Talk ) 17:23, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Baurelia – University of Michigan
The user Baurelia has, for the past month, been creating several articles exclusively about CS professors from the University of Michigan (see: their edit history). The prose in these articles is suspect as well. For example, on the article about assistant CS professor Danai Koutra, there's a 'Media' section with three articles where Koutra is mentioned only in passing, and the National Science Foundation CAREER Award – an award for junior faculty – is labeled "prestigious". Moreover, the subject herself is questionably notable, and while I haven't looked into all of them, the other subject I've looked into that they've written about is Nikola Banovic, who seems to be of even more questionable notability. In general, this editor's other articles, while I haven't read them in detail, seem to be equally suspect.  TheTechnician27  (Talk page)  06:40, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * For what it's worth, NSF CAREER Awards are prestigious - some disciplines have pretty low rates of funding and lots of requests for funding - but I don't think they're anywhere near the caliber of award that we typically look for to establish notability as an academic.
 * You might find it helpful to drop a line at Wikipedia talk:Notability (academics); many of the regulars there have experience in making judgments about notability for academics. ElKevbo (talk) 21:51, 7 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Well, of course, getting an NSF Career Award is better than not getting one, but they're given only to junior faculty in support of "early career development", meaning they're awarded more for potential than achievement. And they aren't that prestigious.  Between Oct 1, 2017 and Sep 30, 2018, they gave out 21 such awards in computer science, a discipline that attracts a lot of funding.  So, it's not exactly like getting a Turing award.  Msnicki (talk) 22:51, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Greg Sestero
See from WikiFollowsFIlm  and  from WikiFilmAcct (obviously the same person). It looks to me like Sestero's company, Sestero Pictures, is trying puff up his bio. I've already requested semi-protection at WP:RFPP. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 09:00, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

WICS
I recently added a controversy on a local news station the other day, per my references this was not an isolated incident and controversies on articles of companies or organizations is not without precedent. I believe this user has a COI due to the fact that the supermajority of their edits are on articles of stations that belong to Sinclair Broadcast Group. Whenever a user questions them, they regurgitate whatever WP namespace page might be relevant, but that doesn't make it relevant. This user's article space history coupled with the fact that he did a revert without notifying me is suspicious. I cannot help but believe there is a possible COI and they might be affiliated or employed by Sinclair based on their contributions. --Charitwo (talk) (contribs) 16:22, 8 June 2019 (UTC)


 * I do not work for Sinclair or any other station group. I edit TV station articles based on facts from reputable sources. In your case, the paragraph was poorly written, so when it was put back, I cleaned it up a little. If you were offended, my apologies. Mvcg66b3r (talk) 16:27, 8 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Poorly written may be subjective and both accurate at the same time, if not a little judgmental...however the circumstances as described are suspicious. Sinclair is taking active measures to try and sweep this under the rug by deleting/blocking comments and users on pages under their control and removing the relevant video of the meteorologist from any place it's uploaded to with no notice or reason. If you had simply cleaned up the article in the first place instead of blindly reverting without any notification to myself, we wouldn't be here. I do appreciate the cleanup, however, as constructive criticism on writing is perfectly acceptable. --Charitwo (talk) (contribs) 16:35, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Artandimage
This user says that they are not being compensated for their edits and they have no COI. I am not convinced either way so would welcome more opinions. SmartSE (talk) 17:33, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I find their contention implausible. Looking at Droga5 and David Droga, the awards section for each article is excessive. Every year we seem to get more and more award ceremonies, and the advertising industry is particularly rife with awards. Hardly surprising that the industry should seek to advertise themselves so much, but this "award-winning" stuff is getting ever more widespread on Wikipedia. I am not saying that these any of these are vanity business awards as such, but are they notable in the sense of Wikipedia having an article about the award? Edwardx (talk) 09:39, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Gregorio Casar


First few edits by this user have been inserting mentions of this politician to multiple articles that could do with careful scrutiny. I haven't notified them, instead blocking because they are quite likely to be a sockpuppet partaking in a sophisticated undisclosed paid editing operation. MER-C 14:52, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Rob Ryan (entrepreneur)


User:Roaring22 created and is the majority contributor to these two BLPs. Thanks to our friends at there appears to be little doubt this user is Robert J. Ryan, the subject of the first BLP and husband of the second (draft). Rob Ryan (entrepreneur) may or may not meet notability requirements WP:NBIO, depending on how one views his role as a co-founder and one-time CEO of Ascend Communications. Both article and draft use events at Ascend Communications years after Ryan's departure to overstate any such notability. Afterwards, the article places WP:UNDUE weight on various "educational" efforts to teach people to be entrepreneurs in their own right. The BLPs appear to me to be WP:PROMO replete with inline links to Ryan's various ventures. User:Roaring22 was first notified about WP:COI and how to manage it in 2016. User did not respond and seems not to have heeded the advice. SVTCobra (talk) 15:30, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Rob Ryan (entrepreneur) is puffed up, but the person seems notable to me. The events at Ascend that occured after he left probably don't belong in his biography.  Roaring22 probably does have some kind of COI but hasn't edited recently. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 23:40, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The problem with rewriting it is the lack of sources. This source is so similar to the article itself, I suspect it too was self-submitted. The citations of Business Week and Investor's Business Daily are not available online. The only credible source I can access is this and it only mentions Ryan once, and not even as CEO. If I were to rewrite it, it would be incredibly short. What is the correct way forward? Also, is there precedent to nominate drafts for deletion or just watch them to see if they go live? --SVTCobra (talk) 00:20, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * You can nominate drafts for deletion at WP:MFD. Sources don't have to be online to be valid.  There are also sources on Google, such as  from Fortune,  from  Inc.,  from Entrepreneur,  from the Missoulian, etc.  This version of the article doesn't seem so bad, and I don't think it needs all that much work.  An IP editor already chopped out the worst of it, but he left a few things that are debatable, like stock prices (who cares?), the exact day the company went public (who cares?), and the company's performance after Ryan left (irrelevant to Ryan).  Some of the claims should be better sourced, but if he's really "the principal architect of DECnet", that shouldn't be so hard to cite.  There are hundreds of books available on Google Books that tediously detail the history of everything related to computing. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 00:58, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, I know print sources are valid, but when there's COI or other reason to mistrust they were used correctly, I am unable to verify. I have found some mentions on Google Books that could be useful. What tool did you use to find the magazines you listed? I have come up empty for such sources in my google searches even using the date range tool to seek out older sources specifically. Cheers, --SVTCobra (talk) 01:13, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * It looks like I was wrong above; the IP editor was reverted, and it was Melcous who did the pruning. Anyway, I'm usually more worried about grandiose claims than outright lies when it comes to COI editing.  For example, .  I don't usually do anything special to find stuff on Google.  I've been working on BLPs for a decade now, so I can usually spot useful sources quickly, and if they don't show up in the results immediately, I search them manually, like "Rob Ryan" "ascend" site:inc.com.  If you use "ascend communications", you might miss out on a journalist who's too lazy to type out the company's full name.  If this were a British entrepreneur, I would have searched the Financial Times instead.  Eventually, you learn where to look if you want the best results. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 02:05, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I worked on the article and posted to the talk page if you are still following this. --SVTCobra (talk) 21:38, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

StorMagic


It turns out user Crackers250 who created StorMagic article works for StorMagic. Doesn't look good. From the user page here (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Crackers250). "Huge motorsport fan, that's where virtually all of my edits have been made. The CoI box above refers to the fact I work at StorMagic."
 * I have moved the article to the draftspace citing DRAFTIFY, and have added notability and paid contributions tags to the draft.--SamHolt6 (talk) 21:01, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I appreciate! NISMO1968 (talk) 21:04, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

City Vision University


This editor claims to be the president of the university and has not only reverted multiple edits that fixed very clear, simple issues (e.g., an external link in the body of the article, incorrect case usage in a section title) but also asked that we "giv[e] [him and his colleagues at the university] more latitude to let us make edits to the page as we have over the past decade." I'm happy to work with him about specific issues or requests (with which we may or may not comply) but it may be helpful if someone else were to help him understand not only our COI policies but also our policies related to paid editing. Thanks! ElKevbo (talk) 21:47, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Will keep an eye on the discussion and join in if another editor's opinion is needed. I will note that this doesn't look like WP:PAID, just WP:COI (the editor is writing about the institution they're in charge of, but not being paid for the purpose of editing). creffett (talk) 22:18, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * To me this is a SPA editor making blockable disruptive edits like this unexplained reversion. BTW they have self-outed as paid (if we may assume the CEO position is paid). ☆ Bri (talk) 22:25, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I disagree; promoting a university is one the primary jobs of a university president. ElKevbo (talk) 22:28, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Please use some common sense. Our school has a budget of less than $500,000 and essentially serves the Mother Theresa's of the world. Most schools our size will have most of their edits done by staff. To me this seems like a heavy handed editor not letting a school update the facts about itself when it is likely to be the only major source to do this. If you look at the talk page of ElKevbo, there is a long history of this type of complaint by other schools.Alsears (talk) 22:35, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Your university has a noble goal, but that doesn't really make much of a difference here. The fact of the matter is that you have a conflict of interest and are not following Wikipedia guidelines. ElKevbo's talk page has similar complaints because they were doing the same incorrect things. You are also displaying ownership tendencies over the university's article, which isn't permitted for anyone. Please take a moment to review WP:COI, WP:OWN (and while you're at it, WP:UNIGUIDE). You have broken a number of rules, and I'm honestly surprised nobody's requested a ban on you for disruptive editing. You are welcome to edit here, but you need to play by the rules, and if you don't you're going to get kicked out of the metaphorical sandbox. creffett (talk) 22:44, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * ElKevboI get that you understand Wikipedia's culture and rules better than I do, and I'm trying to comply. Look man, I gave up a job doing Internet consulting for $200 an hour to train people working with addicts where I took almost a 10-fold pay cut. I'm trying to do the right thing here, and all the additions you just put on our wikipedia page are wrecking our organization's brand to prove a point. It's like you are driving a Mac Truck over Mother Theresa in your approach. Please tone it down, and try not to retaliate in your response. If you put COI notices on every small nonprofit organization that had staff update their pages, then they would exist on more than 90% of the nonprofit pages on Wikipedia. It's important to be consistent in enforcing the rules. You are not being consistent in enforcement because 90% of small nonprofits do not have that notice. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alsears (talk • contribs) 22:54, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The tags at the top of the article are not punishments, they are tools used by the editing community to help with the editing of the article. That you took a pay cut to take your job is not particularly relevant to this discussion, and you may want to realize that you are dealing with a volunteer project where most of the editors are doing this work for absolutely zero pay. If you know of some other pages that are in a problematic state due to the actions of editors with conflicts of interest, you can point us to them so that we can see if they need to be tagged, but in general the argument that WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is a weak one, not a reason that we should ignore the problems here. Even after what scraping has gone on, there is still problematic content in the article. --Nat Gertler (talk) 00:11, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I'll admit that I could be interpreting WP:PAID incorrectly, but my read of it is that it refers to someone who is paid specifically for the purpose of editing Wikipedia (or, more generally, for advertising, and they use Wikipedia as an outlet for that). So if someone from a marketing department is editing their company's page on the clock, then that's definitely paid, since it's part of their job. On the other hand, if I (a mere software engineer) were to edit my company's page (and it weren't part of my job expectations and I hadn't been directed to do it), that would just be WP:COI. While I agree that a CEO/President/(whatever this editor is) has company promotion as a job, I feel like Wikipedia editing is outside of job expectations. Again, I could be misinterpreting, that's just how I understood the policy - if I'm wrong on this, I am completely open to correction! creffett (talk) 22:38, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * WP:PAID states "Users who are compensated for any publicity efforts related to the subject of their Wikipedia contributions are deemed to be paid editors, regardless of whether they were compensated specifically to edit Wikipedia." (emphasis mine) –dlthewave ☎ 16:57, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * So it does (and I did miss that part, thank you for pointing it out). I think it comes down to what you consider to be "paid publicity efforts" - I just don't feel like an executive's job would normally meet that standard. I guess you could say that executives often have publicity as a big chunk of their job (being the face of the company, looking good for investors/shareholders/whatever, not doing monumentally dumb things in public), but that just doesn't seem right to me. creffett (talk) 17:07, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I agree that it's extraordinarily unlikely that "Edit Wikipedia articles" is a bullet point in the job description of a college or university president. But "represent the institution, promote it, and ensure it has a positive public image" is likely in the job description; for modern U.S. colleges and universities, external relations and fund raising have become the two overarching responsibilities of presidents.  I think it all comes down to how someone interprets WP:PAID and how explicitly focused on Wikipedia and public relations on the Web someone's job description or duties has to be for their work to fall under that umbrella.
 * Ultimately, I think it's a moot point in this particular instance (and probably most others) as the COI and POV issues are so prominent and pressing. ElKevbo (talk) 18:10, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Note that I have nominated this page for deletion. TheAwesomeHwyh (talk) 18:45, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Er, the page on the university, not this page on COIN :p. TheAwesomeHwyh (talk) 18:47, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * All I can do is apologize for my actions. I did not do them out of any intent to violate Wikipedia's policies, but simply out of ignorance. When ElKevbo reverted updates that I put significant effort into, I did not realize he was an editor. I had assumed he was essentially vandalizing our page and was angry. When I reverted his changes again, my goal was not to try to start some war, but simply because I thought it would be more productive to start with a page that was more accurate. I did not realize that was a major violation, so I'm sorry. Now that I better understand the guidelines, I get that there was a problem with some of my edits. Having said that, I corrected a number of facts that were simply wrong on the page, and those corrections got reverted. I don't know how to navigate all the rules of Wikipedia. If someone could please help me undo the mess I created it would be greatly appreciated. We train people who work with addicts. At the end of the day, I don't believe it's reasonable to delete our page simply because I was ignorant of the rules. We are an accredited university and have a significant history and impact that would justify having a Wikipedia page.Alsears (talk) 21:20, 10 June 2019 (UTC). One specific request that I would greatly appreciate if those of you with more Wikipedia editing experience could help with. I get that a significant problem with the page is lack of secondary sourses. I just added quite a few secondary sources related in the nominated this page for deletion discussion. I would be glad to try to strengthen the City Vision University article by referencing these sources, but at this point I'm afraid to do anything on the page for fear of violating a policy that I don't fully understand. If one of you (or someone else you know) could go through the sources I listed and add them as relevant to strengthen the secondary sources, it would be greatly appreciated. I'm trying to learn how to navigate all of Wikipedia's policies, but there is a steep learning curve.Alsears (talk) 21:51, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry I didn't see this comment, the ping you sent me didn't show up (Wikipedia is glitchy sometimes- but its understandable, since its over 18 years old at the point!) But I have responded to you over at the AfD (Articles for Deletion) discussion. TheAwesomeHwyh (talk) 23:59, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I am however, going to respond to your statement that we are deleting it because you did not understand policy. Do know that this deletion has nothing to do with your conduct, it has to do with the notability of the school itself. Also, just because your organization has awards and has had a major impact on peoples lives, does not make it notable, as I said over at the AfD, notability is determined by if reliable, secondary sources (that is- a source unaffiliated with your organization) have said things about it. TheAwesomeHwyh (talk) 00:05, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

Anoka Primrose Abeyrathne


The user appears to be editing her own article, how should I tag this? The article has been edited by about 70 single purpose accounts (SPAs) (all the accounts in the article history without user pages except two). Edits by non-SPAs seem to be tidying the article rather than adding content. I have placed a COI message on the talk page of the last account used.TSventon (talk) 12:52, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Two further SPAs (added) have edited the account today, which is in line with the previous pattern of a new account being created for each day's edits. They have removed all changes to the article since 23 May, including unreferenced changes to the subject's academic qualifications by two IP accounts and attempts by User:BubbaJoe123456, User:Cmr08 and myself to improve the article. I believe these edits show WP:OWNERSHIP, conflict with achieving a WP:NPOV in the article and are further evidence of COI editing. It is also possible that the edits breach Sock puppetry guidance on contributing to the same page or discussion with multiple accounts and avoiding scrutiny.TSventon (talk) 10:07, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The page has been semi-protected, which will prevent edits by brand-new SPAs, and I've submitted a case to SPI, so we'll see if that helps.BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 15:02, 7 June 2019 (UTC)


 * The article has been returned to the last edit by User:Avengersarise today. The same editor has also requested extended confirmed page protection for the article. User:Nisallakmal had previously only edited two articles and had not been active since 2015. They were asked on their talk page not to add promotional content in 2015.TSventon (talk) 07:10, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The article has been returned to the last edit by User:Avengersarise today. The same editor has also requested extended confirmed page protection for the article. User:Nisallakmal had previously only edited two articles and had not been active since 2015. They were asked on their talk page not to add promotional content in 2015.TSventon (talk) 07:10, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

by * - On the 30th of May, it was brought to our notice that the information had been changed purposefully to inaccurate(University of London was graduated from in 2013 and University of Colombo were graduated from in 2016. The degree certificates are available. Harvard University was not "signed up" for as it required over B grades, transcripts with A grades available. University of Cambridge was not 'signed up' for. Anoka Abeyrathne was matriculated at St. Edmund's College, University of Cambridge with a full scholarship to read for the Master of Social Innovation at the Cambridge Judge Business School through a competitive application. Faculty information and acceptance letters as well as current transcripts available. Thesis supervisor at Cambridge is Dr. Ana Aranda Jan - . Anoka Primrose Abeyrathne's Cambridge email - . In addition work and awards related information was changed purposefully by removal) information while Anoka Primrose Abeyrathne was presenting at an international conference. The participants of the conference brought this to the attention of the personnel involved in the said person's work. All citations are factual and non-promotional. The initial changes were made to discredit Anoka Primrose Abeyrathne, hence were reversed. Hope this clarifies the situation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nisallakmal (talk • contribs) 09:11, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Please can any editors connected to the article subject read WP:COI and WP:PAID and disclose their relationship to the article subject and whether they are paid for their contributions. It is preferable for COI editors to request changes on the article talk page, not on this page which is for discussing conflicts of interest. I have listed above the two IP editors who amended the subject's educational record without citing sources. TSventon (talk) 14:57, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Please can any editors connected to the article subject read WP:COI and WP:PAID and disclose their relationship to the article subject and whether they are paid for their contributions. It is preferable for COI editors to request changes on the article talk page, not on this page which is for discussing conflicts of interest. I have listed above the two IP editors who amended the subject's educational record without citing sources. TSventon (talk) 14:57, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Please can any editors connected to the article subject read WP:COI and WP:PAID and disclose their relationship to the article subject and whether they are paid for their contributions. It is preferable for COI editors to request changes on the article talk page, not on this page which is for discussing conflicts of interest. I have listed above the two IP editors who amended the subject's educational record without citing sources. TSventon (talk) 14:57, 9 June 2019 (UTC)


 * User:Nisallakmal has been blocked indefinitely (by NinjaRobotPirate) as a spam/advertising-only account, also undisclosed paid editing. User:Avengersarise and User:Pangeatonks have been checkuserblocked. --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 16:01, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Statement by User:AnokaAbeyrathne1
I am Anoka Primrose Abeyrathne, the subject of the article and I have one request. Please delete it. I have no interest in having a page representative of information that insults my education and work. It is very clear that two unidentified accounts removed education that I had worked very hard for, it is not easy to get a 3.85 at Harvard or any university for that matter, which helped me get a full scholarship to Cambridge. Being an activist since 13 didn’t make it any easier to study and work at the same time. https://www.cam.ac.uk/email-and-phone-search - This link can be used to verify my registration. And no I did not ‘sign-up’. I matriculated as a student per Cambridge tradition.

As for my awards, there are plenty of citations and links available and presented to verify them. So if users like EdwardX (or whatever the name) find the work of an under 30 brown girl promotional because it’s actually done, delete the article. As the person who created the most signed petition in the history of my country, to push for Animal Welfare to sending a sexual assaulter to jail, I assure you that I am a doer and that I will continue to advocate for social causes. Me doing so make some people afraid, so afraid that they need to falsify my education, awards and work. It’s quite amusing that no one flagged two accounts randomly trying to change my education reflected across multiple sources, while I was speaking at the Women Deliver conference to 8000 delegates. But you see in reality, in the real world, my work counts. So find someone else’s page to try to fake/falsify and diminish and just delete mine. Also I have never paid and have never needed to pay anyone for ‘promotions’ etc because you see when you are a doer in the real world, people care enough to try to correct false information for free, imagine that! I have also emailed Wikipedia regarding this and they advised me to speak up, hence the only reason I’m even on this ‘website’. To try take away things that someone worked hard for and has citations for, just shows what sad humans some are. But then I don’t expect much. Just the deletion of the page. I will remember this when I graduate from Cambridge next year. Only as a learning experience to understand a subculture of people who don’t seem to do anything useful other than trying to diminish people who do in the real world. Thank you and I hope you will do more in the real world to support genuine people and just really understand that under 30 brown girls do change the world, one cause at a time. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AnokaAbeyrathne1 (talk • contribs) 07:27, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Please understand that Wikipedia's standards require that statements be supported by Reliable Sources, which are third-party independent sources. The material that was removed was because it isn't cited in a Reliable Source.  If there's a way to cite your educational achievements, they can certainly be placed in the article.  If there are statements in the article you believe to be untrue, please comment on the article's talk page, and an editor who doesn't have a conflict of interest can resolve the issue.  If you still want the article deleted, that can be proposed, but you appear to be sufficiently notable to justify an article.  You'd need to email info-en-q@wikimedia.org to prove you actually are who you say you are.  Once that's done, the article could be nominated for deletion, with the community deciding whether it should be deleted or not. (BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 13:00, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

Warren Wilson College


This IP has been tagged with being associated to the Warren Wilson College. The IP has been blocked and warned several times and still continues to add content that is unoriginal. All of the recent edits are a blatant COPYVIO such as. This IP needs to be alerted and potentially blocked indefinitely due to their actions. <b style="color: blue">AmericanAir88</b>(<b style="color: darkred">talk</b>) 18:19, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Given the 10+ year history of edits from that IP, it would appear to me it is one used by students. The recent obsession with the WWC article may just be a case of too much school spirit. The article should probably be tagged for WP:COI rather than WP:PAID. And I would recommend a permanent ban from editing Warren Wilson College rather than block from editing Wikipedia at all. Just my two cents, --SVTCobra (talk) 19:27, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * @SVTCobra: Given that the IP is used by students, is a ban practical or enforceable? I see it causing a lot of blocks to the account for any violation of the ban. —C.Fred (talk) 19:30, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, admittedly I made the recommendation without knowing whether it required human enforcement or if there was a technical way of preventing edits to a particular page. So if human enforcement is required and temporary blocks are the only punishment available, you have a good point. On the other hand, depending on how their Internet is set up, we could be cutting off an entire college from editing Wikipedia forever which, to me, seems incredibly unjust. Cheers, --SVTCobra (talk) 19:37, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * No, there's not really a server-based way to prevent them from editing. And if the IP is used by different people, then short blocks are in order—or a longer block with the school block notice up instructing them to email and register an account if they want to edit. As a rule, IPs are never indefinitely blocked. —C.Fred (talk) 19:40, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * If the disruption is specific to the Warren Wilson College article, perhaps page protection would help. –dlthewave ☎ 19:46, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I'll let the experts handle this, but I propose a school block as a result of the numerous cases of blocking and vandalism. <b style="color: blue">AmericanAir88</b>(<b style="color: darkred">talk</b>) 19:48, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

A good COI detector: LinkSearch on prnewswire.com
If you're bored and looking for bad sourcing to clean up - do a Special:LinkSearch on prnewswire.com. This is a good way to find literally press releases, and there's thousands of usages in article space. It is possible some are relevant (e.g., citing the fact of a press release) - but in almost all cases, they'll be an excellent way to find bad sourcing, advertising and promotional puffery - David Gerard (talk) 19:55, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

Elaine Chao
The Elaine Chao article has an endemic problem with COI accounts adding poorly sourced flattering content about her and removing reliably sourced content. I cleaned the article up last year (the article was just one big promotional piece). In recent days and weeks, IP accounts and newly created accounts have sought to remove reliably sourced content, and add bad content. See, for example, this edit by DoveBar which is basically the same copy-pasta text that got a number of COI accounts blocked in October 2018. The account Megrei is also very likely a COI account: the account has only edited the pages of Elaine Chao and her mother Ruth Mulan Chu Chao. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:01, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * From the October discussion you pointed to this looks more like a potential socking issue than a COI issue (though it might be both). Pinging, who did the blocking last time. R2 (bleep) 16:35, 10 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The account AndyBean89 also looks like a COI account. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 01:49, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * If not COI, they are definitely WP:SPA. They show remarkable proficiency with wiki markup from their very first edit. --SVTCobra (talk) 02:12, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Disgraced ex-admin is retired and so will probably not be of much help, FYI. 199.19.250.74 (talk) 06:36, 11 June 2019 (UTC)


 * (edited exclusively on Elaine Chao and James S. C. Chao)
 * Adding accounts that have also edited exclusively on Elaine Chao and one with a couple of additional edits on James S. C. Chao, her father's article. All started editing end of November/beginning of December 2017. I just looked up the contribs of some of the red accounts.  More red accounts were added in 2018, also exclusive Elaine Chao editors. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 14:24, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * (edited exclusively on Elaine Chao and James S. C. Chao)
 * Adding accounts that have also edited exclusively on Elaine Chao and one with a couple of additional edits on James S. C. Chao, her father's article. All started editing end of November/beginning of December 2017. I just looked up the contribs of some of the red accounts.  More red accounts were added in 2018, also exclusive Elaine Chao editors. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 14:24, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * (edited exclusively on Elaine Chao and James S. C. Chao)
 * Adding accounts that have also edited exclusively on Elaine Chao and one with a couple of additional edits on James S. C. Chao, her father's article. All started editing end of November/beginning of December 2017. I just looked up the contribs of some of the red accounts.  More red accounts were added in 2018, also exclusive Elaine Chao editors. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 14:24, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Adding accounts that have also edited exclusively on Elaine Chao and one with a couple of additional edits on James S. C. Chao, her father's article. All started editing end of November/beginning of December 2017. I just looked up the contribs of some of the red accounts.  More red accounts were added in 2018, also exclusive Elaine Chao editors. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 14:24, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

From 19:26, 15 May 2018 (UTC), to 20:05, 15 May 2018 (UTC), two accounts that had made a few edits in late 2017 (Farleyfoo and Megrei) and lain dormant since then and an account that had never posted before (Beaniacs) added massive amounts of text with a few minor corrections here and there but otherwise perfect Wiki markup. In the process, Beaniacs moved a paragraph critical of Chao from the vastly expanded US Secretary of Transportation (2011-2017) into the Personal/Chao family section, in effect hiding it from view for anybody looking for info on her term in office (1, 2. Next day at 13:32 Megrei added a link to another FAA web page. There were one or two non-primary sources, the rest were press releases or other government publications. Some of the added material was copied with occasional minor changes from DoT press releases.
 * Adding one more.
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841425126 19:26 Farleyfoo +8,177
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841425412 19:28 F 0
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841425412 19:32 Megrei +5,631
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841426437 19:35 M +11
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841427063 19:41 M +33
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841427258 19:42 M -2
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841428086 19:49 Beaniac -4
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841428456 19:51 B -600
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841428638 19:53 B +600
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841429725 20:02 B +1
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841429923 20:03 B +2
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841430173 20:05 B -6
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elaine_Chao&oldid=841540173 13:32 M +404 Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 18:48, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

See also Talk:Elaine_Chao (TLDR: It seems worth to either check all edits of these SPAs for deceptive edit summaries and citations that don't actually support the statement they are cited for, or to preemptively revert them until such vetting has been done). Regards, HaeB (talk) 03:22, 12 June 2019 (UTC)


 * I can't remember where I first noticed this, could have been this very post. Anyway, I opened (and closed) Sockpuppet investigations/Mmacvs. Checkuser results were inconclusive, but the behavioral evidence and odd coincidences made it pretty clear this is either a sock farm or coordinated meatpuppets, so they're all blocked let. Let me know if I you find more. Someguy1221 (talk) 05:03, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Please let me know if this continues beyond today, and I will slap the article with indefinite ECP as a discretionary sanction. MER-C 14:54, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

United Learning


The already-deleted User:Unitogate was a shameless ad for a United-Learning-affiliated school. Just about all this account's edits are either to United Learning or to member schools of this privatization scheme. Orange Mike &#124;  Talk  18:01, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Albright Stonebridge Group (II)

 * (05:53, 5 March 2010 - 00:51, 8 October 2014): 8 articles, 7 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:11, 6 April 2011 - 16:29, 15 April 2011): 5 articles, all connected to ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of "Guarino" relation to ASG in 2011
 * (21:54, 19 September 2014 - 22:07, 19 September 2014): edits only on ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of ASG connection
 * (15:49, 27 October 2015 - 15:50, 2 December 2015): 2 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (15:27, 11 December 2015 - 16:42, 22 March 2016): 3 articles, 2 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:17, 23 October 2015 - 18:41, 25 July 2016): obviously connected, blocked, requested rename to globetrotter601, which was denied
 * (20:28, 25 July 2016 - 15:56, 25 March 2019): see above (name and dates), obvious sockpuppet, expanded significantly the kind and amount of edited articles, always related to ASG
 * COIN report for Globetrotter17 (17:42, 6 August 2018), warnings completely ignored by the user
 * (20:58, 11 July 2017 - 15:06, 7 August 2017): see the above names (Glob*601), obvious sockpuppet (or meat), 9 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (20:58, 26 November 2018 - 17:03, 3 December 2018), ASG only, similar pattern
 * (18:37, 11 June 2019 - 19:25, 11 June 2019): ASG only, see naming pattern
 * (05:53, 5 March 2010 - 00:51, 8 October 2014): 8 articles, 7 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:11, 6 April 2011 - 16:29, 15 April 2011): 5 articles, all connected to ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of "Guarino" relation to ASG in 2011
 * (21:54, 19 September 2014 - 22:07, 19 September 2014): edits only on ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of ASG connection
 * (15:49, 27 October 2015 - 15:50, 2 December 2015): 2 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (15:27, 11 December 2015 - 16:42, 22 March 2016): 3 articles, 2 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:17, 23 October 2015 - 18:41, 25 July 2016): obviously connected, blocked, requested rename to globetrotter601, which was denied
 * (20:28, 25 July 2016 - 15:56, 25 March 2019): see above (name and dates), obvious sockpuppet, expanded significantly the kind and amount of edited articles, always related to ASG
 * COIN report for Globetrotter17 (17:42, 6 August 2018), warnings completely ignored by the user
 * (20:58, 11 July 2017 - 15:06, 7 August 2017): see the above names (Glob*601), obvious sockpuppet (or meat), 9 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (20:58, 26 November 2018 - 17:03, 3 December 2018), ASG only, similar pattern
 * (18:37, 11 June 2019 - 19:25, 11 June 2019): ASG only, see naming pattern
 * (05:53, 5 March 2010 - 00:51, 8 October 2014): 8 articles, 7 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:11, 6 April 2011 - 16:29, 15 April 2011): 5 articles, all connected to ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of "Guarino" relation to ASG in 2011
 * (21:54, 19 September 2014 - 22:07, 19 September 2014): edits only on ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of ASG connection
 * (15:49, 27 October 2015 - 15:50, 2 December 2015): 2 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (15:27, 11 December 2015 - 16:42, 22 March 2016): 3 articles, 2 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:17, 23 October 2015 - 18:41, 25 July 2016): obviously connected, blocked, requested rename to globetrotter601, which was denied
 * (20:28, 25 July 2016 - 15:56, 25 March 2019): see above (name and dates), obvious sockpuppet, expanded significantly the kind and amount of edited articles, always related to ASG
 * COIN report for Globetrotter17 (17:42, 6 August 2018), warnings completely ignored by the user
 * (20:58, 11 July 2017 - 15:06, 7 August 2017): see the above names (Glob*601), obvious sockpuppet (or meat), 9 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (20:58, 26 November 2018 - 17:03, 3 December 2018), ASG only, similar pattern
 * (18:37, 11 June 2019 - 19:25, 11 June 2019): ASG only, see naming pattern
 * (05:53, 5 March 2010 - 00:51, 8 October 2014): 8 articles, 7 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:11, 6 April 2011 - 16:29, 15 April 2011): 5 articles, all connected to ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of "Guarino" relation to ASG in 2011
 * (21:54, 19 September 2014 - 22:07, 19 September 2014): edits only on ASG, additional off-wiki evidence of ASG connection
 * (15:49, 27 October 2015 - 15:50, 2 December 2015): 2 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (15:27, 11 December 2015 - 16:42, 22 March 2016): 3 articles, 2 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:17, 23 October 2015 - 18:41, 25 July 2016): obviously connected, blocked, requested rename to globetrotter601, which was denied
 * (20:28, 25 July 2016 - 15:56, 25 March 2019): see above (name and dates), obvious sockpuppet, expanded significantly the kind and amount of edited articles, always related to ASG
 * COIN report for Globetrotter17 (17:42, 6 August 2018), warnings completely ignored by the user
 * (20:58, 11 July 2017 - 15:06, 7 August 2017): see the above names (Glob*601), obvious sockpuppet (or meat), 9 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (20:58, 26 November 2018 - 17:03, 3 December 2018), ASG only, similar pattern
 * (18:37, 11 June 2019 - 19:25, 11 June 2019): ASG only, see naming pattern
 * (15:27, 11 December 2015 - 16:42, 22 March 2016): 3 articles, 2 directly connected to ASG, additional possible connection for
 * (19:17, 23 October 2015 - 18:41, 25 July 2016): obviously connected, blocked, requested rename to globetrotter601, which was denied
 * (20:28, 25 July 2016 - 15:56, 25 March 2019): see above (name and dates), obvious sockpuppet, expanded significantly the kind and amount of edited articles, always related to ASG
 * COIN report for Globetrotter17 (17:42, 6 August 2018), warnings completely ignored by the user
 * (20:58, 11 July 2017 - 15:06, 7 August 2017): see the above names (Glob*601), obvious sockpuppet (or meat), 9 articles, all connected to ASG
 * (20:58, 26 November 2018 - 17:03, 3 December 2018), ASG only, similar pattern
 * (18:37, 11 June 2019 - 19:25, 11 June 2019): ASG only, see naming pattern

+9 years of continued COI editing, likely UPE and a good deal of sockpuppetry. --MarioGom (talk) 21:49, 11 June 2019 (UTC)


 * SPI filed too. --MarioGom (talk) 22:08, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Likely connected back to (20:33, 17 December 2006 - 15:59, 5 June 2014). --MarioGom (talk) 21:01, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Legacy Christian Academy


This user has been warned before about their unsourced and promotional edits. This user did not listen and continues to make COPYVIO edits that are extremely promotional and 100% violated. No edit is sourced either. See for a recent copy violation. <b style="color: blue">AmericanAir88</b>(<b style="color: darkred">talk</b>) 18:41, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Might not be a bad idea to semi-protect it for a while. IP editor(s) also added text that was revdel'd. --Drm310 🍁 (talk) 19:44, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I think a NOTHERE block or a short term block for disruption is in order for Number1Knight as I just reverted for adding unsourced information again. I'd report it at AIV but depending on who's riding that tonight, it's likely to be declined as it isn't vandalism. John from Idegon (talk) 01:51, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Catalent


More eyes on Catalent, please. The history section is becoming a steady stream of blow-by-blow construction contracts, incremental financing arrangements, partnerships and acquisitions. I do wish there were a solid guideline on how and when this kind of reporting about businesses belongs in articles. In any case, the sources look like churnalism to me, but I am running out of patience with this one to deal with it. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:03, 14 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm looking at the page, and I'm not seeing any claim to notability here after removing all of the acquisition fluff - the entire article is just a company history without saying what they do or why they're worth a page. The sources are all press releases, news coverage about the company acquiring something, or the company website. Also, the original article was a (disclosed) paid edit, which is a very negative thing in my book. I'm thinking AfD, but wanted to bring this up here first in case you disagree and think the article is salvageable. creffett (talk) 18:01, 14 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I was thinking there was a rule-of-thumb that billion dollar companies are notable. We also are looking at a publicly-traded company, which is not automatic notability, but the NCORP guideline addresses this as "probably notable". I would certainly not oppose a WP:TNT proposal. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:07, 14 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. For now, I'll put a notability warning template on it and take a scalpel (make that a hacksaw) to the company history. creffett (talk) 18:17, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Batch ending 17 May

 * - redirect
 * - created by an editor with a connection to the industry, but seems to be ok
 * - very short list article, but (after cleanup) likely fine as far as content is concerned
 * - stub article about a possibly-non notable editor, but seems fine
 * - moved to Draft:Advocate Zaheer Farooqui
 * - moved to Draft:Ahmass Fakahany. Contains some clear WP:OR, and credible off-wiki evidence indicates UDP activity
 * - seems fine
 * - moved to draftspace
 * - seems fine
 * - moved to draftspace

33% more than usual, probably because (1) I've added two search terms and (2) it is edit-a-thon season in the northern hemisphere. MER-C 17:45, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

Batch ending 1 June
Now with tables! (Also, did I accidentally ping everyone on the above list?) MER-C 11:38, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Aren't these actually suspicious just by dint of appearing here to be examined? I.e. not potentially suspicious as the title says? Just pulling your leg! They are good candidates, I hope you keep listing. ☆ Bri (talk) 04:46, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Batch ending 14 June
Less than before despite adding new keywords. Be aware for evasion at NPP! MER-C 18:59, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Studio Drift
Ralph Nauta, (apparently) one of the founders of Studio Drift, edits the article directly after COI warning placed on his talk page. --Bbarmadillo (talk) 08:03, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The history of the article is a little muddled. Is this a previously deleted article? And did Ralph Nauta compose the original article as well as the entire draft which you then recovered? --SVTCobra (talk) 11:49, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * the draft was declined 5 times in this version, but the subject looked notable to me so I reworked it based on Google News press mentions as part of WP:ABANDON. I also placed a COI template at the article's talk page and at the above mentioned user page beforehand, assuming an apparent conflict of interest. I don't think it was deleted before. It looks like Ralph Nauta always worked on the draft and couldn't get it approved. -- Bbarmadillo (talk) 12:13, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Global Access Point
This article deserves a look: Global Access Point. Had two single-purpose accounts (probably undisclosed-paid) write most of this, no sources, may not even meet GNG. Does someone want to clean up or CSD/nominate for deletion? ɱ (talk) 17:38, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I am guessing you mean two of these three (or maybe you didn't notice the third:


 * However, none of them have edited in three years, so the COI issue isn't pressing. Deletion for notability is probably the route to go. --SVTCobra (talk) 17:55, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * How quick we catch it shouldn't matter. They're probably undisclosed paid editors, likely sockpuppets, SPAs. The article and Union Station article have had promo content added due to undisclosed paid editing. ɱ  (talk) 18:18, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * As well, I see nothing in the article that "credibly indicate[s] the importance or significance of the subject". ɱ  (talk) 18:21, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * However, none of them have edited in three years, so the COI issue isn't pressing. Deletion for notability is probably the route to go. --SVTCobra (talk) 17:55, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * How quick we catch it shouldn't matter. They're probably undisclosed paid editors, likely sockpuppets, SPAs. The article and Union Station article have had promo content added due to undisclosed paid editing. ɱ  (talk) 18:18, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * As well, I see nothing in the article that "credibly indicate[s] the importance or significance of the subject". ɱ  (talk) 18:21, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

University of Cambodia


Article was excessively detailed and promotional. Much has been trimmed, but there is still too much. COI issues have been raised repeatedly with User:TravisM416, but they have failed to address them. Now we have a brand new editor, User:Kramarquez removing templates, and in an edit summary stating "Reviewed the talk page and saw the previous versions of the page. I agreed with everyone that it was too detailed. The latest version looks much better and thus the tags aren't needed anymore"; and on my talkpage "COI issues? I have none??". TravisM416 has a clear COI, and Kramarquez is likely an alternate account. Edwardx (talk) 13:32, 11 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Why would I have an alternate account? I have always made all my edits public under my username. I have no idea who the other account is. I also do not have a conflict of interest which is why I did not respond to the question as it didn’t relate to the situation. I’m trying to clean up this article and have the text be appropriate. I’ve deleted over half of it and would honestly like it to be done, so can you kindly point to the paragraph that is giving you trouble? Instead of just saying it’s excessive, I would greatly appreciate something concrete. Thank you — Preceding unsigned comment added by TravisM416 (talk • contribs) 02:40, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry,, but I do not believe you. Since you first edited Wikipedia in June 2016, all of your editing has been to this article, its founder Kao Kim Hourn, or to add University of Cambodia content to other articles. You are employed by the University of Cambodia, are you not? You have an obvious conflict of interest. Edwardx (talk) 10:01, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Edwardx Hi, sorry you dont believe me. I volunteer my time for them, but I have not received compensation. I have no obligation to do this, thus I do not have a conflict of interest. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TravisM416 (talk • contribs) 10:40, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Thank you, . Are you saying that you receive no compensation for any work you do for the University of Cambodia? Could you clarify this please. Edwardx (talk) 19:41, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Edwardx Hi, that is correct. I do not receive compensation and I updated my profile (I think?) to reflect that I volunteer. I don't want to break any COI rules or mislead the public in any way. Thank you! — Preceding unsigned comment added by TravisM416 (talk • contribs) 01:38, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I've blocked both accounts for likely sock puppetry and undisclosed paid editing. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 14:31, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Open Knowledge Foundation
Employees of Open Knowledge Foundation are editing the article of OKF and its CEO. Both in office hours and apparently coordinated, so I think this should be considered paid editing and not just conflict of interest. Edits are generally minor and useful, although today one started to enter the field of puffery. Both have ignored previous warnings on their talk pages. MarioGom (talk) 19:22, 17 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, I agree, the two linked accounts do appear to have direct links to the article (and thus the CEO). I hope they can be dissuaded from direct editing and only contributing to talk pages.--SVTCobra (talk) 23:36, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Sherdil


User persistently editing an article about a film in which he is the self declared and promoted producer. After two strange deletion edits, he self identifies here, an edit which is immediately reverted by a bot. Following further edits, reverted by several different editors, posts a COI template advisory on his talk page.The user continues to edit the article but is blocked for 48 hours for adding unsourced material here. NOMAAN KHAN 2K3 continues editing despite further warnings as here. He also queries his COI on my talk page here and here and receives guidance in both cases. This editor seems unable to understand the concept of COI or to take any actions in response to the notices served.  Velella  Velella Talk 16:04, 19 June 2019 (UTC)


 * I issued a strongly worded warning, but yes, there seems to be a significant language barrier, which I wouldn't expect if we were dealing with the actual Nomaan Khan. I would say any further editing of the article would warrant administrative action against the user. --SVTCobra (talk) 20:03, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Virginia Wesleyan University


Earlier today, this editor uploaded a to Commons that appears to be an official photo of the president of this university. The editor also claimed to own or control the copyright of the photo. Hence it is reasonable to conclude that he or she at least has a conflict of interest if not a closer relationship with the university. But he or she has not replied to messages left on his or her User Talk page and continues to edit the university's article (and the article of its president. ElKevbo (talk) 16:15, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I see the user is very familiar with Wiki markup on their first day of editing. --SVTCobra (talk) 16:31, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Interestingly enough, it is not the official portrait used on the VWU site, but clearly from the same photo session. --SVTCobra (talk) 19:11, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I have blocked for not complying with WP:PAID. 331dot (talk) 12:28, 21 June 2019 (UTC)
 * As an aside I have redirected Scott Douglas Miller to Virginia Wesleyan University; in my view the sources cited (almost all of which are in WP:PRIMARY territory) do not indicate the subject's notability.--SamHolt6 (talk) 14:43, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

Imagination and others




User:Vysha appears to be a subject matter expert. However, they have made numerous edits that center on a few sources (example) that appear to be the work of a single author:, , , ,. I raised this issue at the editor's user talk page:. However, they never replied, and subsequently continued to make similar edits:,. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:05, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
 * it is a very valid concern; looking at the articles list above, the sources by a Andrey Vyshedsky seem to have been cited on multiple occasions. Even if these edits are improving the encyclopedia (not all of the sources being cited by Vysha are related to Vyshedsky), this smells like self promotion. SamHolt6 (talk) 23:28, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Just noting: the user has reached out to me at my user talk, and I've pointed them to here. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:55, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Dear Editors, Thank you for your note! I will review my edits and will make sure that they are as objective as possible and ideally do not reference my own research articles. Thank you! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vysha (talk • contribs) 13:25, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I hope that this will resolve the matter. I'm going to keep an eye on this, and give it approximately a week for everything to be fixed, but if there are remaining problems then, I will just go ahead and revert them myself. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:18, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I have taken care of most salient issues: edited out my name from all articles, added more references, and deleted references to our own research as much as possible. I will do another run on this in July when teaching is over. Thank you for your help!
 * Sorry to jump in here, Vysha, but this sounds like you are promising to obfuscate and hide the fact the article is based on WP:OR. I haven't looked at the article at all, but this just sounds terrible. --SVTCobra (talk) 15:44, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I've cleaned up all of the listed articles. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:20, 21 June 2019 (UTC)