Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/BillFairclough/Archive

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SPA account user:JoannaLockwood created article on non notable author Bill Fairclough. This article is almost entirely based on self published sources, and has serious BLP issues, some now removed. Followed by a promotional spree across a range of Cold War spying articles for Fairclough's "autobiographical novel". See
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After some discussion with user:JoannaLockwood an account purporting to be the subject pops up with remarkably similar writng style shows up to defend notability and the use of self-published sources, social media etc as references.

Concerning interest from a BLP perspecitves from both about whether the content would stand scrrutiny 'at law' and what a 'court would consider proof'

As an aside the article itself alleges his extensive use of pseudonyms... Heliotom (talk) 04:52, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''

I seem to have ended up in some sort of public Wikipedia courtroom on the web where Wikipedia, rightly or wrongly, appears to be judge and jury. Accordingly, I have responded to your latest comments below and have again included the questions I raised that you failed to answer. I look forward to your response. Regards – Bill Fairclough, circa 08.15am London England time, 26 March 2018

Your comments: SPA account user:JoannaLockwood created article on “non notable” author Bill Fairclough.

My comments: You have used the term “non notable”. The term is not in any dictionary but assuming you mean the equivalent of “not very well known to the public at large” that is disputed on the grounds already quoted by both Joanna Lockwood and I in earlier correspondence where specific reference was made to numbers of connections and followers in social media by Joanna Lockwood which I briefly commented on too but from a different angle.

In addition, the article is not about me as an author. The article is about me as a “businessman” and “intelligence agent” as stated plainly in the opening sentence to the article. Indeed, the word “author” is only mentioned in a quotation included in the third paragraph of the article. Hence, by referring to a “non notable author” you seem to have misunderstood what is plainly stated and that is that the article is in essence about me as a “businessman” and “intelligence agent”.

Your comments: This article is almost entirely based on self published sources, and has serious BLP issues, some now removed. Followed by a promotional spree across a range of Cold War spying articles for Fairclough's "autobiographical novel". See [1] [2][3] and about 40 other edits.

My comments: As noted in my earlier comments made yesterday it was Wikipedia that removed many references which were in fact not self-published sources. I asked for your comments on why so many references were removed but none were forthcoming, and no explanation was given.

You refer to serious BLP (biography of living person) issues. The article is not a biography, does not read like a biography and even referred to real biographies in its initial draft. It is of note that Joanna Lockwood initially made references from the article to biographies on other websites (backed up by third party references within the biographies) but Wikipedia deleted the references to the biographies. Furthermore, in your own revision at 13.11 hours (your time) on 25 March 2018 you withdrew your “serious BLP violations” accusation after receiving a response to that and other matters from Joanna Lockwood.

You state that “this article” [was] “followed by a promotional spree across a range of Cold War spying articles for Fairclough's "autobiographical novel". See [1] [2][3] and about 40 other edits.” This is simply untrue. The article was not “followed by” “other articles” etc. The article was preceded by “other articles” many of which had been in place for some time and most of which did not relate to “Cold War spying” which suggests (as I thought) that you have not thoroughly read the article, the references thereto (many of which you deleted) and the changes to the pre-existing related articles. If you look carefully at what you refer to as Joanna Lockwood’s “40 other edits” all it seems she did was try to improve the wording and update/revise pre-existing references in Wikipedia to references to either myself and/or The Burlington Files series.

Your comments: After some discussion with user:JoannaLockwood an account purporting to be the subject pops up with remarkably similar [sic] writing style shows up to defend notability and the use of self-published sources, social media etc as references.

My comments: I am the subject and if you want proof of that please ask (if enough hasn’t already been given) rather than make a null point about my purporting to be the subject. For your information, I and others monitor the web for any mentions of my name and related issues of interest at the time, so I think it is quite reasonable for me to comment on an article being written about me in public which is what I did yesterday. As for purported similarities in writing styles quite frankly I would have thought that you would have known that when commenting on others’ written material, writers are often significantly influenced by the material they are commenting on. Indeed, I could make the point you made about many of your comments included herein resembling (one of) my many writing styles.

Your comments: Concerning interest from a BLP [sic] perspectives from both about whether the content would stand [sic] scrutiny 'at law' [4] and what a 'court would consider proof' [5] As an aside the article itself alleges his extensive use of pseudonyms... Heliotom (talk) 04:52, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

My comments: It is hardly surprising that I should comment further on Joanna Lockwood’s legal observations as I was commenting on all the conversations to date about an article about me! In any event, her observations were both pertinent and apt and I thought it would be sensible and persuasive to repeat and expand upon them.

As for the article itself alleging my “extensive use of pseudonyms”, yet again that is untrue. The article refers to others creating pseudonyms for me. There is a difference and your lack of attention to detail is astonishing to the same extent as I am astonished by the number of your spelling mistakes given the nature of your job and the intent behind your palpably erroneous and/or inaccurate comments. Returning to the use of pseudonyms, if they weren’t used extensively in espionage there would be very few people applying for jobs at intelligence agencies as their life expectancies wouldn’t be that great! In any event, I notice you use a pseudonym, so what?

My earlier unanswered questions: As stated above, you have not answered any of the questions I raised yesterday so for your convenience I have reproduced them below (starting with the statement I later requested a comment on) and look forward to your replies.

I have watched the changes to the page about me and your comments about Joanna's comments. First let me say that what Joanna wrote in the article before you and another administrator changed it several times was all true as noted by me (being the subject of this article) on both a post on LinkedIn and in Tweets. The web reference to the LinkedIn post (the contents of which were very similar to the tweets) is as follows: or just look me up on LinkedIn and see my posts.

Accordingly, at law I am confirming in public that the information that is or was in the Wikipedia article about me is basically true (albeit obviously far from complete). Hence there can be no issues about me making accusations about libel.

I would like your views on my foregoing statement and my ensuing comments.

1. You have removed quite a number of external references and are simultaneously complaining that there are not enough external references when those references you removed referred to: (1) important and relevant information in articles from well known media such as The Mail on Sunday or Citywire; and (2) biographies (in what you might deem your competitors) which themselves had many references included therein. 2. In determining what references to remove did you read the articles referred to or just the description of the references? 3. There is quite a lot of interest in my history, Beyond Enkription and The Burlington Files as evidenced by the numbers of followers I have on social media (which Joanna alluded to). That level of interest is greater than that in respect of many thousands of authors and/or businessmen who feature in Wikipedia. 4. The nature of the work I have been involved in does not normally leave many traces of evidence to quote in public. Nevertheless, by writing a "self-confessed" autobiographical series of books based on my life therein lies the evidence per se at law. Put another way, by way of example, the exposure in 2014/15 of a covert operation in Haiti in the seventies trying to undermine the TonTon Macoute and Baby Doc Duvalier is unlikely to be capable of substantiation other than by those who took part and recorded their memories for posterity. In a similar vein, Wikipedia has thousands of articles about authors (and others) that are "propped up" in the main by what those authors (and others) wrote or said to others without any other supporting references that would hold water in a court of law. AlanPemberton 07:19, 26 March 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by BillFairclough (talk • contribs)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
✅, blocked, tagged, closing.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:54, 26 March 2018 (UTC)