Wikipedia talk:Autobiography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Archives: Archive 1, Archive 2

Contents 1 But what if it IS verifiable, etc.? 2 Here we go again. 3 This policy does not make sense 4 A hierarchy among users? 5 Proposed new guideline 5.1 The problem with autobiographies 5.2 Autobiographical Pitfalls 5.3 If Wikipedia already has an article about you 5.4 Creating an article about yourself 5.5 Verifiable sources 5.6 Comments 6 Issues 7 Corporations 8 Suggesting deletion of your own article 9 Hidden editing 10 Throwing more sticks on the fire 11 Template 12 You need a template {Self-edit} 13 Additional guidance needed 14 Mechanism to allow individuals to supply corrections about their articles without editing the article 15 How does it do that?

[edit] But what if it IS verifiable, etc.?

Hi.

But what if you do deserve a biography on WP, so you write it YOURSELF but try NOT to push your own biases as right and stick to only verifiable 3rd-party sources of information (and try to avoid original research as much as possible)? It is still "strongly discouraged"?!?!?!?! If so that would make no sense at all. 74.38.32.128 02:14, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Any response? This was a point I was trying to discuss. I would suggest that if an autobiography managed to conform to the necessary policy on first writing that it should not be discouraged at all! This does make a lot of sense, at least to me, and I would like to hear some opinion on it. 170.215.83.83 22:01, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

For one, there's common sense. The vast majority of situations will not have an ideal situation like that. -- Ned Scott 00:19, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

But what about if you do manage to pull it off? Then what? Does it get nuked at a glance? Do you get insulted, flamed, etc? 70.101.147.74 00:37, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

If you do manage to pull it off, then you've got an article. If someone lists it for deletion, it will likely survive and be kept. If someone gets mad, then they probably don't get it. No big deal. -- Ned Scott 00:46, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

But would you be reprimanded for "violating" this "official guideline"? 170.215.65.35 02:17, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Why no response? Anyway, I sure couldn't find out "directly", since for one I have no notable achievements (at least not yet) to warrant a biography here, auto or not, so I could not push the guideline into territory it should but does not deal with, without violating official content policies... 74.38.35.171 08:09, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Here we go again.

"Creating or editing an article about yourself is strongly discouraged."

If I was Siegenthaler and saw this, I would conclude that fixing libel in my article was strongly discouraged.

The exception--that you can edit your own article to correct mistakes and remove unsourced negative statements--is important enough that we should *never* state that you can't edit your own article unless we make sure to include the exception right then and there. The exception must be clear and obvious to any new person. It must not be hidden, it should not be mentioned only occasionally, and no new user should have to read two versions of the rule, one with an exception and one without, and have to decide for himself exactly how much he's discouraged from following the exception. Ken Arromdee 06:13, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree, this contradicts the previous section, so I removed the words "or editing". -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 00:42, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Why isn't creating an autobiographical entry banned outright? I assumed it was, except for user pages. If I wanted to describe myself, I'd have to be biased because I want to look good in others' eyes. "Richard Rabinowitz (1979 - ) is a nice, bookish kind of guy who loves biking, art, and urban planning, and goes to synagogue a lot (yeah, right, teeheehee)"... See how silly and POV that looks? — Rickyrab | Talk 03:40, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

ok, it's not really silly. — Rickyrab | Talk 03:41, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

And, no, my dumb userpage doesn't count as an article! — Rickyrab | Talk 03:42, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

If you want to look good, you can, but just not on Wikipedia! See? But in writing an article about yourself, contrary to your assertion, you do not HAVE to be biased. If you WANT to, then you cannot put the article on Wikipedia. But if you do instead decide to try and remain as neutral as possible at all costs, then you CAN put the article on Wikipedia. The guideline, at least in my reading, says: "It is OK to create an autobiography, provided the biography is worthy of inclusion here (WP:N & WP:V), and you adhere STRICTLY to the relevant Wikipedia policy, especially Neutral point of view, Verifiability, and No original research. However it is often very difficult to do this when regarding oneself due to ego, etc., and thus one should only attempt to pull off this stunt if they really, really are capable of being that neutral, etc. Otherwise your A/B is likely to get dumped." 70.101.144.160 02:51, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] This policy does not make sense

This policy is actually a bit of a nonsense in my opinion. Anyone should be able to create an article and that article should be judged on the content of the article, not the person who created it. This is, I believe, a fundemental principle of wikipedia, which is contradicted here. There are enough safeguards in place in the system already. If someone who is not notable decides to make an entry for themselves, this is covered already by the policy on notabiility. If they make statements which cannot be verified, this is also covered in the policy of verifiable sources. Concern about bias is totally unfounded, because all individuals tend to be biased and this is the purpose of discussion.

It is frankly ridiculous to think that the rest of the world other than the individual concerned is going to be less biased than the individual themselves. If someone does post biased biographical information, it can be challenged, and should be challenged on that basis alone. This allows notable people to contribute to the purpose of the entries concerning them, adding information of interest to users. And if it is not of interest, it can be edited out.

A far better solution is to define good standards to biographies, and to allow anyone to create or edit articles as long as these standards are adhered to.

Frankly the current policy represents a prejudice against notable people, making the assumption that anyone notable cannot possibly be trusted to write anything honestly about themselves, and I take exception to this prejudice, and as already stated the issue is completely irrelevant in any case. In fact someone making claims about themselves are immediately accountable for their statements, in a way that does not apply to other users who are essentially anonymous.

Finally as policy it is un-enforcable, for the simple reason that any contributor to wikipedia is not vetted... again this is a fundemental principle of wikipedia. It is quite trivial for notable people to ask friends, colleagues and even staff to work on biographies on their behalf. This policy simply has the effect of driving the contributions of notable people, whether for their biographies or for contributions in their fields of expertise, undergound. Such a policy ultimately is only compatible with the concept of all contributions being anonymous, in which case wikipedia should strictly dissallow any revelation of the true identity of users, and should probably remove the user pages entirely. This would of course be a silly thing to do. Dndn1011 16:10, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Dndn1011 makes very good points about (a) redundancy of policy and (b) the enforceability issue, which drives people to s-/m-puppets. As a policy, it doesn't make sense for those reasons. However, it might work as a guideline or an example under notability and verifiability: "For these reasons, for example, it is typically frowned upon for individuals to establish their own pages, since they are not truly unbiased arbiters of their own notability." "For these reasons, for example, it is typically frowned upon for individuals to significantly contribute to articles about themselves, since they may accidentally introduce unverifiable information." Etc. --LQ 17:22, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes I agree to a point... except that accidentally introducing unverifiable information is something that everyone does all the time. It is ok to do this, because articles are not expected to be perfect as soon as they are first written. It says so somewhere in the policies I read it, but ^{[citation needed]}. It is not a hanging offence. What happens is that people point it out and ask for verification. When people make this "mistake" it is common for ^{[citation needed]} tags to be added. The whole article is not generally deleted immediately ^{[citation needed]} and the user does not immeidately become a persona non grata ^{[citation needed]}. In fact to quote the guidelines in Wikipedia:Your first article:

Articles written out of thin air are better than nothing, but they are hard to verify, which is an important part of building a trusted reference work. Please research with the best sources available and cite them properly. Doing this, along with not copying large amounts of the text, will help avoid any possibility of plagiarism.

This is perfectly fair, but notice how the common sense approach is taken that "Articles written out of thin air are better than nothing". In fact it is very common for references to be found after the original article introduces unverified statements. How many articles exist that have big tags on them saying "This article does not cite sources"? Dndn1011 18:44, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Actually what is perfectly fair in my opinion is to state pitfalls. Something like:

Contributing to an article about yourself presents many extra challenges. It can be difficult to be unbiased and easy to introduce many unverifiable statements. Do not be suprised if such contributions also get extra scrutiny. It is thus best to tread carefully.... blah blah blah....

--- Dndn1011 18:56, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Agreed 100%. It is not impossible to be unbiased enough (it is impossible to be totally unbiased but then again that applies to everyone), it is just difficult. Nobody is totally unbiased, it is human nature to have biases. The thing is is to try to avoid them as much as possible. 74.38.35.171 03:56, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't think I am in disagreement with Dndn1011; I was just quickly tossing out examples of a more advisory approach. Clearly such a thing would need to be worded carefully (including describing it as "advisory" or "statement of pitfalls" or "warning" or whatever). The Dndn1011 example is an improvement over the suggestions I made, and would certainly be refined over time. --LQ 21:24, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

This is a guideline, and thus is not strictly binding. Notice that it says that autobiographies are "strongly discouraged", this is not the same thing as "forbidden". Policy is what sets out what is and isn't forbidden, okay? 74.38.35.171 03:56, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A hierarchy among users?

To quote Bjonesin the section "If you see an autobiography":

What should an editor do if he or she comes across an article written by the subject, but the subject can claim notability. Jeff Tamarkin: This is a recent example. Should we delete and ask someone else to write another article? That's certainly an extra step. On the other hand, letting the article stand would create a hierarchy among users that I don't think I'd like. What's the proper response?

When things don't make sense like this policy, it often means that there is some kind of agenda outside of the apparent rule set... and here it is. What exactly does "...would create a hierarchy among users that I don't think I'd like" mean? Could it be that the reason for this policy has to do with the ego of those who are not notable? Is there an irrational fear that notable people will sweep down and take over wikipedia? Is it a form a jealousy? "Hey I don't see why notable people should be able to create or edit articles about themselves when I can't do the same".

Please someone come up with a better explanation for this policy. Otherwise lets ditch it. Hierarchies are unavoidable. After all who is the most active wikipedian? Efforts to have complete equality might need to include slapping someone on the wrists for writing more articles than other people, or indeed beeing more knowledgeable than other contributors.

Is there some kind of voting procedure to effect change in policy? Dndn1011 09:22, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

First thing would be to check notability -- see if the person and/or their achievements is/are notable enough to warrant a biography, auto or not, and if notability has been asserted in the article If notability has been established, then we check the cites and neutrality. If too few verifiable citations or too much POV, then the article may be deleted if not salvageable, and a full rewrite. If sufficiently neutral and verifiable (ie. not Vanity) then there should be no problem keeping it, even though it is an autobiography I still cannot see the harm. I do not feel comfortable with the AUTO "policy" the way it is as it seems to discourage or outright forbid even honest attempts to stay neutral. I cannot see the fairness in such a rule. For example with the Dino Dini article -- the guy tried to make an A/B edit, and it was reverted. The decision was half fair and half not -- the A/B edit was POV, NV, and OR, so that would be good grounds, however the reverter suggested that the more important factor was it being in violation of WP:AUTO (strange, I thought Policy and not Guidelines take precedence, this should have been secondary!), suggestion that he might be willing to ax even a neutral, verifiable, non-original research (ie. otherwise harmless) A/B edit on WP:AUTO grounds alone. This is what I object to. I've asked him about this too. WP:AUTO should be a guideline to interpreting relevant policy, not a substitute for policy or a way to tighten the bar beyond that found in policy when there would be no harm from the barred material (if we follow policy only we see that vanity A/Bs are disallowed. Good. If we follow this even totally-Official-Policy-compliant, ie. beneficial, A/Bs are disallowed too. Bad.). 74.38.35.171

I agree with you, although I do not agree that all of the removed work in the Dino Dini article was POV, NV and OR. Although POV NR and OR are policy, it is not trivial to decide if a statement is POV, NV and/or OR, because there is no clear cut definition (or rather the definitions have a large subjective component). Common sense makes up a good deal of the decision making process. With my own article I was attempting to add information. Anyone can challenge statements made on any subject, and the normal procedure is to challenge particular statements as POV, NV or OR and then allow the author to argue the case for the existing text, or modify the text, or provide references. In my case the article was completely removed with prejudice on the basis of one individual's interpretation of a guideline instead of working through the accepted procedure and policy. I have no desire to add to my own article in order to add POV, NV or OR statements. As can be seen in my work on Game Design, I am more than capabable of being of being unbiased even on a subject I have strong opinions of. In fact I find the excercise of trying to create an wikipedia article on a subject I am passionate about, and still remain within policy, as a very useful and growthful exercise as it help me understand which views I hold that are based in fact, and which are based in opinion. Unfortunately too many people have their own egos that refuse to admit that it is possible for anyone to be NPOV about subjects that they are passionate about, usually because they themselve are incapable of it. This prejudice on their part can be so strong that they will refuse to judge the content properly and instead dismiss it entirely. Anyway thank you for your support of my point of view. As I keep saying, articles should be judged on their content, not their authors. Dndn1011 16:08, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

All right, then let's go through the edits, now shall we?

This is the section in question:

"Dini worked also in on a new football game to be published by Microprose from 1995 to 1996. However, Microprose decided to drop most of their sports titles, and the project was cancelled with an amicable agreement. (CITE REQUIRED)"

"In 1996, Dini went to the United States in order to gain experience of corporate game development and management working as Group Leader and briefly as Project Manager. Dino helped Z-Axis ship Three Lions, the first fully 3D soccer game. The title referred to the design of England's football badge, famously mentioned in a hit song featuring comedians Baddiel & Skinner. The game was released under various different names in Europe, and also as Alexi Lalas International Soccer in the USA. Later Dini worked at Universal Studios directing prototype work for a project called "Monster Movie"."

There are lots of claims here for which you provided no citations. You might know these things about yourself, but unless you can cite a third-party source so they can be verified, they are not suitable for Wikipedia. Facts have to be checked. So it could easily be dumped under WP:V for lack of verifiability, and under WP:NOR for similar reasons (if there are no pubs then it would be primary or original material.). I would like to hear from the deleter though what exactly he considers POV in the above since he cited an NPOV violation, too. (he said something about "self-aggrandizing" language but I was not sure exactly what that was as he did not say.) Maybe you should see if there are any 3rd party sources for these claims, and if so then try again but cite and cite every claim you make. If you cannot cite a claim, do not include it, as including it might be construed as NPOV violation as well -- too many uncited positive claims. 74.38.35.171 00:22, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Ironically, this text to which you refer was not added by me. It was added by some other person a long time before my contirbutions and was taken from my own website. After the conflict over my edits I tidied the article up by removing the verbatim quotes of my own website, (note that originally I let these stand as they had been added by someone else). My position was that as frecklefoot had "banned" me from editing my page (although I realize he has no such authority), in order to make the article less of a mess I had the right to remove the text on the basis of copyright infringement. But please this is not the place to discuss my particular case or that of anyone else. If you wish to discuss any particular own case (including my own) please do so on the appropriate talk page. Dndn1011 03:43, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, it seems the text he "large reverted" was written by you:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Dino_Dini&diff=next&oldid=82236836

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Dino_Dini&diff=86290504&oldid=84010380

But like you said this is not the place to discuss this specific case. Anyway, thanks for the response, I haven't gotten a lot of those around here! (responses, I mean.) I don't know if I'll discuss _this case_ further, however. 74.38.35.171 22:56, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I said the text to which you refered was not added by me. It existed before my edits. Obviously freklefoot also reverted text which I had. Dndn1011 00:00, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll have to look at that again, I'm not sure what you are referring to now. 74.38.35.171 05:38, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed new guideline

OK I am going to take this apart:

You should wait for others to write an article about subjects in which you are personally involved. This applies to articles about you, your achievements, your business, your publications, your website, your relatives, and any other possible conflict of interest.

This is bad. Asking people personally involved in subjects rules out experts in subjects as well. The concept of conflicts of interest is laughable because the very nature of wikipedia means that there is always conflicts of interest, because of potentially thousands of people can have different views and would like wikipedia to reflect their view. This should be removed.

Wikipedia has gone through many prolonged disputes about the significance, factual accuracy, and neutrality of such articles, including one about Jimmy Wales himself [1]. Refraining from such editing is therefore important in maintaining Wikipedia's neutral stance and in avoiding the appearance of POV-pushing.

Almost all articles go through "any prolonged disputes about the significance, factual accuracy, and neutrality". Why is a ban on editing by people knowledgable about subjects important "in maintaining Wikipedia's neutral stance and in avoiding the appearance of POV-pushing"? People whether notable or not have a tendancy to push their own POV and existing policies cater for this very effectively. This is seen to work for even the most controversial topics, so it should work just as well for autobiographical information.

If you have published elsewhere on a subject, we welcome you to contribute to articles on the subject for Wikipedia. However, every Wikipedia article is expected to cover its subject in a neutral, fair, and comprehensive way in order to advance knowledge of the subject as a whole. Articles that exist primarily to advance the contributor will likely be deleted.

The phrase "Articles that exist primarily to advance the contributor will likely be deleted" should be replaced with "Articles not conforming to the standards or notability, verifiability and neutral point of view are likely to be edited or deleted".

[edit] The problem with autobiographies

It is said that Zaphod Beeblebrox's birth was marked by earthquakes, tidal waves, tornadoes, firestorms, the explosion of three neighbouring stars, and, shortly afterwards, by the issuing of over six and three quarter million writs for damages from all of the major landowners in his Galactic sector. However, the only person by whom this is said is Beeblebrox himself, and there are several possible theories to explain this.

– The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Fit the Ninth

Although humorous, the above illustrates the several fundamental problems with autobiographies:

• They are often biased, usually positively (see puffery). People have a tendency towards self-aggrandizement when talking about themselves, and for presenting opinions as facts. Wikipedia does not present opinions as facts. Muhammad Ali writing "I am the greatest" in a Wikipedia article about himself is not acceptable, for example. Wikipedia articles must be written from a neutral point of view (which does not mean simply writing in the third person).
• They can be unverifiable. If the only source for a particular fact about you is you yourself, then readers cannot verify it. (One common area where this is the case is with hopes, dreams, thoughts, and aspirations. There is no way for readers to verify what you think.) However true something may be, if readers cannot verify it, it does not belong here. Everything in Wikipedia articles must be verifiable.
• They can contain original research. People often include in autobiographies information that has never been published before, or which is the result of firsthand knowledge. This type of information would require readers to perform primary research in order to verify it. (For example: Unless your shoe size is, for some extraordinary reason, already a matter of widespread public knowledge, including your shoe size in an article about yourself is original research, since verifying it would require readers to come to you and measure your feet for themselves.) Wikipedia is not a publisher of first instance, and as such, original research is not permitted in Wikipedia.

This should be removed completely. We do not need an example of biased articles. We know what they are. Yes autobiographies can be biased, unverifiable and contain original research. But then so can any article especially when started by a contributor who has knowledge or interest in a subject but does not wish to conduct research in finding references to subtantiate the information because of lack of time or any other reason. The person making claims does not need to be the same as the person verifying them. That is the whole point of collaboration. This whole section should be replaced with something like:

[edit] Autobiographical Pitfalls

Contributing to an article about yourself presents many extra challenges. It can be difficult to be unbiased and easy to introduce many unverifiable statements. Do not be suprised if such contributions also get extra scrutiny. It is thus best to tread carefully:

• It is easy to be biased when writing about oneself. People have a tendency towards self-aggrandizement when talking about themselves, and for presenting opinions as facts. Wikipedia policy is not present opinions as facts. As such you will find you contributions objected to if they present your opinion about yourself rather than facts about yourself.

• It is easy to make unverifiable statements. If the only source for a particular fact about you is you yourself, then readers cannot verify it. (One common area where this is the case is with hopes, dreams, thoughts, and aspirations. There is no way for readers to verify what you think.) However true something may be, if readers cannot verify it, it does not belong here. Everything in Wikipedia articles must be verifiable. Thus if you do inadvertently or deliberately add such unverifiable statements you may find these contributions objected to.

• It is easy to present original research. People often include in autobiographies information that has never been published before, or which is the result of firsthand knowledge. This type of information would require readers to perform primary research in order to verify it. Original research is not permitted in Wikipedia.

If you contribute material that is biased, unverifiable or original research, then this is is likely to be modified or deleted by others in order to conform with wikipedia policies.

Moving on...

[edit] If Wikipedia already has an article about you

It is difficult to write neutrally about yourself. Therefore, it is considered proper on Wikipedia to let others do the writing. Instead, contribute material or make suggestions on the article's talk page and let independent editors write it into the article itself.

...

It is difficult to write neutrally about anything. This section should be rewritten thus:

When making modfications to articles about you, bare in mind the pitfalls described above. Take care before removing or modifying the prior work of others. It is very easy to be tempted to remove some piece of information that you would rather not be presented, but the only valid reason for doing so is if the information is:

• Unverifiable
• Verifiably untrue
• Biased
• Original Research
• A breach of copyright

Please afford the same respect to prior conrtibutors that you would for contibutors to any other article. The best way to avoid major conflicts is to use the discussion pages before making sweeping changes to any article, including an article about you. Wikipedia does not wish to have an inaccurate article about anything including people. The Neutral point of view policy means that articles should be balanced and fair and verifiable and of course should contain as much relevant infromation as possible. Any contributions that adhere to the principles of notability, neutral point of view, verifiability and non-original research should be accepted by the wikipedia community, regardless of the identity of the contributor. If you don't like the photo, you can help Wikipedia by contributing a good photo under a suitable free content license. It would probably be a good idea to identify yourself on the article's talk page with the {{Notable Wikipedian}} notice.

Finally the final section:

[edit] Creating an article about yourself

Creating an article about yourself is strongly discouraged. If you create such an article, it might be listed on articles for deletion. Deletion is not certain, but many feel strongly that you should not start articles about yourself. This is because independent creation encourages independent validation of both significance and verifiability. All edits to articles must conform to Wikipedia:No original research, Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, and Wikipedia:Verifiability.

...

This is very poorly thought through. Here there is a total prejudice that undermines the very principles of wikipedia. The implication is that even if you are notable and write an article about yourself which is unbiased, verifiable and not original research, it is acceptable for your article to be deleted. I have also read the "independent creation encourages independent validation of both significance and verifiability" phrase many times over and still don't understand it.

This section should be rewritten thus:

Creating an article about yourself has an extra pitfall, which is the question of whether you are notable enough to have such an entry. Ultimately the decision rests with the community. If you are not notable enough then the community will be likely to remove your entry. You should apply common sense here. If you are famous, that is pretty clear and there will probably already be an article about you. However it is not possible to have a hard and fast rule about what constitutes being notable. The best way is to look at existing biographies and get a sense on whther you are notable or not in comparison. As a general rule, if you have had something published or achieved something that has been brought to the attention of the general public you are notable. However the question always remains on whether the notability is sufficient; being famous in your home town might not be enough to warrant an entry in wikipedia. Many people consider it good form to wait until someone writes an article about you rather than you starting your own. This of course still does not guarantee that you are notable enough for the community, but it is certainly a good sign of it. Note that anything you submit can be edited by others. Several autobiographical articles have been a source of dismay to their original authors after a period of editing by the community, and have been occasionally listed for deletion by their original authors. In some cases the article is kept even if the original author requests otherwise.

[edit] Verifiable sources

If you already maintain a personal website, you can ensure that any information that you want in your Wikipedia article is already on your own website. As long as it's not involving grandiose claims like, "I was the first to create this widget," or "My book was the biggest seller that year," (unless, of course, the claim is true and you can provide evidence) a personal website can be used as a reference for general biographical information. As the Wikipedia Verifiability policy states: Self-published sources and other published sources of dubious reliability may be used as sources in articles about themselves . . . so long as the information is notable, not unduly self-aggrandizing, and not contradicted by other published sources.

For my money this is much better.... comments? Dndn1011 10:55, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Comments

I'm not seeing the problems you are seeing. What we have now is really good advice. Not only that, but a guideline is not policy and is not a ban on activity. The statements being made are true more times than not, which is why it's a good guideline. Being a guideline means it is subject to rationale exception. The wording of the guideline internally discourages certain types of edits, and that is a very good thing. I don't believe we have a problem where people are not able to contribute valid edits to any article, about themselves or about something they are involved with. To weaken ourselves on these guidelines will hurt more than it helps. -- Ned Scott 12:02, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

(via edit conflict) Starting with the very first quote: I don't think the current version is bad. The experience has showed that the vast majority of people writing about themselves, their website, or their company write terrible articles. Given that, I think it's fair to say that you should not write an article about yourself.

And what about the small minority who do write good ones? Do their A/Bs just get MERCILESSLY NUKED out of sheer prejudice?!?! Is that fair to them? 74.38.35.171 02:23, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

When you say "Asking people personally involved in subjects rules out experts in subjects as well" you seem to be taking it wider than intended. An oncologist is welcome to write about different kinds of cancer. She may even mention her own research if it is relevant (see Wikipedia:No original research#Citing oneself). The only thing that she shouldn't do is to write a new article solely about her own research.

The guideline that editors should not start articles about themselves has been here a long time, and I think it is still endorsed by almost all Wikipedians. Just to be clear: Do you want to remove "You should not start an article about yourself", or do you want to clarify that oncologists are free to write articles about cancer?

I think that is such a fundamental issue that we should first get to agree on this before we can tackle the rest. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 12:24, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Ned Scott : "Not only that, but a guideline is not policy and is not a ban on activity" : actually I have had experience of this being interpreted as a ban, and had a contribution of mine to my own biography wiped out with no negotiation or consultation, with the person doing so explicitly contradicting the view that it is a guideline. See Talk:Dino Dini. The current guideline appears to be more than a guideline and seems to be overstating its authority if indeed it is just a general guidline for writers of articles. I have attempted to reword the guidline so that it will be interpreted as a guideline and appears to be a guideline rather than a policy. The wording in the current "guideline" is very strong, inconsistent and confusing. I think the rewrite is much clearer and removes the unwarranted portends of doom.Dndn1011 13:30, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Jitse Niesen : I think it is quite clear in what I have proposed for this guideline. I mistakenly called it policy and have edited the section title accordingly. The fundemental principle is that articles should be judged by their content, not the author. This is reflected in the way I have rewritten the guidelines. This fundemental principle (which I believe not only to be central to the philosophy of wikipedia, but central to the process of rational discussion as well) answers your question I believe. If an expert in their field creates an article solely about their field of expertise, providing it is unbiased, notable, verifiable and not original research then it is valid article. Who cares who wrote it when it can be rewritten by anyone with an valid objection?Dndn1011 13:30, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Jitse Niesen : "(via edit conflict) Starting with the very first quote: I don't think the current version is bad. The experience has showed that the vast majority of people writing about themselves, their website, or their company write terrible articles. Given that, I think it's fair to say that you should not write an article about yourself."

Even if you are different and could write a good article? What would be so bad about allowing them to? Would you still WP:NUKE it out of WP:AUTO concerns even if all other policy/guidelines are satisfied?! This is the big question, the one I'd like a real answer to by diehard WP:AUTO supporters. 74.38.35.171 19:23, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

I whole heartedly disagree. This is complete nonsense. If we were to accept your statement we would have to make all kind of other assertions, such as "People with strong opinions should not contribute to wikipedia". Just because people hold opinions does not make them unable to present facts. Dndn1011 13:53, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

There is no problem if "an expert in their field creates an article solely about their field of expertise"; this is not prohibited by the guideline.

What is "complete nonsense"? People with strong opinions have proven quite capable of writing good articles, though there are quite some exceptions. On the other hand, people who start writing an article about themselves have proved problematic, and we won't lose much if they hadn't written the article. There is a big difference between "People with strong opinions should not contribute to wikipedia" and "People should not start an article about themselves". -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 02:21, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

There is no difference at all where articles should be judged by the content not who wrote them. It is nonsense to say that any class of people should not make certain contributions in case they make biased contributions. It is prejudice. I have stated by arguments clearly you have not actually responded to them, particularly the point about judging articles by content alone. Dndn1011 08:36, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

You say that articles should be judged by content alone. The guideline (and I) agree that when an editor has created an article about themselves, it cannot be deleted solely because of that. However, before the article is created, when there is no content to go by, it is best in the guideline's opinion not to create the article at all, but concentrate on other things. You say that is prejudice, and you may have a point, but our goal here is to write an encyclopaedia. We try to have fun and be nice and fair in the process, but getting a good encyclopaedia is the overriding concern, and that is why we do not want people writing about themselves.

What you're proposing is a big change to a long-established guideline, in my opinion akin to abolishing it, and that should not be decided by whomever happens to be watching. If you do want to try and push this through, you should post Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) in order to get more people involved (I'm happy to do this if you prefer, but you might feel I'm not representing your proposal properly). -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 09:52, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Indeed I think you are over representing the significance of the changes I propose. It is not the same as abolishing it at all. I just re-read my proposed changes concerning "Writing an article about yourself". It states all the concerns that the current policy has about such activity. The only difference is that my changes make clear it is the article that will be judged and not the contributor. In other words, if you can write an autobiography that meets the standards agreed for all articles and biographies in particular, then there is no reason why you should not even create an entry about yourself, providing you are actually notable. I have no problem with some kind of protocol regarding a way of determining in advance if someone is notable. If the new guideline stated something along the lines of "If you feel you should have an entry about yourself in wikipedia, good practice is to discuss this with other editors first, rather than just create one." There is plenty of room for maneouver here without the need of striking the fear of wiki into anyone even contemplating creating or editing their own birographies. The village pump is a good idea, and yes I would prefer to raise the issue myself there. Thanks for the constructive discussion so far though.Dndn1011 11:20, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

And how much does Wikipedia have to lose if they do write the article? Not everyone necessarily is irredemably biased even if writing about themselves, and if they are seen to be making an honest effort to keep away from bias they should be encouraged and aided in that pursuit. If the article comes out somewhat biased, it can always be fixed if the notability is high enough. If it's total biased unverifiable tar, it can simply be deleted. As for people making ABs being "problematic", not ALL of them are, and we should NEVER punish those that are not, especially if we see them trying to be neutral, we should HELP. 74.38.35.171 04:05, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Are you saying that nobody is able to make a neutral edit to an article about themselves? 74.38.35.171 19:23, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

So this is pretty much just about a dispute with the Dino Dini article? I'd have to side with the editor who reverted the changes. Even without this guideline, it's all original research, and I see that as a much larger issue than WP:AUTO. -- Ned Scott 09:41, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

The dicussion here has nothing at all to do with my biography. I mentioned it merely because of the view taken by an editor in that case that this guideline was a cast iron rule, in order to respond to your asertion that "Not only that, but a guideline is not policy and is not a ban on activity". Again you are falling into the trap of focusing on who is speaking rather than what is being said. Feel free to add your opinion on my biography there, it is not appropriate here as this is not about my biography but about the guidelines. I sometimes despair at the inability of some individuals to engage in neutral unbiased discussions without bringing personalities into it. An idea or concept or argument does not change its validity depending on who states it. I would assert that mature, productive debate should be based on reason and logic, not finger pointing. Dndn1011 10:18, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Like I said, you are looking at an original research issue, not an autobio issue. I almost reverted back to your changes since you were fairly neutral and contributed a lot of good info (I didn't read it in depth, but I saw no major issues). It doesn't matter who adds the info, we need external sources (see WP:RS). If you can do that then I would likely support your contributions to your own article.

More often than not, when I see someone calling for a major rewrite of a guideline it is because of an isolated issue rather than a widespread problem. And more often than not, there is a reasonable solution that has nothing to do with changing the guideline. -- Ned Scott 11:16, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I understand this, however I assure you that my motivation here has nothing at all to do with my biography. My attention was drawn to this guideline by the incident, however once again that does not invalidate my arguments. I feel that the current guideline is ineffective for the reasons I have already argued, and I have proposed a replacement that is much better, in my opinion. My biography is frankly of very little relevance compared to the bigger issue of this guideline, which is why I am focusing my attention here.Dndn1011 13:01, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree with him on the deletion due to lack of WP:V and it being WP:OR, but I do not agree with his statements that imply WP:AUTO is the overriding issue, as that would suggest WP:AUTO could be used to blast away even verifiable, non-original, and neutral autobiographies (they are not common but they still do exist), overriding all core content policy out of sheer prejudice. 74.38.35.171 02:22, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

You have also said that a website is an OK source, but this is not so in most if not all cases, the sources must be reputable. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources. 74.38.35.171 02:28, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Wrong! to Quote from that very document you refer to:

Self-published sources in articles about themselves Main article: Wikipedia:Verifiability Self-published material, whether published online or as a book or pamphlet, may be used as sources of information about the author, so long as there is no reasonable doubt who wrote the material, and so long as it is: * relevant to the self-publisher's notability; * not contentious; * not unduly self-serving or self-aggrandizing; * about the subject only and not about third parties or events not directly related to the subject; The reputation of the self-publisher is a guide to whether the material rises to the level of notability at all.

Dndn1011 00:05, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Issues

I have reason to believe that User:Asmodeus is actually Christopher Michael Langan. There are a number of pieces of evidence he has offered himself including taking a hardline anti-academic stance (similar to those seen in article written about Langan), admitting to living in a similar location as Langan (the midwest), and exhibiting a close friendship with User:QTJ who has admitted to being friends with Langan, and other users have noticed similar characteristics. Although it is not the place for anybody to "out" another Wikipedian, this has very strong implications for WP:AUTO since the user does edit the article about himself (if it is indeed himself). Any suggestions for how to proceed would be welcome. --ScienceApologist 18:34, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I would maintain that this kind of PI style of posting is quite inappropriate. It is distasteful and irrelevant. I mean look at it... "I have reason to believe that...", "There are a number of pieces of evidence...", "who has admitted...", "taking a hardline anti-academc stance...", "admitted being friends...".

Where will it end? "Further my investigations revealed that X is not only living in the same apartment building as Y, who is known to have strong opinions, but has been observed talking with Y at a local bar. Given the nature of Y's opinions, we believe X should be restrained from access to any computer systems to remove any possibility that he pollute wikipedia with an opinion, even for a moment."

It does not matter who posts as long as they are not disruptive. The way to proceed? Spend you efforts working with the actual text of articles instead of trying to decipher the personal lives, opinions and credentials of those writing them.

And if this was a wind up, good on you... heh Dndn1011 19:28, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

BTW I should thank you. Never knew about this chap before. He sounds interesting.... BTW check out Kurt Gödel, Gödel's incompleteness theorems, Shadows of the Mind, Quantum mechanics and perhaps Double-slit experiment.

Yes. If he keeps trying to opinionate the article, then just deal with it as NPOV violation. You can't prove it is some sort of biased autobiography, you can only prove it is a biased something, and thus should be treated like any other biased something. The bias should be removed, and if he keeps trying to keep it biased, then one could block him from editing that article. Focus on the content and approach him on it (the content that is. Not on something that is itself based on an opinion.). 74.38.35.171 06:18, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Corporations

For the second time now, I have looked for the equivalent of WP:AUTO for corporations, i.e. a user who is a paid employee of a company working on WP in an official (or unofficial) capacity. I send them here and just mention that it is uncouth, but is there something else I can direct them to (besides my current trifecta of WP:AUTO, WP:CORP, and WP:ADVERT)? I am not talking about viral marketing here which is obvious spam, but assumed good faith. — RevRagnarok ^{Talk Contrib} 18:33, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Do you know of Wikipedia:Conflict of interest? -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 23:49, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

That's another good one I guess. Thanx, but was hoping for more of a direct AUTO translation... — RevRagnarok ^{Talk Contrib} 01:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Suggesting deletion of your own article

I suggest that just as you should not be keen on creating your own article, you should also not be keen on seeing that it is deleted. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Theo Clarke for some recent discussion that has some bearing and some possible principles forming... Some potential principles:

• It's OK to suggest deletion, but it may not be wise to tag as speedy (that's too fast, some community review is approrpiate) yourself... let others do that.
• The subject's wishes, if he or she is a wikipedian in good standing, are a factor, but not the only, or not a decisive factor, in the decision (if the decision is on the cusp otherwise, this could sway things but no one gets to say "I just don't want an article, make it go away").

Thoughts? ++Lar: t/c 09:55, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

You can be "keen" on creating your own article. Did you mean "creating your own autobiographical article", perhaps? You could suggest deletion of the former, the latter is tougher and may require a higher level of proof. It can't be strictly forbidden though as we have to be fair, and some people may have good enough judgment. Forbidding would be grotesuqely unfair to them. 74.38.35.171 02:30, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

What about if you ended up writing an autobiography, and you realize it is biased, unverifiable, etc. vanity. Could you then nominate it for deletion? I think you should be able to. 74.38.32.195 07:45, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hidden editing

Say Wikipedia has a biographical article on some guy, and that same guy actually has an account on Wikipedia. But the thing is, the guy wasn't involved in the creation of the article, and no one knows the guy in the article is this user. My question is, if they guy finds this article about himself and starts editing it up and down and all around, is there not any way we could find out that the editor is the guy in the biography? What's to say there isn't—nay, what's to stop there from being—tons of biographies on Wikipedia right now with positive POV all over it that may actually be being made biased by the person in the article him-or-herself who just so happens to have an account that we didn't know about? Or is this covered somewhere? I mean, it's not like I'm going to look for this stuff in WP:AB.
VolatileChemical 18:42, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Well if it's POV then it should be caught and dealt with as a WP:NPOV breach. What may lead to suspicion that it is a non-neutral autobiographical attempt, however, is if it's happening to a single article on someone. Of course if it is not POV, then there's no problem with the changes. 74.38.35.171 06:40, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Good. This would be a really bad website if people couldn't edit their biographies at all. VolatileChemical 05:56, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

That would be really, really bad indeed. What if it's something as simple as a typo? 74.38.35.171 06:12, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Throwing more sticks on the fire

Hi.

I saw this at Talk:Dino Dini:

"Dndn1011, since you are Dino Dini, you really shouldn't edit this article. I removed the sections on your early life, etc., since they don't really add much to the topic of you being a game developer/designer. It's also completely unsourced. I know that you don't really need a source, since you lived it, but that kind of OR isn't permitted on Wikipedia. But moreoever, Wikipedia policy stricly prohibits anyone who has an article from editing that article, apart from blatant corrections ("Hey, I wasn't born in 1932!") and reverting vandalism. Therefore, I removed most of those sections you added."

Doesn't this sound like WP:AUTO is thus being placed on a HIGHER authority than WP:V and WP:NOR?! I don't think it should as this is a guideline, and those are policy. Big difference. Also, it "strongly discourages", not "strictly prohibits" writing an autobiography.

To test my case I've been pushing here, I'd like to know if anyone has managed to pull off a fairly neutral, verifiable autobiography, and I'd like it see exactly what happened. Could you please point me to a couple of cases as they might settle this for me. If it "strictly prohibits" then we should expect to see even neutral, verifiable, non-original-research A/B edits being reverted and the editor reprimanded, obviously at least to me a horribly unfair thing to do since they technically violated no official policy. 74.38.35.171 04:26, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Also, I saw this: "It is difficult to write neutrally about yourself. Therefore, it is considered proper on Wikipedia to let others do the writing." But "difficult" need not mean impossible (if it does, then it should indeed by changed to say it is impossible.). Does the second sentence mean though that it is still improper to even add neutral material if you manage to perform the hard work and pull it off? How is that fair, exactly? Also, if a proposed autobiographical edit is approved by consensus, but someone still hasn't added it, is it OK to do it yourself? If not, what's the rationale for forbidding it? The edit's community-approved after all. Sorry if I'm posting a lot of posts but I have a lot of disagreement with this which sounds like it's not fair to those who really want to make the hard effort to be neutral! What I'm asking is can WP:AUTO become grounds for removal even if the autobiography or other potential-COI information satisfies all other Wikipedia policy including WP:NPOV, WP:V, and WP:NOR? If so, Goodness in Heaven WHY?! What Harm Does It Do??? 74.38.35.171 02:16, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Please read my propsed change to the guideline above. I believe I covered everything. Dndn1011 00:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I did. It's interesting. I do find the present guideline a little too restrictive as it seems to suggest even honest attempts to be neutral would be shunned. 74.38.35.171 21:36, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Template

I am going to make a template concerning WP:AUTO. Please post on pages which contain conflict of interest because I am having the same problem with Julia Allison. Bearly541 22:11, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Please see {{Autobiography}} Bearly541 22:29, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] You need a template {Self-edit}

{Self-edit} produces This article includes text from the actual subject. Please verify content in source box.

If the person doesn't put it up, warn them, and put it up yourself. It allows self edits to fix, wrong dates, correction of vandilism, but at the same time allows users to know they content should be varified. --71Demon 18:33, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Additional guidance needed

This guideline should include some recommendations on what to do when the subject of an article edits it. We have {{uw-autobiography}} for when someone creates an article about themselves, but it would be useful if we also had a politely worded template which could be used to inform people about our policies on autobiography and conflict of interest. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 17:39, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

I don't have much experience with creating templates, but I suppose that if nobody else is going to create a template for this I'll have to do it myself, when time permits. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:38, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mechanism to allow individuals to supply corrections about their articles without editing the article

As the guideline states, editing an article about yourself should be strongly discouraged, but there is currently no other way to amend inaccurate information apart from directly asking another user to change it. I propose we set up a page where individuals can transparently and openly point out inaccuracies in their own articles for other users to review and fix. Apologies if such a page has already been set up but I haven't been around for a while. Any feedback? --Oldak Quill 01:05, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, there is the Biographies of living persons noticeboard. A link to that page should be found on the talk page of any living person, via the template {{WPBiography}}. (If the parameter "living=yes" is included in the template, an explanation of the WP:BLP policy is included, with a link to the noticeboard. For a random example, see Talk:David Tennant.))

Also, there's nothing wrong with the subject of an article editing the article's talk page to ask for corrections. Of course, I don't know how they're supposed to know that. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:37, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

That's what a talk page is for. One could discuss the proposed change on the talk page, and thereby seek consensus to approve making the change. mike4ty4 02:36, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] How does it do that?

Hi.

I saw this:

"Creating an article about yourself is strongly discouraged. If you create such an article, it might be listed on articles for deletion. Deletion is not certain, but many feel strongly that you should not start articles about yourself. This is because independent creation encourages independent validation of both significance and verifiability. "

How does non-independent creation discourage such validation of notability and verifiability? mike4ty4 02:37, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, it's not guaranteed that if you write an article about yourself it's going to be biased, but you gotta admit that it makes it more likely to be. Everyone wants to cast themselves in the best light, it's not even intentional, it's just what we do. About the verifiability thing, if I don't know Mr. DudeGuy, and I write an article about him, I'm going to have to rely on publicly available sources, since that's the only way I can get info about him. But if he writes an article about himself, it's not exactly that that discourages validation etc, but it does make it possible for him to include non-notable and non-checkable info about his cat or his favorite breakfast cereal. Trust me, I have definitely seen this occur (well, not with cats and breakfast cereal per se, but you know). I hope this kind of answers your question, but if it doesn't, definitely keep the discussion going here or by dropping me a message on my talk page. delldot talk 16:47, 18 March 2007 (UTC)