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This week, we moved to the esoteric world of WikiProject Australian Roads. The project is surprisingly new, having been formed in just April 2013. It has slightly over 1,000 articles under its scope, including one featured and four good articles. We interviewed Evad37, Nbound, Wiki ian, and SatuSuro.

What motivated you to join WikiProject Australian Roads? Have you contributed to any of the project's Good Articles?

Evad37: I have been improving road articles in Perth and the rest of Western Australia since I first registered as an editor last year. It's an area that doesn't see that much activity, at least not in recent years, and the average article is either little more than a stub, or has a number of referencing and cleanup issues. I did manage to get the first Australian road to Good Article status (Mitchell Freeway), mostly by myself, but it's a lonely and daunting task to improve an entire subject area by yourself. I created (and therefore joined) the WikiProject in April this year, following encouragement and advice from other Wikipedians, including SatuSuro and ‎Rschen7754. I have contributed to four of the project's good articles, one of which was recently promoted to featured article status.

Nbound: I joined AURD as Ive always found roads and their histories somewhat interesting. Ive had a major part in two Good Articles, Majura Parkway and Abbotsford Bridge, and have helped review some of AURD's other recognised content. I currently have an article (Monaro Highway) awaiting review, and plan to bring other roads upto at least GA level as time and resources permit.

Wiki ian: Being a loyal Wikipedia:WikiProject Highways member for some time, I jumped at the opportunity to join this group when I became aware of its existence. I like most engineering related topics and feel Tasmania related articles lag behind their interstate counterparts. I have at times used this project to benchmark my edits. I have not contributed to Good articles on this project as I feel my contributions are put to better use on articles of lesser quality.

Do Australian roads receive as much attention as British or American roads? Has the project received help from contributors living outside Australia? What can be done to attract more Australians to edit Wikipedia in general?

Evad37:I don't think they receive as much attention. There isn't really an iconic road like U.S. Route 66, which receives 2000+ page views each day. Most Australian road articles get less than 100 or 200 views per day. In terms of editors, there's less project members than the US or UK road projects. As far as I know, all the project members live in Australia, and most of the contributions also come from Australia – apart from minor edits, like spelling and simple cleanup. Some US roads project members have participated in discussions, and Fredddie made a ton of high quality, accurately designed SVG route marker graphics for us. I'm not really sure what can be done to attract more Australians to Wikipedia... perhaps some more real-world interaction. A new GLAM project, Freopedia, was launched earlier this year, and there was some discussion at the Australian Wikipedians' notice board about the feasibility of bringing Wikimania to an Australian city.

Nbound: Not usually, Australia has less people, and a very urbanised settlement pattern, this leaves few editors covering a majority of roads. Overseas contributors have helped the project by reviewing our articles, and helping create imagery of shielding (Thanks Fredddie!). We don't always see eye-to-eye with some of our sibling projects, but for the most part we all get along and help create good articles; after all we all have the same goal at heart, better roads articles. As far as new editors, I dont think theres much that can be done to target Australians specifically, but hopefully Wikipedia can solve some of its editor retention issues and there will be a trickle through for all Wikiprojects. Interestingly, Ive noticed a few Australian editors who arent official participants who also contribute and engage in discussions, but arent specifically listed on the participants page. I hope that they will join, as if everyone knows who the other roads editors are, and their preferred areas of work it helps with sharing of resources.

Wiki ian: No. Since becoming an active editor in 2006, Australian road articles have come along way. However, there is still much work to be done, particularly in standardization of the articles - There needs to be more conversation on how to make state-to-state articles the same. I have seen this taking place with the infoboxes, but not the layout/content of the articles.

How does the project determine notability for roads in Australia? Are sources difficult to find for articles about Australian roads?

Evad37: Unlike many other countries, road articles are based on road names, as numbered road routes are generally not notable. Sources availability varies by state - some government websites have plenty of information, others don't have so much. Reliable sources are out there, but it might require a visit library archives or extensive digging through government websites – which has resulted in articles which are "sourced" to self-published road fan websites that come up in the first or second page of internet search results.

SatuSuro: Some roads and details of their contexts can be accessed via Trove the database from the National Library of Australia.

Nbound: Theres no hard and fast rules for notability within AURD, its largely left up to commonsense and the basic rules for Wikipedia. In general though; motorways, highways, and arterials are very likely to be notable. Your local street or a nearby fire trail is not. It largely depends on whether there is any history applicable to the road. Sometimes you might find when you edit an article, that there is an interesting history that noone knew about, I think having any kind of codified rule in this regard would be a mistake. The participants can (and have) dealt with problem articles on the rare occasions they have appeared. Sources can be very difficult to find for Australian Roads, its largely a function of which state the road is located in (and can become very hard for roads that cross borders). Some states have a wealth of information available online, such as Western Australia, and to an extent New South Wales; while others have very little at all. Not everyone has easy access to hard copies of official documents as they are often located in state libraries and archives. Newspaper archives (such as Trove) can sometimes trawled for information that wouldnt otherwise be easily accessible. In general though it can be difficult to write articles for many roads. "Roadgeek" websites are also an issue as they are not reliable sources, but sometimes editors cite them as they struggle to find appropriate sources to base claims upon. One of the project's goals is to remove these citations.

Wiki ian: For Tasmanian based articles, sources can be very difficult to track down. I rely on Trove, archived material at libraries and the media for citation.

The project's noticeboard includes several initiatives regarding highway shields, article merges, infoboxes, lists, and templates. Have you been involved in any of these efforts? What challenges do projects face when trying to accomplish large-scale housekeeping like this?

Evad37: The main problem is participation. It's probably not most peoples idea of a fun time going through hundreds of articles, making adjustments that are a bit mundane for a human, but too complicated for a bot. I've done some of these, and and you really have to be in the right sort of mood. But there are plenty of other areas of the wiki that need attention, and no deadline for these tasks.

Nbound: Ive been involved in most of them; and as Evad says, you really need to be in the right mindset. Thankfully the project's editors seem to realise the amount of behind-the-scenes organisational stuff that goes into Wikiproject management and content creation, and are quite patient and appreciative of the tasks being done. Some of the major tasks (such as converting all our shield images to an easy-to-use template) have widespread participation from most editors.

Wiki ian: Not with this particular project. I did some major work to Tasmania based articles prior to the conception of this project. Now days people seem to be quick to jump into this line of work (I feel I'm not needed as far as this aspect of the project goes).

Does the project have any difficulties acquiring images for articles? What important features or landmarks still need to be illustrated by photographs in Australian road articles?

Evad37: Australia is a big place with a relatively small population, and plenty of uninhabited or sparsely populated areas - its not easy to get a photo of a road section that may be hundreds of kilometers away from a major city or town. So if anyone does happen to be travelling along a remote road, some photos would really be appreciated - such as this holiday snap. Roads under construction can make interesting photos.

SatuSuro: Distribution of known active editors in wikipedia tends to be towards the southeast of Australia, while a substantial number of highways and interesting roads tend to be a very long away from populated areas, to the extreme point where on the opposite side of Australia - Wapet Road is not only isolated and not a maintained track, but is one which requires permission to access, and a very well prepared adventure set of vehicles (one would not be enough) that are usually well beyond the usual motorists way of driving in The Outback. There are many roads throughout the country where no photographs exist of roads or their context, and where a photo from a holiday snap is always welcome.

Nbound: There is a distinct lack of free imagery for most roads (including major highways and arterials), even ones in quite accessible areas. Images of any roads would be greatly appreciated, images of remote roads and tracks even moreso. As far as features and landmarks along Australian roads go, you'll probably make a fair few friends at AURD if you can get these. I should also give Bidgee a shoutout at this point; he is pretty handy with a camera as has got quite a few good snaps in his travels.

Wiki ian: I can't say I notice issues with photos. I really dislike the inconstancy between articles as far as detailed maps go.

Has WikiProject Australian Roads collaborated with any of the transportation projects for other countries? Has your project borrowed any resources or templates from others?

Evad37: WikiProject Highways is a parent project for all the country specific road projects, and a venue for inter-project collaboration. A-Class reviews take place there, and there is a dedicated highways IRC channel. The Highways project oversees a number of shared templates, such as those for constructing road junction lists, and for displaying KML maps in the WikiMiniAtlas. The WikiProject Australian Roads talk page banner was based on the Canadian Roads banner, and borrowed elements from the US Roads banner. And the design of the project pages and project navigation box is based off those at the Highways and US roads projects.

Nbound: While some of our templates and resources are AURD specific; most of what is used is shared with our sister and parent projects, or with minor modification to suit the Australian context. Much of the wikiproject structuring is based on the US Roads Wikiproject.

What are the project's most urgent needs? How can a new contributor help today?

Evad37: The biggest problems are the number of articles that are unsourced or poorly sourced, and the amount of stubs that need expanding. The project's resources department can help with those tasks, but there's plenty more to do! The project's talk page (WT:AURD) is the best place to start. At the top, there is the to-do list, including a link to the project Cleanup listings. Below is the Project noticeboard. Newly created articles listed there can be checked for things the creator might have missed, such as categories or an infobox, or otherwise copyedited or expanded. The article alerts link to relevant discussions, where you can give your opinions, and there are various tasks listed in the progress indicator table. Or just post a message on the talk page if you want to introduce yourself, or need any help.

Next week, we'll fly the flag and shine our arms. Until then, decipher symbols in the archive.

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2013-10-09

Under the sea

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By Cdtew, Hahc21 and Armbrust

This Signpost "Featured content" report covers material promoted from September 29, 2013 through October 5, 2013.

Featured articles

Seven featured articles were promoted this week.

• Sea (nom) by Chiswick Chap and Cwmhiraeth. The wet, salty thing surrounding all of the world's dry, less-salty stuff is detailed in this featured article, which, it should be noted produced a FAC nomination review page that may be as long as the article itself; given its expansive subject, that is surely no small feat. From history to chemistry to mythology, this article has everything you need to know about the briny deep.
• Sense and Sensibility (film) (nom) by Ruby2010. This 1995 period drama was directed by Ang Lee and featured Emma Thompson and Kate Winslett. Thompson actually wrote the script, and won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, being the only person to have won an Oscar for acting and for writing.
• Pavo (constellation) (nom) by Casliber. Meaning "peacock" in Latin, this is one of four "Southern Bird" constellations – the others being Phoenix, Grus, and Tucana. Pavo was first depicted in 1598, and contains seven main stars. Six of its stars have planets in their orbits. Don't get confused, though – this peacock was named after the Green Peafowl, not the Blue.
• Little Nemo (1911 film) (nom) by Curly Turkey. Not to be confused with 2003's computer animated film, this 1911 silent animated short featured characters from creator Winsor McCay's comic strip Little Nemo in Slumberland. The movie consisted of 4000 rice–paper animation stills that, when photographed in sequence, produced an animated segment of four minutes in length.
• Adam Eckfeldt (nom) by Wehwalt. This article covers the second chief coiner of the U.S. Mint, who served in that position from 1814 to 1839. Throughout his tenure, Eckfeldt played a role in establishing and refining many of the mint's procedures. His collection of unusual coins would later become the National Numismatic Collection.
• Amir Hamzah (nom) by Crisco 1492. This Indonesian poet and nationalist was declared a National Hero of Indonesia in 1975, twenty-nine years after his death in the East Sumatra revolution. Amir's works exhibit a Malay viewpoint, and "did not include symbols of a Europeanised modernity such as electricity, trains, telephones, and engines".
• Malkin Tower (nom) by BigDom, Eric Corbett, and Trappedinburnley. Despite having been demolished in the early 17th century, Malkin Tower is remembered as the site of the "best-known alleged witches' coven in English legal history". In 1612 Alizon Devize, her grandmother, and six others were accused of causing harm by witchcraft, and Alizon's brother admitted under interrogation that the Tower was the scene of the "witches'" coven.

Featured lists

Six featured lists were promoted this week.

• Stanley Holloway on stage and screen (nom) by Cassianto and SchroCat. Holloway (1890–1982) was an English comic singer, monologist and actor. He began his career in 1910, primarily in concert party and variety shows. He made his silent film debut in 1921 in The Rotters and went onto star in over 60 motion pictures, with his last being in 1976.
• List of songs recorded by Ellie Goulding (nom) by Underneath-it-All. English indie pop singer-songwriter Ellie Goulding has recorded a wide variety of songs for her two studio albums, as well as several guest appearances with other artists. She began her career in July 2009 after signing a contract with Polydor Records.
• Christina Aguilera discography (nom) by HĐ. Throughout her career, American recording artist Christina Aguilera has released seven studio albums, one extended play, six compilation albums, one soundtrack album, and 41 singles. She has sold over 50 million albums, and is recognized by Billboard as the 20th best-selling artist of the 2000s. Her debut album, Christina Aguilera, has sold over 17 million copies worldwide.
• List of international cricket five-wicket hauls by Malcolm Marshall (nom) by Sahara4u. Marshall, now a member of the Cricket Hall of Fame, represented the West Indies' cricket team for fourteen years and 81 tests. Over this time, Marshall took 376 wickets, including 22 five-wicket hauls. He has been called "one of the greatest fast bowlers of all time".
• List of ecclesiastical works by E. G. Paley (nom) by Peter I. Vardy. Paley (1823–95) was an English architect. He moved to Lancaster in 1838, when he was aged 15, to join architect Edmund Sharpe as a pupil, and later formed a partnership with him. When he became sole principal, he mostly worked on churches, designing new ones and restoring, rebuilding, and making additions and alterations to existing churches. Paley used the Gothic Revival style in almost all his designs.
• 64th Academy Awards (nom) by Birdienest81. Held in 1992, the 64th Academy Awards took place at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles to honour the best films of 1991. The Silence of the Lambs was the big winner of the night, with five Oscars including Best Picture. Other winners included Terminator 2: Judgment Day with four awards, Beauty and the Beast, Bugsy, and JFK. More than 44 million Americans viewed the show.

Featured pictures

Twelve featured pictures were promoted this week.

• Short–snouted seahorse (nom, related article) created and nominated by Hans Hillewaert. The short-snouted seahorse (Hippocampus hippocampus) is a species of seahorse endemic to the Mediterranean Sea and parts of the North Atlantic. They can usually be found at shallow muddy waters, estuaries or seagrass beds.
• David Villa (nom, related article) created and nominated by Kadellar. David Villa, often nicknamed El Guaje, is a Spanish footballer who currently plays as a striker for Atlético Madrid and the Spanish national football team. Villa made his international début in 2005, and has since participated in three major tournaments, including two World Cups.
• Neuschwanstein Castle (nom, related article) created and nominated by Der Wolf im Wald. Neuschwanstein Castle is a nineteenth-century Romanesque Revival palace on a rugged hill above the village of Hohenschwangau. The palace was commissioned by Ludwig II of Bavaria as a retreat and as a homage to Richard Wagner. Ludwig paid for the palace out of his personal fortune and by means of extensive borrowing, rather than Bavarian public funds.
• Lesser short-nosed fruit bat, newborn (nom, related article) created and nominated by AntanO. The lesser short-nosed fruit bat is a species of megabat within the Pteropodidae family. It is a small bat that lives in South and Southeast Asia and Indonesia. It weighs between 21 and 32 grams (0.74 and 1.13 oz).
• Bush Cockroach (nom, related article) created by Cyron Ray Macey and nominated by Benison P Baby. The bush cockroach is a subspecies in the Blattodea order. It is active during the day, and feeds on pollen and leaves.
• Charles I with M. de St Antoine (nom, related article) created by Anthony van Dyck and nominated by Crisco 1492. Charles I with M. de St Antoine is a Flemish oil painting on canvas by Anthony van Dyck, depicting Charles I on horseback, accompanied by his riding master, Pierre Antoine Bourdon, Seigneur de St Antoine. It is part of the Royal Collection, and is usually displayed at Windsor Castle.
• Sheep flock (nom, related article) created by Keith Weller and nominated by Tomer T. Sheep are quadrupedal, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Like all ruminants, sheep are members of the order Artiodactyla, the even-toed ungulates. Although the name "sheep" applies to many species in the genus Ovis, in everyday usage it almost always refers to Ovis aries.
• Vipera dinniki (nom, related article) created by Benny Trapp and nominated by Tomer T. Vipera dinniki is a venomous viper species found in Russia, Georgia and Azerbaijan. It currently has no recognized subspecies.
• Ducati 748 (nom, related article) created by Ritchyblack and nominated by Tomer T. The Ducati 748 was a Ducati sport bike made from 1994 to 2002. The 748 was the smaller version of the 916, and was succeeded in 2003 by the 749.
• Speedball players (nom, related article) created by Ritchyblack and nominated by Tomer T. Speedball is one of the three distinct game variants in the sport of paintball, woodsball and scenario paintball. It is a general term for a game in which the playing field is composed of bunkers, of the same location and number on each side of the field, that provide an equal playing field for each team competing. It was created in this way to give a better format for competitive paintball, both in playing and viewing the games.
• Reading Power Station (nom, related article) created and nominated by Godot13. The Reading Power Station is a natural gas fueled power station supplying electrical power to the Tel Aviv District in central Israel. It is in the northwestern part of the city at the mouth of the Yarkon River.
• Jaffa from the Tel Aviv Promenade (nom, related article) created and nominated by Godot13. Jaffa is the southern, oldest part of Tel Aviv-Jaffa, an ancient port city in Israel. Jaffa is famous for its association with the biblical stories of Solomon, Jonah, and Saint Peter.

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2013-10-09

Wiki-PR's extensive network of clandestine paid advocacy exposed

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By The ed17

"Let the largest Wikipedia research firm help you claim your top spot in Google search results. ... We build, manage, and translate Wikipedia pages for over 12,000 people and companies." (Wiki-PR's main page)

An investigation by the English Wikipedia community into suspicious edits and sockpuppet activity has led to astonishing revelations that Wiki-PR, a multi-million-dollar US-based company, has created, edited, or maintained several thousand Wikipedia articles for paying clients using a sophisticated array of concealed user accounts. They have managed to do so by violating several Wikipedia policies and guidelines, including those concerning conflict of interest in paid advocacy—when an individual accepts money to promote a person, organization, or product on Wikipedia—and sockpuppetry.

Wiki-PR was founded in February 2011, with a physical office at 1550 Bryant St, San Francisco; the office has since moved to Texas. According to the company's web pages, it employs around 25 in-house staff, most of them in sales, and contracts remote and freelance employees like Puneet S., through separate online staffing companies such as oDesk and Elance that recruit remote workers. Wiki-PR's site includes an upbeat statement of its wish to hire potential writers, a desire repeated on Twitter by its VP of sales—biker and outdoors enthusiast Adam Masonbrink—who also wants to expand his team of sales reps. These contractors are not well paid, given the evidence in an admission of the role played by one and an anonymous $9-an-hour submission for the company on the job and career site Glassdoor.

Wiki-PR's website lists five services, including crisis editing (to help companies "navigate contentious situations" without having to "worry about being libeled on Wikipedia") and page translation (which advertises that they can translate articles into 270 languages, a number possibly based on an outdated version of the list of Wikipedias).

While the company claims that "a professional Wikipedia editor will consult you on Wikipedia standards to ensure your page stands up to the scrutiny of the Wikipedia community", the community has judged many of their article subjects to be non-notable, resulting in article deletion. To increase their customer base the company has sent thousands of unsolicited emails, one of which was revealed on Wikipedia in September 2012:

Hi SiteTruth Team,

Shouldn't SiteTruth have a full-length, professional page on Wikipedia? Wiki-PR.com creates full-length, professional Wikipedia pages. We have software tools to manage your page in real-time.

Would you like more information? Please reply by email or provide your contact number. It will be worthwhile. A full-length, professionally written Wikipedia page will drive sales and inform your clients about what you do best.

Your competitors are getting on Wikipedia. Shouldn't you be on Wikipedia, too?

As one disgruntled Wiki-PR employee is reported as writing: "The warning flag was when I was told not to mention Elance or work for hire." Those who work for Wiki-PR have indeed gone to extensive lengths to hide their activities on Wikipedia. This has included altering their habitual behavioral patterns, frequently changing their IP addresses (apparently to avoid being caught by the "checkuser" tool), and bypassing the normal gatekeeping process by which editors police new submissions to the English Wikipedia. One practice appears to exploit a loophole by creating a new page as a user subpage before moving it into the mainspace, where Wikipedia's regular articles are located. This "bug" was actually first reported in 2007 with the prescient warning: "creating articles in userspace before moving them into mainspace seems to me a sneaky way of avoiding scrutiny from newpage patrollers." Checkuser has also been sidestepped through the company's use of remote and freelance employees, who can operate from a large number of IP ranges.

Wikipedia's long-term abuse file on Wiki-PR, named Morning277 after the first discovered account, shows that the company's employees have created and used a staggering 323 accounts, with another 84 suspected. Their clients are just as diverse: Wiki-PR's Adam Masonbrink announced on Twitter just weeks ago that the company's newest clients included Priceline.com and Viacom, while a source familiar with the Wikipedia investigation told the Signpost that two music bands—Imagine Dragons, of "Radioactive" fame, and Fictionist—have contracted with Wiki-PR to maintain their articles. Our source also claimed that the company has had at least one in-person meeting with the multinational retail corporation Walmart, though we must emphasize that there is no evidence to suggest that Walmart has already used Wiki-PR's services. Other companies, organizations, and people listed in the public file include US Federal Contractor Registration, Inflection, The Wikileaks Party, and Adeyemi Ajao; Silicon Valley companies, their senior employees, and small financial institutions also feature in the file.

When Wiki-PR was in its infancy in 2011, it charged clients around $500 to write a Wikipedia article; today, it charges around $2000 or more per article, depending on the size of the client, with a monthly fee of $99 if the customer wants Wiki-PR to police new edits to an article. The raw arithmetic suggests that this is, or could be, a highly profitable concern: using a degree of speculation, the Signpost calculates that 2000 clients with only one article each at current rates would yield $4M in revenue; similarly, if all clients took up the article-policing service, this would provide a revenue stream of about $200,000 a month. However, the same source close to the community investigation confirmed that upwards of 12,000 articles may be involved; the revenue stream could thus be considerably more than indicated by these calculations.

Wiki-PR did not respond to the Signpost's telephone enquiry.

Publicity

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Wiki-PR duo bulldoze a piñata store; Wifione arbitration case; French parliamentary plagiarism 1 April 2015 With paid advocacy in its sights, the Wikimedia Foundation amends their terms of use 18 June 2014 WMF bites the bullet on affiliation and FDC funding, elevates Wikimedia user groups 12 February 2014 Wiki-PR defends itself, condemns Wikipedia's actions 29 January 2014 Foundation to Wiki-PR: cease and desist; Arbitration Committee elections starting 20 November 2013 The decline of Wikipedia; Sue Gardner releases statement on Wiki-PR; Australian minister relies on Wikipedia 23 October 2013 Vice on Wiki-PR's paid advocacy; Featured list elections begin 16 October 2013 Wiki-PR's extensive network of clandestine paid advocacy exposed 9 October 2013

These allegations were first publicized by Simon Owens of the technology website Daily Dot, whose reporting and investigation were done entirely separate from the Signpost. Owens reported that various Wikipedia editors, including DocTree, Rybec, and Dennis Brown, were involved in "the battle to destroy Wikipedia's biggest sockpuppet army". Owens emailed a "few dozen" companies who had articles that were created under the sock accounts, and received four replies. All declined to be named directly but told him that "they hired a company called Wiki-PR to make pages for them".

The replies to the Daily Dot, although a small sample, expressed dissatisfaction and surprise at the service. One client told Owens that after they noticed their page was deleted, they emailed Wiki-PR, only to receive a response that was "obviously a lie". These deletions were blamed on notability and activist volunteer administrators; the clients claimed they were never aware that Wiki-PR was breaching Wikipedia's policies to create the articles. Problems with these articles were far from limited to notability—for example, references to external websites were frequently misleadingly labeled to obscure their true origins. Links to CNN's iReport and Yahoo's Voices, their citizen journalism arms, were in at least one case labeled to appear official "CNN" or "Yahoo" sites, revealed as fraudulent only when the targets were directly audited. According to Owens:

“

... while reporting this article I couldn’t help comparing the sockpuppet discovery to a large drug bust—perhaps it might take out a major kingpin, but at the end of the day it’s a relatively minor victory in what is an otherwise losing war on drugs. / According to Alexa, Wikipedia is the sixth most trafficked website on the Web. It’s the first listing in a Google search for every topic from major corporations to celebrities to all manner of controversial topics. If biased, for-hire authors have infiltrated the encyclopedia to a broader extent, we should all be worried. Wikipedia is the primary source of knowledge on the Internet.

”

After being told of the Daily Dot's exposé of Wiki-PR, Jimmy Wales responded on his talk page, "Incredible. I've been hearing rumblings about this for a few days, and I'm very eager that we pursue this with maximum effect."

PR professionals weigh in

Historically, there has been a stormy relationship between PR professionals and Wikipedia editors, with Jimmy Wales being a vocal advocate for a "bright line" to forbid paid editing of Wikipedia. In this case there seems to be widespread agreement in professional PR ranks that Wiki-PR stepped over an ethical line.

In reaction to the Daily Dot piece, Phil Gomes, senior vice president for the public relations firm Edelman and founder of CREWE (Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement), expressed his dismay at Wiki-PR’s actions:

“

'Wiki PR' using the term 'PR' is kind of like referring to lancing boils as 'surgery' in that one would not claim to be a surgeon based on that skill. The [Daily Dot] article references their 'aggressive email marketing campaign.' Totally true. [I] fought them off of one of our clients last week.

”

CREWE operates as a Facebook group consisting of PR professionals and Wikipedia editors who discuss critical issues concerning PR and the editing of Wikipedia articles. Gomes has been vocal in the past about avoiding Wiki-PR's strategies, stating that it is imperative the PR industry "demonstrate by cooperation and good behavior that it can work with the Wikipedia community instead of taking the quick, easy-fix route." He was a major contributor to the development of a freely licensed flowchart that teaches PR firms how to avoid direct editing of articles in favor of community engagement.

The prominent British PRs body, CIPR, gave strong guidance in this area in June 2012 when it published a Wikipedia Best Practices Guidance "document" (PDF).. This guide warns against clandestine editing by companies (see Signpost coverage): "There is another interpretation of public relations, commonly referred to as "spin". If this is your mode of operation then you are urged to steer clear of Wikipedia altogether in the performance of your job … You are reminded that 'dark arts' are the antithesis of best practice public relations. Intentional deceit and anonymous or incognito activities are breaches of professional codes of conduct."

While PR industry groups like CIPR have put considerable time and effort into developing such guidelines, they have proved to be no match for the desire to harvest big profits from this volunteer site.

Alex Konanykhin of WikiExperts.us rejects not only Jimmy Wales' zero-tolerance "bright-line rule", but does not reveal his relationships with clients on Wikipedia because "that would expose our clients to being unfairly targeted by anti-commerce jihadists." In recent days, he has been an unabashed defender of his firm's editing activities in the CREWE group.

Previous coverage of paid advocacy

Efforts at paid advocacy have been greatly frowned on by the Wikimedia community, but have received support from some editors. The Signpost has reported on the evolution of the phenomenon over the past seven years. The genesis of paid advocacy is usually traced to Gregory Kohs, who founded a company (MyWikiBiz) with the express purpose of creating and editing Wikipedia articles on behalf of paying corporations. As the Signpost reported in 2006, he offered to write articles for between US$49 and $99, assuming the company met his own eligibility guidelines, which were based on those of Wikipedia. Soon after, Kohs was brought before the English Wikipedia's Arbitration Committee and blocked by Jimmy Wales, the site's co-founder.

The Signpost has covered issues such as Microsoft's attempt to monitor articles and "diploma mills" in 2007, the Nichalp/Zithan case in 2009, and a PR firm's edits ("The Bell Pottinger affair") in 2011. Paid advocacy received its most substantial treatment in 2012 with a series of interviews with paid editing supporters, a skeptic, and Jimmy Wales, the co-founder of Wikipedia. On the site itself, a full conflict of interest guideline was developed in response to the perceived threat of paid editing.

The Signpost's "In the media" writer, Jayen466, reports that the story has been picked up by the San Francisco Chronicle and the German internet portal gulli.com (gulli.com "Sleepers in Wikipedia: admins on the payroll?")—a tea-leaf-gazing feature that partly translates the Daily Dot coverage and partly provides commentary on what they describe as admins' temptation to make money from their position.

On the German Wikipedia, a major vote has been started as part of a paid €80,000 study on Wikimedia projects by Dirk Franke (Southpark), funded by the German chapter. Many editors of the German Wikipedia have opposed the request because Franke is being paid for it.

Tony1, Kevin Gorman, and Andrew Lih assisted in researching, writing, and editing this story.

In briefs

• How much is Wikipedia worth?: An intriguing article on Smithsonian.com, based on a paper by Jonathan Band and Jonathan Gerafi, asks the provocative question of what Wikipedia would be worth in monetary terms. By looking "at what other sites that get similar traffic are worth, how much people would be willing to pay for Wikipedia if it weren’t free, and how much it would cost to replace the site", the researchers determined that Wikipedia is worth "tens of billions of dollars" while having a replacement cost of a bargain $6.6 billion.
• Indian chapter governance issues: Last week we provided an update on the issue of three members of the executive committee (one of whom, Moksh Jujeja, newly elected in August, did not disclose to voters that he employed two sitting members). Former executive-committee member Anirudh Bhati posted a rejoinder on the chapter's mailing list, pointing out that one of the three—Karthik—had been an intern for Moksh Juneja's firm on only a small retainer. Bhati praised the volunteer contributions of all three men to the chapter and advised anyone with any doubts about the issue to contact them directly. This does leave unanswered whether stricter guidelines for future elections in India will be in place and enforced, including full disclosures of potential conflict of interest and adherence to the rules requiring the advance publication of voter lists.
• Jimmy Wales and TED: Jimmy Wales, the co-founder of Wikipedia, was featured this week on The TED Radio Hour, part of an episode on "why we collaborate".
• WMF report: The August 2013 report of the Wikimedia Foundation has been published on Meta.
• GLAM newsletter: The newest edition of This Month in GLAM, the monthly newsletter reporting on interactions between the Wikimedia and galleries, libraries, archives, and museums communities, has been published.

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2013-10-09

College credit for editing Wikipedia

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By Go Phightins!, Andrewman327, and Andreas Kolbe

The University of California, San Francisco attracted substantial media attention over its new course offering that will give credit to fourth-year medical students for editing Wikipedia articles about medicine. Fourth-year students at UCSF travel often, which makes the ability to perform work remotely an advantage. Amin Azzam, MD, MA, an associate professor at UCSF and an instructor for the new class, said:

“

Wikipedia is the second-most commonly used resource for "junior physicians" looking to learn more about medical information, so the goal of the course is to increase that information’s reliability. We’re [also] recognizing the impact Wikipedia can have to educate patients and healthcare providers across the globe, and want users to receive the most accurate publicly available, sound medical information possible.

”

The course is also designed to foster communication skills among medical professionals, and to help them accurately and efficiently share information using everyday language rather than medical jargon. Writing Wikipedia articles will help students in that endeavor. James Heilman, a Wikipedia editor himself (Doc James) and president of the WikiProject Med initiative, told the Signpost that most medical students ‘’use’’ Wikipedia, but the WikiProject would like to see most students contribute to it as well. Time will tell if this class can help achieve that lofty goal.

Additional coverage

• Morning Break: Edit Wikipedia, Get Med School Credit
• Med Students Earn Credit by Editing Wikipedia Articles
• You Can Get Med School Credit For Editing Wikipedia Pages Now
• Medical Students Can Now Earn Credit for Editing Wikipedia
• Wikiproject Medicine
• Doctors prescribe better Wikipedia editors – themselves
• Doctors Decide They Need to Be the Ones Editing Medical Wikipedia Articles
• Wikipedia Goes To Medical School: UCSF Med Students Will Learn How To Improve Online Encyclopedia
• Do you trust Wikipedia with your health? Med students aim to make it better

In brief

• VisualEditor: The Daily Dot (24 September) reported on the VisualEditor woes, as did The Register (25 September).
• Prize-winning paper: phys.org (27 September) reported that a human factors and ergonomics research paper on leadership in Wikipedia has won the 2013 Human Factors Prize. The research in question was reported on in the Wikipedia Signpost of February 27, 2012.
• Odessapedia: According to a report (28 September) on Ukrainian news site dt.ua, Odessa is the latest city to place plaques with Wikipedia QR codes on its architectural monuments.
• Croatian Wikipedia: The Daily Dot (1 October) reported on the fascist takeover in the Croatian Wikipedia. The article features comments by Jurica Pavicic, who is a professor at the University of Split as well as a columnist for Jutarnji, the newspaper that first broke the story.
• French peace: The Las Vegas Sun (7 October) reported that the French government now seems to have made its peace with Wikipedia, after asking an admin earlier this year to remove an article that the government felt spilt military secrets.
• Wasting money: The Register (8 October) covered outgoing Wikimedia Foundation Executive Director Sue Gardner's comments on chapter spending. As covered in detail in last week's Signpost, Gardner believes there is a potential for corruption, and said she is "not sure that the additional value created by movement entities such as chapters justifies the financial cost."
• Wiki-PR sockpuppet army: The Daily Dot (8 October) reported on the Wiki-PR sockpuppeting case. The story was picked up the following day by the San Francisco Chronicle and by German Internet portal gulli.com. For a detailed discussion, see the News and notes in this week's issue of the Signpost.
• Old Crow Medicine Show: The Daily Dot (8 October) and the Phoenix New Times (8 October) marvelled at Wikipedia's detailed article on Old Crow Medicine Show.
• Wiki 'Edit-a-Thon' at Brown U. Will Add Entries for Women in Science: An upcoming edit-a-thon at the US' Brown University has been profiled in the Chronicle of Higher Education (9 October).
  
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2013-10-09

Manning naming dispute and Ebionites 3 cases continue; third arbitrator resigns

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By Neotarf

A proposed decision has been posted in the Manning naming dispute. The workshop phase of the Ebionites 3 case closes 13 October. Arbitrator NuclearWarfare has resigned.

Open cases

Manning naming dispute

Voting is nearing completion on the proposed decision of the Manning naming dispute case, brought by TParis. The case involves the move of the Bradley Manning article to Chelsea Manning, after Manning’s attorney announced Manning’s wish to be known as Chelsea. The article was moved back to Bradley Manning after a move request determined there was no consensus to move the article. A second move request with a comprehensive survey of reliable sources resulted in a move of the article back to Chelsea Manning.

The case focuses on conduct. Sanctions have been proposed for thirteen editors; five of these proposals are currently passing. It was noted that seven editors named in the proposed decision had not participated at the proposed decision talk page; these editors were being notified of the discussion to allow them to respond.

Ebionites 3

The Ebionites 3 case, initiated by Ignocrates involves a long-running dispute between two editors over a 2nd century religious document. The workshop phase of Ebionites 3 closes 13 October, and the proposed decision is scheduled to be posted on 15 October.

Other requests and committee action

• Resignation of NuclearWarfare: Arbitrator NuclearWarfare announced his resignation from the Committee and Functionary team, effective immediately.
• Amendment request: Scientology: An amendment request initiated by The Devil's Advocate regarding a discretionary sanction was vacated and the sanction stricken from the warning log.
• Clarification request: Race and intelligence: A request was made by Cla68 regarding the possible posting of personal non-public data in response to off-site provocation.
  
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