Talk:Terms of use/Paid contributions amendment

User Voting

Support
Strongly Support Paradoxos (talk)

Oppose

Expenses, bursaries, grants, etc

It should be made clear how receiving expenses, grants, bursaries or similar payment from the Foundation, a chapter or other affiliated or associated organisation relates to these proposals.

For example, Wikimedia UK have just approved a grant to an editor to cover travel and related expenses to photograph public art in order to produce a featured list on the English Wikipedia (details). Would this need to be disclosed under the terms of this amendment? Thryduulf (en.wikt,en.wp,commons) 23:06, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I was supported by Wikimedia Australia a couple of years ago to take photographs of a region where there was next to nothing and I just placed them in a category https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Photographs_by_Gnangarra_sponsored_by_Wikimedia_Australia, like wise for another person https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Photographs_sponsored_by_Wikimedia_Australia who had the same. Its useful just for reporting of your activities back to the chapter to categorise photos as a result of that, I see no need beyond that for such activities. Gnangarra (talk) 23:41, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

These are good points. I don't believe incidental charges to facilitate legitimate NPOV editing are intended to be covered by the amendment. Compensation for the editing service is. I think we could address your concern by including an FAQ that clarifies this point. Would that work?

On grants, I do not see a reason not to disclose the grants if the intent of the grant is to constitute payment for the editing services. Indeed our movement grants are granted in a transparent way, and I think that principle of transparency appropriately follows any compensation for editing. Those are my preliminary views, so I'm open to different views or nuances based on the experience and insights of the community. Thanks for your helpful comments. Geoffbrigham (talk) 00:56, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Certainly on the first part, an FAQ would do the job well. Probably for the second part too, but I need to be more awake than I am now to understand it fully. Thryduulf (en.wikt,en.wp,commons) 01:14, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Without expressing a very strong opinion either way, I wanted to say that I don't see any reason not to disclose "travel and related expenses to photograph public art". There are some good reasons to disclose, and no real reasons (are there?) not to disclose. The disclosure doesn't have to be framed in a negative way (why would it be?). "These photographs were made possible by a grant from Wikimedia UK to cover travel and related expenses." Sounds positive to me, not negative, so why avoid it?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 04:03, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The uploads are already disclosed. There's these categories and associated templates (e.g.) used in the file description page. -- Katie Chan (WMUK) (talk) 09:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I certainly wasn't suggesting there was a reason not to disclose, I was just querying whether these this TOU update would make disclosure mandatory or not. Thryduulf (en.wikt,en.wp,commons) 10:08, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

AfD type discussions

I think it should also be a requirement that it get disclosed in any discussion forums where the articles future is discussed.... Gnangarra (talk) 23:23, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Gnangarra - The amendment does cover paid edits on the talk pages, so I think this scenario would be covered in many situations. Geoffbrigham (talk) 00:59, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I think this proposal is fair if the price is minimal for editing pages, e.g under £2.50 GBP per edit would be fair and raise revenue for the site and on top of that not discourage users from using the site altogether.

competition

I also think that a disclosure should be made when editting articles about competitors or topics that could be considered as promoting the client. For example adding a links to the "list of Encyclopedias" or topic "Free culture" when the client is WMF. Gnangarra (talk) 23:32, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Gnangarra (again): The amendment would cover such edits if the user was being compensated to make those edits. Geoffbrigham (talk) 01:00, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Yes it does, see the Questions section of the proposal. --NaBUru38 (talk) 18:56, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Data privacy & what constitutes compensation

Are there any data privacy concerns around requiring this kind of disclosure, especially in the EU? What about the potential facilitation of stalking, where a stalker might use the nexus of a wiki identity with an employer or affiliate to establish identity?

What if someone works in an outreach position at a university, or as an educator in some field, and contributes as part of their job but doesn't receive compensation specifically for editing? I'm thinking about the various Wikipedian in Residence people, teachers who may contribute as part of teaching students to contribute or classes using Wikipedia content as course material, health outreach personnel who make contributing health information in their native language part of their job description, etc. Are these examples where disclosure of employer etc. would be required? Nathan ^T 00:12, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

@Nathan: I do not think this is really a data privacy issue -- the privacy regulations usually require notice and consent, but you are allowed to disclose information about yourself. If a user's employer does not consent to being disclosed, then they should not engage in paid editing. Stalking and harassment are not allowed under the Terms of Use, and projects have additional policies on the topic (such as WP:OUTING on English Wikipedia). As to the second question, users should disclose if they receive payment for their editing. In fact, Wikipedians in Residence usually explain their affiliation on their user page (consistent with this provision), and exemplify some of the best practices for transparency and disclosure. Thanks, Stephen LaPorte (WMF) (talk) 02:04, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Stephen, I think you may be missing Nathan's point regarding stalking. Yes, of course stalking is against the TOU, but that doesn't mean that certain unwholesome individuals won't do it anyway (indeed, I can think of a few examples off the top of my head where it has happened). We shouldn't make it easy for these sorts of people to find out real-life details of those they're in disputes with, as the potential for real-life consequences can be significant, TOU or otherwise. Craig Franklin (talk) 12:23, 20 February 2014 (UTC).

Hypothetical (but not all that hypothetical) examples for discussion

(cross-posted, with edits and additional material, from an En-WP discussion a few months ago, here)

In considering an updated policy or TOS provision addressing paid or COI editing, we need to make sure that it addresses the types of situation that frequently come up in this area, and does so in a way that accords with how we want these situations to be handled, and with common sense. Below are some hypothetical situations—but mostly derived from actual situations I am aware of over the years—in which an editor could be accused of having a paid interest or COI. How do we want to address them? Does the proposed TOS addition do so well, or how might it be changed to do so better?

Of course, given the specific proposal at issue here, the expected answer to all these situations would be along the lines of "make the disclosure." However, each incident could be looked at from the point of view of "is it realistic that editors in this position will do that, and do we need them to?" In some instances below, the answer is probably yes; others may be more borderline.

(Note: The examples refer to "Wikipedia", but could apply with minor tweaking to most if not all projects.)

Example 1:
I am an experienced Wikipedia editor, perhaps an administrator. A friend is an author who has published several novels that are still in print. He does not have a Wikipedia article, and would like to have one. Knowing that I'm active on Wikipedia, he asks me to create an article for him. He gives me information about his background and books to include in the article. There is no question in my mind that the author meets the applicable notability guideline. May I write the article? Do I have to disclose anything if I do write the article? If my friend offers to take me to dinner to thank me for agreeing to write the article, may I accept?

Example 2:
I work at a university library. The library contains archival and manuscript collections of the personal papers of dozens of historical and literary figures, which are of interest to scholars. Our collections are underutilized, and we would like to have more visitors use them. I want to add a short paragraph to the Wikipedia article of each person whose papers our library holds, mentioning that his or her papers are at our facility and providing a link to the online finding aid. May I do so?

Example 3:
I'm the public relations manager for one of the two daily newspapers in a mid-sized city. The other newspaper has a well-written Wikipedia article, which was created several years ago. My newspaper, which has about the same circulation and level of prominence, does not have an article. The owner wishes it did. What are my options?

Example 4:
I'm the mayor of a small city. I have a Wikipedia article, but it's a couple of years old and seriously out of date. I post on the talkpage asking if someone will update my article, and I provide neutral, verifiable information to update it with, but after a few weeks, no one has does the updating. May I update it myself? If I'm not supposed to but I do anyway, what happens? What if I am the mayor's paid campaign manager, or the city's public relations manager, instead of the mayor herself?

Example 4A:
Same as example 4, except instead of a mayor, I'm the President of a Fortune 500 company, or her media assistant.

Example 5:
I'm in the marketing department at a large law firm that has an existing article. A famous lawyer joins our firm. Can I edit the article to mention this increase in our ranks? What if I am the famous lawyer myself? A member of the lawyer's family? One of the lawyer's clients?

Discussion of examples

If I'm not mistakes, there are rules already for most of the cases.

The example 1 isn't related to paid contributions. The same could be said about non-profit volunteers. Now that should be dealt with. --NaBUru38 (talk) 18:55, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

In all cases except #1, I think that common sense, our desired outcome, and the proposed changes to TOU line up. There should be disclosure.

Case 1 is the canonical "I'm just adding NPOV material and not getting anything for it" case. In practice, I'd think this case is incredibly rare. First, if you're really not getting anything for it, the proposed change in TOU doesn't affect it. I'd go so far as saying if all you got was a cup of coffee and a danish ($10 at NY prices), then you need not disclose. The dividing point on what's "too much of a 'payment'" should be common sense and handled on an individual case basis, but I'll say that a $200 dinner (again at NY prices) would be too much and would have to be disclosed. I'll also say that admins should stay as far away from paid editing as possible - they should even declare the cup of coffee. Smallbones (talk) 19:26, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

"that the community considers problematic"

I question this base for the propsal. The issue has come up on en:wp, and in discussion on Wikimedia-I there seems to be very different views on this from other language versions, specillay from the middle sized ones or smalle ones.

I am defintely against this proposal as a general amendment. It will stop many potential good contributers and make the number of contributers to dwindle even more. And on smaller verions it can mean we will come below critical mass of contributers. On sv:wp we have had no real prolem with this issue. if we think it is a potential COI that can be problematic, we ask the user if he has a special reltion to the subject he/she is contributing to.--Anders Wennersten (talk) 05:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Nearly all of the core content policies on en, and likely on other Wikipedias are concerned with the integrity of the information we publish. Neutrality, verifiability, BLP, sourcing, etc. Our integrity, or at minimum, the perception of it, is damaged if we do not have a solid policy regarding paid editing. The practical problem is likely less on a smaller Wiki, where there are both more neutral resources to review edits, and there is less appeal to abuse the Wiki because of lower search engine relevance. But without a policy, the reputation of all projects will be damaged. This is an even bigger risk to long term participation in my opinion, since no one neutral will care to edit a discredited Wikipedia that has begun to be viewed as a forum for corporate shills and advertisers. Gigs (talk) 16:58, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

You express a lot af percettpion I do not share. Our integrety sytands strong independ if this policy come into place. Our reputation will not be harmed, on teh co0ntrary a policy like this Will harm or reputation. And the participation rate will go drasticly if this was to be implemented in svwp. We have a strong and frutiful cohabit that produce a lot of good and neatrla aticles.--Anders Wennersten (talk) 18:21, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Please excuse my bad English, but I will try to add some comments regarding the proposal. I partly agree with Anders Wennersten, this seems to be an issue on English language version on Wikipedia, on the Norwegian Bokmål/Riksmål version the bigger problem is that a lot of articles that should be written, or expanded, are not. Will this amendment make that easier?

It also seems that most, if not all of this is covered already in our rules for neutrality, verifiability etc. Reading through parts of the Terms of Use (which I have never read before) I came across that I am not allowed to post child pornography. What about detailed blueprints for chemical weapons, or nuclear warheads? As far as I know both are bad & forbidden in all countries. It seems that the Terms of Use is very much suited for a lawyer, US-centered standpoint. We have some basic rules and as Less is more I believe we should keep to it, if at all possible.

So instead of adding this clause the whole Terms of Use should be shortened, going from covering every small possible problem to basically tell the users our few basic rules and then explain that you should behave, as if you were "in the real world", if not you will get yourself into trouble. Ulflarsen (talk) 19:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Anders, I take rather the opposite view. I think paid editing holds potent dangers for damage. Speaking only for myself, if I as a volunteer thought I would need regularly to engage paid contributors in POV issues, I would question why I should devote my time and energy to it. Corporate sponsorship always has the potential for overwhelming individual efforts. What's more, I don't come to Wikipedia as a reader in order to view the best advertising. Any interest I have in obtaining information gravitates naturally to neutral and trusted sources. My perception is that corporate motives are often suspect, too often and too suspect to be worth trying to disentangle the credible from the incredible. My opinion is that the most powerful interests have other forums in which to make testimonies, but Wikipedia serves a different function. We already have policies regarding conflict of interest, as we must. Paid conflicts of interest have potential to be entirely destructive if not subject to constant scrutiny. This policy (or something like it) provides a necessary regulation, a means of keeping balance even under pressure. And it will serve well to help editors see and weigh the balances in the many less obvious circumstances, such as those listed in the hypothetical examples section above.

Ulflarsen, I do appreciate that the situations faced by Wikipedia in other languages can be quite different. And I generally like the idea "less is more" in the sense that more is never better if it is unnecessary. I also yield to your point about legalism and its influence in the U.S. - all too unfortunately true. But I think this policy proposal is about a different (and equally unfortunate) influence: the power of money to shape and communicate information. This also is something we deal with daily in the U.S.; marketing and lobbying are pervasive. Beware that its influence can reach across political boundaries much more quickly and more easily than any legal or official matter. It can penetrate national borders readily; it generates political or legal issues only later, after influences have begun to be felt. I tend to view the English Wikipedia as a front line for dealing with these effects where they are most powerful. But if they are not addressed here, I believe they will affect Wikipedia throughout in other languages as well. Evensteven (talk) 19:59, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Harassment and outing

I would like WMF legal to consider the implications of harassment and outing regarding possible implementation of this policy. At the present, there is a very dangerous problem with Wikipedia of people using paid editing as a way of violating local policies regarding harassment and outing. Namely, these policies are ignored if people make the allegation that some one is in any way a paid editor. This recommendation would estentially enshrine into policy that dangerous practice by further encouraging people to target Wikipedia editors employment. Because the worst cases I have seen have involved women (and gender specific harassment), this potentially leaves open the WMF to violating the civil rights of women by creating a hostile workplace for them, whether they work for the WMF or not. Also, it encourages harassment, and successful harassment at that. The WMF supporting this is esentially the WMF supporting the harassment of volunteers and their employment. Beyond hurting the potential to recruit new editors, it will also hurt the WMF's ability to hire new employees from within the community because no sane person and quality candidate is going to want to subject themselves to potential job loss any given day because the community has been licensed by the WMF to harass editors. --LauraHale (talk) 08:25, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Or is it Wikipedia's Outing policy that is leading to the banning of editors who try to address significant conflict of interest among some of the editors here? Yes we need to find a balance between the two. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:50, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

There are always trade-offs. I agree, a balance needs to be found. Right now, the balance is skewed too far to one side, where there is complete permissiveness towards those who are editing Wikimedia projects by proxy for institutions willing to pay to manipulate the information on those projects. That permissiveness is tempered only by whatever local efforts are made at those projects, which can be difficult without the direct support of WMF. This amendment need not lead to witch hunts; on the contrary, it can serve as a guide for people so that they can take a reasonable approach to dealing with paid editors. -- Atama頭 16:39, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The situation is very similar to sockpuppets, in that it is inevitable that such investigations will sometimes require the disclosure of information that ties accounts to identities. We've been doing sock puppet investigations for years. In the case of inappropriate harassment or disclosure, we have all the normal tools of oversight and edit suppression to deal with those. Gigs (talk) 16:44, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Agreed, Gigs. And if LauraHale is right about a dangerous mix involving conflicts of interest, harassment, and outing, then that is the signal that paid editing is perceived as being so serious an issue that some have resorted to undermining important WP policies in order to address it. We need a policy like this all the more then, in order to achieve a balance in editing, and to maintain proper supports for all those important policies. Evensteven (talk) 20:12, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

English Wikipedia's polciy on "outing" is commonly applied in a ludicrously restrictive way. There are many ways in which this applies, but the one that is relevant here is that anyone who is paid to use Wikipedia to promote the interests of a business, person, or organisation should not be hiding the fact. If the "outign" polciy says otherwise tehn theat polciy needs revision. LauraHale asserts that this particularly affects women, but provides no eivdence for that assetion: I would be interested to see the evidence. As for "hurting the potential to recruit new editors", no, it would only hurt the potential to "recruit" new editors whose purpose is to abuse Wikipedia by secretly and covertly using it to promote. The fewer of that sort of editors we "recruit" the better. As for "potential job loss any given day because the community has been licensed by the WMF to harass editors": What? Why? How on earth does requiring people who are paid to promote the interests of a prticualr party to disclise the fact amount to a lciense "to harass editors"? And why on earth should such a paid editor be likely to lose their job because they are required to be honest and open about the fact that they are being paid to edit Wikipedia? JamesBWatson (talk) 20:48, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

It seems to me that those who wish to "abuse Wikipedia by secretly and covertly using it to promote" will continue to do so regardless of the ToU. True, the Foundation might be able to sue them if it could identify them and prove loss (both hard), but I'm not certain that it would. Indeed doing so might be "problematic" itself. Rich Farmbrough 22:19 20 February 2014 (GMT).

Concealment and Deception

Forgive me in advance if this is a daft question, but IANAL.

Is this amendment intended only to cover deceptive practices (such as deliberately concealing or misrepresenting one's affiliation)? If it's intended to stamp out things like WikiPR's stealth editing on behalf of paying clients, then I'm all in favour of it. However, I do worry that good faith contributions by employees and volunteers for GLAM institutions may also be covered, and that's not a good thing. Can I be given some assurance that this clause isn't going to be used to swat a librarian or museum curator who thinks they're doing the right thing by uploading some pictures of items in their collection, but is not aware that they need to make a full declaration of their affiliation, with the full force of the WMF legal department? Basically, punishing deliberate deception I am fine with, punishing honest mistakes or omissions I'm not.

Also, will previous contributions be covered, or only contributions made after the date this is included in the TOU? For instance, would a GLAM employee who made edits at the behest of their employer in 2013 be required to disclose this affiliation now in 2014? Craig Franklin (talk) 12:35, 20 February 2014 (UTC).

I don't think it's a bad thing to include GLAM, and I think it's necessary in order to have a coherent policy. As with most things, we shouldn't be punishing good faith efforts that happen to break a rule, we should just tell the person about the rule and how they can not break it in the future, whether GLAM or otherwise. GLAM outreach people should educate on this topic as well, the same way they educate about all of the other intricacies of Wikipedia such as licensing. I have seen some GLAM outreach editors making pre-emptive disclosures on en:WP:COIN even without a foundation-wide policy, and I think that's a good thing. Gigs (talk) 16:39, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Common sense is common sense. If you're willing to come down hard on good faith contributors who make a mistake without any prior warning or guidance, you have a bigger problem than this amendment. You'll already be driving away contributors. -- Atama頭 16:41, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Craig Franklin, your question is completely legitimate and smart.  :) Like all provisions of the terms of use, we would work constructively with members of our community who are operating in good faith consistent with the mission and traditions of our movement. In this case, if a community member failed to comply as an oversight, we might provide a gentle reminder, for example. :) We might be less forgiving with respect to companies and firms actively hiding their paid editing from our volunteer community and doing this in knowing violation of the TOU, since such actions put an unreasonable, unacceptable burden on our volunteers who help ensure our projects meet the highest standards. I personally would see such deceitful activity as profiting unfairly from the reputation of our sites due to the hard work of our volunteers.

I am following the conversation about GLAM, and want to reflect on and discuss internally some comments made so far. But maybe I can underscore that, as presently foreseen, the disclosure requirement for GLAM participants who are paid to edit our projects would be fairly minimal: the disclosure may be on one's user page and it may simply be a reference to the program that is compensating the GLAM member for their editing. I tend to agree with Gigs that that disclosure makes sense for a few reasons, including the promotion of our GLAM initiatives. Indeed, in putting together this amendment, we studied the GLAM initiatives and found them to be a model of fair disclosure. I would of course be interested in any draft language that may address the GLAM concern, if anybody has ideas on that.

This specific proposed amendment would not be retroactive, so it would not apply to past edits. (Of course, we would have no say on violations that might run afoul of other provisions of the TOU, laws or community policies that are independent and already in place.)

Thanks for the helpful and thoughtful questions as we think through these issues. Geoffbrigham (talk) 17:57, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the "punishment" would be, over and above those actions that the community would normally take to protect the project in question. Rich Farmbrough 22:22 20 February 2014 (GMT).

Illegal in EU

In the article [1]:

"The company in question had argued it had made its conflict of interest as a market competitor explicit through a comment on the article's talk page. However, the court struck down this argument, saying the average consumer who uses Wikipedia does not read the discussion pages. Significantly, the court did not distinguish between problematic and acceptable contributions. The judgment was explicitly based on the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive, valid throughout the European Union."

so, although WMF would allow paid contributions in that way (a statement on your user page, a statement on the talk page accompanying any paid contributions, or a statement in the edit summary accompanying any paid contributions.), according to that sentence paid contributions are illegal in EU. So, the solution is a template in the article, or would be illegal, am I right?--Temulco3 (talk) 16:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't know if illegal is the correct word, but you raise a valid point that talk page or edit summary disclosures probably do not satisfy the EU disclosure requirements. Gigs (talk) 17:01, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

As I see it, the proposed amendment only sets out a minimum requirement, while underscoring: "[a]pplicable law . . . may further limit paid contributions or require more detailed disclosure." We also address this point in this FAQ. So a company who has additional legal requirements within its jurisdiction must comply with those requirements, and, if the processes and policies of a Wikimedia project site do not permit legal compliance, that company should not engage in paid editing (as a legal matter). This would be true, as I see it, whether or not this amendment became part of the terms of use. Geoffbrigham (talk) 17:26, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Temulco3, I agree that the talk page and especially the edit summary disclosures are the weakest. But if the WP policy is weaker than applicable EU law, then surely the standard of the EU law prevails there? Personally, I tend to reject the edit summary disclosures as being too weak in general (and too restrictive of space for proper disclosure). The talk page disclosure I regard as minimal - almost an "ok we can try it but if it doesn't work well it will need changing". The most straightforward approach is on the user page, and that is really what I would favor. Evensteven (talk) 20:26, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The EU did not state that it was illegal to require disclosure. Instead, they said that posting in your talk page is not sufficient for EU rules for disclosure. Wikipedia may determine its own standard as it is not related to the EU. 107.15.113.27 22:08, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

It would be an egregious breach of faith to suggest through the ToU a practice which would leave a significant percentage (perhaps a majority) of those affected liable to lawsuits "just because we can". Rich Farmbrough 22:25 20 February 2014 (GMT).

Two scenarios

Let's say I am Acme Widgets and I want to expand the article about my obscure little widgets company. I hire User:Contractor for that purpose.

1. User:Conractor posts in the Wikipedia Reward Board, soliciting contributions to help bring up Acme Widgets to Good Article status, offering payment in cash or barnstars or contributions to one's favorite charity. User:Subcontractor does the work, gets a lovely barnstar or $75 as compensation. What are the disclosure requirements for User:Subcontractor? As I understand these rules, User:Subcontractor is under no obligation to disclose anything, yet he is working at the behest of a company, with the contractor serving as "cutout." There is no practical difference between User:Contractor making these edits and his inducing User:Subcontractor to do those edits.

2. User:Contractor recommends text on a Talk:Acme Widgets subpage, making all required disclosure. User:Tool cuts-and-pastes the text into the article, or makes a few insubstantial changes and puts the text in the article. What is the disclosure requirement for User:Tool? As I understand it, there are none. Yet those changes go into the article just as they would if they were put there by the COI editor. Indeed, the COI editor gets praised for "following the rules."

I think that you have two gaping loopholes that you have to fill, for otherwise these TOU changes will have little effect. As it is, these TOU changes make no meaningful disclosure to the reader that the articles they are reading were stage-managed by the subject. Coretheapple (talk) 16:55, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

"you must disclose your employer, client, and affiliation with respect to any contribution to any Wikimedia Projects for which you receive compensation" is a reasonable minimum. If User:Tool is being paid they will need to disclose this. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:59, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

As an occasional "tool" editor for editors with a COI, I usually disclose changes I make which were suggested by a editor with a COI in the edit summary: "COI draft replacement" or "COI suggested changes implemented" or such. But ultimately, I view myself as the "owner" of those changes, accountable for what they say and the way they say it. Gigs (talk) 17:05, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

As I see it, according to these rules paid relationships have to be disclosed on whatever type of page is involved. So User:Contractor would have to disclose; as would User:Subcontractor. If User:Tool was paid, he'd also have to disclose. Core is likely worried about quid pro quo tools, i.e. you place my COI edits and I'll place yours. I don't think lawyers would be fooled by this - quid pro quo tools are paid editors and must disclose. But Wiki editors love to wikilawyer, so perhaps it can be made clear here that quid pro quo editors are considered to be paid. It's important to keep the new TOU simple and clear, but perhaps Geoff can respond to see if he thinks this addition is really needed. Smallbones (talk) 18:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Is it worth it to say that compensation need not be monetary? Or is that overcomplicating the issue? -- Atama頭 18:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I think that would help. But just to address Smallbones' point (and I appreciate his bringing this page to my attention), what I had in mind was a situation we've seen frequently, in which PR people or paid editors make extensive suggestions on talk pages, even to the point of drafting text, waiting until a willing User:Tool comes by to execute them. There is no practical difference between the PR person making these changes and finding someone to do them. The outcome, from the reader's and Wikipedia's standpoint, is the same. Coretheapple (talk) 19:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

As a non editor but frequent user of Wiki I have to agree with the above - the proposed TOU changes will make no meaningful disclosure to the reader, which appears to be the purpose of the changes. If you want to make a change that is meaningful to your readers and your public reputation, you would need to require paid edit disclosure be made on the page where the paid edits appear. Otherwise you are simply fulfilling a legal requirement and not actually addressing the issue in a meaningful way. One alternative to this would be to introduce (and make public) a procedural document that outlined a flagging and review process for people who make a paid edit disclosure on their edit summary or user page such that the disclosure and the data to which it relates would be reviewed by an objective third party. But the TOU change you propose is not strong enough in itself.

Not Strong Enough

In my opinion, this is an unacceptably weak response to the problem. The proper response would be to ban all paid editing completely. Paid editing is corruption of the data, and data corruption has no place in a public database. Period.

I generally support User:Redpossum's view immediately above, and think that the following TOU should be added (perhaps in a separate section):

All commercial editing in articles by or on behalf of a corporation or business is prohibited.

Smallbones (talk) 18:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Wholly in support of Smallbones. — Ineuw talk 18:28, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree somewhat, in spirit. I don't like the idea of an editor who is paid by someone else to make particular edits. It is essentially meatpuppetry, and in a way it turns that person's account into a kind of role account, where they're not editing for their own personal sake or opinions but on behalf of someone else (most often multiple people). It's not literally a role account, you should be dealing with a single person who the account represents, but some of the reasons why role accounts are forbidden or restricted will come into play.

But I can't wholly endorse this. Partially because I've worked with open and honest paid editors who've done good work at the English Wikipedia. They may represent the minority but I dislike seeing them restricted. Another problem I see is that I don't think we'd be able to get support for that. The current proposed amendment is something of a compromise between fully allowing paid editing and fully banning paid editing. The last problem I have with this is that I think that the benefit in having this amendment is that it will encourage paid editors to disclose their actions so that we know who we're dealing with, and banning paid editing won't stop it, it will just ensure that those who do it are very careful about hiding it. -- Atama頭 18:43, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I just added "in articles" (hope User:Ineuw doesn't mind). I actually have no problem with paid editors stating their views on talk pages or user pages - as long as it is disclosed. Smallbones (talk) 19:00, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I understand where you're going with this. It's much like the English Wikipedia conflict of interest guideline which considers most COI participation at talk pages to be non-controversial but warns that edits to the actual content may be. I'm worried that too many people may not grasp that concept and think that we're banning them from every aspect of the projects. In many cases it may end up as a de facto ban anyway, because if they're not allowed to edit content at all they'll move on. -- Atama頭 19:12, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I disagree with this simply because it's entirely plausible for someone to be paid to edit and to do so in a manner completely compliant with Wikipedia policies/guidelines. Samwalton9 (talk) 19:13, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

And I think that's so rare a case in practice in the business sector that the possible benefit of those edits is overwhelmed by the biased edits that we can avoid by just banning the whole practice. Somebody who is paid to edit legally owes his loyalty to his employer, not to Wikipedia's mission. In any case of conflict between the two, he must follow his employer's interest. So maybe he can make what appear to be NPOV edits, but if it turns around and NPOV editing go against his employer's interests, he must stop editing (and the employer would stop paying him in any case) and we'll be left with his employer's POV. Smallbones (talk) 19:55, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Smallbones, I noticed your change of heart further on :-). But I still strongly believe that a simple and absolute declaration would eliminate the kind of convolutions that take place in simple straight policy issues such as this. I know that it's an essential part of human nature and tradition to keep people occupied discussing issues forever and ever and examine them from every angle but, this has been rehashed before. This is the very kind of weakness in decision making that's being taken advantage of by commercial interests to manipulate the conversation to their advantage. I would be most content if there exist a few places on the web free and clear of commercial manipulation. Wikimedia.org is maintained by member donations and it could keep itself completely commerce free, as I believe was a fundamental intention from the beginning. What changed? — Ineuw talk 19:28, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree that a simple and absolute declaration would be better, but there is a case for trying to achieve the possible rather than the perfect. I especially agree with your statement about donations - which are being made to a charity - so cannot possibly be used to further the interests of a commercial business. If any board members are reading this, I'd like them to re-read the sentence above.

I also think that putting hidden ads and PR in articles is completely immoral (selling something by deception - but that's just my morality), unethical by the standards of recognized PR associations, and in many, many cases (90%+) illegal. That refers to articles, not talk pages. I view paid editors as falling into about 10 different categories. Some of them are the most cynical SOBs I've ever come in contact with (think about what happened poor Sarah who took $300 - and who did it to her). Some are just confused about our rules. Just clarifying our rules here will help them (I'm thinking about the coffee shop with about 15 seats in Pasadena that had an article on en:WP for about 3 years - I'm not kidding about this). Others are trying to be ethical businesspeople, but have a natural POV - we just need to set out the rules for them in a straightforward way. I don't mind these folks editing on talk pages if it is disclosed. They may even help us in combatting the worst actors. The standard objection to banning them outright is the "right of response" - what happens to a business that employs 100s of people if pure libel appears in an article and nobody notices? Actually this "right of response" thing is usually overstated - we do have methods of dealing with that, and most businesses have good access to the media even if we don't deal with it. But I can sympathize a bit. All I'll say is that these "ethical businesspeople" need to help us in the process of keeping out the other paid editors, or they'll likely get categorized in with the rest. Smallbones (talk) 20:19, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I am sufficiently suspicious of commercial interests that I tend towards the same strength of opinion as Smallbones. But I also agree with Samwalton9, and see outright prohibition as being too heavy-handed, at least to start. Besides, let's not forget that not all paid editing may be commercial in origin. See the hypothetical examples section above. Evensteven (talk) 20:37, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree that it's not strong enough. There's nothing to prevent the foundation from prohibiting all paid editing. However, we all have to keep in mind that the Foundation is the primary victim of paid editing, as it deprecates the value of the Wikipedia brand and potentially impedes fundraising as well as the reputation of all concerned. Thus if the Foundation is willing to settle for disclosure then that is a decision that it made and it has to live with the consequences of implicitly tolerating and even sanctioning paid editing. We volunteers are here to pursue a hobby while this is their livelihood. If they want their project to be infested by paid editors, diminishing the value of their property, who are we to argue? Coretheapple (talk) 20:47, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree 100% with Smallbones. There is no earthly reaon why anyone would ever pay for an edit on Wikipedia other than they they think the edit promotes their interest, and editing to promote someone's interest is totally contrary to the whole spirit of Wikipedia. (Yes, I know the usual defence about someone working for an organisation who, as part of their job, is asked to make a few minor factual updates on the company's Wikipedia article. However, that situation can be dealt with in other ways than paid editing of Wikipedia articles, such as a request for an edit.) I have nothing but contempt for anyone who abuses Wikipedia by trying to use it to promtoe the point of view of a business, organisation, or person inorder to gain money. However, to be realistic, we are not going to get a ban on paid editing, mainly because of the fact that whenever the suggestion is raised, all the professional spammers who earn make a living by posting spam to Wikipedia come out of the woodwork and oppose the suggestion, and under the heavily flawed "consensus" model that Wikipedia uses, their corrupt views receive as much weight as the views of legitimate editors. That being so, the currently suggested, pathetically weak, proposal is a step forward, and should therefore be supported. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I also agree with Smallbones on this one. All commercial editing should be prohibited. Nobody should pay someone to edit Wikipedia, that goes against everything Wikipedia stands for. This website is for amateurs only - no professional editors. Once someone gets paid to edit, their employer will expect (sooner or later) favors and revisions. Kndimov (talk) 21:34, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

We agree with smallbones' outright ban on paid editing: it should be banned outright as paid commercial propaganda poisons the well of information with corporate lies. Think of what would occur with articles on global warming or new pharmaceutical drugs. Consider this alternative: if this paid editing is to be allowed, it should be clearly visible to any reader that these are paid edits and they should be in a different font color than the rest of the article. The article should be labeled clearly in big red letters in the title that "THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS PAID CONTENT" so every reader can be aware of the potential insertion of biased or outright false material. Now wouldn't that sort of openness make Wikipedia look to a casual observer like a cesspool of corporate lies? The more paid edits you had, the worse it would look. Your credibility would drop to zero. It would destroy Wikipedia. It would be much better to just ban paid editing outright.  :[[User:IWPCHI|IWPCHI] --IWPCHI (talk) 22:01, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Future of User Base

Do you think this will have an effect on further decreasing the user base of editors?

>implying this is a bad thing -BitterMan (talk) 18:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

There will likely be two effects here, going in opposite direction on the number of editors

• Decreasing the number of paid editors and their socks (which will be good)
• Increasing the number of non-paid independent editors, who dislike the nastiness that is very common among paid editors (also good)

Though both changes in the editor base would be good, the 1st effect (a decrease in the number of editors) will likely predominate in the short run, and the 2nd effect (an increase in the number of editors) will likely predominate in the long run. Smallbones (talk) 18:53, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm not sure that paid editors are more likely to be nasty than unpaid CoI editors. Certainly being nasty is not an effective strategy for a CoI editor of any type - and we should ensure that it remains that way. (The situation with other editors is more variable, which is where the community fails to have a consistent standard.) Rich Farmbrough 20:00 20 February 2014 (GMT).

My experience is that the nastiest editors on Wikipedia, by far, are paid editors. Are you familiar with Mr. 2001? I think I'm limited by the rules in giving more specific examples. Smallbones (talk) 20:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

"We plan to ask the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees"

Who is "we"? Is this something which community members may sign? Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I wondered the same thing. --Another Believer (talk) 18:28, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I guess the "we" is the WMF legal department in the sense that the legal department is putting this before the community for comments. If, after the consultation with the community and after making adjustments in the draft per the feedback, the legal department feels it makes sense to recommend the draft to the Board, it will consult with the Executive Director. If the ED agrees, the ED with the support of the legal department will make the recommendation to the Board on the draft and refer the Board to read the consultation and the community comments before making a final decision. Geoffbrigham (talk) 20:22, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

It seems to me that this is the beginning of regulated information, stemming from the powers at be outside of WIki's control.

• I just came here after seeing a banner advertising the discussion. I don't quite understand what we're supposed to do now but the edit history indicates that the principal author of this amendment is Philippe (WMF). This seems to be itself a paid work account but the user page has a disclaimer: "Although I work for the Wikimedia Foundation, contributions under this account do not necessarily represent the actions or views of the Foundation unless expressly stated otherwise. For example, edits to articles or uploads of other media are done in my individual, personal capacity unless otherwise stated." So, does this amendment represent the views of that user; the community that he is paid to liaise with; or the Foundation itself? Are the edits which created this proposal compliant with the proposed terms? In other words, if Philippe is acting as our paid advocate and editing on our behalf, is his disclosure adequate? This may be a good test case ... Andrew Davidson (talk) 19:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

An astute observation and excellent question from Mr. Davidson. There is a certain irony (or is it hypocrisy?) for a WMF employee who is not in the Legal department, to be presenting new content that the Legal department says it is putting forward, all regarding a proposal that would require editors to declare their paid interest in subject content. Let's get this ironed out before you "we" take this any further, please. -- Thekohser (talk) 22:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

• This question definitely needs answering. If this is put to the Board, it needs to be made very clear who exactly it is coming from and who is supporting it. I am also concerned that there does not seem to be any clear path to voicing opposition to this proposal. SpinningSpark 19:53, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
  • SpinningSpark: I think the opposition path is fairly clear: start a section on this talk page. :-) Others will chime in if they agree. --MZMcBride (talk) 20:40, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

That's a very good question. What's to prevent anyone from "asking" the WMF to do anything? What evidence is there that this is going to be seriously considered or is even on the agenda? Coretheapple (talk) 20:50, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

General support

I generally support this proposed change in the TOU, but we should take this opportunity to make the prohibitions on paid editing as strong as possible. Nothing I add below (in several individual sections) should be taken as meaning that I don't support the proposed change as is. I just think we can do better.

1st, the possibility of disclosing only on the edit summary may make following paid editing very difficult, so the following change should be made:

'"You must make that disclosure in at least two of the following:

• a statement on your user page, listing all pages where you have made paid contributions
• a statement on all talk pages accompanying any paid contributions, (strike "or")
• a statement in the edit summary accompanying any paid contributions."

Smallbones (talk) 18:26, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I may have some comments to do in other threads. But in general, I also support adding this restriction to the Terms of Use. --NaBUru38 (talk) 18:49, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The proposal also has my support. Accassidy (talk) 18:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I've seen this kind of thing in effect for particular paid editors at the English Wikipedia and it has worked pretty well, so I fully support this addition. -- Atama頭 19:14, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I also support the two-disclosure rule. Evensteven (talk) 20:47, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree with a more stringent policy involving two out of three places of notification. This would result in making it more difficult to obfuscate paid edits. -Thunderforge (talk) 21:19, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't know if an anonymous reader's opinion matters here, but I support this policy. If anything, I think that paid edits to public articles should be disclosed as such in footnotes ("this content paid for by ____"), much as sources are supposed to be cited. There needs to be accountability, or at least awareness, of any use of Wikimedia projects as advertising and potential propaganda and misrepresentation platforms for corporations, businesses, governments, political parties, religious groups, etc. 209.162.56.112 19:40, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

"An anonymous reader's opinion" does matter here. Too often Wikipedia editors ignore reader's opinions. The opposition to this proposed change in ToU is a perfect example of how some editors here put their own interests above the reader's interest. Smallbones (talk) 22:26, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Absolutely. Pages edited by so-called paid contributors should reflect this, such as, "This page has been edited by X, e.g., University of Notre Dame Athletic Department, Committee to Re-elect the President, etc." RaqiwasSushi (talk) 20:30, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I see the page-level disclosures as problematic in that the entire page then looks as though it is advertising/lobbying or some such. What of the other contributions to the page? Besides, entire pages of this kind of material don't belong in an encyclopedia at all. We need to address paid editors and paid edits individually, in order to keep all articles neutral and content balanced. Evensteven (talk) 20:47, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

As I said below, it's neither necessary nor helpful to put a notice on a page that the content has been modified by a paid editor. If there is a dispute about whether or not content should be removed or altered because it was placed by an editor with a conflict of interest, that's what a COI tag is for and that process is already being done (and has been in place for years). The point of the tag is to warn the reader that the material they're reading is being disputed, and why. When neutral editors are satisfied that the content is okay then the tag is removed. There's no reason to put a permanent black mark on an article because a paid editor once contributed to it. I wouldn't have a problem with a new "paid editor" template being applied when a paid editor's contribution is being reviewed or disputed, but again that template should be removed once any dispute is resolved, and really a COI tag would probably work anyway. -- Atama頭 21:21, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

If paid editing is to be allowed at all (we feel it is a very bad idea) the articles that contain paid edits should be labeled clearly as such in the title in big red letters: "THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS PAID CONTENT". Also the actual paid edits themselves should be in a different color font so even a casual reader will see that there is something unusual about this content and will understand that it is paid content. It would be much easier to just ban it outright; it looks to us to be a naked attempt to monetize Wikipedia by making it more useful to what are essentially commercial advertisers. IWPCHI --IWPCHI (talk) 22:10, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Effective use of signature.

There are situations where regular wikipedians get paid for certain edits over a certain period of times. It would be god if they could add the brief employer detail (or a brief information on payment) in signature. And remove that when they do regular edits. --Rahmanuddin (talk) 18:31, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Rahmanuddin. This is a good point. We had a previous internal draft that said the disclosure could be in the signature line as a parenthetical reference - something like "Joe Smith (Acme Corp.)." But some projects don't allow that practice so we ended up not including it in this draft. If you or others have views on this, I would find that interesting. Geoffbrigham (talk) 20:10, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Geoff, I recently started a discussion on the en OTRS noticeboard that I hoped would be the first step toward changing the "promotional username" policy on en. Unfortunately no OTRS volunteers have commented on it as of yet. If we can get OTRS on board, I think we can do the change. Please see that conversation because an interesting exchange regarding corporate copyright issue that could use your feedback is there. Gigs (talk) 20:47, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

This is also an interesting approach for marking individual article edits. I would consider it to be beneficial to require the signature disclosure for any paid edit. Evensteven (talk) 20:53, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

This discriminates against paid editors, when unpaid editors are perfectly capable of being just as biased

People can have any number of motives (e.g. personal affinity for a product they enjoy using, ideological support for a political candidate, etc.) that give them what might be deemed a conflict of interest in editing Wikipedia, but for some reason people make a bigger deal out of it when the person is getting paid. Why is it worse to make edits for monetary gain than for non-monetary gain? It still comes down to personal gain.

Paying someone money to post content is a form of speech, just as buying your own computer and using it to post content is a form of speech. Why discriminate against the former, while allowing the latter? What is so great about personally editing Wikipedia, rather than using your time in a way that's a better fit with your comparative advantage, and then using the proceeds to hire an editor? It's just another form of specialization and division of labor; there's nothing inherently sinister about it.

COI policy should probably be repealed in its entirety, because it boils down to an appeal to motive. People say, "Your edits are bad because you have a personal interest in the matter" when actually the edits could be perfectly good, and even superior to the edits that would have been made by a person who didn't have a personal interest in the matter. Edits should be judged on their own merits, not on the merits of the editor. Leucosticte (talk) 18:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't particularly think of paid editing as immoral or something. Maybe it should just simply be accepted, but fraud should of course be noted. George Slivinsky (talk) 19:05, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

To Leucosticte: You could equally say that judges in the justice system can have personal opinions and biases, so therefore they should not recuse themselves when there is a financial or other relationship-based conflict of interest. But that is not how the world works. Society recognizes financial and relationship-based conflicts of interest as a particularly intractable situation, above and beyond normal biases and personal opinions. Gigs (talk) 20:50, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Leucosticte, this proposal does not address the merits of any editor. The motivations of an editor, however, can come under scrutiny, even when there is no matter of pay. Conflict of interest needs to be declared, and accepting some form of compensation for edits creates an immediate interest that conflicts with Wikipedia's requirement of neutrality. The issue is not free speech either, as WP is not a forum for personal beliefs. As for "comparative advantages", they also do not belong in an encyclopedia, but in marketing material. Personal comparative advantages and interests and biases are addressed (and opposed) in a number of ways on WP, including WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. Evensteven (talk) 21:07, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Of course there are other reasons why an editor may have a conflict of interest or a bias, but that is not reason for not taking action agaisnt this reason. It's like saying "We shouldn't have a law agaisnt burgalry, because tehre are other crimes that are just as bad or even worse, and we shouldn't discriminate against burglars." JamesBWatson (talk) 21:12, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Support

I was recently thinking about if it's against policies of WMF/En-WP to make edits for some sort of self-advancement when disclosure is made, actually. While paid edits themselves sound bad because the most visible implication is that neutrality will be violated, there is another side to paid contribution. Paid contributions could strengthen the neutrality policy because, for instance, I could remove marketing-style wording and false positive information on competing products and services as a CEO. Of course, this must all be disclosed and negatives cannot be added by paid editors. The only problem I see is the aforementioned potential legal issue in Europe. Would have logged in as En-WP's NuclearWizard but there's a bug in the login/IPblock feature.

No. Less regulations, more freedom.

I can't believe u even mention anything from FTC - those people are useless. It's OK if advertisers make money off of their writings. We can correct an article if it's too flagrant. Dk pdx (talk) 19:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Can we judge it by its own merits rather than declare it as poisonous because of its source? -- Atama頭 20:46, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

We cannot judge it unless we know the background facts. That is what disclosure is about. Advertisers do not write encyclopedias. And judging too soon is a personal mistake that one can correct. Evensteven (talk) 21:12, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

That's totally fair. I don't object to that one bit, in fact a discussion about what instigated this proposal is both reasonable and helpful. But to dismiss it because it was at least inspired by feedback from or policies written by the FTC is not helpful. -- Atama頭 21:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

1. What is "FTC"?
2. It may be OK if advertisers make money from their writings, but that does not automatically mean that it's OK for people to dishonestly hide the fact that their editing has the ulterior motive of promoting the intterests of a business, organisation or person, which is what this discussion is about.
3. "We can correct an article if it's too flagrant": yes, but if it isn't "too flagrant" it can slip by unnoticed. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:16, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The Federal Trade Commission is a consumer protection group and independent US agency that put forth guides on digital disclosures for advertisers, and since the Wikimedia servers are in the US, they have jurisdiction over what happens on Wikimedia servers (I assume, I'm no lawyer or other kind of expert in that area). I first got wind of this kind of thing here which may provide some helpful background information. -- Atama頭 21:27, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Definition of "compensation"?

A semantic query. I see "compensation" is defined in terms of "an exchange of money, goods, or services." This is a somewhat broad-brush definition. For instance, I presume the term "services" may include "hospitality" (as, for example, in the stringent COI guidelines used by Cochrane [2]). This raises the question of quite what counts as an "exchange". Some contributors may have such COI to rather variable extents, ranging from collective lunches at sponsored meetings (without obvious direct exchange) to much more substantial individual hospitality (where some degree of indirect exchange may effectively exist).
I suppose it could be argued that editors should be expected to declare any potential COI of this sort. But that might be both impractical and undesirable. In particular, one would scarcely want to discourage direct editing of articles by academics who only have a theoretical (borderline) COI. But where to draw the line... Perhaps a few more words are necessary as to what sort of services (or goods) are intended? MistyMorn (talk) 19:13, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi MistyMorn. Yes, I've thought a bit about this and I see your point. In the end, I think it will not be possible to find a perfectly exact formulation, which is a fault of language in general. But maybe there is a better phrase. I would be interested in hearing other phrasing proposals that might address your concerns, if you have time. Otherwise, I will continue thinking about this to see if there is a way of tightening the language. Geoffbrigham (talk) 20:05, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi. Hmmm, maybe other more legally-savvy contributors have some suggestions? MistyMorn (talk) 20:09, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

• I suppose a possible approach could be to provide a few well-chosen representative examples of what would and would not be considered "paid editing" in terms of received services, goods etc (though I have no idea of the legal implications of this). —MistyMorn (talk) 20:46, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I'll preface this by saying that I like the proposal here, and see it as well-worded and balanced. But I have a related question about defining "compensation". Let's say that an editor owns stock in a company. They are not in any way employed by the company or otherwise affiliated with it. If they were to edit the page about that company, they might be in a position to benefit materially if the value of the stock were to increase (or if they prevented the value from decreasing), but that isn't really "compensation" as it is defined here. My reading of the proposed language is that disclosure would not be required; is that correct? Furthermore, someone might own, for example, a mutual fund that has holdings in a company, and in good faith not even know that the company is held in the mutual fund. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:47, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

• Geoff, you could borrow "consideration" from contract law, if you think that would serve the purpose better. Gigs (talk) 20:53, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

No, please. We're talking WP policy here, not a legal document. Enforcement is by the community. Just make the policy cover the general ground. Evensteven (talk) 21:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

POV

This all starts with pure POV!

We plan to ask the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees to consider a proposed amendment in our Terms of Use to address further undisclosed paid editing. Contributing to the Wikimedia Projects to serve the interests of a paying client while concealing the paid affiliation has led to situations that the community considers problematic. Many believe that users with a potential conflict of interest should engage in transparent collaboration, requiring honest disclosure of paid contributions.

Who is "we"? To criticise anonymous edits but don't declare who is behind this all here makes all not really trsusfull. "the community considers problematic" - is this so? Who is "the" community? Where the initiators know this? "Many believe that" - "many" Who are "many"? And how many are "many". All in all pure POV. But at the end all will work this way - it is not important what we as community will sa. Mister Wales states since longer time what's here wanted. He will decide at the end - so why this transparent democracy game? Marcus Cyron (talk) 19:16, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I guess the "we" is the WMF legal department. This is a consultation similar to other community consultations that we have had, and we actually do listen to feedback and often adjust language to respond. We are attempting to summarize at a high level what we have heard in the discussions around paid editing, but of course are happy to hear different views on this. Geoffbrigham (talk) 19:58, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree it is about POV. In striving to attain a neutral point of view (NPOV) Wikipedia has very correctly placed small obstacles in the path of those who would deliberately edit with bias. It is widely recognised that those with a conflict of interest (COI) are most likely to undermine neutrality in decision-making. In courts and committee deliberations a person with a COI is required, often under threat of penalty, to disclose a COI and in some instances is required to recuse himself from participation in a meeting. Any person editing Wikipedia who is aware of a COI should similarly declare that conflict, and if the COI is bad enough, she should not edit at all.

I support the premise that edits made under an incentive of a reward are potentially not neutral, specifically because the incentive of reward may lead an editor to purposefully introduce bias that will promote or discredit some entity. So, in the interests of maintaining NPOV, which is crucially important for the reputation of our encyclopedia, I do agree that all paid contributors should make a public statement disclosing that they are rewarded for their work by a party which they must name.

Craigallan.za (talk) 21:18, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Why not require all three types of notification?

While I can see the problems with content written for financial gain, there is also the point that corporations have a great deal of information that the outside world can benefit from. But it should be made obvious when that information comes from a corporate source. So what is the problem with requiring that a paid editor post all three types of proposed statement? That's the only way that I can think of to make their motives fully transparent. Will102 (talk) 19:30, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Will, I don't think this is an unreasonable position, but we are also trying to build a disclosure process that is flexible and can accommodate the varying needs of various types of editors, including those who are doing clearly mission-driven editing while receiving compensation (for example, as a Wikimedian in residence). It is a matter of finding the right balance to achieve the goal of the amendment, which is to help ensure greater transparency to ensure against hidden potential bias. After thinking about it for some time, I think the alternative options strike that balance, but I also would understand if others disagreed. I would be interested in learning what others thought as well. Geoffbrigham (talk) 19:40, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Will02 and I don't see how having the choice of how someone discloses that they are a paid editor will "help ensure greater transparency" because you are effectively allowing them to bury this information wherever it is least likely to be discovered; in the middle of a lengthy userpage for example. KADC "Be unreasonable." (talk) 20:40, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I'd say that the primary problem with that is the fact that edit summaries have only a limited number of allowable characters. If a COI notice has to be in every one of them, potentially there won't be any space left for an actually useful description of the edit. Do you really want the article on Foo, Inc. to have a lot of edit summaries such as "m /* Allegations of having too long section titles in their Wikipedia article */ (COI notice: I work at Foo, Inc.) fixed typo (althuogh -> although)"? darkweasel94 (talk) 20:12, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

There's a point here, simply working at Foo Inc would not constitute paid editing, one would have to be specifically paid for editing the Wikipedia in question. Deciding whether an edit constitutes paid editing requires a bright line between work and leisure, which is often in reality very fuzzy. Rich Farmbrough 20:33 20 February 2014 (GMT).

Doesn't change my point about ever requiring anything at all to be put into the edit summary. They should first of all be useful to see what was changed, not for any kind of COI declaration or anything. No, requiring one of these things is entirely sufficient. darkweasel94 (talk) 20:57, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Indeed it was a tangential point. Rich Farmbrough 21:40 20 February 2014 (GMT).

I personally would prefer to see this policy applied on the talk page for the given article. Applying it to the user page is problematic, because it does not allow the user to separate themselves from the paid work. They may have a paid contribution in some areas, and then have unpaid work in other areas not at all influenced by their compensation. The edit summary would only allow for simple notification, such as 'paid contribution'. It's not the place for detail, and could be easily overlooked without being supported on the talk page, particularly as the edit history scrolls on to other pages. The talk page seems to be the best place for this, and consistency and transparency are most important if the new policy is to have the desired effect. -- Dave Braunschweig (talk) 20:25, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Dave Braunschweig - So, if I'm reading your comment correctly, you would require disclosure on the talk page in all cases (and omit the options for the edit summary and the user page). I definitely understand your reasoning, but it may require people who work in movement organizations or on GLAM initiatives, for example, to be constantly disclosing on talk pages - which might be too burdensome. Or maybe we allow an exception for employees of movement organizations and GLAM when they disclose their employment on their user page. Interested in your thoughts (and those of others). Thanks. Geoffbrigham (talk) 22:27, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Restricting the "transparency" of the fact that one is a paid editor to just the user page, talk page and edit summary essentially allows the paid editor to HIDE the fact that the information he or she has added to an article is paid content! It is not openness: it is treachery! That is why the EU courts have held this type of corporate chicanery to be illegal. If you're going to allow paid content, there needs to be a BIG RED LABEL in the title of the article warning everyone: "THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS PAID CONTENT" and then the paid content itself needs to be made to stand out from the rest of the article either using italics or a different font color or both. We believe that it would be easier and better to just ban paid content outright, as the potential for misuse FAR outweighs any benefit to users. IWPCHI --IWPCHI (talk) 22:23, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Can this be enforced while respecting privacy?

I appreciate Wikipedia's attempt to curb intentional propaganda. However, how can you determine with any reasonable degree of accuracy whether an edit was a vandal, paid propaganda, an individual who is honestly unaware of his/her bias, or otherwise? Once this determination is made, how deep does the investigation go and how quickly? This is a very slippery slope. On the one end, it is very easy for privacy rights to be violated on minimal evidence, on the other we have the issue of not being able to enforce this (making it essentially a joke). I don't participate a lot on discussion pages, so I do not know much detail about Wikipedia's policies operations or regulations. But this is the major issue that I see. -- Previous unsigned comment by User:66.188.168.11

Elsewhere on this page, the issue of sockpuppets was raised, and I think it's an apt comparison. This is the same dilemma, really. Can we actually enforce a policy to prevent someone from operating multiple accounts, or sneaking onto a project by using a new account in order to evade a ban or a block? If the editor in that case is careful, the painful truth is no, except for some happy accident (a checkuser uncovers a sock while investigating some other account this editor is using) they'll likely never know.

So just like the sockpuppet policies, this policy would take effect if the editor admits to being a paid editor or reveals it in some way. Just as a project may allow someone to declare an alternate account under the right conditions, editors would be allowed to be paid editors under the right conditions. Privacy rights are a concern with sockpuppets too, because it's all about identity (are you the same person as so-and-so). But I think that the English Wikipedia manages well enough to balance privacy and enforcement (for example, a checkuser doesn't disclose any personal information revealed in the course of an investigation, and doesn't link an editor's account with their IP). We could find a similar balance here. I've dealt with conflict of interest cases for years (both to help good editors with a COI and to stop the disruption of bad editors with a COI) and it's a fine line to balance privacy with identifying a potential problem, but it's possible. -- Atama頭 20:40, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

To oppose a proposal because it can't always be enforced is common in many aspects of life. However, I have yet to come across anyone anywhere saying "We should not have a law against burglary, because in every country in the world the majority of burglaries go unpunished, as the burglar is not caught". Of course we won't always know, but that is not a reason for not having the tools to deal with it in those cases wheere we do know. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:26, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

What are the goals

There are a number of reasons that this ToU change (which I have much sympathy for) might be advanced. It is not clear, though, that the change necessarily addresses the issues it might be intended to. For example reputational issues for the projects are not well addressed (see the BP case - where much bad press was garnered, although this ToU would have been fully complied with - and indeed other cases of engineered bad press for the projects). The question of legal issues, though redounding upon the utterer of the statements rather than the Foundation or Community also seems moot. Indeed, by demanding disclosure, the Foundation may be making a rod for its own back in terms of not only record keeping, but liability for ensuring that disclosure is monitored and vetted in a sensible way (effectively the Foundation is proclaiming that all paid editing is declared).

I am very concerned that these types of rule creep miss the fundamental principles that Wikipedia and the other projects are founded upon. In this case "Is it a good edit?" If the edits are good, we should be happy, and that is an editorial decision. Where organisations or individuals have attempted to abuse the projects they should be prevented from doing so, regardless of their remunerative status (see, for example, the Scientology case). This is far better achieved by an active editing and reading community than by ToU requirements, which, frankly, are unlikely to be read by most users, less likely to be adhered to by those that create problems, and still less likely to be enforceable.

Rich Farmbrough 20:23 20 February 2014 (GMT).

A paid edit is a third-party advertisement...

in my opinion. Full disclosure should apply - though I'm inclined to think that someone has already decided and this discussion is moot.

What isn't moot is this: the moment someone is paying for something to be added, edited or removed from Wikimedia's sites then these sites are serving as paid advertising for a third party - and everything Wikimedia stands for (if it does) will have gone down the drain. Shir-El too (talk) 20:30, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I totally approve the amendment (also because some events have caused too much money to be spent in some events like photo events, with averge costs sometimes reaching more than 6 dollars per photo in some paid events where others contributed many more photos and documents at less than a few cents per document.

Organized photo events (and other organized events to collect contents) must be efficient. But visibly some have profited from the system to make profits with them; using the money collected by the community (see the recent reports in the Evalation and Learning portal about them). In my opinion, a significant part of this money should be returned to the Foundation, for illegal or unfair profits as this money was stolen (IMHO); but the problem was a lack of sufficient protection in the Terms of use, for these paid contributions. In summary we need this agreement (and possibly more to make sure that unused and unjustied money paid in advance by the Foundation will be returned to the Foundation). verdy_p (talk) 20:37, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't think it follows. For example suppose a paid editor corrects the names of the officers of a company, or takes a special brief to revert vandalism? Arguably it gives the company an "edge" (and one might even say an "unfair" edge) over a less fortunate rival whose CEO is named as Mr Potato Head, but it by no means advertising. Rich Farmbrough 20:40 20 February 2014 (GMT).

I think we're protected by at least three well-established policies already. We don't allow promotional language (as it's clearly spam or advertising). We don't allow advocacy because we insist on a neutral point of view. And we require notability for inclusion, so an obscure subject isn't able to get exposure by being covered in an article. Not to mention the fact that paid editors are inevitably going to be under additional scrutiny and are less likely to get away with violating any of these policies because there will be a suspicion that they're trying to advertise/advocate for their clients. -- Atama頭 20:44, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Note that unjustified payments include profiting the money to buy costly equipements that will be used for long by their buyers (but not for building and publishing open contents shared with the Wikimedia community). However, we could finance equipments for groups in poor countries, if they want to build more permanent projects, but these projects should find a way to subsist and getting usable by Wikimedia controbutors in their area. This should however not finance equipments that will be owned and will be usable only by the profiter of these payments. The money should not be used to buy cameras that will be used rarely for publishing open content to Wikimedia (or other convenient hosting sites with usable open licences).

This money can be used for example to rent rooms to organize public events, or pay an Internet connection subscription for a group whose online activity on Wikimedia will persist. But the groups asking for this money should also find a way to finance themselves more permanently. Wikimedia Foundation payments are just here to help them bootstart their project, or to help them to increase their online activities.

This money should not be used to pay the salaries of employees, and if it is used to pay thir party services, copies of their billings must be given back to the Foundation along with accounting reports (based on international accounting standards) detailing how and when money is spent, and how the equipments will be depreciated over years according to standard accounting practices (and the fiscal requirements in the country where the benefitor resides).

The Foundation should provide help about how to produce these acceptable accounting reports (and the Foundation could also host a service to help these groups manage their local accounting; or could help them finance the acquisition of standard accounting softwares. If the benefitors are individuals they could use standard personal accounting softwares to manage this money clearly separately from their own personal money; but in my opinion, money given to individuals should be managed on an accounting service hosted directly by Wikimedia, for improved security and transparency.

Transparent and detailed accounting practices can mitigate a lot the unfair use of this money for something else (including for using it to finance publicity for something else). IT would be an interestint tool to develop in Wikimedia Labs (and promote in the "Tools" section of the Learning and Evaluation Portal, just like Wikimetrics). verdy_p (talk) 21:00, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Verdy, these are interesting points, but should perhaps be in their own section, as they don't relate to Shir-El too's thread about paid editing being advertising. Rich Farmbrough 21:37 20 February 2014 (GMT).

Not a lot of use

As a Wikipedia user, I don't see how any of the three proposed disclosures (user page, talk page or edit summary) is going to enable me to identify paid-for content while I am reading an article. 86.129.17.59 20:48, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

... remember also that content on many talk pages is shunted off into archive after a while, at which point it becomes effectively lost except to anyone specifically looking for it. 86.129.17.59 21:11, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

We don't want to advertise paid-for content, nor should we. Presumably, the paid-for content is being vetted by neutral editors to be sure that it complies with policies and guidelines, and that in particular it's not unduly promotional. In which case, why poison the article with a notice that a paid editor was involved with it somehow? -- Atama頭 21:13, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree entirely with the IP editor. Atama's comment, if not disingenuous, is naive in the extreme. Even utterly blatant promotion sometimes goes undetected for years, and more subtle examples, skillfully camouflaged by professional spammers, can be very hard indeed to detect. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:30, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Then why not put a banner at the top of each Wikipedia site with a disclaimer that any page could have been edited by a paid editor, because they can easily fly under the radar. What does that achieve except to delegitimize the whole project? Am I naïve to think that I should waste my time when anything I do is potentially undone by sneaky paid advertisers? I hope you see the uselessness and damage such tags will bring. Fortunately, I know that there's no chance of ever having such silly notices (and to think that it could happen is naïve in the extreme). -- Atama頭 21:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

These two problems (promotion and spamming) are very real, and are part of the QA issues facing us. I don't see a convincing case that the proposed ToU (or indeed an article tag - which the IP did not suggest) will realistically help with these issues. The biggest benefit from the ToU is to the declared paid editor who can demonstrate "clean hands" - and perhaps the movement can say "we tried a ToU". But in terms of actually fixing problems, rather than making the "right noises" I have my doubts about the efficacy of this proposal. Rich Farmbrough 21:58 20 February 2014 (GMT).

I agree Rich, to an extent. Not to bring this up forever, but I'll go back to the sockpuppet issue. Having a policy against misuse of multiple accounts doesn't prevent it from happening, nor does it catch everyone who does it. And admittedly, we have better tools to catch sockpuppets than to catch paid editors (a financial checkuser sounds disturbing). But it encourages paid editors who want to work within guidelines and edit with transparency, and gives better tools to sanction paid editors who violate those guidelines and get caught. I don't think it fixes the problem but I think it can still help. -- Atama頭 22:03, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree that a provision in the terms of use is never a complete solution. But it does provide guidance and protection for those who do want to engage within the rules in good faith. Also, if there is a truly bad outside player that is maliciously hurting the projects with deceitful paid editing, we may want to consider litigation after the community discovers this player. A terms of use provision can help make a stronger case. Geoffbrigham (talk) 22:18, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Clarity for organisations and possible impact for organisations that pay?

This feels a bit to me like the prostitute and punter debate, and with all the focus on paid editors (prostitutes), I wonder if we are missing the other half of the problem.

Many organisations still have no idea that any of this debate is going on at Wikipedia and are not familiar with the principles here. This means they don't see what they are doing as problematic. I can think of two very recent examples where organisations assumed they had total ownership and total rights over their page until it was explained to them. I don't necessarily see this as their failure – both seemed to be acting in good faith – but ours in communicating principles. Wikipedia is the exception and not the rule – most organisations routinely pay and expect to pay everywhere else. The number of new articles on AfC created by editors who blithely name themselves after the company they are writing about also suggests the message hasn't permeated. Most of these articles are not created with any intent to deceive – self-evidently – since the user name is so blindingly obvious.

So perhaps a two-pronged publicity drive if the amendment is made, in which we address both editors and organisations. It’s never going to be easy for the marketing/PR junior at the organisation or its agency to reason with the powers that be if we only hint at what they shouldn't be doing, so there needs to be a clear and highly visible explanation from Wikipedia of the ground rules for companies and paid editors.

And even if we do spell it out, if it's a toss up between incurring the wrath of the boss who pays you or the wrath of Wikipedia that doesn't, which would you choose? Outside the current debate parameters I know, but I’d like to suggest that possible ramifications for the organisation itself might help publicise the pitfalls of undisclosed paid editing more effectively than simply focusing censure on the editors. I've no idea what is morally or legally acceptable but arguably it should be a tad stronger than the current advice and typical 'connected to the subject' banner so that it focuses minds on the potential reputational risks of paying for writing and editing. Libby norman (talk) 20:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree. This particular policy is targeting only the individual editor, which is fine as far as it goes. But the issues are larger, and additional policy to address the payors of the editors is needed. WP need not accept any obligations wrt organizations or any impact on them from the way they spend their money. But WP needs to defend itself against the influence of money generally to distort its goals. The issue of paid editing has potential for legal ramifications that the foundation itself must address because they will never be within the editors' ability to control. Evensteven (talk) 21:30, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

A publicity campaign to get this across to companies is a great idea. There might be some arguments that this would decrease the perceived reliability of Wikipedia, but I believe that it would increase our perceived reliability: We recognize that there is a problem and are taking steps to address the problem. This is similar to the BLP problem brought up by Sigenthaler (sp?) in 2005 (?) This actually marked a major increase in our editorship and perceived reliability. A major triumph for Wikipedia in the intermediate and long-runs. This change in the ToU would mark a similar triumph. Smallbones (talk) 21:42, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The need to help well-meaning people and organizations understand the basic rules is one reason we wanted to be explicit in the terms of use on how one should represent their affiliation. Many may not read the terms of use, but organizations who engage in paid editing are more likely to do so. I am not sure if these organizations or their clients understand that there are also potential PR and legal ramifications as well, which is why we link to FAQs that explain these risks, namely this section and this section. The prominent placement will hopefully increase awareness somewhat. And I agree that a larger publicity campaign may also be useful. Geoffbrigham (talk) 22:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Are anonymity & pseudonomy now lost?

Determining "compensation" seems very vague; lots of people poke at Wikipedia during working hours. Are they "being paid to edit"? Do they still have a COI about their employer even if they hate their job and don't have any respect for them? What about voluntary affiliations that don't pay, but may be as strong or stronger than a paid affiliation?

More generally, forcing people to disclose their employer is .... rather personal information, which strikes me as incompatible with the notion that our users can be anonymous (or rather pseudonomous, using usernames and keeping their real-world identities private).

If we're going to go that route, we should stop pretending we respect anonymity of our contributors and perhaps go for a true Real Names policy... which of course would crash community participation from many sectors (people at risk for harassment, people who worry they may be at risk of harassment, etc; and of course people at risk of being stalked and murdered, or arrested and tortured and executed).

I'm not sure I'd support that; while "Real Names" has done well by me (as a white male upper-middle-class knowledge worker in a liberal democracy, which is relatively safe) I don't think it's for everybody. --brion (talk) 20:56, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Real names are needed if we speak about real money. The Wikimedia can protect the privacy of its donators, but not the privacy of those to whom it gives money (or at least, the benefitor should give a proof of identity to the Foundation, by a secure mean, if this person really requires protection (e.g. an LGBT group in Russia, in Iran or in many anti-LGBT African countries where they risk jail or even death penalty for their online promotion activities; but such risk should not be considered in countries where their activities are perfectly legal and adequately protected by national laws and constitutions, such as LGBT groups or individual in the European Union, USA, Canada, Japan and some others; the protection by anonyity may be requested on a case per case basis: such cases could be discussed publicly to see if someone in a given country may request for anonymity, but even in this case that person or group should proove his identity to the Foundation that will keep it as secretely as possible, just like for donators: a public forum may ask question to the Foundation, that will forward them to the requester; the requester will reply privately to the Foundation, and then the Foundation will report the anonymized answer to the community for evaluation of the general situation; if the situation concerns lots of people, the question should be debated for the whole group of these persons without detailing them: a policy may be adopted about them, and the Foundation will apply it consistently, but securely). verdy_p (talk) 21:22, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Also there may be situations where some people ask for online anonymity to get some financements for being able to report about some emergency situations (e.g. today for news reports in Ukraine or Egypt), in specific cases where (even in "free" countries like USA) they could take a risk (imagine the situation of another people revealing things about US NSA activities : that person risks years of jail even in US for only reporting the truth to the world !). However in such situation the Foundation may not be able to offer the protection itself (being subject to US law) and could transfer the money to be given and controled by another trusted Wikimedia chapter (e.g. in Europe such as Wikimedia CH in Switzerland, or Wikimedia Sverrige in Sweden, and possibly even Wikimedia Russia for protecting US citizens).

The Foundation would have to trust these Chapters about its control on the final benefitor (located in another country where the benefitor asks for protection of his anonymty), but the Foundation will request to the chapter some aggregated acounting reports about these exceptional extra grants. After all these large chapters also have already good accounting practices. If needed, an amendment to the agreements linking the chapter and the Foundation may be signed to help secure this type of transfer relayed by the chapter protecting the anonymity of the benefitor.

And the Foundation should then inform candidate benefitors that they can choose one of these other chapters to request anonymity directly to them. The chapter would create an online account for that benefitor (with a tracking tag informing the community that the user is anonymous and protected by this chapter according to the signed agreement beween the chapter and the Foundation). verdy_p (talk) 21:34, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Verdy p as to "real names are needed if we speak about real money". Paid editors will need to give up some anonymity in order to make proper disclosures. That needs to be the price of being paid to edit, by the nature of that activity, and I don't think WP needs to apologize for that.

If an individual is paid to edit, I think it is acceptable for that person to have a separate account for that purpose. If he or she wishes also to contribute in an unpaid capacity, a separate standard anonymous account is also acceptable for that activity. If WP is unable to allow such dual accounts, then there is a question of individual rights wrt what their employers (or compensators) demand of them. If WP is unable to resolve such issues satisfactorily, then I think it would need to consider a complete ban on paid editing in order to preserve its goals, just as a practical matter. Evensteven (talk) 21:45, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Standard anonymous accounts are absolutely NOT anonymous. IP accounts are definitely not secure enough as they can be easily traced backed to the user by any one else through public logs of the wikis. What we need are standard registered accounts that are created and controled by someone whose real identity has been secured by the Foundation (or by one of its trusted chapters taking the control, for the Foundation, on how the money will be spent by that anonymous benefitor, that chapter being alone to know the identity of that benefitor for whom the Foundation cannot secure itself the anonymity, such as another Snowden reporting to the world about NSA activities and that would want protection of his anonymity by Wikimedia CH or Wikimedia Russia). Such registered account would have a tag indicating Account secured and protected by the Wikimedia Foundation in USA, or Account secured and protected by Wikimedia CH in Switzerland.

If the account is protected by a trusted chapter, ONLY the chapter will know the identity of that person. The trusted chapter takes its own responsability to control that user but NOTHING (except national laws directly applicable to that chapter) would require that chapter to reveal privately to the Foundation or publicly to the world the real identity of that user and this would be the essential part of the signed amendment linking the trusted chapter and the Foundation. Ideally, the trusted chapter would host an anonymizing proxy for that autorized user, in order to connect to the Foundation servers. The Foundation servers will know that the user comes from that trusted proxy (e.g. Wikimedia CH) but nothing else (so any US agency investigating in the logs of the Foundation will find nothing about that user whose privacy rights are protected by another country). verdy_p (talk) 21:53, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Also this possibility of offering anonymity by proxying users could be offered to other partner trusted organizations (such as Reports Without Borders, whose seat is in France, or the Red Cross International Comity that actively promote the use of TOR, The Onion Routing network, to secure and protect local reporters and humanitaries working in dangerous countries, for promoting education, health and development of political rights and justice).

I think that this could be the base for cooperation with other wellknown organizations in the world defending Freedom of Speech, Human Rights, and Equality. A single organisation located in US cannot do that alone without help from partner organizations exempted from US laws, only because it is subject to US law and US law does not always protect these freedoms on a worldwide scale. verdy_p (talk) 22:22, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

What if you work for $SUBJECT

I know of instances where employees of a company (not mine, I hasten to add) have been given time to edit subjects related to the company, including the company's article. It seems to me that this would be covered, as paid editing time is a form of compensation, but it's not explicitly clear. JzG (talk) 21:08, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

If I understand your hypothetical correctly, I believe you should disclose your employer. The Terms of Use already prohibits misrepresentation of affiliation; this amendment simply sets out the acceptable methods for disclosing that affiliation truthfully. In your hypothetical, the company is paying the employees during the given time. So that affiliation needs to be disclosed. The proposed amendment tells you how. I hope that helps, and feel free to correct me if I misunderstood anything. On your other point, I am not optimistic that we can craft language that clearly governs every hypothetical, but I feel the language here is probably clear enough to cover this situation. If you have better language to propose, I would definitely want to consider it. Geoffbrigham (talk) 21:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

My company and personal pages on Wikipedia are both junk. I have not edited because of conflict of interest concerns, and this just increases the concern. It would be nice to have clear way of addressing this issue. RonaldDuncan (talk) 21:30, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I already disclose my employer, and that I am who I am on my talk page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:RonaldDuncan is this enough to be compliant with the current and new policy? RonaldDuncan (talk) 21:34, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I'd say that "paid editing time" is clearly compensation, but if others think it isn't clear we should make the wording clear. You would have to declare every edit IMHO. Smallbones (talk) 21:45, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

RonaldDuncan - I believe your user page is sufficient disclosure under the proposed amendment (assuming you are linking to it in your signature). Geoffbrigham (talk) 21:54, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Guy, in the instances you're aware of, do you know if the employers had control or oversight over what the editors had written? This is just personal curiosity, I don't think that fact makes that any less a form of paid editing (since even if the employer isn't telling you what to write or enforcing that you are positive, they could and there would at least be the implication that you're supposed to make edits that improve the company's image, otherwise why are they paying you). -- Atama頭 21:59, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

"Paid Editor" user attribute

I think a better solution would be to add a "paid editor" attribute to the user preferences with multiple text fields, one for each employer. This would allow an icon to be added automatically next to a user's signature rather than a written explanation after each entry. Clicking and/or hovering over the icon could bring up the details entered in the attributes text field. Though I personally don't feel it would be necessary to specify which employer contracted for the edit in the case of multiple employers as I suspect that would be obvious in most cases, a check-box for each employer could be presented when "save page" is pressed. This would also cover instances where paid editors are doing unpaid edits on their own (they would select "none").

Additionally, I would like to see the "paid editor" icon at the top or bottom of any page that has been contributed to by a paid editor, and clicking on this icon should bring up a list of all paid editors and their employers for easy reference. I believe this would also satisfy instances such as the "Unfair Commercial Practices Directive" example given under "Illegal in EU" topic subheading posted earlier today. KADC "Be unreasonable." (talk) 21:28, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Do what ever it takes to keep this site non biased

    This is the best site on the web and it needs to be kept as such.

I constantly use it as the first stop for any research, from electronic engineering to Eminem's shoe size. I look forward to my children using this site as a learning platform for homework or hobbies.

The thought of conglomerates taking over this safe haven makes me cringe.

I'm already fed up with Google, Facebook and Microsoft continuously climbing up my elementary canal trying to squeeze every drop of data or disposable income out of me.

Please. Keep this site informative and above all, with information i can trust.

P.S damn fine work, keep it up.

Previous discussions

I believe there have been recent community discussions/requests for comment on this subject in the recent past and the proposal has been roundly defeated. There should be a description of these past results on the page and an explanation of why this one is different, or why a different result is expected this time. At the very least there should be links to those pages so editors can get a complete picture of what is going on. SpinningSpark 21:48, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Indeed there have been: somebody with the required edit permissions (not me, I don't) left a comment at the bottom of the proposal over which this discussion is going. — RandomDSdevel (talk) 22:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia is so useful because of its free editing, paid editing must injure it.

Wikipedia is a free internet encyclopaedia, collaboratively written or, edited by the volunteers that too free of cost, so that it serves the interests of anyone around the world free of cost, through the information contributed in it.

Therefore, a question automatically arises in ones mind that when the efforts of volunteers are available in Wikipedia free of cost, why should at all anyone needs to pay any such volunteer, going against Wikimedia's policy? Wikipedia does expect anyone to pay for its collaborative editing. Unnaturally, all paid editing then would influence writing in it.

Wikipedia is very popular among its users and has immense intrinsic value - that value must be realised by its users around the world, not by any paid contributor.

Therefore, any form of paid editing must be discouraged. This is applicable to all Wikimedia Projects.

S N Thakur (talk) 21:55, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Let us suppose that a conglomerate, such as Mitsubishi, or Tata Group pays someone to fix all spelling errors, and update changes in senior personnel in their group. Does this benefit or damage the Encyclopaedia? Rich Farmbrough 22:01 20 February 2014 (GMT).

Your question sounds as if some other rich person willing to beautify your wife, paying his own money for that purpose when you are, as her husband, supposed to look after her. Does not the other person's willingness injures your dignity. I think it does injure. If at all a conglomerate, such as said Mitsubishi, or Tata Group need to better Wikipedia, better not let them interfere in wikipedia's existing policy. Let Wikipedia grow in its own way.

S N Thakur (talk) 22:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia spirit or something

… In other words, isn't this an attempted (success can be averted) step in the direction of refocusing the main service Wikipedia provides? Henceforth metaphorical description. A mass of readers visits Wikipedia. These readers differ on a scale of being more or less versed in critically perceiving information (extracting "interesting", "good", "irrelevant", "unverifiable", "senseless", "you-name-what-..." pieceworks of facts and characteristics). Certain part of "readerbase" is getting the best service out of state Wikipedia is in now. The amendment proposed means to expand the best served audience to include some part with slightly sub-par abilities, is this assuming too much?
If it isn't, I'm very much sceptical about the prospect of a gain. Instead of expansion, this could evolve into or turn out to be a shift. Meaning, pardon the strength of my opinion, that target audience is to become dumbed down. I strongly feel that the steeplechase with ineptitude of worse parts of general readers population has no hopes. Do you have any estimates on how much (percentage maybe) of poor unsuspecting readerbase you're going to protect by establishing a ban, which is randomly inspired and who know how it can be enforced (in a project that puts emphasis on freedom)?
I'm not meaning to discriminate, rather to promote readers discipline. Легат Ская (talk) 21:59, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Need to give projects flexibility to add other options

We need to add a 4th bullet-item:

• any other method of disclosure specifically permitted by the project in which the edit takes place.

This will allow the various projects to adopt future techniques such as allowing a "paid editor" bit that links to [[User:username/paideditordisclosure]] or some such without having to go back to the Foundation to amend this document.

It would also allow specific projects to say "we don't require public disclosure, a letter to OTRS is all that is needed" or even "we don't care about paid editing, no disclosure is required."

By allowing projects who want to deviate from the "default" 3 options to go through a formal project to do so, it will prevent this policy from being seen as being "shoved down everyone's throat just because a large number of projects and/or the larger projects want it."

I would have no objection to the Commons not being allowed to take advantage of this line-item as its files are used across many projects. Davidwr/talk 22:02, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Paid contribution is antithetical to spirit of Wikipedia

I'm writing to express my outrage at the thought of paid contributions or edits to Wikipedia. This is antidemocratic and is the path of least resistance to total corruption. The world already suffers from money in the spread of information; the truth is already bought and paid for, in the spheres of advertising and print journalism, by global corporations; Wikipedia used to stand alone as a biasless defender of truth.

Far too vague about what being paid means; likelihood of harassment of good-faith real name editors; additional bureaucracy

I have several problems with the proposal as it stands:

• It does not clearly explain how to determine whether one is being "paid to edit Wikipedia". For instance: I am a professor at a university that pays its faculty to perform teaching, research, and service. Here "service" can mean many things including taking part in campus governance as well as professional peer reviewing. I have chosen to interpret my editing on Wikipedia as part of that service, in the sense that (for instance) I disclose it in my regular performance reviews. However, my employer exerts absolutely no control about what I edit and would not care if I stopped. Does that make me a paid editor? Is that an adequate reason to force me to disclose my name?
• The language "Many believe that users with a potential conflict of interest should engage in transparent collaboration, requiring honest disclosure of paid contributions" is a non-sequitur. *Everyone*, paid or unpaid, has a potential conflict of interest of some sort or another. Why is the word "paid" part of this sentence?
• As someone who edits under my real name, I have occasionally experienced workplace harassment (such as phone calls to my department chair and, in one case, a formal complaint to the governing board of the 10-campus university system that employs me) by editors who disagreed with my edits. Is it going to become expected that every academic who wants to participate in Wikipedia must be willing to be subjected to this treatment?
• Has anyone weighed this added burden on editors to know and follow additional rules, to have their real-world identies outed, and to more easily run afoul of these new rules, against the repeated claims that we need to be more welcoming of new editors?

Basically this feels like venue-shopping to me: the discussions of the same proposals on the English Wikipedia led to a lack of consensus, so the proponents of these measures are instead taking it here where they hope fewer people will be on their guard. The fact that the proposal doesn't explicitly say "you have to provide your name" is of no help to people for whom naming their employer and looking at their interests is enough to identify them. None of the problems raised by the English Wikipedia discussions have been fixed, and indeed this proposal is worse in several respects. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:11, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Against Wikipedia ideals?

Copied from content page PiRSquared17 (talk) 22:12, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Weird ideas. They go against the traditional Wikipedia ideals -- transparency, democracy. Why ruin anything that has worked so well, so far? smilesofasummernight Smilesofasummernight (talk) 21:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Will this do anything?

I totally get the impetus behind this, but I don't see this as likely to change anyone's behavior, regardless of how it's wordsmithed. Nobody's going to enroll in a voluntary scarlet letter program.

First, I'd guess that the vast, vast majority of paid articles and edits go completely unnoticed, with experienced paid editors (e.g., PR folks writing Wikipedia articles for a lot of nascent clients) knowing precisely what is needed to avoid attention while delivering for their clients. They will never, ever ever comply with these rules, because why put the stench of bias all over a source of their livelihood?

Those who are really bad at it, meanwhile (e.g., employees copy-pasting their company's about page into an article), will continue to completely ignore the Terms of Use as they always have. They won't even know this is a rule before their content is speedy-deleted anyway. JDoorjam (talk) 22:14, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

i understand your point, this rule alone will not do much but it will lay the groundwork that enable Wikipedia to ban certain users and contents expeditiously. also, PR firms that employ deceptive methods expose their client to legal risks (ie. defamation, fraud etc). Wikipedia's objective is not to prevent crimes. The objective is to prevent them from legally deceive our users. 76.69.126.216 22:22, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

"Tony Stark"?

Can we please have a document that doesn't have "funny" pop culture references in it? Thank you. — Scott • talk 22:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

@Scott Martin: Hi Hex. This was changed here. Would you prefer Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, Peter Parker, Tony Stark, or a non-superhero name? PiRSquared17 (talk) 22:19, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

More hypothetical examples for discussion

Following NewYorkBrad's section above. In considering an updated policy or TOS provision addressing paid editing, we need to make sure that it addresses the types of situation that may come up in this area, and does so in a way that accords with how we want these situations to be handled, and with common sense. Below are some hypothetical situations. How do we want to address them? Does the proposed TOS addition do so well, or how might it be changed to do so better?

Of course, given the specific proposal at issue here, the expected answer to all these situations would be along the lines of "make the disclosure." However, each incident could be looked at from the point of view of "is it realistic that editors in this position will do that, and do we need them to?"

These examples are taken from here, with some editing.

A. A pharmaceutical company adds information to a Wikipedia article about one of its products that is essentially identical to the sales information it distributes to medical professionals and consumers.

B. A company makes negative edits to articles about its competitors.

C. A restaurant owner posts a Wikipedia article about her restaurant containing referenced and unreferenced material, including an unreferenced mention of "delicious apple pie."

• Would it make any difference if the restaurant owner (or employee/contractor) attempted to write an unbiased article about the restaurant? (For example, a hired search engine optimization (SEO) firm might want to push a different website lower in a Google search?)
• Would it make any difference if the article were about a non-profit organization rather than a for-profit business?

D. A company edits an article about itself, but does not pitch its products or services. Rather it extols the company's public service spirit, and its environmental record, in "corporate image advertising".

E. A company's public relations firm does not add text to an article, but removes text others have written,.

F. An OTC drug company has "discovered a new disease" and researched the effect of one of its products on the disease. The company's research on this new disease has not been published in a medical journal, but was reported on in a large metropolitan newspaper which cited the company's research report. A company researcher writes and posts a Wikipedia article, citing the newspaper report but not mentioning the fact that the research was funded by the company.