Talk:Doug Barrowman
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Controversy
[edit]Anonymous editor adding a controversy section - please read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons and ensure that anything you write adheres to it. I've removed your content twice as it clearly violates the rules for BLP. Matthewdjb (talk) 07:15, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
Reliable sources
[edit]The Times of London articles referenced in relation to the Knox Group Loan Charge controversy confirm that a) loans were provided offshore into the UK and b) these loans were provided by a company within the Knox Group of companies. The Times article is here : Ungoed-Thomas, Jon. "Loan schemes offering help to ruined clients — for a fee".
If there are reliable sources that are able to refute these two statements by The Times, please can an editor present these for discussion?
I am of the view it is common ground that the Knox Group provided loans from offshore to UK based individuals that have subsequently become the subject of much debate. Dobsonstar (talk) 13:02, 10 September 2020 (UTC)
Lead paragraph
[edit]The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I'm conscious there have been a few reversions on this page so I thought I'd jump on here to discuss! As per guidelines, could we please reach consensus here on talk before making any further edits? These reversions have mainly concerned what should be in the lead paragraph of this biography.
I undid the previous revision as the content was duplicated in the lead paragraph and could be found below under the Knox Group subheading. I think with the current layout other users will more easily be able to find the information they are looking for as the page is divided into easy to read sections. Wikipedia MoS guidelines for opening paragraphs for biographies state they should establish notability, neutrally describe the person and provide context, which I believe the current lead paragraph does.
It provides Barrowman's name, DoB, context (such as location/nationality), the subject's noteworthy positions and why they themselves are notable. The guidelines also say when writing about controversies the relevant material should neither be suppressed nor allowed to overwhelm. I felt the details about his companies would fit better in the dedicated subheadings already on the page below. Can we come to a consensus as per the guidelines. Other views User:SeonaMillar, User:Dobsonstar? ScepticalChymist (talk) 16:29, 8 October 2020 (UTC)
- Hi ScepticalChymist, I tend to agree with you that the lead paragraph would be better to have his name, Dob, place etc. followed by reasons he is notable. In my view his notability / profile comes from being a businessperson who is involved in a number of high profile projects, and for his relationship with Baroness Mone. The high profile projects I note include VE Interactive ( which was once a Unicorn), several bitcoin projects that achieved national UK attention, and financial services where he ran an offshore contractor processing operation, which subsequently attracted national UK attention. It wouldn't be as an investor or for starting Knox group ( which is notable only for its other projects).
- I hope that is helpful & happy to help distill all the above into something suitable for the article.
- Thanks for reading
- Dobsonstar Dobsonstar (talk) 22:02, 9 October 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Dobsonstar, thank you very much for your response. I think we've reached consensus. Phew!
- I agree with you that the lead paragraph should include name, DOB, and the reasons why he is notable. All added below! With this in mind, I've written a new lead paragraph below to that effect. What do you think? I've taken your lead and included Ve, Aston Ventures and Equi (missed the importance of these, thanks!), and his relationship with Baroness Mone. We'll link to all these various other pages so people can find more info easily.
- I suggest we give discussion around controversies, etc, space to breath in the relevant section down the page, so we do not suppress or overwhelm as per guidelines. I think it would be difficult to get that into a single paragraph up top. We can give it more objective balance there.
- I've added businessman and Knox Group only because that's his present role, which would be strange to exclude I think. Let me know if you have any tweaks, otherwise, I'll get this new version live in 5 days.
- "Douglas Alan Barrowman (born March 1965) is a Scottish businessman and investor. He is the founder of the Knox Group of Companies. He has invested in or owned Ve Interactive, Aston Ventures, and Equi Capital. He is currently engaged to businesswoman Baroness Michelle Mone."
- Hi ScepticalChymist, firstly the opening paragraph should not consist of a list of parties aggrieved over a single issue which would be appropriately positioned in the relevant sub-paragraph. So its frustrating that another editor is continually removing more appropriate material to include these parties.
- In terms of tweaks, I could Suggest:
- Douglas Alan Barrowman (born March 1965) is a Scottish businessman and entrepreneur. He founded the Knox Group of Companies and has invested in Ve Interactive, Aston Ventures, and Equi Capital. He is currently engaged to businesswoman Baroness Michelle Mone
- But these are minor suggestions for inclusion or otherwise.
- Dobsonstar (talk) 14:05, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Dobsonstar, I think your edits make sense and are more appropriate for the lead paragraph. I'm going to leave the page as it is for 5 days and revisit next week for these changes. This will give any other editors some time to contribute if they like, but I think there's a way forward here. Thanks for your contribution! ScepticalChymist (talk) 17:56, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Dobsonstar, just to let you know that I have updated the Lead as agreed. ScepticalChymist (talk) 06:06, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
- Hi all. Often, it requires more than two users to make a consensus! If you find that content is being edited in favour of certain topics over other topics, it may be that such edited content is considered to have relatively more gravity and substance. Conversely, editing an article to highlight considerably more obscure and less significant matters, while removing other content supported by a wealth of cited publications, seems sinister or biased. And I do not recall myself removing others' substantive content regardless of how trivial such content might be. Best wishes. SeonaMillar (talk) 18:07, 23 October 2020 (UTC)
- Thanks SeonaMillar, appreciated. Thank you for joining the talk discussion.
- Consensus is reached on talk when nobody else contributes after a reasonable amount of time. I started a discussion and did invite you to contribute, but you reverted without contributing to the discussion on talk at all. A page is supposed to be held while a talk discussion is ongoing.
- I left the discussion open for a week before changing the text to the one agreed above. You then reverted without contributing to the discussion. I have reverted pending consensus here, as we're supposed to.
- As far as I can see, this is not a content dispute. The content that you added, which improves the page (thank you!), is under Knox Group. This is about the structure and format. Currently, we have a lead paragraph that is hugely long, doesn't really highlight notability effectively and is focussed on a single issue from a single company that isn't necessarily written from a NPOV.
- It seems much more sensible to leave the lead to the factual stuff that establishes notability, and then give the rest of the stuff space to be treated down the page.
- I hadn't even gone into the content before this, caring much more about the page not have a huge whooping paragraph at the top (to be honest!), but taking a look now, I think this might breach BLP too. Cannot see a reference to Barrowman in The Mirror article at all and BLP says avoid using primary sources, like parliamentary records, to support assertions.
- I have left these references on the page despite BLP saying to remove these immediately, and would ask other editors to input their opinions please.
- I can tell you want to improve this page Seona, but I see this is the only page you have ever edited. Collectively, we need to try our best not to edit for promotion or advocacy. That not only means ensuring that content is well sourced with reliable secondary sources, but that content is not added or presented in a partisan way. That's especially important for BLP.
- At all stages I have tried to assume best intentions with everyone else on the page, and I hope you will do the same with me. ScepticalChymist (talk) 15:00, 27 October 2020 (UTC)
Refusal of request for Third Opinion. Dear fellow editors; with apologies, I have removed this good-faith request because 3O is not used when, as here, more than two editors are involved. You might try WP:Requests for Comment, the dispute resolution noticeboard, or one of the other WP:Dispute resolution options. Regards, Springnuts (talk) 21:22, 10 March 2021 (UTC)
This came to my attention from the BLP noticeboard. The additions to the lead were certainly BLP violations, tacitly implying that the article subject was responsible for suicides. The lead itself is a quick summation of the article body, not a place to add more information than exists in the body itself. It's possible that the the Aston Management section could be expanded, but only with information from secondary sources. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 17:00, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
I recently reverted the lead paragraph because its under discussion here, but didn't put in my reason. Please accept my apologies. Dobsonstar Dobsonstar (talk) 08:58, 16 May 2021 (UTC)