Talk:Ripoff Report/Archives/2016

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For the user that keeps deleting everything

Instead of deleting everything, simply saying that "all the revisions are inappropriate", would you please explain your reasons here?

If you think there are sentences that don't represent real facts, we can definitely fix the issue. Removing everything, sources included, doesn't seem a cooperative behavior. --5.170.97.167 (talk) 21:59, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Your version of the article is full of violations of the BLP and WP:NPOV polices. To cite one (of many) examples, 'nothing would prevent RipoffReport.com's webmaster from writing reports and claiming they were written by anonymous users.' is massively inappropriate for a wikipedia article. By 'removing everything' I was fixing the issues. - MrOllie (talk) 01:50, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

When Ripoff Report claims that Larry Page and Sergey Brin, as well as an MIT professor, are all molesters (read the source, that is Ripoff Report itself) the authors of these undocumented "reports" always have fictitious names. There is no guarantee that an external user has actually written that stuff. It's a fact. BLP and NPOV have nothing to do with this. --5.170.98.127 (talk) 20:10, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Also, even assuming the "report" has been written by an external user, when the webmaster modifies the content — e.g. changing "Sergey Brin" into "Sonei Bonoi" — radically altering the original report, he is actually writing a new report, because the (hypothetical) external user didn't request that modification.

In any case, I have deleted the sentence that you didn't like. --5.170.98.127 (talk) 20:21, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Dear IP user, you also need to consider WP:ORIGINAL that prohibits original research. It's all very well trawling through archive.org to find inconsistencies, but this counts as original research and is not allowed. It sounds weird, but Wikipedia is not a newspaper or research publication in itself, but it does cite those sorts of things as reliable sources. If you can find a reliable source that makes the same point then you can cite that, otherwise just re-adding the same material is going to start a pointless edit war. 23:58, 2 August 2016 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shritwod (talk • contribs)

There is no "original research": the content is the "Ripoff Report" website itself. Also, what this Wikipedia article said was incorrect: it is false that reports must not (or cannot) be deleted. In fact, Page&Brin is one of the many examples (there is no need to add a long list). You just have to read the Ripoff Report website, without doing any research. --5.170.98.155 (talk) 02:08, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

Also, Archive.org has always been used on Wikipedia when external references disappear: if it counted "as original research and is not allowed" thousands of sources (or maybe hundreds of thousands) should be removed too. This source (a former RoR webpage) is directly related to the topic of the article and directly supports the material being presented, so it is not original research as per paragraph #1 of WP:ORIGINAL. --5.170.98.155 (talk) 02:42, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't see the value of the examples presented in the Reports and rebuttals section. I don't understand what academic purpose is being served by printing to a global readership the names of people who were accused of harassing teenage girls or of being a pedophile extortionist. It seems like there is significant potential for defamation here, with little in the way of academic return. If we're trying to make a point that anyone can be accused of anything by anybody, that can be said more succinctly, and with references to news articles, which would be better sources than juicy shade at the subject's website. It also seems odd to me that you're delivering a value judgment about Ripoff Report, i.e. that they have contradicted their own policies. This rings of WP:SYNTHESIS, where source A says one thing source B says another, and a conclusion is drawn that isn't stated by either source. We don't know why the data was changed. Maybe the site got hacked/corrupted. Who knows. To say that they contradicted themselves is speculative. If a newspaper made the observation and drew the conclusion, that would be a stronger argument for inclusion. But to do what you did does very much strike me as original research per Shritwod's note. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 03:40, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

I agree that the examples (which includes notable people though — we are omitting many more non-notable examples) are not "academic", but the problem here is the article says that reports cannot be deleted in any case, which is false. Maybe the site got hacked (unlikely in this case, but technically possible)? Well, the webmaster could have re-added the same report, preferably without modifying it, which didn't happen. The bottom line is: the report has been removed.-- 5.170.103.238 (talk) 10:17, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

Rebuttals must be approved

Why did Collect delete the fact that rebuttals must be approved? The mechanism is very simple:

1. a company must sign up
2. they submit a "rebuttal"
3. the rebuttal is read by a moderator
4. if the moderator approves it, an email confirms that the rebuttal has been published.

--5.170.99.27 (talk) 00:44, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

I would note that every single website has the same rule (the ability to decline or remove any post), and appears legally bound to have that rule. Unless you have a reliable source indicating that the specific site has improperly used such an approval process, the claim is of nil value. I point out that Wikipedia, for example, can remove any post from visibility (even of administrators), and makes that ability known. Collect (talk) 12:50, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

You didn't understand: rebuttals must be approved before being published. It has nothing to do with your answers and there are no legal issues. --5.170.128.214 (talk) 17:28, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

fee based on number of complaints

Forbes op cit:

Criticized firms can pay a flat fee based on the volume of complaints received about them.

Seems quite clear. Kindly revert your removal of the statement that fees depend on number of complaints involved. Collect (talk) 13:02, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

From flat fee (and Oxford dictionary): "A charge or level of payment that is the same in all cases". So, a "flat fee", by definition, doesn't depend on a number. Since that statement is contradictory, I'll remove it. --5.170.128.214 (talk) 17:23, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

And a "flat fee per complaint" is a valid use of "flat fee". By the way, Wikipedia is never a valid source for any Wikipedia article. Thus one can charge a "flat fee per complaint" as a perfectly valid use of the term. Next cavil? This is from the Forbes source:

Criticized firms can pay a flat fee based on the volume of complaints received about them. It can be as low as $5,500 but some firms have paid more than $100,000.

If you hate the wording, write to Forbes. Collect (talk) 19:42, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Are you able to read an English dictionary, or a math primer? LOL: "Wikipedia is never a valid source for any Wikipedia article"... too bad the article (which you didn't even read) begins with a definition taken from a dictionary. --5.170.128.200 (talk) 06:54, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a source for Wikipedia articles. Dictionaries are good sources for meanings of English words. By the way, "presto.news" does not meet WP:RS. Collect (talk) 09:29, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

And with regard to Wikipedia never deleting anything see "Category:Wikipedia_legal_policies"

Legal policies are there for a reason, and are found on essentially all such websites. Collect (talk) 13:02, 7 August 2016 (UTC)