User:Z1720/RE Instructions

These instructions are for users to assess edit requests for editors with a conflict of interest. Users completing requests should be moderately experienced with wiki markup and knowledgable about Wikipedia's conflict of interest policy, notability guidelines and what Wikipedia is not. Completing edit requests is not recommended for new users. If you have any questions, please post on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Edit requests.

Assess the conflict of interest

Editors using {{request edit}} are required to declare if they have a simple conflict of interest or if they are a paid editor. They do not need to disclose specifics of their relationship with the article's topic unless they are being paid to edit the article. For example, an editor can say they have a conflict of interest, but they do not need to disclose if they are a family member or friend of the person. If you are unsure of how the requester is connected to the article, please ask them. Do not complete requests until the type of COI is disclosed.

If the requester has a simple conflict of interest, please post the {{Connected contributor}} template as the last banner at the top of the talk page.. Please encourage the requester to post a {{UserboxCOI}} on their userpage.

If the requester was paid to edit the article, they must disclose their employer, client, and affiliations. This disclosure may be posted on their user page, as part of the edit request, as a banner at the top of the page or in the edit summary. Do not add any content from a paid editor who has not made this disclosure. Instead, ask the requester to read WP:COI and WP:PAID carefully and inform them that they cannot propose changes until their paid status is properly disclosed. If their paid status has been disclosed, please add the {{Connected contributor (paid)}} template as the last banner at the top of the talk page.

Assess the text

Uncontroversial requests

Although many conflict of interest editors may make malformed edit requests, often such requests are made in good faith. Often this is because they merely are interested in updating the article on the subject, not promoting it. It should be noted while Wikipedia policy does advise the editors responding to edit requests should look for their own independent sources, this is not always necessary. This is sometimes the case when an editor with a conflict of interest is requesting is uncontroversial and could not possibly give undue weight. Specifically, when the conflict of interest editor is asking for an update of the article, or another improvement that would not cause controversy (typically an edit that would add facts that have context). Such edits are made by editors with conflicts of interest that merely are interested in updating the article, as said before.

Usually, uncontroversial requests such described consist of:

Updates to statistics relating to the article, such as financial or membership statistics
Updates of dead links
Updates to the logo, where the image has already been uploaded to a Wikimedia site and copyright is attributed.

Assessing the proposed changes

No matter how uncontriversial a proposed change might be, the neutrality of the changes always need to be assessed. In addition, editors need to be careful not give undue weight to the subject of the article. Next, the reliability of the sources needs to be also assessed. Typically, a good requested edit will have a mix of primary sources (from the company) and secondard sources (e.g. from newspapers). If the requested edit satisfies WP:NPOV and WP:RS, it is probably fine to implement it.

Quick declines

Edit requests may be quickly declined if one of the following is met:

The article is a draft: Editors with a conflict of interest may edit drafts on their own. When they submit a draft an editor at WP:AfC will assess the draft for notability and promotional languauge. COI editors must submit drafts through AfC and cannot move them to the mainspace themselves.
The COI editor does not clearly state what they want added or changed: If you are unable to figure out what the editor wants to add or change in the article, decline the request and ask them to resubmit with more information. Note: a request should never be declined because it is badly formatted or is not in wikitext. If you can fix the formatting, please do so as you add the information to the article. You can also ask the COI editor to post the exact text they want to see in the article.
The COI editor does not give reliable sources: The Wikipedia community determined the reliability of various sources at WP:RS/P (general list), WP:A/S (music) and WP:VG/S (video games). If the given source is not reliable, or a source is not provided, decline the request.
Copyright infringement: If the requested text is copied from a source, you must decline it and tag the talk page for a WP:REVDEL using {{copyvio-revdel}}.
COI editor doesn't respond: If the COI editor does not respond to questions, you may decline the request and encourage the COI editor to reopen it when they return. Please give editors at least a week to respond, and give more time during holidays (such as the end of December).

Remember: Reviewers should always explain why they decline a request. This allows the COI editor to fix the problem in their next request.

Old instructions (reference)

Do not insert major re-writes or controversial requests without clear consensus. When these are requested, ask the submitter to discuss the edits instead with regular contributors on the article's talk page. You can use {{request edit|D|D}}.
Please check the suggested content for copying from existing sources as an initial task – copyright infringement is a pervasive problem and it is not only important that we don't host such material, but it often leads to significant additional work when not caught early. One way to search for them is to copy and paste into a search engine such as Google (between quotation marks) a limited but unique portion of the suggested text, and try a few such snippets from each paragraph. See also this tool. Also check the sources provided for the accompanying citations for copying from them (if sources are not provided, that will often be a separate basis to deny the requested edit).
If the submission contains material that has been copied from elsewhere and the source is not released under a suitable free license or into the public domain, immediately decline the request as a copyright violation. The talk page itself may need to be cleaned of the infringements from the requested edit, though this is not nearly as important as doing so in articles – and not becoming the tool of infringement by placing requested edits that are violations without checking. If you need to clean up an infringement, the copyvio section at the "quick fail" reviewing instructions at Articles for Creation may be useful by analogy (click "show" in the pink bar).
Reviewers must make sure that the proposed edit does not violate NPOV, and in particular UNDUE. The Wikipedia article must reflect, both in content and tone, the body of high-quality, independent literature that exists on the subject in question, not only the sources the submitter has offered.
Be on the look-out for cherry-picking, for the omission of material or sources, for the misrepresentation of a source's tone, and for the use of source material out of context. Be vigilant about omissions and tone when a paid editor proposes a major rewrite of a contentious article or section of an article.
If the edit is reverted, it is by definition controversial, so do not revert back.
Copyright attribution: Not only should you check for copyright problem with the suggested edit, per above, but if you implement a request you need to provide copyright attribution, since you are making an edit as a proxy for someone else. This is done by attributing the changes/additions to the editor who made the request, with their username hyperlinked. The best and easiest way to do this is in the edit summary accompanying your implementation. A suggested edit summary form to do so: "Content changes/additions per edit request on [[Talk:Name of page|talk page]] by [[User:Name of user]]."