User talk:ALZWikiEditor

November 2023

Hello, I'm Uhai. I wanted to let you know that one or more of your recent contributions to Alzheimer's Association have been undone because they did not appear constructive. If you would like to experiment, please use your sandbox. If you have any questions, you can ask for assistance at the Teahouse or the Help desk. Thanks. Uhai (talk) 23:24, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

Hello ALZWikiEditor. The nature of your edits, such as the one you made to Alzheimer's Association, gives the impression you have an undisclosed financial stake in promoting a topic, but you have not complied with Wikipedia's mandatory paid editing disclosure requirements. Paid advocacy is a category of conflict of interest (COI) editing that involves being compensated by a person, group, company or organization to use Wikipedia to promote their interests. Undisclosed paid advocacy is prohibited by our policies on neutral point of view and what Wikipedia is not, and is an especially serious type of COI; the Wikimedia Foundation regards it as a "black hat" practice akin to black-hat search-engine optimization.

Paid advocates are strongly discouraged from direct article editing, and should instead propose changes on the talk page of the article in question if an article exists. If the article does not exist, paid advocates are strongly discouraged from attempting to write an article at all. At best, any proposed article creation should be submitted through the articles for creation process, rather than directly.

Regardless, if you are receiving or expect to receive compensation for your edits, broadly construed, you are required by the Wikimedia Terms of Use to disclose your employer, client and affiliation. You can post such a mandatory disclosure to your user page at User:ALZWikiEditor. The template {{Paid}} can be used for this purpose – e.g. in the form: {{paid|user=ALZWikiEditor|employer=InsertName|client=InsertName}}. If I am mistaken – you are not being directly or indirectly compensated for your edits – please state that in response to this message. Otherwise, please provide the required disclosure. In either case, do not edit further until you answer this message. Uhai (talk) 23:24, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

I am not a "paid advociate" of the Alzheimer's Association. I'm an employee. We're attempting to maintain some control of what our Wikipedia page says. Please explain why you would revert the entire page and if the changes can be reverted again. ALZWikiEditor (talk) 23:34, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

Also note that the Alzheimer's Association is a nonprofit. ALZWikiEditor (talk) 23:35, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

You're an employee which means you're a paid advocate by the Wikimedia Foundation's definition. Whether your organization is nonprofit has no bearing. You need to follow the instructions above to disclose this and need to carefully read the linked pages regarding paid editing and conflict of interest. While I agree the quality of the article is poor and needs improvement, the changes you introduced were even more problematic in that they added external links to the article body, were unsourced, and were promotional and unencyclopedic in tone.

Because of your paid editing and conflict of interest, it is highly recommend your involvement with the article be circumscribed to edit requests on the article's talk page. Unfortunately your organization is not the owner of the encyclopedia article and therefore should not be attempting to maintain control over its content. If you make further edits—similar to what you have already done—to the page, they may be reverted again. Uhai (talk) 23:50, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

I have disclosed the "paid advocate" (employee) information on the noted page.

I've re-edited the entry. I've removed external links and attempted to reduce promotional tone. In the Achievements section, I've added more recent ones and they're from the same cited source as all of the others in that section. I removed photos that are outdated and likely should've have been there in the first place.

These changes have been made to correct incorrect or outdated information. For example, when the page was reverted yesterday, it even took away the updated Association logo (the one currently on the page is no longer in use). A couple of the events currently listed don't exist.

We understand the policy and have attempted to make corrections. While we understand the policy, we ask for some discretion in applying it because, as stated, we are just attempting to have correct and up-to-date information. We understand we are not "the owner" but do want accurate, current information on this page. That is all we're attempting.

If there are further issues with the content, please advise as to what we can change rather than reverting the entire page to old content.

As directed, I've replied to this message and then re-edited and published. ALZWikiEditor (talk) 15:51, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm trying really hard not to revert again but it's quite difficult. It looks like there's been some sentences or paragraphs copied or closely paraphrased from pages from your website according to this report. This is unacceptable per WP:COPYPASTE and WP:PARAPHRASE. I've now had to scrub the most obvious instances from the article. What else did you copy and paste that I missed?

On a related note, everything you added is referenced using primary sources, when secondary sources are preferred on Wikipedia. Media coverage of your organization from reliable news organizations would be a good place to start for updating and fleshing out the article.

I have also removed the registered trademark symbols as these aren't allowed per the fifth bullet point of MOS:TMRULES. You'll notice you do not see these on other organizations' articles except in maybe logo images.

Also, is only one person using this account? The careful phrasing of the disclosure on your user page along with your use of the word "we" makes me concerned that it may be being shared. Per WP:NOSHARING, shared accounts are not permitted. It would be nice if your username better indicated this, such as "(name) at ALZ". In short, there should be no "we" or "us"; only "I" or "me". Uhai (talk) 22:19, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

We will work on secondary sources. In the interim, we ask that you please consider not reverting any further.

In general, is the expectation that I should take a paragraph and change a few words around so that it's not copied/pasted? Or to use a media article to explain what, say, Walk to End Alzheimer's is? Our assumption was that since this is our information it would be fine to present it on the page, as it is factual and current.

I appreciate you pointing out things like the registered trademark.

I would like to point out that you removed the Achievements section. I actually am fine with that but please note that I did not add that section. It was already there long before I attempted to edit the page -- I just added a few new achievements from the same source as the others. So at some point, that content passed someone's inspection.

The username was created due to the possibility of me not being the editor of this page moving forward. It seemed logical to create an account that someone could take over for me. Given what you've indicated, should I no longer serve as the Association's editor of this page I will instruct the next person of the policy and have them create their own username that is more along the lines of what you suggest.

In instances where I said "we," that meant the Association. I've shared your messages with my supervisor, so "we" (the Association/employees) understand, etc. ALZWikiEditor (talk) 23:05, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately I am obligated to revert as long as there are issues that require such action. As the conflict of interest guideline indicates, I'd like to again emphasize that it is highly discouraged that you edit the article directly and instead limit your actions to edit requests. Doing so would also allow the editors who review them to fix potential issues regarding Wikipedia policies or guidelines or the manual of style before the changes are made.

As far as adding information to pages from sources, changing a few words usually is not sufficient as it would still be considered close paraphrasing. WP:FIXCLOSEPARA contains useful information for how to paraphrase source content correctly. Using a media article to explain what Walk to End Alzheimer's is would be ideal as we strive to use independent references. Such sources can help with bias and reliability, as WP:INDEPENDENT states. Ideally the article would contain no sources from your company's website(s) at all.

You are correct regarding the Achievements section. I apologize for the misattribution.

Finally, that is the correct action to take regarding the account: each new, individual editor will need their own account, so if your employment ends no one but you should still have access to or use of the account. Role accounts such as "Marketing Manager at XYZ Inc." are not permitted and account names must indicate that they belong to an individual person. Your account name is a little borderline but I don't think a name change is necessary in this instance. Uhai (talk) 23:40, 10 November 2023 (UTC)