User talk:Vantongern959

Welcome!

Hi Vantongern959, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like it here and decide to stay. Our intro page provides helpful information for new users—please check it out! If you have any questions, you can get help from experienced editors at the Teahouse. Happy editing! Nat Gertler (talk) 20:34, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

BLP and the Galerie

On my talk page, you said "May I ask why you continue to suppress fully-sourced material on the 'Galerie Gmurzynska' page, citing WP:BLPCRIME concerns?" You will find an explanation of that at Talk:Galerie Gmurzynska#BLPCRIME concerns. Instead of trying to repeatedly re-add material to a page that has been stable for months, please join the conversation on that talk page and find consensus before readding. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 20:39, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

Is Wikipedia supposed to provide information or stability? Your aim is to make pages that don't change, rather than pages that inform? Vantongern959 (talk) 21:28, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

PS. you do realise that those trying to remove the material are employees of the organisation?! Vantongern959 (talk) 21:31, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

My aim is to make pages that conform to our standards, which include the guidelines at WP:BLPCRIME. And yes, I'm aware that User:GGLibrarian has stated their conflict of interest, and would not be surprised if previous editors had conflicts as well. Suggesting or requesting edits while stating one's conflict is considered appropriate. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 21:36, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. With apologies, I am still unclear. Who arbitrates, ultimately? It is clear that the organisation does not want that material on Wikipedia even if it were inscribed on stone by Moses himself. Am I expected to engage in debate with someone coming from that standpoint? What is the point in that? Are you not neutral, in whhich case surely the quality of the sources speaks for itself, along with Wikipedia's responsibility to inform. I note that the complete version of this page was also "stable" for a long time until GG noticed bad news to try to bury again. Vantongern959 (talk) 23:55, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

Stability does not mean that you don't make changes; it does mean that if those changes get challenged, your next step is to enter into discussion, per our Bold, Revert, Discuss cycle. For the most part "arbitration" is by consensus and discussions that focus on our standards and how they apply in a situation. Wikipedia does not have a responsibility to inform; it has a goal to inform and a responsibility to do so responsibly. Toward that end, it has created a large set of guidelines and procedures, many of which are there to define what "responsibly" means in context. The "quality of the sources" do not overflow our standards; our goal is not to repeat everything that is in "quality" sources. I am a neutral party with regards to the Galerie; I am pro-Wikipedia, if one wishes to view that as not neutral. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 00:11, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Thank you @NatGertler for making me aware of this discussion.

As for its merits, I feel that the question whether or not people have been aware of my affiliation to Galerie Gmurzynska is beside the point insofar all edits have been handled via an express conflict of interest declaration.

Speaking as part of Galerie Gmurzynska it seems fairly obvious that of course any organization would much prefer to have as little public discussion of "controversies" as possible, however, that I - as in: the natural person working in that library - have been tasked with leading that discussion was partly due to the fact that I hold great sympathies to the general task of Wikipedia, which is also why I wanted to stress again why the changes seemed relevant and why I had advocated for them in the way that I had.

I do _not_ think that the goal of Wikipedia is to inform everyone of every pertinent discussion in any field, especially not indiscriminately.

However, I also do not think - seeing how I am employed by the Galerie and all - that I can be a proper judge of these discussions, as OBVIOUSLY I have a conflict of interest in this regard.

Which is why I have picked up on Nat Gertler's suggestion from way back to stubify the article. The "stability" of the article was mostly due to the fact that people simply had stopped edit-warring over it, rather than the result of any form of consensus or acceptable standards.

The basic argument is this - since you rightly bring up that Wikipedia should NOT be an advertisement platform, the same goes obviously for adverserial advertisement. Which is to say that also actors that have a vested interest in smearjobs should not necessarily be the ones editing pages.

I have made a somewhat long argument on the talk page about how the bias in presenting those sources clearly trumps the quality of those sources (And I would neither argue that the New York Times NOR the NLR are not quality sources, in fact I hold both in sort of high esteem) in that they are presented not to create a clear picture but a specific picture with a specific goal.

The Stubifying of the article seemed warranted as there didn't seem to be a high interest to clean up the article from disinterested sources, and one part of the interested ones (namely, the Galerie) clearly had reasoned objections to this state, yet should not write the article themselves... however, by the precisely same token this should also not be done by people who have the goal to turn this into an attack page in mind.

Now, while you do not have declared a Conflict of Interest I cannot help but notice that your lofty ideal of maintaining a level of critical engagement of Wikipedia is EXCLUSIVELY focused on the Galerie Page and is at this point ongoing for basically a decade. I have a somewhat hard time to believe that there shouldn't be a COI declaration that is missing, but even if I assume for the sake of the argument that there wasn't all the points I had made that had lead to the change of the article in the first place still hold true, which is why I obviously advocate for the very same thing as before.

I hope that explains this situation a bit.

Best, GGLibrarian (talk) 10:19, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

While I was willing to answer specific questions here about how Wikipedia works, may I suggest that any further discussion of the editing of the page be on the article's Talk page, where any other interested parties can see it? -- Nat Gertler (talk) 14:29, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Absolutely. My bad.

Best, GGLibrarian (talk) 14:59, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

October 2023

Hi Vantongern959! I noticed that you have reverted to restore your preferred version of Galerie Gmurzynska several times. The impulse to undo an edit you disagree with is understandable, but I wanted to make sure you're aware that the edit warring policy disallows repeated reversions even if they are justifiable.

All editors are expected to discuss content disputes on article talk pages to try to reach consensus. If you are unable to agree at Talk:Galerie Gmurzynska, please use one of the dispute resolution options to seek input from others. Using this approach instead of reverting can help you avoid getting drawn into an edit war. Thank you. Nat Gertler (talk) 16:04, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Thank you Nat. As nobody has responded to my comments on the talk pages for that article, I have requested a dispute resolution. I hope I have done so correctly, it seems very complicated. Vantongern959 (talk) 22:46, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

I did not see your comments there until now, because you placed them not in any existing conversation, nor in a new section at the bottom of the page (which is where new comments are supposed to go ) This applies to user Talk pages as well, and I have already moved your comments on my Talk page to a new section on the bottom, and have now repositioned the material you placed on the article Talk page as a response to the bottom discussion one the page, as that would seem where it was intended for. Please let me know if I have placed it incorrectly. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 23:43, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

Hi Nat. Thank you for doing that. Honestly, there are so many rules and technicalities; I wil do my best to follow whatever the protocol is, but obviously I am just a joe public Wikipedia user, not a technician or trained editor so I may need some guidance. Vantongern959 (talk) 00:18, 21 October 2023 (UTC)

Depending on the device you're using, at the top of every talk page you might see a tab marked "New section". Clicking that will allow you to start a new discussion in the appropriate location. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 20:54, 21 October 2023 (UTC)

Sock puppetry

I see by your request for a third opinion that you believe that the "Librarian" has been making recent article edits. As those appears to be the edits that I've been making, it seems possible that you believe that the "Librarian" and I are the same person. I can tell you that that is not the case (it isn't), but I also recognize that if you feel that I/we are engaging in such subterfuge, I would probably not be beyond lying further in that regard. If the two accounts are the same person, "we" would be in violation of the guidelines about editing with a conflict of interest, and probably the policies with regard to paid editing. If you feel that you have sufficient evidence to prove that both accounts are run by the same person, the proper place to report that would be our page for "Sock puppet investigations. Should it be sufficiently shown that the two counts are similarly controlled, then sanctions against me for paid editing are likely easily achieved.

Barring that, however, I ask that you not depict the two accounts as if they were the same. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 17:52, 21 October 2023 (UTC)

Touch of paranoia here I think Nat. I am quite clear that you are a designated Wikipedia censor and "Librarian" is an employee of Galerie Gmurzynska, paid to clean up their image and keep the public in ignorance of their murky dealings. Vantongern959 (talk) 10:25, 24 October 2023 (UTC)