Wikipedia:Corporations and the Community

Sometimes, a corporation or public figure's desire to keep their Wikipedia pages up to date syncs with the interests of the Wikipedia community to keep information on articles as accurate as possible. Unfortunately, there are frequently issues with this:

• The corporation or public figure assigns an employee to make the corrections, without bothering to read Wikipedia's policies (particularly WP:Conflict of interest).
• The employee does as he is ordered, but is noted as having a conflict of interest because of his username or writing biases. Oftentimes he is unaware of the relevant policy.
• The community, through administrators, blocks the user but leaves him more or less in the dark about how to resolve the situation. This causes assumption of bad faith on both sides and puts the employee's job in danger.

This page is intended to be a brief primer for corporations, employees of same, and the Wikipedia community to resolve situations like this with as little mistrust as possible.

Corporations and Public Figures

1. Wikipedia is made up entirely of volunteers, who tend to react poorly towards paid editors, not least because such editors generally make mistakes that don't match an encyclopedic, neutral tone. If you send in an employee, make sure you and he have read all of Wikipedia's content and conduct policies first to understand what the employee will need to do in order to do his job. Of particular note are Wikipedia:Biographies of living people#Relationship between the subject, the article, and Wikipedia and Wikipedia:Five Pillars.
   • Also note that per the updated Terms of use for all Wikimedia Foundation websites, any employee you send in must publicly disclose both that they are being paid to edit and their employer. Not disclosing this is grounds for a block upon discovery.
2. There is a volunteer response team, often referred to as OTRS, who handles requests from article subjects regarding factual inaccuracies in their articles. See Wikipedia:Contact us/Article problem for more information. An email to them will generally be far more effective than an employee editor will, but it should be used as a last resort.
3. Don't assume an edit won't be traced back to you in some form. WikiScanner and other tools can be used to trace an edit to its originating IP. This could result in some negative press if the edit was overly positive.
4. Wikipedia does not acquiesce to your schedule. While we do wish to see errors corrected, we don't appreciate being pressured to do so. In general, edits will only be accepted when they're ready to be accepted, not when you or your employees deem it convenient.
5. Do not assume your edits will be seen in a good light, especially if it looks like you're attempting to game the system or otherwise exploit Wikipedia. See Conflict-of-interest editing of Wikipedia#Incidents for the consequences of such editing.

Employee Editors

1. You must disclose your employer. See the note about the Terms of Use above.
2. Wikipedia:Plain and simple conflict of interest guide is an excellent starting point for employee editors as it explains most of Wikipedia's policies with respect to your job in a nutshell. (In fact, the page was created expressly for that purpose.) Wikipedia:Expectations and norms of the Wikipedia community is also extremely helpful as it describes the social aspect of Wikipedia for beginners.
3. The neutrality policy is a Wikimedia Foundation directive and not negotiable. Be sure to read it thoroughly, as most editors with a conflict of interest can't see the biases inherent in their writing - but other editors and readers can, and you may be blocked for it.
4. Do not choose a username that represents your employers. These usernames are generally blocked on sight as public-relations or shared accounts.
5. Use article talk pages. Wikipedia runs on collaboration and discussion, and you are far less likely to be reverted and blocked if you use the talk page to help hammer out your edit(s) first.
6. If you're blocked, you will need to demonstrate that you are willing and able to edit articles unrelated to your employer as a condition of unblocking. You can do this by finding an article about a subject that interests you, copying it to your user talk page (which you can still edit while blocked) and making corrections and other positive edits to it.

The Community and Administrators

1. Assume good faith - as much as you are able to, at least. Odds are the person behind the edit hasn't read up on the relevant policies yet because he's got a deadline.
2. Explain and educate a user after blocking him. Don't just leave a block notice, leave an explanation as to why they were blocked as well as what would need to be satisfied for an unblock.
3. Maintain a gentle tone. Don't be aggressive in your word choice.