- In stating "if you are being paid for your contributions to Wikipedia... you should not directly edit mainspace" this essay goes too far, and continues to devalue the contributions of people like me: a university professor who, as part of my job, is expected to perform some level of community service, who chooses to do that service updating Wikipedia, and whose raises and promotions depend (in a very minor way) on that service, but who is not directed by anyone to edit specific articles. You should be more careful in distinguishing people who edit Wikipedia for self-serving reasons from people who edit Wikipedia as a form of public service, regardless of which of either of those two groups of people are paid for it. —David Eppstein (talk) 02:16, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- User:David Eppstein we have this Q and A which addresses your situation [1]. It specifically says for professors "you are only required to comply with the disclosure provision when you are compensated by your employer or by a client specifically for edits and uploads to a Wikimedia project". The paid editing discussion above does not appear to apply to you as your employer is not directing your edits. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:06, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- The paid editing policy may not apply to me, but this poorly-worded paid editing essay fails to make that clear. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:12, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- It begins with if you are being paid "in exchange for creating or editing a Wikipedia article for an individual or entity". In this case best practice is not to edit directly in mainspace. We need to keep seperate those involved with paid promotional editing and those who are a WiR with a like minded organizations or are doing community service on Wikipedia. Muddying the two just protects those who would do Wikipedia and by extension our readers harm. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:06, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- It may begin that way, but the part I explicitly quoted in the comment above, the one you replied to, uses a different and more vague definition of paid editing. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:16, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- In my opinion, that first bit continues to be implied throughout the rest of the piece. But yes maybe it could have been clearer. Have taken the liberty to emphasize this. The author of the piece is free to revert if they have concerns. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:23, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- WP:COI states "... you are very strongly discouraged from editing affected articles directly". This is fair enough, and has been the stance we've held for many years. The policy is not "you should not directly edit mainspace" as was written here. While it is discouraged, and it can create problems, if a paid editor has fully disclosed their relationship to the client they are not prevented from editing mainspace, even though we might rather they didn't. - Bilby (talk) 03:10, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- @Bilby: Not disputing that is what COI states and that what is written above is incorrect, but in practice, there is a consensus (in terms of actions, not necessarily discussion) that paid editors shouldn't directly edit articles. This is distinguishing between an employee of a company who edits their article in their free time and at nobody's request, with someone being paid specifically to create content, often with a promotional angle. There does seem to have been a shift in opinion in recent years that we would prefer paid editors work to be reviewed prior to being in mainspace. SmartSE (talk) 12:44, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- I am concerned the the above signpost article is, as you say, incorrect. If we are going to give advice - especially through something like the Signpost - it seems important that we are accurate. If the practice is now to ban paid editors from directly editing articles, (something which has always been opposed by the community when it has been asked of them, or at least something which has failed to find consensus), then the guideline needs to be changed, rather than simply giving people advice which does not match current policies or guidelines, especially when the incorrect claim states outright that it is "per the WP:COI guideline" when this is clearly false. Those writing this should know better. - Bilby (talk) 14:51, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Smartse and Bilby: There seems to be a couple of misunderstandings in these latest comments.
- First, This is an essay from Wikipedia's current collection of essays, not something written specifically for The Signpost. It's at Wikipedia:Paid editing (essay). I was hoping that would be clear from the introduction:
Paid editing is a topic that comes to the forefront every six months or so, after the latest horrendous disclosures. This essay is part of our continuing series of influential essays on Wikipedia. It was begun in January 2011 and 38 editors have contributed to it. - S
It wouldn't do any good for me to edit this page - the essay itself would be unchanged. But, of course, you can change the essay itself, the same as anybody can.
- 2nd - the disputed text has always been difficult for most people to parse. What is the difference between "You should not ..." and "You are strongly discouraged from ..." or even "You cannot ...". Not much, in most everyday discussions IMHO. Perhaps the difference changes when we are talking about policies vs. guidelines vs. essays. "Should not" seems natural and accurate in this essay IMHO.
- 3rd - this type of fine-parsing of the text does not actually define the policy - according to Wikipedia policy! Policy really depends on the generally accepted practice of what the policy writers were trying to express. I think Jimbo's "bright line rule" (which is not even a written policy, but a "best practice") is the actual policy followed by ethical paid editors these days. A couple of months ago there was a kerfuffle about a declared paid editor doing too much "editing" or was it "too much armtwisting"? All the editors in the discussion, including the named paid editor and a couple of other paid editors just accepted the bright-line rule as the starting point of the discussion. It looks like an accepted policy to me at this point. Maybe it's time to get it into the written policy. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:16, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Fair enough. A link would have helped and I hope you don't mind that I've added one. I've also changed this and the essay - while I can see where you are coming from, if anythiing is presented as "per a guideline" it seems logical that this should not misrepresent the guideline. As I mentioned before, whether this is what is done in practice is neither here nor there and this is probably not the place to decide whether it really should be forbidden or just strongly discouraged. SmartSE (talk) 16:39, 31 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
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