Wikipedia talk:Spam/Archive 2

message: I just want to double check on something. I looked through this page, and found no reference to one's user page. There was a brief mention of the talk page for a user (I assume), but nothing on a user page itself. I just want to know if self promotion is permitted on a user page. I'm thinking about making some changes and expanding my user page further with regards to my interests which will include a larger amount of self promotion to what is already there. I'm also toying with the idea of doing a template for personal "upcoming events". Again - on a user page would this be spamming or not? I know it wouldn't be on a Wikipedia article (and fair enough as well) but I want to be given the proper guidance on the conduct of my user page when it comes to such things. Curse of Fenric 05:22, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not 100% sure but I think that should be ok.  As long as you play nice, most anything is allowed in userspace.  The better place to look for an answer to this question is probably our user page policy though --T-rex 22:58, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't know about that.  WP:USER#What can I not have on my user page? states "Generally, you should avoid substantial content on your user page that is unrelated to Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a general hosting service, so your user page is not a personal homepage. Your page is about you as a Wikipedian."  I have seen user pages get deleted under MfD for having too much promotional content that has nothing to do with Wikipedia. Probably best to avoid this stuff.  I do believe, however, that it is okay to have a link to your personal website, which I see you have done.  -- Satori Son 00:41, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Double checking

message: I would like to factor the section on Canvassing to its own page, for example Wikipedia:Canvassing.  Discuss. —Quarl (talk) 2006-10-12 07:58Z
*I believe the term "talk page spam" sees more use than "canvassing". Why do you want to split them? >Radiant< 08:55, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Factor canvassing 

message: if I want to put in an external link that has good information on the subject, am I right in thinking that I should put it at the bottom of the list and contribute to the page by adding some information that's relavant
*Yes. Also, please consider whether your link is a reliable source (e.g. not someone random guy's blog). >Radiant< 08:05, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  external links 

message: I recently added an external link to a magazine website that is a good source of information for the topic page I was visiting on Wikipedia. It was removed and I was told to refer to the guidelines, which I read extensively. It seems that linking to a website, such as magazine that focuses on a specific content subject would be a relevant resource. Thoughts? — Preceding unsigned comment added by LFW (talk • contribs) 2006-10-16T19:36:49
:Who knows? It's hard to say when you've given us little to go on — what link, what article? Thanks/wangi 19:47, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Offshore magazine (if that's the link you mean) appears to be light on content, at least without a subscription, so I expect it was deemed as having little useful free content.  Decency should have obliged the reverter to give some indication why they thought it unworthy, but a high volume of spam links have wearied many editors.  (Perhaps a new summary acronym should be used:  rvsl.)  — EncMstr 19:49, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Might actully be http://www.laserfocusworld.com/ looking through contribs... I'd say it's rather light too... Thanks/wangi 20:01, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: An untitled question

message: When an editor puts  on a page and then the page gets fixed, who's responsability is it to take that off the page?
And if it's the editor in question, what does one do if this editor has been subsequently blocked indefinitely?— Preceding unsigned comment added by User:Mgrant0 (talk • contribs) 
:Ideally the person who fixes the page should remove the tag, but its not a big deal - anyone can do it as long as the problem has been dealt with. -- — Moondyne 10:19, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  who's job is it to remove the <nowiki>{{advert}}</nowiki> tag from the page? 

message: From the phrasing, it would appear acceptable to contact people on the grounds that they've editted a certain page, or editted it quite a bit, as long as it's POV neutral -- but is it?  Goldfritha 23:14, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, from my reading it is acceptable. But only so long as it is done neutrally, that is without regard for their expressed or suspected opinions. In other words, don't contact past editors selectively. Derex 23:22, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Votestacking

message: This is a topic that really isn't covered by this policy, but should be.  Rather then spam all pages just looking for google ranks, many spamers look for somewhat related articles and then just add their site to the list of external links at the bottom.  Granted, about 5% of the time these links are probably appropriate, but the vast majority of the time they are not.  Obvouslly the defacto policy is against this, but it would be easier to deal with spammers if we had a section of this page that delt more directly with this situation.  any thoughts? --T-rex 15:31, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm going to rewrite this to clarify things.  I don't see anything remotly contriversal, but if so let me know --T-rex 19:47, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Your improvements look good to me.  -- Satori Son 20:13, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: External link spam, wihout bots

message: It appears that Jericho (TV series) has been the target of a mis-directed promotional campaign from CBS.  The page is now semi-protected. See Talk:Jericho (TV series).  It also seems that  is a dedicated spam account operated by the producers/writers/publicists, and had created some (now deleted) articles Jennings and Rall and Ravenwood Solutions (see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ravenwood Solutions).  I'm just drawing attention to other admins in case they pop up again. -- Chuq 12:46, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Jericho (TV series) spam 

message: To get an idea of the thinking behind wiki spammers, you may want to take a look at a couple of posts on this forum. There is a lot of discussion on how to get external links to stick on wikipedia.
Here are a couple of interesting threads . . .
*Link on Wikipedia
*How to get a link from en.wikipedia.org ?
If you pay attention, it's possible to match up some of the posters to actual spam. ScottW 00:33, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That was some fascinating reading - thanks for the links.  A few of them seem to have a genuine understanding of what Wikipedia is, at least, and take a win/win angle.  Others, not so much.  I need to start checking citation links more carefully.  :)  Kuru talk 03:41, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, it was interesting to see that some people legitimately didn't know that spamming wikipedia was frowned upon. Of course, that apparently is balanced out by people who do know it's bad and try to figure out ways of getting a link on there anyway. One person went so far as to copy text from a wikipedia article to his website so as to try to give the appearance of an appropriate citation. Also, I'm sure this has been discussed previously, but it seems like a lot of these issues would go away if WP just used the nofollow attribute for external links in the article space like is done on talk pages. ScottW 11:54, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm against that. As long as our links are overwhelmingly "good", which I think they are, we do the search engines (and, hence, the search engine users) a service by having our outgoing links "count". - Jmabel | Talk 18:37, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Interesting reading . . . 

message: Very annoying. I just made some edits to a talk page - adding  as needed, responding to one comment - and now the spam filter won't let me save the page. And, of course, it doesn't give me a clue as to which of the dozen or two existing links on the page (none of which I added, or at least not recently) is the offending link. So unless I'm going to go through the whole page removing links, I'm hosed. So I guess I'll do something like that, but... there seems to be a dubious assumption here that the reason there will be a blacklisted link in a newly saved page is that the latest editor added it. If I didn't know Wikipedia well, I'd find this all as confusing as I now find it annoying. If an engine is detecting an inappropriate link, why the heck can't it report what link has a problem? - Jmabel | Talk 01:26, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I misread your comment and thought you were referring to this page (hence my odd edit). I thought that the message included the problem link. Which talk page are you trying to edit? ScottW 02:08, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spam filter 

message: I have made a proposal on the proposal pump on this issue. It would be good if we could get people to give comments (but make sure all talk is there, or at least in one place). -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 19:29, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "wikimyspace" 

message: Someone has filled Wikipedia with mall spam, purely spam articles, no background about the mall, simply lists of retailers.  They've been warned numerous times, and blocked for failing to dialogue the issue, can't articles attached solely to this spamdress simply be deleted en masse, instead of having to request speedy delete on each one?  KP Botany 17:22, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mall Spam 

message: Is there or should there be a policy, perhaps as part of WP:SPAM, which prohibits links to websites purportedly collecting money for the victim families when there are memorial articles about people who die in well publicized incidents such as the tragic case of James Kim dying of exposure when he and his familiy got lost and stranded in the mountains? The links in question go to sites  JamesAndKati.com "set up by friends and family of James Kim" and (Link provided by James' former employer CNET)the first of which says which says in part
"We have set up "The James Kim Memorial Fund" through Bank of America. Donations to the paypal account above will be transferred to that account. Checks can be sent to either of the addresses listed below. Make checks payable to "The James Kim Memorial Fund".
We have also received requests for some who wish to send items to the girls or the family. Cnet has graciously offered to receive and store these packages, letters and cards.
 
The Kim Family
c/o CNET Networks
235 2nd Street
San Francisco, CA 94105  The James Kim Memorial Fund
c/o Bank of America
Noe Valley Banking Center
4098 24th Street
San Francisco, CA 94114-3716
James and Kati started two stores in San Francisco in the past couple of years. Helping to support these stores is a way that residents of San Francisco can help support the family. Doe is in the lower Haight and Church Street Apothecary is in Noe Valley. 
I deleted the link to the website, but it was restored onn the grounds that it is an official family website providing info about the family of the subject of the article. It is claimed in the AfD debate for the article that the James Kim article is not a memorial article, that he was notable before the incident, but just did not happen to have an article. But in general, if links are sometimes deleted as being spam links because they link to a site which provides information but also seeks to sell items, is it legitimate to link to a site created by the family or friends of the family which solicits funds and gifts in addition to well-wishes and condolences? I can see that this method might be widely used wnehever there is some well publicized tragedy in which Wikipedia readers might feel sympathy for the families of conjoined twins, victims of a plane crash, coal mine disaster, war injury, or fire, in which money might be sought for the family or sadly, as in several well-known cases of the past,  by charlatans. Thanks. Edison 19:01, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fund solicitation link from [[James Kim]] article 

message: Re User talk:Sharlene Thompson and WP:AN#Spam surveys on talk pages: should requests made to user_talk pages, article talk pages, and/or emailing editors be prohibited? -- Jeandré, 2006-12-17t10:30z
:If the community decides to allow these surveys, and the survey is about a specific topic, how substantive should edits have been: several major edits with sources (and not reverts of blanking)? How recent? 
:User_talk is very specific but some users only want content creation messages.
:Article talk and meta namespace messages are topic specific, but may not target the required users.
:Email? -- Jeandré, 2006-12-17t11:18z
::I've received survey solicitations by email and Talk, and neither really bothered me.  That said, email is probably best, because only users who have enabled their email account will receive it, and it won't leave any traces on Wikipedia at all.  Thought:  perhaps a limit should be put on all broadcast messages to User talk pages (aside from welcome and warning templates); no more than 100 10 without prior community approval? -- Visviva 11:25, 17 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: *People such as Sharlene should probably be advised that there are more productive ways of reaching people for their survey. A notice on e.g. the village pump will attract quite a bit of people, without annoying those who do not wish to be contacted. I'm not sure how at all we can make this clear to surveying people, though. (Radiant) 13:28, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[WP:WD|Academic]] [[Wikipedia:User survey|user surveys]].

message: There is a spate of AfD proposals over articles to do with 9/11. While some of these are eminently justifiable, there seems to be little discrimination between articles that are noteworthy and ones that are not. Some of the editors voting in these AfD proposals actually have hit lists of articles they want deleted and make little attempt to hide their blatant POV pushing.
In one particular case an editor nominated The New Pearl Harbor by David Ray Griffin for deletion because it was "advertising" and "spam", despite the fact that the book is plainly noteworthy according to Wikipedia guidelines because it is written by an eminent philosopher who is plainly noteworthy in his own right.
The article in question contains a reasonably balanced criticism section (although it could do with being expanded to include a summary of the outside articles it links to) and also contains the term "conspiracy theorists" which has never, to my knowledge, been used in the mainstream media except in a derogatory sense. I even challenged many of those who habitually vote in these AfD discussions several times to provide a single example to prove me wrong about this, but they were quite unable to do so. I cannot for the life of me see how an article that containing content that casts its subject in such a negative light could possibly be called advertising. I have discussed the matter at slightly greater length on the talk page of the user in question.
The problem I have is that, in spite of what common sense tells me, the definition of "advertising" that provided at Wikipedia:Spam are far from clear. Could anyone advise me on this? Many thanks. Ireneshusband 18:39, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I would try the village pump, policy page.  You get a lot more traffic on that page. Best wishes, Travb (talk) 00:43, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Advertising is not clearly enough defined 

message: I recently tried adding some external links to minor league sports team pages on Wikipedia and had some changes rolled back. I wanted to see if I could get them reinstated. According to Wikipedia:External links (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:External_links), "information that could not be added to the article for reasons such as copyright or amount of detail" is an acceptable reason to add external links. In fact, the article specifically cites "professional athlete statistics" as an example. For instance, one of the links added was for the Quad City Riverhawks, with the link going to http://www.oursportscentral.com/sports/?t_id=1942. You can see that scores, stats, press releases and links online newspaper articles for the team are available there, something that is too detailed and constantly changing for a Wikipedia entry. All are also missing from the official team website.
I realize that the site I'm linking to, OurSports Central, is a commercial site, but all the content is available for free and much, if not most of it, isn't available anywhere else. I believe it adds significantly to the Wikipedia entry. December 29, 2006Preeths10 19:02, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Linking to COPYVIO is just as bad as having COPYVIO on wikipedia itself.  Team stats are the copyright of the team in America.  Therefore, I suggest reading WP:COPYVIO. ✎ Peter M Dodge ( Talk to Me • Neutrality Project ) 19:20, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I don't believe that's a correct interpretation of the law or recent precendent. The NBA lost out to Motorola in a bid to copyright stats (http://legal.web.aol.com/decisions/dldecen/nbadec.html) and Major League Baseball lost a similar case to a fantasy sports operator (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2543720&campaign=rss&source=ESPNHeadlines). No copyright violations exist at that external link. Preeths10 19:36, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have to agree with Preeths10 on the copyright issue; I saw none on the site in question. Unfortunately, however, I believe the site violates the "objectionable amounts of advertising" clause of WP:EL#Links normally to be avoided (pop-ups and multiple banners everywhere). Is there truly absolutely no other source for such information? -- Satori Son 20:04, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you for looking it over. I know it was a legal question for some time on the stats, so I can understand the confusion. There really isn't any other source for the information found at that external link. Most of the ABA team sites don't even carry score information or their own press releases. Even the official ABA site is often behind on scores compared to the site. It is the best source of minor league sports information I've found.Preeths10 20:19, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be best to link to an official team site instead, regardless if the updates are a little slow or not, however if there is no official listing at all then I see no reason why you couldn't link to this site --T-rex 22:47, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Understandable. Most of the ABA sites receive minimal, if any, updates, and I wanted to be sure users could find some updated information. Nearly halfway through the season, about a third of ABA team sites haven't been touched at all this year. Is there a way to relay this information to the admin (Jmax) who rolled back all the changes? Preeths10 23:25, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: External links (oursportscentral.com)

message: Does anyone object to moving the internal spamming part to a separate page? I notice that even somewhat experienced editors running for admin are unaware of the guidelines, part of the reason might be that it's tucked in amids the lengthy discussion on external spamming. They're also targeting very different audiences, so a WP:SPAM link in an AfD discussion might be ambiguous: It could mean that the article itself contains spam links or that a discussion participant engaged in canvassing. In short I see few reasons to keep them together but quite a couple to separate them. Comments? ~ trialsanderrors 21:22, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I concur.  Canvassing seems to have support, but SPAM seems to be universally derided here as disruptive.  The two are not the same, so a separation is natural.  I will support your proposal.  Morton devonshire 21:52, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: While I am always wary of the dreaded instruction creep, I agree with trialsanderrors on this one.  Originally, the concept of Wikispam was meant to be all inclusive, but there are now significant differences in our policy on aggressive spamming by outside business entities and our policy on questionable talk page canvassing by internal editors. Covering both in one guideline is no longer warranted. I support the proposal to separate as well, as long as the new WP:CANVAS guideline is shown prominently here in a top-link disambig notice. -- Satori Son 22:14, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I also agree; I found it surprising that this policy covers both.  Telling an editor that he/she has violated WP:SPAM seems a bit insulting if in fact it's a canvassing violation, something that even more experienced editors can be unaware of (as those who follow RfAs have seen recently).  So it would be great to be able to cite a violation of Wikipedia:Canvassing instead [and, yes, that's a blue link, but it redirects to the canvassing section of the spam policy].  John Broughton  |  Talk 01:37, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I created a provisory version here. I reset to the redirect for now, but if it gains consensus we can just revert to this version and set the shortcut. ~ trialsanderrors 02:15, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I've done some copyediting of the new guideline, but, as far as I know, have changed nothing in its intent or details.  After a few people have looked at that, I think it would be time to follow some of the steps (some don't apply) at Wikipedia:How to create policy.  John Broughton  |  Talk 03:05, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks.  I've also made changes to Wikipedia:Canvassing, please see Wikipedia talk:Canvassing. —Quarl (talk) 2006-12-31 09:06Z
By the way, I now realize that there is a slight nuance between "canvassing" and "internal spamming": the usual problem is the former, while the latter can also include for example telling lots of users about how great an article is -- something that isn't trying to influence a debate.  I don't think it's nearly as much a problem as canvassing but it might deserve a paragraph still within the WP:SPAM guideline after Canvassing is officially split off. —Quarl (talk) 2006-12-31 09:09Z
*
*As a sidenote, the correct spelling is "Canvass".  I've created shortcuts for that and changed it on the proposal page (WP:CANVASS/WT:CANVASS). -- Renesis (talk) 23:07, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I never said that you said that it was a big deal. ;)  -- Satori Son 21:46, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Can't hurt, but the thread directly above, WT:SPAM#WP:CANVASS already expressed unanimous consensus to move, not to duplicate, and the Proposal to move tag in the actual text did not trigger any opposition in the last ten days. ~ trialsanderrors 00:32, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

text: I completed the move. ~ trialsanderrors 02:53, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks good to me. Progress. Andrewa 03:57, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: [[WP:CANVASS]]

message: See Wikipedia talk:Canvassing#Reset. 
There appears to already be consensus that this guideline should be split (and I'll add my strong support). But, we now have a large section of duplicated text, with both copies marked as official, and almost certain to diverge in content fairly rapidly. Not good.
My suggestion is that we need to either degrade the status of Wikipedia:Canvassing back to a proposed guideline, or replace the cut-and-pasted section in this guideline with a nutshell summary and a wikilink to the new guideline at Wikipedia:Canvassing. Other thoughts? Andrewa 00:21, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Can't hurt, but the thread directly above, WT:SPAM#WP:CANVASS already expressed unanimous consensus to move, not to duplicate, and the Proposal to move tag in the actual text did not trigger any opposition in the last ten days. ~ trialsanderrors 00:32, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

text: I completed the move. ~ trialsanderrors 02:53, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks good to me. Progress. Andrewa 03:57, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Official cutover

message: It is suggested on the talk page of Wikipedia:WikiProject External links, to merge that project with Wikipedia:WikiProject Spam, with the impression that the External links project is actually inactive, and the Spam project, as an active project, can handle its tasks to. I would like to know your points of view in this regard. - huji—TALK 20:08, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  WikiProject External links - merger?

message: This private school in Switzerland has been spamming Wikipedia by putting on the first line of famous philosophers and artists: "teach at the EGS", and also by uploading photos taken by User:Europeangraduateschool (I believe such names do not respect policies). Maybe someone would like to want to check what's going on there... A Google search on "European Graduate School" 's occurences on Wikipedia gives, as of January 2007, more than 80 occurences. See Talk:European Graduate School and contributions from very few users (you might notice that the EGS entry is in many languages, including Chinese, and were all created by Wikipedia:Single purpose account. Lapaz 02:34, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh God. I just recently took this off my watchlist after trying to keep it from turning into a gush piece for the last half year. Sadly the AfD closed as almost-unanimous keep despite a dearth of secondary sources, so that route is blocked (and I agree that they're probably notable, but clearly not as notable as they think they are). A note at WP:ANI might be in order if the article spamming has started over again. ~ trialsanderrors 02:53, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[European Graduate School]]'s spamming 

message: This user Jenny44 keeps reverting my reverts to what I think is spam. She keeps putting a link to a screensaver on the waterfall article. I tell her that Wikipedia shouldn't be used for promotional material and she says that the link isn't promotional and that its free. Is this still spam? She keeps putting back the link after I remove it...
*[]
*[]
*[]
*Posted by User:  Hdt83 | Talk/Chat 20:39, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, it's definitely spam. Hell, if we allow it, why not put desktop themes about oranges on Orange (fruit)? Why not candy cane cursors as well? It's impossible not to be spam. --Dayn 03:39, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Possible [[Waterfall]] Spam

message: User:Jason ilacqua has been adding commentary/blog links to a multitude of sports articles. Google the name and you will find him to be the senior editor of the site in question. I removed some, but he has been busy. ccwaters 17:59, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've posted a notice on his talk page regarding WP:COI.  If you notice the problem continuing, you might want to post something at  Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam - they specialize in dealing with spam, including using semi-automated tools to clean up quicker.   -- John Broughton   (♫♫) 20:41, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Sports Business News

message: ...that this is a "prime spam target". Of the external-to-WMF external links, all three of them use interwiki mappings and any real SPAM would be extremely easy to see. I also note that prior to this protection most reverted edits were either: Simple or silly vandalisms, or, edit warring over the now-moved "Canvassing" section. 68.39.174.238 23:09, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  I disagree... 

message: Is there a guideline for whether articles on radio stations should contain details of the wavelength? I am thinking that this may be a form of advertising, a little like giving the address of a corporation, but it seems quite prevalent. Any suggestions where I might look? Abtract 18:07, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You could check Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory to see if there is a project that covers radio stations; if so, ask there.  My personal opinion is that giving the frequency is (a) factual, (b) useful, and (c) takes up little space, so my feeling is that the matter isn't worth pursuing, but YMMV.  -- John Broughton   (♫♫) 20:37, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks. I have looked around a little at radio station articles and they all seem to have the frequencies shown so I guess you are right. Life's too short to worry anyway Abtract 23:59, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Radio stations

message: The Men from the Ministère will be requiring that commercial spammers toe the line and refrain from posing as a consumer in sockpuppetry and fake bloggery stunts
http://www.smartmobs.com/archive/2007/02/11/eu_makes_sock_p....html#comments
Bwithh Join Up! See the World! 21:13, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Spam fake customer sockpuppeteering to become ''criminal offence'' in Europe in 2008

message: Should I add a paragraph about spambots to the page, or should this be a separate article??
This is because of the Wikipedia talk:/w/index.php (as an example, this using the  variable to display it here) created by spambots, that are happening frequently.
On the Cornish Wiktionary, where I'm an admin (the only one), I've had to delete-protect spambot pages created. I'm in the process of
writing guidelines there about spamming.
Advice is appreciated - I'm unsure about making changes to policy pages without consensus. --sunstar nettalk 11:08, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: A belated response - beware instruction creep.  A policy or guideline exists to provide guidance to editors.  A spambot is essentially vandalism; it's fairly pointless to say "don't use a spambot", not so much because dedicated spammers don't read (or follow) policy, but because to an editor reverting spam, it's not clear it makes any difference where it came from.  (If it does make a difference - if a spambot should be handled differently than a human spammer - then post something on this page for discussion - a new paragraph for the guideline.)  -- John Broughton   (♫♫) 00:34, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spambots 

message: I'm pretty sure this wouldn't have any effect, but check out this edit to a redirect last November... -- nae'blis 03:05, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  sneaky spam? 

message: I recently added two external links to Wikipedia, and then received three messages on my talk page (from the same user) about spam. I read the Guideline on Spam he/she linked for me, and this part is worrying me:
"Subsequent offences can be tagged with  or , then  (warning of possible block) and  (final warning). The template  indicates that the spammer has been blocked."
The templates used on my talk page were Welcomespam, Spam and Spam2. Should I have gotten three tags, or only two since there were two links, or only one since I added both links basically at the same time? Does this mean that I am now only three links away from being blocked? Playing the devil's advocate here, is it possible to get another user blocked simply by filling their talk page with spam templates? (mwahahaha) Is there a way to get the tags removed?
Does anyone else hear that Violent Femmes song in their heads ... "I hope you know that this will go down on your permanent record" ...? Yeah. It's probably just me.  Fauxpaw 22:01, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Given the timestamps, I think one spam warning would have been sufficient; I'm not sure why there are three. Regardless, you shouldn't have anything to worry about as long as you stop adding commercial links. Cheers, OhNoitsJamie Talk 22:19, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spam templates on talk page 

message: I've seen publisher's book sites included in articles in many different ways, and always consider them linkspam because they are promotional in nature.  However, in Wikinomics (book) I saw for the first time that an official site was included for the book in the External links section.  I removed it, but with reluctance.  It seems to be more just a way to get a promotional link into an article, rather than provide readers with useful additional information on the subject of the article.  Given that more and more book sites, especially technical books, contain large amounts of useful information, it might be useful to clarify how to treat official book site links. (Related discussions: , 
) --Ronz 23:38, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Links to official book sites

message: There have recently been edits to WP:COI changing the spam wording from always avoid linking to your own site to avoid or exercise great caution when linking to your own site.  Additional opinions would be appreciated.  --Milo H Minderbinder 12:56, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's practical if the external link expands significantly on an article's definition, or a subject of a biographical article wants himself to add some personal links. Caution, then, applies to concerns for WP:COI. Jrod2 (talk) 17:51, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Changes to [[WP:COI]] 

message: I'm currently involved in a polite disagreement over at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam#DermAtlas, and I'd welcome feedback from this community.--Hu12 02:25, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Conflict of interest related SPAM additions 

message: this site: [www.filmfocus.nl] , is listed as spam and I am not allowed to use it as a reference. It is obviously not a spam site, but a serious site about what's happening in film in the Netherlands. I need to use an article there for a reference in an article here about European films/ What am I supposed to do? Jeffpw 13:42, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You can request a review at m:Spam blacklist. -- ReyBrujo 01:02, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: How does one get a site off the spam list?

message: Can i place an article of a CHARITY? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Ancientneareast (talk • contribs) 18:10, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If it follows the external link guidelines or you can give a very good reason why it shouldn't have to (being a charity doesn't count). Whether it's a charity or not doesn't really make a difference; I'd consider www.savethepuppies.com spam if it was added to Ethanol or Integral or something. Veinor (talk to me) 18:21, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

text: We've recently dealt with a few charities spamming pages on Slavery and Child abuse related subjects. Just because an organization deals with issues of a particular type, doesn't mean it should be linked from the Wikipedia article(s) on the subject. Wikipedia is not a directory or collection of links. If your site isn't being used as a reference for material in the article(s), consider adding your organization to http://www.dmoz.org and other web directories instead of Wikipedia.  If you are talking about creating an article for you organization, please determine first if the organization meets the Wikipedia notability guidelines. --Versageek 22:43, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

text: Please read WP:ORG, if your organization meets those criteria - then it is acceptable to create an article about it. --Versageek 15:32, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

text: (edit conflict)Are there any neutral sources which demonstrate the charity's notability? Even if there are, you shouldn't write about the organization yourself because that would be a conflict of interest. I suggest requesting that an article be written by a neutral editor. RJASE1  Talk  15:34, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Charity 

message: When I first came to Wiki a little over a month ago, I made a mistake. Having looked at existing entries in various Torah related sections, I added links absolutely in line with what I saw in those sections, to related Torah commentaries at LearningTorah.org, a non-profit organization whose work is to spread Torah. As I understood from the Wiki moderators, there was no problem with the relevance of the links or the relevance of the commentaries, but the problem was the amount of links that were added at one time which made it appear that this was spam. In fact, this was just a desire to add to the list of commentaries that are included in Wiki, to help to further spread commentaries about the Torah. It is very similar in nature to other sites that are in fact listed as commentary under every single Weekly Torah Portion section. In fact, the relevance of these links and commentaries can be seen in Parsha Shemini or Tazria where for some reason, the LearningTorah commentary is still up.
Now I see that the site has been added to the Wiki spam list and this is very concerning. I request to please have this decision reversed and also to be treated as as the norm with other listed commentary sources that you can see under every section of the Weekly Torah Portions. 
I appreciate Wiki very much and look forward to contributing in the future. Torahorg 06:45, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spam? 

message: After being in WP:EL since October, there's a proposal (and revert war) at EL over the mention of substituting a link to open directory category to try and keep the number of external links down.  Since this is a potential linkspam fighting tool, editors here should be aware of the proposed change.  Feel free to weigh in there (EL talk page) if you have an opinion on the matter.  Thanks.  --Minderbinder 12:46, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed removal of DMOZ mention in [[WP:EL]]