Wikipedia talk:Autobiography/Archive 1

message: Wikipedians who support the rule "do not create new articles on yourself" include:
* Robert Merkel (proposed the rule - "the minimum necessary to ensure the continued improvement of Wikipedia")
* Kat - but "I think we should take it a couple steps more"
* Angela - but "I think there is a danger in the rule becoming too general".
* Vicki Rosenzweig - "The basic idea seems sound, but I think it should be narrow".
* Kosebamse - "I'm still in favor of an outright NO on everything that smells of self-promotion".
* till we *) - "One shouldn't write about things one is mainly emotionally interested in (like one self, lovers, crazing fandom), but one should write about things one is mainly 'professionally' interested in".
* MB - "I totally support this new policy, and vote to make it official".
* Daniel Quinlan - "premise of policy is good, but there is still some problematic auto-biographical material not covered by this policy yet: editing of articles to include links to oneself or ones own works, adding articles for wares, etc."
* Deb - It should be seen as guidance for newcomers.
* —Eloquence - Definitely a useful rule to avoid bias and bogus articles
* Isomorphic - There's no need for anyone to write an article about themselves.
* Wile E. Heresiarch -- If you're notable, someone else will write about you.
* Trilobite
* Peter S.
* Vsion -- pls use stronger language "... shall not edit an article about yourself or promote yourself in any way in any mainspace article."
* SlimVirgin (talk) 08:06, 15 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some surveys 

message: I'm interested when Kosebamse says "it takes long discussions and much work to revert that" - I don't see that. I merged all the Boyer articles into one, and the discussion needed basically amounted to me saying "I want to do this - objections?", ignoring Boyer's objection as self-interested, and then doing it. Similarly, I removed links to Boyer's article from a bunch of articles, and did so with no discussion at all. 
The reason that the deletion of certain redirects, and the proposed deletion of Daniel C. Boyer has caused so much discussion is largely because there are a range of competing views on the subject. That's just a side-effect of Wikipedia's consensus-based model: all systems of government have weaknesses. Martin 14:36, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, and I don't have a problem with that. To me it looked like it was a great amount of discussion in the past few days and I hope we can distill that discussion into a policy to make things easier in the future. Kosebamse 15:22, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  Amount of discussion 

message: Can someone try to clean up the wording?  I do not believe that a policy can be promulgated effectively while at the same time the possible silliness of said policy is expounded upon.  I changed this once before but the original wording is back.  The wording is rather defeatist and weak in other areas as well.
Kat 12:18, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wording 

message: I have problems with proposed guidelines #4 and #5. To me, not being neutral is not enough reason to forbid someone from engaging in a controversy. In almost all cases where there is a controversy, there are people involved who are not neutral. I would even say that that is usually how controversies start: Someone sees an article and does not agree with it. Usually the person who does not agree is not someone neutral, but someone with an opposite POV. They try to improve it, someone else thinks they have overdone it, and bingo. Controversies don't occur on subjects that people are neutral about.
As for #5: citing one's sources often is hard for such a subject. One has heared, read, experienced much about the subject, and might well be able to just write about it without getting any sources involved. I recently wrote an article about Cantor's diagonal method for the Dutch Wikipedia. I am a mathematician and the diagonal method is my favorite piece of mathematics, so one might well say that it is a "subject close to my heart". I have read about it in various books, but none of them were at hand as I wrote my article. If asked for sources, I would not know which to mention, and even if I did, might have to take a 500 km train ride to just get the title and author. Andre Engels 10:47, 26 Aug 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  Arguments and sources 

message: There's an oft-quoted principle of ajudication that is very applicable here:  Hard cases make bad law.  I've watched various online communities ruined by well-intentioned policies, and now Wikipedia is moving in that same direction. -- NetEsq 19:14, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I'm leaning in this direction. I now feel that requiring content to be verifiable and informative is a better, more general, approach to the issue.Martin 23:45, 25 Nov 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Rule: No More Silly Rules 

message: I've rewritten this proposed policy -- removed some stuff that had absolutely no place here (subjects near and dear to your heart), and turned the whole thing into a more or less NPOV compromise that should be a useful guideline without becoming a sledgehammer.—Eloquence
:Some of the old material that doesn't match the article title could be resurrected into a broader article.  Something like "Possible conflicts of Interest" or "Personal Involvement."  That would allow it to cover autobiography in addition to similar issues like writing articles about friends, writing articles about events you participated in, linking to your own website or to material elsewhere on the web that you authored, etc.  Isomorphic 13:06, 1 Jan 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rewrite 

message: True or false: many un-registered Wikipedians create articles about themselves. 66.245.92.131 00:54, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: This depends on how one defines "many."  Does it happen often?  Yes.  Is it done by any significant percentage of unregistered users?  No.  The vast majority of unregistered users don't make articles about themselves, but there are so many unregistered users that if only a few do it, then we see such articles often. Isomorphic 03:08, 22 Jun 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  True or false?? 

message: The page sounds reasonable enough, but I created a page on myself for purely my own benefit that was highly unlikely anyone else would see (except for people with the same name doing a google search perhaps). The page was there for a while and then Antaeus Feldspar found it and it has now been scheduled for deletion. Wikipedia isn't what you'd call a fun place, I seem to have run-ins periodically with these sorts of people. Technically they're following the rules but they seem to target everything that falls outside of their inflexible guidelines with extreme predjudice. Diceman 19:35, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: The key phrase in your comment is "purely for my own benefit."  Things you are writing purely for your own benefit should be done on your own website, or on your user page.  The main namespace is for encyclopedia articles. Wikipedia is very open, but Wikipedia is not a free webhost. Isomorphic 21:29, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  The spirit of wikipedia 

message: Hi All, 
(I posted on the request for pages talk area, but figured a cross-post to this talk page would be ok.)
I work for a US-based non-profit that does reproductive health work in Asia, Africa & Latin America.  We don't have an article about us yet, and I'm inclined not to create it myself, although that does seems to be permissible under certain circumstances and depending on a number of factors.
However, I'm also disinclined to wait for someone to happen to create it, since we're a significant enough presence in our area to justify an article on us.
Is it being done yet that Wikipedians can be "hired" to create content?  Obviously, that sort of thing could raise concerns about objectivity etc, but seeing as though anything that might be written on spec would be subjected to the same editing for NPOV etc as anything else, it seems like something that could be made to work in some fashion or other.  
Thanks in advance for any thoughts. 
-Pfwebadmin 18:50, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: We've long anticipated that people might do that kind of thing, but as far as I know we've never heard of of any real cases.  Some Wikipedians would probably frown on it, but as long as the description stayed neutral I don't think you'd have any problem. Isomorphic 04:01, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article about my company?  Wikipedians for hire? 

message: I was looking for guidance when writing about your own company, and I found this page. It doesn't answer my questions, though, so I proposed a new guideline for dealing with Wikipedia:Conflict of interest. There's an analogy between writing about yourself and writing about your company, so I invite you to weigh in on my proposal. Thanks. --Yannick 03:22, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed Guideline: Conflict of Interest 

message: What's the dispute that's so weighty that 'disputed' notice needs to have been there for months and months? I've removed the notice pending an actionable list here - David Gerard 11:01, 11 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Dispute notice?

message: Is it OK or in poor taste to add a link to other people sharing the same name as a famous person listed in the Wikipedia? I brought this up on Talk:Tim_Regan but have not had any replies. The case in point is the page of the American Football player Tim_Regan. I am not famous, though I do Google higher than my namesake (http://www.google.com/search?q=Tim+Regan) but it really riles me to see the page bearing my name not have any link to me at all. But it also feels like adding in a link to my homepage (http://research.microsoft.com/~timregan) at the end of his page contravenes the guidelines in the Autobiography page. What would you recommend I do. Leave it or add in a link? Dumbledad 15:38, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The fact that a page exists for someone who happens to have your name has nothing to do with your own notability.  If the page is about someone other than you, why should it have a link about you? This is an encyclopedia, not a directory. Isomorphic 04:36, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Question: Adding link to oneself on Wiki page of person with your name? 

message: This opinion piece in USA Today. If this "policy" wasn't in place, we wouldn't have had the negative press in that link. I'm putting it up for deletion now. karmafist 07:06, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: The Perfect Reason To Ignore/Get Rid Of This "Policy"

message: Take a look at the AFD.  4/1 voted for keep, was properly referenced, notable person.  But it seems that he wrote it about himself.  Managed to write it neutrally too.  So it was userfied.  Is that the right thing to do?  I for one think not. Zordrac  (talk) Wishy Washy  Darwikinian Eventualist 10:22, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Daniel_Hirst]] 

message: If we agree with the general policy that people writing about themselves have a conflict of interest when it comes to being open minded, then this also applies to 
Seigenthaler Gate. AlMac|(talk) 08:20, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikepedians writing about Wikipedia 

message: There's been discussion above on the situation where a clearly-notable person 'discovers' his own Wikipedia article, written by others, and wants to start editing it. But what about the case of a long-time wikipedian who eventually becomes famous/notable and gets written about? He/she will be in a dilemma: it will be ethically inappropriate to edit the article without disclosing his/her personal interest; yet if the user values the anonymity of all his/her past edits he/she may not want to identify him/herself. Just a little brain-teaser. Doops |  talk 21:49, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Couldn't they just register a second Wikipedia login to use for just that article? SeaFox 01:25, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: That's called sock puppetry, and it appears that Wikipedia discourages (SHOULD NOTs in RFC 2119 parlance) such practice. As Jimbo Wales put it: "There's no specific policy against it, but it's generally considered uncool unless you have a good reason." Would this count such a good reason? --Damian Yerrick 03:05, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Maybe it's not a sock puppet if no page is ever edited by the person's two accounts. That is to say, I could have one account for historical articles, and another one for mathetmatical ones, and be rigorously sure never ever ever to cross this boundary. Doops |  talk 03:57, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Maybe this hypothetical user needs to make a decision about which is more important to them; keeping their edits anonymous, or correcting flaws in an article about themselves. Not to play big-brother/privacy-nazi here, but if the user doesn't want to associate their real name/reputation on edits they don't sound like they have much faith in their own knowledge and probably shouldn't be making those contributions to start with. I'm just having trouble seeing a situation where someone would not want their contributions scrutinized in regards to who they were unless they were making negetive contributions, or simply a commonly known quack in the field they protrayed themselves as being an expert in. Ironically, before this policy change on having to be registered to edit articles, the person could have made the changes to their autobio while not logged on, citing who they were in the Talk page, and have maintained the anonymity for their regular account. SeaFox 08:44, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  an interesting wrinkle 

message: Including a note in this manner now, while the page is still "hot" on Slashdot, is going to be good for WP's image. Being overly defensive is not. Fool 16:42, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Jimmy Wales