Talk:Donna Williams

message: I think "author" is a more appropriate disambiguation term than "writer". Q0 08:41, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Move

message: As noted by wikipedia at the top of the Discussion area:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Donna_Williams_%28author%29
The creator of this article, or someone who has substantially contributed to it, may have a conflict of interest regarding its subject matter.
It may require cleanup to comply with Wikipedia's content policies, particularly neutral point of view.
Please discuss further on the talk page.
Donna Williams herself has been an active editor and contributor to this article on her.  The person who is the subject of the article shouldn't take part in the construction and editing of the article.--Appto (talk) 16:59, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd like to request that Donna's additions and editing be looked at.  It appears that she uses this encyclopedia as a personal website to promote and draw attention to her books, websites, blogs, media coverage, etc, as she does on her website. --Appto (talk) 17:22, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Conflict Of Interest, Non-neutral Source

message: The Health Report; controversy over Williams' diagnosis.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:50, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: ABC Radio National - The Health Report. From Australia (Williams lives in Australia) "Autism - a special report by Kathy Gollan" An investigation by Kathy Gollan [] The legitimacy of Donna Williams's diagnosis of autism is discussed by autism experts.--Appto (talk) 19:00, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It appears that Donna's diagnosis is highly questionable. I didn't know the extent until I saw the ABC.net Australia article , an exceptional article interviewing world renowned autism specialist Fred Volkmar of Yale, and William's doctor herself, and a former professor of her who attests to how she was very socially and communicatively functional in the 1980's, and a former friend/acquaintance who observed the apparent intentional adoption and claiming of autism. [Comment removed for WP:BLP concerns by Q0 (talk) 17:31, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: How reliable is this source?  If it is not reliable (see WP:RS) then I think it should be a WP:BLP violation to repeat information from it on the talk page, given the seriousness of the charges. The rest of the above comment should probably be removed for WP:BLP concerns if that source is unreliable. I was about to remove it but I wanted to be sure about how reliable that source is concered first so that I can make sure I am following Wikipedia's policies regarding this matter. Q0 (talk) 17:36, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't think we have any basis in policy for questioning the Australian Broadcasting Corporation interviewing an esteemed researcher like Fred Volkmar.  I'm not sure why you question its reliability?  Do you want me to ask an Australian practicing professional to have a look ? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:39, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with the above reply by SandyGeorgia  Furthermore, Q0's question of the article's and source's reliability is a showing of this person's non-neutral status and bias.  Administrators please note this.  Abc.net.au is a major media entity in Australia, and the article is of the highest investigative quality.  Also note that this user removed my full entry based on this users biased suspicion of the reliability of the source, and I will now redo my entry (below) because the source is highly credible and reliable.--Appto (talk) 17:56, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I would like to note that user Q0 is not neutral, but rather, has been involved in biased and interested advertising and promotion of various claimed or real autistic individuals on wikipedia as well as promotion and advertisement of the "autism rights movement" in the form of templates attached to the article pages at many claimed or real autistic person's wiki articles.  Furthermore, user Q0 has been editing many of my Discussion entries and I would like for an administrator to check this person's editing of my entries, and undo any entries that are warranted, and in light of this persons non-neutral status, to ask this person to not edit any of my future entries but instead let any administrators do so.--Appto (talk) 17:56, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

text: I was suspicious of its reliability because parts of it seem to question Donna William's diagnosis. Since autism is related to how Donna Williams is well known, I was concerned that claims like that could be damaging. I also had concern because it is very frequent for people to doubt the diagnosis of well known autistic people. I am unfamiliar with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Fred Volkmar and am unsure how notable or reliable they are. However, I wanted to ask about it because out of concern that its contents might be damaging or unreliable given what seemed to me to be similar to other things that have been said about people. Q0 (talk) 18:02, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  It was a reasonable question. Appto, you are violating Wiki policies of WP:AGF and WP:CIVIL and verging on WP:NPA.  Add this to the repeated copyvio issues and BLP issues, and you are skating on thin ice.  Please stop.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:07, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

text: Perhaps I got ahead of myself when I said that I was about to remove the comment. I apologize for that. I should have waited for an answer as to the reliability of the source first. Instead, I probably should have said, "If the source turns out to be unreliable, then I'm not sure the above comment is acceptable for the WP:BLP policy," instead of the sentence that started with, "The rest of the above comment ..." However, I am not from Australia, so I think that should explain my unfamiliarity with the Australian broadcasting company. Also, the reason I have removed comments is because they contain serious but unsourced information about Amanda Baggs. Q0 (talk) 18:18, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

text: Excerpts removed--Appto (talk) 18:45, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: And yet your obvious bias is okay? Additionally, you have yet to explain just what about that template is promotional, as you were asked to on another talk page. It is a subject-specific template - you'll find them all over Wikipedia if you'd care to look. Having a template that groups articles about the same subject is in no way promotional - does our discrimination, abortion, glbt issues, or war template promote any specific ideology? Not any more than categories in a bookstore do. Natalie (talk) 19:48, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

text: Appto, do not remove other people's posts unless they are WP:BLP violations, personal attacks, or copyvios.  Please see WP:TALK for guidelines.  Since you have removed my warnings from your talk page, I will leave them here.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:51, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

text: I think things will be quiet for at least the next 12 hours - Hu12 just blocked Appto for that time. We can all take some time and do something less frustrating. Natalie (talk) 20:01, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Two and a half hours to get through my morning watchlist :-)  Q0, I'll write this text after I catch up on my WP:FAC duties.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:03, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

text: I am declaring up-front to begin with that I am an online penpal of Donna Williams, and that she has interviewed me in the past.  For reference, I believe (from what I have read previously, so it needs to be checked out by someone with access to it) that there is an article in the "Family Circle" magazine, that also discusses this matter and that, if someone could track it down, it might have information about the source of the "controversy" in it.  The article is called "Understanding Donna: The Story of A Remarkable Friendship", and the author is Mary Kay Blakely.  The issue of "Family Circle" is March 2001, and it appears to be dated March 13, 2001.  I am saying this article should probably be checked out on the basis of my own memory of what I was told was discussed in it, and that memory might be faulty.  So someone ought to track down the article and read it to see if anything in it applies.  (I have no access to such articles, so I'm putting it out there as something people might want to look up.)  It might also be worth figuring out whether Fred Volkmar continues to hold these opinions today, given the fact that when Donna Williams first published her book, the idea of autistic people with her level of ability in certain areas was still controversial, whereas it is far less controversial today.  It is also not clear whether Volkmar had the full story when he made these comments about Ms. Williams, and even if he did, it is not possible for someone to conduct an actual diagnosis over such a distance.  It might also be worth reading this link about the "controversy" as well, which includes some directions as to how to find evidence that at least one of the people (such as one teacher) interviewed was even mistaken as to which student Ms. Williams was when she was remembering her.  Other people can decide whether this is relevant, because of my closeness to the subject of this article, but I wanted to mention that the information was out there in case someone more distanced and objective might want to look these other articles up. Silentmiaow (talk) 20:33, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I will try to track down that source as soon as I have time; I am also concerned about what proposed wording to use around this issue because of the date (1996) of the ABC report.  It is fine and good to take our time to get this right, as it will need careful wordsmithing.  We have to stick to reliable sources, though; your own opinions can't really enter into what goes on Wiki.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:39, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, the reason that I declared my relation to her was so that it would be obvious that I am not an objective source, rather than to promote my particular opinions.  I just wanted to point out those two potential sources.  What I'm getting right now as an error is "We're sorry. Your request failed to connect to our servers. We may be experiencing technical difficulties and suggest that you try again later." so presumably it will be up later. I noticed that if I plug directly the link http://www.donna.inuk.com/autie/ into the archive it does show the archived page, though. Silentmiaow (talk) 21:57, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

text: Note that Volkmar didn't discuss Williams' diagnoses; he discussed the books.  See my proposed wording below, which incorporates Williams' rebuttal.  I wasn't able to glean much useful content from the rebuttal, as it didn't specifically relate to the Gollan interview.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:59, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Volkmar does discuss William's diagnoses, and also considers the testimony of the various people interviewed such as William's own doctor, a college professor of Williams, past people who knew her, and others.  See my comments in the section below related to this.--Appto (talk) 23:26, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: To support this, etc, I'll prepare my own Talk or Discussion on the article, and will parallel the one you offered below, and stay within the parameters that you yourself abide by.  I also have to ask- I find it confusing that a different wiki editor allowed another person's lengthy response to my criticisms about another article, yet deleted all of my criticisms, 100%.  If my criticisms were 100% unacceptable, then why allow a several page long reply to each of my criticisms, yet delete all of my criticisms?  To me it appears there is often a lack of objectivity here.  It would seem that if an article is not ENTIRELY objective and has NO QUESTION of being neutral, then it should not be allowed.  I also find the strange self-promotional aspects of many of these autistic authors articles to be sad, and especially that they took part at all in any aspect of the articles.  Is this neutrality?  I would think that these articles should be done by 3rd party sources, not individuals personally involved who have INTEREST and PREFERENCE in having these articles on wiki, and having them of a particular content.--Appto (talk) 23:34, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Appto, this exact complaints was discussed on Talk:Amanda Baggs. Did you read it? I can only assume you did not, since you are claiming, yet again, that you are being held to a different standard. Let me try to explain again: Your posts were not the only posts removed; some of  posts were also removed. They were not deleted because they are long, or because they were criticisms of the article, or because we don't like you, or because you used the word "the" too many times. The portions that were deleted contained negative, unsourced information about a named living person, in violation of our WP:BLP policy. That particular policy is one of the most strictly interpreted and enforced policies on Wikipedia because we've had problems in that arena before (if you'd like the background of the BLP policy, read Seigenthaler incident). The long defenses you are referring to did not contain any unsourced, negative information about a named living person, which is why they were deleted. Length or criticism makes no difference, but things that could be interpreted as libel do. Natalie (talk) 14:21, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Controversial diagnosis 

message: ::I just read over this article on Donna Williams again.  It presents like an advertisement, a promotional, and infomercial.  Like her personal website on wikipedia.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.160.129.153 (talk) 04:12, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Donna herself mentioned above that she wasn't aware she wasn't supposed to edit the article, just provide information on the Talk page, until her more technology-capable husband helped her figure it out.  It looks like a misunderstanding to me.  Remember to assume good faith.  Silentmiaow (talk) 18:44, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It may be a misunderstanding, but whether 1210donna is her or her husband or someone else, it has been an ongoing problem.  I've been struggling alone on this article for months, trying to keep it to some sort of standard in accordance with Wiki guidelines and policies, and it has often reflected bias, unencyclopedic tone, non-independent sources, and a COI.  I hope it will stop; it's still not an encylopedic article, and Wikipedia is not Myspace or Donna William's personal website.  I'm not likely to continue with much interest in maintaining this article to any Wiki standard considering there is now POV coming from all sides, in addition to the COI issues.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:15, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: To me, this article doesn't look "encyclopediatic" but also doesn't look like an advertizement or personal site or anything like that. I think it resembles an entry at the IMDB. It is basically a list of books she has written, television documentary appearances, and some brief trivia about her artwork and marriage. Q0 (talk) 19:42, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  You should look in the history tab at some of what I've had to clean out of here; it has been constant and unrelenting (not to mention the ongoing WP:MOS cleanup), and it has been far worse than it is now.  At times, I've given up, because keeping this article just somewhat clean has been tedious and unrelenting.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:19, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  And, it carried over to many other articles, like autistic art.  SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:25, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: COI

message: As it is now late July, it appears this issue has been resolved for some time now (4 and 6 months, respectively), so I am going ahead and removing the "neutrality" and "conflict of interest" tags.
As a side note, it is completely within Wikipedia rules for the subject or original author of an article to edit it (and there are copious examples of each), so long as such edits do not violate any of the other basic tenets. 137.244.215.51 (talk) 11:16, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Resolved?

message: (I) In Diagnostic Controversy area, this statement's source is Donna Williams' own blog.  Not neutral.  And, blogs are not credible/legitimate sources:
She sought and received clarification from Professor Volkmar on his comments.
(Ia) The "clarification" from Volkmar mentioned here is, only, Donna's copying and pasting an alleged email sent to her by Volkmar to her blog.  Not an external source, not neutral, not 3rd party, and tha like.
(II) The first statement of the article is also sourced with Donna William's own blog:
Donna Williams (born 1963 in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) is a best-selling author, artist, singer-songwriter, screenwriter and sculptor diagnosed with autism after being assessed as a psychotic infant in 1965 at age two,Autism; it ain’t all physical. | Donna Williams’ Blog
Request to have these 2 sentences removed or revised.--USinopt (talk) 02:46, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Sources in article

message: This help request has been answered. If you need more help, please place a new  request on this page followed by your questions, or contact the responding user(s) directly on their user talk page.
 On June 17, 2011, this edit was done removing the entire section
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donna_Williams&diff=prev&oldid=442992723
and there was no reason provided for why.  As such I undid the person's deletion of the section.  Please advise if I did something wrong, or if the editor did.  I'm also curious why 4 months went by with no one catching that.  Aren't there editors who "watch" the page for apparent vandalism like this?  I didn't see any Talk discussion on the editors huge deletion.Hello90hello (talk) 07:03, 28 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The ABC article for the Diagnostic Controversy section is temporrily not available, but this cached versiion is available 
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:QhgRxLPmvAsJ:www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/8.30/helthrpt/hstories/hr290796.htm+%22Autism+-+a+special+report+by+Kathy+Gollan&hl=en&client=firefox-a&gl=us&strip=0
Could ya use this link in the meantime?Hello90hello (talk) 09:53, 28 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't worry about it, it might really have been vandalism. If there is a dispute over this, our editors usually know to check the talk page first. You should remember to explain your Undo-edits in future though so that people know, why you restored that material. As for the archive URL, the template actually supports that, I fixed it accordingly. Regards SoWhy 18:19, 28 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The link to the ABC Austrailia Health Report article has expired, but the company "Radio National Enquiries info_rn@your.abc.net.au " said they are trying to resolve the issue.  I'll apply the update link when I'm sent it.Hello90hello (talk) 10:35, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I added a cached version of the ABC Australia article in place of the expired links that were there previously.  In the section Diagnosis Controversy.Hello90hello (talk) 02:59, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Vandalism?  Section on Diagnostic Controversy was deleted

message: I have had a go at addressing many of the concerns expressed above. I hope the article reads better now. Some weak references remain e.g. IMDB (entries by Williams &/or her representative(s)?), Williams personal blog/official website, and perhaps others. I'm not sure of her mother's name and whether she is still alive. I'm not sure of her first husband's last name or whether he is still alive. I have included mention of scepticism over her autism diagnosis. Both sides of that issue require delicate handling but ignoring the point is not justified. It is part of her biography, although the claim is dated at 1996, reliable sources discuss it.shaidar cuebiyar (talk) 02:54, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Recent edits

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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