OTbullseye

Managing a conflict of interest

Hello, OTbullseye. We welcome your contributions, but if you have an external relationship with the people, places or things you have written about on Wikipedia, you may have a conflict of interest (COI). Editors with a conflict of interest may be unduly influenced by their connection to the topic. See the conflict of interest guideline and FAQ for organizations for more information. We ask that you:

• avoid editing or creating articles about yourself, your family, friends, colleagues, company, organization or competitors;
• propose changes on the talk pages of affected articles (you can use the {{request edit}} template);
• disclose your conflict of interest when discussing affected articles (see Wikipedia:Conflict of interest#How to disclose a COI);
• avoid linking to your organization's website in other articles (see WP:Spam);
• do your best to comply with Wikipedia's content policies.

In addition, you are required by the Wikimedia Foundation's terms of use to disclose your employer, client, and affiliation with respect to any contribution which forms all or part of work for which you receive, or expect to receive, compensation. See Wikipedia:Paid-contribution disclosure.

Also, editing for the purpose of advertising, publicising, or promoting anyone or anything is not permitted. Thank you. HickoryOughtShirt?4 (talk) 22:25, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

I am surprised and confused by the actions that have occurred over the past 24 hours. Dr. Whittaker is included in Wikipedia without providing any input in what has been published about him. He saw what was written and seeks to bring clarity to the information in order that he be represented accurately. Additionally, on his behalf as his friend (yes, we are social friends), I included several reputable news articles that validated the updated information I added. I have always thought Wikipedia’s intent was to provide correct information. Is the protocol to not inquire about edits and instead just revert copy to its prior and somewhat misleading version without checking the reason for the update? The idea of conflict of interest is a huge surprise. Does everyone who updates a Wikipedia post get this notice?

Can you help me understand why, as his friend, my making a slight update is considered a conflict of interest over others who have posted information about him that doesn’t properly represent him and doesn’t include mainstream media links to support the edits?

Those that are paid or have a conflict of interest tend to write non-neutrally, displaying obvious bias toward themselves or their clients, and write promotionally. A neutral point of view is one of the five pillars of Wikipedia, and is non-negotiable. Using the talk page as you did was exactly what one should do when they have a conflict of interest with the subject.HickoryOughtShirt?4 (talk) 19:45, 5 June 2020 (UTC)