Wikipedia talk:Conflict of interest/Archive 35

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Should we upgrade this to policy?

We have always treated policies as codification of existing practice. The recently closed Conflict of interest management cited failure to meet the conduct standards expected of an administrator, specifically as pertains to conflict of interest editing and conflict of interest disclosure as sufficient reason to revoke sysop status, with essentially unanimous agreement. So it seems to me it's time to make it official and upgrade this from a guideline to a policy. This would recognize that demanding adherence to this is indeed existing practice, and would be consistent with the community's increasing intolerance of COI editing. RoySmith (talk) 16:26, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

@RoySmith: I'm pretty sure we would need an RfC for that. If you plan on starting one, I would most likely support, since I thought that it was already policy. QuicoleJR (talk) 17:08, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I figured the place to start is with an informal discussion and move on to a formal RFC if it looks like there's broad support. RoySmith (talk) 17:49, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I think so. Though that case also highlighted some ambiguities in the definitions of paid editing and financial COI, and relatedly this guideline's relationship to WP:PAID (see Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Conflict_of_interest_management/Proposed_decision#Statement_by_Joe_Roe for both). It might be a good idea to try and iron those out first. – Joe (talk) 18:31, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

The general principles of the conflict of interest guideline are widely accepted. However, I'm inclined to think revision of the text would be necessary before accepting it as a policy would be possible, in order to have more clarity about what are conflicts and what are acceptable practices. I say this as someone who has been confused by gaps between what the guideline says and what some members of the community expect (and gaps between what different members of the community expect, as this interaction between Donald Albury, Teratix, and Levivich indicates). For instance, the current guideline's examples and language emphasize articles about current (being an owner, employee, contractor, rather than "having been") and close relationships, like an article about a business that one owns or an article about a direct family member. This has led, at least for myself personally, to being surprised to learn there are editors who consider since terminated institutional employment relationships a conflict as well. If this is going to be a policy, I think it's going to need to be shored up to avoid these confusions. I get desires to avoid rules creep, but if the community expects something as a rule but doesn't communicate it, that just creates more muddles and makes it harder to apply, follow, and enforce the potential policy. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 18:35, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Regarding previous employment, I'd say it's not black and white. If I retired from XYZ Corp on good terms and with a generous pension after 30 years of high-ranking service then I would likely still have a COI with the company for at least a few years, especially if I'm still in contact with current employees. Similarly, if I was fired by MegaCorp in a manner that I thought unfair then I would almost certainly still have a COI for probably some months (maybe a double digit number) after my employment ended. However, if I spent a short time temping at Joe Bloggs Ltd or had a summer job at Bob's Burger Franchise then any lingering COI would be measured in weeks at absolute most. If I am a self-employed plumber contracted to fix the toilet at Chain Restaurant then my COI with my client ends pretty much as soon as I walk out the door. This is all generally speaking of course - stronger COIs will last longer than weaker ones for example.

Reading this back, I'd say this is actually a good argument for it remaining a guideline. Thryduulf (talk) 23:06, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

FWIW, I have tried to clarify what I did to articles I may have a COI on, and what the relevant policies and guidelines said at the time, at: User:Donald_Albury#Conflict of interest declaration. - Donald Albury 21:50, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes, but as Joe Roe points out, some ambiguities need resolving before starting the formal procedures. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 20:36, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I could support something along these lines. ——Serial Number 54129 21:04, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

IMO another point point of clarification is what should disclose your COI actually means. I've always interpreted should to be opposed to must. So if an editor fails to disclose their non paid COI, this isn't actually a violation of anything and by itself is unsanctionable. Now if an editor fails to disclose their CoI and then we may have much lower tolerance for any problematic behaviours, so we may block or topic ban them or whatever much more readily but we do actually need something else for it to be sanctionable. However I know from discussions as far back as 15 years or so ago, there are plenty of people who interpret it as a "must" and consider failure to disclose a non paid CoI by itself sanctionable unless perhaps the editor can provide a sufficiently compelling reason for not disclosing. While I haven't followed this case that well, I'm fairly sure I read several commentators who still interpret it as a must and this also seems to be the direction arbconm has lent. Yet I read back in long ago discussions as well as ones when this blew up people who share my view. Nil Einne (talk) 22:09, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Just post a simple proposal at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy). Moxy🍁 22:14, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I can envision a slew of problems with trying to make it a policy. It's important not to undercut the harassment policy by giving fuel to those who argue that outing is no big deal if there's a COI; there's been a ton of previous discussion at the harassment policy talk page about the balance between the two. And whereas undisclosed paid editing has an important place in the terms of use, COI covers such a broad spectrum of degrees of "conflict" (just look at some of the talk sections above this one) that it probably lends itself better to a guideline. I recently saw a thread on a good-faith editor's user talk page, where a POV-pusher asked the editor if they were a physician, implying that physicians cannot impartially edit pages about fringe medical theories or quackery. Just imagine where that could go if this were raised to policy-level. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:23, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

It wasn't so much NihonJoe's failure to disclose the COI that resulted in the desysop, but the manner in which he did not disclose. It's almost certain that had his initial response to a civil question of "Do you have a COI with X?" been "Yes, and I also have COIs with A, B and C." it wouldn't have reached arbitration let alone a desysop. Thryduulf (talk) 23:12, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Quibbling about should? "Should" is not hard to understand, should means, you should do it. Should is used throughout the consensus policies and guidelines: eg. you "should explain the sides, fairly and without editorial bias" is the nutshell of perhaps Wikipedia's most fundamental editorial policy. That does not mean, it's just fine not to do it. Do it, if nothing else, because Wikipedia, which as there is a guideline means Wikipedians by consensus have asked you to. But really, why not take real stock of what we are doing here, Wikipedia is a publisher and responsible writers and publishers disclose COI. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 23:52, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

'Should' does not mean 'must', and very few policies/guidelines use 'must'. COI isn't something that there should be any doubt around, so this should be one of the exceptions where 'must' is used. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:04, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

I don't understand the concern people have about inviting harassment. Of course you shouldn't be subjected to harassment, and people who do harass you should be sanctioned. But as I said earlier nobody's making you edit COI articles. One perfectly good way to avoid being harassed about COI is to just not edit COI articles. We've got 6,812,642 articles right now; surely there's other topics which interest you that you could edit. And if you do chose to edit articles with a COI, all we're asking is that you disclose it. If you're unsure if your association meets the definition of COI, just say what your association is and let other people figure out for themselves. This really doesn't seem like an onerous requirement. And if you do find it onerous, then there's still those 6,812,641 other articles. RoySmith (talk) 16:29, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Having been pressed in the past about alleged COI for a topic I did not actually edit articles about (different than the matter I mentioned earlier), I find the concern about harassment credible. When there do exist editors who claim COI investigation justifies harassment (something the Arbitration case, so long as it's been brought up, unanimously agreed wasn't a legitimate excuse), I worry that advice along the lines of just [do] not edit COI articles inadvertently veers a little too near to victim blaming. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 20:09, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

In addition to Hydrangeans comment, there was also a case recently of a good-faith editor being subject to borderline harassment, to the extent oversight was needed, when a different editor refused to take "no" for answer when accusing them of having a financial COI. We must be careful not to accidentally encourage or legitimise such behaviour. Thryduulf (talk) 20:49, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

That sounds like you are positively encouraging COI writing. "Don't edit COI articles" prevents readers and Wikipedia from being misled, and also editors who don't want to be publicly connected to the subject from being publicly connected. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:25, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

In re very few policies/guidelines use 'must': Guidelines use must more often than policies, and Wikipedia:Manual of Style uses it the most. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:35, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

I would support upgrading this guideline to policy unchanged. Not saying I wouldn't support changes. I'd appreciate a ping when this goes to VPP. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 17:13, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Something that I don't think has really been addressed so far in this discussion, and needs to be carefully thought through and spelled out before making a formal proposal, is what is the problem that the proposal to make it a policy is going to address? Are we having a problem that results from it being only a guideline, that will be fixed by making it a policy? --Tryptofish (talk) 19:49, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes, and that's the main reason I'd support a change to it being a policy. People frequently break out the "it's just a guideline, not a policy" argument when they disagree with a guideline. HJ Mitchell mentioned that in the case. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 20:02, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. So if I restate that, it becomes: the problem that needs to be addressed is that users often treat COI as unimportant, because "it's only a guideline". I think I could get on-board with that. But I still have serious concerns about whether the community will have consensus about enforcing this as a policy. I understand the comments about "should". But consider someone who has a significant and problematic COI, leading them to make biased edits, and they are not disclosing it, and they have always been very careful not to make it possible to dox them. They should disclose that COI, and arguably they must, but if they don't, what do we do to enforce it? As a guideline, we focus on enforcing NPOV, which is is a policy, and enforcing NPOV as a policy also effectively enforces the COI guideline. So, if we take "COI is only a guideline" off the table, how does this change? --Tryptofish (talk) 20:14, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

I think the community is treating COI like a policy most of the time. This could be problematic for users who are treating it like a guideline and who might think their cases are exceptions. There are, and there will continue to be, COI cases that remain undetectable for a long period, or forever. I don't think upgrading COI to a policy will have much of an effect on those either way. I agree that the quality of the edits made by COI editors is a factor, but it's not just about NPOV. I don't think—if this is what you were implying—that NPOV enforcement is sufficient to handle all COI problems. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 00:55, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes, just like there are NPOV violations that remain undetected for a very long time or forever, that's clearly not a reason for not having policy or guideline and enforcing them when they come up. Moreover, part of the purpose of the guideline is to promote ethics, and also honesty with readers, which should be what we always try to enforce and reinforce in almost every policy and guideline. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:32, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

I agree that the quality of the edits made by COI editors is a factor I strenously disagree; the quality of their edits makes no difference at all (notably, this was a repeated defense made for Rachel Helps and she still got topic-banned.) There are clear red lines for COIs where, once crossed, nothing else can serve as a defense. We wouldn't accept "I like their edits tho" as a defense in a sockpuppetry case, I don't see how a COI case is any different. --Aquillion (talk) 23:44, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

We wouldn't accept "I like their edits tho" as a defense in a sockpuppetry case: Perhaps you or I wouldn't; but the community has done just that and is again considering doing just that (permanent link). Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 23:57, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

The purpose of the COI policy is to maintain the quality of the encyclopaedia. If editors have found that the contributions of an editor with a COI are beneficial to the encyclopaedia (i.e. the articles they've contributed to are notable, neutral, due, etc) why would we want to block them? What benefits would we gain? Thryduulf (talk) 00:12, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I think you're thinking about direct benefits. The more obvious benefits are indirect: expressing certain views about COI signals that you're part of the in-group, that you share values with those in power (that'd be most of us in this discussion), that you support the current social order, etc. Groups use words and intensification to help strengthen the group's power and identity.

In the song "Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead", there's a solo that runs:

As coroner I must aver
I thoroughly examined her
And she's not only merely dead
She's really most sincerely dead

What's the difference between "only merely dead" and "really most sincerely dead"? Well, nothing, in practice. But the point isn't to change the practicalities; it's to indicate an emotional state. IMO the same thing happens here: We have said for years that you should normally disclose a COI before editing (except when that would require self-OUTING); now we want to say that you really most sincerely should disclose a COI before editing. The practical difference is zero. The psychological difference is significant. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:56, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

• They should disclose that COI, and arguably they must, but if they don't, what do we do to enforce it? We topic-ban them or block them as soon as sufficient evidence emerges. The recent ArbCom case and the ANI cases for Rachel Helps and Thmazing have made that obvious (though it was obvious already, since that has always been our practice.) Obviously some policies (like sockpuppetry) might not always be obvious or could be hard to prove, but once it comes out, what happens is clear. --Aquillion (talk) 23:44, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

But that wasn't what I asked. I asked about when they are very careful about not leaving any way to identify them, and therefore "as soon as sufficient evidence emerges" never arrives. You make a comparison with the sock policy, where we have the checkuser tool, but we wouldn't use checkuser to "out" someone who might or might not have a COI. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:06, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

@Aquillion, that hasn't "always" been our practice. The COI rules were very different back when we made our first edits. We have admins who created articles about themselves, their family members, or their employers, and nobody thought that was a problem back in the day. The idea back then was that if your personal interest aligned with Wikipedia's interests, then there was no "conflict", so writing an autobiography was acceptable, so long as the result was neutral. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:03, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

A neutral autobiography has got to be an oxymoron, but sure there was a time when this project had no real concept of COI. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:27, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

neutrality is judged by the words on the page, not by who wrote them. Thryduulf (talk) 19:35, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

Nonsense. A person writing their autobiography is POV writing. They are creating their life story -- now, part of their life story is the writing their autobiography. He wrote that, '[he] was born in a car seat', or he wrote a paragraph on his first job, is not neutral information no matter how it is written, it is important self-information, it is him, telling you about himself, indeed him telling you what's worth knowing. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:18, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

You are conflating notability, neutrality, DUE, and other factors into a mess that accurately reflects nothing more than your personal, rather extreme, point of view:

• Whether the subject of an article is notable or not is completely independent of who wrote the article.
  • It is more likely that an autobiography will be written by a non-notable person than a notable person (simply because there are fewer notable than non-notable people and a significant proportion of notable, living, people with the necessary skills and opportunity to write an article on the English Wikipedia already have an article) but that does not mean that everybody who writes an autobiographical article is non-notable.
• What information about the subject of an article is encyclopaedic and due is completely independent of who wrote the article.
  • What information the article should contain is solely determined by what reliable sources write about the subject, and the consensus of editors deem is important. This always overlaps with what the subject of the article thinks it should contain - sometimes the overlap is tangential, sometimes it's (almost) complete, most often it is between the two extremes. The exact same is true when you substitute "fans of the subject", "haters of the subject", "the subject's family and friends" and many other groups of people.
• What information is present in the article is present in the article is completely independent of who wrote the article, what should be in the article, and whether it is neutrally phrased.
  • Only a featured article contains everything it should contain and nothing else. Every other article contains either omissions or excesses. Given the overlap between what the subject wants in the article and what independent editors want in the article, an autobiography will contain at least some material that consensus says it should (e.g. both an autobiography and an independent biography of a notable actor will include information about their career and at least a partial filmography). How much (and what) is missing and how much (and what) is present that shouldn't be can (obviously) only be judged by the actual content of the specific article.
• Whether the information in the article is written neutrally is completely independent of who wrote the article, and of what information is in the article.
  • It is obvious that this can also only be judged by the words on the page, but it is entirely possible to write both neutrally and non-neutrally about both encyclopaedic and non-encyclopaedic information, and all combinations are possible for both the article subject and for others. It is less likely that an auto-biography will be neutrally written, but that is not the same thing as impossible.

Thryduulf (talk) 14:38, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Your statements are the complete mess. Indeed, its as if you have no idea what you are responding to, it's like you just rattling off random talking points. Nothing I said addressed notability, nor encyclopedic. And your pretense of divorcing DUE form neutrality just demonstrates a complete lack understanding of neutrality. You appear to not even understand autobiography. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:51, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Now try reading what I actually wrote and responding to that rather than assuming that someone who disagrees with you must not be understanding you. Thryduulf (talk) 16:55, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Oh, I read what you wrote. It is a complete mess of random irrelevant talking points, and nothing but misunderstanding or lack of understanding on your part. And as I said, which you apparently did not read, your misunderstanding goes far beyond me, to neutrality and biography. Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:58, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

I'm not misunderstanding anything, it's a detailed explanation of why you are wrong, but as you have no interested in listening I'll end the conversation here. Thryduulf (talk) 17:16, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

No, your comment is not. It is about other things, not responding to what I wrote, its either pretending that due is not part of neutrality or you are fundamentally misinformed or spreading misinformation. Your comment further betrays a misunderstanding or misinformation about biography and autobiography. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:33, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

A person writing their autobiography is POV writing. They are creating their life story – I think this is overstated. If the article says "Alice Expert is the chair of the Expert Department at Big University", and that's what independent sources say about Alice, then the article is neutral, no matter who wrote it. (Articles were usually shorter back then. A single-sentence or two-sentence substub was pretty typical.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:00, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

No, not neutral, it's the thing the very subject thinks is important to say about the very subject.

(As for creating their life story, it is them living it, which now for your author includes writing their autobiography but deceivingly so, as independent biography.) Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:56, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

@Alanscottwalker You need to explain how the words "Alice Expert is the chair of the Expert Department at Big University" are neutral when written by an independent editor but the exact same words are non-neutral when written by Alice Expert. Until you can do that the foundation of your argument is baseless. Thryduulf (talk) 11:02, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

You said you were done talking to me, now you ping me back. I have already explained. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:24, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Except you haven't explained anything. Please answer the question asked. Thryduulf (talk) 12:04, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

I certainly have.

And your latest flip-flop further decreases trust in your commenting, so just stop. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:20, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Forget personalising the dispute and just answer the question asked. Thryduulf (talk) 12:40, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Already answered. Your badgering is not in the least useful to Wikipedia. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:54, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for acknowledging that you cannot answer the question. Thryduulf (talk) 13:27, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

I did answer the question. Your last comment is just further evidence of your untrustworthy commenting. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:30, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

@Thryduulf the answer to your question is that when an independent editor writes that, they have made the independent (and presumably, unbiased) decision that it is important enough to put in an encyclopedia. The same cannot be said when Alice Expert writes the exact same words. RoySmith (talk) 14:06, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

That still doesn't answer the question. If an independent editor makes a judgement that those words are neutral and DUE, but those identical words are not neutral and DUE when written by someone who isn't independent then there must be some way of distinguishing the words without knowledge of who wrote them. Given that the words are identical that isn't possible, therefore you still haven't answered the question. Thryduulf (talk) 14:17, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Now you're just being pig-headed. RoySmith (talk) 14:25, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Now you're just making personal attacks. Thryduulf (talk) 14:27, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

I think Thryduulf is correct about the article. An article's neutrality is judged by its contents, not by its author(s). If a given string of words is neutral when I write it, then it's neutral when anybody writes it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:00, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

Well, since we're talking about nuance: the basic logic behind the COI policy, as I see it, is to recognise that, like all text, text in Wikipedia articles comes with paratext. The text "Alice Expert is the chair of the Expert Department at Big University" written by Alice Expert and "Alice Expert is the chair of the Expert Department at Big University" written by Bob Volunteer are identical; the paratexts are very difficult. One says this is an editorially independent encyclopaedia, the other says this is Who's Who. One imbues a degree of confidence that Alice being the chair of the Expert Department at Big University is neutral without qualification, the other raises the possibility that Alice might in fact be a disgraced former chair at Big University Degree Mill Inc, working in the hotly-disputed field of Expertise. And so on. In theory we could make the paratext irrelevant by rigorously assessing the verifiability and neutrality of every piece of text contributed. In practice we don't have time, so we take the reasonable shortcut of trusting some contributors of text more than others. – Joe (talk) 12:21, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

How does the paratext differ if both statements are supported by a reliable source? Especially if they are supported by the same reliable source? Thryduulf (talk) 12:39, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

In exactly the same way. – Joe (talk) 12:50, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

So you are saying that identical text, supported by an identical citation to a reliable source, magically changes from neutral to non-neutral based on whether the person writing the words is the subject or not? I seriously don't understand how you can say that with a straight face. Thryduulf (talk) 13:26, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Make sure you never find yourself in the literature department of a university then, it'll blow your mind.

But seriously, I agree that the text either neutral or it's not. What I'm trying to say is that in practice, we all know that it's not that easy to tell. It sounds neutral and has a reliable source, great, but does that source really check out? Has it been fairly represented? Is it independent? Has it been cherry-picked from other sources that say something different? Given time you can answer all those questions, but in day-to-day editing we usually take a shortcut by rely on contextual clues. WP:COI just extends that logic into a guideline. If I see a potentially non-neutral edit to Alice Expert from User:Thryduulf, with admin bits and 95k edits, I'm not going to blink an eye. If I see the same text as one of the first ten edits from User:McNewbie, I'll probably check out the source. If I see it from User:AliceExpertOfficial, I'm going to be so suspicious that I'd really rather they didn't make it in the first place.

And just as importantly, I think readers have a similar logic. Luckily, few people actually understand who writes Wikipedia articles or how to check, but everybody I know assumes that our articles are written by random nerds, because if they wanted to read what people and companies had to say about themselves, they'd be on Facebook. – Joe (talk) 14:04, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

So what you are actually saying is that, no, the neutrality of identical text supported by an identical citation to a reliable source doesn't change depending on who wrote it. What you are saying is that your assumptions about the text change based on things other than the words on the page. That is a very different claim to the one you were making previously. Thryduulf (talk) 14:20, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

That's a very good way of putting it, yes. I didn't intend to claim anything different. – Joe (talk) 14:37, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Another way to look at this is to consider that if Bob Volunteer thinks about making that edit about Alice Expert, and then decides that it would be better not to, then Alice Expert making the edit herself is objectionable. But then if Alice Expert made the edit first, and it got reverted because of COI, after which Bob Volunteer decides to reinstate the edit and assume responsibility for it, then the edit has been vouched for. In that way of looking at it, Alice Expert making the edit by herself is not the same as Bob Volunteer making the edit by himself, although Bob Volunteer can take a positive action to make Alice Expert's edit effectively the same as if he had first made it. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:05, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

I think some literary departments would disagree. Sincerely, Dilettante 21:40, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

Joe, it sounds like your analysis is less about whether the article actually is neutral, and more about how the RecentChanges patroller feels about the edit (e.g., confident because it's a familiar face vs. suspicious because it's not). That's a popular heuristic for everyday patrolling activities, but as you say, it's not really about the article itself. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:56, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose. The recent arbitration case highlights the complex interplay between managing conflict of interest in editing and upholding our privacy through the harassment policies. While the case underlines the necessity for clear COI guidelines, escalating these to a policy could rigidify processes that need to remain adaptable to context and sensitivity. The intricacies revealed through the case, where concerns about COI were mishandled or led to heightened disputes, show that a flexible approach is crucial. By codifying the current practices into a rigid policy, we risk not only an increase in administrative disputes but also potential misuse in contentious cases, thereby exacerbating challenges rather than providing clarity. The existing guideline allows for nuanced application that can be adapted as needed, which is more appropriate in handling the varied scenarios of COI that arise in an environment as diverse as Wikipedia. FailedMusician (talk) 23:26, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose per FailedMusician. I couldn't have said it better. COI isn't a black and white thing. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:29, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose The biggest reason is that the the COI def here is far too broad and vague. North8000 (talk) 00:56, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose. WP:COI is large, unweildy, and not well defined. The only "policy" we need, in my view, are a few items derived from the guideline: Don't write about yourself or associates in main space, don't cite yourself or associates in main space, don't link to places with which you have an association, use the talk page to propose any substantive change in any article where you have an association with the topic. Something like that, short and sweet. ~Anachronist (talk) 07:06, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

  Sounds good. Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:34, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

  While I do think these shorter and sweeter principles are generally good, the last two I think still would need clarification before further elevation as policy. For instance, with don't link to places with which you have an association: I think it makes sense that we want to avoid promotionalism—the owner of a business wikilinking to their business, or someone who runs, say, a personal online warship database adding their website to external links. On the other hand, I think we go too far if the impression is given that a user who is a member of a professional association like the Society for Historians of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era or the American Association of Physics Teachers shouldn't add citations with DOI links or wikilinks to the organization's peer-reviewed journal, in these cases The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era or the American Journal of Physics. And any article where you have an association with the topic is a phrasing that's too capacious, imbricating as it would trans editors contributing to biographical articles about transgender people, or Americans editing U. S. president biographies, or maths teachers editing mathematics articles. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 04:03, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

  In addition to Hydrangeans poitns, any article where you have an association with the topic would prevent any (established) editor from editing the Wikipedia article. Thryduulf (talk) 09:54, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

  Both your comments suggest you did not read what was written. The brief comment were grounded in the guideline which is based on defined relationships, so your parade of horribles are a waste of pixels. Alanscottwalker (talk) Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:13, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

  Something can be "grounded in" something that is "based on" something that is good and still be problematic - especially when those things are proposed to be present outside of their original context as would be the case here. Thryduulf (talk) 00:15, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose per the above, and per the things I was pointing out in my earlier comments. (I was beginning to wonder if community sentiment had changed suddenly, and I was an outlier. In fact, I was starting to wonder if Jytdog had simply been ahead of his time.) I do want to say that I appreciate the views of those editors who want to treat COI more seriously, but I also want to suggest that trying to make a formal proposal of elevation to policy would be a waste of time and effort. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:20, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
• This isn't an RfC so I won't !vote. But if this were an RfC then I would oppose making the current guideline a policy. There is too much in the current guideline - and how many editors interpret it - that assumes that COIs exist in a binary state and that all COIs are equal. In my professional experience, the organizations and people with whom I have worked recognize that COIs exist on a very large spectrum. Some bright lines are helpful and appropriate - WP:PAID is a good example - but this concept is much more nuanced than currently described and handled in this project. ElKevbo (talk) 22:08, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
• I think we absolutely do need a policy about this, because in practice we are already using it as policy, because it is extremely serious and because there are clear red lines; in recent disputes over this many people who ultimately ended up topic-banned or blocked have breezily defended their actions (and had their actions defended by others) by arguing that the whole thing was not policy and therefore they weren't required to follow it. They were wrong, as can be seen from the numerous recent blocked; and fact that there gray areas makes it more important to have a well-thought-out, clearly-defined set policies for how we approach COI issues, not less. That doesn't necessarily mean that the current wording is ideal and should be translated directly into policies, but we need to think about what the red lines are, what the gray areas are, and when and how people have responsibilities to disclose potential COIs or to avoid editing in an area entirely. Clearly they do have such responsibilities; editors are regularly being blocked for failing to meet it. We need to make at least some effort to have a policy page that reflects current practice and makes it clear to people what their responsibilities are, because otherwise we're going to end up with more situations where editors go "ah I don't have any responsibilities, it's not policy" and then end up blocked by ANI or ArbCom. That is not ideal - the ideal situation is to have clear policies that make the requirements as clear as we can in advance, so editors don't find out where the red lines are only after being blocked. --Aquillion (talk) 23:38, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

  I see several editors saying that we use this as a policy, and I wonder if we all agree on what the difference between policies, guidelines and essays actually is. I suspect that we don't, and what's meant is "we enforce this pretty strictly". We enforce a lot of "mere guidelines" pretty strictly. We even block people for violating "mere essays". On the other hand, RecentChanges patrollers violate the WP:PRESERVE section Wikipedia:Editing policy every hour of the day, and none of them get blocked. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:08, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

  Our enforcement is haphazard at best in most things, because many of our policies and guidelines rely on decentral enforcement, decentralized judgement, and fuzzy (or is that, nuanced) lines, content or editing policies or guidelines are probably the most haphazard, as there is minimal barrier of entry for any edit. Perhaps, the best we can do here is stress and reenforce for an amature encyclopedia writing publisher, the ethics of the matter. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:14, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

  That's true, but I think what's more relevant is that policies tend, on average, to articulate more general principles (e.g., "Wikipedia is not a place to publish new ideas", "Wikipedia is not a web directory", "Thou must not violate copyrights") and the other pages get into the details (e.g., all the different pages about identifying and dealing with POV pushers, spammers, and copyvios).

  We might need a different way of talking about this. Perhaps we'll end up with the Wikipedia:Editing policy being classified as "gently recommended best practices" as well as "policy", and Wikipedia:Spam as "strictly enforced" and yet "guideline". WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:08, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

  Perhaps, but that seems less relevant than, some things are easier and some things are harder, but it is the harder that are usually more central to complex tasks. And functionally it does not compare to decentralization as a reason for uneveness. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:28, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

• Per FFF above, I'd support promoting the guideline to a policy unchanged, and I'd also support some changes. (Shorter, clearer, probably stricter.) Levivich (talk) 06:40, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
• Well, I'd need to know what problem this is solving. The case OP cites did end with the person getting the heave-ho on COI grounds, so it didn't seem necessary there. We have a lot of policies here, and a some of them suck, so I would support a trade: enact this as a policy in return for demoting another one, leaving no net change in number of policies. Which one to demote would be up to the community, I can think of several. Herostratus (talk) 01:33, 23 April 2024 (UTC)
• Hi, I'm a paid editor who has recently been banned for a lack of COI disclosure (but which I believe was actually an issue of NPOV that other editors were unable to articulate well). I believe that we should get rid of this whole guideline. It promotes suspicion of editors, and since Wikipedia allows anonymous editing, requires some editors to be known publicly while allowing others to remain anonymous. This creates an environment that motivates outing and discrimination based on an editor's relationships and background. It is inherently unfair. Instead, we should focus on whether or not edits maintain NPOV. I would support making the policies surrounding NPOV clearer and having an environment of enforcing NPOV more strictly. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 19:42, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ltbdl (talk) 06:57, 14 May 2024 (UTC)

  @Ltbdl: I'm not sure what you find funny here. QuicoleJR (talk) 13:19, 14 May 2024 (UTC)

  While the response is unnecessarily rude, I do see the humor in a paid editor arguing that COI editing can produce neutral results, as if people can be immune to implicit bias, confirmation bias, and, well, just bias. As if Wikipedia doesn't have a 20-year history of COI editing leading to NPOV problems. As if we didn't just prove that again in recent months. As if COI editing leading to NPOV problems isn't the reason why this particular paid editor is now topic banned. There's this very famous Upton Sinclair quote, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it." And, indeed, paid editors and COI editors seem to have difficulty understanding that paid editing and COI editing invariably leads to non-neutral editing. Funnier still is the argument that restrictions on COI editing are "inherently unfair" -- unfair to whom? The COI editors? The idea that fairness requires letting people edit about subjects with which they have a COI is, well, laughable. Levivich (talk) 17:22, 14 May 2024 (UTC)

  invariably leads to non-neutral editing: Recent months don't indicate this is invariably true, per a finding of fact from an Arbitration Committee case about editing while having a conflict of interest [that] did not, in general, violate other content policies or guidelines; this would include WP:NPOV (the case maintained that conflict of interest editing is against guidelines; the point is that the claim about an invariable chain between COI and POV isn't, well, invariably true).

  unfair to whom? Unfair to those who become targets of discrimination and harassment. If a Wikipedia guideline inadvertently motivates harassment or discrimination, I can understand why an editor might consider it unfair. I'm reminded of recent experience at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:No queerphobes, where it became apparent that some detractors to the essay believe that being LGBTQ+ constitutes a Conflict of Interest for LGBTQ+ topics (see for instance the comment claiming the essay is really only going to be [..] used to claim that editors do not have a conflict of interest even when it's obvious)—a claim that WP:No Queerphobes rightly says is a queerphobic claim—to the point that the deletion discussion was taken to Deletion review to overturn the keep decision on the claim that notifying WikiProject LGBT Studies had the effect of prejudicing the discussion. While the XfD decision was not overturned, it was pretty chilling to see editors so willing to try to justify excluding LGBTQ+ editors from matters pertaining to LGBTQ+ topics. Among the comments opposing overturning, there were even a few that apparently agreed that notifying WikiProject LGBT Studies did wrongfully prejudice the discussion, which was unsettling.

  laughable: I don't see what's funny about someone being concerned about harassment; that'd seem to entail supposing, however inadvertently, that people being harassed is funny. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 20:48, 14 May 2024 (UTC)

  It may be my inability to articulate well Rachel, but I fail to understand how the following sentences are logically coherent: "It promotes suspicion of editors, and since Wikipedia allows anonymous editing, requires some editors to be known publicly while allowing others to remain anonymous. This creates an environment that motivates outing and discrimination based on an editor's relationships and background. It is inherently unfair." Could you also please expand on which NPOV policies you think should be made clearer, and how they should be enforced? ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 00:38, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

  Sorry if that wasn't clear. WP:PAID requires that paid editors reveal the identity of their employer; we assume, correctly, that any paid editor has a financial COI regarding their employer. However, there are other COIs, which the policy proposed on this page would cover. For example, it's a COI to edit the page of a friend or relative. However, this relationship is not apparent unless the identity of the author is revealed (encouraging authors who want to edit pages for people they have a COI for to be anonymous, because of the scrutiny declaring a COI often causes). Since so many people are editing anonymously with a COI, other editors become suspicious that their fellow editors have undisclosed COIs. This leads them to wonder what the identity of the other editors is, sometimes resulting in harassment. So here is a possible alternative. Let's say that an editor whose identity is unknown is making a lot of edits that seem to be promoting a living author. Rather than questioning them about a possible connection to the author, a fellow editor could ask them to comply with NPOV. If they disagree, they could ask for a third opinion, or take things to the NPOV noticeboard. When an admin agrees that they are not up to NPOV editing standards, they could give that editor a warning. After this formal warning, continued NPOV editing could result in a topic ban. That way we could use an existing policy (NPOV) to enforce what we actually care about, which is NPOV. We don't have to ask the editor what their relationship to the author is. There is no hidden information! We could make WP:UNDUE more detailed about what constitutes undue weight, with examples, so it is easier to understand. I think my own past editing had issues with NPOV, and in conjunction with my topic ban, and to demonstrate I understand what the problems with my editing were, I am in the process of drafting guidelines for NPOV specific to religious topics. To comply with my topic ban, this is off-wiki. Please email me if you would like to know more. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 15:52, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

  They ask for a third opinion and then a third editor comes and gives an opinion and turns out that third editor is also a friend of the article subject and doesn't disclose it. This is what actually happens in reality. Levivich (talk) 16:32, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

  "So here is a possible alternative..." Yes, a perfectly normal procedure. Take a discussion I participated in today on Talk:Bachelor, where two editors got in a dispute, and I answered a third opinion request; one of the editors attempted to continue their non-neutral editing, and was subsequently page-blocked by an admin. Again, this is common. The "process" you seem to be pushing back against, where editors take the time to extensively investigate undisclosed COIs, is much rarer (I do sometimes have a life). I think you are overestimating the extent to which your topic ban represents a widespread problem (the case was in reality unique in nearly every way), among other things. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 03:15, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

  one of the editors attempted to continue their non-neutral editing The point is that it is irrelevant whether they were doing that because they have a COI with the topic or for some other reason. If they are unable or unwilling to edit neutrally they should not be contributing (to that article/subject), regardless of why that is. If they are able and willing to edit neutrally there is no benefit to preventing them contributing. Thryduulf (talk) 08:02, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

  It is relevant whether or not the people who decide what is and what is not NPOV have a COI. Levivich (talk) 15:43, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

• Comment It seems like this accidentally evolved into an RFC. Do we consider this discussion to be one? If so, we should probably update the formatting and list it at CENT. If not, we should probably go ahead and start one to figure out community consensus. QuicoleJR (talk) 16:44, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

  Initially, I understood this discussion to be a sort of testing-the-waters, prior to starting any sort of formal proposal. Based on the discussion so far, it's not clear to me that there is enough support for upgrading to make a formal RfC worth the effort. (But of course anyone who wants to start an RfC is free to do so.) --Tryptofish (talk) 20:37, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

  That makes sense. QuicoleJR (talk) 20:43, 16 May 2024 (UTC)