User talk:Marlan Drive

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Welcome![edit]

Hello, Marlan Drive, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions.

I noticed that one of the first articles you edited was Society of the Cincinnati, which appears to be dealing with a topic with which you may have a conflict of interest. In other words, you may find it difficult to write about that topic in a neutral and objective way, because you are, work for, or represent, the subject of that article. Your recent contributions may have already been undone for this very reason.

To reduce the chances of your contributions being undone, you might like to draft your revised article before submission, and then ask me or another editor to proofread it. See our help page on userspace drafts for more details. If the page you created has already been deleted from Wikipedia, but you want to save the content from it to use for that draft, don't hesitate to ask anyone from this list and they will copy it to your user page.

One rule we do have in connection with conflicts of interest is that accounts used by more than one person will unfortunately be blocked from editing. Wikipedia generally does not allow editors to have usernames which imply that the account belongs to a company or corporation. If you have a username like this, you should request a change of username or create a new account. (A name that identifies the user as an individual within a given organization may be OK.)

In addition, if you receive, or expect to receive, compensation for any contribution you make, you must disclose your employer, client, and affiliation to comply with our terms of use and our policy on paid editing.

Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place {{Help me}} before the question. Again, welcome! Train of Knowledge (Talk|Contribs) 22:38, 21 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There's a whole pile of policies and guidelines and which can trip up any new contributor on Wikipedia and if you've a connection with that article that difficulty increases enormously. For a general discussion and guidance from neutral editors try the WP:TEAHOUSE in the first instance. For more specific information on making an edit request see Wikipedia:Edit requests. Thankyou.Djm-leighpark (talk) 08:38, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
As I have said on my talk page, I have self-reverted my edits after finding out that you do not have a conflict of interest. I may even replace the original welcome template that tells you about COI with a generalised welcome template for editors everywhere. Anyways, thank you for your contributions! Train of Knowledge (Talk|Contribs) 22:23, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

December 2019[edit]

Information icon Thank you for your suggestion regarding Society of the Cincinnati. When you believe an article needs improvement, please feel free to make those changes. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the edit this page link at the top.
The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold in updating pages. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes—they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills. New contributors are always welcome. You don't even need to log in (although there are many reasons you might want to). I am sorry for the revert I have made. Because your edit summary made me think that you had a very close connection with the article in question (which is a Conflict of Interest), I have reverted your changes. Please do not be discouraged and please be bold and fix existing errors on the article. I have reverted my edit after finding out my mistake. Train of Knowledge (Talk|Contribs) 22:28, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Dealing with the frustration[edit]

At this point, I expect you are frustrated with the flip-flops at Society of the Cincinnati: you edited Lead, Train reverted, Train reverted revert, and now, User:Djm-leighpark reverted that back to before your edit. Please be patient. David notMD (talk) 10:33, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yes ... I'd like to re-iterate how frustrating and confusing this must seem. There are ways you can suggest changes (I'd like to think I might help you formulate those changes but I don't want to make promises I can't keep and the process can seem like getting through the eye of a needle until you get the hang of it Thankyou.) Djm-leighpark (talk) 10:56, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Your statement on Train's Talk page "...while I run the organization in question, I'm not a member of it." combined with your mention in the Edit summary that you are CEO of the organization means that minimally, you have what Wikipedia defines as a conflict of interest, and most likely the PAID restrictions (see WP:PAID) apply. I see that on the Talk page of the article you are already identified as having a COI, which is a start.

What I recommend going forward is that you declare PAID on your User page. This is a requirement. After that I recommend that you state your intentions to conduct a major revision of the article, on the Talk page of the article. Given PAID, Wikipedia calls on editors to describe in detail their intended edits on the Talk page, so that independent editors can decide to implement or not. Given what you intend, this would be exceeding cumbersome. What I recommend is that after describing intent on the Talk page, you edit the article in modest chunks, perhaps section by section, each time detailing the changes in an Edit summary. Add references as you go. Only as that process nears completion should you revise the Lead, and because of your COI, adding references should be part of that revision. During the process, stay aware that Wikipedia requires a neutral point of view. If ever there was or is criticism of the Society, that belongs in the article. Given your situation, do not directly delete referenced content and references. For any deletions, I recommend the more formal path of proposing specific changes as a Talk section and allowing other editors to make the final decision.

Many of us here are experts in our field (see my User page for example). This does not exempt us from substantiating all changes with quality references, and does not allow original research, i.e. based on what we know or conjecture, but not published. See vitamin B12 for an article I am progressively radically rewriting prior to nominating it as a Good Article (which process I expect will require score more edits once a reviewer starts the process). If I was still an industry consultant I would have declared a COI even though none of my clients knew I was a Wikipedia editor.David notMD (talk) 10:33, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Userpage COI compliance[edit]

{{UserboxCOI|1=Society of the Cincinnati}}
or
{{Paid|employer=Society of the Cincinnati|userbox=yes|article=[[Society of the Cincinnati]]}}
Thankyou. I will add some more advice shortly. Djm-leighpark (talk) 22:50, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Request edit technique[edit]

While not mandatory I suggest using the Template:Request edit technique for requested COI edits. See also I really suggest starting small until confident what is going on. It is better to have small wins and smaller examples which are easier to correct rather than a longer paragraph that will often be rejected of multiple reasons and multiple times.

Example[edit]

This may not be the best example (and may have problems) but it is meant to be illustrative (looking at pages going through Category:Requested edits and seeing what is accepted and what are rejected may be a better way at looking at things: 

==Request edit 20191225a - Example with issues==

{{tlx|Request edit}}
{{collapse top|Change x to y using z|float=center|width=40%|bg=#DCDCDC}}
{| class="wikitable" width="96%" style="text-align: center" 
|+ 
|-
|{{n/a|'''x'''}}||In the Origins section, remove the words:
back to plowing his fields.
|-
|{{n/a|'''y'''}}||Replace with:
return to ploughing his fields.<ref name="Ref001">{{cite web|url=https://grammarist.com/spelling/plough-plow/|title=Plough vs. plow|website=The Grammarist}}</ref>
|-
|{{n/a|'''z'''}}||Using:
{{talk-reflist}}
|-
|}
{{collapse bottom}}

Article talk pages where used[edit]

Below is a set of three pages where the attempt has been made, they may have issues and may not represent best practice:

You can also monitor edit requests at Category:Requested edits to see how it works. You don't have to go about it this way, see also WP:Requested edits. Thankyou. Good luck, you may need it. 23:46, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Lack of Useful Guidance[edit]

I'm posting this here with no idea that it will be read. It's a bit like putting a message in a bottle and sending it off to sea.

I was under the impression that people involved with Wikipedia cared about the truth, so I set out today to share some by correcting a clearly defective article about a subject I know a great deal about. The article is littered with red flags posted by editors (I assume) about lack of documentation and other issues, so I thought a sensible revision would be welcome. I described some of the issues and offered a pretty clear example. I didn't hide my connection to the subject of the article. I was candid about my background and said I'd welcome editorial oversight and constructive criticism. What I got back was mostly suggestions about something called a "tea house" and warnings that I had too much of a conflict of interest to be trusted, along with lots of lines of what, to someone used to writing in plain English, was bewildering computer code. No one who stopped by to comment on this suggested any concern about the inaccuracies and misleading statements I touched on. One of the people who got involved didn't write in grammatically correct sentences, and the idea that they edit the written work of others was a little appalling. At the end of the day I find myself surprised, dismayed, and disappointed. I thought the people involved — mostly volunteers, I know — cared mostly about getting things right. Although one day may be a small sample, that doesn't seem to be the case. Their chief concern seems to be with processes — extremely arcane and peculiar ones.Marlan Drive (talk) 04:14, 24 December 2019 (UTC) Jack Warren[reply]

To quote Reagan: "Trust, but verify." As long as you reference as you write, changes can be accepted. For transparency, Wikipedia requires declaration of COI and PAID. Abide by the guidelines and your improvements to the article in question - and to other articles - are welcome. David notMD (talk)
You may actually feel like your in a sea of guidance that goes round in a whirlpool. The Wikipedia:Plain and simple conflict of interest guide as indicated at the top of this page is a useful start. And keep re-reading it. I see from your contribution history you've not used WP:TEAHOUSE; you could also try Wikipedia:IRC though I've not always done well particularly on the latter myself. Thankyou.Djm-leighpark (talk) 08:21, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Some guidance: Disagreeing with edits is fine, but criticizing editors, even obliquely, is not. ("One of the people who got involved didn't write in grammatically correct sentences, and the idea that they edit the written work of others was a little appalling.") Some one can mean good dispite errors in spelling and grammer. David notMD (talk) 13:25, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We are all volunteers here[edit]

There is no "Wikipedia Team." Every article is the accrued contribution of many editors. Society of the Cincinnati dates back to 2003, and has had hundreds of editors. I, for one, am willing to believe that it is a jumbled mess that needs radical revision. However, it is especially important that (self-proclaimed) experts provide references for the content being added, and rationales for content and references being deleted. Your initial attempt to edit the article was reverted not because anyone challenged its content, but only because it was not referenced. The editors who have been trying to advise you have no vested interest in the article, nor knowledge, and frankly, no personal desire to participate to improve the article. If this article is to be improved, you are the right person to do that, but you must be willing to comply with Wikipedia rules. Please try again. David notMD (talk) 13:53, 25 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. The Society's website cannot be used as a reference. David notMD (talk) 18:42, 25 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

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