Hello, FredLipman, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

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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! -- Uzma Gamal ( talk) 10:54, 3 August 2012 (UTC) reply

Please do not add inappropriate external links to Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a collection of links, nor should it be used for advertising or promotion. Inappropriate links include (but are not limited to) links to personal web sites, links to web sites with which you are affiliated, and links that attract visitors to a web site or promote a product. See the external links guideline and spam guideline for further explanations. Because Wikipedia uses the nofollow attribute value, its external links are disregarded by most search engines. If you feel the link should be added to the article, please discuss it on the article's talk page rather than re-adding it. Thank you. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 14:32, 23 July 2012 (UTC) reply

Please stop adding inappropriate external links to Wikipedia. It is considered spamming and Wikipedia is not a vehicle for advertising or promotion. Because Wikipedia uses nofollow tags, additions of links to Wikipedia will not alter search engine rankings. If you continue spamming, you may be blocked from editing Wikipedia. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 17:47, 23 July 2012 (UTC) reply

Apologies OhNoitsJamie...I am new to editing WP and am working to amend my contributions. I do not want any links back to content on the Blank Rome website, so will be looking for other sources or otherwise removing. Thanks for you patience. FredLipman ( talk) 18:39, 23 July 2012 (UTC) reply

It's not just the website. Wikipedia is not a vehicle for self-promotion. If you continue adding references to your works on Wikipedia, you will be blocked indefinitely. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 12:28, 24 July 2012 (UTC) reply

Dear Editor: I will in the future avoid external links if I am permitted to be resurrected as an author and not considered a "spammer" However, I wish to advise you of a problem which Wikipedia has. I am the author of 14 books which have been published by such prestigious publishers as Palgrave Macmillan, John Wiley & Sons, Prima Publishing, The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc. (now part of Random House), etc. Whenever I try to cite Wikipedia in the footnotes to the books, I have been told by the publishers that Wikipedia is not a proper citation because there is no source for the information contained in Wikipedia. Accordingly, when I edited the word "IPO", I cited my book entitled "International and U.S. IPO Planning" (John Wiley & Sons, 2009) in the text of the section entitled "Advance Planning". My book was the most recent one to my knowledge that discussed this topic. which is extremely important to the IPO process and is not currently referenced under the word "IPO". I therefore cited my book in the text. You eliminated my Advance Planning section entirely once I was designated a "spammer". Likewise, you eliminated the section comparing US with international IPO's because I cited my book in the text as a reference. It seems to me that if Wikipedia is to be taken as a serious source you should at least permit footnote references to original source material and should insist upon it, even if you do not permit text references. I think it is in your interest to have source references in your material. If you wish, I am willing to limit the source references in the future to footnotes. However, without such references, the statements made in Wikipedia are not and will not be given credence by the major publishers. I would like to be resurrected as an author and not a "spammer". Aside from writing 14 books on topics which would be helpful to Wikipedia, I taught at the University of Pennsylvania, including its law school and the Wharton School of Business (MBA program), for approximately 12 years and ,before that, have taught at Temple University. I have lectured internationally on IPO's, corporate governance, and family business. I have written a book on each topic and the books are used in universities around the world. Please advise me of your decision. FredLipman ( talk) 20:44, 1 August 2012 (UTC)Frederick D. Lipman reply

Please see Wikipedia:COI#Citing_oneself. While you'll see that citing yourself isn't banned per se, you are discouraged from doing it excessively. Furthermore, it's not particularly useful to Wikipedia to simply add content like "for further information on this topic, see this article by Fred Lipman." Instead, you should be incorporating useful material (not just links) with references to support that material. Citations should not be links to commercial websites, but rather to ISBN links to books or journal articles; there are tools available to make this easier. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 20:56, 1 August 2012 (UTC) reply

Dear Editor: I take it from your response that if I avoid "excessive" citing to my own books, I can resume making changes to the following words: IPO, Whistleblower and Corporate Governance. It was my intention to cite to my books, all of which are recent, once per word in either the text or in a footnote to the text. Is this excessive? FredLipman ( talk) 18:31, 2 August 2012 (UTC)Frederick D. Lipman reply

You're intending to add content as well? Can you give me an example of what you propose to add? OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 19:16, 2 August 2012 (UTC) reply

Dear Editor: I would add the following under IPO: Under a separate caption entitled "Advance Planning" "Careful advance planning is crucial to a successful IPO. One book [insert footnote to cite my book] suggests the following 7 advance planning steps: (1) develop an impressive management and professional team; (2) grow the company's business with an eye to the public marketplace; (3) obtain audited or auditable financial statements using IPO-accepted accounting principles; (4) clean up the company's act; (5) establish antitakeover defenses; (6) develop good corporate governance; (7) create insider bail-out opportunities and take advantage of IPO windows". The footnote to my book would be to "Lipman, International and U.S. IPO Planning, ISBN 978-0-470-39087-0" Please advise if this is acceptable. FredLipman ( talk) 19:33, 2 August 2012 (UTC)Frederick D. Lipman reply

I'm not going to object to that; seems reasonable. However, decisions here are consensus-based as well as policy-based; others may possibly object. Wikipedia does recognize the need to subject matter experts; as long as your edits suggest that you are here to add quality content versus an emphasis on self-promotion, there probably won't be any further issues. Also please note that conversations flow in a top-to-bottom fashion on talk pages, i.e. if you were to respond to this comment you'd want to post immediately below it. Thanks, OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 19:44, 2 August 2012 (UTC) reply

Although Wikipedia is often being used as a press source, your publishers are correct in their decision that Wikipedia is not a proper citation. See Wikipedia#Citing_Wikipedia. Wikipedia should not be taken as a serious source and major publishers should not give statements made in Wikipedia credence. Instead, major publishers should cite to your books directly; they don't need Wikipedia for that. -- Uzma Gamal ( talk) 11:12, 3 August 2012 (UTC) reply

Dear Editor: I would like your permission to make the following change under the word "Whistleblowers" (new words are underlined). The purpose of the change is that the reader has no way to determine what is a "robust whistleblower system" without reading my book. We will cite the book solely by its ISBN number in a footnote.

Wikipedia is not a vehicle for advertising your book. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 19:16, 15 August 2012 (UTC) reply

Dear Editor: We will abide by your decision and we will not cite the book in a footnote, even though it is source for the material.

I don't even see why this article needs a "best practices" section, as the definition of a best practice can vary across entity and categorical lines. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 21:00, 15 August 2012 (UTC) reply

"Best International Practices For Organizations

"All organizations, whether public, private, or non-profit (including governmental) should, as a best practice, adopt a robust whistleblower system to induce its employees to internally report illegal or excessively risky activity directly to its board of directors or trustees. Without a robust whistleblower system, directors/trustees of the organization may fail in their oversight responsibilities. A robust whistleblower system, which is suggested in one book[will insert reference/citation to book here], encourages internal reporting of misconduct so as to permit it to be corrected. It is particularly important in countries (such as the United States) which provide significant financial rewards to whistleblowers who externally report illegal behavior to government entities. "There have been numerous examples of boards of directors/trustees who have been uninformed as to problems in the organization, even though lower level employees knew about these problems. These boards were misled because they relied primarily on top management and the auditors for their information.”

I've started a new topic regarding this issue here. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 19:17, 2 August 2012 (UTC) reply