Hello JennyMc66. The nature of your edits gives the impression you have an undisclosed financial stake in promoting a topic, but you have not complied with Wikipedia's mandatory paid editing disclosure requirements. Paid advocacy is a category of conflict of interest (COI) editing that involves being compensated by a person, group, company or organization to use Wikipedia to promote their interests. Undisclosed paid advocacy is prohibited by our policies on neutral point of view and what Wikipedia is not, and is an especially serious type of COI; the Wikimedia Foundation regards it as a "black hat" practice akin to black-hat search-engine optimization.
Paid advocates are strongly discouraged from direct article editing, and should instead propose changes on the talk page of the article in question if an article exists. If the article does not exist, paid advocates are strongly discouraged from attempting to write an article at all. At best, any proposed article creation should be submitted through the articles for creation process, rather than directly.
Regardless, if you are receiving or expect to receive compensation for your edits, broadly construed, you are required by the
Wikimedia Terms of Use to disclose your employer, client and affiliation. You can post such a mandatory disclosure to your user page at
User:JennyMc66. The template {{
Paid}} can be used for this purpose – e.g. in the form: {{paid|user=JennyMc66|employer=InsertName|client=InsertName}}. If I am mistaken – you are not being directly or indirectly compensated for your edits – please state that in response to this message. Otherwise, please provide the required disclosure. In either case, do not edit further until you answer this message.
MrOllie (
talk) 20:03, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
- Hello -- I'm unsure whether I followed your instructions clearly, but I disclosed my employer on my page. JennyMc66 ( talk) 20:23, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
As previously advised, your edits give the impression you have a financial stake in promoting a topic, but you have not complied with Wikipedia's
mandatory paid editing disclosure requirements. You were asked to cease editing until you responded by either stating that you are not being directly or indirectly compensated for your edits, or by complying with the mandatory requirements under the
Wikimedia Terms of Use that you disclose your employer, client and affiliation. Again, you can post such a disclosure on your user page at
User:JennyMc66, and the template {{
Paid}} can be used for this purpose – e.g. in the form: {{paid|user=JennyMc66|employer=InsertName|client=InsertName}}. Please respond before making any other edits to Wikipedia.
MrOllie (
talk) 20:18, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
Hello! Revisiting this topic in March 2024. As I have disclosed, I am employed by Tricentis. Information on the Tricentis page is incorrect. That's why I (and other Tricentis employees before me) have attempted edits. We have no wish to run afoul of your editorial rules; we just would prefer that our company be accurately reflected here. (For example, we are not an Austrian company. Several products that are listed are no longer on the market. Our office locations are incorrect. We have made several acquisitions since the last one listed in 2021.) How can we update the listing so that it is correct without breaking the rules? I assure you that I have no interest in adding what was termed as 'promotional language.' I understand that this is not a product brochure, and it is not our intent to pull a fast one on Wikipedia. Can someone please advise me on the best way to move forward?
Thank you, Jennifer McCarthy
Hi @ Mrollie,
I can see that you've made some changes -- my edit request looks different. I followed instructions from the link you provided; if I need to do anything else please let me know. I can't tell whether the edits were approved, even though it appears that you've seen them. May I move forward?
Thank you,
Jennifer McCarthy JennyMc66 ( talk) 17:39, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
- The last significant edit
MrOllie made was
this, last year. I'm mentioning him again so he knows: you misspelled his name. I saw what you proposed on the talk page--sorry, but I think you need to be a bit more than just a COI editor, because there are problems with formatting. I don't know what "JM1" is supposed to be or point at. And the actual edit request seems to be to add a bunch of locations of offices, sourced to the company website--and MrOllie already signaled (above) that this is a problem.
Drmies (
talk) 17:44, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hello! Thanks for your reply. Yes, I reached out to him in advance of trying to accomplish this without breaking any rules. He said to proceed as long as there was no promotional language. He said nothing about a link to a locations page, so I'm a little confused. Question: we don't necessarily get press coverage just because we open a new office, and we don't issue press releases for all of them. How do I prove that these are our offices without that press?
- I'm trying to understand and I have followed all advice/direction given to me. Is there a link someplace that would explain to me how an edit should be formatted?
- JennyMc66 ( talk) 18:31, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
Hello JennyMc66. The nature of your edits gives the impression you have an undisclosed financial stake in promoting a topic, but you have not complied with Wikipedia's mandatory paid editing disclosure requirements. Paid advocacy is a category of conflict of interest (COI) editing that involves being compensated by a person, group, company or organization to use Wikipedia to promote their interests. Undisclosed paid advocacy is prohibited by our policies on neutral point of view and what Wikipedia is not, and is an especially serious type of COI; the Wikimedia Foundation regards it as a "black hat" practice akin to black-hat search-engine optimization.
Paid advocates are strongly discouraged from direct article editing, and should instead propose changes on the talk page of the article in question if an article exists. If the article does not exist, paid advocates are strongly discouraged from attempting to write an article at all. At best, any proposed article creation should be submitted through the articles for creation process, rather than directly.
Regardless, if you are receiving or expect to receive compensation for your edits, broadly construed, you are required by the
Wikimedia Terms of Use to disclose your employer, client and affiliation. You can post such a mandatory disclosure to your user page at
User:JennyMc66. The template {{
Paid}} can be used for this purpose – e.g. in the form: {{paid|user=JennyMc66|employer=InsertName|client=InsertName}}. If I am mistaken – you are not being directly or indirectly compensated for your edits – please state that in response to this message. Otherwise, please provide the required disclosure. In either case, do not edit further until you answer this message.
MrOllie (
talk) 20:03, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
- Hello -- I'm unsure whether I followed your instructions clearly, but I disclosed my employer on my page. JennyMc66 ( talk) 20:23, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
As previously advised, your edits give the impression you have a financial stake in promoting a topic, but you have not complied with Wikipedia's
mandatory paid editing disclosure requirements. You were asked to cease editing until you responded by either stating that you are not being directly or indirectly compensated for your edits, or by complying with the mandatory requirements under the
Wikimedia Terms of Use that you disclose your employer, client and affiliation. Again, you can post such a disclosure on your user page at
User:JennyMc66, and the template {{
Paid}} can be used for this purpose – e.g. in the form: {{paid|user=JennyMc66|employer=InsertName|client=InsertName}}. Please respond before making any other edits to Wikipedia.
MrOllie (
talk) 20:18, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
Hello! Revisiting this topic in March 2024. As I have disclosed, I am employed by Tricentis. Information on the Tricentis page is incorrect. That's why I (and other Tricentis employees before me) have attempted edits. We have no wish to run afoul of your editorial rules; we just would prefer that our company be accurately reflected here. (For example, we are not an Austrian company. Several products that are listed are no longer on the market. Our office locations are incorrect. We have made several acquisitions since the last one listed in 2021.) How can we update the listing so that it is correct without breaking the rules? I assure you that I have no interest in adding what was termed as 'promotional language.' I understand that this is not a product brochure, and it is not our intent to pull a fast one on Wikipedia. Can someone please advise me on the best way to move forward?
Thank you, Jennifer McCarthy
Hi @ Mrollie,
I can see that you've made some changes -- my edit request looks different. I followed instructions from the link you provided; if I need to do anything else please let me know. I can't tell whether the edits were approved, even though it appears that you've seen them. May I move forward?
Thank you,
Jennifer McCarthy JennyMc66 ( talk) 17:39, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
- The last significant edit
MrOllie made was
this, last year. I'm mentioning him again so he knows: you misspelled his name. I saw what you proposed on the talk page--sorry, but I think you need to be a bit more than just a COI editor, because there are problems with formatting. I don't know what "JM1" is supposed to be or point at. And the actual edit request seems to be to add a bunch of locations of offices, sourced to the company website--and MrOllie already signaled (above) that this is a problem.
Drmies (
talk) 17:44, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hello! Thanks for your reply. Yes, I reached out to him in advance of trying to accomplish this without breaking any rules. He said to proceed as long as there was no promotional language. He said nothing about a link to a locations page, so I'm a little confused. Question: we don't necessarily get press coverage just because we open a new office, and we don't issue press releases for all of them. How do I prove that these are our offices without that press?
- I'm trying to understand and I have followed all advice/direction given to me. Is there a link someplace that would explain to me how an edit should be formatted?
- JennyMc66 ( talk) 18:31, 26 March 2024 (UTC)